“You thought…” His eyes widened, face going blank with disbelief, and he drained his cup. He set it down and reached for the bottle again. “I had no idea you were this willful,” he murmured. “I’ve underestimated you, clearly.”
He walked in close again, and raised the cup to Val’s lips, pressing the sticky rim between them. Val opened his throat and drank, obedient in this small thing. Swallow after swallow, and he immediately felt the throbbing in his head ease.
Mehmet gave him half and sipped at the rest himself, sitting on the edge of the table so they were on eye level with one another. In an eerily calm voice, in control of his vast temper now, he said, “Do you think me stupid?”
It was defeat, and not bravery, that gave Val the courage to speak the truth. “I think you’re lustful, and unhappy, and spoiled.”
Mehmet stared. Then he laughed, sharp and hollow. “The two of you really are brothers, aren’t you?”
“No one ever seems to think that. Palace gossip has it that we’re half-brothers.”
“You certainly look it. But thatrebellion,” he said the word like a curse, “is certainly an inherited trait. Perhaps from your father. He never could adhere to a treaty.”
Father had rebelled when he saw no other choice. But it was Mother who’d passed along her temper. Val kept such knowledge to himself, saying a quiet prayer that, against all odds, she was still alive.
“You might be beautiful, but you aren’t stupid,” Mehmet continued. “So you already know that you could never go back with your brother.”
“Like I said. It was worth a try.”
“My, but I hate you like this.”
“Then why not let me go?”
A cruel smile. “Come now, I just paid a compliment to your wits. You know why you must stay. You are leverage against your brother.”
“Vlad hates me.”
“He acts as if he does, yes, but he doesn’t. He wouldn’t hate me so if he actually hated you. So you will stay here, and be a good little boy, so Vlad Dracula knows to uphold his part of the bargain.” Another smile, this one satisfied. “You are here for the duration, little golden Radu.” He stood and paced back toward the side table for a refill. “You should be grateful,” he said over his shoulder. “You still have all your limbs, and both your eyes. Comfortable accommodations and the sultan’s favor.” He spread a hand across his own chest in demonstration. Tilted his head. “It would be wise of you tokeepmy favor.”
Yes, keep it. Until he was able to get loose, to run home. Stay on Mehmet’s good side, gain his trust, gain his freedom…
That little bead of resolve inside him gathered mass, weighty as a stone in the pit of his stomach.
He thought of Vlad, of the riding crop slapping his head, his shoulders, the backs of his knees. His willfulness and sullenness in the face of all his teachers.Thatwas resolve. The kind of thing that got men through captivity. It was only his body that had been hurt – and it was a strong body at that. An immortal one.
What was a little pain and a little time to a vampire if it would, in the long run, get him what he wanted?
Val decided something. He wet his lips. “Alright. Let’s make a bargain, then.”
“A bargain?” Mehmet’s laugh turned slowly disbelieving, and then faded away altogether as he took in Val’s seriousness. “Alright,” he said, quieter, “what sort of bargain?”
“I’ll be obedient,” he said. “I’ll pleasure you.” It was only a physical sacrifice, after all. What did it matter? “And you will train me to be a proper prince.”
It was a risk. He could be killed on the spot.
But Mehmet smiled, slow and nasty. “You’re terrible,” he said.
And Val knew, though abuse awaited him, that he could do this. That it was worth it.
And that, even in this small way, he’d won.
