Stepping out of the storeroom on the main level of the Egypt Miraculous Temple, Amina paused suddenly, her head cocked to one side, sniffing the air. The main sitting room was quiet and empty. Yousef was in his meditation room at the far opposite end of the hallway extending off the sitting room. She hadn't seen Omar since breakfast that morning – her son had been disappearing for hours at a time, and with far greater frequency. But, then, he was a man now; she couldn't stop him or regulate his habits. Anan had been called away to a meeting with several of the other Guardians. And the last she had seen Iman, the girl had been in the small children's library, ensconced in a chair with a half-dozen children's books laid out on the table next to her.
Amina smiled fondly. The last time that library had seen such regular use had been over a decade ago, when Omar had been growing up.
Pensively, Amina sniffed again, looking for the odor she had smelled from the doorway. It had been faint – so faint she had almost missed it. But now that she knew to look for it, she could smell it far more clearly. Stopping near the center of the sitting room, she closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. The musty smell of the temple – a mixture of sweat and sand and dust – assaulted her nose, nearly overwhelming any other scents. Yet as she filtered out that must, the scent of shawarma shone through – the meat she had spent half the morning preparing for that evening's dinner. But that was not the smell she had noticed… there. A piquant tang, almost imperceptible, the smell of something spoiled, merging in with the must. But where was it coming from? Slowly, Amina walked up and down the sitting room, close to the wall, pausing every few meters to sniff the air by the cubicle doorways. Not by either of the vacant rooms they had set aside for guests. Not Omar's room, or Anan's. Suddenly, Amina halted, standing outside the room next to the one she shared with Yousef, and placed her hand on the doorframe, poking her head inside. There.
But where exactly was the smell originating?
"Amina?" squeaked Kiff, floating next to her head, giving her a confused look.
"There's something…" she murmured, more to herself than to anyone else. "I smell something. But I can't quite tell what it is." She frowned. "It's going to bug me until I track it down," she grumbled.
"I do not smell anything," the Kwami observed, swinging around to float upside down.
With a heavy sigh, Amina walked into the bedroom and clanked around to find the hamper full of dirty laundry – they would need to be washed soon enough. Selecting a shirt off the top of the pile, she held it up to her nose and took a deep sniff, closing her eyes in concentration. No; not this shirt. Furrowing her brows, Amina rummaged around to pull out a blouse from near the bottom of the pile, smelling it cautiously. She frowned. No; it definitely was not the clothing. But it did smell stronger in here…
"Do you smell it now?" Amina asked Kiff, raising an eyebrow at him.
Kiff hummed, drifting closer to the dresser. "I do…" he confirmed, nodding slowly. "And it even smells stronger over here. But I am unsure what it could be…"
"I know," Amina agreed, following him toward the dresser, her frown deepening. "There's something going on here – but what?" Carefully, Amina started opening dresser drawers, pausing and smelling the contents of each one as she went. Finally, the moment she opened the second drawer, she sucked in a breath and nodded in realization, pushing a shirt out of the way. Staring into the drawer, she sighed, shaking her head. "Of course."
"W–what are you doing?" a small, scared voice asked from the doorway behind Amina.
Amina turned around, raising an eyebrow expectantly. "Iman, what have we told you about having food in your room?"
The young girl looked down at the solid stone floor and sniffled. "Not to leave food in the room," she mumbled, carefully looking anywhere except at Amina.
"And why?" Amina prompted.
Iman swallowed. "Because it can attract bugs and rats."
"Considering that the temple is underground, pests are far more of a serious problem for us than they might be under any other circumstances," Amina confirmed, nodding. "But that's not the only reason you can't hide food in your room like this: it can spoil and start to smell." Leaning over, Amina found the trashcan and double checked that there was a bag in it. She pulled the drawer open a little further and pulled away the shirt that had been on top of the small stash. Her nose wrinkled on spotting flecks of something clinging to the fabric, and she tossed the shirt on top of the pile of laundry. Carefully, Amina began picking through the drawer, pulling out a half-eaten sandwich, a package of cookies with only a couple missing, several pieces of moldy bread, even half an orange. All of them barely touched. All of them starting to smell. But as Amina placed the last of the moldy food in the trashcan, Iman sucked in a breath. "Yes?" asked Amina, pausing and glancing over at the girl.
Iman flushed, her eyes wide and nervous. "It's just… could–could I keep that? My food. I–I would still eat it." She gulped. "If–if you're…"
"I'm sorry?" Amina furrowed her brows, her head cocked to one side in confusion. "If we are what?"
"I–If you're…" The girl's voice trailed off, and she looked down, staring intently at the cold stone floor beneath her feet. Amina paused, watching her patiently, waiting for her response. Finally– "A–are you… are you kicking me out? Be–because I was bad?"
Amina felt her heart break. "Oh, alhabiba…" Blinking away tears, Amina placed a hand on Iman's shoulder. The girl tensed, but she quickly relaxed when Amina pulled her into a big hug and directed her across the small room to sit down together on the bed. Amina rubbed Iman's back gently. "We would never make you leave, just for something as silly as this," she assured her.
Iman tensed against Amina's chest, sniffling. "But – of course, you are! You said not to do it, and I–"
Amina silenced her with a kiss on her forehead. "Little one, you are not the first in this temple to hide food away in your bedroom; you will not be the last." She sighed, looking off to the other side of the room for a long moment before glancing back down at Imani, her lips quirking up in a smile. "In fact, if sneaking food automatically got one ousted from the temple, I would have been kicked out in my first week!"
Iman leaned away from her and looked up in surprise, her eyes wide. "You did it, too? But I thought you said not to do it."
Amina nodded, rubbing the girl's back. "And that is why I know not to do it – and why." Iman stared at her, a question in her eyes, for a long moment, before Amina relented and added, "And, that is how I know why you did it."
Iman's breathing hitched.
Swallowing anxiously, Amina looked away from her, allowing herself to become lost in the memories. It had been so long ago – she had become such a different person in the decades since then. And yet, it didn't take much for her to mentally drift back to the little girl she had been, so many decades ago. Sometimes, it felt like only yesterday…
Amina let out a breath. "We never told you when you first arrived, but you aren't the only orphan that the Egyptian Miraculous Temple had taken in over the course of its history; in fact, in recent memory, Omar is the exception in that he is not an orphan."
Iman cocked her head to one side. "You mean, you and Master Yousef were…"
Amina nodded. "Before coming to the Temple, Yousef and I were both in much the same position that you were when Yousef found you: orphans, living alone on the streets of Cairo, scraping and scavenging to find food. Speaking for myself, my father had been a soldier, but he was killed; my mother couldn't handle the grief and just… wasted away, leaving me all on my own. I fell in with a group of fellow orphans – including Yousef. We had been living on the streets for a couple years, and then our lives were changed forever. The old Guardian found us. I still don't understand quite why, but he chose us. He brought us here and gave us rooms and clothes and beds and… all the things that we hadn't had in years. It all – it just seemed too good to be true. And so, I treated it as though it could end at any time. As if I would end up back on the streets again." Iman tensed, sucking in and holding her breath. Amina gave her a kind smile. "I know: you are worried that this will end, that you'll have to leave and go right back out onto the street, that we will not let you stay – for one reason or another. But I assure you, that will never happen. You can live here with us for as long as you wish – regardless of anything you do. You are part of our family now, and nothing you do will ever change that."
Iman's shoulders relaxed slightly, and she leaned into Amina's side. "Thank you," she murmured, sighing in relief.
AN: Tomorrow, look for the first chapter of "The Next Jagged Ride."