The Architect's Apprentice (5 page)

No one could tell for sure how many souls resided within the palace walls. Taras the Siberian, who had been around longer than anyone could remember, said it was as many as the stars in the heavens, the hairs in a pilgrim’s beard, the secrets wafting in the
lodos.
*
Others believed it was at least 4,000. At times Jahan caught himself staring at the gigantic gates separating them from the inner courtyards, wondering what kind of people lived on the other side.

He wasn’t the only one who burned with curiosity. Every animal-tamer that he knew prattled on in muted tones about the various residents of the palace – the head of halvah-makers, the master of ceremonies, the tasters who savoured each dish before it arrived at the sovereign’s table. Eager to find out more about them, the tamers gossiped in earnest, relishing every scrap of tittle-tattle, sweet as boiled sugar in their mouths. Above all, they were fascinated by the concubines and the odalisques. That they were invisible to all men, save the Sultan and the eunuchs, allowed the tamers to imagine them in any way they wished. In their minds they could paint freely the women’s faces, blank and promising like empty scrolls. One could never prattle on about the favourites of the Sultan, not even in whispers, unless it was the Sultana, whom everybody seemed to hate and felt justified in slandering.

They had heard plenty of tales about the harem, some real, most fanciful. Its gates were guarded by black eunuchs who had been castrated so badly that they could pass water only with the help of a tube they carried in their sashes. Since Islam forbade castration of any kind, Christian and Jewish dealers employed slave merchants to do the job elsewhere. Boys were captured from the deepest recesses of Africa and unmanned. Those who survived were bought by the
palace and shipped to Istanbul. Of these many died during the voyage, their corpses dumped into the sea. If they were lucky and talented, they made their way up. Thus a sin for which no one took the blame, yet to which everyone contributed, lived on. Sangram said it wasn’t just their balls that had been removed but also, much too often, their hearts. The mercy that they had been denied in the past they now denied to all. If a concubine attempted to escape, it would be these eunuchs who would be the first to find her.

The harem flowed through life in the palace, hidden but forceful. They named it the
darussaade
– ‘House of Happiness’. Every single one of its rooms and halls was said to be connected to the bedchamber of the Valide, the mother of the Sultan. For years, she and she alone had scrutinized what hundreds of women ate, drank, wore and did every day. Not a cup of coffee was brewed, not a song was chanted, and not a concubine caught the eye of the Sultan without her blessing. The Chief Black Eunuch had been her ears and her eyes. But now she was dead. And all her power, and much more besides, had passed into the hands of the Sultana.

Hurrem was her name, yet many called her witch,
zhadi
. Of admirers and foes, she had plenty. They said she had put a spell on the Sultan, poisoning his sour-cherry sherbet, sprinkling potions under his pillow, tying his clothes into knots on nights of full moon. Breaking a 300-year-old tradition, the Sultan had married her in a ceremony so lavish it was still the talk in every tavern, brothel and opium den in town. Not that the boy knew anything about taverns, brothels and opium dens, but Sangram did and he loved scattering bits of gossip. Most of Jahan’s knowledge about what was happening inside and outside the palace came from him.

Witch or not, the Sultana had a soft spot for curiosities and went to great lengths to collect them. The tiniest female dwarf in the empire or a musical box with secret compartments; a peasant girl with skin like a lizard’s or a bejewelled dollhouse – she took possession of each one with the same delight. Being fond of birds, she frequently visited the aviary. One parrot there was her favourite – a green-bellied,
crimson-winged macaw – and she taught it about a dozen words, which the animal squawked at the top of its ugly voice whenever Sultan Suleiman came close, making him smile. Hurrem enjoyed feeding the gazelles and foals, but she rarely, if ever, spent time with the wild animals. All the better, Jahan thought, for he feared her. How could he not fear a woman who read minds and stole souls?

The first weeks in the
payitaht
, the ‘Seat of the Throne’, passed by eventlessly. Chota recovered slowly, regaining his weight and good humour. He was given two saddlecloths: one for everyday, yards of blue velvet embroidered with silver thread; and one for festivities, a golden mantle made of heavy brocade. Jahan loved the feel of the needlework on the tips of his fingers. He no longer lamented the precious cloths that Shah Humayun had sent with the elephant, but that Captain Gareth’s sailors had shamelessly plundered on that ominous ship.

At night, as soon as he closed his eyes, his stepfather’s face appeared from out of the gloom. A part of him yearned to return to his village – and kill him. The way he had taken the life of his mother. Kicking her in her belly, even though he knew, for how could he not, that she was pregnant. Another part, a wiser part, whispered he should return but not immediately. After stealing the Sultan’s gems, what harm could there be in saving a few for himself? Captain Gareth would never know. Then he could go home, rich and mighty. His sisters would greet him. Forlorn as they must have been that he had left on a whim, the immensity of their joy upon seeing him again would wipe away their sorrow. Kissing their hands, Jahan would unload the riches at their feet: diamonds, emeralds, jade.

Then, one day, he would come upon a young maiden, pretty as the full moon. Her teeth like pearls, her breasts like ripe quinces, she would walk away from him, but not before honouring him with a furtive smile. He would save her from a terrible danger (drowning or a gang of robbers or a ferocious animal – this part of his dreams always changed). Her lips, when she kissed him, would taste like raindrops, her embrace would be sweeter than honeyed figs. They would
fall in love, her caresses washing over him like fragrant waters. So immaculate would be their bliss that, even years after they died of old age in each other’s arms, people would remember them as the happiest couple under God’s sky.

His early days in the menagerie would have been harder were it not for Olev the lion-tamer, who took him under his wing. A man unrivalled in bravery and recklessness but oddly besotted with his moustache, which he combed, waxed and perfumed five times a day. Like Jahan, he had a family waiting for him somewhere – a life he had lost when, at the age of ten, he had been taken by slave traders. His reddish hair, robust build and, especially, his dauntlessness had determined his destiny. Snatched from his family, he was brought to the Ottoman palace, which he was never to leave.

Each morning at dawn the tamers washed their faces in a marble fountain that ran so cold their hands turned raw red. Before noon they shared wheat soup and bread; in the evenings they tucked into rice dripping with sheep’s-tail fat. When darkness fell, they rested their heads on coarse sacks that housed a horde of creeping lice. The nits were everywhere. And fleas. They leaped from animals to humans, from humans to animals. When they bit, which they did often, they left angry marks that swelled into bumps if scratched. Time and again, the tamers examined their animals, the large and the small, scrubbing them with crushed camphor, cardamom and lemongrass. However thoroughly they searched, one flea would always survive. And one flea was all it took.

Twice a week the Chief White Eunuch, who was known to all and sundry as Carnation Kamil Agha, dropped in for an inspection. He never scolded. Never raised his voice. Yet he was one of the most feared men in the palace, his scowl sharper than steel. His skin was so pale that one could see the fine tracery of veins underneath. He had dark circles under his eyes and was said to spend the nights walking the corridors because he could no more sleep than an owl on the hunt. Knowing that the slightest grime was enough to make his hackles rise, the tamers cleaned to no end. They wiped urine off the
basins, picked up the faeces, rinsed the feeding cups. Jahan was not sure the animals thought much of this frenzy. Deprived of natural odours – theirs and their mates’ – they got confused about their territories. None of the tamers had the heart to reveal this to the eunuch. Still, they took good care of their animals. Their lives depended on their well-being. When they thrived, so did they; when they fell from favour, so did they.

One day in mid-April a strange thing happened. Jahan was taking Chota back to the barn when he heard a rustle from behind a row of bushes – faint but so close as to give him a start. Pretending not to have noticed anything, he remained alert. Before long, an embroidered silk slipper poked out from under the shrub like a baby snake, unaware of being in the open.

Now that Jahan knew it was a girl hiding there, he racked his brains as to who she could be. There were no females among the tamers. The concubines could not get this far, and certainly not unchaperoned. As he did not wish to scare her, he kept his distance, assuming all she wanted was to see the white elephant up close. So he went on with his work and let her spy on them. She kept coming back – he could hear the crack of twigs beneath her feet, the swish of her robe, always on the sly. By the end of the month Jahan had got used to the mysterious snooper. Such was his acceptance and such her stealth that they would never have spoken to one another had it not been for, of all things, a wasp.

That morning Jahan was cleaning a lump of soil stuck on Chota’s tail when a shriek pierced the air. A girl darted out from behind the hedge, her hair fluttering every which way. Waving her hands, screaming an incomprehensible stream of words, she whisked past them, dashed into the barn and closed the door so harshly it bounced back open.

‘Shoo.’ Jahan grabbed a large leaf and flapped it at the wasp that was chasing her.

Buzzing frantically, the insect circled a few times in frustration and, having tired itself out, steered for the closest rosebush.

‘It’s gone,’ Jahan said.

‘I am coming out. Lower your head, servant.’

She emerged, tall, lithe and reedy. Scrunching up her nose she declared, ‘May Allah forgive me for saying so, but I don’t understand why He would create wasps.’

She walked towards the elephant, curious to see the animal this close. Jahan glanced furtively in her direction, noticing the tiny freckles on her cheeks, the colour of marigold. Her robe of palest green appeared almost white against the sunlight, and her wavy hair peeked from beneath her scarf, which she wore loosely.

‘Has my venerable father, his Majesty, seen the beast?’ she asked.

Jahan swallowed, only now realizing with whom he was speaking. He bowed as low as he could. ‘Your Highness Mihrimah.’

The Princess nodded nonchalantly, as if her title were of no interest to her. Her eyes of dark amber slid back to Chota.

‘Would your Excellency like to pat the elephant?’

‘Would it bite?’

Jahan smiled. ‘I can assure your Highness there is only kindness in Chota.’

With a wary look she approached the beast and touched its crinkled skin. In that moment Jahan had another chance to inspect her. He saw a precious necklace with seven milky-white pearls, each larger than a sparrow’s egg. His gaze strayed to her hands. Such delicate hands she had, now raised to her bosom, now nervously clasped. It was this last gesture that got to him: he sensed that, beneath the surface of colours and contrasts, she carried a fretful soul, like his. Otherwise he would never have dared to say what he said next. ‘Humans are frightened of animals but we are cruel, not they. A crocodile or a lion … None of them are as wild as we are.’

‘What a ridiculous thing to say! These are fierce beasts. That’s why we keep them in cages. They would gobble us up.’

‘Your Serene Highness, ever since I came here I have not heard of
an animal attacking anyone unless we starved it to death. If we don’t disturb them, they won’t disturb us. But humans are not like that. Whether hungry or not, man is prone to evil. Where would you sleep more peacefully? Next to a stranger with a full belly or next to a well-fed lion?’