Suraqah (ra) and the Bracelets of Khosrow

As the two travellers pushed toward Yathrib, the hundred-camel bounty drew a skilled tracker named Suraqah ibn Malik (ra). He spotted them, mounted his swift horse, and gave chase, the prize almost in his hands. This was the danger of the open road that the cave had only delayed.

But as he closed the distance, his horse's forelegs sank into the ground and threw him. He remounted, charged again, and again the horse plunged into the sand. It happened a third time, and Suraqah, no fool, read the sign: the man he was hunting was protected by something beyond him. He called out for safe-conduct, and approached now not as a hunter but as a supplicant, offering provisions, which the Prophet ﷺ declined, asking only that Suraqah conceal their trail.

Then the Prophet ﷺ, a fugitive in the desert with a price on his head, said something staggering: O Suraqah, how will it be with you when you wear the two bracelets of Khosrow? The two golden armlets of the emperor of Persia, the mightiest ruler on earth, on the wrists of a Bedouin tracker. Suraqah rode home and quietly turned other pursuers away from the road.

Years later, after the Prophet ﷺ had passed and Persia had fallen to the Muslims, the spoils of the emperor were laid before Umar ibn al-Khattab (ra), and among them were Khosrow's bracelets. Umar called for Suraqah ibn Malik (ra) and placed them on his wrists, saying: say, Allahu akbar, praise to Allah who stripped these from Khosrow and put them on a Bedouin of Banu Mudlij. The promise made by a hunted man in the sand had come true to the letter.