‘It is against the law for a European to dress as a Turk,’ he said.
‘Idris will see me out of any trouble with the law,’ Swan said.
Alessandro made a face. ‘You are the only one of us getting anything done,’ he admitted. ‘See if you can keep the costume when your outing is over.’ He pinned the skullcap against Swan’s head with a dextrous finger and began to wind his turban.
‘These were all the rage in Venice when I was a boy,’ he said.
The stirrups were short, the saddle virtually non-existent, and the other Turks laughed at his attempt to lengthen the leathers. A servant – a Turkish servant – slapped his hand away and motioned for him to mount, and he did, vaulting into the saddle because the stirrup was so high above him he couldn’t dream of getting a foot into it.
Once he was up, the servant tucked his booted feet into the very light stirrups.
Idris pulled up next to him. ‘I have ridden on one of your knight’s horses,’ he said. ‘It is like riding in a sedan chair. With us, you must actually ride the horse.’
Swan was not a great rider – life in London offered little scope for riding, and his periodic time with his father hadn’t offered him any more than a cursory education. The small saddle made him uncomfortable, and he almost missed the ride out of the city, he was so focused on staying on the horse. The Turks were all superb horsemen, and they galloped, cantered, walked and trotted, changing gaits to suit the length of the street and the thickness of the crowd.
On the other hand, the Arab mare he was riding was, without a doubt, the best horse anyone had ever put him up on. The horse was small by European standards – like a lady’s riding horse – but she seemed to carry him without effort, and she flowed along under his inexperienced seat without offering any protest. At one point, on a long straight stretch just before the Belgrade Gate, when the other young men were galloping and an old beggar stepped into the road, she pivoted neatly under him and then – it seemed to him – rolled her own hindquarters to keep him in the saddle.
By the time they had crossed the great walls, heading for the farm country to the west, he was in love, and although there was no one to tell him so, he was riding better than he’d ever ridden in his life. And enjoying it.
Idris was laughing with his friends, and servants met them – a pair of carts with a dozen hawks and two more young men. But after they had reined up and let the carts join them, Idris came back down the cavalcade to Swan. ‘Do you like her?’ he said, pointing with his jewelled crop at the mare.
‘I love her, Idris. She is . . . superb.’ Swan grinned.
Idris grinned back. ‘You English are so honest!’ he said. ‘You are like Turks. You think a thing – you say it. Venetians never tell me this horse is wonderful. They are always cautious.’ He looked at the horse. ‘To us, her colour is not so good. That golden coat – we call it yellow – is . . .’ He shrugged. ‘But she is among the smartest of my horses.’ He leaned over. ‘I beg you to accept her.’ He frowned. ‘Or anything else you see that you want.’
Swan laughed. If only you knew, he thought. ‘I love the kaftan,’ he said.
Idris nodded. ‘All that is yours. You cannot ride without it. Indeed, all of your guards know now that we are friends. If you are found in these clothes . . .’ He smiled again. ‘Call for me.’
‘You are very like a prince, I find,’ Swan said.
Idris shook his head. ‘Now you sound like a Venetian,’ he said. ‘Flatterer. Listen – of all my friends, none speaks Italian. So none of these men can speak with you, but all know that you saved my life.’ The other young men bowed from their saddles or saluted with their riding whips as they were introduced – a long string of Turkish names that even Swan had trouble understanding, much less remembering.
Swan’s training as a royal page came in handy. He understood – intimately – that Idris was the great man here, and that he couldn’t monopolise him. So he bowed to the various Suleymans, Murids and Bazayets, and smiled at all of them, and occupied himself riding.
Idris rode superbly, of course. He took a hawk on his wrist and offered another to Swan, who had to profess complete ignorance.
‘Another time I’ll teach you,’ he said. He looked grave. ‘See you at lunch.’
And he was off. He loosed his bird at a series of ground targets, and Swan felt this was vaguely at odds with English practice, but then the prince sent his largest bird into the air after something that was a speck above them, and then the whole cavalcade galloped away across the fields of the Greek farms that ringed the fallen city.
Swan reined his little mare in and stayed with the carts. He noted that the two men who’d joined with the carts – also obviously gentlemen, in that they had rich kaftans and jewels in their turbans – both stayed with the wagons. The nearer young man – a boy, really – flashed a smile at him, and he bowed in the saddle. His mare misinterpreted the shift in his weight forward and went directly to a gallop, stretching away over the fields to the south, towards the sea.
It might have been exhilarating, except that, at the very moment when the horse exploded into motion, Swan’s foot slipped out of his left stirrup. He sat down, hard, and tried with increasing panic to find the stirrup under his left foot. The little mare turned in a very tight circle to the left, and suddenly he hit the ground.
He lay there and his shoulder hurt. And he felt like a fool. His mare came and stood by him.
After a moment, he heard hoof-beats, and suddenly one of the boys was there. He dismounted from a dead gallop, actually running alongside his horse for two or three paces, and flung himself down by Swan.
‘Are you alive?’ the Turk asked in a lilting Italian.
Swan looked up into the Turk’s eyes.
Eyes with smudges of kohl around the thick lashes. Wide-set, deep brown eyes above a slender, arching nose and a heavy, sensual mouth.
‘You are not a boy,’ Swan said. ‘Oh, my neck hurts.’
She laughed good-naturedly. ‘How . . . kind of you to notice,’ she said. ‘Are you unbroken?’
He sat up.
The second boy was riding towards them. ‘It is – how do you Italians say this? A polite fiction that I am a boy today. Yes?’
Swan rotated his head from side to side. ‘A fiction I will endeavour to maintain, demoiselle,’ he said gallantly. Her very palpable presence at his side – her hand on his arm – reminded him that he hadn’t talked to a woman in two weeks. The siege had emptied the great city of women – there weren’t even prostitutes in the Venetian quarter.
She put a strong hand in his hand and hauled him to his feet. His horse was two steps away, and he mounted as efficiently as he could manage. He knew he looked like a fool to the Turks. He couldn’t help it.
‘My brother has given you this mare?’ she said.
‘Khatun Bengül!’ shouted the second ‘boy’. In Arabic.
‘Shush!’ the Turkish woman said. ‘I am Salim.’
‘You touched him.’
‘He was on the ground and needed help.’
‘And now he knows you are a woman!’
‘You shouted my name across the world!’
‘He is a Frank. They are as stupid as cattle.’ The second woman was ten years older than Khatun Bengül, and several inches shorter. Under her mantle and turban, Swan judged her to be every bit as attractive, with beautiful eyes and high cheeks. Khatun Bengül, however, had a translucent skin that Swan had seldom seen – hers was the colour of oak newly split – not white, but like slightly aged ivory – and her brows were black and strong.