The Reluctant Princess Page 5

  At the start, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Nedira had told me, that the Prince knew I’d been watching him every night. But he didn’t mention it, and after a while I stopped worrying that he was going to raise the subject.

  He stayed away from intimate details and instead continued to relate information about his people, about the history of Samarkand, of how he came to be the ruler, and his plans for the city in the future.

  He also asked me lots of questions about myself. He wanted to know where I had grown up, and made me describe my father’s castle, the countryside around it, and the people who tilled the land. He asked about the large cities I had visited, about London and Southampton, and about the journey across the English Channel to France.

  He was interested in the political background between England and France, but I had never been taught politics and couldn’t go into much detail. I did, however, know many ballads and songs about the two countries and their ancient rivalry, and spent some time telling him those.

  “You enjoy storytelling?” He asked the question when we stopped at an oasis to let the horses drink. He helped me dismount, and we walked a little away from the others, under the shade of a few palm and peach trees that grew near the water. A grey heron flew away from us as we walked near to him, and a lizard scuttled under a rock.

  “I do.” It was one of my greatest pleasures. “I like the way the bards paint pictures in the air with their words. And I enjoy reading the words of the poets—I like the way they sound like songs.”

  “You can read?”

  “Yes, my Prince.” I spoke hesitantly. Not all men liked it if women could read.

  “I have a magnificent library at the Palace.” He spoke with pride. “We have hundreds of books, and many scholars go there to study. It would be give me great joy to show you around there. And to teach you to read my language.”

  “If I stay.” I still hadn’t decided, although I felt a glow inside at his attempt to let me know that he would make an effort to make me feel welcome.

  His lips twitched. “If you stay.” He moved a step closer, and I held my breath. He hadn’t attempted to kiss me again since the first morning.

  Reaching out a hand, he tucked a finger under my chin and lifted my gaze to his.

  “The tunic suits you,” he murmured.

  Nedira had finally persuaded me to wear one of her lighter dresses. Made of white silk and embroidered with gold thread, it was cool on my skin, and easily the most beautiful thing I had ever worn.

  “Thank you,” I whispered.

  “You are stunning. Your skin is like fine Chinese porcelain, although it is flushed here, where you have caught the sun.” He brushed his thumb across my cheek.

  Just that simple touch was enough to send heat rising through me.

  “Interesting,” he said. “Now it is even more flushed.”

  “You like to tease me,” I snapped, annoyed that I’d reacted so obviously to his touch, but breathless with yearning.

  “I do. It amuses me.” Moving his hand to the side of my veil, he unclipped it and let it fall.

  Already used to wearing it, I glanced across nervously at the men standing talking in groups around the oasis, but I realized that even if they were shocked at a woman showing her face in public, they would never say so in front of the Prince. Most of them kept their gazes averted, apart from the occasional curious glance across.

  It was only at that moment that I realized how powerful he was.

  I had married a French count, but his household had held little respect for him. And as for my Bavarian husband, he had been disliked by his whole household, including me.

  But the Prince was not just any man. Everyone I had met here treated him with respect, and they genuinely seemed to like him. They obeyed his every command. Such was the power of his personality.

  The Prince is a stallion—beautiful, jealous, and passionate, full of fire. More than ever, I knew what Farah had meant.

  Even so, coming here hadn’t been my choice, and I hadn’t made any promises yet.

  “I’m not going to marry you,” I said.

  He chuckled and brushed his thumb across my lips. “You know how much I want to kiss you when you say that?”

  “I mean it.” My heart pounded.

  “Of course you do.” Smiling, he bent his head and kissed me.

  Once again, he was as light as the breeze, his lips barely touching mine. Mine parted as I inhaled, and I felt the touch of his tongue, also light and soft, across my bottom lip. It was the most sensual and erotic thing anyone had ever done to me, and I gasped.

  He lifted his head. “You do not like?”

  I refused to answer. “Stop trying to seduce me,” I whispered.

  “No.” He gave me a look that told me I wasn’t supposed to tell him what to do. “You are too beautiful.”

  “No I’m not.”

  “Yes, you are, and stop arguing with me.”

  “No.”

  He laughed. “Marry me, Eleanor. I want to make you my wife, my princess, and I will worship the ground you walk on.”

  “Stop teasing me.”

  “I am not teasing you. I am flirting with you.”

  “I do not understand flirting.”

  “That is why I am teaching you.”

  “I don’t want to be taught.”

  “Don’t you?” He stroked my cheek. “I want you as my wife.” His expression turned sultry. “I want you in my bed. I want to make love to you, Eleanor. Don’t you want me to make love to you?”

  My mouth had gone dry, but I shook my head.

  “Are you sure? I have a very skilled tongue.” His eyes gleamed.

  He was saying he would do to me what he had done to Nedira. My whole face burned as if I’d sat in the sun all day.

  He chuckled and touched the back of his fingers to my hot cheeks. “You like that idea?”

  “No.”

  “Did Nedira not look as if she was enjoying it?”

  It was the first time he’d referred to me watching them. I tried to look away, but he cupped my face in both his hands and held it there so he could look into my eyes.

  “Enjoying pleasure—other people’s and your own—is nothing to be ashamed of. I wanted you to watch. I want you to understand what I am offering you. Protection, security, comfort, and pleasure. These are not small things.”

  I could have drowned in his eyes. How had this man learned the art of seduction so well?

  “I cannot tell if you really want me in your bed, or if you just see me as a challenge,” I said.

  He stroked my cheeks with his thumbs. “It breaks my heart that you have been hurt by another man. What he did to you—that is not making love, do you understand? I am determined to show you the difference. Making love is a wondrous thing—it can be tender and gentle, or fun and enthusiastic. It should never, ever, be against another person’s wishes.”

  “So you won’t force me into your bed?”

  “You will come to my bed voluntarily, Lady Eleanor. I promise you that.”

  “I won’t,” I replied, but my resolve was weakening. Every tender thing he said, every kiss, each hot glance, and the way he looked at me as if he could see beneath my clothes eroded away some of my resolve.

  He glanced across the oasis and sighed, and I saw the men preparing the horses ready for the next part of the journey.

  “Time to go,” I said, half-relieved, half-disappointed.

  “Until later,” he promised, re-fastening my veil.

  I followed him from the water’s edge back to my horse, my mind whirling. Until later? What did he mean?

  You will come to my bed voluntarily, Lady Eleanor. I promise you that.

  My brain disagreed, but my heart wasn’t quite so sure.

  * * *

  Chapter Eight

  That night, after we had eaten, I took a bath and readied for bed. The last few nights, the Prince had not come to the tent until midnight. Tonight though, after I�
�d brushed my hair and was about to climb under the bedclothes, I heard voices in the main room, laughter, and the clink of bottles on glasses. Someone began playing a fiddle, which Nedira had told me was called a kamancheh.

  I hesitated, wondering if the Prince was going to entertain, and then the partitions opened, and Nedira’s head appeared.

  She smiled brightly. “Come! Join us for a glass of wine.”

  I swallowed nervously. “I was about to go to sleep.”

  She moved back, holding the partition for me to pass by her. “Please, Eleanor. We just want to talk. It is our last night before we arrive, and we thought it would be nice to all have a talk together.”

  Feeling that she wouldn’t take no for an answer, I saw that she was in her night tunic too, and so slipped past her into the other room.

  The Prince was there, and so were Farah, Malik, and Jasim, while another slave sat on the floor in the corner, playing the kamancheh. Farah sat cross-legged on the end of the bed, her dark hair tumbling around her shoulders while she chatted to Malik. The Prince was talking to Jasim as he filled six glasses with wine from a bottle, but he glanced over and smiled as I came through.

  “Good evening, Eleanor.” He held a glass of wine out to me.

  I took it, feeling the need for a drink to help calm my nerves. “Thank you.”

  He smiled and carried on pouring, continuing to talk to Jasim in his own language.

  Nedira took my hand and led me over to the right of the large bed. Taking some of the pillows scattered over the blankets, she piled them up and then patted the mattress. “Have a seat.”

  I didn’t want to go anywhere near the bed, but there wasn’t anywhere else to sit, so I perched on the edge of the mattress. Nedira flopped down, curling onto her side and propping her head with a hand.

  “I hope it has not been too arduous a journey for you,” she said.

  “This past week has been much better than the last few months,” I admitted. “Better company.”

  “The men who came with you did not seem very friendly.” Farah turned to face me. “And I did not see your servant say goodbye to you when she left.”

  “No. We were not friends.”

  “You must have been very lonely,” Malik said.

  I stared at him. “I did not know you spoke French!”

  Jasim grinned and sat next to Farah. “They… um… teach us… a little. So we may… talk at you.”

  “To you,” Nedira corrected.

  He stuck his tongue out at her, and we all laughed.

  “It is important for us to be able to talk.” The Prince walked over and sat on the right side of the bed. He stretched on his side, propping his head on a hand like Nedira, and sipped his drink. “We want to make you feel welcome.”

  “You are all very kind.” My throat tightened, and I covered my emotion by sipping my wine.

  “Everyone wanted to come and meet you,” Farah said. “Jamila and Alesha were very cross at being left behind.”

  The Prince rolled his eyes. “Alesha will sulk for weeks.”

  “I am sure you will think of a way to tease her out of it,” Nedira said. He just grinned.

  “Tell us some more about the castle you lived in before you came here,” Farah begged. “Nedira said it had a moat—what is a moat?”

  So I told them about the castle in Bavaria, explaining the difference I had seen between the buildings here and those in Europe, and explained a little about life there. They all listened, occasionally asking questions, and sometimes Nedira translated bits for Malik and Jasim, whose French was obviously very basic.

  Jasim asked a question at one point, and Farah told him to shush.

  “What did he say?” I asked.

  “He wants to know about your husbands.” She pulled a face.

  The Prince sipped his wine. “He does not believe what you told Farah.”

  So Farah had apparently told everyone what I’d said to her. I glared at her, and she shrugged, unabashed. “We have no secrets at the Palace.”

  “Why don’t you believe me?” I asked him.

  Jasim hesitated, then replied in his own language and gestured for Nedira to translate.

  “He says he does not believe you because it does not make sense that a man would be married to such a beautiful woman and not treat her like a princess.”

  My face heated as they all smiled.

  The Prince gestured for Malik to get the bottle of wine and refill everyone’s cups. “Jasim grew up at the Palace. He is innocent in the ways of the world.”

  Jasim replied with something that made Farah smack his wrist and the Prince laugh.

  “I speak the truth,” the Prince said. “He cannot conceive of the evil in some men’s hearts. You should explain to him, Eleanor. Tell him what life was like with your husbands.”

  He patted the pillows between him and Nedira. I hesitated—I was uncomfortable on the edge of the mattress, but I felt nervous about moving closer to him.

  However, the wine was threading through my veins, and the others were so relaxed and content in each other’s company that it was difficult to remain withdrawn and aloof. I shuffled across the bed, nearer the Prince, curled my legs beneath me, and accepted a fresh glass of wine from Malik.

  The others were waiting with interest to hear what I was going to say. I tried to put myself in their shoes. Perhaps all of them, like Jasim, had grown up knowing only the kind of relationship they shared with the Prince, his open attitude, and his delight in lovemaking.

  “I don’t remember much about my first husband,” I began. “I wasn’t married long before he was killed. He wasn’t violent or anything—he just didn’t care about his new young bride.”

  I took a mouthful of wine, swallowed it, and sighed. “I knew nothing about sex. My mother never explained what happened between a man and a woman, and none of the friends I had as a child knew anything about it either. On our wedding night, I cried for hours afterward. I was so scared, and it hurt so much.”

  The Prince muttered something, but he didn’t explain himself when I glanced at him, so I carried on.

  “Anyway, he was killed, and I was sent to Bavaria,” I began. “The same thing happened on that wedding night, too. I knew what to expect, but it didn’t help. He was much rougher, and it hurt even more. If I cried, it made him angry, so I learned to wait until he had gone.”

  “And he never tried to give you pleasure?” Farah asked, frowning.

  I gave a humorless laugh. “Never. Actually, I think he enjoyed hurting me. I think it made him feel powerful because he was stronger than me, and even if I fought back, I couldn’t stop him.”

  “Did you fight him?” Nedira asked, obviously puzzled. “Did you ask him to stop?”

  “Sometimes, yes, of course, but it made no difference. And he was my husband. He told me it was my duty to do whatever he asked of me. He made me feel I was wrong to say no.”

  Jasim asked something, and Farah translated, “He wants to know, did your husband hit you?”

  “He would slap me.” I swallowed another mouthful of wine, welcoming the warmth it sent through my veins. “If I refused to do something. And then he would make me do it anyway, and he would make sure it hurt to punish me.”

  “Stop!” The Prince flopped onto his back and covered his face with an arm. “I cannot bear it. Do not tell me anything else.” His fingers tightened into a fist, and beneath his arm I could see the muscles of his jaw bunched hard as if he was clenching his teeth.

  I looked back at the others. The men were frowning, and both women looked upset.

  “It is all right,” I tried to say, aware how strange it was for me to attempt to comfort them. “It wasn’t all bad there. If I did what he wanted, he left me alone most of the time.”

  The Prince yelled something, and the others flinched, suggesting it was probably a curse, while the kamancheh player stopped for a second before starting again softly.

  The Prince rolled off the bed and got to his f
eet, then strode to the door. Halting, he turned and paced back, muttering to himself.

  “Do not worry,” Farah said. “He does that a lot.”

  He glared at her, but she just sipped her wine, and he paced off again.

  “Is he angry with me?” I whispered to Nedira.

  “Of course not. He wants to kill him all over again.” She gave me a reassuring smile. “He will calm down.”

  I sighed, finished off my wine, and handed my glass to Malik, shaking my head as he gestured to pour another one. I would fall asleep if I had any more to drink.

  It was nice to finally relax, though. I stretched out my legs, leaning back onto the pillows, and watched the Prince pace while the others talked quietly among themselves.

  Deep inside, I couldn’t help but be touched. He was angry because another man had hurt me. He wanted to protect me. Nobody had ever wanted to protect me before.

  I tried to imagine what it would feel like to belong to this man—to have his protection all the time.

  To be loved by him.

  He let out a long sigh, then turned to look at me. My breath caught in my throat. He was so handsome. He stood with his hands behind his back, surveying me thoughtfully. He wore a pair of dark blue loose trousers and a lovely light blue tunic, stitched at the neck and wrists with a beautiful gold and silver brocade.

  He looked every inch a prince, like a character from one of the stories I had spent hours reading in the library of the Bavarian castle to pass the time. He wanted to show me his library, and to teach me to read his language. No one had ever been kind enough to be interested in me before.

  It breaks my heart that you have been hurt by another man, he had said. What he did to you—that is not making love, do you understand? I am determined to show you the difference.

  His lips curved, and his tense shoulders relaxed as I continued to meet his gaze.

  Slowly, he walked toward the bed, finished off the wine he’d left on the table, and then sat beside me.

  Stretching out, he rested an elbow on the pillow and propped his head on a hand.

  “Enough talk about bad things.” He picked up a strand of my hair where it curled on the pillow. “Let us talk about pleasure instead.”