Rogue Emperor (The Chronoplane Wars Book 3)

by Crawford Kilian

  Willard clapped as Pierce took three steps backward and bowed to Maria Donovan.

  “Well done, Alaricus,” she said. “And you men, too, did well. You met a fighter trained in deadly skills.”

  “No wonder the barbarians conquered Rome,” Willard murmured in English. “That’s the pure Nordic showing here.”

  “He doesn’t look very Nordic, but I like him. He’s practically the first endo Christian we’ve found — ”

  “Come on, Maria — ”

  “Who hasn’t converted in the last two days, and what’s more he can take care of himself. I think he’s worth using.”

  “Will Dear Michael approve?”

  She laughed. “Approve a primitive Christian who can take out five or six Praetorians? Of course. Goodness, isn’t this confirmation that Dear Michael’s right? The early Church obviously isn’t just a bunch of wimps.” Turning to Pierce, Maria Donovan said, “Brother Alaricus, we are pleased to see your skills. Come inside with us. We will share a meal and talk more about you.”

  “I shall do whatever my lady bids me.”

  To the Praetorians’ surprise, Pierce hugged each of them in turn, and then followed the two Militants into the palace. He felt the old addictive elation: The bad guys were coming into range. An ancient spies’ proverb said that if you live among wolves you must howl like one. He would howl until the time came to show his fangs.

  Twelve

  Robirius, Domitian’s architect, had been a master. Unlike the brick-built boxes of the insulae, light filled the palace. Every window seemed to open onto a different garden. Every wall not faced with marble was richly painted, and the floor of every room was a unique mosaic. Robirius had used poured concrete more than brick; walls were often curved, and some ceilings swelled into graceful domes pierced at the top to let in still more light.

  The Militants were quickly making themselves at home. Workers in uptime civilian clothes were tacking wire screening over the windows to keep out mosquitoes. Generators were at work: Electric cables snaked along the corridors, and fluorescent lights glowed even in rooms where they weren’t needed. Pierce heard the whine of an old-fashioned dot matrix printer, and telephones warbled incessantly.

  Aware that Maria Donovan and Willard Powell were amusedly watching him, Pierce kept himself round-eyed and amazed. The act, he reflected, was easier than it should have been: The Church Militant was extremely well organized. The administrative infrastructure was already in place, complete with computers, filing cabinets, and desks. The Hesperian embassy had not been much better equipped, and it had operated in a windowless box rather than an imperial palace.

  The halls were full of people, not all of them uptimers. Some were Praetorians, evidently advising their new masters on the resources of the palace and the city. Others looked like regular palace slaves, their faces downcast and frightened as they carried boxes of mysterious objects or trays piled with TV dinners.

  Maria and Willard led him to a large room lined with bookshelves; the original scrolls were gone, replaced by loose-leaf binders, uptime books, and computer printouts. A small sallow man sat at a desk, watching a Polymath computer flicker at ten pages per second: Brother David Greenbaugh, a renegade Trainable. Pierce wished he could see the flickerscreen clearly, but Greenbaugh shut it down with a brief command and turned to face them.

  “Actually found a Christian, have we?” said Greenbaugh dryly. He was still in his twenties but had lost much of his hair. Years of hardship on Albion had aged him as they had not aged Willard and Maria, making him seem very frail. But his eyes were those of a Trainable: quick, observant, hard and alive.

  “He’s a Goth named Alaricus,” said Maria. Then, in Latin, she said, “This is Brother David, one of the emperor’s closest advisers. Tell him your story, as you told it to us.”

  Haltingly, Pierce repeated his account of his vision and his journey south in obedience to it. Greenbaugh listened well, showing little sign of the Trainable’s impatience with ordinary speech. When Pierce had finished, the first question came instantly:

  “Who was this holy man who brought the gospel to your tribe?”

  “We called him Christmanna. His own name, I think was something like Shimon or Shomanna.”

  “What did he tell you about himself?”

  “Only that he had been sent by the Church of Rome to preach the gospel to the peoples of the north.”

  “Was he an old man?”

  “I recall him as a young man, not tall, with a brown beard. But I was a very young boy when he came to us, and he stayed only two or three years.”

  “Did this Shimon preach to other tribes as well?”

  “Yes, but only we listened. The Suebii nearly killed him.”

  “And why should your people listen when others did not?”

  Pierce shrugged and grinned. “Perhaps Satan had preached to them first.”

  The interrogation went on, with Greenbaugh especially curious about the doctrines Shimon had preached. Pierce gave him a simplified version of Martelism, which sprang from Christ’s statement that he had brought not peace but a sword.

  “Shimon taught us that God had made us warriors, but we must choose whether to war for Christ or for Satan. Our chieftains chose Christ, and Shimon baptized them.”

  “What became of Shimon?”

  “He went on to the east many years ago.”

  “And your people have had no contact with the Church since then?”

  “You mean the Christians here in the south? No. We have been too busy converting our neighbors.”

  Greenbaugh smiled faintly. “And how do you convert them?”

  “By the sword, of course.”

  “Very interesting,” Greenbaugh said in English to Maria and Willard. “Could you follow that?”

  “Yes,” said Maria, and Willard nodded. “Isn’t it fascinating! It confirms Dear Michael’s revelations about the early Church teachings.”

  “It certainly does,” Greenbaugh said. “The apostles here in the empire made a terrible mistake in preaching to the slaves. They should have gone straight to the army. This Shimon, whoever he was, understood that the true gospel would have to be taught to fighters. If the other apostles and missionaries had understood that, Rome would have been Christianized by now.”

  “But what happened to this fellow’s people on Earth?” asked Willard. “Why didn’t they convert all the barbarians?”

  Greenbaugh shrugged. “Probably backslid. Without a charismatic leader, the flock soon scatters. In any case, it won’t happen this time around. We’ll bring them into the fold; they’ll be extremely useful.”

  “If they’re all as good fighters as this one, we’ll be truly blessed.” Willard chuckled.

  “That reminds me,” said Greenbaugh, who then shifted to Latin: “Your tunic is bloodstained. Why?”

  “This afternoon I was praising the emperor Martellus outside a house the Praetorians were purging of Jews. Someone struck me from behind and robbed me of what little I owned.”

  “And the Praetorians did nothing?”

  “None were in sight at the moment. They came to my aid as I lay on the sidewalk, and when they heard my tale they sent me here.”

  That seemed to satisfy Greenbaugh. Before he could ask another question, Maria broke in.

  “Brother David, what do you think of this man’s so-called vision? Does it seem like a real revelation?”

  Greenbaugh pursed his narrow lips. “Alaricus,” he said in Latin. “How did you learn Latin?”

  “I hired on as a bodyguard for Gnaeus Ennius Minor, the son of the governor of Transalpine Gaul. The boy and his tutor taught me what little Latin I know.”

  Greenbaugh nodded. “Seems plausible,” he remarked to the others. “His Latin’s not very good, but he’s got a patrician’s vocabulary and he tries to pronounce words like a patrician.” He smiled. “Sort of like a house nigger’s English.”

  “Brother David,” Maria said complainingly, “we’re talking ab
out a real live Nordic here, not some ape.”

  “Yes, Maria. But he is a barbarian, remember.”

  “He’s a witness to Christ’s Providence,” Maria said intensely. “Our Pilgrimage was foreknown and Christ prepared the way for us, just as Dear Michael said. Oh, why should I feel surprised? Hasn’t he been right every time?”

  “Amen,” Willard said. “Uh, Brother David, shouldn’t we tell Dear Michael and the rest of the Elders about this?”

  “Indeed. We’ll put him on the agenda for tonight’s meeting. Meanwhile, why don’t you get him cleaned up and fed?”

  *

  Pierce allowed himself to relax slightly once they were out of Greenbaugh’s sight. Trainables could pick up the subtlest nonverbal cues, and Greenbaugh might well have spotted some unconscious response or mannerism in Pierce and recognized him as a fellow Trainable. The renegade’s long years among unTrainables, and the sudden transition to Ahanian Rome, had evidently blunted Greenbaugh’s sensitivities. Even so, Pierce would avoid the man as much as possible.

  But that computer would tell him everything about the Militants; if he could get access to it for even a few minutes, the Agency could wrap up this whole mess in a day or two.

  Willard and Maria led him through more corridors and down a curving staircase of pink marble to the palace baths. They filled a series of rooms, paved with marble and decorated with statues and murals finer than anything Pierce had yet seen. The rooms all opened onto a garden; each room held a shallow circular pool of water about seven meters in diameter.

  “The first pool,” said Maria, “is tepid, the second is hot, and the third is cold. Scrub yourself with a sponge and this bar of sapo. We don’t use oil, only this.” She beckoned to an attendant, a little man with a big nose who seemed mortified at the sight of a woman when a man was about to bathe.

  “Naso, give this man fresh clothing when he’s finished, and take him to the servants’ dining hall for something to eat.”

  “Certe, magistral.”

  “Alaricus, stay in the dining hall until you are summoned. The Elders will want to meet you tonight — including the emperor.”

  Pierce clasped his hands under his chin and looked alarmed. “My lady, this is too great an honor. I ask only to serve and protect you, and through you the emperor. Surely the emperor has weightier matters to attend to.”

  “Indeed he does. But if he chooses to see you, you will be ready.”

  “Yes, my lady.”

  They left him to Naso and the other attendants, who regarded him with cautious disdain. “Give me your clothing,” Naso said in a voice not quite civil. “If the emperor is going to see you, we will make you as presentable as possible. Do you know what sapo is?”

  “No.”

  “Our new masters are very fond of it. It’s a kind of grease or tallow that makes a froth in water. No, don’t laugh — try it and you’ll see. It’s not a bad cleanser, though it puts a dreadful scum on the water.”

  Pierce descended a flight of shallow steps into the tepidarium, the lukewarm pool. It felt wonderful; he settled onto the bottom, so only his head and shoulders were above water. The soap that Naso handed him was a slightly used bar of Ivory. He used it cautiously at first, even tasting it and then spitting while the attendants laughed.

  “Everyone does that the first time,” Naso said with a smile. “Don’t use it on your hair; we have a different kind for that.”

  Another attendant, at Naso’s gesture, climbed into the pool with a plastic bottle of Alberto V05, poured a little in the palm of his hand, and rubbed it energetically into Pierce’s hair. Pierce winced at the sting of shampoo on his cut scalp.

  “Ah — did our masters do that to you?” asked Naso from the edge of the pool.

  “Raptores. They took all I own except a few sestertii in a belt pouch.”

  “Well, you’ve done well to end up here, then, haven’t you?”

  “God has put me where He wants me.”

  “Oh, indeed, indeed. I must say God has certainly shown a changeable frame of mind lately. On the Ides of May I was bathing the Lord God Domitian. Twelve days later I’m bathing a blood-soaked German in the same pool. Another twelve days and who knows what might happen?”

  “It’s all in the hand of the Lord.”

  “That’s exactly what makes me worry. Close your eyes and hold your breath.” The attendant pushed Pierce underwater to rinse the soap from his hair, then pulled him up again. “Now please go on into the caldarium.”

  Another slave tended to Pierce in the scaldingly hot pool, while Naso continued to supervise. Finally Pierce plunged into the frigidarium, from which he emerged shuddering but refreshed. Naso handed him a large towel and a new dark-blue tunic.

  “The fullers will clean your old one. Here’s your belt and money pouch, and your shoes. They must have had to skin a couple of bulls to get enough leather.”

  “Only one; our bulls are very big. Is there a tonsor here?”

  “I am he. Please be seated and I will shave you with a genuine Hesperian razor.” He opened a small leather pouch and brought out a Wilkinson Rehonable.

  Pierce gaped at him. “Do they allow idolatrous tools?”

  “In grooming items our new masters seem most forgiving.”

  But he used no shaving soap, and the result was painful. Still, Pierce felt better for it. With his hair trimmed and combed forward, he looked a little more Romanized.

  The sun was setting as Naso escorted Pierce down a series of staircases to a dark and smoky dining hall adjoining a kitchen. A taciturn cook handed him a bowl of stew that was mostly onions and garlic, with a few small bits of chicken. Naso ate the same, with gusto, and then led him back into a different part of the palace.

  A broad terrace overlooked the Amphitheater and the slums beyond. Under the darkening sky, fires glowed in a hundred places. If anything, the noise in the streets below was louder than during the day.

  “The Elders meet in there.” Naso nodded toward a doorway that gave onto what must be a large room. At the doorway four Praetorians stood guard with AK-47s. The windows had been screened; inside, electric lights glowed through the gauzy material of the curtains. Pierce could see the vague outlines of a long table and people sitting at it. A soft male murmur of voices drifted out into the warm evening.

  Pierce drew a deep breath and let it out. With a clearer idea of just who was inside, and where, he might have been tempted to seize one of the Praetorians’ weapons, break in, and kill as many of the Militants as he could. But Martel and his lieutenants protected themselves well; this was not the time or place for dramatics. He leaned against a marble railing, looked out over the city, and listened to Naso’s whispered comments on the ox-like expressions of the Praetorians.

  Time passed. Naso fell silent. The conversation in the room was too low even for Pierce’s enhanced hearing. Mosquitoes whined about him. His head hurt.

  Suddenly Maria’s voice called out: “Bring in Alaricus.”

  “Good luck,” Naso whispered.

  The door swung open; another guard stood there, beckoning to Pierce. Beyond were the Elders of the Church Militant.

  *

  Six men, some in Roman dress and others in uptime clothes, sat around the table; in chairs along the walls were Maria and several others. They ranged in age from Greenbaugh’s twenty-five to Elias Smith’s fifty-seven. They had the look of men in power, a look Pierce had often seen, a look they must have had even on that first terrible night on Albion six years ago. They were masters, comfortable in their mastery. Pierce recognized them all, though he was struck by how much older they had become. The years on Albion had been hard on more than David Greenbaugh.

  The one exception was Michael Martel. He sat at the head of the table in an uptime padded swivel chair, flanked by two Crucifers carrying Uzis, and he looked as splendid as he had back on Earth. He was tall and erect, broad-shouldered, with thick blond hair combed in the Roman style. His face was astonishingly beautiful, yet it
showed nothing effeminate or weak: The underlying hardness in the man made his looks attractive to men and women alike. In the turmoil of the early years of the International Federation, when the Church Militant had first sprung from the ruins of the neo-fascist movements, Martel’s physical presence had inspired mass hysteria. If his old fans could see him in a toga, Pierce thought, they’d go crazy again.

  Smiling, Maria guided Pierce to stand at the opposite end of the table from Martel. Pierce immediately fell to his knees and lifted both hands.

  “Praise God and His emperor! Allelulia!” he shouted.

  “Stand, brother,” said Martel with a slight smile. He leaned forward slightly, studying Pierce with interest. At thirty-eight Martel was too old to have been Tested, but Pierce suspected the man would have been Trainable.

  “You are Alaricus the Goth. Sister Maria has told us how you came here speaking of a vision you had been granted, and a mission you had been given to serve the Church through her.” His Latin was indeed as good as Dennis Brewster had said: He had caught the patrician cadence as Pierce had not.

  “Yes, Emperor.”

  “And Brother David here” — Martel nodded to Greenbaugh, who sat at his right — “says you and your people were converted to the gospel by a missionary named Shimon. That you were taught to take up your sword in the cause of Christ.”

  “Yes, Emperor.”

  “We would like to know more, Alaricus.”

  The grilling began. Martel said nothing more, while Greenbaugh, Willard Powell, and the others took turns interrogating Pierce: where his tribe lived, who its chieftains were, how services were conducted, how the young were brought up in the faith. Powell was especially interested in the tribe’s ability to make war: the number of warriors, their equipment, their tactics, their success against their enemies. Another Elder, Martin Armbruster, asked about the tribe’s theology.