“Madar, I’ll stay.” Gold Dust’s words broke the expectant silence. “I’ll stay to punish you. So you won’t impose your desires on me again.”

Rebekah waved a bangled wrist, a futile attempt to arrest her freshly emerging qualms. “Gold, it’s our desire, not mine….”

“No, Madar.” Gold Dust’s stare was unwavering. “Yours. I have other desires.”

Narcissus entered with a rhythmic gait. The flush on his black complexion alerted the women that a monumental event had transpired in his life.

He gauged the gathering in the room, the ominous silence. Even the little princesses had stopped playing and hugging their dolls to their chest, and now lingered around the hall. He went to the Bibi Sultana and kissed her hand. “My apologies. I wanted to surprise you with my latest trophy. But apparently she found her way before I could make an appropriate introduction.”

The Bibi glared at the eunuch. “You have a way of spoiling delightful moments.”

Rebekah went to the Bibi Sultana and prostrated herself, murmuring her apologies for disrupting the calm of the inner quarters. “I shall leave immediately, my lady.”

“Take your time to wish your daughter farewell,” the Bibi said. “She’s an ignorant creature, but once I’m done with her, she’ll be a different woman.”

The brand between Rebekah’s breasts turned into ice. She had not fully considered the dangers of the seraglio. Now it was too late. Once the Bibi Sultana wished a girl to join the harem, no force could change that.

“Gold,” Rebekah whispered, “listen well, even if it’s the only advice you’ll ever follow. Never submit to the pitiless clutches of the brown addiction. Never become part of the opium-filled hours here.”

The Bibi’s final decree had stripped Gold Dust of her last trace of anger. Her bones shuddered at the fear thrust her way. “Please, don’t forget me here.”

“You are the air I breathe, Gold. How could I forget you?” Rebekah glanced at her right hand, the skin translucent as onion peel. She felt the heat between her breasts as intensely as the moment she was branded. She touched her thigh, where she still carried the heaviness of the gold pouch Rouh’Allah of the melodious voice had once dropped in her lap. Would this decision become another load she would lug the rest of her days?

“Madar, are you allowed to visit?”

“Listen to me, Gold,” Rebekah whispered. “Relatives are not, but I’m now the official bundle woman of the palace, so I can visit you. Don’t be afraid. I won’t abandon you.”

The eunuch decided to expedite matters before the Bibi Sultana lashed out at the two women who whispered in her presence. “I shall now,” he announced, “withdraw with the girl to communicate with the spirits. I’ll return with the decision of the higher powers.”

The Bibi Sultana curled a finger and motioned the eunuch to her side. “This one better find favor in my son’s eyes … or else one of these nights your head will roll in the Courtyard of Horses.”