The Drowning Guard: A Novel of the Ottoman Empire (27 page)

The eunuch sat down next to the janissary and whispered. “The man who attends you, Emerald, is a spy for the Sultan. He has told the Sultan of your treasonous talk. He says that you are part of the conspiracy that will bring disgrace upon the Ottoman name. These words insure your death, Kapikulu.”

“Emerald is a spy for Mahmud,” Postivich said slowly. “Was I a fool not to see it before now?”

Saffron nodded stiffly as if this was quite clear.

“He has brought this story of your collaboration with the Janissary plot as evidence for your arrest. It will be commanded that you be imprisoned and beheaded.”

Ivan Postivich nodded and rubbed a towel over his perspiring neck.

“If the Sultan calls for my death, there is nothing I can do.”

“You can flee, Ahmed Kadir. Back to your homeland! Sail to Venice or cross the Danube to Vienna where they will protect you from the Ottomans.”

Ivan Postivich threw the towel down on the wet tiles of the hamam.

“I am a janissary, whether or not I ever chose to be. A janissary never runs away, especially when his life is threatened. That is all I have learned in my life and all I have ever needed to learn.”

Postivich felt the eunuch’s eyes steady, studying him.

“And you. Why have you not escaped, Saffron?” said Ivan Postivich. “Surely Esma Sultan would accept it if you were to leave and return to your homeland.”

“My homeland is forever lost to me. Not only did I give up my manhood, I gave up my Christian faith. There is no going back home. It is a place that does not exist for the man I have become.”

“Then we are brothers,” said Ivan Postivich. “For my faith has been scratched from my heart, the host snatched from my open mouth. I miss the compassion
of my mother’s faith. There was the home I longed to return to, but it lies buried under the embers and ashes of my childhood. Gone.”

Ivan Postivich stared down at the floor, his eyes glittering. He slowly raised his head and clenched his fist.

“But I rejoice now in my knowledge of the Koran, for it is with a man’s voice and janissary’s heart that I answer to Allah and cry blasphemy on the deeds of our Sultan. The words of the Prophet stir my heart and demand revenge.”

“Would that you remember the forgiveness and love of our stolen faith,” said Saffron quietly, “your kismet would be sweeter than the taste of certain death.”

With that, the Head Eunuch turned to leave and give specific instructions to the servant who waited in the tepidarium.

Never had there been a more miserable sound than the mourning wail from Esma Sultan’s palace for the drowned women of her dead brother’s harem. The Solaks gazed with horror at the walls of the harem, their weapons hanging useless at their sides.

At dusk Esma Sultan led the keening women, her harem of over a hundred, to the banks of the Bosphorus across from the deepest channel where their sisters had been murdered. Each lit a candle to honor the memory and soul of the dead women, and they knelt on their prayer rugs, chanting sura after sura of the Koran in their grief.

When the women finally returned to the palace, Esma Sultan strode to her chambers, and threw herself on the crimson divan, weeping, pounding her fists on the silken cushions. Her eyes were so swollen, she could hardly see the white eunuch who approached her.

“Forgive me, my Sultane. Will you be requiring Ahmed Kadir’s presence this evening?”

Esma Sultan pulled herself up from the divan and wiped her eyes with a handkerchief stained black with kohl.

“How dare you approach me in my privacy, eunuch! You were not announced, nor permission granted to enter my chamber. I shall have you flogged.”

Emerald did not register any fear but instead drew his short body up as tall as he could and twisted his face in a sneer.

“You seem not to be inclined to see any man this evening. I shall tell him he is to go.”

“No, stop! “the Princess commanded. “Tell him—I will see Ahmed Kadir later. I must see him.”

Emerald tightened his lips at her remark. Then he opened his small polished hands to her, in invitation.

“You know I can foresee your desires,” he whispered urgently. “It is not Ahmed Kadir you seek, for he is untouchable as a Muslim. A new Christian man from Galata would serve your needs better. Shall I fetch the carriage? I have heard of a young man whose hair is as fair as wheat and whose body is hard and taut as rope. His hands are large as a horse’s hooves, but with elegant fingers, tapered like French candles.”

Esma Sultan sat up, gathering her strength. “I shall not be tempted again, Emerald! I have just cried for my women companions, there in the water just beyond our palace walls. I want no more death on my hands.”

“But these would be men, your Sultaness,” coaxed the eunuch. “They are the beastly gender. You can have your revenge another night, the moon is still waxing and I know the rhythm of your urges.” His voice was hypnotic, as liquid as precious oil. “Think of the wet kisses of those young lips on your restless body, dry from this heat, the weight of him over you, again and again, in pursuit of your love and his life.”

“Enough!” screamed the Sultaness, her body involuntarily surging towards the image, like the pull of the tide. “Your venom shall not infect me again. It is your own revenge you seek and you have coaxed my royal hand to murderous deeds.

“I shall not add more carnage to these waters. Your lustful ideas have corrupted my soul!”

She took a deep breath.

“And tell me now what happened to the last one. I begged my brother to spare him. I left him chaste so that he might be released. But the janissary admits he drowned him. And I have heard rumors from the docks that he was covered in bruises and bites before he was sent to Bosphorus. That is your vile indulgence, Emerald! Your vile hatred killed him and poisons my brother’s mind to insist on this bloodlust!”

Emerald returned her stare and the corner of his lips quivered, stifling a smile.

Her eyes bore into the eunuch. “You lied, Emerald! The boy was killed, virgin that he was. There was no cause!”

“I serve my master, the Sultan. It was his wish.”

“He swore to drown those who had shared my bed. My brother had no right to take this man’s life, you had no right! I left him untouched, to return to his village to become a priest.”

“And what tales he could have carried to the northlands—the weakness of the Ottomans, a Princess who cannot even seduce a lover from the lowest class. What shame you would bring your brother and the Ottoman name!”

“I allowed him to leave! He told me of his being a priest and I never touched him. There was no seduction by my choice, not his!”

“Your brother commanded the death, my Sultaness. I am put on this earth to follow his orders.”

The Princess grabbed a jewel-encrusted hairbrush and hurled it at the eunuch.

“If I could have you murdered, I would sing at your death.”

“May my Master Mahmud II live a long life and protect me from your eager hand.”

“Send in Ahmed Kadir.”

“But, my mistress—”

“Send in the janissary, I say, and trouble me no more with your evil counsel!”

The skin of the eunuch’s face pulled tight and he stared at the Sultaness.

“You will still call for me, Esma Sultan. Your appetite will never be satisfied, not even with the help of Ahmed Kadir. And if he should ever become your lover, I shall escort him, like all the others, to his death. And that day shall make me smile.”

Ivan Postivich entered the room and saw the red eyes of the Sultaness. Silently, he nodded, to show his understanding.

“There was nothing I could do,” she said.

“But why?” he asked. “Why now?”

“My brother suspects another coup. He says the Janissaries are mutinous and he must be sure there is no trace of his brother’s seed, no concubine who will suddenly produce a hidden heir that the Janissaries can seize and place on the throne.”

“Where is Irena?”

“She is with the other women in the garden. Her grief has consumed her. Let her have this time with the women who can console her.”

Ivan Postivich nodded.

“But you must go to my stables in the morning and select your horses for Friday’s games.”

The janissary looked at her, astonished.

“The celebration, your brother’s birthday? This is to come to pass with the air still filled with the dying screams of women and children?”

Esma Sultan smiled savagely. “Do you think I would call off a fête in my palace and disappoint my guests? I have planned for months for this day. My brother shall have to appear on Friday and he will see you compete. Tonight I will mourn my sisters and their children. I will keep vigil with the women of my harem. You must rest and be at the stables early to select your horses for the match. I shall send a servant to alert the head groom of your visit.”

“Thank you, Sultaness.”

Esma Sultan’s mouth hardened. “I have never looked so forward to a cirit game in all my life.”

Turkish Horse

T
he next morning, Ivan Postivich walked along the Bosphorus to where the horses of Esma Sultan were kept. Her stable was adjacent the Sultan’s own, where he kept more than four thousand horses, with nearly two thousand grooms who scurried about with the dedication of priests.

The Head Groom greeted the janissary.

“Ahmed Kadir! What an honor it is to have you ride the horses of Esma Sultan. I shall help you select the best for tomorrow’s game.”

The Royal Stables were familiar to Postivich. He had spent many days working there as a boy as part of the apprenticeship to the cavalry. He knew the feel of the pitchfork in his hand, the combs used for grooming the Sultan’s horse, the ritual of tacking the horse early in the morning for the Sultan’s ride to morning prayers.

At the far end of the stables, there was a special building where the Sultan’s ceremonial saddles and jewel-encrusted bridles hung. More than a hundred Solaks stood guard, their yataghans and scimitars glinting in the sun, protecting the priceless trappings.

The grooms all peered out from the stalls to catch a glimpse of the legendary rider.

“Abdul! He is as big as they say! Look at his arms! As thick as the branches of the plane tree.”

“Have you not seen him walking the streets or in the Spice Bazaar?”

“I swear by Allah’s name, never until today. But the Head Groom has promised me that I can watch the games at the Princess’s palace.”

The barefooted boys dressed in rags pressed their cheeks against the stable door to peek out at the janissary.

“You boys there! To your duties!” shouted the Head Groom.

The faces vanished into the recesses of the stables.

“Come, Ahmed Kadir. Look at this stallion I have for you. Never have you seen a horse more nimble footed.”

Ahmed Kadir pressed his lips together in doubt, but followed the groom to the stall.

“There, look at the mighty brute. He comes from a line of horses from the English, bigger than our Turkish breeds.”

Ahmed Kadir entered the paddock and approached the stallion, looking him in the eye.

“Calm yourself,” he said in Serbo-Croat, as the horse snorted noisily and backed away. He repeated the phrase, over and over, like a chant, and extended his hand, putting firm pressure on the horses neck. The stallion stood still, but his withers quivered as Ahmed Kadir smoothed his flat palm over the animal’s back, counting the vertebrae with his fingers.

“A long-backed horse,” said Postivich. “You say he is agile?”

“I have trained him myself. I must do so when the Sultan is not present, or he would add this mount to his stables,” laughed the groom. “He was a special present to Esma Sultan from the British Ambassador, the night after a fête.” The groom winked. “I believe he enjoyed himself mightily.”

Postivich ignored the comment. His hand continued to inspect the stallion, slipping over the horse’s fetlocks and measuring the angle of his leg.

“I shall try him. But I find stallions unpredictable and missing the heart of a mare when a competition requires stamina.”

“This horse will not let you down, Ahmed. I can swear to this for I have trained him well.”