Prayer-Cushions of the Flesh (13 page)

Passing through the ante-room, Orkhan led them back into the Rapturous Chamber. Anadil and Roxelana stripped him of his white robe and tossed it into the pool. It rested on the bubbling surface a few moments, before abruptly vanishing. Multiple reflections of gold and silver on silver made Orkhan dizzy. Mihrimah waited on the far side of the pool, until he was ready to assist in her undressing. His fingers trembled as he set to work removing the layers of cloth and she had to tell him not to be in such a hurry.

She smiled at what she took to be his lustful impatience,

‘In desiring my body, you have learned to love the transient and that is a good and necessary stage. But it is a stage that you must pass beyond, for, in the end, only the Devil loves what is passing.’

Finally, Mihrimah’s white robe, veil and shawl lay at her ankles and she stood naked and very beautiful. However, he was not suffered to linger at her side. Anadil beckoned him back to the other side of the pool. Beside her stood Roxelana, resplendent in her silver dress. In one hand Roxelana held up the train of the dress, in the other she dangled the silken bowstring.

‘Turn to face Mihrimah,’ she said as Orkhan walked towards her.

He did so and Anadil knelt in front of him and reached for his cock, which fear had made small and soft.

‘Do not worry,’ said Anadil. ‘It becomes hard in an instant.’

And she pressed her lips to it.

‘Look to the lustrous Mihrimah,’ said Roxelana, who now stood directly behind him.

Mihrimah stood at the far end of the chamber, radiant and glorying in her nakedness.

Orkhan sensed rather than saw Roxelana stretching to raise the silken bowstring above his head. She began to speak,

‘In the name of the Holy Rapture – ’

As the cord came over his head, Orkhan reached for it and pulled hard. At the same time he bent double, so that Roxelana was pulled onto his back. Then he had her by her wrists and brought her over him and down on top of the kneeling Anadil, and together the two women were sent tumbling into the quicksilver pool. Its momentarily turbulent surface closed over their heads in interlinked rippling whorls. Glittering bubbles rose and exploded.

Next Orkhan went after Mihrimah. She attempted to escape by running round the far side of the pool, but she was less agile than Parvana, Najma and Gulanar had earlier proved themselves, and Orkhan, having caught her at the door, swiftly had his arms round her throat.

‘Is there a way from here to the laundry?’

Her voice was wheezy in reply,

‘The laundry? Yes, if you go back to the tepidarium. I think there is a passage from there to the laundry. The slaves use it to fetch fresh towels.’

‘You are going to take me there.’

The handful of the women lying cooling in the tepidarium did not give them a second glance. Orkhan walked behind Mihrimah with his hands encircling her throat down the passageway which led out of the tepidarium and through a series of doors into the laundry. They entered the hall full of vats that Orkhan had previously glimpsed on his way to the hammam and, as they did so, the women who worked there started shrieking and throwing up their hands. Perizade, who seemed to be their overseer, came hurrying up to deal with this bizarre intrusion.

‘Perizade, I need your help. I need you. Together we are going to try and escape from the Harem.’

‘It is death to even think of such a thing,’ she replied.

Even so she did not hesitate. First, she dismissed the other laundry-women from the hall of vats. Secondly, she began to tear up strips of cloth and together she and Orkhan set to gagging and tying up Mihrimah. They were not kind to her and, despite her moist, pleading eyes, their knots were tight and the cloths bit deep into her soft flesh. She was bound in such a fashion that her face was pressed down over her knees with her arms tied behind her back.

Orkhan was bent low over Mihrimah, checking the knots when he was knocked over, by a cracking blow to the side of his face. He rolled over and looked up. It was Roxelana. Her eyes glittered and her face had a curious greyish look about it. Tiny drops of silver fell from her dress with every movement.

‘I now know that I was too gentle the last time,’ she said. ‘This time it is going to be really bloody. The jinns in me are parched for your blood. They are going to suck your soul out through your arse.’

She hitched her dress to deliver a kick, but, even so, her kick was constrained and had little force. She was panting heavily and she seemed to be having difficulty in seeing Orkhan. Nevertheless, she threw herself upon him and began to pound at him with her fists. He fought back, yet not as strongly as he should have done, for he felt himself unmanned, half-mesmerised by this strange, lead-grey creature, more demon than woman, who chanted in a strange language as she beat at his chest and face. She was trying to kill him, yet still he felt the stirring of desire and he wanted to kiss her even as they fought. Then suddenly it was as if one of the jinns in her body had made away for another. The glittering eyes softened and she fell forward on him.

‘I am too weak to resist you. I want you inside me,’ her voice was pleading.

Her mouth was questing for his and with one of her hands she was seeking to hoick her skirt further up.

‘You want it too. Just a little soft, lingering kiss will be enough … ’

She pressed her mouth hard against his.

It was Perizade who brought this perilous seduction to an end as she came up from behind and swung a laundry paddle at the back of Roxelana’s head, so that the brilliant eyes went suddenly dull.

‘We need her dress,’ said Perizade. ‘Get her dress off her.’

This was not easy, for the dress was tight and Roxelana was heavy. As they struggled with the limp body and clinging fabric, Perizade explained that though the concubines were confined to the Harem, their servants were not. The latter were often sent out into the city on errands. Orkhan’s only chance of escaping the Harem alive was to be disguised as a woman in Perizade’s company.

Leaving Orkhan to struggle into the dress, Perizade went off to look for shawls to cover his head and shoulders. Orkhan had managed by wriggling to get the dress half way up his hips when he heard a rasping voice behind him,

‘That is my dress you have on and I want it back.’

Roxelana staggered towards him. By now her skin had turned deep black and her eyeballs seemed to have shrivelled in their sockets.

‘Oh my prince!’ she continued throatily. ‘Just one dying kiss. That is all we need to consummate our love. Just one little kiss.’

She seemed to sniff her way towards him. She put her arms around him and stuck out her tongue. It was like a twig of charred wood. She coughed and a gob of mercury appeared on her lower lip and swiftly ran down her chin. Then she loosened her clasp round Orkhan’s neck and slowly sank to die at his feet.

Perizade reappeared with plain white shawls. She did not give the corpse of Roxelana so much as a glance. One shawl covered Orkhan’s shoulders, the other went over his head and he held it together across his face with his teeth. Together they walked out of the laundry and they passed by the Valide Sultan, who was anxiously pacing about in the garden. They were detained for a while by the Janissary guards at the gate out of the Inner Court. Perizade explained to one of the soldiers that the furnaces which served the hammam and laundry were about to run out of firewood and that they were being sent on a mission to hurry up the next delivery.

While they waited for the young Janissary to return from consulting with his officer, Perizade turned and whispered to Orkhan,

‘Why did you come to me?’

‘It was as you said. We are destined to be together. I am destined to love you and I do. I need you – and, besides my viper needs to drink at your tavern. It is a hopeless addiction.’

‘That viper and tavern stuff!’ Perizade laughed. ‘That’s just Harem folklore. It is merely one of the stories made up by Afsana and the other concubines. You must just like the taste, that’s all!’

The Janissary returned and indicated that they might walk on. So they passed through the Gate of the Inner Court into the Outer Court, which was open to the public. The real world of old and young men and women, children and animals, carts, traps, sacking, planks, bales, barrels, hides, bottles, lanterns and knives seemed to explode before Orkhan’s eyes. He had left the tainted fairyland of silk, silver and porphyry forever.

Under assumed names, Orkhan and Perizade found work in the city. They prospered and, after only a few years, they set up a laundry of their own in the village of Eyup beyond the walls of Istanbul and there they continued to dwell in contentment until they were overtaken by Death, the breaker of bonds and destroyer of delights.

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ISBN printed book  978 1 873982 63 1

ISBN e-book           978 1 909232 25 9

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Publishing History

First published by Dedalus in 1997

Film tie-in edition in 2005

First ebook edition in 2012

Non film tie-in ebook in 2012

Copyright © Robert Irwin 1997

The right of Robert Irwin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

Printed in Finland by Bookwell

Typeset by RefineCatch Ltd

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