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Despina burst into laughter. “The captain of the guard? Even I’m not that bold. What makes you—”
“Actually, you are that bold.” Shahrzad pushed back the tray of food and rested her elbows on the beveled ledge of the low table. “And this explains your odd behavior whenever you’re around him.”
“You’re being ridiculous.” Despina laughed again, the sound trilling ever higher, her eyes burning with a blue light.
Shahrzad gri
Despina glowered at her in sullen silence.
“You needn’t worry.” Shahrzad propped her chin on the heel of her palm. “Your secret is safe. You can trust me.”
“Trust you?” Despina sputtered. “I’d sooner trust a sieve.”
“That’s—rather unfair.”
“Is it? You don’t trust me.”
“Of course I don’t trust you. You’re a self-admitted spy, and I’ve nearly died twice on your watch.” Shahrzad stared at her pointedly.
Despina blinked. “Don’t be dramatic.”
“Dramatic? Need I remind you about the tea?”
“You still think that was me?”
“Then who was it?” Shahrzad demanded. “If you want me to trust you, tell me who was responsible.”
“It wasn’t the caliph, if that’s why you’re asking. He was . . . quite furious when he found out about it.”
“Was it the shahrban?”
Despina said nothing, but failed to conceal a cringe of affirmation.
“I’m not surprised,” Shahrzad continued. “I suspected as much.”
“Did you? Perhaps you should be the spy and I the calipha.”
“Perhaps. But I believe your pregnancy by another man may present a hindrance to that,” Shahrzad said in a droll tone. “Does Jalal know about the baby? If so, he should marry you. Or face my fury. The choice is his.”
“He doesn’t know. And I don’t intend to tell him.” Despina stood up and straightened the folds of her dress. “Because I don’t think he needs to know.”
“Well, that is simply ridiculous.”
Despina hooked a strand of golden brown hair behind an ear. “Maybe it is. But, for now, I choose to believe it is not.”
Shahrzad watched in pained silence while her handmaiden began cleaning up the mess as if nothing had occurred. As if a world of chaos had not been unleashed only moments before.
Like a canary in a gilded cage, Despina flitted about, stu
Trapped.
“You should rest,” Shahrzad directed.
Despina faltered, midstep. “What?”
“You’re pregnant. You don’t have to hide it from me anymore. Sit. Rest.”
Despina’s eyes swam crystalline for an instant before they flashed back to blue. “I don’t need to rest.”
“I insist.”
“Truly, it’s not—”
“Rest this morning. I’ll go with the Rajput to practice shooting in the training grounds. Come there when you feel better.” Shahrzad began preparing a cup of tea. “Do you think some tea would help your stomach?”
“I can make the tea,” Despina whispered.
“So can I.”
Despina paused, staring down at the figure of the small girl with the long mane of sleep-rifled hair. “Shahrzad?”
“Yes?”
“You are not at all what one would expect.”
“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” Shahrzad gri
“Absolutely. I think it’s kept you alive.”
“Then I’m very grateful for it.”
“As am I.” Despina smiled. “Most grateful.”
• • •
A wild cheer rang out from the sidelines as the arrow struck the eave on the opposite side of the courtyard with a solid thud. The shouts of the soldiers rolled into a chorus of laughter that rose into a cloud-filled sky.
A sky tinged with the scent of impending rain.
Shahrzad smiled at Jalal.
His shoulders shook with soundless mirth. He ran his free hand through his curly brown hair and shrugged at his men.
“You ca
“Indeed. I ca
Shahrzad thought for a moment. Her question had to be a good one. It had to be worth discarding any attempt to conceal her skill with a bow. It also had to be worded in a judicious ma
“Why are you permitted to call the caliph by his first name?”
Jalal shifted the yew of his longbow from palm to palm. Ever careful. Ever calculating. “Khalid is my cousin. My father married his father’s sister.”
Shahrzad had difficulty suppressing her reaction. This was the most information she had obtained the entire morning.
Jalal gri
“Choose the next target, Shahrzad.”
She sca
He wagged his eyebrows, appreciating the challenge, as he pulled an arrow from his quiver and nocked it to the string. When he drew it back, the edges of the unyielding longbow barely shifted.
Jalal was an excellent archer. Not as gifted as Tariq, but precise and sharp in his movements. He loosed the arrow. It flew in a spiral and sailed above the roofline before it struck the topmost branch, causing the entire tree to shudder from the force of its impact.
The men began to cheer in approval.
Shahrzad fitted an arrow to the recurve bow. She closed her eyes as she nocked it tight against the sinew. Exhaling, she pulled the arrow back.
The instant she opened her eyes, she released the string. The arrow soared through the air, whistling past the branches . . .
Embedding just below her intended target.
Shahrzad frowned.
The soldiers raised another cry of triumph. Again, Jalal bowed, this time with his hands outstretched at his sides.
“Oh, don’t gloat,” Shahrzad scolded. “It’s quite unbecoming.”
“I have never gloated. Not a day in my life.”
“I find that rather difficult to believe.”
“Gloating is for weaker men.”
“Then stop smiling like such a fool.”
Jalal laughed, raising his arms to the sky. “But it’s going to rain, Shahrzad. And I’m a fool for the rain.”
“Just collect your prize, Captain al-Khoury,” Shahrzad grumbled, folding her arms across her chest, letting her recurve bow dangle by her feet.
“Don’t be so frustrated with me. I’ve been quite fair in my questions.”
She rolled her eyes.
“In fact,” he continued, “this will be my first truly unfair question of the day.”
Shahrzad’s posture reacted to his words before her features did.
Jalal took a step forward, balancing his longbow across his shoulders. “Where is your family, my lady?” he said in a low voice.
They’re looking for my family . . . as I expected.
She smiled up at him. “Safe.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“In a place of sand and stone.”
“That’s also not an answer. Everything is made of sand and stone.”
“You ca
His eyes moved across her face with an odd mixture of ready discernment and playful diversion. Yet, in that instant, she saw more of his father in him than she had ever seen thus far. And she understood.
This was not merely his occupation. Jalal al-Khoury was protecting his family. To him, family always came first.
And she was not family.
“No,” he countered, “but I would like to ask another question in lieu of the last. Since your answer was quite unsatisfactory, I feel it only appropriate I be permitted another question.”
“Excuse me?”
“I promise to grant you the same right, should the occasion arise on your end.”
“Jalal—”
“Why do you always close your eyes before you aim?”
“Because . . .” Shahrzad hesitated. “I—”
What is the harm?
“I learned to shoot in a place where the sun played tricks on the mind. You could not rely on it if you wanted to aim well. So you had to practice until you were good enough that you only needed its light for the blink of an eye.”