Once upon a time, there was a great sultan, who was knowing and wise in all matters of rulership. Long was his reign, and by his guidance, his people flourished. The markets thrived, the people were safe, and his armies knew no defeat, until his borders stretched to the furthest horizon.

But the sultan grew old, as men do, and fear touched his heart. And so he traveled into the deepest of his palace’s vaults, where he kept the greatest treasure he possessed: a single silver ring. Solomon himself had once worn it. Where the great King of Israel had found such a treasure, only Allah knew.

It was tight on the King’s finger, and when he touched it, a creature appeared before him. A man, whose eyes were fire and whose skin was the space between the stars.

“Three times,” the jinn said, “I shall be called to your service. Three times you shall ask of me a boon. And three times I shall say, ‘only Allah is eternal,’ for nothing in heaven or earth may last forever. Each warning you shall ignore, until it is too late.”

“My kingdom needs me,” the Sultan said, “for my sons are fools and tyrants. I wish that my rule should never end.”

“No man lives forever, oh sultan: only Allah is eternal.” The spirit’s voice was grave, it’s eyes sad. “But I promise you this: so long as your kingdom persists, you shall be its ruler, and death shall stay his hand.”

The spirit vanished, and the sultan returned to his palace, a strength in his steps he had not known since he was a boy. Time touched him no longer, and his rule stretched for decades more, and his kingdom became the jewel of the earth.

But jewels inspire greed in the heart’s of men, and with his kingdom’s every glory, the resentment of his neighbors grew. No army could defeat him in battle, but soon he found himself facing two armies, then three, then ten. With every victory in the field came news of the sack of two undefended cities, and the kingdom began to fracture.

Sitting in his tend in the field, the king again touched the ring that Solomon wore, and again the jinn appeared before him. “I wish that my kingdom last forever,” he said.

“No kingdom lasts forever, oh sultan: only Allah is eternal,” the jinn said. “But I promise you this: so long as your people live, your kingdom shall never fall.”

It was on that day that the black death came to the sultan’s enemies. In time, the all were vanquished, and his kingdom conquered all its foes.

But with his conquests came slaves, and with those slaves came language, tradition, science and art. And as the decades passed, the city the sultan looked out on grew strange. The sultan’s people no longer saw his rule as wise, and one morning he knew himself a foreigner to them, and felt the weight of age return. And so he touched the ring that Solomon wore.

“I wish,” he said as the spirit appeared, “that my people, my culture, should last forever.”

“No nation endures forever, oh sultan: only Allah is eternal,” the jinn said, “But I promise you this: so long as men watch the sun rise in the east and set in the west, your people will never fade.”

And in time it passed that a man stood in the middle of the street, the last sultan of the last sultanate in a world full of “Islamic Republics” and foreign invaders. Cars that drove themselves quietly moved around him. Down the long boulevard framed by skyscrapers, he could see the sun set, and he looked to his people. But their eyes were turned to phones, absorbed by screens, blinded by glasses that projected a computerized reality.

He looked to the sky, and took a breath, and touched the ring once again. “What should I have done?” he asked the spirit, tears in his eyes.

“You should have learned to love that which will be, instead of that which is,” the spirit said.

“And what,” the sultan asked, “will be?”

“None can say. Our perspective is each flawed, each limited. We each only have our little time on this earth, oh sultan. Only Allah is eternal.”

The sultan nodded, and shut his eyes, seeking for the first time to truly understand.

It was there in the street that he died.