After closing the heavy gate and locking it with a crossbeam from the inside, he climbed back up the watchtower.
“By the beard of the Prophet!” bin Aziki muttered when he recognized the first riders. “Is this a procession?”
André squinted and hesitated. “The first rider is the sultan’s personal eunuch. It’s safe to open the gate again. We have nothing to fear from Feradge.”
Half an hour later, horses, mules, camels, donkeys, and people filled the interior courtyard of Qasr el Bahia. Feradge dismounted and greeted André. His face glistened with perspiration; his brocade robe was covered in dust. Still, he radiated all the solemnity of a master of ceremonies. He explained that His Most Holy Majesty Sultan Moulay Abd al-Rahman had sent his best mosaicist, blacksmiths, gardeners, carpenters, and lime-and-mud plasterers to help the Frenchman. Rouston was to dispose of them as he saw fit.
“I also bring another gift,” Feradge continued. “His Imperial Majesty thanks you for advocating for the interests of Morocco after your compatriots dictated their demands following the ignominious bombardment of Mogador and Tangier.”
The eunuch whispered a command to a waiting boy, who ran off and soon returned with an adult slave holding a camel’s reins. It was wearing a silver-studded bridle and a blanket adorned with tassels and fringes, and carried a palanquin that was closed off on all sides by curtains. An older black woman wearing a striped turban and a cotton dress followed behind.
“What the devil . . .” André mumbled as the camel slowly kneeled.
Feradge stepped close to the animal, opened the door of the palanquin, and solemnly declared, “A gift for you, Monsieur Rouston!”
A hand appeared, small and narrow like that of a child, only gloved in silk and adorned with precious rings. Feradge grasped it gingerly and a small veiled figure slid out of the palanquin. The wind gently blew her silk veils—rose and gold, orange and deep red, they seemed to change color like the desert sands throughout the day. Gold wrist and ankle bangles jingled softly and André caught a glimpse of tiny pearl-studded slippers. He was almost paralyzed when she turned around and scrutinized him with kohl-rimmed eyes crested with long curved lashes and, above them, arched eyebrows like butterfly wings. She studied first his face, then his figure, and he noticed the interest he aroused in her before she gracefully pulled the veil over her face and turned away once more.
Feradge looked pleased with the Frenchman’s dazed reaction. “His Imperial Majesty knows how lonely the Palace of Beauty is without women and children, and so, he sends you a flower from his garden: Aynur El Glaoua. Her father is the chief of the Glaoua Berbers. He had her educated at his court.”
André had perspiration running down his back and the midday sun had nothing to do with it. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see his friend Udad bin Aziki, whose expression did not betray his thoughts, but the man’s sons grinned and smirked. The young Berber woman stood just a few feet away. Her fluttering veils traced the silhouette of a delicate feminine body. Against his will, André felt a tingling sensation in his loins and forced himself to look away.
The Berber woman summoned the older woman with a tiny movement of her hand and whispered something to her. The servant nodded and said to André, “El Sayyida Aynur wants to know where the harem quarters are. She wishes to retire.”
He fought the urge to laugh out loud. “There is no harem here, and I do not intend to create one.”
“Then have some other rooms prepared for me!” He was startled to hear her voice, which was melodious and soft, yet determined and surprisingly powerful. She stalked away with her veils flowing as though she owned Qasr el Bahia, and he just watched her go, unable to utter a single word.
It was only after she had disappeared inside the house that he found his voice. “Take her away!” he snapped at Feradge. “I don’t want her here!”
The eunuch wrung his bejeweled hands. “That would be a disaster, Sayyid! You may not refuse a gift—or do you wish to insult His Imperial Majesty?”
“It’s not possible, Feradge, please try to understand!” André threw up his hands in exasperation. The whole thing was a colossal disaster! How could he go to Sibylla and say, “Dearest, you don’t mind that the sultan has placed a seductive harem girl in my bed, do you?” Qasr el Bahia was the paradise he wanted to share with Sibylla and only Sibylla!
Feradge too was frantic. “What do you not like about her, Sayyid? She has the figure of a gazelle. You will not find a single blemish on her skin. Her hair is soft as silk, her teeth are like a string of pearls, her mouth is sweeter than honey, and I swear by God and on my life that she is a virgin. Not even the sultan has broken this rosebud!”
“Well, I won’t break it either, because I’m sending her home today!” André cried out angrily.
Feradge tore the turban from his head and pulled his curly hair. “Do you not understand, sir, that you cannot send her back? She would be dishonored; His Imperial Majesty would have her killed!”
“Merde! Putain bordel de merde!” André clenched his fists. Even uttering the worst curses, he knew, did not change the fact that he was caught in a terrible trap. “Is there no solution?” he implored the eunuch.
Feradge sighed deeply. “I am going to be entirely honest with you, Monsieur Rouston, even if His Imperial Majesty throws me to his lions for this . . . Aynur is without a doubt one of the most beautiful roses in the sultan’s garden. But every rose has thorns and Aynur’s are particularly sharp.” He looked in the direction in which the young Berber woman had disappeared, and continued. “Aynur’s father is wealthier than the sultan. From his fortress, Aghmat, he controls the only caravan route from the Sahara to Marrakesh. His Imperial Majesty the sultan—may God grant him a long life—knows that the Glaoua sheikh craves power. That is why he forced him to educate Aynur and her siblings at his court. As long as the sultan has his children, the Glaoua will not instigate an uprising. But Aynur has become very burdensome because she is as unpliable as a cork oak and refused the sultan when he wanted to possess her. If you send her back, he will kill her.”
A sharp pain throbbed behind André’s forehead. He felt as though the ground underneath him were opening up and swallowing the very thing of which he had been dreaming: a life with Sibylla at Qasr el Bahia.
Feradge looked at him with pity. “Keep her here for a while,” he counseled softly. “And if you still don’t want to keep her, send her not to the sultan but to her family.”