Lady Of Fire (4 page)

“Insufferable!” Alessandra tossed up her hands.

Rising onto an elbow, Sabine watched her daughter pace, her hair a splash of color against the softly painted walls. “He is that,” she agreed.

“Then for what did you purchase him?”

“You are spoiled, Alessandra. It takes time for a man recently made a eunuch to accept his fate. The Englishman will come around.”

“But he is not like the others.”

After a hesitation, her mother said, “Given time, he will be.”

Alessandra rubbed her arms. “I do not like it when he touches me.”

Sabine sat up. Had it started, then? If so, how long before her daughter succumbed to Lucien’s seduction? Though steps could be taken to ensure her virtue remained intact while she remained in Algiers, once she was in Lucien’s hands, Sabine had only his word that he would not touch Alessandra. And his word was not enough, especially considering her daughter’s heightened awareness of those things far removed from a girl’s world.

Silently, Sabine cursed the illness eating through her. If not for that which often incapacitated her, she could have continued to control Alessandra’s exposure to the harem women and their boastful, vulgar tongues. Now, her daughter knew by word what she had been shielded from, and it would not be long before curiosity tempted her to gain knowledge through experience.

“He touched you?” Sabine could not keep the tremor from her voice.

Alessandra shrugged. “He but grabbed my wrist.”

“For what?”

Her daughter ceased pacing, muttered, “He did not like what I was doing.”

“Which was?”

“I did not mean to, but…I nearly gained the dance floor again.”

Sabine dropped back on the divan. “And you think yourself suited to harem life.” She shook her head. “You would be better off in England.”

After a long silence, her daughter crossed the room and perched on the divan’s edge. “Let us speak of the marketplace. You have not told me what else you purchased besides that dreadful eunuch.”

“’Tis England we will speak of,” Sabine said. “There is still much I have not told you.”

Alessandra’s shoulders slumped. “I know enough. I am the firstborn child of Lady Catherine—you—and Lord James Breville of Corburry. My father is wealthy and noble, a good man. Though you did not know it, you were with child when you were stolen from your home and sold into slavery—”

“Enough,” Sabine said. “’Tis Agnes I would speak of.”

“Agnes?”

“The cousin with whom I came to live when my parents died. I was ten years of age.”

Alessandra had not heard of Agnes. She leaned nearer. “Were you great friends?”

A snort escaped Sabine. “We were rivals.”

“In what way?”

“Every way. Agnes was a year older and quite lovely. Her parents doted on her and gave her everything.”

“And you?”

Sabine shrugged. “I was not neglected. Though my clothes were those Agnes cast off, my playthings those she tossed aside, I was mostly content.”

Alessandra felt a pang of sorrow for the lost girl her mother must have been. “Did you and Agnes quarrel much?”

“Often, and like boys—rolling on the ground, kicking, pulling each other’s hair.”

It was difficult to believe her gentle mother had engaged in such sport. Amused, Alessandra said, “Who won?”

“Agnes. Every time. She was larger than me.”

“You never bettered her?”

“Aye, though not in wrestling.”

“Tell!”

Sabine smiled. “Agnes wanted James Breville. She courted him, flirted outrageously, even asked him to marry her.”

“And?”

Her mother laughed. “Though I had not encouraged him, James chose me.”

It seemed a fitting revenge. “He loved you?”

“He did. It mattered not that my dowry was paltry. He wanted only me.”

“And you loved him as well.”

Smile lowering, Sabine lifted a hand and caressed her daughter’s cheek. “I cannot lie. Never did I love your father, though I did have great affection for him.”

Alessandra shook her head. “But you love Jabbar. I have heard you say so.”

“Aye, though it was not so in the beginning. I hated the one who bought me and sought to make me his concubine. But he was patient with my Christian ways, and so handsome my tongue cleaved to my palate each time I looked at him. Not until you were born did he touch me.” She sighed. “Though I did not wish it, I fell in love with him. And he with me.”

“Thus, you became his wife.”

“One of three.”

“And you have been happy with him, have you not?”

Happy.
Sabine turned the lovely word over in her mind, wished she could wholeheartedly claim it. “At times. Unfortunately, it is a difficult thing to share the man you love. For that, I do not wish this match between you and Rashid. It is not Christian. Nor is it English.”

“I am not English—”

“’Tis the only blood in your veins, Daughter,” Sabine said more sharply than intended, having pointed this out many times before. “Though you have been raised amongst those of a different culture and faith, you are English and true only to the god of the Christians. Thus, this is not the life I wish for you, nor the life you could live.”

“You do not know that!”

“Do I not? Who cannot stand to be long indoors, who waxes impatient when there is naught to do but sit around the fountain and eat sweets, who longs to dance and go unveiled before all, who plays pranks and grows indignant when Rashid takes a concubine to bed?” Who, Sabine did not say aloud, was becoming too curious about what other women of the harem knew of men.

Alessandra surged to her feet, the bells around her ankles sounding harsh in the tense room. “I will hear no more.”

Urgency lending Sabine speed, she caught her daughter’s arm. “You are too spirited and strong-willed to become one of several wives. Though you wish to wed Rashid, such a life will not satisfy you.”

Hurt flashed across Alessandra’s face. “You would send me away? To England and people I do not know? People like that new eunuch? Why, he has not a smile with which to smite the devil from his eye!”

Fearful Alessandra might stumble upon the true purpose of Lucien de Gautier, Sabine let tears she often contained moisten her eyes. “You know ’tis my greatest desire that you return to your father.”

Alessandra dragged her bottom lip between her teeth. “But what of you? If you would send me to him, why would you not also come?”

“My place is here, with Jabbar. This is my life—”

“As it is mine!”

“Nay, Alessandra, it will never be yours. You are your father’s daughter—different from those simpering, conniving creatures Rashid will wed and take to his bed, rivals who will make you consider every morsel you place in your mouth for fear it could be your last.”

Sabine recalled Leila’s ill-fated attempt to poison her shortly after she had come to live in Jabbar’s harem. Though the woman had already bore him his first son—Rashid—earning herself the esteemed position of mother of the heir, she had become intensely jealous as Jabbar showed his preference for Sabine. Thus, Leila had tried to murder her rival.

Sabine had shielded Alessandra from such things, but the danger was ever present. And now, it was time she learned of it. “Leila is as opposed to you wedding Rashid as I am. So much that she would think nothing of poisoning your food to be rid of you.”

Alessandra stared at her mother. Though she was hardly ignorant of Leila’s animosity, she did not believe Rashid’s mother capable of murder. “I think you exaggerate. And even were that true, Rashid would not allow her to harm me.”

Sabine made a sound low in her throat. “A fortnight before you were born, Leila poisoned my food. Fortunately, as I was so nauseated with pregnancy, I ate very little. Though it was not enough to kill me, I was sick unto death. Nay, Alessandra, there is nothing Rashid could do to prevent his mother from doing the same to you. I was fortunate. You may not be.”

Alessandra was so shaken that it was some time before she could form coherent words. “For this, Khalid oversees the preparation of everything we eat—the reason I am forbidden to take food from Leila.”

Sabine stroked her arm. “Thus, I do not want this life for you.”

“But…” Alessandra shook her head. “Why did Jabbar not punish Leila?”

“He did. He took Rashid from her and sent her back to her family. Had her son not needed her, he would not have allowed her to return, but Rashid became so distraught that he refused to eat. Day and night he cried, his small body growing weak.” She sighed. “As Jabbar could not bring himself to send his son away, he brought Leila back.”

Alessandra gripped her hands so hard they hurt. “Yet you would send me away.”

“England is your home. There you will be safe.”

Though Alessandra feared as never before, she could not accept that she must be forever parted from all she knew. “I understand your concern, but I will not leave you, nor those with whom I have been raised.”

“You will leave.”

“I will not.” Alessandra pushed upright. “And there is naught you can do to change my mind.”

“Then I will not change your mind.”

Sabine’s threat was not of the sort that promised to take away sweets or minor privileges. Still, Alessandra pressed, “Jabbar will not send me away, and neither will he allow you to do so.”

Face flushing, her mother said, “I ask no man for permission to do with my daughter what must be done to keep her safe. I bore you, and
I
will decide your fate.”

Alessandra took a step back. This was a different woman from the one who had raised her. This one was unyielding—almost cruelly.

But then Sabine blinked, and the hard lines of her face eased as if she slid back into herself. “Because I love you so much,” she said softly, “you cannot stay.”

Alessandra moved nearer, gripped her mother’s hand. “Because I love you so much, I will resist any attempt to steal me from your side. Though I am not Arab, neither am I English. This is where I belong, and here I will stay.”

“Then you will fight me.”

“Pray, do not make me, Mother.”

With a sad smile, Sabine said, “You know how I dislike losing.”

Hoping the matter was settled, Alessandra kissed her cheek. “You are not losing. We both gain.”

Sabine considered her. “There is something else we must speak of,” she said. “You are not to tell Seif of your English background.”

Alessandra frowned. “He is a eunuch. There is not much chance we shall engage in such a conversation.”

“Nevertheless, do not name your father, nor speak of his lands.”

“You have never forbidden me such. Why now?”

“It does not matter. Just do not speak of it.”

“What are you hiding?” She and her mother had always been close such that, until the revelation of Leila’s murder attempt, Alessandra would have said there were no secrets between. But it seemed there were more secrets, and one of them had to do with the Englishman.

Sabine laced her fingers, stared at them. “Is it not enough that I ask this of you?”

“It is not easy to accept the secrets you put between us. And you know how deep my curiosity.”

“Very well,” Sabine acceded, “I will tell you, but ask me no more. Though I did not know it when I purchased him, the eunuch’s English name is Lucien de Gautier.”

Alessandra tried to remember where she had heard it.

“He is of the same family whose lands adjoin those of the Brevilles. The family who has been at odds with your father’s family for years.”

Now she remembered, though the details were vague. “Continue, Mother.”

“For many years, theirs was a blood feud. Before I was taken from England, it had mostly lessened to petty skirmishes and disagreements, but still their dislike for one another went deep.”

“Did the De Gautiers sell you into slavery?”
 

“I do not know, though I have considered it.”

“And as Seif is a relation, you fear he might do us harm should he discover our identity.”

“It is possible, especially now that he has recently become a eunuch. I think, in time, he will settle down, but one should never knowingly cross swords with the devil.”

Alessandra smiled at the comparison. “I shall say nothing of my lineage.”

“Do not forget,” Sabine cautioned. “You cannot know how important it is.”

Rising before the other women of the harem, Alessandra dressed and ascended to the roof terrace she often frequented. From there, she could observe the boats on the Mediterranean and watch the sun rise above the city of Algiers.

Her mother’s husband, an intensely private man, had chosen to build his sprawling home inland, away from the city. Its location was inconvenient, as it could take a half day to reach Algiers’s bustling marketplace if one traveled by donkey. However, the journey could be made in two hours upon a swift horse. Or so Alessandra was told.

Plagued as always by restlessness—Sabine claimed it was her father in her—she had been disappointed when she had not been allowed to accompany her mother into the city the last few times. In her search for a new eunuch, Sabine had been adamant that Alessandra remain behind. And they had argued over it.

Soon, though, Alessandra would be allowed to venture into the city, for she needed cloth for her wedding attire. Although she and Rashid were not to wed for several months, it would take considerable time to complete the embroidery that would adorn her costume.

She wrinkled her nose in anticipation of the endless hours of needle and thread. Though proficient at sewing, it was a chore she disliked. But, as with most things her mother insisted she master, it was a skill of gentle Englishwomen.

With the coming of dawn, Alessandra lowered to her knees and clasped her hands before her. She had only begun her prayers when a voice said, “To which god do you pray? Muhammad’s, or that of the Christians?”

She jumped to her feet, spun around. “For what are you here?”

The new eunuch straightened from the wall. “I followed you.”

He had been watching her all this time? “Why?” she demanded, resenting that with each step he took, the farther back she had to tilt her head.