Sandstorm (47 page)

They would have been so pleased! To have their youngest, useless son so close to the King.

Of course he would never have done anything to betray Shahjahan…but his family would
have been proud of him for once. And now he was going to attempt to have them all put to
death.

His family would hate him. Shahjahanwould loathe him. That hurt worst of all.

Nanda looked up as a servant appeared, signaling it was his turn. Normally performers were
simply called from the assembled diners, but in a formal dinner like this the performers were
called in one by one. He nodded and as the servant left smoothed his hair and adjusted his
costume – formal black, the robe fitting tight at the top and flowing at the bottom, the sides
split high to show the dark gold pants beneath. The ends and sleeves were embroidered with
his family’s beetle crest. For just a moment, he allowed himself to pretend that soon he would
be wearing the pants and skirt of a concubine; chest bare to show always who and what he
was.

Originally he had arranged to five songs; never telling anyone that he would actually be
playing six – In the Garden, he had finally decided, would be first – to begin boldly and then
he would wind down from there. Start strong, end peacefully, humbly.

Not that it mattered now – so long it ended with Shahjahan alive, he would be content. He
would have to be.

He was beautiful; he knew he was. If he had not been, his family would have sent him away
somewhere – probably to a monastery to be forgotten, his religious devotion to be brought up
in conversation when useful. His hair, bound with costly gold, reached just past his knees.

Heavy, but a weight he was long used to.

Nanda kowtowed to the King, to the assembled, and spoke all the appropriate platitudes.

Settling his instrument in his lap, he dared a brief look at Shahjahan from under his lashes.

And could barely breathe to see how intently Shahjahan was watching him. It hurt. He closed
his eyes and began to play.

Not the playful notes of In the Garden but a slower, more haunting melody. A song titled The
Candle. About a man waiting for his lover to return, watching as the candle melted, counting
the hours. And how he has to kill his lover, when he finally arrives. Nanda kept his eyes
closed, willed his heart to slow though he knew it wouldn’t. At least, he thought, there is a
song for everything. There’s even a song for killing loved ones.

It would have made him laugh, had the situation not been his own.

He wished he was brave enough to open his eyes, but he had been trained to play without
needing to see. Opening his eyes would be distracting…and he didn’t know what would be
worse. To see the confusion, or the comprehension.

The song seemed to last forever, and Nanda wished he could just go to sleep until the worst
was over, but he continued to play, blending the first song into the second – hardly lazy, he
thought contemptuously – and then the world exploded.

Discordant noises drowning his song, shouts – someone grabbed him, hauled him roughly to
his feet. Nanda cried out as his instrument hit the floor; he could hear it break. Was that
really necessary? He thought he heard the King shout something, but then he was being
hauled away, trying in vain to block out the angry cries and frightened shouts.

Seconds, minutes, hours – he couldn’t tell – he was thrown down on a soft, deep rug. He
focused on the deep jewel tones, the intricacy of the design, desperate to think about
anything except that he was probably about to die a traitor. He’d betrayed his King
unwittingly, but repairing that mistake had forced him to betray his family. He wasn’t sorry,
but he hated it anyway.

“Nandakumar,” a voice said softly.

It made him shudder. Nanda couldn’t bear to look up. “I—I’m sorry, Majesty. It wasn’t—I
didn’t know until too late.”

A hand cupped his jaw, forced his head up. “Nandakumar,” Shahjahan repeated. “Explain
everything to me.”

Nodding, Nanda did so. Shahjahan sat there before him on the rug and listened to every
word, breaking into the explanation only to clarify something here and there.

“Your song puzzled me at first – I thought perhaps I had somehow managed to tell you the
wrong one. But then I began to realize what exactly you were playing and quietly ordered my
men to act. We found the assassin, and your parents…they confessed before long.”
Nanda flinched, and did not ask for details about what had persuaded his parents to talk.

“The only point I disagreed with was your willing participation.”

”I didn’t know until yesterday, I swear it.” Nanda looked down again, staring at the way his
long, thin fingers were attempting to pull up or burrow into the rug. “I just---I just wanted to
play the song you requested.”

Shahjahan forced him to look up again. “As did I,” he said, and Nanda could see the genuine
regret in his face. “I’ve been looking forward to this night since the afternoon we met.”

“I’m sorry, Majesty.”

“You have nothing for which you must apologize, Nandakumar.” Shahjahan released him,
fingers withdrawing slowly, and stood up.

For the first time, Nanda took in the room they were in. The smallest of the three court rooms
in which the King conducted business. He watched Shahjahan recline in the low seat on a
raised dais, dropping his eyes when Shahjahan looked at him.

“My guards are not pleased at all with me, for insisting on speaking with you alone. Nor is the
council.” Shahjahan’s teeth flashed in a grin that was remarkably boyish. He stroked his
close-cut beard. “It’s a good thing my father taught me to care only so much what all of them
think. I was not about to let them kill you, when I was quite certain the last thing you wanted
was me dead.”

Nanda shook his head, but did not speak.

“More cold-bloodedly, why kill me when you knew very well I was about to put you in a very
ideal position? This, of course, they would not know.”

“Majesty…” His fingers were beginning to hurt, they clung so tight to the carpet. “I…” Nanda
dared to look up. “You are not going to kill me?”

Shahjahan shook his head. “No. Your family…should be put to death. But they are going to
be exiled.” He sighed. “So soon after my father’s death, I am not eager for more spilled
blood. Especially not with war looming.” A faint smile. “It will cause a ruckus, Nandakumar,
but if you are willing to endure it I would have you for the first flower in my garden.”

“Even after…” Nanda stared at him, then shook his head, then nodded. “Yes, Majesty. It
would be…an honor and a pleasure.”

Shahjahan held out a hand, beckoning Nanda forward, tugging him down into his lap, taking
a hard, sure kiss before Nanda could find his balance. He smelled like incense, always
present for the countless meetings and sessions that filled a King’s day, and like the sands, a
warm breeze. He tasted just as warm and welcome, a bit like pale, sweet wine. “Majesty…”

“Shah,” Shahjahan corrected. “When we are alone, you should call me Shah.” He smiled,
and Nanda could not resist smiling back. “Another kiss, my lovely Nanda? And then I shall
have to go and deal with everyone else.”

“Yes, Shah.” Nanda leaned in to give the requested kiss.

Nanda ignored, as he always did, the negativity he could feel emanating from more than a few people in the crowd. If anyone thought he should have been with his family beneath the rocks in a far-away mountain, that was their opinion. Once he had let such things affect him; no longer.

Eyes closed, Nanda focused on his music. His fingers moved fluidly on the strings; he did not bother trying to think about what he was playing – his fingers always knew before he did, by the time he mastered a song. And this was one he’d known forever; a song he’d written, based on a lullaby his nursemaid sang to him.

He’d been with Shah for nearly ten years; in all that time he had spent at least a moment of every day wishing that he had become Shah’s under happier circumstances – that his family, as aggravating as they were to him, would redeem themselves.

But they had died doing the same things that had gotten them exiled. It felt, on some level, like they were betraying him.

Nanda kept playing, letting the music take everything away. Let the music he loved, and which they had always disdained, wash them from his life completely.

He looked up as the music faded into silence, and returned the four gazes watching him so carefully. Shah, who had trusted and wanted him despite the happenings of that night, and men who were brothers as much as lovers. And gave one of his whispery smiles that only they could see.

Beynum

“Majesty,” the guards greeted as they released their prisoner.

The King and guards alike were surprised when the prisoner dropped to his knees on his
own, rather than having to be forced. And though has hands were bound behind his back, he
managed to move with the inherent grace of a wild cat.

Shah arched an eyebrow, instantly intrigued by the seemingly complacent prisoner. By the
fact they’d brought a prisoner directly to him at all. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked
idly, hand reluctantly sliding from Nanda’s hair.

“Majesty,” one of the guards repeated. “A pirate, one of three dozen recently captured.”

“Then should he not be with his fellows for sentencing?”
The guards nodded. “Yes, Majesty. But this one has something that we thought would be of
interest to you.”

“And what is that?”

Nodding again, the men forced the prisoner to his feet and turned him roughly around.

“My, my,” Shah said, and heard Nandakumar’s gasp of surprise and pleasure. Across the
prisoner’s back in black ink was Shah’s sunburst crest. Not the sword and falcon royal crest,
but Shah’s personal emblem. It spread from the top of his shoulders and neck down to the
small of his back, done in a level of detail to match the work of royal artists. Beautiful. “I do
not recall giving you leave to use my symbol, prisoner.” Shah motioned for his guards to exit,
leaving him and Nanda alone with the captured pirate. “So why do you wear it?”

“Wear it?” the prisoner asked, grinning. “You make it sound, Majesty, like the tattoo is a piece
of clothing. It’s been inked into my flesh from the moment I could afford to have it done. I
don’t wear it.”

Shah fought back a smile, taken with the audacity that he should by all rights beat out of the
man. “Why do you bear my mark then?”

A smile instead of a grin, tinged with sadness – or perhaps nostalgia. “I doubt your Majesty
remembers the incident at all. But when I was ten, I was playing with some friends and fell
into the Green River.”

“You can’t be…” Shah stared. “I remember the incident quite clearly.” His voice was dry as
he continued. “I was made quite the hero while in public, but once in private I was beaten
quite soundly for so foolishly jumping in the river to save a mere peasant.” He shook his
head.

“The mere peasant appreciated the effort, Majesty.”

Shah didn’t quite succeed in hiding his smile that time. “What is your name, mere peasant?”
Teeth, surprisingly white for a peasant-turned-pirate, flashed in a pleased grin. “Beynum.”
This one, Shahjahan thought, was going to be an interesting addition. “Nanda,” he said
softly, turning his head to glimpse the man behind and to the right of his throne.

Nandakumar moved forward and knelt on a pillow beside the king. He watched Beynum, who
returned the thorough perusal. “Yes,” he said quietly.

“I thought you would approve,” Shah said, and let his satisfied smile show. “Beynum,” he
tasted the name. “A strange name for a man who grew up in the mountains.”
Beynum shrugged, looking suddenly less amused. “My father was a sailor. How he met my
mother, I don’t know. But he left again. My name is – or was, perhaps – his. Maybe she
thought I’d be the Beynum that stayed with her.”

“But you didn’t.”

A shrug. “No, I didn’t. For many reasons – the largest being that I can see why my father
left.”

“A hard fact for a son to face; the failings of his parents.”
Beynum shrugged again. “I told her I would return, and I did – but in my absence she packed
up and vanished. Where she is now, I don’t know. I returned to the sea.”

“Are you especially fond of the sea?” Shah sat back, relaxing. “Nanda, cut him loose.”
Nanda rose smoothly to his feet. His floor-length hair, loosely bound today, waved like
rippling silk as he approached Beynum. From the folds of his skirt he drew a small knife and
cut the ropes that bound Beynum’s arms. He returned to Shah’s side.

“Not especially – I enjoy her company, but she does not call to me.”
Beynum had all the grace of the wild jungle cats Shah had seen when he was young,
traveling every inch of the kingdom that would someday be his. He also had their size – from
a distance they did not seem so large; but once close the cats made a man feel quite small
and fragile. He did not doubt Beynum was also taller.

Shah bit back an amused smirk; the council would not like this addition at all. Even less than
they had liked his selection of Nanda. He wondered sometimes what he’d wind up with if the
council was responsible for choosing his harem.