Captive of Kadar

Everyone, it seemed, wanted to have a word and shake his hand as he made his way back into the stands and alongside her and he spent time listening to them all. She watched him as he gave them each time, one by one, and felt an insane amount of pride.

Which was mad, because he wasn’t hers to be proud of, and she was only here because of his overblown sense of duty, but she was proud all the same. Because she was here, and every now and then it was just nice to forget the real reason why they were together.

He apologised for the delay once he’d managed to reach her side.

‘Your workers love you,’ she said. ‘No boss should ever apologise for that.’

He looked at her strangely, and at the little girl sitting in her lap, and then smiled. ‘Wait until you see what’s coming next. The best fireworks in the world, made right here in the valley of Burguk.’

As the last of the light leached from the sky they watched a fireworks spectacular the likes of which Amber had never seen. Bright colours lit up the sky in wheels and airbursts and fireballs shooting across the sky, turning night back into day, the air filled with the gasps and cheers of the onlookers, and all overlaid by the ever-present smell of sulphur.

And on her lap sat the little girl—Ayla, she’d learned her name was—her dark eyes wide with wonder, her mother sitting alongside, a baby wrapped snug in her arms.

When the last of the smoke had drifted away and it was time to hand a now sleepy Ayla back to her family and go, the little girl roused with the motion and put a hand to Amber’s hair and said the first words she’d heard her say. She turned to Kadar. ‘What did she say?’

‘She asked if you’re a princess.’

Amber smiled and shook her head at the young girl. ‘No. Not a princess. Just an ordinary everyday girl.’

She was anything but ordinary, Kadar thought as they headed back to the Pavilion of the Moon.

Anything but everyday.

And when they went to bed and she handed him the silk scarf to bind her wrists, he said, ‘No,’ and let the shred of silk flutter to the floor. And she blinked but she turned around and he took her shoulders and turned her back to face him. ‘No,’ he said again, urging her down upon the big wide bed, before climbing on top. ‘No ties this time.’

‘But—’

‘You haven’t recoiled in horror yet. I’m thinking I can handle it if your fingers brush my scars.’ He hesitated. ‘If you can, that is.’

And she wound her arms around his neck and pulled him into her kiss.

Their lovemaking that night was tender and achingly sweet. He sighed as her fingers stroked the hard nubs of his nipples, growled when her fingernails raked slowly down his sides and reached for him, hard and wanting.

And when he slid into her, Amber almost cried out with the sheer bliss of the connection.

Afterwards, as they lay facing together in the bed, and Kadar lazily stroked his hand up and back along the curve of her side, he asked her, ‘Why did you let a stranger’s child sit in your lap?’

She smiled. ‘Ayla is sweet. Who could resist her?’

‘You have a way with children.’

‘Lucky, really, seeing that’s what I do.’

‘You work with children?’

She dipped her head. ‘I teach at a special school in Melbourne, for children who have problems, physically or developmentally. It’s good work. Rewarding work.’ And a way to help other children when she’d been too unknowing and too young to help Tash.

‘That is a noble thing to do.’

‘Not noble,’ she said, shaking her head, as she told him about her tiny cousin who had died aged barely ten. ‘But useful, I hope. I just want to do something that helps.’

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I see,’ and his smile told her he did understand, and his thumb made slow, lazy circles over her hip for a while, so that Amber was almost lured into sleep by his restful touch.

‘Ayla has a crooked leg.’

Amber blinked open her eyes and bit her lip. ‘I know. I didn’t want to ask.’

‘I will ask then. Perhaps her family were too shy to ask for help.’

She raised herself up on her elbow. ‘Is this your village? Is this where you came from? Is this why you care so much?’

He shook his head. ‘My village was further east and much smaller, nominally part of Iran, but so close to the border with Armenia and Azerbaijan that our elders felt beholden to no one.’

She ignored the fact he’d finally answered a question he’d skirted around that very first day and concentrated on what he hadn’t said. ‘Was?’