Early morning and Istanbul seethed with a thick fog that twisted around the pointed tops of minarets and cloaked the ground. Elijah stepped off the train into Sirkeci Terminal and was immediately assaulted by the city?s strange mixture of climates. His suit coat became less like fabric and more like paper mach? drying over his forearms. Humidity plastered his pants to his thighs and calves. Inside the terminal was no better, teeming as it was with bodies and vendors, loud with the echo of voices calling out greetings or hawking wares.
As soon as Elijah got beyond the station, he stopped at the first clothing shop he spotted and replaced his suit with linen trousers and a shirt in the same fabric of a darker color. He dropped his old suit into an overflowing rubbish bin in passing. Elijah intended to stay no longer than it would take to ascertain the identity of the man Mus?ad sought and the strange symbols tattooed on the cultist the Jinn and Una interrogated weeks prior. He carried no luggage.
The city was busy with its morning ablutions, shrugging off the night before, its citizens thick in the streets and the sidewalks, their strides purposeful and direct. Elijah stood on a street corner and watched for awhile, letting the rhythm of the populace sink below his skin until it found a place in the cadence of his heart. He thought he perhaps hated this city as much as he loved it. Istanbul had never been particularly welcoming to Elijah Cristea, but then he had never been a very polite guest to her, either. Scattered among its many districts were still the rubbled remains of some of his former visits. His name was a curse that traveled in whispers in certain neighborhoods and among certain echelons of its inhabitants. Elijah wasn?t the man he?d been when he?d last stepped foot in the city, but he had no plans of redemption on this visit. After passing alongside Topkapi palace, a wistful once over of its twin towers, he left the main thoroughfares in favor of narrower alleyways.
Elijah walked until he came to his first prospect: an iron gate with a painstakingly-wrought Shahmaran taking up a majority of its surface, the serpent queen?s scaly tail coiling through the railings and the serpent head at its terminus aiming its gaping mouth as if to strike those who?d seek entrance. After gripping the serpent by the neck and twisting the iron until it emitted a low hiss, Elijah stepped back and waited. The iron serpent began moving, threading itself around and through the iron bars. Its words came with a dangerous sibilance that vibrated the spokes of the gate: ?Burada hoş karşılanmazsın.?
Reaching for the snake and arresting its motion with his fist, Elijah spoke into its gaping maw at the lens he could see in the back of the serpent?s throat. ?Come and tell me that in person.? Wrenching from his grasp, the serpent?s head reared back in threat. Elijah ducked to narrowly avoid its strike and sidestepped the next attempt easily, starting to laugh. ?Still slow, I see. Too bad, my friend. I spent hours on the train looking forward to our reunion.? After dipping a low bow, Elijah continued on his way, the serpent?s heavy head twisting to follow his egress until he vanished around a corner.
His second stop was no more productive than the first, and where the old serpent had at least the courtesy to acknowledge him, the next house he visited gave him only an empty concrete facade and the tattletale of heart beats rattling just inside its silent walls. Elijah counted four of them and eyed the top of the wall speculatively, but in the end he?d never found the elves who lodged there particularly entertaining.
The third door he arrived at was the most modest of the three, made of heavy oak inset in white-painted concrete. A small pair of shutters on the door opened before he could consider ringing the tarnished bell that hung from an old brown string. The face that filled the door?s small window forced him a step backward.
?You are the spitting image of your mother,? Elijah said, trying to recoup from his shock. The girl hadn?t the vivid green of Natalia?s eyes, instead her irises were a strange shade of iron and violet. The warm oxblood waves that fell over her shoulders, however, were exactly the same as her mother?s. He remembered the cut of Natalia?s eyes over her shoulder, that pale little hill with the soft protrusion of bone. How he?d been unable to resist brushing his lips over it once. The sting of Natalia?s hand across his face that followed. Elijah smiled.
?You?re thinking of her right now, aren?t you?? Mila said, narrowing her eyes at him from behind the iron grating. ?Even though you know better.?
Elijah chuckled and gave her a hapless shrug, then asked, ?Will you be letting me in or will we catch up through the window? I?m more charming without a door to impede.?
?I shouldn?t. Your name isn?t favored in this city right now.?
?It hasn?t been for a long time.?
Mila shut the small window and shortly after, the wooden door swung upon. ?You did my mother a great kindness once, after Una. And I also had a crush on you at one time.?
?So which can I thank for turning your hand upon the lock?? Elijah asked, ducking through the doorway into the small courtyard blanketed by vines and the gnarled branches of old olive trees. Mila?s feet were bare on the old paving stones. Water dripped into a small stone basic from a copper spout set in the wall.
?The former,? Mila said, shutting the door behind Elijah.
?What happened to the latter?? He bent over the stone basin, remembering. Two fish swam in a circle, and then the water went black and gave him the reflection of Natalia?s face, the stern line of her mouth the point through which Elijah drew his finger. The water bubbled angrily until Elijah removed his hand and wiped it across his pants, smile widening.
Mila turned a series of locks, and then a flick of two fingers sent a shower of shimmering sparks against the back of the door. Satisfied, she turned to address Elijah at the fountain, ?Sense replaced it.?
They moved through the small courtyard and into the dim interior of the parlor. She?d not changed much since inheriting it from her mother, at least that Elijah could tell. Plants and vines spidered over the walls and windows like great veins and arteries comprising some larger circulatory system, choking light so that it came only in thin, dusty drafts the size of bullet holes.
Elijah stopped before a small mahogany table, fingering the edge of a velvet scarf on top of which lay a worn stack of black and gold-backed cards. He reached and Mila?s hand shot out to close around his wrist, surprisingly strong for the thinness of her fingers, her skin too warm. ?She would have your hands if you touched them.?
?Even now??
?Even now.? She released Elijah?s wrist and he ran his thumb over the impressions left behind, his study of the girl gaining a newly speculative edge.
?But I will read them for you, if you like. If your opinion has changed after so many years.? Mila looked at him steadily, her eyelashes a thick frame for the shifting violet and gray of her irises. Elijah thought he detected a challenge within them, but it was hard to say. She gestured to a sofa patched together in varying fabrics with stuffing that peeked from the join of fabric and ornate wood, then sat in a carved wooden chair, tucking her bare legs up beneath her skirt.
?It hasn?t,? Elijah said, sitting. He ran his hands over the raised stitching of the sofa, a vague memory surfacing and receding again before he could grasp it fully.
?You are seeking information then. What did you bring for me?? Mila asked.
?I was hoping you?d provide solely on the memory of your mother.?
?But I am her daughter, am I not?? Mila smiled and extended her hand, turning the empty cradle of her palm upright.
?So you are.? Elijah pulled from his pocket a baggie of pale blue pills, extracting two and laying them in her palm even as Mila wrinkled her nose.
?These aren?t party favors, love. They?re from another realm entirely,? he said.
Mila?s eyes narrowed as she held the two pills up to the light, displaying the faint shimmer coating them.
?Dissolve them in tea. They give you the ability to visit the world of dreams while awake, and they?re powerful enough to put a Jinn down. If you diluted them, imagine the possibilities.?
Mila considered the pills for another handful of seconds and then nodded, tucking them away in the folds of her skirt. Elijah leaned forward, passing his phone over to her to share the photo album loaded onto the screen.
As soon as Elijah got beyond the station, he stopped at the first clothing shop he spotted and replaced his suit with linen trousers and a shirt in the same fabric of a darker color. He dropped his old suit into an overflowing rubbish bin in passing. Elijah intended to stay no longer than it would take to ascertain the identity of the man Mus?ad sought and the strange symbols tattooed on the cultist the Jinn and Una interrogated weeks prior. He carried no luggage.
The city was busy with its morning ablutions, shrugging off the night before, its citizens thick in the streets and the sidewalks, their strides purposeful and direct. Elijah stood on a street corner and watched for awhile, letting the rhythm of the populace sink below his skin until it found a place in the cadence of his heart. He thought he perhaps hated this city as much as he loved it. Istanbul had never been particularly welcoming to Elijah Cristea, but then he had never been a very polite guest to her, either. Scattered among its many districts were still the rubbled remains of some of his former visits. His name was a curse that traveled in whispers in certain neighborhoods and among certain echelons of its inhabitants. Elijah wasn?t the man he?d been when he?d last stepped foot in the city, but he had no plans of redemption on this visit. After passing alongside Topkapi palace, a wistful once over of its twin towers, he left the main thoroughfares in favor of narrower alleyways.
Elijah walked until he came to his first prospect: an iron gate with a painstakingly-wrought Shahmaran taking up a majority of its surface, the serpent queen?s scaly tail coiling through the railings and the serpent head at its terminus aiming its gaping mouth as if to strike those who?d seek entrance. After gripping the serpent by the neck and twisting the iron until it emitted a low hiss, Elijah stepped back and waited. The iron serpent began moving, threading itself around and through the iron bars. Its words came with a dangerous sibilance that vibrated the spokes of the gate: ?Burada hoş karşılanmazsın.?
Reaching for the snake and arresting its motion with his fist, Elijah spoke into its gaping maw at the lens he could see in the back of the serpent?s throat. ?Come and tell me that in person.? Wrenching from his grasp, the serpent?s head reared back in threat. Elijah ducked to narrowly avoid its strike and sidestepped the next attempt easily, starting to laugh. ?Still slow, I see. Too bad, my friend. I spent hours on the train looking forward to our reunion.? After dipping a low bow, Elijah continued on his way, the serpent?s heavy head twisting to follow his egress until he vanished around a corner.
His second stop was no more productive than the first, and where the old serpent had at least the courtesy to acknowledge him, the next house he visited gave him only an empty concrete facade and the tattletale of heart beats rattling just inside its silent walls. Elijah counted four of them and eyed the top of the wall speculatively, but in the end he?d never found the elves who lodged there particularly entertaining.
The third door he arrived at was the most modest of the three, made of heavy oak inset in white-painted concrete. A small pair of shutters on the door opened before he could consider ringing the tarnished bell that hung from an old brown string. The face that filled the door?s small window forced him a step backward.
?You are the spitting image of your mother,? Elijah said, trying to recoup from his shock. The girl hadn?t the vivid green of Natalia?s eyes, instead her irises were a strange shade of iron and violet. The warm oxblood waves that fell over her shoulders, however, were exactly the same as her mother?s. He remembered the cut of Natalia?s eyes over her shoulder, that pale little hill with the soft protrusion of bone. How he?d been unable to resist brushing his lips over it once. The sting of Natalia?s hand across his face that followed. Elijah smiled.
?You?re thinking of her right now, aren?t you?? Mila said, narrowing her eyes at him from behind the iron grating. ?Even though you know better.?
Elijah chuckled and gave her a hapless shrug, then asked, ?Will you be letting me in or will we catch up through the window? I?m more charming without a door to impede.?
?I shouldn?t. Your name isn?t favored in this city right now.?
?It hasn?t been for a long time.?
Mila shut the small window and shortly after, the wooden door swung upon. ?You did my mother a great kindness once, after Una. And I also had a crush on you at one time.?
?So which can I thank for turning your hand upon the lock?? Elijah asked, ducking through the doorway into the small courtyard blanketed by vines and the gnarled branches of old olive trees. Mila?s feet were bare on the old paving stones. Water dripped into a small stone basic from a copper spout set in the wall.
?The former,? Mila said, shutting the door behind Elijah.
?What happened to the latter?? He bent over the stone basin, remembering. Two fish swam in a circle, and then the water went black and gave him the reflection of Natalia?s face, the stern line of her mouth the point through which Elijah drew his finger. The water bubbled angrily until Elijah removed his hand and wiped it across his pants, smile widening.
Mila turned a series of locks, and then a flick of two fingers sent a shower of shimmering sparks against the back of the door. Satisfied, she turned to address Elijah at the fountain, ?Sense replaced it.?
They moved through the small courtyard and into the dim interior of the parlor. She?d not changed much since inheriting it from her mother, at least that Elijah could tell. Plants and vines spidered over the walls and windows like great veins and arteries comprising some larger circulatory system, choking light so that it came only in thin, dusty drafts the size of bullet holes.
Elijah stopped before a small mahogany table, fingering the edge of a velvet scarf on top of which lay a worn stack of black and gold-backed cards. He reached and Mila?s hand shot out to close around his wrist, surprisingly strong for the thinness of her fingers, her skin too warm. ?She would have your hands if you touched them.?
?Even now??
?Even now.? She released Elijah?s wrist and he ran his thumb over the impressions left behind, his study of the girl gaining a newly speculative edge.
?But I will read them for you, if you like. If your opinion has changed after so many years.? Mila looked at him steadily, her eyelashes a thick frame for the shifting violet and gray of her irises. Elijah thought he detected a challenge within them, but it was hard to say. She gestured to a sofa patched together in varying fabrics with stuffing that peeked from the join of fabric and ornate wood, then sat in a carved wooden chair, tucking her bare legs up beneath her skirt.
?It hasn?t,? Elijah said, sitting. He ran his hands over the raised stitching of the sofa, a vague memory surfacing and receding again before he could grasp it fully.
?You are seeking information then. What did you bring for me?? Mila asked.
?I was hoping you?d provide solely on the memory of your mother.?
?But I am her daughter, am I not?? Mila smiled and extended her hand, turning the empty cradle of her palm upright.
?So you are.? Elijah pulled from his pocket a baggie of pale blue pills, extracting two and laying them in her palm even as Mila wrinkled her nose.
?These aren?t party favors, love. They?re from another realm entirely,? he said.
Mila?s eyes narrowed as she held the two pills up to the light, displaying the faint shimmer coating them.
?Dissolve them in tea. They give you the ability to visit the world of dreams while awake, and they?re powerful enough to put a Jinn down. If you diluted them, imagine the possibilities.?
Mila considered the pills for another handful of seconds and then nodded, tucking them away in the folds of her skirt. Elijah leaned forward, passing his phone over to her to share the photo album loaded onto the screen.