The Dark Lord

by Thomas Harlan

  So the lord of heaven gave, and the lord of heaven took away.

  Mechanically, she lifted blocks of turf away with the spade, then began to dig out the soil below. This grave did not need to be so big, only enough to hold the corpse of a six-year-old boy who loved bears and horses and a drink called cold-water-with-ice. Shirin's arms and shoulder burned with effort, but she continued to dig, her mind carefully empty. In the end, there had been no need for mother and children to be separated. The attentions of the Eastern Emperor were diverted by the revolt of the Decapolis cities, even before Shirin's children reached Rome.

  They did not have to be dead. She did not have to be alone. Her dear friend did not have to be a monster.

  Shirin finished the second grave. Sweat stung in half-healed wounds across her back and side. A thin golden chain slithered on her neck and the heavy egg-shaped ruby hanging between her breasts bounced each time she drove the spade into the ground.

  When Vesuvius erupted, she had been on the deck of a merchantman in the great half-circle of the bay. A wave rolled up out of the deep and smashed the Pride of Cos onto the shore. Shirin leapt from the ship, taking her chances in the midnight sea. Something struck her, leaving long cuts on her back, but she was a strong swimmer and managed to reach the pebbly beach alive.

  By great good luck, an offshore wind followed the great wave, driving the choking air away from the beach. By the time Shirin had crawled out of the surf, the sea was filled with corpses. The strand was packed with stunned people, the citizens from the beachfront villas and little towns dotting the rim of the bay. Flames filled the night and the people watched in silence as their homes burned furiously. The sky billowed with huge burning clouds, streaked by plunging comets trailing sparks and fire. Shirin, bleeding, staggered south along the beach, wading at the edge of the surf, pushing her way through drifting bodies. The water thrashed with violence—great gray-bodied sharks tore at the dead, jagged white teeth sparkling in the red air. It seemed wise to flee the glowing, thundering ogre of fire filling the eastern sky.

  The third and fourth graves were still smaller. Both of her girls had been little sprites with curly dark brown hair, like their father. Shirin, arms caked with ash and loam, laughed bitterly at the thought of dead Chrosoes, king of kings of Persia. He had been an Emperor too and he had been cold in the ground for more than two years. She felt nothing, thinking of him now, though she had loved him dearly in life. His passage into madness had suffocated their love. Shirin grimaced. The spade clanged against a root. Relentlessly, she hacked away, metal biting into the soft yellow wood. The blows echoed up her arm, but she was young and strong and her back had healed well.

  Royal Ctesiphon seemed like a dream; a faint memory of luxury and glorious splendor. Today, under this bright sky, sweating, digging the graves of her own children, her marriage and husband were distant phantoms. Memories of her youth were brighter, as clear as a swift river or a still pool among mossy rocks. The faces of her uncles were sharp in her mind; and racing horses, or hunting ermine and fox in the deep snow, or the sight of storm-heavy clouds winging up over the black peaks of the Kaukasoi.

  Shirin leaned on the spade, weary and gasping for breath. Her arms and legs were numb. A breeze drifted over the hill, carrying the acrid smell of wet ash. Months had passed since the mountain vomited fire. The stinging yellow rain had stopped, the sky washed clean of a bitter haze. Now the green shoots of grass and flower buds poked up from the gray earth. In another year, a carpet of green and yellow and orange would cover the hills. She frowned, supple lips twisting into a grimace.

  Chrosoes had tried to keep her—a beautiful, singing bird in a gilded cage. He had died, hacked to death by Roman soldiers in the burning ruin of the Palace of the Swan.

  Heraclius and Theodore had desired her, to seal the conquest of Persia and bind her royal blood to theirs, cutting the root of Chrosoes' dynasty. Both had perished in the wreck of their own grasp for power.

  Thyatis had tried to set her away, a perfect crystalline beauty, in the prison of Thira. For safety. So that she would be unchanged, unblemished when Thyatis returned. Shirin spit to clear her mouth, bile rising in her throat.

  There were four graves in the ground, and four little corpses to fit them.

  Thyatis was gone, wrenched away by fate and transformed beyond recognition. Shirin's hands trembled and she clasped them firmly around the haft of the spade. The same madness, which filled Chrosoes, distilled into the shape of her lover, like wormwood settling into wine.

  The day had been blindingly hot. Now night came, bringing close stifling air. Within the oval domain of the Flavian amphitheatre, Shirin was crushed into a narrow marble seat, pressed all around by sweating, anxious Romans. The entire city was in a fever, enthralled by the newest, most ferocious fighter to ever enter the arena. Every tavern and bath was filled with men and women praising the killing speed and ferocity—the art—of the Amazon Diana. Down on the white sand, lit by thousands of gleaming white spheres, it was butchery.

  An axeman leapt in, hewing wildly. Thyatis skipped back, parrying and parrying again. Sparks leapt from her blade as it caught the edge of the axe. The man screamed, a high wailing sound that flew up into the air and vanished into the constant roar of the crowd. Blocking, Thyatis caught the haft of his axe on her hilts, and they grappled, faces inches from each other. The man was still screaming, tendons bulging, eyes bugged out. Thyatis let him charge, taking his full weight upon her. She twisted gracefully and he flew, slamming into the ground. She kicked the weapon away, knelt, reversing her own blade and driving a convulsive blow into his chest. Ribs cracked and splintered, blood bubbled up through his armor, and then the body stiffened and lay still.

  Thyatis stood, unsteady, limbs trembling with desire. She turned towards the crowd, oiled muscles streaked with scarlet. Thyatis' expression was wild, ecstatic, transported by blood lust. Shirin shrank back in her seat, the entire world focused down on the face of her friend. The expression there was all too familiar.

  "Are there more?" Thyatis' scream echoed back from the marble walls. "Are there more?"

  Shirin stabbed the spade into the soil, letting it stand, then bent and dragged the first corpse to the grave. Carefully, she rewrapped each body, tucking in the wool all around. For a moment, she considered placing her knife beside her son.

  You will need a hunting knife, in the green fields and forests, to skin your game and cut the fat from sizzling meat above the fire. Then Shirin remembered the blameless dead, the children taken before their time by accident or sickness, were watched over by the elohim and all the servants of the lord of the world. Rejoice my son, she thought, drawing great consolation from the thought of her children among the bright ones. You will not wander in torment, among the uneasy dead.

  Beside her neat pile of clothing sat an urn of lime, and she sprinkled each corpse before turning the soil back over to fill the little pit.

  "The lord of heaven gave you to me and the lord of heaven has taken you away," she said, softly, bending her head to her knee. "Blessed be the name of the lord of heaven."

  When the graves were filled, she worked, kneeling, and fitted the cut turves back into place. There was quite a mound of soil left, so she scattered it across the grassy sward. In some future spring, flowers would bloom and saplings would rise out of the ash.

  The plants would grow swiftly and well in such rich soil.

  I do not think I am accursed, Shirin thought, but my choices have been poor.

  She felt very old, standing on the hillside, looking down at the sparkling blue arc of the bay. The sky was filled with racing clouds, puffy and white, and she watched their shadows pass over the land. After a time, the sensation of emptiness grew too great and she drew on the stola and gown. The Roman garments were hot and binding, but she desired no undue attention, not in this place and time.

  The rocky beach ended in cliffs, but Shirin found a narrow path and followed it up onto a headland at the end of the ba
y. The sky was still black with ashy cloud and a constant gray rain of soot drifted out of the heavens. The promontory held a small temple and she took shelter there, suddenly realizing she was bleeding from a dozen unnoticed cuts. Many women were already huddled under the arched dome, for the hill was sacred to Minerva. When the sun returned, after days of gloomy darkness, the priestesses came and took them all away, out of the devastation. A larger temple sheltered them, and in time, Shirin's back healed and she could move without pain.

  Then she set out for Rome, in search of her children, who were supposed to be staying with Thyatis' guardian, the Duchess Anastasia De'Orelio. She located the residence of the Duchess, and made inquiries, but found the servants close-mouthed and suspicious. A placard in the Forum had caught her eye next—a towering Amazon, red-haired, stood over crudely drawn opponents—Diana, read the legend. The Emperor promised a greater spectacle than ever beheld by Rome. Shirin stared and stared, finally succumbing to curiosity, spending her last coins.

  Shirin climbed the crest of the hill, spade over one shoulder, the urn of lime tucked under her arm. Her cloak and gown seemed very heavy. It seemed doubtful a gardener would ever tend the ruins, but Shirin was no thief and she returned what she borrowed. The dead pines made a strange palisade of blackened trunks, but the path was clear. When she came down to the low fieldstone wall marking the top of the kitchen garden, she paused.

  There were voices, people speaking in the ruins of the big house. Shirin laid down the tool and the urn, then turned up her hood. The thought of seeing another person, much less a survivor of this devastation, was repugnant. This was a private day, her grief not for public display. She would have welcomed a priest to sit by the evening fire and hear her lament. Bile rose in her throat, almost choking her. Shirin hurried away, following the line of the wall, and disappeared over the crest of the hill. There was a road not far away, an easy walk on this brisk afternoon, and it led down to the shore and the ruined port.

  —|—

  "You're sure they were here?" Thyatis pushed aside a fallen timber, letting it crash to the smoke-blackened tiles. Her long limbs were filled with nervous energy and she walked heavily, sending up puffs of ashy dust from the ruined floor. "Not away at the seaside—not returning to Rome? Not lost, among the crowds of refugees, nameless, without a guardian?"

  The tall Roman woman looked around, rolling slightly from foot to foot. In better days, the villa had sprawled around a big central courtyard ornamented with fountains and a running stream. Red tile roofs and whitewashed walls, climbing trellis of flowers and fragrant herbs—only a shell remained, gutted, the walls crushed in by falling stones, the tile blackened and broken. She paced through the remains of the great entrance hall, clouds of black ash rising and settling as she moved.

  "They were here." Her companion answered in a lifeless voice. The older woman did not enter the ruins; she remained on the bricked entranceway, one slim hand raised to hold a veil of gauzy silk between her eyes and the sun. "They sent me a letter—all scrawled and covered with paints and fingerprints—the day of the eruption. The messenger was found on the Via Appia, asphyxiated, by one of my men."

  Thyatis turned, red-gold hair falling short around her lean head. Freshly healed scars shone white against the tanned skin on her shoulders, arms and neck. Her face was blank, thin lips compressed into a tight line. Her fingers settled on the hilts of the sword slung on a leather strap over her shoulder. They were uneasy there, but the touch seemed to calm the tall woman. "I will look, for myself. I must be sure."

  "Of course," the older woman answered, still refusing to enter the burned house. "I will wait here."

  Thyatis nodded, her thoughts far away, and then moved quickly off into the ruins.

  —|—

  Anastasia watched, her own mind troubled. The crushing depression afflicting her after the events of the eruption had recently eased. Her efforts had turned askew on the mountaintop that dreadful night—many men and women she treasured had been killed. For a time, she had feared Thyatis—whom she had come to care for as a true daughter—was lost as well. The prince Maxian, whom she had hoped to kill, survived. A disaster. At least—at least—it seemed the prince, whose sorcerous talents had seemed so implacable a threat, such a monstrous, unforgivable abomination, had righted his path.

  The Duchess considered biting her lip, but forestalled the impulse. Her maid would take great exception if the carefully applied powders and pigments were disturbed. Instead, the Duchess contented herself with making a sharp corner out of the silk of her stola and rubbing the crisp edge against her thumb. Her eyes, shadowed by the veil, followed Thyatis' movements among the fallen, burned timbers and the soot-stained walls. In happier times, they would have gleamed violet, sparkling in wit or delight.

  Now she had seen too much, lost too much. Despite Betia's best efforts, her eyes were smudged and dark, revealing exhaustion and despair. The Duchess looked away from the ruins, driving away fond memories—idle summer parties, long twilit dinners, the intoxicating aroma of jasmine and orange and hyacinth in the spring—and looked out across the rumpled, tormented plain towards Vesuvius.

  The mountain loomed, dark and shrouded with smoke. Jagged and broken, its smooth flanks rent by the vomitus of the earth and terrible mudslides. All the land around its feet—once some of the richest in Campania—was abandoned, haunted, dangerous in poor weather. Anastasia sighed, thinking of the wealth destroyed and the Imperial resources now consumed, trying to set right the wound. Gold and men and time were desperately needed in the East, where disaster tumbled after disaster like a summer flood.

  Anastasia felt old and tired. With an effort, she walked back to the horses they had ridden down from Rome and sat—ignoring the damage to the dark gray silk and linen of her stola and cloak—by the roadside. The gentle cream-colored mare bumped her with its big nose, and Anastasia responded by rubbing its neck. The horse was disappointed—no apples, no biscuit were forthcoming.

  "Someone was here." Thyatis appeared out of the twilight, long bare legs streaked with charcoal, strapped sandals black with ash. "There are many bodies among the ruins, all burned or rotted. A young man in boots came into the little house by the garden and rooted around. They may have taken something away—but the light is failing and the signs were unclear." Thyatis squatted down, peering at the Duchess, who had her head buried in her arms.

  "Are you sleeping?" Thyatis brushed the Duchess' hair with the back of her hand. "Shall I carry you back to the city?"

  "No." Anastasia's voice was muffled, hidden behind her round white arms and the huge pile of curls Betia had pinned up in the morning. "I will be fine."

  "Surely," Thyatis said gently, her voice soft. "Come on, stand up."

  Anastasia allowed herself to rise, thin white fingers standing out in the gloom against Thyatis' darker skin. "Have you seen enough?"

  Thyatis looked back at the ruin, now all but hidden in shadow. Beyond the hill rising above the villa, the sky was still bright, filled with glowing orange thunderheads set against an overarching field of sable and purple. High up, out over the sea, long thin clouds gleamed like bars of molten gold. Here, in the hill's shadow, the villa walls gleamed like phantoms in the dim light. She felt drained of the nervous energy that had driven her down from Rome in such haste. "Yes, I have seen enough."

  "What will you tell her?" Anastasia removed her veil. In the twilight, she did not need to protect her pale skin. "What can you say?"

  "Nothing." Thyatis' jaw clenched and she began to make a chewing motion. Then she stopped, aware of the nervous tic. Instead she captured the big stallion's traces and pressed her hand against his muscular shoulder. "I dreamed... I dreamed she was drowning, her face was in the sea and there were flames and lights upon the water. I think she is dead, and I hope—no, I pray to the gray-eyed goddess—they are together, with Nikos, and the others, and every man who followed me into death, in the golden fields."

  Anastasia nodded, though her face w
as almost invisible, only a pale white shape in the gloom. "You believe in the gods, then. You think there is a life after this one. A place without care and suffering, in Elysium and the gardens of the blessed."

  Thyatis snorted, swinging up onto the horse. She leaned over and helped Anastasia onto the mare. "I hope, Duchess. I hope. Do you?"

  "No." Anastasia arranged her stola and cloak to cover her legs, then twitched the reins. The mare, amiable and hopeful, turned away from the ruins and the blackened trees and began to clop down the hard-packed road leading down the hill. "I think there is only a black void, a nothingness. But that too is free from the weight of this world."

  Thyatis said nothing, and the stallion followed the mare down the road and towards the distant dim lights flickering in the ruins of Baiae.

  —|—

  The night deepened, yet Thyatis did not feel weary. Her exhaustion lifted as the heat of the day faded. The horses were happy to set an easy pace and the two women turned north, on the road towards Rome. The wasteland stretched away into darkness on either side. Without the lights of farmhouses, or inns, it seemed they rode on the mantle of night itself. A small paper lantern, carrying a candle inside a screen, hung from the end of a long pole in front of Thyatis' horse. In that pale, flickering light, they kept to the via. The land was quiet and still, lacking even the whisper of night owls or the chirping of crickets.

  The clop-clop-clop of the horse's hooves seemed to carry a great distance.

  A mile marker passed, a granite tooth momentarily visible on the roadside. Then another.

  Thyatis stirred, uneasy. Her thoughts turned to the face of her enemy and she felt anxious. Time was slipping past, invisible grains spilling from a phantom glass. She looked over at the Duchess, who rode with her head bowed, cowl drawn over glossy curls. Thyatis wondered, suddenly, if all these deaths lay as heavy on the Duchess as in her own mind.