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Jared muttered
after him, and then a wicked smile swept across his bronzed
face.
    He woke the next morning just as the sun was
peeking over the horizon. He lay still for a moment, watching the
light spread through the curtains and across the floor. It was like
watching a flower blossom in accelerated time, and Jared felt a
deep and quiet joy flood through him. A breeze ruffled the curtains
gently, as if to rouse him from rest, and he got up and
stretched.
    He poured water in the washbasin against the
far wall and splashed it over his face and neck, shaking the
droplets out his dark hair and wetting his bare chest. When he had
finished he wiped his hands dry on his wide-legged black pants and
stepped out onto his balcony, drawing a deep breath of the fresh
morning air.
    The rising sun splashed the eastern sky with
a wash of red and orange, and the eastern wing of the Great House
cast a sharp shadow over the courtyard. Jared’s room, in the center
of the third floor of the west wing, was just high enough to escape
the deepest shadow, and the ambient light around him grew steadily
brighter.
    He stretched again, closing his eyes and
putting his hands behind the back of his head. Then he leaned his
forearms against the stone balustrade of the balcony and gazed down
into the courtyard. It was utterly empty, but the fountain’s
gurgling voice seemed to be welcoming the dawn with the same joy
that pulsed through Jared’s veins. His eyes flickered over the
windows of the east wing, lingering on the third-floor balcony
second from the southern end of the building, where garnet colored
curtains fluttered in the early morning breeze.
    He smiled to himself and was about to go back
inside when some movement on that balcony arrested his attention.
The garnet curtains were suddenly jerked aside, and then Sahara
stepped out onto the balcony. She was rubbing her arms, not
brusquely, but slowly, as if comforting herself. As she paced up
and down the length of the balcony, her hands on her arms kept time
with her feet—a slow, meditative pace. Then she stopped, put her
hands on the balustrade, and inhaled deeply, her eyes closed, her
face tilted up toward the morning sky.
    She did not look in his direction when she
opened her eyes, but down into the courtyard. She leaned on her
arms, as Jared had done, but her right hand went to her hair, her
fingers lifting the strands and testing their length.
    What’s she doing? Jared wondered,
unable to take his gaze from her.
    Her hand worked methodically from the back to
the front, and when she had measured the hair that lay across her
forehead, she suddenly bowed her head until it rested on her
forearms.
    Jared felt like his heart had lodged itself
somewhere in his throat. Sahara’s shoulders heaved, and he felt in
his gut, though he couldn’t hear them, the sobs that were wrenching
themselves out of her. At last, her shoulders stilled, and she
lifted her head, wiping her cheeks with the palms of her hands.
Then she was gone, and the curtains, disturbed by her swift
movement, billowed in and then out again.
    Jared lingered on the balcony a moment
longer. Could my invitation to breakfast be so distressing to
her? he wondered. And if not that, then what?
    He went inside and dressed rapidly. He would
go and ask her, and he would go right now. Snatching his sword off
the table, he pulled the door shut behind him and started off down
the corridor.
    He reached her door sooner than he had
expected, and he hesitated for a moment. A wave of doubt suddenly
washed over him, but he dropped his fist against the smooth wood of
the door anyway.
    No answer. Another wave of doubt threatened
to extinguish his resolve utterly. He put a hand on the doorknob
and turned it, surprised to find it unlocked. Gently he pushed the
door open a crack.
    “Sahara? It’s me…it’s Jared.”
    “Isn’t it too early for breakfast?” Even
through the heavy door, he could hear the strain of tears in her
voice.
    Jared peered