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waited for the people of Karbala, a nearby city, to rally to his support.”
    Hassan’s mother lowered her voice. “To their great shame, the people of Karbala never came. And so, after more than a week of no food or water, many of Imam Hussein’s followers became so dry that they could not swallow, their tongues sticking to the roofs of their mouths. That’s when the imam took his six-month-old son in his arms and walked toward Yazid’s army, holding his baby up so the leaders could see that the boy was dying. He asked them to take the baby and give the child water even if they intended to kill Hussein.”
    Hassan’s mom held her arms out with the imaginary baby resting in her hands. Hassan scooted forward, holding his breath, his eyes wide.
    “One of Yazid’s men shot a poisoned arrow through the neck of the baby, killing the child and pinning his neck to his father’s arm.”
    Hassan gasped. A baby killed! And not by Jews or infidels! By other Muslim warriors!
    “They demanded that Imam Hussein surrender, but he would not. ‘Death is superior to disgrace, and I am ready to die defending Islam and the Muslims,’ he said. And then the battle began.”
    Hassan listened breathlessly as his mother described the conflict—the imam mounting a black stallion and wielding a sarif, cutting down dozens of Yazid’s soldiers. But eventually, the brave man was overwhelmed by his enemies. “The evildoers cut off his head and left his body to rot for three days without burial,” Hassan’s mother reported with great sadness.
    Hassan was crestfallen. The good guys seldom lost in his mother’s stories. And when they did, it was never like this . Killed. Left to rot. His baby dead in his arms.
    Hassan looked toward his older brother, checking for a reaction. As usual, his brother was stone-faced. Just as he had been the day that Hassan’s mother taught Sura 99, the lesson about the earthquake and the Day of Judgment. Hassan had shivered in fear as she described the tormenting flames of hell. “If your bad works outweigh your good works, you will go to hell,” Hassan’s mother had explained. And Hassan had known immediately that hell would be his lot. His conscience had tormented him for days, and nightmares had haunted his sleep.
    But his brother had seemed unfazed. What did he know that Hassan did not?
    His mother’s voice brought him back to the story. “But it didn’t matter what Yazid’s men did to Imam Hussein’s body because he was no longer there,” Hassan’s mother explained, her tone reflecting the excitement of a big secret she was about to share. “He was sitting on the shore of a crystal river, surrounded by many women who were feeding him and taking care of him.”
    Hassan recognized the description immediately. It was Jannah ! Paradise!
    His mother closed the Qur’an and looked solemnly from Hassan to his brother. “We call Imam Hussein ‘Sayyid al-Shuhada,’—the Lord of the Martyrs. When you die a martyr—a shahid—you do not feel death. It is more like the minor pain of a mosquito sting. You wake up in Jannah, and Allah smiles at you, placing a crown of virtue on your head.”
    Hassan’s mother held two of her fingers and her thumb together now, opening them slightly, as if letting go of a tiny precious thing. “No matter what you have done wrong in this life, you will be forgiven with the first drop of your blood that is spilt. With the second drop, you may redeem seventy family members who would have gone to hell.
    “To die a martyr is to never die at all.”
* * *
    the present
    washington, d.c.
    Hassan received the text message on Wednesday night. The young wife of a prominent leader in a Norfolk mosque had left the faith. She had been seen in the company of a married American man, a devout Christian. She was making a mockery of her marriage and, more importantly, of Allah.
    The Norfolk mosque to which she belonged had been started as part of the Islamic Brotherhood’s Strategic