Late that night, snug in a blanket near the glowing embers of the fire, he woke abruptly, his heart pounding. No dream lingered to disturb his mind, but neither was there any sound in the starlit darkness to alert his ears. A year ago he would have considered it tiresome, all this jolting awake in the middle of the night. But other times he’d woken thus he’d either learned something useful or saved his own life. He paid heed to the night and the desert around him, listening intently and slitting his eyes open.
The mother, father, daughter, wives, and children occupied the wagon; the two sons had curled up in blankets near Azzad by the fire. These blankets were now empty. Azzad eased over onto his back, raising his head slightly. The wagon was still here.
Was Khamsin? The stallion would scream his outrage if anyone came near. But suddenly Azzad could not get it out of his mind that something threatened their freedom.
About to rise and investigate, he suddenly heard what must have awakened him: a feminine giggle, muffled as if in a man’s shoulder. Azzad grinned at his own foolishness and relaxed. Of course; the brothers had gone off with their wives for a little midnight gratification.
A few moments later he heard a soft footstep. Scarce had he opened his eyes when a woman’s voice whispered, “Lie still—I mean you no harm.”
The plain, dull-witted, unalluring daughter nudged aside Azzad’s blanket and slithered down beside him. She was clad only in her waist-length black hair. He scrambled away from her, throwing the wool blanket over her body.
“Lady, what are you doing?” He kept his voice low; if her father and brothers caught them here, he’d be dead.
Or married.
Which, he realized as she smiled nervously up at him, was precisely her intention. He was young, handsome, and though he had no family they knew of and no prospects they could see, any husband was better than no husband. A threat to his freedom, indeed. No wonder the other blankets around the fire were empty.
“Make a baby for me,” she breathed.
Acuyib help him! “Lady,” he said with careful courtesy, “this is wrong, I will not despoil you—”
“Oh, that’s already been done.” She sat up, letting the blanket fall from her shoulders. She had very pretty breasts. “One of my cousins did it, but it was not my time to conceive. If you make a baby for me tonight, then I can say it’s his, and he’ll have to marry me.”
Women! What mere man could comprehend them? It occurred to him to be insulted that her object was not marriage with him—young, handsome, wealthy Azzad al-Ma’aliq. Young and handsome still but wealthy no longer. He really would have to start remembering that.
It was a measure of Azzad’s first twenty years of life that he actually considered her proposal. He’d gone without a woman since early autumn—and it was now full winter. And she did have very pretty breasts....
But it was equally a measure of what had happened to Azzad since the autumn that he shook his head. “Believe me, lady, you are lovely and gracious, and it would be any man’s honor and pleasure to be your husband. But I cannot.”
She was not fooled by the flattery. Her mirror had schooled her to realism. “Cannot, or will not?”
“Both,” he answered honestly. “Any children I father, I will raise and teach.” Raised in full knowledge of their noble heritage as al-Ma’aliq and taught to hate Nizzira al-Ammarizzad. Abruptly he wanted such children with all his heart.
“You will not do this small thing for me?”
“It is a very great thing, and I’m sure you can find a man more worthy than I.”
She sighed. “But it must be tonight. If I wait another moon, I will not be believed.” She reached for his groin with all the seductiveness of a gardener reaching to cull spoiled fruit. “You are a man. I am a woman. Do this for me.”
“No.” He gently took her hand from his body. She examined his face narrowly in the dim light and drew in a long breath as if to sigh once more—but Azzad knew what was coming. He clapped a hand over her mouth and pulled her against his chest. “None of that, now,” he murmured into her lank black hair as she struggled against him. “I will not father your baby, and I will not marry you. But I will tell you how to marry the cousin you love.”
She tensed in his arms, but stopped fighting him.
“Very good. The way to do it is this. Hide your moon-cloths from everyone, especially your mother. This is possible?”
She nodded. In Beit Ma’aliq, with servants everywhere, it would have been hopeless. But this girl probably had to wash all her own clothes.
“Run weeping to your parents and say that you fear you are ill, because your moon-days have not come since you journeyed to your uncle’s tents. When they ask if you were alone with any man, deny it—and then weep harder than ever and let slip your cousin’s name. I guarantee that you and he will be married. When next you bleed, it will be thought that you miscarried of the child. But by then you’ll be married, with plenty of chances for another baby. Do you understand?”
Again she nodded. Azzad cautiously took his hand from her mouth. She stayed quiet, so he let her go.
“I hope you’ll be very happy,” he told her. “Now go back to your bed, and start planning what a fine life you will have with the true father of your children.”
She slipped away without a word of thanks for his clever solution to her problem. Women! Azzad lay back, exhaling to the bottom of his lungs and blessing his luck.
The next day he rode on. Quickly, and alone.
The landscape changed subtly. Azzad paid so little attention, trusting Khamsin and involved in his own thoughts, that before he knew it, he was riding up toward a forest. Above were truly formidable peaks, hidden until now by the clouds wreathing their heights. Azzad reined in, contemplating the magnificence with pleasure—until he realized he would probably have to cross these mountains. By comparison, the castle of the al-Ma’aliq stood on flat ground. Nothing in those hills had prepared him for the summits looming above him now. At least the puzzle of why Rimmal Madar knew nothing of this distant land was solved—for who would dare these peaks and cross the desert unless absolutely necessary?
“Ayia,” he muttered to Khamsin, “we’ve come this far—Acuyib won’t let us die now.”
There was good hunting and forage and plentiful water. Yet as the cold sank into his bones every night, more cruel than the dry chill of the desert, he huddled in his cloak and wished that he believed in the Shagara spells and that such spells included one of warmth. He should have gone to the seacoast after all.
At noon one day he emerged from a narrow tree-lined defile into a bowl-shaped valley. The creek ran full, and the grains and grasses were lush, even in early winter, and the grazing land was strewn with fat brown sheep. A road snaked up the hillside, and stone houses perched along it at intervals. Azzad counted thirty individual structures and a cluster of buildings about halfway up the road—probably markets and workshops. Bayyid Qarhia? he wondered. If so, he’d best stay only tonight and then move on, before his would-be mistress and her family arrived home.
Staying even one night was, however, out of the question. He had barely emerged from the trees when a shepherd whistled shrilly. Within moments a contingent of fiercely bearded men were marching down the road, carrying scythes and axes and other instruments of peaceful agriculture easily turned to murderous intent. The laws of hospitality quite obviously did not apply in this country. Azzad hastily weighed his chances of proving himself harmless to man, woman, and sheep—and pulled Khamsin’s head around.