Empire of Lies

2

By noon, the heavy sun had the city firmly in its grip, an oppressive presence over an auspicious Friday at the overcrowded Mehmediyye Mosque.

Across Paris, the unrelenting heat wave was suffocating. In the shade of a coffeehouse by the banks of the Seine, it might have been slightly more tolerable, but under the towering dome of the prayer hall, with the midday sun at its most potent and the massive hall filled to capacity, it felt like being in a hammam. Or perhaps Kamal Arslan Agha of the counterterrorism directorate of the sultan’s Tashkeelat-i Hafiye—the secret police—was feeling it more acutely than any of the other supplicants around him. He was in full uniform, which didn’t help. He was also a key player in the events that were scheduled to follow today’s noon prayer. A lot of eyes would be on him.

With the last rak’at finished, the horde of men rose to their feet and moved to collect their footwear. All around him, the hall reverberated with portent, the shuffling noise amplified by the heat. Kamal caught the eye of his partner, Taymoor Erkun Agha, who had arrived earlier and had been a few rows closer to the pulpit. By the time the slow wave of worshippers reached the main doors, Taymoor had caught up with Kamal.

“That was painful,” Taymoor said. “This new imam—the man’s a human sleeping pill.”

“Another late night?” Kamal asked, instantly regretting it.

Taymoor recoiled slightly with mock indignation. “Not here, brother. Where’s your respect?”

Kamal gave him a slight roll of the eyes. “Spare me.”

“All I can say is, thank God for text messaging. How did our parents ever manage to hook up with anyone without it?”

“I’m pretty sure they didn’t,” Kamal replied.

“That’s just sad.”

“But thanks for the inspiring imagery.”

Taymoor’s boasts about his nocturnal pursuits had become tiresome to Kamal. He’d suffered them ever since the beginning of their partnership within the Hafiye, a partnership that began three years ago, when they were both fresh out of the military academy. But now, with the two young agents’ newly growing notoriety within the service, the boasts had got worse. Both men were unmarried, despite being thirty years old, naturally blessed with handsome physiques that had been further enhanced by years of hard training, and, as officers of the state, highly eligible—a fact that Taymoor was certainly exploiting to the fullest, oblivious to the more conservative, repressive tide that the new sultan had ushered in. Kamal couldn’t conceive of him ever entering into a marriage contract, which was probably a blessing for the aspiring brides of the city. As for Kamal, marriage was something he did aspire to, but it wasn’t likely to happen anytime soon.

The one woman he wanted above all others was the one he could never have.

Taymoor gave him a slap on the shoulder and ushered him out. “Come on. Our legions of admirers are waiting.”

In the large vestibule, the two agents retrieved their boots and their börk headgear—tall tubes of white felt that rose at the front before folding back like a sleeve to below the neck. Even though it was the day of communal prayer and rest, the formal proceedings that were to follow the prayer meant Kamal and his partner had to be in uniform: baggy shalvar trousers, a long-sleeved tunic, and a short-sleeved kaftan with elaborate frogging all the way up the chest, all of it in ominous blacks and grays. On the right collar of the kaftan was the emblem of the Hafiye: three interlocked crescents, each with a small, five-pointed star cradled between its sharp tips. The left collar displayed rank—in Kamal and Taymoor’s case, chaouch komiser, or sergeant inspector—which was confirmed in tattoos on the right arm and leg of each agent, a tradition that dated back several centuries, to the earliest days of the janissaries, when it was both a symbol of brotherhood as well as an aide to identifying corpses after battle. The two men weren’t likely to be caught up in battle anytime soon, but the war they were engaged in, a war of suicide bombers and car bombs, did carry a real risk of putting their tattoos to use.

They also wore wide belts that held holsters for their standard-issue Galip automatic handguns and loops that housed their khanjar daggers.

The two men followed the crowd out to the vast rectangular courtyard fronting the mosque. Two floors of semicircular vaulted arcades lined all four sides of the monumental space, which had managed to retain its original name of cour d’honneur in common parlance, even though Ottoman Turkish had, after three hundred years of foreign rule, long since replaced French as the city’s main language.

The vast compound’s original name, Les Invalides, was of course long gone. Its renaming had posed a dilemma for Mehmed IV, the sultan whose army had conquered the French capital in the summer of 1100.[2] Besides the magnificent domed chapel at Les Invalides, Paris also boasted the sublime cathedral of Notre-Dame. Mehmed couldn’t put his name to both. In his infinite wisdom, he decided to bestow his name on the former, which became the Mehmediyye—as had Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome after the Papal States had fallen and the pope had been beheaded, but that was acceptable since they were in different cities. Notre-Dame, on the other hand, would have to settle for basking in the splendor of the sultan’s nickname: the conqueror. Shorn of its stained glass windows and other Christian iconography, dressed in domes, and flanked by minarets, it had become the Fatih Mosque.

The sun, close to its zenith, wasn’t sparing any corner of the courtyard from its merciless pounding. Its ferocity blasted Kamal and Taymoor the instant they stepped outside. Their uniforms, though of the linen and cotton summer variant, were still way too heavy for the conditions. With sweat running down the length of his spine, Kamal would have much preferred to be in his lighter, off-duty attire, but today he wasn’t there as a civilian. He and Taymoor were being fêted. Which didn’t sit all that comfortably with Kamal. They’d worked hard, to be sure. They’d put in the hours and the legwork. They’d been focused. But they’d also had a lucky break. A break that, admittedly, had saved many lives.

Of that, Kamal was very proud.

The courtyard was heaving with people. Kamal took in the scene, one he’d witnessed many times before. It was an impressive setting. The viewing areas were laid out on either side of the length of the courtyard. Along the east arcade were eight public grandstands, stepped but devoid of any seating. Facing them along the opposite side were two official tribunes. Those did have seating and rose more steeply, which was useful given the more substantial turbans and headgear most of those seated there would be wearing. As guests of honor, Kamal and Taymoor would watch from there, along with their superiors from the Hafiye and a number of state officials. At the far end of the courtyard, facing the Seine, two of the mosque complex’s six minarets rose proudly, the tallest landmarks in the sprawling city.

In one corner, Kamal spotted the state television crew filming the proceedings. Armed ceremonial guards stood by the pillars around the arcade. As with all public spaces in the empire, the grandstands and the tribunes had separate male and female sections. On both sides of the huge courtyard, attendees would be corraled in segregated areas.

Kamal and Taymoor made their way to their designated area through a stream of congratulations and pats on the back from officers of the Hafiye.

“Tebrikler, mulasim komiser,” one of the officers congratulated Kamal. “The youngest in the department, eh? Just don’t let the expectations become too much of a burden on you.” He squeezed Kamal’s shoulder a bit too tightly.

Kamal responded to the backhanded praise with a curt nod and moved on. He had already heard the murmurs: promotions to lieutenant inspector for both partners were in the offing. Still, Kamal couldn’t find the peace of mind to savor the moment. He kept glancing across the courtyard, scanning the faces in the women’s public stands, looking for her.

It was almost impossible to distinguish individual faces, of course—the head scarves and veils, some less opaque than others, were intended to block that kind of scrutiny. Still, once or twice, his eyes fell on a figure that, for the briefest of instants, he thought might be her. But then something about the body language, the height, an almost imperceptible detail told him he was mistaken.

It didn’t relieve his discomfort.

As he caught up with Taymoor, he glanced up at the upper-level arcade and saw Mumtaz Sikander Pasha, the beylerbey of the Paris eyalet, a province that included not just the great metropolis itself but the entire ancient kingdom of France. Dressed in his ceremonial robe, his head wrapped in a bulbous turban that was only dwarfed by the girth of his waist, the governor was making his way to his box, which was already crowded with senior officials, including, Kamal now saw, the overall commander of the Paris division of the Hafiye, Huseyin Celaleddin Pasha.

Celaleddin was tall and, given his position in Ottoman society, unusually slim. His jutting chin, always tilted slightly upward, and his sloped-back brow made it hard to tell what was going on behind the discerning eyes that now caught sight of Kamal. The commander surprised Kamal by acknowledging him with a subtle congratulatory nod. Kamal responded with a slight bow before his superior turned away to greet the beylerbey.

Taymoor led him to their seats. After pausing to bask in the attention a bit longer, he took his seat and, with beaming satisfaction, patted the one next to him. “Front row, brother. It’s our day.”

“Mashallah,” Kamal replied half-heartedly as he did another quick scan of the female tribune before sitting down.

His distant attitude wasn’t lost on Taymoor. “Why the sour face?” he asked. Then his face cracked with a bawdy grin. “You got somewhere else you’d rather be?”

Kamal shrugged. “Of course not.”

Taymoor let out a small snort, then studied him for a moment. “You know something? We’re partners. We face danger, death maybe, on a daily basis—together. We’re supposed to share. I tell you everything—”

“Yeah, too much maybe,” Kamal griped.

“Protest all you want. I know you love it.” He dropped his voice. “You’re as much of a depraved luti as I am. You just don’t like talking about it. So go on, tell me, who is she? Who’s turning your balls blue?”

Kamal had to play the game. He knew they were both lying to each other, but it suited him fine. He didn’t want Taymoor to know what strings were tugging at his heart. It was enough of a burden to keep it locked away deep inside of him; he’d never live it down if his licentious partner found out.

So he chose to keep up the act and not answer while an ominous silence descended on the courtyard. All attention turned to its far end, where five men appeared from a portal in the arcade. They were dressed in ceremonial uniforms. The middle man, though, stood out because of his black robes and turban and his hulking, heavyset frame. Even under the robes, it was clearly more muscle than fat.

He was also striking because of the long sword he carried.

Kamal and Taymoor watched as the procession made its way solemnly to the center of the courtyard.

“To be continued,” Taymoor warned jokingly, wagging a finger at his partner. “You know better than to mess with my bloodhound nose, right, brother?”

Kamal forced an enigmatic smile—the fact was, Taymoor did have great investigative instincts. In terms of their work, this was an undeniable asset. But in terms of Kamal’s personal life, he could have done without it.

He turned his attention to the center of the far portal, where four officers now appeared, two on either side of a fifth man, who was dressed in a simple white robe. He was blindfolded, and his hands were tied behind his back.

The arena went quiet as the officers escorted the man to the center of the courtyard and handed him over to the first group before marching back the way they came.

The large man with the sword stepped forward and, facing the prisoner, took hold of the man’s shoulder, guiding him to the ground until he was kneeling. Then the large man stepped back, took a sheet of paper from one of his assistants, and began to read out the execution order in a loud voice that echoed across the stillness of the enclosed space.

Kamal had heard those same charges read out many times before—“enemy of the state,” “high treason”—as well as the verdict. He had heard them most recently a week earlier, in that same spot, proclaimed by the same executioner, the state’s executioner corps being a small, exclusive club. But this time, the words carried far more resonance for him. This time, the condemned man kneeling on the parched cobblestones of the cour d’honneur was put there by Kamal and Taymoor.

It should have been an untainted day of great pride for him. When it came to terrorists, to barbarians who were plotting to murder innocent citizens, he never questioned whether the punishment fitted the crime. Case in point: the condemned man presently before them in the courtyard, an Algerian extremist who, along with his brother and a few others, had made his way to Paris with the intention of attacking the festival celebrating the impending marriage of the beylerbey’s youngest daughter to one of the sultan’s favorite sons. A lot of dignitaries would have been in attendance, including the bey himself. A major catastrophe had been averted, and Kamal and Taymoor had become heroes overnight.

The executioner finished reading out the order, then started to recite some verses from the Koran. Kamal’s scowl was fixated on the condemned man, who remained impassive and wasn’t pulling against his restraints or pleading for his life. Kamal knew that by the time the day of execution arrived, any strength the man had left would have been sapped away by the terror of what awaited him. He also knew that the rumors about sedatives being slipped into the final meals of the condemned were true.

The executioner finished his recitation. Then he straightened up and looked to the governor’s box.

Kamal, and everyone else in the courtyard, followed his gaze.

The beylerbey stared down in silence, then gave him a small, impassive nod.

The executioner bowed his head in acknowledgment, and then he turned to the condemned man. He bent down and used his free hand to adjust the position of the man’s head, exposing his bare neck more fully. Then he bent down further and spoke some words to him, instructing the man to recite the shahada, the declaration of absolute faith.

The executioner then took a step back, planted his feet firmly, and, holding the sword in both hands, swung it around slowly to the prisoner’s neck, which he nicked with its blade. The prisoner, surprised, flinched instinctively, tensing up and straightening his neck—exactly what his executioner wanted; he had already raised the sword high above the prisoner’s head, and, in a fluid, lightning-quick move, he brought it down full force.

The blade went right through the prisoner’s neck in one clean cut. One single, brutally efficient, fatal blow. The man’s head didn’t just drop: it sprang off, hit the ground, and rolled through a full turn before coming to a stop. The executioner took a swift step back to avoid getting his robes soiled as blood instantly squirted out of the headless body, which remained immobile in its kneeling position.

Across the courtyard, shouts of “Allahu Akbar”—God is the greatest—rang out. Taymoor hissed it, too, as he pumped the air with his fist before glancing over at Kamal with a fierce glow in his eyes and clenched teeth.

“That’ll teach those sons of whores,” he rasped.

Kamal nodded, even though he knew it wouldn’t. Death, after all, was no deterrent to those fanatics. If anything, it was the opposite.

As the blood flow slowed, the executioner surveyed his handiwork with no visible emotion. One of his assistants handed him a small bottle of water and a cloth, which he casually took without looking away from his victim. He poured water over his blade and wiped it with the cloth, which he then discarded onto the rigid corpse.

A four-man crew of attendants pulling a steel cart appeared from a far alcove. Moving with well-practiced efficiency, they unfurled a white plastic sheet and placed it on the ground next to the lifeless, headless body. Three of them rolled the corpse onto the sheet and lifted it onto the cart while the fourth retrieved the head and placed it in a bag made of the same white plastic. Moments later, they were wheeling it all away.

The courtyard could now welcome its next victim.

Today’s ceremony would feature seven beheadings. The next three, coconspirators of the Algerian, didn’t trouble Kamal. After all, it was he and Taymoor who had uncovered the plot, identified the terrorists, and led the team that had tracked them down and brought them in after an intense, frantic manhunt.

The final two didn’t bother him either. He had played no part in their arrest, but they were tried and convicted murderers who, high on khat, had killed an elderly couple while robbing their mansion in Saint Germain.

The fifth prisoner, however, did.

His name was Halil Azmi, and he was a muderis—a teacher, in this case a university law professor. Agents from the Hafiye’s Z Directorate, the ever-expanding internal security force tasked with protecting the imperial order, had arrested him along with two others, a prominent journalist and a lawyer. The three men were accused of belonging to the White Rose, an underground subversive organization that the Z agents had recently uncovered, and a closed court had deemed them to be “colluding to instigate revolt.”

He was also her friend.

Which was why Kamal was now scouring the female grandstands again, looking for Nisreen, his brother’s wife, hoping she wouldn’t be there as the professor was paraded in to a chorus of suppressed gasps from the public stands.

Part of him begrudged Nisreen the unease that was needling him. He felt irritated by her ill-judged friendship, one that was spoiling his moment of glory. At the same time, he couldn’t help but empathize with what she must be feeling, knowing her friend would soon lose his life. He hoped she wouldn’t witness what was about to come, hoped it wouldn’t cement an indelible link between him, an agent of the Hafiye, and Azmi’s fate.

His heart seized as his eyes snagged something, a pair of eyes that were looking his way, and for a second he felt her there, watching him, loathing him from across the courtyard, the last vestiges of a friendship that had started when they were children about to be obliterated forever under the scorching sun. For a moment, he froze—then the woman turned, and, despite her light head scarf that also veiled the lower half of her face, he knew it wasn’t her.

He looked away. And with the high sun pummeling the courtyard, Azmi was positioned so that, like the others before him, he was kneeling no more than twenty kadems from Kamal.

The professor wasn’t cowering. He held his head high and seemed oblivious to everyone in the crowd. Instead, he was staring stoically at the official tribune.

Kamal couldn’t help but meet his gaze, couldn’t tear himself away from the man’s eyes, which seemed to have zeroed in on him, a silent, accusing glare that triggered a pounding inside the agent’s ears that drowned out the executioner’s voice along with the sound of his blade as it cleaved the air before slicing through the professor’s neck.

Which was when Kamal’s mobile phone buzzed in his pocket.

As did Taymoor’s.