hoes, rakes, scythes, hatchets, bows, butcher’s knives. And the women came in their own contingents, armed with stones and clubs. The track was quickly covered with these unlikely soldiers, and then even the seats began to fill up.
Halldor pointed to the Imperial Box, high up on the east side of the stadium. It was an enormous oblong structure that projected vertiginously over the tiers of seats below, its weight supported by thick marble columns. The Emperor’s seating pavilion resembled the portico of an ancient Greek temple, and this was flanked on both sides by balustraded balconies where dignitaries were usually seated; directly behind the Imperial seating pavilion was a long, flat terrace that bridged over to the adjoining Triclinium in the palace complex; the entire ponderous marble platform allowed no direct access from the seats below, unless one could shimmy up the marble pilings. And even if one could, armoured units of the Imperial Hyknatoi already waited on the balconies.
Those balconies are where the battle will be won or lost,’ he explained to the Blue Star. ‘They are an excellent platform for the defenders, but if we can take them, they will be the platform for our attack on the entire Palace. This is clearly our best opportunity to breach the palace defences. Elsewhere the walls are sheer, but here the seats give us a natural incline. It is never wise to attack up a hill if it can be avoided, but attacking up a hill is better than attacking straight up the sheer face of a mountain.’
The Blue Star nodded. ‘This is very different from what we expected last night, isn’t it, boy?’
Halldor looked around at the still-filling stadium. ‘Very different. But that is the nature of conflict. It always presents us with the unexpected.’
‘It is as if God sprinkled the earth with stars,’ said Bianca Maria. She stood at the railing as Mar’s
Mar looked at the conflagrations along the city’s affluent spine. From the vantage of the Marmara coast, the huge tongues of flames seemed painted in eerie, brightly enamelled miniature against the darkness. The palaces of the Dhynatoi were coming down. ‘There is some trouble in the city tonight, precious,’ said Mar. ‘But it will be over tomorrow, and then you will be able to see everything.’
The massive galley turned larboard to head into the Bucoleon Harbour. The lights of the palace burned with their usual brilliance. ‘That is where the Emperor lives,’ said Bianca Maria with rapt self-confidence.
‘Yes. Remember what I told you about the proper way to greet him.’
Khazar guards waited at the jetty when the
‘What a lovely child,’ said Michael. ‘What is your name?’ He leaned towards Mar’s adolescent companion.
‘Bianca Maria, Majesty.’
‘Well, Hetairarch, if I may reinstate you with your former title,’ said Michael quickly, ‘your return is so provident that I quite believe you are moved by the Holy Spirit.’
‘I am moved by a desire to preserve the office of Emperor, Autocrator and Basileus of the Romans,’ said Mar.
Michael shifted uneasily in his throne. Mar had said
‘You have done well in aggrandizing your investment, Majesty. But I fear that the value of your commodity has once again plummeted. It seems to me that the vital centre of Rome is now the Hippodrome, where the Varangians who so recently served as your guard are preparing to lead an assault by the wretches of the Studion and their new allies, the tradesmen and merchants. Only the Dhynatoi and the Taghmata stand with you now, and I question how vigorously the men of the Taghmata will enlist in the slaughter of the women of Rome, who have risen against you as vehemently as their husbands, fathers and sons.’
Michael seemed to regard the threat as a minor negotiating point. He smiled at Bianca Maria. ‘I have developed a special relationship with the Pantocrator, Hunrodarson. He will not permit me to surrender the troth that links us.’ Michael bowed his head for a while. ‘What? What?’ he whispered. Then his voice seemed to buzz, very low, like an insistent insect. ‘So it would be the three-in-one, as it was in your mind in the beginning, because in the light all souls will hear the word . . .’ The buzz trailed off. Michael lifted his head and clapped his hands three times. ‘He has no objection to a trinity! Here is how we will have it. You shall be Basileus, Lord of the Entire World. I shall be Autocrator, Lord of the Universe! And He shall rule for us in Heaven until we come to share His throne! Indeed! Kiss my hand, come forward and kiss my hand, Basileus, Lord of the World!’
Mar’s pale eyebrows twitched as he came forward, ascended the golden dais, and knelt at the purple boots of the new Lord of the Universe.
‘Are you ready to lead our seraphim against the thrice-damned rabble, Basileus?’ whispered Michael.
‘I will send for my men and be in position to slaughter every living soul in the Hippodrome by first dawn, Autocrator.’ Mar rose warily, afraid that the slightest tremor on his part might bring the fantastic, wondrous edifice of Michael’s madness tumbling down. He backed away with his arms crossed, took Bianca Maria’s warm little hand, and prepared to take his leave.
‘Basileus! I forgot to mention that your friend, Nordbrikt, will be unavailable to oppose you. You can visit him this evening if you have time. In the Neorion. I’m quite afraid you will not find him with his usual vigour, however. He is … changed.’
Mar’s spirit ebbed slightly; he had so often dreamed of being the architect of Haraldr Sigurdarson’s demise, perhaps even himself cleaving Norway’s skull and seeing the last instant of terror in his eyes. He bowed to Michael. ‘Perhaps I will console Nordbrikt later, Autocrator. I have told Bianca Maria that the Emperor of Rome has a golden lion that roars, and she wants very much to see it tonight.’
‘Get out, you gelded swine!’ Maria plucked the dish from the hands of the appalled chamberlain and hurled it at the Pecheneg guard who had escorted him into her ante-chamber. As the guard cowered from the hurtling silver disk spraying garos sauce, she bounced a goblet off his breastplate. ‘Get out!’ she screamed at the chamberlain; she kicked him in the seat of his white robe and shoved him out of the door, on the heels of his retreating Pecheneg escort.
Maria returned to her bedchamber, leaned against the ponderous sleeping couch, and grunted as she slid it across the smooth marble floor. She hiked up her scaramangium and knelt beside the knife that had been concealed beneath the bed. Still on her knees, she ran the point of the knife along the fine seam between two sections of marble flooring. She popped up the slab of purple Docimian marble – it was no thicker than an ivory bookcover – and slide it aside. She lifted several more of these thin revetments before she finally exposed the underlying, fathom-wide masonry flooring tile she had been working on all day. She knocked out the few remaining chinks of mortar and arduously pried up the limestone slab, which was as thick as a bound Psalter. Once she had a handhold, she was able to slide the slab out of the way. She reached into the hypocaust heating duct and felt the oak slats of the ceiling below. She took a deep breath and slid into the duct.
She could not lift her head enough to see even in front of her. She wriggled along in the dark, choking on the fine layer of dust. She wondered vaguely what it would be like to become stuck and die like this.
Finally her outstretched hands grasped dead air. The heating closet, she thought with relief. She squirmed along until most of her torso projected into the dark cubicle. She could feel the opposite wall almost against her nose, and she panicked. No matter how she contorted herself, she would not have enough room to manoeuvre her legs out of the duct. She reached down and felt the round bronze lid of the furnace just below her. She prayed that it was not sealed. She pulled with desperate fingers and got the lid loose, then slid it off; it clattered to the floor of the closet. She realized she might have alerted the guards, and she put her arms out and dropped headfirst into the bronze belly of the furnace. There was not even a layer of ashes at the bottom. She thanked the Theotokos that this terrible day was at least not a cold one, and that the Empress’s servants were made to keep the furnaces clean.
She was still stuck like a circus buffoon head first in a barrel. She lowered herself onto her elbows and
