Vast Fields Of Light

Chapter 8

Dastan dipped his head and another silence stretched. Slowly, Tamina started to notice the view from the window in front of her. Eventually she took pity on her husband's silence.

"The view from your chamber is not nearly as nice as the view from mine," she murmured.

Dastan puffed out a wryly amused breath, lifting his head. "Well, of course..." he muttered. "The Princess of Alamut must have the best view in the house, after all."

Tamina half-smiled as she stood, walked over to the window and looked outside. In one direction there were pretty gardens and beyond them a small orangery; the rest of the palace building stretched away in the other direction, and she muttered a slight "Hmph!" as she noticed something.

"What is it?" Dastan asked, rising and crossing to join her at the window.

She gestured over to the ornate fountain in the middle distance, lit by the torches on the palace walls, its trickling water just audible in the night-time stillness.

"The spot where I accepted your proposal," she murmured, knitting her brow as she remembered that recent moment which already seemed far in the past. "Or rather, the proposal that Tus made on your behalf..."

"Oh, God, don't remind me," Dastan said with a groan that made Tamina turn her head in surprise. He rested his forearms on the window ledge and dropped his head, shaking it slightly. "I thought that I was about to watch you - agree to become his fourth wife," he murmured in a distant, pained tone.

This made her turn to face him fully. "But... didn't you have any idea what he was going to suggest? Surely you said something, to give him the idea..."

"No, I - I would have, if I'd thought of it, but..." he hesitated and sighed without turning to face her. "My mind was racing. Just seeing you all there in front of me - alive..."

He trailed off and pushed the hair from his eyes, and Tamina saw as if for the first time the shadow on his brow, the crinkling of his lower eyelids as he battled his own thoughts.

Her heart clenched and a soft sigh pushed through her lips. Taking a step closer to him, she reached out a hand to the back of his neck and ran her fingers lightly into his hair, her forearm resting gently against his upper back. He turned his head to look at her with cautious curiosity, and she willed herself to meet the pain in his eyes. She let her hand fall warmly down his shoulder and arm and took his hand in her own.

"I'm sorry for everything you had to suffer in that other time..."

Dastan gazed back at her with sad warmth in his shadowed eyes, and exhaled slowly as his hand squeezed hers.

"It was worth it," he said eventually.

Tamina's lips pursed ruefully, a smile just beyond reach. She looked down for a few moments before looking back at up at him with thoughtful eyes.

"Do you know why I accepted your proposal, Dastan?"

His brow furrowed. "What? Well... it was the dagger, wasn't it? You wanted to protect it, and keep Alamut safe," he said quietly.

"That was only part of it," Tamina said thoughtfully. "Certainly, that's what stopped me from laughing you and your brothers out of my Palace immediately. -Persia committed a grave error when it invaded, and I was not under any real obligation to do anything," she said lightly.