Khalid asked them not to begin with accusations.
"First name those from whom the bowls were hidden."
The courtyard waited to hear the names of Yusuf, Gonzalo and Marwan. Instead Khalid named the children at the sabil, the sick in the hammam, the wounded on both sides, the women by the Darro, the boys in the northern ditch, the prisoners, cooks and carters: everyone they had meant to drown for better terms of surrender.
There were people in the courtyard ready to speak for each of them: Rafiq for Samir, Elias for the sick, Nura for the women of the hammam, Íñigo for the boys at the ditch. Fatima answered for the children for whose sake she had almost chosen the death of a stranger, and Zulaykha for the father who had refused to buy back his good name with other people's lives.
Yusuf spoke in his own defence.
"Without harsh measures, the city would have perished in the assault. Do you think the kings will enter peacefully if we resist to the last? I held back the water so the city would surrender before the fires began."
Zulaykha did not deny it.
"You feared a massacre," she said. "So you decided to torment the city slowly with thirst and hide behind seals."
Yusuf flinched.
Boabdil closed his eyes.
Gonzalo said:
"A city that surrenders from thirst is easier to feed."
"Easier to keep obedient," Íñigo replied.
His father looked at him with hatred.
"You are my son."
Íñigo raised his right wrist. Everyone could see the mark of the water's turning.
"You treated me as something you owned. My mother taught me to remember. Now I will decide for myself what I am to be."
He walked over to the copper bowl of the water contract, which had been brought to the fountain as evidence against the house of al-Mairi. The bowl had remained dry since the first day of the contract. Zulaykha held it beneath the thin stream.
It did not fill at once.
Everyone waited.
When the bowl was full, Zulaykha gave it neither to Íñigo nor to Boabdil nor to Yusuf.
She carried it to the edge of the crowd, where stood the boy from the Castilian baggage train through whom Íñigo had sent his signal, nearly putting his life at risk.
The boy looked at the bowl as a hungry man looks at bread he does not yet dare take.
"Drink," Zulaykha said.
He drank.
That act became the first term of surrender spoken without paper.
Boabdil understood before the envoys did. Isabel and Fernando were far away, but their men had seen it: even before the city keys were handed over, water had been given to a child from the Castilian baggage train.
The scribe of the royal delegation stepped forward.
"Terms of surrender are not written at a fountain."
Khalid turned his blind face towards him.
"But the terms of thirst are always written wherever the bowl stands."
The envoy meant to object, but saw the empty bowl in the boy's hands and held his tongue.
Zulaykha turned to the emir.
"Until the royal forces arrive, the sabils are to be opened to the wards and the sick. The water-masters are to remain by the bowls as witnesses. No one is to be executed over water without a hearing at the fountain. No Granadan. No Castilian. No prisoner."
She did not raise her voice, but everyone in the courtyard heard her.
"Water cannot be judged by the sword."
Fatima added without looking at Zulaykha:
"And the children of the houses that leave are to receive water for the road. Even if yesterday their fathers demanded the death of others."
Khalid said:
"And the children of guilty houses do not inherit thirst. Water does not judge a child for his father."
Marwan jerked up his head: that condition protected his family too. The crowd did not love him, and Rafiq did not forgive him. But Marwan's mother, sisters and nephews had sent no pigeons and put out no lamps.
Nura said:
"The sick go through the hammam. Not through the crowd."
Elias raised his physician's bag.
"And I will record the names of those who did not make it, so no one can later say they never existed."
Yusuf gave a faint smirk.
"Now you set terms without a seal?"
Boabdil looked at the fountain.
"She proved her right before everyone could see it, before I had time to acknowledge it."
Yusuf suddenly looked up at the scribes.
"If you are to keep the count, count everything," he said. "The eastern aljibe will last until spring if the queue is observed. The garden reserve will run dry in nine days if soldiers are allowed in with jugs. The lower course must be cleared by the third dawn, or the lime will return to the bowls."
No one thanked him.
Yusuf had not expected thanks. Even in defeat, he went on counting the water. But now others would record his information and check it.
The senior master who had remained silent during the false hearing against Khalid a year before came to the bowl and removed the wooden judgement tablet from his belt. His hands trembled from more than age.
"The record against Khalid al-Mairi is void," he said. "Abu Salim signed it under threat. Marwan has confessed to substituting the lime. Yusuf has admitted that he secretly kept the master alive. The charge against Khalid's house is lifted."
Boabdil opened his eyes. "Record it so. Before the keys are handed over and after. Khalid's name is restored to the water."
Gonzalo tried to leave, but Íñigo said:
"Stay as a witness, Father. You have always loved evidence that can be tested."
Gonzalo stopped.
Zulaykha went to Íñigo. The knife and chain lay behind them, and the copper bowl was full of water at last.
"I cannot give you back your good name," she said.
"I do not ask it."
"And I cannot keep you a prisoner."
"I am no longer a prisoner."
She held out the bowl to him. He touched its rim but did not drink.
"Witnesses?" he asked.
Nura said:
"Too many."
Khalid smiled towards the water.
Íñigo drank after the boy from the baggage train, the sick girl from the hammam and Rafiq. The copper bowl of the water contract became their common oath: none of them would rule the water alone.
Zulaykha drank last.
The water was cold, slightly cloudy, with a faint taste of stone. Ordinary city water, still to be purified and fairly apportioned.
The gates had not yet opened.
But for the first time in many days, the city heard water in the night.
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