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She knew she was being ridiculous, since she’d essentially asked him to be her lover. Why would asking him to dance be any different?
And yet it was.
For she would be asking for more than just a dance. She’d be asking if she could be that woman he described. The woman he chose. The one he wanted.
Even though it seemed to beherhe described,herhe was inside of and licked off his fingers, she never really believed him. Because she didn’t think she was worthy of him.
But if she asked him to dance, and he “considered her twice” and accepted her, maybe she’d believe in herself more. In them. Maybe she could slowly earn her way toward deserving him.
Suddenly, two women came forth and grabbed onto Shai. One of them clutched his hand with both her own, and the second woman grasped the front of his tunic, pulling it so hard, the laces that ran down his chest ripped open.
Frozen in shock, hand going lax, Heba didn’t even realize that one of the women had pried her fingers away from Shai’s until he was being tugged away from her.
He didn’t budge much, despite the women’s insistent pulling. He wouldn’t be moved unless he decided to.
He was staring at her and calling her name, but she couldn’t hear him somehow, could only see his lips form the word.
The beat of the drums boomed within her head as she watched with a bloodless numbness as the two women, then more, surround Shai and rub against him. Curving and contorting their bodies this way and that. Pulling at his clothes, touching his body.
Distantly, she noticed that he was taking their hands off of him as best he could, but there were many more hands than he could avoid. He tried to break apart from the group, tried to come toward her, but they kept dragging him back.
When one woman practically climbed on top of him and yanked his face to hers to kiss his mouth, Heba lost it.
Lost all sense of reason and calm.
But instead of charging into the throng of women mauling Shai like half of her wanted to,demandedto, her fear and doubt won out.
She turned and determinedly walked away.
She could hear him calling her name, but she didn’t stop. The farther she walked, the faster her strides, until she was all but running from the festival.
And then, she did run. She ran until she caught a stitch in her side, until her lungs felt like they would burst. And still, she kept going.
She didn’t know where she was headed; she didn’t care. She just wanted to put as much distance between herself and that awful scene as possible.
Thiswas what Shai was missing. What he could be doing and enjoying instead of indulging her.
All of those women were more beautiful, more graceful than Heba, and sofree. They saw what they wanted and went after it. It had taken Heba her entire life to ask Shai for what she wanted.
She wasn’t free.
It was ironic how their situations were reversed now. How he was the free man, and she, a royal prisoner. He could have anyone, choose any of those dancers or even a noble woman. One who was free to give him everything he deserved. To share everything with him equally.
And that woman would never beher.
Finally, she stopped running and fell to her knees at the base of a giant blackwood tree, out of breath and out of her mind. For she was bawling uncontrollably, tears dripping continuously down her chin, mingling with mucus and saliva as she opened her mouth and simplywailed.
“What in Amun’s name do you think you’re doing!”
Suddenly, she was lifted upright by a strength not her own and set on her feet.
“Do noteverwalk away from me, never mind run. If assassins lurked, you could have been ambushed at any time. Taken around a corner I cannot see. And what they do to you in those moments before I reach you…HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND, WOMAN!”
Somewhere inside of Heba, it registered that Shai had followed her and found her. But in the moment, she didn’t care. She just kept on bawling, now hiccupping, like a motherless, starving babe.
She’d never cried like this in her life. She’d only shed tears quietly when her Papa passed into the Afterlife. Nothing else affected her. She was too practical to dwell on the indignities she suffered at her dead husband’s hands. Nothing he did made her cry. Made her furious, yes, disgusted too. But never made her cry.
It seemed she was releasing a lifetime’s worth of tears and blubber now. She couldn’t stop herself. She didn’t know how.
