King Rashid the Just

Have I told you about my brief time spent in the court of King Rashid The Just?

Well, it all began with a letter which I received while vacationing on Pantelleria. I found this letter odd for several reasons. Primarily because I had told no one of my intended destination of respite. Secondarily because the letter was in fact written in Swahili. Stranger still, perhaps, was that my search for a translator ended nearly the moment it began when I discovered that a certain baker who lived not three minutes from my bungalow was fluent in Swahili. He made the most exquisite Miguelitos. How can something be so flaky and moist at the same time? The man was as much a wizard as he was a baker. He was just then delivering me a box of them, as he did whenever I came to the island, and he happened to overhear me instructing the messenger to seek out a translator.

At any rate, the Baker interpreted the note. Perhaps it was the amount of trouble the King had clearly gone to in tracking me down or the eloquence of his formal request for my humble audience; perhaps the urgent nature of the letter’s contents or the sizeable sum of diamonds alluded to in the note. Suffice it to say I found it prudent to shorten my vacation and hasten at once to the realm of King Rashid The Just. I will not divulge the location further than to say it was Somewhere in Africa. Indeed, were you to brave the perilous river journey, the rampant disease, the venomous snakes and insects, the vicious indigenous wildlife, the bands of marauding nomadic tribesmen, and the dark living evil that is the jungle in that land, upon arriving you would find nothing more than the burned-out shells and crumbled halls of a kingdom that once was - but that is a different story.

Despite our careful preparations, our journey was indeed perilous. We lost three to the fever and more to the jungle. I had convinced my friend the Baker to come along as my translator, and he served as such in all excellence, and also as a quite welcome cook, and a fine companion during the difficult weeks to come. One day as we all lay on our tattered raft where we had dragged it ashore, famished and miserable in the sweltering heat and endless drench, the Baker appeared, standing over us, and in his hands, he held a loaf of freshly baked bread. For the life of me, I can't understand how he had managed it, but I happily took and ate what he tore away and offered me. Having divided the loaf among our party, he sat down next to me. "Of all the fine and elaborate things I can bake," he said, "my wife's favorite is my humble, basic bread." To me, that piece of bread was without a doubt the most delicious thing I have ever eaten.

We finally made it to our destination - and soon I was ushered in before King Rashid. The King had commissioned me to find his son Jela (Swahili for "Father Suffered During Birth") who had mysteriously vanished. The popular opinion was that he had been taken hostage by a particular rival tribe, by whom such an act would not, it seemed, be considered unusual. The King was loath to take aggressive action toward them, however. It was quite near his favorite holiday, and His Majesty preferred to avoid the dips in morale that so often accompanied the loss of life and limb in such conflicts. Many a king have been dragged down from their thrones by men whose morale dipped too low.

The Baker let on to me that he fancied taking tales back home of baking for a king. As we were short on provisions and needed fresh supplies for our expedition, the King gladly agreed to allow the Baker free-run of the royal kitchen. So pleased was he with the Baker's confections, he all-but begged the man to stay on as his royal chef. Stocked with fresh bread and bountiful supplies, we set out again, bearing the King's own seal.

At first, our finest efforts all seemed fruitless, as there seemed to be no evidence of the boy having been abducted. Presently the trail grew warmer when we arrived at the boy's hunting lodge, where the Baker detected the distinct scent of sweet alyssum in the otherwise malodorous bedchamber. The smell, it turned out, was infused in a scrap of paper tucked hastily under the goatskin bedroll. The king's men knew of only one supplier of sweet alyssum in the markets, as it was quite a rare and difficult flower to cultivate in that climate.

I am certain, should the Baker have survived, he would have greatly enjoyed witnessing King Rashid's happy reunion with his morose son Jela. Perhaps between us, we might have been able to piece together the story from memories now fractured by the strange steaming drinks proffered by the witch doctor at the ensuing celebration, as I have so often tried to do since then. Perhaps one day I might recall exactly how we managed to track Jela down, or who exactly the beautiful woman was with whom the boy had absconded. Perhaps I might find out what happened to the woman. Perhaps one day I'll determine with what poison those deadly darts were tipped, or why I managed to escape them alive, while the Baker did not. How had I then convinced Jela to return home to his father? What became of our reward? Then again, perhaps I'll never know.

All that matters, I suppose, in the end, is that I did as my friend the Baker requested with his last rattling breath. His sight had already gone - the cruel darts protruded from his neck and chest. I buried his heart in Pantelleria, and to his wife, I gave the last loaf of bread he ever baked.

"He baked it," I told her, "in the oven of a King."

Note from the Author

You may have imagined, given the title, that you would learn why King Rashid was given the epithet "the Just." I must admit I have no idea. Should I ever discover the reason, I shall be quick to publish the tale.