As we went through the usual gateway leading to a central garden, there was a left turn into the building. All was dark at first, though not smelly in the least. If anything, the place was rather pleasant. With Lucas to guide me, though without any lamp, I passed through a series of interconnecting rooms, each unlit and stuffed with furniture. We turned right into another stretch of the building. There were more rooms, again all in darkness. In still more complete darkness, we went up a staircase, our feet scraping on the rough brick of the stairs. There was a short corridor at the top. This terminated in a door, light pouring out from underneath to show the dull roughness of the floor.
‘You go in alone,’ Lucas whispered with what sounded like a suppressed snigger. I said nothing. He knocked briefly, then pushed the door open and stood back for me to go in. I stepped forward, my mind a deliberate blank, and rubbed my eyes in the sudden brightness. Except for a couple of chairs and a little table over by one of the walls, the room was unfurnished. In one of these chairs, his back to me, a man was sitting. He twisted round and looked at me.
‘Ah, Alaric,’ he said, ‘I’ve been expecting you.’
Priscus stood up and advanced towards me across the room. He had that bastard cat of his in his arms. As he got within a few feet of me, the thing hissed and raised one of its paws at me.
Chapter 57
‘Oh go on, my blonde little darling,’ Priscus said, returning to his theme, ‘just admit you’ve been had.’ He rocked back on his chair and raised his cup in a mock toast. He hadn’t bothered in this heat with cosmetics, but he did have on the robe of an Imperial Council member. ‘Yes, it is the piss pot. I was telling the truth when we first spoke in Alexandria, and a lie when we last spoke. You may have given our friend the Pharaoh the slip more than once. But when Uncle Priscus sets his trap, no one escapes.’
‘So tell me, Priscus,’ I asked with a sneer, ‘when did you turn traitor and throw in your lot with a bunch of wog rebels? Was it on your trip to Siwa? Or was it as late as your improbably lucky escape from the mob?’
He put his cup down and rubbed his face into the cat’s fur. ‘I don’t think I need explain the details of what I’m about,’ he said. ‘Besides, the story is both long and a touch improbable.’ He now put the cat down and reached for his satchel of drugs. He was about to make a selection when Lucas grew tired of lurking and walked into the room.
‘Lucas, how delightful to see you again,’ he said. ‘Would you be a dear and arrange for another jug of wine? You might also care to bring a cup for young Alaric here. I’m sure he could do with refreshments after his dash here through the desert.’
‘My name is not Lucas,’ came the chilly reply. ‘You call me “Your Majesty” or by the name my people have urged upon me.’
Priscus sighed. ‘My dear boy,’ he said with a tired wave, ‘this night is far too hot for unpronounceable and unmemorable wog names. Your real name is Gregory. You are the son of a customs clerk in Naucratis. You have a warrant still pending there for defacing a statue of Septimius Severus while drunk and disorderly. Unless you really want me to call you Gregory, you’ll have to settle for Lucas. Let’s face it, if you don’t like the name, you should have found a better one when you introduced yourself to Alaric. It’s too late now to change things. Now, go and get more wine – and be quick about it.’ Priscus mopped at his face and motioned me into the one other chair in the room.
Looking several inches shorter than when he’d come in, Lucas turned and went out.
Priscus waited until the door was pulled to. ‘You left Alexandria almost before I’d noticed,’ he said. ‘How you got here so fast is quite beyond me. You will surely rejoice when I tell you, though, that Nicetas remains out of action, and Alexandria is in most capable hands of my own choosing.’
‘You’re feeling sure of yourself,’ I said. ‘Where is Martin? I suppose you told me the truth in Alexandria about his being alive.’
‘I told you, my love,’ Priscus said, ‘that he was alive when the ear was sliced away from his head. I made no warranties regarding his continuation in this world. However, he is alive, and you will see him soon enough.’ He switched into Latin and dropped his voice. ‘It goes without saying that you will do exactly as I tell you if the pair of you want any chance of getting out of this in one piece.’
The door opened again. Lucas walked in, a slave carrying wine behind him. Priscus smiled and waved at the table against the wall.
‘I think His Magnificence the Legate may feel obliged to give up his chair,’ Lucas said in a tone that hovered between the mad and the plain nasty. ‘We do have another guest whose status may be taken as higher than that of a mere commoner.’
There was a long moment of silence as Priscus and Siroes looked at each other. Their faces would have been a scream in better circumstances. But persons of quality don’t allow their composure to slip in front of people like Lucas. After the first shock of recognition, and the first apparent realisation that things were not as they’d agreed, they both recomposed their faces.
‘Siroes, what a delightful surprise, and after so many years,’ Priscus cried. He got up and hurried across the room.
Siroes opened his arms, and there was a most convincing reunion of old friends.
‘And do tell me,’ Priscus asked after some endless reminiscing over a work of nastiness they’d played on a barbarian king back in the days of Maurice, when the two empires had been at peace, ‘how is Roxana doing? And the children?’
From the brief answer, I gathered the woman had been taken as one of the Great King’s concubines, and the children had been smothered. Priscus squeezed his face into an expression of sympathy, and the conversation moved to less personal matters. I noticed that Siroes continued looking downcast.
‘Since when,’ Lucas broke in loudly, ‘has a Pharaoh been host to supplicant representatives of such great rulers?’ He struck a pose, showing his chest and shoulders while twisting his legs and head into profile.
I don’t suppose it was other than incompetence that led Egyptian artists into painting their kings in this pose. But Lucas appeared to think otherwise. Siroes looked at him, a thoughtful look just visible on the strip of his face not covered in hair. Priscus smiled politely.
‘It may be that I have called you here with a slight element of deceit,’ Lucas continued. ‘But you are here, and I will state my demands of you both.’
No chair was now free, and I wasn’t inclined to sit on the floor. It was as clean as anywhere else I’d sat this day, and there were some rugs that had a comfy look about them. But this wasn’t the time for putting aside dignity. I leaned against the wall and waited for this little comedy to play itself out. Priscus was first to speak.
‘I don’t know about Siroes, but I haven’t found it hard to guess what you have in mind. Let us consider. We made a deal. I would deliver Alaric. He would find the relic. I would then use this for my own purposes, granting Egypt full autonomy within the Empire and recognising you as its lawful King. You appear to have made a similar deal with Siroes – or with Chosroes directly. Now that we’re all gathered here, you are about to announce that all deals are off, and that you will keep the relic for yourself. Is that it?’ Priscus waited for Lucas to puff his chest out before continuing. ‘Well, my dear Lucas – and I still can’t speak for Siroes – do you really think I’d deliver myself into your hands, here in the back of beyond, without some precautions?’ He held out his cup for a refill.
Lucas scowled and muttered an order to the slave.
‘If I don’t return to Alexandria,’ Priscus went on, ‘or if I do return without what I came here to get, a series of letters in your own hand will be passed over to the Monophysite Patriarch. These are most incriminating, and you should recall that they are conclusively incriminating. In particular, you will recall your promise to Leontius to establish Isis as the tutelary deity of Egypt. I got these from poor foolish Leontius after I’d killed him. While he was still alive and able to speak, I got
a mass of circumstantial information that only blackens your name further.’
‘How the fuck did you kill Leontius?’ I blurted out. I thought back and tried to reconcile the times. They didn’t fit. He’d been with me all evening. Priscus gave me a look of cold power. It was as if I were in one of his dungeons, awaiting his pleasure. I fell silent and leaned back against the wall.
‘All very good, Priscus – and I expected nothing less of you,’ Lucas replied, sounding more troubled than he wanted to appear, ‘but what should I care about the opinion of a Christian priest? You know that my first act as Pharaoh will be to reopen all the temples, not merely the one at Philae.’
‘Don’t give me any of that, you silly little man!’ Priscus said. As he stretched his legs out, his robe fell back slightly, showing a patch of varicose blue. ‘You know as well as I do that Egypt is a Christian country. The wogs will humour your taste in dress, so long as you can kick out all the foreigners. They won’t stand by you for a moment if you lay hands on the Faith. I haven’t made enquiries among the common wogs, but I had a real heart-to-heart with all the other leaders of your Brotherhood. Get a man close enough to an impaling stake, and he’ll scream the name of the God in which he truly believes. Not one of those fuckers you betrayed to me called on Isis. When it comes to the Old Faith of Egypt, I’ll wager you’re in a decided minority.
‘But this isn’t the end of it. I have some of the letters you wrote to the Brotherhood leadership, getting them to Alexandria. The Intelligence Bureau broke your code years ago. I have the most damning evidence that you sold out the whole upper leadership of your movement. Those who might be inclined to overlook your theology will never forgive you for that. Let those letters be published, and you’re in the shit good and proper.’ He put his cup down again and beckoned to his cat. It jumped straight up. He stroked it with his free hand. Its back arched as it purred. It still found time to twist round and give me a horrid look.
‘Now, Lucas,’ he added, ‘you just have my dear friend Siroes taken out and hanged, and we’ll proceed with our business.’ With a flash of his riddled teeth, he smiled broadly at Siroes, who got up from his chair and bowed to Lucas before sitting back down.
‘I don’t think that would be wholly sensible,’ Siroes said with one of his diplomatic smiles. ‘You may agree that Priscus has a controlling hold over you. But what makes you think he’ll give up this hold once he has what he wants? I think he will cheat you – just as he tries to do with everyone. I can give you the names of a dozen fools who trusted him and are now dead.
‘With all respect, Your Majesty, I suggest you have my thrice-sworn brother Priscus taken out and hanged. You just put yourself in our hands, and we guarantee you the throne of Egypt. We may have a Christian minority. But our army is true to the Faith of Zoroaster.’
The room fell silent. The window out to the courtyard was shuttered and bolted. With five people there, and all those lamps, the air was growing uncomfortably stuffy. Priscus rubbed noses with his cat. Siroes drank steadily. Lucas tried to put on a brave face in front of the slave. He failed miserably.
‘But I am now in a position to get the relic for myself,’ he said at last. He straightened up and began to look as chirpy as he’d been when Siroes had first come in. ‘I must remind the pair of you that I command every armed man within a day’s ride of this place – perhaps more. Neither of you has so much as a bodyguard. We all agree that whoever has the relic becomes unapproachably powerful. Why should I listen to either of you? Now that Alaric is here, I can take what I please.’
‘Dear me, no!’ said Priscus with an easy smile. ‘We all agree that the relic confers great power, but it does so only once it’s been authenticated as what it’s claimed to be. If your Patriarch declines the authentication, you might as well piss in it yourself. And your Patriarch won’t support someone like you against the Empire – not when there’s a deal on the table to settle the whole Monophysite controversy and get him back in full communion with Constantinople and with Rome. You could ask Alaric here about that. He’s the scholar, and can lecture you black in the face about these things. But I don’t think you’ll need to do that.’
The room fell silent. The three protagonists of the little play acted out under my eyes looked at each other and then at no one in particular.
‘You all seem agreed,’ I said, breaking the long silence that followed, ‘that only I can lead you to this powerful object.’ Since there appeared to be at least two opinions about the nature of what was sought, I clung to the ambiguous phrasing I’d had from Siroes. ‘You all assume that I will do this for whichever of you is still alive tomorrow morning. Well, I want to see my secretary before I make any commitments. I also want to know what guarantees you can provide that either of us will survive its finding.’
‘Please keep out of this, Alaric,’ Priscus said wearily. ‘You will see Martin when I see fit to have him produced. If you refuse to do exactly as told, you know what I can and will do to him. If that fails to persuade you, bear in mind what I will certainly then do to you. If I tell you that you will both return safely with me to Alexandria, that is just something you’ll have to make yourself believe. You have little choice, after all. You gave up all freedom of action in this matter the moment you fell in again with Lucas.’
‘Not good enough, Priscus,’ I said. I stared at Lucas and pointed at the wine.
He spat an order to the slave, then went back to a morose inspection of the floorboards.
‘You see, if I don’t choose to believe you, I remain as free an agent as the three of you. When I’ve seen Martin and the nature of your joint guarantees, I will consider what steps may be required to secure the object. One way or another, let me observe, everything you have and everything you want is staked on getting this object. Either you give me what I want, or you might as well kill me now, and then see how well you can sort out the resulting mess among yourselves.’ I drained my cup and sat on the third chair a slave had just brought in and set before Lucas.
There was another long silence. Then Siroes got up. He brushed away more of the dust that still clung to his riding clothes and looked round.
‘Do you not agree how fine a place this world would be if only there were a little more trust among equals?’ he asked with a sigh. ‘However, it does appear that not one person in this room trusts any other person. This being so, I can only propose that we proceed as if we did trust one another. His Magnificence must be given what he demands. Once he has done what the prophecy says that only he can do, we can proceed to a discussion of what should be done next. I already feel a suggestion for compromise may be in the air. But I do beseech you all to put everything out of mind for the moment except the finding of what we are all gathered to find.’
‘Agreed,’ said Priscus. He and Siroes smiled at each other.
Lucas appeared set to speak again. But the slave was looking at him. If he hadn’t understood a word of the conversation, it couldn’t be hard to guess that Lucas had been worsted. All else aside, he was the only one of us still standing. The anger on his face was visibly giving way to dejection. Priscus put his cat down. It went and sat on one of the rugs. It looked up at me with the sort of face even his master hadn’t been able to match – not even after a lifetime of practising in front of a mirror.
‘That leaves the matter of our late supper,’ Priscus said. ‘Let us pretend it is out of friendship alone that the four of us will drink from the same cup.’
Chapter 58
We set out again at dawn, this time for Soteropolis. Priscus and Siroes rode together. Watching them talk, anyone would have thought they were bosom friends. I rode with Lucas.
‘I hope I shan’t need to remind you,’ Priscus had said as we were mounting up, ‘that His Magnificence Alaric is not a prisoner. It should be enough that we have his secretary.’ Lucas had scowled into his beard. But Priscus had started to border on the nasty, and that was the end of the matter.
It was a ride of about
twenty miles through the edge of the desert. The Nile rolled by sluggishly far down on our right. I did see a few boats, though nothing that could have been useful to me, even if the wish had been there. The journey was completely without event. Lucas had put off all his antique finery and was now dressed in normal riding clothes for the desert. This meant we attracted no more attention from the few lowly travellers on the road than twenty mostly armed men always would.
Martin and I had been coming from the north when, a month earlier, we first saw the monument marking the centre of the old Soteropolis. We’d then had to go over a sand dune before we could see the Mistress and beyond her to the dead palm trees. We were now approaching from the south. The whole expanse of sand that had then seemed so desolate was now crowded with tents. They stretched all the way to the dune, and spread out right and left before then. Was this where the Brotherhood had pitched its camp? I asked myself. There could easily have been a thousand men in this temporary city. This was almost everything the camp I’d found had not been. But, no. I squinted to see better in the bright sunshine. Most of the figures darting between the tents were locals of the lowest class. As usual, burned a dark red by the sun, they ran about almost naked. These weren’t the five hundred workmen drilled and well fed I’d been thinking to divert from work on the old canal. But they would do very well for the excavations I had evidently been brought here to oversee.
As we rode into the camp, someone came running over to Lucas. He saluted and shouted something. There was a brief conversation. Lucas sounded mighty pleased with everything. He got down from his camel and disappeared among some of the minor players in the Brotherhood who had escaped the purge laid on by Priscus in Alexandria.
‘I think you’ll find everything in order, my dear,’ said Priscus as he helped me down from my camel.
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