There was a long stillness in the room, and then the voice said, "You received a present this day from Murad the Sultan, did you not?"
"Yes," he said bitterly. "A gift from the goodness of his heart."
"Where is the cat?" the voice asked.
Vlad looked around irritably and saw the little white kitten sleeping peacefully upon Radu's mat near the large eastern window. "There," he said casually. "Over there."
"Watch the cat, Little Dragon," the voice said. "Watch it carefully."
Despite his irritation, Vlad looked at the small animal and noticed that it was suddenly awake and visibly discomforted. The kitten rubbed its face with its forepaws, trembled, whined, and then leaped in confusion and pain. It rushed over toward him, its little face contorted in terror. And then Vlad noticed that the face was not truly contorted; it was changing, shifting its shape, melting into a visage utterly unfeline. In a moment a miniature head of the sultan stared up at him from the shaking body of the little cat.
"Here is a token of my friendship, Little Dragon," the voice said. "I have other plans for our friend Murad, but for your pleasure I shall allow you to enjoy some small vengeance upon his image."
Vlad gulped and tried to speak, but no words issued forth from his mouth. He continued to stare at the monstrosity that sat upon the marble floor in front of him, the diminutive Turkish head perched atop the white kitten's frame. The Murad face moved its small lips but managed only to hiss a cry of uncomprehending terror.
At last Vlad was able to force himself to ask, "Are you God?"
The voice laughed. "No, Little Dragon, far from that. And yet He and I are associates of long standing."
"Are you an angel, or a saint?"
"Perhaps I should not have said 'associates,' Little Dragon. God and I are adversaries, we are enemies."
Vlad finally understood. "Ordogh!" he whispered, addressing the voice after the manner of his people. "Ordogh!" The Devil.
"At your service," the voice said. "Take my gift to you, Little Dragon. Let us be friends. Let us help each other. Take my gift."
Vlad stared back down at the misshapen creature, and it seemed that the Murad face twisted its lips into a self-satisfied smile, gazing back up at him smugly. A wave of uncontrollable rage swept over the boy, and he grabbed the cat by the scruff of the neck and yanked it up into the air. His trembling hands closed around the neck of the creature, and he began to strangle it madly. The eyes of the Murad-face bugged out and the mouth opened in a silent cry of agony. Vlad relaxed his grip just slightly, then looked over to the ornamental spears that had been hung on either side of the doorway of his chamber. He kept the cat firmly in his grasp as he rose painfully from the cushion and stumbled over to the wall. He took one of the spears from its holder and held it tightly in his left hand, bracing the shaft in the crook of his armpit, pressing it tightly against his body. Then he put the cat creature on the floor, never releasing his tight grip upon the fatty neck folds, and placed the spear tip against the animal's abdomen.
Vlad smiled to himself, then thrust the spear into the creature's body. The sharp blade tore through the fur and the fat and the muscles, causing the animal to writhe in mute agony as Vlad lifted the spear upward toward the high ceiling of the chamber. The boy smiled as the Murad-face wept and screamed silently, as the blood began to pour from the Murad-mouth and the icy glaze of death spread over the Murad-eyes. The writhing body shuddered and then was still. The boy threw the spear away from him, watching as the dead animal slid across the marble floor upon a slick of its own blood.
He stared at the dead form as the Murad-face slowly shifted back to the face of a cat, and then he laughed softly. "I thank you, Ordogh. That was a great pleasure."
"It pleases me to please you, Little Dragon," the voice said.
"And what am I to give in exchange for your gift?"
The voice laughed again. "Only that which you will give of your own free will, Little Dragon. I have chosen you because I know you. You are like unto a dancing girl who strips away layer after layer of silk to reveal only more silk beneath. None can see the flesh that is masked by the garments, none but I. All others see you and know you not, but I see you and know you well. You shall serve me well, Little Dragon. You shall write your name in blood, and I shall give you pen and parchment for the writing."
Little Vlad did not respond immediately. When he did, he said carefully, "We are told that God loves us and forgives us our sins. We are told that God's victory over Ordogh is certain and preordained. Why then should I serve you?"
"Because it is your will to serve me, Little Dragon. You shall serve me because it shall please you to serve me. You shall serve me because I shall give you power for a time, and pleasure and wealth. You shall serve me because your heart is black and your soul is as predestined for damnation as I." The voice paused and then said, "Hear me well, Little Dragon. Never again shall you see your father or your brother Mircea. You shall be Voivode of Wallachia, and you shall inflict much suffering and shall in your turn suffer much. Your life shall be hard and bitter and brief, and yet shall you serve me with devotion. You shall experience ecstasy such as few ever experience, and such misery as few ever suffer, and yet shall you serve me."
Vlad shook his head. "I do not like your words, Ordogh. If you offer me a cup of sweet and bitter wine, why should I drink it? If you offer me a short life, uncertain rule, and suffering—"
"I do not offer these things to you," the voice said. "I tell what must be, what shall be, regardless. I do not control this world, Little Dragon, I can only influence it. But some things I can do. I can see to it that you become voivode, and not Radu. I can see to it that while you rule, however brief that may be, you will be able to use your power for your own pleasure. I can see to it that whatever anger you have, whatever bitterness or sorrow, whatever misery you suffer, will be balanced by as much pleasure, power, wealth, and renown. The former are your destiny, Little Dragon. The pleasure, power, wealth, and renown are mine to give."
Vlad gazed over at the mutilated body of the cat and thought for a moment. "I want you to give me Murad."
The voice did not respond.
"I want to kill him, myself, with my own hands. I want
him
,
not a beast with his face. I want
him
!"
At last the voice spoke. "The lives of all men follow predestined courses, Little Dragon; but even the flow of the river can be diverted for a little time. The day of Murad's death is fixed and cannot be altered. But the manner of his death . . ."
The voice ceased to speak to him, and Vlad surmised that Ordogh was thinking. He waited patiently, and after a long while the voice said, "It shall be as you wish, Little Dragon."
The mist descended upon the world and the years floated by him, scenes and incidents and events seeming to merge with one another as he grew from childhood to young manhood in the Ottoman court. As Malcolm Harker lay in cold paralysis upon the moist floor of the ruined castle, his mind's eye saw the events of that other life—buried deep in the polluted blood that coursed through his veins—drift past him. He saw the year 1447
come and go, watched himself, a thin but vigorous boy of sixteen being informed by Murad's vizier Khalil that the Hungarians had captured and beheaded his father and elder brother. He watched himself depart from Smyrna at the head of a small host of Turkish foot soldiers early the next year, the good wishes and promises of support from Sultan Murad following upon the heels of his small but well-trained army. He saw himself enter Bucharest with his sword drawn, easily overcoming the small force that the Hungarians had left to guard the provincial capital, saw himself proclaimed voivode by the aged Orthodox prelate, heard himself publicly avow his loyalty to the sultan, felt himself repress the urge to bite off his own tongue as he voiced the words of vassalage directed toward the man whom he hated with such passionate intensity.
He watched as the year 1448
drew to an end, as the Wallachian nobles rejected his claim to his father's throne. He saw himself defeated in a pitched battle against the proud boyars of his homeland. He saw himself flee for his life into the Carpathian hills.
It was 1453
when the mist lifted again.
He was sitting easily upon a low-cut tree stump, surveying the little domain which was all he had to call his own. He had spent the past five years as little better than a bandit, roaming the Balkans with his little band of marauders, looting without discrimination the settlements of Turks and Greeks, Bulgars and Serbs, Macedonians and Moldavians, Wallachians and Transylvanians. His host—how dare he call this assemblage of thieves and murderers a host?—consisted-of a few hundred Gypsies and renegades, Turks who loved the fruit of the vine more than they loved Allah, Slavs fleeing from rapacious landlords, homeless Magyars, uprooted Jews, vengeful Greeks.
And in the midst of their ragged camp, bound with thick ropes, lying naked, weeping, and trembling, was Murad II, onetime master of the Ottoman Empire. Now no better than a refugee himself, he had fallen by unhappy chance into the hands of his old friend Vlad.
Unhappy chance?
Vlad thought.
No, there is no chance involved here. It is Ordogh, keeping his word.
Vlad rose from the tree stump and walked slowly over to the fat old man who lay in misery upon the cold forest floor. "Sublime One," Vlad said easily. "I think that it is time we negotiate with one another."
Murad looked up as the tall, thin, young man approached him. He tried to ignore the circle of ruffians who giggled with anticipatory glee as they scratched their scarred faces through flea-infested beards and waited for the fun to begin. "Little Dragon . . ." Murad said thickly, "we were friends . . . allies . . ."
"Yes, yes." Vlad nodded seriously. "How sad that fortune has so unjustly afflicted you, Sublime One."
"When I regain my throne, I shall give you all Dacia," Murad said desperately. "All of it, not just Wallachia. Moldavia as well, and your homeland, Transylvania."
Vlad nodded again as if
impressed by the offer. "And what of Bukovina, Sublime One? Will you give me Bukovina as well?"
"Yes, yes, Bukovina as well!" Murad said quickly.
Vlad nodded once more, then shook his head sadly. "But you have no throne, Sublime One. There is another Sultan. Mohammed, he calls himself, Mohammed II."
"A usurper!" Murad screamed. "Allah will damn him for his treason!"
"That may be," Vlad agreed, sitting down upon the ground beside the onetime master of the east. He placed his hand sympathetically upon Murad's arm and said, "But the problem, Sublime One, is that this usurper happens to be ruling the Ottoman Empire right now, and you are merely the prisoner of a group of homeless bandits." He frowned as if in thought. "And yet, a sultan may bestow provinces."
"Yes, yes!" Murad agreed, the terror showing in his face. "When I have reclaimed the throne, I shall—"
"Oh, my dear old friend, I do not mean you!" Vlad said. "Mohammed has been sultan for two years, ever since your overthrow. You have been a fugitive, powerless, now even out of gold to buy yourself supporters and protection." He leaned his face close to Murad's. "Haven't you heard, Sublime One?
Even now Mohammed's cannons are pounding against the walls of Constantinople. He is the greatest power since Charlemagne, the greatest conqueror since Genghis Khan. If anyone can restore me to my rightful place in Wallachia, it is he, not you! If anyone can give me Moldavia and Transylvania, it is he!"
"Little Dragon . . ." the old man whimpered.
"No, I am sorry, Sublime One," Vlad said, rising to his feet. "I must buy myself into the good graces of Mohammed. I think that I must do two things in order to become his friend and ally. First, I must become a Moslem." He shrugged, dismissing the idea as a trivial matter. "And second, I must give him your head as a token of my devotion."
"No! You would not dare!" Murad sputtered. "Ransom me, at least! Yes, yes, Little Dragon, a ransom! I have friends, I have friends!"
Vlad rose to his feet, ignoring the pleading from the fallen sultan. "Janos, Anatoly, Kurza," he snapped. "Prepare him." Three members of Vlad's eclectic army rushed forward and grabbed hold of the sultan. One of them grabbed the old man's left leg, one other the right, and the third took the sultan's head in his hands and pulled open the eyelids, so as to force Murad to watch what was about to occur.
Vlad walked over to the edge of the small clearing, and Murad's eyes followed him as if mesmerized. The young man ran his fingers fondly up and down the smooth trunk of a small, straight tree, smiling to himself and muttering a few low, unintelligible words. Murad squinted to see the tree more clearly, then realized to his horror that it was not a tree at all. It was a long stake which had been sunk into a deep hole in the forest ground, a long stake with a menacingly sharpened tip.
Murad screamed and begged and wept as Vlad pulled the stake free from its foundation with a mighty heave, then carried it over toward the old man. He dropped it heavily upon the ground and stood over Murad, smiling as one of the Gypsies handed him a woodcutter's axe. Vlad nodded to another of his men, who ran forward and positioned the sharp tip of the stake against the entrance to Murad's anus.