Feathers in the Wind: The Cygnets Page 8

  "For doing what he was ordered to do?” Susan shook her head. “We hardly think so."

  Emil nodded his head, pleased. His sense of honor had made him offer the females a chance at revenge. His respect for them rose when they proved themselves above such petty vengeance. Not many in their place would have chosen so. “Well, Shirka—?"

  The large Black man, who understood a bit of the heathen English, was amazed that the women had not taken this chance to harm him or cause his death. In gratitude, he threw himself down at their feet fervently promising, “I swear before Allah, barring only my loyalty to my master, the Bey, I shall serve the effendiler all the days of my miserable life."

  Finished with the situation, and thereby no longer interested in it, the Bey signaled for Shirka to leave. Gesturing towards the food-laden table, he asked, “Are you not thirsty and hungry? Come, refresh yourself."

  Looking at the array of foods and juices, the girls’ bellies rumbled in unison, and they realized it had been a very long time since their last meal. Their mouths watered, and they found themselves edging closer to the table.

  "How do we know you won't drug us again?” Merri asked, wanting the food, but remembering how quickly their systems had succumbed under the influence of that earlier drug.

  "There is no reason to render you unconscious here,” Emil pointed out. “The food and drink is without taint. The effendi Seana can attest to that."

  Seana slowly nodded her head in affirmation. “It's true. They have never drugged me."

  "So, then. Enjoy your repast,” the Bey urged. “I will send the physician to attend you when you have finished your meal."

  "The physician—? For this little bump?” Merri snorted. “We are not so fragile—"

  The Bey did not answer immediately. Sweeping all but one serving woman before him with an expansive gesture, he cleared the room. “The physician is to examine you, and report back to me with the outcome of his exam."

  "For what purpose?” Susan asked suspiciously.

  "To insure you are worthy to be presented to my Master.” The door closed behind the Bey with quiet finality.

  "Why a physician, Seana?” Merri questioned, her face terrible as she turned to confront the Scottish girl, somehow knowing she would not like the answer. “What kind of exam?"

  Seana shivered, crossing her arms to rub away the goose-bumps that puckered her flesh. “I told you earlier,” she whispered miserably. “The tall, thin man ... he ... the one who...” her voice faltered. “They have to make sure you are ... virtuous. He will touch you ... there.” Her voice dropped on the last word, her remembered shame choking her anew.

  "No.” The word was a harsh whisper. Her face pale with shock, Merri reeled against a cloth-swathed wall. The last two days finally caught up with her and it was suddenly too much. First, the public fiasco with Worth—a traumatic experience, though she had initiated it herself. The beating administered by her father, the kidnap, the knock on the head, waking up aboard a vessel peopled with creatures from an outlandish fairy-tale, and finally ... this outrage.

  "No.” She ran.

  Merri."

  "Stop."

  The anguished cries of Susan and Seana were unable to pierce through the fog of panic that had engulfed Merridyth. She barreled into the thin serving-woman, knocking her aside as she fumbled at the door, desperate to find a way out. The door opened under her determined assault, and she fled past the startled guard, who made a futile grab at her. Voices yelled, sentences in many languages struck her ears, making no sense to her darkened reasoning. She fled on, instinctively making her way up from the bowels of the ship.

  And then she was topside. Merridyth swayed on her feet, inhaling raggedly, letting the sharply crisp sea breeze bring her back to her senses. She glanced about; startled to see how far they had come from England's shores. She saw nothing familiar. The ship had ventured so far out to sea that no land blued the horizon. No gulls screamed their cries or swooped for fish disturbed by the turbulence of the ship's passing, telling Merri they were many fathoms away from land and help. She stood trembling, turning this way and that, as a crowd of people rushed towards her, converging from every direction.

  "Effendi."

  The soft, sympathetic voice of the man, Shirka, had her spinning towards him.

  "There is no place to go, effendi. Take my hand,” he pleaded earnestly, holding out a huge appendage towards the frightened girl. “There will be no punishment for this action,” he reassured her.

  Wild-eyed, she backed away from him.

  "My master understands. He has promised to be lenient.” His soft words urged her to calm down. He could see it was futile. His deep black eyes widened as he saw the girl look away from his outstretched hands, her own eyes drawn fatalistically down to the waves that crashed against the sides of the ship, their explosive pounding ending in a fine spray that wet the deck of the ship and all that stood upon it. Unbelieving, Shirka watched her little chin firm in a manner that was quickly becoming familiar. Too late, he recognized what she planned to do.

  "Effendi, no."

  Moving faster that he ever had in his life, Shirka strove mightily to reach the determined girl. His despairing cry rent the sky and he dove for her, even as she launched herself over the side of the ship. Shirka howled to the heavens, his empty hands grasping air where, scant seconds before, the English woman's airborne body had been. Leaning against the rail, he watched, frozen in horror, as the black haired English woman disappeared beneath the turbulent, hungry waves.

  Chapter Ten

  ...and what was I supposed to do? Sit back and see you hanged? Not likely—. Which was it you resented more? My not telling you before all this happened, or my telling Pitt and the King? If it was the former, you must blame your—Randolph, also, for it was his decision, alone, to keep this from you. I am tired of bearing the guilt alone. If you cannot understand what moved me, then I disown you. I know your stubbornness, Jared. When you were a little boy, I tried to spank that right out of you. You are beyond me, now—. I wrote you this letter with the main intent of informing you that Arnold has asked me to marry him. I'm inclined to consent. I am lonely with both Randolph and you gone from me, and Arnold has always been a good friend. I believe I can be comfortable with him. If you cannot bear it, I will, of course say no. You are, after all, the head of the family. Only, please bestir yourself and say something. If not out of concern for me, then bear in mind that I cannot keep Raeburn dangling. It would not be fair. Now, as to the other business affairs I need to discuss with you...

  Chapter Eleven

  Ankara, Turkey

  Late November, 1800

  Jamal strode into the presence of his father with little pomp and no circumstance. The servants no longer gasped at the liberties his father allowed. It had become an accepted fact that the Sultan was pleased to indulge his ogul gavur, his infidel son in all things.

  "Has she written to you also ... as usual? And have you heard my mother's latest start—?” Jamal questioned, waving Emily's letter before his father's amused face. He came to a halt before the peacock-backed couch upon which his sire reclined, feeling sensitive and out-of-sorts before the laughter that lit Selim's countenance, not sure why it was making him so angry.

  "I see nothing amusing in this.” he growled. “She wants to remarry, to replace my father with Raeburn. Raeburn. He was at my trial, you know, and was one of those who thought me guilty. I could read it in his face—. I cannot see why he would lower himself to marry the mother of a traitor..."

  Selim gestured for a chair and signaled his son to sit. An indulgent half-smile played about his lips. Engrossed in his musings, Jamal stumbled and tripped over the low, backless chair quickly positioned by an eager-to-please servant.

  "Have you considered the possibility that the man has changed his mind concerning your guilt?” Selim asked. “Perhaps he feels that a woman with such purity of values—a woman like Emily—could not rear a child that would turn to trea
chery. Indeed, would not be capable of breeding such perfidy into her offspring—"

  "Pure. That's a joke for those who know better, isn't it?” Jamal sneered, hurt rising anew at the memory of his mother's deceit. He had thought they'd had no secrets from each other, and for years, she had been hiding the most devastating one.

  Twin pairs of tiger-gold eyes measured the other, raking over features that were so alike it was almost uncanny. Jamal's ugly insinuation lay, stark and naked between the two men; father and son.

  The tableau held until the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire reared up on his throne. Pointing an imperious finger shaking with rage, he shouted in an awful voice, “Be silent and hold thy intemperate tongue, thou jackal of sons, lest I have it held for thee. There comes a time when leniency must cease and we have come upon it. I will bear no further rending of the mother's tender soul. Thou shalt hear from my own lips, the tale of thy Anne, and henceforth, shalt hold her in reverence, as Allah commends all faithful sons to do."

  Jamal had risen in agitation, his mouth open to refute his father's statements, but abruptly changed his mind as Selim sharply clapped his hands, causing two burly eunuch guards to move in close at his back.

  "Not one word.” Selim-the-father had been totally submerged into Selim-the-Sultan, supreme potentate of one of the most powerful, wide-spread kingdoms in the world. He would brook no interruptions. Jamal clamped his lips together and settled, seething, back onto his chair. He recognized what had happened and knew he had no choice but to hear his new-found father out. He would try to hold his peace, no matter how difficult. He shook his head. Nothing Selim could tell him could change the facts: his mother—the woman he had placed on a pedestal all his life—had been anything but pure. A whore bearing a child out of wedlock, he growled silently, then cringed at the ugly name he had labeled his mother. Even in the private depths of his tortured soul, the label didn't fit the woman he had known all the growing and shaping years of his life. Yet the facts of his birth remained and were irrefutable. He, Jared Michael Randolph Jamal Tyson, eighth Duke of Wyndmere, had been born a bastard.

  "Upuzun hakiyat bu nutuk dir. Art thou prepared to listen?"

  Jamal would have known his sire was upset, even without the guards. Selim spoke several languages, English being especially well-known since childhood. When he reverted to “thees” and “thous” or his own native tongue, it was a sure sign of deep agitation.

  "You spoke that first too fast for me,” Jamal said stiffly, disliking the feeling of inadequacy. “I did not quite understand you."

  His father nodded sagely. “I say to thee: the speech I would tell thee is truth, has been truth for a long time."

  "In that case ... behold me all ears, O, my father.” Jamal taunted, needing, in his overweening anger, to lash out. And his father was not an innocent in the events of long ago.

  Selim cocked an eyebrow, but apparently decided not to comment on his son's disrespect. “I understand the strain you are under, wanting desperately to be reconciled with your mother. Your strict moral codes have been deeply ingrained and according to those codes, your mother has fallen short. I know the truth—know Emily has never disgraced herself. The Englishman who spirited her away also knew the full story, but he is now dead, and therefore, eternally silent on the matter. Personally, I feel Emily and her English husband should have told you of your true heritage long ago. Had they done so, the present situation need never have arisen. And while I can not be sorry for the chance to come to know my only son—even if you are an infidel—yet the circumstances could have been more auspicious. Well, the story...

  "You are aware that your maternal grandfather was, for a short time, the Crown-appointed English ambassador to the Ottoman Empire?"

  "It is a matter of history,” Jamal said impatiently. “I hope you plan to cut to the heart of the matter, for that information is very old news. What bearing does it have on this situation?"

  "You lack patience, my son,” Selim reprimanded. “Like most Eastern people, I enjoy the dramatic re-telling of a good story, and this one has all the elements: passion, betrayal, redemption.... Oh, yes. It runs the entire gamut of emotions. I begin ... again."

  "Your story begins with your grandfather. Your Anne's Baba was a despot and a poor Ambassador for England. Instead of fostering closer relationships between our two countries, he set out to amass an even greater fortune than he already possessed. That was fine, in itself. We Ottomans understand the compulsion to gather wealth and secure one's family in whatever ways possible. Indeed, in that arena, your Grandfather's behavior was expected ... even applauded. What was not expected, nor acceptable, was the dishonorable love-affair between your grandfather and a certain Sultana.

  "What?"

  Selim nodded. “Your shock is understandable, ogul. A Sultana is not just a concubine or Odalisque, she is a woman who has born a child by the Sultan; a wife.

  "Attempting to appear more Westernized, the ruling Sultan, Mustapha III, allowed his three wives to be present at a dinner given in the Ambassador's honor. One of his wives was smitten with love ... or lust. Whichever it was really doesn't matter after all this time. Suffice it to say that the Ambassador and the Sultana were soon setting clandestine meetings—"

  "How was the Sultana able to do this from within a guarded harem?” Jamal interrupted, becoming intrigued despite himself.

  "Trust me, my son,” Selim said dryly, looking pensive, “No matter how tight the cage, there are ways out ... One has but to look diligently. Many things are possible, even inside a guarded harem. And when the people are ruled by the strongest emotions—” He shrugged his shoulders with an Eastern man's fatalistic outlook. “Of course, this was not just any Sultana. Oh, no. This was the Hatun; the first wife, anne of the first-born child. The insult to the Sultan was enormous. Still, they might have gotten away with their plans to secretly flee the country—they knew there would be no safe place for them here—” Selim stroked his pointed beard while momentarily sunk in retrospection. “You know, I wonder at your Grandfather. He should have known there was no way he could hide the Sultana. England, itself, could not have harbored the two in obscurity, for the wrath of the Sultan was great. And he was a very vengeful man—"

  Jamal heaved a sigh at the round-about way the story was unfolding. He was totally engrossed now and resented these frequent asides. “I assume they were caught,” he prompted, no longer interested in being subtle with his interest. “What was it that gave them away?"

  "Not what, but whom. The Hatun's private guard, a eunuch named Asheed, had been her lover for years. When he discovered their plans to flee, he betrayed the lovers to the Sultan in a fit of jealous rage. The Sultana was invited to drink the Bosporus—"

  "To do what?"

  "It is a saying which means she was drowned,” Selim said matter-of-factly. “Her death was relatively easy. It was not so for the Ambassador. He disappeared into the dungeons for quite some time. Over a month later when he was brought out to be publicly impaled, he was unrecognizable. Even to his daughters, your anne and teyze, who were forced to witness the gory execution.

  "You must understand, ogul,” the Sultan explained, “the Eastern mind is much more sequential than that of the West. Events must follow a pattern and that pattern must be complete. The Sultan was desperate for revenge, and to us, revenge is not complete unless the person suffers on every level. It is believed that, though dead and beyond pain, a man is aware of his family's suffering in some mystical sense. Therefore revenge often encompasses those left behind. For revenge, your anne and teyze were taken as slaves and brought into the Great Harem. The Sultan himself took your teyze Amelia, but he gifted me with Emily.” Selim's eyes grew vague as they focused on long ago.

  "I was a hot-blooded young man of fifteen years and I had been incarcerated in the Kafes for the majority of my life. My goings and comings were extremely restricted, and it was rare, very rare, that I was allowed to indulge my lusts for female flesh. You can imagine my fee
lings at having a woman of my own whom I could take at will, over and over, and thus assuage my great, pent-up needs."

  "Usually, any woman given to an Emir in the Kafes is rendered infertile. Emily escaped this because Mustapha III wanted her to become enciente. Understand, to control the succession, any child fathered by me would be killed before it left the womb, along with the mother. For the Sultan, knowing Emily would be killed the moment it became known she was carrying a child was but one more point of revenge against your grandfather.” Selim stopped and regarded his tight-lipped son warily. “I know you do not enjoy hearing this portion of the story, yet I reveal all to you so you may understand."

  "I was young, I say. And though I knew your mother's fate, I did not care. On the one hand, I was only overjoyed to accept the gift of a female of my own. But on the other, she was the daughter of the man who had grossly insulted and spat upon my sovereign and family member ... It was not until later that I came to love Emily. Being arrogant and young, I believed she would eventually come to love me in return."

  "To say that Emily was not quite as overjoyed or as in love as I, is an understatement. Your anne hated me. Though it made not a whit of difference to me, she informed me she was betrothed to the Duke of Wyndmere, who had traveled to Turkey to take her home for the wedding. I bedded her in spite of her tears and pleas. In fact, I drugged her to make her compliant and willing. After that first time, she fought no more, submitting quietly to my attentions. Still, she never came to me, never offered herself. She rejected all my attempts at pleasuring her and made it an uncomfortable exercise each and every time.” Selim grew pensive as he thought on those past days and nights, fraught with so much pain and glory.

  "She once told me that I could control her body, but never her heart. That was her own and she would bestow it upon whom she wished. In her heart, she was always faithful to her betrothed—” Selim sighed. “You cannot imagine how that only made me want her more. Made me long to be the recipient of such prevailing loyalty. I showered her with gifts and presents.” The Sultan shrugged. “I was trying to bribe her ... all to no avail. She would not love me. In the end, it was again Asheed who destroyed a harem romance ... this time mine."