Bright We Burn

by Kiersten White

  Cyprian nodded toward Radu’s turban. “It suits you.” He lifted his fingers to his own. “I am not used to mine yet.”

  “You—you came with Nazira.” The man he had recognized from afar at the back of her guard. He had not looked closely at Nazira’s guards when he went out because he had been so overwhelmed seeing her again. This was why she had given her meeting instructions so loudly. They were not for Radu. They were for Cyprian.

  “I went back to Constantinople first,” Cyprian said. “I will not lie: it hurt to see my city remade. But you were right. Mehmed has done incredible things with it already. It is vibrant and living in a way I have never known it to be. He has renewed its former vitality. But that only explained why you trusted Mehmed. I wanted to understand you, where you came from.” He turned to the side and gestured out at the landscape, scarred and marked with the violence of twenty thousand desecrated men. “This explains a lot.”

  Radu was still too shocked to know what to say, or how to say it.

  “I can see now, a little, why the Ottomans were your salvation. Why you love them. It is the same reason I loved my uncle. He took me from cruelty and gave me a place, a purpose.”

  Radu could not bear to look at Cyprian any longer. If being apart from him and knowing they would never be together had hurt, being here with him and knowing they would never be together was such agony Radu did not know if he would survive. He lifted his eyes to the cloudless blue sky. “I am sorry. I am so sorry. I cannot ever—”

  Cyprian interrupted him. “I have thought through it all. I have thought of very little else, to be honest. And I have had a tremendous amount of time to think while stuck being cared for by our dear Nazira. I keep coming back to three details.

  “The first: You never betrayed me or my trust personally. I gave you many chances to use me against my city, and you never did.

  “The second: You saved my two little cousins when you did not have to. I saw them, in the city. I did not approach them. But they are alive, and happy. They would not have survived had you not gone back for them.

  “The third: You had ample opportunities to assassinate my uncle, and you never made that choice.”

  “I thought about it,” Radu whispered.

  “But you could not do it.”

  “No.”

  “Because you are a good person.”

  “How can you say that after what I did?” Radu finally looked at Cyprian, searched his face for the trick or the lie. Because it was not possible that Cyprian could look on him with anything but hate.

  “We were on different sides. I would have done the same, given the circumstances. I did do the same—I went into Edirne with the sole purpose of using you for information. But the sides we were on no longer exist.” Cyprian took a step, closing the distance between them. Radu could touch him, if he could lift a hand. If he were not paralyzed and terrified by what he wanted.

  “I told you once,” Cyprian said. “Do you remember?”

  “I remember every moment we spent together.”

  “I told you,” Cyprian said, with a tentative smile so full of hope it was physically painful to see, “that I would forgive you. I meant it.”

  Radu let out a breath like a sob. This could not be real. It was too big, too great a gift, too powerful a mercy. He had never had anything like this in his cruel and punishing life. He did not know it was possible. Radu lifted one trembling hand and—still half expecting Cyprian to turn away—placed it against his cheek. Cyprian lifted his own hand, covering Radu’s and twining their fingers together.

  “I meant it,” he whispered.

  Radu leaned forward and Cyprian met him halfway, their lips touching in a movement as familiar, as sacred, as healing as prayer.

  Hunedoara

  “I THOUGHT SHE WAS GOING to be kept in a house,” a man with a face like a turnip said, peering into Lada’s dank cell. The door was solid wood with a square—too small to fit through, too high to reach the lock on the other side—cut out of it. A barred window was set high in the wall opposite the door. A pile of matted and mildewed fur lay on a low cot, beneath which a much-used and little-cleaned chamber pot resided.

  “She is,” another guard out of her view said. “But she needs a little time to calm down. She killed four guards.”

  “Four of them?”

  Lada watched the first man’s face make an expression no turnip ever could. She did not smile. She did not break eye contact. He looked away first, tugging at his collar.

  A third man shouldered the others out of the way, carrying a metal tray with a bowl of porridge on it. “I know you prefer to eat your meals in the company of the dead.” He leaned close to the opening. “Seen the woodcuts myself. No human flesh for you today.” He jerked his chin toward the door. “Back up.”

  Lada did not move.

  “Back away from the door!”

  Lada still did not move.

  He shrugged, turning the bowl sideways and shoving it through the hole. It clattered to the rough stone floor, spilling its contents in a mess. “Next time I can bring something to make you feel more at home.” With a dead-eyed smile, he left. The other two settled into their chairs against the wall.

  Lada stood in front of the door, watching them.

  Hours later, her feet aching but her back still straight, someone she had never expected to see in a prison in Hunedoara came into view.

  “Hello, Lada.” Mara Brankovic smiled with bland formality as though this were a routine social call.

  “What are—” Lada took a deep breath, steeling herself against showing emotion. “Mehmed bought Matthias.”

  “He does not come cheap, this replacement king.” Mara wrinkled her nose, whether in distaste for Matthias or as a reaction to the odors of urine and despair that permeated the prison, Lada did not know. “I am sorry for this. You always insisted on taking the more difficult path. Think of how different your life would be if you had married Mehmed, as I advised long ago.”

  “You are not married, and here you are, free, while I am imprisoned,” Lada accused.

  “It took me many years and many sacrifices to get here. But I did it in an acceptable manner. I am sorry to see you like this. You may not believe me, but I sincerely hope this is the beginning of a new path for you. One that will not end in your death.”

  “All paths I take involve a tremendous amount of death.”

  Mara arched one elegant eyebrow. “I suppose you have only yourself to blame, then.”

  “I am perfectly capable of blaming you. And Mehmed. And my brother. And Matthias.”

  “Be that as it may, you were given opportunities. It did not have to end like this. It still does not.” Mara leaned closer, her voice dropping lower. “Matthias cannot kill you outright. You still have goodwill in Europe for your success against Mehmed and for your willingness to fight. He is keeping your imprisonment a secret, so no aid will come. Only Mehmed knows that you are here. I am not to tell even your brother. As far as Wallachia is concerned, you disappeared into the mountains and abandoned them. Matthias will keep you for as long as he feels necessary. Play your part, be demure, at least pretend to be tamed, and eventually you may be able to arrange an advantageous marriage that will get you out of here. Not to Moldavian nobility—that would be viewed as a threat. Your odds of marrying anyone important in Transylvania are quite small. I assume you want no Hungarians. I can make inquiries among Serbian nobility.”

  “Is that what Mehmed wants for me?” Lada asked, incredulous.

  “No, silly girl. That is what I want for you. It makes me sad to see you locked up. You are so young. You have an entire lifetime ahead of you. Do not waste it on this. Be good, marry. And then use that to secure more power. I am leaving this afternoon, but I will start looking for prospects and suggest to Matthias that an eventual arranged marriage for you is in his best interest. Bu
t you must do your part.” She passed a tightly wrapped bundle through the hole. Lada took it, feeling its weight.

  “No weapons,” she said, disappointed.

  “It is a dress, which is a subtle sort of weapon you will have to learn to use.”

  Lada tossed the bundle aside. “I have never been good at subtlety.”

  “I hope you will change your mind. Please know I wish only the best for you.”

  Lada opened her large eyes as wide as they went, tilted her head, and smiled. “Come in here and let me embrace you for your kindness.”

  Mara backed up a step, shaking her head. “Yes, you will certainly need to work on your acting skills. I have no desire to be anyone’s hostage. Goodbye, Lada. Good luck.”

  Mara disappeared, and Lada stared at the empty space the other woman had so fully occupied. She had often imagined what she could do with Mehmed’s resources. The money and the land, yes, but especially minds as clever and ruthless as Mara’s at her disposal. Mehmed did not deserve Mara.

  No man did, as Mara well knew. And still her advice was for Lada to marry. Did everything really come back to that?

  * * *

  Matthias waited an entire day before coming to see her. “Why have you not changed?” he asked, eyeing Lada’s dirty, blood-stained tunic, which she still wore over her chain mail. The dress Mara had given her lay on the floor, half in the mess from the dumped porridge.

  Lada did not answer. She had slept only a few hours, preferring to let rage sustain her. The tapestry of power that she had spent so many years collecting threads for had once again been pulled apart by a man. A stupid man. He would pay.

  “I cannot let you out looking like that. And you will get a chill wearing your chain mail in there.”

  Lada neither moved nor changed her expression, continuing to stare at Matthias with hooded eyes.

  He shifted, shoulders twitching as though trying to shrug off some unseen irritant. “Did you consider I am doing this for your own benefit? Many people want you dead, little prince.” He spat out the last word as a mockery. “You are safer here than you would be in Wallachia. Consider it my penance to the Dracul line. My father killed your father. I am keeping you alive.” He waited. For what, Lada could not imagine. Gratitude? Weeping? He would get nothing from her.

  “Change your clothes!” he snarled. “I have prepared a house for you, but you will not disrespect my hospitality by looking like an animal.”

  Lada finally let a hint of a smile break the flatness of her expression. But still she did not answer.

  “Guards!” Matthias yelled. He turned back to her. “If you will not accept my generosity gracefully, we will help you.”

  Matthias moved out of her view. A lock clicked, and the bar to the door slid free. The guards were ready when they rushed her.

  Lada was readier. She ducked under the arms of the first, kicked the knee of the second so hard that it popped. The third caught her wrist, but she twisted and threw her elbow into his nose. She was almost to the door when it was yanked shut. The lock clicked again.

  “Now you cannot get out.” The first guard, the one with the turnip face, held his arms out as though he expected her to run past him, to the other corner of her cell.

  Lada bared her teeth at him in a smile. “Neither can you.”

  A flicker of uncertainty passed over his face. Then Lada launched herself at him. She knocked him to the stone floor. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her down with him as he tried to pin her. Their faces smashed against each other’s. She opened her mouth and bit down, hard, on his throat. He screamed, and her mouth filled with blood.

  She was tackled from behind, her forehead bouncing hard off the floor. A knee dug into her back, then she was grabbed by her hair, and her head slammed into the floor twice more for good measure. Lights spun in her vision, and she did not know how much of the blood in her mouth was her own now.

  “You stupid little bitch,” the guard on top of her said, out of breath. He shifted to the side to get a grip on her clothes. Lada planted her palms on the floor and pushed with all her strength, knocking him off-balance. He fell to the floor. She stood and stomped with every scrap of strength she had.

  His windpipe collapsed beneath her foot. As he grabbed at his throat, desperate for air that would never again fill his lungs, she turned to the remaining men.

  Judging by the amount of blood on the floor from the turnip-faced man’s torn throat, only one guard remained. He was pressed against the wall, balanced on one leg because of his damaged knee, banging on the door.

  “Please! Please let me out!”

  Lada looked past him at the door’s viewing hole. Matthias stared back at her, aghast. “If you would stop behaving like a rabid beast, I could help you,” he said.

  It had been years since Lada had killed a man without weapons. Her head swam from the blows, and she spat. She did not like the taste in her mouth. And she did not like the bodies on the floor. Why had they made her do this? “I have already had your version of help. I do not need any more. But he does. Open the door.”

  Matthias turned his head. “Get me more men!” he barked.

  “They will not come soon enough.” Lada spat blood again. The man next to the door had begun weeping. Matthias did not follow her order to open the door. She could show no weakness. She went far into herself, past the animal instincts that had propelled her to kill the other men. This one was more of a choice.

  But there was no choice. She would do what must be done, as she always had.

  Matthias, coward that he was, did not even watch as Lada broke his soldier’s other knee, and then his neck.

  * * *

  Lada knew what Mara would have advised her. What Radu would have. What Nicolae would have. What even Daciana would have.

  Play the part. Do as she was told. Survive.

  But she was a prince. She had other methods of survival. She had cut through years and lives to get there. There were those in Europe who still believed in her, and those in Wallachia who would never give up on her.

  She was prince. She did not have it in her to be anything else. And she would never give Matthias the satisfaction of thinking he had beaten her.

  An hour later, the next attempt to dress her involved ten men. Lada did not stand a chance, and she knew it. But she did as much damage as she could in the meantime. After they had stripped her of her chain mail, leaving only her underclothes on, they kicked her and threw her in the corner. Then they grabbed the three bodies and hurried from her cell. That, at least, was gratifying.

  Standing as carefully as she could to avoid showing how much she had been hurt over the course of the two attacks, Lada stalked to the door.

  “At least now you look like a woman,” Matthias said.

  “And yet you still look nothing like a king.” She smiled, her teeth bloody, her face covered in gore, until he turned with a poorly suppressed shudder and left.

  Only when night had fallen and it was dark did she finally collapse onto the cot, curling around herself and feeling everything she had lost.

  Tirgoviste

  NAZIRA, TRUE TO HER word, had not only set herself and Fatima up in a room but had also secured the one next to it, for Radu. Radu was curled around Cyprian in the dark. He had thought he would never be happy in this castle.

  He had been wrong.

  He pressed his forehead against Cyprian’s, relishing the tickle of the other man’s breath on his face. It meant this was real. Radu would take all the evidence he could get.

  They lay on top of Radu’s bed, limbs tangled. Their discarded boots and turbans lay on the floor. Radu wrapped his fist in Cyprian’s shirt, pulling him closer. “I cannot believe you are actually here.”

  Cyprian laughed, the sound as soft and intimate as the darkness around them. “You have no idea how long I have wanted this.”
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br />   “You could…tell me?”

  Radu felt the laughter in Cyprian’s chest. He put his palm flat against it, relishing the beat of the other man’s heart. His heart now, too.

  “You know I wanted to know you from the first moment we met.”

  “I remember that, too. You made an impression when I thought I could not see anyone but…” Radu drifted off. There were still so many tender edges of their history that they would have to be careful around. It had been filled with terrible things. Which only made this miracle of connection feel even more precious and sacred.

  “It was my smile, right?” Cyprian nuzzled his face against Radu’s cheek, and Radu felt the smile there.

  “No, that caught me our second meeting. The first, it was your eyes.”

  “Hmm,” Cyprian said. “It was not your eyes that attracted me.”

  “What was it?”

  “I do not know if anyone has ever told you, but you are quite a beautiful person.”

  This time it was Radu’s turn to laugh, though his was sheepish. “I have heard that on occasion. Though the term more preferred is ‘Radu the Handsome.’ ”

  “Radu cel Frumos,” Cyprian murmured, using the Wallachian words. His own language had never sounded so lovely to Radu. Even the name that had been used as a taunt sounded new and clean when Cyprian used it. It gave him hope that his past would not haunt him forever. He had not done or experienced anything he could not recover from—not with Cyprian at his side.

  “It is such a relief to be able to touch you,” Cyprian said, brushing his lips across Radu’s throat. Radu’s pulse strained with the effort of keeping up with his emotions. He had imagined how these things would feel, but he had never come close. Every part of his body was alive in a way he had felt only in battle. But instead of feeling disconnected and merely reacting to things around him, he felt completely and utterly connected to himself. Every touch, every move was deliberate.