Anna sat across from Sitt Hatun. The Polish girl was even thinner than when Sitt Hatun had taken her into her service months ago. They always dined together, and Anna always ate first. For although Sitt Hatun had official tasters to check for poison, she did not trust them. They had already failed her twice, and both times Anna had come close to death. While Anna lay sick, Sitt Hatun ate nothing but fruit that she herself picked from the harem garden. Anna had just now recovered from the last poisoning, and Sitt Hatun was looking forward to her first full meal in weeks.
Before eating anything, Anna sniffed carefully at each of the dishes. 'I do not recommend the dolma,' she said as she put the dish aside. 'Nor do I trust the nirbach. It is richly spiced, perhaps to cover a poison.'
Sitt Hatun signalled for a servant to take the offending dishes away. She would take no chances. 'At least we shall not go hungry,' she said. There had been times when all of their food was tainted. On those days, her entire court went hungry, for they dined on whatever Sitt Hatun did not eat. Sitt Hatun would order the food sent back to the kitchen and force her servants to watch while her, or head chef, was forced to eat from every dish. It was an instructive lesson for the others in her court.
Anna now began to taste the food. She ate a few almonds, and they both waited while their stomachs twisted from tension and hunger. After several minutes, Anna handed the plate to Sitt Hatun. 'You may eat,' Anna told her. While Sitt Hatun ate the nuts, Anna tasted the rest of the food, pausing for several minutes between each dish. By the time she passed the chicken to Sitt Hatun, more than an hour had passed.
Sitt Hatun scooped up some of the thick yoghurt dip with a piece of flatbread and ate it with a morsel of chicken. She closed her eyes to savour the taste. When she opened them she found a eunuch standing at the doorway to her chamber. She recognized him as Davarnza, one of the secretaries to the grand vizier, Halil.
'I bring a message, My Lady,' Davarnza said. He bowed low and presented a folded piece of paper. Sitt Hatun took it and read quickly: 'Gulbehar has hired assassins to murder you this very night. The sultan himself has given his consent, and your guards have been bribed to let the assassins do their work. I will help you escape the palace, if you accept my offer.' The letter was unsigned.
'I am to wait for a response,' Davarnza told her. Sitt Hatun had no doubt as to the truth of what Halil wrote. She could try to flee on her own, but she would be lucky to escape the palace, much less the city. She could beg Murad for mercy, but this tactic was even less likely to succeed. Halil was the only person who could help her. Much as she dreaded the prospect of giving herself to him, Sitt Hatun knew that she had little choice.
'My answer is "yes",' she said.
'Then you are to have this.' Davarnza handed her another note. It read: 'My man, Isa, will come for you tonight. Pack nothing; he will provide. He will bring you to me. Afterwards, you will travel to Manisa and tell Mehmed what Gulbehar has done in his absence.'
Sitt Hatun dismissed Davarnza, and then tore the two notes into tiny pieces. She ate the pieces one by one, washing them down with the cool ayran. When she was done, she ordered all of her servants but Anna away, and then tried to sleep. She needed her rest. It would be a long night. Sitt Hatun woke shortly after nightfall. She armed herself and Anna with daggers, and they arranged pillows in Sitt Hatun's bed to mimic her sleeping form, before moving quietly into the adjoining room. They shut the door behind them and sat down on Anna's bed to wait. There was no moon, and the night settled thick and dark, so that Sitt Hatun could barely make out Anna sitting mere inches away. The busy noises of the harem slowly faded until Sitt Hatun could hear nothing but her own breathing and the racing of her heart. She sat wide awake, straining to hear the slightest noise. Outside, she heard the night watch change – the distant sound of laughing voices and tramping boots. That meant that it was midnight, and still no sign of Isa. Sitt Hatun began to have doubts. What if Halil had betrayed her?
At last, a noise – a boot scuffing against the floor – came from the hallway. Then, there was silence. Sitt Hatun and Anna looked at one another. 'Check the hallway,' Sitt Hatun whispered. 'It may be Isa.'
Anna rose in the darkness, and drawing her long, thin knife, moved to the door that opened to the hallway and peered through a spyhole. She turned back to Sitt Hatun and shook her head. There was no one there. Then another noise: the rustling of fabric from Sitt Hatun's bedchamber. Anna crossed to the door that led to the chamber. She looked through the spyhole for only a second before hurrying back to Sitt Hatun's side. 'Isa?' Sitt Hatun whispered. Anna shook her head, no. A voice barked out in the adjoining room – a harsh exclamation in a language that Sitt Hatun did not understand. 'The servants' passage,' Sitt Hatun whispered and rose, taking Anna by the arm. She led her to the wall, pressed a lever, and a small portion of the wall swung inward, revealing a narrow, inky-black passageway. They slipped inside and pushed the door shut. Sitt Hatun pulled Anna down the passage as behind them, she heard the door connecting her and Anna's rooms crash open.
Sitt Hatun quickened her step, moving by memory in the darkness. They reached a stairwell that led down to the main harem kitchen and hurried down it. Sitt Hatun froze just before she reached the bottom. A man was standing there, dressed in black and lit red by the banked fires in the kitchen. He wore a black scarf across his face and held a long knife in his hand. He had heard them and was peering up the dark stairs towards them. 'Chi va la?' he called out. Sitt Hatun did not move. 'Chi va la?' he asked again and took a step up the stairs towards them.
Sitt Hatun turned to run, but Anna stopped her. 'Wait here,' Anna whispered. She slipped by Sitt Hatun and down the stairs. When the man saw her approaching he stopped, but Anna only sped up. She met the man at a run, ducking under his thrusting knife and bowling him over. They tumbled over one another and into the kitchen, where the man landed with a thud, Anna sitting astride him, her knife plunged into his chest. She removed her knife, cut the man's throat to make sure that he was dead, and then rose and motioned for Sitt Hatun to join her.
Sitt Hatun led them down a side passage from the kitchen to the harem's central courtyard. She paused before entering the courtyard to make sure that it was empty, but when she stepped forward, a man's hand grabbed her, covering her mouth and pulling her close. She bit his hand and tried to scream. 'Silence,' the man whispered in her ear. 'It is I, Isa.' He let her go, and she turned to face him. His broad Asian face was smooth and his movements graceful and self-assured. He carried a small pack and wore nondescript brown robes. 'The assassins arrived early at your chambers,' he told her. 'We haven't much time. Follow me.'
He led the way down the side of the courtyard, through a door back into the harem, and through a series of storerooms until they came to a windowless room with a rug crumpled against the wall and an open trapdoor in the floor. Isa took a burning torch from the wall and motioned for them to climb down. 'Hurry,' he said. 'This is the way the assassins entered the harem – the only way out not guarded by a janissary. We must move quickly before they return.'
Once inside the tunnel, Isa removed his pack and produced two more brown tunics of the same type he wore. He handed them to the women and ordered them to put them on over their clothes. Then he led them down the tunnel at a jog, his torch guttering in the damp breeze that blew in their faces. The walls of the tunnel were rough-hewn, dripping with moisture, and the floor sloped gently downwards. Sitt Hatun guessed that they were headed towards the river.