“You are lucky,” the consul told her, after making some inquiries on her behalf. “There is a descendant of Prince Haytham’s who is a scholar of their family history. He will provide you some information that may be helpful to your article, as a courtesy from one academic to another.”
Several days later, she’d been called back to the embassy to pick up a sheaf of papers, faxed over by the scholar. Returning to her hostel, burning to read the pages, she’d been frustrated by the weakness of her body, which made her stumble on the stairs and forced her to sit there until she regained her breath and could make it the rest of the way to her room to read the information in privacy.
But once there, she’d sunk down by the window, opened up the folder. The first thing had been a short series of letters from Prince Haytham to his father. The prince had been deeply grieved by the loss of his friend, but he’d been forced to condemn his rash actions as a dishonor to their friendship. Then her fingers had tightened on the page as she read his additional comments.
It is no surprise to me that he was harder to kill than expected, and escaped the pit. At least I believe it to be so, for I have heard that the girl’s body, left to feed the desert scavengers, was gone within a day of her death. The family swore a blood oath to find and kill him, and reclaim her. But when the sheikh sent his oldest son on this mission, he returned two days later, his body dragging behind his frightened camel, his head mounted on the pommel. The rest of his escort never returned.
Lord Mason cannot be found when he does not wish to be. Which means he is seeking their blood as much as they are seeking his. I expect they will not be dissuaded from this now, but from my experience, they would be wise to leave him alone and let the desert absorb his rage and grief. They will not find her grave—it will be only where a desert tiger can find it.
Or one sick and dying woman who’d persisted, who’d put together a few hundred clues and discarded a hundred more, as if shuffling pieces of many different puzzles, until she’d at last found all the pieces to the one she sought. She was sure of it.
Jess glanced up at the stars. Using the accommodating body of her camel, she levered herself to her feet, hobbled twenty paces, checked her notes again, her detailed calculations using GPS and historical data of shifts in the night sky.
“Harry.”
She’d stopped resenting the need to ask for help. Mostly. In the past twenty-four hours, as they’d drawn closer, the overwhelming desire to do this in profound isolation had returned. She was visiting a temple that should only be seen by those who understood the type of sacrifices made on its altar.
“Yeah, darling.” He didn’t have to be asked, sliding a hand under her elbow, another around her waist to steady her, taking her the next fifty paces. Jess was used to the casual endearments, which seemed to be his way of referring to any woman, but the first time he’d touched her like this she’d turned on him like a savage animal. When she’d yanked the knife from under her robes, she would have skewered him if he hadn’t been far more agile. After she calmed down, she made herself bear his touch, because she knew it wouldn’t be the last time she’d need help to move, as fast as she was declining.
Dying or not, though, she wouldn’t tolerate Mel anywhere near her. Harry had either warned him, or she repulsed the other Aussie, because he never drew close. And of course Dawud would never touch her.
Sand and more sand. In the distance, to the left and right, were more dunes. One’s steep slope escalated to two hundred feet.
They’d traveled past even higher dunes, ones that would equal a fifty-story building. But this one held her attention because of her certainty about the stars and what had been here three hundred years ago.
It was ironic that the constellation named for the woman confined to Hades half of the year, shut away from the light, had marked the right location. Had Lord Mason thought of that when he did it, or had it merely been astounding coincidence, after he’d created the tomb?
Squeezing Harry’s arm, she stopped about sixty feet away from the foot of that dune. “This is the place. Get the shovels.” She could be brusque without offending him, she knew. Talking drained her energy, and she’d conserved as much as possible toward this end.
“Right-o. You’re okay here?”
She nodded.
As he left her, she settled next to the spot where they were going to dig. Though she was grateful for the consideration when Harry brought her a folded chair and helped her into it, the burning warmth of the sand had felt good. The night always closed in too fast.
Even before she shivered, he was wrapping her up in the blanket he’d brought.
“Thank you, Harry.”
He nodded, touched her chin briefly, giving her a thorough look. “Woman of your age and condition is a pretty tough bird to be here, Miss Anna. You sit tight. We’ll have it dug up in no time.”
She’d not told them her real name, of course. To the bank, the embassy, and all her fake papers, she was Anna Wyatt, not Jessica Tyson, and she’d been able to believably record her age as fifty-two. There was no better disguise for a twenty-nine-year-old fugitive than a wasting illness.
“If it’s there,” Mel observed dryly.
“If it’s there,” she agreed before Harry could quell him. “But it will be. If nothing else, I’m a smart crazy person, Mel.” His lips twisted at that. Even Dawud gave an uncertain smile, standing a few feet away from this unlikely group of infidels. She hoped they did find it tonight. The young man wanted to go home and missed his family. He also was wary, rightly so, of the two
Australians. She missed her family, too, but of course she’d never see them again. In her worst moments, she feared they were already dead. After what she’d done, there was no way she would have returned home, but that didn’t mean the vampires hunting her knew that. They might have tortured and killed her mother, father or siblings to try to find her. God rot her, she was too weary and sick to give the guilt any energy. It was just another thing she couldn’t control. Another person she couldn’t protect.
While they dug, she closed her eyes and went back to Farida, her words pressed against her heart beneath the robe.
As Farida’s feelings grew, so too did Lord Mason’s. In an environment where every action was under the scrutiny of others, subtle gestures took on the significance of passionate embraces . . .
JOURNAL ENTRY 17, PAGE 8
Farida bint Asim
Allah must forgive my weakness, for I am merely a woman, but when he rides, he entrances me. His strong, beautiful hands are gentle but firm on his horse’s mouth, his seat so comfortable, as if he and the animal are one creation. Sometimes I think the fact they are separate is as much a surprise to him as to us, when he comes in past dusk and finds he can dismount.
He always strips off his robes and shirt in the shadows in front of his tent to wash off. I watch him out the slit of my tent. The tattoo of a tiger high on the back of his shoulder surprised me when I first saw it. It is not only inked but scarred into his flesh in a fascinating way, the image raised as if the creature is seeking to leap free. I think of passing my fingers over that, down the line of his broad back, where light perspiration runs down the narrow channel of his spine and darkens his waistband.
I have sought a way to approach him, and I know I will surely be punished for thinking that Allah provided me the way. Last night, he was on a raiding party with my brother and father, and I was told Lord Mason saved my brother’s life from a sand trap. As the head-woman of the house, I knew I should make a gesture as my mother would have, out of gratitude for her son, for my brother.
So for that at least, I am not ashamed to say what I did. I did it before all that were within view of his tent, so I did not bring shame on myself or my father. But if they had known what stirred inside me as I did it, my father would have had me whipped until I bled.
I came and knelt before Lord Mason. He’d removed his boots and socks and was preparing to bathe his upper body as usual. I took the wet cloth from him and I bathed his feet. Oh, how I wanted so much to do the rest of him. I did not, of course. But I took great care over the arches and toes, the shape of his heel, the soles. And then, so his feet would not get recaked with sand, I dried his feet, my fingers stroking flesh and bone through the towel. I wanted to press my lips there, touch my forehead to the fine length of his calves.
His eyes were upon me the whole time, but as if he’d discerned my thoughts, I felt him grow ever more still, like a watchful desert tiger in truth. I had my face covered, but I dared the worst. I looked up and met his eyes.
Not as a wanton—Allah, no. I can’t explain why he brings these feelings out in me, but I needed him to see, to let him know how I felt . . . and he did.
Later that same night, when he was eating dates after dinner, he placed one in his mouth and then, when no one was watching but me, behind my screen, he took it out again and put it on the plate, unmarked by his teeth. I came and collected the plates, and when I was back behind the screen, I lifted that date, placed it in my mouth. Thinking of the heat of his tongue, the press of his lips, I let our eyes meet again . . .
. . . Something amazing has happened tonight. Several hours before dawn, I awoke in my tent, restless, thinking thoughts of him.
Somehow I became certain he was near, though I could not see him. I rose from my bed, and allowed my night garment to pool at my ankles. Stepping up to the back slit of the tent where no one could see, I let the moonlight come in and touch my flesh the way I wished for him to do.
And there he was. Barely moving against the hills of sand surrounding our camp. He held the reins of his horse, and though he was far away, I knew he could see me. So I parted the tent further, let him see me, my body that had never been seen this way by a man, and never would be except by him. I was sure of it. Though the coolness of the night air made me shiver, I held myself proudly, as the daughter of a sheikh should, and let him see what gifts Allah had bestowed upon me. His gaze moved over my skin like the hot wind, scorching me, and I wanted to be burned.