Mahound’s death is narrated as a dream of Gibreel Farishta, not as an unambiguously witnessed event outside the dream. It brings the story’s struggles over revelation and religious authority to an intimate close: Mahound lies ill with his head in Ayesha’s lap, confronts a choice between this world and the next, and dies after a final exchange associated with Al-Lat. In the room beyond, Ayesha turns grief into a distinction between the dead Messenger and the God whom his followers worship.

Hind’s Waiting and Revenge

The dream first follows Hind after Mahound’s victory has displaced the old order in Jahilia. Abu Simbel’s surrender has handed the city to Mahound, and Hind has publicly submitted, but submission has not ended her resistance. After learning of the destruction of Al-Lat’s temple at Taif and the goddess’s statues, she withdraws to a tower with ancient books written in scripts no one else in Jahilia can decipher. For two years and two months, she lives apart from other people, receiving only a daily plate of food and having her chamberpot removed.

When Hind finally enters Abu Simbel’s bedroom at dawn, she is dressed in finery and appears not to have aged. The narrative presents this arrest of time as a report that lends credence to rumors of her witchcraft, rather than explaining it. Her return is purposeful: she announces that, though she cannot turn history backward, revenge remains possible. The contrast is sharp. Jahilia’s political history has changed decisively, yet Hind has seemingly preserved herself outside its ordinary passage, waiting for an opportunity to act against Mahound.

Within an hour, news arrives that Mahound has fallen into a fatal sickness. Hind calmly prepares a banquet, but no guests will attend. Abu Simbel refuses to join her, and the servants weep before she dismisses them. Hind eats alone in the great hall, taking simple couscous among the elaborate dishes prepared for the occasion. Her solitary celebration does not cause or cure the illness; it places her private satisfaction beside the Prophet’s approaching death and makes revenge the dream’s first interpretation of what is happening.

The Choice in Ayesha’s Room

The account then moves from Hind’s preparations to Mahound’s bed in Ayesha’s room. His head aches with unprecedented force, and the dream frames his crisis through a religious account of a Prophet’s death: before dying, he must be shown Paradise and asked to choose between this world and the next. Mahound’s life seems to depart, then return. He tells Ayesha that he has been offered the choice and has chosen the kingdom of God. Ayesha understands that he is speaking of his death and weeps.

The scene makes the choice both a moment of religious conviction and a recognition of imminent loss. Mahound does not ask Ayesha to decide for him, and the dream does not depict her as able to prevent the outcome. She is instead his intimate witness: he rests in her lap, returns from the apparent approach of death long enough to communicate his decision, and turns his gaze toward a presence she cannot see. The prophetic choice belongs to Mahound; the burden of hearing it falls on the person beside him.

The Voice in the Dark

Mahound addresses the unseen presence as Azraeel, but Ayesha hears a woman’s voice answer that it is not Azraeel. The lamp goes out, and Mahound asks whether Al-Lat has caused his sickness as an act of revenge. The voice identifies the illness as her revenge and says she is satisfied. In the dream’s logic, this makes Hind’s earlier celebration part of a larger, supernatural pattern: her announced desire for revenge is echoed by Al-Lat’s claim to have achieved it. The narrative leaves that correspondence within Gibreel’s dream rather than establishing an external explanation for the sickness.

When the voice departs, the lamp lights again. Mahound responds with thanks to Al-Lat for the gift. The exchange resists a simple account of the final encounter as either a straightforward punishment or an uncomplicated triumph. Mahound has chosen the next world, yet he gives thanks to the goddess who claims responsibility for his illness. The dream places his composure, the voice’s vengeance, and the restored light together without resolving their tensions into a single theological judgment.

Death and Ayesha’s Distinction

Mahound dies not long afterward. Ayesha leaves the room and joins the other wives and disciples, who are waiting with heavy hearts. She wipes her eyes and tells them, in effect, to distinguish mourning the Messenger from rejoicing in God: those who worshipped Mahound should grieve for his death, while those who worship God should rejoice because God remains alive. The response does not cancel the human loss. It gives the assembled mourners a way to understand that loss without making the Messenger identical with the object of faith.

The dream ends with Ayesha’s statement, so the final emphasis falls less on Hind’s revenge than on what survives Mahound. The Prophet dies; his followers’ grief remains visible; and Ayesha redirects their attention from his mortal person to God. Set against the earlier uncertainty about the source of revelation, the conclusion also preserves a distinction between the Messenger and the authority he conveys. Because the scene is framed as Gibreel Farishta’s dream, the death carries the force of a narrated ending while retaining the novel’s larger uncertainty about how visionary experience and religious meaning are produced.