“Bogdan snores. This is my reward for carrying his great weight for nine months and nearly dying bringing him into the world. My beautiful little boy turned into a great hulking man who sounds like a dying pig when he sleeps.”
Lada could not help laughing. “Have you walked the camp at night? An army of boars would make less noise than my men do.”
Oana nodded, squinting, then set aside her work. “It is too dark for my old eyes.”
“Sleep.” Lada stripped some of the furs from her bedroll and tossed them at Oana. “Or, if you want, I can probably get you a bed in the castle.”
“Lada, my dear one, you got me my Bogdan back. You do not need to get me anything ever again.” The nurse sounded dangerously close to crying. “Though,” she said, her voice turning gruff, “I would very much like to get out of Hungary. They all have marbles in their mouths. I cannot understand one word in five.”
“You may get your wish soon enough.”
“Back to Wallachia?”
Lada let out a breath heavy with the weight of the future. “No. Hunyadi plans to defend Constantinople.”
“Why would we go there?”
“Because he thinks it is the right thing to do.”
The nurse made a derisive sound. “The devil take Byzantium and all its glory. It never did anything for us.”
Lada listened as the nurse lay down and shifted around, making all the small noises tired bodies make. It was annoying, but there was also something comforting about having another woman present. Someone she knew cared for her.
“Which way is the wrong way?” Lada asked. “How much should I give if it means getting back to Wallachia?” She could lie to Mehmed, tell him she had persuaded Hunyadi to stay out of Constantinople. He would not discover her duplicity until she already had the troops. There would be hell to pay after, though, and her castle was already filled with enemies.
Hunyadi’s love and trust was a valuable thing; it meant more to Lada than she had thought possible. But he could not get her the throne. And she did not feel the pull of Constantinople that all the men in her life seemed to. Hunyadi, she cared about. Constantinople was only a city.
Wallachia, though. Wallachia was everything.
As though hearing Lada’s thoughts, her nurse echoed, “Everything. There is no cost too high for your people, for your land.”
“Even if it means betraying someone who trusts me? Or making deals with the empire that took your son from you?”
“You brought him back. You brought yourself back. Wallachia needs you, and you deserve Wallachia. Let your loyalty be only where your heart is. Everything else can fall by the road and be trodden underfoot as we pass to our home.” Oana patted Lada’s arm. “My fierce little girl. You can do anything.”
Lada did not know if it was permission or prophecy, but she believed it either way.
Though manipulating people was Radu’s area of expertise, Lada found the opportunity to do so handed to her with all the poetic grace of a gazelle’s neck.
Hunyadi paced in front of her. He had called her to the meeting room in the castle, but this time only the two of them were present. “What about Serbia?” he asked.
Lada shook her head. “I know for a fact Mara Brankovic, one of Murad’s wives, made a new treaty for Serbia. If you go to Constantinople, you will fight against Serbians, not with them.” Lada wondered briefly what Mara Brankovic was doing with her cleverly purchased freedom. Mara had taken an offer of marriage from Constantine himself and used it to forge a deal between Mehmed and her father, the Serbian prince—creating a new, permanently single life for herself.
“Damn.” Hunyadi leaned back with a sigh. “What do you think of the Danesti prince? I know you hate him, but will he aid us? Maybe he will die at the wall, which would be very convenient for you.”
Lada dragged a knife along the tabletop, scoring the wood deeply. “He is a worm. And not long ago he was in Edirne, delivering his loyalty to Mehmed in person.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I had someone in Tirgoviste trying to kill him at the time.”
Hunyadi shook his head, but his expression was more amused than shocked.
“Besides,” Lada continued, “he cannot commit troops without the boyars giving him support. They will bide their time and twiddle their thumbs until any usefulness has passed, and then they will send their condolences.”
“The Wallachian boyars like me, though.”
“Yes, and they fear Mehmed. Which do you think will be a stronger motivator among that pack of cowards?”
Hunyadi nodded grudgingly. “I have some support, though. Elizabeth encourages me to go. And I have you and your men. It will be good for you to have something to do.”
Lada already had something to do. She respected Hunyadi, but he could not give her the throne. Mehmed could. He could also take it from her afterward, if she failed to uphold her end of their bargain.
“Elizabeth is exactly why you need to stay,” Lada said, working her knife back and forth along the gash she was carving into the table.
“What do you mean?”
“Hungary is in turmoil. Ladislas will not live long, and Elizabeth knows you are a threat to her power. Matthias has a chance at the throne. Your son could be king.” She paused, letting the word hang in the air between them. “He will never have a better chance at the throne. If you go to Constantinople, Elizabeth will maneuver him out of the castle. You must see how much your strength and reputation buoy his popularity. All your toil and blood will be wasted if you shed it for misplaced loyalty to the emperor of a dead land.”
The lines in Hunyadi’s face deepened. “But I go for Christianity.”
“Serve Christianity here. Protect the borders. Keep Mehmed from pushing farther into Europe. He will not be satisfied with taking Constantinople. As soon as the city falls, his eyes will turn toward Hungary. You cannot leave it under a weak child king and his conniving mother.” Lada paused, as though thinking. “Besides, you will not make a difference at the walls.”
She knew that was false. If Mehmed was willing to trade troops for the promise that Hunyadi would stay out, he understood that Hunyadi’s experience and reputation were both weapons that could tip the city out of Ottoman reach forever. Hunyadi would absolutely make a difference to the defense of the city. And Lada could not let that happen.
“But the infidels—”
“If even the pope does not see this as a threat to Christianity, I hardly think you need worry about it. Cities fall. Borders change. God endures.” Lada finally dared look at Hunyadi, and what she saw nearly destroyed her resolve.
He looked older than he had when he began speaking, and infinitely more tired. “I already told Emperor Constantine I would fight for him. He depends on my aid. Matthias can manage without me.”
Lada saw her opening, and she struck deep. “Then you are no better than my father. He sold our future for his own selfish desires, just as you would sell Matthias’s to satisfy your soldierly pride.”
Hunyadi held his hands apart, palms up, and looked down at them. They were thick and callused hands, with knotted joints. Then he dropped them to his sides, his shoulders drooping. “You are right. It is selfish of me to seek glory elsewhere. My duty is here.”
Lada wanted to embrace him. She wanted to offer him comfort. She wanted to confess that she cared nothing for Matthias or Constantinople, but that she did care for Hunyadi. And she had manipulated him anyway.
Instead, she let him walk away, alone. Then she drafted her letter to Mehmed. His ambassadors were leaving the next day and would carry it to him. They would deliver her betrayal—and her future—to Mehmed.
Wallachia was waiting.
17
Late March
THE NEXT DAY they passed Rumeli Hisari, Mehmed’s new fortress. Radu strained his neck to see as much as he could from the road. The fortress loomed, three soaring towers watching over the Bosporus. Cyprian regarded it with sad, solemn eyes. Valentin spat in its direction. They paused as a series of stakes came into view. Lining the banks of the Bosporus, decapitated bodies stood sentry.
“What happened?” Nazira whispered.