didn’t want any kind of fuss or reception,’ she said, smiling as she held up the large pink parcel she had purchased at Qurhah’s airport. ‘I want this to be a surprise. For my niece, the princess Ayesha.’
The palm-fringed road was reassuringly familiar and when she saw her childhood home appear in the distance, with the morning light bouncing off the white marble, she felt her heart twist with a mixture of pleasure and pain.
She’d never seen the guards outside the main gates look more surprised than when she stepped from the airport cab into the bright sunshine. But today she wasn’t impatient when they bowed deeply. Today she recognised that they were just doing their job. They respected her position as Princess—and maybe it was about time that she started respecting it, too.
She walked through the grounds and into the palace. Her watch told her that it was almost two o’clock and she wondered if her brother was working. She realised that she didn’t know anything about his life and she barely knew Ella, his wife.
But before she could decide what to do next, there was Haroun walking towards her. His features—a stronger, more masculine version of her own—were initially perplexed and then he broke into a wide smile as he held out his arms.
‘Is it really you, Sara?’
‘It really is me,’ she whispered, glad that he chose that moment to gather her in his arms in a most un-Kingly bear-hug, which meant that she had time to blink away her tears and compose herself.
Within the hour she was sitting with Haroun and his wife Ella and begging their forgiveness. She told them she felt guilty about her absence, but if they were prepared to forgive her—she would like to be part of their lives. And could she please see her niece?
The royal couple looked at one another and smiled with deep satisfaction, before Ella hugged her tightly and said Ayesha was sleeping, and that Sara could see her once they had taken tea.
The three of them sat in the scented bower of the rose garden and drank mint tea. She started to tell them about the Sultan, but of course Haroun knew about the cancelled wedding, because the politicians and diplomats from the two countries were working on a new alliance.
‘So you’ve seen Murat?’ she asked cautiously.
‘I have.’
‘And did he...did he seem upset?’
‘Not unless your idea of upset is being photographed with a stunning woman,’ laughed Haroun.
It was only after gentle prompting that she was persuaded to tell them about Suleiman and how much she loved him. Her voice was shaky as she said it, because she’d realised that the truth was something she couldn’t keep running from either.
‘But it’s over,’ she said.
Ella looked at Haroun, and frowned. ‘You like Suleiman, don’t you, darling?’
‘I don’t like him when I’m playing backgammon,’ Haroun growled.
Sara was shown to her old room and there, set between the two gold-framed portraits of her late mother and father, was a book about horses, which Suleiman had bought for her twelfth birthday, just before she’d left for England.
For the brave and fearless Sara, he had written. Your friend, Suleiman. Always.
And that was when the sobs began to erupt from her throat, because she had been none of those things, had she? She had not been brave and fearless—she had been a coward who had run away and hidden and neglected her family. She hadn’t lived up to Suleiman’s expectations of her. She hadn’t been a real friend. She hadn’t fulfilled her potential in so many ways.
She bathed and changed and dried her eyes and Ella knocked on the door, to take her to the nursery. And that was poignant, too. Shielded from the light by swathed swags of softest tulle lay a sleeping baby in the large, rocking cot she had slept in herself. For a moment Sara touched the side and felt it sway, watching as Ella lifted out the sleepy infant.
Ayesha was soft and smiling, with a mop of silken curls and a pair of deep violet eyes. Sara felt her heart fill with love as she touched her fingertip to the baby’s plump and rosy cheek.
‘Oh, she’s beautiful,’ she said. ‘How old is she now?’
‘Nine months,’ said Ella. ‘I know. Time flies and all that. And by the way—they say she looks just like you.’
‘Do they?’
Ella smiled. ‘Check out your baby photos if you don’t believe me.’
Sara stared into the baby’s eyes and felt the sharp twist of pain. Was it normal to feel wistful for what might have been, but now never would? To imagine what kind of baby she and Suleiman might have produced?
‘I wonder if she’d come to me,’ she said, pulling a smiley face at the baby as she held out her arms.
But Ayesha wriggled and turned her face away and started to cry.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Ella. ‘She’ll get used to you.’
It took four days before Ayesha would consent to have her auntie hold her, but once she had—she seemed reluctant to ever let her go. Sara wondered if the baby instinctively guessed how badly she needed the cuddles. Or maybe there was some kind of inbuilt recognition—the primitive bond of shared blood.
She fitted in with Haroun and Ella’s routine, and began to relax as she reacquainted herself with Dhi’ban and life at court. She went riding with her brother. She helped Ella with the baby and quickly grew to love her sister-in-law.
One afternoon the two women were wheeling the pram through the palace gardens, their heads covered with shady hats. The week off work which Gabe had given her was almost up and Sara knew that she needed to give some serious thought to her future.
She just hadn’t decided what she wanted that future to be.
‘Shall we go back now?’ questioned Ella, her soft voice breaking into Sara’s thoughts.
‘Yes, let’s.’
Along the scented paths they walked, back towards the palace, but as they grew closer Sara saw a dark figure silhouetted against the white marble building. For a moment her eyes widened, until she forced her troubled mind to listen to reason. Please stop this, she prayed silently. Stop conjuring up hallucinations which make me think I can actually see him.
She ran her hand across her eyelids, but when she opened them again he was still there and her steps faltered.
‘Is something wrong?’
Did Ella’s voice contain suppressed laughter—or was she imagining that, too?
‘For a minute then, I thought I saw Suleiman.’
‘Well, that’s because you did,’ said Ella gently. ‘He’s here. Suleiman’s here.’
The ground seemed suddenly to shift beneath Sara’s feet—the way it did when you stepped onto a large ship which looked motionless. She was aware of the rush of blood to her ears and the pounding of her heart in her
