by Jane Feather
She nodded, her tongue touching her lips as she felt the power of the promise. She shifted on her horse as her body responded to that power with a pulsing, liquid surge of arousal. Her eyes widened and Abul chuckled, well aware of what was happening.
“I should sit very still if I were you,” he advised. “And try to think of something else.”
Sarita began to count the tassles on the palfrey’s saddlecloth. They were delicately braided strands of silk, and fortunately there seemed to be a great many of them; they were very difficult to count. She could never be sure she hadn’t missed one, so it was necessary to start the count again with increased concentration.
Abul, smiling to himself, rode in considerate silence beside her.
When they dismounted in the court of the alcazaba, a mere one hour after the warlike party had set out for Castile, Abul said, “Go back to the tower. Kadiga and Zulema will attend you there. You must break your fast, and it would please me if you would come to the baths wearing something other than that dress.” He smiled, touched the corner of her mouth with a grazing fingertip. “Will you do that for me?”
“You don’t find my dress becoming?” she queried, one eyebrow raised. “But I am most fond of it, my lord caliph.”
“I had noticed,” he replied. “But you have worn it a great deal, and it really has seen better days.”
Sarita thought of all the garment had been through: rope climbing; a tumbling, thorny scramble down a mountainside; a night under the stars; long hours spent in a dirt-encrusted prison cell.
“Perhaps it had better be washed before I wear it again,” she conceded.
“Yes, I think so,” Abul concurred with a wonderful assumption of gravity. He turned from her and then realized she was standing quite still, looking around with an air of expectation that contained more than a hint of mischief. “What now?” he asked, waiting with a bubble of amusement for whatever roguery she was about to produce.
“Well, where is Yusuf?” she inquired innocently.
“He always returns me to my tower when you have finished with me.”
“Don’t you know the way by now?” Abul responded with imitative innocence. “You must forgive me, but I had thought you familiar with this place by now. As I recall, you had no difficulty finding your way to this court the other afternoon. But I will have someone accompany you.” He raised a hand, summoning one of the soldiers.
“Perhaps I can find my way,” Sarita said hastily as the armored man came hurrying over. “The cypress path lies beyond the Myrtle Court, does it not?”
Abul nodded, saying solicitously, “But are you quite sure you will not be lost?”
“Quite sure, my lord caliph.” She offered him a formal bow, the effect spoiled by an irrepressible grin. “At least, no more so than I am already.”
“In one hour,” he said softly, lost himself in the sensual mischief in her green eyes.
“In one hour,” she repeated and turned, leaving the court with swift, energetic strides, her skirt fluttering around her calves.
Kadiga and Zulema arrived in the tower within a few minutes of Sarita’s return. They were initially awkward, uncertain how to treat her. The entire palace knew what had happened, how she had been brought back, and it was clear to Sarita that they were unsure as to her present status.
“Help me choose a robe,” she said gaily, making for the stairs. “I must meet with the lord Abul in the baths within the hour and would wear something other than this.” She indicated her dress. “And I suppose I had better wear slippers. Will you brush my hair, Zulema? It is such a tangle.”
The two women exchanged looks, and then all uncertainty fell from them. Suddenly, for the first time since she had arrived in the Alhambra, Sarita was behaving in a manner they understood. They followed her up the stairs.
“Where did you go?” Kadiga asked, sorting through the robes on the rod. “Did you truly climb down from the balcony?”
“Yes,” Sarita said. “The rope is still there, if you care to look.”
Zulema approached the balcony as if it might bite, and her jaw dropped as she saw the silk hanging from the rail. “You climbed down that, Sarita? But it is impossible. You would kill yourself.”
“Well, I didn’t,” Sarita responded cheerfully. “As you can see.” Frowning, she flicked through the material Kadiga was holding. “I don’t know. I have no experience in choosing clothes. Which do you think, Kadiga?”
“If it is to please the lord Abul, I think any one will be suitable since they are all his choice.”
“So they are … so they are,” murmured Sarita, for some reason finding the idea as amusing as it was strangely pleasurable. “Well, you decide. I am very hungry.” She wandered to the gallery rail, looking down into the court. “Is someone going to bring food?”
“Yes, indeed,” Zulema said in her customary soothing fashion. “Let me help you remove your dress.” She unlaced the bodice, clucking at the general condition of the orange garment. “Whatever have you been doing, Sarita?
Sarita laughed, feeling wonderfully lighthearted as she pulled the dress over her head. “You would be shocked if I were to tell you, Zulema. And I don’t imagine you would believe me—oh, is that someone bringing food?” Sounds from the court below drew her back to the gallery rail. A woman was laying a tray on the table by the fountain. “That bread smells delicious.” She ran down in her shift, Zulema following, and took a flat buttery round from the basket, smiling at the woman who had brought it. The woman looked completely nonplussed at the sight of this flaming-haired creature, smiling warmly, wearing nothing but a flimsy and none-too-clean smock.
“My thanks,” Sarita mumbled through her mouthful, turning her attention back to the tray. There was a bowl of yogurt, a dish of honey, a gently steaming pot of the jasmine infusion these people seemed to find so refreshing. In fact, she decided, dipping a spoon in the yogurt, the scent alone was most refreshing. “What have you found, Kadiga?” She wandered back up the stairs, licking the yogurt off the spoon, sipping a cup of the jasmine tea.
“This one … for the baths.” Kadiga held up a robe of lavender silk. It was simpler than the others, without decoration except for a circle of coral beads sewn at the neck.
“Oh, yes, that looks perfect.” Sarita put down her cup and hauled her shift over her head. Kadiga dropped the lavender silk in its place, smoothing it over the lines of her body. It clung and hinted just as the others did, for all its simplicity.
“Let me brush your hair now.” Zulema flourished Sarita’s hairbrush. “It is such a tangle,” she tutted, tugging through the curls. “Shall I tie it back with a ribbon?”
“No,” Sarita said. She had the impression that Abul liked her hair in all its unruliness. He had never said, but there was something about the way he ran his fingers through it, lifting it away from her face, something about the smile in his eyes as he did so that had given her that unmistakable impression. “Hurry now. It is time I was going.”
“We will escort you,” Kadiga said.
“Oh, there is no need. I know my way.”
“It will be expected,” Kadiga said stubbornly. “We are your attendants.”
Sarita looked at herself in the glass and shrugged. It was one thing to roam the courts and gardens of the Alhambra alone as a fiercely resistant prisoner in her orange dress, barefoot and bare-legged. But assuming the garb of the Alhambra implied acceptance of its customs and expectations.
“Very well. Then let us go. But I will not cover my head.”
“If the lord Abul does not insist …” Zulema murmured doubtfully.
“The lord Abul insists upon nothing,” Sarita stated absolutely. She read incredulity and disbelief in their eyes but shrugged it off. Impossible to explain what had happened … impossible to explain how she felt … impossible to explain what lay between Muley Abul Hassan and Sarita of the tribe of Raphael. Impossible to explain that what lay between them was about to be consummated. The two women could nev
er believe that it hadn’t already been so.
Her toes curled in the silly slippers she wore, her blood singing in her veins, as they left the tower. She thought of Sandro … of how she had felt when she had been hurrying to meet him for one of their snatched, clandestine, terrifying lovings. She had felt the same heart-stopping excitement and anticipation, but never this lightheartedness, this desire to laugh, to sing, to dance. She had loved Sandro. It was a love she could keep within her, a warm, youthful memory of a shared passion. The tragedy of his death would always be with her, but it need not sour the present or the future. It had nothing to do with Abul, with her feelings for him. The love she had shared with Sandro and the consequences of that love had their own integrity. They were a part of her and always would be. And that was all they were; sufficient unto themselves.
Her attendants accompanied her to the hall of immersion. As before, they met no one on their way through the soft green, water-imbued peace of the grottoes.
“We will leave you here to await the lord Abul,” Kadiga said as they reached the central hall.
Sarita looked for the keepers of the baths, but they were not in evidence, and when Kadiga and Zulema had left her, she was quite alone in the profound, reposeful silence of the chamber. The solitude and silence had a curious effect, turning her mind inward in contemplation of what was to come, of the physical act for which these moments were preparation. Without conscious thought, she drew her robe over her head, letting it fall to the ground, and stood running her hands over her body, feeling the rippling of her skin, the tingle of her nipples, the slowly building surge in her loins. She raised her arms, her hands catching her hair at the nape of her neck, lifting it away from her as she stood on tiptoe, stretching with a deeply satisfying languor.
Abul stood behind a column at the rear of the hall, watching her in her abstraction, finding her private absorption in her body and its sensations more arousing than anything he could have imagined. He took in every line of that delicate frame, the clean-limbed perfection, the ivory tones of her breasts, belly, and loins startling against the sun-gold of her forearms and legs, the silken red-gold dusting at the base of her belly. He had seen her naked before, but he had never watched her nakedness, watched her alone with herself.
“How very beautiful you are,” he said, stepping out from behind the column.
Sarita whirled toward him, her eyes startled, a slightly self-conscious smile touching her lips. “It is unchivalrous of you to hide when a lady is disrobing.
“Maybe, but it afforded me much pleasure.” Moving toward her, he took her hands, held them away from her, ran his eyes in a long, slow sweep down her body, before drawing her against his length, cupping her chin in his palm, lifting her face, taking her mouth with his. Sarita gave herself to this kiss without reservation, without guilt or inhibition, finally able to indulge her wanting unrestrainedly.
His body hardened beneath his burnous, and Sarita pressed against the shaft nudging her belly, her hand moving in a tantalizing caress through the soft material. “Take the robe off,” she whispered. “I cannot feel you properly.”
Abul drew back for a minute, surprised at the directness of the demand. For some reason, although he knew she was not inexperienced, he had not expected such confidence, such lack of inhibition. He had thought she would be more hesitant, more reserved. He looked down into her eyes, glowing green pools of candid desire, and he smiled, swiftly pulling the burnous from his body.
Sarita gave a little sigh of satisfaction as his body was revealed. “I have wanted to touch you so many times,” she confided, moving her flat palms over his nipples and down to his belly. “When we were last in this place, I had such difficulty containing myself. Only you …” She looked up with a rueful chuckle. “Only you seemed completely unaffected by my body. I was afraid you no longer desired me, and it was most mortifying.”
Abul frowned, trying to remember; then he gave a crow of laughter. “That, sweet innocent, was because I had spent some considerable time with Fatima. After the night we had passed, I was in great discomfort.”
“Ahhh …” She nodded, and her hand drifted over his belly, feeling the involuntary contraction of his abdominal muscles before passing in a whisper of a caress between his thighs. “But there seems no such difficulty today.”
“None whatsoever,” he agreed, his breathing ragged. “Quite the contrary. Let us move to the baths, querida, before we … or rather I … reach a premature conclusion.”
Smiling, she took her hands away from his body. “I do not believe you lack control, my lord caliph.”
“In general I do not,” he said, taking her hands, turning them palm upward, pressing his lips into the warm skin. “But you have the most disturbing effect on me, Sarita mía.”
Sarita’s bare feet shifted on the cool tiles as desire rushed immoderate and invincible from her scalp to her toes. “Perhaps we should take the baths later.”
“No,” Abul said firmly. “I have already waited a lifetime. I can wait a little longer. Come.” He encouraged her to the edge of the sunken marble tank of hot water.
Sarita slipped below the surface, watching through half-closed eyes as Abul came in opposite her. She stretched out a foot and ran it up his leg, her toes nuzzling between his thighs. “I do not think we should use the cold water today,” she observed judiciously.
“The progression must be complete, hija mía,” he said lazily, shifting his body for her exploring toes.
“But I’m very much afraid that the cold will have a shriveling effect,” she said with an assumption of great concern, her toes continuing to make the point.
“The soles of your feet are more likely to do that,” Abul retorted, suddenly seizing both her feet in his hands. “Enough mischief; come here.” Releasing her feet, he reached out to grasp her hands again, pulling her across the tank until she was sitting on her ankles in the water between his knees. “That’s better.” His hands moved over her breasts beneath the water, lifting them clear so that the cool air and the tip of his finger could graze their crowns. Gentry he rolled the hardening nipples between thumb and forefinger, increasing the pressure until she moaned, her body arching, offering her breasts to his touch.
“Kneel up,” he softly directed, his hands now drifting downward over her belly where his fingers lost themselves in the silken triangle at its base. As she obeyed, he parted her thighs to receive the smooth caress of the water even as his fingers followed, probing deeply, insistently, until her moans became sobbing cries of delight. He drew her upward until she lay across his knees, her body opened for his exploration, the gentle lapping of the water as much an instrument of pleasure as his hand, and he used both with knowing artistry until she was mindless, a sensate being at one with the watery element that held and caressed her, indivisible from the man.
This time there was no mind-induced denial of her body’s pleasure. She rose to meet the delight he brought, curled around it, stretched beneath it, gave herself absolutely.
He held her until the quivering of her body had ceased and she opened her eyes, smiling up into the dark ones above her. Effortfully, she reached up a hand to stroke his face, to trace the curve of his mouth. “I seem to be dissolved.”
Abul laughed softly. “The next stage will put you back together again.”
“Oh, no!” Sarita struggled upright, pushing herself off his legs to slide into the water beside him. “No, you cannot really intend—”
“Most certainly I do,” he interrupted, standing up.
“But you will shrivel,” Sarita wailed, only half laughing. “It cannot be good for you in such a condition, Abul.”
He stood on the edge of the bath, feet apart, looking down at her with wicked amusement. “You know very little about this, it seems. Come, one quick dip and it will all be over.”
“No, I cannot. I feel too wonderfully relaxed. The shock will kill me.”
“It’s because you are relaxed that it’s good for you,” he tr
ied to explain. “For me, the opposite is true. I am overstimulated and need to cool off. You need to wake up. Come now, it will soon be over.”
“I don’t want to,” she said, softly pleading, cowering under the warmth of the water. “Please.”
Abul shook his head in defeat. “I told you I would never force you to do anything you don’t wish, cara. But I wish you would trust me to know what’s best.” He turned and plunged into the marble tank of cold water, emerging, spluttering, shaking the water off himself with all the vigor of a drenched dog as he hauled himself out.
Sarita stood up, stepped resolutely to the edge of the other tank, closed her eyes, and jumped. Her feet touched bottom, and she leaped upward again with a shriek, scrambling out in a hasty and inelegant tangle of limbs.
“What an enchanting sight!” Abul bent to help her up, laughing at her graceless haste and her expression of shocked indignation. He tossed a towel around her shoulders and began to rub her dry. “Why did you change your mind?”
“Because it seemed only just that I should trust you,” she said through chattering teeth. “But I felt wonderful before, and now I am all cold and awake.”
“You need to be awake,” he said. “We have but barely begun. Or did you think it was time for a little sleep?”
“Well, no, not exactly.” She took a corner of the towel and began to rub his thigh with great concentration. “But it’s a very rude shock, I’ll have you know.”
“I am aware.” He stood still while she dried him as vigorously as he had performed the service for her. “Now we shall get thoroughly warm.”
“In that place where you can’t breathe,” Sarita lamented, following him nevertheless into the steam room. “Where are the keepers of the baths?”
“Somehow I felt they might be in the way.” Abul stretched out on a marble slab, already prepared with a towel. “Lie very still and breathe.”
“I can do one but not the other,” she grumbled.
“Don’t talk!”
Smiling to herself, she stretched out. Abul was so wonderfully single-minded. A few minutes before, he had been making transcendent love to her, and now he was telling her to be quiet and melt because that was the activity at present at hand. That the lovemaking and the melting were compatible partners Sarita did not dispute. It was something Abul would know a great deal better than she, and she supposed she would learn in time. So far he had made no mistakes … not even, she had to admit, the icy dunking.
