The Ghosts of Athens (Aelric)

by Richard Blake

  I turned to Simeon, who was now muttering over the text of Gregory. ‘My Lord,’ I opened with a smooth and diplomatic smile, ‘I cannot say what a pleasure it always is to see you.’

  ‘Then it’s not a mutual pleasure!’ came the immediate and spat reply.

  I caught sight from where I stood of a reasonably complete book roll within one of the fallen racks. I bent and picked it up. Big disappointment: it was complete, even to the firmness of the glued sheets, but someone had washed it in vinegar or some other corrosive, and all the lines had faded to a pale grey.

  I walked back over to the table and sat down again. ‘It would please me much to learn the reason for My Lord’s intemperancy of mood,’ I said, still very smooth.

  Simeon glared back at me like some caged beast. ‘I have just discovered,’ he said, rising towards another snarl, ‘that I shall not be sitting on your right at tomorrow’s dinner. That place, I am told, is promised to some gross and vulgar barbarian out of Italy.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘But, surely, Simeon, you will appreciate that the Lord Fortunatus represents the Universal Bishop,’ I said. ‘As for his origins, he comes from a most illustrious family that has produced great men ever since very ancient times. I do even think he is related, on his mother’s side, to the Great Augustus himself.’ Gross and vulgar barbarian – eh? I could be glad the Dispensator was half a mile away in his rat-infested monastery. I could think of no words better calculated to have him calling for his packing boxes.

  ‘If it doesn’t know Greek, it’s a barbarian!’ Simeon snapped.

  I looked back at the twisted face and thought quickly. I could have lectured him on the continuing status of Latin, even now that I’d got Greek established as the official language of the Empire. But you’d have to be a bigger fool than Simeon was not to be aware of this. I gave him a long and very cold stare.

  ‘My dear Simeon,’ I said quietly, ‘I can see from the slight blueness of the powder under your left nostril that you’ve come straight here from a meeting with your dear cousin Priscus. Doubtless, he told you about the seating arrangements for tomorrow. He may also have told you certain things about the reason for the council that has been summoned to Athens. But do please allow me to give you the full story.’ I could have waited for someone to come back with wine. I could have waited for the effect of the drugs he’d been given to fade. But, if that made him less personally unpleasant, it would have done nothing to shift what I could see was his settled view of things. There’s a time for jollying along, and a time for turning nasty. I could see it was time for the latter.

  ‘Simeon,’ I took up again, ‘you were appointed to your see with the express consent of the Emperor. By the Emperor’s grace, you are permitted to spend part of the year amid the joys of Constantinople. You undoubtedly have certain advantages of wealth and learning over your brethren of Rome. The Scriptures were composed in your own language. You may claim primacy in certain spiritual matters. But the real difference between you and the Lord Dispensator is this.’ I leaned forward over the table and snapped my fingers into his face. I took hold of his beard and pulled it. I pushed him gently in the chest and watched as he nearly went backwards.

  ‘You presume too much, Alaric,’ he finally cried back at me. ‘Just because the Great Augustus—’

  I silenced him with a crash of my fist on the table that knocked all Theodore’s waxed tablets out of order. When he’d finished jabbering back at me, I leaned forward and pushed my face close to his.

  ‘Don’t talk back to me about the Emperor,’ I said with quiet menace. ‘So long as he keeps the army sweet, and doesn’t let the Circus mob get out of hand, Heraclius can declare for any Eastern heresy that takes his fancy. He can announce that Christ appeared on earth as nothing more than a ghost, and that it was by a continuing miracle that those round him thought he was other than a direct Emanation of God. Or he can resurrect the Arian heresy. Or he can declare that Christ had a bald patch two inches wide, and got seven children on Mary Magdalene. He can do all of this, and your interest will be best consulted by assenting to what he says and preaching it to however sceptical a people. And if you breathe so much as a word about his orthodoxy or sanity, a file of guards will march straight into your church and arrest you at the very altar. If you still refuse to see sense, you’ll be lucky to drag out the rest of your days in some monastery on the edges of Scythia. Shall I take you through some of the precedents? Or can we take them as read?’

  When he was able to look back at me, I continued: ‘Those Western clerics you’ve spent the past ten days or whatever insulting, and over whom you’ve now insulted me and the Emperor himself, are in a very different position. They don’t ultimately give a toss about us or our difficulties with the Eastern Patriarchates. They don’t need to. Between Ravenna and Bari, I don’t think we have a single armed man in Italy. Certainly, Rome is both governed and defended by the Church. For all we can do anything to those he represents, the Lord Fortunatus might as well be from China.

  ‘We can do nothing to him and his,’ I said, now with savage ill-humour, ‘but they can fuck us over good and proper. That deacon from Rome has more power in his little finger to hurt us in our Syrian and Egyptian dealings than you Greeks have in your collective loins. And I know that he will use that power if he thinks he or the Roman Church has not received the total respect he believes appropriate. And I’ll do whatever it takes to keep him absolutely sweet – even if it means dragging you by the hair into the dining room tomorrow and setting about you with a cane until you offer him your clerical kiss of peace.’

  ‘And what makes you think Heraclius really wants your settlement of the Monophysite heresy?’ Simeon now got the wind to cry back at me. ‘How much confidence do you think he’s still got in Sergius? If anyone is at risk of being shipped off to Scythia, it’s surely His Present Holiness the Patriarch of Constantinople – a Patriarch, I’ll remind you, appointed by the tyrant Phocas against the wishes of every Greek bishop.’ He laughed bitterly, and even managed to stare me in the face.

  ‘And I know exactly how much confidence he has in you, My Lord Senator!’ he went on. ‘You failed him in Alexandria. You’ve made trouble for him among everyone of quality with your land confiscation project. You want to give land to the peasants, in the hope that they’ll do more to defend the Empire than their betters have. More likely, you want to reproduce the same chaotic spirit of independence as among your own dirty barbarians! Can’t you see how you’ve been set up to fail? Oh, you can lay violent hands on me. But it doesn’t alter the truth of the matter.’

  Whatever drug Priscus had fed him was working miracles for his courage. But, if he really thought I’d set about him with the cane he deserved, he was wrong. I made my mind up and smiled calmly back at him.

  ‘Dear Simeon,’ I said. ‘The workings of the Imperial Mind are far above both of us. Let us not argue what they may or may not have resolved before you took ship for Athens. But I will remind you that we have a most important council starting the day after tomorrow. Your duty there will be to judge such issues as may be raised purely on their theological merits. If I find reason to think that you are following some other agenda, I will see to it personally that Heraclius is made aware of certain facts that will not stand to your credit. I assure you that your truest interest lies in acting as a bishop of the Church and not as some third-rate politician, dabbling in affairs that are beyond your understanding.’

  I waited for this to impress itself on his mind. The thing about intelligence information is that it should only be used when all else has failed. Even then, it should, in the first instance, be used allusively. This was now one of those first instance times. Possibly, Heraclius was out of sorts with me. Possibly, he was tired of Sergius, and was interested in some purely local deal with the Greek Church. Whatever the case, all I could do was press on as if the words of my commission were explicit instructions to do as I’d resolved. And, if I gave him that on my return, he might eve
n decide it was what the Great Augustus had wanted after all.

  ‘Simeon,’ I continued in more earnest tone, ‘I will assume Priscus has told you what you may already have suspected. This being so, please do consider that nothing in the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, nor officially declared since by way of explanation, rules out the possibility of a Singularity of Will for Christ. If you can agree with the Westerners that this is not ruled out, we may bring the Eastern Churches, little by little, to full orthodoxy. The main council may still be several years off. But do consider that you have been spoken about as the next Patriarch.’ I paused and waited for that lie to sink in. ‘We know that Sergius has weak lungs, and that the smoke of last winter in Constantinople was a sore trial for him. Who knows what advice the doctors may give him this winter? Who knows what gratitude Caesar will feel for a man who has done more than any other senior Greek churchman to enable a reconciliation with our separated brethren in the East?’

  I got up and stretched out a hand for Simeon. Silent and thoughtful, he took my hand. I led him from the library and down to the main body of the residency. I put him with my own hands into his carrying chair, and followed him into the street.

  Back in my office, I sat down and unlocked the sliding compartment under my desk. I took out twelve of the better coins and transferred them to a leather purse. When it came to shopping, Athens plainly didn’t compare with Constantinople. It didn’t even compare with Rome. But, if none of the silk factories I’d seen from the Acropolis existed for any purpose of tax or regulation, I might see what they could do for me. I smiled and thought how, by doing nothing at all, Nicephorus might unwittingly have done this place quite a favour. If you could only find the right mix of neglect with a dash of civil justice, the whole Empire might be saved yet.

  That brought me back to thoughts of my duty here. Unless Nicephorus was far more effective than he’d so far appeared, and Priscus did get to deliver my funeral oration, I could handle things in Athens. As for Constantinople, that was out of my present control. So long as there was no overpowering emergency in Church or state, Heraclius would remain irresolute in all things. If only I could get back home before Christmas, and give him that provisional settlement on a plate, he might well forget all the poison Ludinus had been dripping into his ear. At the least, it would remove any excuse for turning openly nasty. Give me that, and I could give another few months to sorting out the Imperial finances. Give me that, and he might persuade himself that I was irreplaceable. I might even find myself basking again in the sun of Imperial favour.

  I stared at the scroll of Dexippus that Martin had carried down from the library and left on my desk. Even if the single lamp he’d set out for me had been enough, this wasn’t a book I now fancied. What it described had been the greatest crisis Athens had faced since the end of its long war with Sparta. The ruin it left had closed one chapter in the city’s history and opened another that wasn’t yet ended. Given the lack of any Imperial assistance, Dexippus had managed the best defence possible in the circumstances. It was a shame he’d written it all up so badly. A month of carefully walking over the ground might illuminate the story as he’d told it. Or it might only deepen the confusion of his text.

  Since there was nothing else to read, I decided, I might as well change out of these clothes. I took up the lamp and made for the door. Though it was covered with a thick cloth, there was a smell of unemptied chamber pot in the outer room. If I could have trusted for it to be collected, and not simply kicked over, the next morning, I’d have put it out in the corridor. Instead, I put it on the window seat. Still half pleased with myself, half nervous about what might be happening seven hundred miles away in Constantinople, I opened the door into my bedroom.

  There was a sudden smell of beeswax. I heard the creak of leather bed straps. I looked at the dim but smooth shape on the uncovered bed. ‘Your secretary’s wife was most pleased to accept Theodore’s offer of help in the nursery,’ Euphemia said with a slightly nervous giggle. ‘He will sleep there until further notice.’

  ‘He’s a good boy,’ I said. My fingers shook slightly as I untied the cords that held my outer tunic in place. It couldn’t be seen in this light, but I reached up automatically to tap the much reduced swelling on my nose. ‘You must let Martin direct his reading. He can be a most excellent schoolmaster. His father was the best in Constantinople.’

  She giggled again as I pulled my inner tunic over my head. ‘You must think me a most abandoned woman,’ she said.

  ‘I’ve been hoping no less all day,’ I replied. I turned the lamp full up and stood beside the bed.

  Chapter 29

  I looked up from my prostration into the blackest face imaginable.

  ‘You failed me in Alexandria,’ Heraclius whined. ‘All I then asked was that you should get Greek and Latin Churches to agree that probably manifest heresy might be orthodox. And you failed me again.’

  I tried to speak, but no voice came as the Emperor got up from his throne and stepped over me. Court protocol didn’t allow me to get up yet. Instead, I crouched on all fours, looking at a mass of purple cushions.

  The gong struck, and I could finally get up. Heraclius now sat on the far side of the Great Hall of Audience, every bishop he’d called to Athens ranged about him. I felt the blockage clear from my throat and was able to speak. ‘If I was never meant to succeed, how can you blame me for failure?’ I shouted.

  My answer was a burst of laughter that went on as if without end.

  Acquittal was beyond hoping. Perhaps I could beg for mercy – if not for myself, then at least for mine. I hurried over and fell down for another prostration, and tried to think of the best form of plea. Should I be the manly young Alaric? Or should I just squeal and babble? What was most likely to move these bastards?

  I heard the grind of machinery as I raised my face from the carpet. The throne had now been raised about six feet, and all I could see when I finally stood up again was purple flesh bulging over the red leather boots.

  ‘Who are you to question the workings of power?’ Heraclius asked from aloft. ‘If I command you to do something, I expect it to be done – even if I command others to frustrate you.’

  There was more laughter. The bishops had now been joined by the whole of the Imperial Council and what may have been the whole of the Senatorial Order. Already large, the Great Hall of Audience had expanded somehow to the size of the Great Church. The laughter came in massed bursts, and echoed from the impossibly high ceiling.

  I put aside all thoughts of protocol. The hall had expanded still further, and contained everyone in Constantinople above the lowest class. It even managed to contain people who’d died years before. Every one of these was dressed in white, and had a nimbus about his head. I stepped forward to approach the distant throne. As I came close, I saw the bishops shrink back as if I’d carried a sword. I looked up at Heraclius.

  ‘I could have you shut away in a monastery,’ he sobbed. ‘I could have you blinded. I could have your tongue slit in two to make you resemble the serpent that you truly are. Behold, however, the Mercy of Caesar!’ He looked down at two heralds. There was a sheet of parchment held out for them by one of the black eunuchs.

  ‘It is the judgement of our Great Augustus,’ they read in unison, not trying to keep the laughter from their voices, ‘that you be taken to the topmost roof of your palace, there to look down for the space of one hour at the manifold glories of the Imperial City; and that you be taken thence to the land of endless night and of endless cold that was once the fruitful Province of Britain; and that you there be turned loose among the filthy and unlettered savages who are your rightful people; and that infamy attend your name in the Empire, and that death attend your return to the Empire.’

  As they ended the sentence, there was wild applause and cheering. I wanted to stand upright and look defiance into every face. But I was only pushed from behind for another grovel. The laughter and the cheering went on and on. It left off any echo
, and I felt a chilly breeze on my exposed neck, as if I were now in the Circus, and my sentence were being pronounced before the whole assembled people of Constantinople . . .

  I woke in my bed to the sound of wolves howling in the distance. I had the impression that Euphemia had been shaking me for some while, but was only aware of this as I came fully back into the present.

  ‘You were crying in your sleep,’ she said. ‘Were you dreaming?’

  The lamp was long since gone out, and there was no sign of dawn. But I sat up and reached to where I knew there would be a cup of water. I drank and wiped my sweaty face on the sheet. ‘It was nothing,’ I said, ‘just a dream.’ I pressed my eyes shut and put it all out of mind. Of course, it had been just a dream. All else aside, when did the real Heraclius ever finish a sentence? If he’d managed that even once since he came to power, there might have been less doubt regarding his actual wishes. I opened my eyes again and listened. ‘But how have wolves got into Athens?’ I asked. Even before she began her soft laugh, I realised the answer. Though awake, I’d still been in the vastness of the Imperial City, where a man could walk for days and never see the same street twice. Here, in Athens, you were never more than a quarter of a mile from the walls. If some shortness of food in the mountains had brought them down early to prowl about the plains of Attica, it stood to reason they’d sound close enough to be just outside the residency.

  ‘Were you dreaming?’ she asked again.

  I made a non-committal reply and drank more water. It was rather brackish. But Euphemia was now sitting up and had her arms about me, as if to protect a frightened child. ‘Do you believe that dreams are a communication with some higher force?’ she asked.