Devil's Daughter (Devil 2)

When at last he lay on top of her, his head resting beside hers on an embroidered pillow, he realized she was stiff beneath him and came up on his elbows.

“Thank you, Maya,” he said, and lightly kissed her. He saw that she was staring at him uncertainly, and said in a weary voice, “You gave me great pleasure. You may go now, Maya, and rest. Hassan Aga is waiting outside. He will give you a token of my pleasure.”

“Yes, highness,” she said, and quietly left him.

His body was eased somewhat, but his mind was not. Maya was like all the other women in his possession. Even Elena would only pretend to listen to him, lower her lashes seductively, and tell him that she didn’t understand him. He remembered with vague regret the European women he had known. Though they lived by rules as rigid as any in the Muslim world, they knew freedom that neither a Muslim man nor a Muslim woman could conceive. They spoke their minds, loved with discretion, and had spoiled him with their willful and entrancing freedom.

Kamal sighed and rolled over on his belly. He knew he must take a wife soon; it was expected of him. It was his duty to his people and his position. If he did not marry and produce a son, his half-brother, Risan, now nearly twenty, would be his heir. Until Lella’s child was born. Risan could never cope with the com-plexities and the responsibilities that would face him as Bey of Oran. Risan was happiest among the rais, captaining his own ship, preying on the hapless merchant vessels that had not paid tribute to the Dey of Algiers.

“The girl, Maya, highness. She did not please you?”

Kamal looked up to see Hassan Aga standing uncertainly in the doorway. “Enough, old friend. I trust you gave her a jewel or something to compensate her for her maidenhead.”

“Indeed, merely a small token.”

Hassan turned to leave, but Kamal stayed him. “No, Hassan, remain with me a moment. Come, sit down.”

Kamal pulled on a bed robe of soft crimson silk and joined Hassan beside a small table surrounded with soft embroidered cushions.

“You do not act like a man who has just relieved his needs, highness. You are thinking about Europe, perhaps, and the Corsican who keeps England’s eyes focused away from us? Or perhaps”—his voice deepened—“you dwell on the two ships taken under your seal?”

“Yes, and ordered, as you suspected, by my mother.” Kamal rubbed his fingers over the knotted muscles in his neck. “At the moment, I think about honor. There is little of it in any of us, it appears. Do you know that I stopped years ago telling anyone in Italy and France that my home is in Algiers, indeed that I am half-Muslim, for they made me the butt of jokes and treated me like a rabid barbarian.”

“Intolerance is bred into every culture, highness,” Hassan said quietly. “A man, it appears, cannot be content with himself and his station unless there is another man he can disdain.”

There was silence between them for several minutes before Kamal recounted to Hassan, his voice expressionless, the story his mother had told him. “Do you know anything of this, Hassan?” he asked when he had finished.

“No, highness, I know nothing of what your mother told you. I have met the Earl of Clare—the Marchese di Parese, as he is known in Genoa. Your father and your half-brother Hamil knew him better. I met him but once, in Algiers, shortly after I arrived here, some ten years ago. He has paid tribute for many years.” He paused a moment, his eyes on his crooked fingers that pained him when the weather changed. “It is distressing,” he said finally, “that your mother took action against him without your knowledge or consent.”

Kamal’s lips tightened into a thin line. “ ‘Distressing’ is a mild word, Hassan. It scarce touches my feelings in the matter.”

“What do you intend to do, highness?”

“I have not as yet decided. As I told you, if I allow her her revenge, she will no longer be welcome in Oran. She will return to the life she forfeited over twenty-five years ago. This English nobleman, the Earl of Clare, what do you remember of him?”

Hassan spoke slowly, dusting the years off his memories. “I remember him as a man who understood his power, as a man of ability.”

“An honorable man?”

“I would have said so, yes.”

“Did he deal well with my father?”

“As I recall, there was a certain coolness between them. But they were two vastly different men. He dealt quite well with Hamil.”

“Anyone with half a notion of honor dealt well with Hamil. Hassan, your eyes tell me there is something more you would say.”

“There are many motives, highness, that men may not understand. A motive of vengeance can be clear in one man’s mind and a tangle of confusion in another’s. I understand vengeance, highness, but in this matter I am not sure. I ask you to tread carefully in this.”

“I shall, old friend.”

“Your learning is important for our people,” Hassan continued after a thoughtful moment. “They live as they lived a hundred, nay, two hundred years ago. When I think of Cairo, my home, and its vast libraries, I would weep for what we have lost here. The Moors no longer hold learning above all else; the Turks are content to spit on the Jews and Christians and slaughter anyone who intrudes upon their sport. The Europeans loathe and fear us, and want only to crush us. I fear for the future, highness. The Grand Turk cannot help us. Your half-brother Hamil sought change for our people, but more than that, he sought honor.”

“I did not wish to become the Bey of Oran. You know that, Hassan. And never at the sacrifice of Hamil’s life.”

“Hamil was proud of you, highness. Each letter he received from you, he read proudly.” Hassan paused a moment, then added quietly, “I do not think he was a man to be governed by a woman.”

Kamal met Hassan’s wise old eyes. It was a bold statement for Hassan, who usually spoke obliquely, in the Muslim way.