Innocent in the Sheikh's Harem (19 page)

‘Ramiz, that is the most beautiful thing I have ever heard.’

‘Yes, darling Celia, but it was a question.’

‘Yes.’ Celia smiled and laughed and cried all at once. ‘Yes.’ She threw herself into his arms, toppling them both back onto the cushions. ‘Yes, yes, yes,’ she said, punctuating each affirmative with a kiss.

A loud thump outside the door startled them both. ‘I think we’d better face your father before my guards are forced to use their scimitars on him,’ Ramiz said.

It was not to be expected that either Celia’s parent or her aunt would accept her marriage without protest. Ramiz listened with remarkable patience while first Lord Henry and then Lady Sophia asserted that such an alliance would end in disaster, would make Celia miserable, and would be the downfall of her sisters, who would be quite lost without her.

Celia countered by pointing out that her marriage to the ruler of a kingdom rich in natural resources with a port of immense strategic importance could hardly be deemed a misalliance. ‘In fact,’ she asserted, ‘you should be honoured to have Prince Ramiz as a son-in-law, Papa, for association with him can only enhance your own career prospects—provided you can persuade him to forgive your rudeness.’

Lord Henry was much struck by his daughter’s good sense. From that moment forward his affability towards Ramiz was marked. Indeed, in a lesser man such extreme cordiality might well have been branded obsequiousness.

Lady Sophia, whose objections were, to be fair, based upon her real affection for her niece, took rather more persuading. At Celia’s behest Ramiz left the matter most reluctantly in her hands, concentrating his own efforts on discussions with Lord Henry on settlements, dowries and the all-important treaty.

‘You talk as if I will be living here in isolation from the world,’ Celia said to Lady Sophia as they walked in the palace gardens later that momentous day, ‘but I hope you don’t mean to deprive me of the company of either yourself or my sisters. I will be expecting all of you to stay here with us for extended visits—starting with Cassie, if she wishes,’ she said, smiling at her sister. ‘Though she may not wish to postpone her Season.’

Cassie clapped her hands together in excitement. ‘What is a Season compared to this? Say I may stay, Aunt. I can come out next year, and anyway,’ she said mischievously, knowing perfectly well what her aunt thought of Lord Henry’s intended, ‘I don’t want to steal Bella Frobisher’s thunder by having my come-out ball in the same season as her wedding.’

As the day progressed, and Lady Sophia graciously permitted Ramiz to take her on a tour of the royal palace and its famed stables, her stance visibly mellowed. The following morning, a visit to Yasmina cemented the seal of approval. Yasmina’s mother was visiting—a formidable woman of Lady Sophia’s stamp. The two ladies spent a most amenable few hours together, with Yasmina translating, at the end of which Lady Sophia was able to declare herself happy with her niece’s proposed marriage, and even prepared to remain in A’Qadiz in order to attend the nuptials.

‘Ramiz came to call this morning,’ Yasmina said to Celia over a glass of tea. ‘Such an honour—our neighbours will be talking about it for ever.’

‘He and Akil are reconciled, then?’

Yasmina nodded happily. ‘He knows Akil only acted for the best. He loves Ramiz like a brother.’ She pressed Celia’s hand. ‘I have never seen Ramiz so happy. You will forgive me if I spoke out of turn when we first met?’

‘Yasmina, I trust you will always say what you think. Your friendship means a lot to me, I would hate it if you started treating me differently when I am Ramiz’s wife.’

‘Not just a wife, you will be a princess.’

‘I will still be Celia, and it is as Celia that I ask you to be frank with me, Yasmina. What will the people really think about our marriage? Ramiz says that what makes him happy will make his people happy, but I know it’s not that simple.’

Yasmina took a sip of tea. ‘I will not lie to you. There will be some who will find it difficult to accept simply because it is a break with tradition. But Ramiz has come to symbolise change for A’Qadiz, and a Western bride will not be such a huge surprise as it would have been two years ago when Asad ruled.’

‘You said that because I was married before—’

‘“A prince’s seed must be the only seed planted in your garden,”’ Yasmina quoted. ‘I remember. But it has been, hasn’t it? The man you were married to was a husband in name only. You need not be embarrassed. I told you, I have the gift.’

Celia shook her head, blushing. ‘No. Ramiz was the first—has been the only…’

‘Then, with your permission, that is what I will say. People will listen to me as Akil’s only wife,’ Yasmina said proudly, ‘and it is natural to talk of such things. You need not worry. I will drop the word in a few ears, and you will see. Now, we must go and talk to your aunt and my mother, and Akil’s mother too. We have a wedding to plan.’

It took four long weeks to orchestrate. Four long weeks during which it seemed to Celia that she hardly saw Ramiz, what with the need for him to personally invite all the ruling families of all his neighbours, and the need for her to receive endless visits from the wives of Ramiz’s most esteemed subjects, to say nothing of the terrifying amount of clothes which Yasmina declared necessary for a princess, and the equally terrifying regime of buffing and plucking and pampering and beautifying to which Celia was subjected.

At Ramiz’s insistence, Celia and Cassie rode out every day, with only a discreet escort, signifying to the people of A’Qadiz the start of a new regime of freedom, and signifying to his beloved Celia and her sister the trust he had in their ability to treat such freedom with discretion.

Aunt Sophia left with Lord Henry for Cairo, promising to return in time for the week-long celebrations. Having heard her confess that her one remaining reservation was that the wedding would not be a ‘real’ one, Ramiz suggested that he would be happy for an English priest to participate if she wished. Suitably reassured, she informed him that she would not insult him by demanding any such thing.

Abstention from intimacy of any sort was part of the tradition surrounding the celebrations. This Ramiz and Celia managed with extreme difficulty, but were assisted by Ramiz’s frequent absences, Cassie and Yasmina’s perpetual attendance upon Celia, and the fact that the palace harem was suddenly overrun with female visitors.

By the time the week of her nuptials finally arrived Celia was beginning to think it never would, so slowly had the days passed despite the frenzied activity.

The formal betrothal, which took place in a packed throne room, was the first ceremony. Celia, dressed in richly embroidered silks and heavily veiled, was presented to Ramiz by her father. The ring, a fantastic emerald set in a star-shaped cluster of diamonds, was placed on her right hand.

Next came a round of pre-wedding visits and feasts, with the women and men strictly segregated. Lord Henry accompanied Ramiz on the most important of these, returning after each one more exuberant as the extent of his future son-in-law’s wealth and influence was revealed.

The night before the wedding was spent by Celia in the harem, where her hands and feet were painted with intricate designs of henna like the ones she had seen on Sheikh Farid’s wives. Ramiz’s formal wedding gift was delivered—a casket of jewels which it took two men to carry, including an emerald necklace, bracelets and anklets to complement her ring, each beautifully cut stone set in a star of diamonds.

Finally it was the wedding day. Dressed in gold, veiled and jewelled, and almost sick with anticipation, Celia stood before her sister and her aunt.

Cassie, in a traditional Arabic dress of cornflower-blue silk the colour of her eyes, hugged Celia tight. ‘I’m so happy for you.’

‘And I too.’ Lady Sophia, splendid in purple, her grey curls covered by a matching turban in which feathers waved majestically, gave her a peck on the cheek. ‘Good luck, child.’

Ramiz was waiting for Celia at the doorway of the harem, which she crossed for the last time, for they would share rooms in a newly decorated part of the palace—another tradition he had broken, having insisted that they would not spend another night apart. He was dressed in white trimmed with gold, the pristine simplicity of the tunic and cloak showing to perfection his lean muscled body, the headdress with its gold
igal
highlighting the clean lines of his face, the glow in his copper eyes which focused entirely on his bride.

They progressed under a scarlet canopy through the city, a band of musicians preceding them, family and close friends taking up the rear. Crowds sang and prayed, strewing their path with orange flowers and rose petals. Children clapped their hands and screamed with delight, jostling with each other for the silver coins which were thrown for them to gather. And through it all Celia was conscious only of the man by her side, of the nearness of him, of the scent of him, of the perfection of him.

Ramiz. Her Ramiz. Soon to be her husband.

The wedding ceremony itself took place in an open tent in the desert on the edge of the city, strategically placed on a hillside to accommodate the massive crowd. The bride and groom sat side by side on two low stools on a velvet-covered dais, while first Lord Henry spoke, in the hesitant Arabic in which Akil had coached him, before formally handing over his daughter. The
zaffa
, Sheikh Farid himself, declared the couple man and wife. Ramiz removed Celia’s ring from her right hand and placed it on her left. Then he helped her to her feet and removed her veil. She was dimly aware of applause. Dimly aware of Cassie crying and of Aunt Sophia sniffing loudly. What she was most aware of was Ramiz. Her husband.

‘I love you,’ he whispered, for her ears alone, his voice sending a shiver of awareness through her. ‘My wife.’

‘I love you,’ she said, looking up at him with that love writ large across her face. ‘My husband.’

The applause became a roar as Ramiz kissed her. The music started, and she and Ramiz performed their first dance together—she nervously, he with aplomb. They sat together as the feast got underway, receiving congratulations, but as dusk fell and the first of the stars appeared Celia thought only of the night to come. They left, covered in rose petals, on horseback—a perfect black stallion for Ramiz, a grey mare for Celia, the wedding gift of Sheikh Farid. Their journey through the desert was magical and brief, silent with promise as the horses picked their way through the sand until the dark shadow of palm trees marked their arrival at an oasis.

A single tent. A fire already burning outside it. An ellipse of water lapping gently at the shelving sand. The stars like silver saucers. The new moon suspended in the velvet sky.

‘Hilal,’
Celia whispered to her husband, as they stood hand in hand looking up at it. ‘New beginnings.’

Ramiz smiled tenderly. ‘New beginnings. Come with me. I have a surprise for you—a gift.’

‘Darling husband, you have done nothing but shower me with gifts since our marriage.’

‘And I will continue to shower you with gifts for the rest of your life, since you are the greatest gift of all. Come with me.’

Ramiz led her over to the tent. As they grew nearer Celia could make out a strange contraption. It had a round base from which a wooden pole rose to support an irregular shape. It looked a bit like a very odd sundial. As they got closer Celia realised that the bulky shape was made of cloth. It was some sort of covering. She looked at Ramiz in puzzlement. He put a finger to his lips before carefully removing the cloth. There, on a perch, sat a hooded bird of prey, white and silver with black wing-tips. ‘A falcon!’

‘
Your
falcon, my beloved.’

‘Oh, Ramiz, he’s beautiful.’

Ramiz removed the hood from the bird and, taking Celia’s hand, pulled a leather gauntlet over it. ‘Keep very still.’ She hardly dared breathe as he placed the bird carefully on her arm. ‘The wings of my heart,’ he said to her, ‘my gift to you.’ He jerked her arm and the bird flew high, its magnificent wingspan outlined against the crescent moon. ‘Now, hold out your arm again, and whistle like this,’ Ramiz told her, and Celia watched breathlessly as the bird glided back, landing delicately on her gauntlet. ‘Like the falcon I fly, and like the falcon I will always return to you,’ Ramiz said, putting the hood back on the bird.

He led her into the tent. ‘I hope these are happy tears,’ he whispered, gently kissing Celia’s eyelids.

‘I didn’t know I could be so happy,’ Celia replied, twining her arms around his neck. ‘I didn’t think it was possible. Love me, Ramiz. Make love to me.’

‘I intend to, my darling. Tonight. Tomorrow. And tomorrow. And tomorrow, and…’

But he had to stop talking to kiss her. And to kiss her. And to kiss her. Until their kisses burned and the abstinence of the last few weeks fuelled the flame of their passion, and their love made that passion burn brighter than ever—brighter even than the stars in the desert sky which glittered above their tent. They made love frantically, tenderly, joyously, with an abandon new to them both, whispering and murmuring their love, shouting it out to the silent desert in a climax which shook them to the core, and which Celia knew, with unshakeable certainty, truly was the new beginning heralded by the crescent moon.

A new life together beckoning her.

And a new life growing inside her.

Historical Note

W
hile I’ve tried very hard for historical accuracy, I’ve taken a few liberties with timings and some events referred to in the story which I hope you’ll forgive me for.

In 1818, Mehmet Ali had already wrested control of Egypt from the Ottoman Sultan, and the major powers, primarily the British and the French, were maintaining a local presence in the hope of rich pickings when the Ottoman Empire collapsed. The British Consul General was Henry Salt, a renowned Egyptologist who did, like my fictional Consul General, regard the relics of ancient Egypt as there for the taking, but there the similarity between my bumbling diplomat and the real one ends.

Obviously, A’Qadiz is an invented kingdom. In my imagination it sits in what is now Saudi Arabia with a coastline a couple of days’ sail away from Sharm-el-Sheikh, which would be an ideal port for the “fast” route to India via the Red Sea. This route did play a significant role in reducing the overall journey from two years to three months, but it was about fifteen years after the story is set that this came into use, and not until 1880s that the Suez Canal made it commercially viable.

In real life, it could take up to three months to get from England to Arabia, depending upon the weather, the type of ship and the number of stopovers, though at a push it could perhaps have been done in about three weeks. Since I needed Celia’s family to come to her rescue, this proved to be a bit of an issue. I speeded up the process by giving them access to the Royal Navy, but there is no doubt that I’ve stretched credibility a bit by expecting a letter to get from Cairo to London, and Celia’s family to get to Arabia when they receive it all in the space of about six to seven weeks.

Richard Burton’s (bowdlerized) translation of
One Thousand and One Nights
is the most well-known, but it was not published until 1885. The French edition was published in 1717 however, and this is the one Celia has read.