An Agreement's Small Print

A/N: Didn't really expect anyone to guess correctly the movie scene from the beginning of the previous chapter – it's from the movie Requiem for a Dream, based entirely off my favourite scene in the movie (Jennifer Connelly on the pier, for anyone's who seen it). But invisible cookies to everyone!

Foxfire: Nothing wrong with laughing at Aladdin's breakdown! I've laughed at totally inappropriate moments in other Aladdin stories!

Thank you for the lovely reviews on the previous chapter (which is as graphic as the sexual content is going to become in this story, I'm not one for detailing such scenes for no purpose), enjoy the next...


Chapter Nine

During the meal the following evening, the tension in the air could be cut with a knife. And the poor Sultan was perplexed as to why. The day had begun oddly, only to become stranger still and now the Sultan wondered how much longer it would be until someone set the bomb off.

The Sultan hadn't seen a sight of either his daughter, the sorcerer or the depressed boy until mid-afternoon, until Jafar had suddenly appeared and demanded a conference with him. This request wasn't so unusual within itself – it was Jafar's attutide towards the conference; if the Sultan didn't know Jafar as well as he liked to believe he did, he would nearly think that Jafar was happy.

In the years that Jafar had lived in Agrabah's palace, the Sultan had never seen an emotion inside of Jafar that was anywhere near happiness, unless it was sarcastic. The Sultan had continously asked him to lighten up and have a little fun, though the Sultan had never thought of his daughter being the source of Jafar's fun (and he was reasonably certain this was the case, considering the deliriously happy state that Jasmine had also seemed to be in when he had seen her a couple of hours later, if only her emotion lasting for a just a few minutes). But whatever the reason was, Jafar appeared to be physically relaxed, appearing plently younger than his thirty-eight years, and in a frighteningly genuine good mood – ifanyone in Agrabah wanted a favor from Jafar, no matter how extreme, today seemed to be the day to ask for it, because it would only be a matter of time before Jafar returned to his usual arrogant self whom everyone had come to know and hate.

Even now, sitting at the head of his table, Jafar seemed to be unable to pay attention to atmosphere in the room, going so far as to terrify the Sultan when he smiled at him, with no malice at all.

Besides him, Jasmine appeared to have taken Jafar's normal foul mood and was using it for herself; the Sultan wondered if Jasmine even knew how dangerously she was waving her knife in Aladdin's direction.

The Sultan had originally felt real sympathy for the poor boy, but now he wondered why Aladdin seemed to be intent on torturing himself so. The chance to be with his daughter appeared to have well and truly left, much to his own despair, but Aladdin didn't seem to be catching on to this idea. The Sultan was quite certain that there were plently of other nice young ladies in Agrabah who would've fancied Aladdin as their husband, and had attempted to tell him so, but Aladdin had nearly snapped – did he believe the Sultan to be sick, allowing Jasmine to remain married to that perverted creep? Aladdin appeared to be conviently forgetting that it wasn't the Sultan's decision as to whom Jasmine married.

But if Aladdin had looked frustrated before about the situation, he looked truly wrecked now, and the Sultan was quite certain that he'd overheard Aladdin muttering to himself that afternoon, "if I could live through that for Jasmine, I could live through anything" – the Sultan decided that he didn't really want to know what Aladdin was referring to. But he knew that the combination of Jasmine's gentle words and Jafar and Iago's vicious insults would eventually cause Aladdin to break, and for everyone's sanity, the Sultan preferred for Aladdin to be out of the palace before the grand occasion.

As it was, Aladdin looked like he was going to cry into his food, and the Sultan rather hoped that he wouldn't, as things were already awkward enough. But in a way he blamed his daughter and the sorcerer for the mess that life had become, and deep down, he blamed himself even more so for allowing it to happen.

The Sultan had always feared this union – he'd always been able to break the law in regards to Jasmine only marrying a prince, but he had hoped that by keeping the law in place, that Jasmine wouldn't be tempted to look elsewhere for a husband, to consider other possible suspects. For years he had seen Jasmine and Jafar circling each other like sharks, one constantly biting and and the other wanting to bite back harder but keeping himself in check. She had simply been a little girl after all, with words that would hardly effect an adult man.

But Jasmine wouldn't always remain a little girl, and that was what the Sultan had truly feared – the day that the emotions other than anger would suddenly leap forward and engulf the other. And he had been certain that one day it would occur, it was obvious to him; the way Jasmine's face heated up when arguing with Jafar, heat that had no relation to her anger, and the way Jafar would sometimes stare after her as she'd leave the argument, with unusual emotions in his eyes. Eyes were the windows to the soul after all, and the Sultan was certain that at those times, the thoughts in Jafar's soul were not of a proper nature.

And so the Sultan had desperately tried to ignore it; besides, there was the law.

So much for it.

The dull metallic crash of Jasmine throwing her knife down to her plate brought the Sultan out of his disturbed thoughts; she'd thrown it so hard that it had nearly bounced off the plate and onto the table. The Sultan looked up at his daughter in surprise, but Aladdin continued to stare at his plate gloomily, and Jafar into space with a rather demented and dumb look on his face.

"Father, may I be excused?" Jasmine asked, forcing politeness into her voice with a fake smile, but her eyes were cold and she chipped off the end of each of her words.

Despite this, the Sultan's heart warmed for his daughter – even at nearly seventeen years old and married to the most powerful man in Agrabah, she still asked him if she could leave the table like a child. He smiled a genuine smile in return, before remembering the conversation that he had had with Jafar earlier that day.

"I believe that Jafar wanted a word at dinner, dearest... Jafar?" The Sultan questioned when Jafar appeared to not have heard him, but then the usual calm and snide appearence slipped into Jafar's face, and his hand slipped over Jasmine's on the table, as it had many months ago but with a touch that was nearly gentle, rather than possesive.

Aladdin watched every moment, every entangle of each finger.

"I have already advised your father of this," Jafar began. "I will be leaving in a couple of days, for several months – a little over a year if all goes well."

"Where are you going?" Jasmine asked, surprising herself at the hurt in her voice, both at his leaving and the fact that he'd told her father first rather than his wife. She saw Aladdin's face light up through the corner of her eye, and she wanted to smack that smile away.

Jafar appeared to notice his smile as well, but he matched it in one that spoke of triumph, before turning to face Jasmine's openly concerned face once more. "I am first travelling to Dadu for business, then travelling to London to oversee some personal matters." He went silent for a moment, and squeezed her fingers. "I would be... honoured... if as my wife and queen, that you came with me, if you'd like."

The room went quietly as Jasmine and Aladdin stared at him, trying to understand what he'd just said. This came as no surprise to the Sultan, whom Jafar had also confided this news in earlier in the day.

It felt as if her anger had been wiped away from her mind – Jasmine stared at her husband, unsure as to whether to believe him, but Jafar's face seemed to tell no lies. She was first surprised at how he had phrased the request – as a question that was truly up to her, rather than a demand or assumption. As if he really valued her response.

Then secondly, she was surprised that Jafar was even asking in the first place. After all her begging to go with him to just the neighboring city for a few days and his refusals, he was offering to take her on his travels for several months. Jasmine simply didn't understand the change of heart, so before allowing her own heart to dream of such adventures, she decided it was better to ask. "Why... I mean, you've never let me come with you before..."

Jafar shrugged lightly, still maintaining eye contact, as if that was all such a simple matter. "As I will be away for some time, I thought you might enjoy the journey... it'll give you a chance to think about some situations..." again, Jafar glanced at Aladdin with a triumphant smile, "... away from home."

Aladdin struggled to fight the rage he was feeling towards the sorcerer, and wondered if Jasmine and Jafar had been teaming up some special plot to drive him away. He had also been pleased when Jafar had said that he would be leaving – finally, a chance to try and make things work between himself and Jasmine, a chance to bring Jasmine around to a normal way of thinking and encouraging her to realise who she really wanted in her heart, for her to be far away from palace life by the time her joke of a husband returned, no matter what physical pleasures he might be able to offer her. The chance to make her his wonderful, sweet and pure Princess once more.

But the way Jasmine's eyes lit up at Jafar's offer, the way the corners of her beautiful lips tugged upwards at the wonder of all the countries and sights that she would be able to see, had put a dampen on this idea. He felt like throwing himself across the table when Jasmine broke into her stunning smile, a smile for Jafar and not for him, as she began: "I would like – "

Aladdin stood with such speed that his chair fell backwards and went flying back across the room, putting a quick stop into Jasmine's acceptance as she looked up at him with a mixture of frustration and annoyance on her face. Quickly, he glanced at the Sultan upon the sigh that the older man exhaled, but glared at the satisfied smirk on Jafar's face and spun on his heel, walking quickly away from the table and out of the room, desperate to be able to fight the conflicting emotions of sadness and anger in private.

Jasmine slumped in her chair upon his leaving, the eleation of travelling across unknown worlds gone, and closed her eyes tightly, trying to control her own emotions. There was silence for a time, until she heard Jafar's chair screeching backwards across the marble floor, and then his warm hand resting on her bare shoulder, in a strange show of comfort from the man.

"I understand if you can't give me an answer right now, but I will need to know by this time tomorrow to send word." Then the soft swish of his indoor slippers as he walked away, fading away into nothingness.

Yet she kept her eyes closed, feeling her father's gentle and caring eyes on her, even as she rested her elbows on the table and buried her face in her hands.


TBC

*for everyone's understanding, the place of Dadu that Jafar mentions is the 13th century name for Beijing (according to Wikipedia)