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“I’ve been sitting for hours.”
“Yes, well, you’re a weak sickly woman—” he broke off with a grunt as Tally’s elbow made contact with his ribs.
“I wasn’t that sickly until I was poisoned.”
“And the asthma?”
“You don’t want another one of these, do you?” she asked, pointing to her elbow.
“Indeed not. It’s a dangerous weapon. One you actually know how to use.” He led her to a wide stone staircase. They took the steps slowly and Tair talked as they climbed.
“This is Bur Juman.” His voice was toneless and yet she heard his pride, as well as possession. “It was my father’s home, and his father’s home before that. For one hundred years my family and our people have lived here.”
“Bur Juman,” he said, pausing at the top of the staircase, “means Pearl on the Other Side.”
Tally immediately got the significance of the name. Pearl on the other side. This beautiful retreat of sun drenched stone patios and terraces was a world away from the dangerous desert they’d left, a world dominated by barbarians much like Tair.
And yet here, this was a world of beauty, of women, of jewelry and ornamentation. The women were all hennaed, draped in gold, gold bracelets, necklaces, earrings, gold everywhere. Even the air around the women smelled sweet, perfumed by some indefinable Arabic scent that she’d caught whiffs of in town but here the fragrance permeated the very air, rivaling even the cloying sweetness of lemon and orange blossoms.
Pearl on the other side. Yes, definitely and Tally felt almost overwhelmed by the sensual beauty of it, ensnared by mystery and that which was new, different, exotic.
It was even harder to fathom coming as she and Tair had from the Spartan conditions of the desert camp. The encampment had been eerily desolate, deprived of women, softness, comfort of any sort. There were the men, the animals—goats, horses, the one scrawny dog that followed Tair everywhere—but no families, no children, no cry of babies or murmur of elders talking.
“Your men,” she said, comparing the encampment to this stunning city cut from the cliffs, “this is their real home, isn’t it?”
Tair turned, looked at her. For a moment he didn’t speak, then just when she thought he wouldn’t answer, he said, “My men choose to live apart from their families part of each year to better protect them. It’s a choice they make. I’ve never insisted or dictated. They do it because they know they must.”
“You rotate the men?”
“Regularly. It is hard on them—on the wives and children, too—when they are gone. But this is life on the border.
“Thirsty?” he asked.
Tally nodded. “Very.”
“We’ll have tea in my orange garden,” he said, gesturing up one gently curving staircase carved from the peach colored stone of the mountain. “There’s a private room and bath off the garden. Your attending girl will be waiting for you there.”
A private room? A bath? A garden? Tally felt like she’d died and gone to heaven. She nearly clapped her hands. “This is wonderful here. Really lovely. Now if I could only have my camera back with the film,” she concluded wistfully.
“You can,” Tair said. “I’ll have both brought to you later tonight.”
Tally spun to face him. “Are you serious? You’re giving me my camera and all the pictures back?”
“Yes.”
“I can take pictures again…pictures here?”
He nodded gravely. “Yes.”
Tally nearly hugged him. “That’s fantastic, absolutely fantastic. You don’t know how happy you’ve made me. Thank you.” She beamed, impulsively touched his arm. “Thank you.”
“My pleasure.”
She rocked back on her heels. “So you believe me now. You know I’m a photographer, and trustworthy.”
“Tally—”
“I’d love to take pictures here. But if you don’t want me to photograph the children, I understand. And even if you don’t want me to photograph the children, I’ll still send you copies of the photos I take when I’m home—”
“Tally.”
His curt tone cut through her bubble of happiness. She broke off, looked at him, saw the shadows in his eyes and the fierce lines in his face. He looked like the old Tair, the one who was more monster than man. “What?”
“This is home now.”
She stared at him not understanding. She tried to hang on to her smile but it wobbled, disappeared. “You said that about the camp, Tair.”
