virtue is our reward!’ She turned to Maria. ‘You are not troubled, are you, little daughter? Symeon simply thought we should know. I can hardly see that it changes anything.’
Maria’s nostrils flared. ‘It means that this Haraldr is almost certainly a principal in this conspiracy. If it is to happen near St Symeon, and this Haraldr says it is to happen here, is he not saying watch out for the dog at our feet when he knows that the lion approaches from behind?’
‘But Komes Haraldr implies that Constantine and Attalietes are allied in this enterprise. There is no sense to that accusation, unless--’
‘Yes! Yes! The best actor is both a liar and a madman! Euthymius would pay a thousand solidi for this Haraldr’s talents!’ Maria’s cheeks glowed, stoked with outrage.
Zoe settled Maria’s hands. ‘I believe he is innocent simply because there is no method, no plan to his contrivances. Why would he have so visibly challenged Attalietes last night if he was in league with whomever wishes Attalietes to play the ass?
In doing that, he has already made Attalietes the fool, thus relieving the scene that will follow of its necessary drama. And why would he warn us of a conspiracy we have already been far more subtly, and misleadingly, alerted to?’
‘So you believe it will happen here?’
‘Oh, dear, I have no concern where it happens.’ Zoe settled back and admired the sad elegance of a crumbling arcade. ‘You must enjoy your day here, my darling. Simply remember that I now regard my Tauro- Scythian, Komes Haraldr, as wedded to me by a loyalty that would embrace death with greedy arms. You must only think to weld him to our cause with a yet more implacable bond.’
Maria looked out on the dead splendour of Daphne and said nothing.
‘Who are these men?’ White wisps of hair clung to the parchment scalp behind Symeon’s ears, and several errant strands floated in the breeze like gossamer. The Varangians stood at rigid attention, breastplates gleaming.
‘I have detailed these men to follow the Empress at a discreet distance wherever it is her pleasure to go.’ Haraldr stood with his single-bladed axe pressed against Emma’s polished links.
‘These men are not necessary.’ Symeon studied the Varangians with his watery stare. ‘They are relieved from their martial duties so that they may imbue themselves with the culture of the ancients. It will heighten their appreciation for the glories of the Roman Empire. Certainly that will make them better servants of Her Majesty.’ Symeon returned to Haraldr. ‘The Empress believes you alone are sufficient escort for her Sacred Person and her ladies.’ Symeon’s bony fingers moved through the air like the passage of an apparition. ‘And, Komes, do not go to her in your war costume. She does not want to be reminded of military matters in any fashion.’
The Empress was accompanied by the eunuchs Leo and Theodore, two serving ladies, and Maria and Anna. She waited for Haraldr and Gregory beneath a single large laurel tree; her own fragrance and that of her ladies blended with the scent of the leaves. ‘Komes!’ she offered enthusiastically. Haraldr mastered his urge to look at Maria’s face. He knelt before Zoe and she gave him her hand to kiss. When Haraldr and Gregory stood again, Zoe regally scrutinized Gregory. Then she spoke sharply to him.
‘She asks if you can trust me. . . .’
‘I understood, Gregory.’ Haraldr looked at Zoe. ‘With my life,’ he said in Greek.
Zoe nodded slowly and graciously, then lifted her crimson hem and whirled. ‘Daphne!’ She plucked a leaf from the tree and pressed it to her cheek. ‘Dear little Daphne. Do you know her story, Komes Haraldr?’ Haraldr shook his head. ‘Daphne was the fairest nymph who lived in this, the fairest place on earth. Apollo, son of Zeus, devotee of beauty, looked down upon her as he rode in the chariot of the sun. Struck by mad longing, he leapt to earth and pursued her! She fled in terror to save the lovely flower of her chastity!’ The ladies seemed highly amused by this passage. ‘But Apollo was swift and relentless! He was upon her, his golden shaft poised to pierce her with the wound from which there is no recovery! Was there no pity among the gods! Daphne pleaded and sobbed, and good Gaea, Mother of the Earth, was stirred to mercy. “Poof!” Gaea decreed. Even as Apollo held her in his arms, Daphne bloomed into the very tree we see here!’ Zoe pressed the leaf to Haraldr’s lips. ‘You see, she still has the freshness of a virgin.’ Zoe turned to her ladies. ‘And she will be fresh and pure for ever, for that is the reward for woman who has never known man.’ Haraldr was startled; the Empress had been so gay a moment before. Zoe whirled again. ‘Ah,’ she said, the lust returned to her voice, ‘but to have loved Apollo even once, to have felt the heat of his golden arms!’
Despite the frivolity of the tone in which the Empress had told her tale, Haraldr sensed that the Romans still had a reverence for their old gods. He looked about at the wonders of Daphne. Behind the laurel tree stood a row of columns, half toppled, with fragments of architraves forming zigzag patterns; the crocus-veined marble was chipped and weathered and spotted with lichen. Beyond these ruins was a perfect grove of ancient cypresses set as formally as the row of columns, and above these cool, dark spires unfolded a tumbled-down city of enormous crumbled columns and jagged walls and ruptured towers and curious rows of small stone terraces, all of it set as if by giant hands into the garland-scattered limestone cliffs. The old gods, the gods of the ancient Greeks and Romans, had lived here once.
‘Nephew!’
Michael Kalaphates strode among the Imperial party, his sparkling robe of white Hellas silk far superior to the tunic of Syrian silk he had worn the previous night. Kalaphates knelt and kissed the Empress’s hand. She clasped his shoulders and raised him up, then turned and whispered to the youthful, full-jowled eunuch, Leo. Although the Empress gave no signal that Haraldr could discern, the ladies stepped away from her. Haraldr was confused; he wondered if he should stay and guard his mother, or offer her his own discretion.
The hand on his arm was as light as if a butterfly had settled there. Maria smiled up at him without guile, her coiled hair almost touching his upper arm. The crimson lips, the pearl teeth; he shuddered perceptibly at the thrill of her presence.
‘May I use your name?’ she asked. Did the multihued, ethereal lights of Halogoland have a sound? If so, her voice was it.
Haraldr nodded. ‘May I call you by your name?’
‘Certainly, Har-aldr.’ The weight of her hand increased minutely. ‘And perhaps you will think of another name for me before we leave Daphne.’ Her tone was an invitation.
Yes, thought Haraldr, your name is already snow-breasted goddess.
‘May I show you Daphne?’ White silk dazzled as she waved her ivory fingers towards the ruins on the heights. With Gregory, the unseen voice, following behind them, they crossed to a paved path that rose in a series of worn stone stairs flanked by small, disarrayed columns. Birds sang and a green lizard scampered from atop a chunk of white stone carved with a floral pattern. Soon the rows of cypresses draped them in cool misting shadows.
‘Did you enjoy our mother’s tale of how Daphne gave her name to this place?’
‘I found it quite beautiful. A skald will often use a tree kenning to describe a lovely woman.’
‘Ken-ning. I’m afraid that word does not translate into the language of Homer.’ Gregory elaborated in Greek. ‘Oh, yes, when a poet likens one thing to another. “He went on his way like a snowy mountain.” So the Bard spoke of fair-helmed Hektor, because his size and ferocity and, some would say, his arrogance put him above other men.’
There was no dominant tone here that could guide Haraldr. Was she teasing him, or was there a threat in her bewitching melody? Had Hektor been too arrogant, too bold, and if so, was Hektor/Haraldr considered to share the same faults? ‘Yes, a kenning is much like that, though not entirely so. Take this example: raven-flocked laurel tree of the golden sea cliffs.’
Maria stopped for a moment and looked up at him. Her silk-sheathed breast brushed momentarily against his sleeve. ‘Whatever might that be?’
‘You. The lovely laurel tree, with hair as dark as the raven’s breast, who comes from the Great City where the mountainous walls that face the sea are golden in the sun.’
Maria simply looked at him for a very long moment. It was as if her eyes were mysterious chasms with blue lights in their depths. She turned and guided him up the steps and out of the cypress grove.
Incredible, thought Haraldr. How could such things be built and then discarded? Men would not abandon such a place, only gods. The huge marble structures clung to the cliffs, dappled all over with flowering vines and lacy ivy. Haraldr and Maria and Gregory walked towards two broken towers surrounded by the glacier-like rubble
