LILACS AND
A RAGING SANDSTORM
JALAL SLID THE REPORT ACROSS THE TABLE AND drummed his fingers against the edge of the stained wood.
“Do you have someplace you need to be, Captain al-Khoury?” Khalid did not
look up from his work.
“No. Not at the moment.”
Jalal continued tapping his right hand on the carved mahogany¸ staring
intently at Khalid’s face.
“It appears—”
“I wish you would confide in me, Khalid.”
Khalid’s gaze flickered to Jalal, giving away less than nothing.
“And what brought on this sudden desire for closeness?”
“It rained yesterday. You must have a great deal on your mind.”
Khalid studied Jalal with deliberate composure. “There is usually a great deal
on my mind.”
“And what of the rain?”
Khalid put down the scroll in his hand. “Rain is merely one element of a storm—generally a hint of things to come.”
“As always, you are the perfect portrait of bleak.”
“As always, you are the perfect portrait of nothing.”
Jalal smiled in a slow arc. “Regarding Shahrzad—”
“I am not discussing Shahrzad with you.” The tiger-eyes fired once in an otherwise cool countenance.
“She must have rattled you last night, with a vengeance. Well done, my
lady.”
“That’s enough, Jalal.”
“Don’t be unduly vexed, cousin. It rained yesterday. You don’t have to feel guilty anymore, on top of everything else. The people of Rey are not suffering unnecessarily on your account. Or Shahrzad’s, for that matter.”
“Enough!”
At that, all traces of Jalal’s smugness vanished. Lines of consternation appeared across his forehead. “See? I wish you would confide in me. You are clearly troubled. Perhaps even afraid. Do not live in fear, Khalid-jan, for that is not a life.”
“I am not afraid. I am tired, and you are presumptuous. There is quite a difference.” Khalid turned back to the stack of scrolls before him. “It appears the riots in the city square have completely ceased?”
“Of course they’ve ceased. We are no longer executing their daughters without explanation,” Jalal muttered offhand.
When Khalid failed to respond, Jalal glanced over and saw Khalid glaring at him, with his left hand clenched in a white-knuckled fist.
“Must you always be such an unapologetic bastard?” Khalid exacted in a deathly whisper.
“Be fair. I’m only like that when it suits a purpose. I have been known to apologize when the situation warrants it.”
“I doubt you grasp the notion.”
“You are not the only one who suffers in this. Admittedly, you bear the brunt, but you are not alone. And you take on far more than necessary. Let me help. I would gladly assume some of your burden. That is what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
Khalid shoved aside the scrolls and strode to the window to his right. A marbled arch framed a midday sky above. In the garden below, lilacs bloomed, and their clean scent mingled on the breeze, blowing back into the alcove,
rustling the pages strewn on his desk.
Taunting him.
He shuttered his gaze. The sight of shining black tresses across jewel-toned silk and half-lidded hazel eyes flashed back at him. Khalid latched the screens shut, but the aroma of the pale purple blossoms lingered, much to his chagrin.
Jalal took note of Khalid’s irritation. “So you have an aversion to sunlight
and flowers now?”
“Just that particular flower.”
“And what has that flower done to you?”
Khalid remained resolutely silent, and Jalal’s eyes widened in understanding.
“Tell the gardeners to remove it,” Jalal suggested after a time, leaning back against the cushions.
“No.”
Smiling to himself, Jalal laced his fingers across his stomach and stared at the
mosaicked alcove above. “Khalid?”
“Are you still here?”
“I’m waiting for you to confide in me.”
Khalid twisted his head to Jalal and expelled a frustrated breath.
“I can wait all day. As you so cheerfully noted, the city riots have ceased . . . for the time being.” Jalal crossed his feet at the ankles.
“Fine. I’ll leave.” Khalid walked to the doors and thrust them aside.
Jalal followed in his footsteps, like a shadow with a dubious agenda. When Jalal began whistling to the domed ceiling of blue-veined agate, the muscles in Khalid’s jaw flexed.
“We’re blood, sayyidi. I am every bit as stubborn as you. It would behoove you to confide in me because, sooner or later, you’ll feel compelled to rid yourself of my enduring nuisance.”
After they strode a few more paces down the polished corridors, Khalid glanced at Jalal. “Salim . . . wishes to visit Rey on his way back to Amardha in two weeks’ time.”
Jalal froze midstep. “That—jahkesh?” he swore. “Why?”
“It should be obvious.”
“To you. Would you care to elaborate?”
“Shahrzad.”
Jalal paused and then laughed with palpable scorn. “Of course. The Jahkesh of Parthia wants to meet Khorasan’s new calipha.”
“And he will undoubtedly bring Yasmine.”
“Marg-bahr Salim Ali el-Sharif.” Jalal drew his index finger across his throat as a warning to their impending guest. “What are you going to do?”
“Your father thinks I should send Shahrzad away while Salim is here.”
Jalal snorted.
“You disagree?” Khalid asked.
“Yes. Very much.”
Khalid stopped walking. “Why?”
Jalal swiveled to face him. “Because, if the jahkesh wants to see the future of Khorasan, I can think of nothing better than the sight of you with Shahrzad al- Khayzuran. The strength she instills in you. The utter rightness of it all.”
Khalid studied Jalal’s fiery expression. “You seem quite convinced.”
“I am. As you should be, sayyidi. Trust me. And trust in this.”
“In the rightness of it all?” A look of acerbic amusement settled across Khalid’s face.
“Yes. In her and in you.”
“Two rather unreliable people, Jalal.”
“I disagree. Shahrzad is a remarkably reliable girl. Brash and unpredictable, yes, but steadfast in her convictions. It’s true you are taxing and rather bleak, but you’ve always been reliably so.” Jalal grinned.
“So you would have me throw Shazi to the wolves?”
“Shazi?” Jalal’s grin widened. “Honestly, I pity the wolves.”
“Be serious for once.”
“I am. In fact, I would take the enterprise a step further. Invite all your bannermen to Rey—every last emir. Let them see that you are not your father.
You are not the rumors that have been plaguing you of late. You are a king worthy of their allegiance . . . with a queen full of fire and promise.”
The edges of Khalid’s mouth turned upward, ever so slightly.
“My God. Are you smiling, Khalid-jan?” Jalal teased in an incredulous voice.
“Perhaps.”
The two young men continued making their way down the hallways until they passed into the main corridor, where they were joined by Khalid’s normal retinue of bodyguards. As they entered the open-air gallery, Khalid stopped short, his features darkening at the prospect before him.
Shahrzad was crossing toward the series of double doors leading to the gardens, with Despina at her side and the Rajput trailing behind her.
When she saw Khalid, she paused and pivoted on her slippered heel, gliding in his direction.
She captivated him in the way she always did, with unguarded beauty and unassuming grace. Her hair rippled behind her in shimmering waves of ebony, and her pointed chin was turned high and proud in the rays of sun streaming from above. The light gold of her mantle cloaked the deep emerald of the silk beneath it. Woven into the myriad colors of her eyes, Khalid saw the same mixture of reticence and defiance as always.
But now there was something else. A new emotion he could not place.
She wrinkled her nose at the Rajput’s looming presence, and the power behind this simple gesture pulled Khalid to her side, like sweet wine and the sound of bright laughter.
As she drew closer, the memory of last night washed over him.
The feel of her in his arms. The scent of lilac in her hair.
The futility of all else, save his lips against hers.
Of his will . . . crumbling.
“Tell me.”
“Anything.”
She opened her mouth to say something, a strangely uncertain look marring her lovely features . . .
And Khalid blew past her, without a glance in her direction.
Jalal followed him, wordlessly. Once they were out of earshot, he grabbed his cousin’s shoulder. “What are you doing?”
Khalid knocked his hand aside.
“Khalid!”
His gaze mutinous, Khalid continued striding down the corridor.
“Are you a fool?” Jalal persisted. “Did you not see her face? You wounded her!”
Khalid whirled around, seizing the front of Jalal’s qamis.
“I told you once, Captain al-Khoury: I will not discuss Shahrzad with you.”
“To hell with that, sayyidi! If you continue down this path, there won’t be much to discuss. Have you not learned your lesson yet, cousin?”
Jalal bent toward Khalid, his brown eyes harboring a cold fury.
“Was Ava not enough?” he whispered in a cruel tone.
At that, Khalid shoved Jalal back and punched him once in the jaw. His bodyguards scrambled to Khalid’s side as Jalal slid across the marble floor and wiped at his bloodied lower lip before sneering up at his king.
“Get out of my sight, Jalal,” Khalid seethed.
“Such a wizened old man in so many ways. And such a little boy in so many
others.”
“You know nothing about me.”
“I know very little, and I still know more than you, Khalid-jan. I know love is fragile. And loving someone like you is near impossible. Like holding something shattered through a raging sandstorm. If you want her to love you, shelter her from that storm . . .”
Jalal rose to his feet, straightening the insignia of the Royal Guard at his shoulder. “And make certain that storm isn’t you.”
