by Jane Feather
“Why would you not acknowledge me in the court?”
“I had much to occupy me … people who demanded my attention.”
“And a woman may not do so.”
“No. Not in public, Sarita.”
A frown touched her eyes. “You have not held to that premise in recent weeks, my lord caliph.”
It was true. He had not. “There were many people in the court,” he extemporized. “Soldiers not of the Alhambra.”
She let it go, for all that she sensed there was much more to it. She didn’t think she had ever before seen Muley Abul Hassan look tired.
“Come within.” Taking his hand, she drew him toward the door. “Let us greet each other in proper form.”
The parchment burned its message through his tunic, but he didn’t know how, without hurt, to turn aside the soft sensuality of her welcoming smile, her hands gently, yet with an inbuilt excitement, moving in a preliminary caress across his thighs. He kissed her and she leaned into him, feeling for the buttons of his tunic.
“What have you here?” Her fingers drew out the parchment. “Abul, is this something you must read before we greet each other in proper form?”
He laughed, as much with relief as amusement as he heard the feigned scolding in her voice. Turning his palm upward, she thumped the parchment into his hand, saying, “I refuse to compete with such immediacies. Read it and have done with it, querido, and then we may turn to our own business.”
“No, I have no need to read it now. Come and let me feel you. I have missed you beyond reason.” He sat on the divan and pulled her down on his lap. She landed with a thump and a squeak of protest before catching his head between her hands and bringing her mouth to his in a hard, passionate assault.
They fell back on the bed, her tongue dancing with his, her body moving in sinuous demand over his.
“I want you, Abul.” The husky imperative whispered against his mouth, and her hands tugged at the fastening of his britches, her body twisting to give her room for maneuver even while she resisted every lost inch of contact.
He loved her importunate need, the naked hunger she evinced for his body, the way after an absence of any duration she would have no time for foreplay but would express her eager passion with a demand to equal any man’s.
He lifted his hips as she tugged at the confining garment, losing his mouth for a moment to kneel so that she could pull his britches free of his body. They ran into the barricade of his spurred heels, and with a chuckle she abandoned the exercise and stretched full length to caress that part of him now made freely available for such caresses.
Sarita inhaled deeply of the rich, earthy scent of him, her tongue gently lifting, stroking, her teeth grazing. She became lost in the spiraling excitement of desire, cast adrift in the maelstorm of wanting. With an exultant chuckle, she straddled his body, drawing her skirts up to her waist as she lowered herself onto the impaling shaft.
Abul laughed with matching elation and reached to hold her skirts high, watching the rise and fall of her creamy thighs as she moved him within her with the circular rhythm of her body. With an abrupt movement, she reached up to pull the netted snood from her hair, and the whole glorious cascade tumbled loose. In the same moment, he touched her at her heated core and she cried out, falling forward, covering him in the flaring torrent of her hair, her mouth locking with his as his own climax pulsed within her.
“I bid you welcome, my lord caliph,” Sarita murmured against his mouth, once she could draw breath. “I think that was a proper welcome, do you not?”
“Indisputably,” he breathed. “Such a wild creature you are, Sarita mía. ”
“Would you have me otherwise?” She disengaged slowly, rolling onto the divan beside him, her skirts still rucked up to her waist.
“No.” He ran a finger over her thigh. “Never.”
They lay still for a minute; then Abul remembered the vizier, who would be awaiting him in his office, and groaned. “Cara, I have things I must do.”
“Then do them,” she said, sitting upright. “The sooner they are done, the sooner you will return. Should you not read the parchment?”
He rolled off the divan and picked up the discarded missive. “Yes, I suppose I should.” He went into the curtained alcove that contained the commode, and Sarita hugged her knees in thought.
The usual lassitude that followed such a frenzied burst of lovemaking was absent. She was bubbling with an urgent curiosity.
“What does your letter say?” She slid off the bed and went to the curtain.
Abul emerged. His expression was dark, but he tried to smile, to recapture the mood of a minute earlier. Except that the mood had been generated by the desperation and uncertainty they had both felt and been unable to express. “It is from Aicha’s father,” he said, tossing it to the divan as he refastened his britches. “It simply says that she has claimed his protection … I have to meet with the vizier, Sarita.”
She nodded. “I will not keep you. But come back soon.”
“Por cierto, querida.” He drew her against him. “How can you doubt it?”
“I do not.” She lifted her face for a gentle salute.
A sharp knocking came from the door to the antechamber. “My lord caliph? There is a messenger come from the Abencerrajes,” the voice called from without. “He would have speech with you.”
“So soon,” Abul murmured to himself. Sarita caught the murmur, although she didn’t understand its significance. Without a further farewell, he left the sleeping chamber, and she heard the door to the antechamber open and close.
The parchment from the Mocarabes lay forgotten on the divan.
Chapter Nineteen
The parchment was largely incomprehensible for Sarita, written as it was in Arabic. She puzzled over the hieroglyphics, making out the sense of one or two of the groupings. Her lessons with Fadha had mostly been oral, but the other woman had shown her something of Arabic lettering.
Sarita’s own literacy was unusual. Her father had been literate and had served as scribe for less educated members of the tribe. Estaban had been proud of his skills and had imparted them to his only child as part of a family heritage, imposing upon her the obligation to do the same with her own children. But the ability to read and write Spanish was little help with the strangeness of Arabic characters.
She lay on her stomach on the divan, legs in the air, ankles crossed, as she pored over the script. Hearing Zulema’s soft footfalls, in the main chamber, Sarita called to her. “Are you able to read your language, Zulema?”
The maidservant appeared in the doorway. She shook her head, “No, but Kadiga is learned in that way. Shall I send for her?”
“Mmm, if you would,” Sarita murmured, distracted as one word seemed to leap at her from the parchment. It was repeated several times and appeared to be of some importance to the whole.
When Kadiga came, she showed her the word, carefully covering the text above and below, conscious that perhaps Abul would not want his letters made common knowledge among the palace household.
“It is ‘unbeliever,’ ” Kadiga said without hesitation.
“Mmm.” Sarita chewed her thumbnail. “And this one, I believe, is ‘woman.’ And here is the lord Abul’s name—”
“I hadn’t realized how far your education had advanced, Sarita mía.” Abul’s voice came lightly from the doorway to the main chamber.
“It has not advanced far enough, I fear,” she said, waving her legs idly in the air. “Will you help me read this?”
“You don’t think it might be private?” he questioned amiably, gesturing a dismissal to Kadiga.
“Not really,” Sarita replied. “Since you left it on the divan.”
“So I did,” he agreed, with the same affability. “But I told you what it says.”
She shook her head. “Some part, maybe. But not the important bits.”
“Why do you wish to know them?”
“Because you are troubled by them
, and because I believe they have more than a little to do with me.” Her eyes held a challenge as she looked up at him, demanding the rights of partnership. When he didn’t immediately respond, she continued. “It could be said, could it not, that my presence here prompted your rejection of Aicha? That you imprisoned her and intended banishing her because I found greater favor in your eyes? Who is to know of poisoning and long-planned ambition if Aicha does not tell them?”
“You have been doing some thinking, it would seem.” He sat on the divan beside her, resting a hand on her backside. “Let us look at this, then, and see if you can make out some more.”
“Why do you not just read it to me?” she asked, holding the parchment to him over her shoulder. “It would be simpler, and I am not really interested in a lesson.”
“You do surprise me,” he said dryly, taking the letter from her. “Aicha’s father informs me that his daughter is under his protection, having fled barbarous treatment and the threat of cruel and unjust banishment. My treatment of his daughter the emir takes as an insult to his family honor. The repudiation of his daughter in favor of an unbeliever and a captive slave doubles the insult. The emir therefore will be revenged. He issues a challenge to my kingship, maintaining that I have forfeited the rights to the loyalty and allegiance of the people of Granada. He demands that I relinquish the caliphate in favor of my son and a regent to be chosen by council.”
It was an arid exposition of the contents of the letter, Abul’s voice maintaining an even monotone. Once finished, he rerolled the parchment and lightly tapped the top of her head with it. “So now you know, Sarita. What have you to say on the subject?”
She rolled over, squinting up at him. “I would say that you must shout the truth of his daughter’s treachery from the watchtowers, before too many others believe what he has said.”
“I have no proof.”
“And I am here as proof positive of the emir’s accusation,” she said slowly. “Will others believe him?”
Abul nodded. “The emir of the Abencerrajes, the second most powerful family in the caliphate, has just made a similar demand for my abdication. My failure to comply will lead to military challenge.”
“It is all because of me.” She frowned, feeling a sick tremor in her belly.
Abul shook his head. “It is a matter of much complexity, Sarita. You are only the excuse for a challenge that has awaited an excuse for several years. But I have made some mistakes just recently that might well sway the undecided to the opposition.”
“In your treatment of Aicha?”
“I admit to a degree of carelessness there, and to a certain neglect of warning signs.”
“So what is to be done now?”
“I must answer the challenge, and then we shall see what move they make next.”
“Are you deeply worried?” She reached for his hand, trying to read his expression.
“It is more serious than I had originally thought,” he conceded. “And if we are warring within our borders, then the predators without may well have easy pickings. That is what concerns me the most.”
“You will lose Granada to the Spaniards.”
“It will happen one day,” he said. “We cannot continue to maintain this toehold in the peninsula against the combined strengths of Aragon and Castile. But I would prefer it not be lost during my stewardship.”
“I understand that.” Lifting his hand, she rested it against her cheek. “There must be some way I can be of help.”
“Just by being here,” he said. “I need to know that you will be here even when I must be away from you.”
She smiled a little ruefully. “Do not keep things from me, then, Abul. I need you to promise that.”
“I promise.”
Abul sent a ringing return to those who had challenged his authority and prepared the Alhambra to withstand siege or direct attack. Either approach would have little chance of success on such a fortification, but an attempt would nevertheless weaken him in the eyes of his supporters. He was under no illusion that many of them would remain loyal to a sinking ship. They would have too much at stake in the event of his failure to withstand his enemies.
He sent troops out to patrol the roads of the kingdom, and reports of skirmishes between his men and those of the Mocarabes or the Abencerrajes came in regularly. Alliances were formed and broken, conspiracies hatched and dismantled. Abul kept spies in every camp and worked ceaselessly to circumvent the unification of his enemies, hatching his own conspiracies, spreading his own tales, watching with sinking heart as his own machinations achieved the splintering and weakening of the kingdom as effectively as those of his enemies. And yet he saw no choice.
One afternoon, a troop of soldiers arrived at the gates of the Alhambra. They had a message for the caliph from the emir of the Mocarabes. The message was contained in a wooden casket that, when opened, revealed the head of one of the caliph’s spies in the court of Ferdinand and Isabella in Cordova.
The message was clear. Those allied against the caliph had sought the support of the Spanish monarchs, sought it and been given it. What had they been obliged to offer in exchange? Abul wondered. The new caliph’s allegiance to the Spaniards? They were fools if they believed their most Christian Majesties would settle for anything but total control of Granada and the ousting of the Morisco-Spanish rule forever.
Sarita asked questions constantly, holding him to his word that he would not keep her in the dark. He answered as patiently as he could, but he was distracted much of the time, and she developed the habit of listening to the rumors within the palace. Kadiga was a dependable informant of kitchen gossip, gossip that Sarita privately decided was as reliable as anything else.
Abul was as calmly centered as ever, as unquestioningly authoritative, his equilibrium unaffected by the danger and turmoil surrounding him. At least that was the appearance he gave. Sarita was sometimes not so sure. He had lost his humor, the readiness to laugh, the gentleness that she was so accustomed to, and sometimes she saw in his eyes a frightening uncertainty. Was Abul questioning some previously unquestionable assumptions?
It alarmed Sarita even as it filled her with compassion and a desperate need to help him. But she did not know how. She was there for him, and often he needed her, coming to her sometimes in the middle of the day, needing to lose himself in the loving she so freely offered, to forget the plaguing doubts and ground himself again at his center. Sometimes he seemed to pour out the frustrations upon her body, using her with a rough passion that she matched, transforming frustration into excitement and the deep, plunging descent into annihilation that could only renew. And sometimes he needed her to love him with soft gentleness, to bring peace to his body with the use of hers. Determined never to fail him, she watched, gauged, guessed, and sent him back into the fray stronger and steadier.
But it still wasn’t enough to assuage her restless anxiety, her need to take some active part in catching the castles as they tumbled around his ears. Part of her wanted to cry: Give it up. It’s too hard a fight for such a thankless responsibility. Let them fall beneath the yoke of the Spaniards, since it’s a yoke they’ve sought for themselves. But she quenched the voice with a shamefaced vigor. It was not for her to make such assumptions, to impose her own aching need for a life with Abul that they could truly share.
One day, Kadiga appeared when Sarita sat in the seraglio listening to a harpist, the gentle chatter of the women, who seemed undisturbed by the chaos beyond the walls of their gilded cage, floating tranquilly around her.
“The lord Abul wishes you to join him in the baths,” she said.
Sarita rose immediately. It had been many weeks since Abul had wished to share that place of repose and harmony with her.
She entered the hall of immersion to find Abul already in the hot tank, Leila in attendance. The woman came to help divest Sarita of her robe and then left the hall.
Sarita slipped into the water opposite Abul. She was so used to the baths now, not e
ven the prospect of the cold dip to follow could spoil the pleasure spreading upward from her toes as she sank below the surface. “Are you well?” she asked softly, examining him shrewdly but covertly.
He smiled slightly. “I am well.”
“But not reposeful.”
“No,” he agreed. “Not that.”
“Something other than usual is disturbing you,” she hazarded.
He nodded. “I am going to send you away from here, Sarita.”
She sat up abruptly, water sloshing around her. “What are you saying?”
“It is necessary,” he said heavily. “No, listen to me …” He put out a hand to catch her wrist, forestalling her leap out of the water. “There is danger for you in this place—”
“There is danger for you,” she exploded, pulling on her captive wrist. “How can you talk so?”
“Sarita, if the Alhambra falls, your life will not be worth a day’s purchase. You do not need me to explain why.”
“No, I do not, but I maintain the right to take my own risks,” she fired back. “And why would you talk now of the fall of the Alhambra? Has something else happened?”
He shook his head, still holding her wrist. “But I must make provision. You will go from here, through the passes to Cordova. The passes are held by my men. In your own country you will be safe. When this is over, I will come for you.”
She glared at him, disbelief in her eyes. “You will not come for me because you do not expect to live through this. You have lost hope.”
Abul said nothing. It was not hope he had lost, but inclination. He looked at Sarita, the lodestone of his life. He wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of that life with her, and he didn’t think he minded very much where or how. He was thirty years old and had done his duty rigorously. He didn’t want to spend what remained of his life in battering struggles against mounting odds to defend something that he believed was now fundamentally indefensible, as much through the greed and errors of others as through the great powers ranged against him with the fusion of Aragon and Castile. But he was his father’s son, and he could not yield Granada to the Spaniards without that fight. So he must fight his own people.
