The Drowning Guard: A Novel of the Ottoman Empire Read Online Free PDF Page B

filled the barracks.
    Postivich left his cot and threw on his tunic, slipping his long dagger under his waistband. He closed the door behind him and was greeted with the fresh breeze coming off the water.
    “Where go you, janissary?” questioned the sentry.
    “A night errand,” Postivich replied.
    “Business or pleasure, Janissary Kadir? Are you doing the Sultane’s bidding?”
    “Pleasure. I need to visit the brothel.”
    The sentry leered at him. Ahmed Kadir had special permission to come and go at all hours as the Sultaness’s trysts were erratic and unscheduled.
    “Pick a sturdy one, Ahmed—a fat one with a strong back. The weight of your body could crush the delicate girls,” said the guard, waving him on.
    Ivan Postivich had no intention of visiting a brothel. His only wish was to breathe fresh air that did not carry the mingled stench of murder and sex.
    For most, a walk along the Bosphorus long past midnight was a dangerous proposition. The waterfront was home to thieves who had immigrated on the ships that passed through the Golden Horn each day.
    But no one dared approach the dark silhouette of Ivan Postivich, his giant shadow preceding him, the moon at his back.
    A pack of dogs circled him, silent in the dark, as he strode the path towards the harbor. The dog packs of Constantinople were notorious, claiming their territory and killing strays that wandered within their limits. But Postivich bent down to pick up a rock from the ground, and the pack ran whimpering for cover under the blanket of night.
    He walked the shore of the Golden Horn below the high walls of the Topkapi Palace. He heard nothing, but knew that the sentries watched his every step, each passing the word in whispers and clucks of the tongue to the next, as they checked his progress around the perimeter of the fortress. At last he came to the palace limits and into the harbor. Here there were signs of life.
    He bought some chestnuts from a vendor, the chalky taste of the outside skin cleaning his mouth of the greasy lamb he had eaten earlier.
    “Ahmed Kadir,” whispered a voice from the rocks.
    Postivich turned towards the voice and shouted down. “Who calls my name?”
    “It is I, of your own name, Ahmed—the oarsman,” said the voice coming closer.
    Postivich spat out a piece of chestnut shell, deliberating. Cracking another between his fingers, he pried out the soft meat.
    “What are doing out at this hour, oarsman? Surely your mistress will call you tomorrow to row her in the Sultan’s procession for Friday prayers.”
    “Yes,” answered the oarsman, stumbling through the darkness on the rocks. He made his way towards the light that spilled from the chestnut merchant’s lantern. “But sleep will not visit me tonight.”
    The young man’s body was now visible to Postivich, narrow-waisted with a hairless chest and muscles cut deeply into his arms and legs. He saw the wide-eyed fright that was concealed by day from the world and especially from Esma Sultan.
    “I cannot sleep,” whispered the oarsman, “when the Bosphorus stinks of death.”
    “Your words could be your own death,” cautioned Postivich. “Speak no more, the shores and even the waters have ears.”
    “They have heard me cry, then,” he replied. “For I cannot face Allah laughing at the death of dozens of men.”
    Postivich picked at a bit of chestnut in his teeth. He looked over his shoulder towards the water and the grief-stricken man.
    “What then, oarsman, do you plan?”
    “My name is Ahmed,” he said. “Surely you can remember the name that is the same as the Ottomans have given you! Why will you not speak it when we are intimates in murder?”
    “I despise my own name, oarsman. Do not curse yourself by having me utter it. What do you propose then, as you make your way to the mosque to pray on the morrow?”
    “I have no plan but to confide in Allah of my horror.”
    “Allah surely sees all that man does, before a man even sees it