There was another splash, another body floundering in the water. The Arab turned and lunged for the sternpost. Erlan wrenched his sword clear of the water at last and slashed down at the limit of his reach. Battal’s left hand flew off, severed at the wrist even as his right had caught the gunwale. He screamed in agony, his legs churning the water madly to drive himself up into the boat. He got an elbow over and kicked again, too far now for Erlan to reach him. But suddenly there was Aska, calmly paddling out to the boat. Without breaking stroke, the hound sank his teeth into the Arab’s flailing calf. Battal roared in protest, but Aska held on with savage tenacity. Katāros’s face appeared like the moon above them, clutching at his side. He reached over to drag Battal into the boat, but Aska still gripped him. A blade glinted in the dark, the hound yelped and at last fell away.

The boat was drifting further, the swirling currents of the Marmara now catching it and carrying it out of reach. Aska wasn’t moving. The woman thrashing in the shallows had reached the steps and was on her feet, coughing out seawater, her hair a smear across her face. It wasn’t Lilla’s hair. It wasn’t Lilla’s face.

Erlan waded out to the clump of grey fur floating on the surface, his heart breaking. He pulled the body towards him, seeing the ugly gash across Aska’s chest, feeling the warmth leaching out of his faithful hound into the cold water. He moaned in despair.

There was a splash to his left. The water’s surface broke, just for a moment. It was like a lightning bolt to his brain. Dropping the sword, he plunged under the water, eyes searching in the darkness. His fingers touched a swirl of cloth, then a fistful and a limb inside it. He grasped about in a frenzy for the rest of the body and then dragged it upwards, bursting through the surface in a snarl of hair and silk and wool.

Pale hair. Lilla’s hair.

She was unconscious, her wrists still bound together. He pulled her towards the steps until he could feel solid ground underfoot. At the steps, he lifted her head clear of the water and tipped it back. Her eyes were closed as if in sleep – or death. Desperate, he pressed down hard on her chest, once, twice. . . and suddenly her eyes opened, her mouth opened, and she vomited a fountain of water between them.

He brushed the strands of hair out of her face. She was breathing again, staring up at him, struggling to focus. ‘Erlan?’ she murmured. ‘Erlan? Is that you?’

‘No, my love,’ he whispered over her. ‘My name is Hakan. And it’s time to go home.’

HISTORICAL NOTE

A note about names, first of all.