With Helena again in an affectionate mood, I was happy to spend the next several days idle within the confines of the lighthouse on the pretense of illness, revisiting my father’s lessons in private with Helena—generally while seated or lying down as a precaution against sudden bouts of weakness inflicted by the anti-mage cuffs. I found that I did not remember the lessons as well as I liked, and the reactions (or lack thereof) from my cuffs were a useful check on my memory.
I had never before sought to trigger the cuffs’ own hungry magical drain and power their curse of weakness, but under the persuasive influence and focused attention of my companion, I was eager to lay myself out flat as often as needed to reconstruct and rehearse my father’s lessons. Helena asked probing questions, wrote down notes summarizing my words, copied in ink the diagrams that I sketched out in chalk on the slate, and kept me pleasant company when I was incapacitated.
Some of the incantations I pulled out from my memory were very precisely worded and quite specific to my father’s magic; these laid me low if and only if I performed them correctly. I collected bruises in spite of my precautions and one painful bump on my head that Helena fussed over. Every lesson was rewarded with smiles, kisses, and other affectionate gestures; as sharply as she teased me when I was at my full strength, she was purely sweet when I was weakened by the cold iron cuffs, offering words of admiration, encouragement, and sympathy mixed with gentle and loving affections.
When I lay at her mercy, I was her prince; when she was at mine, I was merely her master, her moods more mercurial, though not to the point of pushing me away as she had the night of the full moon. Though that evening had clearly sparked an important change in her behavior, I did not try further to pry into the causes of her changes in mind out of fear that she might, once pressed, revert to the Helena who had not wanted to be around me at all.
Physically, we were markedly gentle with one another, as if a harsh word or forceful movement would break the bond between us. To me, Helena seemed somehow all the more delicate and precious to me after her period of self-imposed solitude and prayer; she, for her part, no longer sought to test my strength and vigor. Tender touches, teaching, and talk of my father’s feats consumed our time, as Helena was curious about the details of his activities.
What I knew of my father’s battles against the Turkish armies was, in the light of what I had since learned of Osman strategy and tactics, insufficient. After trying to work out details on the slate, I found myself stealing from Helena’s servant-scrounged supply of paper to mark down detailed diagrams. I knew the land well; I knew my father’s mind little, and the versions of his stories he told his sons were long on gore and glory while being short on strategic motivations.
How had the Turkish columns been supplied? How far had their outriders ranged? Had my father taken efforts to cut off their lines of supply as they marched away from the great Istros River and not told me about it, or had he simply tried to take them head-on?
Had he employed invisible scouts? Aerial and magical reconnaissance? He had never talked about flying over the enemy armies simply for the purpose of looking; he only talked about the glories of battle, and I had been young enough not to be included in his field council, kept safe at home. Even if he had not made reconnaissance flights himself, several of the Osman generals who had tutored the courts’ princes had spoken of the need to shoot any birds that lingered over an army, on the grounds that many western witches could speak to animals and see through the eyes of those most familiar to them. Had my own homeland been filled with witches who had been part of its failed defense?
The more stories I told Helena about my father, the more questions I had about his strategic thinking, and the more I regretted the fact that I had been torn from his side before I was old enough to ride to war at his side. A prince must learn the art of war, and I had only been educated in the least secret of the Osman ways of war—of bombards, of sieges, and of the maneuver of galley squadrons anchored by lead-clad paddlewheel cruisers. If I had my father’s magic, I should learn his own secret stratagems, not just his spells.
I had not even studied the Osman ways of war very closely. Not at the level of a general strategist; the arts of riding, fighting, archery, and shooting had been far more interesting than accounting for the maintenance of magical fireboxes, supplementary coal fuel, the safe transport and storage of powder supplies, the manufacture and salvage of phoenix stones, the provision of galley slaves, and the other matters of material tedium that the old sultan’s hired horde of tutors had tried to drill into Allaedin and the other Osman princes.
The revealed ignorance bothered me. I had assumed I knew everything about my father, but I could barely remember his lessons—and realized that he had taught me only the first part of the Dragon’s secrets. As pleasant as Helena’s company was, I itched to return to the court; I could remedy my ignorance in part by learning the Osman accounts of his battles better. So, I told Helena I could not pretend illness for too long without worry of contagion or the appearance of one of the sultan’s physicians and rejoined court society.
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The sultan shifted on the throne, settling into a more comfortable slouch, then straightening again uncomfortably. He looked around irritably. “The Greek notion of a throne hall does not suit me,” he said, gesturing broadly at the great octagonal chamber, filled with milling officers, officials, and sundry courtiers. “It is very grand, but this grandness provides a volume that seems to inevitably fill itself with triviality and tedium. I have full trust in the Grand Vizier. Today he will hold audience in my place and relay to me any truly important business. I shall be in the harem.1”
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Silence hung in the air for a moment, and then the susurrus of whispers grew, crashing like a wave as the sultan stood and walked away, flanked by eunuch guards as he walked through the southern arch and to the exit leading into the palace proper.
This was the first I had heard any mention of the vizier since I recovered from my supposed case of food poisoning and resumed attending court. My presumption was that Pasha Halil had been kept busy with some important task, though it seemed unusual that nobody I looked around, looking to spot Pasha Halil. The man I had been chatting with—black-haired with a high-pitched tenor voice and a heavy strange accent that I could not place—was short and therefore easy to see over, but I had not seen the vizier since our evening of playing dice together, and I still did not see him now.
However, in reaction to the sultan’s pronouncement, a tall pasha who had been standing and chatting with an officer of the guard near the great open silver doors that were the main entrance to the throne room walked purposefully in the direction of the vacated throne. I tried to remember what I could about him: He was Illyrian by birth, though a convert to the Osman religion, hence his high office, and had risen in ranks through the army.
Then the man sat in the throne, keen eyes flickering around the room, resting on me for one long moment before he spoke. “If a certain someone does not return to where she is supposed to be before her brother wonders where she is, he will be forced to take notice of his little sister’s absence.”
The short, black-haired man who had been standing next to me suddenly vanished. I heard rapid footsteps heading in the direction of the silver doors. A moment later, I realized that I had been speaking with the sultan’s favorite sister. It is not unusual for a talented enchantress to dabble in illusion, and to present the image of another person is not a difficult illusion; however, I suspect that Gulben had found some kind of trinket to assist her in achieving invisibility, as invisibility is another matter entirely from mere disguise.
To present the image of nothing at all is a complex and difficult illusion because nothing appears to be something quite different from every side; some even go as far as to say that invisibility is the most singularly difficult type of illusion, and that to make a moving person invisible, even a small one, skilled illusionists with a full measure of magical power in their blood will often resort to using a spell focus for assistance. Still, invisibility is such a useful art that such foci are in great demand.
As the tall Illyrian pasha stared at me, I wished I had such a focus—I had the misfortune to be standing next to the true target of his statement, and as she was suddenly absent, his gaze naturally fell on me. He was a wizard—or at least possessed of some magical talent or item that let him pierce Gulben’s disguise—and appeared to think himself the sultan’s vizier in the continued absence of Pasha Halil. Then his gaze moved elsewhere, and I felt relieved. The business of court resumed, and it was not long before I could have a private conversation with Pasha Mustafa’s astrologer.
“I believe I still owe you half of my winnings,” I said, reaching into my pouch. “I left with eighteen ducats—”
“Ah. I suppose I should not say no to nine ducats,” the astrologer said.
For a moment, I felt torn between greed and correcting his accounting to include the original stake he had loaned me. “I know I did not outmatch Pasha Halil’s luck like you expected,” I said. “But it was a lucky night for me.”
“In spite of his winnings, I would say it was quite an unfortunate night for Pasha Halil, though. If he had kept the beys’ trust, he might have been able to mount a defense against certain rumors that circulated that very same night around several other gaming tables elsewhere in the palace—allegations regarding collusion with the Greeks.” The astrologer shook his head slowly. “Unscrupulous behavior at the game table is all too often accompanied by unscrupulous behavior elsewhere.”
“On that note,” I told him, “I owe you ten ducats, not nine—at the rate Pasha Halil exchanged it, the initial stake you gave me was worth near to two ducats, and half the profit is another eight.”
“Scrupulous, indeed,” the astrologer said. “Ten, then—you drive a hard bargain, but I find I must accept, at least until I can arrange to lose the balance to you at dice.”
“Where is Pasha Halil, exactly?” I asked.
“I am glad you are interested in theology,” The astrologer lifted a finger thoughtfully, his expression shifting in a way that made me suspect a lengthy lecture could be forthcoming. “His soul now lies in the realm of dreams, which functions as an isthmus between the mortal realm and divine realm.”
“I see,” I said, raising my hand to forestall the rest of the lecture the astrologer was prepared to eagerly give. “Pasha Halil will not be showing up to any more dice games, then. And, I think, neither shall I.”
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1. Translator’s note: “Harem,” meaning “forbidden,” refers here to the part of an Osman household in which family members dwell (along with concubines). Notably, unrelated intact males are generally not permitted entrance. Salacious readers should feel admonished and cautioned against making unjust assumptions about Sultan Allaedin’s priorities vis a vis business and pleasure on this occasion. He may have wished to consult with his mother, for example; the mother of a sultan is generally one of his chief advisors. However, even if his priorities related to the unrelated permanent inhabitants of the harem, the disapproving reader is admonished that a young and newly ascended sultan may be expected to sire multiple potential heirs in case of mishap, such as those that had recently fallen many of his brother-heirs, and thus such matters would fall under the aegis of being important royal duties.