Desert Wind Read online

  “What?”

  “This one is called Sitara.” A dark stain of embarrassment shot over Halim’s face. “She is the eldest daughter of the maharaja.”

  Sabir’s mouth dropped open. “Tell me you are jesting, Halim.”

  “I wish to Alel I was, but she bears the royal tattoo.” He pointed to the back of his right hand. “She is Bhishma’s get, all right.”

  “How did that happen?” Sabir asked. “How could the men have made such a mistake?” He shook his head in disbelief. “The maharaja will move heaven and earth to have one of his precious seven daughters returned to him unharmed.”

  “I know that,” Halim snarled.

  “What good is she to us?” Sabir asked, throwing his hands in the air.

  “She is a Kishnu woman,” Tarik spoke up. “She knows her duty and will help us.”

  “For her people among any prisoners, aye,” Sabir conceded, “but to Asarabans? She would just as soon let our men die in agony than lift a finger to help.”

  “I disagree. Bring her here,” Tarik said. “She will do her duty.”

  “What?” Halim scoffed. “To help Prince Ardalan on his way to Jannah?” He shook his head. “I think not, Tarik.”

  “She may be a princess but she is a woman and Kishnu women are compassionate by nature,” Tarik insisted.

  “Aye, well they may have been before we invaded their lands but now?” Sabir let the question hang in the air.

  “Bring her here. Let her aid me in caring for our prince,” Tarik asked.

  Sabir started to protest the order but Halim waved away his objection, handing the cautery he had been holding in the fire to his brother-in-law. “We will be right here with her. If she makes one false move, I’ll slit her throat myself,” Halim said, and with that, he was stalking back through the pouring rain to get the woman.

  “Is the cautery red-hot?” Tarik asked.

  “Aye,” Sabir replied.

  “Then give it to me. Kneel down and brace his arms. With the help of Alel, he will not feel too much of the pain.”

  Sabir felt sick to his stomach as he looked at the glowing tip of the cautery. He had experience of the instrument and knew all too well how much discomfort it brought. Dropping to the ground, he leaned forward and pinned Ardalan’s arms to the muddy floor.

  Tarik drew in a breath then applied the cautery to the worst of the shallower wounds. He quickly shifted the tip to another as the prince came awake howling with anger and pain. “Hold him!” Tarik commanded.

  “What the hell are you doing to me?” Ardalan demanded.

  Bending over his friend, Sabir looked into Ardalan’s wild eyes. “You were wounded, remember? Lie as still as you can,” he pleaded. “Let him finish.”

  The pain was a burning wave of agony spreading across his chest and abdomen, but Ardalan remained as quiet and motionless as he could. His jaw was clenched tightly, his breathing shallow and rapid as the cautery once more moved over his flesh. A quick intake of breath was the only sign he was in acute distress.

  Neither Tarik nor Sabir saw Halim escorting the drenched woman beneath the overhang. Their attention was on the charred flesh of Prince Ardalan’s chest.

  “Again,” Tarik said, handing the cautery to Sabir for him to re-heat it in the flame of the torch.

  Sabir took it from him and turned around to thrust the tip into the fire. When he moved, Ardalan’s eyes went to the petite woman whose arm was being held in Halim’s savage grip.

  “This is the Princess Sitara,” Halim stated in Obinese, a language universal to both their cultures and one everyone there could speak and understand.

  “Princess?” Ardalan questioned groggily. “A royal shamaness?” He had a hard time getting his mind and mouth around the Obinese language.

  “The men took the wrong woman,” Halim explained.

  “Your Grace,” Tarik said, coming to his feet quickly with a deep bow. “I am sorely in need of your help.”

  The woman’s gaze flicked over Tarik then settled on the man lying on the ground. “You are Jaleem,” she said, her eyes wide.

  “He knows who he is,” Sabir sneered.

  She lifted her head. “My people have sworn to slay you, Jaleem.”

  “No wonder I can’t seem to make friends here, eh, Halim?” Ardalan quipped.

  Sabir cursed as the handle of the cautery became hot. He nearly dropped it, but fumbled with it, wrapping the handle in the fold of his robe to keep from being singed by the heat. “It’s ready, Tarik, but it is overly hot.”

  Tarik extended his hand. “It matters not,” he said. “Give it to me.” He barely flinched as the hot handle was laid in his hand.

  “You are a careless man,” Sitara said, “to risk injuring yourself as you care for your patient.”

  “My discomfort is of no consequence. Prince Ardalan has many serious wounds,” Tarik said as he laid the cautery to the next to the less serious cuts on his patient.

  Sitara’s scrutiny flew to her enemy’s face, judging his ability to withstand the torment. She cocked a brow at the mere narrowing of his eyes. “I speak of doing harm to your primary instrument, your hand,” she continued, speaking to Tarik. “You can do more harm if your hand is unsteady due to the heat from the handle than if you waited until the handle was safer to wield.”

  Tarik bowed his head. “I see your point, Your Grace.”

  “And you are not applying the cautery effectively,” she observed. “You need to leave it on his flesh longer to seal the wound.”

  “Aye, and hurt him the more!” Sabir snarled.

  Sitara ignored the objection. “The wounds will break open the first time he sits a mount,” she said then shrugged. “But if it is your intention to let him bleed to death—”

  “Be quiet!” Sabir shouted. “You are babbling in the presence of the Crown Prince of Asaraba, darkling!”

  Fury shot over Sitara’s face at the insult. “You son of a diseased ox!” she yelled at him. “How dare you call me such?”

  “Because that is what you are,” Sabir sneered. “You may not be as black as the rest of your countrymen, but you are—”

  “Sabir!” Ardalan hissed from between tightly clenched teeth. “Apologize. Now!”

  “But she is a muwallad,” Sabir protested.

  “I am not of mixed blood!” Sitara flung at him, stamping her foot. “Do not confuse me with the one who sired you!”

  Sabir started forward, intent on laying hands to the woman, but Halim moved in front of her to protect her. “You go too far, Sabir,” he warned.

  “Apologize,” Ardalan repeated sternly, though his voice lacked authority. He was growing weaker and the fever was beginning to claim him. His vision was jumping with strange images and the rain seemed to be calling to him in a crystal-soft voice.

  “Help me,” Tarik begged Sitara. “My prince is very ill.”

  Ardalan was fading in and out of consciousness. His body felt as though he were lying inside an inferno and sweat was oozing from his pores. The burns on his chest were a living hell that made him want to groan.

  Sitara met the stare of each of the four men, desperately wanting to tell all of them to go to hell, but it was the respect for her on the corpsman’s face that decided Sitara. “Let go of my arm,” she ordered Halim. When his grip tightened, she gave him a withering look that would have quelled a lesser man. As it was, the burly warrior only slightly loosened his hold on her arm.

  “Hurt him and I swear to you before Alel and these men, I will make you rue the day you were ever born,” Halim warned.

  Sitara jerked her arm from his grip and flounced her shirt as she dropped gracefully down beside Tarik. “Give me room to see his wounds,” she told him. “Have you given him something for the pain?”

  “He will not take it,” Sabir said at the same time Ardalan said no.

  Sitara locked gazes with Ardalan. “Are you being overly brave, Jaleem, or merely foolish?”

  “I don’t like drugs,” Ardalan
said. “I can take the pain, milady.”

  Sitara shook her head. “I’ve heard many men say such things while howling with agony. It makes no sense to me.” She began studying his wounds.

  Tarik moved back, handing the cautery once more to Sabir with a look that suggested the major be more careful with the instrument.

  “This one you can cauterize,” Sitara pronounced, pointing toward the shallower of the two remaining cuts.

  Tarik frowned. “You think so?”

  “Aye but the other wound concerns me. It is deep and looks to be infected.”

  “I thought as much, as well, Your Grace,” Tarik conceded.

  The dark woman shifted her gaze to Ardalan who was staring back at her with a glazed look that said he was drifting in and out. “How long have you had these wounds?” she asked.

  Ardalan was looking into a stunning face the color of caramel with black eyes that shone like polished obsidian. A slightly flaring nose, Cupid-bow lips of a dusky pink color, almond-shaped eyes rimmed with kohl and framed in long, spiky eyelashes that curled sweetly at the tips, a thick braid of shiny black hair that hung over one full breast that he ached to mold with his palm…

  “Stop looking at me in that way and answer me,” Sitara said with exasperation.

  Sabir shot to his feet and moved toward the woman, but Halim intercepted him, reaching out to block the younger warrior’s advance. Halim shook his head.

  “You are beautiful. Do you know that?” Ardalan whispered. “A bronze goddess.”

  Sitara blinked and her heart did a funny little jump that brought her hand to her chest. “Do not say such things,” she said. She was staring at his mouth. Unlike many men who grew a mustache with their beards to cover a weak upper lip, this man did not need to for his lips were full and very sensual. She shook her head to rid herself of such thoughts.

  The Crown Prince of Asaraba lifted a trembling hand as though he would cup her cheek, but his eyes slid shut and the hand dropped to his side.

  “Quick before he regains consciousness,” Tarik said, snapping his fingers at Sabir.

  Sabir didn’t move. He was staring at the dark woman, hating her with every fiber of his being. When she turned her head around and looked up at him, he wanted to lay the cautery against the smooth perfection of her cheek and brand her.

  “Give me the cautery,” she said, holding Sabir’s raging glower. She did not flinch as he thrust the instrument toward her, the fiery tip only inches from her outstretched hand.

  “Sir, please,” Tarik begged.

  “Let her have it, Sabir,” Halim commanded in a low, authoritative voice.

  With a muscle jumping in his cheek and a white line of anger around his lips, Sabir turned the cautery so the woman could take the handle. He felt the weight of her dismissal as she took it then turned her back on him.

  It was Halim who moved to Ardalan’s head and knelt down to hold him still. He never took his attention from the cut toward which the red-hot instrument moved. As the burning tip was laid to his prince’s abdomen and the pungent smell of searing flesh filled the air, it was all he could do to keep from gagging.

  Ardalan bucked as the burning sank down through the layers of haze and gripped him with fiery talons. The agony moved again—crisscrossing the first line of ungodly pain—and he cried out, screaming with the intensity of the agony. His eyes flew open and widened, became wild.

  “Stop it! You are hurting him!” Sabir bellowed, and he would have grabbed the woman by her hair had Tarik not jumped up to prevent it.

  “Let her do her what must be done!” Tarik exclaimed.

  “That is not healing!” Sabir accused. “That is torture!”

  Sitara held the still glowing tip of the cautery over the prince’s abdomen. Her hand was shaking, her breaths coming in ragged intakes that made her lightheaded. The moment she had laid the heated instrument to his flesh, she had felt a searing pain across her own flesh.

  “Give me that!” Sabir snarled. He jerked the cautery from the woman’s hand, mindless of the burning that instantly scorched his skin. He dropped the instrument and grabbed his injured hand, cradling it in the palm of the other.

  “Your Grace?” Tarik questioned. “Will you sew the other wound?”

  Stygian eyes blurred with tears turned to Tarik. “I cannot,” she said in such a low voice he had to strain to hear her.

  “But, Your Grace, your fingers are smaller than mine and less clumsy. Your stitches are bound to be finer. I—”

  “No, I will not hurt him further!” she said, and shot to her feet, backing away until she was pressed up against the rear of the lean-to. She shook her head and pressed a hand to the lingering phantom pain that burned her belly. “No. Never again!”

  “Selfish bitch,” Sabir named her.

  The needle Tarik had chosen to use was lying in a small basin of astringent. He plucked it out of the basin and made quick work of threading catgut through the narrow eye. Taking a deep breath, he lowered the needle toward Ardalan’s wound, his hands shaking.

  “I cannot hold together his flesh and sew it at the same time,” he said to no one in particular. “My fingers are not agile enough for that.”

  “Woman, do what Alel intended for you to do and sew the prince’s wound!” Sabir snapped.

  Sitara shook her head vehemently. “You don’t understand. Our meeting was foretold and—”

  Ardalan’s eyelids fluttered open and he looked up at the strained faces above him. He recognized all but the lovely, tearful face of the dark woman. She seemed vaguely familiar but for the life of him, he could not place her. “Sabir?” he questioned, his voice cracked with the escalating fever. “Where am I?” He tried to get up and the pain overwhelmed him. He gasped, his eyes going wide. “What is wrong with me?”

  “You were wounded, Your Grace,” Tarik said. “There is a deep wound that needs sewing then Captain Evren must give you some of his blood. You have lost far too much.”

  “Then close the wound,” Ardalan said. “I can’t hurt any more than I already do.”

  Halim and Sabir exchanged a look between them. It was out of character for their prince to admit he was in pain of any degree.

  “Your Grace,” Tarik said, “I ask that you forgive me if I add to that hurt.”

  Ardalan found himself staring into the soft eyes of the woman and a sliver of memory nudged at his fever-ridden brain. “You are the shamaness?” he asked.

  Before Halim could tell him otherwise, Sitara nodded. “I am she,” the princess replied.

  “Can you not seal the wound with just your mind?” he asked, a hopeful smile hovering on his full lips.

  Sitara looked up at Halim. “Aye, Jaleem, I can.”

  “Then do it, wench,” he told her.

  Sabir bent down until his lips were at Sitara’s ear. “What game do you play, you heathen bitch?”

  Sitara moved away from Sabir and laid a hand on Tarik’s arm. “You must sew the wound first for it is deep and wide. Once it is closed, then I can heal it from the inside out.”

  Halim hissed at Sabir for the young major had opened his mouth one time too many for the older man. “Shut the hell up, Sabir, or get out of this lean-to!”

  “She’s no more a shamaness than I am!” Sabir protested.

  Reaching the end of his endurance, Halim got to his feet, took Sabir by the arm and propelled him into the pouring rain. When Sabir would have come back under the overhang, Halim pointed a rigid finger at him.

  “No! You are not welcome here. Go to the caves and stay there until you are called!”

  Standing in the downpour, Sabir’s face hardened with rage and his lips were skinned back from his teeth. With fury dogging him, he turned and stalked off.

  “Thank you, Sir,” Tarik said, letting out a relieved breath.

  “What ails Sabir?” Ardalan asked. His voice was growing weaker and there was a yellow pallor to his face that alarmed Halim.

  Hunkering down at his leader’s head
, Halim leaned over Ardalan. “You have a jackass for a best friend, Your Grace. What more can I tell you?” He looked over at Tarik and nodded. Once more he put his hands on Ardalan’s arms to hold him down.

  “Is it going to hurt that bad?” Ardalan asked.

  It was the softness in his voice, the pain underlying words that had been meant to be comical, but instead betrayed the fear of hurt in the prince’s heart. She felt those words to her very soul so Sitara put out her hands and pressed the two jagged edges of the deep cut together. “Do not close it all the way,” she instructed Tarik. “It needs to drain.”

  “Aye, Your Grace,” Tarik agreed.

  “What is your name again, pretty shamaness?” Ardalan asked.

  “Sitara,” she replied, casting him a quick look.

  “Sitara,” he repeated then flinched, his eyelids flickering. “Morning star.”

  She wanted to keep his mind from the pain. “Aye, that is what it means in Kishnu. What is the meaning of your given name?”

  The room was tilting strangely around Ardalan. He was digging his fingers into the mud to keep from passing out again. “I don’t know,” he said then could not stop the grunt as one stitch sent shudders down his body.

  “It means faithful friend,” Halim answered for his prince.

  Ardalan frowned. “That’s what it means? What about my second name?” He locked gazes with Sitara. “Halim knows these things.”

  “Tansel is his second name,” Halim said softly. “It means belonging to the dawn’s light.”

  Ardalan grinned. “Dawn’s light? Morning star? Does it mean I belong to the morning star, Halim?” he asked wistfully then sucked in a breath as Tarik pierced a place on his flesh that was excruciatingly tender.

  “It means you were born at dawn,” Halim said dryly.

  Sitara removed her hands from the fevered flesh that had been far too hot beneath her palms. His sweat clung to her and she ran her hands down her skirt.

  “I will be finished when I tie this off,” Tarik said, and with care placed the last knot in the sutures. He slid his dagger across the thread and sat back on his heels.

  “Where do you want me for the transfusion?” Halim inquired.