The Sultan, the Vampyr and the Soothsayer

by Lucille Turner

  Radu began to cry. One look at the Sultan was enough to make it clear that there was no point in struggling. Only their father struggled; he strained desperately against the grip of the guard until the moment they were led out of the hall. Suddenly motionless, he turned, following them with his eyes until they left the room. Vlad glanced back to look at him, a look that was over in an instant. The wave of anger broke. The door closed.

  Half led, half dragged, they crossed a courtyard, past a pavilion and a kiosk, where birds dipped their wings in the water, and through another. Vlad looked up, and saw domes against the sky. The Sultan’s palace was like a small city. The courtyards were joined together by corridors that ran from east to west and north to south. In the centre of all this were the gardens of the court and beyond the gardens was yet another door, one they did not enter.

  ‘Where are they taking us?’ whispered Radu behind him.

  Vlad said nothing. He was thinking too much to give an answer. He was thinking of their father, wondering if he had given up. Perhaps he was deep in conversation with the Sultan, finding a way to get them back, a way that did not need an oath. Behind him, Radu started to sob. Sensing his resistance, the guards tightened the rope around Vlad’s wrists. In the middle of the courtyard a fountain of water flowed into a large basin. The air was mild and sweet, warmer than Bucharest and warmer still than Targoviste in the shadow of the mountain. He thought of Mircea, and wondered what his brother would do in his place.

  They entered another part of the palace and sat in a large room, which appeared to be made almost completely of marble. An old woman brought them food. She smiled, showing two black teeth. He pushed aside the plate of meat. Then he thought better of it, and pushed it over to Radu. ‘Eat. I know you’re hungry. You’ll feel stronger.’

  Radu obediently pulled a chunk of meat from the bone and began to chew. Vlad looked away, suddenly wishing that Radu would not eat or that he could cry as Radu did, but his eyes were powder dry and his stomach had closed up like a tomb.

  The guard stepped back; the door opened and the Sultan entered. He stood before them, quietly watching. Radu spoke. ‘Where is Father?’

  At the sight of Radu’s tear-stained face, the Sultan seemed to soften. ‘He is well occupied. There is much to talk about, to set right.’

  ‘When can we see him?’

  Murad frowned. ‘Why not forget about that for the time being? There will be no cause for idleness here. I will see to it that you continue your studies. You will learn new things. Our language, to begin with.’ He looked closely at Vlad. ‘My treasurer informed me that one of the Draculesti princes in particular would make a promising janissary. I have little doubt now to whom he was referring.’

  Vlad opened his mouth to tell the Sultan that he would rather die than become a guard for the Turks, but Radu’s face made him close it again. He moved towards the Sultan. ‘I would like to ask you something.’

  Murad stared at him in astonishment then gestured to a divan in the far corner.

  ‘You have no need of my brother,’ said Vlad quickly, ‘why not return him to our father straight away? Such a sign of good faith would make things easier and since you still have me, your position would be otherwise unchanged.’

  Murad’s groomed brow twitched. ‘You presume a great deal, to dare to suggest a stratagem to a sultan.’

  From the middle of the room, Radu gazed over, sullen and scared.

  ‘But since you are newly arrived and do not know how to speak, I will overlook it this time.’ The Sultan looked at him curiously. ‘You would rather see your brother returned than yourself. Why?’

  ‘He is only a child.’

  ‘And you, I suppose, are already a man?’

  Vlad did not answer. ‘Then will you return him to our father?’

  The Sultan hesitated. For a moment it seemed he was going to say yes, but the moment passed. ‘Of course I can do no such thing.’

  Vlad felt the weight of Radu’s safety fall upon his shoulders.

  The Sultan flicked his fingers for a janissary. ‘You will make travel arrangements for these young men. Where is my son – where is Mehmet?’ he added, lightly.

  ‘I believe he is in his quarters, Excellency.’

  The Sultan nodded and said nothing for a few moments. He looked from Vlad to Radu and back again. ‘You will make a journey. On your way, you will see a little more of our lands. We too have mountains. Not your Carpathians, but I think they have their own wonders.’

  ‘What will happen to my father?’

  Murad turned back, impatient. ‘Brother, father. I’m glad you have no sister or this conversation would never be at an end. He will be my guest. That is what he came for, to profit from my generosity.’

  ‘No he didn’t,’ said Vlad. ‘He came because he had no choice.’

  The Sultan stood up. ‘That is enough, I think. You are upset. We must try to have a little patience with you. I will have patience. But not forever.’

  When the Sultan left, Radu stood close to Vlad and slipped a hand in his. ‘Father didn’t swear an oath. Why not?’

  For the first time in his life, Vlad could not answer him.

  Chapter 17

  Murad left the Chamber of Marble, where the sons of Dracul were being held, and walked back to the Audience Room. The Defterdar, who had been watching the comings and goings from the pavilion, returned to his side.

  ‘Where is the Grand Vizier Pasha?’ Murad asked him.

  ‘In his apartments, Highness.’

  He called the gatekeeper to his side. ‘Make ready a guarding party for Egrigoz.’

  ‘You will send them to the fortress?’

  ‘I am not certain; I am thinking on it.’

  The Defterdar appeared relieved. ‘Mmm. You cannot keep them in the same place as their father, naturally. What will you do with Dracul? Is he…?’

  ‘Compliant? Has he ever been? No. Will he be now? We shall see.’

  ‘So, what did you make of them?’ The Defterdar looked back at the Chamber of Marble.

  ‘They are boys. Boys are boys.’

  ‘And the older one?’

  ‘He tried to save his brother,’ said Murad. He delivered the words as though they were nothing: a collection of sounds strung together.

  The Defterdar looked impressed. ‘Really? That was very valiant of him. But he was insolent, I imagine. He has enough insolence for ten boys put together. Did I tell you what he said to me in Targoviste?’

  ‘You did, several times.’

  ‘Yes. And then there was that servant of Dracul’s. I couldn’t believe the cheek of the man. He offered me wine, and then had the audacity to make a comment about it. Can you believe it? Not that I would have accepted, naturally.’

  Murad thought of the ten bushels of Shiraz, reserved for guests, which he had purchased not three months earlier and half of which had vanished. There was no question where that had gone. ‘Naturally,’ he said.

  The Defterdar nodded to the Audience Room. ‘Will you go back and see him?’

  ‘Dracul? Not today, I think. I will leave him time to reflect a little. Night always clears the head. Or at least let us hope so, or we will find ourselves with an empty throne in Wallachia and nobody to fill it.’

  ‘There is always Janos Hunyadi. With the right incentive…’

  ‘And spend the rest of my days dealing with a servant of the Holy Roman Emperor? I think not.’

  From the opposite end of the hayat, the Kizlar approached at a fast walk. ‘Mehmet Celebi is waiting for you in your chambers, Highness. Shall I tell him you are disposed?’

  Disposed for what, he wondered.

  The Defterdar mumbled something unintelligible about having things to attend to, and then he delivered the load that had been sitting on his mind all day. And, Murad noticed, with a certain smugness.
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br />   ‘I take it then that you will not be making wedding arrangements for his young highness?’

  By the time the words had left the Defterdar’s mouth, Murad was gone, sweeping through the courtyard like a wind. He was in two minds, as he crossed it, whether to announce to his son Mehmet that he was henceforth what the Defterdar would have called ‘out of favour’. As God was witness to his heart, he knew that if he had the strength to do it – if he had another son of age, and not the babe in arms beyond the fourth door – he would have dismissed him outright. When he thought about it, it was not even the memory of the tellak boy that had set the seal on that thought, so much as a momentary conversation with the son of a vassal.

  Dracul’s son had tried to save his brother. The man did not know it, but he had inflicted more pain on him through that boy of his than he could have done with an army of ten thousand. He caught his breath and sighed. Mehmet had been but twelve years old when Aladdin had died. He had barely left the seclusion of the fourth courtyard. How he would have profited now from the affection of an older brother as he trod the path to manhood. There would have been no talk of tellaks. Aladdin would have set him right. That was what brothers did.

  Pained, he glanced over at the Audience Room. The guard had already taken Dracul to a place of detention out of the way of the main palace rooms, well enough hidden from his sons, who would soon be made ready for travel. By sundown tomorrow, they would be at the fortress of Egrigoz, out of his sight and hopefully out of mind.

  And now, what to do? Why did he even need to ask? There was only one thing to do, and it had not, could not, alter: take the Golden City. Take what belonged to them, what was theirs by right and by the hand of God and destiny. We shall see, he thought, what Mehmet can come up with. He wandered into the first courtyard. The boy had proposed a discussion; he would let him have his say. He watched the craftsmen lining up at the gate touting their wares to the gatekeeper. He called the gatekeeper over. ‘Buy all they have,’ he said. ‘And no bartering them down.’

  Chapter 18

  Mehmet Celebi, as he’d been known since becoming the heir, left his quarters and walked the distance to the pavilion, where he found his father pacing up and down impatiently. A group of craftsmen were packing up their goods on the other side of the first courtyard. His father was deep in conversation with the gatekeeper. One of the potters addressed him directly, his head low. Mehmet frowned and turned his face away. It would certainly be a request for some sort of favour, and Murad would bestow it in an instant. His father thought it kept him close to his people; he did not know that all they cared about was the amount of tax they had to pay into the coffers of the sultanate and whether the gatekeeper would supply a bowl of pilaff and a dish of watered yoghurt at midday. Mehmet could see it on their faces, and he was more than ready to tell them, when they pressed for more advantages and favourable edicts, that there was no such thing as a free meal. Everything, in the end, cost something, even an edict. His father’s generosity would only be repaid by gluttony. Greed was the first governor of humankind; duty to the sultanate did not even come second. The customary baksheesh, the bribing of the poor by the wealthy, was the true ruler of the sultanate, only his father didn’t see it. Even in the seraglio he was blind to it. One day Murad would drown in the baksheesh of his own concubines. How they peddled the favours he gave them! A pearl here, a brooch there, trading his misplaced generosity for what they really wanted, clout. He almost admired them for it, even Azize Hatun, who thought that she could turn Murad against him. She did not know that he already had his father exactly where he wanted him, one step from compliance.

  His father entered the arbour of the first courtyard and Mehmet pressed his forehead to his outstretched fingers. He looked up.

  ‘I have a plan, Father. When you hear it, you’ll wonder why you didn’t think of it yourself.’

  Murad parted his robe and sat on the divan.

  ‘I have made a study of what should be done, and this is what I think. The wall of Constantinople must not be scaled, it must be broken down.’

  His father smiled. ‘I don’t think you understand how thick it is.’

  ‘The wall is strongest on the land side. We attack by sea. But as past experience has shown…’ he hesitated here a little, just long enough to make the point that his father had not succeeded ‘…numbers of men are never enough because the wall is, as you say, both thick and high. So, we need another plan.’

  ‘What sort of plan?’

  ‘Chinese fire.’

  ‘Chinese fire,’ said his father, rubbing his beard. ‘How will that help?’

  ‘Cannons first, to break the wall; fire lances second, to break the defence. Of course we can still use normal weapons also, spears and lances and crossbows. But the fire lances will put them on their knees. Then, when we are close enough, we finish them.’

  His father sank back and crossed his fingers together. ‘Cannons have been tried before; the wall has resisted.’

  ‘Yes, but the cannons were not large enough. You have a big wall; you need a big cannon,’ said Mehmet. He threw open his hands. ‘Boom.’

  ‘Very well. I will think on it.’

  ‘Think on it!’ His voice was raised too high; his father had noticed. He brought it down a bit. ‘It doesn’t need thinking; it needs trying.’

  ‘Trying on whom?’ said Murad acerbically. ‘The potters at the gate you won’t even take a greeting from?’

  Mehmet curled his lip. ‘I thought it rude to interrupt a bribe.’

  ‘The gatekeeper was buying pots.’

  ‘Every purchase is a bribe. In my view…’

  ‘If I want your view I will ask for it. In the meantime, perhaps you should return to your activities,’ said his father in an alabaster tone.

  Mehmet hesitated. He thought of Azize Hatun and turned his tongue over in his mouth.

  ‘But I have decided…’

  ‘You are not sultan here. You decide nothing.’

  ‘But you said I would be regent before the hot season. The hot season is almost here.’

  ‘You will be regent when I say you are.’

  His father stood up and walked away, accompanied by the gatekeeper. Mehmet watched him go, satisfied. The word regent had been thrown into the air again. Soon enough, like a juggler who dared not drop a ball, Murad would have to catch it.

  Chapter 19

  Beyond the door of the Chamber of Marble, Vlad waited for news of his father and listened to the sounds of Murad’s palace. There were women’s voices, the rustling of silks, the far-off hum of talk, but his father’s voice was not among these sounds. As for the rest of their guard, they could not be far away. He strained his ears to listen, but ever since the night they’d passed inside their father’s circle of fire after the border crossing, he had not been himself. For the first time in his life he wanted to sleep. Only Radu kept him wakeful, that and the fear that if he did close his eyes, he might never open them again. Then again, perhaps the opposite was true and if he did not close them now, he never would.

  What was his father’s plan? Vlad did not doubt that he would make one. The Sultan was holding them here because Dracul had angered him. But once that anger died down, the door would open and they would be escorted back the way they came. He tried to forget their father’s reticence to swear an oath. Whatever lay at the bottom of it could easily be remedied by a change of heart, a concession or a pledge. Until then, he must watch over Radu. His father had said that blood was all that mattered. He would not doubt him now.

  He walked over to the doorway. Who was standing in it? Someone was there, or at least the shadow of someone was there. He took a step nearer and stared. His hand alighted on the hard surface of polished glass. He had seen mirror glass before, but only small holders of glass, which would show a glimpse of an eye or a mouth. This was an entire wall of it. He peered closer. His fath
er’s long arms hung either side of a tall, sinewy body. The Draculesti eyes, green and wide, winked back at him from the elusive shadow in the door. But now the shadow vanished. The door opened to admit two of the Sultan’s hand-picked guards. Whatever their father had pledged or sworn had not been enough. They were to leave the palace immediately, as the Sultan had said they would. He took Radu’s hand, and stepped out into the bright light of the palace courtyard.

  Once outside, he looked around. In a kind of loggia above them, the Sultan was busy in conversation with a man he recognised as the Turkish Treasurer who had come to visit them at Targoviste. The thought of Targoviste brought him to Mircea. What would his brother say now if he saw them in this state? He had Cazan to help him, but Cazan did not like his older brother. He put his hand over the small holder of the lucky amulet round his throat. It contained something. Broom perhaps, he thought, as he ran his finger over it. Mircea liked to collect herbs; he knew everything about them, and even had a book that listed every plant and herb in Latin. Once, when he’d had Mircea at the point of a sword in training, Cazan had said that Mircea was not a real Rumani. When he asked Cazan what he meant, he said only that a real Rumani had wolf in his blood, and that Mircea would never understand. His mind went back to the wolf he had heard beyond the circle of fire. His father had not heard it. Perhaps he was not a Rumani either. Perhaps it was as he had always suspected and his father was a coward. A brave man takes an oath; a coward shies away from one. Which was worse, an oath to a god that did not listen, or a father that dared not make one? His hand tightened over the amulet. Mircea would have found an excuse for their father’s refusal, as he had for everything else. But that would not make it true, would it?

  His horse was led out; he mounted and glanced up at the loggia. There had been something in the Sultan’s face that had struck him, something that could be used, in the same way that the Sultan had used the Holy Books to trap their father. Vlad searched his memory to find out what it was, but his new-found need to sleep and the strength of the Turkish sun, which was blazing overhead like a naked flame on his skin, would not let him think. He felt himself sink into the saddle, and he put out a hand to grab a tuft of mane. Sensing his discomposure, the mare started to prance about. She reared up and took off in a wind of panic around the courtyard. Thrust back to wakefulness, Vlad gripped her body with his legs, determined not to be unseated. They rode around the courtyard this way at speed. The branch of a tree snapped across his face and he ducked under another. He knew he must find the will of the mare, and govern it. But before he had the chance to, a hand reached over his. It grabbed the mare’s reins and steadied her. They come to a halt. Vlad gathered his wits. He glanced up at the sun, then at the owner of the hand. From the look of his face, he was either a Rumani or a Serb.