Steampunk Omnibus: A Galvanic Century Collection

by Michael Coorlim

  Safiyya claimed a sudden but fierce headache upon returning, leaving Aldora to supper alone with Cemal. She did not complain.

  With just the two of them dining, Cemal arranged for a smaller table to be brought out between them. A large loaf of round braided bread, sweet and rich to the palate, sat as centrepiece, and Aldora found herself served a plate of shredded lamb topped with tomato, cucumber, onion and a savoury white sauce. Thick frothy yogurt drinks were served in large glass mugs.

  "No rakı?" She smiled demurely.

  "If you'd rather--"

  "No, I don't mind. The rakı was a bit strong for me. I'm afraid I'm not much a drinker."

  "There's a reason it's called lion's milk." He reclined on his pillows, leg bent, arm propping up his head.

  "Is it? That's very funny."

  He gestured towards her mug with his own. "This is aryan. It's quite good."

  Aldora took a sip, then nodded. "Very tasty."

  "Some make the claim that it dates all the way back to ancient Persia."

  Aldora nodded, her eyes flickering to the door, to the window, to her hands.

  "You're worried about your ward," Cemal said. "Forgive the inanity of my small talk."

  "No, no. It helps. Distracts me. I'm not very used to... to doing nothing when something needs to be done."

  "You're a strong woman, Miss Fiske."

  "Please, call me Aldora."

  Cemal chuckled. "I will try to remember. The Ambassador made such a fuss over your family name. The Fiskes."

  "The Fiskes. Yes. A name that follows wherever I go."

  "You do not get along with your father, I take it?"

  "We're very different people," Aldora said. It wasn't a matter she liked to dwell upon, let alone speak of.

  "As I was with my own father, a prominent mullah. We did not always see eye to eye. While tolerant of failings in others, he was always strict with me. I do suppose he is to thank for the opportunity to join the Young Turks -- he was a Young Ottoman back in his own prime, and it was that connection that led the Turks to seek out my aid in the Rebellion."

  "That was fortunate."

  "I owe him much that I wish I did not."

  Aldora picked at her plate. "My father. Lucian Calvin Fiske. Scion of one of the oldest noble houses in England. A popular saying goes that all you need to know of English gentry you can see in the eyes of a Fiske, and in a sense it's true. Father used to say we were what the other families aspired to be. I was raised to be the ideal others fell short of."

  "That must have been a heavy burden to bear."

  "Perhaps?" Aldora looked towards the balcony. "I knew no other way, growing up. Regiment. Discipline. The tyranny of tea-time. My brother used to say that if you cut a Fiske, we bleed Union Jack. We are not English, we are the English."

  She trailed off. "He's dead now."

  "Your brother?"

  "I killed him." She rose and stepped away from the table, towards the balcony overlooking Constantinople's bay.

  Cemal did not respond, just watching her move through the shadows.

  "I killed my brother, the only one in my family whom I truly loved. We were all one another had, you understand, in the days of our youth. We had that bond, growing up Fiske. Raised to love queen and country, but most of all family, and he saw through it all long before I ever did. He saw the dark spots in our family portraits, the ones behind our parents' eyes. Even after they sent him away, after he went to study in Paris, we kept in touch. His correspondence allowed me to go on with the masquerade of being a gentlewoman while at home. And then I killed him."

  Cemal rose, crossing the dining room to join her near the balcony. "Why?"

  "Because he was sick," Aldora said. "Suffering an illness of the spirit. At first I thought it something he'd picked up in Paris, a disease of the mind. I won't lie, it's what I wanted to believe, somehow my poor sweet brother Grayson had been seduced by criminal anarchists into their twisted philosophies. After his death I realised he had let himself become cruel and callous because of our family, because of our parents."

  "You speak of it like a mercy killing." Cemal's voice was gentle, his tone soft.

  "Mercy, in a way, but pity wasn't why I had to kill him. He hurt many people. I... as much as I loved my brother, as a Fiske I have a responsibility, a noblesse oblige, burned into my soul. In killing Grayson I would suffer, but it was what was Right. What must have been done for the greater good of the English people."

  "I understand, perhaps more than you know," Cemal said. "I betrayed my military vows when I joined the Young Turks in their coup, but I did what I thought best for the Turkish people. And for all the peoples of the Empire."

  "My fiancé said he understood. Does it shock you? To hear I am an engaged woman? Carrying on with you as I do?"

  "No."

  "He claimed to understand, but I don't think he could. He's never had to make that sort of choice. I think, though... I think you understand."

  Cemal stood close behind Aldora, his arms wrapping around her front, his hot breath on the back of her neck. "I do."

  She leaned back into him, into his embrace, into his body. It would be so easy to let go, to forget about her life in England, about her family, about Alton, about the responsibilities of being an Englishwoman. The need to lose herself in Cemal's arms, to lose herself in Constantinople, to give herself up to a man who saw her as a person first and a woman second, to a culture poised on the cusp of recognising the universal rights to which women were due... if only she could forget what it meant to be a Fiske.

  To be a Fiske meant to do right, even at the cost of your own happiness, simply because it was the more difficult path.

  Maybe she'd had enough of it.

  She felt Cemal pull away, and he took a piece of her soul with him, replacing it with longing.

  "You've had a trying day, Aldora. Tomorrow we rise at dawn, and I will lead a police unit into Stamboul, and we will continue our search for your ward."

  She turned towards him, taking his hand in her own. "Aren't the great powers expecting you to focus on finding the kidnappers?"

  "Right now your well-being is more compelling to me than their demands."

  "Cemal..."

  He reached up and cupped the side of her jaw in his palm. "You have a choice to make, Aldora. Perhaps the most important of your life. Of both our lives, and you will be unable to make it until you have your Penelope at your side. To me, that is more important than the anger of the European powers."

  She closed her eyes, feeling a hot tear roll down her cheek. This was too much, Cemal's understanding, his touch, the way he looked at her... was all too big, too much, too fast. He was right. She needed rest. She needed a clear head.

  She sniffled, opened her eyes, and nodded.

  ***

  The guest room Cemal had provided her was sumptuous in the extreme, ornate embroidered furnishings centred around a broad canopied bed, its mattress as soft as a cloud. A shuttered balcony looked out over the Bosporus Strait, wine dark waters bisecting the city, the pilot lights of airships crossing far above. It would have been beautiful if she had not been so exhausted.

  Her back hit the bed and she kept falling, sinking, descending into the warm close oblivion of sleep, too tired even to dream of olive skinned men with eyes of deep hazel.

  ***

  Instinct dies hard and Aldora slipped out of bed before she even realized the bells had woken her. Masculine shouts of alarm came from the hall. She grabbed a translucent shawl from one of the bed-posts to wrap around her shoulders before striking out into the corridor.

  A pair of guards ran past, one with a torch, the other a rifle. Aldora slipped into the hallway and followed them, shawl held close at her neck.

  They lead her to a larger group of guards, some with rifles, some pistols, some torches, all talking in Turkish. Safiyya, hastily dressed in her valet's skirt and jacket, was coordinating their actions.

  "What's going on?" Aldora aske
d.

  "Someone tried to break into the palace," Safiyya said. "Go back to your room -- the halls aren't safe."

  "Is it any safer in my quarters?"

  "No, but I'll feel better if I know where you are," Cemal said, hastening to join the group.

  "Üç -- sol koridora gidin," Safiyya said to half of the men, and then continued to the others, "Geri kalanlar mutfakta kontrol edin."

  The men departed, weapons and light sources in hand.

  "It must be the kidnappers, trying to abduct you from beneath my very nose." Cemal pounded his fist into his palm.

  "Perhaps you should return to the embassy," Safiyya said. "If they would strike here--"

  "I will not be chased away," Aldora said. "Not without my ward, and not under anyone else's terms."

  "You're far braver than most," Cemal said, fingers lightly touching her hand. "But if you are to remain, I must insist that you stay within these walls."

  She turned her wrist, clasping his arm briefly. "But Penelope--"

  He took her aside by the arm, speaking softly. "I insist. I can help protect you, here, while searching for the girl in the city. I cannot search for her if I have to worry about you, too."

  Aldora dropped her eyes. "I don't think any place is safe."

  "None will be. Not until we discover who is after you, and why. Until then... until then we must be very careful."

  She nodded and reluctantly let go of his hand.

  "Return to your room." Cemal said. "Get some rest."

  "I'll try."

  ***

  The next day Aldora joined Safiyya and the palace staff in the dining hall for a breakfast of fried spicy dry sausage, eggs, and sweet black tea. Cemal and several of his guards had departed in the early morning to search the old city for Penelope or signs of the kidnappers, and while Aldora couldn't understand their chatter, the attitude among the servants was one of nervous anticipation. Safiyya looked more excited than worried, though, and she kept pumping Aldora for information about her dealings with Cemal.

  "A lady does not discuss such things."

  "She doesn't?" Safiyya said. "What's the point of having exploits, if not to share them with your girlfriends?"

  "A lady does not have exploits."

  "I don't think I'd much enjoy being one of your ladies."

  Aldora allowed herself a small smile. "Penelope has said the same thing, on multiple occasions."

  "Your bond with your adoptive daughter is strong, isn't it?"

  "I'd like to think so," Aldora said. "I'm all she has."

  "Being an orphan is difficult," Safiyya said. "No matter the circumstance."

  "I have always been of the opinion that the family you create for yourself is more important than the family you are born into," Aldora said.

  "That's not very English."

  "Truth be told, many of my attitudes are not. I've struggled against what I was raised to be and who I really am for most of my life."

  "It's sounds as if you tire of leading a double life."

  Aldora looked down at her plate, mopping up the grease from her eggs with a crust of bread. "I think I very much am. In London all eyes are upon me, watching for the opportunity to gossip or to put a Fiske in her place."

  Safiyya made a sour face. "Gossips and wags."

  "They're why I travel. The further from London I roam, the fewer expectations are placed upon me, the more... genuine I can be."

  "Constantinople and Cemal are far from London, Aldora."

  The Englishwoman made a face. "I, while remaining prim and proper when the eyes of society are upon me..."

  "...would much rather be a free woman."

  "Yes."

  "Like the women, here, in Constantinople."

  "...yes."

  "Then is your course not clear?"

  Aldora didn't respond. Safiyya had come from a truly horrible situation. It was no great tragedy to leave behind a legacy of slavery and abuse. But Aldora had had her English mindset drilled into her from a young age, raised to be a Gentlewoman, to be Fiske. The lessons she'd learnt had hooks sunk deep into her psyche, and extracting them wasn't a simple matter of picking up and moving.

  No matter how badly she might want to.

  ***

  The waiting was not easy. As beautiful and expansive as Cemal's palace was, Aldora was not used to being cooped up inside all day long. Back in London she'd scheduled her days full of the obligations that befell a woman of her stature; social calls, shopping, games of lawn tennis or croquet, rural horseback rides. Here, corridor after corridor of gilt mosaic offered no distraction from her worries about her adopted daughter, and even the expansive library held no escape, for she could read no Turkish or Arabic. With Safiyya gone to run errands in the afternoon, she found herself aimless, adrift, and feeling a little alone.

  Like it was when she was a girl.

  Could she do it? Leave London behind? Leave the world as she knew it, turn her back on everyone she knew, for a small chance of happiness in Cemal's arms? It wasn't the responsible thing. It wasn't the logical thing. But it was what she wanted.

  Wasn't it enough?

  ***

  Cemal hadn't returned by the time Aldora retired for the evening, and this time her dreams were troubled, fitful. Again and again she revisited the same scenarios; her lonesome upbringing in her parents' Yorkshire estate as a small girl alone in a big empty house, the social manoeuvring of the London season, striking an agreement with her fiancé. She woke several times, tossing and turning, worried about Penny, the turmoil she felt over the choice between returning to London to marry Alton, and giving it all up to remain in Constantinople with Cemal, lay in her belly like a red hot bowl of molten disquiet.

  She was awake in the early morning hours, staring through the gauze of the bed's canopy towards the ceiling, when the alarm bells rang again.

  Another attempted kidnapping? So soon after the last?

  Aldora lurched out of bed, grabbing her shawl, and ran out into the hall again. She could hear the sounds of conflict from elsewhere in the palace -- clashing blades, masculine Turkish curses, and the pounding of the guards' boots as they converged on the intruder's location.

  Safiyya stepped out of a cross-hall and grabbed her by the shoulders as she headed towards the commotion. "Wait! It isn't safe. Let the guards handle the intruder."

  She struggled in the valet's strong grip. "Let me go! He might know where Penny is!"

  "After his last attempt he's almost certainly armed," Safiyya said.

  "I can handle a little swordplay!"

  "I'm sure you can. But you're unarmed." Safiyya let the woman go, pulling a sabre from the wall, offering it to her hilt first.

  The Englishwoman took it hesitantly. It was old, and with a sharper curve than the fencing weapons she was accustomed to, and it flared out wider in its furthest third. Still, the balance was good, and the steel seemed strong. She could handle it.

  "I give you this for your protection, but Cemal's men have orders to take the intruder alive," Safiyya said. "He trusts them to keep us safe. You can trust them to do their jobs."

  Somewhat mollified, Aldora nodded slightly. "Let's head in that general direction, though."

  "Okay. But slowly. We don't want to get underfoot."

  ***

  The fighting was over by the time Aldora and Safiyya arrived, and most of the guards had dispersed, save for a pair having minor scratches bandaged up. Cemal was talking to guard captain Uğur, but headed over when he saw the girls approach.

  "Another intruder?" Safiyya asked.

  "Yes," Cemal said. "This one we managed to take alive."

  "Let me see him," Aldora took Cemal's hand. "I must know if they have Penelope."

  Cemal brought her hand to his lips, brushing against her skin with the lightest of kisses. "You don't speak Turkish, my dove, and I've had my men deliver him to the French Embassy."

  "To Ambassador Bompard?" Aldora asked. "But why?"

  Cemal le
t her hand go. "The situation with the European Powers grows ever more tense. No one has heard from Minister Viviani or his wife since the initial attack, and Bompard has had little luck in persuading his government to let us handle matters. If the French intervene, the Germans will not be far behind."

  "Is military intervention a possibility?"

  "It is seeming more and more likely. I'm doing what I can to forestall it, but it is only a matter of time before the kidnappers make their demands."

  "What could they possibly want?" Aldora asked.

  "Concessions, possibly," Safiyya said. "Many in the empire are tired of European interference in the Balkans. They circle like vultures over the provinces they covet to expand their own colonial holdings."

  "The great powers of Europe would never let a conspiracy of kidnappers dictate their foreign policy," Aldora said.

  "Small concessions can have large effects down the road," Safiyya said. "But who can say what the kidnappers believe?"

  "It's late," Cemal said. "I've a long day of placating the French tomorrow, and I'd rather be present for the interrogation."

  "May I attend as well?"

  Cemal and Safiyya exchanged a glance.

  "It would be safer if you stayed within the palace," Cemal said. "At least for now."

  "I can handle--"

  "I am well aware that you can handle yourself, brave one, but I cannot handle the thought of you endangering yourself needlessly," Cemal held Aldora by the forearms. "I need my wits about me when I deal with Bompard tomorrow. Please, stay in the palace."

  "Very well," Aldora leaned against Cemal, her cheek against his chest. "But tell me everything he says upon your return."

  "That I shall. Now go to bed."

  "Yes, darling."

  ***

  The next day found Aldora confined to her room.

  Uğur, assigned to guard her door, was apologetic with what little English he spoke. "Many sorries. Cemal Bey say much intruders in palace. Keep Khanum safe in room."

  "This is intolerable!" Aldora slapped the frame of the door. "I demand you let me out at once."