In the last chapter we were in 1870 and Erik woke up saying he "wouldn't kill them." Now we know what he means.

Ch 13

There were children playing in the courtyard on a sunny mid afternoon. They chased each other around fountains and hid from one another behind the rose bushes, oblivious to the man watching them from behind a marble column.

Erik stood stiffly on a balcony with his hands clasped behind his back and a gaze void of expression. The Sultana had summoned him but not yet appeared. When she did, it was always like a ghost gliding into a room. She constantly came up from behind and held a knife either to his neck or groin. Twice she had cut him, once on the neck and once between the shoulder blades.

The Sultana had mastered the power of fear.

"Don't they look happy, Frenchman?" the Sultana said.

Erik made no attempt to move. He held his breath and waited for her to appear. She sidled up beside him and showed him the decorated broadside of a curved dagger.

"Acid etched," she explained. "Look at the detail."

Erik stepped back. His stomach churned with sickness. Red stains filled the delicate lines carved into the blade. It was a depiction of herself holding a head. By the crimson soiling the weapon, she had already used it.

"Interesting," he mumbled, forcing the word from his mouth.

"Have you finished my plans yet?"

The close proximity in which they stood made his throat dry and his knees weak. The Sultana had ordered one hundred deaths in the last week alone. It had been her request to have him witness the way the Steel Forest worked with the new designs in place.

"Yes, they are finished," he answered.

"When will it be built, my new toy?"

A toy, he thought with a shiver. She thought of a torture chamber as a new toy. The idea sickened him to his soul. In less than three years the Sultana had made him into a slave more than a commissioned worker.

Erik swallowed hard. He needed to stall. "I need more workers…more material…"

The Sultana stepped around and blocked his view of the garden. "Look me in the eye," she demanded, pressing the tip of the dagger to his chest.

Erik forced himself to obey. She would think nothing of stabbing him in the chest. She would watch him sink to the floor with a blade between his ribs and gain satisfaction with his suffering.

"My plans must be finalized," she said to him.

Erik leaned to one side and looked over her shoulder. He was sinking. His heart, his mind, his soul, everything was slipping away. "Those children, who are they?"

"Unimportant."

He met her eye again.

"Vagrants," the Sultana purred. "Worthless brats, open mouths, the children of thieves."

"Orphans?"

The Sultana headed back to her bedchamber. "Not for long."

Erik held back a shudder. "But they're…they're only children."

"Yes, all men were children once. The bad seeds grow into terrible, ruthless weeds."

Their fathers were men who had entered torture chambers in previous weeks. Their fathers were poor men kept destitute under the Sultan's rule.

Erik's apprehension rose with each giggle in the courtyard, each dash of a child through the manicured grounds.

"They haven't done anything wrong."

The Sultana touched his shoulder with the edge of the blade. She lightly traced a star on his shirt, gentle enough not to break through fabric down to skin but hard enough that he drew in a breath.

"Given time they will follow in the steps of their fathers. It is within my power to stop them before they become a plague within my city." The blade moved up until the cool steel touched his neck. She ran the sharpened edge up to his jaw and paused.

Erik turned his eyes away from the garden below. She had brought them here to die, and she had brought him here to design their deaths. There were many things he could do. Many of their fathers had slit throats and violated women. Their deaths had been unpleasant, he knew, but they had been for retribution. He slept at night knowing criminals had been put to death.

The Sultana's finger touched his earlobe and he flinched. Her hands were always cold, frigid as ice. Meeting her had disproved the theory of cold hands meaning a warm heart. She had no heart. She had no conscience.

"What is it?" The Sultana questioned. He watched as hr eyes narrowed in the small opening of her veil.

"I can't do this."

"You can do anything I tell you to do."

Her hand slipped low across his stomach, low enough where Erik was glad the Sultan had not installed two-way mirrors on the unfinished side of the palace. He was lenient with his favorite wife by allowing her privacy. She was the only one of his twelve wives who was allowed a room devoid of secret doors and hidden mirrors.

"I will not kill a child."

"You must only finish your plans," she replied. Her fingers tugged on his belt before he stepped away.

Realizing his mistake, he offered a courteous bow. A month, two at the most, and the palace would be completed, he reminded himself again.

"Stay with me a while, Frenchman," the Sultana suggested. "Amuse me."

She disappeared into her apartments with her long robes and veil fluttering behind.

Erik lingered a while longer attempting to harness his breathing. He couldn't bear the thought of amusing the Sultana a moment longer. His hand dropped to his side and touched the cool ivory guard beneath his overcoat. With a shiver, Erik walked into the little Sultana's apartments, blocking the sound of children playing from his mind.

Sixty days, he assured himself. At the most he had to stay for sixty more days. Then he would leave Persia for good.

Joseph DeChantel shouted as he pounded on the door. "Eh, Levesque! You in there?"

Erik woke with a start and rolled to the edge of the bed, reaching for a knife that wasn't there. He ran his hands along his bare arms as he rose and lumbered to the door. As much as Erik dreaded the person waiting in the hall, he swung the door open.

"Have you ever held a gun before?"

Joseph DeChantel stood in a white shirt, vest and overcoat. His face was beet-red from a day spent out in the sun and an afternoon spent socializing and enjoying brandy.

"Have I…what?" Erik asked. He shifted his weight and scratched his chin, realizing he hadn't shaved in the morning.

Joseph punched Erik lightly in the shoulder. "A gun, a rifle, you ever shot anything?"

"No," Erik answered warily.

"Do you want to?"

Erik rubbed his hand over his face. He hadn't rested much due to the heat and the sound of a crowd through the open windows. "Do I want to shoot something? Not particularly. What happened to lunch at the Chateau?"

"Lunch? We'll have lunch after the tiger hunt."

Erik took a step back from Joseph, which turned into an unintended invitation for the visitor to enter the hotel room.

"My papers haven't arrived yet, Joseph. I need to finalize plans—"

"Wouldn't you like to have a tiger's head mounted on your wall back home? A nice trophy with the jaws open, teeth bared?" DeChantel used his hands to demonstrate an open maw. He let out a snarl as he circled Erik. "One you can show every woman you bed as you lead her through the home you designed?" He clapped his hand shut. "Snap! Make them jump right into your bed."

Erik turned away. "The tiger can keep his head."

"There's three of us going tomorrow. Figured I'd bring the wife along. She asked if your concubine would join us."

"Concubine? Joseph, she's not—"

"Relax. Come with us into the jungle and see what you can bag." Joseph winked and snapped his fingers. "We'll be here at nine. Don't disappoint me, Levesque. I'd hate to write my old man and tell him you refused a DeChantel."

Joseph turned toward the door again and smiled. "I'll leave you two alone," he said to Corinna. He glanced back at Erik again and grinned wider. He nodded toward the mortified young lady standing in the doorway.

It was a relief to see her entering and Joseph DeChantel leaving.

Corinna covered her mouth with her hand and turned away from Erik, muttering her apology. She held a brown paper package in the crook of her arm which she almost dropped as she exited the room.

Before he asked what she was doing, Erik realized why she had looked so embarrassed. He was standing half-naked before her. With a chuckle he reached for his shirt. Three years of standing shirtless in rock quarries with his pant legs rolled up to the knees had stolen some of his modesty.

"Knocking would suffice," he teased.

She stood with her back to him. "Are you dressed?"

"Not fully. What's in the bag?"

She turned her head slightly and spoke over her shoulder. "A sherwani. I thought you would be more comfortable in something like this than your European clothing. It's made of cotton. It would breathe better."

Even half-dressed Erik was still sweating. He watched her turn her face back to the hall the moment he moved forward.

"You may turn around if you like."

"Are you dressed now?"

"Turn and see," he grinned.

"No. And don't tease me, it isn't nice."

"Perhaps not nice but your innocence makes it easy."

Corinna handed him his traditional Indian garb over her shoulder. "When you are dressed, knock on our door."

He started to unbutton his shirt again. "Where are we going?"

"There's a festival by the riverfront."

"A festival for what?" Erik asked as he tossed his shirt back where he had found it. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Corinna had turned.

"The Goddess Kali," she said, turning her eyes away from him.