In the Heart of Darkness

A moment later, there came a splintering crash.

He leapt back into the room and slammed shut the door.

'That,' he announced, 'was a lance driving through the main door.'

Balban hesitated no longer. He scrambled down the ladder after Narses. Before his head sank below the level of the floor he heard a rolling series of thunderous noises. Doors and windows being shattered. By the time he reached the small tunnel fifteen feet down, he could already hear the screams echoing through the entire villa. The rest of the Malwa mission resident in the villa were being butchered.

Ajatasutra took the time to close the closet door before he started down the ladder. As best he could, feeling his way in the darkness, he tried to position the rug so that it would cover the trapdoor after he lowered it.

When he reached the tunnel below, he found the two other men waiting for him. Balban had lit the small lamp which was kept in a cubby.

'I don't know the way,' whispered the spymaster. 'I've never been down here.'

Ajatasutra took the lamp from his hand.

'Follow me,' he ordered. 'And watch your step. We never bothered to grade the tunnel floor. I didn't really think we'd need it.'

After the three men had inched their way down the narrow tunnel for hundred feet or so, Narses asked:

'How much farther, Ajatasutra? My shoes aren't designed for this kind of travel. And-damnation-they're silk! Expensive.'

Ajatasutra chuckled, grimly.

'Forget about your shoes, Narses. We've another two hundred feet to go. Before we reach the sewer.'

'Marvelous,' muttered Narses. 'Just marvelous.'

Fifty feet down, he sneered: 'What other brilliant ideas did you have today, Balban? Did you jump into the Bosporus to see if it was wet? Did you swallow a live coal to see if it would burn your throat? Did you-'

'Shut up,' snarled the spymaster. 'I received orders-from Nanda Lal himself.'

Narses was silent, thereafter, until they had reached the sewer and slogged their way down its stinking length for at least two hundred feet. He began lagging further and further behind. Eventually, Ajatasutra handed Balban the lamp and went back to help the old eunuch.

'Are you all right?' he asked.

'I could use your shoulder,' grunted Narses. 'This damned sewer's so low I have to stoop. My back hurts.'

Ajatasutra leaned his right shoulder under Narses' left arm and helped him along. The eunuch turned his head until his lips were but inches from Ajatasutra's ear and whispered:

'You do realize what those orders from Nanda Lal mean, don't you?'

Ajatasutra nodded, very slightly.

'Yes,' he replied, also in a whisper. He glanced up. Balban's dim form was visible thirty feet ahead of them, backlit by the lamp he was carrying.

'It means you were right about Belisarius,' whispered the assassin. 'He must have escaped from India.'

They progressed another fifty feet. By now, all of them were soaked with filthy water up to their mid- thighs.

Again, Narses turned his lips to Ajatasutra's ear.

'There'll be a boat, waiting. At the Neorion harbor in the Golden Horn. Do you know where it is?'

'Yes,' whispered Ajatasutra. 'Why me?'

'You're the best of a sorry lot. And if I have to flee to India I'll need someone to vouch for my credentials.'

Ajatasutra smiled, thinly.

'You don't sound entirely confident in the certain success of our plans.'

Narses sneered. 'Nothing in this world is certain, Ajatasutra. Except this-better to have loosed the demon from his pit than to have loosed Belisarius. Especially after murdering his wife.'

'She wasn't murdered,' muttered Ajatasutra. Seeing the frown on the eunuch's face, the assassin chuckled.

'I followed. At a distance, of course. And I stayed well out of the fray. Quite a set-to, judging from the racket coming out of that cookshop-even before the cataphract arrived. I waited until he brought Antonina out. The woman was covered with blood, but none of it was hers.'

Narses sighed. 'Well, that's something. Belisarius will just be his usual extraordinarily competent and brilliantly capable deadly self. Instead of vengeance personified.'

They slogged on, and on. Eventually, now well ahead of them, they saw Balban rise from his stoop and stand up straight. He had finally reached the exit from the sewer.

'Come on!' they heard the spymaster's hissing voice. 'Time is short!'

Just before they came within Balban's hearing range, Ajatasutra whispered:

'What does the boat look like?'

'Like it wants to leave Constantinople in a very big hurry,' was the eunuch's only reply.

Maurice waited until the cataphracts circled the monastery before he would let Antonina or Irene dismount. The Thracian cavalrymen were in a grim, grim mood. The small crowd of curious onlookers, which began to gather from the nearby residences, quickly drew back under their hard gaze.

'Marvelous,' muttered Antonina. 'Just marvelous.'

She glared at Maurice. The hecatontarch returned her hot gaze with placidity.

'So much for keeping the whereabouts of the Theodoran Cohort secret,' she growled.

Maurice shrugged. He pointed toward the southwest.

'Take a look. The time for secrets is over.'

Antonina and Irene twisted in their saddles. They were not far from the Column of Marcian. The monastery, and the cathedral which adjoined it, were located just inside the old walls of the capital-the 'walls of Constantine.' The heart of Constantinople, the corner of the city which held the Great Palace and the Hippodrome, was not more than two miles away.

In the vicinity of the Hippodrome, the two women could see smokeplumes produced by bonfires which the gathering Blue and Green factions had set aflame to warm their toughs. They could hear the faint roar of the mob, even at the distance.

Antonina asked Irene: 'What's the situation at the Great Palace?'

'Tense. Very tense. Justinian called for a meeting of the high council for today, at noon. He's still listening to John of Cappadocia, however, who assures him that most of the army units will stand by the throne. So he's living in a fool's paradise. He doesn't realize that the only military forces he has left are his own excubitores-all five hundred of them! — and the forces which we're bringing.'

Irene turned her head, looking to the south.

'Sittas and Hermogenes should be in position at the Harbor of Hormisdas. I'd better leave now and tell them where your forces stand.'

Antonina nodded. Maurice ordered a squad of cataphracts to escort the spymaster.

A commotion drew Antonina's attention.

A mob of grenadiers and their wives were pouring out of the monastery's doors, heading toward her. All of them were staring at her, their faces full of worried concern.

'You told them,' she said to Maurice, accusingly.

Maurice chuckled.

'Told them? I sent ten cataphracts over here this morning, to regale them with the tale. Every last gruesome, gory, grisly great moment of it!'

Antonina sighed with exasperation. Maurice edged his horse next to her. Leaning over-all humor gone-he whispered harshly: 'Listen to me, girl, and listen well. You're at war, now, and you're the commander. A female commander-the first one in Roman history outside of ancient legends. You need all the confidence you can get from your soldiers. And they need it even more than you do.'