Byzantium

but he had realized an inescapable truth. He was at the Empress’s beck and call, and like her husband, no matter what rumours one heard of her, she was more than capable of that command. Whoever was her enemy was his. A truth, he reflected, that brought him little comfort.

The second course was a large poached fish smothered in the oily, tart sauce called garos and topped with more tiny fish eggs. Haraldr was pleased with how he had handled the thin, two- pronged silver fork, particularly since he was still rattled by the incident with Attalietes.

Zoe spoke with Anna for a while; the girl seemed to have taken the outburst with aplomb. Haraldr found this attractive; she seemed so young and blushing, yet she had a woman’s grace. When he had finished his fish, he kept glancing at her until he caught her eye. She looked at him and cocked her head slightly. ‘Komes?’

Odin. No, Homer. Gregory had set him upon the study of the famous ancient Greek skald, saying that it reflected well on one to recite his verse. Haraldr frantically reviewed some remembered passages. ‘ “Laodike, loveliest … of all … the daughters . . .” ‘

Constantine’s fork clattered on his silver plate. He stared as if he had heard a dog speak. Even Zoe’s jaw sagged slightly. Anna blushed furiously and fluttered her lashes. Then her eyes widened and her teeth flashed as she spoke.’ “Tall Hektor of the shining helm . . .” ‘ Haraldr understood immediately; Hektor was the hero of Homer’s seemingly endless lay called The Iliad. But wasn’t Hektor killed at the end of this lay?

Zoe leaned forward, her eyes sweeping from Haraldr to Anna. ‘I have certainly heard many far more subtly . . . allusive citations of the Bard,’ she said, ’but none quite as . . . extraordinary.’ Zoe looked at Maria – Haraldr would not turn to see Maria’s reaction – and then back at him. ‘I had no notion that your . . . inclinations extended to verse.’

‘I hope that your Imperial Majesty and this estimable lady do not consider it an indignity. In my own tongue, which has not the grace of the Greek but is not without its own beauties, I have composed verses of my own. And I have three men in my company who record in verse the valour of the Varangians as we serve your Majesty. It is customary for a Norse king never to be far from his poets. We call them skalds.’

‘But you are not a king.’

Haraldr concentrated on not lowering his eyes. ‘No,’ he answered firmly. ‘But then no Norse King has had the privilege to stand next to your throne. Perhaps I imagine myself above them, though I am just the servant at your feet.’

‘Anna,’ said Zoe, turning to the rapt girl, ‘I believe you have found a gallant. If he can celebrate your beauty in our tongue, think what glories he might ascribe to you in his own.’

Haraldr only wished Halldor could hear this. He turned and glanced quickly past Maria, as if he were checking on the eunuch who held his axe. Hah! She was looking at him.

The second course was a whole goat stuffed with delicate miniature onions and other tiny vegetables. Haraldr was grateful for the distraction, as he realized that Halldor’s first lesson had not included all he needed to know. If he lingered by Anna’s booth too long, pointing and jabbering, then certainly Anna would demand a price he could not meet, or else shoo him away. It was endless.

Fortunately a dance with men and women in sheer gauzy costumes gyrating madly to wild, ringing, circular music followed the dinner. Haraldr watched the Empress for a moment; her eyes seemed to fill with the music and sinuous movements as if they gulped the pleasure of love. She devoured with those eyes, the dancers, Kalaphates. The Strategus Meletius Attalietes, now wearing white, was readmitted to the table. Maria began to converse animatedly with him.

When the dancers were finished, Haraldr drank deeply and met Anna across the table. He desired her now; he felt she desired him, and there seemed to be no caveats against a woman of the court freely enjoying a man, even a barbaros. She raised her goblet to him, he to her. They remained locked, sipping, their eyes like stroking fingers, their tongues darting over silver. Haraldr’s head dizzied; they no longer mixed the wine with water. He signalled the eunuch and told him that Ulfr should assume command of the Varangians for the rest of the night.

Zoe rose and drank toasts, and the voukaloi chanted. First to Constantine, then to Kalaphates. Shockingly Kalaphates came beside her. He sat on the couch next to her. ‘Nephew,’ she said, and she pressed her wine-dark lips to his forehead and touched his hair. Haraldr felt the seduction around him like a great, hot, yet fragrant wind, sweeping, sucking. It was their perfumed scent, the vague outline of nipples beneath silk, perhaps the air of this place. He desired.

The voukaloi celebrated the pastries and fruits. Haraldr took a fig. Someone was on the rope high above again. Anna nodded, eyes heavy with desire. She bared her teeth, she . . . Kristr! Anna’s head bobbed and then plunged to the table, nearly crushing a silver-wreathed pastry. She raised her head again, but the eunuchs were around her like white spume and whisked her away like a white cloud riding the wind. The Empress had not even noticed. Haraldr steadied himself. Halldor, he lamented dizzily, now there is only one booth open.

Citron was at his side like an answered prayer. Her gauzy robe hid little more than her working costume had; the nipples were dark. Citron sat, bringing a mist of rose and pine with her. Her arm was smooth and cool around his neck, her breath hot on his ear. Another white arm drew her back.

So. Haraldr turned and met Maria’s eyes; it was she who had taken Citron away from him. Even with the herons fluttering in his head she was as detailed as one of the Empress’s jewel-like icons. The scroll of her lips, seemingly painted with blood; the slight flare of the delicate nostrils and the chiselled tip of her nose; the gull-wing brows. She did not flinch from his rapture, nor did her blue silk irises flare with jealousy. She stared at him for a moment and then her glistening lips descended on Citron’s ear, almost as if she, too, desired the lithe acrobat. But Maria only whispered something, then drew away. A eunuch bent to Maria, listened for a moment, and nodded to Citron.

Citron almost imperceptibly tilted her head. Then she wrapped Haraldr like a hot breeze, like cool marble, her fevered lips on his.

John Chimachus, Turmarch of the first Brigade of the Imperial Thematic Army of Antioch, waited alone in the darkness. He watched as the pearl-faced moon settled just above the eerily luminous crest of Mount Silpius. He did not like it on this side of the mountain, with Antioch hidden to the west. Silpius was the city’s great natural shield, and on this eastern slope of the peak he felt about as safe as he would were he advancing into battle with his shield behind his back.

Something rattled, and Chimachus gripped the pommel of his sword. He looked back at the skewing arms of the thick-trunked old tree, isolated in a rock-strewn pasture. The peasants had tied talismans in the branches, bits of cloth, bells, entire weather-shredded garments hanging like moss. To appease the djinn of the place, thought Chimachus. He wished there was some djinn he could appeal to; things had been so much easier when he was a mere koines in command of a vanda. Then he simply had to worry about fighting Saracens. Not about making deliveries to them in the djinn-haunted night.

Chimachus looked at the leather bags at his feet. His Strategus, Constantine, ran an army in a queer sort of way, all his letters and dispatches and sealed missives. And for the past two days, Theotokos! Four of the dispatch unit’s fastest horses were lame and a good messenger was even now being treated with St Gregory’s salt in the Brigade hospital. Of course something was up; why else would a Turmarch be standing alone in a Christ-forsaken pasture? But the Strategus who had ordered these strange things was very close to the Imperial Dignity. What he bade was done, and questions were a waste of time.

Good. He heard the hoofbeats. If they had wanted to come with stealth, he would have seen them first, and by then it would have been too late to outrun the Saracen horses. Then he saw the silhouettes as the horsemen rode over a slight ridge to east, just four of them. Four black horses. They do not like this night, thought Chimachus, and perhaps this errand, any more than I.

The horses wheezed, sweat lustrous on their necks and flanks. The black robes of their riders concealed all but black faces. White teeth, lit by the moon, appeared with frightening brilliance. ‘Yes?’ asked the black face from atop the largest horse.

‘Yes.’ The Turmarch grunted as he handed up the first bag. The other horsemen came forward in turn. After the fourth bag had been laboriously hoisted, the horseman who had spoken nodded, spurred his horse, and led the others galloping into the night.

The Turmarch returned to his own horse and gently soothed the beast’s sweat-crusted neck. A pack mule