22
The rain fell for most of the following fortnight, splashing at my heels as I roamed the city. I spent many hours at the gates, watching as small parties of barbarians were admitted to admire the sights of the city and our civilisation. Most were content to gape in silence, though some felt compelled to mask their awe with belittling jokes and snide insults. Occasionally these would spark scuffles with Romans, but the Watch were always there, always ready to draw the combatants apart without violence. Clearly they too had had their orders from the Emperor. And all the while I wondered about Thomas.
The first two days after he left I had thought of little else, though I knew it would be weeks before I had news of him. His life was on my conscience, and I ached to ask those passing merchants who dealt with the Franks whether they had heard anything of him, but for the sake of his safety I could not dare. At least there was no news of his death, and as the days drew on my thoughts returned to more immediate concerns. Always, though, it was a weight on my heart, an itch worrying at my mind. Often it haunted my dreams.
There were also long days at the palace, when I wandered its corridors like a ghost, interviewing guards and functionaries, probing for any sign of trouble, and — as Krysaphios instructed me — keeping my eyes open. It seemed little enough to do for the gold he was paying me, but the strain of it told, for every hour I spent in those halls I lived in the terror that a slave would approach and announce that the Emperor was dead. I did not see him after that day in the unnatural garden, except once at a great distance: a gilded statue in the midst of an endless train of monks, guards and nobles, processing past a far door to the strains of music and incense. Otherwise, it was as if he inhabited a different world.
But I did see his brother, a week or so after my audience. A morning on the walls had left me too tired to face clerks who prided themselves on the time they could take telling me nothing, and I was walking down some empty, forgotten arcade when I heard the sound of voices. Not the gaiety of courtiers, nor the grumbling of servants, but the hushed murmur of men who do not wish their words to be heard. It seemed to come from behind a small door recessed between two columns, open just enough to be ajar but not so much that you would guess anyone was within.
I walked towards it, but at the sound of my footsteps the voices paused. With a nervous glance at the solitude around me, I pressed my boot against the door and pushed.
‘Demetrios.’ The Sebastokrator’s head jerked up as I fell to my knees, but I kept my eyes raised enough to see that he had been talking very closely with another man, who shrank back into the corner of the tiny room as Isaak stepped forward. He seemed flustered, but the time it took me to perform the full proskynesis allowed him to compose himself.
‘Get up,’ he told me. ‘What are you doing in this corner of the palace?’
‘I was lost,’ I said humbly. ‘I heard voices and thought I might find a guide to lead me out of here.’
Isaak scowled. ‘Count Hugh, have you had presented to you Demetrios Askiates? He works for us to thwart our enemies.’
I bowed. It seemed that Count Hugh had forgotten the scribe who accompanied him on his embassy to the barbarians, though it would be many months before I forgot the preening Frank who had almost been pissed on in the barbarians’ tent. ‘An honour, Lord.’
‘Count Hugh is one of the few Franks who understands the need for all Christians to unite under the banner of God and His Emperor,’ Isaak explained. ‘He hopes to persuade his countrymen to follow his good sense.’
‘Thus far without success,’ said Hugh mournfully. He fingered the agate clasp on his mantle. ‘Some of them are reasonable men, yes, but too many listen to the poison which the whelp Baldwin spouts.’
Isaak looked at me carefully. ‘But these great cares are not for Demetrios. If you seek the way out, take the north door from this passage and continue until you find the chapel of Saint Theodore. You will find your way from there.’
I bowed. ‘Thank you, gracious Lord.’
He attempted an insincere smile. ‘A Caesar’s duty is to aid his subjects. And perhaps I will see you next week — at the games?’
I did see him at the games, though I doubt if he saw me. He was seated on a golden throne beside his brother on the balcony of the Kathisma, while I shared a bench high on the southern side with a group of fat Armenians, who cared for nothing but gambling and honeyed figs. Worse, they supported the Greens.
‘Why would anyone support the Greens?’ I asked of my neighbour, a thin man who chewed his fingers incessantly. ‘You might as well declare yourself in favour of the sun.’
The man looked at me with terror, and returned to his fingers.
‘Demetrios!’
I glanced up warily, for one meets many men in the Hippodrome and not all are to be welcomed. This one I was happy enough to see, though I barely recognised him without his axe and armour. He wore a brown woollen tunic with a studded leather belt, and high boots which had little difficulty poking a space between me and my timid neighbour.
‘Shouldn’t you be at the walls?’ I asked.
‘The walls have stood safe for seven centuries, and broken every army which came at them. They may survive an afternoon without me.’ Sigurd shuffled along the bench a little, taking advantage of the newly vacated space. ‘I thought I could take a few hours to see the Greens win.’
I groaned. ‘Not the Greens. Why would you want to see them win?’
Sigurd looked puzzled. ‘Because they do win. Who would not support the strongest team? Don’t tell me that you support the Blues?’
‘The Whites.’
Sigurd guffawed, happier than I had seen him in weeks. ‘The Whites? You can’t support the Whites — no-one does. Have they ever won once in your entire lifetime?’
‘Not yet. Their day will come.’
‘But they don’t even race to win. Their only purpose is to act as spoilers for the Blues, to knock the Greens off the track and let the Blues past. They’re not competitors. You might as well see me supporting the Reds.’
If you supported the Whites, as I did, these were not new arguments. ‘Perhaps there is nothing I would rather see than the Green chariot upturned on the spina. The first and only time that my father brought me to Constantinople, he took me here and told me to choose a team. I was wearing a white tunic that day, so when I saw the Whites I decided that they would be mine.’
‘You must regret not wearing green.’ Sigurd was merciless.
‘Not at all. Because one day the Whites will win. .’
‘If a murrain strikes down the Greens and Blues and Reds first.’
‘And I will have more joy from that single victory than you will from a lifetime of seeing the Greens roll past the finishing post.’
Sigurd shook his head sadly. ‘You will die a bitter man if you wait for that day, Demetrios.’
Thankfully, a fanfare of trumpets rescued me. We fell silent as the Emperor rose from his throne.
It was the first race of the afternoon, and the hippodrome was as yet only three-quarters filled, but its spectacle remained undiminished. The arms of the arena stretched away from where we sat, alive with the colours of all the races and factions of men in their tens of thousands. In the distance, above the far gate, four bronze horses reared up as if pulling their golden quadriga into the air, while the great dome of Ayia Sophia crowned the horizon. Along the spine in the foreground were the statues and columns, the monuments of a thousand years of competition towering above us. There were Emperors and obelisks, set beside half a dozen effigies of Porphyrius and the other charioteers of legend, to whose company the church had added saints and prophets. I could see Moses, clutching two tablets of stone as he hurried towards the north gate; Saint George, brandishing his lance; and Joshua sounding his horn from atop a sandstone column.
Down in the Kathisma the acclamations were finished. The Emperor retook his seat, accompanied by a thundering roar from the crowd as the gates sprang open and the chariots emerged. They were quick on the damp sand of the arena, and had passed the northern marker in seconds. The factions rose as their champions galloped past, great squares of blue and green, many hundreds of men wide, all shouting in unison. None wore White or Red, for few were fool enough to support the junior teams who raced only in support of their seniors.
