Page 11 of None Such as She (The Moroccan Empire #2)

M any and many hours of travel go by, many and many days.

The sun beats down by day, the cold nights make us shiver even in our thickest robes and the tents which are erected for us each night by the servants do little to protect us from either heat or cold.

Yusuf travels far ahead of us with his men by his side.

The servants are unknown to me, some speaking strange tongues, all belonging to a different land, a different household.

I speak to no-one and no-one speaks to me.

I am grateful for the silence outside of me, for inside there are too many voices.

I do not see the landscape change as we sway onwards, nor seek out new sights and sounds as we pass through foreign lands.

My body is very still save for the movement of my camel and my face betrays no sign of my thoughts.

This is how my mother always looked, still and straight, her face unmoving, her body elegant but always controlled.

Did my mother also have these voices screaming in her head?

I will never know now, for it is unlikely I will ever see her or any of my family again.

I want to ask her. I want to run up to her and scream into her face, to see if her eyes would blink, if she would step back. I would scream and scream until her dark eyes flickered and she looked away. I want to shake her and see her elegance and poise vanish into fear.

Why didn’t anyone tell me before it was too late?

Why didn’t you tell me? Why? Why did no-one think I should know that he had another wife, one more senior than I, one who has five sons and will never be put aside for me to take her place?

Why did you let me dream and love a man who had a wife of whom I knew nothing? Why?

My why is for everyone. In my mind as the hours pass I turn to each of them standing in our courtyard bidding me farewell.

My mother, my father, Myriam, Hela, all of the servants.

I see them step back from my screams. I see them cast down their gaze in shame before me.

Of course many men have more than one wife, but not to know?

To enter a house believing you are this man’s only beloved and to find another woman standing there, her five sons gathered proudly around her?

Why? As the miles go by I try to understand.

Myriam and the servants, of course, may not have known, although they always seem to know everything.

But my mother and father did know, and they did not tell me.

Hela knows everything and she did not tell me. Yusuf did not tell me.

***

We pass the great city walls of Aghmat in the distance and continue towards the mountains, and it is only now I realise we have been travelling for more days than I thought, for we are nearing my new home.

A narrow valley is our destination, greener than the hot deserts and scrubland around because of the river that runs through it, giving its name to both the valley and my husband’s tribe.

Here the mountains rise steep on either side of the river and any small patch of land that can be cultivated is set aside for food.

The river is channelled here and there to wet the earth.

The crops do not lack for water even if they must be hardy to grow so high.

The sheep and goats are obliged to fend for themselves on the steeper rockier outcrops, with only bushes and rough grass for their food, although they are forever finding ways to try and sneak a little closer to the greener plants grown for their owners’ benefit.

If they are caught at their tricks they feel a stick across their haunches and bleat indignantly as they make their escape to higher ground.

Above the river, set high so as to avoid its fast and dangerous flooding in the winter, are the houses.

Some are little groups of humble mud dwellings, their roofs thatched.

Some, where the valley shape permits, form larger outlines.

In the largest such space there are smaller houses surrounding a kasbah, a fortified castle, its moulded and decorated turrets towering above the simpler homes of the tribe.

In the kasbah live those of importance, the chieftains, their families, their closest and most trusted men.

Should danger come, as it so often does, from the nomads of the desert or refugees from tribal wars, those in the smaller houses would run here, their animals driven ahead of them, the heavy wooden doors then pushed closed by many hands, made to open only from inside.

Here people and their animals can live for many days before hunger drives them out, and the turrets and rooftops allow for an advantage in warfare.

This, then, is my husband’s home, and now it is mine.

The kasbah towers above us as the camels make their final weary way up the hillside.

The houses around it glow soft peach as the sun sets and their outlines offer a stepped silhouette following the shape of the valley sides.

I look up towards the kasbah and see smiling faces at every window and on every rooftop leading to it.

Their chieftain Yusuf bin Ali is home again after much time away, and every person feels some measure of relief that he is returned to protect them.

Once they have looked at him their eyes run over the servants, all known to them of course, and at the many bundles of new goods that Yusuf has brought back with him.

Then their eyes turn to me, the unknown woman in the caravan, dressed in fine robes, young and beautiful.

The whispers run quickly from the base of the valley to its very summit, to the high turrets of the kasbah itself.

It is clear what I am. A new wife for their chief.

There are giggles between children, smiles between women and lecherous glances from the men at me behind Yusuf’s back as we progress.

The whispers all around me die to silence as we reach the kasbah and its great doors are flung open.

They stand in the doorway, five boys, little height difference between them.

The eldest is perhaps only seven or eight, his cheeks round and pink as ripe figs, his smile full of delight at seeing his father.

The youngest is only a baby, he cannot even stand alone but clings grinning to his oldest brother’s robes.

All of them come beaming towards Yusuf, who leaps down from his camel and embraces them one by one.

I scan the crowd from my place high on my camel. I see servants, soldiers, slaves and in the midst Yusuf and his sons. But I see no woman of high rank. Where is this wife who has won everlasting honour for having borne five sons in such quick succession?

One of Yusuf’s men stands at my side and commands the camel to kneel. It does so with weary relief and I am lifted bodily from its back. I stagger a little, for I have been riding since daybreak. I am dizzy with fear.

Yusuf turns to me as I approach. The crowd’s noise dims a little. He smiles at me. He is happy to be home, to be with his sons again. “Welcome Zaynab,” he says. “Welcome to your home. These are your children now, as they are mine. Boys, welcome your new mother.”

They make their welcomes to me, the eldest with a nervous but formal speech, the youngest with a grin that shows me his first tiny teeth, newly acquired.

I try to smile but I am watchful. Where is the mother of these children?

It is dangerous to be enchanted by cubs when a mother is nearby and may rip you apart for passing on your scent to her offspring.

But still there is no woman. Gently I greet each child.

Then I am led through the gates and into my new home.

It is cool in my new rooms. The servants chatter excitedly to one another.

They seem pleased by my presence, eager to welcome me.

Yusuf and his sons have been ushered away, no doubt to visit his first wife, wherever she may be.

Meanwhile I am brought fresh water to drink and for bathing, my belongings are unpacked at speed and distributed about my quarters.

There is much admiration for my clothing, which is stupidly rich for my new life.

My father’s house was one of luxury and idleness.

This is a community where there are farmers and warriors, where women work hard.

Their clothes are of good quality but simple, of wool and sometimes linen in plain bold colours or stripes, not rich embroidered silks like mine.

There are servants and slaves, but not as many as I am used to.

They are more familiar, addressing me and smiling, trying to show me everything at once.

“Get out of the way, you fools, you’re exhausting her.”

The servants scatter and I see the woman who has entered.

She is old, bent, but wiry and quick in her movements.

She grins at me with a mouth missing many teeth and hustles the rest of the servants out of the room.

She settles herself on my bed and pats it invitingly.

I stumble slightly on my way across the room but recover and sit beside her.

She smiles and puts one arm about me as though she has known me all her life.

“Cry if you like.”

And I do. I do not speak, only sob against this stranger’s shoulder, wetting her clothes, sniffling until I can cry no longer. She passes me water without removing her arm from me. I gulp it down and sit up, a little ashamed.

“S-sorry,” I begin. “I – ”

“Nonsense,” she interrupts briskly. “What have you to be sorry for? You’re only sixteen and you have been married off to a man who lives a very long way away from your home. You have travelled in the heat and you are tired. Too much for a child to bear.”

I do not object to her calling me a child, for it is how I feel – a babe among strangers, disorientated and fearful, fretful for a familiar face.

She looks about the room. “Have you everything you need?”