Dragon Slayer (Sons of Rome Book 3)

by Lauren Gilley

  Then the man turned his gaze to Vlad and said, in Slavic, “Welcome to Edirne, your graces.”

  They’d been brought to the Ottoman capital, then.

  In the heart of enemy territory.

  ~*~

  In 1437, Vlad Dracul sighed a treaty with the Ottoman Sultan, Murat, that made Wallachia a vassal state of the empire. In exchange for their promise of peace, the Wallachians were assured trade and diplomatic relations, and some semblance of autonomy. In addition to cooperation, Dracul would provide a yearly monetary tribute, as well as a selection of able-bodied boys destined for the sultan’s Janissary Corps.

  Vlad knew this, had been briefed on it as both a student and a prince. And he also knew that his father – turning John Hunyadi away despite his own personal sympathies – had upheld the treaty, and never broken it.

  And yet here they were.

  The sultan received them in an audience chamber with soaring, painted ceilings, and brightly-colored tiles on the floors, tapestries on the walls. Multiple fountains filled the vast space with the musical splash of water. Massive, glazed urns boasted flowers and ferns. The plants nearly disguised the armored janissaries that lined the walls, spears propped against their shoulders.

  Mama would love this, Vlad thought, faintly. Though she wouldn’t love the circumstances. Then he pushed all such soft thoughts aside. He was a hostage – and he didn’t plan on being one for long.

  He and Val had been separated, their hands re-cuffed in front of them. The walked side-by-side. Val stared at his dusty boots, still sniffling occasionally; he trembled like a new foal and reeked of fear.

  For his part, Vlad held his head high, his shoulders thrown as far back as the cuffs would allow, and faced the puppet master behind their abduction as they were marched forward to a low dais where a gathering of men awaited them.

  They were advisors and scribes; a messenger boy, bare-chested under an embroidered vest. All wore jewel tones, rich fabrics, and elaborate turbans, each unique, displaying the wearer’s individual aesthetic.

  Sultan Murat II was seated. That was the only thing that distinguished him from his viziers. A compact, tidy man, he was even handsome, though unremarkably so; he wore the usual neatly trimmed beard and white muslin turban. His dress was that of royalty: an indigo kaftan with gold embroidery and buttons, gold silk şalvar, a kusak of bright teal around his waist.

  One of the soldiers stopped Vlad with a hand on his shoulder, the other on Val’s. Then he pushed them down to their knees on the tiles, so they knelt before the sultan and his retinue.

  Vlad growled – he couldn’t help it, and these men already knew what he was. Why hide it? Why not show them that he was well aware he was a monster, and ready to make use of that fact?

  A flat palm struck him hard, right in the ear. For a moment, his vision whited out and the pain of the strike was a burst of light, and then a sharp sting, and then a faded red roar that echoed through his entire head.

  Vlad gritted his teeth and breathed through it. He wouldn’t give any of them the satisfaction of crying out.

  Val did, though, a soft little exclamation. “Vlad!”

  Shut up, Vlad thought, wildly, even as his own head rang. Shut up, shut up, or they’ll hit you, too!

  His vision cleared, spots receding off to the edges, and he saw that the man who’d first welcomed them stood before him now, frowning. A vizier, or a mullah. Something.

  “Do not speak to the sultan,” the man said in Slavic, voice vibrating with contained fury. “And don’t you dare growl, you immortal, amoral dog. You are no creature of God. Do not sully our sultan with your profanity. You should be grateful to even be in his presence. You should kiss the floor and–”

  “Ali,” a voice called out, low and commanding.

  The man’s teeth clicked together with an audible snap. He stepped back, and revealed that it was the sultan who’d spoken, his unreadable gaze pinned on Vlad.

  “I am perfectly capable of speaking for myself,” Murat said in flawless Romanian. Then, to Vlad: “I welcome you to Edirne, Vlad Dracula.” He looked at Val. “Radu Dracula. The sons of the prince of Wallachia.” Back to Vlad: “Trust that you are here in a gesture of goodwill. Your father has been, up to now, quite agreeable in our negotiations. Your presence here ensures that such agreeable conduct will continue. You will be fed, and cared for, and educated, as befits any prince. In exchange for such luxuries, I expect your cooperation and good behavior.” He tilted his head to the side. “Do we understand one another?”

  Hostages, Vlad thought. They were political hostages, here to ensure that Father never betrayed his Ottoman masters.

  Vlad took a deep breath and said, “Understanding doesn’t automatically lead to cooperation.”

  He was struck again, across the back of his head this time. He tasted blood.

  Val let out a frightened, strangled sound.

  Shut up!

  “That’s enough,” the sultan said. “He can’t agree to anything if his mind’s addled.”

  Vlad braced a hand on the floor. The tile beneath was blue and white, patterned like flowers. Or stars. Blood dripped from his lip in regular splats, the bright crimson a contrast.

  “Prince Vlad,” the sultan said from above him. “You can resist this if you want to, but it will be easier for you if you don’t. Easier for both of you.”

  Head still ringing, it took a moment for the sultan’s words to sink in, but when they did…

  A chill skittered down Vlad’s back. That was how they would manipulate him, then: by threatening his little brother.

  He lifted his head, and found the sultan staring at him.

  “Do we understand one another?” Murat asked again, voice smooth and cool.

  Vlad swallowed a mouthful of his own blood. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  ~*~

  They were taken to a bathing chamber, one with a sunken center full of steaming water, tiled in cool blue. Very Roman, Vlad thought, before his clothes were stripped off and he was shoved unceremoniously in. Val tumbled in after him, yelping. Vlad steadied him with a hand on his small shoulder and pulled them out deep into the water, until their heads were the only things breaking the surface.

  Through the haze of steam, Val looked at him with tear-filled eyes. “Vlad,” he whispered. “I want to go home.”

  “I know, but we can’t.” Not yet, he added silently. Because they were only boys, and it would take time to formulate an escape plan. But as slaves joined them, with sweet-smelling oils and floral soaps in their hands, Vlad made a vow that someday, hopefully soon, he would get his brother out of this beautiful prison, and take him home.

  After, when they were scrubbed pink and clean, dressed in soft silk kaftans and şalvar, they were escorted to a chamber with barred windows that looked down on an elaborate garden below. Two beds were made up, in the Turkish style, a series of doubled-over and stacked carpets cushioned with silk and satin, across from a washstand with basin and ewer, a wardrobe full of clothes. Ottoman clothes.

  Their guard, a stiff-backed, armored contrast to the lavishness of the palace, said, “You will be sent for in the morning,” in Slavic, and then retreated. He closed the door behind him, and a key grated in the lock. When his footsteps had receded down the hall, Vlad said, “Fuck,” with great feeling.

  Val, who’d been valiantly fighting his tears for hours, dissolved into silent, body-wracking sobs, his hands covering his face.

  “Oh, Valerian,” Vlad sighed, and crossed the room to pull his brother into his arms. Val buried his face immediately into Vlad’s chest, his little arms going around his waist. His breath rushed hot and quick through the buttonholes of Vlad’s kaftan, fanning across his chest.

  Vlad held him close and smoothed a hand through his soft golden hair, still damp from the bath, smelling of roses and lavender. “Listen to me,” he urged. “I know this is terrible, and frightening. But I’m going to get us free. I promise you that. You just have to trust me and not dr
aw any attention to yourself.”

  Val mumbled something.

  “What?”

  “What happened to Father?”

  Vlad took a deep breath, and tried not to let it shake on the exhale. “I don’t know,” he said, which was mostly the truth. He feared Father had been tortured for information – a prospect made more likely by the fact that someone had told Murat that they were vampires. Did they know Father was? Had they pinned him down, as his blood gushed across the stones, and cut out his heart? “I’m sure he’s fine,” he told Val.

  “Will he come for us?” he whimpered into Vlad’s collarbone. “He will, won’t he?”

  “Maybe.”

  Vlad looked up, over his brother’s head, and out the grilled window, into the garden below, melting into rich sunset golds and indigos as the shadows grew long. The high, smooth white walls gleamed faintly, sheer and shiny, as if polished. Not a toe-hold in sight.

  He took a deep breath and forced his panic down deep in his gut. No doubt it would eventually fester, might boil and rise to choke him, a black sickness of worry and dread. But for now, it settled, a cold lump that he could still breathe around.

  “I’m sure Father will negotiate our release. This is how this sort of thing works. We’ll be kept here a bit, and when Father pays, the sultan will send us back.”

  But will he? a tiny voice asked in the back of his mind.

  ~*~

  Dawn saw Vlad at the window, his elbows braced on the wide stone sill, skinny arms draped through the elaborate silver bars. Watching the sun rise in vibrant pinks and oranges above the tumbling deciduous forests around the Ottoman capital. Beyond the onion domes and spires of mosques, beyond the unclimbable palace walls, the land reminded him of home. The sharp tang of pine needles and the breathless quality of mountain air.

  But inside, everything he could touch was foreign.

  It was Sultan Murat, he recalled, who’d changed the city’s name – formally, among the Turks – to Edirne. Before, the Latin name by which he knew it, it had been called Adrianople, named for the Roman emperor Hadrian, that visionary engineer who’d designed the wall by the same name.

  The heir was here, Vlad thought, being educated. And the hostages of the Ottoman court. Of which they were now two.

  A sound from the pallet behind him drew his attention and he put his back to the sunrise to see the faint light play across his sleeping brother’s face.

  If it had been up to Vlad, he would have sat on the floor, back to the wall all night, and kept watch. But Val had been exhausted, and tearful, and hadn’t been able to bear sleeping alone. So they’d settled down on a single pallet together; Vlad had woken a few minutes ago with Val’s head shoved up under his chin, his little hands clutching tight to his kaftan. Exhaustion was the only thing that had kept the boy from waking when Vlad extricated himself and slipped away.

  Vlad studied him now, heartsick. Tears had dried on Val’s cheeks, their tracks tight and shiny in the early light. The top few buttons of his kaftan had come loose during the night, and the garment gapped now, revealing a delicate wedge of throat, pulse beating in its hollow. His fingers clutched tight at a pillow, knuckles white.

  The problem was, Vlad had heard stories. The kinds of stories the wolves had whispered to one another, followed sometimes by shudders or uncomfortable laughter. The kinds of stories children weren’t supposed to overhear. He’d heard what sometimes happened to beautiful little boys who were abducted and taken as hostages.

  Vlad, with his almost gaunt face, and his gangly limbs, and his dark eyes with even darker smudges beneath, was not the sort of boy that anyone had ever called beautiful.

  But Val was.

  Women were always wanting to pinch his cheek, and men awkwardly mistook him for a girl more oft than not. And then there had been the looks that made Vlad’s blood boil – the careful, slanted, breath-held looks of people, boys their age and grown men alike, who set eyes on Val and wanted him. Sometimes it was a nameless longing, but others it dripped with intent.

  Because Valerian was beautiful. And so Vlad’s stomach ached now, because terrible, terrible things happened to beautiful boys in war.

  As if sensing that he was being watched, Val shifted and opened his eyes a crack. He made a low, inquiring sound that was all vampire, and not at all human.

  Vlad answered, a soft rumble in his throat like a lion cub, then crossed to the pallet and sank down to his knees. “We can’t make noises like that. They’ll know we’re not mortal.”

  Val blinked a few times, clearing his vision, and then sat up, frowning and rubbing his eyes. “I thought they already knew? The cuffs were silver.” His sleeve slipped down to reveal the still-pink mark of one of them.

  Vlad suppressed a growl. “Well. The sultan knows, at least. And maybe some of the others. But we don’t know how many know. It’s safer to pretend we’re mortal.” Because if some unsuspecting fool tried to kill them, they probably wouldn’t succeed that way.

  “Al-alright,” Val murmured, and swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing hard. “I’m…Vlad, I’m really scared.” His breath hitched, and his lip trembled, and his eyes filled with fresh tears.

  He couldn’t keep doing this, Vlad thought. Emotion was weakness. Tears inspired cruelty.

  And Vlad wanted to bite throats and claw open stomachs when his baby brother was upset like this. He couldn’t think.

  So his voice came out harsh when he said, “You have to stop that.”

  Val’s mouth fell open, expression slack with surprise. The tears swelled, and they were tears of hurt now, caused by his own brother.

  Vlad hated that. Hated himself for causing it. And the anger fell out of his mouth as an order. And an insult. “Don’t be a baby, Val. What good do you think crying’s going to do? Do you want to draw attention to yourself?”

  “N-n-no–”

  “No more crying, Val, I mean that. It’s time to grow up. Can you do that?”

  His watery blue eyes fell to the floor, the plump cushions and rugs under their knees. He said, very softly, “Yes, brother.”

  Vlad heard the sound of footsteps out in the hall, distant but coming closer. He moved around Val, put himself between his brother and the door. By the time a key turned in the lock, and the portal swung inward, he was on his feet, hands balled into fists at his sides, a growl barely checked behind his teeth.

  But it was only a slave, bearing a breakfast tray. He looked up, startled by the aggression in Vlad’s stance, and hastened to set the tray between two colorful rugs that Vlad realized were mats for sitting and eating.

  A janissary lingered at the door, hand on the knob, sword at his hip and flat gaze trained on Vlad. “Eat,” he suggested. “Before they come to drag you in front of the mullahs.”

  The slave scurried out, and then the door was pulled shut and relocked.

  ~*~

  When they were alone, Vlad could admit that his stomach was gnawing on itself he was so hungry. The tray, when he approached it, smelled of strange humans, but not of anything harmful. And better: it smelled of meat…and of blood.

  Still, he approached it slowly, balanced on his toes, and pulled the lids off the dishes in a quick flurry, jerking back to avoid any kind of a trap.

  All that looked up at him was breakfast.

  Two platters heaped with soft warm flatbread, and roasted lamb, and cups of water, and tea, and heated sheep’s blood. He wanted to refuse it; to cast the whole tray against the wall and watch the cups break, and the blood spray bright across the floor. But he needed his strength, and so did Val.

  “Come eat, brother,” he ordered, and settled down cross-legged on one of the rugs.

  Val hurried to sit beside him, pressed tight to his side, shaking, breathing shallow.

  Vlad pressed a cup of blood into his hand. “Drink.” And he did.

  By the time their bellies were full, another slave had brought a ewer of hot water, and the same janissary as before told them to wash their hands a
nd faces in the little bowls provided for the purpose. Vlad helped Val wash the last sticky residue of blood from his mouth, and finger-combed his hair with damp fingers, but refused to wash his own greasy face.

  Fuck what the sultan wanted.

  Because during breakfast, he’d begun to form a partial plan. If he played the role of the rebellious boy, the one who talked back and didn’t follow orders, then golden Val would look sweet and obedient by contrast. Vlad would earn the punishments all for himself, because he could endure them…

  And because he would enjoy being disobedient.

  When the janissary came back – with a friend this time – to cuff them and lead them away, he took a look at Vlad’s messy hair and no-doubt shiny face and shook his head a fraction. “You’ll probably regret that.”

  Vlad shrugged.

  Their escorts marched them down a long hallway with pale stone walls and more painted tile floors. Open windows let in shafts of morning sunlight, white-gold, heatless. They went down a gentle half-turn of a staircase and then down another hall, a parallel of the one above, in reverse. Vlad twisted his hands, testing the cuffs. They didn’t break the skin, but they would if he twisted any harder, and he could feel the cold, dulling drone of the silver, a soundless buzzing that turned his arms numb all the way down to the bone.

  They were led through an open archway out into a patch of garden, down a short, gravel path to an open pavilion, flooded with sunlight, its tile floors laid with more woven mats like the ones they’d used at breakfast. Three rows of rugs, lined up neatly with a view of a courtyard. At the edges: trunks, heaps of scrolls, and stacks of heavy books.

  Some things were universal everywhere, and Vlad knew right away that this was a schoolroom.

  Two men with gray beards and long cream robes over their kaftans waited for them, and the janissary guards sent the boys forward with firm nudges.