Usama spread his hands. ‘I have no idea what you mean. I visited Jerusalem only to serve you, my lord.’
Nur ad-Din laughed. ‘Me and the ladies of Jerusalem. I know you too well, Usama. I’ll wager that there’s more than one Frank in Jerusalem who will be expecting a suspiciously dark-skinned child.’
All eyes turned to Usama. ‘How can I help it,’ he asked, ‘when their women are so obliging, and their men so lacking in honour?’
‘Ah ha, you see!’ Nur ad-Din exclaimed. ‘You are a scoundrel.’
‘Do tell,’ Asimat said, her eyebrows raised.
‘If you insist, my lady,’ Usama said with a smile. ‘Just a few days ago, on my way back from Jerusalem, I passed through the valley of the Kadisha, where I found myself in the bed of a kind Frankish lady, the wife of a wine merchant.’ He paused as the servants entered with two more dishes – fragrant, roasted
lamb with chickpeas and onions, and a dish of oranges and figs.
‘And how did you happen to find yourself in her bed?’ Khaldun asked.
‘It was an arduous journey,’ Usama said with a wink. ‘I was tired, which is what I told her husband when he returned and found us together. “What are you doing with my wife?” he demanded. I told him that I had come in to rest. I found the bed made up, so I lay down to sleep. “And my wife slept with you?” he asked. “The bed is hers,” I replied. “How could I prevent her from getting into her own bed?” The wine merchant, as you might imagine, grew quite upset at this. His face turned red and he shook his fist at me. And do you know what he said?’
‘I’ll kill you here and now?’ Yusuf offered. Usama shook his head.
‘I’ll have your balls for this, you Saracen bastard?’ Nur ad-Din suggested.
‘Not even close.’ Usama grinned as he anticipated the punch line.
‘Did he beat his wife for her infidelity?’ Khaldun asked.
‘No,’ Usama said. ‘He shook his fist and roared, “By God, if you do it again I will take you to court!”’
There was a moment of silence, and then Nur ad-Din began to roar with laughter. One by one, the others joined him, all except Turan and Nadhira. Yusuf examined his brother, who looked away and forced an unconvincing laugh.
‘But surely not all Franks are so permissive,’ Asimat said when the hilarity had subsided. ‘There must be some with a sense of honour.’
Usama nodded. ‘I have a theory regarding this. The longer the Franks remain in our lands, the more they adopt our ways. Eventually, they may even become civilized.’
‘Ridiculous,’ Turan snorted. ‘They will always be savages. It is in their nature.’
‘I am not so sure,’ Yusuf said. ‘I have a Frank amongst my
men, a former slave. When I bought him, he was as dirty and savage as the rest of his kind. Now he dresses as we do. He reads and speaks Arabic. He is as civilized as any of us.’
‘You see!’ Usama declared.
Asimat turned her dark eyes upon Yusuf. ‘I should like to meet this Frank of yours.’
‘Of course.’
‘But is he a jealous man?’ Khaldun asked.
‘I do not know,’ Yusuf said. ‘I have never seen him with a woman.’
‘This is no man. He is a saint,’ Nur ad-Din declared. ‘Or a eunuch!’ He chuckled at his own joke.
‘And he proves nothing,’ Asimat added. ‘He may be civilized, but we know nothing of his sense of honour.’ She paused, glancing at Nur ad-Din. ‘Perhaps the Franks are not wrong to give their women more freedom.’
Nur ad-Din’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Freedom for what, Wife?’ he demanded, his voice rising. ‘To be prostitutes and whores? To bear other men’s children? No, women must be protected. Their place is in the home.’ He met Asimat’s eyes. ‘The good wife is the one who bears many sons. You do not need freedom to do that.’
‘Well said,’ Khaldun agreed, slapping the floor for emphasis.
Asimat flushed red. ‘I see,’ she said tersely. ‘I am not feeling well, Husband. Please excuse me.’ Nur ad-Din nodded, and Asimat rose.
‘Makin!’ Nur ad-Din called, and a mamluk stepped into the room. ‘Escort Asimat back to the palace.’ Asimat pulled her veil over her face and followed the mamluk out into the courtyard.
‘May Nadhira and I also be excused, Husband?’ Zimat asked Khaldun. He nodded, and the two women rose. ‘We will leave you men to your talk. Good-night, brothers,’ Zimat said. She gave a small bow, and they left.
‘I fear I will have no peace tonight,’ Nur ad-Din said with a sigh when they had gone. ‘I have made Asimat unhappy.’ He
cocked his head as a thought came to him. ‘She seems to like you well enough, Yusuf. Perhaps you can amuse her. You will visit her, tomorrow.’
Yusuf’s eyes went wide. ‘Are you sure, my lord?’
Nur ad-Din smiled. ‘You are an honourable man. I am sure I can trust you. But remember this,’ he added, and his smile faded. ‘I am no Frankish wine merchant. If you touch my wife, I will have your head.’
John shivered in the chill night air as he stepped out into the courtyard, leaving the mamluks behind him in the gatehouse. The men were laughing and joking as they played at dice, but John had no stomach for their good spirits. He walked to the fountain at the centre of the courtyard and stood staring at the main door into the villa, light peaking out around its edges. Zimat was there, just beyond that door. How long had it been since he last saw her? Three years? And now she was married with children. John doubted if she would even remember him. He sighed and looked up at the bright stars above.
The door to the house opened, spilling bright light into the courtyard. A mamluk stepped out, followed by a veiled woman. John’s heart quickened. He examined her closely, and their eyes met as she passed around the far side of the fountain. The woman looked quickly away. She was not Zimat. John watched as she stepped into a litter. As the gate swung open, four burly mamluks emerged from the gatehouse and carried the litter away. The gate was just swinging closed when John heard a creaking sound behind him. He turned to see a veiled woman standing in a shadowy doorway that opened into the courtyard from the side.
‘Zimat?’ John breathed.
‘John,’ the woman whispered. ‘Come quickly.’
John stepped through the door, and the woman closed it behind him. She took his hand and led him down a dimly lit hallway and into a bedroom on the right. She shut the door and
removed her veil as she turned to face him. It was Zimat. Her face was thinner and her features sharper than when John had last seen her, but she had the same enchanting, dark eyes. John opened his mouth to speak, but no words came. His mouth felt dry and his heart pounded. He had played this moment out a million times in his mind, but now that it had come, he felt awkward and confused.
Zimat stepped close. ‘I thought you would be happy to see me, John. Surely you have not forgotten me.’
‘Of course not.’ He embraced her, and she pressed her head against his chest. Her hair had been oiled and smelled of jasmine, as he remembered. After a moment she began to sob quietly, her shoulders shaking. ‘What is wrong?’ John asked. ‘What has happened?’
‘Do you still love me?’ Zimat asked.
‘You know I do,’ John whispered and kissed her. Her lips were soft, and her mouth, when she opened it to him, tasted of honey. But after a moment she pulled away to once more bury her face in his chest.
‘I never stopped loving you,’ she murmured, ‘even when I was in the arms of my husband.’
‘Your husband—’ John’s brow furrowed, and he gently pushed Zimat away. ‘I should go. Khaldun will be missing you.’
‘No, he is more interested in his new wife, Nadhira. He has not visited my bed in weeks.’
‘Why? Surely he is pleased with you.’
Zimat lowered her head. ‘I have borne him two daughters, but no sons. It is not my fault. None of Khaldun’s concubines has produced a male child.’
‘I see. So now you come to me for comfort,’ John said, his voice hardening. ‘And I was fool enough to believe you loved me.’ He stepped past her and put his hand on the door. ‘I will not be your toy, Zimat. And I will not put both our lives at risk just so you may spite your husband.’
Zimat grabbed his arm. ‘Wait! There is more that I must tell
you.’ John lowered his hand. ‘Khaldun’s new wife is not faithful to him. She sleeps with another, hoping he will give her a son.’
‘Why tell me this, not your husband?’
‘Because he would not believe me, and because Yusuf will want to know. The man that Nadhira lays with is Turan.’
John’s eyes widened. ‘Are you sure?’
Zimat nodded. ‘I have seen them together.’
‘You were right to tell me,’ John said.
‘You will tell Yusuf?’
‘Yes.’
‘Thank you.’ Zimat stepped closer to John and placed a hand on his chest. She looked up at him with her dark eyes. ‘I have missed you, John. May I see you again?’
John hesitated. He knew he should say ‘no’, but as he looked into her eyes, he felt his resistance crumble. ‘Yes,’ he said at last, ‘but how?’
‘Come to my chambers at night.’
‘I cannot. It will cost both of us our lives if I am seen.’
Zimat flashed a brilliant smile. ‘You won’t be. I will tell you how.’
The next morning Yusuf presented himself at the door to the harem, which occupied its own wing of the palace. He was met by the tawashi – the chief eunuch in the service of Nur ad-Din’s wives. ‘You are expected,’ he said, and led Yusuf to Asimat’s chambers. At the door, he paused and turned to Yusuf. ‘I will be watching,’ he said. Then he knocked and pushed the door open. Sunlight from a row of broad windows on the far wall spilled into the room, illuminating the saffron-yellow carpet, a canopied bed in the corner and a large loom at which two servant girls sat, passing a pair of shuttles back and forth as they wove red and gold threads into a weft of tautly stretched, white wool fibres. The only other furniture was a washbasin. Asimat sat in one of the windows, reading. She looked up from her book and frowned.
‘Forgive me for disturbing you, my lady,’ the tawashi said with a bow. ‘May I present Yusuf ibn Ayub. He has come at the request of lord Nur ad-Din.’ The eunuch bowed again and backed out, closing the door behind him.
The girls at the loom kept working, ignoring Yusuf. Asimat stared at him fixedly. The soft morning light illuminated her from behind, outlining her form underneath a thin caftan of green silk. Yusuf shifted awkwardly and looked away, then looked back. ‘Well?’ Asimat demanded.
‘Nur ad-Din—’
‘My husband has sent you to cheer me,’ Asimat said, cutting him off. ‘I do not need cheering. You may go.’ She returned to her book. Yusuf did not move, and after a moment, Asimat looked up. ‘Why are you still here?’
‘I am sorry, Khatun, but you are misinformed. You husband did indeed send me to cheer you, but that is not why I am here. I have come because I wish to speak with you.’
Asimat’s eyebrows rose. ‘That is unfortunate, because I do not wish to speak with you.’
Yusuf felt himself flush, but he held his ground. ‘In that case, my lady, I will do the talking.’
Asimat sighed in exasperation. ‘Since it seems I cannot get rid of you, what did you wish to discuss?’
‘Damascus. You visited the city when Nur ad-Din took it.’
Asimat stared at him for a moment. ‘Very well,’ she said, rising from her seat in the window. ‘Come, we will speak in the gardens. Kaniz, bring me my veil.’ One of the servants left the room and came back with a white silk veil, which Asimat pulled over her face. She opened the door to find the tawashi waiting just outside. ‘I wish to visit the gardens,’ she told him.
‘Of course, Khatun,’ the eunuch said. He clapped loudly, and a moment later a dozen eunuch guards marched into the hallway. They surrounded Yusuf and Asimat as they left the palace, heading across the broad open space within the citadel towards the gardens on the far side. Asimat walked ahead
of Yusuf and did not speak. She did not turn to look as they passed the mamluks training in the middle of the field. Finally they came to the gardens. Asimat took a gravel path that passed through an orange grove and into a large rose garden containing dozens of varieties in shades of red, white, yellow, pink and orange. The eunuch guards waited outside the garden.
Asimat stopped before a rose bush covered in loose, pink blossoms. She picked a flower and smelled it. ‘A damask rose. They were first cultivated in Damascus. They always remind me of my childhood.’
‘I, too, spent much of my childhood in Damascus,’ Yusuf said. ‘My family lived in Baalbek, but we had a home in the city, not far from the great mosque.’
‘I know it well,’ Asimat said. ‘I was rarely allowed outside the palace. Most of what I know of the city, I saw from the windows of my room. It faced the mosque. I used to watch the people in the market square behind the mosque and wonder what it would be like to be one of them.’
‘Surely you do not regret your place in life. You are married to the greatest ruler in all of the East, perhaps in the world.’
Asimat sighed and dropped the rose. ‘No, I do not regret my place,’ she said as she resumed walking. ‘But I remember once visiting the orchards of Damascus to pick mangos. I must have been five or six. As I was carried to the orchards in a litter, I saw two children my age playing in one of the gardens beside the road. They seemed so happy.’
‘I too visited those orchards,’ Yusuf said. ‘They are beautiful, a paradise. But the people there are not so happy. They lead a hard life.’
Asimat nodded. ‘I miss Damascus. Seeing it again after all these years was hard. I had not visited it since my marriage. That was long ago, just before the Christian siege.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Fourteen, barely a woman. Nur ad-Din was more than twice my age. I was terrified of him. I begged my father not to send
me away, but it was an important alliance. It could not wait.’ She smiled. ‘I was wrong to be afraid. Nur ad-Din is a kind man.’
‘And yet he says you are unhappy.’
‘I have not given him a son,’ Asimat explained. ‘You heard Nur ad-Din last night. That is my one duty as a wife, and I have failed.’
‘You are young still.’
Asimat shook her head. ‘After eight years, what hope do I have? I have donated to the mosques and prayed to Allah, but my prayers have not been answered. I fear they never will be.’ They walked on in silence, their feet crunching on the gravel, until they reached the end of the path. ‘What of you?’ Asimat asked. ‘Do you have a wife?’