Iskender's grandmother had been dead for three months when he found the letters. Hidden in a false bottom of her jewelry box, wrapped in faded silk, were dozens of letters written in both Turkish and Greek. As he carefully unfolded the first one, dated 1520, his breath caught. "My beloved Nikos," it began. "I know this letter can never reach you, but I write anyway. They have forbidden me from seeing you. My father says you are the enemy, that our love is impossible. But how can love be the enemy? How can two hearts beating as one be anything but divine?" Iskender read through the night, discovering a grandmother he never knew—young, passionate, defiant. And as dawn broke over modern Istanbul, he made a decision. He would find Nikos's story. He would understand their love. He never expected to find his own...