"Really?" she asked, leaning back into the softness of his robes and twisting her head around and upward to look at him from where she nestled in his arms. The underside of his neck, and his adams-apple looked so inviting that for more than a moment it took her mind off the stargazing they had been doing together. She wanted to run her fingers over the skin she now knew to be soft, to be warm and fragranced with the bite of sandalwood and the sweetness of Jasmine.
"Aiwa, ya Nafisahi," he answered softly.
"That star, there?" she asked, still not taking her eyes of his neck.
"Yes," he said, then he looked down at her, caught her admiring him, and he chuckled, "Nafisah, what... my wife?"
"Nothing," she whispered, suddenly captured in his eyes. She turned fully in his arms, pressing her hands against him, against his chest, but high, so that her fingers could brush against that soft skin. "Nothing more than you already know..."
"Ahebik, we rohy," he whispered, and captured her lips under his. She sighed, and her eyes fluttered closed as she softened her lips to open to him, sliding her fingertips along the side of his neck and up into his long dark locks. She felt his hands climb her spine to likewise tangle in her hair, to lean her backwards and allow him to deepen the kiss still further. He moaned. The sound vibrated into the kiss when her tongue caressed his within the warm oasis of her mouth.
"I love you too, my heart," she murmured softly when the kiss came to a breathless end.
"What a touching display!"
He spun round at the sound of the sarcastic voice, pushing her further back behind him and drawing both blades in a single moment. They were all he had to hand. The rest of his weapons were inside the tent beside the lapping waters.
There were six men, armed with guns, and the guns were all pointing in his direction, but instinct told him they were not alone... that there were others in the sands beyond the darkened Oasis. It crossed his mind to wonder how in the name of Allah they got past the Medjai sentries, but that was not a matter for now... now he had to protect his wife. He took a half step forward.
"I wouldn't," the man instructed, raising his own weapon to point it at his chest. "You'd be dead before you took the first swing and your lovely wife would be mine."
A slight rustle of sand was all the warning the small band of men received before they were surrounded by the dark robed Medjai that seemed to have melted out of the desert. For the first time, Ardeth saw as others did, where the Medjai got their preternatural reputation. He shook his head slightly and answered the man's comment.
"I think not," he said as half of the other man's lackey's dropped their weapons and raised their hands at the sight of the armed Medjai, but the other half did not, in fact they did the opposite, and raised their weapons ready to fire.
Ardeth had no choice. "Medjai, xatar!" he cried and knowing his men would give him the moment of time he needed, and hearing the thunder of hooves that would be his second returning, he turned and caught Nafisah against him, and lifted her into his Second's arms.
"Get her out of here!" he commanded.
"Ardeth No!" she screamed, but already he had turned and was wading back into the battle now raging behind him... though he did not turn around until he was sure she was out of harms way, safe on the back of his second's horse, riding toward where they more usually made camp.
The slightest of sounds behind him saved him from a certain and bloody death, and he angled one of his scimitars over his back to catch the blade descending toward his neck, spinning at the same time to lessen the injury from the smaller curved knife heading toward his hip. Still he growled in pain as the blade sliced through his flesh, before launching a blindingly fast counterattack that pushed his assailant back on his heels toward the thick of the melee. Around him, shots split the air, and the ringing of metal on metal as blades clashed was almost deafening. He had every faith in his men, in spite of the numbers against them, since his attackers henchmen had rushed in out of the darkness. He looked around, wading through a constant barrage of eager opponents, looking for the one that had been trying to take his new-made wife from him.
"Rabah!" he called out the man's name, making the other turn instead of taking a swing at the young, newly-sworn Medjai warrior who was on his knees, hurt before him. "Call them off! This is between you and me!"
"Enough!" the other warrior instantly called a halt. Medjai and opponents stood glaring at each others, swords raised, warily.
"Medjai, hona!" Ardeth instructed... and the two sides backed away from each other... the Medjai behind Ardeth, and the others behind Rahab.
"She was mine, Medjai... mine!" Rahab growled, an ugly expression on his face.
"She is not a possession, Rahab," Ardeth replied, calmly - his eyes taking a measure of the man. "She does not love you."
"And she loves you?" Rahab mocked. "She's used you, Medjai. Used you to escape the life she was born to."
"I do not think so," he said very softly, remembering her tears the night before - tears of love and joy as they consummated their union.
"She belongs... to me." Rahab spat into the sand and pulled the two blades up into a ready position.
"You do not need to do this," Ardeth offered. "Leave now... stay out of Medjai territory and for Nafisah's sake - for the sake of her mother, I will let you live."
Rahab laughed... "Coward!" he accused.
"So be it," he shrugged and raised his own blades, turning them over the back of both hands and returning them to his palms to settle their balance.
"Tawal, no," Nafisah struggled in the arms of Ardeth's second in command, trying to slip from his grasp, trying to make him release her so that she could return to Ardeth's side, "He'll kill him. You do not know… you do not know Rahab."
"He said to take you to safety, First Wife." Tawal only tightened his grip on her as she squirmed. "Be still!"
"No," she protested, but still she could not free herself from his grasp. She wondered then if her sister had struggled… those months ago – almost a year… in the arms of the British soldier that she had known would take Sophia to safety, while Nafisah, as Ardeth now, remained in the desert, and in danger.
"Why?" he asked her. He was still holding the hand he had just bound, and she could feel it throbbing as the ache from the cut seeped past the adrenaline still coursing round her body. She turned her gaze out into the night, hoping – praying – that Sophia would be safe.
"We do what we can," she said at last, her voice was quiet and soft as a whisper, "to protect the little ones."
He looked at her then, a slight tilt to her head. "What would have me do, ya sitti?" he asked. "Where would you have me take you?"
"Anywhere," she sighed, and suddenly it felt as though the tiredness of all her years descended on her at once. "Nowhere could be worse than Rahab's harem."
"Did he touch you?" his eyes darkened, and she supposed that he had heard the tales. It explained perhaps why his men fought alongside the British soldiers to free the many westerners that were captives within.
She shook her head, thankful of the darkness that hid her blush. "My mother…" she said, and on the words, and the memory of her mother's final moments, the tears burst in on her, and she sobbed, shamelessly in front of the stranger. She did not even object when, moments later, the warm soft dark of his robe closed around her and he rocked her in his arms.
"I give you sanctuary," he whispered against the top of her head. "The Medjai will keep you safe."
It was hours before she woke… approaching dawn… just as he and the rest of the Medjai reached the village of Koptos. The gentle sway of the horse beneath them had soon lulled her to resting and he held her against him, to be sure she did not fall. It was a feeling that comforted him too.
He chuckled as she sat up from where she rested against his chest, and rubbed her eyes.
"Where are we?" she asked.
"One of the villages close to my tribal home," he told her. "You will be safe here. There are friends that will take you to their hearth and care for you."
She frowned. "I'm not coming with you?"
He shook his head. "Not yet, ya sitti. I cannot take you into First."
"Not ever?"
"Not now at least." He chuckled as she pouted.
"That isn't nice."
"What?"
"Laughing at me." She pouted more fully and he shook his head. "You said that the Medjai would protect me."
"And we will."
"How?" she demanded. "If I'm here and you're… wherever you're going."
"There are Medjai here," he told her, and pointed out one or two men that came out to meet their horses, calling greetings and welcome in the deep Arabic of the desert. "We stay here often."
As if to prove his point many of his warriors got down from their horse and embraced the villagers as brothers, long missed friends, even lovers. As she watched, he dismounted from behind her, and offered up his arms to help her down, lifting her effortlessly as she slid toward him.
"I'm sorry," she said at last. "I shouldn't have assumed--"
"You did not," he interrupted, "assume anything unreasonable."
He shook his head and helped her closer to a small family group that were waiting for him off to the side. They greeted him warmly, almost like a long lost son, before he turned back to her, to make introductions.
"These are my family outside of the Medjai. My mother's family, Gidda and my aunts," he told her, indicating the women. "They will care for you." Then he turned to the old woman standing among them. "Gidda this is…" There he stopped, for she had not told him her name. He saw her hesitate and tilted his head in query.
"My mother," she almost faltered on the word once more, "always called me Precious."
He smiled, "Then that is as we shall call you. Nafisah… in Arabic means precious."
"I like it," she smiled at him then, but before he could respond to the smile she was surrounded by his mother's sisters and drawn away into village toward the house they shared with his grandmother. He blinked a little in surprise when Gidda called his name.
"Where does she come from?" she asked him when he looked at her.
"British soldiers were in battle with raiders west of Farnou," he tried to be as vague as possible. "They attacked one of the raiders' bases there and I believed it best for the Medjai to assist them."
Only a moment after he had finished speaking he could see that he had not fooled his grandmother for a single moment.
"You helped them because they were attacking against Rahab," she said. "Ardeth, why do you always get involved in such things? And why bring the woman here? It will bring us only trouble. She is from his harem is she not?"
Why…?
He paused, wanting to give her an honest answer. Why had he kept the woman with them? Why not just bring her to the fort where the soldiers would have taken her sister? Once the battle was over it would have been a simple enough things to do.
"I took a vow," he began slowly, "that I would always be the hand that protects those in need, and the women and children of the SaHra…"
"I know the words of the Warrior's Oath, grandson," his grandmother reminded him. "I was there when you and your brother took them."
Ardeth's face darkened at the mention of his brother.
"I keep the oaths I have sworn. She was such a woman and in need of protection," he said in a tone that would brook no argument. "I have given her sanctuary. The protection of the Medjai is hers and if my own family will not shelter her until I can have her brought to First, then I will find another that will."
"I did not say I would not have her in my home," Gidda said. "All I wish to know is why?"
"Because," he began and in his mind he heard words, but did not speak them. She saved my life.
"It is a dangerous road you walk with this choice."
"I am not afraid of Rahab," he told her.
"Perhaps you should be," his grandmother said, "but you still have not answered my question, Ardeth."
"Because we do what we can," he said at last, his voice barely above a whisper, "to protect the ones we love."