The Sheik and the Runaway Princess

She told herself that he was a barbarian and his opinion didn’t matter. Unfortunately those words didn’t stop the sting of tears or the lump in her throat. She hated that people judged her based on a few reports in newspapers or magazines. It had happened to her all her life. Very few people took the time to find out the truth.

“Did it ever occur to you that sometimes the media gets it wrong?” she asked.

“Sometimes, but not in your case. You have lived most of your years in Los Angeles. Picking up that lifestyle was inevitable. Had your father kept you here, you might have learned our ways, but that was not to be.”

She didn’t know which charge to answer first. “You’re making it sound as if my father letting me go was my fault,” she told him. “I was four years old. I didn’t have any say in the decision. And just in case you forgot, Bahanian law forbids a royal child being raised in another country, yet my father let my mother take me away. He didn’t even try to stop her.”

She couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice. All her life she’d had to live with the knowledge that her father hadn’t cared enough about her to keep her around. She didn’t doubt that if she’d been a son, he would have refused to let her go. But she was merely a daughter. His only daughter, but that was obviously not significant to him.

She felt her frustration growing. It wasn’t fair. It had never been fair and it was never going to be fair in the future. One day she would figure that out. Maybe on the same day she would cease caring what people thought about her. Maybe then she would be mature enough not to worry when they formed opinions and judged her before even meeting her. Unfortunately that day wasn’t today and she hated that Kardal’s low opinion stung more so than usual.

“You can say what you want,” she told Kardal. “You can have your opinions and your theories, but no one knows the truth except me.”

“I will admit that much is true,” he said, his deep voice drifting around her and making her wonder what he was thinking.

“Relax now,” he continued. “We will travel for much of the day. Try to rest. You didn’t sleep much last night.”

She started to ask how he knew, then remembered they had been tied together. Although she’d fallen asleep right away, she’d awakened several times, tossing and turning until she could doze off again. No doubt she’d kept him awake as well. What with being kidnapped, blindfolded and left with her wrists tied, Sabrina wasn’t sure she was even sorry.

She drew in a deep breath and tried to relax. When the tension in her body began to ease, she allowed her mind to drift. What would it be like to be someone as in charge of his world as Kardal? He was a man of the desert. He would answer to no one. She’d always been at the beck and call of her parents. They were forever sending her back and forth, as if neither really wanted her around.

“Do you really live in the City of Thieves?” she asked sleepily.

“Yes, Sabrina.”

She liked the sound of her name on his lips. Despite her predicament, she smiled. “All your life?” she asked.

“Yes. All my life. I went away to school for a few years, but I have always returned to the desert. This is where I belong.”

He spoke with a confidence she envied. “I’ve never belonged anywhere. When I’m in California, my mother acts like I’m in the way all the time. It’s better now that I’m older, but when I was young, she would complain about how she wasn’t free to come and go as she wanted. Which wasn’t true because she just left me with her maid. And in Bahania…” She sighed. “Well, my father doesn’t like me very much. He thinks I’m like her, which I’m not.”

She shifted to get more comfortable. “People don’t appreciate the little things in their lives that show they belong. If I had them, I would appreciate them.”

“Perhaps for ten minutes,” Kardal said. “Then you would grow weary of the constraints. You are spoiled, my desert bird. Admit it.”

Her sleepiness vanished and she sat up straight. “I am not. You don’t know me well enough to be making that kind of judgment. Sure, it’s easy to read a few things and listen to rumors and decide, but it’s very different to have lived my life.”

“I think you would argue with me about the color of the sky.”

“Not if I could see it.”

“However you talk around me,” he said, “I’m not removing the blindfold.”

“Your attitude needs adjusting.”

He laughed. “Perhaps, but not by you. As my slave, you will be busy with other things.”

She shivered. Did the man really intend to keep her as his personal slave? Was that possible? “You’re kidding, right? This is all a joke. You think I need a lesson and you’re going to be the one to teach it to me.”

“You’ll have to wait and see. However, don’t be too surprised when you find out I have no intention of letting you go.”

She couldn’t get her mind around the idea. It was crazy. This wasn’t fourteenth-century Bahania. They were living in the modern world. Men didn’t keep slaves. Or maybe in the wilds of the desert, they did.

She swallowed hard. “What, ah, exactly would you want me to do?”

He was silent for several heartbeats, then she felt him lean toward her. His breath tickled her ear as he whispered, “It’s a surprise.”

“I doubt it will be a very good one,” she murmured dryly.

Sounds awakened her. Sabrina jerked into consciousness, not aware that she’d been asleep. For a second she panicked because she couldn’t see, but then she remembered she was both bound and blindfolded.

“Where are we?” she asked, feeling more afraid than she had before. There were too many noises. Bits of conversation, yells, grunts, bleats. Bleats?

She listened more closely and realized she heard the sounds of goats bleating and the bells worn by cattle. There were rooster calls, clinks of money, not to mention dozens of conversations occurring at the same time. The fragrance of cooking meat competed with the desert animals and the perfumed oils for sale.

“A marketplace?” she asked. Her stomach lurched. “Are you going to sell me?”

A coldness swept over her. Until this moment, she hadn’t really thought through her situation. Yes, she’d been Kardal’s prisoner, but he’d treated her well and she hadn’t felt more than inconvenienced. Suddenly things were different. She was truly his captive and at his mercy. If he decided to sell her, she couldn’t do anything to stop him. No one would listen to the protests of a mere woman.

“Don’t think you have to throw yourself in front of the next moving cart,” Kardal said calmly. “Despite the appeal of the idea, I’m not going to sell you. We have arrived. Welcome to the City of Thieves.”

Sabrina absorbed the words without understanding them. He wasn’t going to sell her to some horrid man? Her life wasn’t in danger?

She felt his fingers against the back of her head, then her blindfold fell away. It took several seconds for her eyes to adjust to the late-afternoon light. When they did, she could only gasp in wonder.

There were dozens of people everywhere she looked. Hundreds, actually, dressed in traditional desert garb. She saw women carrying baskets and men leading donkeys. Children running between the crowds. Stalls had been set up along a main stone street and vendors called out enticements to come view their wares.

It was a village, she thought in amazement. Or a town. The City of Thieves really existed? Did she dare believe it?

She half turned in her saddle to glance at Kardal. “Is it real?”

“Of course. Ah, they’ve noticed us.”

She returned her attention to the people and saw they were pointing and staring. Instantly Sabrina was aware of feeling dirty and mussed. Her cloak lay across her lap, hiding her bound hands, and a thin cloth covered her hair so no one could see the bright red color. Still, she was a woman sharing a saddle with a man. Worse, she had western features. Her skin wasn’t as dark as a native’s and the shape of her eyes was all wrong. There was also something about her mouth. She’d never quite figured out exactly what bow or curve set her apart, she only knew that she was rarely mistaken for a true Bahanian.

“Lady, lady!”

She glanced toward the high-pitched voice and saw a small girl waving at her. Sabrina started to wave back only to remember at the last second that her hands were bound. She had to settle for nodding pleasantly.

“Where is the treasure kept?” she asked. “Can I see it? Do you have it inventoried?”

Before he could answer, she heard a most peculiar sound. Something familiar, yet so out of place that she—

She turned toward the noise and gasped. There, on the edge of the marketplace, was a low stone wall. On the other side, a lazy river flowed around a bend and disappeared from view.

“Water?” she breathed, barely able to believe what she saw.

“We have an underground spring that supplies all our needs,” he told her, urging his horse through the crowd. “On the east side of the city, it returns underground, here it provides irrigation for our crops.”

Sabrina was stunned. In the desert, water was more valuable than gold, or even oil. With water, a civilization could survive. Without the precious commodity, life would end very quickly.

“I read several references to a spring in some of the diaries,” she said, “but no one mentioned a river.”

“Perhaps they weren’t allowed to see it, or chose not to write about it.”

“Maybe. How long has it existed?”

“Since the first nomads founded the city.”

She jerked her attention away from the flowing river and focused again on the marketplace. “These people can’t all be nomads. By definition, they would want to spend some portion of the year in the desert.”

“True enough. There are those who live permanently within the city walls. Others stay for a time and move on.”

Walls? Sabrina searched the far edges of the marketplace for the beginnings of walls. It was only then that she noticed they appeared to be riding through a giant courtyard. She turned in the saddle to glance behind them. Nearly a quarter mile away were massive stone walls.

“It’s not possible,” she breathed, amazed by the sheer size of the city.

“And yet it exists.”

They approached an inner set of walls. She raised her gaze to study the thick stone, taking in the massive wooden arch that was actually a frame for the largest set of double doors she’d ever seen. They had to be at least fifty or sixty feet high.

She longed to jump down from the horse and study the doors.

“How old are they?” she asked, barely able to speak through her excitement. “When were they built? Where did the wood come from? Who were the craftsmen? Do they still work? Can you close them?”

“So many questions,” Kardal teased. “You haven’t seen the most magnificent part yet.”

She was about to ask what could be better than those incredible doors when they moved through the arch. On the other side of the inner wall was a second courtyard. Sabrina glanced around with great interest. The walls continued to circle the city, probably surrounding it completely. How big was the walled city and how long was the wall? Two miles? Ten? Were there—

She raised her head and nearly fell off the horse. Kardal reined the animal to a halt and let Sabrina look her fill. In front of them stood an awe-inspiring twelfth-century castle.

Sabrina tried to speak and could not. She wasn’t sure she was even breathing. The structure rose to the sky like an ancient cathedral, all towers and levels, complete with arrow slits and a drawbridge.

A castle. Here. In the middle of the desert. She couldn’t believe it. Not really. And yet here it was. As she continued to study the design, she recognized that it had been built in sections, modernized, added to and modernized again. There were western and eastern influences, fourteenth-century windows and spires, along with eighteenth-century towers. People walked across the main bridge. She could see shapes moving inside.

A real live, to-scale working castle.

“How is this possible?” she asked, her voice breathy with shock. “How has it stayed a secret all these hundreds of years?”

“The color, the placement.” Behind her Kardal shrugged.

Sabrina studied the sand-colored stones used to build the castle and noticed the low mountains rising up on either side of the city. It was possible, she supposed, that the city could not be seen from the air. At least not with the naked eye or conventional photography.

“Other governments must know about the city,” she murmured, more to herself than to him. “They’ve seen it from satellite photos, infrared.”

“Of course,” Kardal murmured from behind her. “However, it is to everyone’s interest to keep our location a secret.”

They stopped just in front of the entrance to the castle. As Sabrina glanced around, she recognized descriptions from the diaries she’d read. She was absolutely right in the middle of the City of Thieves. She felt almost dizzy from excitement. There was so much to study here; so much to learn.

“I will dismount first,” Kardal said, easing himself off the horse.

Sabrina waited for him to help her down. It was only then that she noticed they’d gathered a crowd. She felt disheveled and dirty, but fortunately very few people were paying attention to her. They were busy watching Kardal and murmuring to themselves.

As he walked around the horse to help her, several men in traditional dress bowed slightly. Sabrina swallowed against a sudden lump in her throat. She had a bad feeling about this.

“Why are they watching you?” she asked. “Did you do something wrong?”

He grinned up at her, then put his hands on her waist and pulled her off the horse. “What a suspicious mind you have. They’re simply greeting me. Welcoming me home.”

“No. That would mean waving as you rode by.” She glanced at the collecting crowd. “This is more than that.”

“I assure you, this is very common.”

He started to lead her up the stairs toward the entrance to the castle. The crowd parted as they walked and everyone bowed. Sabrina stopped suddenly.

“Who are you?” she asked, knowing she wasn’t going to like the answer.

“I have told you, I am Kardal.”

He waited, obviously expecting her to start walking again, but she stood her ground. She glanced around at the happy, almost reverent crowd, then back at him. “Uh-huh. Okay, Kardal, what am I missing?”

He tried to make his expression innocent and failed badly. If her hands hadn’t still been bound, she would have planted them on her hips.

“Look,” she said, both fearful and irritated. “You can call me a spoiled brat if you like, but I’m not stupid. Who are you?”

An old man stepped forward and smiled at her. He was stoop-shouldered and barely came to her chin.

“Don’t you know?” he asked in a quavering voice. “He is Kardal, the Prince of Thieves. He rules this place.”

Sabrina opened her mouth, then closed it. She’d heard of the man, of course. There had been a prince of the city for as long as the mysterious place had existed.

“You?” she asked in disbelief.

Kardal shrugged. “I suppose you had to find out sometime. Yes, I’m the prince here.” He motioned to the castle and the desert beyond. “I am ruler over all we survey. The wild desert is my kingdom…my word is law.”

At that, he jerked the cloak from her bound hands and grabbed her fingers in his. He pulled her up the stairs to the entrance to the castle, then turned to face the murmuring crowd.

“This is Sabrina,” he said, motioning to her. “I have found her in the desert and claimed her as my own. Touch her and you will have breathed your last that day.”

Sabrina groaned. Everyone was staring at her, talking about her. She could feel herself blushing.

“Great,” she muttered. “Death threats to those who would help me escape. Thanks a lot.”

“I say these words to protect you.”

“Like I believe that. Besides, you’re treating me like a possession.”

“Have you forgotten that you’re my slave?”

“I would if you’d give me a chance.” She glared at him. “Next you’ll be putting a collar around my neck, the way my father does with his cats.”

“If you are very good I might just treat you as well as your father treats his cats.”

“I won’t hold my breath on that one, either.”

Kardal laughed as he led her into the castle. She followed, her mind whirling with a thousand different thoughts. Too much was happening at once. She was having trouble keeping up.

“If you’re the Prince of Thieves,” she said, “have you really spent your entire life stealing from other people?”

“I don’t steal. That practice went out of style some time ago. We produce our income in other ways now.”

She wanted to ask what, but before she could, they stepped into the castle. Everywhere she looked she saw beauty. From the perfectly even stone walls to the intricate tapestries to the elegant mosaic tile floor. There were candleholders of gold, frames decorated with gems, paintings and antique furniture.

The main room of the castle was huge, perhaps the size of a football field. It stretched up at least two stories and there were stained-glass windows and skylights to let in the light. She motioned to the candles and gas lamps.

“No electricity?” she asked as Kardal cut the bindings on her wrists.

“We generate some, but not in the living quarters. There we live as we have for centuries.”

Again he took her hand in his, tugging her along. She tried to take everything in, but it was impossible. Everywhere she looked, she saw something old, beautiful and very likely, stolen. There were paintings by old masters and impressionists. She recognized the style but not the subject. There were some she’d seen in books, rare photographs of paintings missing and long thought destroyed.

Kardal led her through a maze of corridors, up and down stairs, twisting and turning until she was completely lost. People passed them, stopping to smile and bow slightly. If she hadn’t been sure of his identity before, by the time they finally stopped in front of double wooden doors, she was convinced. The Prince of Thieves, she thought in amazement. Who knew such a man existed?

It could be worse, she told herself as he pushed open one of the doors. He could be the troll prince. With that thought, she stepped into the room. And gasped. When Kardal released her, she turned in a slow circle, taking in the spacious quarters.

Each item of furniture was huge. The four-poster bed could easily sleep six or seven. There was a fainting couch, covered in the same thick burgundy as the bedspread and a fabulous Oriental carpet on the stone floor. A brilliant mosaic of a peacock displaying for his peahens graced one humongous wall. There was a fireplace as large as her dorm room and books. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of old, leather-bound books.

She crossed to them and reverently ran her fingers along their spines.

“Are they cataloged?” she asked, opening an old copy of Hamlet by Shakespeare, then gasping when she saw an inscription dated 1793. On the small table in front of her sat a hand-illustrated text of the Bible. She’d never seen such bounty.

Still holding the slim volume, she turned to face him. “Kardal, do you know what you have here? It’s priceless. The knowledge and history.”

He dismissed her with a wave. “Someone will see to you. A bath will be brought, along with appropriate clothing.”

She could barely force her attention away from her book to concentrate on what he was saying. “Appropriate?”

Something dark sparked to life in his eyes. “As my slave, you will have certain…responsibilities. To fulfill them you will need to dress to please me.”

She blinked at him. “You can’t be serious.” She replaced the book and for the first time really looked at the room. At the chaise and the very large bed. Her throat tightened.

“Uh, Kardal, really. This is a game, right?” She backed up until she pressed against the far wall. “I mean, I’m Princess Sabra. You have to think this through.”

He walked over to her, striding purposefully until he was directly in front of her. Close enough to touch. Which he did by cupping her jaw.

“I am aware of your identity so there’s no need to play the innocent with me.”

The implication of his words hit her like a slap. She flinched. “Did it ever occur to you that I’m not playing?”

One corner of his mouth turned up. “Your lifestyle in California is well documented. I might not approve of what you’ve done, but I intend to take advantage of it…and you.”

His fingertips barely grazed her cheek, yet she felt his touch all the way down to the pit of her stomach. He stood too close—it was nearly impossible to breathe. Fear combined with a sense of disbelief. He couldn’t really be saying all this. He couldn’t mean to…to—

“We can’t have sex,” she blurted.

“I will not be a selfish lover,” he promised. “You will be well pleased.”

She didn’t want to be pleased, Sabrina thought frantically. She wanted to be believed. Tears burned but she blinked them away. What was the point? Kardal would never listen, no matter how she protested. He thought she was some party girl who slept with every man who asked. Telling him she was a virgin would only make him laugh.

“I doubt my pleasure will be enough payment for what you have in mind,” she said bitterly.

“You’re making that judgment before you’ve had your way with me.”

“The only thing I want is to go back to the palace.”

He dropped his hand to his side. “Perhaps in time. When I grow tired of you. Until then—” He motioned to the room around them. “Enjoy your stay in my home. After all, you’ve finally found your heart’s desire. You now reside in the City of Thieves.”

He turned and left.

Trapped, she thought dully. She was well and truly trapped. She had no idea where she was, and didn’t know a soul to help her.

Sabrina slid down the wall until she sat crouched on the stone floor. He was right. She had found what she’d been looking for. Which reminded her of that old saying. The one about being careful about what one wished for. The wish might come true.

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