Constantine straightened in his saddle, the alarms clanging in his road-assaulted skull. That would be the end of them all. Why hadn’t Joannes thought of this? Then the alarms were replaced by sweeter music. Well, perhaps the august Orphanotrophus Joannes simply could not dictate everything to ‘Brother’ out here in far-flung Antioch. Perhaps ‘Brother’ would have to rescue this perhaps not-so-thoroughly planned enterprise with his own astute initiative. Ah, but ‘Brother’ must be careful; he was reaching high, and he should provide a bed of straw to cushion his fall if he did not attain his objective. ‘What is your plan, Domestic?’ growled Constantine with feigned uninterest.
‘I believe they will stop, water and fodder their horses, and rest for a few hours. Then they will send half their force in one direction to mislead or even harass us, while the rest will proceed directly to Aleppo. I believe they will make this stop at a fortified place.’
‘Between here and Aleppo?’ asked Constantine irritably; Blymmedes was falling to pieces. He was a typical career military man, Constantine reflected, crowing lustily atop his own dung heap but at an utter loss in true adversity. ‘The closest fortification is only eight leagues from Aleppo. Why would they pause there?’
‘Have you ever sent a reconnaissance as far as Harim?’ Blymmedes was astonished. The Saracens exerted control of the countryside only several leagues east of Antioch; wasn’t Constantine concerned as to what the infidels might be up to right on his own threshold?
‘Our tax collectors don’t go out that way any more,’ answered Constantine. ‘We don’t need those revenues, and not many peasants are willing to farm out there, what with nothing to protect them save the ruins of the kastron near Harim.’ A kastron was a fortified town. ‘I suppose you would suggest I rebuild the kastron? The cost would hardly be offset by the increase in tax revenues. You should focus on military matters, Domestic, with which you seem to have ample difficulty as it is. Leave civil administration to those with the requisite expertise.’
‘You would not need to rebuild the kastron, Strategus. My akrites have seen it recently. The Saracens have rebuilt it for you.’
For a moment Constantine refused to believe Blymmedes. Very well, he then conceded to himself, perhaps one did become contemptuous of Saracen threats within the walls of Antioch. ‘So you think they will pause at the kastron. If it is such a threatening fortification, how do you expect to besiege it with several exhausted droungos of light cavalry?’
‘I think if we appear, we will bottle them up. Then we can bring up siege machinery and go to work on the walls.’
Constantine frowned, trying to make sense of this new music. It was becoming increasingly titillating to his ear. Yes, most pleasant. With the siege engines in place, the leader of the Seljuks might be compelled to negotiate independently of his agreement with the Emir of Aleppo. He might be convinced to surrender his prize at a significant discount. And the Emir could hardly grumble, because he had already received partial payment and would be relieved of having to compensate his Seljuk hirelings. And the enormous sum left in difference, well of course that would be returned to Joannes’s special treasury - minus a suitably ample reward for the extraordinarily illustrious engineer of this successful conclusion. Ah, very sweet music indeed. But what if the Seljuk beasts are not so reasonable? Well, that was the risk one had to take, or else remain in Antioch for ever. Besides, there was an easy way to indemnify himself.
Constantine pulled himself erect. ‘I concur with your judgement, Domestic. But since your intent for the moment is merely to frighten the infidels into remaining at the kastron, I reason that it would make sense for me to withdraw my forces to Antioch and begin requisitioning the appropriate siege equipment.’ Constantine tugged his horse’s reins and rode off without waiting for a reply.
‘What a filthy man,’ Zoe pulled her veil more tightly around her face. Her blue eyes shone like gems in the dismal room. The eunuch, who spoke only the local Arabic dialect, set the silver tray down, then bowed and retreated as if he had been addressed with appropriate decorum.
Maria sat crossed-legged on a stained linen cushion, balefully studying the four Saracen women who sat against the wall opposite her; the plaster was new, but the tapestry that covered much of it was moth-eaten and faded.
‘Can you imagine?’ said Zoe airily. ‘I had heard that their women were veritable chattels, but the emirs and ambassadors we have dealt with were always so civilized. Apparently, here they are rather less gracious. I’m certain that their stables are cleaner than their women’s quarters. Of course, given the choice, the brutes who have absconded with us might prefer the enchantments of their steeds to these greased piglets they call their wives.’
The Saracen women - three chubby, barely pubescent children and one darkly pretty young woman - tittered shyly at the Empress’s dismissive gesture and then resumed their entranced study of the silk-draped woman they understood to be the mother of the prophet Christ. Maria caressed the back of her hand with the fingers of the other and avoided Zoe’s inquiring look.
‘Little daughter,’ admonished Zoe, ‘you are making far too much of this. Tomorrow we shall be in Aleppo, we shall have our Leo back, and no doubt the Emir will immediately regale us with tales of his exotic land. You know that their literature is so much more . . . forthright than ours, don’t you dear? I suppose that explains why all the sons of Hagar are so frightened of women that they must keep them locked away. After all, they have heard so many epics of these . . . temptations. Pity that the reality is so artless. Have you noticed the coarseness of their complexions?’
‘We will never see Aleppo.’ Maria’s voice was so deep and soughing that it scarcely seemed to be her own.
‘Little daughter! Don’t tell me the Prophet who haunts the Orient has taken you as his deputy. You are as gloomy as a Bogomil. From wherever have you received this . . .
intimation?’
‘He told me.’ Suddenly Maria whipped her head, her eyes fired, and she spat the words out. ‘He told me while he loved me!’
Zoe pursed her lips in deliberation. ‘My darling,’ she said with paired concern and anticipation, ‘would you like to elaborate on that?’
Maria’s eyes were almost phosphorescent. ‘I had intended to kill him. As I had in my dream. I even had the knife.’
Zoe shut her eyes and leaned against the wall. ‘Oh, darling, I had hoped that was all done with. That was so long ago. You mustn’t go on reliving that . . . accident with every other man. Everyone knows you are not at fault.’
‘There has never been a man like this man. This Haraldr.’ Maria clutched her arms and cocked her head; her voice was hypnotic. ‘All the rest have simply drawn the poison out of me, sucking away the putrescence of my soul with the proboscis between their legs, feeding on that obscene gruel because it is the only sustenance their own corruption can digest. They leave me empty, yet cleansed of my own toxins. This man filled me with the brilliance of the stars. The sun. A thousand suns. A light pure and searing. An incandescence in which every fate is revealed. A light in which I saw love and death as lovers, joined in the mad ecstasy I shared with them. At the moment that light flared to infinite brilliance he offered me an exchange. He offered me that light in exchange for my life. He offers that trade to everyone he touches. I saw it in his eyes. There are souls trapped in his eyes, a thousand thousand souls for a thousand years. I know. I am with them now. He lives, and I will die.’
Zoe slid next to Maria and took her limp, almost lifeless hand. ‘Little daughter,’ she said with a sigh, ‘now you have entered a realm I perhaps know better than you.’ She wrapped her arms around Maria’s vision-stiffened shoulders. ‘Our Komes Haraldr has beguiled you. Fear is the most powerful aphrodisiac; it not only arouses passion but also bonds souls. You were there when he killed that man, weren’t you?’
Maria nodded numbly. ‘Blood excites me. I wanted him to make love to me again.’
Zoe raised her eyebrows for a moment. ‘Well,’ she said conclusively, ‘we are each plagued with our passions. I am a slave to simple caresses and the merest devotions, while you, being rather more . . . cosmopolitan, have developed more . . . complex desires. We can never fully exhaust these passions, and yet we can acquire the wisdom to endure them. You are wise, my child, you will endure long after this Komes Haraldr has gone back to the frost-breasted maidens of distant Thule.’ Zoe kissed Maria’s forehead. ‘I rather think your unwarranted inquietude at our predicament has inflamed your memory of the golden giant. When we see him again, you will find him just another Tauro-Scythian curiosity.’
‘You are not afraid, Mother?’ Maria’s eyes were wide and incandescent.
‘Of course not. I am the most valuable being beneath our Lord’s sight. The ransom I can bring is worth far more than any goal that might be obtained by placing my soul before the judgement of God. No one clever enough to steal me would be fool enough to kill me.’
Zoe stroked Maria’s downy temple with her fingers. No, little daughter, I do not fear the hands I have fallen into, however rough and unwashed they may be. I do not fear a confinement that will probably be long, longer than I can permit your precious heart to suffer before it must. But now I know what must be done when we finally return to my city and my people. And when I think of that, I know fear.
The Mandator, chief intelligence-gathering officer of the Imperial Excubitores, spoke in Arabic to the squat, scruffy-bearded man, a petty merchant from the look of his uncalloused hands and his dirty linen robe. The merchant showed several blackened teeth as he jabbered in a singsong voice; as he spoke, he seemed to clutch frantically at the vague, ground-clinging, early-morning mist. The Mandator gestured to the man’s cup and ordered a batman to fill it with more wine. He bowed to the merchant and stepped back to talk with Blymmedes and Haraldr.
‘He’s an Arab from this place, not a Seljuk,’ said the Mandator, a wiry, spooky-eyed man who usually dressed just like the akrites he supervised. ‘He says they rebuilt the kastron for defence and they have no wish to invite quarrel with the Romans. According to him, the Seljuks have murdered the governor of the kastron and have sent out couriers to the east.’ The Mandator lowered his bristling, sun-bleached brows, for a moment fixing his usually wandering eyes. ‘He is telling the truth. I have no need to intensify his interrogation.’
Blymmedes nodded agreement. ‘See that the paymaster attends to him.’ He turned to Haraldr. ‘It appears the hireling has initiated his own scheme. Are you prepared to interrogate the Seljuk?’
Haraldr pulled his knife from his belt and nodded. Blymmedes’s akrites had chased down a contingent of the Seljuk rear guard and had succeeded in capturing a Seljuk warrior.
‘Good,’ said Blymmedes. ‘It is important that you do it. They think you fair-hairs are demons, Christ’s avengers.’
The Seljuk waited on his knees, his arms bound behind him. Haraldr forced his hands to steady. This was not his type of business, and it required a kind of courage that he had not considered before. But Blymmedes had convinced him how important this was. And he needed no convincing of the importance of the lives this wretch might save when his tongue was persuaded to glibness.
The Seljuk’s bright, feral eyes widened when he saw the golden giant approach. Then he remembered his own fierce father, and his big brothers who had swatted him, and he spat at the demon’s boots. Allah would soon embrace him.
Haraldr held the Seljuk’s eyes. He reached around and slit the rope that held the Seljuk’s hands, then raised him up. He signalled the batman to give him a bowl of steamed grain with bits of sliced lamb. The Seljuk looked at the bowl, sniffed, and barked something in his staccato tongue. An akrites who knew the Seljuk dialect - many of them did - spoke in Greek to Gregory, who then translated for Haraldr.
‘He says why should he poison himself? He - excuse me, Haraldr Nordbrikt - calls you a huge pig.’
Haraldr looked into the furious, curiously smug face. The man was not much older than Haraldr, with a dense black beard and a sharp handsome nose. He clearly prided himself as an indomitable warrior and was probably one of their officers. Haraldr took the bowl from the Seljuk’s hands, shovelled several handfuls of the food into his own mouth, chewed at length, and swallowed before handing the bowl back. The Seljuk snatched the bowl from Haraldr and devoured the rest of the dish like a ravenous dog.
‘Does he wish more?’ asked Haraldr. The Seljuk nodded and another bowl was brought, tested by Haraldr and served. And then another. Did their guest wish to drink? Watered wine was brought, tested and poured for him. Was their guest at last satiated? The Seljuk nodded, eyes gleaming, certain that Allah had bewitched his foes.
Haraldr gestured that he would relieve the Seljuk of the burden of his empty goblet. When he had given the cup to the batman, he turned suddenly, clamped his hand to the Seljuk’s forehead like a vice, and neatly sliced his right ear off.
The Seljuk was rigid with shock; blood streamed down his neck and dripped off his shoulder. Haraldr seized the Seljuk’s jaw, popped it open, and stuffed the ear in. ‘Tell him to eat his ear!’
The Seljuk fell to his knees, retching and coughing. Haraldr knelt with him, his hands over the Seljuk’s mouth and nose. ‘Eat!’ The Seljuk’s eyes seemed to grasp for the air denied his lungs. Haraldr held his knife to the desperate face again. ‘Tell him to eat his ear or I will feed him his other ear and then his nose’ - Haraldr waited for the translation and sliced skin from the tip of the nose - ‘and then I will make him eat the nose that droops between his legs.’ He lowered the knife to the man’s belly, slit the coarse linen robe, and made a shallow cut across the abdomen. ‘And if he does not eat, I will find another way of filling his belly.’ Haraldr then placed the bloody point of the dagger against the tear gland of the Seljuk’s right eye. ‘When he has seen all this, we will provide him a dessert. He will have no trouble swallowing his eyes.’ Haraldr pushed against the Seljuk’s face and toppled him backwards. ‘Then our physicians will make certain that he lives.’