The Towers of Samarcand

CHAPTER NINE

EDIRNE, AUTUMN 1398

The season was changing from yellow to gold and Anna was taking her ease among falling leaves in the harem garden of the palace at Edirne. It was almost two years since she’d come here and the passage of time had been made bearable by the discovery of new friends. She was with them now, watching a strange animal that had the mouth of a camel, the body of a horse and the eyelashes of a courtesan. Its forelegs were longer than its hind and its hooves were like a bullock’s. Its belly was white and its body gold and covered by large white rings. But those were not its most extraordinary feature.

‘The neck!’ cried Angelina, leaning over the pavilion’s balustrade, her hand to her mouth. ‘Have you ever seen anything like it?’

Maria thought that she had. ‘I saw it in a book once,’ she said, coming to lean beside her. ‘In Trebizond. A book of wonders. It’s called a jornufa and it eats only leaves.’

‘Or birds perhaps,’ laughed Anna, joining them. ‘Look at it nuzzling the cages in those trees. The poor things are terrified!’

The animal had ambled slowly to the wall of the harem garden, undisturbed by the giggling concubines who crowded as close as they dared. It had begun to pull branches from a tall tree on the other side of the wall and the caged birds were screaming their alarm.

‘Where has it come from?’ asked Maria.

Anna looked at the men trying to guide its progress with bamboo poles. It was early in the evening and the waning sun shimmered in the yellow folds of their pyjamas and turbans. Their black skins shone with exertion.

‘The Sultan in Cairo,’ she said with confidence. ‘The Mamluk Sultan has sent it as a gift to Bayezid. The jornufa must come from Africa.’

There was another shriek, this time from the bathing pool where other girls had been playing with a ball. The jornufa was approaching them.

‘It wants to drink!’ laughed Angelina, clapping her hands together. ‘Now we’ll see its face!’

The animal stopped by the side of the pool, its smile reflected among the lily pads and apples. The harem girls were lying naked on the grass, helpless with laughter.

‘Its horns! Look at its horns!’ cried Maria, moving to get a better view. ‘Like a young stag’s!’ She looked beyond the pool. ‘Speaking of which, where are the deer?’

The deer were cowering in a group against the far wall, necks erect and ears twitching with bewilderment. Above them was the balcony of the Valide Sultan, Gülçiçek, a woman bitter with age and spite who hated Anna with every nerve in her withered being. It was said that she was sick and Anna hoped, with all her heart, that she was close to death. Already, in her absence, the heady scent of rebellion was in the harem air. Anna had not seen her for weeks: not since the old witch had had her bed dragged on to her balcony to watch the punishment meted out to two Circassian girls. They had been caught in lesbian embrace — understandable given the Sultan’s indifference — and the Chief Eunuch had had them flogged.

Since then, Anna had taken charge and decided that the regime should be relaxed. Away had gone Gülçiçek’s word games and in had come games in the pool, races through the gardens and the rare sound of laughter.

‘He’s smiling!’ whispered Angelina, leaning to Anna’s ear and pointing, not at the jornufa, but at the Chief Eunuch. ‘He’s actually smiling. I never thought I’d see that!’

Neither did Anna. But then everything was so new suddenly. Angelina and Maria, for example. Captured at the field of Nicopolis, the two girls had been brought to the harem and, such was their beauty, Gülçiçek had had them instantly locked away. Angelina was the illegitimate daughter of King Sigismund of Hungary and her sixteen-year-old looks were famous throughout Europe. Maria was older, fair and from Trebizond, a niece of the Emperor, and no one knew why she’d been at Nicopolis at all. Anna was grateful to them both. Angelina had brought laughter and an indifference to protocol. Maria had brought oils.

‘What have you anointed me with, Maria?’ she asked, turning to the Greek. ‘I smell like a Persian whore.’

Maria smiled. ‘Many things. But mainly musk from Silingui, mixed with camphor and a little rhubarb.’

‘And it’s the musk that smells so?’

‘It is,’ replied Maria. ‘The Arabs will tell you that it’s among the scents that the blessed will breathe in heaven, along with Persian rose, basil from Samarcand, citron from Tapurastan, violets from Isfahan, saffron from Qom, water lilies from Sharvan, aloes from India and amber from Sikhr.’

‘So many!’ cried Angelina. ‘How will they manage their doe-eyed virgins in such a heady mix?’

‘Ah,’ replied Maria, lowering her voice, ‘musk is used for many things. The Chinese believe it to be an aphrodisiac. So perhaps they will manage.’

Anna asked: ‘Who taught you, Maria?’

‘I was taught by a cousin. She was the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen. And she knew about every potion there is to make, especially love potions.’ She paused. ‘She eloped with a Venetian.’

There was noise from the other end of the garden where a gate led through to the main part of the palace. Two eunuchs with scimitars had hauled themselves to their feet and were adjusting their turbans. The Chief Eunuch was gesturing towards the jornufa.

‘This might be Suleyman,’ said Anna. ‘Do you want to go?’

Angelina squeezed her hand. ‘I am the daughter of the King of Hungary.’ She smiled. ‘I am not daunted by eldest sons.’

‘He might prefer you,’ said Anna, looking towards the gate.

‘Over you? No, he’s in love.’

It was Suleyman. He strode through the gate, stopped to look at the jornufa, and then shouted something at the eunuchs. The girls around the pool had seized their clothes and were already making their way to another gate. Suleyman marched through the fruit trees with his eyes fixed on the chiosk. Then he was standing at the top of the steps, breathing deeply.

Anna studied him with calm. He was the opposite of Luke. He was tall and wiry with a dark, high-ridged face that ended in a beard of pointed precision. Luke was fair and generous in face and dimension. She’d hardly seen the Prince since he’d come to get her from Mistra. They said that he never left the siege, determined to do what no ruler of the House of Osman had yet been able to do: pluck the Red Apple from the tree of Byzantium.

‘I thought you said that you would never enter these walls again,’ he said, glancing at the two strangers before making the smallest of bows to Anna.

Anna rose from the bench. ‘Lord, may I present my friends to you?’

‘No,’ said Suleyman. ‘I wish to talk to you alone.’

*

In Kutahya, the stench of the Porsuk River reached over the walls and into every room of Yakub’s home. The palace had been built by his father, another Yakub, and sat on high ground. The river, since it was the height of summer, was low and the carcasses of fish and other animals littered its steep banks. Where there wasn’t death, there were chimney stacks built into the banks. Kutahya was expanding fast and its brick-kilns were working at full blast.

The smell of rotting fish and lime came in with the wind. It wafted in past the ruins of the Byzantine castle, past the domes and minarets of the city, past the pyred cremations of herbs that lined the palace walls. When it became unbearable, Yakub would leave the audience hall to receive visitors amongst the lemons and flowers of the little orchard surrounding the carp pools.

He was there now, dressed for the hunt with his high boots tided with dust and his shirt open to the waist. He was in a less-than-congenial mood. He’d spent the morning chasing boar and jackal in the hills to the north of the city and had not wanted to stop. Next to him sat a mastiff and greyhound, both silver-collared.

‘You’re supposed to be elsewhere,’ he growled. He was crouched by the side of the lake, throwing bread to the carp. He looked up.

Luke had changed since he’d last seen him after Nicopolis. He was thinner and his hair and beard longer. Both were bleached by the sun and his face bore the mark of the steppe: wind-blown and sun-blasted. It was as it should be, he thought. Luke looked like a gazi or, given his height, perhaps two.

Yakub picked up an arrow and began to wipe its head with a cloth. ‘Poison for the boar. Did you know that your emperor John Komnenos scratched himself on one of these and died?’

Luke didn’t answer.

‘Or that the Emperor Basil got his belt caught in an antler and was dragged for a mile to his death?’ He paused and looked up. ‘We have to hope that this emperor is less careless in the hunt. You do not like his plan?’

Luke shook his head. ‘It’s Plethon’s plan. I don’t understand it.’

Yakub’s hand went into his pocket and emerged with a biscuit. He broke it in two and gave a piece to each dog, patting both heads. ‘What’s there to understand? You learn how to ride and fight like a Mongol, then bring Tamerlane to fight Bayezid. That’s the plan. That’s all there ever was.’

‘Except that it isn’t working. Gomil wouldn’t let me ride and now I’ve killed him.’

Yakub nodded slowly. ‘I’d heard. But perhaps it’s for the good. Tamerlane is finally on the move and it’s time for you to go east. If the world thinks you dead, you’ll get there quicker.’

‘But it wasn’t me that died.’

‘Yes it was. You were executed for killing Gomil. If there’s no Luke, there’s no one to pursue. We’ll spread the news and you can go east without further delay.’

Suddenly Luke was angry. He’d spent two years in this man’s beylik and nearly died. He said: ‘I am not going anywhere until I’ve seen Anna.’

Yakub stopped wiping the arrow. Then he began again, more slowly. His voice was low. ‘Tamerlane is on the move. He wants to go to China. He must be persuaded otherwise.’

Luke said: ‘By me? Why not you, Yakub?’ There was silence while both men stared at each other. Luke continued. ‘You speak for the gazi tribes, I don’t.’

Yakub shook his head. ‘Tamerlane will not be persuaded by reason, only by someone he trusts.’

‘And why will he trust me?’

Yakub shrugged. ‘Because you are a warrior prince with a talent for making horses do what you want. It has already been seen at the camp.’

‘But I can’t speak for the gazi tribes who Tamerlane will need to defeat Bayezid. Only you can do that. Will you come with me?’

‘I will come with you as far as Tabriz. Bayezid wants me to go and talk to Qara Yusuf, chief of the Qara Qoyunlu, who rules from there. He wants to strengthen his borders with an alliance. I can’t go further without Bayezid suspecting.’

‘But I can because I’m dead.’ Luke paused. He looked down at his hands. ‘Yakub, I want to do what is best for my empire. But what about Constantinople? Can’t I be of help there?’

‘Constantinople is not your concern.’

Luke shook his head. ‘The city needs good engineers with good weapons and the money to make them. I have all three.’

Yakub scratched his chin. There was thick stubble beneath the curve of his moustache and the sound reached across the silence. The sun dappled the orchard grass around them and felt warm on his neck.

‘You can best serve your empire by going to Tamerlane. Now tell me what you need to go without further delay.’

Luke thought for a while. Then he said: ‘I want to see Anna, here, before I go. And I want my Varangian friends to join me for the journey.’

Yakub raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re making conditions?’

‘Yes I am.’

Yakub glowered at him. Then he shrugged. ‘The girl who brought you here, Shulen. She will travel east with you. She will help you.’

Luke remembered a time in a tent not long ago. He’d thought her a creature of Omar. Was she obeying Yakub instead? They’d hardly spoken on the fast ride to Kutahya.

‘She has already tried to help me. I don’t want that kind of help.’

Yakub’s face darkened. ‘She will go east with you. It is my condition.’

‘For seeing Anna?’

‘For seeing Anna.’

*

At that moment, Anna and Suleyman were watching the backs of Angelina and Maria as they walked away from the chiosk. ‘Do you know who they are?’ Anna asked, sitting again.

‘Do I care?’ asked the Prince.

‘Both are royal. They deserved some manners.’

Suleyman shrugged. ‘The King of Hungary is about to be a vassal and Trebizond will fall when we sneeze in its direction. I will expend manners where they are useful.’

The Prince walked over to the balcony and looked out. By now the jornufa had been led to the gate and there appeared to be debate as to how to get it to the other side. The deer were gingerly reoccupying the garden and one had even approached the bathing pool and was nibbling at an apple. The sun was low in the sky and little fingers of shadow were reaching towards Mecca. Suleyman joined his hands before him. He seemed irritated.

‘Is it your grandmother?’ Anna asked. ‘They say she’s very ill.’

‘Which should please you,’ said the Prince, addressing the garden.

Anna glanced up. ‘She wishes me harm. And the harem is a better place without her.’

The Prince turned. ‘Are you practising to be Valide?’ he asked unpleasantly. ‘Soon the birds will be free too.’

Anna looked away. She could hear the sound of deer nearby cropping grass. The evening was very still. Suleyman turned his back on the garden and folded his arms. He was wearing a tunic of dark blue damask embroidered with gold peacocks’ fans. The collar was lifted so that his long hair was splayed across his shoulders like a fan.

‘Luke Magoris is dead,’ he said.

Anna felt the sudden beat of a drum close to her heart. Four words. She blinked once. Twice. She looked away. The jornufa was being pushed through the gate now, its neck roped low by a minder. Soon they would be alone. She couldn’t hear anything except for a ringing in her ears.

A lie. It’s a lie.

‘He tried to rape the bride of the chief’s son, then killed him.’ Suleyman was watching her closely. ‘He was killed trying to escape. Yakub has just delivered the news.’

Relief. Rape. Luke? No.

Anna forced herself to look at Suleyman. It was a lie and it was clumsy. No. She felt herself recovering, her mind re-engaging. The lie had been told by Yakub so it was important. Somehow.

A lie for a purpose. I must lie too.

‘It was following a banquet. He must have been drunk.’ Suleyman shrugged. ‘Anyway, he’s dead. You can get the annulment of your marriage to Damian Mamonas. There is nothing to stop it now.’

Anna nodded slowly. The jornufa had left the garden and they were alone with caged birds in faraway trees and a smell of jasmine. ‘The Patriarch will need to be persuaded that my marriage to Damian was not consummated.’ Suleyman was watching her from beneath those hooded eyelids. She continued: ‘He will need to see me in person. I will have to enter Constantinople.’

Suleyman walked over and sat beside her on the bench. He took her hand and it was a dead thing without bone. He looked down at it. He’d arrived expecting resistance and there’d been none. She seemed more docile than he’d ever seen her. ‘I had thought as much. Yakub has offered to take you into the city as guard.’ He paused. ‘We will be married there,’ he said, his voice softer. ‘We’ll be married in Constantinople once it falls. Which it will, soon.’

Anna turned to look at him and saw the uncertainty spread like a map across his features, invading every line and contour of his face. She felt a sudden onrush of pity. She lifted her hand and brought her fingertips to his cheek, tracing the high ridge of bone that divided it. He looked up and grasped her hand and kissed it again and again until she pulled it away. Then he took her face between his palms and forced it up and his lips came down to hers and what had begun in Anna as pity was quickly turning to something else. She pulled away.

‘No,’ she said, wiping her lips. ‘No, not now. Not yet.’

Suleyman was breathing hard, his nostrils moving. He looked away. ‘Of course,’ he said quietly. ‘You are in mourning.’

Anna felt her heart beating loud enough to be heard. She was not in mourning because Luke was not dead. She was as sure of it as she was that there was a message in the news. They were silent for a while, both looking ahead, no part of them touching the other. Then Anna said: ‘The Varangians. Their friend is dead and I have agreed to the annulment. They must be released from their oath to Bayezid and allowed to go home.’

Suleyman frowned. There had always been conditions. Was this all part of it, part of why he loved this woman with fire for hair and jewels for eyes?

‘Very well.’

*

Watching the scene from the balcony of a bedroom that wasn’t hers was the Valide Sultan Gülçiçek. She was propped up on a bed and sitting on it with her was her son, the Sultan Bayezid. The bed was pulled back so that it couldn’t be seen from below. A sunshade was above them, its shadow not deep enough for her liking. But it was only Bayezid, her first-born, who was close enough to see the mark of death upon her. And smell her smell.

They had enjoyed the jornufa but were finding what had followed more interesting. They couldn’t hear anything of what was being said but Suleyman’s gestures required little explanation.

‘My grandson is in love,’ murmured Gülçiçek. Beside her was a cup of sherbet with a straw. She extended a brittle arm to it. Bayezid leant over to the cup and lifted it. He sucked up some of the sherbet before passing it to her.

‘I must be one of the few people safe from your poison, Mother,’ he said, wiping his lips with the side of her sheet.

Gülçiçek coughed and grimaced. The pain in her stomach was worse. She ignored the comment and closed her eyes. ‘He is in love and he is angry. Why is he angry, Bayezid?’

Her voice was little above a whisper and held a rattle somewhere deep within it. Speaking more than a sentence was tiring. Bayezid sighed and looked around for wine. There was none. The Sultan stood. ‘He is angry because he cannot get his way. It was always the same.’

‘Constantinople?’

The Sultan nodded. ‘I won’t storm it without a breach in the walls. I’m waiting for cannon to do it. From Venice.’

Gülçiçek would have spat if she’d been able. Venice was Shatan.

‘And he’s angry because I listen to Mehmed more than him these days.’ Bayezid paused. ‘He’s afraid.’

‘And he’s right to be,’ whispered the Valide Sultan. ‘You sent your own brother to the bowstring when you ascended the throne. Why not kill a son?’

Bayezid considered this. Was he strong enough to kill Suleyman? The truth was that he too was afraid. Suleyman had support at the court, the Grand Vizier for one. He turned. ‘He wants to kill me, Mother.’

Gülçiçek nodded, her eyes still closed. ‘I know.’

Gülçiçek knew most things about her son and those around him. Her tentacles were long and many, and one had been smacked away by this young Byzantine girl with whom her grandson was in love. She hated Anna for the love bestowed on her by her grandson. She hated her for daring not to reciprocate it. She hated her for usurping her in the harem and for her own powerlessness to do anything about it. Her hatred for Anna was infinite.

But there was another Greek girl on whom Suleyman was slaking his lust, a dark girl much more to her liking. She sensed that her grandson was more afraid than Bayezid knew and that this girl was becoming more and more important to him, a refuge as much as a lover. She would prefer to see her marry Suleyman.

But how to bring it about?

They were both silent for a while, both listening to their own breathing, both knowing where this conversation was meant to lead. Finally Gülçiçek said, ‘I won’t do it. He is my grandson.’

‘It’s either him or me.’

Gülçiçek shook her head slowly against the pillows. ‘No, there is another way. The girl.’

‘What girl?’

‘The red-haired one he’s in love with. The one down there.’

‘What good would it do to kill her?’

Gülçiçek took in air. Talking was hard. She signalled to Bayezid to help her sit higher on the pillows.

‘It would either send him mad,’ she continued, the message coming in rasps, ‘in which case you would have reason to kill him, or it would make him see sense, in which case you wouldn’t have to. She is a large part of the reason that he’s so obsessed with taking Constantinople.’

Bayezid considered this. ‘How would you do it?’

‘I would do business with Shatan,’ she replied. ‘I would send someone to Venice.’ She yawned. The opiates were beginning to have their effect.

‘Whom would you send?’

But she was asleep.

*

At the other end of the palace, in a dormitory adjacent to the Throne Room, three Varangian Guards were taking their ease.

Matthew, Nikolas and Arcadius were Luke’s closest friends, raised with him in Monemvasia and the sons of Varangians, as he was. They’d been with him at Nicopolis and had managed to escape as he had. Now they were Varangian Guards in the service of Bayezid: tall, fair-haired adornments to the Sultan’s throne. Hostages in all but name.

In the two years that they’d passed in Edirne, they’d seen emirs and sheikhs, beys and pashas bend the knee to find some favour from this man who won his battles. And they’d seen Princes from the Kingdoms of Christendom arrive to find out if Yildirim had really meant it when he’d said that he’d water his horses at St Peter’s in Rome.

The three had just come in from displaying their skill with the axe to a delegation from Dulkadir. They were still dressed in their gold, scaled armour and blue chlamys cloaks and their distralia were leaning against a wall, each blade polished to a blinding sheen. They were lying on beds, too tired to speak.

Which was how Anna found them.

To begin with they didn’t see her because their eyes were closed. She paused in the doorway to study each of them: Matthew, as fair as Luke and almost his build; Nikolas with his pointed good looks and eyes, even when shut, arced with laughter; Arcadius bigger than all of them. She thought they looked much older than when she’d last seen them.

‘I’ve found your treasure,’ she said.

Six eyes opened. ‘Anna!’

Then they were on their feet and smiling and inviting her to sit on the remaining couch. They offered her wine, which she took. They’d not seen her during their time in Edirne.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I found it with Plethon. It’s extraordinary.’

‘And you can’t tell us what it is.’ This was Matthew.

Anna smiled. ‘No, I can’t tell you. But it’s not gold. Something better. Something that might, perhaps, still save our empire. And I’ve brought your freedom.’

‘Our freedom?’ Matthew had come to sit beside her. ‘We’re free to leave?’

Anna nodded. ‘Free to leave. Free to go and join Luke. He needs you.’ She paused. ‘And you must take Eskalon.’

Eskalon. The horse that Luke had made his own. It was stabled at the palace and had been Suleyman’s gift to Anna. Matthew had cared for it, finding in those deep brown eyes some memory of his closest friend. He missed Luke with an intensity that surprised him.

‘Where do we go?’ he asked

‘First to Constantinople. Yakub is to take me in to see the Patriarch. I’m to get an annulment. I think Yakub will tell you where to go next.’

Matthew frowned. ‘An annulment to marry Suleyman. Was this the price of our freedom, Anna?’

Anna didn’t reply. She looked down at her hands, remembering a kiss that she hadn’t hated. Suleyman’s taste was still on her lips. She turned to Nikolas, who was sitting on the adjacent bed. ‘They will tell you that Luke is dead,’ she said. ‘Suleyman believes he was killed after committing rape. Does that sound like Luke?’

Matthew had taken her arm. ‘If he’s not dead, then why must you marry Suleyman? Why get the annulment?’

When she turned back, there were tears in her eyes. ‘Because it’s the plan,’ she said. ‘If Luke is following it, then so must we. We are not free.’

Matthew looked hard at her. There was something new and unrecognisable in her eyes. He thought suddenly of a night of wind and rain when he’d stood beside Luke on a jetty and faced the soldiers of the Mamonas family, Damian sitting on a rock, laughing. He remembered her dragged back along the jetty while Luke sailed out into a storm. ‘How do you know that Luke is still alive? He may not have raped, but that doesn’t mean that he’s alive.’

‘He is,’ she said. ‘I have been to Eskalon and looked into his eyes. Luke is alive.’