Giustiniani’s Greek was heavily accented, but he spoke with a command and even a joviality that demanded confidence. “We are nearly settled, your grace. We stretched your purse as far as we could. All the food and water is stored. We have enough to last for a year, with minimal supplementation.” He smiled bitterly. “There are advantages to so many leaving, after all.”

Radu wilted inside. No easy surrender, then.

Giustiniani continued. “We may be outmatched in artillery, boats, and men—overwhelmingly outmatched in men—but rest assured, Constantinople is still the best-defended city in the world. It will not fall easily. Tell me, Radu: do you think we can outlast Mehmed?”

Radu weighed the truth. Surrender was not on their minds yet. And they were right to make an effort. Even speaking the words felt disloyal, but acknowledging reality would not change it. “If you can draw out the siege long enough, you have a chance. The Ottomans have come against Constantinople before, and they have always failed. They are superstitious; they will see portents of doom in any delay or failed initiative. Mehmed will be fighting time and morale. He is better prepared than anyone who has ever come before, but he is betting his throne and his legacy on this single assault. If you can outlast him, he will never be able to amass the support to make another attempt.”

“So if we do this, the city is safe from him.”

Radu nodded. “I do not doubt that if Mehmed fails at the wall, he will not live long afterward. There are too many powerful men who do not like him.” The thought terrified Radu. Halil Vizier was still with Mehmed, working against him at every possible turn. How could Radu protect Mehmed from here?

Constantine stared blankly at the floor, his expression far away. “All we have to do is outlast him, then.”

It was as simple and as impossible as that.

20

Late March

“WHERE ARE YOU going?” Bogdan asked.

Lada whipped around, knives in her hands. Taking a deep breath, she put them away. It was near midnight. She had thought her furtive exit from camp would go unmarked. She should have known Bogdan would mark it, as he did all her movements. He had a way of tracking her, watching her without watching. His childhood loyalty had grown as broad and strong as he had. Usually Lada found comfort in that. But lately it felt far more serious, like he was not only looking for her but also looking for something from her.

She had been deliberately vague about their purpose on the shared border of Hungary, Transylvania, and Wallachia. None of her men had questioned her disobeying Hunyadi’s directive and leaving the Transylvanian passes they were supposed to guard.

Lada did not know how her men would feel about taking up with the Ottomans yet again. Some harbored less ill will toward their onetime captors and benefactors; others hated them. Doubtless some would prefer to fight for Constantinople than at the sides of Ottomans. But she was their leader. They joined her to take back Wallachia, and she did not need permission to make decisions. If they did not like it, they were welcome to make their own way.

Her way was forward, to the throne, however she got there.

“You are supposed to be patrolling on the other end of camp,” she snapped.

Though she could not see his face, she could practically feel Bogdan’s blunt smile. “You did not answer my question.”

“Because I do not have to. I am leaving. I will be back. That is everything you need to know.”

“Something is wrong.”

“Nothing is wrong!” All day she had been on edge, knowing how close Mehmed was. She was not certain of the precise location of his camp, but she knew it was within a few miles of where she stood now. Mehmed was within a few miles, not separated by rivers and countries and the year that had come between them. She thought she had hidden her agitation well, but apparently not.

“I will go with you.”

“No!” Not Bogdan. Anyone but Bogdan. Lada could not face him if he found out what she was doing. Admitting it felt like asking permission, and she refused to do that. Besides, she remembered Bogdan’s thinly veiled distaste for Mehmed. She did not want to bring that along with her. “I must go alone.”

“Why?”

“Get back to your patrol.”

Bogdan stood, unmoving, for five eternally long breaths. Then he walked off into the night.

Lada hurried through the dark, knives back in both hands. She had a lot of ground to cover. It would have been easier on a horse, but that would have drawn even more attention to her departure. Still, after an hour crisscrossing through the terrain, looking for signs of a camp, Lada found herself slowing down. She wished she could enjoy walking alone—solitude was not a luxury she had much of lately—but she knew what awaited her.

Who awaited her.

And she did not know how to feel about seeing him again after so long apart. She had not been able to sort through her feelings, to separate what was real and what was merely a reaction to the circumstances of her childhood. What if she saw Mehmed and felt nothing? Worse, what if she saw Mehmed and felt everything as acutely as she had when they were together? It had been a hard thing, leaving him. Would this reopen the wound?

Before she could settle her emotions, she saw the familiar white cap of a Janissary. It glowed in the moonlight. Annoyance flickered through Lada. They should know better than to wear those white caps at night. If she were an assassin, this sentry would already be dead.

A slow, vicious smile spread across her face. She had planned on walking into the camp and announcing herself. She was not expected tonight—Mehmed had merely said where they would be. There had been no specific time to meet established.

It was a night to play “Kill the Sultan.”

She generously decided not to hurt any sentries. They would probably be punished for their failure to detect her, but they deserved that. The first was easily skirted. The second and third announced their approach with a cacophony of snapping twigs. Closer to camp, the going was more difficult. The tents were packed close, and under cover of trees. Between the trees and the darkness, Lada could not get a sense for how many men Mehmed had brought. It did not seem like enough. He probably had them spread out, though. That was what she would have done.

She pressed into the deeper darkness behind a tent as two Janissaries walked by, talking in quiet voices. She had an odd stirring of something that felt like nostalgia at hearing Turkish again. Scowling, she gripped her knives harder.