Protecting the Desert Princess(4)

                ‘Here.’ Jamila handed Layla a cloth, which she took, and she washed her private parts as Jamila washed her hair.

                Still Layla carried on speaking.

                ‘Well, you should rest while we are in Australia,’ Layla said. ‘You deserve to have a holiday too.’

                ‘Layla!’ Jamila’s shrewd eyes narrowed as she rubbed oil into Layla’s long black mane of hair. ‘What are you up to?’

                ‘Nothing.’ Layla shrugged her bony shoulders. ‘I just think that it would be nice for you to have a chance to rest and relax.’

                Layla said no more, but she was worried about how her plans might affect Jamila, who was old and very set in her ways.

                Trinity and Zahid, Layla had decided, would just have to bear the chaos of her actions. After all, they had had their fun—but poor Jamila…

                Layla swallowed and dismissed the gnaw of discontent. She certainly wasn’t going to change her plans to spare a servant’s feelings.

                ‘You are too thin,’ Jamila said as she looked at Layla’s skinny knees jutting up out of the water, her slender arms wrapped around them.

                ‘Jamila,’ Layla said, ‘I could fill this bath and you would still say that I was too thin. Do you remember when I was a baby and always hungry and you said that I was too fat?’

                Jamila’s hand paused as she went to rinse Layla’s hair—Layla should not remember those times. Jamila thought of those little fat legs and arms and her round belly. Layla had been such an angry, demanding baby and toddler. She had begged for attention from her father and it had been denied her as he’d grieved deeply for Annan, the late Queen. Jamila had tried to comfort the little princess with food, feeding her cream, honey, anything that might stop the relentless sobs that filled the palace.

                Such sad, sad times.

                ‘Let us get you dressed,’ Jamila said, quickly finishing Layla’s hair. ‘Your father wishes to speak with you before you leave.’

                Layla had chosen a simple burnt orange cotton tunic for the journey, but Jamila prepared a silver robe and silver jewelled slippers for her to wear on her arrival as there would be some dignitaries to greet them. Her fingers, toes and ears were dressed in pretty jewels, and her long black hair was tied in a low bun which was worn at the side of her head.

                ‘Dismissed,’ Layla said to Jamila, and then frowned when still she stood there.

                ‘You will listen to what your father has to say, won’t you?’ Jamila asked, for she too was worried at the thought of Layla beyond the palace walls.

                ‘Dismissed, Jamila,’ Layla said.

                Alone, Layla stepped out onto the balcony. The sun was starting to set and the sky was a fiery orange. The desert was like molten gold and it was a sight to behold, a view that she loved, and yet she knew there was more. She looked up to the sky, through which she would soon be being carried to her long-awaited adventure.

                She knew she was being bad, and yet she had tried so hard to be good.

                Once this was over she would be good for ever, Layla vowed.

                This was her last chance.

                Four years ago, when she was twenty, Layla had been dressed in white and gold and led down the stairs to walk into a room and select her husband from the men who knelt there.