Free The Golden Lion (Knights of Passion Series 2) by Evie North Page B

put it on, and walked boldly out of the palace.
    Her heart was beating fast but no one stopped her because as difficult as it was to believe, no one could see her.
    T hat day was the best she had ever known. She visited the markets and ran her hands over the fine rolls of cloth and breathed in the scent of the spices, and finally she stood on the dock and looked out to sea and thought about climbing aboard a ship and setting sail.
    But where would she go? It was so long since she had been taken into the harem that she no longer remembered where she came from or who she belonged to. At least inside the Palace she was fed and cared for and she was safe. It was still a prison, however, and she’d hoped that one day she might find the courage to escape. And now she had the means to do so.
    “She could go wherever she wished and no one could see her?” Garrick said sleepily. His eyes were closing.
    “That’s right. She was invisible when she was wearing the magic cloak.”
    She watched him as he slept, knowing he was dreaming of Batilda. She lay down herself and closed her own eyes, and prayed that tomorrow he would be a little better.
    ***
    “So of what use to her was the invisible cloak if she was still a prisoner in the harem?” Garrick said, as soon as she entered the room the next morning. He was awake and he had been thinking about her story.
    She smiled. “We are coming to that, Garrick.”
    He settled down and waited for her to begin.
    “One day she saw a golden lion . . .”
    “ A golden lion? Were there wild beasts there in the palace?”
    “The golden lion was what she called him to herself, but he was an English lion, really.”
    “An English lion?”
    “Hush, Garrick. Let me tell the story.”
    He was standing in the inner courtyard, walking with the Sultan’s adviser, and they paused by the fountain, with its cool water and flower petals floating on the surface. He looked up toward the carved screen where Batilda was watching him.
    He was glorious. Tall and broad shouldered, with golden hair and blue eyes, and dressed in fine clothing.
    Her body, which was no longer innocent of course, grew warm and desire filled her. Before she had pretended at being lustful, for the Sultan’s pleasure, but she had never really felt lust. She had never really felt love. Not for any man. But at that moment, gazing down at the golden English lion, how she wanted him!
    But she was in the Sultan’s harem , and she could not look at another man. It was not allowed and she knew that to do so would be to risk her life, and yet the vision of this man took root in her mind and her heart, and she determined that whatever the risk she would have him.
    It so happened that the Sultan wanted a feast for his English guests, who had been stranded on his shores when their ship was wrecked on their way home from the Holy Land. The night of the feast he commanded some of his women to dance. Perhaps it was because the Sultan wanted to show the Englishmen how lucky he was to have so many wives, or perhaps he genuinely wanted to please, one never knew with Aghar, but whatever the reason Batilda made certain she was one of the dancers.
    She was good at dancing. The music seemed to creep into her blood and bones, and she moved sensuously to the sounds. Tonight, she knew that the golden lion would be watching her and she was determined to dance even better than usual so that she could capture him.
    Her costume was made up of a number of silken veils in pale colours, and with the sinuous movements of the dance, her flesh was revealed tantalisingly and then the veils were cast aside as the dance grew more intense. Not all of the veils of course, but enough to cause the men to wish they could take the dancing women to their beds.
    Batilda danced as she had never danced before, turning and spinning, her hips gyrating, her long dark hair tumbling about her, her eyes flashing over the silken veil across the lower half of her face. Her shapely legs