The Pirate Prince (35 page)

The corsairs nervously moved to the edges of the salon to make room for Malik’s huge bodyguards.

Just then the man Malik had sent returned to inform His Excellency that his threat was true; six ships in addition to
The Whale
waited in the harbor.

“Well then,” he said in amusement, “we’ll have to hurry, but never fear, my boy. We’ll have you back in time.” He beckoned in some men behind Lazar.

Lazar turned to face the two Janissary warriors who appeared in the doorway. The first was his old friend Gordon, a gold-haired English giant who’d been known in his youth for his practical jokes—but there was nothing left of his friend in that dead, metallic-gray stare. If Gordon even recognized him, he showed no sign. The second was a dark-skinned young African—a more recent recruit—built like a mountain. His brown eyes wore the same dead, murderous expression as Gordon’s.

Malik’s eyes shone with red demon glee. He rose from his golden throne and minced down the platform steps. Lazar watched him warily. Circling behind him, Malik slipped his hands into Lazar’s holsters, carefully dragging his pistols out of them.

“You won’t be needing these.”

With a snarl Lazar jerked away from him, removing his knife, his sword, and his vest for combat. He knew the rules of Malik’s deadly game from long experience.

“If you win, you get this,” Malik said, rolling the signet ring between his fingers.

“And if I lose?”

Malik gave him a dark smile. “Then you come home forever, Lazzo. To Master.”

Lazar was going to be furious at her for leaving the ship, but it didn’t matter. Allegra had no idea how or even
if
there was anything she and Bernardo could do to help him, but within a quarter hour, they were hurrying down the sandy road in the direction the Moors had led him and Vicar.

When one of those mysterious wild animals of the desert howled again, she tilted her head down to smell the reassuring scent of Lazar, which permeated the soft fabric of the gigantic shirt she wore, tucked into a pair of his black trousers, his belt wrapped nearly twice around her. She had hidden the long plait of her hair with a dark silk scarf tied into a skullcap like Lazar’s, and all she could think of was how he was going to laugh when he saw her.

It had been Bernardo’s idea that she don masculine garb, to draw less attention to herself.

In addition to being terrified, she felt utterly ridiculous. Her costume was so hastily thrown together she did not think she was going to fool anyone. The fact that she was armed with a knife only made her more nervous. Perhaps it should have made her feel secure, but it only reminded her to hope she wouldn’t need it. She clung to Lazar’s statement that his meeting with this Malik creature would be more a battle of wills or wits, rather than outright violence. In all but the third, she felt she could hold her own.

Another howl sounded, closer this time, filling the night. It trailed off, dwindling to a ponderous stillness broken only by the murmur of the sea laving the desert beach.

“Whatever that thing is,” Bernardo muttered, “it’s hungry.”

She murmured agreement and glanced over her shoulder to make sure the animals weren’t stalking them. Behind them,
The Whale
was still plainly visible as it waited in the berth, its white sails drooping on the spars.

“Remember,” she told Bernardo, “these people call him Shaytan of the West. I hope we can communicate with them a little.”

Ahead, over the sandy hill, rose an ancient-looking fortress, squat and square, made of light-colored stone block that gleamed in the moonlight. As they drew closer, she saw that darkness and distance had masked the true condition of the structure, for in fact at closer range it looked a thousand years old, preserved by the dry heat, but nevertheless slowly crumbling. Many robed men lounged on the steps and under the portico before the entrance.

She and Bernardo stopped, still a couple hundred yards away. It was dark, so no one noticed them yet.

“That’s where they took him,” she murmured. “Let’s go.”

She walked on.

When a small band of the Moors saw them coming, she turned to wait for Bernardo to catch up to her, only to find he was running away, bolting back down the road without a word. Her eyes widened.

“Bernardo!”

He kept running. She turned back furiously to study the foreign, swarthy faces of the men coming toward her. They had Lazar. She couldn’t do him any good out here. She raised her hands slightly to show she would not fight, walking slowly toward them.

“Where have you taken the man called Shaytan? I want to see him,” she said in a steely voice, though she doubted they could understand her any more than she could them.

Two of them grabbed her arms and, after removing her knife from her belt, they took her to the fortress.

Other Moors were standing around, conversing in agitation and smoking long pipes under the stars, their eyes red from the pungent spice. One man sat on the bottom step, playing a rectangular stringed instrument in a seemingly random series of long notes that slid high and low with silvery fluidity. Here and there men called out to her captors in their strange tongue.

“Where is he? Where have you taken
Shaytan
?” she shouted.

One gave an incomprehensible answer, nodding.

“Take me to him,” she persisted. “Now!”

They babbled and pulled her along.

She tried another tack. “Let me see Malik.”

They laughed and gave one another knowing looks.
Malik
was the only word she could understand as they talked.

Inside the fortress, she marveled at the exotic, columned halls of gilt and alabaster. Clearly the dilapidated condition of the fort’s exterior was a ruse to ward off unwanted attention. Inside, it was sumptuous. The floor was of purest white marble, and the walls were decorated with colorful, intricate tilework. She struggled against the Moors’ grasp, trying to look into every room they passed, hoping to see Lazar. Meanwhile, the halls echoed with the sounds of a roaring crowd, as if some sporting contest was in progress somewhere in the huge maze of halls.

The sound grew fainter as she was taken through a wide doorway guarded by two giant, obese, and unmoving Ethiope eunuchs standing on either side of the hall. The doorway was hung with silky veils, softly obscuring from full view the chamber beyond.

Her captors prodded her and gestured that she should go in. She glanced warily at the two motionless, ebony-skinned sentinels as she parted the gauzy veils overhanging the doorway.

She found herself alone in a large, airy chamber dimly lit by thuribles full of low fire on tall, twisted iron stands. Incense burned in their basins along with the coals, making the air thick and soft with heady fragrance. The room was lined with graceful white columns, and in the center was a lovely tiled bath with a lilting fountain. Everywhere woven carpets were strewn over the cool marble floor, and colorful silks hung from the walls.

As she glanced about, trying to find an exit so she could search the fortress for Lazar, she heard a soft, scuffling sound behind her, and she turned around to find a lad of about fourteen standing between two of the columns. He glanced to the right and left, then beckoned her over.

He was an exceedingly beautiful youth, compact and well proportioned of form, with none of the gangling awkwardness of his age. He had jet-black hair, brooding dark eyes under long, thick lashes, and full lips that gave him a sullen, sensual pout that was a bit unnerving, considering his tender years. He was dressed in flowing white robes like the men outside, but his were made of finest lawn. When she approached, he nodded to her and asked a question in what she supposed was Arabic.

She shrugged and shook her head. “I don’t understand. Do you speak Italian?”

They settled on Spanish.

“I come from Andalusia,” he said with a quick smile that never reached his eyes. “My name is Darius Santiago.”

“You have to help me!” she said. “Then maybe we can both get out of here. How do I make them let me see Malik?”

“Don’t worry. He’ll come looking for you soon enough,” he said with a short, cold laugh. “He takes the greatest interest in all his newest slaves.”

She stared at him without comprehension for a moment. “Slaves?”

He looked at her quizzically. “Don’t you know?”

Oh, my God
. Staring at him, she knew now. Lazar had been a slave here.

She stood there, motionless, barely able to breathe in her shocked horror. She felt as if her world were crashing down around her, but there wasn’t a moment to lose.

Quickly she introduced herself, and though Darius did not seem to believe she was in fact a female under her masculine disguise, he listened intently as she explained that in less than an hour the city would be shelled. When she told him Lazar was somewhere in the fortress, Darius’s onyx eyes lit up with awe.

“So that’s what all the commotion is tonight! To think of it! He is here, the great
Shaytan
pasha! By all that is holy, what I would not give to serve such a warrior!”

“You’ve heard of him?”

“Of course.” He snorted, tossing his black forelock out of his eyes. “Everyone here knows of him. Many times I’ve heard tales of him—tales that give me courage when I long to die. He survived this place, and so will I. Sword will not break my spirit! I will escape, like
Shaytan
, and be mighty and powerful, like him! But when I come back to kill Malik,” he added, a savage gleam in his black eyes, “I will not fail.”

“Can you help us?”

“Perhaps. I will go spy out the situation. Wait here.”

“I’ll come with you—”

“They won’t let you,” he said, “but they’re used to me. I’m allowed free movement throughout the fortress.”

“Please hurry,” she implored him.

He nodded and prowled off silently, but before he reached the doors, he turned and gave her a hard look. “In case Malik comes for you in the meantime, take my advice. Don’t ask him for pity, and try not to scream. He feeds off fear and the pleasure of causing pain.”

With that, Darius pivoted amid swirling white robes and slipped out the door, allowed past by the two giant sentinels. Allegra closed her eyes for a second, striving for calm.

She was entrusting Lazar’s fate, her own, and Ascencion’s to a child. But for the moment she had no choice.

She would have rather done anything at all but stand still and wait in this place, where the echoes of pain and innocence violated filled the serene, vaulted spaces. Every lovely inch of it made her blood boil. Here and there grew miniature fruit trees in clay pots, but underlying the salon’s mood of earthly delight was her knowledge that Lazar had been terrorized here, an orphaned innocent. She had never seen an uglier place in her life.

Her gaze wandered to the corner, where she spied a lovely wrought-iron cage. Inside it was a great, gorgeous cockatoo with a short, curved beak and long white plumage with the luminescence of pearls. The unearthly creature seemed to study her from across the exotic salon.

Just to give her hands something to do, she marched over to the cockatoo’s cage and opened the little door. When the bird did not fly out at once, she reached into the cage for it. To her relief, it did not bite her but endured her touch wearily, used to being handled.

But when she carried it to the window, an excitement came over the bird as it smelled the night air. Its wings began to beat; its clawed feet scratched her hand. The beautiful thing didn’t know its own strength. At the window she raised her hands, releasing her protective grasp on the soft body.

The white-plumed bird spread its wings and climbed free into the black night.

Lazar was tiring.

He could feel the burning, molten rock in all his muscles; he tasted the blood from his battered lip. It felt as though he had been fighting forever. Gordon, mute and mechanical, his gold hair plastered by sweat to his forehead, kept coming.

After a wild battle, Lazar had dislocated the African’s right shoulder. Now it was down to Gordon and him—a fair fight, only now he was already tired from when the two of them had been pounding on him together.

He was astounded at the savagery with which his old friend rushed him. He kept leaving himself open unintentionally, because each time he peered into his friend’s eyes and saw the malicious automaton there, it distracted his concentration. Gordon was too well trained to spare these opportunities.

Earlier Lazar had made a few choice remarks to try to jeer his old friend into some more human sort of reaction, but it was no good. Now grimly, silently, and with the beginnings of real despair, he labored on, pressing his body and skills to the limit against his inscrutable opponent.

They barreled across the marble floor like embattled titans, heedless of the thundering mob that looked on. They beat each other brutally, then parted and circled for a moment, panting hard, blood dripping from noses and various cuts onto the white marble floor. When they engaged again, Lazar slammed Gordon in the jaw with a powerful left jab.

Gordon stepped back to catch himself from the impact, then stepped forward and rammed him in the forehead with his own skull. Lazar saw stars.

While his head was still reeling from the brunt of the Englishman’s rocklike pate, Gordon decided to strangle him. He drove Lazar back against the cool tiled wall with Moors scrambling everywhere to get out of the way.

Lazar clawed against the iron grip around his throat. His lungs began to scream for air. He pummeled the lummox in the gut, but Gordon brought his knee up into Lazar’s belly in reply.

As the airless minutes passed, the great hall began to get dark…speckled…distant…and then Gordon dropped him onto the floor, and it felt as though he cracked his head on the marble.

As he lay on the cool floor, gasping for breath, his eyes full of black clouds and double vision, Lazar heard Malik announce Gordon the winner, heard the pitch of eager heat in the sheik’s raised voice.

Lazar groaned in defeat, a low, animal sound.