Page 31 of Do Not Awaken Love (The Moroccan Empire #3)

I walk through the marketplace and buy things I have never bought before, spending much of the money I have.

I buy more food, cloth to sew new robes for Rebecca and myself and to use for swaddling bands.

I buy plates and cups, more fenugreek seeds than Rebecca will ever be able to drink, another blanket.

I ask for a carpenter to come and build a second bed, a second chair.

My household has tripled in one strange night.

By the time I reach home, I find Rebecca asleep, with Ali contented by her side.

I take a blanket from the bed, wrap myself in it and sleep on the floor, so tired I cannot even think, nor feel the hard tiles beneath my body.

When I awake Rebecca is feeding Ali and we sit together, for a little while, not speaking, only looking at him, the two of us wondering how our life has changed so fast and so unexpectedly.

“What will your master say?” Rebecca asks me.

“I do not know,” I say. “He is a kind man. I will tell him the baby is yours but that I have agreed to help you care for him.” I do not say what I am thinking, which is, what will Kella say to Yusuf?

Will she claim the child died in childbirth?

Will she even stay strong enough to tell such a lie, to not break down in his arms and tell him everything that happened, leading him back to me and my part in all of this.

I shake my head. What lies will I have to tell him?

What will he say when he sees this child?

And what if – what if he recognises his own son?

I take Ali, now half asleep, from Rebecca and stare into his face.

He is the very image of Yusuf. I cannot imagine how anyone could look at him and not see the resemblance.

But perhaps, I think, it is only I who sees this, because I have gazed at Yusuf’s face once too often, have let my eyes linger on every part of him that I can see, and thought of him daily.

Perhaps it is only my eyes that wish to see his countenance in this baby.

The sun is sinking when I hear the gate open and look out to see Yusuf standing in the courtyard. His eyes are rimmed red. He comes to the doorway, and looks at Rebecca, frowning.

“She’s a beggar girl,” I say, too quickly. “She had a baby and nowhere to live. I have taken her in, for now.”

He looks at Rebecca, and the tiny dark head of Ali.

I freeze, waiting for him to ask to see the baby, to look into his face.

But he only nods and makes a gesture of dismissal.

Rebecca quickly stands and leaves the room with Ali, murmuring something about a walk.

I look into Yusuf’s face, to see if I am about to be unmasked, called a liar and worse.

Yusuf takes a few steps forwards, so that he is standing in front of me, closer than he has ever been.

I swallow and look up into his face, seeing again the red rims of his eyes, realising that he has been crying.

“My son Ali is dead,” he says, and suddenly he sinks to his knees before me, puts his face against my belly and weeps.

I do not speak. I find my hands on his head, pushing back the veil that has always hidden his face from me, letting its folds of cloth slip down onto his shoulders as he sobs against me, his shoulders shaking so hard that I think I may fall over.

I brace my legs against his grief and run my hands through his dark hair, that I have never seen before, let alone touched.

He looks up at me, and I see his face in its entirety for the first time since I have known him.

The skin below his eyes is very pale, protected from sunlight and drained by grief, his dark eyes, the only part of him I know, now flooded with tears.

I stare back at him; my own eyes filled with tears as I think of the pain he is being unnecessarily caused.

I open my mouth to tell him it is not true, that his child lives and is safe in Rebecca’s arms as she paces the narrow street outside, that he is a strong baby and will outlive us both.

But I cannot. I have sworn otherwise, and I am afraid for this child, for the lies surrounding him and the power of Zaynab’s jealousy.

I am afraid of what Hela might do to serve her mistress, I am afraid that she has powers greater than mine, that she is no common healer and that she serves the darkness in Zaynab’s heart without question.

I must look into Yusuf’s eyes, raw with grief, and lie to him.

“I am so sorry,” I say, and my voice shakes. “I am so sorry.”

“He was my first son,” says Yusuf, the words gulped and choked in his mouth.

I cannot bear to meet his gaze and so I pull his head towards me, pull him tight against my belly and my thighs, against my most secret parts and feel his warmth and strength against me.

I am swept all over with a desire so strong it frightens me more than the lies I have told.

I know now that I have told myself greater lies than I would have thought possible, that those lies and these new ones I am telling will have to live together, side-by-side, for the rest of my life.

I wonder what I have become, what kind of a nun I could possibly claim to be, who lusts for this man, this heathen man, who holds a baby in her arms and tells lies about his birth to his own father’s face.

I am committing sins such as I never dreamed of, teetering on the edge of the abyss, the devil himself calling my name in ever more seductive tones.

And I know that it would take so little, so very, very little, to take one more step and fall.

“What is the woman’s name?” asks Yusuf at last, sitting back on his heels, his head bowed low. His voice is still hoarse.

“A beggar girl,” I repeat. “Her name is Rebecca.”

“The Jewess?” he asks.

I stare at him in surprise. “Is there nothing you do not know?” I ask.

He stands, face still unveiled, looks down at me and shakes his head. “I look about me. I listen.”

I nod in silence. I wonder if he will insist that Rebecca must leave Murakush, that she may not live within the city walls, as is the law.

“You must keep her here,” he says. “There has been enough sadness for one day. I am glad at least one person has been made happy today, has been cared for. I will send you money, enough for both of you to live well.”

“Thank you,” I say. “I will ask her to name the baby Ali, in honour of your son,” I say, knowing that I am casting myself ever deeper into dishonesty.

He bows his head as though acknowledging this offer.

“I will find you a bigger house,” he says.

“I must go now; Kella has need of me.” His hands are swift.

Suddenly the dark veil is wrapped around his face again and once again I can see only his eyes.

I try to think of something to say, but he has already gone.

It is a long time before I see Yusuf again, although he sends me money, as he promised, far more than Rebecca and I have need of.

He also sends a tiny ivory rattle for Ali, a grand gift for the supposed child of a beggar.

I wonder sadly whether he bought it in anticipation of Ali’s birth and am comforted that if so, at least it has reached its intended recipient.

Murakush celebrates, for Zaynab gives birth to another son for Yusuf, this child named Abu Tahir al-Mu’izz.

Zaynab’s legend grows greater, her prophecy seems more accurate than ever.

For she was barren for three marriages and now, at an age when many women might have stopped bearing children, she has given Yusuf a son and heir.

His younger first wife has lost her son at birth, so it has been given out, but Zaynab has succeeded where her younger rival has failed.

Zaynab’s son is surrounded by servants and slaves, as though a tiny baby has need of much.

When I catch glimpses of Zaynab I see that she is recovering well from her pregnancy, filling back out again after the nausea rumoured to plague her, standing tall and powerful once again.

It is she who will prepare everything that is needed to support Yusuf’s army as it marches against Fes, a twin city, whose two amirs have been given due warning to surrender, which they have ignored and for which they will pay a heavy price.

The troops march north, and I can only pray for Yusuf’s safety, hoping that Ali will not lose the father he does not even know is his.

At first, I care for Ali’s needs with brisk efficiency.

He is kept clean and well fed, I keep a note of when he feeds and when he sleeps.

Rebecca, I see, pours the love intended for her lost child into Ali, sometimes she weeps when she is rocking him, but she also smiles and murmurs to him, sings to him, strokes his hair.

But I begin to find my own care of him growing softer, caught up in his wide-eyed gaze and the scent of him.

He holds my finger in his whole fist one day and I sit with him for more than an hour in the warm sunshine, unwilling to move lest he let go again.

I do not see much of Kella, catch sight of her briefly sometimes in the market crowds, but it is a rare thing.

I wonder whether she sometimes sees Ali with Rebecca or me and hope that she knows he is cared for.

I wish that she could see him at night, curled by either my own or Rebecca’s side, his chubby little hands held in ours, the loving embraces he wakes to each day.

I knew that I desired this baby, and so it proves.

He is showered with love, both by Rebecca who has lost her own child and by me, attempting to fill the emptiness in my heart made by his father.

Our days revolve around him and I already know that if Kella were ever to demand him back, I would struggle to give him away, even to his own mother.