Free Slave to Passion by Elisabeth Naughton

was about to tell him something important. Something he needed to hear. Something that would change things between them forever.
    The guard moved to the side. Nasir looked over as his mu’allim stepped into the room.
    Malik wore his traditional leather breastplate that fit his sculpted muscles, his hands clasped behind his back, his shaved head reflecting the dim candlelight. “You look better.”
    Nasir ground his teeth against the dull pain in his side and pushed up higher in the bed, trying not to look like such a pussy. Trying to get the raging libido that seemed to come out of nowhere under control. “How long was I out?”
    “About thirty-six hours. You should have alerted the guards that the wound was deeper than originally thought. It won’t serve you to die in here.” Before Nasir could ask what he meant by that, Malik nodded toward the highborn and added, “You have the jarriah ’s quick thinking to thank for your speedy recovery. By the time I came for you yesterday and realized the severity of your wound, it would have been too late.”
    Jarriah . Nasir looked back toward the female, standing at the foot of his bed, suddenly studying the floor with great interest while twisting her hands together in front of her. The male who’d brought her to see him that first day had called her jarriah . The word was foreign to him—of Ghul origin—but something in his gut told him to find out what it meant. That it mattered. That it was the key to what seemed so off about her.
    Her …
    He didn’t even know her name. In all the time they’d been locked up together, he hadn’t asked. Hadn’t thought to ask, because he hadn’t wanted to see her as anything other than his enemy. Now he couldn’t stop wondering if that was true. Now he wanted to know everything about her—who she was, where she came from, and most of all, why she’d saved his life.
    Not all Ghuls are evil .
    “Get up,” Malik said, reaching for the cover and pulling it back. “Rest is over. You need food, then we have work to do.” He wrapped his hand around Nasir’s bicep and helped haul him to his feet.
    Malik handed him off to the guards, who, thankfully, were more gentle than normal. His head swam, but he was able to stand without crumbling to the floor. At his back, Malik said, “The servant is waiting outside to check you, jarriah .”
    “There’s no reason for that, mu’allim ,” she replied in a quiet voice. “Nothing has…changed.”
    “Nevertheless, she must do as she’s been instructed.” His voice softened. “I’ll be back to speak with you later.”
    “Thank you, mu’allim ,” she replied.
    Check her? More questions swirled in Nasir’s mind as the guards herded him toward the door. Light burned his eyes as he stepped out into the corridor, but he caught sight of the slim brunette wearing the traditional gray servant garb with the slave band tattooed across her right bicep.
    The girl didn’t make eye contact with Nasir, just nodded once to Malik, then disappeared into the cell, but whatever was said inside that room was too quiet to be heard. And as the guards ushered him down the hall, Nasir couldn’t stop wondering what was really happening.
    He was bathed, his wound tended and re-bandaged, then he was taken to the dining hall, which was empty, as always. From the courtyard beyond the high windows that let in only light and the blue of the sky, the crack of training swords slapping against each other echoed, telling him the rest of the sahad s were being put through a grueling workout in the baking heat of the sun.
    A ripple of contempt washed through him. As champion, he never trained with the others—a luxury, he was told. But he knew the truth. His isolation was just one more way the Ghuls could punish him for being Marid. One more way they tried to break him. They were smarter than he’d given them credit. Torture was one thing, but loneliness…
    “ Being left alone isn’t safe. It’s the greatest