The Kadin - Bertrice Small [100]
The Janissaries and the Tartars were as one when they entered the city. They passed through the gates, those hard, disciplined young men, and for one of the few times in Turkish history, the Janissaries were cheered.
Behind them danced a group of gaily appareled children, their skin hues as varied as the colors of their costumes. Some carried baskets of flower petals, which they scattered on the ground about them Others had baskets of gold dinars, which they flung to the crowds. The people went wild.
Following the children was Prince Selim, mounted on Devil Wind. The prince was dressed all in white. He wore tight-fitting silk breeches, a white silk shirt embroidered with gold thread, and a magnificent white silk coat styled in the Persian manner, which was embroidered with gold thread and dotted with small diamonds. His high boots were a soft, gold-colored suede. On his short-cropped dark head he wore a small white turban, the most predominant feature of which was a hen’s-egg-sized yellow diamond from which sprang an egret’s feather. A white wool cloak with a hammered gold clasp flowed down his shoulders and over the horse’s dark flanks.
The crowds screamed themselves hoarse at the sight of their handsome, smiling prince. He rode with ease, holding himself straight and occasionally raising a gloved hand to wave at the sea of people. They cheered.
Behind him rode his personal guard, and following them were Selim’s kadins and their children. The men in the crowd were merely curious about the unattainable, but the women of Constantinople were beside themselves with excitement at seeing these fabled creatures, their clothing, and their jewels.
Their anticipation was well rewarded. The prince’s wives rode in gilded howdahs hung with pale-green draperies, each mounted upon the back of a dainty white camel wearing a red harness hung with gold bells. The kadins were ranked according to their standing in Selim’s household, Cyra coming first. Each was followed by her sons mounted upon white horses; and following each prince came his sister or sisters in rose-garlanded, gilded willow carts drawn by little gray mules and led by small black boys.
The young princes were full of pride at their part in the procession and sat straight in their saddles, but of the four daughters of Prince Selim, not one acted the same. Nilufer, Cyra’s daughter, sat alert and wide-eyed at her first visit to the city. Hale, one of Firousi’s twins, laughingly threw sweetmeats to the urchins who scrambled amid the procession, while her sister, Guzel, sat shyly beside her, wishing they were in a litter and feeling no protection in her veil. Mihri-Chan, Sarina’s baby daughter, cuddled in her nurse’s arms, alternately throwing kisses to the noisy crowds and playing peek-a-boo with her chubby fingers.
The procession wended its way through the city toward the palace on the hill. The sun was high and hot, but the crowds lining the route stood their ground, and the water vendors did a brisk business.
Selim thought his face would crack with the strain of smiling. He did not feel like smiling, but the people demanded a happy prince, and at least this day they would have one. The painful events of the past week were etched sharply in his mind, and he pondered them carefully. His father lay near death, or so he thought His brother had fled, and now he, Selim, was entering the capital in triumph. If Ahmed attempted to return to the city, he would kill him. He would probably kill him anyway. There was no doubt in his mind now that he would be sultan.
He chided himself for growing son these past years. The softness was neither of mind nor body, but of attitude. For too long he had been separated from Constantinople. Thanks to Hadji Bey, be had always been informed on all state business, but it wasn’t like being in the midst of it Safe in the country at his Moonlight Serai, surrounded by the love and the warmth of his family, he had almost forgotten that his mother had borne him to replace his brother. Well, there was no longer a Moonlight Serai. It lay behind them