Lada would not play along. She stood. “Whose child is that?”
Stefan picked up the boy, holding him close. “Mine,” he said. He took the little girl in his other arm and walked out of the room.
Daciana gathered her things, keeping her eyes anywhere but on Lada. “There are a lot of orphans,” she said, shrugging. “We thought our little Lada would like a brother.”
“Hmm.” Lada watched as Daciana fumbled the comb, dropping it on the floor. She picked it up, then dipped her head and hurried from the room. She had not finished her work, which was unlike her.
Daciana had been a wet nurse to a boyar family after she had her own baby. A Danesti boyar family.
Lada had killed all the Danesti boyars. And ordered all their heirs killed as well.
She found Nicolae’s sheet of carefully taken notes and added two of her own at the end.
Watch Nicolae.
Watch Stefan.
Constantinople
RADU AND HIS MEN rode out to the gates of Constantinople, accompanied by Mehmed. Mehmed rode in the center of a ring of guards. His turban gleamed and sparkled in the sun, woven through with pure gold threads. His horse stepped high, a head taller than the rest of the horses, white and gleaming. Mehmed’s purple cloak cascaded behind them. Radu imagined he was a citizen on the side of the road, watching, daz
zled. The sultan was certainly everything he should be. Power and glory personified.
They stopped just outside the city, and Mehmed allowed Radu to approach him. “Bring her home.” The quiet urgency in his voice was in contrast to his confident posture.
Radu nodded, but he could not pretend at confidence. Lada was already home. And Radu did not feel at home in Constantinople. But he would get Lada, and he would bring her back. And then…
He did not know where he would go. But his duties to both Mehmed and Lada would be discharged, and he knew what he would do: spend the rest of his days looking for Nazira.
With a hollow pain in his body that was familiar and dull around the edges now, Radu spurred his horse forward. Away from Mehmed.
Kumal drew close to him a few miles outside the city. “Thank you for coming,” Radu said with a more genuine smile than he had been able to muster for Mehmed.
“Of course. It will be good to get out of the city.”
“Do you dislike it?” Radu had never heard a word of complaint from Kumal. But he had also never heard a word of remonstration for losing Kumal’s only sister. Radu wondered if Kumal was capable of cruelty. He hoped so, actually. It gave him hope to think that men like Kumal were the same as everyone else—they simply chose to be better.
Kumal looked surprised, then shook his head. “No. I am happy with my position close to the sultan. He is a good man, and I respect him. It is an honor to serve our people. But it is difficult not to feel like we are doing nothing while waiting for word of Nazira.”
Radu hunched his shoulders reflexively. He knew Kumal did not bring up Nazira to chastise him, but he could not escape his guilt over her continued absence.
Kumal noticed his discomfort and drew his horse even closer. “You made the best decision you could have at an impossible time. I know you did everything in your power to protect her. I meant that staying in one place waiting will drive a man insane. It is good to be going out, being active, defending the empire. We will continue to hope and pray for word of Nazira’s safety. But that can be done just as well from the road.”
Radu nodded, feeling slightly less burdened. “Thank you. You have always been a friend to me.”
“You are my brother.”
Radu laughed. “You are certainly the brother I chose. My own brother was never a friend.”
“Speaking of your siblings, what is the plan for your sister? Will you try to negotiate first?”
“I am sending word ahead for her to meet us at our outpost in Giurgiu. She will come to see me, I think, even without specific promises. When she arrives, we separate her from her men and bring her back to Constantinople.”
“How much force are you prepared to use?”
Radu shifted uneasily in his saddle, hunching deeper into his furs. It had seemed like a good plan when discussing it with Mehmed and Mara. But Radu had not thought through the specifics. Lada would not want to come. That much was obvious. Would he have to kill her men? What if Bogdan was with her? Radu had never liked Bogdan; he encouraged the worst in Lada through his dogged loyalty. But Radu did not want to kill him. Or Nicolae. He had always thought Nicolae superior to the rest of Lada’s men. Funny and smart, even kind sometimes.
And then there was Lada herself. Radu imagined tying her up, bringing her back in one of their supply wagons. She would fight them the whole way, otherwise. And once they got her back, what then? A prison cell?