not giving a reason for the extra lesson, and he’d agreed without asking any questions.
She didn’t know if she even wanted to talk about what had happened.
Laila had gone to her old guest suite after the argument she’d had with Zayid. Was that even the right word for it? He hadn’t fought her or anything. But he hadn’t called for her that night or come to see her. Or the night after that, or the night after that. This would be the fourth night in a row they’d spent apart. Laila was hardly sleeping. And it made no sense.
But getting distracted wasn’t part of being a master potter, according to Talif, so she kept the wheel spinning and her hands moving lightly over the clay.
“As you know, it takes a delicate touch,” Talif reminded her again in his quiet, even voice. “You have excellent form. Don’t lose sight of it.”
She forced her concentration onto the clay, but it wandered away again. It was bad enough that she’d let herself get hung up on Zayid. It was worse that she was letting him break her heart. Of course Zayid was always going to put Raihan before her. But why did it hurt so badly? Why had she harbored a secret hope that announcing her pregnancy would change him in some way? She could see how he’d be disappointed in this little “complication,” though she understood that less and less each day. Yes, the fake marriage had to last a bit longer, but what was that in the scheme of things?
The clay slipped under her fingers, and she felt the pulse of the wheel under it all. She took a deep breath and shook out her shoulders. This was for the best. They’d gotten too tangled up in emotion and forgotten that their marriage was for convenience only, not for pleasure. And certainly not real.
Laila pretended to mold these thoughts into the clay. As part of a pot, baked in, they wouldn’t be able to bother her. It was an old trick she’d used in college when her classes got overwhelming. Make that feeling an art piece and take it down off the shelf when you’re ready.
She didn’t know if she’d ever be ready to take this pot down from the shelf.
But it was finished, and she couldn’t even remember doing it—that complicated lip, getting the width just right. It had been part of her hands, her muscle memory. It was finally part of her. Even if Zayid never would be.
Laila sat back, the potter’s wheel falling into silence.
“Very good,” Talif said, and her heart thrilled at the praise even though her pain. He hesitated. “Your Highness, do you think you might teach your class this afternoon?”
She blinked at him, her smile more genuine than not. “I wouldn’t miss it.” Laila said the words for Talif, but she found she believed them, too. The time she spent with the children at the pottery school had given her a purpose in Raihan. Was she going to let that go now because she’d been up fretting the last few nights? Not a chance.
Talif nodded. “Then we should both prepare to go.”
Laila glanced at the clock. The morning had slipped away into the clay pot. Just as well. Who would want that kind of morning, with a thundercloud of pain hanging over your head, to linger?
“Let’s go now,” she told Talif. “Right now.”
“No, I don’t think so,” said Zayid, the words coming out of his mouth on autopilot.
“Your Highness? Is something the matter?” It took him a beat, but then the embarrassment of having missed something caught up with him. It burned to a crisp under a lightning bolt of irritation. His oldest advisor’s voice held a note of reproach, and Zayid glanced around the table. All the old men at the council table exchanged a look. “If it’s something involving the business of the kingdom, better to—”
“No.” He brought his hand down on the table, sharp enough to make them jump. “We’ll reconvene this meeting later.” Then he stalked into his private office, shutting the door behind him.
Let them sit in the council room and gossip about what they thought was wrong. He was in no mood to hear it.
Zayid sat in the chair behind his desk and stared at the closed door. He missed Laila. He missed the way she barged through his outer office and drove everybody crazy with the way she stepped on schedules and appeared in the middle of meetings.