The Fierce and Tender Sheikh Read online

  A piercing shriek electrified them all.

  “Aminaaaaaa!” screamed Jamila, and then, “Mama, it’s my Amina!” and she launched herself off her mother’s lap to run to Noor, wrapped her hands around the doll, tore it from Noor’s startled grasp, and danced around the studio, the doll hugged to a cheek wet with tears.

  Then she turned to her mother with an expression that had the studio audience groping for their own hankies.

  “We have Baba and Amina, Mama. Can we go home now?”

  “Dear Princess Shakira,” read the note.

  I have seen you on television. What has happened to you and the Gulf Islanders is dreadful, but it has been very difficult to know what to do. When I saw that little girl, I knew I couldn’t remain silent. They call it “corporate secrets,” but I can’t square it with my conscience any longer.

  It’s all eyewash. They never wanted to turn those islands into a resort—that was just the excuse they gave for getting rid of the islanders. What they want is exclusive patents on the healing herbs that the islanders use in their traditional medicine. Those herbs have been proven effective in clinical studies. Webson Attary Pharmaceuticals have got scientists working on synthesizing six different herbs, so they can patent the formulae.

  But that means stopping the island trade in the natural herbs. And the legal side is complicated, because some drug companies are getting slapped with lawsuits for things like that. Who knows where the judgement of the International Court will go in a few years? And because the herbs are unique to the islands, it might mean having to pay the islanders big royalties down the road.

  That’s what it’s all about—ensuring the future profits of Webson Attary Pharmaceuticals. And it could be very big—one of the herbs that the islanders use to heal burns and abrasions looks like having important skin rejuvenation properties. It’s got a very expensive future as an ingredient in anti-aging cream.

  You’ll get everything you need from the document attached. It’s top secret—no one’s supposed to have a copy. It’s all in there. There’s a lot of technical language. Among other things it says that the turtles are indeed unique to the islands, and technically they could be called “endangered” because of the high risk of their small numbers and having only one known habitat. But that’s not a situation human beings have created. In fact, there has been no significant decrease in their numbers over the past fifty years. So the islanders are not a problem.

  I’m sorry I can’t sign this. I hope I meet you one day and can signal to you, so you’ll know who I am.

  They walked in the garden at night, his arm around her, her head against his heart. Around them the fountains burbled and sang, and the scent of sleepy roses perfumed the air.

  “It couldn’t have happened without you,” Sharif said. “Congratulations, Princess. Not everyone can turn life’s hard experiences around and make something so positive out of them.”

  “Does Ashraf say the islanders will be able to go home now?”

  “Yes, this has changed everything. The original contract for the lease of the islands wasn’t signed in good faith, which means the company won’t be able to ask the courts to enforce it. But in any case the fallout from public opinion if the company now proceeded with a claim is too big to risk.”

  Shakira smiled and sighed.

  “This also means we’ll have an easier time with the tribal council. Now that we’re no longer fighting for their agreement to resettle the islanders inland we’ll make headway on other issues.”

  She lifted her head and looked up into his face. “It’s all because of you. So many lives changed so completely, because you found me in that camp. Especially my life.”

  He was silent for a long breath. Then he murmured, “My life, too, Princess.”

  Nervously she withdrew, but his arm held her firm, and she subsided against his heart again. “I love you, Shakira,” he said softly.

  Her blood created a flurry in her breast. “Do you?” she whispered. “Do you love me?” Tears spurted over her cheeks, as if being loved by him were too much for her heart to bear. “Oh, Sharif!”

  He turned to face her, wrapping his arms around her as the night embraced the moon. “Very, very much. I want you to be my wife. Will you?”

  “Oh!” Her breath caught, and she swallowed over the lump that had suddenly leapt into her throat. “Oh, Sharif! I don’t think—oh, Allah, marry? How could I be married? I’m not like Noor, or even Jalia. I’m not a woman, I’m still half a boy. You know that better than anyone. I’m so ignorant about everything. I need to go to school, and I need—oh, how can I be a wife?”

  “Do you love me, Shakira?”

  His voice was half rough, half gentle, and her skin shivered with the danger that beckoned. “Yes—oh, yes, I do! But—”

  He bent his head and his mouth came closer and closer while her heart kicked and struggled. Tenderly, he brushed her lips with his, and a kind of sweetness she had never tasted before flowered in her, as if her heart tasted the scent of roses.

  He lifted his mouth a little away, and rested his forehead against hers. “If you love me, the rest can wait, Shakira. We can take it as slowly as you need. But tell me you love me.”

  It was the first time in her life that anyone had asked for her love, and her heart cracked with the sweet pain and the newness of it. To be someone whose love was valued—oh, how far she had come from Burry Hill!

  “Is it—is it important to you?” she pressed, just to prolong the sweetness.

  “Nothing has ever been as important.”

  She could not hold out longer against that. “I love you, Sharif. I don’t think I knew what love was before I loved you. But it’s—it’s when your heart opens, isn’t it? When someone gets inside your heart and you’re glad they’re there.”

  “Yes,” he said, for he, too, had learned that frightening joy. “Yes, that’s what love is.”

  “And then you find that there’s room for lots more people, too. I—I thought I loved my family, but my heart didn’t know how to open right away. And then you went in and now—now I can love everyone I want to love.”

  His arms wrapped her so tightly then that she couldn’t breathe, but it seemed you didn’t need breath when you had love. His mouth sought hers again, but although she lifted her lips he sensed her fear, and again, though he trembled with the effort, his lips only brushed hers.

  “Promise to be my wife,” he whispered.

  “But I’m so—I told you why.”

  “Shakira, you are perfect and true. What is it you fear?”

  “I don’t know,” she whispered helplessly, for how could she tell him?

  He looked at her closely, as if he guessed something, and she dropped her eyes.

  “Let’s sit down,” Sharif said after a moment. He led her to a bench under a rustling tree, and they sat. Above them the bright moon sailed above a wisp of grey cloud in the lush, purple-black sky. Its light gleamed on the turquoise dome, and on the sparkling fountain.

  “I want to tell you a story,” he said.

  “I love your stories. Who is it about?” she demanded. In the distance she heard music, and her grandmother’s voice.

  When the incense does not burn

  It gives off no perfume

  Only those who have been consumed by love

  Understand me….

  “It’s about you, Shakira, as all good stories are,” Sharif said. “Listen.”

  Sixteen

  “Once upon a time,” he began, and with a sigh she nestled against his side. “Once upon a time, there was a young man named Yunus. He worked hard and saved his money, and one day he decided that it was time for him to marry.

  “Now, Yunus had several times seen a pretty girl at his neighbour’s window, and he thought that she would make him a fine wife. So he went to his neighbour, and asked him for the girl’s hand in marriage.

  “But the neighbour looked gloomy. ‘Yes, it is time my Fatima was married,’ he said, ‘bu
t I would not inflict her on you, Yunus, good friend that you are. For although she is lovely to look on, she has the voice of a corncrake, and a very bad temper with it. There is only one thing which can be done to correct this, and it is far too difficult for me to suggest that you attempt it. No one should go to so much trouble for my little Fatima.’

  “But Yunus was undaunted, and he asked what could be done. ‘I have been told by a wise man,’ said the neighbour, ‘that three drops of water from the Well of Sweetness, carried in a tiny bottle, will cure her bad temper.’

  “‘Then I will go and get the water,’ Yunus declared. ‘Where is the Well of Sweetness?’

  “‘The woman who sleeps on the steps of the mosque knows where it is,’ said the neighbour. ‘But let me urge you not to go to so much trouble, my friend!’

  “But Yunus was determined and, having first purchased a tiny bottle in the bazaar, he approached the beggar on the steps of the mosque. He dropped a gold coin in her bowl, and then asked her how he could find the Well of Sweetness.

  “‘Travel seven days to the west, and seven to the east,’ she said. ‘There you will find a river. Cross that, and you will come to where a Giant lives. Ask the Giant what you want to know.’

  “Yunus followed her directions until he came to the river. As the ferryman rowed him across, he asked about the Giant, and learned that the Giant lived in a cave in the mountains. ‘But be polite, or he will kill you with his club,’ advised the ferryman.

  “Yunus walked a long, weary way, and at last met the Giant. Politely wishing him peace, he explained his mission. ‘Since you have spoken so respectfully to me, I will tell you,’ said the Giant, ‘though few who come this way are so polite, and I usually kill them. Inside my cave is a secret passage, guarded by a three-headed dragon. When you see him, say, By leave of Suleiman, Son of David, upon whom be peace, let me pass! And the dragon will let you pass.’

  “All was as the Giant had foretold, and after passing the dragon, Yunus travelled far along the dark passage. Finally there was a shaft of light ahead, and he saw a beautiful fairy pulling up a bucket of water from a deep well. ‘Peace be upon you!’ Yunus cried, and the fairy replied, ‘And upon you, peace, mortal! Come, and I will fill your bottle.’ And she put three drops of water into the little bottle and gave it back to him.

  “Then he went back along the passage, and it seemed a longer and harder way to him than before, with the darkness cloying and stones cutting his feet. But finally he reached the dragon, recited the magic sentence, and was again allowed to pass.

  “When he reached the Giant’s cave again, he showed him the bottle of water from the Well of Sweetness, and the Giant commended him. ‘Now, mortal,’ he said, ‘you must work for me a year and a day, and then you may go home.’

  “So Yunus served the Giant for a year and a day, tending and milking his goats and cooking the Giant’s meals. He washed his dishes and scrubbed his shirts and spread them to dry on bushes, and he kept the fire alight. And at the end of a year and a day, the Giant was so pleased with his work that he gave him a bag of gold and sent him on his way.

  “When he returned home, Yunus was greeted by his neighbour. ‘You have been so long away, friend!’ exclaimed the man. ‘We were afraid for you. What an experience you must have had! Did you get the water from the Well of Sweetness?’

  “Yunus told him of his adventures, gave him the bottle of magic water to give to Fatima, and went home to prepare himself for the wedding. When all the arrangements were complete, his bride appeared, veiled and magnificently dressed, and the celebrations began. Yunus felt he was the happiest man alive.

  “That night, when the feasting was over, Yunus removed Fatima’s veil, and found her to be as beautiful as he could wish. Her voice was sweet and soft as the cooing of a dove. ‘Dear wife,’ he said, ‘what wonders there are in the world, Alhamdolillah! How glad I am, hearing your soft voice, that I went to the Well of Sweetness for your sake!’

  “‘What do you mean, husband?’ his bride asked. And Yunus explained that her father had sent him to get the magic water to soften her voice and improve her temper.

  “At this Fatima threw back her head and laughed and laughed. ‘It was not I who had the bad temper, husband, but my mother! My father was told by a wise man that three drops of water from the Well of Sweetness on her tongue would transform her. And so he made up his mind that whoever asked for me in marriage should be made to go for the water.’

  “Yunus laughed with her, and he and his wife were so happy together that they never had a cross word all their lives.”

  Shakira sat in silence while he waited and watched. “That’s about me?” she asked at last. “I don’t understand.”

  “Don’t you see that Yunus has seen perfection and loves it, but because of some flaw in himself, some doubt, he imagines that his future bride is flawed? It may be that Yunus has to go on a quest, but his travails and his search do not affect his bride. They affect Yunus, so that in the end he is brought to a state where he is able to appreciate what Fatima is. That is the true end of most quests, isn’t it?”

  “But who am I in the story? Yunus or Fatima?”

  “You are both, aren’t you?” Sharif said.

  “Both?”

  “And perhaps everyone else also. Fatima is your true inner self, Shakira. The doubting part of you thinks that she is flawed, but she is perfectly beautiful and true. It may be that your outer self has to be brought to a state where you can recognize your own truth, but your inner self needs no transformation.”

  She sat silent, taking it in. Was it true? Was the fear that she felt just that—fear? She hardly knew what she was afraid of. Of not being good enough. Of still being too close to the boy who had learned to think himself worthless, unlovable.

  She was afraid of being judged.

  4

  The Beloved

  The Dream of the Beloved

  In the dream she swam in a jade-and-emerald sea, cool and sweet and spangled with gold, and he was beside her. Naked she swam, and the water held her close as a lover, so that with every wave that lapped, a delicious pleasure rippled across her skin.

  Then it was not the water that held her, but his body, for he lay under her like a bed, and now his hands and the waves caressed her together.

  In the dream he kissed her, and her heart sounded her yearning, and her delight. In the dream she had no fear as his hands cupped her cheeks, her head, and held her face to the sweet whisper of his mouth on her flesh. His lips brushed her eyelids, the bridge of her nose, her cheek, her ear, and her blood pulsed eagerly up under the caress, seeking his warmth, and then rushing to carry it to every part of her being.

  In the dream her body melted into his with a divine and fearless hunger, and she yearned against him, so that he felt her trust and her love as one thing. His arms encircled her with fierce and tender passion, and his hand cupped her head and drew her up to his wildly seeking kiss. And only then did she understand how long he had waited for her, and how hungrily.

  His face was shadowed in the dream, but she knew he smiled. His eyes were dark and as deep as the sea, and in them she saw a glow. The glow reached deep into her heart, and she felt its touch all through her being.

  “It’s love!” she exclaimed.

  “Yes,” he said, though she could not hear his voice.

  Was it his hands, or was it the sea, that began to stroke her then, so that joy and love and melting pleasure pulsed through her? She sighed and moaned, and stretched herself luxuriously against his body the sea, and felt his touch everywhere.

  She clasped him tight, and then she knew that he was herself, and she was him, that they were one being, and one with the sea. Then the joy was urgent in her, like a storm, pressing up through soul and heart and body, seeking a way to the sea.

  Pleasure beat unmercifully against their bodies. It drew her down into the green depths. Deep she went, and deeper, amongst spangles of golden light. The water, or his hands, stroked
and loved her, for he stayed at her side as she sank, and the pleasure pushed and pushed in her.

  Deep within the mysterious green then she saw that they were among shining domes and minarets. And as they moved under arches and between rows of pillars, she saw a golden pavilion encased in a golden glow.

  Inside the pavilion there were chests of jewels, red and green and blue and white, yellow and turquoise, purple and black. And there were treasures of gold and silver. And all the jewels and treasures were her own.

  “Oh!” she cried. “I didn’t know this!”

  He turned to her, and wrapped her again, and then at last the beating, pushing pleasure found its way. It flooded up and coursed through them, and over them, and made its way out into the endless green sea. Then she swam in the sea of pleasure, and was part of it.

  And then came love, a deep, flooding love that filled her, heart and body and soul, with calm and knowing.

  Her heart lifted and soared, and they followed it up till they floated on the surface of the green, green sea, and the night sky sparked and spangled all around them.

  Seventeen

  For the next two days she could think of nothing but Sharif. His eyes, the way they had looked at her, flames of moonlight and passion in their depths—the memory of it trembled in her bones. As if she was precious and he was frightened to the soul that she might not love him.

  She did love him. Oh, she loved him! She couldn’t prevent herself loving him, though she knew how dangerous it was to love. How fragile existence was.

  But she could not give him the answer he wanted.

  She did not see him often, because the tribal leaders were in the palace and Sharif was sitting in on the negotiations. For the second day she ate lunch with Noor and Jalia, who were now full of their wedding plans, having dress fittings with Kamila and discussing music and the guest list replies and a host of other things.