Sahara's Prince

Gahzi called her Hûr because he couldn't pronounce "Gretchen" justifiably. It was difficult for her to determine which was worse. She'd thought Gretchen was a cruel joke of a name, but so much time had passed since she had been called it that the idea of someone referring to her by her given name was almost enticing. Her eyelids dropped in satisfaction as her teeth sunk into the lush, giving flesh of the fig in her hand. A slow, quiet moan escaped her throat as she placed the fruit back on the platter beside the tub, and she found it remotely funny that a simple little plant could procure the kind of noises from her that so many men struggled to. She thought that was a rather odd thing to come into her mind, and opened her eyes, staring at her hands. Who knew her palms could be so very white? The backs of her hands made her virtually undistinguishable from the native girls, which would make Gahzi unhappy. She wondered what was so much more valuable about a skinny, rather plain, deeply-tanned white woman when his most beautiful employees were those born on Cairo's streets, of Cairo's inhabitants.

A knock on the door made her flinch so badly that some of the precious, aromatic water splashed upon the floor. She cleared her mind quite easily and yelled:

"Someone's in here!"

Despite her warning, the rotting wood crashed against the wall as a rather irritable young woman flung it open. Gretchen sighed audibly, pushing a soaking lock from her eyes and glanced up at the stained ceiling for strength. With a personal groan, she met the feral black gaze reluctantly.

"What do you want, Meela?"

Meela was bitter because she was Gahzi's most beautiful girl and registered as almost nothing to him. Gretchen would have killed to have Meela's high cheekbones or feline eyes or glistening jet hair, at least at one time. Nowadays, no one's looks made much difference to her.

"Gahzi says to hurry. And you have a visitor."

Before the proud Egyptian woman could manage a deathly glare for good measure, Jonathan was pushing past with barely a glance. Gretchen watched him notice her after a moment, running his tongue thoughtfully over his lips before ripping his eyes urgently back to her. He was holding up his fist triumphantly, and the prostitute was smiling despite herself.

"You have the money!" she exclaimed, a wave of energy overtaking her.

The Englishman grinned, throwing a fistful of bills by the figs and rubbing his hands together plaintively, looking about the room with a distinct lack of nonchalance. "So! I'll be taking my trinket, and then I'll be off."

She sighed disdainfully and gripped the lips of the tub with her long fingers, pulling herself from the warm, comfortable waters. Instantly, she was encompassed by a cooling sensation she may have appreciated, had she been too hot before. Jonathan's eyes were tracing the paths of every droplet that rolled off her skin, and a remotely self-conscious feeling itched in her spine for no more than a moment. After all, it wasn't as if they saw her so often in the daylight, and...well, she knew her body was nothing to be envied after. It was not so much the fact that he was studying her naked form--but that he was seeing what she really looked like, and she wasn't sure how she felt about that. Gretchen figured she could be quite ravishing after a series of whiskey shots and a badly-lit room, but Jonathan was sober now (well, sober for him), and the sun was shining harshly through the window and illuminating the humble little room, and there was nothing she could hide at the moment. She reached stiffly for her shift hanging just within arm's reach and pulled it on in a jerky motion and pushing passed the tall Englishman to the door and out the hall. With quick, mechanical steps she reached her room and threw open the door, not bothering to glance over her shoulder and meet his eyes. She didn't really have the apathy to look him in the eye just then, and that worried her.

The odd little box that had pathetically captured Jonathan Carnahan's interest was just where he had left it before. She closed her fingers about it and dropped it into the palm of his hand with a businesslike ease. He was smiling at his lost toy so ridiculously that Gretchen didn't know whether she wanted to laugh at him for the audacity of it or slap him in the face for his skewed priorities. Seeing as how he had just paid her, she decided good manners would make the best course of action.

"Well, there you are..."

He glanced up to meet her in her cool, dark eyes. "Yes, I suppose so."

She smiled, taking hold of his arm and leading him gently towards her door. "Please stop by again very soon, Jon."

He forced a small grin, though something about that stretch of his lips was tragic and ingenuine. It made her feel cold inside, and, in Egypt, that sensation was rare. "Of course, love."

Jonathan tagged a kiss on her cheek before he was out the door, down the hall...gone. She sighed, tangled in her thoughts for a moment before remembering the bills he had left her in the bathroom. She jumped to her feet, rushing from her room to the public bath. Now, that would just be her luck -- some nosy little bitch sneaking in there and taking her money--

Gretchen was able to breathe a sigh as her eyes collided with the crumpled mess of bills untouched on the tray of figs. Reinforced by their appearance, she slowed, her fingers brushing over the soft paper just as a deep, unfamiliar voice echoed down the hall:

"Know this, Ghazi. The only reason you are still a Med-Jai is on my grace. This establishment is an embarrassment to the tribes."

She turned about, catching a glimpse of the whoremaster bobbling his head like an idiot as a tall, dark man in black robes chided him in Arabic. She choked down a laugh, stuffing the money in the pocket of the shift and slipping out slowly. She met Ghazi's buggy, nervous eyes and bit down on her dry bottom lip, glancing up at the somber stranger. His black gaze froze the blood in her veins with an icy intensity she didn't know was capable of a man who'd apparently been birthed and bred in the sizzling sands. She swallowed anxiously, trying to think of the most nonchalant way to slip by them and into her room. Before that thought could ferment too long in her head, however, Ghazi's plump, rough fingers had closed easily about her thin wrist, yanking her into the middle of the hall.

"Please, my chief," Gretchen didn't know a man Ghazi's age could hit such a high note. "accept my humble tribute."

She wasn't a genius by any stretch of the imagination, and her Arabic was stuck in shabby mediocrity, so it took her a little longer than it probably should have for her to realize what the squat Egyptian was suggesting. Her eyes widened suddenly and her jaw dropped to compensate. She gaped for the words to say, but the Stygian fellow with the pensive frown beat her to it:

"You want me to take her? As tribute?" the nearest thing to a smile tugged at his lips, and something like a chuckle echoed from his throat. If he didn't seem so frighteningly dangerous, she would have considered him a handsome man. "Are you serious?"

Gretchen was shaking her head fervently, turning her shocked glare to Ghazi. "You can't--I can't go with him--"

But the pimp was all toothless smiles and flustered, over-exaggerated hand gestures. "Anything for the Med-Jai!"

She wanted to plead her case with this Med-Jai...individual, but she really lacked the guts to beg him. Mercy seemed outside of his character. She heard him sigh, and made the effort to glance up and watch him shake his head.

"You always gave my father a tribute of money..."

Ghazi shrugged. "Hard times."

His eyes--those deep, perpetual, soulless dark eyes were scraping over her like the sharp edge of a knife, and when she mustered the strength to flick a glance in his direction, she was struck by the remote, offended pain that glimmered back. Gretchen looked away quickly, a tremble slithering up her spine.

"Listen," Ghazi started up in his most salesmanlike tone, having the nerve to take the black-robed Med-Jai by the arm. He frowned at the short, slimy man, once, and the touch was quickly retrieved with an unnerved chuckle for good measure, "you collect the other tributes, and think about it. Come back at sundown and take her, if you want her, or we can negotiate something else."

Gretchen swallowed, something in her stomach itching in anticipation. In a way, she couldn't believe the words being spewed from the whoremaster's mouth; in another way, she was grimly unsurprised. Still--what was he thinking? He couldn't just...pawn her off to some desert man. She made a good deal of money for this place, and...well...seriously, what was she supposed to do out there? Milk camels and stitch sackcloth? She couldn't...well, she just wouldn't--

"We will see," he pronounced firmly, and with a swoosh of his cape (which Gretchen found a little too melodramatic, given the circumstances), he was striding down the hall and out of the wretched establishment she called a home.