with inland cities. Roads into a desert had military uses only. But the Saracen familiarity with the desert, plus our own hold on the sea, had worked another revolution in the conditions of everyday life.
We were now passing through the main gateway into the city. Above us, in gold letters set into the granite, the one inscription anywhere to be seen said in Saracen: ‘There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is His Prophet.’ Inside the gateway was one of the remnants of much older work that had survived the Persians. This had recesses set into it and was covered with plaques. But the statues had all been removed. So far as I could tell, the inscriptions had been cemented over or otherwise obliterated. All that was left and that I could read was a partially obscured notice of a tax remission granted by some emperor whose name was now missing. We passed into a large courtyard, surrounded by very high walls. At the far end of this was another gate that led into the city. Here, the little people who’d been going in or out had been lined up to bow down before the three chairs and all their army of guards as they went by.
I had assumed a very short pause in this holding courtyard before we went through the other gateway into the city. People of our quality are not to be delayed by local guards. But the far gate was shut, and no one seemed inclined to get it open. Now, some other commander of the gates – this one of normal size, but with a false beard – crept out through a side door into the city, and began a whispered conversation with Karim. The brown face tightened again. He gave me a long and thoughtful look. Above the gate into the city, I could see what had been three plumes of smoke now as a single rising cloud.
‘Your Magnificence will forgive us,’ said Karim with false jollity, ‘if we await the restoration of order on the city streets.’ He got down from his chair and clapped his hands. Attendants hurried out of a low building, in their hands cups of honeyed ginger cooled with snow from the mountains. I took and drank, and ignored the smell of burning that drifted from behind the far gate as often as the breeze lined up. I uttered some non-committal politeness to Karim. But he was listening again to a low and urgent commentary from the man with the false beard. It was too fast and low for me to follow. So I sipped again and dug round in the front pouch of the carrying chair for my fan. Before I could find the thing, Edward was flapping his own at me. I smiled graciously and settled back. Someone behind me arranged the cushions into a more convenient softness. Karim went over to the doorway of the building to continue his conversation.
‘So what went wrong, My Lord?’ Edward asked.
I sniffed at the thin smoke that was now about us like a mist, then realised the boy hadn’t got his tenses wrong. He was still asking about the past. I tried to think of a neutral answer. But if Karim could just about make himself understood in Greek, neither he nor anyone else within hearing distance could be supposed to know a word of Latin. Though I’d keep my voice low, we were safe enough. We could discuss the Victories of the Just from whatever point of view we pleased.
‘Two days later after that triumphant celebration of world empire restored,’ I said, ‘we got a letter in comically bad Greek. It was brought to us by someone who was passing by Jerusalem with a train of camels. While we were otherwise occupied, some merchant who claimed an acquaintance with the Archangel Gabriel had unified all the Saracens under his own rule. He’d ever since been preaching them out of their less constructively barbarian ways. Now, he was inviting Heraclius, Lord of the Earth, to bow down before him. Of course, the letter went unanswered. Shortly after, the merchant died. That should have been the end of the matter. But this new faith didn’t die with its founder. His followers waited a couple of years, then burst out of their desert homes.
‘At first, we thought it was just an opportunistic raid. The Saracens had been an occasional pest for centuries. Then, after our efforts at reinforcement failed, we found that what had been taken back from the Persians was lost again for good.’
I laughed bleakly. ‘When he gave his victory speech in the Circus in Constantinople, Heraclius departed from the text I’d written for him and referred to some prophecy a monk had jabbered down from atop a column: that before his reign ended, the Euphrates would no longer be the frontier between two empires. The man was spot-on, it turned out. Sadly, that river does now run through a single empire – it just isn’t now our Empire! Still, it might have been worse.’ I thought of those desperate holding battles we’d fought along the southern borders of our Asian Provinces. In Syria, and then Egypt, we’d lost our two richest provinces to these people. But we’d kept the rest. It might have been worse. And worse it might still be.
But the inner gate was now opening, and fingers of black smoke drifted through. I stared a question at Karim, who looked back, trying to keep the embarrassment from his face. He got back into his chair, and the carrying slaves took hold again of the long poles to front and back.
‘You might ask,’ I added quickly, ‘why we didn’t put up a better fight. But, you see, the all-conquering armies of Heraclius had been paid off, and we had no money to raise more. It didn’t help that Heraclius had flooded the regained provinces with tax gatherers – though worse than that were the priests he sent in to bully everyone into the Monothelite Compromise.’ Yes, the Monothelite Compromise. Sergius and I had been very proud of that. Properly sold, that could have ended two centuries of dispute over the Nature of Christ. Trust Heraclius to try imposing it at sword point. We’d simply got three verbal farts for the theologians to cry at each other, instead of two. But I put the sad recollection from mind and carried on with the matter in hand. ‘The Saracens caught us off balance. If Heraclius had died of a seizure in that Jerusalem ceremony, I’d certainly have got young Constans to take the right action.
‘On the other hand, Heraclius may for once have been right when he buggered up what little resistance we could offer. When they were attacked, the Persians didn’t have our choice in the matter. For prestige reasons, they had to stand and fight. They threw everything we’d left to them at the Saracens when they invaded. They were utterly defeated, and their whole empire was swallowed up. We at least were left with the Asian Provinces, where even the common people are Greeks. It may – it really may – have been for the best.’
The lesson was over – rather, my part of the lesson was over. The inner gate swung fully open, and we were carried swiftly forward into the capital of an empire five times larger than the one now ruled from Constantinople.
‘We cannot proceed along the Avenue of the Righteous War,’ Karim said hurriedly. Directly before us, the street had been blocked with large cloth screens. These were held steady by men whose bearded faces my tired eyes weren’t up to seeing in detail, but whose posture indicated nothing happy. I didn’t for a moment doubt that all this was for my benefit. I gave a friendly wave. ‘I am informed that the street has been closed for essential repairs,’ Karim went on. ‘But the Baths of Omar will surely impress My Lord. They can accommodate more people than all the public baths of Constantinople combined. If we go this way, we shall approach them from behind.’
‘Let it be as you wish, my dear young friend,’ I cried happily. If I cocked my good ear in the right position, I could just make out bursts of wild shouting, and perhaps a clash of arms, far behind those fluttering cloth screens. If Edward could hear anything out of the ordinary, his face said nothing. I directed his attention to the remains of a triumphal column put up in ancient times. The statue that had once topped it was long gone – perhaps it hadn’t survived the Persian occupation. The column itself was now surrounded by scaffolding, and was coming down a section at a time.
Chapter 34
‘On behalf of His Majestic Holiness the Caliph, Commander of the Faithful,’ the Grand Eunuch trilled in very dramatic Greek, ‘I must announce that Your Magnificence is our most honoured guest. All that you may require, it shall be our pleasure to give.’
I looked out of the window at the bronze pipe that was loosely held in hoops six feet apart. These, in turn, were clamped to the outer wall. I didn’t need the demonstration he’d failed to arrange. I could see that, if the animals on the ground moved fast enough, it would rotate, and water would be carried up by its internal screw to the vast copper tank that took up most of this floor of the tower. I wanted to ask how the screw would be turned that carried water from this tank to the one that must have been set into the roof of the tower. I also wondered how much noise all this would make as it grated round and round in those weather-roughened hoops. But I suspected I’d get no sense out of the creature. Better to wait and see for myself.
‘It is to free you from the polluted air of the city that I have given you rooms in the Tower of Heavenly Peace,’ he explained, just a hint in his voice to give the true motive. ‘You are free to come and go as you please. You merely need to have the carrying slaves summoned with your internal chair to be moved up and down, and to be
