Literature / The Angel of Khan el-Khalili

"-to find the Angel of Khan el-Khalili means going to the market late at night, when most of the city have long retired to their beds, leaving the souk to the curious, the adventurous, and the desperate—like you."
Art by Kevin Hong

“I haven’t come for a wish,” you state adamantly. Wishes are risky business anyway—undependable and unpredictable. You never can tell what end of the bargain you’ll come out on when dealing with djinn. You hesitate, but bring yourself to say it: “I’ve come looking for a miracle.”
At this, Seeker straightens, so that a bit of light glints from her brass breastplate. “A miracle,” she repeats. There is a savoring of the word. “Quite a favor to ask. You understand that such things come with a price.”

—Excerpt, The Angel of Khan el-Khalili

"The Angel of Khan el-Khalili" is a Short Story by P. Djèlí Clark set in the the author's Alternate History Myth Punk Dead Djinn universe, It follows the young garment worker Aliaa as she seeks the aid of a supernatural being secreted away in Cairo's sprawling Khan el-Khalili bazaar. But all transactions have a price, and Aliaa is about to find out first hand that the miracle she so desperately needs will cost more than she bargained for.

Written in 2017 and first published in the Clockwork Cairo: Steampunk Tales of Egypt anthology, the story is now available to read on publisher Tor's website here.

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Tropes in "The Angel of Khan el-Khalili":

• Bargain with Heaven: Zig-Zagged — Seeker and other supernatural creatures like her claim to be angels serving god, but human religious authorities (from a whole spectrum of Abrahamic religions) have refused to recognize them as such. It's never made clear if Aliaa is actually bargaining with an angel, or if the self-proclaimed "angels" are something else. Seeker openly admits to taking "a bit" of Aliaa's soul with each secret the girl offers, which seems more along the lines of a Deal with the Devil — even if Aliaa does come away with the "miracle" she came searching for in the first place.
• Bazaar of the Bizarre: Downplayed — Khan el-Khalili is a sprawling marketplace selling everything from non-magical carpets and lamps to steampunk automaton repair services and alchemical appliances, but the protagonist is looking to find/ hire a supernatural creature that can heal her mortally wounded sister.
• The Confidant: Zig-Zagged — Seeker takes payment for the favors and miracles she grants in the form of "hidden" "truths" that are "more than secret", which Aliaa interprets to mean a confession. The confessions must be given willingly, and are done so in the confidence that Seeker will not share them with outside parties. Seeker believes that these confessions are helpful to her supplicants, asking Aliaa if she doesn't feel unburdened for having shared her Dark Secrets; Aliaa disagrees.
• Dangerous Workplace: Aliaa and her sister Aisha worked in a garment factory under horrible conditions. That included high quotas, dangerous equipment that could injure the workers, no breaks for hours on end, and owners who locked their employees in the building to stop them from stealing the wares. When a fire started in the workshop, the workers nearly died because they couldn't escape.
  Work at the factory has never been fair. You labor endlessly, for wages that are a pittance at best. Because you are women, the company pays all of you less. And if you are younger, less still. The machines are dangerous. You’ve seen women scalded by ruptured steam valves or lacerated by weaving looms. The floor bosses don’t care. The company demands they meet quotas, and the lot of them wring every last bit of sweat and blood from each of you.
• Dark Secret: Aliaa set the fire that nearly killed all the women in the garment factory and mortally wounded Aisha.
• Deal with the Devil: Zig-Zagged — Seeker claims to be an angel in service of god, so on the surface it would seem that when Aliaa strikes an accord with Seeker she's Bargaining with Heaven. But the price Seeker extracts for their deal is "truths," which all siphon away a piece of Aliaa's soul when Seeker extracts them in a painful, frightening process.
  “What did…you take from me?” you whisper.
  “Only a bit of your soul,” Seeker replies. “Why do you look so? Truth, after all, resides in the soul.”
• Healthcare Motivation: Aliaa comes to Seeker looking for a miracle that can heal her mortally wounded sister Aisha. The dress factory where Aliaa and Aisha worked caught fire, and after dragging Aliaa to safety Aisha ran back inside to rescue their coworkers from the blaze, suffering horrible burns and smoke inhalation in the process.
• Panacea: Seeker gives Aliaa a bezoar for Aisha — once it's been ground up an ingested, all of Aisha's wounds and ailments will heal.
  The angel appears to pluck something from her lips. When her hand lowers to you, it opens in offering. You take what she holds. A stone. Dull-brown and unassuming, it is small enough to fit in your palm. You turn it over, running your fingers along its unevenly smooth surface.
  “A bezoar,” Seeker explains. “Grind it to a fine powder for your sister to ingest.”
  “This will save Aisha?” you ask uncertainly. “This will heal her?”
  “She will make a swift recovery,” the angel replies. “Even her burns. Some might even call it miraculous.”
• Rule of Three: Seeker asks for Aliaa to pay for her sister's miracle with "truths," which Aliaa interprets to mean "secrets" or "confessions." Seeker gives Aliaa three chances to provide a truth that will satisfy their bargain. While Seeker deems the first two truths Aliaa offers to be petty mortal "lies and thievery," the third satisfies their bargain.
  “I search for truth,” she explains. “I seek it out. This is my purpose. The reason of my creation.” You have little time to digest that before she continues. “You will be given three chances to give me what I seek. Do so to my satisfaction, and I will grant your miracle. This is the price I set.”
  You frown at that. Three chances? “You want me to tell you something…true?”
  “A truth,” she clarifies. “From the depths of your soul. Something hidden.”
  “You mean a secret?”
  “More than that.”
  You dwell on that momentarily. When is a hidden truth more than a secret?
  “A confession,” you realize aloud.
  Seeker gives a deep nod. “Those are the truths we hide most deeply,” she states.
• Second-Person Narration: The story drops readers into Aliaa's perspective.
• Secret Shop: Seeker's sanctum is hidden in the twisting back alleyways of the Khan el-Khalili bazaar, down in the basement of a boilerplate eunuch repairman's shop. It is only accessible by asking the repairman to see "the lady of the house" and gaining his permission to enter.

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