Page 13 of Bright We Burn

“Yes.” She heard Nicolae sigh in relief.

He dropped his head from shoulder to shoulder, rubbing his neck. “Do you want me to leave men behind?” he asked. “Are we expanding?”

“No, we are deterring. I have no interest in conquering. Only in letting others know the borders of Wallachia are inviolable. No one will attack my villages again. Not unless they want war.”

Nicolae grinned wearily. “I think that message has been sent.”

“Good. I have new messages to send now.” Lada stared into the fire, watching it devour the darkness around it.

Constantinople

RADU STILL FOUND PEACE in prayer. During the siege, he had missed mosques, missed praying in unison with his brothers all around him. It was a comfort returning to that routine.

He could not bring himself to go to the Hagia Sophia, though, even now that it was a mosque. He had too many memories there to truly lose himself to praying. Instead, he visited other mosques through the city. They were mostly converted Orthodox churches, though a few new mosques were being built. His brother-in-law, Kumal, joined him for most prayers, and, as promised, Radu also joined little Murad and Mesih in prayer.

Coming back with them from afternoon prayer, Radu was surprised to meet Mehmed. The sultan was so rarely in the streets. Radu bowed low. Mehmed gestured for him to join them. One of his Janissary guards dismounted, offering Radu the horse.

“Where are we going?” Radu asked, careful to keep his horse a step behind Mehmed’s for appearance’s sake. He had been in Constantinople for a week, and while in private they were as close as ever—when Mehmed had time to see him—in public Radu knew the importance of maintaining distance. Mehmed needed to be apart, needed to stand above. Radu would not disrupt that.

“Urbana has some new hand cannon designs she wishes to show me. I am certain she would be happy to see you, too.”

Radu snorted a laugh. “You do not know her very well, do you?”

Mehmed turned his head, smiling at Radu over his shoulder. “I cannot imagine anyone would ever be unhappy to see you.” His gaze lingered on Radu’s face. It felt almost as though he was watching for Radu’s reaction more than wishing to continue to look at Radu.

Mehmed did that more and more often lately. He would say some little shining thing, or touch Radu on the shoulder or the hand or even the cheek, always watching, studying. Cataloging what actions or words triggered which reactions. Radu did not know what to make of it. He offered Mehmed a smile now, which seemed to satisfy him.

Over their past week together, though, Mehmed had not spoken again of Lada. Whether he had discussed her “message” in private with other advisors, Radu did not know. But it seemed as though, for the time being, Mehmed was content to let the issue be buried alongside the bodies of the men Lada had sent back.

Envoys were often casualties of aggression between countries—Mehmed had killed Emperor Constantine’s envoy a year ago, Cyprian spared only because he had taken Radu and Nazira out of Edirne—but Mehmed had to be bothered by the loss and the intent behind it. Maybe he was planning something and thought Radu would object. Or maybe, with Constantinople so recently settled, Mehmed did not want to antagonize Lada until he absolutely had to.

Either way, the memory of what Radu had seen in the box stayed with him, wriggling beneath the surface of his skin. The spike. The face frozen in agonized death. His sister had done that. And she would have to be answered. When she was, Radu did not know how he would feel, or what he would want to happen.

He had chosen Mehmed’s side the year before when Lada asked for his help. He would, it seemed, have to make that choice over and over again for the rest of their lives. He had changed his faith, his life, even his name, but he could not change or escape his sister.

Radu was still thinking about the problem of Lada when they arrived at their destination. The world swirled around him. Frozen atop his horse, he stared at the foundry where he and Cyprian had spent a long night melting down silver and making coins.

“Radu?”

Startled, Radu blinked rapidly and turned toward Mehmed.

The other man stared expectantly at him. “You look as though you have just woken up.” Mehmed gestured to the foundry. “Do you know this place?”

Radu nodded silently, hoping Mehmed would not inquire further.

“What did you do here?” Mehmed leaned eagerly toward Radu. “You have told me so little of what you did in the city during the siege! You were a stranger to me those months. I want to hear all of it. Did you sabotage their attempts at building an arsenal?”

Radu rubbed his eyes, leaving his fingers covering them for a few seconds too long for the gesture to appear casual. “No. They never had a hope of amassing enough cannons to meet you that way.”

“Then what did you do here?”

Radu straightened his shoulders, staring at the door behind which he had spent a deliriously hot and confusing night with Cyprian. He remembered the shape of the other man’s shoulders, the lines where his torso dipped down to his trousers. The feelings in Radu’s own body that he had hidden behind the table between them. But before that, the laughter, the pure devious fun of it all, sneaking around with his beloved false wife and the friend they were already betraying.

“We stole silver from the churches and melted it down to make coins.”

“You and Nazira?”

“And Cyprian.”

---