Tycho and Salvator followed the prince into the room and the guards closed the doors behind them. It was a small room with a tiled floor and unadorned walls. A heavy oak table dominated the space, and it was surrounded by straight-backed armchairs. Vlad sat down beside the Duchess and gestured to the two people who stood manacled before them, flanked by Vlachian soldiers.
Tycho stared.
The man appeared to be Aegyptian or Numidian, and in his middle age judging by his salt and pepper hair. He was well-dressed in a slightly wrinkled and stained but well-tailored Mazigh coat and shirt and boots, and he only glanced at his captors briefly before returning his gaze to the tall windows beside them that overlooked the palace walls and the waves of the Bosporus beyond.
But Tycho wasn’t staring at him.
The girl was deathly pale, like the maidens in old stories about the Olympians and their conquests. Her hair was a riot of long curling red tresses that bounced and shuddered all around her face with every movement of her head. Her thin lips were the palest pink rose, threatening to vanish against her skin. She had golden eyes, not hazel or bright green, but pure gold that made her pupils and lashes appear all the more perfectly black.
But Tycho wasn’t staring at her eyes.
Her ears. By heaven and hell, those ears!
Rising from her luxurious masses of red hair were two tall animal ears, broad at their bases and rising to triangular tips. White fur covered the fronts of the ears and dark red fur covered the backs.
They’re moving.
The ears twitched and swiveled like those of a dog or cat, each one moving alone, each one seeming to track a different person by the soft chuff of a shoe or the clearing of a throat.
That’s impossible.
Tycho glanced up at Salvator and saw the same dumbfounded expression on the Italian’s face that he knew must be on his own, so he blinked and closed his mouth and cleared his throat loudly. He looked at the girl one more time, into her wide golden eyes, and he saw her lip tremble, and he saw the traces of red around her eyes.
She’s terrified.
The dwarf turned around. “Your Grace, I was just informed about the capture of these two prisoners and came to interrogate them when I learned they had been brought here. How can I assist you?”
Lady Nerissa looked at him with a strange smile. “I have no idea, major. None at all. I had them brought here because this gentleman was seen speaking to the Damascena. But now I find that information rather… unremarkable.”
“I understand. If I may?”
She nodded and the prince nodded as well.
Tycho looked at the Aegyptian, forcing himself to remain focused on only him for the moment. “Sir, what is your name?”
“Omar Bakhoum.”
“Are you an officer of the Eranian army or an agent of the empire?”
The man called Omar grinned. “When I was a younger man, yes. But not for many years now.”
“What business did you have in the Strait today?”
“I boarded a ship in Varna bound for Alexandria,” he said. “I was simply passing through when my ship was assaulted, first by the Turks and then by your own marines, who took the ship and me and my poor apprentice captive.”
“You were seen speaking with the Damascena,” Tycho said.
No one speaks with the Damascena. She just appears on the battlefield, slaughters as many Hellans as she likes, and vanishes again. She’s a weapon. A terror. Something that Radu unleashes on us to destroy morale. But she’s never been seen with an officer, never giving or receiving orders. Just killing.
Tycho asked, “What did you discuss with her?”
“The Damascena?” Omar’s grin grew a little broader. “How poetic. I’m certain that she didn’t name herself that. Nadira was never one for poetry, even at the nunnery.”
A silent instant of shock rippled through the room. The Vlachians glanced at each other, and Nerissa and Vlad glanced at each other, and Tycho felt Salvator’s eyes on him, but he pressed on. “Her name is Nadira? You know that for certain?”
Omar laughed. “You don’t even know her name? But you wouldn’t, would you? Not that it matters, really. She is what she is, by any name. And yes, to answer your question, I know that for certain. I met her a very long time ago.”
“And what did you discuss with her today?”
Omar shrugged. “The weather. How time gets away from us. The old days. Better days. Old friends-”
Tycho picked up the report on the table and scanned it quickly, and then cut off the prisoner. “I find it hard to believe this woman took command of a Turkish gunboat and attacked an Espani merchant ship just to make small talk with an old friend.”
“Can my new friend sit down? She’s a bit tired,” Omar said.
Tycho allowed himself to look at the beautiful girl with the tall red ears. She was shivering. “Yes, of course. What’s your name?” he asked her.
“It’s Wren,” Omar said. “She doesn’t speak Hellan. Just Rus, and a little Eranian, though not very well just yet. She’s still learning.”
Tycho pulled a chair forward and said to the girl in Rus, “Please, sit down. No one is going to harm you. We just have a few questions for your friend.”
The girl blinked and sank warily into the chair. “Thank you.”
That accent. She’s not from Rus.
Tycho let his eyes linger on her ears a moment longer before returning to the man. “What did the Damascena, Nadira, what did she say to you?”
Omar rolled his tongue around his mouth for a moment. “She asked me to help her with a small personal problem. A medical problem.”
“You’re a doctor?”
“Of a sort. I specialize in very rare cases.” He nodded at the girl in the chair.
Tycho nodded. “I see. What’s wrong with the Damascena? Is she sick? Is she dying?”
Omar laughed. “No, quite the opposite, my little friend. The lady suffers from an overabundance of life, much like myself, as a matter of fact.”
An overabundance of life?
Tycho froze. His mind flew back several months to the arrival of the two strangers from Rus, the barbarian Koschei and his damned mother, Yaga. The ugly northerners had entered the Chamber of Petitions dressed in furs and rags, the man covered in patchwork armor and curved daggers from all over Asia, and the woman covered in bones and feathers. Prince Vlad had boasted of the two so-called immortals from Rus, and Tycho had not been impressed. And then they both slit their throats and fell dead on the floor, and then, only moments later, both had staggered back to their feet, wiped the blood away, and pledged their service to the defense of Constantia.
An overabundance of life?
Tycho blinked. “Sir, how old are you?”
Omar stopped smiling. “Older than I look.”
“Do you know a man from Rus called Koschei the Deathless?”
It was Omar’s turn to freeze with a queer look in his eye. “You know Koschei?”
Prince Vlad leapt to his feet. “Do you know Koschei?”
Omar nodded and said softly, “I do. Better than he knows himself.”
Tycho exchanged glances with the others. “I believe this is no longer an interrogation of a military nature. Mr. Bakhoum, was it? Please have a seat. Let’s all have a seat for a moment.”
Everyone sat down around the end of the council table, except the Vlachian soldiers who retreated toward the door. Tycho placed himself between Lady Nerissa and Omar, and he was about to speak when he saw the Aegyptian take the Rus girl’s hand in his and whisper in her ear. The girl seemed to relax a bit more.
“All right.” Tycho folded his hands on the table in front of him. “Mister Bakhoum, for the record, are you now in the service of Emperor Darius in any capacity?”
“No.”
“Do you intend to give aid to the troops in Stamballa?”
“I intend nothing except to return to my home in Alexandria. But, truth be told, if someone did ask for my help, I might feel inclined to help them. I’m a scholar, not some sort of monster who snatches innocent girls, ties them up, and throws them into dank dungeons without just cause.”