Nehal

"And there you were. All this time. A reflection of who we... once were."

―Basim understanding Nehal's true nature, 860s.

Nehal (Persian: نهال) was a psychological manifestation of the Isu Loki's consciousness within the mind of his human incarnation, Basim Ibn Ishaq. While struggling with understanding his nature as a reborn Isu, Basim mistakenly perceived Nehal to be real and his oldest friend and companion.

Biography

Early life

"I am only looking out for you, ya sadeeqi (friend)."

―Nehal to Basim, 861.

Basim telling Nehal about his nightmares of the djinn

Within Basim's mind, Nehal had been by his side for as long as he could remember, with the two having been "friends" since childhood. As Basim was orphaned at a young age, Nehal quickly became his only constant companion, and he would confide all his hopes, dreams and fears to her. These included his recurring nightmares of a djinn, which Nehal helped him cope with and which were, unbeknownst to Basim at the time, a representation of Loki's repressed memories.

In his youth, Basim would regularly visit the House of Wisdom in Baghdad, where he enjoyed reading poetry and heroic tales while Nehal was fascinated by pagan gods and dark magic. After Basim took to thievery as a means to survive on the streets of Baghdad, Nehal frequently assisted him, pointing out targets for Basim to pickpocket.

Nehal and Basim in Anbar

When Basim moved to Anbar in his teenage years, he lived in a small home alongside Nehal and joined a network of thieves led by Dervis, who assigned him various contracts on behalf of his clients, including the Hidden Ones. While Basim admired the Hidden Ones for their fight against oppression and injustice and hoped to one day join them, Nehal was not as enthusiastic about their cause and constantly tried to remind Basim that he should focus on his own self-gain.

Falling out with Basim

Nehal: "Watch where you point your blamey little finger, Basim. It was your idea to steal from the palace. All so that you could impress your cunning friends. I saved us."

Basim: "You killed them! You did this!"

—Nehal and Basim arguing following the deaths of the latter's friends, 861.

On 11 December 861, after Basim was tasked by Dervis to steal a ledger from the Anbar harbor on the Hidden Ones' behalf, Nehal tried to convince her friend to turn down the contract, as the Hidden Ones usually paid very little. However, Basim ignored her and completed the contract anyway before meeting the Master Assassin Roshan and learning that the ledger contained information on a chest sought by the Hidden Ones.

Basim and Nehal breaking into the Winter Palace

Despite both Dervis and Roshan's warnings, Basim decided to break into the Winter Palace after learning that the chest was kept there. Nehal protested, but as Basim was insistent on stealing the chest to prove himself to the Hidden Ones, she reluctantly decided to accompany her friend on his mission. After breaking into the palace at night, the two witnessed a meeting between the caliph, Al-Mutawakkil, and five masked figures who threatened him to keep the chest safe and to never lay eyes on its contents.

After the masked people left, Basim stole the contents of the chest: a disk-shaped artifact which displayed a holographic message of an unknown man striking a prisoner. This attracted the attention of Al-Mutawakkil, who realized that the masked people would punish him for seeing the artifact and attempted to take revenge on Basim. In the ensuing struggle, the caliph manage to pin Basim against a pillar and began choking him. Acting quickly, Basim grabbed the caliph's knife and stabbed him in the neck, though in his mind it was Nehal who had done this.

Basim ending his friendship with Nehal

Following Al-Mutawakkil's murder, Basim was able to escape from the palace with the artifact, though the next day the Caliphate's guards retaliated by executing his entire thief network. When Nehal appeared to console Basim, he angrily blamed her for killing Al-Mutawakkil and, indirectly, causing his friends' deaths, and stated that he did not want to see her ever again.

Reuniting with Basim

"Maybe some day you will find the light. But until then I will walk behind you, every step of the way, to remind you not to forget who you are."

―Nehal to Basim at the symposium, 860s.

After Basim became a Hidden One under Roshan's tutelage and assassinated his first target, the Order of the Ancients member Mas'ood Al-Ya'qoob, he briefly saw Nehal among the crowd formed at the scene of Mas'ood's death. Before he could approach her, however, he was pulled away by Roshan. Regretting what he had said to Nehal when they last spoke and wishing to make amends, Basim asked his mentor for a respite to find Nehal and talk to her.

Nehal showing Basim the symbol

Suspecting Nehal would have returned to Anbar, Basim headed there and found his friend inside their old home like he had expected. As the two caught up with each other, Nehal claimed that she had been investigating a symbol that was on the artifact stolen by Basim from the Winter Palace. Believing that she had seen the same symbol somewhere else before and that it was calling out to her, Nehal asked Basim to investigate further and he agreed to do so.

Later, during Basim's investigation of Ahmad ibn Musa's disappearance, Nehal surprised her friend at the House of Wisdom and handed him a book that she claimed she had saved from a recent fire. After Basim reprimanded Nehal for stealing the book, she in turn mocked him over his Hidden One duties, causing Basim to dismiss her and resume his investigation.

Basim and Nehal observing the diagram

Not long after, during a symposium held at the House of Wisdom, Nehal again reunited with Basim and invited him to take a look around Ahmad's empty workshop. There, they found a strange diagram hidden behind some curtains, which Basim quickly recognized, having seen it in an ancient manuscript recently stolen by the Order. However, Basim claimed that he did not want to investigate any further, causing an upset Nehal to question why her friend refused to look for the truth even when it was right in front of him.

Basim responded that sometimes it was better not to know the truth behind their actions and that, when he joined the Hidden Ones, he took an oath to leave his past behind. To this, Nehal vowed that she would continue to accompany Basim at every step, to prevent him from forgetting who he was, and left.

Basim promising Nehal that he would not forget about her

After Basim assassinated the Order member Fazil Fahim al-Kemsa, Nehal surprised him when he returned to the Hidden Ones bureau in Abbasiyah. When Basim asked her how she had found the bureau, she claimed that she had followed the "trails of blood". She then tried to call out to Basim's eagle companion Enkidu, who ignored her, before revealing the true reason for her visit: she was feeling that she and Basim were growing apart. Although trying to distance himself from his past, Basim promised Nehal that he would never forget about her, much to her relief.

The truth revealed

Basim: "I will never see you again, will I? Will I be... alone?"

Nehal: "You are never alone."

—Basim and Nehal's final words to each other, 860s.

Despite his attempts to overcome his nightmares of the djinn by focusing on his Hidden One duties, Basim was ultimately unsuccessful, requiring Nehal to continue helping him cope with them. Wishing to see her friend freed of this burden, Nehal encouraged him to seek the Order's knowledge of the artifacts they had found, in order to better understand his own nature. However, Basim disagreed, leading to an argument between the two friends, in which Nehal tried to convince Basim that the Hidden Ones were not telling him everything, to no avail.

Shortly after, Basim departed Baghdad to go on a quest of self-discovery upon finding a clue suggesting that his father, Ishaq ibn Khalid, whom he had long presumed to be dead, was living in al-Ula. As Basim and Dervis departed the latter's shop to commence their journey, Nehal quietly observed them from afar.

Nehal criticizing Basim's obedience to the Hidden Ones

After Basim uncovered the identity of the Ra's Al-Af'a of the Order—the royal concubine Qabiha—he reported his findings to Roshan, who initially wanted to eliminate Qabiha herself, but eventually allowed Basim to do it. Nehal eavesdropped on the conversation and, following Roshan's departure, confronted Basim, reprimanding him for allowing his mentor to tell him what to do. After Basim claimed that he owed his life to Roshan, Nehal told him that, for as long as he continued to blindly obey the Hidden Ones, he would never be free of his nightmares, then left.

In the end, Basim could not bring himself to assassinate Qabiha, who revealed that she was aware of his true nature and encouraged him to seek an ancient temple in Alamut before being slain by Roshan. Returning to Anbar, Basim met with Nehal and told her that she was right to doubt Roshan and the Hidden Ones, as they had been trying to suppress his true nature. He then decided to ride for Alamut to investigate its temple, with Nehal by his side.

Nehal and Basim exploring the Alamut Temple

Following his arrival in Alamut, Basim was attacked by Tahirid soldiers allied with the Order, who had launched a surprise assault of the Hidden Ones' stronghold, causing Nehal to vanish. She re-appeared after Basim had defeated Roshan, who tried to prevent her former student from accessing the Alamut Temple, and accompanied him into the site. As the two explored the ancient ruins, Nehal claimed that the temple was familiar to her and began to inexplicably panic, worrying Basim.

Eventually, Basim reached a chamber with a pod and, upon opening it, he was surprised to see Nehal inside. This made him realize that Nehal had never been real; she existed just within Basim's mind and all of her actions were actually his own. At that moment, Nehal took a Memory Seal and activated it, displaying a recorded memory of a prisoner being tortured by a guard. This caused Basim to have an internal struggle, culminating in him overcoming the djinn that had been tormenting him his entire life.

Nehal and Basim's final moments together

However, to put a permanent end to the nightmares, Basim had to embrace Loki's repressed memories, erasing Nehal from his mind in the process. After several moments of hesitation, he agreed to do so when Nehal assured him that he would never be alone. As the two merged their consciousnesses, Basim regained the memories of his past life and finally embraced his nature as Loki reborn.

Personality and traits

"You owe nothing to anyone but yourself."

―Nehal to Basim, 861.

Nehal, as a representation of Loki's consciousness, was independent, resourceful and fascinated by all things ancient. She also had a tendency to steal various items, regardless of the risk of being caught, ranging from books to jewelry and even measurement instruments. Although she could sometimes come off as a stubborn loner, she deeply cared about Basim and wished what was best for him.

As the only person to be initially aware of Basim's recurring nightmares of the djinn, Nehal tried her best to comfort him. She also encouraged him to focus on his own self-interest rather than helping others, believing that people only owed a moral obligation to themselves and should be free to act as they pleased.

Nehal hugging Basim

Due to Basim's strong desire to fight against injustice and join the Hidden Ones, his and Nehal's relationship became strained over time, culminating in an intense argument following Nehal's supposed murder of Al-Mutawakkil, which indirectly caused the deaths of most of Basim's friends. However, both Nehal and Basim later came to regret what they had said to each other and, after their "reunion", vowed to never leave each other's side again.

That being said, upon learning that Basim had joined the Hidden Ones, Nehal did not hesitate to mock him about his new beliefs and obedience to his mentors. She also tried to convince him that the Hidden Ones were keeping secrets from him and that he should seek the Order of the Ancients' knowledge to be free of his nightmares. Basim at first refused to listen to Nehal, but eventually discovered his true nature and merged his consciousness with Nehal's to become "whole" again.

Behind the scenes

Nehal is a character created for the 2023 video game Assassin's Creed: Mirage, where she was portrayed the Canadian-born Lebanese actress Jan Kamar.

Etymology

Nehal (نهال) is a Middle Eastern name derived from Sanskrit meaning "intelligent" or "born at a time of intelligence". It also has some Persian roots and can be roughly translated to "newly planted tree," metaphorically referring to attributes of beauty and youth.

In Arabic, Nehal (نيهال) is a collective word describing water from springs, essentially meaning "source of life"; as a name, it symbolises the will to drink from the source of knowledge and therefore means "eager to acquire knowledge".

Gallery

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  Concept art of Basim and Nehal
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  Promotional art of Nehal
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  Close-up of Nehal's face
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  Character model of Nehal
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  Nehal telling Basim of her doubts about the Hidden Ones
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  Nehal killing Al-Mutawakkil
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  Basim spotting Nehal after assassinating Mas'ood
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  Nehal handing Basim a book
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  Basim explaining his Hidden One duties to Nehal
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  Nehal trying to summon Enkidu
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  Nehal and Basim arguing
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  Basim and Nehal travelling to Alamut

Appearances

• Assassin's Creed: Mirage (first appearance)
  • Valley of Memory (cameo)