10
Why am I still here, she’d asked herself a thousand times when Darius had finished explaining what he’d been planning.
“Neither Ephraim nor I can back down, not after three years of public posturing. And the problem of Habeetha’s overpopulation is real and drastic. It might have been caused by Ephraim’s haste and short-sightedness, but now it is also my problem to deal with. On the other side of Habeetha is uninhabitable desert and then the salty ocean waters of the Gulf of Oman. When the capital city can no longer hold the population, they will look to the borders of Noramaar.”
“So open your borders to immigration,” Jan had said as she listened to him talk, already understanding that Darius was perhaps as proud and immovable as he accused Ephraim of being. “If the options are invasion or immigration, then it’s a no-brainer, right?”
The Sheikh had taken a breath, and Jan saw a cloud pass across his handsome face. “That would mean I am yielding to Ephraim’s threats, Jan. It would mean that anyone can come to my borders, puff out their chest and threaten war, and I will bow my head and compromise.” He’d shaken his head fiercely, his green eyes ablaze. “I know what you are thinking: that it is my stupid pride. But it is more than that. A king is a symbol to his people. You Americans have your flag and your troops, Hollywood and Wall Street, the Grand Canyon and the Rocky Mountains, Disneyland and Las Vegas. You have a vast source of achievements and culture from which your people draw pride and self-confidence. But my people have only their Sheikh. Only me, Jan. I do not bow to pressure. I will not bow to Ephraim and simply back down. It would lower me in the eyes of my people, while it would make Ephraim look stronger, more powerful. Perception matters in politics, Jan. If I simply yield and—”
“You could make him pay,” Jan had said. “Let him continue to pay the stipend to the folks who move from Habeetha to Noramaar. Then it’ll look like you’re doing them a favor.”
“A good idea, but then there is the issue of who decides which people actually move. Ephraim might want to ship the worst of his people—criminals and madmen perhaps! And it is my people who will need to adjust to the influx, live side by side with them! It is a complex, sensitive matter, with implications that will play out over generations. It is quite possible that even if I ignore my pride and open my borders now, in twenty years there will be war anyway! I know Ephraim. He has never been satisfied with his tiny kingdom. Every time he looks out across the Golden Oasis from his Royal Palace, he thinks of expansion, conquest, invasion. It is not personal. He and I do not hate each other. In fact I understand those dreams of conquest, because as a king I too have fantasies of ruling the world. But those days where kings ride out with armies to invade and plunder are long gone, and I have enough self-control to not let the fantasies lead me down the path of madness.”
“So what’s the solution then? Just fight it out?”
The Sheikh had given her a strange look. “In a way. But on a different battleground.”
“And what’s the battleground?” she’d asked, frowning at the way Darius was looking at her.
“Not what, but who,” the Sheikh had said, his gaze unwavering, that look of seriousness returning, but this time mixed with a hint of darkness that made her shiver.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you, Jan,” he’d said. “You are the battleground.”
And then she’d listened as the world began to spin away from any semblance of sense or sanity. She listened as the Sheikh told her that the only solution that made sense was a full integration of Noramaar and Habeetha. A merger. A union.
A marriage.
“We combine the kingdoms. Yes, there would be a million administrative details to take care of, but our councils and ministers would handle that if the decision were made,” the Sheikh had said as Jan listened with wide eyes and a throbbing head as the pieces slowly fitted together like a jigsaw. A jigsaw in which she was that last piece, the one that held it all together. “The problem is, the biggest decision is one that can never be agreed upon: Who would be supreme Sheikh of the new union?”
Jan had nodded absentmindedly as the plane began to descend towards the black runway that stretched through the golden desert like a racing stripe. She understood that although the pride and arrogance of two kings was certainly at play here, it was more than that. Perception indeed mattered. The self-image of a kingdom is indeed founded upon the perceived strength and power of its king.
Or its queen.
“It is the only way,” the Sheikh had said, his voice deep and low as he said it. “The only way Ephraim and I can ever combine our nations without losing face is if neither of us is supreme ruler of the new kingdom. We are both unmarried with no heirs or siblings. The idea is unprecedented, perhaps insane. But it could work. It could work well enough to save thousands of lives, create a stronger, bigger kingdom, preserve the peaceful sharing of the waters of the Golden Oasis for another hundred years.”
“What are you saying?” she’d whispered as the plane swooped in for landing, that funny feeling in her gut almost making her pass out. “Darius, are you asking me to . . . to . . . what are you saying?!”
“Marry us,” he whispered, his jaw set tight but his deep voice trembling at its core, his green eyes burning deadly serious, that hint of darkness still alive in them. “Marry us both, and become queen of the new land. One kingdom, one people, one union, one queen. And one marriage. Three ways.”