A/N: I find it easier to write in Farah's voice, so later chapters will probably be mostly from her POV.

Lost

When I saw her, I nearly wept—tears of joy, that my Farah was alive again, but also tears of grief. I had lost my beloved. She could not possibly remember me.

How I ached to hold her. The desire for her was like a dull knife thrust into my back. Each glance of hers twisted it, each word drove it slightly deeper, yet also wrenched me closer to her. Water felt coarse to my fingertips as I remembered the silk of her touch, which rivalled the exquisite textiles of her native land. How sweetly supple she had been in my hands in the caverns beneath the sultan's palace, how lithe and lissom her movements, how mellifluous her voice… I longed to return to that wonderful place, to remain there with her forever. "It's so beautiful," she had murmured. "If only we could stay here."

Now, in undoing the evil I myself had wrought, I had also erased the love from her heart. I was a stranger to her, and an enemy at that. She had no reason to trust or believe me. She could not open her heart to me. She was closed, distant, out of my grasp, a door shut fast by the inexorable hand of Time.

The treacherous Indian Vizier lay dead upon the princess' balcony, slain at last by my own hand. Should I have felt remorse, killing a sick old man? I felt only hot hatred for him and his black arts. I felt my blood pounding, tracing the words the foul wizard had burned into my mind while I was raw and torn, kneeling over my love's frozen form. I saw none of my anguish reflected in her face—she could feel nothing. She was dead. I had let her go.

His rank breath licked at my ear from the shadows across the room. "The girl is unimportant."

"Then it's true… he was a traitor." I looked up from the Vizier's corpse, shocked to be gazing into Farah's endless eyes—deeper and darker than any well, and as open as the ocean. But she—she was… not dead. Only lost.

I presented her with the dagger. "Take this. Return it to your father's treasure vaults. Guard it well."

"I owe you thanks." The princess bowed her head slightly in gratitude. Then looking me straight in the eye, she asked with eagerness in her voice, "But why did you invent such a fantastic story?" She smiled as she said it. "Do you think me a child, that I would believe such nonsense?"

I could not bear this torture any longer. A fantastic story… nonsense…! All that we had been through together, so near to death that survival could have been rebirth… the love we had nurtured and finally succumbed to… gone. There must be a way to make her feel our passion again!

Impulsively, I took her and kissed her. I knew very well how foolish it was to do so, but I knew with even more conviction that I needed her. I could live for days without water, but I could not last without her. Her golden touch was my sustenance. She laid a hand on my arm, gently. Warmth flooded through me—the heat of our arduous romance, so quickly fashioned, yet so deeply cut into my soul. Hope lit me aflame inside. Did she feel it too?

She shoved me roughly away, the insult clear on her face. "I said I owe you thanks," she said angrily. "You presume too much."

I knew then that it was hopeless. She would never remember. Time had taken her from me, robbed me of hope and love. I had lost her forever. Surrender carved a gaping hole inside me, a yawning maw to swallow me. Despair would be only a mist to fill it. If the emptiness consumed me, I would not care.

I looked down at the dagger in my hand and, sighing inwardly, I pressed and held the switch on its handle.

The world rushed past me in a now-familiar whoosh. This had snatched me out of Death's claws countless times. Now, it ripped me from her. I felt her warm lips again for an instant, then mine were once again cold and empty. I released the switch.

"—such a fantastic story? Do you think me a child, that I would believe such nonsense?"

I gave the cursed blade one last look. I thought of what it had given me: Sorrow. Death. Then life. I looked into her spirited eyes and saw what it had taken away: Love. "You're right," I said, tasting bitterness in my voice. "It was just a story." I handed Farah the dagger and turned to leave her.

"Wait!" she called. I looked up from my perch in the tree beside her balcony, refusing to let hope seep into my heart. "I don't even know your name."

A small, bittersweet smile pulled irresistibly at my mouth. "Just call me… kakolukia."

The last I saw of my love before sliding down out of sight was the expression of amazement gracing her features. The shock—the recognition.

Kakolukia.

The secret word washed over Farah's mind. She had never told anyone of it. How could he know? Inhaling sharply, she gave a moment of serious consideration to the possibility: could he have been telling the truth? His story was surely too fantastic to be real—but it was hardly less believable than the chance of him knowing such a unique Indian word… her word.

She rushed to the edge of the balcony, frantically searching for a glimpse of him among the rustling foliage.

But he was gone.