2: The Burning

If you wish people to stay, you do not bind them.

'If you wish people to stay,' Ela almost replied, 'sometimes you must. And perhaps they even want it.'

Not that she could be sure - not that she would ask. Of those with whom she could speak most candidly, that was not a question she wished to ask. Selfish? Yes, but she was willing to be selfish about this.

For the sake of good conversation.

A return to the past.

Whatever it was that Nehir desired of her, Ela would give. She tired of the pace at which her work progressed - she tired of the clawing suspicion of the Viziers, huddling in their cloaks of importance, made powerful by keeping others weak. If the knowledge she had now had been more accessible only two years sooner...

There was little doubt in Ela's mind that their host was trained in the magickal arts. The only question was the degree to which she was trained, and which order she might belong to. Her perspective on knowledge thinned the list somewhat, but then Ela herself clearly saw things differently to others in her orders, so who could tell? That said, if Nehir truly was so trained, it made her intention that much more powerful.

And more dangerous.

Nehir knew more than Ela was comfortable with her knowing. Father Korsakov visiting...a strange coincidence. Whatever he saw in that scroll was of enough import that he returned. Whatever it was, he could understand. Whatever it was bore importance to her, and he clearly had not shared that knowledge.

And this was the point. Even within the orders, with all working to the same goals, they hid things from each other as if to speak the words together might make them lesser. Ela did not fear naive hands on her work. Talent could be honed and many hands made light work. She did not fear leylines drained of their power, inaccessible from the number trying to use them. She feared never achieving her goals because the final piece of a puzzle lay in a dusty storage room, warded to prevent it being removed. She feared someone else holding the key to her success just out of reach in spite. In hiding, aeons passed before advancements were made, people aged...time passed.

Things change and nothing changes.

Who would be the first, though? And what would be the consequences of such an action? One did not run from angered sorcerors - one could not run from angered sorcerors. 

Nowhere was far enough. 

Not in space, nor in time.

Ela's thoughts came to rest briefly on her mentor, at once everywhere and nowhere in Europe. What would he say? Did he know Nehir - what she was attempting? It seemed the sort of thing he would find interesting. 

One of her latest designs sat rolled to be sent to him with the mail the next day...perhaps she would add a note. It had been a while since he had been in Constantinople. What did he know of the Oikolygos and Ferravanti family lines? He would certainly know of Georgina Bradbury, if she was important enough to be here at this table... oh, and she must remember to pass time with Marco Ramirez. Learn what he might know of locomotive technology -just out of curiosity. See, Zehra. Not work...pure interest.

As she made the mental note, she glanced across the table and raised a brow slightly. Europe...Berlin ...perhaps he also knew of a Kate Clark from a textiles family in London.

Research is crucial, after all.

***

It was the first summer, and she was alternately hot, then cold, so Ela kept both chilled water and a thick blanket to cover them both as she shook, despite being bathed in her own sweat. This was, however, the best sanctuary they could find from the piercing Istanbul heat, and Zehra refused to do the sensible thing and use the cot for herself, so the two of them were huddled together such that Zehra could sleep upon Ela's breast when she fell into fever dreams.

As Zehra slept beneath the stage of the coffee house above, Ela read whatever medical texts she could get her hands on. It wasn't just the fever - Zehra was pale, thinning despite the food Ela managed to force into her, her breathing harsh. Just 21 years of age, almost one year an orphan, the family home was too busy too busy. Anne and Baba hadn't been pleased by the lover they had inadvertently introduced her to - an inventor, an engineer deserved someone who would stretch her mind academically. Zehra was a dancer of all things.

She was more than that, though. To Ela she was an artist, a creative mind, a visionary. The extent of her knowledge surpassed the academic and travelled into lived experience. They had travelled for the first time that Spring to get away from anne passing - baba was still too soon much less anne...there was no reason to stay in Istanbul. Italy, Rome. Switzerland, Spain, London, Versailles, Berlin.

So many memories, now.

Even if she wanted to, how could Ela escape that orbit?

A hot, hot hand grazed a thigh and brought Ela back to the room beneath the stage. She looked at the placid smile and her eyes softened.

"You weren't reading."

"No."

"Where were you?"

A sigh.

"Somewhere. Anywhere. I never know right now, sevgili."

The hand slips higher. It makes no sense to wear clothes when you're hidden beneath a city and trying to keep cool. Beneath people dancing for a living while one of theirs slowly wasted away. Sure, she would be fine by summer's end, but...

At this time there was no time.

"Let me distract you."

A slight gasp, a sigh - a hand so warm it almost burns.

She wants to say no. No, Zehra, I'm doing this for you - I want you well, I want to be with you always. I want you by my side to the end of days, watching the world end.

But she doesn't want that. The dancer, lithe, sweating - God - is her fever breaking or rising? She wants to be here, now, and how can I give her anything but here and now?

Lips meet, a hand cups around a throat, holds gently, lovingly. Kisses pressed around the face, neck, ears as the hand is released. A gasp - reminder of life.

She would need to sleep soon. Ela knew. The exhaustion of a fever overcame the most aroused dancer eventually. But for those moments that first summer, Ela did not fear death, for it seemed close and yet so so far away.

Despite everything, despite anne dying that year, despite still feeling the need to hide her lover from the house for God's sake...despite that, she cherishes that first summer. 

It lasted the longest and felt the fullest.

And she remembers it all. Every detail. Her thigh sometimes burns with that heat, as if to remind her it was not a dream.