My name is Zainab Habiba bin Khalifa al Makhtoom al Sura and my father’s family are distant relatives of the billionaire al Sura family. When I was eighteen, I was selected by Walid al Sura of the main branch of the family to be his fourth and youngest wife. He was forty-seven at the time, nearly thirty years my senior.
Just before the wedding, I had a chance encounter with a stranger in the First Class lounge at the international airport in the capital. I was a virgin with no experience with men, and he used the most creative means to have sex with me – he finger fucked me, went down on me, then fucked me like a satyr with his huge cock. He made me cum again and again, and finally ejaculated a copious outpouring of his seed deep inside me. (See my story, Zainab Habiba.) He impregnated me and the pregnancy resulted in twins, a black-haired boy that looked like the stranger, and a blonde girl that looked like me. The boy’s black hair convinced Walid that the children were his since I am a very pale blonde.
I resumed my intense exercise routine on my stationary bike and with free weights soon after the children were born but Walid did not come to visit us till they were about three months old. By this time, I had lost all the weight I had gained and was feeling as fit and strong as I had before I got pregnant.
I had hoped to escape to have a tryst with my stranger, Jack Grierson, at our remote camel breeding station in Ras al Natheel. But I found that I was a virtual prisoner in the al Sura palace in the capital. I could not leave without Walid’s consent, even to go home to visit my mother. Sadly, I sent Jack a text, telling him I could not make it.
I’ll find a way, he texted back.
*
There was a big gathering of our clans the next week to be held in an isolated desert oasis far from the capital. These were usually men-only affairs, so I didn’t think too much about it, except that it meant I wouldn’t see Walid.
However, the day before Walid was due to leave, his harem mistress, Najma al Wakhar came to my suite. She had a darker shade of Arab coloring but was very pretty and moved sensuously. I suspected she was one of Walid’s concubines, though she denied it when I asked her. However, Walid was always touching her rump and sometimes her breasts when he thought no one was looking. She had a five-year-old son who looked a lot like Walid.
Najma resented me from the first day I arrived. She indicated with word and deed that she thought I was not good enough for Walid. Now she fidgeted about for a few moments without saying anything.
“Get packed,” Najma said. “You’re going to the clan gathering.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Don’t ask questions.”
I asked my maids to help me pack my things. One of them was Suhaila, a cute dark little thing from Bangladesh who barely came up to my shoulder. But she had winning ways and an ear for gossip.
“All the chieftains are bringing their newest wives to show them off, Lady Zainab Habiba,” she said to me. “Lord Walid will be very proud of you, so young, so beautiful, so European-looking.”
“I told you to not call me lady,” I said to her, crossly. “You are my friend. Anyway, Walid is not proud of me. He hates how I look, ‘too Russian’, he always says.”
“He says that to you perhaps,” said Suhaila slyly. “But I have heard the chauffeurs and footmen say that he boasts about you to his clansmen, and even to foreign dignitaries.”
This was news to me and I digested it slowly.
“I will take you with me to the gathering,” I said to Suhaila.
“Oh no, Zainab Habiba. Only Lord Walid can decide who will go.”
“I will ask Walid,” I said determinedly.
Walid was not encouraging.
“We will be very short of water and all sorts of provisions. We cannot take superfluous persons. But if you must have her, tell Najma. She has made all the arrangements.”
“I’m sure she has,” I said sarcastically.
“You have no reason to be jealous, Zainab Habiba. You’re my fourth and youngest wife. You have the lowest claim on me.”
I don’t want any claim at all, I thought. But I said. “I’ll do as I’m told.”
“Good, good,” he said, and left rubbing his hands.
*
The gathering was at an oasis in the Rub al Khali or Empty Quarter. Chieftains had come from all around were there and as we got closer, our caravan of vehicles joined a much longer one . No expense had been spared, and palatial tents had been put up all around the oasis. As one of the richest chieftains, Walid’s tent was one of the biggest, with every modern convenience and multiple rooms separated by heavy drapes – more like a suburban house.
“You will stay here in our suite,” he said to me as soon as we got there. “When you are needed, I will send Najma to fetch you.”
“As you wish, Walid,” I said.
“You call me ‘Walid’” he said. “You do not give me the respect I deserve. You don’t understand the difference between us. I am a purebred Tamimi, and through my mother, I can trace my lineage back over a thousand years. Whereas you are a mixed-blood mongrel who speaks Badawi, the rough dialect of the desert, a girl raised in a remote oasis far from civilization.” He paused for a moment. “Your father is quite respectable, related distantly to my family as well as other leading Houses. But your mother! Her father is a rough nomad chieftain and her mother was a Russian slave, a wild, aggressive girl who died young. You seem to have inherited her temperament.”
“Then why did you marry me, Walid? You could have left me where I belong, in the desert among the camels and goats.”
*
I did not see Walid or any of the other chieftains on the first day. Suhaila and I chatted and played some silly games. Our suite had two bedrooms and I occupied the smaller of the two. I heard Walid and Najma having sex the first night, finally giving the lie to her denials. I heard her sucking his cock, then his loud groans. She made loud choking sounds. She certainly gave him a performance, with strangulated moans like she was cumming over and over as she sucked on him. He cried out, “Oh Najma! How you pleasure me when you choke on my manhood!”
Then I heard the slapping of his mount on hers as he began to fuck her. I counted the thrusts … one … two … three … then, sure enough, he cried out his release. It was less than fifteen seconds.
Nonetheless, Najma screamed with him, “Oh, Walid, I am cumming again! You are a stallion!”
I had over a year of sex with Walid, I could not believe that he could make any woman cum, let alone drive her to wild orgasms like that. I was sure Najma was faking it, but it obviously worked. I put an ear to the heavy drapes between our bedrooms and heard him whispering sweet nothings to her.
“I kiss your dark nipples, my dearest Najma,” he whispered. “I kiss your shell-like ears. I kiss your big eyes, dark like the desert sky. You are a girl after my own heart, unlike my young Russian.”
“So pale, she looks sickly,” responded Najma. “You should divorce her and get a real wife who can please you.”
“Perhaps, perhaps. But she will impress the chieftains with her European looks. And she will be useful by my side when I go to Europe and America on business and diplomatic trips. She is beautiful in her own way, but much too high-spirited, too independent. I still have to teach her obedience.”
“Beat her,” said Najma, viciously. “Beat her every time you have sex with her. You must show her that you are the master. She is rebellious, and like her grandmother, she may turn violent.”
“Quite right,” said Walid.
“Najma al Wakhar is a witch,” Suhaila whispered in my ear.
“You’re just biased, Suhaila. Najma is very beautiful.”
“What is she saying about your grandmother?” Suhaila asked curiously.
“My mother told me the whole story,” I said. “Her name was Aiza Ismailova and she was a blue-eyed blonde born near Odessa. My grandfather bought her from human traffickers when she was very young. Though he beat her regularly, she was never violent, and never tried to defend herself. But when my mother was five, she tried to stop a beating and he turned on the child in a rage. Aiza screamed, ‘You will have to kill me before you touch my daughter!’ and struck him with a metal poker. She disappeared soon afterward, we assume she is dead. She was in her early twenties.”
“What a sad story!” exclaimed Suhaila. “Do you still see your grandfather?”
“My mother and I, we never speak to him, we cannot bear to look at him. He is a monster.”
“I saw your mother during your wedding,” said Suhaila. “The two of you are the best-looking women I have ever seen. You look like sisters.”
“All women are good-looking when you look at them with a loving eye,” I said, putting my arms around her and enveloping her in a hug.
“No, no, I heard all the menservants and they said the same thing.”
“If we attract lustful looks, then we are sinful,” I said.
“The two of you cannot help how you look, Zainab Habiba. God made you both.”
“Like he made you,” I said, squeezing her. “The dearest little bundle of joy.”
*
Najma woke me the next morning, perfectly turned out. Her hijab was set to perfection in a stylish tie and she wore a thin gold chain around the waist of her abaya to emphasize how narrow it was. It also caused her abaya to cling to the swell of her belly. My mother always told me this was strictly forbidden for it drew lustful looks that the shapeless abaya was designed to prevent.
“Wake up, you stupid girl. You are to sit with Lord Walid in the reviewing stand this morning to watch the camel races. Then cheer him as he races against the other chieftains in the last race of the day.”
“Camel races?” I cried, jumping out of bed. “I didn’t know there was going to be fun like that!”
Suhaila helped me to hurriedly get ready. I worked hard to make sure my silk hijab was at least as well tied as Najma’s. Then I put on my ankle boots and ran out to find Walid. He was waiting for me impatiently in the foyer of our tented suite and walked out immediately on seeing me. I followed him three paces behind like a good, submissive wife. But on the way to the reviewing stand, I saw Mahmood, leading Berber, the fastest, wildest camel from our breeding station in Ras al Natheel.
I ran toward him and he dropped to a knee in front of me.
“Mistress Zainab Habiba,” he said. “Apologies, I meant, Lady Zainab Habiba. Such a pleasure to see you.”
“Oh, don’t be like that, Mahmood!” I cried.
We had grown up together, riding and racing camels in the barren wastes around the breeding station at Ras al Natheel. I was always chaperoned by one of my mother’s ladies or one of my older half-sisters, but we still had a lot of fun together as children. We both loved camels and camel riding. He was one of the best camel jockeys in the royal service – I thought he was the best! He had represented our country at many international meets. I don’t like to boast, but I think I was nearly as good as him – there was no camel I could not ride.
Walid came up looking like a thundercloud and asked, “Who is this?”
“Walid, this is Mahmood al Jabal,” I said. “He is your best camel jockey. I knew him as a girl at the camel breeding station at Ras al Natheel.”
“It is very improper for you to run off and address him like this, Zainab Habiba.”
“I’m sorry, Walid. But I have not seen him for a long time. And you are right here to chaperone me.”
Mahmood went to his knees and kissed the sand at Walid’s feet.
“Lord Walid al Sura, I am your underserving servant,” he said.
“You will be racing for our House today, I assume?”
“Yes, your highness.”
“Will you be riding this beast?”
“No, your highness. Berber is a mongrel, doesn’t have the bloodlines of a race camel. I will be riding Wahid Sarie, he’s a purebred with the best pedigree and has superb race temperament.”
“Well, you are the expert. Just make sure you win for us.”
“I will do my best, highness.”
“Who is racing Berber, Mahmood?” I asked.
“No one. I brought him along as a training partner for Wahid Sarie, he cannot race against the purebreds. And he’s so difficult to ride, never been properly broken.”
He gave him a slow smile and I returned it. We both knew why Berber was not properly broken. I loved his wildness, his stubborn independence. He fought me, rolled, and tried to unseat me, but I hopped off and back on, and used my whip and the reins until I got him under control. And then we flew across the desert together. In his own way he loved me too, for we were two of a kind – fiercely independent outcasts.
Now Berber grunted and pawed the sand, stretching his neck toward me. I reached out, scratched his snout, and he grunted louder. Walid took a few steps back.
“Get that beast back to the pens,” he said. “And get ready for the racing!”
“Yes, highness,” said Mahmood.
He remained on his knees with his face in the sand till Walid left. I followed Walid but looked back at Mahmood, who gave me a jaunty wave.
*
We sat in the shaded reviewing stand, watching the races through the day. I sat with Walid in the second stand, just beside the main one reserved for the royalty. Several chieftains came by to pay respects to Walid and congratulate him on acquiring a new young wife – me. They all looked at me appraisingly, some letting their eyes rove over my body, mentally undressing me. But no one addressed me directly. Walid looked on all this with pride, ignoring my discomfort.
I got looks from many of the other young wives and heard several snatches of conversation with “ … the young Russian upstart … granddaughter of the blonde slave … lowborn whore …”.
Mahmood duly won the main race of the day, the race of champions. I was so proud of him, I stood and clapped and cheered till I was hoarse. Walid was equally happy with this victory for the House of al Sura but looked at my enthusiasm disapprovingly.
Finally, as the sun was beginning to get low and the air turned cooler, it was time for the Chieftains race. Walid stood up and was escorted by his grooms to his mount back in the pens. I took advantage of his absence to run out and find Mahmood.
“Mahmood, can you saddle Berber for me?” I asked, excitedly.
“Of course not, my lady. You cannot ride in the chieftains’ race.”
“Why not? Where is it written? I am a chieftain’s wife, does that not make me a chieftain? The Quran does not make a distinction on the basis of sex, and the prophet himself said – women have equal rights in every sphere of life. Prince Walid will be happy to see his wife is better than any of the others.”
“Are you sure, Zainab Habiba?”
I wasn’t sure, but I wanted to ride Berber, so I said, “Yes, I’m sure.”
Mahmood saddled Berber and I hopped up onto his back as I had done so many times before. He shied and tried to unseat me as he always did – it was a game between us – and I whacked his rump with my whip and pulled sharply on his harness to bring him into line.
“You haven’t lost your touch,” said Mahmood, approvingly.
“I love Berber, Mahmood.”
“The two of you are equally unruly,” he sniffed. “You deserve each other.”
I laughed. Several of the grooms were staring, so I said, “I am Zainab Habiba al Sura, I will ride for the House of Walid al Sura in the chieftains’ race.”
They all bowed and made way as I rode out of the pens.
The other chieftains were just lining up as I got there. I realized I wasn’t properly kitted out, for they were all wearing helmets, gloves, and goggles. I just pulled up my pink sequined hijab over my chin, mouth, and nose against the blowing sand, leaving just a narrow slit for my eyes. I found a spot at the edge of the long line, a position of disadvantage. But I was sure that Berber’s speed would make up for it.
“What are you doing here?” shouted Walid leaning down from his saddle. “Go back and take your seat in the reviewing stand at once!”
“I’m representing our House of al Sura, Walid!” I shouted back. “We double our chances of winning now.”
This brought forth a great deal of laughter.
“That mount looks wild, brother,” said Prince Mushtaq, one of the chieftains. “See how it paws the sand. She will be thrown within the first hundred meters, she may break a bone or two. That will teach her a better lesson than getting her to leave the race.”
“Very well,” said Walid with bad grace.
We were under starter’s orders and I leaned forward, tense as I waited for the gun. It went off and I whacked Berber to get him to move. He grunted and took off. He took an elliptical rather than a straight line and we...
