“His Holiness appears before his subjects at a distance. No one has depicted him truthfully.”

Gold Dust dashed out of one of the many branching corridors.

Rebekah and the Great Black Eunuch passed the inner court and the kitchens and entered the lodging of the eunuchs. He unlocked a door framed with elaborate carvings of wooden animals with bulging eyes of ruby.

She brushed past him like a breeze, feeling a hard object against his side. She raised an eyebrow. “What’s this?”

He mumbled unintelligible words. His cheeks trembled. He turned his eyes from her scrutinizing stare.

Her fingers traced the plush velvet of his cape, the satin lining, the ermine trimming, the slippery silk of his billowing pants, and rested on his waist. She grabbed the solid object.

He slapped her hand away, but like leeches her fingers stuck. “Can you keep my secret?”

She fluttered her lashes and slid her tongue over red lips. Yes! She would treasure his secret, tuck it away in her heart, and produce it at the right time.

“Promise,” he begged, imploring clemency from the spirits of the dead.

She touched her bosom. The shape of her mark began to change. “I swear by all my ancestors.”

He reached under his sash and the elastic of his waistband and retrieved a small jar full of brine.

Rebekah shut her eyes; her fingers sprang to her mouth; the mark between her breasts throbbed.

He held up the glass container, checking its contents, then turned it in circles in front of her face.

She opened her eyes again, her breath labored, sweat trickling down her cleavage.

He displayed the glass on the palm of his hand. “Our Muslim tradition demands we bury the whole body to attain heaven.”

“Poor, poor Narcissus. Your manhood is pickled in a jar!” She touched him between his legs. “I’ll show you there’s more here than what’s preserved in brine.”

“It’s useless. I’m not a man.”

“I shall prove otherwise.”

“What arrogance makes you think you’ll succeed where others failed?”

She pressed the discolored skin of her palm on his mouth. “The arrogance comes from this burned hand you’ve been staring at.” She uncoiled his turban and the sash around his waist, removed his dagger and cape, vest and pants, then led him to the floor-bed at the corner of the carpeted room.

“What caused this burn?”

“Don’t ask questions. In return, I’ll raise your passion to such heights you won’t want to return.”

He snickered. “I don’t want arousal. I’ve enough of that. Passion without release is like enduring castration over and over again.”

“Will you tell me about it, Narcissus? Do you want to?” She knew he would. She recognized his need to communicate his pain. She herself, in her capacity as a healer, had learned to listen and to hoard secrets and to use them to her advantage. “Talk to me, Narcissus.”

“It happened in the desert, the operating hall of slave traders. Can you believe they said a prayer over me when they saw the bush of mature hair?”