harem; not that he would have tried, it seemed.
Pelasia’s absolute ruler was a man in his early sixties at a guess. He could be older and very well preserved, but he was certainly no younger. Tall and lean, he dressed in simple black, almost like one of his soldiers, the only thing that marked him being the symbols of the royal line stitched into his cloak in gold and the very simple gold circlet on his brow. He was clean shaven and with short grey hair and piercing bright green eyes that reminded Asima of a cat caught in the light. Almost the precise opposite of Asima’s imagined ruler, the God-King was a simple and noble man, handsome in an almost indefinable way, who carried such weight and gravitas that even standing in a room full of kings, emperors and princes, he would still stand out.
Asima instantly recognised that this was a rare figure indeed and could understand now why the wives and concubines she had occasionally encountered spoke with such love and reverence of the man. Asima had smiled at that moment and had settled into her role, determined that her future would be at the side of this unsettlingly attractive older man.
Asima and Yasmin, after the second month, began to divide their time better. Now that the order of precedence in the harem had changed enough to move them both close to the top, their campaign of character assassination slowed. Now they need only keep themselves among the top runners, while allotting more time to learning those things that would make them stand out among their contemporaries.
Since that day she had seen the God-King before the harem gates several more times. It transpired that one of his most favoured pastimes was hunting and, once he had returned from a morning out with his court, he would often call at the harem and take one of his wives or concubines with him to the palace until the morning.
Discrete enquiries had further strengthened her resolve and bolstered her favourable impression of the God- King. It would appear that, despite his reputation for his… appetite seemed the most appropriate word, the God- King was charming and respectful and often took one of his favourites merely to spend the evening playing games of towers or listening to poetry or taking night time walks among the gardens.
By the start of Asima’s fourth month at Akkad, she had been a little disturbed to realise that she was happier now than at any time in her life. Moreover, she had more direction, determination and resolve that ever before and the potential for a fabulous future, living beyond the imaginable means of even the wealthiest merchant.
Toward the end of the fifth month, however, the pace in the harem changed. In seven more weeks the festival of the maker would begin in Akkad and across the country. There would be a series of events in the capital over several days, culminating in the events at the great temple, where the God-King would choose three new ladies. Preparations in the harem became manic and lessons would be cancelled for the younger students for a whole month in order to concentrate on preparing those older girls for the upcoming event.
Asima had suddenly found she had unexpected time on her hands and saw considerably less of Yasmin. It was good to become accustomed to that, though, for in the very near future she would likely see nothing of her for a while. Those girls who were being groomed for the festival began to be taken out of the harem on escorted occasions and shown other areas of the palace; introduced to those people they would need to know. They were permanently occupied with preparations and the younger girls virtually ignored.
And that was why it had been such a surprise when Yasmin had found Asima daydreaming in one of the solar rooms and dragged her hurriedly to the stairs and back up to the very corridor where they had first collided. Along a little further and they had reached the witch’s antechambers and this very window.
And now Asima stood at the window, frowning at the palace grounds as Yasmin tapped her fingers on her folded arms tensely.
“What are we waiting for?”
“Just be patient”, the other girl replied.
They could hear, muffled by the distance and corridors, the ringing of bells. Asima shook her head.
“That’s your call, Yasmin. You have classes.”
“I don’t care.”
Asima blinked.
“If you miss your classes you’ll be punished. And it will be noted among the people that really matter here.”
Yasmin smiled broadly.
“Yes, I know.”
“What?” Asima said incredulously. “Are you trying to ruin everything we’ve been working towards?”
“As a matter of fact, I am.”
Asima turned her head and stared in the shadowed hall at the nearest thing she had in Akkad to a friend.
“What?”
Gently, but firmly, Yasmin grasped Asima’s shoulder and turned her back to the window.
“Look.”
Asima, baffled and shocked, did as she was told. A small group of riders had come in from somewhere out of view to the left. There were eight… no nine. Their horses were steaming and had obviously been ridden hard. All of them wore the plain black of soldiers, though one wore a cloak with gold designs similar to that of the God-King and, as he dismounted and slowly removed the black scarf wound around his head, also wore a circlet.
Asima stared and the strangest thing happened: the man with the circlet turned and cast his gaze across the wall of the harem almost as though he knew he was being observed. Asima caught her breath. The man was like a younger version of the God-King himself. Handsome and tall, he was clearly one of the royal line. Not one of the God-King’s sons, though, since they both had yet to reach manhood, while this specimen had clearly done so a while ago.
“Who is he?”
Yasmin grinned.
“He is the reason I miss my lesson. He is the reason I shall be punished several times in the coming weeks and he…” she sighed and Asima recognised the hopeless adoration in the sound, “… he is the reason I shall not be selected by the God-King.”
“Yasmin, I will grant you that he’s handsome, but the God-King is both God and King. There is no one in all the world higher than he. Why settle for the moon when the sun is within reach?”
Yasmin stared at her as though she were insane.
“Look at him, Asima! Just look at him. He will be mine. You can have the God-King. I will have Prince Ashar Parishid for my own.”
“You know him?”
Yasmin nodded, grinning like a fool.
“We have spoken. He has been in the palace for a while during our escorted visits. He apparently used to spend much of his time at Velutio but, since the Empire has collapsed, he’s come home. I stumbled on a walk through the main palace’s garden. The witch went to whack me, but Prince Ashar stepped in and stopped her. He helped me up, Asima! A prince helped me up!”
Asima smiled a calculating smile as she examined the man below.
“Then I hope things go well for you, Yasmin. I really do.”
And she really did. She knew the ropes in the harem well enough now and had no use for Yasmin, and the idiot girl had just taken herself out of the running. There was nobody left that Asima considered a threat. She would be a Queen soon enough.
In which Calphoris encounters Pelasia
The ship lunged forward through the waves like a hungry animal in sight of food. The call had gone up a few minutes ago that a Pelasian sail could be seen around the headland and the ‘Wind of God’, a former Imperial navy vessel now crewed by the Calphorian militia, furled the sails and began to hammer out a rhythm for the three banks of oarsmen.
Ghassan, too young still to serve in an official capacity with the militia, stood ready in the stern of the ship. Resigned to his lot after months of bailing out water by hand during heavy storms, scrubbing the deck in the searing
