Shariara and Sarvazad strolled, or rode out daily, his hound always faithfully at his side, with Margaret trailing at an indulgent, but watchful distance. On their walks, they usually stopped to rest at the small marble gazebo, marking the eastern boundary of the estate’s park. Margaret always sat beneath her parasol at a distance, on a shallow, stone bench in the grassy glen, absorbed in some tome or other.
On one such day, Shariara regaled Sarvazad with tales of the local gossip, which greatly amused him. Removing her fetching burgundy bonnet with gold-colored ribbons, she shared all the rumors concerning him. Her flame-colored locks glowed like a halo about her little heart-shaped face. She ended the tales in a light, teasing tone with, “But, my favorite is that you are the son of the Regent, himself, and an exiled Persian princess.”
He threw back his head and laughed outright at that. Light flashed blue in his wavy black hair and the sun gleamed off his perfect teeth. Then, he shared the truth of his tale with her. “Nothing so glamorous, I assure you,” he said with a sardonic smile. “My father was raised in a monastic school. He was the last of eleven brothers and his father intended he should assume orders. But, he was ill-suited to the rigors of the Cloth. So his father purchased him a commission aboard a merchant ship of milord Montague, where he, in time, rose to captain.”
Sarvazad continued, “Eventually, he rose to manage milord Montague’s considerable trade concerns in the Orient, from the Persian Gulf, at Abadan. On a tour of those concerns, milord brought with him his wilder young sister. I’m afraid she made rather a spectacle of herself with a minor French noble in the neighborhood. My father extricated her from a looming debacle. She was my mother.”
“Years passed before the French made the British situation too intolerable. Father, at milord’s behest, then made the treacherous journey with mother and myself and my sister to England.” He ended on a pensive tone.
Shariara’s asked, “You have a sister?”
Sadness darkened his expression, “Her name was Parvani. She and my parents died of a fever on the journey to England… within sight of the French coast. I was but a callow youth.”
She took one of his hands between hers and bowed her head. Spreading tear stains darkened the pale rose muslin of her gown, and the golden yellow ribbons of her bonnet trailing across her lap. Sarvazad took her face in his hands, wiping away the tears. He kissed her so tenderly it was like a whisper upon her lips.
Margaret looked on in silence, smiling at so reverently touching a scene, her own eyes brimming with unshed tears.
© 10 October 2014 by D. Denise Dianaty
