‘Pahlavan and the Nightingale’ by Niloufar-Lily Soltani

Forbidden Territories

From Pulp Literature Issue 50, find an excerpt from the Second Runner-up of our 2025 Raven Short Story Contest, ‘Pahlavan and the Nightingale’ by Niloufar-Lily Soltani, below. Read the opening of this story of family history and art, then uncover the rest in Issue 50, Spring 2026.

Pahlavan and the Nightingale

by Niloufar-Lily Soltani

Baba wanted me to be anything but a painter. I never fathomed how he abandoned his art, given his talent. After he passed, Mum’s revelations were disturbing. “Life as a Persian miniaturist in the 1960s meant hard work, extreme punishment, and humiliation. Just too much for Kaveh.”

Escaping the image of a teenage Baba being slapped, I always let my mind swing between different memories.

We owned a small stationery shop in London. Baba included affordable local art, and Mum’s work was also on the shelves, but nothing from him.

Nothing.

When I was ten, I saw Baba exercising in the backyard. His movements were unlike anything I’d seen. He spun around the yard, his arms outstretched. I mimicked him until I got dizzy. He chuckled and sped through tales of being a Pahlavan, a heroic warrior. He showed me old family pictures taken in Tehran, of his father and brothers standing shirtless on a round stage in tight capris. Behind them was a man with a drum and a bell. He would roll the drum and recite Shahnameh poetry while the athlete spun and performed. That was my first glimpse of Zourkhaneh, a house of power, and it was how I became a callisthenic athlete.

Baba’s Pahlavan.

Mum never considered herself as skilled in painting as Baba, likely because of the perceptions of others. She focused on birds and flowers; her white, pale green, and sky blue stood out against Baba’s crimson and orange. Mum used one of the bedrooms as her studio but locked it after Baba died.

She was from a wealthy family, which had allowed her to pursue the arts and work with a talented mentor, Ramin.

That name also remained a mystery.

Ramin’s and Baba’s artwork were the forbidden territories we weren’t allowed to enter. Until we prepared the basement for use as a gym.

Until Atusa walked into our lives.

Read the rest of this story in Pulp Literature Issue 50, Spring 2026!

Niloufar-Lily Soltani is the author of Zulaikha (2023), praised for exploring class, gender, and race. A graduate of the Humber Creative Writing programme, Lily is also a poet and poetry translator featured in various literary magazines. She lives in Vancouver, BC, and works in the power and energy sector.