He was waiting for her at the usual place, his black cloak a shadow that seemed to take life as it emerged from the darkness of the alley next to an arcaded fruit market. He quickly took her next door, into the graveyard of the small monastery at the end of the street. She placed her pail down on the grass next to the toothlike rows of grave markers, hating as always this business amid the screaming souls of the dead, and waited for him to begin.
‘How many times did they meet this week?’ asked Joannes, looking down on the woman’s plain, pained face.
‘Three times,’ she said, her voice muffled by shame.
‘So they are busy, are they.’ She did not answer the rhetorical question but looked at her sandalled feet; dainty and smooth, they were her most attractive feature. ‘What did your husband tell you they discussed?’ asked Joannes.
Her eyes roamed as if she suspected the dead of eavesdropping. The monastery chapel, shrouded by trees, was a dark, forbidding presence behind the rows of gravestones. ‘H-he said they are against . . . y-you, Orphanotrophus. They are . . . planning something. He would not say what.’
Joannes nodded. ‘Has he ever talked of any association between his group and certain malefactors in the Studion?’
‘I heard him talk to a ... friend . . .’ She paused, aware that ambiguities annoyed the Orphanotrophus. ‘The . . . friend was the baker I already told you about.’ Joannes nodded that she could continue. ‘They said that this group in the Studion was . . . well organized and would be a ... good ally. They said that the middle class and the poor would have to unite against y-you, Orphanotrophus.’
Joannes bent over the woman as if he were about to grab her and shake the truth out of her, but he merely leered. ‘The name of this group in the Studion. Did they mention the name of this group?’ The woman shook her head and stifled a sob. ‘But you will find out the name for me, will you not? I should think that when we meet next week, you will know.’
The woman nodded affirmatively, her hands clutching at the borders of her cloak as if she were suddenly cold. She looked up with tears on her cheeks. ‘Have you brought a message from my boy? Is he well? Oh, please . . .’ The desperation in her voice would have broken the heart of a statue.
‘He is well,’ rumbled Joannes. ‘He is one of the Neorion’s pets already. I will have a message from him for you next time, when you bring the name.’
The woman looked up at Joannes with the curious gratitude that victims of the rack often displayed to their torturers. She sniffled and waited.
‘Has your husband touched you this week?’ asked Joannes.
She did not think to lie. ‘No,’ she said numbly. Joannes nodded. She mechanically pulled her cloak aside and then slowly pulled her tunic up to her armpits, leaving everything beneath that line of demarcation exposed. Joannes’s eyes never left her flat, low breasts. Her veined nipples were puckered from the cold, certainly not desire. Her eyes were closed. Joannes’s huge, deformed fingers reached out and spread over her breasts, and the spatulate tips pressed against her sallow flesh like the suction cups of a squid. There was no movement in his face, no expression in his shadowed sockets. After a brief moment he removed his hands and the woman slowly pulled her tunic down. She quickly picked up her pail and ran out of the graveyard and disappeared down the street. Joannes looked around the graveyard for a moment, as if he wished to frighten even the dead with his terrible visage. Then he, too, walked beneath the stone portal and disappeared.
The dead rose from behind a large, square-sided fountain in the middle of the haphazard rows of slabs. One was an enormous spirit, the other a small man who moved with the quick, furtive, utterly silent spurts of a creature used to going where it was not wanted. The two spirits huddled their heads for a moment and spoke to one another.
‘You see. Once a week. This night, always the same time and the same thing.’ The little man smiled, showing crooked, partially rotted teeth. ‘The only thing that ever changes is, sometimes he feels her breasts and sometimes he doesn’t.’
Haraldr smiled grimly and placed five silver nomismata in the little man’s hands. ‘My thanks to you, friend. And to our mutual friend, the Blue Star, my gratitude and greetings.’
The little man scurried off behind the monastery, leaving Haraldr alone with the dead. He doubted that any of the souls buried in this hallowed ground were damned, but if any were, he had a message for them to take to the Prince of Hell: ‘At this time a week hence, I will deliver to you the soul of the Orphanotrophus Joannes.’
There were tiny black clouds high in the otherwise perfect, porcelain-blue sky, and the sun was hot and his hair was golden with the heat. She could not touch him any more, but somehow her mind was inside his and she could see through his eyes, though she knew she was so distant from him. For a long time she did not notice the little black clouds become ravens flocking ever lower, until she saw the glittering ice on top of the hill and felt the cold wind rip through his heart. But beyond the ice was a creek, gentle, a surface of many-faceted diamonds. She whispered to him, ‘The king is on the other side,’ and she knew when he reached the king beyond the creek, he would be safe. Then a single raven came from the zenith of the black sky, arrow-swift, its obsidian beak as sharp as death. She felt it hit his neck, and then she saw the blood pump out horribly, and she reached for him desperately. . . .
Maria awakened shivering, her tears like ice crystals on her face. She sat up and listened to the stillness of the night and felt eternity round her like a black, weightless shroud. What does it mean? she asked herself, feeling as if her soul were a tiny flame fleeing ahead of her in the darkness. What does it mean?
‘Nephew. You look so well this morning. Have you refreshed yourself with one of your sluts? Perhaps, being young and foolish, and this the season of renewal, you have dedicated your earnest heart to one in particular.’ Joannes nodded to his secretary, who closed the door to his plain, immaculately cluttered office in the basement of the Magnara. Michael Kalaphates sat without greeting his uncle.
‘So you have renewed your liaison with the queen of sluts. What morsels has the lovely woman given you to share with me?’
‘Uncle, she has engineered another plot.’ Michael looked at Joannes as if this were one of the most painful utterances of his life. His dark lashes blinked furiously.
‘Indeed. How is she to accomplish this assassination?’
‘I do not know the details, Uncle.’
Joannes picked up his pen, dipped it in an ugly little porcelain inkwell, and made a note on a document before him. He looked up at Michael once and wrote a few more words before placing his pen carefully in a small clay tray. Suddenly he rose like an eruption of black smoke, his huge arms flying, one deformed finger pointing to Michael’s nose like the sword of the Archangel. ‘The slut has always had some plot against me, you snivelling moron!’ he thundered. ‘I do not need warnings! I have the resources to deflect any of the blows that are directed at me!’ Joannes lowered his voice abruptly. ‘I need to find a way of luring her into drinking her own poison. That is why I need details, you witless harlot-monger. Can you remember anything?’
‘Yes.’ Michael’s eyes were wide with terror. ‘Her confederate in this enterprise is the Manglavite Haraldr Nordbrikt.’
‘Thank you, Nephew. You may see yourself out.’ Joannes did not look up. ‘Next time we talk, I hope you will have a more persuasive and thorough argument against your return to Neorion.’
When Michael had left, Joannes leaned back in his chair and rubbed the deep sockets of his eyes. So the Manglavite Haraldr Nordbrikt would come against him. Excellent. That made the decision so much easier. Yes, one of the two Tauro-Scythian swell-heads had to go; their connivance was too dangerous, particularly at this time, but then the preservation of one was just as certainly necessary. And since the Manglavite Haraldr Nordbrikt was clearly the more foolish of the two and would soon offer the same allegiance to the Orphanotrophus as had the pathetic Caesar, the choice simply had to be the Hetairarch Mar Hunrodarson. It was time for Mar Hundrodarson to conclude his lengthy stay among the Romans with a final, exquisite night in Neorion.
‘I cannot tell you.’
Mar slapped his powerful hands to his vast chest with a resounding thump, as if ascertaining for himself that he was indeed the person to whom Haraldr was speaking. ‘I do not believe what I just heard. I have spent months trying to goad you into taking some action, and now you have this insane plan that I can only assume has been inspired by your woman, and I am informed that you are going to strike directly at Joannes tomorrow evening, but you cannot tell me where this assault will take place, or who has convinced you that this scheme will not get every Varangian in the Roman Empire killed. Why do I see the hand of Maria in this?’
‘Maria is not involved. I am withholding the details for your own protection. If I fail, the less you know the better. I simply want you to be prepared when it happens.’ Haraldr knew this wasn’t entirely the truth; he didn’t trust Mar enough to name the Empress. But the safety of his pledge-men depended on Mar knowing that the attempt would be made.
‘Prepared? We are
not
prepared. If we move now without pledges from the Scholae, Excubitores and Hyknatoi, everything will be lost. I don’t think you are aware of the considerable effort I have made to convert several topoteretes to our cause. I am moving forward. You are about to rush off a precipice and you are going to take the rest of us with you.’
‘I have . . . pledges that assure much more than a few topoteretes of the Taghmata can offer us.’
Mar walked over and kicked at a stack of canvas tents; he had agreed to meet Haraldr in the storeroom beneath the barracks of the Middle Hetairia. He looked about at the bags of field equipment, battle armour, and rows of ceremonial banners resting against the wall. For the first time he realized how dangerous the Prince of Norway really was. He turned back to Haraldr. ‘The lives of one thousand men are at stake. You had better name your confederates.’ Mar’s face reddened ominously.
‘Do you think I would take any action that would recklessly jeopardize the life of any Norseman? First of all, I am not going to have any trouble dealing with Joannes in the place where I am planning to do this. And when I succeed, I have guarantees that the Taghmata will be neutralized. I am virtually certain that when they see what they are up against, they will not even fight. If they do, we will crush them.’
‘And I am supposed to take your word for this?’ Mar propped his hands on his hips. ‘Maybe you have forgotten the lesson I taught you the night we met.’
Haraldr hadn’t; he clearly remembered how easily Mar had overpowered him. ‘Do you intend to beat this information out of me?’
Mar walked towards him. ‘That depends on you, little Prince.’
Haraldr had almost decided to reveal everything, reasoning that he had already trusted Mar with the lives of his pledge-men. But Mar’s physical intimidation galled him. ‘Perhaps it does.’
This time Haraldr was ready. He caught Mar’s serpent-quick arm and threw him against a row of standards. Mar flailed at the clattering shafts and rebounded against the wall; in an instant he had lunged into Haraldr’s knees and sent him sprawling. They grappled and rolled, pummelling limbs thudding violently into the stone floor. Haraldr could not believe how powerful Mar was; he remembered wrestling with Olaf when he was a little boy. And yet Mar was unable to pin him down.
They were on their feet. Mar glared; perhaps not the Rage but an inhuman fury. Haraldr put his shoulder down and bulled him into a pile of canvas bags. Mar was slapping him frantically at the ears. A bag slipped away beneath Haraldr and he pitched to the floor. Somehow Mar was at his back. Mar’s arm was across his windwipe, shutting it off, and the knife was at his cheek.
‘This is madness!’ shouted Mar, breathing furiously. ‘This is doing nothing to stop Joannes.’ He let go of Haraldr’s throat and put his knife away.
Haraldr angrily shoved the canvas gear bags aside and got up on his knees. It
was
madness. He told Mar where the assassination would take place, and how the Empress had guaranteed to exhort the city against the Taghmata.
When Haraldr had finished, Mar looked off to the side and rocked slightly on his heels for a pregnant interval. Finally he said, quietly, ‘I think it will work.’
Haraldr rubbed his throat.
Yes, it will work,
he told himself.
And the next time we fight, Mar, if I am lucky and you are not, I might be able to kill you.
Mar stormed through the halls of the Numera to the wing containing the private rooms of his centurions. He pounded on Thorvald Ostenson’s door, and when it was opened a crack, he burst in. He ignored the young boy who cowered in Ostenson’s bed and thrust his bronze oil lamp in his subordinate’s face. ‘I want you to go into the city and arrange an interview for me tonight. Without fail. Immediately.’
Ostenson gulped for words. ‘W-who is the concerned party, Hetairarch?’
‘The Grand Domestic Bardas Dalassena.’
Mar watched Ostenson dress, as if he were afraid his centurion might climb back into bed. When Ostenson had left, Mar slammed the door on the bewildered boy and walked quickly to his own third-floor apartments. He flung open doors and went out on his balcony, wishing he could vent his rage for the entire palace to hear. Incredible. Who did he hate most? Himself, Haraldr Sigurdarson, or the conniving, unbelievably clever slut? Sigurdarson! Incredible! Mar had spent months forging an alliance with Alexius and Theodora, and in one evening with the purple-born whore, the boy Prince had arrived at a plan that would probably leave the bitch Zoe in power for the rest of her life. Had she also promised to make Haraldr Sigurdarson
Hetairarch?
Or worse, would she allow him to return to Norway before he had begun to be useful? This is what he had hated most about Sigurdarson all along, his extravagant good fortune, simply to be alive, and then his preposterous string of successes on top of that. Mar walked back inside his bedchamber, picked up the enormous armoire opposite his bed, flung it into the wall. The massive piece of furniture shattered with a noise like a ship breaking up on the rocks.