Chapter Thirty-Eight
Sophia stared at the lacquered screens of pierced geometric shapes. Flowers took shape and changed as the sun moved across the floor outside the alcove where she lay. Her body ached, and her limbs itched from the rough scrubbing she had endured as her skin was buffed and scraped with pumice. Even the effort to breathe required conscious thought. The itching was driving her mad, but at least it was a distraction from the pain between her legs, where fingers had touched and probed. A thick mixture that smelled of lemon and honey was poured on her most private places while fingers threaded with cotton plucked away hair until she was left as bare as she had been as a girl.
The fact two women had done this to her, ignoring her cries of pain and distress, made it seem a double violation.
The screen before her shimmered, and she blinked back tears. Enough! Feeling sorry for herself would do no good here. She knew she had not been uniquely singled out for this treatment. How did these women survive? How did sweet, gently-born Laura cope?
“It was bad the first time.”
Sophia heard the whisper-soft rustling of Laura’s gown as she approached. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her cousin gracefully lower herself to a large cushion on the floor, gold bangles at her wrist jangling.
“How do you stand it?” Sophia asked, her voice only loud enough to be heard over the spill of water into a pool somewhere nearby.
“I would have borne this nightmare better had you not been here. Why did you come?” At the harshness in Laura’s tone, Sophia turned to learn its cause.
She forced herself to sit up. The temptation to draw a small cushion in front of herself was great. The seafoam green gown she wore was nearly transparent and made her feel near naked. She set the cushion down. They could have no secrets here. Perhaps it was only right they bare their souls as well.
“You and Samuel always had a low opinion of me. ‘Silly Laura, naive Laura, dear little thing needs protecting’. Yes, I was flattered when Selim Omar took notice of my paintings, but I knew from the moment he took me the life I knew was over. There would be no rescue. When he…,” Laura paused for a moment and blinked away tears. “I would go away in my mind. I would imagine Samuel and Victoria planning their wedding, you and Captain Hardacre, ever so much in love. It made it… him… tolerable. I might have even found the courage to refuse him, but not now.”
“You still could, together we…”
Laura shook her head as much in sorrow as it would appear in pain. “You don’t understand, do you? It makes it worse! Knowing the family I loved was safe was the only thing that could give me courage. Alone, I might have learned to make the best of things. It didn’t matter because you and Samuel were safe, living the lives you ought to live. Now I’m in torment. How can I refuse him anything now? All he needs to do is threaten to harm you, and he knows I will bend to his every dictate, every filthy, degrading act. Why? Why did you come? Why are you here?”
Sophia opened her mouth but words refused to come out. If she did explain that Samuel thought he was paying a ransom and she had been kidnapped, too, it would sound like Samuel was solely to blame. But he wasn’t, the fault was equally hers. She had underestimated Selim Omar and as good as offered herself up to be taken. She took a deep breath and answered.
“You’re not the only one who was naive.”
She next opened her eyes to the sound of a birdcall outside. Through the grate she could see it, a wren of some kind, its chest puffed up in song. It was free, and its song proclaimed its liberty. She shifted to sit up and discovered she was alone. She felt momentary panic. Where was Laura?
“Sophia! You’re awake.”
She became aware of the sound of laughter somewhere else in the building.
“I thought I’d let you sleep, but you have to wake up now. There is someone I want you to meet.”
Her voice sounded as bright and chirpy as the bird outside; only the set of her mouth, that once would have smiled, betrayed her.
Behind Laura was another woman, tall and willowy, dark skinned. When she stepped out of the shadows, Sophia recognized her.
“This is Yasmeen, she played the harp for us in Palermo, remember?”
Sophia stood on unsteady feet. “You spoke English,” she said, clasping Yasmeen’s arm. The woman, a couple of years older than herself, smiled.
“There used to be another English girl here, but she was sold on,” said Laura with a matter-of-factness that was shocking. “She taught Yasmeen some English, and now she’s teaching me some Arabic.”
“I will be happy to teach you, too.” Yasmeen’s voice was low and rich. “But you must come with me.”
“Yes, breakfast first,” said Laura and insisted on taking Sophia’s arm in hers. “There’s a lot to learn. Remember when we were girls, and we spent entire summers with the daughters of the bon ton?”
Oh yes, Sophia did remember. Laura saw her shudder and that was answer enough.
Cliques and clubs, snide remarks, direct cuts – and worse if you weren’t part of the right group… To someone already the outsider, a girl living on the charity of relations, Sophia was beneath the notice of many of these girls. Not that it mattered, their interests weren’t hers, but it was worse for Laura who actually cared for the good opinion of these daughters of aristocrats.
“Rabia is Selim Omar’s favorite wife, a kadin…” Laura turned to Yasmeen who nodded at the correct use of the word. “She is the third of his four wives, but the mother of his heir. She jealously guards her position. We are officially a part of her household. There are other girls serving other wives. Rabia prides herself on having the most beautiful women subservient to her. There are different hierarchies within the harem. There are the odalisques who are servants. If they are especially beautiful and talented, they are trained to be concubines.”
Laura’s voice hardened on the last word, leaving Sophia in no doubt about how she felt about her status.
“And, of course, there are rivalries between the concubines for favor and privilege.”
“Your sister,” said Yasmeen. “They are jealous of her skin, her hair, and because she is new.”
Sophia accepted the warning implicit in the statement. It wasn’t just the sheik Laura needed protection from.
“All the men here are eunuchs. That means…,” Laura waved her hand downwards and her voice trailed off. Sophia nodded, saving her from an uncomfortable explanation. She knew what they were and how they became that way. The Roman Emperors Deocletian and Constantine both had them as important court officials.
“Apart from Selim Omar and his guests, they will be the only men we’ll see again until the day we die.”
*
The outer garden gate opened and one of the black eunuchs entered. Sophia watched him cautiously from over her art board where she had started a watercolor of three odalisques, lounging in stages of undress by a pool. She wasn’t sure whether he was one of the men who had separated her from Laura on the first day.
“That’s good,” murmured Laura, looking over her shoulder. “You have the advantage of having the techniques of drawing already. I’ve had to start at the beginning with the other two girls. They have no talent.” Laura raised her voice for the benefit of anyone overhearing. “Just be sure to water down the black and go back over the blue to add depth to Dymphnia’s gown.”
The harem appeared to be some kind of perverse finishing school. Laura insisted on painting lessons in the morning while the day was fresh. After lunch, it would be embroidery for several hours – again a drawing room skill that was second nature to her. Sophia feigned interest in her artwork but still kept her eye on the eunuch.
“What’s he doing here?” she said softly, so as not to be overheard.
“Yasmeen calls him Malik. I’ve never heard him utter a sound. It’s plain they like one another. They’re careful not to show it, but you just watch them. Whenever he enters the harem, he will look for her first of all.”
Sophia did watch Malik, a man easily six-and-a-half feet tall with a physique like a wrestler. He was built to intimidate, and he would do it easily even without the scimitar he kept at his side, shining bright against the red pantaloons he wore.
He and Yasmeen conferred over a document he had brought into the harem with him. When they had finished, she briefly laid a hand on his arm before he walked away to replace the guard who had been on duty all morning.
Yasmeen rolled up the note and tucked it in the belt of her robe. She clapped her hands and called all the women’s attention. There were twelve in total, some of whom looked to be no older than thirteen. She addressed the group in Arabic. Sophia stood at the back of the group with Laura who provided a halting translation.
“The Lady Rabia has been instructed to provide entertainment for a delegation of important… emissaries from… I can’t make out from where… we’ve been ordered to play music and dance for the men.”
Yasmeen’s animated expression dimmed as she continued to speak. Laura’s eyes were narrowed, her forehead puckered in concentration, listening as Yasmeen delivered her message.
“What?” Sophia whispered. “What’s she saying?”
“We may be expected to service His Excellency’s guests.”
Bile rose up her throat as her mind processed the full meaning behind the word. She swallowed her revulsion but allowed the shudder. Sophia waited to see from the other girls an equal measure of the horror and shock she felt. She did not. If there was any discernible expression at all from these young women, it would be best described as resignation.
Dymphnia pulled the hands of the two girls next to her and dragged them away from the others for a huddled conference. Clearly, the three were the more dominant of the odalisques. A moment later, Dymphnia called to the other girls who were quickly marshaled and made to pose, apparently a starting point for choreography.
Yasmeen approached them and, for Sophia’s benefit, spoke in English. “None of the girls plays an instrument. Rabia says we must teach them, but it is too late for this performance, so they will dance. We will play. Come, we will get the musical instruments.”
Sophia trailed behind Yasmeen and Laura, taking in the layout of the harem complex. They passed corridors along which she could hear the sound of other women, presumably the odalisques and concubines assigned to the other wives to administer.
Another eunuch, not as large as Malik, opened large twin doors to a room nearly as big as the ballroom in Brentwood House. In fact, it seemed to be a throne room of sorts, with two chairs on a raised dais. In the corner of the room were musical instruments – guitars, mandolins, violins, flutes, psalters, timbrels, lyres, tambourines, and small drums.
Laura picked up a lyre and fingered the strings. It needed tuning. “How long do we have to rehearse?”
Yasmeen answered. “Five days.”