“Is she nicer?”
“Oh no, far worse.”
Lazar’s laugh made Radu feel lighter. Lazar motioned for him to follow, and he did, helping the Janissaries unload and set up their spare, efficient camp.
They traveled this way for more days than Radu thought to count. At first he worried about what his father would think of how he spent his time, but his father never so much as spoke to him or Lada. He wore his worry in the gloom of his brow, wrapped around him tighter than his cloak. He muttered, practicing some sort of speech, waving away anyone who got too close.
So Radu was free to ride with the Janissaries. He loved the constant jokes, the exaggerated stories, the calm and easy way they rode, as though they were not fleeing—which Radu suspected was the case, though no one would tell him—but rather on an adventure.
“Your sister rides like a man,” one of the soldiers—a quiet Bulgarian with an old scar cutting across his chin—said one day as they passed through a rocky valley.
Radu shrugged. “They tried to teach her to ride like the ladies, but she refused.”
“I could teach her to ride like a lady,” the Bulgarian said, something in his tone different. A few of the other Janissaries laughed, and Radu shifted uncomfortably, certain he had missed something, but unsure what.
“Too young,” Lazar said dismissively.
“Too ugly,” another soldier added.
Radu glared, but he could not tell who had said it. He watched his sister ride tall and proud and alone. “She could beat any of you.” The soldiers laughed, and he scowled. “I mean it. Any one of you.”
“She is a girl,” the Bulgarian said, as though that were the end of any discussion.
“Shhh.” Lazar shook his head. “I think no one has told her this. We would not want her to hear it from us.” He grinned at Radu, bringing him in on the joke, and Radu smiled, though it was not as easy as his smiles for the Janissaries usually were.
After that, Radu spent more time riding beside Lada. She pretended not to notice, but she held her shoulders a little more loosely when he was next to her. Her hands drifted frequently to a small leather pouch, tied around her neck and tucked under her collar. Radu wondered what was in it, but he knew better than to ask.
They were going south, through Bulgaria, studiously avoiding any cities as they picked their way across valleys and over steep terrain. Radu had gleaned enough to know that they were heading for the Ottoman capital of Edirne. The closer they got, the further into his cloak their father retreated. He spoke only when he had to, casting heavy, worried looks at Lada and Radu over the evening fire.
“I am sending them back,” he said, several nights into the journey. “I do not want them with me. They slow us, and the boy is too weak to travel so far. He has always been delicate.”
Radu did not realize whom his father meant until all the Janissaries turned toward him and Lada. What had they done wrong? Radu had kept his homesickness and his longing for his nurse to himself. Surely no one had noticed him crying silently the first two nights. He had ridden without complaint, helped set up and take down camp, done everything right!
He expected Lada to protest their father’s rejection, but she remained silent, staring at the fire. Their father looked anywhere but at them, his face a mask in the darkness.
Lazar rested a hand on Radu’s shoulder. “Radu is doing very well. He rides like a seasoned soldier. Besides, we cannot spare a guard for them. The sultan’s hospitality is beyond compare. You would not want to deprive your children of the opportunity to experience his generosity.”
Radu’s father sniffed and turned his face away, staring into the night. “Very well. It is all the same.”
He retired to his tent, and for the rest of the trip he neither spoke to nor looked at them. Radu tried to ask Lada about it, but she, too, was silent and preoccupied.
When at last they came over the crest of a hill and saw Edirne laid out before them, Radu’s heart seized with joy and wonder. The buildings were pale white stone, the roofs red. Streets lined with spring-green trees weaved through it all, leading to a building with a spire so high that Radu was surprised it did not scratch the blue of the sky. Several domes made up its roof, and another, shorter spire rose to greet the party, welcoming them.
Nearby was a large, imposing building, its outside striped red and white with alternating brick and stone, but Radu could not take his eyes off the spires that reached so confidently for heaven.
They had arrived.
1448: Edirne, Ottoman Empire
VLAD WALKED BEHIND SULTAN Murad, half stooped from bowing so often. Lada watched with resigned wariness. Radu was at her side, clinging to her like a small child. She had to pry his hand off her arm, where he was wrinkling the sleeve of her finest dress. He had acted as though their journey here was playtime and befriended the soldiers. The enemy soldiers. Radu was a fool. They had not journeyed here, they had fled. Leaving the throne in the waiting hands of Mircea.
Mircea, who had long curried favor with the boyars and Hunyadi. Mircea, who promised to hold the prince title in wait for his father’s return.
Lada had no doubt her father would need an army to return, and not just against the boyars and Hunyadi.
For a few precious hours Lada had nurtured a dream that perhaps she could find Bogdan here, but all hope had vanished. They had been welcomed with rooms prepared just for them. Lush, perfumed, and pillowed prisons they had not been permitted out of for the past two days. Vlad had paced so much, muttering and practicing speeches, that sweat soaked his silk undershirt. Radu had stared out the window, which was framed by metal twisted and shaped like vines. Lada had watched her father, his threads snapped. One left. One single thread that he desperately hoped to loop around the sultan and his mercurial support.
She tugged Radu’s hand to make him walk faster so they could keep up with the party of adults. This was not the behavior Lada expected from Vlad Dracul. From her father. From a dragon. A dragon did not crawl