Sultana's Legacy by Lisa J. Yarde Read Free Book Online

she loved hunting birds. He had learned to ride on his own at six years of age, despite Fatima’s useless protests to Faraj. Since her husband’s departure, she had taken to riding with Ismail. If she could not stop him, at least she could be with him.
    Her hand rested against his cool cheek. Beneath her palm, the prickly beginnings of facial hair that would soon cover his angular cheeks scraped her delicate flesh. “Do not tarry for long. I am always at my happiest when you are beside me.”
    Ismail beamed. He had not lost the childhood dimples. “I thought you only felt that way about Father.”
    She caressed his cheek and returned his generous smile. He bowed before her and attended both horses. She lingered before turning from the stables and their pungent scent. She rounded the outlying buildings that bordered the familial residence. The red-roofed arsenal dominated on the left, its polished marble walls echoing with the sounds of the workers inside. One of the men stepped out and upon seeing her, immediately turned to the wall with his head bowed. Laughter bubbled up inside of her. She pulled the folds of her hijab closer around her face.
    Heat and smoke from the firing chambers of the kilns escaped directly into the open air. The workers paid her progress no heed, their attention devoted to glazed and gilded ceramics. In the previous year, a Persian fleeing the onslaught of the Mongols in the east had sought refuge at Malaka. He worked a fine technique of luster faience for the benefit of her household.
    Fatima drifted beyond the confines of the industrial quarter into the orchards. A light breeze rustled the bare tops of pomegranate, almond and fig trees. Malaka produced the best figs in all Al-Andalus. Earlier in the year, merchants had exported them as far as Baghdad and Damascus.
    Columns graced the entryway to the governor’s castle. As Fatima crossed the threshold of her home, rows of decorative tin objects gleamed on shelves fitted on either side of an elongated chamber. Some glistened in a turquoise color, with the addition of cobalt oxide from the Persian’s skillful hand.
    The room led to an inner garden courtyard, where the sounds of a child at play beckoned. Fatima leaned against a column and watched.
    Six-year-old Mumina scrambled up the steps to an alabaster-colored woman. “Look, Aunt Baraka, I have more star thistles for my crown.”
    The concubine attended the little princess, tousling the dark hair tumbling down her back in thick curls. A slight smile curved Baraka’s lips while she strung flowers together into a diadem.
    She placed the delicate circlet on Mumina’s head. “There now, you look like a proper princess.” 
    “I am a proper princess!” Mumina insisted, stamping her tiny feet in that imperious nature she had developed of late.
    “Yes,” Baraka replied, “and a pretty one at that.”
    Mumina spied Fatima beside the column. “ Ummi !”
    She skipped toward her, her silken tunic bunched around her knobby knees. “Look, Aunt Baraka made me a crown.”
    Fatima picked her up and kissed her soundly on both cheeks. “You are very beautiful, my sweetness.”
    “I know.” Mumina fingered the green jasper brooch that held Fatima’s tunic closed at the neck.
    When Fatima set her down, she scrambled back to Baraka, kissed her cheek and then played among the rows of flowers. At the opposite end of the garden, her governess Amoda sat feeding the youngest child of the family, baby Saliha, who was in her second year. Amoda inclined her head and offered a smile, which Fatima returned.
    Then she greeted the concubine. Baraka clasped her hands together and returned the acknowledgment. Now in her forty-sixth year, Baraka and her counterparts Samara and Hayfa had been Faraj’s companions from his youth, although he never visited them now. Fatima rarely saw Samara and Hayfa outside of the harem’s walls. Only Baraka did not hide herself away.
    Since the family had lived at Malaka, Fatima