Sahar may still have been a virgin, but shewas no idiot.She knew full well what that whore had been doing.Set up or not, Aleksandr had been letting her, and to make Sahar’shumiliation complete, all the others had seen it too.As if thatwasn’t bad enough, they heard Aleksandr tell Sahar that she wasnothing to him.
She’d run out of the stables , not knowing orcaring what happened after, though it was a sure bet that the storyof the princess happening upon Aleksandr being serviced by a whorewould be known far and wide by morning.Brawn and Munir would tellher father, of course, and the three of them would remaincircumspect about the whole matter.The others though, Yago andTaweel and Anastasia, they would spread the tale throughout thepalace every chance they got.As for the painted harlot, who hadbeen quite pretty actually, Sahar could only guess who and what shewould tell.
“Arghh.”Sahar gnashed her teeth and fistedher hands so tightly she dug her nails into her palms.Unclenchingher fists, she rubbed the tender indents and then glanced up andaround.She was standing no more than fifty paces from the entranceto the royal family’s private chambers, not where she wanted to beright now.Where she wanted to be was some place she could screamloud and long without being heard, a place where she could rage andrail, and even weep if she wanted to, which she felt ridiculouslyclose to doing now.She paced in a tight circle, trying to figureout such a place she could go to, alone, in the dark of night, whenshe heard her name being called.
“Sasa.Sasa.”Halah was standing in the opendoorway, waving Sahar in.“Rima wishes for some female companytonight while Asim is going over the race’s course with ourfathers.Our mothers are already with her, they sent me to findyou.”
Sahar stood there for a long moment, unableto think of an excuse for not joining them.The last place shewanted to be was in a room full of happily married and betrothedwomen whose men adored them and where pregnancy and childbirthwould be the topics of conversation.
“What is the matter with you?”Halah asked,closing the door behind them.“What happened in the stables?”
“It was a set up,” Sahar said, her voicesounding oddly distant.“Yago, Taweel, Anastasia, they wanted me togo with them so that I would discover Aleksandr in a compromisingposition with a harlot.”
“No.”
Sahar nodded numbly.“Oh yes.”
“What did Aleksandr do?What did he say whenyou discovered them?”
“He swore it was not what it seemed.”Saharclosed her eyes against the image of the harlot kneeling beforeAleksandr and took a shaky breath.“He said he did not know why hewas bothering to explain himself to me, that we were nothing toeach other.”
She stepped away from Halah, refusing to meether eyes.If she did and saw pity in them, she would surely burstinto tears.That she would not do.
“He was lying, Sahar.”
“No.”Sahar shook her head.“He was set up.Iam certain of it.”
“I am sure he was too.I am saying that helied about you two meaning nothing to each other.”
Sahar chuffed.“Aleksandr may be arrogant,bold, and beyond cocky,” she said, “but above all else he’s honest.Brutally at times.”
“Perhaps about most things,” Halah insisted,“but not about his feelings for you.”
“Munir was there, he heard Aleksandr.Askhim.”
“Oh, I am sure that’s what Aleksandr said,caught with a harlot, by you, in front of all those others.”
“Adding to my humiliation.”
“And his.”
“True enough,” Sahar admitted.
The gossip would be as cruel to him as toher, of that she was certain.Still, it was a humiliation theywould both survive, yet another distraction to what they bothwanted.Sahar wanted to win the coming race, to prove a woman asgood and capable as any man, and to show the world that a woman didnot need any man.Aleksandr wanted a wife, and not any wife, but aneasy-tempered broodmare, something Sahar would never be.
“You are right, Halah,” she said.“As wasAleksandr.We may be drawn to each other, but we are nothing moreto each other than a passing distraction.When the race is over anddone with, he will go back to his home with his winnings and I willstay here with mine.”
CHAPTER 7
Wounds
Aleksi slowed Zolotoy to an easy trot for thecool-down lap around the track, pleased with how well the stallionhad run.It was the last day of training before the third andlongest race, and Zolotoy was well fed, well rested, and welltrained for the hundred-league course.Which was more than Aleksicould say for himself.
He was well fed and well trained enough, buthe had not gotten much rest the past two nights, not with thememory of Sahar’s face blanched white with shock at finding himwith Roxanna.When he’d told Sahar that he and she were nothing toeach other, her crystalline eyes looked shattered and dulled withhis betrayal.
Yago and his pack of Taweel and Anastasia hadwasted no time in spreading the story with their own twists andembellishments.By the next morning the palace was abuzz with thetale of how the princess had cried and pleaded with Aleksandr todenounce his favorite whore and come back to her, and how he hadrejected her, telling her she was nothing compared to theharlot.
If the tables had been turned and Anastasiahad been the princess left publicly humiliated by a man beneath herin station, much less her supposed lover, heads would have rolled,but Sahar had held her spine erect and her head high through itall, refusing to acknowledge the side glances and palm whisperingaround her.When Aleksi had passed her at the training trackyesterday, she had answered his greeting with a stubborn silence,her chin lifted and her eyes glinting green shards of ice.
