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❝Once upon a time in Baghdad, a street girl teaches the Khalifa of the kingdom why a king needs a queen.❞
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Started: June 5, 2021.
Completed: March 30, 2022.
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cover by @xniftykayx
featured on wattpad historical fiction, undiscovered...
But in solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. Such a constellation was he to me.
— Madeline Miller
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Him
"Can I play with your sword?"
The young prince stops swinging his wooden sword and turns to her. She's eagerly waiting for him to give it to her, already reaching for it before he can agree.
"This?" He holds it out of her reach. "This is mine."
"I'll give it back," Noura insists, and he seems to consider it before handing her his sword. She takes it grinning, swinging it around happily and poking him in the abdomin with it. The prince patiently waits for her until she has fulfilled her exhilaration of using it. She then returns it to him and he takes it back, running away to play with the other kids.
Noura comes to him where he's sitting upon a wooden horse, faking to ride it. She kicks a stone at her feet.
"Do you have a sword too, JooJoo?"
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Her
"What's your name?"
Two curious eyes stare back at her upon her question and answer it back with silence. They gleam under the sun, one like warm honey and the other like deep ocean. His lips remain set in a thin line and he doesn't make an effort to so much as utter a word to her. Noura stares back at him, a little abashed.
"Do you remember me?" she asks again. "I stumbled into you a few days back and spilled your milk."
No response. He continues gazing at her as if a statue carved out of stone, expressionless and unmoving. Noura shifts her weight from one foot to another, titling her head at him, feeling lost.
"You don't speak?" She takes a step closer, and he takes it a sign that she wants to sit, so he scoots away on the plank, creating room for her. Noura looks between him and the empty space. At least he moved.
She takes out a few coins from her pouch, more than the price of milk, and hold them out to him. "Here, for your milk I spilled."
He doesn't attempt to take it from her, so she just puts it on the plank beside him. He looks at the coins, then back up at her, still not saying anything. He might be mute, Noura thinks, feeling sorry some more for the man.
"Take it," she requests. "I'd like it if you can keep them. Consider it my apology."
Silence. That's all he offers her, his bewitching eyes still on her, as if speaking to her what his mouth cannot say, a language she cannot understand. They grow tender, maybe raw, as Noura tries to keep afloat and not drown in them. Something about them breeds nostalgia-- she feels spellbound.
