Page 34 of None Such as She (The Moroccan Empire #2)

T he fires burn brightly, plate after plate of food is brought out. There are stories, music, much chatter and laughing. I sit in near silence, so close to Yusuf I have to stop myself from reaching out to embrace him. He will come to me tonight.

He has no choice. The drug Hela mixed was stronger than she has ever made it.

As we eat the wedding feast Kella sits in hopeless silence as each mouthful he takes makes his heart beat harder, his face turn ever more my way, his skin aching for my long-promised touch.

She must have thought he would be glad to see her, and indeed he is solicitous, but she is a dish he has already tasted.

I am new, and have been promised to him for so long that he can think of nothing else.

She sits on his other side, freshly robed.

Under the dust that has been washed away her facial tattoos have emerged, claiming love and protection from her far-away people, who cannot see her present humiliation.

Her hair is piled up in bright swathes of coloured cloth, her woollen striped reds and yellows are tied to accentuate every part of her slender body.

Silver jewellery cascades from her. She should be glorious.

Younger than I, bright and shining, while I am a childless woman growing older with every marriage.

But she looks like a colourful wild bird caught in a net, hopelessly seeking a way to escape while I sit freely, robed in my black rippling silks, back erect, surveying my domain, a sharp-eyed, cruel-taloned falcon to Yusuf’s right hand.

Perhaps before, in her desert tribe, she was ruler of her own domain, knew her own strengths.

Here she is out of place, weakened, uncertain.

There, Yusuf would have seen her bright spirit, her courage.

To a man about to face an uncertain future these qualities may have drawn him.

Here, where he feels safe in his conquests and dreams of more to come, he sees my power and it draws him more strongly.

What can she offer when I have given him everything he might desire in a woman?

The feast drags on too long for my liking.

I grow restless and at last, in a rare moment when Kella is not staring pitifully at him, I allow my hand to brush Yusuf’s as I pass a dish.

He turns as though burnt, with a quick low intake of breath, and meets my gaze.

I lower my eyes but it is all the encouragement he needs.

He stands and announces that we are retiring.

This, of course, is met with cheers and whoops, with comments relating to my beauty, Yusuf’s bravery in battle, the great bed awaiting us and other such ribaldry.

Yusuf waves it all away, smiling, but his hand grips mine tightly as he leads me away.

I look back for one second as we walk towards my tent and see Kella.

Head down, her shoulders are hunched over as she sits in barely contained misery.

I should feel sorry for her but I do not.

It is the first time that I have been the woman more desired than my co-wife, the first time that I have longed to be in my husband’s arms and known that he longs for me also. I cannot feel pity, for I am too happy.

He barely lets the folds of the tent close behind us, my foot is still outside the tent when he grabs me and throws me bodily onto the bed.

I had thought to entice him further, to dance for him, to let him touch the figures on my bed, to then turn and touch my own warm body.

I had thought I would slowly display my body, then let him discover my skills, taught to me so long ago, for another man in another time.

But he is wild with desire. He cannot pause for even a moment, grasping my silken robes and ripping them from me.

I gasp, for I am afraid now. I know Hela made the drink strong tonight at my own request but now I doubt my choice.

He is like a madman, tearing away all the fabric, leaving tatters of it on the floor and pulling at his own clothes.

I would reach out, would try to stroke him gently to soothe his fire a little, to bring back some control, but I am pinned beneath him and he is moving too fast.

I think of my past husband, lord of Aghmat.

I remember with fear his tortures and my body after a night in his rooms or mine.

I try to remind myself that Yusuf is not intent on torturing me, indeed he holds me tightly and groans my name as might a gentler lover, but now he spreads my thighs and I brace myself for what is to come.

I have not been touched by a man for many years now and I am afraid as though I were a new bride once more and not a woman lying with her fourth husband.

I have no choice but to try and tame him.

He enters me too fast. I cry out in pain, but grip my legs around him and try to move in his rhythm.

The tighter I hold him the faster he thrusts inside me and I cannot help but cry out with every stroke.

But even as I cry out in pain and even as I feel his hands too tight on me, bruising my arms, my waist, my thighs, still as he groans I know I have a triumphant smile on my face although my teeth are clenched.

This man would not look upon any other woman in this moment, he wants only me, he needs only my body and as he cries out I hold him tighter to me and feel his release.

He does not stop. He does not pause all night.

Every time he is granted a release, a moment of sweetness in my arms so he begins again.

He cannot stop, he is driven on and on by the potency of the drink.

Sometimes he is gentle with me, whispers to me and kisses me, sometimes he forgets his soft caresses and once again I try to contain my cries.

There are moments of sweetness for me too, when he is gentle enough and I can find my own rhythm and revel in his whispers, in his voice grown husky with love for me.

But pain grows through the night, as parts of me that were made tender in his first passion are bruised and stretched again and again.

***

The days pass and despite the pain I cannot help but long for his presence.

“Too much,” says Hela, as she smooths my bruises with her ointments. “You are mistaking pain for love. You have been twisted by Luqut and his ways.”

“I never mistook what he did for love,” I say.

“You think that love must be painful,” she repeats. “You have known nothing else.”

“My first marriage,” I begin, although my voice dies away.

“A different kind of pain,” says Hela. “Can you not trust that he loves you, that he will come to you without being gripped by a false desire?”

“It is not false!” I say too quickly.

She looks at me. “He would come anyway,” she says. “I can make the drink lighter. Night by night. Then you will see that he comes out of true desire. And he will be gentler.”

For a moment I am tempted. For a moment I contemplate giving her the order, imagine what it would be to have Yusuf come to me in gentleness.

But I cannot give up the burning desire I see in him.

I cannot give up being so badly wanted, no matter the physical pain.

The feeling of being so greatly desired is something I cannot give up.

I look away and Hela waits, but I stay silent and so the drink is made again and again.

***

One night I wait for him and he does not come.

The drink waits, untouched. Restless, I pace about my own tent while time goes by, until I hear his voice close by.

For a moment I feel a wave of relief, before I realise that he is not coming closer.

I hear him laugh and I run to the door of the tent.

In the darkness I see lights flickering in Kella’s colourful tent and see his outline on its walls.

Hela refuses.

“You will take this to him,” I snarl.

She shakes her head in silence.

“He must come to me,” I say.

“It is too late,” she tells me. “He is with her tonight. Let him be. You know he will return to you.”

I shake my head and lift the cup.

“Be careful of what you do,” says Hela.

“It will bring him back to me,” I say.

“You cannot know what it will do,” she says.

When I hold out the cup it takes everything I have to speak softly.

My voice shakes a little and I can only hope that they think I am speaking from duty, one wife to another, a meek and obedient woman.

I see her hesitant face and I return to my own tent and pray that she will not stop him from drinking it.

I wait for him to come to me and instead I hear her cry out and I know that he has drunk the cup down to its very dregs and that his passion, his poisoned lust, has been unleashed upon her.

I turn out every light in my tent and I kneel all night in the darkness, hearing their sounds, unable even to raise my hands to my ears. I do not want to hear and yet I must.

***

He comes back to me. I see that Kella no longer seeks him out.

She keeps to herself. I know there will be bruises fading on her body.

She is afraid of such passion, knows it for the sorcery that it is, knows herself unable to withstand it.

And so I hold Yusuf to me again and endure the pain in order to feel myself desired.

What can she offer when I have given him everything he might desire in a woman?

I am happy. I have defeated my rival. She stays away from me and from Yusuf. She seems well enough but she is no danger to me now, no threat.