The Spring of the Ram - Dorothy Dunnett [185]
He couldn’t believe, yet, that the plan had become more than a plan. He had been wrenched away with the foundations half laid. Half laid Turkish-style, he thought, with ram’s blood mixed with the chalk and the mortar. He had bled. Perhaps it would stand firm. Unless it was still not his plan, but Pagano Doria’s.
The eunuch had gone. What was required? An act of homage, perhaps, like the boy’s. Arrived before the glittering dais, Nicholas sank at some cost to his knees, touched the ground with his brow, and then rose and stood. Finally he took his gamble and spoke. “Sara Khatun?”
He heard the little rustle on either side among the women behind him. In front of him, the enthroned woman gave him a long, contemplative look. He thought she would speak in Arabic. Instead, she used the Trapezuntine Greek of her great-niece. She said, “Who else, Messer Niccolò? But a moment ago, you were confounded.”
“I am still confounded, princess,” he said. “But I guessed the name of the Khatun from the painting.”
She didn’t glance round. She said, “Artisans do not read Farid ud-Din Attar.”
He had turned the pages of the Thirty Birds in the Palace, dressed-undressed—under a robe. He contradicted her gently, with a quotation. I am not that bird who will reach the King’s door. To reach the keeper of his gate will be enough for me. If she did not, he appreciated the irony.
The eyes remained on him. Then she tilted her head and spoke, but not to him. “Well?” she said. “If this is not humility, and it is not, then it is insolence. Come and help me deal with it.”
He had expected a woman to join her, and then saw that he was, of course, quite wrong. The figure moving out from the screen was that of a man robed and hatted in black, with a forked white beard spreading over the old copper cross on his breast. Nicholas said, not entirely with pleasure, “Diadochos.”
One person who would, all too well, perceive the irony. In the chamber of Violante of Naxos, he had discussed Persian books in his presence. The monk seemed to smile. He said, “Messer Niccolò, you are in Erzerum. As you have guessed, this is the lady Sara, noble mother of the lord Uzum Hasan, prince of Diyarbekr; lord of High Mesopotamia; chief of the White Sheep tribe of the Turcomans. To her you owe your present safety.”
So it was his plan, and not Doria’s. But for the way it had been carried out, he would have felt relief. He said, “I must convey gratitude for those of us who survived the rescue. Did it include Master Julius?”
The monk said, “The manner of your rescue was no concern of the Khatun’s. Men were hired to bring you here, for your sake and your safety. They found you in difficulty. They killed your oppressors, all but the leader and a few of his servants, who escaped. They removed you. They were too rough, I know it. But your scars may yet serve you well.”
“And Master Julius?” Nicholas repeated.
The woman made a disparaging movement. “He is a child. Must you copy him?”
“He is not a child. He is a man, and a friend. I don’t wish to copy him,” Nicholas said, “I wish to see him. And then the camel train.”
Diadochos said, “This year, they are late.” The woman’s eyes narrowed.
Nicholas said, “They are here. I heard them. Do you want to let them take their merchandise through to Erzincan and Sivas and Bursa, with all the Ottoman armies lying off to the west? I hear Amastris has surrendered to Sultan Mehmet.”
“Indeed?” said the woman. Her hands had tightened.
“The Sultan was there in person. No one knows where he will march next.” Nicholas paused. “I am a merchant. I, too, am concerned with the course of these wars, and how they will affect my company. It may be convenient for us to compare what we know. Once I have seen Master Julius.”
He had wondered if they knew about the loss of Amastris. He had got the news from a flockmaster. Amastris lay on the Black Sea west of Sinope and was run as a Genoese trading base. He couldn’t weep for the Genoese; not at the moment. But if the Sultan’s gaze was already turned to the East, he might look closer and further.