“You’re pregnant. You don’t have to hide it from me anymore. Sit. Rest.”
Despina’s eyes swam crystalline for an instant before they flashed back to blue. “I don’t need to rest.”
“I insist.”
“Truly, it’s not—”
“Rest this morning. I’ll go with the Rajput to practice shooting in the training grounds. Come there when you feel better.” Shahrzad began preparing a cup of tea. “Do you think some tea would help your stomach?”
“I can make the tea,” Despina whispered.
“So can I.”
Despina paused, staring down at the figure of the small girl with the long mane of sleep-rifled hair. “Shahrzad?”
“Yes?”
“You are not at all what one would expect.”
“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” Shahrzad grinned over her shoulder.
“Absolutely. I think it’s kept you alive.”
“Then I’m very grateful for it.”
“As am I.” Despina smiled. “Most grateful.”
• • •
A wild cheer rang out from the sidelines as the arrow struck the eave on the opposite side of the courtyard with a solid thud. The shouts of the soldiers rolled into a chorus of laughter that rose into a cloud-filled sky.
A sky tinged with the scent of impending rain.
Shahrzad smiled at Jalal.
His shoulders shook with soundless mirth. He ran his free hand through his curly brown hair and shrugged at his men.
“You cannot dispute that, Captain al-Khoury,” Shahrzad announced.
“Indeed. I cannot, my lady.” He bowed, his fingertips to his forehead. “Your arrow struck the target. Mine . . . did not. Name your price.”
Shahrzad thought for a moment. Her question had to be a good one. It had to be worth discarding any attempt to conceal her skill with a bow. It also had to be worded in a judicious manner. He was gifted at deflecting responses and offering eloquent nonanswers.
“Why are you permitted to call the caliph by his first name?”
Jalal shifted the yew of his longbow from palm to palm. Ever careful. Ever calculating. “Khalid is my cousin. My father married his father’s sister.”
Shahrzad had difficulty suppressing her reaction. This was the most information she had obtained the entire morning.
Jalal grinned with a dangerous gleam in his light brown gaze.
“Choose the next target, Shahrzad.”
She scanned the courtyard. “The topmost branch of the tree to the right, beyond the roofline.”
He wagged his eyebrows, appreciating the challenge, as he pulled an arrow from his quiver and nocked it to the string. When he drew it back, the edges of the unyielding longbow barely shifted.
Jalal was an excellent archer. Not as gifted as Tariq, but precise and sharp in his movements. He loosed the arrow. It flew in a spiral and sailed above the roofline before it struck the topmost branch, causing the entire tree to shudder from the force of its impact.
The men began to cheer in approval.
Shahrzad fitted an arrow to the recurve bow. She closed her eyes as she nocked it tight against the sinew. Exhaling, she pulled the arrow back.
The instant she opened her eyes, she released the string. The arrow soared through the air, whistling past the branches . . .
Embedding just below her intended target.
Shahrzad frowned.
The soldiers raised another cry of triumph. Again, Jalal bowed, this time with his hands outstretched at his sides.
“Oh, don’t gloat,” Shahrzad scolded. “It’s quite unbecoming.”
“I have never gloated. Not a day in my life.”
“I find that rather difficult to believe.”
“Gloating is for weaker men.”
“Then stop smiling like such a fool.”
Jalal laughed, raising his arms to the sky. “But it’s going to rain, Shahrzad. And I’m a fool for the rain.”
“Just collect your prize, Captain al-Khoury,” Shahrzad grumbled, folding her arms across her chest, letting her recurve bow dangle by her feet.
“Don’t be so frustrated with me. I’ve been quite fair in my questions.”
She rolled her eyes.
“In fact,” he continued, “this will be my first truly unfair question of the day.”
Shahrzad’s posture reacted to his words before her features did.
Jalal took a step forward, balancing his longbow across his shoulders. “Where is your family, my lady?” he said in a low voice.
They’re looking for my family . . . as I expected.
She smiled up at him. “Safe.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“In a place of sand and stone.”
“That’s also not an answer. Everything is made of sand and stone.”
“You cannot force a better answer out of me, Jalal. These are my answers. If you dislike them, we can cease with our game.”
His eyes moved across her face with an odd mixture of ready discernment and playful diversion. Yet, in that instant, she saw more of his father in him than she had ever seen thus far. And she understood.
This was not merely his occupation. Jalal al-Khoury was protecting his family. To him, family always came first.
And she was not family.
“No,” he countered, “but I would like to ask another question in lieu of the last. Since your answer was quite unsatisfactory, I feel it only appropriate I be permitted another question.”