Byzantium

he chills me. It is not as if he is an agent of some worldly power but an emissary of destiny itself. There is this current of raw fate that seems to surround him, almost as if you could touch him and . . .’ Maria clasped her hands, as if to stop them from quivering. ‘I do not make sense, I know. But I have told you what Ata said about the three lines crossing. He never said that the man might be a barbaros fair-hair. I don’t know.’

Zoe placed her hands over Maria’s. ‘I think this Tauro-Scythian is a chorus player in this drama of ours. But perhaps . . . don’t take offence, daughter, but you said once he brought you pleasure, if only in the evanescence of sleep.’ Zoe smiled wryly. ‘Perhaps he is an instrument of a simple fate. I know you find the Tauro-Scythians pleasurable to countenance, and you never did conclude your . . . investigation of the Hetairarch’s . . . abilities. Perhaps you make too much of a basic desire, the one, as you so astutely pointed out the other day, that is easiest to assuage.’ Zoe laughed delicately. ‘You would hardly be the first lady of my court to take a Tauro-Scythian barbaros to your bed.’

‘Perhaps. I confess that he was in my bed last night after your conversation with him.’ Maria’s eyes widened as she recalled the vision. ‘May I tell you?’

‘Oh, yes, little daughter,’ said Zoe, all weariness forgotten.

‘He came to me, quite naked, his chest covered with hair like golden threads, his arms as hard and smooth as sculpted stone. He ripped my gown away. I submitted totally, willing it. Mother, it embarrasses even our confidence to mention my shamelessness – I begged him to enter every orifice with the most savage thrusts. I screamed at him to break my flesh with his teeth, to bite my lips and nipples, and blood and sweat mixed to a hot oil spread between our merciless breasts. And then I rose above him, now pulling his hair, then clawing his eyes, and he knew my pleasure. We rose, conjoined in ecstasy, towards a golden dome, and in my hand I discovered a knife, a cold, icy blade, and at the moment of supreme passion I plunged it with all my force into his neck and he faded, he died as I was transported, raised by the last warmth of his burning member as his body froze, and the arms of the sun held me. When I awakened from the dream, I was drenched in my own effluxions.’

‘Maria! You exceed yourself! Your nocturnal musings would make our esteemed specialist in sexual disorders faint away like a maiden at the sight of her first unsheathed column! So you see, you can have your pleasure of him. But I think we can ultimately dispose of our overweening Tauro-Scythian in a fashion that might be less . . . provocative, but more useful to our cause.’

Maria nodded, her jaw still tense. Yes, she could finally admit that the desire existed; after all, it was of the type easiest to assuage. What she could not confess, even to her beloved Empress mother, was that her dream had demonstrated to her a frightening but essential truth. Her desire could only be quenched in the moment that its object was destroyed.

If Constantinople was the Queen of Cities, stately and elegant, then Antioch was a ravishing courtesan. The walls, golden in the late-afternoon sun, were almost as vast and proud as those of the Empress City; studded at intervals of a bowshot with huge round towers, they rose from a glowing emerald-and-ochre valley to the pine- dotted heights of a mountain ridge thousands of ells above. The city tumbled down the slopes; beneath rocky heights were terraced fields, rowed vineyards, and gardens dotted with lemon and orange and ivy, interspersed with the white domes of vast palaces. The buildings thickened as the incline graduated to the flat plain before the river, crowding together in fantastic arrays of domes and spires and colonnades that faded into the southern horizon.

For almost a rowing-spell the people of the surrounding villages had come out to stand by the road; they were simple farmers in brown tunics brightened by vivid shawls and sashes. They threw flowers and aromatic herbs beneath the wheels of the Imperial carriages and chanted in Greek mixed with a tongue Haraldr did not know. The women held their children and pointed, saying, ‘Theotokos’; apparently many of the peasants could not distinguish between the Mother of the Romans and the Mother of God.

The city became more distinct as the Imperial party advanced parallel to the looping, sluggish yellow river that flowed towards the city’s eastern flank. The buildings seemed more open than those of Constantinople, with rows of wide arches and canopied balconies to draw the breeze that wandered idly through the valley. Banners fluttered and glazed domes sparkled.

‘It does not have the aspect of a virtuous city,’ said Halldor lightly.

‘She is a whore,’ offered Ulfr admiringly. ‘Goddess of neck-ice, golden-haired shaker of the limb of Frey’s orchard.’

‘Please repeat that,’ asked Gregory. ‘That was a very difficult kenning.’

‘He means that this whore is both very beautiful and very skilled,’ said Halldor. He gave his horse a little spur and came up beside Haraldr. ‘You haven’t had a woman in some time. I think abstinence has made you despondent. Your comrades have decided to plunder this wanton city until we find a woman who will put the fire back in your eyes.’

Haraldr struggled to smile. ‘I can always count on you to be blunt.’ He thought for a moment. Halldor had bedded a woman in Nicomedia, one in Nicaea, one in Ancyra, one in Adana. None of them whores, either, but seemingly well-born women prominent in provincial courts. The one in Nicaea, with dark hair and dark eyes and a waist like a wasp, had rivalled even Maria in Haraldr’s fancy for several restless nights. Why had he not considered this before? If a man’s arrows consistently missed their target, should he not ask the advice of an archer who inerrantly struck that at which he aimed? Haraldr asked Halldor to join him in riding up ahead of the Varangian ranks.

‘I knew you were lovesick,’ said Halldor when Haraldr had finished his tale, ‘but I thought it was still that Khazar girl.’ Halldor rubbed his fine nose with his forefinger as he thought for a moment. ‘Haraldr, do you know why I drink a full cup of love for every drop that dampens your lips?’ he asked rhetorically. ‘Because you approach love like a poet, your breast bared for all to see, while I approach love like a trader with his hacksilver hidden in the lining of his girdle.’

‘But you have never had to pay for a woman’s favours.’

‘Exactly. Look. The wise trader sees an object he must acquire. He does not run pell-mell to the merchant’s booth, swoop the desired merchandise into his arms, with heaving chest declare that his life will end if he cannot have this exquisite item, and then offer to hack off a limb to place on top of the merchant’s price so that he may have it. No. The wise trader in fact strolls idly by this merchant’s booth, then looks for hours, perhaps days, into the booths of the neighbouring merchants. He examines their wares and sets his praise-tongue wagging over the quality of their merchandise. Then, his bag already full of items he has purchased at the other booths, he walks by, almost walks on, thinks better of it, and pauses to poke here and there among the wares that surround his treasure. He asks the price of this and that, and then, well, since he is here, what about this? And then of course he haggles, as if this treasure is nothing more than dried dung to be burned, and how could he possibly pay such a price and so on. Soon the merchant is so convinced he will never be relieved of this worthless item that he virtually gives it away. So as I see it, this Maria is a wiser trader playing games with you. Now all you need to do is turn the tables on her.’

That is remarkable, Halldor,’ said Haraldr with genuine respect. It had never occurred to him that one needed to deal as hard with a woman he hoped to clutch gently to his breast as he did with a man with whom he was doing business. The wise trader indeed. The next time he saw Maria, he would not offer so much as a sideways glance at the wares in her booth.

‘Haraldr Nordbrikt! Of course! Haraldr Nordbrikt!’

Constantine, the Strategus of Antioch, virtually leapt from behind his ivory-surfaced writing table. Haraldr observed that Constantine was a beardless eunuch like his brother, Joannes, though he had been spared the grotesque giantism of his brother’s features. In fact, there was more of the Emperor himself in Constantine’s look. As he came closer, though, Haraldr noticed the glaze of nervous perspiration on the Strategus’s forehead and upper lip, and he wondered if this man was so daunted by his brother that he grew anxious in the presence of someone merely bearing a letter from him.

‘Welcome, welcome, welcome. My brother, Joannes, has not only told me to expect you, but word of your fame has already begun to buzz about my city. We are verily beneath the blade of the Saracens here, so your proficiency in exterminating heretics is particularly well valued in fair Antioch.’ Constantine fluttered his hands and hated himself for it. Mother of God, what a monstrous thug, he thought, albeit splendidly formed. The scar over his eye gives him the sinister aspect. Certainly the type of delinquent my brother would enlist in his employ.