Read Online The Fierce and Tender Sheikh by Alexandra Sellers - Free Book Online Page B

confessed.
    Noor smiled and nodded as if that were a problem you ran into every day. “No worries. We’ll teach you.”
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    There was so much to learn, so much she had missed. When they took her through the palace, telling her about the portraits, the beautiful miniatures, the great bronze trays that formed part of the artistic treasure of the nation and the family she was part of, she was equal parts enthralled by the stories and dismayed that she knew so little of her history.
    â€œThis is your ancestor Akram,” Sharif said one day, stopping in front of a haunting portrait of a man wearing an intricately sculpted crown. “He fought a war with the great World Burner, Ahmad Shah, and the Emperor was so impressed with his bravery and strategy that, although the empire’s superior numbers meant Akram would inevitably be crushed, he offered Akram a truce. As long as Ahmad Shah lived, they were allies, and that is why Bagestan was never conquered by the Moghuls. It must have been his blood in your veins, Princess, that made you so dauntless in adversity.”
    Shakira gazed at the stern, noble face. “He is like you,” she said softly, for what she saw was not eyes and mouth, but the heroic humanity of the portrait.
    She was enchanted by Sharif’s stories, thrilled by them. Although many in her family took part in this area of her education, the stories he chose to tell her somehow seemed to connect to her own experience. Sharif’s retelling of history made her feel proud not merely of her brave ancestors, but of herself. As if, in surviving the life she had, Shakira had been following in their footsteps. He made her feel that she had always been a princess.
    â€œThis is the great Suhayr, your ancestress, who ruled Bagestan after her husband died, while her son was too young to rule. When she was threatened by a great army, she sent a message to the King. ‘Why do you invade my country, at such cost to your reputation? For if you defeat me, they will say only that you have defeated a woman. But if Allah should grant me the victory, they will say that you have been defeated by a woman.’ And he was struck by the truth of her argument, and withdrew his army.”
    She loved listening to him, and in giving her her lost past, he also gave her her lost self—as an artist restores a work of art, painstakingly filling in the blank areas of the pattern.
    The way he had given her her name.
    At night, still, when she couldn’t sleep, she often crept across to his room, clambering up the balcony to appear at his window with dark questing eyes, never quite sure of her welcome.
    Sometimes, if he were still at his desk, she would sit andwatch as he worked, drinking tea and munching the burnt sugar medallions that a servant had left warming for him. If it was late, he would put her straight to bed, and sit beside her as she fell asleep.
    The times she liked best were the nights when he tossed down his pen and they spread cushions on the balcony and he sat with her there, watching moonlight turn the garden into a place even more magical than it was by day. He told her stories from fairy tale and from history, and she told him stories of her past. England, and the camps, and the hazy, happy time before, with her family.
    She told him most often of her brother, dreaming that Mazin was still alive, and how it would be when they met again at last.
    There was one story she never told him. It came to her tongue many times, but Shakira bit it back. It was a horror story, from the camps, but however many stirring adventures Sharif described to her from her family’s past, this was a part of her that could never be told.

Seven
    A llahu akbaar…. Allahu akbaar….
    Shakira awoke in the first grey of dawn, to the sound of the muezzin.
    God is great.
    She sat up with a start, gazing around in the gloom. Where was she? Why was she alone in such a big tent? And why was the tent so