Climbing the Date Palm Page 3

  “I--” Rivka was caught sideways. “Now that I’ve got a job, I wanted to give you a place to live where you’d be treated with respect.” Because nobody here knows that you got knocked up by a vegetable gardener when you were a teenager, she added silently. Except the queen, and she doesn’t care about things like that.

  “I didn’t mind,” said Mitzi. “I had learned to live with it. It was no more than I deserved. I was happy up there!”

  “Then why did you come? You didn’t have to.” But by looking at her face, Rivka knew she’d made a mistake.

  “Yes, I did.” Mitzi looked away. “Your uncle got ahold of the letter and decided it was a good idea for me to come down and live with you. And now he doesn’t have to be responsible for me anymore.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I--”

  Then both women looked over sharply, because they realized they weren’t alone anymore. A gentle-faced woman about Mitzi’s age, with long hair held back with a scarf that had been folded into a headband, had limped over to them with a pretty little cane. “Are you Riv’s mother? So nice to meet you, finally. I’m Leah -- Aviva’s mother. You must be so proud of Riv. And you have such beautiful hair! I’ve never seen a woman with golden hair before.”

  Mitzi blinked a few times. Rivka knew her mother wasn’t used to random castle-inhabitants treating her so kindly. “Please call me Mitzi.”

  “May I show you around the palace? I only just moved in a few years ago, just after Riv came.”

  “I’d like that.”

  “We love Riv here,” said Leah. “You really did raise him right.”

  As far as Rivka knew, it was the first time Mitzi had heard anything like that in her entire life. Her mother’s face made it clear she was soaking it up like dry soil in a rainstorm. “See you at dinner, Mammeh,” Rivka called out to them as they walked away.

  Isaac was at her side. “Leah to the rescue?”

  “She could charm the stone out of a peach,” said Rivka.

  “Now you sound like Aviva.”

  “’Vivaleh would have said something even weirder. Something about peaches with wings, and a flute in there someplace. Or maybe snails.”

  “Come on, Captain. We still have a few minutes of ‘day off’ before sundown.” He could say so much with just his eyes, and with that subtly smirking mouth.

  Rivka followed him inside their room, their little ‘dragon cave.’

  The door panel was barely shut before his powerful arms snaked around her, pulling her into the cushion of his belly. She caramelized into his heat like a ripe plantain, sizzling at the feeling of his hungry lips all over her face and neck as he pushed her down onto their bed. “I wanted you so badly out there in the brush when we were sparring,” she told him huskily, “and then when Hersch and what’s-his-name showed up swinging swords I just couldn’t believe...” She began to remove the leather armor that both protected her and kept her breasts -- and therefore her womanhood -- secret. “Need to feel your skin on mine.”

  He seized her wrist. “Not in the palace. Put it back.”

  “Don’t wanna! Your tongue... everywhere...”

  “Not here. Someone might see. And you know I can’t do that here, either.”

  Her growl sounded like a charging bear.

  Propping himself up on his right elbow, he untied the laces between her legs with well-practiced fingers and purred into her ear. “I promise, Mighty One, I promise I’ll make it so good you won’t mind so much.”

  “Aaaahh,” Rivka moaned.

  “And then, on another day off, I’ll take you back into the woods and you can have as much dragon’s tongue as you want.”

  Her legs were wrapped around him now as she rubbed herself eagerly against his bulging trousers, trapping his left hand between them. “Waited... all... day...”

  “For this?”

  Rivka threw her head back and let out a deep groan of abandon as she was filled. He began to thrust, and she overflowed with pleasure at the feeling of his bulky torso bearing down on her, his fingers working at her, himself inside of her stretching her and colliding with the parts of herself she couldn’t see that buzzed and shuddered. True, they were separated by layers of heavy clothing that preserved her status and reputation and sometimes her ribs ached, but it was still so very good.

  She seized up and came, her fingers grabbing his back hard enough to leave marks.

  “Would it be so terrible if they found out? If the world finally learned to cheer a lady warrior?” Isaac’s head rested on her shoulder as he idly stroked her thighs.

  “If they don’t learn, I’ll lose everything.” Rivka feared practically nothing; for years she had gone into battle with a strong heart and a ready temperament. But a childhood near her bullying, misogynist uncle had given her one thing of which to be scared: that even after they’d seen her succeed, if the rest of the world found out she was female, her great reputation would shatter into unbelievable lies, and she’d have to start anew.

  “You wouldn’t lose me,” Isaac reminded her. “But I’ll help you protect your secret.”

  “I know you will. Keeping secrets is kind of your specialty.”

  He grinned. “Not from you, Mighty One. Never again from you.”

  And she knew he meant it.

  Chapter 4: What They Built

  “Wake up, Your Highness.” The voice was a deep, quiet bass he didn’t recognize.

  “Can’t.”

  “Yes, you can. The herbs are wearing off. Open your eyes. I need to know you’re listening to me.”

  “Who is this?”

  “Isaac.”

  Prince Kaveh’s eyes snapped open. The room had grown dark in the nighttime, with moonlight sneaking in at a window. Its pale light merged with the light from an oil lamp at his bedside to illuminate a round face with a trim beard and mustache. “You’re Captain Riv’s--”

  “Wizard.”

  “How did you meet?”

  “I taught him to sword fight,” said the wizard.

  “So you’re a warrior too?”

  “Was a warrior,” Isaac corrected. Drawing back his sleeve with his other hand, he showed the prince the raised, gnarled scar across his right palm and forearm, then strained his right fingers to show how they no longer closed properly. “I prefer other ways of fighting now, and if I have to use a sword, I still have my left hand.”

  “I feel normal around you,” Kaveh blurted suddenly and irrelevantly.

  “I think we all feel that a little bit, sometimes,” said Isaac. “Sometimes, I only feel normal around the Captain. Whatever ‘normal’ is.”

  “Is Riv going to save Farzin?”

  Isaac met Kaveh’s pleading eyes with his own sky-blue stare. “We’re all going to do everything we can. For my part, I’m supposed to save your life tonight. You’re so full of infection I could almost draw it all out and make a whole second Kaveh.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “My magic will kill the infection. Your part is to think of something that makes you happy. I need you to keep your mind on pleasant thoughts.”

  “Farzin.” Kaveh’s word was almost a sob. He immediately thought of the last they’d seen of each other, with Kaveh outside the prison window, straining against the bars to touch his beloved’s face and hands as best he could.

  “That is not what I meant!” Isaac growled, and Kaveh believed the dragon rumors.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, quickly.

  “Happy moments, Highness.”

  “I’ll try harder.”

  Kaveh slipped into a reverie, and Isaac used his magic to convert the happy thoughts into that which would fight the infection.

  My despondent meditation ended as my father jerked me up from the floor by my shoulder. “I can’t believe I have to pick my own, grown son up off the ground,” he complained to whatever aide stood beside him. “At least he has two brothers that know how to be men, so that I know I did something right.”

&nb
sp; “What do you want, Baba?”

  “Show a little respect. And clean yourself up. I’m sending you on a mission.”

  I tried to tidy the dark, messy disaster of my hair, insulted that he’d treat me like this in front of his aides -- but not altogether surprised. “What is it?”

  “Everything is ready to go for the improvements to the City,” said the king. “I’ve selected the site for the new bridge across the river, and all the places where the road needs to be repaired are marked on the map. The bridge is going to connect all the new houses with the new market, so that the people won’t have to walk to the old bridge on both sides of the river to get back and forth. You’ll go and oversee the entire project.”

  “Public improvements?” My brow furrowed. I knew nothing about roadwork and bridge building. “Me?”

  “Just the thing to take your mind off Azar,” my father added cruelly. “Surely you realize how ridiculous you are to mope after her to this degree. Why, all it took was one joke from me about how she’d never be queen, and the next thing she does is go off and change her allegiance. A woman like that isn’t worth all the fuss you’re making over her.”

  My chest heaved as I simply breathed in and out, unable to defend the maligned, innocent Azar without incriminating myself. And that had been no joke. Baba always tossed off his insults as jokes later. “I don’t know how to build a bridge.”

  “You dizzy boy.” My father rolled his eyes. “I’m not asking you to build it, just babysit the project and make sure my money’s being spent properly -- and the glory of the City made great. I’ve got a real engineer working on the practical details -- that fat fellow you were friends with in school. Farzin, I think he calls himself.”

  “It’ll be good to see a friend,” I said softly, almost to myself.

  “Go -- I told him to expect you at the bridge site.”

  That was how it started, with me trudging toward the new marketplace, a pack on my back, looking for Farzin.

  I found him standing at a table under a makeshift canopy, at the edge of the high, steep riverbank. The table was covered with parchment, and he was alternating between marking things off and staring at them when I approached.

  He looked different and the same. He was still pudgy, the way I remembered, with a softness to his belly and arms, and a face that was a little bit flabby. But he seemed taller, somehow, and simply by standing there he created a presence. He radiated confidence, and he hadn’t always been like that.

  I watched a commoner approach him with a brick in each hand and ask a question. Farzin studied both bricks, then pointed to the one on the left. The commoner nodded and scurried off. The decision had been made with complete self-assuredness. What would it be like to have that kind of confidence?

  Then Farzin must have sensed my eyes on him and looked up. “Prince Kaveh?”

  I grinned and joined him under the little tent. “You remember me!”

  He greeted me with open arms, and we hugged briefly. Then I laid my pack on the ground beside his table, and he began to show me the plans he had designed for the new bridge.

  I put in my best effort, but I couldn’t keep my mind focused on what lay before me. “Farzin... it’s so good to have a friend.”

  “What’s eating you?”

  “Everything.”

  “Intense as always. You haven’t changed.”

  “You have. You’re so full of... power.” It wasn’t the word I wanted to say, but it must have been what I felt.

  “I’m so full of math,” said Farzin. “Maybe math can fix your problems. It’s going to fix the problem of how to get those people home with their groceries without dying of exhaustion.” He pointed at the houses across the river, then at the market in front of them.

  “I’ll give you a math problem,” I said. “One prince minus one fiancée equals an absolute wreck.”

  “Oh. Azar. Well, I heard about that.”

  “What did you hear?” I gasped, a little more frantic than I would have preferred.

  Farzin put a hand on my shoulder to steady me. “I heard that she was marrying you, and then all of a sudden she was marrying your brother, that’s all. Why, is there more?”

  I blinked, not having enough room in my brain to figure out whether my distress was at his question -- or his touch. As I looked away into the river, I heard him softly calling me. “Hey.” It didn’t help.

  “She found out something about me.” He had coaxed that admission from me with that one soft word, and the warm, firm hand on my shoulder.

  “Must have been quite the secret,” said Farzin. “What--”

  “I can’t tell you.” I pulled away from him and took a couple of steps toward the river. “Maybe you’ll hate me too.”

  “I’m not like that,” said Farzin. “I could never hate you. I’ll always be your friend -- nothing could ever make me feel otherwise. I knew that the minute you stood up to those boys on my account, the first day of school.”

  “I’m glad I did it, even if it got me beaten to shreds. They were being horrid to you.”

  “They wouldn’t have beat you up if they’d known you were the prince,” Farzin pointed out.

  “Once they found out they kept trying to make it up to me, but I never had any respect for them.”

  “Instead, you chummed around with me -- the fat nerd.”

  “You were the nicest.”

  “See? I’m the nicest. You should trust me. Tell me what’s so bad that it drove away Princess Ficklepants.”

  “She’s not technically a princess yet.” I chuckled in spite of myself at the ridiculous name. “I--” The scene with Azar replayed itself in my mind, the suddenness with which my admission shattered her love looming before me. So I said nothing. “Explain to me again what a keystone is?”

  Farzin laughed outright. “That wouldn’t fool a kitten.”

  “Fine. I don’t see any kittens.”

  “Since you’re not telling, I’m just going to guess. Tell me if I get it, all right? She left you because you... roast small animals alive and eat them.”

  “What?”

  “Well, it can’t possibly be worse than that -- I know you well enough to be sure. I’m just starting big and working my way down.”

  “Roasting small animals alive? Where do you even come up with--?”

  “So that’s a no, I take it?”

  “A big no. I don’t even like rare meat.”

  “I think I remember that. Okay, another guess... You... you’re in love with your own stepmother!”

  “I don’t even have a stepmother anymore,” I pointed out. “She and Baba quarreled, and he had the marriage annulled.”

  “See? Your way is clear! Now you can marry her right away.”

  “Very funny. I’m not into older women, and I’m especially not into older women who have slept with my father.”

  “You’re right. That’s a bit disturbing. Well, how about... You eat shoes!”

  “What do you eat, that you’re able to come up with these off the cuff like that?”

  “You beat the maid.”

  “I never beat anyone.”

  “You cast spells on rabbits.”

  “I’ve never done magic.”

  “That’s it! She left because you can’t do magic.”

  I shook my head, grinning at his silliness.

  “You tried to juggle oranges and dropped one on her foot... You caught a fish and named it after her because of the smell... You stole enchanted gold from mermaids... You got into a knife fight with a hashish girl... You threw the wrong baby into a fire.”

  “Since when is there a right baby to throw into a fire?” But he made me grin and laugh at my own misery, and I realized I was really enjoying his company, even more than I thought I would when I first heard my father say his name.

  “Mmm, babies.”

  “You’re ridiculous.” It was my father’s word, and it wasn’t quite what I wanted. Somehow, he understood anyway. Maybe it was becau
se of the giant silly grin plastered across my face. My cheeks hurt from smiling so hard.

  “But I’m helping,” he pointed out.

  “Yes, you are. Okay, I’ll-- I’ll tell you. I--”

  Then a pair of workers walked up, each holding rolls of parchment. Farzin threw me a look of resignation, murmuring, “Your secret is safe with me -- or without me, I suppose!”

  I grinned again and returned to looking at the designs for the bridge. This time I was able to concentrate, and I lived my first productive hours since Azar’s defection.

  I didn’t get a chance to tell him later, either, because when the work for the day was done and it was time to head off to Mother Cat’s for bread and meat and wine, I found that we were accompanied by three of the workers. Farzin had invited them, which surprised me, but I went with it because I trusted him. The five of us sat at one of the bigger tables, all sharing a conversation as if we were equals.

  Farzin often did things like that. He himself was of noble birth, but he had a passion for ranking men based on ability, not class. I learned as I worked with him those happy months that some of his brightest assistants had begun as brickmakers or errand boys. It was a wise way to structure an operation. Sometimes I was grateful and confused that I had made the cut. I had no special aptitude for math, although he was patient with my efforts and seemed pleased by the double effort I poured into understanding things that didn’t come naturally.

  He hadn’t forgotten the secret, although he wasn’t too mean about it. He would just say things in quiet moments, like “I still haven’t answered your question about keystones, but maybe you should go first.” And I’d start to say something, but I liked him too much to open my mouth.

  Brick by brick, the bridge was built.

  And moment by moment, I fell in love.

  This was a love deeper than what I had experienced with Azar. She was intoxicatingly beautiful, and her strong will was exciting. Farzin wasn’t beautiful, although I found his appearance pleasing in a baffling way that defied everything I had always been told about beauty. He was also admirable and principled and gentle and just and brilliant.