The Debt of Tamar (12 page)

“A thousand apologies…” Don José explained. “Our daughter…” he whispered in a tone of hushed grief. “The fever…yes it was awful…two days ago…there was nothing we could do…If it is G-d’s will, let it be.” José could feel his heart throbbing in his chest as he lied to the Sultan. His teeth and mouth and jaw stiffened. He did not expect the sense of shame that quickly overpowered him. Don José the Jew fell to the ground and wept at the feet of the Sultan. He would never see his daughter again. He had killed her with his deeds. He had banished her with his lies.

José took leave of his duties at the palace for a month of mourning. He mourned the loss of all that he held dear. He had lost his daughter, he had lost his wife, and when it came to his faith—he had lost his way.

“She is gone,” the Sultan said to his son.

Murat looked out of his window. In the very place where the sun should have been, he found a large, black hole in the blue sky. Below, people were walking and moving about their business as usual. The gardeners tended the bushes, as though they still believed it were possible for life to grow. Jaffar, along with the other African eunuchs, continued to guard the gates under the mistaken impression that there was anything left on this earth still worth protecting. A bird chirped a contemptuous song of oblivion. White doves brazenly spread their wings and dove recklessly through the wanton sky—a sky so bright and blue and without shame that Murat grit his teeth and fists in frustrated rage.

He wanted to scream down to all those oblivious, passing by, “You scurrying fools! Your appointments, your plans, your dreams! Go ahead and drop them all, only take up your shovels, for we must bury it all. How disappointing life is!” But he didn’t shout these words. He did not speak, only let out a low growl, a deep rumbling from within.

Murat was silent for six days. Day after day, Sultan Selim sat at the edge of Murat’s bed, talking to him and trying to coax him to eat something. And still, Murat did not answer, but looked up blindly for trap doors in the ceiling where he wished he could slip away from his life, from his cruel fate. On the seventh day, he finally spoke. “I only loved her a little.”

He had not left his chamber in a week. The room was kept dim, the shutters drawn tight. In the darkness, Sultan Selim could barely see the boy’s face. Curled up in a snail’s silhouette, Murat sat with his knees tucked up to his chin.

“I only loved her a little.” Murat said the words quietly, as though trying to convince himself.

The Sultan pondered those words. “Can fire rage only a bit? Can floodwaters drown
only a little
?”

Murat fought back his tears. “
Baba
.” He caved into his father’s embrace. He had always seen her as a force in nature, an enchanting, mysterious force, with the power to entice, to pull, to shape. Like gravity, a luring charm so potent, it had the ability to affect, but never be affected. Like light and wind. The idea that a force as unholy as death could take her away, that he, the son of the Holy Ottoman emperor, the Conqueror, ruler of Dar Al-Islam, the idea that
he
could do nothing to bring her back, thoroughly stunned him. That she was only human was inconceivable. In fact, it was more than he could bear.

“I do not accept,” he breathed in a tone so eerily low and dismal, it sent a chill through the Sultan.

“I do not accept,” he told the servants when they attempted to serve him his dinner.

“I do not accept,” he would hiss, his eyes cold and distant. He waved away the delicacies that were brought before him, from the furthest corners of the empire.

“I do not accept! I do not accept! I do not accept!” He dismissed them all with a dangerous, thrashing gesture, a motion so sweepingly violent, it could have knocked over even the chief black eunuch.

“I do not accept,” he repeated again and again, as dozens of beautiful slave girls were brought before him.

“Dismissed.” He sent them all away, one by one, with the same contemptuous scorn he used to dismiss his meals at dinnertime.

“I do not accept,” he pleaded with G-d, as he knelt on his carpet during the sunrise prayers.

“I do not accept!” he threatened menacingly, in his prayer at sundown.

“I do not accept,” his spirit howled through every pore in his flesh.

“I do not accept,” he cried out beneath the mist of a weeping pomegranate tree, planted in the secret garden of their desire.

“Come back…” he pleaded in his sleep. In his heart, he could not believe that Tamar was dead. He believed she could come back, if only she willed it.

In Murat’s distress, visions of Tamar weighed heavy on his lids. Her mischievous smile, her emerald eyes, her bronzed skin, they all found their rest in the hollow space of almost sleep. They were leaching images, eerily sedentary, and haunting. They snuck upon him the way a dead body washes ashore under the cloak of night.

It was
just a few hours before sunrise when Murat was startled awake. His sheets were drenched in a cold sweat. Crickets chimed in the still of night and a silver mist hung low over the river. He summoned the interpreter of dreams, the Halveti Sheik Suca, to his bedside.

“Murat, what is it?” The Sheik’s long robe trailed as he hurried to the bedside.

“A strange dream.” Murat kicked his legs over the side of the bed as he sat up. “You must tell me what it means.”

“You will dream many dreams. Best not to ponder the meaning of each and every one.”

“This one’s different.” Murat leaned forward anxiously. “I know it.”

Their eyes locked for a moment before the Sheik nodded. “Go ahead then. Tell it to me.”

Murat closed his eyes. “I was resting in the garden. The sun was warm on my face and the grass was cool under my skin.”

“You weren’t alone, were you?” the Sheik interrupted.

Murat shook his head. “She was on the grass beside me. We were lying there, not speaking, not moving, just being there, together.”

“What happened next? Take your time, Murat. It’s important you remember the events just as they unfolded.”

Murat nodded, his lids still sealed tight. “It was all very strange.”

“Go on.”

“I looked over to her and saw something like a seed rising up from her chest. I watched as it rose from her and came to settle in me. All the while, we lay there, not moving, not speaking, beside one another. We lay this way for a lifetime. We watched as seasons changed. A hundred winters came to pass, and then, in the very place where the seed had sunk, a tree sprouted. It grew tall and strong and hovered high above the clouds. Its shade encompassed all the world.”

The Sheik stroked his long white beard. “A pomegranate tree you say?”

“I did not say.”

“But it was a pomegranate tree, was it not?”

“How could you know that?”

“I saw it, just as you did.”

Murat nodded.

“Was that all?”

“I awoke shortly after.”

“Strange, indeed.”

“Have you any idea what it could mean?”

“I’ve more than an idea.”

Murat leaned in. “So I was right to summon you. I was feeling so very foolish.”

“This is not the dream of a fool, Murat. It is a window into the future.”

“I cannot bear another moment. Tell me what it means, dear Sheik. Tell me now and tell me quickly.”

“Through you and the girl, the Osman family will continue to live on forever. She is the one who has planted the seed in you Murat, and through her, your descendants will live and prosper.”

“But the girl in my dream,
she is dead
. She cannot be the one
.
”

“Murat,” Sheik Suca pressed. “The girl is certainly not dead. Your forefathers have saved her and her people. The Nissim children will carry this debt through time until it is repaid.”

“I don’t understand—”

“When you save a soul, you do so by making it a part of your own. When you save a life, you save it forever. Allah has granted you a guardian savior for all eternity. Don’t you see?
S
he must pay it back.
”

Murat looked on dumbfounded. “Pay it back? But to whom?”

“You are your father’s son, are you not? The girl will inherit the debt of her father, and you, my boy, will inherit the deed.”

“So we will meet again?” he asked, eyes wide and heart thumping.

“You will meet again, but not before it is time for the debt to be repaid.”

Murat swallowed hard. He blinked several times before addressing the question that hung limply between them. “When is the debt to be repaid?” His voice was barely a whisper.

Sheik Suca frowned. “When Allah wills it.”

Murat stared on blankly.

“Perhaps you should try and rest now.”

“I don’t need to rest.” He headed towards the open shutters and peered out over the dark, empty courtyard. He spun around and challenged the Sheik, “If she’s not dead, then where is
she
?”

The old Sheik winced. “I think it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to spend some time out of the city. Perhaps Buyukada? Yes, I think so,” he continued without waiting for Murat’s response. “There, the dust is laced with gold—very good for the eyes and for healing the heart. I will speak to the Sultan and make arrangements for your departure.” The Sheik shuffled toward the door and muttered unintelligently to himself, before turning back to Murat. “Do try and get some rest.”

But Murat could not rest. He sat up all that night, thinking only of her debt, his deed, and a day they might someday meet again.

On the sixth day of the month of Elul, the young prince set sail for the small Island of Buyukada, just an hour’s journey South of Istanbul. He boarded the ferry from the shores of Topkapi and sailed through what was known as the Port of Justice. Upon arrival, his ferry glided through the outstretched embrace of two weathered docks. He stepped off the wooden vessel onto the deck situated at the northwestern tip of the island.

His shoulders sloped sullenly, as though naturally dislodged from his withered frame. His servant was waiting at port to unload his trunks onto the carriage. She had been sent days prior of Murat’s sojourn and was instructed to secure his smooth arrival. She carried his trunks with as much ease as his thick Albanian guard had upon their departure from the palace. After loading the trunks onto an unadorned, horse-drawn carriage, she accompanied him on the journey through the pine-shaded promenade. She looked at Murat and saw that though the seagulls had come to greet him, he had winter in his eyes.

When Sultana Nur-Banu received word of her son’s excessive mourning, she arranged for a diverse entourage of servants to attend to him in Buyukada. She sent beautiful slaves from the Caucuses, a yellow-headed Armenian who strummed magic with her flute, his tutor and spiritual adviser, Sheik Suca, and a troop of dwarves who were trained in dance and entertainment. She also sent the Halabi, a large man of nomadic origins who was as stern and unflinching as a cement brick. He’d tutored Murat in Arabic and insisted the boy memorize the suras of the Koran. She sent Persian poets, Greek astrologers, and boyhood friends who’d been employed in the palace as janissaries.

When Sheik Suca finally found the young prince, he discovered Murat wasting away in the saunas and steam-rooms of the imperial hamam.

“My dear Sheik!” The naked boy stood in a steaming tub of rose petals. “To what do I owe this great honor!” His words were slurred as he stumbled up the bathhouse stairs, drunk on the island’s plum wine. Around his feet, a small pool of water and wilted pink petals gathered around wooden bath clogs. He snapped his fingers. Immediately, the servant girls arrived, swathed him in Kashmirian linens, and patted him dry.

“You are not well, Murat. I’ve been sent to oversee your recovery.”

“Not well! I’m perfectly fine, good Sheik! Look around.” He raised his hands towards the gilded domes and Byzantine frescos overhead. A servant girl with red hair let out a startled little cry as he grabbed her waist and yanked her close. “I am surrounded by beautiful women and vast riches!” He pushed her aside, “Shouldn’t I be fine! Let me guess. Has my mother sent you with more beautiful women…How many? Five, ten, twenty? What exponential joy!” He snapped his fingers again. This time, the servants appeared with a jewel-encrusted goblet. Murat threw back his neck and downed the contents, then tossed the empty goblet aside.

Sheik Suca winced as it skidded across the blue and jade tiles and clattered against the marble wall.

Murat lifted his arm to his face and wiped away a trail of crimson wine that streaked his chin. With moisture beads glistening on his brow, he cackled loudly, his misery echoing throughout the steam-filled bathhouse. “Perhaps the Sultana thinks me a wild beast. As easy to please as a roaming dog! You can send them back. Send them all back!”

“To think you are a crown prince of the Empire!” the Sheik scolded. “Look at you, drunk as the bees in the orchard. Come, boy! Get out of this sweaty pit. Let’s get some fresh air.” The Sheik clapped his hands loudly and three girls arrived in white tunics. “Dress him,” he instructed, his voice uncharacteristically harsh. “He’s not to have another drop of wine. I speak on behalf of Sultana Nur-banu, favorite to the Sultan. That’s an order!”

Sheik Suca and Murat boarded an open-air carriage. They made their way along a cobblestone street flanked on either side by white wooden mansions and the shadows cast by cypress trees that kept the households cool. They took in the scent of honeysuckle and lavender. Crumbling monasteries were perched atop the hills and nestled in the valleys of Buyukada. They were ancient relics that housed the islands monks and nuns and had once been home to Byzantine empresses exiled centuries ago.

At the base of a low hill, beneath the shade of a bamboo lattice, the sheik attempted to recreate some semblance of normalcy in the prince’s life. He began to tutor Murat in history and philosophy, while the servants kept them cool beneath the steady wand of their outstretched, peacock fans.

And yet, Murat failed to grasp most of his lessons, losing his concentration to the vast expanse of the Marmara. The gentle stirs and ripples of the turquoise sea so captivated him. Was that the color of her eyes? Her emerald eyes, or perhaps hers had a touch of the azure sky? The memory was fading and for this, he began to hate himself.