by Scipio42-2
Welcome! Welcome worthy ones! Be seated.
A slave girl will be by in a moment with refreshments, and once you have been served, she will take care of your other needs.
Allow me to take you on a journey, a story. Come with me back to old Bagdad, as it was in the time of Scheherazade, the greatest teller of stories in history. In those days the city was ruled by the Sultan, carpets could fly, djinns granted wishes, and viziers were inevitably evil. There were many clever men and women in the city - makers and craftspeople - creating the most amazing things and their arts were celebrated. It was a time when even the humblest of men could rise to better things.
In the city at that time there was a young man – not much more than a boy, living a hand to mouth existence in a side street off the main thoroughfare of the city. Every penny he earned went into his craft – save those that he needed to keep his soul within his body – and those that knew him said there is no finer preparer of girl meat within the great city of Bagdad.
The girl spat at him, hissing, but he laughed. This was the part he enjoyed. The hard work – spitting her through her pussy and up through her stomach and out of her mouth, was over, now it was the slow steady work of rotating her over the fire, making sure the flames didn’t get too high, or the meat didn’t linger too long so that it burned. This was what he was good at, tending the meat, basting it, with his special basting sauce. The juices of the meat ran off her skin on onto the charcoal, and it was this that spat and hissed as he cooked her.
The girl on the spit was a small one, oh she was a lawful meat sure enough, but she was slight of build, her figure small and boyish. There weren’t the girls available in the market these days. The ones that the merchants were bringing to sale were all the same, skinny and underfed.
Oh, he knew what was happening, all the best girls were being sold before they got to his local markets, and the Sultan’s palace was taking the lion’s share.
Despite her lack of size, the girl’s belly bulged – filled with yesterday’s bread and dates and fruit, and the girl’s chopped heart, liver and kidneys. Each time it rotated slowly through the heat the grease from her sparse layer of fat dripped into the fire, sizzling and setting up a delicious aroma.
Already the customers were coming to see when she would be done.
“Selim, is she not done yet? When will you be carving Selim?” The usual questions.
The bread arrived from the bakers. Selim counted out the coins for the delivery and began opening the flat breads.
“Soon! Soon!” He answered the questions.
“Hot girl meat! Hot girl meat!” Selim gave voice, not that it was needed, there was already a queue of people waiting.
Swish! Swish! Selim’s razor-sharp knife sliced the steaming hot flesh from the girl’s roasted body.
Clink, clink! The coins fell into Selim’s bowl.
Click! Click! The carved flesh revealed the girl’s white bones.
The customers were little to Selim as his attention was on carving the flesh and filling the flat-breads, until a break in the steam of customers got his attention.
The boots were the first sign that this was different from his usual customers, riding boots not the slippers most of his clients wore.
Looking up, he first saw a robe of the finest cloth, wrought with patterns woven into the cloth itself. Next there was the blued steel rings of a hauberk, wrapped with a fine silk sash, in which rested the silver decorated scabbard of a tulwar curving downwards. Above the hauberk was a fine moustache and a goatee beard but the eyes that glowered down at him were serious and focussed.
“I am looking for the Selim, the girl meat seller.”
“Does he owe you money, oh Commander of Ten thousand?”
“Just answer me boy.” At this time Selim was just turned eighteen years of age, a man by most measures and would it have been another he might have bristled, but the man had a sword and the air of one well-versed in its use.
“I am Selim Master. How may I help you?”
“Can you read?” Selim nodded, like many boys he had been compelled to attend the school at the mosque. The man thrust a parchment into his hand.
“This is a summons?” He said as he read it. “To the Sultan’s palace?”
The man nodded. “After the second call to prayer tomorrow, at the river gate.” Without even thinking about it, Selim had carved meat and presented the soldier with it. Without thinking the man took it and bit down.
“This is good!” He said around a mouthful of the hot spicy meat. “You are to bring any personal equipment you require. You will be there all day at the very least. This is very good!
“Ask for Haroun of the Guard at the gate. I shall be nearby.” And as he left Haroun of the Guard dropped gold into the bowl in payment.
You should know gentle reader, that it was the smallest gold coin in circulation in Bagdad at that time, but it was gold, and very rarely was it ever seen. Still Selim felt less concerned about closing his business the next day to spend the day at the palace.
After the muezzin’s call to dhurh the next morning, Selim, with his knives and a couple of other things wrapped in a cloth bundle, presented himself to a surprised looking guard at the palace’s river gate.
“What are you doing here?” He asked.
“To be honest, sir, I have no idea myself, but a summons to the palace is a summons to the palace, and what must a man do in those circumstances?”
“Bugger off!” The guard said after a few moments thought. “There’s all sorts of shit going on in there and I’m not letting every Ibi, Ali and Mohammed in – so piss off!”
“And what should I tell Haroun of the Guard when he comes looking to see why I did not attend as he requested? Master?”
“Haroun?” the man asked nervously, “Oh! You should have said so.” And a boy was sent to summon Haroun.
“Come with me Selim.” Haroun told him as soon as he appeared. And they set off through the palace.
They arrived at a doorway guarded by two huge black soldiers and Haroun knocked.
It was a voice as dead as a desert tomb, that told them to enter.
Inside Selim observed a neat office, with small, neat piles of papers placed in an arc around a large single cushion, with a low, bare table. There were two more guards by the door and several slaves busily transcribing documents. But for all of the activity it was the man who sat upon the cushion that drew Selim’s attention. If the office was neat, and it was, painfully neat - and tidy, even the piles of paper were neat, the man on the cushion being attended by two slaves was neater still. Not a hair was out of place in his combed beard. His turban was whiter than the whitest swan and his cloths bore no creases.
“You are Selim the girl meat seller?”
“I am, most high one_” A raised hand silenced him.
“I am Caspar the Vizier, vizier to the Sultan Abdullah, I not a ‘high one’, you will address me as my Lord Vizier.”
“Yes, my lord vizier.” Selim replied with the adroitness of a man of the streets of Bagdad, though privately his views were less respectful.
Satisfied by Selim’s prompts response, Caspar continued. “It has come to my ears that you have a way with you, when it comes to preparing a girl for roasting. That it is your trade and that you are dedicated to it. Is this so?”
“It is my lord vizier. I do my best with what I can.”
“Good!” Caspar declared. “The sultan is hosting the Sultan Qaboos of Muscat. You are to prepare a feast for the two of them for tonight. Haroun will show you where you need to be.”
Selim found himself outside of the office. For the first time in a few minutes he remembered to breathe.
He looked at Haroun who was watching him carefully.
“What, oh commander of ten-thousand thousands?”
“You were going very red.” The soldier told him. “Will you live?”
“Please sir, what happens if the Sultans don’t like my cooking?”
Haroun looked at him, “I suppose it all depends on how much they don’t like it, they might just dismiss it, or they might…” He drew his finger slowly across his throat in the universal gesture.
Selim wanted to tell the big man that they had the wrong seller of girl meat, that they had mistaken him for the ‘other’ – any other - Selim, girl meat seller. He wanted to turn around and go, go back to his little shop and never talk about this again. But there was pride there as well. The Sultan of Bagdad would sample his food, and word of it would spread as far as Muscat. And he would be able to brag how one time he served his food to the Sultan. It had to be worth a go he decided.
“But if they do like it…?”
“There will be a reward and fame for you.” Haroun told him.
As they walked Haroun asked “Why do you do it? Surely there are easier ways for a man to make a living?”
Selim laughed, “It’s a tale as old as time,” he said, “My father was a girl meat seller, and his father before him, and his father before him.”
Haroun nodded. “It’s a hard trade, so many sellers around…”
“But is it not written, oh Captain of ten thousand-thousand-thousands, that a man should strive to be the best at what he does, no matter what ever it is he does?”
“And you are quite good,” Haroun conceded, the spiced meat he had tasted the day before had been the high-light of a day that stank higher than the arse-holes of a thousand camels.
“I will tell you something Selim, and tell no one that I told you this.” He looked around, “You are being set up to fail. The Lord Vizier wishes to embarrass the Sultan over a slight of some kind. You were picked because of your reputation but he himself does not believe that you can do it. He thinks the meal will be poor, and the Sultan made a fool of for using a street vendor.”
Selim bristled. He drew himself up to his full height, which admittedly was only level with Haroun’s chin, and said, “Because you told me this, I do not think you want me to fail?” Haroun nodded, “I can only do my best Haroun, leader of the Sultan’s forces, and my best is very good, providing I can work without hindrance. Get me a levelled field and I shall work miracles, such a meal that slave girls will be asking to be slaughtered to be part of it.”
Haroun looked at him. “It’s leader of a thousand. My title. And I shall be with you all day making sure that you do not poison the Sultan.”
Selim looked back at him, though by now he was getting a crick in his neck, “Well that’s a shitty stick to stir a pot with! How did you come by that job?”
Haroun looked back in the direction of the Vizier’s chambers. “Never you mind. You do realise as well that if you do pull this off – you’re making yourself a target for his wrath?”
“Inshallah!” Selim told him, “If that is God’s will who am I to dispute it?”
“Truly?”
“Truly!” Selim smiled, “The rich and powerful can always shit on your life, even when you haven’t done anything. But God gave men wits to use in situations like this and I can boil that pot when I come to it.”
“Come on Selim,” Haroun said hurrying him down the corridor, “Let us go to the kitchens.”
The palace kitchens were huge, and franticly busy. There were cooks, their assistants and under-cooks, their assistants, pastry cooks and their assistants and porters and their - well. I’m sure you get the idea.
Cauldrons, spits, pans, dishes, fires, grills, all blazing away each with their attendants all being utilised by someone making something.
And noisy? Oh! The din was immense, everyone shouted at everyone else, pans rattled and generally anything that could be utilised to make a noise was utilised to make a noise.
Haroun led Selim through the press, the big man clearing a path easily through the throng. They eventually arrived in front of a huge fat man. The only man who seemed calm in this whole maelstrom of activity.
The big man, he was even bigger than Haroun of the Guard, looked down his nose at Selim.
“Is this the one Haroun?” He asked.
Haroun nodded as he gently pushed Selim forwards. “He is good Master Ibrahim. Very good indeed.”
Master Ibrahim’s right eyebrow went up. “Good you say? Well that is a great compliment coming from a man who scarcely can tell a plum from a pear. And you sir, what do you have to say for yourself?”
“Simply this oh great master of all bedlams,” Master Ibrahim leaned forwards, “Where in all this insanity may an honest man do his work?”
The huge chef looked at him, peering forwards, “Master of all bedlams?” A wide smile broke out on his serious face. “That one I like!”
“You! And you!” He started pointing at people, “And you too! Attend Master Selim, anything he needs get it for him.
“You need a spit and coals?” Master Ibrahim asked over his shoulder as he led Selim and the selected helpers through the kitchen.
“There is a table here and the spit is there. How many girls do you require?”
“Just the one please master, but if I may, may I make a selection? So, perhaps four or five?”
Master Ibrahim despite his size, was an animated man, with quick movements, but he paused a moment as he considered, then abruptly nodded.
Soon they were outside looking in the slave pens.
Five girls were paraded in front of the assembled men – Haroun, Ibrahim and Selim.
Four of them were black women, from the African lands to the south of the Sahara Desert. They were all fine women – though one was a little too old to be a good spit roast - firm of limb, full breasted and with the wide hips that are common among such people. They all seemed healthy enough, clear of eye, and showing no signs of any sickness.
The fifth one was a pale skinned woman, with hair the colour of gold, and pleasantly sized breasts. Selim had seen women like this before, but usually they went as bed warmers and pleasure slaves because they were so rare.
Professionally he ran his hands over their limbs, feeling the flesh and watching it move. He knew he was being watched by Master Ibrahim but he did nothing different to what he would do everyday when selecting women to cook at his stall. He was looking for a balance between muscle and fat, not too much of either and not too little. Selim worked gently – not trying to alarm the women, but he was thorough in his examinations.
The pale-skinned woman, from the north and west apparently, would have made a lovely piece of tumble, he reflected, imagining what it would be like to bury his throbbing manhood between her plump lower lips. But she was also perfect for what he wanted. Unusual enough to stand out but the fact that she was in the kitchen slave pens meant that she wasn’t considered valuable enough to go in the harem.
“This one!” he said, and Master Ibrahim nodded. “She is just the right size to be cooked thoroughly by the time for the banquet.”
The other women were dismissed, leaving the pale-skinned on alone. Selim could see she was starting to get restless, nervous of what was about to happen.
“Do you need someone to do this?” Master Ibrahim asked.
Selim thanked the master and shook his head, he was an adult, and thus able to complete the next step.
Taking the girl gently by the shoulders, he turned her to face Mecca, before removing his dagger from his robe and slicing her throat open – not too deeply. “Bismillah!” Selim said as he made the incision, ‘In the name of God!’.
The woman did not even see it coming, but a spray of red flew forwards into a trough, unable to bring her hands up because of her bonds, she struggled as the darkness closed her sight.
Soon the pale-skinned slave was unconscious, dead but her heart was still pumping, making her life’s blood ooze down her front. Selim was eager to get her inside and washed, so he started to carry her into the busy kitchen while slaves brought water to clean the trough and wash the blood away.
With the woman on his table Selim began to feel happier. Up to now he had been a pawn in someone else’s game. Selim go here, Selim do this, Selim do that, now he was doing what he was good at.
As he told the assistants to bring him things, he forgot the people around him, the noise of the kitchen dimmed, Haroun and Master Ibrahim watching him faded away and he concentrated on the pale-skinned woman on the table in front of him.
Having removed the slave’s bonds, he carefully removed the girl’s head and set it aside. Most times he would leave the head on, but this time he wanted the effect. After the girl was cooking, he would clean the head and face and make it more presentable. Next, he cleaned and shaved the girl’s body, washing any blood and dirt off and removing any body hair, except for the fine hairs that would burn away in the roasting process.
While he was waiting for the assistants to grind the spices as he had told them and combine the ingredients in bowls, he went over to the fire pit to check the charcoal, stopping one of the helpers and telling him to bring more charcoal, placing it carefully, to increase the heat.
He walked back to the table adding some of the dark balsamic vinegar to the sauce, dipping his finger and tasting it, before going to a basket and taking out three pomegranates.
These were chopped and the seeds scraped into a bowl where they were pounded, with sugar, water, a tamarind fruit, more of the balsamic vinegar, all spice, ground ginger, and some herbs to make a thick, dark viscous sauce.
The girl was gutted. A slit from the sternum to the crotch saw her liver and lights removed, before the heart, the liver and the kidneys were chopped finely, added to rice, crushed garlic bulbs, shallots, dates, plums, sugar, honey, salt and ground black pepper and then some more pomegranate seeds, at which point they were replaced and her stomach was sewn up with fine stitches. The same stuffing, though with more emphasis on the rice was used to pad out the girl’s now, empty breasts which otherwise would have deflated.
Selim took a step back, looking at the body on the table critically, he wanted to make sure that the girl’s figure looked as natural as possible, not distended at all. Satisfied that it did indeed look as he meant it, it was time for the spit.
He signalled for two of the helpers to hold the girl’s body but was surprised when Master Ibrahim stepped in instead. He had been watching the young man work, amused by the way Selim had blocked everything around him.
“Allow me?” He asked.
Selim nodded, “Hold her steady master.”
Placing the fine steel of the spit at the entrance of her womanhood Selim began to insert the spit. This was one reason why he preferred to spit a woman when she was dead, unlike his father who insisted that alive was best. Beside the pain and stress adding what he thought was a bitterness to the meat, there was no issues with lubrication or the meat wriggling. Just simply insert the spit, and with a steady pressure and good eye, push it all the way up through the abdomen, into the chest and out through the throat. The hands and ankles were secured to the spit, and a cross-bar would stop her sliding and rotating round the spit’s motion.
Master Ibrahim went to pick up the end of the spit, Selim gestured he wait. “If you will please master Ibrahim?”
Taking his knife, he scored the girl’s flesh, criss-cross cuts to slice the skin making diamond shapes as long as his thumb on a side all across her back, flanks and belly. Finally, he washed the whole of the girl’s body with the pomegranate sauce, covering her flesh with a thin, even coat, and leaving plenty in the bowl for during the roasting.
Now at last the two of them lifted her onto the fire.
Once the roast was on, and turning over the fire, Selim began to relax a little.
“Would you like some fruit juice, little master?” Master Ibrahim asked.
It was as if Selim was waking from a dream, no longer concentrating his surroundings came crowding back in on him. “Uh! Oh, yes please master?”
They sat for a while and watched the girl’s body rotate over the flames, already the greasy sweat was beginning to hiss and spit on the charcoal.
“I was dubious when Haroun told me what was happening,” Master Ibrahim started. “By the Prophet’s beard I wish I could get half of this lot to work with your skill and concentration.”
“I suspect the stakes are different to those young Selim is working under.” Haroun observed.
Master Ibrahim looked at him and then at Selim. “In truth?”
“Aye!” Haroun assured him, as Selim got up and poked at the coals, evening them out,
“Apparently if I fail…”
Master Ibrahim pulled a sour face and scowled. “By the …! If that roast tastes as good as it looks, you should be given a parade through the city, not threatened like a criminal…”
Master Ibrahim paused and then called an assistant over, “Go swiftly now and ask Nahla if she will come and see me, and explain that it’s urgent, and we need some garments for a man as tall as my chin.”
“Nahla, master?” The assistant asked nervously.
“That’s what I said,” Master Ibrahim said, “And be quick.”
Selim looked at him. Master Ibrahim smiled, “She has been known to throw things. But she is the palace seamstress and if any one would have a kaftan and a presentable bisht it would be her.”
While waiting for Nahla to arrive, Selim fussed and fretted with the fire, basted the roast and daubed more of the sauce on its skin.
By now it was after the third call to prayer – asr, the girl was cooking well, and would be done nicely by the time of the meal after maghrib, the last prayer of the day, without the customers queuing for the meat Selim was at a bit of a loss as to what to do. That was until Nahla appeared.
“Ibrahim! What is so important that you have to drag me into the pit you call a kitchen, do you have no work to that you need to disturb me.” Selim wasn’t sure what to expect, but he was surprised to find the loud voice came from a woman shorter than himself.
She had two of her own assistants with her. Both of them carrying bundles of clothes. The first one was a tall girl who looked past him, the second was prettier and she smiled at him.
“What am I doing here?” Nahla asked again. Master Ibrahim pointed at Selim.
“This visiting master, he may be presented to the Sultan tonight” or he may be facing his death, he thought to himself, “What have you got that will make him more presentable?”
Nahla looked at Selim critically, “You are a visiting ‘master’?”
“He is a cooker of women, Nahla, and a fine one at that,” Master Ibrahim told her, “And unless you want to find out how good he is – from the wrong end of the spit, you harridan, you will find him some raiment.”
Nahla gave the head of the palace kitchens a look that said ‘you wish!’ but she turned to the bundles of clothes and started sorting through them. Soon Selim had a new clean shirt and a coat. He kept his cap, and pants, but Nahla also left him a new pair of slippers.
Before she left the woman looked him up and down, “You’ll do ‘master’, not so flash that you look brand new, but neither do you look like you’ve just walked in from the fields.”
“I used to look dream about having cooking her over the coals, insolent old houri she is.”
“What changed?” Selim asked him.
Master Ibrahim laughed, “Now I dream about you cooking her, and we’d sit down and stuff ourselves silly.”
The afternoon passed in talking shop, as the two men talked about what they did. As they talked Selim cleaned the girl’s head, washing her face and brushing her hair.
“See!” Master Ibrahim laughed again, “It’s attention to detail, so many young cooks haven’t got the faintest idea.”
Then it was time for the feast.
A huge steel tray was brought, and piled with more rice and green vegetables, trays of flat breads were brought. Finally, the girl was removed from the fire.
Undoing her hands and feet, Selim braced himself before sliding the spit back through her body. It actually came out easier than he thought it would, accompanied by wisps of steam. Carefully the browned and crispy looking cadaver was placed on the tray, lying on her back, hands beside her, head on a spike, looking sightlessly down along her body.
Master Ibrahim called for his porters who carefully picked up the trays between them and carried them through the palace to the Sultan’s chambers (Ibrahim had threatened them all with most excruciating deaths should they be so unfortunate to drop anything).
The two men waited in an anti-chamber while two sultans feasted, suddenly a servant appeared. “The Sultan!” he said with a bizarre emphasis on the words, “The Sultan would see the cook!”
Eyes lowered Selim walked into the chamber behind the servant. He prostrated himself before the banquet, but not before he caught a glimpse of the platter with the girl on it, and huge holes in her body where the men had ripped pieces of her flesh away and devoured it.
“You are Selim, the girl-cooker?” The Sultan asked.
“I am oh mighty Sultan, ruler of the wide world.”
“My food taster thinks you used to much garlic.” The voice was humorous, amused, “But I, oh prince of the street vendors, I think that I have never eaten a better meal. My friend the Sultan of Muscat agrees with me.
“Look up Selim.”
Cautiously Selim raised his head.
Selim in his whole life had never seen so much sumptuous wealth as sat at the table before him. It was as if someone had piled jewels upon gold, upon silver and then topped it all off with cloth of the most expensive cut, and draped it around the two men.
Beneath these displays of ostentatious wealth sat two very happy men. Still gnawing on the odd bone, they both sported satisfied grins, and showed full rounded bellies, pushing the fabrics of their richly embroidered coats out around full stomachs.
Both men looked to be about the same age, and both appeared strangely ordinary to be such powerful men, Selim observed. Certainly, had they come to his booth and not summoned him, apart from the quality of their apparel he would not have marked either one as anyone special.
The roast had been torn apart as if it had been attacked by wild dogs, the bones disarticulated and spread all over the platter. The head still sat blind-eyed at the head of the scene but the flesh of the pale-skinned girl had been destroyed, white bones showed in the gaps, and the stuffing he had worked so carefully to prepare was spread in a dark purple puddle across the tray on which the remains sat.
The Sultan belched loudly and if truth be known quite joyfully.
“You truly are a wonder Selim, the sauce was exquisite and the skin so crisp.”
“If I may,” The Sultan of Muscat asked, “What was the recipe for that sauce, I would bring it back to my cooks?”
Selim bowed, “Oh Lord of Muscat and the oceans between us, is it not written that a man must guard the secrets of his craft, else he will have no craft to guard.”
“So, a ‘no’ then,” The Sultan of Muscat laughed, “But very graciously done. Here!”
The Sultan of Muscat gestured towards the table, and a servant placed a finely embroidered bag down. It chinked quite pleasingly. Muscat nodded towards it, as he reached for one of the ribs of the meal in front of him, gnawing on it absent-mindedly.
Selim moved forwards careful and lifted the purse, feeling the satisfying weight, but resisting the urge to jingle it.
The Sultan of Bagdad was watching him carefully. He returned to his original place in front of them.
“I have a reward for you too Selim, and truly such a meal deserved a fine reward.”
Selim bowed low.
“But I understand,” the Sultan continued, “That such a reward will put you in a difficult position.”
Selim remained non-committal. “Do not worry Selim, I would be a poor ruler if I did not know what was going on in my own palace wouldn’t I? You were set up to fail weren’t you? Despite that you have provided us with a feast fit for – well for two Sultans.” He laughed cheerfully.
“I like that. So, my reward will be threefold.
“Firstly, I shall give you this.” A second purse appeared, bigger than the first and when Selim picked it up, it was decidedly heavier.
“Secondly you may now tell people that your business is by appointment to the Sultan of Bagdad.”
“And the Sultan of Muscat,” that worthy added.
“And finally, I shall instruct my next vizier that you are to receive a pension of fifty gold pieces a year, for the rest of your life.”
Selim was amazed, and said so, “Oh Sultan of the deserts, master of the wadis, and the oases, that is a magnificent reward, and one for which I am not truly worthy after just one meal.”
“About that_” The sultan gestured and the guards brought in the vizier Caspar. He was no longer a ‘mighty one’. He had been stripped, chained, and from the looks of it soundly beaten. “Your meal was, as has been said, magnificent, but I would ask you now Selim_” And he looked at the defeated former vizier, “Do you ever cook men?”