“It’s just the same,” she said in surprise, tethering her horse to a bush. “I thought there were plans to commercialize it.”
“Not my plans. My father’s. I stopped it.”
This made her look at him. “But it could—”
“Have brought in income and been a great tourist attraction? Yes, I know. But some things are sacred and easily damaged. The very things the people would have been coming here to see would have been destroyed.”
She walked toward the water, an emerald green under the overhanging palms. In one corner, the fan-like leaves rose and fell on the current of warm air rising from where the hot springs bubbled up, driven by the geothermal activity far below ground.
She sensed Zavian standing behind her.
“Do you remember?” he asked quietly.
Of course she did. How could she not? She nodded. Without meaning to, her gaze shifted to where her grandfather’s tents had once stood as they’d excavated in the place where, decades earlier, he’d found the Qur’an. There was nothing there now, of course. But she found what she was looking for, the dark entrance to the cave.
Zavian was about to speak when the sound of vehicles approaching broke through the charged silence, and he sighed and walked off to meet his staff. They were soon following orders, erecting tents for both themselves some distance away, and the main one in the prominent position overlooking the pool, in front of the cave wall. Gabrielle knew from experience that the tent would be connected to the cave and would be an extension of it. She’d slept there after all—before, when she and her grandfather had been working on the site, and then after. When there had been no one except Zavian and herself, and she’d fallen for him physically, just as she had emotionally.
She cleared her throat, trying desperately not to think of those times. They were gone. Whatever Zavian was trying to do, he’d fail because she knew she was doing the best thing. They could have no future, because his country would have no future if they were together. It was as simple—and as complicated—as that.
Soon the formality of the palace had been replaced by the traditional customs of the Bedouin. Food was being prepared, and the camp readied for the night. She smiled as she watched Zavian’s people, free of the formal clothes and actions of the palace, sit cross-legged as they prepared the food while listening to one man talk.
She sat, too, and listened to the man who told a story of a journey across the desert. The story emphasized the meaning of family, brotherhood, and belonging to their people. Before she knew it, Zavian had seated himself beside her and joined her in listening to the man’s story.
After the story ended and the men relaxed to drink and talk, Zavian leaned back against the palm tree’s rough bark. “These stories are old. They should be updated. Life isn’t like that anymore.”
“But it is. For these people, anyway. And they are the people who matter.”
He looked at her thoughtfully. “I have a favor to ask, Gabrielle.”
She swallowed. “And what’s that?”
“Please, show me what you refused to show me the last time we were here.”
“I promised grandfather never to show anyone.”
“I know. But the place is well controlled now. No one can ransack this place. It is secure in a way that it never was before.”
She bit her lip. On the one hand, she felt terrible betraying her grandfather’s confidence. But then she was the last one with the knowledge.
She nodded and looked toward the cave. “It’s this way.”
He followed behind her, so close that she felt as if she were in orbit, a moon to his earth, earth to his sun, aware of him and the pull of him to her.
She stopped before the cave opening, now half-hidden by the adjoining tent. But, instead of going inside, she walked along a narrow ridge behind it. Zavian followed her.
The undergrowth had grown rampant since she’d last been there. She and her grandfather and a few trusted servants had ensured the path to the site wasn’t obvious and that it would re-grow and hide the precious site within months. And it had. Now, years later, it was impossible to imagine that the narrow ledge led anywhere. Certainly, from the frown on Zavian’s disbelieving face, he had no idea that what he was about to see existed.
They had to get on their hands and knees and crawl the last little way. When she emerged, her bare arms were scratched from the thorny scrub, but she didn’t feel a thing as she jumped down from the ledge onto the tiled surface covered with sand and dust. It was instantly apparent from the lack of footprints that no one had been there in years. It had remained a secret.
Zavian emerged from the bush, equally scratched, and equally uncaring, and stepped into the space beside her. “What the hell?”
She grinned. “That’s not a very kingly thing to say.”
He strode out into the center of the tiled area and turned 360 degrees, absorbing the towering trees, the cliff face on one side, and the sharp drop down to the plains far below on the far side. Ancient hot pools were carved into the cliff face with steps leading up to them. The remains of columns dotted the enclosure, nearly enveloped in trailing plants, lush under the thermal steam. Rock faces which hid the place from the world bore the traces of paintings, groups around a pool, men and women in various stages of undress. It had been a secret escape from the desert to the abundance of everything. Fruit trees, offspring of long-ago planted fruit, still clung to the rocks, watered far below the surface by underground water. Their vines were thick and ancient, grown into the rock for support, their fruits hanging lush and plumply purple, attracting both animals and birds.
“It’s the place of which the ancients used to speak,” said Zavian. He turned to face her, his expression serious. “Isn’t it, Gabrielle? The Havilah of old when the three kingdoms were one.”
She nodded. “It is. Grandfather discovered it but swore all of those who came with him to secrecy. He’d intended to return to finish excavating. But it never happened, and—”