All the disparate peoples of the First Unified Sultanate were restless and frustrated. The new sultan had risen to power two years ago, seemingly out of nowhere. He seduced both the population and the leaders of the ummah with vague promises of golden nuggets while slowly amassing more and more power until all other competitors fell under his spell and flocked like Zoroastrians to Allah. The Sultan did this so skillfully it seemed almost subconscious. Despite some initial trepidation that immediately followed the fall of the previous regimes, the people were happy with The Sultan. What his people felt when they gazed into his big hazel eyes only the greatest of poets could describe. It was hope! Passion! Love! Not being a poet myself nor having witnessed in person the events of our story or The Sultan, your humble storyteller can only suppose it must have been ecstasy. Things did not remain in this state for long though. The Sultan could be many things. One day he'd be restless, others simply lazy. He also had a cold streak interrupted only by episodic storms of temper. The people were constantly questioning just who The Sultan was. In spite of the opulent and entertaining nights with choice members of the populace that began following his rise to power, the people began to notice that his nuggets had yet to materialize. The Sultan sent slaves to the far reaches of the known world in search of exotic spices and mysterious recipes. Whole rooms in the palace were filled with these gastronomic secrets, but like the rooms themselves, those epicurean treasures were never opened but were instead hoarded away in dark cool cellars. The pittances he handed out were meager, and his attention was focused solely on himself.
To save the sultanate (not to mention The Sultan himself), The Grand Vizier and His most trusted advisor arranged to have a story told every night before bed. This story would illuminate the problems of the last two years without offending the man with the power over who would live and who would die...
سلطنة
