Empire of Dreams

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"I have blood on my hands, Laila. Blood of countless nameless men and women. People whose names I'll never know." Ali finally uttered, his face a mask of anguished fury.

Okay, that was a start.

He moved towards the bed, his knees nearly buckling underneath him, his chest heaving. I followed, climbing on to the bed, sitting beside him.

"People look at me with fear in their eyes, fear mixed with disgust. For them, I'm a monster," he looked at me. "I could not bear it if you looked at me like that."

"Tell me the truth, Ali. What happened with the Turks?"

"I had been newly appointed as the General. Baba had said that I had to prove myself. Our first task had been to quash the small rebellion on the outskirts of Egypt, near Tunis." He trembled slightly and I kissed the back of his neck in a comforting gesture, letting my lips linger. "We gathered a small force, heading to the designated point, only to end up facing a small village of women and children."

I worked through the lump in my throat. "When was this?"

"Three years ago. We went there and checked the village. Everything seemed to be normal. We thought that our intelligence network had made a mistake."

"They hadn't made a mistake," I guessed quietly. His lips twisted in a mockery of a smile.

"No, it was a trap. The spy had deliberately lured us there. Lured me there, they wanted to keep me as a hostage." he clasped my wrists, holding on to me as his mind replayed those memories. My bottom lip wobbled a little; it was hard to see him like this.

So vulnerable. So scarred.

"They attacked in the middle of the night when the moon was at its peak. Women, children bearing arms, descended on our small force, slashing and fighting," he gestured to his back.

I controlled my sob by placing my lips on the scar he was referring to, kissing the faded mark.

He stiffened, and then shuddered.

"I got that from a particularly fearsome warrior. We didn't even have the time to react. I lost a lot of my men, they lay there on the ground, fighting for survival, helpless. Cutoff from the supply chain." His words conjured up black and white images of a lost war, pictures of hopeless men dying in the dessert, of a young General, barely a man, stranded and helpless to help his men.

Injured. In pain.

My hands moved over his shoulders and I pressed my face into his back, trying to stop the tears from flowing, being strong, for him. He relaxed and slumped against me, his body losing its tense energy.

Trusting me.

"What did you do to the person who attacked you?"

"Shot them with an arrow," he said bitterly. "It was a massacre. I gathered my men and escaped that very night. Our survival was key. We needed to get physicians and supplies. Plus, we had to weed out the spies," guilt gnawed at me. "A small operation evolved into a full war. We chased them everywhere, eventually driving them out towards the Byzantines."

"The refugees," I said connecting the dots.

"Are just the consequence of an instigated war," he muttered, disgust coating each and every word. He sighed and swiveled to look at me. "They wanted to bring down the Caliphate."

"But why?" He shrugged, his right hand trailing through my hair, over the shoulder, and down my back.

"Who knows? They never talked. But they're always ready to cause a rebellion." His left thumb lingered on my neck, brushing across the hollow at its base.