The brother had his servants pack food, and presents for Shahryar, and he put his loyal minister in charge of the kingdom. The queen, he decided, would stay behind: it was better for her to remain at court in case there was trouble while he was away. Not that he expected any.
On the night before leaving, Shahryar’s brother kissed his wife goodbye and joined the vizier’s camp, next to which he had set up his own, ready to leave at first light. It was a warm, scented night, and happy as the brother was to be visiting Shahryar, he was already missing his wife’s soft skin, and the husky note in her voice. He tossed and turned in his bed, under the myriad stars that shone in the night sky, until he could take it no more. He decided to sneak back to his palace and surprise her with a last goodbye.
You should never sneak in on your lovers, for you might be the one who is surprised; had the sultan’s brother been older and wiser, he would have known that.
He found his wife in her rooms, asleep. She was naked; her skin, as smooth as water on a perfectly calm day, reflected the starlight coming in through the window. She was not sleeping alone. A young man, one of those bucks whose muscles have been drawn with care and pleasure, was asleep with her, naked too. They were both smiling, their limbs entangled, satiated after what had clearly been a long night.
The cuckolded brother took the only option open to him: he drew his sabre and killed his wife and her lover. He threw their bodies in a hole, and then sulked his way back to the camp. He gave the order to leave at once.
The cortège soon reached the sultan’s palace. If anyone noticed that his brother was in a foul mood, they chose not to point it out. But when the two men met, all worries were forgotten. The brothers hugged, and went in to dinner, and then they smoked and drank and chatted late into the night. There is a special warmth, an iron bond, that only people who have known each other for a lifetime can share. The sultan’s brother went to bed a different man.
Or so he thought.
Once in his bed, he could not fall asleep. He could not believe how stupid he had been, and how ill-fated. He got up. Yes, ill-fated was the word. Of all the pretty women there were in the kingdom (and there were many), he had to fall in love with the one who would not be faithful. Had he been cleverer, clever like his brother for example, he would have seen through her, and would never have married her.
Lost in thought, he paced his room, and when his room was not big enough, he paced the palace, and then he went outside and paced the gardens.
Shahryar was awake too – after having entertained the sultana in ways fitting a sultana – and saw his little brother sulking by starlight. He thought that the brother must be missing his wife: a night like this was made for love. He made a resolution to lift his brother’s mood.
Starting the next day, the sultan sent his brother gifts, organized parties for him, fed him the sweetest dates and wine. But his brother continued to sulk. When Shahryar suggested they go hunting, his brother refused, saying he was feeling ill. Shahryar did not insist. He went hunting without him. And of course, his entire court went with him.
The only people of note who remained at the palace were his brother and the sultana.
The brother locked himself in his room to sulk some more. He was sulking by the window, when he saw movement in the lush gardens. A secret door opened, and twenty-one veiled women emerged from it. One of them was the sultana. They walked until they came very close to his window, and there they stopped, and undressed. Now he could see that ten of the women were not women after all, but men (of the better-looking variety) in disguise. The sultana undressed too. She called out a name.
Another man appeared, stronger than the others, taller than the others, and naked too, and quite ready for what was to come. He approached the sultana and kissed her full on her lips. Her hands gripped his waist.
That was the signal the others were expecting. The women and the men started kissing, and touching, and playing with each other in the bright sunshine, drunk on the scent of the garden. It was a beautiful orgy, and it lifted the sultan’s brother’s mood a little. But for the wrong reasons. He was still a cuckold, but at least he wasn’t the only cuckold in the family: Sultan Shahryar’s wife was unfaithful too.
When Shahryar came back, he found his brother in a better mood. He asked what had changed, and his brother told him the whole story, describing in particular detail how the sultana’s careful ministrations had exhausted the vigorous young buck. Shahryar did not believe him; surely the sultana would not demean herself in such a way.
His brother suggested they set a trap, so that Shahryar could see with his own eyes what the sultana was getting up to. They would pretend they were going on another hunt, and secretly come back together. The sultan was sceptical, but he agreed to the plan to humour his brother.
The next day the two brothers departed for the hunt accompanied by the entire court, but then soon slipped away and returned in secret to the palace. Sure enough, another orgy was in full bloom in the garden, a rose of splendid bodies with the sultana at its centre. For reasons that I will never fathom, rather than join in (and I am sure the orgiasts would have welcomed them warmly), the brothers fled the scene and went off together in a sulk.
They decided to abandon their kingdoms and their palaces and seek out a land where they could sulk as much as they wanted. They vowed not to return until they had met someone more ill-fated than they were. They left behind the happy sounds and entwined bodies, and rode all day long, until they reached the sea. They set up camp under some trees.
They had just fallen asleep when a noise from the sea woke them up; a mighty bellow, like a beast on the hunt. A black column rose from the water, reaching out to the sky, and when the brothers saw it, they knew who was coming: a jinn, a creature of magic. They scrambled up a tree to hide.
The column of blackness eventually assumed the form of a man, more or less, who moved from the sea to the land, bringing with him a box of fine glass. The jinn opened the box and from it there emerged a woman, her hair as black as jet, her eyes dark and shining. It was clear that the jinn was deeply in love with her. He whispered sweet words in her ear and asked if she would allow him to rest his head on her legs, the softest pillow of all. She graciously permitted him to do so. The moment the jinn fell asleep, the woman shifted her gaze to the top of the tree and smiled at the sultan and his brother. She beckoned to them to come down.
While they were climbing down the tree, the woman gently moved the jinn’s head so it was resting against a rock. She whispered to them to follow her, and so they did.
When they got to a secluded place, she ordered them to undress, and before they could answer, she started undressing herself.
The brothers would have rather carried on sulking (that’s the sort of people they were). But they were worried that the woman might wake the jinn, so they did their best to make her happy.
I imagine that the brothers’ best was not up to much, but the woman appreciated their efforts nonetheless. When their last ounce of strength was spent, and she had allowed them to get dressed again, she remarked on their wedding rings, and asked if she might have them for herself. The two men were happy to oblige: after all, they had no further use for the rings, since the wife of one of them was dead, and the wife of the other was probably still going at it hammer and tongs in the scented garden.
The woman thanked them warmly. She explained that she had a collection of ninety-eight such rings, and it was nice to get to a hundred. The jinn kept her in a glass box beneath the sea, but even so, she managed to take her pleasure whenever she wanted. Now, if the brothers didn’t mind, she was pleasantly tired and needed some sleep, so she would be grateful if they could take their leave.