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“Good morning, Miss Henderson.”
“Please, call me Olivia,” she invited, moving quietly towards him.
“Olivia,” he repeated with a nod. “His royal highness, Sultan Faisal Fayez has requested an audience with you.”
Her heart dropped to her knees. “With me?” She repeated, her brows knitting together as she contemplated just what the heck Zamir’s father could have to say to her.
Marook nodded. “Immediately.”
“Oh.” She looked at him beseechingly. “Will Zamir be there?” And though she was furious with him, and felt sure she hated him in that moment, she was desperately hopeful he would be.
“My understanding is that he doesn’t even know this meeting has been requested.”
“Oh.” Great. A kaleidoscope of butterflies was bursting through her stomach.
What had Zamir said? That his father would feel betrayed by what he would view as Zamir’s disrespect in bringing Olivia to Dashan. And yet, here she was. Against her will, and his better judgement.
Marook led the way from Zamir’s apartment, back down the burgundy and gold corridor she’d seen days earlier, and into yet another wing of the palace. This one with cream tiles and gold and white walls, and large pillars that stretched all the way to the ceiling. There were marble statues along its length, and at the end, a window the size of the wall that framed the view of the glistening desert beyond. There was a small collection of buildings far off in the distance, simple and low-lying, with cream-coloured walls and holes for windows.
“An old village,” Marook explained, when he saw the direction of her gaze.
“Do people still live there?”
“Yes, though more and more villages such as this are being deserted for the cities.”
“It’s so far from anything.”
“That, Miss Henderson, is part of its charm. Until you have had dined and slept in a clay hut, and stared out at the stars above, you have not lived.”
She arched a brow at him, though she wanted to smile and ask him to go on. The old Olivia – the version of herself she’d been before meeting Zamir – would have laughed and linked arms with him regardless of his position within the royal family. She would have been uncaring for such boring considerations as etiquette and causing offence.
But now, she had a weight of expectation pressing on her shoulders.
So she fell back into step beside Marook, moving silently through the palace as though she belonged in its exquisitely designed walls.
Marook paused eventually outside a glossy cream door. There were marble statues on either side. He spoke into a small device at his wrist and the doors opened inwards.
There was so much light in the room that Olivia was momentarily blinded. She had to blink for a moment to let her vision adapt. The source of the light was the windows that ran the whole length of the room, on two walls. The midday sun beat in unrelentingly, but it was beautiful and warming, rather than over-hot.
His royal highness Faisal Fayez was standing with the aid of a cane, looking unflinchingly towards the door. His bearing was very like Ra’if’s. Far more so than Zamir’s.
His eyes though were pure Zamir. Heavily specked with amber and gold, they regarded her as though she were a fascinating specimen of insect. “Leave us.”
Marook did so immediately and without a word; Olivia was sorry to see him go. Though she didn’t know him well, she still considered him to be a sort of ally, and his presence had been slightly mollifying.
“So. You are the American.”
She nodded, though she was no such thing. He had an air of authority that was humbling and awe-inspiring.
“Come closer.”
She swallowed then took a step, and another, and another after that, moving forward nervously. She had no idea what a picture she made, lit up like gold dust and flickering flame, as she glided gently over the marble floor. The dress brought out the green of her eyes and her hair, silky and fair, had been braided into a long rope down her back. She was beautiful and she was vulnerable, and despite himself, and his intention to berate the woman who was making his son miserable, Faisal felt an unfurling of pity. For if Zamir was miserable, so too was this woman.
“Sit. Please.” He gestured to one of the cream chairs before him.
She did so, and her anxiety was a cloak that draped around her as she clasped her fingers in her lap and held his eyes with obvious effort. It was an effort he admired, for it was brave and determined.
“You are Olivia Henderson.”
