Rudābeh Kaboli

Daughter of the Serpent

Rudābeh was born to affluence, a princess of Cabul, and daughter to Mehrāb and Sindoḵt. She was a great granddaughter of Aži Dahāka, the most feared of Ahriman’s dread lieutenants, and her family’s reputation was ever blighted by the connection. Indeed, their territory came as a result of Aži Dahāka’s cruel conquests, passed down by blood to the last of his line. Yet despite his grandfather’s legacy, Mehrāb proved to be a surprisingly fair ruler, perhaps owing in part to the influence of his astute and headstrong wife. The city paid taxes to the Shah, the ruler appointed by Ohrmazd, which maintained a peace if not a true alliance. Cabul allowed the worship of fake gods inside its walls, and was much maligned for idolatry, despite no outward rebellion against either man who claimed himself of singular godhood.

Rudābeh grew up in the Women’s Tower of her father’s estate. Like her mother, she was a shrewd politician who pulled strings from within her household, but her life was a closeted one dictated by rules and restrictions on her freedoms. Not because she was a woman, but because she was a channeler. In Cabul her gift set her on a pedestal she never really cared for. Rudābeh’s public life was punctuated by ritual that reaffirmed her father’s rule, her divinity both beloved and feared, though in truth she was seldom seen for how much she disliked the spectacle. It only added to her mystery, of course. Amongst the people she became renowned for a beauty comparable to the moon, and just as unreachable.

In private she was a dedicated musician, favouring the chang (angular harp), a courtly pursuit befitting of a lady, though that wasn’t why she loved it. Behind the mask of expectation and familial duty, Rudābeh was dry and quick-witted, and did not require formality from those closest to her. A rebellious spirit skirted rules rather than broke them, for she knew a misstep might draw attention that brought the Shah’s wrath down upon their heads. Or Ahriman’s. They lived in a precarious grey space, but in those margins, Rudābeh was restless.

“From head to feet as Paradise—all ornament, learning and beauty.”

The Moon of Cabul

As part of its peace treaty, Cabul’s taxes were usually collected by an envoy sent by Saum, the revered Pahlevan (champion) of Ohrmazd. Saum was a steward of his own city called Sistan, which had been given to him in reward for his heroic service as one of the Shah’s favoured Generals in the ongoing wars against Ahriman. He was also a man bound by honour to purge the world of Aži Dahāka’s blood, an oath long kept at bay by Mehrāb’s agreement with and loyalty to the Shah. It was why Saum never came to collect Cabul’s fealty in person – so that he never placed himself in a position where he might be forced to break one promise while fulfilling another. It remained a threat they were ever aware of, should the Shah’s favour with Cabul ever falter.

Then came a year when it was not the usual envoy who arrived to collect, but a son of Saum. His name was Zāl, a child said to have been abandoned for bad omens at his birth and instead raised in the mountains, only to have been reclaimed by his father as a grown man – despite the ill mark on him still.

At Sindoḵt’s careful advisement, King Mehrāb rode out to dine with Zāl in his tents outside the city, noble retinue all decked out and laden with lavish gifts to make peace anew. He brought a great feast to pass the evening, intending to get a measure of the stranger, though it soon transpired that this was not a man with any obvious political agenda, but a youth exploring the new world his father’s legitimacy suddenly laid before him. At the time Saum himself was away at war against Ahriman’s forces in Mazinderan, the land of demons, and it seemed he had left his kingdom in the safe-keeping of his sons. After a night’s genuine festivity, Mehrāb ventured to invite Zāl to visit his home, but Zāl declined: sure that it would anger and dishonour his father if he dined under the roof of the line of Dahāka, and furthermore risk the wrath of the Shah upon them.

When Rudābeh’s father returned in the morning, he spoke nothing but praises and undiluted relief that their agreement with the Shah still stood strong, assuring his family that Saum had not sent his son in trickery, and that they need not be concerned by his presence. Even her mother seemed placated, if thoughtful still. Zāl was, after all, a new and unknown piece on the board.

That afternoon Rudābeh sent three of her women outside the city to discover more in secrecy, though they chided her greatly for the risk. A son was not his father, but this was a family with a blood oath against her own. Not to mention a man his own father had cast out – and one who was still branded among other men, which might make him dangerous. But she’d seen her mother’s thoughtful look, and wanted to know for herself if her father had the truth of it – that this was not a person they needed to fear. For if he was, she intended to act.

By the time the women returned from the task, their tune had changed entirely. Despite being caught and scolded by a soldier for wandering while a stranger lurked outside the city, they were pink-cheeked with new enthusiasm, bringing a gift of jewels with the roses they had collected at the river’s edge. Rudābeh rolled her eyes for the flattery, knowing it meant Zāl heeded hearsay of a king’s beautiful daughter, as had many before him. Men had sent tokens in the past like benisons at an altar. But it was to the vision of a woman who didn’t exist. 

She kept only a stray feather from the finery – there by accident or purpose she could not say – and let her women share the rest, in thanks for their loyalty and honesty. Whatever this Zāl perceived of the mythical Moon of Cabul, Rudābeh determined to use it to her advantage. She would find out from him what she could, and ensure her city’s safety.

The Catalyst for Change

The meeting took place at night. Enthroned in darkness, Rudābeh watched him from the heights of her balcony. With arms leaned against the railing, she greeted him with straight-faced formality – all but for the sly glint in her eye, which spoke a more truthful mockery of her own intentionally superior manner. She offered him a way up, which he declined in favour of lassoing his own rope to climb the battlements. It was the first deviation from her expectations, and not the last, but one that flickered her lips with amusement. It seemed he had a flair for the dramatic, and she told him so when he reached the top.

Zāl wasn’t what she expected. Perhaps it was the mountains in him, but he did not have the manners of a Pahlevan. Just the heart of one perhaps.

She asked about Mazinderan and the war, news that did not easily penetrate Cabul’s walls, for none would take soldiers whose loyalty might be questioned, only coin and jewels aplenty to fund their holy crusade. She asked about his half-brother too, left to rule in Sistan while Zāl roamed the land on a servant’s errand. Not that she put it quite so bluntly. The conversation flowed surprisingly easy, though perhaps that was the comfort and wine intended to ease his guard. Rudābeh had nothing to hide , but none usually glimpsed at her true face, nor cared to. She was surprised again when he noted the callouses on her hands, and even hazarded as to why, given the chang was nowhere in sight. For all the lavish finery around them, everything to be expected of a spoiled king’s daughter, there was nothing personal here. Quite purposefully so. She had intended an interrogation.

Instead she shared the pieces of herself as he found them, curious of the unexpected exploration. Around them the night deepened unheeded. Rudābeh did not shy from asking about Ahriman’s brand in turn; an uneasy burden, and impolite to question so directly, but she knew something of the weight, and it stirred in her a kindred sense. When he asked if she was afraid, she only laughed and coyly suggested he check her shoulders for snakes. It was a sultry and baseless tease, yet her stare was a brazen challenge; no man in Cabul would entertain the notion of so intimate a touch given who and what she was. But then, Zāl was not from Cabul, and if he understood their transgression he did not seem to see the line that ought to remain between them, as she did. Still, when he reached to tease the hair from her neck she did not stop him, surprised at the shiver of connection inside.

She knew it was foolish, even at the time. It proved Zāl’s madness. It endangered her entire city to allow it. But perhaps its doomed nature was precisely the reason she did. Because he felt like freedom, even if it was only one of a moment.

“Abandon this desire, sow no discord, return to reason.”

Afterwards she convinced herself it was nothing but a dalliance; one that would end when Zāl moved on to whatever duty awaited him next. If he even survived that long. He was clever, astute in his own way, and certainly brilliant-minded, but he did not – or would not – see why the moment his repentant father returned to the Shah’s war, he had been sent away. She was surprised how that lingered on her mind, not least because there was nothing she could do about it, even if she cared to.

Her mother, Sindoḵt, was too observant to remain ignorant for long. As the days slipped by, she confronted her daughter in private and entreated her for the truth. Rudābeh rarely lied, if she could certainly be circumspect with the truth, but that very morning she had received an unexpected message from Zāl. Unbeknownst to her he had taken it upon himself to write to his father, seeking his support for the match by calling upon the oath Saum had once made to redress the wrongs of his son’s abandonment. It made her stomach sink to realise how endearingly stupid he had been to put his father in such a position – to make him choose between his conflicting loyalties. But worse, Zāl only told her now in order to share that Saum had replied. His father denounced it a passion of greatest folly, but he would abide by his oath to his son, and petition the Shah.

Her mother’s face paled at the news. Because they both knew the Shah would not offer clemency or blessing, but wrath and retribution. “He will see Ahriman’s device in this,” she warned. “And he will raze Cabul to dust for the mischance of such recklessness.”

She was right. But of course, it was far too late.

Fate’s Knot

“Go hence, O Saum, and take with thee thine army, for I command thee to go yet again to battle. Set forth unto Cabul and burn the house of Mihrab the King, and utterly destroy his race and all who serve him, nor suffer that any of the seed of Zohak escape destruction, for I will that the earth be delivered of this serpent brood.”

to be continued

Family

• Aži Dahāka; great grandfather, lieutenant of Ahriman
• Mehrāb Kaboli; father, King of Cabul
• Sindoḵt Kaboli; mother, Queen of Cabul

• Zāl Nariman; husband
• Rostam Nariman; son, a great hero of Persia
• Zavara Nariman; son
• Bānu Gošab; granddaughter

Previous Lives

• 1st Age: Natalie Northbrook
• 3rd Age: Nythadri Vanditera