Duty Quotes in Beneath a Marble Sky

"I can't go," I interrupted sadly, remembering my promise to Mother, made so long ago.

"What?"

"You must flee with Arjumand. But I—"

He stepped back, his face wrinkling in consternation. "Are you mad?"

"I must stay."

"Stay here and you'll die!"

"I have to help Father."

"By Allah, he's the Emperor! He's man enough to help himself!"

"He's sick, Isa. And I can't leave him."

"Then take him with us!"

"And give the throne to Aurangzeb, who'll destroy the Empire?"

"Better it than us!"

"Better neither!" I said fiercely. "I can't leave him, Isa. And we have a good plan, one that will work. Once Aurangzeb is defeated, I'll find you. Father has promised to send us to Varanasi, where we can live forever in peace."

"He can promise nothing!"

"Listen!" I demanded, poking a finger into his chest. "If you love me, if you truly, truly love me, you'll do this. Because if I left with you, and Father died at Aurangzeb's hands, then my heart would die as well. I'd become a stranger to you and our love would never—"

"Survive? Then it's a shallower love than I thought."

I started forward as if to slap him but stilled my arm. "Don't say that! You know it's not true!"

"But how can you leave us?"

"Would you, Isa, let your father and brother die?" When he didn't answer, I continued, "You think that I feel differently because I'm a woman, or that I might offer them less?"

"I've never treated you differently than any man," he replied, his hawklike face gleaming in sweat. "Not once."

"And I love you for that. More, it seems, than you think. But if you love me, you won't ask me to abandon my family."

"We are your family!"

"Don't you think that I'm torn?" I pleaded.

"Your father—"

"Has given you everything, Isa. Everything! He let you build the Taj Mahal. He brought us together when our love could have destroyed him! Would you have me abandon him now, when he needs me most?"

"Then I'll stay with you."

"No! You must flee with Arjumand. She's seen enough horror. More than enough."

Isa cursed, which I had never heard him do. He pounded his fist against his hip. "Is there no other way?" (15.142-171)

I nodded slowly, strangely indifferent to what fate would befall the Empire. The weight of its woes was a burden I no longer wished to carry. "Father?"

"Yes, my child?"

"Did you ever tire of ruling? Tire of duty?"

He tried to rise to a sitting position, and I placed a cushion behind his back. His turban was loosening and I rewound the indigo silk about his head. "Not when your mother was alive," he replied as I gathered a blanket about him, for dampness dominated the room. "But after she left me for Paradise, I found the court dramas suddenly trite. At any rate, as you told me not long ago, she was always the real ruler. She'd have been a better emperor than I, as you would have." (18.23-26)

As dusk fell two days later, when all the arrangements had been made, I bade farewell to Father. I hated abandoning him and questioned the soundness of my judgment. Was I betraying my promise to my mother? Would anyone care for him once I was gone? I couldn't answer these questions, but knew that the last time this choice presented itself I had let my love and my child go without me. I couldn't bear to pass up this second chance. Furthermore, Father demanded that I take it. (18.86)