Those Above: The Empty Throne Book 1

by Daniel Polansky

‘I have owned many. To protect my property and to chase rats and for company. Some are clever, some foolish. Some large, some small. Some will roll onto their back when they see you, some will bite your hand should you try and feed them. But they are all dogs – their variations do not obscure this essential fact.’

  ‘Busir was your father’s name – and his father? And his father before that? How far back does your knowledge go? I can recite my lineage for three centuries, and for all that time, the Aubade has watched over us.’

  The first hint of annoyance seeped into Bulan’s oaken baritone. ‘Such studious shepherding, and with no hope of gain! I have misjudged the High entirely.’ Their table was in the corner, and the bar was not busy, but Calla swivelled her head round nervously all the same – it was unwise to speak so loudly of Those Above. ‘I had been under the impression that you were his servant, responsible for seeing that his wants are swiftly fulfilled, but perhaps I am mistaken.’

  At some point, without entirely realising it, they had shifted positions – in Calla, pride ran stronger than guilt. And not in Calla alone. ‘It is only four-fingered hands that drip with blood? In Chazar no one is impoverished, nor brutalised? There is neither desperation nor vice?’

  ‘I have already said otherwise. You may be sure of this, Calla of the Red Keep – in all the world, should you see anything of grandeur, of artistry, of beauty, you may know that it is built upon the bones of one man, the flesh of another, the misery of a great many. The Roost is not unique in subjugation – though, as in everything else, the Eldest manage it with a skill no human can match.’

  Calla bit her lip and fell silent, as much because she was afraid the other patrons might overhear the conversation as because she could not, in that moment, think of a retort.

  Bulan seemed not to take any great joy in his victory. ‘The tide rolls in, the tide rolls out. The moon wanes and waxes. Man lives and screams and breeds and dies; the One God alone knows the why of it.’

  ‘I do not believe in your One God,’ Calla said petulantly.

  ‘Then no one knows,’ Bulan said. ‘Or at the very least, I do not.’

  Calla did not know either. Her wine glass was empty, as was the pitcher the waitress had drawn for them what seemed only a short while ago. A steady rain had begun to beat against the windowpane, a hard, cold rain. The sort of rain that made one grateful to have a roof to shelter beneath, and a fire to keep warm beside, the sort of rain that reminded one that not everyone had either of those things.

  ‘The boy is dead, Calla. Regret will not revive him. There is cruelty in the world, yes. There are miseries uncountable. But there is the moonlight,’ he said, gesturing towards the evening. ‘There is wine, and music, and the feel of flesh against flesh.’ He proved this last by leaning forward and caressing her cheek. ‘Bitterness avails no one.’

  But Calla had spent her life enjoying the moonlight, and wine, and music, and the other pleasures of which Bulan spoke. She had never been unaware of the sparkling joys that infused her existence, had relished them, had followed the practice of her masters in setting, if not hedonism, then at least beauty, as the purpose and cornerstone of her existence. ‘Perhaps I am new to the novelty,’ she said, slipping away from his touch, ‘but the taste is yet strong on my tongue.’

  ‘You will have long years to grow used to it,’ Bulan said, tapping out the ash from his pipe in too forceful a fashion. ‘Despair is a common garnish.’

  They ordered another flagon of wine, drank it in a silence that seemed loud. At one point Calla opened her mouth as if to say something, but after a moment her lips closed round it. From the First Rung Calla could hear the chiming of the hour of the Woodcock, signalling the firm arrival of darkness.

  ‘It grows late,’ Bulan said, finishing what little was left in his own glass. ‘Shall I arrange you a palanquin back to the gates of the First? Or perhaps there is somewhere else you’d like to spend the remainder of the evening?’

  Calla thought about Bulan’s apartments, his warm bed, wanted to find herself in it, and not simply as recompense for using him as a convenient if unwarranted target of her anxiety. He smelled of rosewater, and beneath that of his own musk, ripe but not unpleasant. His eyes, unaccustomedly hard these last moments, had reverted to their canny softness. Calla saw herself once again lost in his embrace, solving, however briefly, in sweat and seed, that equation which had bedevilled her ever since visiting the Fifth Rung a month prior.

  ‘There is no need for a palanquin,’ Calla found herself saying. ‘I can make the walk.’

  ‘As your preference,’ Bulan said, frowning, one more unfortunate amidst the multitude.

  22

  When Andronikos finished his wedding toast the whole party, five hundred souls at two tiers of long, wooden tables, erupted into applause, Eudokia first among them. It was far and away the best speech that she had ever heard him give, pithy and funny and even faintly insightful, qualities he had never previously demonstrated in his past pronouncements. But then, love is a more interesting subject than politics, if equally treacherous.

  Andronikos’s daughter sat hand in hand with her husband, blushing and smiling. Prisca looked beautiful, and very happy, though the former was much the product of her dress and the light and the singular, shining moment, and would be gone by morning. The latter wouldn’t stay much longer either, if Eudokia had to make a guess on the subject. Because Galerius was every bit as pretty as Prisca, and perhaps a bit more so, and though he had so far managed not to offend etiquette by outright flirting with any of his wife’s handmaidens, nor was he able to keep himself quite as focused on his beloved as one might hope in a man who had been married all of three hours.

  But tomorrow was tomorrow, and tonight no one with a claim to honest speech could say anything other than that the gala was magnificent. No expense had been spared in celebrating the marriage of Andronikos’s only child. The leading lights of the Commonwealth had been invited to the senator’s country estate to bear witness to his majesty, and to celebrate the continuation of his line.

  From Andronikos’s wit they moved on to more substantial fare. The house slaves who brought dinner were dressed in finery that would have shamed a provincial noble, and they did their duty with grace and speed. For the first course they served leg of duck and roasted rabbit and some sort of animal from south of Dycia that looked like cow and smelled like cow but was called something different. As it tasted like cow also, Eudokia wasn’t sure she saw the point in having it imported across the continent, but the rest of the guests seemed to appreciate the novelty more than she did. After a brief interlude of sherbert and fresh fruit, they were back to flesh, roasted turkey and golden-crusted pies stuffed with chicken and partridge and groundhog and pig liver and pig heart and a number of other cuts of meat that Eudokia couldn’t distinguish. Eudokia had been going to this sort of feast since she was a child, found the gluttony absurd. How much did anyone need to eat? Why not just throw it directly into the trash heap, save the middle step?

  As to everything else – the silverware, the decor, the sweet, soft music wafting in from the band – no, one could not deny it: Andronikos had taste, and the celebration was a demonstration of that. He also had, somehow, acquired a great deal of money – and the celebration was a demonstration of that as well.

  Eudokia allowed a passing servant to refill her wine glass, thanked the girl and brought the cup to her lips. It was an excellent vintage, and well paired to the course. It must have cost a solidus a bottle. Eudokia smiled to herself, drank it quickly and motioned for more.

  Eudokia was seated one over from the main table, but she caught Prisca’s eye easily enough, the girl blushing and smiling and seeming as though she might burst from happiness. From Prisca’s pride of place Eudokia had to run her gaze a long way down the table to find Manuel, looking small as well as small-minded, shovelling a titbit of meat into a grimace.

  It had been an easy thing to get Prisca to sit Manuel at the second tier of tab
les, the least recompense given what Eudokia had already done to ensure her happiness. Eudokia had asked that the bride might make a point of keeping the two of them apart, claiming a longstanding dislike for the senator – which was true so far as it went, though if Eudokia was to have the deck cleared of every member of the party who she disliked, there wouldn’t be enough guests left for a cantra dance. Regardless, Prisca hadn’t seen any harm in the matter, was just as happy to keep his homespun robe and his body odour as far away from all the bright young things as possible. Andronikos had probably not noticed, his attention being focused on the multitude of small tasks required of him as founder of the feast. But Manuel noticed, his usual look of sober superiority replaced with one of undisguised bitterness. And for a man who claimed drink was a refuge of the weak and enfeebled, he was obliging himself with Andronikos’s wine at a rate which would impress a sot.

  It was shaping up to be a wondrous evening, Eudokia thought, nibbling at a flaky crust of bread. One to be remembered for years afterwards.

  Dinner lasted on and on and on, and though the Domina herself barely swallowed a mouthful of pudding, the arrival of each new course brought a wider and wider smile to her face, until she seemed almost giddy. It was two hours after Andronikos had finished his speech when the final course concluded and the rest of the evening’s revelry began; though after the marathon of consumption in which they had all just taken part, few seemed enthusiastic to take to the dance floor.

  Eudokia noticed her handmaiden holding court in one corner. Irene had somehow only got prettier, which hardly seemed to be fair to Prisca, nor any of the other women at the party. Her hair was up in a beehive, her black dress was short above the bust and long down to her ankles, albeit with a slit in the side that showed no small dash of skin. The cadre of gentlemen standing in a semicircle around her didn’t seem to mind, laughing at gags that Eudokia suspected weren’t quite as clever as their behaviour suggested. She had to clear her throat twice before any of them noticed her, which was ungallant but not unexpected.

  ‘Revered Mother,’ Irene said, kissing her in greeting.

  ‘Cruel to shame the bride on her wedding night,’ Eudokia said, taking her handmaiden by the arm and walking her away from her suitors.

  ‘Was I to come dressed in rags?’

  ‘I doubt it would make much of a difference for your catch.’

  ‘What do you think of them?’

  Eudokia looked back at the group of men pretending they weren’t watching Irene walk away. ‘The Third Consul is as devoted a practitioner of the Salucian vice as one is to find – he’s probably more interested in finding out the name of your tailor than getting into your dress. The Dycian ambassador has the pox, I have that from an unimpeachable source. Tiberius is such a well-known frequenter of dockside brothels that he almost certainly has the pox also, though I confess that to be an educated guess and not the product of certain intelligence. Maurice is rich and not altogether unattractive but he has that habit of snorting every time he makes a joke, which I would find intolerable were he seated on the Empty Throne. And Zeno is as handsome as any man in the Commonwealth, but he barely has the wit to sign his name. So, all in all, my dear, I’d tell you to throw them back, and see what else your nets can fetch.’

  Irene laughed. ‘As always, Revered Mother, your insight is rather too keen. Though I think you are too quick to dismiss Zeno – I’ve always thought wit to be an overrated quality, in a man. Certainly Heraclius has served you well enough.’

  Eudokia wrinkled up her nose. Heraclius’s rank was not, in and of itself, sufficient to have earned him an invitation to the wedding and, as Eudokia had explained, it would hardly be appropriate for her to insist on the presence of her nominally secret lover. That he wasn’t here was a good part of the reason she was finding the evening so enjoyable. ‘I do not require cleverness in Heraclius any more than I require my pastry chef to play the flute. One chooses a servant for their competence in a particular task, and avoids putting them in a position that requires skills they have no hope of developing.’

  ‘My point exactly.’

  ‘But a husband is not a servant,’ Eudokia continued quickly. ‘More is expected of him, or more should be. Nor can a husband be dismissed quite so easily as a valet.’

  ‘You are thinking of dismissing Heraclius, then?’ Irene asked.

  There was no particular reason to remain silent on the matter, but Eudokia did not need one. Privacy was second nature to her and she had already gone further in discussing the matter with Irene than she had intended. ‘I think those prawns were the best I ever had,’ she said. ‘I might have to find a way to steal Andronikos’s chef.’

  ‘He’s all but wasted among these churls,’ Irene agreed smoothly.

  ‘I do wish you would allow me to find someone appropriate for you,’ Eudokia said.

  ‘I wish very much the same, Revered Mother, though it seems we have a different notion of whom that might be.’

  Eudokia took one of Irene’s hands between the two of hers. ‘You are a sparklingly beautiful creature, and short on neither charm nor intelligence. But Konstantinos is as far beyond you as an oak is a weed.’

  ‘He seems to think differently.’

  ‘Like the greater portion of his sex, dear child, Konstantinos doesn’t think. He feels, and he speaks, and sometimes he follows my advice closely enough that if you were to watch him from a distance you might be forgiven for supposing that the outcome of his actions are the result of planning. But you would be wrong – and whatever sweetness he may whisper to you in the still hours of the morning, you will find them insubstantial against the day’s harsh light. He will take you to bed, and perhaps even to his heart – but you will never marry him.’

  ‘Surely you would not stand in the way of true love?’

  Eudokia thought it inappropriate to express to Irene exactly what she thought of that hallowed ideal, given that they were at a wedding. ‘I have been grooming that boy for greatness since before your first blush,’ Eudokia said. ‘If you think I would allow his destiny to be derailed because your arse looks magnificently fetching in that dress, you know me less well than you suppose.’

  One of Eudokia’s elder brothers, now long dead, had been given a dog one year for his birthday. Big-headed, stupid-seeming with a grin made of tiny, sharpened teeth, teeth that had never done anything worse than gnaw at the furniture, teeth that one day, without explanation or warning, had suddenly gripped onto Eudokia’s brother’s arm so swiftly and so tenaciously that one of their house slave had needed to beat the creature’s brains in with a stool to gain its release. It was a lesson Eudokia had received ample reminder of throughout the remainder of her life: there is nothing on earth that loves you so much it might not one day hurt you.

  Eudokia thought about that dog, as she watched Irene force a smile and return to making her assembled coterie of suitors miserable.

  Eudokia drank more of Andronikos’s very expensive wine and thought over this new development. There were times when she wished she could castrate her stepson, though that would do poorly for his masculine image, as well as any future hopes she had for heirs. No, severing his testicles might be too strong a measure, under the circumstances. A firm conversation should be sufficient to remind her nephew of his responsibilities. So far as Eudokia was concerned, Konstantinos could go ahead and dip his cock in a hornets’ hive if for some reason he was so inclined. But he would marry who she told him to – yes, by the Self-Formed, there could be no doubt about that.

  She’d talk to him tomorrow, and decision made she felt better about the subject, and even less disposed to wound the genitals of her adopted son.

  The older generation – those that could admit to it, and weren’t hanging around the dance floor in a shamefaced attempt to pretend they had not yet exhausted the greater portion of their virility – were standing on Andronikos’s small enclosed patio. Eudokia saw Andronikos, Manuel and a number of other senators of their clique. It was
bad form for a woman to approach such a gathering of grandees, she knew; her feminine aura might well wither in the face of such sheer masculine force. But Eudokia was not one to hold too dearly to convention, at least not unless it suited her.

  ‘Honoured Father,’ she said, addressing Andronikos by the title she had arranged for him to receive. She said it loudly enough for Manuel to take notice, and was gratified to see his sneer stretch. Rumour held that relations between the two senators were worse than icy, that only the most desperate pleading had been sufficient to convince Manuel that his being passed over for the Archpriesthood had not been Andronikos’s doing.

  ‘Revered Mother,’ Andronikos said, made happy enough by the evening to eschew their traditional antagonism.

  ‘You’ll excuse my interruption, I can only hope,’ Eudokia said. ‘But I wanted to offer congratulations on this auspicious union, as well as to comment on what a magnificent and beautiful occasion it has been. One worthy of the ancestors – don’t you think, Senator?’ Addressing the last question to Manuel.

  ‘I think the ancestors would find much in today’s Commonwealth to be wasteful and extravagant,’ he said.

  And if Andronikos had had any sense at all he would have allowed that one to pass, because it was the sort of thing Manuel could be expected to say whenever offered the opportunity, and perhaps even less foul than usual. But strength rarely breeds magnanimity, Eudokia had found. The higher a person rose, the more bitterly they raged against any blot or stain on their eminence. ‘By Enkedri, do you set out every morning to be the worm in the apple? Is there no moment of joy that you can’t find yourself tainting?’

  ‘I simply believe that life’s happy occasions are best celebrated modestly, without any unnecessary indulgence.’

  ‘Of course you do,’ Andronikos said. ‘That’s why I ate dried cod at the wedding of your son!’

  Andronikos and the rest of his senators laughed, and to Manuel, who did not laugh, it must have seemed that the entire party was enjoying themselves at his expense. And though Andronikos, made exuberant by the levity and his daughter’s seeming happiness and the concrete manifestation of his own self-importance, did not notice the way Manuel’s little black eyes swelled in his head, Eudokia took notice of it most clearly. And as happy as Andronikos was in that moment, Eudokia was happier – because what is more congenial than the sight of a plan fulfilled, of a scheme brought to fruition?