Chapter Text
Everything had started with a pouring rain, a congestion atop the 6th of October Bridge and a humming radio in a stuffy car. In other words, on an exceptionally shitty Tuesday evening.
Tighnari was sitting under the AC; bigger raindrops were almost leaking through the rooftop of an old Chevrolet car and yet, the captivating desire to slam the doors and dive straight into the Nile were ruling out any reasonable thoughts. Not like Tighnari had much of those after an entire day: a list of medicine to buy at the pharmacy, odds and ends of today's lectures, and a budgeting of expenses and savings. The swelter par pouring rain were only making it worse.
There were many things Tighnari disliked, but among them, Cairo's stuffiness triumphed particularly.
As if hearing his thoughts, Makhfi hit the klaxon again—though to no avail, since the traffic jam didn't move an inch—and sighed, crouching down to fiddle with the dashboard.
"You alright?" she asked, nudging his knee with her sharp nail. "Should I switch it up a notch?"
Tighnari shook his head. Makhfi, the sole ray of sunshine amidst the snake pit of Cairo University's graduate students as well as the only person with a car and enough good will to lend the passenger seat to Tighnari on their way home, sighed once more. The dense traffic jam on the bridge was nowhere near dissolving; and Makhfi was always boring out without talking.
"Open the roof lid," Tighnari suggested in desperation, "might as well take a shower."
"No way, this old lady's just out of car wash, she is not gonna survive any more water," Makhfi glued herself to her own window, following the raindrops downwards. "Can't recall such a nice weather since long time ago. The governor is probably having so much fun."
The governor, according to the radio humming in the background was just as astounded as the rest of sixteen million citizens. In fact, the radio had been humming about many things: about the annual rainfall record being broken during the last three hours, about the storm drains' financing, about the schools and universities cancelling lessons—starting tomorrow Tighnari would be stripped of his evening part-time job. He could, probably, ask for additional shifts at the hospital, besides they'd be overjoyed, and the wage would be a bit better... but then his shifts would end later, which means that he'd have to pay Nilou more... okay, but what if—
"Look," Makhfi called, "we're moving!"
She grabbed ahold of the gear, and her Chevrolet moved half a meter forward before stopping dead right behind a delivery scooter. A glance at the thermal bags strapped to his trunk made Tighnari sympathize with the delivery service—someone was probably waiting for their dinner, which, by the looks of it, would be delayed indefinitely. The congestion went way past the bridge.
"At this rate, we'll flood up and get hauled into the river."
"Great! Then I'll get to swim back home."
"Speaking of," Makhfi started drumming her fingers against the steering wheel; she had a bad habit of restless hands whenever she got nervous. She was fidgety, although abnormally caring—Tighnari liked her way more than other graduate students, who he had the displeasure of working with. "Are you...well...d'you even go into water? Don't you like start, I dunno..."
"Hiss?" Tighnari snickered. "No. I don't know how to swim, though."
"Ah. Cool. I mean... you get it."
An awkward silence fell upon the car. Tighnari felt his tail starting to itch under Makhfi's sideways gaze.
He—his family, in fact—was lucky. Everyone Tighnari had to work with, they all had been saying that, thinking themselves to be some sort of scholars in a field they had never ever encountered before. Valuka Shuna, the race of the desert foxes, is still a curiosity for city dwellers (especially for the bustling city of Cairo), people stare at them unabashedly: large ears, long tails, fluffy dark fur; is it true that you have claws on your hands, is it true that you have pads on your feet— Yes, true, all true, Tighnari always replied. And then added with a polite smile: we also have sharp teeth and we do not abhor raw human meat. Those who appreciated the joke became something like a buddy to him.
Makhfi was one such example—she simply stretched her arm out and offered him to take a bite. Ever since their first meeting at the campus canteen when she dropped a whole bag of spices into his mashed potatoes, she would only bring up his ancestry occasionally. She was curious, that much was obvious, but the politeness always balanced it out. Tighnari liked that. He'd had enough of those sideway glances on the streets.
People got used to the fact that his kin lived in the forests; left the desert and climbed the creepers on the evolution's whim. Their claws are cutting enough to grasp at the tropical flora, the pads make their steps inaudible, their keen hearing as well as sharp eyesight help with hunting and surviving. Valuka Shuna rarely show up in public, and many considered them simply a reclusive tribe with fancy ears. To see Tighnari in a doctor's coat or behind a lectern at the university is probably akin to meeting a Celtic druid in a science lab.
All in all, yeah. His family is lucky. Although sometimes—like Makhfi hitting the klaxon violently again, and the traffic jam resounding with a discordant buzz, making Tighnari's head swim—sometimes he thinks that the forest life would have been quieter.
"Makhfi!" he beseeched. "We're not moving, stop tearing up my ears!"
"Sorry, sorry! Silly me, I always forget..." she smiled apologetically. The smile, though, looked a lot like the 'post lecture's coffee is on me'. "We're here for a long time. I shouldn't have offered to give you a ride. You'd already have been home by metro. It's just I thought you wouldn't want to get wet at the station, and—"
"No harm done," Tighnari replied automatically, "it's alright."
Except, if he's brutally honest, he'd prefer to be back at home as soon as possible. The clock almost struck nine, and Nilou usually couldn't stay so late; just as Tighnari couldn't always promise her to pay extra. He was counting every pound, and Nilou knew that as well.
Amidst the awkward silence the radio switched to broadcasting about the Australian fires. Tighnari, whose thoughts were hectically jumping between the rain and the student's notes, decided to at least give Nilou a call—to warn her about the delay. If the pharmacy across the street is closed by the time he gets home, the day could officially be given 'the worst day ever' title.
Nilou picked up on the second ring.
"I was about to call you! The news says that the city is all jammed, you're probably—"
"I'm not an exception," Tighnari smiled sadly. "I'm sorry. You need to go home already, right?"
Nilou remained silent for a moment. Her and Tighnari formed a weird duo where neither wanted to upset the other. But Nilou was like that naturally, and Tighnari... Well, Tighnari feared that if she left, he'd never find another nurse that would accept low wage and, in turn, would get accepted by Collei. Nilou was a blessing.
"I can stay a bit longer," Nilou finally sighed, "but if you manage to switch to metro... I just don't want to leave Collei alone."
At the sound of her name, Tighnari, who was generously air conditioned by the Chevrolet's AC systems, felt his heart swelling.
"How's she?"
"Asleep. She almost didn't leave her bed, but she still ate well and took all her pills, I checked. Ah, right, Tighnari, her Aricept is running low, I could—"
"Don't worry. The prescription is with me anyway, so I'll just buy some on the way home."
Makhfi managed to drive them another half a meter forward. The rain, it seemed, wasn't planning on stopping at all; the drumming on the rooftop only became quicker and louder. If Tighnari crossed the bridge by foot right now, when he got to the closest metro station, there'd be nothing left of his favorite boots.
"Right, another thing," Nilou's voice was laced with concern now. "There's been someone calling your house phone the entire day. The caller ID didn't show up, so we decided not to pick it up, but Collei said that was probably for you. They also left a voicemail," she paused, "about ten voicemails, in fact."
Tighnari suppressed a sigh. There was a reason why he only gave his mobile number in case of serious emergencies—he wanted to be ready for the evening brainwashing as well as manage his guilt on his way home.
Being this adamant in getting his attention could mean only one person in the entire world. Besides, that person detested being ignored.
"Thank you," Tighnari mindlessly twitched his ear—someone along the congestions hit the horn again. The scooter in front of them joined in on the cacophony with a weak trill. "I'll try getting to the metro. Might turn out to be faster."
"Don't drown," Nilou chuckled. "I'll catch you into the towel at the doorstep."
She hung up, and Tighnari turned to Makhfi, already prepared to compete in guilt with her, but Makhfi wasn't looking upset—she just had that cunning streak across her lips.
"Girlfriend?"
"Nurse," Tighnari tried to convey his unwillingness to discuss any further, which Makhfi caught onto immediately. Now she looked upset. "Well, I'll probably—"
"I heard. Let's not apologize, neither of us, okay? I'll just buy you a coffee when we're back for lectures, and you'll let me pat your tail."
Tighnari snickered, "I am not your house pet."
"I know, and I'm sorry for that! But it's probably so soft—"
Tighnari stretched his tail across the seats to tickle Makhfi under her ribs. She laughed out loud, bright and happy, and when she stopped, Tighnari was already halfway out of the car, with one foot on the bridge. She stuck her tongue out from the inside of her dry car.
"If you drop the students' notes into the river, I'll keep it a secret."
"Had the thought," Tighnari admitted. "Thanks for the ride."
They quickly smiled to each other in place of saying goodbyes, and Tighnari, illuminated by the headlights under the heavy rain, turned to the bridge walkway and trudged forward in the direction of the metro. The scooter driver first followed him with envious glare, until he noticed the soaked tail, and huffed, turning away.
Tighnari was kind of used to it, at this point. All the same, during those ten minutes until the station, he, damp and disoriented, considered himself to be the most unfortunate Valuka Shuna in the entire Cairo. Not considering the fact, that he was probably the only one of the sorts.
To the best of his knowledge, the Valuka Shuna were scarce in the cities, and big names among them were fewer still. His mother is excavating back in their native Spain, his father is hunting some rare bugs in the Amazon jungles; there is another branch of their many times removed relatives living in Jakarta (all of the Valuka Shuna are related somehow), there are a few communes scattered across the Mexican region... but that's about it. Tighnari didn't know about any other, even if he'd been quite curious in his childhood. He never really understood why the rest of the boys that were playing in the vineyards didn't have ears or tails, but he did. The idea of a separate race was somewhat of a foreign concept to him at that time.
His mother's tales about curses and ancient artifacts, however, he accepted at face value. Turned out, there was a grain of truth to those stories, after all. Meeting the person that has left him a dozen voicemails was anything but the proof to that.
The metro was stuffy and crowded. Tighnari didn't like the metro: it was indeed easier to hide his tail in the crowd, but it was just as easy to have it caught between the doors or ripped by someone's zipper. Despite that, he needed to get home as fast as possible.
Tighnari managed to drop by the pharmacy minutes before closing, as he raised a whole lot of splashes around himself, simultaneously fighting the urge to shake off the wetness in the most ridiculous dog fashion, leaving with a bag of medicine that cost him his weekly wage. The grocery shop across the street supplied him with a bunch of bananas, a few apples, celery, some cottage cheese... On a second thought, Tighnari added a bottle of wine to the grocery list. He'd hide it from Collei, but the tipsy courage was definitely a must before dealing with the voicemails.
Nilou opened the door without so much as a single bell ring, fully dressed and with the towel at the ready. Tighnari crashed into the terry embrace with a grateful groan, squeezed the water out of his tail and grasped the oil bottle—only tp remember that it ran out a week ago. Nilou followed his movements with a smile to her eyes, idly twisting her red curls around her finger.
"This is my first time seeing a dripping wet desert fox," she shared friend-to-friend. "How bad is it out there?"
"Terrific. I hope you know how to swim."
Tighnari danced on the rug, warming up. Nilou never looked below his eyes, she was polite like that; a trait that was probably essential for a good nurse. That allowed Tighnari to feel less uncomfortable at the way his left behind boots uncovered his legs and everything that went on down there. Short fur up to his ankles, claws and those damned pads.
Tighnari wouldn't want to hold Nilou back more than he already did, so he quickly gave her the entire payment for today, nodded to her with a trivial 'Tomorrow at 8, right?' and locked the door behind her. Only then he remembered the thin strapped sandals that she wore and sighed—not the best choice of footwear for the puddles outside, but truth be told, not a single morning forecast mentioned the absurd rains.
Nilou had left, and Tighnari was left practically alone. He gave himself a five-minute break in the hallway—to dry up a bit, catch his breath and count down just how much was left until the rent was due. Turned out they didn't have all that much, but they're gonna figure something out for sure. If he texts the hospital now, asks to take tomorrow's evening shift... Maybe take some night shifts...
Tighnari shook his head. He quietly brought the bags to the kitchen, added to the pile of medicine on the table, put the groceries to the fridge, and hid the wine bottle in the shelves. There were cups and a jug full of some fruit drink—Nilou's work, for sure, only she'd put so much effort. He thought some more, and quietly trotted to Collei's room.
She was clearly asleep, carefully tucked in with her blanket. Tighnari immediately tuned into her breath, uneven and hoarse, the way Collei was breathing like that for the past two years. There was a mountain of plush toys and study notes scattered on her bed, a small laptop at the edge of her bed; nothing but the pile of medicine and a strong pharmaceutical smell indicated that the person inhabiting the room was sick. Collei was recommended to attend online lessons—at least before the surgery—to ease the stress on her body, and that day marked their very first fight. Collei couldn't imagine her life without her friends, but she didn't see Tighnari as a friend, only the elder brother. Which he obviously wasn't. He couldn't even properly fulfill the elder brother's responsibilities.
Tighnari quietly shut the door and returned to the kitchen. Their house phone was right next to the fruits bowl, flashing with incoming voicemails. He hesitated before pushing the receive button; after he does, there will be no way back, he will have to answer.
The voicemail came alive with the first swig of the wine.
'Ah? Recording already? Tighnari, my darling, it's been so long! Ever since that cozy restaurant by the Al-Azhar, do you remember? Gods, their mussels were so delicious, I still can't figure out why you'd turn up your nose... What? No, I'm busy! Now, about the mussels... oh, about the...'
Ding.
'I'll be the one to decide when my time runs out, you got that! Tighnari, darling, let's get down to business. I have wonderful news for you. No, I am not absolving you of your debt, I even have to raise the interest rate; no offense, business is business, and your last payment was seriously overdue. I know we all have our bad days, but...'
Ding. Tighnari applauded himself for being quite sagacious about her, taking another swig from the bottle.
'Every voicemail I lose my money... So, I have a job for you. It's great, right? I will pay generously, and you'll have enough to pay off your debt as well as some allowance left. Nobody can resist this kind of offer, so I'll get the contract ready and...'
Ding. Only three left.
'Tighnari, my time is quite valuable, so I expect to see you at my place tomorrow at 7, alright? It's not about the next payment...for now. We'll simply talk like all old friends do. See you.'
Ding. Tighnari took a swig twice as big as the last one.
'Oh, and another thing. Tell the security at the gates that you have an appointment. And dress accordingly! Recently, paparazzi is trying their hardest to have a taste of me.'
Ding.
'Just to motivate you a little! I'm talking big money. Thousands of pounds, maybe even 6-digits—if you prove to be reliable. If I were you, I'd already be singing praises and brow beating to the Lord Sangemah Bay for her generosity... I expect you'll do that face-to-face, though. See you!'
Ding.
Tighnari exhaled, squeezing the bottle with both hands—as if it's the only thing keeping him from falling down to the lower floor, directly into the flat of a big family. The wine had its soothing effect on his brain, but so far, it was the only 'soothing' about this entire situation. Everything else made him covet crawling under Collei's blanket, becoming a wet gob for living and stay there for the rest of his life.
Lord Sangemah Bay, as she demanded to be addressed, or simply Dory Ziryab-al-Tajir, as the Wikipedia mentioned, was nothing less of a celebrity in the East. A philanthropist and a connoisseur; she constantly donated to charities, dyed her hair poison pink, opened up private schools across the Middle East and always eagerly bragged about her collection of curiosities from all over the world—every last thing about her was to either eternally admire her or avoid her at all costs. Tighnari, to his dismay, was not given a choice.
He still had no idea as to how Dori had found him. She claimed to be acquainted with relatives, yet Tighnari suspected she was simply magnetized by anything that stood out of the ordinary: she didn't care if it was an artifact from the Valley of the Kings or a graduate student from the department of audiology with a pair of ears and a tail. Dori was a literal pro at magical antiquities. There was no doubt she'd take interest in the newest Cairo resident Valuka Shuna.
Tighnari didn't even want to move to Cairo. Out of every city he'd ever been to due to his parents' jobs, Cairo was at the very bottom in his list of preferences—he'd simply never return there. Little Tighnari memorized Cairo as a dirty, noisy anthill, not without a peculiar ambience, but still an anthill. Turned out that years down the line it only became dirtier and noisier.
Although Tighnari wasn't given much of a choice that time either. After applying to twenty universities in five different countries from the list he'd compiled with his mother after arduous research, only the Cairo University agreed to accept him—for all that he had ears and tail or was Valuka Shuna. He'd traded adventures for a degree, got addicted to studying and still anticipated to attend graduate school anywhere but here. Then, Collei appeared.
Collei herself always says that she's ruined everything. Tighnari didn't even dare to think that way. Her parents worked with his father; they died during an air crash on their way to Cairo and his father'd pled and threatened him to take girl into his care, until the 'special people resolve everything'. He promised to help financially as much as he could, but then Collei was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis, those special people mysteriously disappeared, then Tighnari got laid off from a good hospital and then both of them—a furry vermin and a sick minor—were asked to vacate the flat... All that kickstarted the sickening period of famines and keeping track of last cents.
That was precisely the moment Dori had found him through unknown means.
Originally, Tighnari regarded her as a heavenly blessing. Chronic patients' rehabilitation program, orphan assistance program, public housing, appointments with the best Cairo doctors... Only later Tighnari learned that there had been an invoice of meticulously counted expenses already prepared for him—and that Dori never ever took sick and orphaned into her care for free. He couldn't help but resent her for her antics, blamed himself for not figuring out this clear as crystal ploy of laundering reputation. Although there was simply nothing he could do at that point. Had he acted up, there would be just his word against an army of lawyers and her ostentatious nobility in court.
If anything, he had learned that Dori's altruistic whimsies did not come unattached. Dori always wanted something—and when she wants something, the best way to get it without spending a single piaster1 is to ask a person that is already indebted to you.
Tighnari was never a friend to Dori, but rather an investment. He even knew what exactly had drawn her attention, as he tried to calm down his agitated, thrashing tail.
There was no need for a call back, but the demand for him to show up at the snake's pit the next day was non-negotiable. His dream of taking the evening shift at the hospital shattered into pieces.
Somehow that antagonized Tighnari even more, so he took another heavy swig of the wine. He'd probably sit there, amidst the kitchen's silence, being angry at everything: himself, Dori, the university, the rain... but the adjoining room echoed with faint sounds of fuss. Then Collei murmured "Nari? You're back?" quietly, although Tighnari'd hear her, nevertheless.
She was slumping, surrounded by her toys, drowsily scratching a big green cat's belly. Her lids were shut, since it was always hard for Collei to keep her eyes opened by the end of the day. Simply put, she and Tighnari objectively didn't see each other eye to eye—Collei mostly reacted to his voice.
"Yeah," Tighnari confirmed, sitting down on her bed. "Is everything alright? Nilou told me you ate well."
"Her cooking is delicious. How are your patients?"
"Alive and almost kicking," Tighnari smiled, forgetting that Collei wouldn't see it. In the dim lights of the room, only his bestial vision helped him see her serene face in a halo of hair, splayed across the pillow. "Zakariya says that in a few months he'd be able to cleave me a personal column in the reception table. Armin's laryngitis is almost healed, he doesn't even wheeze funnily anymore, can you imagine? Per contra Maddah still can't figure out his hearing aid device..."
Collei was fatigued of scratching the cat, and her hand dropped limply onto the blanket. Tighnari followed the movement unconsciously, suppressing a sigh—Collei disliked pity, hence she pretended to be healthier than everyone else. Myasthenia, however, seized much of her opportunities, exhausting her muscles after the measliest of actions, and the pile of medicine barely kept Collei from experiencing her first ever crisis at the terrifyingly young age of nineteen. The doctors collectively said that the surgery could help with going into remission, but Dori was not in a rush to give out new donations, and besides her—Tighnari riled himself up anew—he had no one to provide them with six-digit sums on his bank account.
Too much of Collei's wellbeing depended on Dori. That was another reason to stomp down his own pride and show up at her tomorrow's important meeting.
"Did you figure out the caller?" Collei asked sleepily, as if reading his thoughts.
"Hospital," a white lie to which Tighnari didn't even bat an eye. Collei should avoid being stressed. "Zakariya had something important for me. since tomorrow is lesson-free anyway, I'll take the evening shift..."
"Lesson-free?"
"The rain's been pouring the entire day, and most roads are flooded. You can also take some rest tomorrow."
"So, it is..." her fingers were clenching and unclenching, and Tighnari, without thinking, covered them with his tail. Collei's lips formed a faint smile. "Wet. And cold."
She started twiddling the fur—it was still wet and would stick out every direction once dry; Tighnari couldn't allow himself to buy a new bottle of oil without cutting down on their already meager dinners. If the rain doesn't stop in the morning, he might have to roll it up into cling film.
"You reek of wine," Collei suddenly noticed.
Perhaps Tighnari was not the only person with a sensitive nose in this household. He silently berated himself—again—and smiled, "Had a hard day," and then immediately changed the topic. "You know what? I bought bananas, do you want some? We can make pancakes, pour some—"
"...raspberry syrup," Collei finished for him. Her voice became a teensy livelier, a small victory. "Yes, please! I mean, if you're not too tired...or, y'know, too drunk and will set the kitchen on fire."
Tighnari tickled Collei under her chin with the tip of his tail. She chuckled but didn't open her eyes.
"I can jump on one leg. Lay down, I'll be done in a few minutes."
"With wine or the pancakes?"
"Collei!"
As a matter of fact, Tighnari would want to finish the bottle and drop onto his sagging sofa—not to sleep, but rather to look at the ceiling, thinking that leaving the forest was a mistake; that higher education was a mistake, that the life amidst the Spanish vineyards was pretty damn cool, but the urge to become a doctor had led him to this shithole.
He was not angry at Collei. He never even anticipated blaming her. He took responsibility, learned how to be an adult. He is the one to deal with his problems and fulfill his promises.
So, he better start with the pancakes.
𓂀𓂀𓂀
Next morning Tighnari met Nilou in the main hall of the building: he was getting rid of the rotten fruits that were purposefully or otherwise left on his doormat by his neighbors, while she was shaking water off of her fluffy hair. The rain did not stop for the entirety of the night, and the city was jammed again. Tighnari gave Nilou a few short instructions (Collei is still asleep, you can heat up the pancakes, there's some cottage cheese in the fridge) and left for the metro station.
Without the oil his tail looked pitiful as did Tighnari with his eye bags after a sleepless night, and the metro trains were packed to the brim. For the entire day Tighnari barely followed whatever Zakariya was asking of him or understood what was written in his patients' anamneses. To rival yesterday's emptiness in his head, today's thoughts were harassing him ad infinitum.
He didn't reply to Dori. So she was, without a doubt, awaiting his presence.
Collei had called him during the lunch break, for which Tighnari had hidden himself away from curious patients behind the elevator shaft ("No, my tail is not therapeutic, trust me, none of you will get better only due to scratching under my ears"). She asked him when he'd be home, shared her progress from the morning—she took up sewing and even managed to pierce her fingers a few times.
"It is hard to hold the needle," she complained, while Tighnari actively chewed the apple. "The fabric is rough, and I got tired really quickly. Nilou wants to buy flour and bake a pie from the leftover fruits, what should I tell her?"
Tighnari hesitated, wiped the apple juice off his lips with the sleeve of his medical coat and stared somberly at the stained white cotton.
"Let me see if we have enough for a pie, alright?"
"Nilou said it's on her. She..." there was a noise, like Collei covered the microphone with her hand, "I think she just wants to cheer me up."
Tighnari bit his lip, adding the taste of rust to the prominent taste of apple sourness. Nilou was buying groceries into their fridge far too often. In Tighnari's world, people were not able to be this kind, albeit her and Collei were proving his assumption wrong so far. Which in turn disoriented Tighnari, shaking him out of the casualty of always being indebted to someone.
"Alright," he gave up, exhaling. There were steps in the direction of the elevators—a muted clicking of heels and a drumming of a child's running. Tighnari peeked outside of the column, noting the familiar brown mane of Armin's mother as well as Armin himself—the boy was running rounds, demanding to be given the ice cream from the canteen, and Tighnari just had to step in to prevent the worst mistake of a cured laryngitis patient. "Sorry, I have to go. See you in the evening, alright?"
"Did you take the evening shift after all?"
'Didn't manage to'.
"Yeah," Tighnari sighed once again, "I'm sorry. If I finish earlier, I'll be back at nine. Maybe even with some good news."
Collei started excitedly narrating something over the call, but Tighnari forced himself to put his phone into the pocket, discarded the leftovers of the apple to the trash bin and moved to intercept Armin. For some reason, the first thing kids ask after laryngitis is ice cream, and the more serious their case, the louder the demands. Armin was wheezing for two weeks straight so he might as well start blackmailing his mother, but as much as Tighnari loved kids, he did not want to see Armin back to the line of his patients tomorrow.
If he even gets to have a shift tomorrow.
Perhaps the general melancholy and the weather anomalies affected everyone around: when Tighnari was changing into his only good-looking shirt in the staff's room no one said a single word to him. Only Zakariya patted him on the shoulder.
"Is my favorite graduate student going on a date tonight?"
Tighnari wanted to wail in chagrin, but he simply shrugged.
"And who's the lucky girl?"
"She has an awful personality," Tighnari huffed in response. He habitually put his tail into the special cutout and hid his ears under a hat. The hat was cheap and made him itchy, but at least in the crowd Tighnari's head didn't stand out, gluing gazes of every last person from everywhere. "She's always demanding. Might as well break up with her tonight."
Zakariya nodded in understanding.
"Well then, good luck. Want a sip for courage?"
"Of medical alcohol? I'd rather refuse."
Tighnari lingered at the exit—in case Zakariya recalls his promise and not only his favourite pastime of teasing him about every other thing in his life. One day Tighnari had enough courage to seek help from him, asking him to find a doctor for Collei, if possible, who might be willing to perform her surgery at...a slightly lower price; and ever since then Zakariya sometimes handed him phone numbers of clinics that Tighnari could just as easily googled himself. He already knew the lowest price for this surgery, and Zakariya couldn't offer anything better for now.
Not like he had to. Zakariya was a specialist in eardrums, not in motoneurons.
He gave Tighnari thumbs up, and Tighnari exited the room, completely unsatisfied. Annoyance and nervousness that he managed to shut down the entire day while working had finally broken free, urging him to elbow people and loudly aimlessly curse—and specifically, in Spanish. Tighnari deemed it to be a bad sign, because Spanish was his language of anger but to be angry in Dori's presence meant to add a few random percents to his debt. Simply because her mood worsened as well.
Tighnari emerged with his umbrella in the city center, trying his best to calm down. He breathed in time with his measured steps, avoiding splashing his boots too loudly when stepping into bigger puddles. After two days of continuous raining, Cairo became one endless gutter which in turn obstructed Tighnari's attempts at looking 'accordingly', looking like an ordinary human and not getting too soggy. His tail was puffing up from humidity, his feet were sweating, and his chest was tightening from anxiety.
As Dori's house appeared before him—well, one of her houses, a bunch of glass, lurid statues and garden illumination—Tighnari felt the tightness dispersing. His nerves preferred the preparation hassle, reeling anxiety into a tight ball, foreseeing the worst-case scenarios; and when the time comes, everything disappears altogether, leaving icy tranquility behind. Tighnari had his first interview for the hospital in an absolute apathy, having puked his entire stomach out minutes before, so he should have expected the same outcome here. An absolute indifference to whatever Dori has prepared for him.
Al diablo con esto. 2
To the security at the iron gates Tighnari relayed what Dori told him to say. He'd probably been acutely evaluated from under the helmet—starting with his plain umbrella and a crumpled hat to his badly harmonized heavy boots. He was then asked to show an identity card, forced to take off his boots and only after he was led along the garden path into the marble foyer. Dori's garden wasn't flooded and Tighnari could clearly hear the murmurs of running water inside the storm drains—only the pomegranate trees were dipping heavily under the rain.
When Tighnari was finally standing on the cold white marble he was told to raise his hands for a security to pat him down shoulders to feet—without much force, though, just out of necessity. The only thing Tighnari heard during this inspection was a disparaging, "Mind the claws. Don't scratch the floors."
His umbrella disappeared somewhere. His phone was taken from his back pocket, showed to him and put into a zip-bag along with his house keys and, for some reason, his belt buckle.
Tighnari followed the bustle around himself out of boredom. He'd been to Dori's place only twice—and never further than the foyer, where a servant would take the envelope with debt payment, with Tighnari getting his things back after and going home to digest the harsh humiliation. He endured in silence, knowing that otherwise the bruises from something as light as a nudge by rifle butt stay around for ten days. Last time he offered to walk on his hands to avoid 'scratching the floors'. His acrimony was obviously not appreciated.
Security silently disappeared to the outside, leaving Tighnari to his own absence of thoughts in the middle of marble and lousy taste. Dori had never had much of a sense of beauty; her collection amassed anything that wasn't secured in place or interested her at least a tiny bit: the pedestals in the foyer had Chinese vases and Sumerian figurines kept under glass; the walls were covered with faded tapestries and rusted axes—the center of the foyer was decorated with a bronze Imugis3 twice the height of a human.
"I'd advise against touching it," there was a voice, coming from the stairs. "There is a nasty risk of dropping dead on the spot."
One of the faceless assistants was descending the stairs towards him—Tighnari recognized him from the last time, his name was probably Raunak. They exchanged similarly forced smiles, Raunak fixed the hem of his jellabiya4 and nodded to the large stairs.
"After you. Lord Sangemah Bay is waiting."
Raunak directed him across the second floor around the foyer, past many doors, turned left and knocked on the only door with an electronic lock. Somehow the flashing panel of the lock had an even more depressing effect on Tighnari—whatever Dori was up to in here, her house obviously wasn't used just for sleeping or having meals. Besides, electronic locks didn't sit well with the exhibition of antiquities.
Raunak pressed the call button and it immediately flashed green. The lock clicked. Tighnari took a deep breath.
"Wish me luck?" he smiled at Raunak, but the assistant was already hurrying to where he came from. Tighnari stuck his tongue out to his back.
Then he stepped inside, feeling like he's sticking his head into the fire-breathing dragon's maw.
Dori was there, in her office swamped with pedestals and statues even more than the foyer. She was casually spinning around on her white leather chair, as if it was her own throne, smiling wide and welcoming with her white teeth under bright pink lips—as well as with her radiant of insincere cordiality, gold-lined eyes. Everything about the way Dori looked, from her curls in the color of her lipstick to her funny diamond-shaped glasses, screamed about the fact that she was the preeminent curiosity of her mansion. That, and her gigantic puffy harem pants.
Tighnari caught a whiff of her corrosive flower-scented perfume, making his head spin and his steps wobbly. Dori's smile couldn't deceive him, but she didn't care about it in the slightest—instead she stretched her arm across the table to shake his cold fingers energetically and started chattering without allowing him to even open his mouth.
"My darling, long time no see! Sit, sit, make yourself at home. Tea? Sweets? Maybe a slice of orange? I should apologize for the mussels, so choose whatever you like. I prefer talking to well-fed people, and you look like you haven't eaten since that restaurant..."
Tighnari aimlessly stared at the table filled with small plates. At the center, right above the baklava and bowls of nuts towered the biggest treasure that Dori protected at all costs. An ancient copper lamp.
Dori wasn't actually hiding the fact, and spared maybe only the blind with the boasting, but nobody had ever seen the jinni. After Tighnari met her for the first time, he ransacked many different journalists' investigations only for half of them to conclude that the jinni did not exist altogether, and the lamp was but a toy. Regrettably, most of the journalists didn't have what Tighnari had. Namely, his sensitive nose and an ability to sense magic from a mile away.
Dori's lamp glowed faintly, causing tips of his fingers to tingle. Worn edges beckoned him, the bitterness on his tongue manifested as a desire to reach out and—
Dori covered the lamp with both hands and put it away from the table.
"I'm sorry, darling, but this one's not for sale even if you had all the money in the world," she continued smiling, although now it looked much closer to a tiger grin. "You felt it, right? A powerful thingy. My best investment."
Tighnari fought the urge to shut his eyes, driving away the obsessive desire to follow the scent and try touching the copper anyway. Instead, he clawed at his knee—faint pain sobered him up and returned focus. He recalled just where and in front of whom he was sitting.
"No tea," he shook his cotton head. He didn't trust Dori. Even the baklava, a personal favorite of Tighnari which he didn't eat ever since his birthday, even that couldn't make him lose his head; he was not a hungry student or a stray dog to gobble at every pittance. "So, it is a real thing."
"Of course, it is a real thing!" Dori fixed her glasses, caressing the lamp gently with the tips of her fingers. "Haven't you heard this wonderful story? A small poor girl from an orphanage found an ancient lamp in the attic, deceived the mighty ancient spirit dwelling within, and ever since then, whatever she tried to do was bound to succeed. The mighty jinni gave her wealth and prosperity..."
Tighnari shook his head again. He already knew the fairy tale circulating in the media, but actually trying to find proof for Dori's biography was akin to seeking the Atlantis—and she was far younger than Atlantis. Well, at least her makeup and hairdo worked really hard to pull that off.
"You had business to discuss. What is it?"
Dori's curls swayed. Her sly look sowed seeds of suspicion that the lamp was left on the desk on purpose—that Tighnari was tested. She started the first interview without even warning him.
"Straight down to business, huh? Well, if you insist. Even better, my time is precious," Dori opened the drawers and started rummaging there deliberately slowly. Papers with numbers and charts replaced fruits and sweets. "So, my darling, this is the debt that you owe me. In my humble opinion, that's a little bit too much for you."
Dori's humbleness was self-evidently disclosed that her harem pants cost three times the number on the paper. Tighnari swallowed. The number was not that hefty for someone with a good, secure job and a decent income, but Tighnari didn't have either. Dori knew that better than most.
"And this," a new paper dropped on top of the rest, "is your future work contract. Look here," Dori tapped the lower line with her nail, "this is the money you'll get if you do what I say."
Tighnari swallowed once again, louder, heavier.
For a few long seconds he was staring at the white paper, searching for giant red letters 'Do not fall for it, it is a trap'. His head was spinning, mouth filled with viscous saliva. He came to regret not heeding Zakariya's advice for guzzling down a bottle of medical alcohol.
"What's the catch then?" Tighnari asked, once he regained his ability to speak steadily. "This is a lot."
"I am willing to pay generously for exceptional skills," Dori smiled wide. "And you, my darling... It's quite hard to find people like you."
Like you.
Then, Tighnari was right about Dori from the very beginning—she latched onto his ears and a tail.
"What do you need me to do?"
"It is quite a long story," Dori spun another round on her armchair. "Help yourself to some tea and let me tell you sincerely why I'm ready to cover your entire debt. Now, darling, tell me..." her eyes pierced Tighnari with keen interest, "have you ever heard about the Staff of King Deshret?"