Kidnapped by the Sheikh (6 page)

Sheikh Akbar looked at her bemused and Sarah was struck by how utterly different their worlds were. She was talking about stabling costs in London and pony rides in Europe to a man that lived as a warlord in a camel-hair tent amongst the Bedouin. Their lives were too different for them to come together permanently. Her dreams of living with a handsome sheikh in the desert and helping the local women were just that: dreams. She had to face reality and find a way to get back to civilisation. “I can ride a horse,” she said. “But how will I know where to go?”

“I’ll show you the way,” the sheikh replied, “but it’s too hot to set off now. We can go in an hour, when the sun’s a bit lower, before night sets in.” He then leaned towards her and began to unbutton her blouse.

“I am taking our guest on a tour of Sakara to show her some of the Al-Zafir territory,” the sheikh announced to a group of his men who were crouched outside one of the smaller tents. “Saddle those two horses and fill up a couple of large skins with water.”

The men nudged one another and made a few lewd references about how their leader was a master of women. Sarah pretended she couldn’t understand them. She guessed that her long stay in the sheikh’s tent alone with him hadn’t gone unnoticed and who knows what his men had heard. She doubted that the sheikh’s tent was soundproof, despite all the carpets and hangings, and anyone listening outside would have soon realised that Sarah was having more than just a friendly chat with their tribal leader. However, she didn’t care what his men thought; in a few moments, she would never see them again and she didn’t regret her moments with Akbar. It had been the most blissful experience of her life and she could certainly live with a few vulgar remarks in return.

“Are you ready?” the sheikh asked.

She certainly wasn’t ready to leave him, but she knew that they wouldn’t be separated quite yet and she looked forward to riding out into the desert with him. However, she did want to say goodbye to Minna and Fatima, but when she asked the sheikh whether she could, he advised against it. He said it would be suspicious, because they were only meant to be going for a short ride. Reluctantly, Sarah agreed and mounted the horse that was stamping its hooves restlessly next to her. It was a stunning chestnut Arab stallion and she hoped she wouldn’t have any problems controlling it. However, once she was in the saddle, she could feel its gentle nature and it wasn’t long before it was responding compliantly to her movements.

Once they were far away enough from the camp and riding at a steady pace, she pulled her horse closer towards his. “Where are you taking me? To a desolate place to seduce me again?” she asked.

The sheikh looked at her. She could see the deep longing in his eyes. “If I had my way, I would seduce you every night for a thousand nights.”

Sarah took hold of the leather reins in one hand and reached across with the other to stroke the sheikh’s lips with her fingers.

“There’s no time for that now,” he said, taking her hand in his own and kissing it. “I must get you to the road before nightfall.” He dropped her hand, gave his horse a firm kick and galloped off across the open desert. Sarah nudged her horse, which lost no time in coming up fast behind its companion.

Sarah and her horse were hot and tired by the time she spotted a badly tarmaced road in the distance. She brought her stallion to a halt and reached down for some of the water that hung in a saddlebag off the horse’s side. The sheikh did the same.

“This is where I leave you.” He pointed to the deserted road ahead.

“But this isn’t the road we came on when you brought me to your camp.” After the sheikh abducted her, they’d gone off the main road and along dirt paths in the desert for the entire journey. She didn’t remember them driving down an empty road like the one ahead of her.

“This road will take you back to the capital. That is your way to freedom.”

Was it? It looked like the way to a certain death. Sarah only had enough water to last maybe half a day at best. It wouldn’t be long before she died of dehydration under the desert sun. Maybe she’d been wrong to trust the sheikh and let him lead her out to this bare stretch of land. She looked around. The sheikh’s camp was far away now and nowhere to be seen. In fact, there was nothing to be seen but desolate desert. “How do I know that’s the correct road? It isn’t the way we took in your Jeep.”

“When I travel, it’s easier for me to go across the desert and avoid as many roads as possible. There are some villages along the way that are…” The sheikh paused for a moment and patted the coarse black mane of his horse before he continued. “Some of the villages along this road are hostile towards me and my men.”

“Is it safe for me to travel this way?”

“Probably,” was all he said.

“Probably? You never said that this would be dangerous.”

“Yazan is a dangerous country. Surely you must know that by now. The other way is across the desert, but you don’t know how to navigate your way through it and also, it would take too long on a horse. If you follow the road, you should be within sight of the capital in an hour or so. When you get there, take the horse to a man called Ahmed. He has a stall in the market on Al Wadi Street selling knives and swords. He’s a friend of mine and will look after the horse.”

“Why can’t you ride back to the capital with me?”

“Because I have to get back to my people. I’ll tell them that you escaped. I’ll explain that I tried to chase you, but your horse was too fast. I made sure that you were given one of our best horses.”

Sarah didn’t know a lot about Arab stallions, but she could see that the horse she was on was much stronger than the sheikh’s.

“But when you pick up this horse from your friend Ahmed and bring it back to the camp, won’t it look a bit suspicious?” Sarah asked, pointing out the obvious flaw in the plan.

“I won’t bring it back. I’ll sell it and return with a large sum of money. I’ll be sorry to lose a horse as fine as this, but it’ll mean that I can tell everyone that even though you escaped, I managed to negotiate a handsome settlement for you. My men won’t care then whether you were a doctor or a diplomat; they’ll be impressed that I got so much money for a hostage that I didn’t even have.” The sheikh laughed, obviously very pleased with his plan.

However, Sarah wasn’t so impressed. He was sending her out into a barren wasteland on her own just so he could keep his male pride and show off to his friends. “If you were a real man, you’d tell them the truth and take me back to the city yourself!” she jeered.

“If you were a real woman, you wouldn’t be running around a dangerous country on your own, sleeping with strangers,” he retorted.

Sarah kicked her horse so hard it reared. However, she held firmly onto the reins and steered the stallion towards the road ahead. “You pig!” she called out over her shoulder, but he was already cantering off in the opposite direction and she wasn’t sure the desert winds carried her words fast enough to reach him.

“Morning, Ahmed. How are you today?”

“Good morning, Dr. Greenwich. Maybe today you will buy one of my swords. This one is very fine. Come and look.” The rotund man behind the stall held up a curved ornamental sword for her to inspect. It had a beautifully engraved hilt that was inlaid with mother-of-pearl.

Sarah gave the sword a cursory inspection and handed it back. “It’s very nice, but not today, thank you.”

“Every week you come here and every week you say the same. Always looking, never buying. What do you really want?” The man pulled out a packet of cigarettes, put one in his mouth and lit it with a worn-out brass lighter. He knew better than to offer one to Sarah.

Sarah knew what she was looking for and it wasn’t a sword or a dagger. It had been a long time since she’d left Akbar’s horse with this man and every week, on her day off, she came back to his stall in the marketplace. She knew the chances of seeing the sheikh here were slim, but she didn’t know where else to look.

Several times she had driven out in her car down the same road that she had ridden along to get back to the capital, but it was impossible to work out where she had joined the road when she left the sheikh. There were no discernable landmarks; it was all just one continuous mass of barren desert and to go off-road and drive around aimlessly was a certain way to get herself hopelessly lost and eventually dead.

She’d asked people about the Al-Zafir tribe, but her colleagues at the hospital just looked upset every time she mentioned it and said how sorry they were that she’d endured such a horrific ordeal. However, it hadn’t been horrific and she missed Akbar. She was sad that they’d parted on such bad terms and, if nothing else, she wanted to say that she was sorry.

“Any news from Sheikh Akbar?” she asked Ahmed.

“Every week you ask and every week I say the same.” Ahmed flicked cigarette ash off one of his cheaper swords with a plain handle and a black plastic sheath.

Sarah knew the response. Every week Ahmed talked about the great Sheikh Omar Al-Zafir and how he had subdued his enemies and brought peace to the region of Sakara. He then talked about how Akbar was even more clever and stronger than his brother as he outwitted his foes and grabbed their wealth. Sarah wondered whether this idea came from Akbar’s deception with Sarah and the horse, but Ahmed never said. However, the sword-seller never had any more specific news. Several times Sarah had left a message with him to give to the sheikh, but he was always very vague whether these notes were delivered and he never had a message to hand back to her.

“But this week I do have some news.” Ahmed gave her a wink.

“A message?” Sarah asked.

“I think it is better than a message; it’s a wedding!” Ahmed threw up his arms, revealing large sweat stains. “Sheikh Akbar, in his great wisdom, has finally consented to the marriage of his nephew, Saeed Al-Zafir. The wedding took place several weeks ago, but I forgot to tell you last time you were here because a thief tried to steal one of my daggers.” Ahmed began a torrent of abuse about a man who had attempted to run off with one of his most expensive daggers.

“Who did he marry?”

“The daughter of Sheikh Omar Al-Zafir, the great warrior. A very fine match, very fine indeed! The wedding was a splendid affair. I was invited, of course, but my responsibilities here prevented me from attending.”

“So he married his cousin.” Sarah was not surprised that she hadn’t managed to persuade the sheikh to defy hundreds of years of local tradition. “These blood marriages will be the end of the Bedouin.”

“No, there was no blood.”

“I meant a marriage between two people who are blood relatives.”

“And I meant that they weren’t blood relatives,” Ahmed said, pointing his cigarette at her, which was now no more than a butt.

“You just told me yourself that they were cousins.”

“Cousins, yes; blood cousins, no. Saeed’s mother was the wife of Sheikh Al-Amad. When Sheikh Omar killed him, he took pity on his enemy’s widow and their baby son. He arranged for her to marry his younger brother, Zak Al-Zafir, who brought up the boy, Saeed, as his own. Saeed is now an Al-Zafir, but not by blood.”

Sarah was stunned by the news. She was pleased that Minna wasn’t marrying her cousin, but confused by the idea that the groom, Saeed, was marrying the daughter of the man who killed his father. She was also angry that Akbar hadn’t told her any of this.

Sarah decided that she’d had enough local gossip for one day. She thanked Ahmed for the news, said goodbye and headed off through the hot, dusty marketplace in search of something to quench her thirst.

After a short while, she came to a stall that sold hot mint tea. She took a seat on one of the grey plastic stools next to it and ordered a glass. When it came, it was so hot that it scalded her lips, but at least it meant that they boiled the water long enough to purify it, or at least most of it. She took another sip. The sweet mint taste reminded her of Sheikh Akbar, but then almost everything did. Barely an hour passed by without her thinking of him: the way he looked, the way he talked, and most of all, the way he had touched her. Sometimes at night, she would wake up hot and confused thinking that he was lying next to her, caressing her, and then she would realise that it was just another one of her many dreams about him.

“You missed the wedding,” a voice said behind her.

“I wasn’t invited,” Sarah replied automatically before she even realised who was talking.

“I told Ahmed to tell you and bring you to the wedding. I waited all day and all night for you to arrive.”

Sarah turned around and came face to face with the sheikh. She had spent so many hours, days, and weeks thinking about him that she wasn’t quite sure that it really was him.

“He didn’t tell me. He was caught up with chasing someone who was trying to nick some stuff off him. You didn’t tell me that Minna wasn’t marrying her cousin. You didn’t say that Saeed was getting married to the daughter of the man who murdered his father.”

“Murder? My brother was defending his people and who are you to demand all these details about my family?”

Sarah looked at him. She had imagined this moment so many times, but in each one of her dreams and fantasies it had never been like this: the pair of them bickering together.