Black Lion’s Bride (Warrior Trilogy #2)

Chapter 23

For better than a week, all the time they had been back at Ascalon, Zahirah knew the boundless warmth and light of Sebastian's love. It was a wondrous thing he gave her, a freedom of feeling that seemed to lift her very soul heavenward. It was joy just to look upon him and think that he was hers; bliss to know the wonder of his regard, his touch . . . the sensual skill of his glorious body. And when he was gone, doing work for his king in the city or beyond its sheltering walls, she missed him with a keenness that surpassed anguish.

That morning, he had left the palace to oversee more repair work on the city walls. By noontide Zahirah was mad to see him, the empty space of the chamber they shared closing in on her and making her yearn to be outdoors. She would bring Sebastian a picnic, she decided, eager to surprise him with an excursion to one of Ascalon's garden parks. With a meal and a blanket and a board for playing shatranj bobbing along in the basket on her arm, she quit the palace. The knights on watch at the outer gate had come to know her as their captain's lady; they let her pass unmet to head into the bustle of the city.

Beyond those guarded palace gates, the streets and market teemed with a new day's commerce: tight-fisted Muslims and Christians haggled over goods with squawking vendors; soldiers and peasants strolled the alleyways and loitered about the common square, each group eyeing the other warily, while a pack of dirty, laughing children and two yapping dogs raced hither and yon, oblivious to all but the merriment of their game .

Zahirah saw a Muslim holy man heading for the mosque, his fine white robes looking crisp and pristine among the filth and dust of the city, and she realized with a jolt of surprise that this was Friday, the Sabbath. How could she have forgotten? A group of veiled women huddled in a knot near a fountain at the end of the main artery through town, whispering amongst themselves while they waited for the prayer call that would summon them to jumah . Zahirah passed them with her gaze averted, telling herself she should not feel ashamed that on this holy day she was going instead, bare-faced and eager, to break fast with her Christian lover.

She spied him but a moment later, there, at the far end of the street where the brick in the soaring city wall was still damp with new mortar. He stood on scaffolding at the top of that high perimeter, talking with a mason, his legs braced apart, balancing him as easily as a great cat on a bough. His tunic was tied about his head like a kufiyya to shield him from the heat of the sun; the tail of the shirt hung down past his neck and huge bronzed shoulders, the edges of its hem lifting in the thready breeze. He gave an order to someone on the ground, then glanced out and saw her approaching from up the street. Zahirah felt his welcoming gaze reach out to her across the distance, and her heart skipped a beat.

Beaming, she sent him a wave of greeting. He said something to the mason, then clapped him on the arm and turned to descend the ladder. Zahirah did not even try to bite back her giggle of excitement as she watched him jump the last few rungs to the ground, disappearing into the thick crowd of folk that stood between them on the avenue. She took a quick step forward, about to rush on to the end of the street to meet him, when someone suddenly stepped into her path.

“Oh!” she cried, drawing up short to avoid a collision with the hunched, slim form of a beggarly old man. “My apologies, sir. I did not see you—”

The graybeard lifted his hooded head and Zahirah's gaze locked with a pair of chilling black eyes. Those knowing eyes stared hard at her, narrowed in something that went deeper than mere disapproval. She felt all the blood drain from her face. Her picnic basket hung on her arm like a weight of a hundred stones.

“Father,” she gasped, scarcely recognizing the reclusive King of the Assassins for the unexpectedness of his presence there in public and his ragged commoner's disguise. “W-what are you doing here?”

“Come to ask you much the same, daughter .” Sinan leaned heavily on the word, his calm voice sounding infinitely more lethal to her than would the loudest bellow. “I have been hearing nothing but disappointing news, Zahirah. News of unsuccessful attacks and delays, a score of my best men dead . . . these failures concern me greatly. Now it is my understanding that the Frankish king is here, with you, in Ascalon—here for a week or more, from what I have gathered. Yet still Lionheart lives.”

In the periphery of the milling crowd, Zahirah saw three of her father's fida'i bodyguards. They were dressed to blend in, but she knew their faces, and she knew each of them would be as well-armed as Sinan most certainly was beneath his pilgrim's rags. Like hounds, they watched her, hanging at the ready and waiting for their master's command. From the feral looks in their eyes, she had no doubt that any one of them would be happy to tear out her throat. She swallowed down a knot of stark cold fear. “Father, I can explain—”

“I'm not interested in explanations,” he cut in sharply, although his tone retained its deceptive calm. “I am interested in action. Swift action, Zahirah. I am tired of waiting.”

“Yes, Father. Of course, I understand.”

“Do you?”

Zahirah nodded, but her attention was suddenly drawn elsewhere. Amid the hubbub and shuffle of the busy street, she heard Sebastian's voice, heard its deep masculine rumble as he greeted someone in Arabic. He was likely halfway through the crowd, drawing nearer by the moment. She did not dare venture a glance in his direction, fearing her father would scent her worry. Too late, she realized, nothing escaped the notice of the almighty Old Man.

“The Frankish captain seems quite taken with you.” Sinan's thin lips flattened. “Oh, yes, daughter. I've been watching. Is he the reason you have not yet fulfilled your mission?”

“No,” she denied in a rush. Then, with forced casualness, “No. There have been complications to my plan, that is all. He has nothing to do with it.”

Masyaf's Old Man grunted, and slid a look to one of his hovering guards. “Perhaps I would be a better judge of that.”

“W-what do you mean?” she asked, but there was a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach that warned of her father's intentions.

He would have Sebastian killed—right there, in the middle of a crowded street, if he thought the captain a threat to his goal. Sebastian would never see the daggers coming. And at this very moment, Zahirah was leading him directly into the trap.

“Please, Father,” she whispered, desperation making her reach out to take a hold of Sinan's vein-riddled leathery hand. She gripped the lean fingers that would not respond to her touch. “Please . . . I beg you. Don't.”

“You have a task to carry out, Zahirah.”

“And I will,” she said, praying he would believe her, recommitting herself to her mission. “I have not forgotten my pledge to the clan.”

“I am glad to hear it,” said Sinan. “You have two days.”

“Two days,” she gasped. “But that won't possibly be enough time—”

“Two days, Zahirah. And do not fail, or your Frankish lover dies.”

“I will do it,” she vowed, sick with the blood promise that stood to cost her so much. “I will not fail you, Father. But please, swear to me you won't do anything to him.”

Stoic and inflexible, he would give her no answer, and there was no time for further entreaty .

Shrugging into his tunic, Sebastian stepped around a passerby and gave Zahirah a warm smile. Then his eyes flicked to Sinan and he paused, his easiness replaced with a look of mild suspicion. “Is anything amiss here, my lady?”

“N-no,” she replied, shaking her head in quick denial. She released her father's hand and went to Sebastian's side. Her smile felt pasted on and tight; her lie seemed cemented to the roof of her mouth. “I'm afraid I was not looking where I was going, and carelessly I bumped into this gentleman. I was just offering him my apologies.”

Sebastian's chin went up a notch in acceptance of her explanation. He looked once more to her father, who stood in watchful silence, holding himself as still as a viper waiting to strike. “Well, I'm sure he pardons you of any offense,” Sebastian said in their tongue. With a studying glance, he took in Sinan's rumpled clothing and gaunt features. “Are you hungry? We have food. Zahirah, what have you got in your basket for this man to eat, my love?”

She winced inwardly at the endearment, feeling her father's condemning eyes fix on her like a slew of poison-tipped daggers. Nervously, she stuck her hand inside the basket and fumbled around for something—anything—to give him. Her fingers closed around a velvety peach and she jerked it out, bruising the tender skin and almost dropping it in her state of near hysteria. She held the fruit out to Sinan, willing her hand not to tremble as he took it from her and offered her a fractional nod of thanks.

Sebastian added a large round copper to the gift, retrieving the coin from a pouch on his baldric and placing it in Sinan's palm. “Peace be upon you,” he said. “Go with God.”

Though the Arabic blessing was customarily polite, it contained an undercurrent of dismissal that would not sit well with Masyaf's Assassin king. Unable to speak, unable to so much as breathe, Zahirah stared at her father while he absorbed the situation. She could almost hear the wheels grinding and turning in his head as he evaluated Sebastian, his gaze as emotionally vacant as a vat of the blackest pitch. Slowly, his fingers closed around the coin. Then, with a meaningful glance toward Zahirah, he simply turned away and left them, becoming just another faceless figure on the wide avenue, trundling along in a sea of the same.

“This is a pleasant surprise.”

Zahirah startled at the sound of Sebastian's voice beside her ear. He kissed her cheek and took the basket from her arm. Her pulse was racing. Willing it to slow, she returned his smile, praying her fear of the moment before would not be evident in her expression. “I'm glad you're pleased. I thought you might welcome a break from your work.”

“Indeed, I would,” he said. “Shall we find a place to sit and enjoy this meal you've brought me? Perhaps there will be a spot of shade in one of the parks.”

Although it had been her plan when she set out from the palace, suddenly the thought of sitting in a busy city garden held little appeal. Nor did she think she could force down one bite of food so long as her stomach was churning with worry over her father's deadly ultimatum. But as distressed as she was about the prospect of being forced to fulfill her mission with the king, she could not afford to let Sebastian know that anything was wrong.

To chance that he might suspect something now, when her father and his bodyguards lingered around the city like ghosts, would be to place his very life in jeopardy. She had to keep him unawares; now more than ever, the totality of her deception would be paramount.

“Yes,” she said. “The park will be lovely.”

Linking her arm through his and holding onto him perhaps a little tighter than she should have, Zahirah walked with Sebastian to an unoccupied pocket of lawn in a park that overlooked Ascalon's shore. There, some near dozen ancient Roman pillars stood among tall cypress and palm trees, creating a strange, sparse forest of stone and wood that shaded the edge of the silvery dune and framed the sun-dappled gem-green water that tossed and rippled beyond. Children's voices carried up from the beach on the breeze, their laughter and shouts of mock battle joining with the calls of sea terns that wheeled overhead, looking for charity from the folk who had come to rest and refresh at the park. Somewhere not far was a lemon grove; the citrus fragrance twined pleasingly with the perfumes of myriad spices wafting in from a merchant galley docked at the harbor.

God had given them a perfect day, but Zahirah found it difficult to appreciate any of the peace and beauty surrounding her. There was only Sebastian, the enemy she had come to love. There was only this man, a noble man who had given meaning to the words honor and acceptance.

And now, suddenly, there was only this moment and the precious few that remained between here and the time she would be forced to betray him. Two days. So little time.

Sebastian was looking at her as she knelt in the grass and unpacked the basket. She handed him the blanket, returning his smile when their fingers brushed and lingered for a heartbeat. While he unfurled the large square of cotton and spread it on the ground, Zahirah set out their meal. She had brought them a round of flatbread and some cheese and wine. There was fruit in the basket as well—less one peach for the token she had been made to give her father. But she would not let him invade this moment any further.

Pushing aside all thoughts of Sinan and the unpleasant business that awaited her, Zahirah broke the bread and offered a chunk to Sebastian as he took his place beside her on the ground. He must have been hungry, for he made quick work of his meal, eating like a ravenous youth still growing into his bones. It was pleasure to watch him at the simplest things, and she knew this day would be burned into her memory for all eternity. She wanted to wring everything from it, to make the day last, and so, despite that she was in no state to concentrate on strategy or diversion, when Sebastian found the shatranj board in the basket and offered her a game, Zahirah agreed.

Happily, she watched him set up the board, admiring the agility of his strong fingers as he placed each piece into position in its proper colored square. “Ladies first,” he said when the last pawn had been set in its spot. He propped himself on his bent elbow, stretching out to recline on the blanket, his long legs extended, big leather boots crossed at the ankle.

Zahirah glanced at the new game and bypassed her vanguard of pedestrian white pawns with nary a hesitation, instead moving the horse-shaped faras into play.

“Feeling a bit ruthless today, are you, my lady?”

She laughed at his jest, though in truth she felt anything but ruthless. His gaze on hers in challenge, he moved a black pawn and the dance of mock war began on the board. It went back and forth for some time, an equal match; they had been playing often, and Sebastian had a natural skill for the game—a skill that had come into its own when they played in the privacy of his chamber as he preferred, where the cost of each lost piece meant the surrender of a kiss, as determined by the victor. Zahirah blushed, thinking on the many games she had lost to him in the past week, some not entirely accidental.

“I am loathe to intrude on whatever it is that has you smiling so prettily, but it seems you have left your ruhk wide open.” He slid one of his pieces onto the square and neatly captured hers. His smile was dazzling. “Sorry, my love.”

“Hah! As sorry as a falcon on a mouse,” she replied with arch humor, giving him a suitably offended glare. She sized up the board with a shrewd glance, then moved her faras deeper into his ranks, getting a minor revenge on an unsuspecting pawn.

Sebastian's eyes were on her as she collected his lost man and set him aside; she felt their heat, felt the potent male interest in his gaze as surely as she felt the sun, warming her skin through the silk of her clothes. He reached out then, taking her hand in his and bringing it to his lips. His kiss sent a tingle of desire through her, but she could not keep from nervously glancing around, could not keep from withdrawing her hand when her gaze lit on the inquisitive and mildly disapproving stares of a group of Muslim matrons.

“Let them stare,” he said as she averted her eyes, embarrassed, and sat back on her heels. “In England, it would not be improper for a gentleman to kiss his lady's hand in a public park.”

Zahirah felt a smile tug at the corner of her mouth. “In England, you also eat off the ends of your knives and dance around bonfires like moonstruck wild animals.”

Sebastian let out a bark of rich laughter. “We are not entirely lacking sophistication, my lady. We have manners of our own, much like here, and we have parks and pleasure gardens and places of higher learning. I wish I could show you. You'd like England, I think.”

How easy it was to forget he had another life, a privileged life far away from the scorching deserts and forbidding mountain crags she called home. That life of castles and court and loving kin awaited him, and she should not feel sorrow at the prospect that he would one day go back to it. “I'm sure it's beautiful,” she said, somewhat wistfully. “You must be eager to return.”

“Oh, not so eager, my lady.” He gave a nonchalant shrug, but there was an intensity to his gaze when he looked over at her. “England has much to recommend it, but it doesn't have shatranj. ”

Zahirah smiled. “A problem easily remedied. In the souk just the other day, I saw a merchant selling a fine board with carved ivory pieces—”

“It doesn't have you.”

At first, she did not think she heard aright. She sat frozen, unable to do more than stare at his serious expression, her heart squeezing as though caught in a vise. “Me? My lord, I . . . “

“Come with me,” he said when her voice drifted off and abandoned her. “When this war is over, should God will that I survive, I want to take you with me back to England. Back to my home at Montborne.”

Stunned, humbled, miserable with all that he was offering her—with what she could not possibly accept—Zahirah felt her head shaking slowly back and forth. She wrapped her arms around her waist where a steel-cold knot had begun to settle. “Sebastian, I . . . I don't know what to say. ”

“Say you'll come with me.” He put his hand out and gently turned her face back to him. “Say you'll spare my pride and think about it, at least.”

Zahirah smiled despite the cumbersome weight of her heart. “Oh, Sebastian,” she whispered, “you have no idea what it means to me that you would ask. That you would think so much of me—”

“I think the world of you, my lady. I ask because I love you.”

“And I love you,” she said, her throat thick with emotion. “I love you, Sebastian . . . so much.”

“Well, that's a good enough start,” he replied, grinning. He leaned in and kissed her.

Zahirah closed her eyes, wishing for things she would never have, things she would never know. For a moment, while she was kissing him, feeling his arms around her, she could almost believe that she might one day know another life with him—a life far away from the pain and brutality that was so much a part of her homeland. She could almost believe that there was a way, somehow, for them to be together.

In the shelter of Sebastian's arms, she could almost believe their love might be stronger than the power of Rashid al-Din Sinan, and that was dangerous thinking, indeed. That sort of thinking could get Sebastian killed, a prospect she would do anything to avoid, even if it meant she would lose his love forever.

“I must go,” she said, breaking out of his embrace before she had no strength to leave him at all.

He arched a brow. “You will quit now, when the game is this close? You're hardly one to walk away from a challenge, my lady.”

“It is the Sabbath today,” she said, pressing her forehead to his. “The third call will come soon, and I really should be in prayer.”

It was an excuse, but one he did not rise to challenge. Growling in exaggerated protest, he released her. “We will finish our game—and our conversation—later this evening. Agreed?”

Zahirah gave him a small nod. He pushed himself to his feet and helped her gather together the shatranj board and pieces. While she packed it away and threw their food scraps to the gulls, Sebastian shook out and rolled up the blanket, then returned it to the basket. With his hand resting easily on the small of her spine, he walked her out of the tranquility of the park and back to the sweltering chaos of the street.

“I'll take you back to the palace,” he said when she hesitated to bid him farewell.

“No. There's no need,” she replied. “It's not so far. I'll be fine.”

“You're sure?”

Nodding firmly, she caressed his face, savoring the feel of his strong jaw against her palm. “I will see you tonight, my lord.”

She pivoted before he had a chance to say anything more, and stepped into the busy current of the street.

~ ~ ~

Sebastian waited where she left him, watching as Zahirah weaved back into the throng and headed up the avenue toward the palace. He had surprised her with his offer to bring her home with him to England; in truth, he had surprised himself with it. But he had meant what he said, and now that he had said it, he was determined that he would not leave the Holy Land without her.

Behind him some distance, someone hailed him, drawing his attention away from the place into which Zahirah had since disappeared. It was Logan calling him, he realized, hearing the brogue roll off the soldier's tongue. The Scot had been patrolling the city that morning with a group of other knights, assigned to help keep order on a busy Muslim holy day.

Sebastian turned to greet his friend's approach when something else drew his attention. He jerked his head to the right, where his scalp prickled with warning. The sun's midday rays were strong, beating down in a heavy wash of light that bent off a roof tile to blind him. But something was there, buried deep within the crowd. A pair of coal-black eyes, watching him, the gaze steady where others darted or hid within the folds and shadows of veils and kufiyyas .

Could it be the queer old man Zahirah had bumped into in the street? He had seemed peculiar somehow, his reticent manner oddly belligerent. Sebastian brought his arm up to shade his vision from the glare and get a better look. He peered hard into that knot of shuffling, talking people, but the eyes—and the gaunt, gray-bearded face he felt certain he would find—was gone.

“Damn,” he swore, scanning the crowd to no avail. Logan drew up beside him nearly without his notice.

“Anything wrong?”

“I thought I saw something—or, rather, someone.” Sebastian ran a hand over his scalp, scowling.

Logan followed the direction of his gaze, and gave a shake of his head. “Things have been quiet for more than a week, my friend. No sign of trouble anywhere, and we've been looking. I reckon we got our man when we got Halim and his pack of fida'i dogs.”

“Did we?” Sebastian asked. “I'm not so sure. Something doesn't feel right to me.”

The Scot grunted. “Well, at least we can take some comfort in the fact that Lionheart is out of danger now that he's here under guard in Ascalon.”

“He may be under guard,” Sebastian said, turning a serious look on his friend, “but I don't think the king is out of danger yet at all.”