Byzantium - A Novel

by Michael Ennis

  Mar and Haraldr exchanged helpless looks. ‘And I would not consider a woman--’ Danielis broke off, realizing that her voice was rising and the conversation around her abruptly diminished. She looked straight ahead and lifted her chin. Anna breathed hotly against Haraldr’s ear. ‘Tonight I want to emulate Aphrodite,’ she whispered with more anger than desire. Haraldr wondered why he could suddenly hear the clinking of silver and glass. A collective gasp drifted from the far end of the room. Anna turned her head and in spite of herself sighed the name. ‘Maria.’

  The cold knife ripped Haraldr from breast to belly. He could not turn his head. He could not be the only one who had not turned.

  He did not recognize her at first. Her hair, loosely braided, glistening in the light of the candelabra, was arranged simply around her head in the fashion of the ancient statues and wreathed with a band of fresh flowers woven with almost tapestry-like intricacy. She wore no paint on her face, but her eyes were so deeply azure that they seemed, even from a distance, to have been coloured in with some intensely concentrated pigment.

  But it was her attire that had reduced them all to silence. Instead of a scaramangium, she wore a long, loose gown, again much like those depicted on the statues. Held by a small gold clasp at each shoulder, the shimmering white gown scarcely draped her breasts and seemed to leave half of her upper body exposed; the delicate yet proud sculpture of her bare throat and arms was as astonishing as any immortalized in marble. As she walked, the fabric teased her audience, clinging momentarily to the contour of her breast or thigh like another skin, then falling into complex folds to reveal glimpses of bare bosom. It was as if a goddess walked towards them, naked except for the iridescent cloud in which she had cloaked herself.

  Every man who was free to choose her stood, more in homage than invitation. Homeric paeans flew into the awed silence. ‘Helen, daughter of Zeus . . .’ ‘She challenged Aphrodite the golden . . .’ Serene, almost oblivious, Maria walked towards the apse at the end of the room.

  Haraldr was numb. He had loved so many since her, had held so many tender breasts and opened so many white legs. Why had they all done nothing to make this moment easier? She could still choke the breath from his lungs. She was behind him, her presence so strong that it seemed to bind his limbs.

  ‘Rome’s goddess has returned! Welcome, precious light, we mortals beg even the merest moment of your grace!’ Nicephorus Argyrus gestured to the chair that already waited for her. ‘You have no choice. I will close this establishment, dismantle it, sink the bricks and stone in the western sea if you take your seat beside any but your humble host!’

  Maria laughed, the falling of liquid silver, and descended like snow. She was two seats down and across the table from Haraldr. He could see her face without looking at it, even taste her flesh. She nodded now, first at Anna, then at Danielis, at Mar, and finally her eyes passed like hot brands through his heart. They never paused, never reflected, only moved on like a great blue storm, unconscious of the destruction it left behind.

  Anna put her hand gently on Haraldr’s arm and whispered in his ear: ‘You still love her.’

  The great black horse struggled against the reins. Joannes shouted at the Komes of the Imperial Excubitores to grab the bit. The stallion jerked his head, jittered his flanks, and settled. Joannes quickly dismounted. The Topoteretes who had sent for him waited outside the abandoned warehouse, a blazing taper in each hand. ‘Orphanotrophus,’ he said as he bowed.

  ‘How do we get down there?’ asked Joannes brusquely. If this were anything less than reported, the Topoteretes’s head would greet tomorrow’s petitioners at the Chalke Gate.

  ‘This way, Orphanotrophus.’ The Topoteretes held his torch up into the empty vault of the warehouse. Heavy, distorted shadows flickered over the brick ribbings. The floor had a thick layer of dirt. A small animal darted along next to the wall.

  ‘The stairs were covered with freshly cut boards and a layer of earth for camouflage,’ said the Topoteretes. He plunged his taper into the dark hole in the floor. The ancient, crumbling steps had been cleaned and repaired with hastily set brick and mortar. Joannes followed the Topoteretes down, fifteen steps in all.

  The floor below was hard earth, almost like fired clay. The Topoteretes thrust his torch up again. Joannes’s jaw tightened, and his shoulders began to ache. It was an old cistern, probably one of the City’s original water-storage facilities, long forgotten, drained, the residue of silt compacted and dried on the floor. The mortar had fallen away from many of the thin, slab-like bricks used to build the vaults, leaving the masonry surface as jagged as old teeth. Beneath the vaults were stacked thousands of spears.

  Joannes grabbed one of the spears and examined the shaft, threw it aside, and examined another. How could this be? How could this cancer exist in the body he knew as well as his own, and yet leave him unaware of the symptoms? No. He had known. And he had denied his own knowledge of this sickness, this plague.

  ‘Who is responsible?’ he asked the Topoteretes, his question more wondering than demanding.

  ‘We are interrogating some individuals now, Orphanotrophus. I am certain we will have some names for you by tomorrow.’

  Names. Four, five, a dozen mutilated wretches yielding their final sobbing confessions. Pointless. This was the work of many. Well organised and, considering their means, well funded. There was substance here. Rage - channelled, directed, plotted into the uncertain future. And he was not ready for them.

  ‘Thank you, Topoteretes.’ Joannes felt the weariness in his legs as he climbed back into the night. He had known, he had vacillated, he had postponed, he had hoped against hope. Soon it would be too late. What had to be done had to be done.

  ‘Komes!’ rumbled Joannes when he reached the street. ‘I want you to deliver a message for me. Tonight!’

  ‘Altogether remarkable.’ Michael Kalaphates raised his cup to the stage just exited by the actress who had emulated Aphrodite. ‘Her subtlety was most affecting, was it not, Uncle?’

  ‘Perhaps I am in a better position than you to appreciate her subtlety, or lack thereof,’ said Constantine.

  ‘Ah . . . yes,’ Michael had, in his excitement, forgotten that his eunuch uncle had a rather different perspective on the female anatomy. He tipped his cup to Haraldr. ‘Well, for subtlety it would be hard to exceed the performance of our Manglavite, who this evening entertained three women with whom he is ... well acquainted, all at the same table. A display of courage as well as subtlety.’

  ‘His courage has not been tested yet. He still has to go up there, if only to make his apologies.’ Mar pointed to the women’s gallery on the mezzanine surrounding the theatre; there was an open seating area at the rear, and rows of curtained booths along each side.

  ‘Excruciating dilemma--’ Michael broke off. ‘Is it possible that the divine emulation we have just witnessed has aroused the ire of responsible authorities? Look at the grim set on the face of that officer of the Excubitores. I believe he is coming our way.’

  ‘Komes,’ said Mar, identifying the man’s title. ‘I hope he’s not bringing news of another military debacle.’

  ‘I hope he tells me my officers have rioted and my men have invaded the Mangana Arsenal,’ mumbled Haraldr with genuine hope of some sort.

  ‘Hetairarch, Manglavite.’ The komes bowed to his superiors and turned to Michael. ‘You are Michael Kalaphates?’ Michael nodded, and the komes handed him a sealed paper, bowed, and shouldered back through the milling audience.

  Michael identified the seal before he broke it. ‘My uncle. The Orphanotrophus Joannes,’ he said, suddenly seeming quite sober. He read the missive and rolled it up again before speaking. ‘He wants to see me as soon as the palace gates open in the morning.’

  Haraldr noticed the look that passed between uncle and nephew and realized that Mar had been right about them. Michael Kalaphates and his Uncle Constantine were indeed interesting.

  ‘I believe you are receiving a signal,’ s
aid Michael to Haraldr. He nodded at the mezzanine boxes, his carefree demeanour instantly restored, as if he regretted the lapse.

  Haraldr looked up to a row of curtained booths separated by columns topped with madly foliate capitals; the drapes were tapestries woven to resemble animal skins, a detail that had aroused considerable favourable comment from the more fashionable patrons. The curtains of the fourth booth were slightly parted, and Anna peeked out. She beckoned him with a flip of her fingers.

  Anna waited in the alcove that joined the booths. A little string of vial-like oil lamps along the wall cast a rich, almost silvery glow over her face. Anna took Haraldr’s arms in her hands and folded her drowsy, thick, dark lashes. ‘Maria is my dearest friend,’ A tear left a silver track down Anna’s cheek.

  She threw her arms around Haraldr and pressed her face to his chest. ‘I love you,’ she said. ‘But I love her more.’

  He stroked her soft neck. ‘I love you. I want to take you tonight . . .’He did not finish, realizing although that much was true, now it would only be to spite Maria.

  ‘I am not ready,’ said Anna. ‘Perhaps later, when I have had more . . . experience.’ She looked up at him and smiled. ‘Danielis was right. I am not a woman yet.’

  Haraldr held her close. ‘You are a woman,’ he whispered to her.

  Anna nuzzled him and then pushed him away gently. ‘Maria asked me to tell you something.’

  Haraldr shook his head. ‘I will not talk to her until she answers a question for me.’ He set his jaw. ‘She once mentioned a certain bird to me. I must know if this bird is entirely black, like a raven, or if its plumage is of a scarlet hue.’

  Anna raised her eyebrows discreetly, turned and opened the narrow door to the booth. She was gone only for a moment. Haraldrs heart pounded, his life again on a needle of fate, when she faced him again. Anna shrugged. ‘She says the bird in question is feathered like a raven.’

  Haraldr felt both relieved and saddened; now he could never truly hate her. Anna reached up, brought his head down, and kissed him, seeming both relieved and sad herself. For an instant Haraldr wondered, as he often had at greater length, if Anna had a secret dread of her fair-hair gallant, if he perhaps was a risk with which she taunted herself.

  ‘She still loves you,’ said Anna, and then turned and ran down to the end of the alcove and danced down the stairs.

  Maria’s eyes were waiting for him when he entered the booth, the blue flames blazing. Her arms were folded beneath her breasts. Her bare skin was like white marble in white sunlight. Her sexuality seemed to change the very atmosphere of the room, flooding the chamber with a thick, drowning, honey-like liquor.

  ‘I wanted to kill you once.’ Her voice had the strange detachment of a seeress. ‘In Hecate. The knife ... it was not yours. I did not bring it for my protection.’

  Haraldr felt only a tinge of surprise. He had known that, really; at the time, drunk with her, he had not wanted to think what the knife had meant, and later it had not mattered.

  ‘The second time I loved you, it was for her. So that you would kill for her. Not her husband. The Orphanotrophus Joannes. I am sorry I could not make the distinction more clear. We were desperate, and yet too cautious. We did not want to use his name until you had agreed. Our Mother is surrounded by spies.’

  Each word was a cold stone Haraldr had to disgorge. ‘If I had understood that a service to our Mother, and Rome, was at issue, and not a love that existed only in words lost to the night, then I could have made cause with you. I had something that in my folly I thought was real, and found that it was hollow. You had something real, your love for your Empress, and yet by making a mockery of me you fouled that love. My folly is a poison that corrodes only my own breast. Your folly is a poison that seeps into the world and corrupts everything.’

  Lyre music drifted up from the stage. The audience oohed at some revelation in a mime. Maria’s breasts rose and fell in a slight, irregular rhythm. ‘Yes.’ Her eyes flinched from nothing, denied nothing. ‘Yes. I am the greater fool. I betrayed you, and I betrayed myself.’

  ‘Liar. You do not believe that.’

  ‘I have told you every truth now. . . .’

  ‘I know nothing of you.’

  A vague blush spread over her breast. ‘I know nothing of you, land man from Rus.’ Her chin tilted up. ‘You have loved a dozen women since you held me. Do you sob to each of them that they have also abused your love?’

  ‘And you have loved more than a dozen before me, no doubt. Did each of them earn your tearful remorse?’

  Maria’s left wrist, folded over her right elbow, began to twitch slightly. ‘I ask nothing of you tonight. Not even forgiveness.’

  ‘But you have asked me to hear your confession. Have you Romans not priests enough to attend to those needs?’ Impulsively, Haraldr stepped towards her, unwrapped her arms, and seized her wrists. It was a mistake; he felt as if he had taken hot irons in his hands and yet was compelled by some desire entirely his own to hold them until his flesh was incinerated. He had to grit his teeth in order to speak. ‘Perhaps you have other needs.’

  She resisted for a moment and then clutched at his robe, her lips savage and her teeth showing. ‘Yes, Manglavite,’ she spat out, ‘for those needs you are ... superior. You are, of my dozens, by far the best. You alone drive me to madness.’ Her voice was monstrously mocking, and yet Haraldr glimpsed that she also mocked a certain truth that was too painful for her not to admit. ‘Make me your whore again, Manglavite!’ she trilled angrily. ‘Make me your whore!’

  Haraldr let her go. ‘I am sorry,’ he said.

  For the first time she cast down her eyes. ‘No. I am the one who has made love a currency of exchange between us. Or perhaps I mean a stick with which to strike each other.’

  Haraldr’s defences sagged again. ‘Why would you wish to strike at me?’ he asked sadly. ‘What did I do to invite your . . . contempt?’

  The crowd below broke into raucous laughter. Maria sighed and folded her arms back under her breasts. She looked directly at Haraldr again. ‘You have not. You have only invited my ... fear.’ The audience laughed even louder. Maria gestured with her hand towards the noise; the movement of her arm and the shimmer of her gown was almost magical. ‘This is not the proper place. I want to ... explain. To understand for myself.’ She pursed her lips. ‘I have a villa in Asia, just above Chrysopolis. It is a short ferry. Will you go there with me? Not tonight. Tomorrow. In the light of day.’

  Haraldr nodded. Yes. Below him, the audience suddenly fell silent, and then a cymbal crashed like a tinny thunderclap.

  ‘This way, sir,’ said the Komes of the Excubitores.

  Michael Kalaphates had an almost overpowering urge to wet himself. The marble steps of the Magnara gleamed like ice on the cold sunny morning, but he had not been asked to ascend those steps to the waiting glory of Rome. Instead he was escorted down a side ramp that sloped gradually, then seemed to plunge straight to the bowels of the earth in a series of steep, poorly kept steps. The abrupt descent ended at a long, dark corridor lit at intervals with smudgy lamps.

  Parchment. That was the smell. Musty, pungent, almost palpable. Chamber after chamber full of documents; halfway down the hall, a man worked inside one of the rooms, and his lamp illuminated the endless stacks, the layered shelves of rolled parchments. A compendium of Rome’s centuries, each ancient decision, each long-forgotten act a parcel of the huge accumulation upon which each succeeding Lord of the Entire World would raise his golden throne. Men died, and yet here their deeds endured, a chorus of voices to render invincible, indisputable before man and God, the will of one man.

  The long corridor ended at a plain wooden door. The komes knocked and was greeted by a small, ageing eunuch who wordlessly pointed to another door at the end of the cramped ante-chamber; most of the floor space in the room was occupied by disordered stacks and tumbled piles of rolled documents. The komes knocked on the second door. A beast seemed to growl behind the sealed
portal. The komes opened the door and waved Michael in.

  Michael blinked. The windowless chamber was flooded with light from a stark, functional candelabrum fashioned from a single metal band. The room was all papers and parchment, and yet not a sheet was out of place, the stacks immaculate, the rolled documents set into plain wooden boxes. The smooth, whitewashed plaster walls were unmarked by any kind of decoration, not even a solitary icon. Joannes sat in a backless chair behind an unornamented wooden writing table; the varnished surface was eroded in places. His heavy iron sealing pliers were placed neatly next to a row of rolled and sealed missives; a pile of lead seal blanks glimmered dully in a little wooden casket, a common coin that would have the power of life and death once the jaws of the Orphanotrophus Joannes’s seal-stamp had pressed his imprint into the metal.

  ‘Nephew.’ Joannes held out his freakish, akimbo arms. ‘Please sit.’ His spade-tipped fingers seemed to fling the dense, smoky air towards the backless, canvas-upholstered chair behind Michael. ‘You are well.’ It was strange how Joannes never asked a question, only requested confirmation.

  ‘Yes, Uncle. Sir.’

  Joannes brought the splayed ends of his fingers together just beneath his smooth, jutting chin. ‘Let us consider you, Nephew. I see before me a young man, robust, vital, well formed indeed, of agile wit and intellectual acuity. A young man who, unlike his uncles before him, has not suffered the vicissitudes of the journey from Amastris to the Imperial Palace. A young man whose health, then, and mental equilibrium, are unmarred by the struggles that have bowed and cicatrised his illustrious forebears. Our father was disgraced before our eyes, a small man made smaller. Your father, in no little part due to the efforts of your Holy namesake and myself, is now a Droungarios of the Imperial Fleet.’ Michael’s father, Stephan, a former ship tarrer, was married to Joannes’s sister, Maria, and had proved his lack of military experience by taking a severe pasting from the Carthaginians in the waters off Sicily. ‘You share in your father’s glory, and of course you bask in the reflected radiance of the Imperial Dignity; though the diadem does not rest on your head, it is close enough to accrue to you a station and consequence that most men would deem themselves the idols of fortune to enjoy, even after a lifetime of dedicated labour.