The Scourge of God

The senator bowed. “Bigilas has offered his own son as proof of our good will, kagan, reminiscent of how the God of our faith offered his. Peace begins with trust, and surely this reinforces your faith in our intentions, does it not?”

Attila was silent for so long that all of us became uneasy.

Silence hung in the room like motes of dust.

“Indeed it does,” he finally said. “It tells me exactly what your intentions are.” Attila looked down at Crixus. “You are a brave and dutiful boy to come all this way at the command of your father. You demonstrate how sons should behave. Do you trust the sire of your flesh, young Roman?”

The boy blinked, stunned at having been addressed. “I—

I do, king.” He searched for words. “I am proud of him.” He beamed.

Attila nodded, then stood. “Your heart is good, little one.

Your soul is innocent, I think.” He blinked once. “Unlike your elders.” Then he let his dark eyes pass over each of us in turn, as if seeing inside our hearts and selecting different fates for each of us. Instantly we knew that something was desperately awry. “It is too bad, then,” the despot rumbled,

“that your father has utterly betrayed you and that you must be tortured for his sins.”

It was as if the air had gone out of the room. Maximinus gaped like a fool. Bigilas went white. I felt confused. What treachery was this? Poor Crixus looked like he had not understood.

“We will uncoil your entrails like yarn and let my pigs feed on them,” Attila described without emotion. “We will boil your toes and your fingers, immersing them one by one so that you will know the pain of the last before we start on the next. We will cut away your nose, flay your cheeks, and break out your teeth in turn—one per hour— and cinch a thorny bramble around your privates and pull until they turn purple.”

Crixus was beginning to shake.

“What madness is this?” the senator croaked. “Why do you threaten a child?”

“We will do these things—and my wives will giggle at your screams, young Crixus—unless your father shows the honor that you have shown.” Now Attila’s dark gaze swung to settle on Bigilas.

“S-show honor?” stammered Bigilas. The guards, I saw, had quietly formed around us. “Kagan, what can you—”

“We will do it”—here Attila’s voice was rising to low thunder—“unless the translator here tells me why he has brought fifty pounds of gold from Constantinople.”

We other Romans turned to Bigilas in consternation.

What was Attila talking about? The translator looked stricken, as if told by a physician he was doomed. His legs began quivering, and I feared he might collapse.

Attila turned to his chiefs. “He did bring fifty pounds, did he not, Edeco?”

The warlord nodded. “As we agreed in the house of Chrysaphius, kagan. We searched the translator’s saddlebags just moments ago and brought it here for you to see as proof.” He clapped his hands once, a sharp report. Two warriors came in bearing sacks, leaning slightly from the weight. They strode to Attila’s dais and slashed open the sacks with iron daggers, releasing a shower of yellow metal.

Coins rolled at Attila’s feet.

The boy’s eyes were darting in confused terror. I could smell his urine.

“Edeco, you know what this gold is for, do you not?”

“I do, my kagan.”

“This is some monstrous misunderstanding,” Maximinus tried wildly, looking to Bigilas for explanation. “Another present sent by our emperor, as proof of—”

“Silence!” The command was as final as the fall of an ax.

It echoed in the chamber, ending all other sound. It was an order that made courage desert. What insanity had I enlisted for?

“Only one man here needs to be heard from,” Attila went on, “the one who can save his son by practicing the honesty he claims.”

Bigilas was staring at Edeco in horror and hatred. The betrayer had been betrayed. Edeco had never intended to carry out his promise of assassinating Attila, the translator realized. The gold was a trap. Now he fell to his knees. “Please, my son knew nothing.”

“And what nothing, translator, did the boy not know?”

Bigilas bowed his head miserably. “It was a mission en-trusted to me by Chrysaphius. The money was to bribe Edeco to assassinate you.”

Maximinus looked like he’d been struck by a German long sword. He reeled backward, his face pained. His mission, he understood instantly, was in ruins. What treachery for the chief minister to not tell him of this plot! The proud senator had been made a complete fool. Worse, it probably meant the end of us all.

“To murder me, you mean,” Attila clarified, “when I was most trusting and most defenseless—while I slept or ate or pissed. A murder by my most trusted warlord.”

“I was only obeying the will of my master!” Bigilas wailed. “It was all Chrysaphius! He’s an evil eunuch— every man in Constantinople knows it! These other fools were ignorant of the plot, I swear! I was to fetch my son and with him the gold . . .” Suddenly he swiveled toward Edeco, furious. “You gave your word that you were with us! You promised you would assassinate him!”

“I promised nothing. You heard what you wanted to hear.”

The translator was beginning to weep. “I was no more than a tool, and my son ignorant. Please, kill me if you must, but spare the boy. He is innocent, as you said.”

Attila’s look was contemptuous. A quiet that really only lasted moments seemed to us Romans to last hours. Finally he spoke again. “Kill you? As if your master would care? As if he wouldn’t send a hundred idiots to try again if he thought one of my generals was foolish enough to believe him? No, I won’t waste the moment’s work required to kill you, translator. Instead, you will walk barefoot back to Constantinople with your bag around your scrawny neck, its gold replaced by lead. You will feel each pound with every step of your bleeding feet. My escorts will ask Chrysaphius if they recognize the bag, and he will do so, or you will die.

Then you will tell Chrysaphius that you met ten thousand Huns and could not find even one who would raise his hand against the great Attila, not for all the gold in the world. This is what your Empire must understand!”

Bigilas was weeping. “And my son?”

“If he is foolish enough to go back with you, he may do so. Maybe he will become smart enough to despise you and find a proper mentor. Maybe he will eventually flee the corruption of his father and come live the clean life of the Hun.”

Crixus collapsed, holding on to his father as they both bawled.

“God and the Senate thank you for your mercy, kagan,”

Maximinus said shakily. “Please, do not let this blind foolishness destroy our partnership. The emperor knew nothing of this monstrosity, I’m sure! Chrysaphius is a vindictive plotter, all men in Constantinople know this. Please, let us make amends and start our talks—”

“There will be no talk. There will be no negotiation.

There will only be obeisance or war. You, too, will return to Constantinople, senator, but it will be backward on an ass, and my warriors will make sure your head is always pointed toward the land of Hunuguri as you ponder your foolishness.”

Maximinus jerked as if struck. The end of his dignity would be the end of his career. Attila, I was certain, knew this.

“Do not humiliate Rome too much,” the senator said in despair.

“She humiliates herself.” Attila considered. “You and the one who betrayed you can contemplate my mercy. Yet none dare raise a hand against Attila without someone being struck down in consequence. So he”—Attila pointed at Rusticius—“will die in place of his friend. This man will be crucified to rot and dry in the sun, and his dying words will be to damn to Christian Hell the greedy and corrupt companion who put him in such danger.”

Rusticius had gone ashen. Bigilas turned his face away.

“That is not fair!” I cried.

“It is your Empire that is not fair or trustworthy,” Attila said. “It is