The Walls of Byzantium (57 page)

Luke watched the scene unfolding with appalled fascination. He was to die, along with his friends, any hope of reprieve having been dashed by Suleyman who’d come up to him and spoken quietly into his ear.

‘This is a pity, Luke Magoris. I had given my word to Zoe that you would come back alive. Now it seems that a higher power has intervened.’

Luke had looked back with loathing. He was to die at the hand of this devil and he would never see Anna again.

‘You’ll not see me beg,’ he had said evenly. ‘Just do me this small favour, Suleyman. Release my friends. They have done nothing to deserve this fate.’

But Suleyman had laughed and turned away without answering.

By now the imams had arrived. They were elderly men with heavy beards and heavier robes. They stood uncertainly in front of their sultan and looked at him quizzically. Did he require further interpretation of the ulema?

But Bayezid had had an idea.

‘Give them swords!’ he shouted, waving the goblet in the direction of the old men. He went back to his chair and lowered his bulk into it. He turned to the ulema. ‘You will show us how to kill these men. Please proceed.’

The imams glanced at each other. Swords were being thrust into their wrinkled hands and they looked at them with distaste.

The eldest stepped forward, shaking his head. ‘Highness, we are men of the law, not executioners. We do not know how to kill.’

Bayezid laughed. ‘Then you can learn as you go along, old man. Come, it’s not that hard!’

No one moved. The knight with his head on the block looked up and now there was fear in his eyes.

‘Begin!’ yelled Bayezid.

And so it began. So began the clumsy slaughter of knights from Burgundy by men hardly able to lift the swords to do it, by men whose hands were used to writing, to explaining, not to meting out death.

They did their best. They worked hard to kill with some precision. And the knights’ determination to die well, to show no resistance, helped. But the sword blows were weak and missed their targets and necks were left half severed, spewing blood while the executioners paused to draw breath or vomit.

Mehmed, de Nevers, even the guards tried to intervene again and again, but every time they stepped forward, Bayezid would raise his hand and fix them with a glare that left no doubt as to his will.

The massacre went on for what seemed hours. The old men slipped and fell in the blood they were shedding; knights tore off their mail to offer easier flesh to strike; men knelt to offer themselves to their God and to beg, silently, for a killer with some strength or at least sight.

At one point, a sudden ray of sunshine pierced the clouds and the knights took it as a sign from heaven and a great cry went up as men called out to one another to take strength, to trust in their God.

At last it was over. The final pitiful groan subsided and the
imams, their robes crimson, sat on the ground and stared at each other in horror. Their limbs ached and their breath came in spasms and sweat trickled its way past the blood and dripped on to the sodden earth around them.

Bayezid was drunk. He had enjoyed himself, laughing and clapping as the murders went on, roaring insults to de Nevers and impervious to the disgust around him.

Then it was the turn of Suleyman’s prisoners.

Luke had braced himself to face death with the same courage as those who’d gone before. Now he turned to his friends and saw the same determination in them and he drew them all to him so that they formed a circle, their arms entwined and their heads pressed together.

‘We are brothers,’ said Luke quietly, ‘brothers and Varangians, and we will die as such. Let’s show these bastards how a Varangian dies.’

‘Just one last question, Luke.’

It was Nikolas.

Luke looked at him. Nikko. The one never far from a joke.

‘Did you actually … you know, with Zoe?’

The arms gripped harder with the laughter.

‘You can’t die without knowing that?’

‘No.’

Luke smiled. ‘I’ll tell you on the other side,’ he said.

The imams looked at the next group being brought forward and they looked at Bayezid, who could have been asleep. His eyes were closed and his huge chest rose and fell and his goblet had fallen from his hand.

Suleyman and Mehmed looked at each other.

‘We must stop this madness,’ whispered Mehmed.

Bayezid opened his eyes. ‘We will continue, Prince Mehmed,’ he said quite calmly.

‘I will not continue.’ The oldest of the imams had risen. ‘This is ungodly cruelty and I will have no further part in it. Great Sultan, you may kill me, but I will not go on.’

He threw down his sword and one by one the imams rose and did the same. They faced their Sultan, their backs as straight as they could make them, and they defied his will.

The only sound came from the sky and the birds of prey that had gathered to circle these new pickings. The sun emerged from behind a cloud and bathed the scene in a warmth that belied its savagery. Bayezid stood up and moved to the edge of the pavilion and looked up, enjoying its heat on his face. Then he smiled and shrugged; he beckoned to a servant for another goblet, which he lifted in the direction of his heir.

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Prince Suleyman, you may continue. Perhaps rather quicker, if you will.’

Anna had heard, rather than seen, the dreadful spectacle. And, because of the courage of the Christian knights, she’d heard little beyond the exertions of old men and the soggy connection of blade with skin.

She was sitting in a little tent to the rear of Bayezid’s and beside her sat Devlet Hatun, her elbows resting on a table and her palms to her ears. Since their first meeting at Serres, the two women had come to trust each other. Anna knew that much of what she confided to Devlet Hatun was passed on to her brother Yakub Bey and that this was all part of a wider plan to connect good with good.

During the journey north to Nicopolis, Anna had barely slept and now she clutched the older woman’s shoulder as much for
support as comfort. She was dizzy with exhaustion.

The uncomfortable ride had given her time to think, to let logic push Luke from her mind. At Monemvasia, she’d agreed to go with Suleyman to save the lives of Luke’s friends. Now the Turks had won a great battle and nothing stood between them and Constantinople. They would win and she would be forced to marry Suleyman. She had to banish Luke from her thoughts.

But logic couldn’t push him from her dreams, and the little sleep she’d had had been devoted to him.

Now she stood, swaying and praying that he had survived the battle.

Then someone spoke.

To begin with, she couldn’t place the voice. Then she could.

Yakub
.

He was standing at the entrance to the tent. ‘You should come.’

Anna let go of Devlet Hatun’s shoulder and walked to the entrance. Through it, she could see the side of Bayezid’s tent, and beyond it, an open area littered with bodies. In the centre, in the midst of death, knelt Luke, his head on a block. Above him, sword raised above his head, stood Suleyman.

Now she was running, running towards the scene before her. Everything else was a blur. Bayezid had turned in his chair and was moving his head. The Vizier’s head was bent, listening to one of the imams. De Nevers was being supported by Boucicaut, vomit at his feet.

She reached the open ground, stopped and swung around to face Bayezid. ‘Stop this.’ She paused, recovering her breath. ‘This is unworthy of you, lord.’

Bayezid was looking at her as if he wasn’t quite sure who she was. His head was on one side and there was spittle gathered
at the side of his lips. An empty goblet was in his hand.

‘I think not. Please proceed, Prince Suleyman.’

Anna spun and looked around her. Then she ran over and picked up a sword. She held out her arm and put the blade to her wrist. She stared at Suleyman. ‘If you do this, if you harm one hair on his head, you will never see me alive again.’

‘No, Anna …’ It was Luke.

Bayezid leant forward in his chair. ‘And if you don’t do this, Prince Suleyman,’ he growled, ‘you will not rule this empire after me.’

Suleyman looked from Anna to his father, his sword still raised.

‘You will submit!’ screamed Bayezid, flinging his cup to the ground.

Suleyman didn’t move. There was a silence so complete around them that the sudden shriek of a carrion bird came out of the sky like a thunderclap.

Anna walked over to him and, very softly, so that only he and Luke could hear, she spoke.

‘Spare him, Suleyman, and
I
will submit.’

Suleyman did nothing. Then, very slowly, he lowered the sword.

But someone else was speaking. It was Yakub: he’d moved to stand in front of Bayezid. With him was the Vizier and one of the imams. He turned to the imam. ‘Tell your sultan. Does not the law forbid the killing of prisoners if they are below twenty years of age?’

The imam’s hands were still stained with blood. He stared at them, then looked up. He nodded.

‘Majesty.’ Yakub now faced Bayezid. ‘You cannot kill this boy. The Book forbids it.’

‘Cannot, Lord Yakub?’ growled Bayezid.

But the imam had recovered himself and came to Yakub’s aid. ‘Highness, the lord Yakub is right. Allah has granted you a great victory and perhaps it would be wise to regard his law. It is forbidden to kill child prisoners.’

Bayezid slumped back in his chair. He shook his head as if to clear it. ‘And what should I then do with this …
boy
, lord Yakub?’

‘Send him to the tribes of Anatolia, highness. Do what you always do with your share of the prisoners. Send him to our homeland to be taught how to be a janissary. He will make a fine one.’

Behind him, Suleyman had recovered some of his composure. This was not as it should be. Luke was going somewhere he didn’t want him to go. He watched Yakub as an animal watches another steal its prey.

He turned to be sure de Nevers was watching. He wanted to be heard by him.

‘Father,’ he cried in French, ‘the law may spare his life but this one we cannot send away. He speaks languages and has the Varangians’ skill at arms. He would be valuable to us here.’ He paused and looked directly at Luke. ‘After all, he was the one we sent into the crusader camp.’

Luke leapt to his feet. ‘That’s a lie!’

Scores of Christian faces were turned to him.

Suleyman addressed de Nevers. ‘Did he not ride into your camp with news of our battle order, my lord Count?’

De Nevers was looking strangely at Luke.

Marshall Boucicaut spoke. ‘Indeed, sire. You will remember. He claimed to be Serbian. We didn’t trust him.’

Luke reeled. This was madness. He’d told de Nevers everything
that had then come to pass. But who here knew this except men who had everything to gain by shifting the blame for this catastrophe?

Bayezid was getting bored. He didn’t know why Suleyman wanted this prisoner or why he was speaking in French but his son had publicly challenged him and he was in no mood to favour him. ‘Lord Yakub? You were the one to point out the law that has saved this boy. You will send him to one of your villages and make him into a gazi.’

Suleyman strode over to his father. ‘Father,’ he said in a voice that only Bayezid could hear, ‘I have reasons for wanting this boy to stay.’

But Bayezid had had enough of his eldest son. He said softly, ‘You have humiliated me before the army. I care nothing for what you want!

‘Yakub, you will do this?’

The gazi bowed. ‘I will do this, highness.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

EDIRNE, OCTOBER 1396

The party that left Edirne with the Sultan Bayezid a month after the Battle of Nicopolis was a varied one. This was especially true in the matter of age: Luke found himself the youngest by some years, the pretty page having been made to stay sulking in the capital.

The oldest person present was a man he’d never seen before but who’d joined them at the city gate, slipping quietly into the column behind the ranks of the imams. He was tall and gaunt and rode badly, his simple white robe rucked up to reveal legs spotted with age. His beard was as white as his caftan and was shaded by a beak that an eagle would have raised with pride. He wore a turban of green cotton from which grey hair hung like netting. He seemed to be known to Yakub, who rode next to Luke, and brought his horse up to the gazi’s other side. He glanced at Luke, nodded and said to Yakub, ‘we should talk, old friend. Shall we fall back a little?’

Anna had remained in Edirne, imprisoned in the harem, and Luke had not set eyes on her since she’d put a sword to her
wrists. Matthew, Nikolas and Arcadius had stayed with her and become part of the Court Guard. If he couldn’t keep Luke, Suleyman would at least have the Varangians who, with some polishing, might make a fine embellishment to his retinue one day. Luke was relieved.

They’ll be close to Anna
.

Suleyman himself had gone to straight to Constantinople, partly to resume the siege and partly to escape the necessity of explaining to Zoe why he’d not returned from Nicopolis with Luke. Suleyman had missed Zoe. He’d not taken her on the campaign because he believed carnal diversion before battle to weaken the sword arm. After it, he’d wanted nothing more than to lie with her.