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Eyes and Ears
—
Smoking back to Dimitriou’s estate seemed a logical next action. With luck, their absence wouldn’t have been noticed. Though it wasn’t on the way, they detoured across the scrubland the unknown djinni had come from. No houses marked the rough landscape. Even for locals, the atmosphere near the In-Betweens was uncomfortably uncanny. One lonely shell of a building stuck up from the wild grasses. What it had been Yasmin couldn’t guess. Currently, it had no roof, only crumbling stone wall remnants.
Inevitably, the mists pulled their attention from the ruin. The great billows of sunlit and shadowed cloud heaved sluggishly in the immeasurable abyss. The shapes the clouds formed were hypnotizing: almost faces of almost creatures that almost seemed alive.
“That’s close enough,” she warned when Joseph’s smoke form began to drift toward the cliff-like edge. He jerked and flew back to her.
“Forgot where I was,” he said.
“It’s not forgetting. In-Betweens possess a slight siren call. My father claims the mists want to lure people in. You learn to steel yourself against it.”
Joseph turned glowing eyes to her. “Apart from that, it’s hard to imagine what would draw Dimitriou to this place.” He considered the mists once more before shrugging hazy shoulders. “I suppose we won’t discover the reason this minute. We’d better get going while we can.”
Since Yasmin had no argument against this, they continued to the estate.
They arrived early enough that only servants moved in the corridors. Relieved to have slipped in undetected, Yasmin crawled back into bed for a catch-up nap. Though she recited the standard prayer for illumination, her dreams left her no wiser.
On the bright side, she rejoined Dimitriou’s party with her energy restored.
She found a pleasant buffet-style meal set up on the lawn under fluttering white awnings. Apparently finished eating, Stefan’s personal friends played a raucous game of croquet in the bright sunshine. The males she privately thought of as the cabal relaxed on cushioned lounge chairs loosely grouped around Stefan and Safiye. Joseph wasn’t among them, though she noticed Eamon Pappus sullenly forking up cantaloupe.
She continued to glance around as she filled a plate. She didn’t see the mistresses. Perhaps they were brunching in seclusion.
“Over here,” Safiye called, spying her. “I saved you a place to sit.”
This was nice of her. Yasmin wouldn’t have blamed her client for being angry over her unsanctioned snooping fiasco. But it seemed all was forgiven. By Stefan too. As she passed his chair, he shaded his eyes and smiled.
“Glad you could join us, sleepyhead.”
His voice was an indolent purr, his posture relaxed in the extreme. The ice she’d seen in him during their confrontation might never have existed. She recalled Safiye’s failure to return to her rooms last night. Cutting her gaze to the djinniya revealed she appeared as putty-limbed as Stefan.
It also revealed other things. Safiye’s cheeks were flushed from more than the warmth outside, her lips rosier than cosmetics could account for. Her morning tunic was multilayered gold-on-gold diaphanous silk. The glittering stuff draped her figure in an ideal mix of seduction and elegance. Empresses didn’t always strike that balance so perfectly. In lieu of embroidery, a fortune in canary diamonds ornamented her bodice. Yasmin was willing to bet this outfit was another present from Stefan.
She’d also bet the couple had consummated their relationship.
“You look . . . in the pink,” she said as she sat beside Safiye.
The djinniya smiled like a well-fed cat. “A good night’s rest will do that.”
Her tone suggested an inclination toward female confidences—even toward a female she was paying to act friend-like. That suited Yasmin. She had one confidence in particular she wanted to pin down.
“I didn’t hear you come in,” she said, her voice as muted as Safiye’s. “Were you and Stefan together the entire night?”
Safiye caressed the extravagant fabric that draped her thighs. “Perhaps,” she said coyly.
“Are you sure? He couldn’t have slipped out while you slept?”
Safiye’s expression changed from self-satisfaction to annoyance. This time when she answered, she hushed her voice magically. “Are you suggesting Stefan left our bed to visit another woman? Trust me, Yasmin—whatever his usual habits—pleasuring me didn’t leave stamina for that.”
That was an interesting way to put it. Didn’t being a concubine mean placing more emphasis on pleasing your partner? But maybe Safiye’s strategy was better. Joseph hadn’t had any trouble tearing himself away from her.
Joseph stepping onto the lawn distracted her from posing more questions.
“Well, well,” Stefan drawled from Safiye’s other side. “You two must be on the same schedule.”
LaBass—the allegedly tight-fisted business mogul whose mistress Tara had left early—was first to greet the newcomer. The only of the males with a beard, LaBass was a sleek but solid djinni Yasmin found hard to read. He decided the best seat for Joseph involved chucking Eamon out of his.
“Don’t pout,” LaBass chided the younger man. “You’re done eating. Joseph needs somewhere to set his plate.”
“He hasn’t got a plate,” Eamon said.
“So he doesn’t. Why don’t you fill one for him? Or find a servant who will, if you’re too proud for that.”
Eamon could be obtuse, but even he knew performing the task wasn’t optional. He strode off, huffing slightly, toward the buffet tables.
Looking a little awkward, Joseph lowered himself into Eamon’s chair. “I could have done that myself.”
“It’s good for Eamon to learn his place.”
That, evidently, wasn’t meant to be argued with either.
Eamon returned shortly with a generously laden plate. To his credit, he handed it over gracefully.
“Thank you,” Joseph said with grave politeness. “These are precisely the foods I like.”
Too stubborn to leave or perhaps encouraged by Joseph’s thanks, Eamon floated a drum table into the privileged circle and perched on it.
LaBass seemed to find this ploy amusing. His laugh shook his broad wrestler’s chest. “If we’re rearranging furniture, we should float Joseph’s lovely partner and her chair over too.”
Joseph looked startled by the idea. “That’s not necessary. I’m sure Yasmin is comfortable sitting with her friend.”
“Nonsense.” LaBass waved a beringed hand. “You mentioned you two haven’t had the chance to keep company openly. Young romantics belong together. I’m not so old I don’t know that.”
“Oh, go on,” Stefan encouraged. He took Safiye’s hand and squeezed. “Safiye and I will entertain each other.”
Yasmin wasn’t asked her preference. Clearly, it was irrelevant. Resigned, she gripped the chair arms and clenched her teeth as LaBass and Joseph joined their magic to levitate her across to them.
“There,” LaBass said, neatly shifting his lounger so that she landed between the men. “Now we’re cozy. And, look, we didn’t spill anything from her plate.”
“Which I appreciate,” she said, breathless from her spur-of-the-moment ride.
LaBass smiled approvingly. Up close, she saw he was older than she’d initially believed. Deep lines of amusement appeared around his eyes. He patted her knee like an uncle. “Tell me about yourself. Who is the pretty lady who caught our favorite promising young man’s eye?”
He asked as if Joseph’s associations—and therefore she—were somehow his business. Rather than try to fathom why, she answered.
“I’m Yasmin Baykal, sir.”
“That much we all know,” he laughed. “And your father is Aydin Baykal of Baykal Shipping?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Call me LaBass. Everybody does. Even my mistress!”
“LaBass,” she complied. “And please call me Yasmin.”
“Excellent.” He patted her knee again. “Your name is a flower that perfumes the tongue. I imagine your life has changed since leaving court? Not so long ago, wasn’t it?”
Unlike Eamon, he didn’t claim Iksander ‘tossed her out.’ Nonetheless, his expression was sympathetic. That was natural, she supposed. He and his group would view her previous status as the highest a female could aspire to.
“Outside life has been an adjustment,” she admitted cautiously. “But it hasn’t been all bad.”
“Yasmin’s parents were understanding,” Joseph volunteered.
“Of course they were,” LaBass said. “I can tell you’re a good daughter. What happened with the sultan wasn’t at all your fault.”
It was a little her fault. She hadn’t forced the issue, but in her own small way, she’d maneuvered circumstances so that the breakup of the harem would come about. She’d longed for personal freedom more than she’d feared disgrace.
In case her face betrayed this, she bowed her head. “That’s kind of you to say.”
“You’ll find a new husband,” LaBass assured in a wink-wink tone. “Maybe even someone we know.”
Oh, she wanted to snap at him. She didn’t need a husband, not even one as appealing as Joseph. Maybe she wasn’t the queen of being independent, but she was learning. Her hands curled tighter around her plate.
“May it please the goddess,” she said respectfully.
“You hear that?” LaBass chortled to Joseph. “That’s womanly modesty.”
Eamon coughed into his fist. Yasmin guessed he had his own opinion about her modesty.
“Yes?” LaBass peered at him narrowly.
“Nothing, sir. Just it’s a shame her harem training will go to waste.”
“Eamon,” LaBass pronounced. “Sometimes you’re a bigger idiot than Iksander.”
This was too much for the djinni not to defend against. “I wouldn’t disband a perfectly good collection of concubines. I think a leader should have a harem, for the prestige of his territory, if nothing else. Certainly, he shouldn’t commit himself to some human whore and her male lover. What’s more, I know you agree with me.” He spread his arms to indicate their sunlit surroundings. “This is how life is meant to be for djinn like us. Men being men. Women being women. The ranks sticking to their place. All that jabber about improving conditions for the lower classes is absurd. If the poor can’t raise themselves, they belong where God put them.”
Murmurs broke out as he crossed his arms. To Yasmin, they didn’t sound like murmurs of disagreement—disapproval, maybe, for Eamon speaking so openly.
LaBass didn’t react to Eamon’s speech, not that she could see, anyway. He surprised her by turning to her instead.
“What’s your opinion on that?” he asked.
“Me?” She blinked, her pulse speeding up at the direct inquiry. Joseph tensed on her other side. Obviously, LaBass’s question was a test, but maybe Joseph didn’t know she understood this. Meanwhile, the older djinni was watching her. Would he guess if she lied? Some djinni were good at that. She tried to speak carefully. “I hadn’t really thought about it. I don’t suppose anyone likes too much change all at once.”
LaBass stared a few heartbeats longer. “No,” he said, seeming to nod mostly to himself. “No one likes too much change all at once. Better to go step by little step when bringing about the world one wants.”
She doubted the world he wanted was the same one she did. Too aware of this, she fought to breathe evenly and look amiable.
Without warning, his smile broke out.
“You’re a clever girl,” he announced. He reached across her to slap Joseph’s arm jovially. “Don’t let this prize slip away from you.”
“I . . . shall attempt to avoid that,” Joseph said haltingly.
His lack of enthusiasm tempted Yasmin to roll her eyes. Hopefully, LaBass would chalk his reaction up to shyness. The scroll network’s pitiful local access suddenly struck her as fortunate. LaBass couldn’t easily deep-search her. He had to discover what he could by means of old-fashioned questioning. As long as Safiye watched what she said, he wouldn’t unearth her real reason for being here.
That information getting out might be awkward for her and Joseph both.
This thought triggered fresh annoyance over him keeping her in the dark. Really, if she were going to be drawn into these sorts of interrogations, he ought to share what he was up to.
Her private fuming was interrupted.
“Listen,” one of the male croquet players called. “I think I hear Nessie.”
Yasmin’s eyebrows rose, but everyone fell silent . . . most everyone, anyway.
“I thought Nessie was a myth,” Safiye objected.
Stefan patted her knee. “We locals like to give her the benefit of the doubt.”
“Hush,” the croquet player scolded. “You need to be quiet. The call came from far away.”
Yasmin held her breath. A moment later, she heard a distant rising and falling moan. The noise came again, faint but discernible. The hair on her arms stood up.
That was the kind of sound that haunted djinn nightmares.
“Good Lord,” Safiye said, vaguely horrified.
Stefan laughed. “It’s lucky to hear Nessie. Locals claim it augurs good fortune. I’ve certainly found it to be the case.”
“You’re kidding,” Safiye said. “That horrible wailing is lucky?”
He kissed the tip of her nose, amused in the manner of someone enjoying a private joke. “If you’re frightened, darling, you must allow me to hold you tight.”
She laughed when Stefan embraced her, her repulsion dissolving in the face of his playfulness.
“Young love,” LaBass commented, watching them. He employed the same indulgent tone as when describing her and Joseph.
“They are an attractive pair,” Joseph said.
“They’ll go far together,” Eamon added while studying his fingernails. “All the way, one might say.”
His tone was fraught with suggestion. LaBass sent him a sharp look, which reminded Yasmin to guard what her face revealed. What did Eamon mean by them going ‘all the way?’ More than to the altar, it seemed to her.
“What did we miss?” Antonina asked, leading her fellow mistresses into the bright garden.
Yasmin’s heart jumped at their arrival.
I’m relieved, she thought, startled by the realization. When she hadn’t seen Antonina’s group with the other guests, part of her had wondered if they were safe and sound. Ivy’s disappearance was making her imagine all sorts of awfulness. Come to think of it, had LaBass’s mistress Tara truly fled? People said she left in embarrassment, but did any of them know?
Despite the warmth of the day, she shivered. As fate would have it, Stefan turned his head in her direction.
Their eyes collided, crystalline aqua to luminous gray. The effect was a parody of lovers locking glances across a room. The world and the people in it metaphorically fell away.
It simply wasn’t romantic.
Yasmin blanked her expression as completely as she could. A second shiver threatened to seize her shoulders, but she suppressed that too.
She didn’t suppress it well enough. Stefan’s lips curved, a fresh sparkle of humor lighting his blue-green eyes. He winked at her, and somehow, she knew no one else witnessed it.
I see you seeing me, the tiny act seemed to say.
A moment later, Safiye touched his arm. As he turned back to her, he was perfectly casual—perfectly affectionate, for all anyone could see. Safiye was his ideal partner, his hoped-for future bride.
Goddess help us all, Yasmin prayed.
~
For the next little while, she couldn’t have said what topics Dimitriou’s guests discussed. Her thoughts—which she hadn’t yet made sense of—whirled through her mind too quickly. She nearly failed to notice the alfresco meal ending.
“I’ll walk you into the house,” Joseph said.
He was already on his feet, offering his hand to her. She let him take charge of her, though normally she’d have minded being led along like a child. When he increased the impression by patting her forearm, it had the salutary but probably unintentional effect of clearing her mental fog.
Joseph had stopped walking.
They stood beneath the golden dome of the entryway, halfway between the men and women’s arched corridors. Yasmin sensed no one else around, not even invisibly. The potted ferns rustled slightly in the breeze from the back garden.
“Well,” she said. “Are you going to explain what that was about?”
Joseph’s expression twisted unhappily.
“Honestly,” she exclaimed in disgust.
“Yasmin, I . . .”
“There you are,” Stefan said. “Just the djinni I need to speak to.”
Per usual, Joseph had drawn too much of her focus. Without her noticing, Stefan and Safiye had entered arm-in-arm. Yasmin certainly should have noticed. Despite the atrium’s shifting shadows, the diamonds on Safiye’s tunic glittered like trapped stars. She stroked her suitor’s bicep as if reluctant to part from him.
Stefan smiled at her before turning to Yasmin. “I hope you’ll forgive me if I drag your friend to my office. We’ve a bit of business to discuss. LaBass has promised it won’t take long.”
Yasmin stood close enough to Joseph to feel him come to alert.
“I am at your disposal,” he said with a polite bow.
Of course, he was. Leaving gave him an excuse to avoid the tongue-lashing he knew awaited him. “How could I stop you even if I wished?” Yasmin said. “You men will do what you men will do.”
Perhaps to provide a contrast to Yasmin’s tartness, Safiye kissed Stefan’s cheek. “I’ll do my best to console her, darling. You need not worry about us.”
He kissed her back in the same light fashion then waved for Joseph to come with him.
Safiye’s face lost its sweetness the moment the males were gone. Yasmin recognized the look from their days in the harem. There, Safiye had been the queen of icy disapproval. The trait had helped her maintain supremacy over the concubines.
At least, over the ones who shared her ambitions regarding Iksander.
Knowing this aspiration hadn’t applied to her, Yasmin fought an unhelpful urge to smile. It occurred to her that Stefan hadn’t outdone Safiye’s glacial stare. Then again, she never claimed the couple had nothing in common.
Lost in the small amusement, she jerked as Safiye strode past her.
“Come,” Safiye said, barely turning her head to issue the low order.
Safiye didn’t wait for her to catch up. She was a strict mother duck who assumed her chick would follow. She wasn’t wrong. Aware she was in for it, Yasmin hurried after her.
She’s your employer, she told herself. If you’ve got a scolding coming, you’ll take it like a professional.
Safiye wasn’t so angry she forgot Yasmin’s room had shields against eavesdropping. In silence, she thrust its door open.
“Yes?” Yasmin said after she’d shut it behind them.
Safiye seemed not to like her relative composure. Her cheeks flushed dark as she wagged one elegant, stern finger. “I saw that look you shot Stefan in the garden. You’re not spoiling this for me!”
“What look?” Yasmin asked, genuinely confused.
“Like he horrified you!”
“Ah,” Yasmin said. Her after-the-wink dismay.
“Yes, ‘ah,’” the former concubine bit out.
“You hired me to dig into him,” Yasmin reminded. “I’ve been doing so, and I have concerns.”
“What concerns? I’ve seen no evidence you found anything wrong with him.”
“I believe he’s been less than honest in some of his dealings.”
“What if he has? Name one highborn male who does everything on the straight and narrow.”
Yasmin considered how specific she ought to get. It could be argued her client had a right to know everything. On the other hand, anything she said might get back to Dimitriou. “He may have stolen the ruby trees in his garden from the women they belonged to.”
“May have,” Safiye huffed. “Did this woman give you proof?”
“She can’t give me proof. She’s disappeared.”
This silenced Safiye for a space. Her mouth worked as she struggled to deny the information might be important. “That’s unfortunate,” she conceded. “I pray she’s well wherever she’s gone off too. However, if—if—Stefan did misappropriate her trees, perhaps he did it to impress me.”
Yasmin had thought the same herself. “The woman disappeared as if she’d never existed. Magic was used to accomplish it.”
“That doesn’t mean Stefan was involved.”
“Okay,” Yasmin said, committing to the devil’s advocate position. “What about Tara then?”
“Everyone knows why LaBass’s mistress left. She accidentally covered herself in spots from that stupid Particolored Polka.”
“But is that really what happened? Did she actually leave? And was it she who botched the spell?”
Safiye crossed her arms. “What are you implying?”
“I’d swear Stefan nudged that choice toward her in the game. He was angry with her because she embarrassed Joseph and me.”
“Oh, please.” Safiye’s arms slapped her sides as she dropped them again. She shook her head contemptuously. “I thought you’d be a good detective. In the harem, you always seemed coolheaded and observant. Now I realize you’re prone to flights of fancy—and ludicrous ones at that.”
Safiye had good instincts for pricking people where it would hurt. The knack didn’t fail her now. Yasmin couldn’t stop her cheeks from warming.
“I’m concerned for you,” she said as levelly as she could. “I think Stefan may be dangerous.”
This was too much for her client’s patience. “That’s it. I’m firing you.”
Yasmin temporarily lost her breath. “You’re firing me?”
“Yes. I’ll pay you what you’re owed, but you’re officially out of here.”
She hadn’t seen this coming—though she should have. Her mind raced for a way to undo the disaster. Never mind her pride. If Safiye fired her, she’d marry Dimitriou for sure. Her relatives already considered him a catch. She’d be at his mercy with no one to protect her.
“I—” Yasmin rephrased a question inside her head. “Won’t people think it’s odd if I go? I’m supposed to be at this house party as your friend.”
As she’d hoped, this caused Safiye to stop and think. “Fine. I’ll pay you to stay for that but nothing else. No more poking your nose into Stefan’s business.”
Yasmin began to say she didn’t care about being paid then thought better of it. Safiye was unlikely to believe that.
“I mean it,” the other woman said. “You’re not ruining this for me.”
Her voice was stubborn and passionate—hardly the imperturbable courtesan Yasmin knew. Sentiments deeper than ambition were driving her. “You care about Dimitriou that much?”
“He’s a good man. He—” Safiye smoothed her gown as if this would also smooth her agitation. When she’d done, she lifted her chin coolly. “I don’t have as low an opinion of our sultan as some of Stefan’s friends, but no one can call Iksander selfless in his lovemaking. Can you imagine him—or any man—telling a concubine to lie back and enjoy? I couldn’t until I shared Stefan’s bed. He wanted nothing but my pleasure; refused all my offers to use my arts on him. I was his everything, he said. I deserved to be worshiped on a high pedestal. I felt—” Her voice broke. “I felt as if I’d been waiting all my life to meet a man like him.”
Yasmin might not find such a passive role appealing, but she couldn’t doubt Safiye did. The emotion behind her words wasn’t about recovering lost status. She honestly seemed dazzled. Her cheeks had flushed with remembered pleasure, and her eyes were as bright as stars. By accident or design, Stefan satisfied a predilection Safiye might not even now recognize she had.
“I’m glad you enjoyed the experience,” Yasmin said carefully.
Safiye rolled her eyes. “I should have known you’d judge.”
“Whether I do or not doesn’t matter. I would point out, however, that his ability to please you doesn’t negate my suspicions.”
“It speaks to his character! As do a hundred other—” She broke off and shook her head. “I’m not debating this with you. Your opinion no longer holds sway with me.”
Proud though it sounded, this didn’t ring completely true. I could still convince her, Yasmin thought. I mustn’t give up without a fight.
“I shall consider your words,” she said diplomatically. “Perhaps you’d be kind enough to excuse me so that I may.”
Forgetting they were in Yasmin’s rooms, Safiye grimaced and waved her off.