With a knowing glance, Joseph nodded and left. A few moments later he reappeared with three items that he handed to Alexios.
Alexios held one up for them to inspect. It was a slim item about one-and-a-half hand-widths long with two long prongs that had been carefully beaten out of steel and inserted into a slim wooden handle by a tong.
Sir Guy sat back with a tiny smile on his face. Talon glanced at him, then peered suspiciously at the device and said, “Can it not wait, Alexios? I am hungry.”
“No, Talon, it cannot wait, and furthermore I shall command that unless you can master this device you cannot eat this meal today, as you may only eat with the fork,” Sir Guy said with a laugh, but it was clear that he meant it.
Alexios gave one of his cool smiles and handed one of the implements to Talon, then passed one to Sir Guy, retaining the last for himself. He leaned over the morsels of chicken in the pot and speared a large one that Talon had already decided was his and took it to his own bowl. Talon watched as Alexios then held the meat in place with the strange device and dissected it with his knife. He followed that up by picking one of the smaller pieces up with the fork and placing it between his lips. He chewed with obvious satisfaction, all the while keeping his eyes on Talon who was in danger of gaping.
Sir Guy copied the action with more care, but it was clear that he was no stranger to the device.
“Now, Talon, it is your turn.”
Talon gripped the fork in his right hand like a weapon and stared at the food. “Why do I have to do this, Sir?” he asked plaintively.
“Because no respectable person is allowed in the royal palace to dine who does not know how to use one of these,” Alexios informed him.
“Am I expected to dine with people at the palace then? I thought that it would be you, Sir Guy,” Talon asked.
Sir Guy ignored the question and speared another piece of meat. He ate with relish and motioned to the bowl.
Talon tried to spear a piece of the chicken with too much energy; it slipped away from his fork and he came up empty. He stabbed again and this time splashed the sauce out onto the decks. He heard a snicker from the steersmen. He shot a glare in their direction but those worthies were staring forward with intent, wooden expressions on their faces.
“You are not going to get far at the table if you continue like this, Sir Talon.” Sir Guy sounded severe but there was a twinkle in his eyes; Alexios was looking smug. Patronizing swine, Talon thought to himself.
“Show me again,” he said with a glare at his table companions.
Alexios took the fork in his fingers and gently pierced the very morsel that Talon had wanted and took it away to his bowl. There were now only two more pieces in the bowl and Sir Guy took one just to prove how adept he was at the art. Talon hated him.
His stomach was now rumbling. Talon emulated their moves, but this time he first trapped the piece against the side of the bowl and then speared the meat. He brought it triumphantly up in the air, but just before he brought it to his plate it slipped off the fork and fell into his lap. He stared at the meat resting on his tunic, mortified more by his companions who roared with laughter than the mess it made. He had not realized that Max and Claude as well as Henry had been watching fascinated while he struggled with the new device.
“Have you not got anything else to do but laze about?” he yelled at them, his face red with embarrassment.
This only provoked more roars of laughter. He scooped up the morsel of meat with his fingers and popped it into his mouth with a defiant glare at Sir Guy. His consolation prize for the meal was the soup remaining in the bowl, which he tried to soak up with the hard biscuit and sips from his spoon.
*****
Alexios gave him no respite, and each day at noon he was forced to use the fork. It was not long before he managed to handle it comfortably, if not with the skill of Alexios; at least he did not go hungry.
His companions, Henry, Max, and Claude, teased him by pretending to eat with forks and stabbing themselves in the face, as he had done once when not paying enough attention. The pain of that encounter and the embarrassment, aggravated by the lack of sympathy from everyone around, stayed with him long enough to make him not to want to repeat it. He noticed, however, that when Sir Guy challenged the others to use the fork they all found other things to do, which made Talon smirk in derision.
Max later told him that Brother Jonathan had witnessed the display and the training and had commented that it was a sin to eat food like that, as were not a man’s fingers, provided by God himself, good enough for eating? Both Talon and Claude had shaken their heads at this.
“I am a man of God, indeed, we all here are servants of God, but this idiot irks me. It would be a good thing to throw him overboard one dark night,” Claude had muttered, his tone ominous. Talon half believed him.
“What would we do about a confessor if you did that?” Max enquired with a grin.
“There is always that other young pup, Martin.”
Talon decided that Claude was a good man to have around.
The other skill he worked hard to master was that of navigation. He was enthralled by the strange symbols on the large sheet of velum that Sir Guy had brought on board with him. One of the charts appeared to be a picture of all the countries on the eastern seaboard of the Middle Sea. He discovered that the cartographer had captured the essence of Egypt and the Nile, although it was clear that he had left much in the way of detail. The artist had marked in the Dead Sea and Jerusalem, followed by the Principality of Tripoli. For the first time Talon began to see the region from another perspective and his interest grew.
“It is as though we are seeing the world we live in as through a bird’s eye, but higher, if that is possible. We would have to be close to the sun to see this much,” he commented to Henry and Sir Guy while they were in the cabin staring down at the charts. Henry laughed, but he said, “Yes, in some ways that is so, but these charts only give us a rough idea of where we are. The other important indicators are the sun at any given time of the day and the year, and what the stars are telling us.”
Henry would then take Talon on deck and ask him to remember the chart, while trying to figure out where they might be with respect to the land mass they had kept on their starboard side for many days now.
“Are we heading north? South? Which direction are we going?” he would ask Talon.
At first Talon could tell him with some conviction that they were going north but little beyond that.
At his request, Henry, Nigel, or Guy would call Talon to the deck at night to show him the stars and make him memorize the constellations, their positions in the sky, and how these positions seemed to change over the course of hours. Talon’s respect grew for the three sailors as he began to understand more fully how important was their skill to find port in this wasteland of water. It was not long before he could estimate where they might be with respect to the chart, but then Henry told him something disturbing.
“These charts are just pictures of what men think the world looks like, Talon. They do not tell us the whole truth, as no one knows how to chart every single bay and cliff along the coast. That is an art we have not yet been able to master.”
“So it is mostly guesswork and hope?”
“Men get to know a particular sea well, Talon. And God’s help is important, but yes…there is a lot of praying.” Henry grinned.
When mornings came Talon would often be yawning mightily as he struggled with the Greek, much to the annoyance of Alexios. But Talon understood that he was learning an art that was without price and such an opportunity would not easily present itself again, so he persisted. His companions were flattered by his interest and pleased with the progress he was making.
The day came when Dmitri pointed out that the land was converging directly to their north and they were heading into a narrow band of water. “The land we have been following on the east is about to meet that land over there,” he said, waving his hand to the northwest. “We
will sail into that gap there, and after about a day or two, depending upon the wind, we will be in the Marmara Sea. We are almost there!” He sounded excited to be returning home after several years at sea and in a galley.
Henry, with Dmitri and Alexios at his side, navigated the straits comfortably despite the dense shipping sailing to and fro they now encountered. At one point they saw a large fortified city on the east coast, which Talon mistakenly thought might be Constantinople.
Dmitri laughed. “No, Talon. That is the city of Abydos. You will not be able to mistake Constantinople when you see it. Nothing can match it!”
They sailed on along the slightly curved straits packed with sails. The dawn of the second day, a cool misty morning, found them emerging from the straits of the Hellespont. Talon stepped onto the deck and noticed that the land mass had begun to recede into the distance on either side of them. He glanced up at the sky and, despite the mist, could discern that their course was unchanged. They were still sailing due north.
There were still many other sails to be seen, but they kept their distance; one ship, however, changed direction and began to come their way. Henry ordered the crew to prepare for trouble. Talon came to stand with him on the upper deck to watch events alongside Alexios and Sir Guy, both fully armed, as were he and the two sergeants.
It soon became clear that the other ship was coming to investigate theirs. It was a warship, a long sleek three-masted galley, but Alexios reassured them.
“I think it might be one of the Byzantine naval ships that scouts these seas, and we would be well advised to stay on course and not run from it.”
All the same, there was heightened tension as they watched the approach of the larger vessel. It was indeed a Byzantine warship: Alexios pointed to the pennant flying from its forward masthead, showing the image of a double-headed eagle. The ship appeared to be well manned by a large crew as it sailed directly towards them and then hove to within hailing distance.
Henry, at a signal from Alexios, had already furled his sails but had ordered the rowers to take their places as a precaution.
Talon observed the men standing on the deck of the strange ship with interest. The crew appeared to be composed of tough looking seamen all dressed in a similar manner. They were armed to the teeth with spears, sabers and even axes. The cluster of men on the rear deck next to the steersmen was composed of elegantly dressed warriors in fine gleaming armor, flowing robes and plumed helmets. The only person on his own ship dressed in anything like this manner was Alexios, who jumped onto the side of the ship and held onto a main stay as he shouted across the sea-swell between them.
Talon was chagrined to find that despite the long hours he had spent with Alexios learning that man’s language he barely understood a word that was shouted between the two ships.
He beckoned to Dmitri and asked him what had transpired. Dmitri seemed embarrassed.
“I do not speak his Greek very well, Sir Talon, it is Attic. But I think he is telling them that he is on a mission to our Constantinople and that we are escorting him.”
Indeed, after a lot of shouting to and fro the men on the other vessel seemed to want to come aboard.
Alexios turned to Sir Guy and said, “Their captain wants to verify that we’re who we say we are, Sir Guy. Do you give permission?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“No, Sir, you do not.”
Sir Guy glanced at Talon and the men around him, then gestured to Alexios to call over to the other ship. There was more shouting and then a boat was lowered from the other ship into which several crewmen jumped, followed at a more dignified pace by someone of rank.
“Do you see that tube pointing our way from the middle deck, Talon?” Sir Guy murmured, lifting his chin to point.
Talon followed his gaze and noticed a group of men clustered around some kind of apparatus placed on the deck. A large tube was being maneuvered so that it pointed directly towards them. It was made of some kind of metal and its muzzle was blackened.
“What is it, Sir Guy?” Max asked. He had joined them as they watched the small boat cross the short distance between them.
“It is known by many names, but I know it as Greek Fire and that is what delivers it. We have to be careful, for if they shoot its flames at us we have no defense at all. We would be burned to the water within minutes,” Sir Guy said quietly.
Talon and Max stared at him, their faces registering shock. There was no time to discuss the strange weapon, however, for Alexios rejoined them. The small boat bumped alongside and an officer was assisted aboard, followed by some large, well-armed men who stood behind him protectively while he looked around the ship. His gaze was keen, that of someone who knew what he was looking at. He wasted no time but strode to the ladder that led to the deck above where Alexios and Sir Guy awaited him.
There were elaborate greetings between him and Alexios, who seemed to be speaking on behalf of the ship. Alexios motioned several times to Sir Guy, offering explanations for his presence. He even showed the man a paper that he had brought on deck for him to examine. The officer finally nodded and raised his hand in salute, then he prepared to disembark. Alexios accompanied him to the side of the ship and waved him off.
Henry did not give the command to drop sails until Alexios gave him permission. Meanwhile the other crew, demonstrating a smart example of seamanship, hoisted their own sails and moved off southward at a fast pace, tacking into a brisk wind. Talon was impressed by this display of naval efficiency.
_______________
Here from my Window I at once survey
The crouded City & resounding Sea,
In distant Views see Assian Mountains rise
And Lose their Snowy Summits in ye Skies.
Above those Mountains high Olympus Tow'rs
The Parliamental Seat of Heavenly Powers.
New to ye Sight my ravish'd Eyes admire
Each guilded Crescent & each Antique Spire,
The Fair Serail where sunk in Idle ease
The Lazy Monarch melts his thoughtless days
“Overlooking Constantinople”
Chapter 3
Constantinople
They saw the city long before they arrived. It loomed out of the early dawn like some magical creation from a glowing legend.
Talon went forward with Max and Alexios to see better from the bows while Henry and Sir Guy stayed on the back deck. He could only stare. The massive fortifications encircling the city seemed to go on forever and to rise straight out of the sea. Behind the fortifications he could see a row of low, uneven hills upon which were dense clusters of buildings of every shape and size. There were enormous, square-looking constructions with many pillars, and lesser buildings planted all over the green hillsides. In the distance he could see the domes of numerous churches rising among the red tiled housing, denoting a pious population. What dominated the entire city, however, was an enormous complex of domes and towers that Alexios pointed to with pride.
“The Great Palace and the Hagia of St Sophia.” There was reverence in his voice as he spoke.
“It was built for the Glory of God,” Brother Martin said as he joined then. “It is magnificent! I must go there to pray at the earliest opportunity.”
“I will come with you, Brother Martin,” Talon said. He rather hoped that Jonathan would decide not to come but had faint hope of that.
These buildings were built on the highest point of the peninsular ridge to the right of the harbor, and the church was without doubt the most magnificent Talon had ever seen. Apart from its general size he could tell that the width of its dome was immense, and he wondered how men could build such a structure. Its dome dominated, yet clustered about the round central building were many others, each with a lesser dome. He gazed in awe at the most enormous and beautiful city in the world that sprawled over a long tongue of land jutting out into the Marmara Sea.
He pointed to a huge construction with many arches nearer to them. “What is t
hat building over there, Alexios?”
“That is the Hippodrome, it is where we race chariots.”
He began to point out many other places, from palaces to barracks, as they drew near to the walls of the city.
After three weeks of traveling all of them were ready to step onto dry land and stay for a while, but the men on the ship were silent as they contemplated this huge city that they were about to visit. The journey north had been interesting, Talon reflected. They had spent most nights anchored off the coast of the islands along the way. The sea was dotted with them in this area, and fortunately Dmitri knew many of them and had guided them unerringly northward through the archipelago. What harbors they had visited had been populated with Greeks who were part of the empire, so Alexios had been able to obtain fast service from the authorities when it came to resupply and fresh water. At the first sign of any bad weather, Henry had sought the shelter of an island inlet, anchoring and waiting out the rough seas that followed.
Alexios had begun to thaw towards Talon as they spent time together speaking the complicated Attic Greek, which, he had reminded Talon, would provide him with a passport to higher society when the time came; and besides, the court affairs were all conducted in Attic.
They had played chess often and Talon had begun to hone his skill. He enjoyed the game, which, Alexios told him, had come from Persia. He remembered his time with Reza, his friend, and the games they had played in Isfahan.
Talon had not had much to do with the two monks, who had shown up on the deck from time to time. Sir Guy wryly told him that he had to keep them engaged as they were part of his entourage, but even he had begun to tire of the incessant carping from Brother Jonathan. Brother Martin, once he had recovered from his initial bout of seasickness, had spent time on deck keeping Max and the others company. He was young and eager to please, but clearly scared of Brother Jonathan, who imposed his authority at every opportunity. He endured the treatment cheerfully enough, seeking the company of the sergeants when he could, his thin features ever ready to smile. Even Sir Guy seemed to like him, although the boy kept a respectful distance from the exalted man.
Greek Fire Page 5