The Saracen: The Holy War Part 57

But, like an enemy in ambush, the pain of her indecision struck her in the heart.

_The more fool I am to have betrayed him._

He drew up beside her and rode around her sedan chair so that the head of his glistening black horse was toward Lucera. In a sudden movement he leaned down from the saddle. An irresistible arm encircled her waist and pulled her up out of the sedan chair. For a moment she felt alarmed and amazed, as if she were flying through the air. Then, before she could scream, she found herself comfortably seated across the great horse, her shoulder resting on his breastplate, his arms around her.

Her only fear was that she might faint at his touch.

And like that they rode into Lucera. Together for all the world to see.

What exquisite irony! She gazed around the bedchamber Daoud had led her to, hardly able to believe her eyes. The big bed with its golden curtains was the same, and so was the window with its pointed arch. This was the very room, the very bed, in which Manfred and she had made love for the last time.

Manfred must have deliberately chosen to give this room to them.

Daoud's weapons hung on the wall, and his armor was mounted on wooden stands. Chests of clothing and other possessions were lined up along the wall. Soon the servants would be bringing her things in too.

This room--another thing she could not tell him about. She despised herself. But it might well offend him if he knew of Manfred's little joke, and enmity between Daoud and Manfred at this moment could be disastrous.

_Manfred needs Daoud. Why is he so foolish as to risk angering him?_

Daoud and she stood staring at each other. They had said little so far.

She felt overwhelmed, and she supposed he did too. She felt her longing for him as a strange not-quite-pain in the pit of her stomach.

He took her shoulders in his hands. How good to feel his strong fingers holding her.

"How long has this been your room?" she asked.

"For about a month. Rather grand, is it not? The king says it is suitable to my rank. I have my own command, a division of his mounted Muslim warriors. I call them the Sons of the Falcon."

_Suitable to my rank._

She wondered how much Daoud knew about herself and Manfred.

"What troubles you?" he asked.

_So many things._

"Manfred," she said, choosing the worry easiest to speak of.

He stroked her cheek gently. "No need to torment yourself. I understand how it must have been."

_But would you understand about Simon?_

She said, "But can Manfred accept what you and I are to each other?"

He shrugged. "You see that we are together in his palace. You saw that I rode with you before me on my horse through the streets of Lucera and into Manfred's castle."

"I see that Manfred must know about us. Are you sure he does not want me back? It can be fatal to cross a king."

"When we got the message that Ugolini and you were coming here instead of going to Viterbo, I talked with Manfred, not as subject and king, but as man and man. He was most gracious, as Manfred usually is."

"What did he tell you?"

"That indeed he still cares for you. Too much, it seems."

"Too much?"

Daoud's teeth flashed in his blond beard. "His queen, the mother of his four children, Helene of Cyprus, usually looks the other way when Manfred beds beautiful young women. But she saw in you too serious a rival. He had to send you off with me, or the queen would have had you poisoned."

Sophia's eyes strayed to the bed in horror. She remembered now that before she left here, Manfred had hinted at something like that.

"Poisoned! And I am safe now?"

Again the white grin in the blond beard. During the six months they had been apart, she had begun to think that her love for him might have seduced memory and enhanced his good looks beyond reality. But now in the flesh he surpa.s.sed even the image her memory had cherished.

"You are safe as long as you stay away from Manfred and he from you.

There will be a feast tonight, in honor of Cardinal Ugolini. You will see how carefully the king will avoid you."

Daoud pulled her close to enfold her in his arms. He had taken off his surcoat and breastplate, and with her head against his chest she could feel his heart beating strong and fast under his silk robe.

"And you?" she said. "Do you hate the thought that Manfred and I were lovers?"

_In that very bed._

"It is far in the past," Daoud said. "Before you met me." He held her away from him and looked at her with laughter in his blue eyes. "Even the Prophet married a widow."

His gentle acceptance, his easy a.s.sumption that all was over between herself and Manfred, tore at her heart. If she even mentioned Simon, it would be different. That was not in the past. That was after she had met Daoud, after they became lovers. For the thousand-thousandth time she cursed herself for letting it happen.

_G.o.d, I am a wh.o.r.e! As bad as the worst painted prost.i.tute plying her trade under the arches by the Hippodrome._

No, worse than that, in a way. A prost.i.tute had a clear reason for doing what she did with men. The more Sophia thought about the time she let Simon possess her, the less she understood it. And even a prost.i.tute knew her occupation and her place in the world. From the night that Alexis cast her adrift, Sophia had, in a way, been lost.

But there came to her a glimmering of hope. Daoud had a place here with Manfred, and she had a place beside Daoud. Could it be that at last she had a home?

Then she should do nothing to endanger it. She should say nothing about Simon.

"Come to bed," he whispered, still holding her and taking a step in that direction.

The feel of his arms around her and his body pressing against her sent ripples of need for him through her. But now, with thoughts of Manfred and--much worse--of Simon, confusing her, she felt frightened, unready.

She needed more time.

"I have had no proper bath in days, Daoud. I feel the grime of the road all over me."

"Of course." He smiled. "And now you can have a proper bath. Let me see to it."