4: Fast Thoughts

As Ela sipped the thick chocolate, her eyes perused the room, with its heavy armchairs and thick, overstuffed lounge. Their round table. So much had happened in such a short time that even for someone well used to emergencies, the moment to gather herself was welcome. 

She'd had to fight back hard the desire to spit in the face of the sneering, pompous vizier. For all Zehra's assurance of her ability to fit in, Ela didn't think that particular instinct would get her what she wanted. 

His words had stuck, though, and rankled.

Regardless of the purpose of their meeting this night, the fact remained that someone, staff or family or supposed ally, had known where the curator would be that evening and had shared not only the location but the guests - or at least some of them.

The vizier - Rain? - whoever - had certainly known at least Cassandra. Even the viziers were subject to sociopolitical frippery, and Cassandra had been invited to the table. That alone warranted respect. And if he knew Cassandra, it made sense for him to know Zeynep - though if he knew of Zeynep he would also know how foolish it was to call them a girl. But then...an entourage of guards...

The number was respectable, but odd, and she couldn't place why.

Beneath the table, her fingers had twitched in preparation. 

Combat? No...defence? No, yes, perhaps defence...defend who? Seven guards, who could she defend beyond herself? Who was within her sphere to defend? 

Her eyes had flickered momentarily to Theodosia, silent at the end of the table, a little pale. She wouldn't need further defence with Zeynep beside her. Nehir seemed capable of protecting herself, Yelda more so, which seemed strange for a woman her age. Ela calculated the angle and force she would need to pull the tablecloth to distract the guards at each end of the table regardless. Bastiano had the sharp eyes of one prepared, Georgiana's face was stone. Kate's muscles seemed loose, very loose, as one prepared to run or hide. Marco...drank. Her eyes lingered there a moment longer, then flicked to Cassandra, who was watching the situation as intently as Ela herself. Looking back, in her mind's eye, everything felt off.

Something was very wrong.

Dammit Zehra. Thousands of thoughts and I cannot unpick the knot fast enough.

What others called intuition, Ela called rapid calculation. Glancing about the table, her fingers got their wish. 

Just to see.

If she'd been caught by a vizier of the sultan using sorcery at his back, she would have been in much worse trouble than Adnan, but

Something was wrong.

"You're most Ela when you look at me."

"That, sevgili, is because you're one of the only people I look at while I use sorcery.."

 Looking down at her plate and feigning dispassion, she completed the ritual to sense magick in the air around her. The cutlery shimmered, which made sense. Fae made. It should. But -

"Stop."

The green drained from her eyes, which shifted from hazel green to light brown as she'd stood.

Not-magick had just walked out the door. And she had let it. 

Thousands of thoughts. Not fast enough.

Zeynep knew Cassandra wasn't human. And Shadow? Neither what they seemed.

Perhaps the number of guards was justified after all.

Perhaps there were not enough.

Nothing was more dangerous to Ela's mind than knowledge in the hands of the wrong people. But the definition of wrong is very much a matter of opinion.

Thousands upon thousands of thoughts.

As Ela sat with the hot drink pleasantly searing her hands, the thoughts continued unabated:

the mechanisms in her latest project and the odds that something could go wrong in the next test,

potential ritual bases Father Korsakov may have used to arrive with haste,

potential rituals used by Nehir or her staff to locate and summon him,

the expected amount of time and where he could have been before -

how old he must be if he could manipulate time and space even that much -

the uncomfortable comparison of Cassandra's memory loss with her own, 

how much time - time -  Theodosia would need to recover, and whether Father Korsakov would be speeding that process,

how to deal with Rain, how to prompt memory recovery in a Jinn - a Jinn! - 

trying to understand why - why - Marco was still wanting to drink,

wondering how long the others had known about this plan for a university,

what spells were used in the walls and who had placed them,

whether the scroll was safe where she'd hidden it,

did it have a part to play?

why did they not ransack the house for evidence?

what evidence?

did they even have any?

how much did the sultan know about this?

the extent she was willing to go to for this project to succeed,

the impact it might have on her career...

whether it would help or hinder her life goals...

Treason was a strange thing. It required fealty, an authority, an overthrow. 

Betrayal.

How did one betray those in whom you could never place your trust?

It was long past the time to be considering treason, in reality. Could one be too self-aware to commit treason?

In learning what she had learned, in travel, in study, in her books - in her workshop right that moment could be found evidence, real, justifiable evidence of treason.

Zehra would laugh at this thought - of all of them.

When have you not been treasonous? You seek things - always beyond the boundaries set. You have a treasonous soul.

Indeed. To be treasonous, one required allegiance. With the death of her parents and her isolation, she held allegiance to just two things.

Well, one.

And it was not whatever the viziers wanted.

What did the treasonous soul want? To strengthen and improve what she saw as all the failings of Constantinople. That "Constantinople" was becoming its name spoke of a loss of self already. Istanbul was changing, whether the sultan wanted it or not.

If fighting for change, for growth, for a world she could give to her heart was treason, then it was as sweet and thick and luxurious as the chocolate in her mouth. She swallowed, the flavour dissipating. 

It was one thing to rule and provide for the needs of your subjects. It was another to grasp at a dying country to cling to brief, ending, luxury.

Of all of them, perhaps the Sultan was the greatest traitor of all.