Roxelana & Suleyman

CHAPTER FIVE-1

CHAPTER FIVE

The captives spent several weeks in the confines of the valley. They were treated indifferently throughout the day, allowed to wander amongst the tents and kitchen fires, even stroll into the surrounding fields where the horses grazed. But all the while it was apparent to all, particularly Aleksandra, that they were prisoners. On top of the ridges surrounding the valley, sentinels could be seen keeping a close eye on all that occurred in and around this natural fortress.

Aleksandra knelt by the side of the brook that ran past the encampment and across the thickly grassed valley floor. With her sat Maryana and Tetyana. Further upstream, near a cascade of mountain water, the other girls from Lvov washed themselves and the bundles of clothing that had been provided by the Tartars. Tetyana was transfixed on the bubbling water. She had not spoken a word since that first night in the encampment, and Aleksandra felt somehow responsible for her... for her... loss. Maryana threaded a daisy chain absently—peering over the grassy lawn and up the slopes toward the snow-capped peaks that embraced the valley.

“This really is a beautiful place,” she said with a touch of grief.

“Yes, it is,” Aleksandra replied. One of the sentinels, high on a rocky outcrop, took aim with his cross-bow at a young doe, below his perch. His arrow sung through the air, slapping into the animal’s chest. It dropped to the ground, dead. “A very beautiful place....”

The two girls lay down in the grass, their bare feet dangling in the water. It was freezing, but Aleksandra rejoiced to some small degree in the sensation that proved she was still alive. The sky was an intense blue. Clouds toppled down from the top of the mountains to cross the roof of the valley.

“Do you think we will ever see Lvov again, Aleks?” Maryana whispered.

“No, and after what has happened there I could never go back.”

“But don’t you want to see your...,” Maryana bit her lip, and burst into tears.

Aleksandra rolled over, placed her arms around her companion, and kissed her on the cheek. Maryana wiped at the tears and, sighing heavily, cuddled into Aleksandra’s side.

“Come on.” Aleksandra stood and pulled both Maryana and Tetyana to their feet. “Let’s go for a walk and see where this brook leads.”

The girls linked arms and started along the water’s edge. Hearing a screech from high above, Aleksandra spotted a Lonely Eagle winging freely through the air. It soared high, circling the field in which they walked—searching for prey. She knew that its keen eyes and those of the guarding sentinels followed their every move. Several yards downstream the brook narrowed and the girls were able to step to the other side. The grass was thick and lush. Daisies sprung up everywhere, interspersed with lily of the valley and purslane. Up ahead, a grove of yellow, trembling poplar crowded around a slight bend in the waterway. Nearing the grove, Aleksandra once again glanced up into the sky. The eagle flew off at full speed toward the head of the valley and disappeared from her sight.

The grove followed the stream for several minutes’ walk, a myriad of yellow leaves fluttering in the morning breeze. They wandered amongst its trunks and spindly branches—approaching the center where it opened up into a sheltered clearing. Here the brook tumbled down a fall and broadened into a pond.

All three stopped, fascinated by what they saw.

Warily, Aleksandra urged her companions back into the protection of the poplars, but continued to gaze through the branches into the clearing and at the pond.

On a large flat shard of granite by the water’s edge sat the Chieftain of the Tartars. They had rarely seen him since their arrival, but here he was, alone. He had discarded his clothing and sat n***d on the rock—the foaming water lapping just below his knees. He vigorously scrubbed himself with a chamois. His broad tan back glistened with cold mountain water. His muscled legs and arms flexed as he ran the cloth across his chest and under his armpits. Long black hair clung damply to hang down between his shoulder blades. Maryana gasped—digging her fingers deep into Aleksandra’s arm—in fascinated terror. The Chieftain stood up, throwing the chamois onto the rock, and slowly walked away from the girls into the deeper water of the pond. Aleksandra glanced to Maryana, noticing how she bit her lower lip, concentrating on the dark smoothness of the Chieftain’s skin, as it gradually submerged beneath the water. When the surface of the pond lapped around his buttocks, he dived into and under the water. Ripples crisscrossed the pond and back before his head and torso once again appeared. He let out a whoop of exhilaration, and waded back toward the rock, toward the girls. He lifted himself up out of the water and walked onto the grass of the embankment toward them. He shook himself—droplets of water flinging off his n***d flesh.

All of the girls blushed. None of them had ever seen a fully n***d man, and never so openly exultant, before.

But still he is just a man, thought Aleksandra, just a man like any other.

Maryana sighed as she reached out and placed her hand on the slender trunk of a trembling poplar. She took a step back.

A twig snapped.

The Chieftain turned to face them, his dark gaze piercing through the undergrowth and straight into their own. The trio screamed and turned to run back the way they had come through the grove and along the banks of the brook, toward the camp.

Behind them Aleksandra could hear his booming laughter.

* * * *