During the Ridda Wars, Khalid accused Malik bin Nuwayra, a well-liked Arab chieftain, of apostasy from Islam. The Sword of Allah slaughtered him and, that same night, raped—Islamic chronicles call it “married”—his wife, Layla. Not content, he decapitated Malik, stood his head up between two stones, set it aflame, and cooked his evening meal in a cauldron above it. “And Khalid ate from it that night to terrify the apostate Arab tribes and others,” writes Muslim historian Ibn al-Kathir. “It was said that Malik’s hair created such a blaze as to thoroughly cook the meat.”
