had calmed, his breathing eased marginally, and he had ceased straining at the halter. It was almost as if Rafiq had managed to put Batal into a trance.
‘Are you a horse mystic?’ she asked, only half-joking. She had heard tell of such things, but she had always been sceptical.
‘I learned some of the ways of the Bedouin as a child,’ he answered in a whisper. ‘If you wish to cool him down now, he won’t resist.’
She did as he suggested. The mule’s flanks were worryingly swollen, his fur already damp, though the water she doused over him seemed to give him some relief. They worked together, calming and cooling, listening, their own breathing suspended, their own hearts pounding, while Batal grew worse, every breath a tremendous effort.
‘Is there truly nothing you can do, at least to ease his suffering?’ Rafiq said, breathless with the effort of keeping the mule on his feet during the last, grim bout of coughing.
Stephanie shook her head. Her own feeling of helplessness was reflected in his expression. ‘We must not despair,’ she said, far more reassuringly than she felt. ‘Hope is the most mysterious of all healers. Batal will sense it if we give up on him.’
‘Then we won’t give up,’ Rafiq said grimly.
* * *
They did not, though it was a long, exhausting night. The lanterns were extinguished, the first grey morning light filtering through the high window of the closed box when Stephanie carried out her half-hourly check of the mule’s heartbeat. Rafiq had no need to calm him this time. She thought at first that desperation had misled her, but a second listen was reassuring. ‘I think he has turned a corner. He is not out of danger yet, but his breathing has eased marginally, and his fever is slowly abating. I think he has a fighting chance of a full recovery.’
‘You can have no idea how much this means to me.’
‘Rafiq, we must not get ahead of ourselves. This proves nothing as yet. Batal’s infection was a less severe case, I think. It may affect mules differently from horses. You must not think I have necessarily found a cure. I simply let nature take its course.’
‘Which achieved more than all of Jasim’s remedies put together.’ He pushed her hair back from her face. ‘Thank you.’
Rafiq’s touch was gentle, he smelled of sweet sweat and fresh straw and olive-oil soap. It was a very different kiss from that one yesterday by the pool. A gentle kiss, their lips clinging, almost tender in the dawn’s light, after the long night’s vigil. Her fingers in his hair, his in hers, threading themselves through her tangles, so gently, the warmth of his palm on her nape, the soft flutter of his breath. She was acutely aware of his body, though there was still a tiny gap between them which neither moved to close, because this lingering kiss was enough, more than enough.
They broke apart slowly. Their eyes met, slightly dazed. Stephanie did not speak. She had no words, and no desire to spoil the tenderness of the moment. Rafiq’s mouth curled into a half-smile that twisted her insides, reminding her that desire was not entirely a foreign country after all, and so she busied herself with the now exhausted Batal. ‘I think we can let him lie down and rest now.’
‘I think all three of us would benefit from a rest,’ Rafiq said. ‘I will ask Fadil to look after Batal. No,’ he said, when she made to speak, ‘there is no need for you to stay here with him.’
‘But, Rafiq...’
‘You will be no use to Batal if you don’t rest yourself. You have been up all night. That is a command, Stephanie, from a prince. Do not pull a face as stubborn as your plucky patient here.’
She was forced to laugh. ‘Very well. Only let me see him settled—and, no, I won’t leave that to anyone else, no matter what you command.’
‘Very well.’ Rafiq kissed her cheek. ‘Thank you. I will see you and your hopefully restored patient later.’
She watched him go, listened to him issuing orders in that commanding way he had, wondering what it was in his tone that made it clear he took instant obedience for granted, for she had never heard him raise his voice. She put her fingers to her mouth, reliving the gentle touch of his lips on hers.
Batal brayed, a plaintive little sound, but a valiant one. Stephanie ruffled his ears. ‘You really were named well, my hero,’ she said softly. ‘You are going to get well, little man, I promise you.’
A noise in the doorway made her turn. Fadil stood there, a gaggle of stable hands gathered behind him. ‘It was an auspicious day when fate brought you to us,’ he said. ‘His Royal Highness was a wise man to appoint you his Royal Horse Surgeon, Miss Darvill. Now we dare hope that the Sabr will return to Bharym as our Prince has promised.’
* * *
Rafiq, who had returned to the loose box to check on Batal, was not surprised to see Stephanie walk in. ‘You managed to obey my command for two whole hours,’ he said blandly, ‘I suppose I should consider that progress.’
Stephanie had bathed and changed, her hair tied back with a fuchsia-pink silk scarf, a colourful contrast to the muted pink-and-cream stripes of her tunic and cloak.
Though it had been a very different kiss, that kiss this morning, a kiss fuelled by relief on both their parts, by gratitude on his, it had been there all the same, that tiny thread of awareness that linked them, no matter what the circumstances. It was present now. He could no longer pretend that it was abstinence which fired his desire. It was Stephanie. This particular woman, most likely because of these peculiar circumstances. Circumstances which made him hesitate to act, for though his desire for her was fierce, his desire to rid himself of the past was even stronger, and Stephanie held the key to that. He could not afford to lose her. That much, he sincerely hoped, he had made clear to her, though she could never understand the true significance of the Sabr to him.
Batal’s survival was a portent, another step towards the future, when Bharym’s people would recover their spirit, when Bharym’s Prince would rid himself of his guilt. He had a foretaste of how that would be when he was with Stephanie. He was a different man, with her. He caught himself sometimes, talking to her, teasing her, laughing with her, in a way that was quite alien to him. He didn’t recognise that man, but he enjoyed the change, no longer a man haunted by his past, but a man who relished the present. Stephanie gave him a glimpse of how it would be in the future. He wished fervently that there was a way to glimpse more of it, to indulge their mutual passion, without endangering the future itself.
Was there a way? Watching her rise from checking Batal, Rafiq wondered. It could mean nothing to either of them, they had already established that. If Stephanie wanted to—and he was pretty certain she did, as much as he—then surely they could come to some sort of tacit understanding, within strict boundaries?
Meeting her eyes as she dried her hands, Rafiq smiled.
‘I think Batal here has made a quite remarkable recovery,’ she said, ‘though how he became infected in the first place is a question which I can’t answer at the moment, for he shares neither food, water nor bedding with the horses in the stables.’
‘Batal is what we call a companion,’ Rafiq told her, ruffling the mule’s ears. ‘Despite his behaviour last night, he is a placid beast, and has a very calming influence on our more highly strung thoroughbreds. He has seen some of our most nervous mares through difficult foalings, some of our friskiest yearlings through their early training.’
‘So
