as they ripened in the sun. But looking towards Constantinople, dark on the horizon with lights shining here and there, Longo felt something pull at him. A part of him always felt more at home in the East, far from the shores of Italy and the squabbles of his countrymen. Perhaps things would be different if he married, as his chamberlain Nicolo had been urging him to do for years. He thought of the Princess Sofia, with her bright, intelligent eyes, and then laughed at himself. He would never see her again, and he knew better than to wish for things he could never have. He had learned that lesson long ago.
Longo turned away and made his way to the ladder leading below decks, but before he could descend he was stopped by a noise so unexpected that it took him a moment to identify it. Floating in and out of the myriad noises of a ship at sea — the creaking of wooden planks, the slap of waves and the constant roar of wind in the sails — was the barely audible sound of someone crying. Longo looked around him, but saw only a few sailors coiling ropes. He listened more carefully. The sound was coming from above him.
Curious, Longo mounted the ratlines and climbed up to the crow's nest, high above the deck. He hauled himself over the side and found himself face to face with William, who looked away as he wiped the tears from his eyes. 'Why aren't you below with the others, William?' Longo asked.
William wiped away a last tear. 'I was just watching the city, the lights,' he said, struggling to master his quavering voice. 'It's like nothing I've ever seen.'
Longo looked out to where the city was still floating past, visible only as a million flickering flames from torches lining streets or fires burning in hearths. Its sea walls rose abruptly from the waves, giving it the look of an island, or some fantastic city afloat at sea, another Atlantis. 'Constantinople is magnificent, isn't she?' Longo reflected.
William nodded. 'Why do they call themselves Romans? They don't live in Rome.'
'They are the heirs to the Roman Empire, with an unbroken line of emperors all the way back to Augustus,' Longo explained. 'In some ways, they have a greater claim to the name Romans than the people of Rome themselves.'
'Is Rome like Constantinople?' William asked.
'Like Constantinople? No,' Longo laughed. 'But it is a magnificent place. It is filled with palaces, fountains, markets where you can buy whatever your heart desires, and beautiful women. I will take you there someday. You will like it.'
'I know I will. And yet…' William looked at Longo steadily, and Longo was surprised to see that the young man's eyes were filled not with sadness, but with anger. 'Part of me does not want to leave this place. The Turks killed my crewmates, my friends. It is my duty to avenge them. I owe them that.'
The blazing eyes, the hatred, William was so much like Longo at that age. 'Do you know, William,' Longo said, 'that I too took up the sword looking for vengeance? Do you know how many Turks have died at my hand? I have killed more men than I can count, more than I dare remember. War is all I know.' He looked closely at William. 'Vengeance will not bring your friends back, nor will it bring you peace.'
'You don't understand,' William snapped, shaking his head. 'The Turks betrayed us. They cut my friends down in cold blood. They killed my uncle, my last family in this world, but they let me live.' William fought back tears. 'I cannot live in peace until they are dead. All of them.'
'I do understand, William,' Longo said. 'Better than you know. I was only nine when a Turkish raiding party came to my family's home outside Salonika. The sultan had claimed Salonika, and I was to be forcibly recruited into the janissaries as part of the devshirme, the gathering. My older brother fought, hoping to save me. He was killed, and as punishment for his defiance, the Turkish commander had my parents gutted and left for the wolves to finish. I took up my brother's sword, thinking I could save them. I surprised the Turkish commander, and had I not been so clumsy, I would have killed him. Instead, I left an ugly gash on his face. In his rage, he beat me almost to death. When I came to, I swore that someday, somehow, I would kill that man. I still see his face in my dreams.'
Longo paused. The lights of Constantinople had been swallowed by the darkness and grey, barely visible land rose from the sea on either side of them — the walls of the Dardanelles Strait. 'But my vengeance had to wait,' Longo continued. 'I was taken to Edirne, the Turkish name for Adrianople, and placed in the acemi oglan, the school for young janissaries.' Longo fell silent. He had never told his story to anybody. He rarely allowed himself to think of it. Now, he gazed into the darkness beyond the reach of the ship's lamps and battled with old memories.
'You were a janissary?' William asked. 'What did you do? How did you get out?'
'Three years after my capture, when I was twelve, I escaped. I tried to reach Constantinople, but I never made it. I lost my way and spent nearly a year wandering the countryside, stealing food and sleeping in barns. I passed through Athens, Kossova, Thebes. Eventually, I stowed away on a ship and ended up on the island of Chios. I lived on the streets until one of the Italian families that rule the island — the Giustiniani — took me in. My parents were Venetian and I could speak Italian, so they made me a house servant. Eventually the head of the family, who had no children of his own, adopted me.'
'And the man who killed your family, did you ever find him?'
'Yes, I found him,' Longo replied quietly. He thought again of the battle of Kossova, of how close he had come to the scar-faced man, of how he had failed. Longo closed his eyes against the pain of the memories. 'Get below,' he told William. 'That is enough talk for one night.' Later that night, long after the streets of Constantinople had been abandoned to thieves and packs of wild dogs, a lone traveller dressed in black spurred his horse along the deserted avenue that wound up the fourth hill, high above the waters of the Golden Horn. The traveller's face was invisible, swallowed up in the shadows of his hood. He kept to the darkness, carefully skirting the intermittent pools of light that spilled on to the road from open windows. At the top of the hill the Church of Saint Saviour Pantocrator came into view, its many domes rising high above the road. The traveller quickened his pace, riding at a gallop into the church courtyard.
Two monks in long, black cowls stood waiting. One took the traveller's horse and led it away to the stables. The other led the traveller into the monastery, along dim passages and down a short flight of stairs to a low- ceilinged cellar, where they stopped at a heavy, wooden door. The monk took a lantern from the wall and opened the door, leading the traveller into the catacombs beneath the church. The catacombs had been built above an ancient cistern, and the air was cold and wet, thick with the smells of rock and decay. Their path twisted and turned amongst the crypts before coming to an end at another thick, wooden door. The monk knocked, twice slowly and then three knocks in rapid succession. Then he pushed the door open, and the traveller stepped inside. The monk closed the door behind him.
The small, brightly lit room was dominated by a rectangular table of rough-hewn stone. Around the table stood three men. To the traveller's left was the rotund Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, Gregory Mammas, a nervous man with small, darting eyes. He had only been named Patriarch after the more influential bishops had refused, not wanting to be associated with Emperor John VIII's policy of unifying the Greek and Catholic churches. The two churches had been separate since 1054, when the pope and the Greek patriarch had excommunicated one another, and the rift between them had only deepened over time.
To the traveller's right stood Lucas Notaras, a tall man with chiselled features and dark, brilliant eyes. Only forty, Notaras had shown himself both an able warrior and an implacable foe of union. John VIII had placed him in charge of the city's defence, a position he had filled capably. As megadux of the empire he was second in power only to the emperor.
George Scholarius Gennadius, a small, wiry man with bright, penetrating eyes, stood across the table from the traveller. Gennadius wore the simple black robe of a monk, his mode of dress ever since he had rejected the patriarchy and retired to the monastery of Saint Saviour Pantocrator. He was the leader of those who opposed union, and he commanded the support of nearly all the Orthodox clergy. From his small cell in the monastery, he wielded far more power than the actual patriarch and almost as much as the emperor himself. It was Gennadius who had called this meeting. He spoke first.
'Welcome to Constantinople, Prince Demetrius,' he said. 'You honour us greatly by accepting our invitation.'
'The honour is mine, Gennadius,' Demetrius replied, pushing back his hood. He had dark black hair, cropped short, and a small beard, immaculately groomed. 'Forgive the late hour of my arrival, but you all understand the importance of my entering the city unseen.'
'Of course,' Gennadius agreed. 'None can know that our next emperor has already arrived in Constantinople.'
Demetrius's eyes glittered. 'So it is true. You wish to offer me the crown.'
