Now that she was here, she did not know what she had expected to accomplish. Rebury him? Bring his remains back to the castle? Say a prayer over his body, one that might as well be blasphemy for all the sincerity it held? She finally had to admit that she had seized on this adventure mainly as a way of escaping the city. Toma had been pestering her, wanting to talk about various Danesti boyars and their loyalties—how to gain them, why she needed them, what marriages might cement them. The other boyar lines were not thrilled with her ascension, but they would not object as long as they profited. The Danesti lines took it personally, though. Toma never passed up an opportunity to circle back to the subject of marriage with a Danesti, dangling the possibility in front of Lada with all the subtlety of a noose.
Finally she had told him she would meet with every Danesti boyar at the same time, and left him to plan it for her. She was certain his letter-writing skills far surpassed her own; he would know what to say to get the boyars to come. Her idea had been to tell them to come or forfeit their land and their lives. Toma had laughed like she had made a wonderful joke.
At least Mircea was dead, and she did not have to listen to him. That made him preferable to Toma. “How did he die?” she asked.
“He died well,” the soldier said, voice tight as he stared straight ahead.
Lada snorted. “You are a liar. My brother was a bully and a coward. He would not have died well. He would have died fighting, or begging for his life. Which was it?”
The soldier shifted uncomfortably. “He died fighting.”
“If he died fighting, why did you not say that to begin with?”
The soldier swallowed, saying nothing further.
“Dig him up.”
The man finally met her eyes, horror shifting his dull expression into something childlike. “But—”
“Dig him up.”
The man looked from the grave to Lada, then back again. “But we have no shovels, no tools.”
Lada reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a hard loaf of bread. She broke off pieces and passed them to Bogdan and Petru. They dismounted and dragged an old stump over for Lada to sit on. She made herself comfortable. The soldier still stared dumbly. Lada pulled out a knife, setting it on the stump. “You have your hands. For now.”
The man began digging.
The sun was directly overhead by the time he finished. His fingernails bled and he cradled his hands to his chest as he backed away from the body he had unearthed. Lada held her cloak over her nose. It would have been better had she taken the throne in the winter. It was warm enough now for her to smell him.
But that was not the troubling part. Her brother—Mircea the cruel, Mircea the hated, Mircea the dead—did not stare up at her with the accusing eyes of the dead. He did not stare up at all.
She was looking at the back of his head.
“Turn him over,” she said.
Gagging, the soldier reached into the grave and maneuvered the corpse so it was faceup. Mircea’s skin was waxy and thin where it had not been eaten away to the bone. His fingers, too, looked like the soldier’s—nails broken and caked with dirt. Mircea’s mouth was open in a scream, black with rot. Lada leaned closer. No—it was black with dirt, all the way down as far as she could see.
“You buried him alive,” she said.
The soldier shook his head frantically. “I had nothing to do with it. It was Hunyadi’s men and the Danesti prince.”
“But you were there.”
The man shook his head, then nodded, foolish tears of desperation leaking from his eyes. “But I did not kill him!”
Lada sighed, kicking the corpse of her brother back over so he could not see her. It was a terrible way to die. She imagined him twisting and turning, the weight of dirt suffocating him as he grew more and more disoriented. In the end, he had been clawing deeper into the earth, instead of toward the sun and freedom.
She wondered how her father had died. No one in Tirgoviste knew where he had been killed. Or, if they did, they were smart enough to say nothing. And she wondered about her own loyalty—and disloyalty—to Hunyadi, the man who had helped the Danesti boyars kill both her brother and father. The boyars whose support she was still courting. Guilt and regret warred with resigned exhaustion. She did not know how to feel about this. Why could she have no easy relationships? Why was there no man in her life she could feel only one way about?
“I did not kill him, I did not kill him,” the soldier whispered, chant-like, as he rocked back and forth.
Lada did know how to feel about the soldier. She latched onto it with a startling ferocity. It offered her a lifeline, something solid and secure to react against. “I do not care if you killed him. He is dead. That problem is past us.”
The soldier slumped in relief. “Thank you, my lady.”
Lada sheathed her knife. “I am not your lady. I am your prince. And while the death of Mircea is not our problem, your lying to me is.”
The soldier looked up, fear curling his lips to reveal his teeth, sticking out just like those in Mircea’s agonized skull.
“Bogdan, a rope.”
Bogdan took a rope out of his saddlebag. Lada tied it tightly around the soldier’s wrists. She tossed the free end to Petru. He nodded grimly, then tied it to his saddle.
“What are you going to do to me?” the soldier asked through clattering teeth.
“We are taking you back to Tirgoviste as an example of what happens to those who do not honor the truth.”
“What if he cannot keep up with the horses?” Petru asked.
Lada looked at the open grave of her brother, where his corpse once again faced the dirt that had claimed him. “That is what the rope is for.”
She spurred her horse forward, going too fast for any man to run long enough to keep from being dragged to his death.
She did not look back.
47
May 29
DAWN CAME AT last. Birds circled overhead, dark silhouettes against the sky, drawn by the carnage beneath. Soon they would descend.
Nazira and Radu ran as quickly as they could. The streets had filled with groups of citizens, clustered together and panicking. “Is it true?” a man shouted as they sprinted past. “Are they in the city?”
“Run!” Nazira screamed.
The man dropped to his knees and began praying instead. Behind them, they heard the sounds of conflict drawing closer. There were no Byzantine soldiers in the city—no one left to fight—but the Ottomans surging over the wall did not know that. They would come ready to fight in the streets, and when they realized there was no one left to bar their way …
“We have to get Cyprian out,” Radu said, gasping for air. “Valentin, too.”
“How?”
The way to Galata would be closed. The Ottomans would anticipate that. The bells on the seawall began clanging a warning. If the Ottoman soldiers in the galleys knew the city had been taken, they would be eager to join the pillaging. The seawalls were barely manned now, and with word spreading through the city that the walls had fallen, everyone would abandon their posts, leaving the sailors free to climb over. No one wanted to miss out on the looting. Nothing was off-limits—gold, jewelry, people. Anything that could be moved and sold would be.
But if the seawalls were not manned, and all the sailors rushed into the city—
“The horn,” Radu said. “We make for the horn. There are still the Italian ships. We may even be able to steal one of the Ottoman galleys.”
“Are you certain we will meet no resistance?” Nazira asked.
Radu could not be certain of anything. “It is our best chance.”
“What about Mehmed? You could ride out to meet him.”
They collapsed against Cyprian’s door. His home was deep enough in the city that no sounds of fighting had reached it yet. “I will not leave you and Cyprian here, not for anything,” Radu said. “I can come back when the three days of looting are over and everything has settled.”
Nazira squeezed his hand; then they ran into the house. “Valentin!” Nazira shouted.
The boy rushed down the stairs, nearly falling. “We heard the bells. Cyprian is getting dressed to fight. I told him not to, but—”
Nazira handed Valentin his cloak. “The city is falling. We are running.”
Radu looked up to see Cyprian standing at the top of the stairs. His injury had left him unable to get out of bed for more than a few minutes at a time without becoming dizzy. He was as pale and bleak as the dawn. “My uncle?”
Radu shook his head. “It is over. If we do not run now, we will not get out alive.”