A Death in the Venetian Quarter (23 page)

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Authors: Alan Gordon

BOOK: A Death in the Venetian Quarter
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“Why do they denounce him?” protested the flutist. “Can't they see he only brought the army out to decoy the Venetians away from the seawall?”
“My fellow entertainer, I am surprised at you,” I said. “First law of pleasing the public is to give them what they want, whether it's performing or warfare. Displease your audience, and you'll be run out of town.”
“He won't leave,” she declared.
“He will if you persuade him to leave,” I said.
She looked at me, her eyes narrowed down to slits. “That's why you're here with a knife at my back? To ask me this? Why should I?”
“Because he'll listen to you,” I said. “And because it will suit your masters as well.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“I've been following you, you know,” I said. “Ever since I saw you hook up with that captain in the Moslem quarter. You're a Saracen spy, milady, and I've got the goods on you.”
“Who will believe you?” she scoffed.
“Quite a few people,” I said. “But I'm not interested in denouncing you. I want you to work your seductive charms on the Emperor and get him to leave town. I don't think he'll need a lot of persuading. And it will be in your interests.”
“You see, lady, we figure that with Alexios off the throne, the Crusaders are going to have to remain here a while just to help the new regime settle in,” explained Rico. “And since your masters have been doing whatever they can to keep the Crusade from coming to a theater of battle near them, you'll come out smelling like a rose.”
She looked back and forth between the two of us.
“Who do you work for?” she demanded.
“We're just fools,” I said. “We work for no government and no church.”
“And if I refuse, you denounce me,” she said.
“No, lady,” I replied. “If you refuse, then we report how, in your despair over the public cowardice and shame of your Emperor, you threw yourself from this very window to your death.”
“It will be a magnificent recounting,” said Rico. “I shall be weeping copiously for your loss.”
“I won't,” I said.
She glanced out the window, estimating the height in her mind and not liking the result.
“And if I denounce you instead?” she asked.
“Listen to what they're shouting down there,” I urged her. “If they storm Blachernae, do you think that the Emperor's concubine will be spared?”
“Excuse me for a moment, ladies,” said Rico. He slipped out the door. Seconds later, we heard a thud and a clatter of armor. He came back in.
“Well?” I asked her.
“All right,” she said. “I'll persuade him.”
I sheathed my knife, relieved. Rico opened the door for us, bowing as we passed by. There was an Imperial Guardsman lying in a heap nearby. The flutist looked at him, then back at the dwarf.
“Did you do that?” she said, impressed.
He bowed, grinning broadly. She walked away, shaking her head.
“Think it will work?” he asked.
I shrugged.
There were cries of panic from the side of the palace facing the city. We ran to a balcony and watched in horror as we saw a great fire climbing the Fifth Hill and surging across the valley before us. Below us, we saw the Emperor and his retinue gallop into the courtyard. The Emperor started barking orders, and servants and soldiers scattered in all directions.
“I'd better get down there,” said Rico. “To think, Julius Caesar gained this empire by crossing a river, and now Alexios has lost it by not crossing one.”
“And that makes all the difference,” I said, watching the flames finally die down just short of the Blachernae wall. “Do you know what I was thinking just now?”
“What?” asked Rico.
“That I had set aside some bread to bake this morning.”
He looked out at the expanse of smoldering embers that had until recently been our neighborhood.
“I think it's probably done by now,” said the dwarf, and he left me on the balcony, wondering where my husband was.
He who had been blinded was ordained to oversee all things.
—NIKETAS CHONIATES,
O CITY OF BYZANTIUM
 
 
N
ight fell, but no bonfires lit the seawall. There was nothing left to burn. Around me, citizens roamed through what was left of the neighborhood, salvaging what they could from their homes. Thieves flitted through the shadows, sifting the ashes for anything of value.
I sat on a low wall by the monastery, watching it all like a hawk. Or more like a vulture. Then I glimpsed a strange sight: a royal procession emerged from Blachernae, consisting of chariots, wains, and Imperial Guards.
When an Emperor merits a triumph in this city, he enters through the Golden Gate amidst cheers and banners, and everyone lines the streets and cheers him on. I guess one would call this little parade a defeat. No one came out to watch Alexios Angelos skulk out of the city. No one except for a tired, sooty fool.
The Emperor was leaning back in a large chariot, a quartet of stallions pulling it along, their hooves wrapped to muffle his departure. His legs were propped up on cushions, and the flutist was kneeling by him, massaging his feet. Irene sat behind them, looking tearful and resigned.
“Hail, sire!” I called as they approached.
He motioned to his charioteer to slow down, and I trotted alongside.
“Well, Fool, I must bid you farewell,” he said. “You will be one of the people I shall miss.”
“You are most kind, milord,” I said. “But you have a musician by your side to give you comfort.”
“That I do, that I do,” he said, stroking her hair. She managed to smile at him while at the same time shooting me a look of pure hatred.
“Now, this isn't surrender, mind you,” he said.
“Of course not, milord. Who could think that the Emperor would surrender his empire?”
“Exactly,” he said, subdued. “The Empire is wherever I am. Divine Providence has seen to my survival.”
“You are truly blessed, milord.”
“Yes,” he said, brightening. “Blessed. That's the word. I still reign, have troops to command, money to pay them, my musical treasure for companionship, and a newly marriageable daughter, eh, sweetheart?” He reached back to pat Irene's knee. She cringed and buried her face in her hands. He turned back to me.
“She'll get over it,” he assured me. “Not the first husband she's lost. But I'm saving her for an alliance somewhere. Daughters are quite handy when it comes to that sort of thing.”
“Your wife, milord?” I asked.
“Where?” he cried in alarm, looking over his shoulder. Then he regained control of himself. “Well, yes, my wife. Need to leave someone here to run things for me, don't I? What she always wanted to do. I'll leave the city to her. And Laskaris. I always liked him. Capable fellow. I'll make him my heir someday if Irene can't catch me a better one.”
Irene started wailing.
“Oh, do stop that, the journey's going to be long enough as it is,” he muttered. “Well, Fool, thank you for all the funny stories and songs. Good luck. And if you see my wife, give her my regards.”
And he rode off, chuckling to himself.
I watched the wains go by, guards escorting them on both sides. They must have taken every surviving horse in the army. Then, as I was about to turn and leave, I saw a pair of donkeys pulling a familiar-looking cart.
Rico reined his animals to a halt when he saw me.
“Just where do you think you're going?” I demanded.
“I think they said Develton,” he replied. “That's somewhere up north, but they're going the long way round. Don't want to risk any inadvertent encounters with a real army.”
“What are you doing?”
“Someone has to keep an eye on him,” he said. “Do you know what's in those wains? Most of the Imperial Treasury. I saw them loading it. He's down, but by no means out. He has an army, gold, and Irene, and with those three things he can make a lot of mischief still. As soon as we get settled, I'll get word either to you or the Guild.”
I looked at him, not knowing what to say.
“Come on, Feste,” he said. “I'm the Emperor's Fool. It makes sense.”
I grasped his tiny hand and held it for a moment.
“Take care of yourself,” he said gruffly. “Give my love to that wife of yours, and good luck with the baby. And teach Plossus how to cook a decent meal before I get back.”
“We will,” I promised.
He flicked his reins, and the donkeys followed the wains down the Mese. I watched them until they turned at the Forum Amastrianum and disappeared.
I was hungry. I couldn't remember when I had last eaten. I rummaged through my bag and found some dried fruit and some nuts, which I wolfed down, following with the dregs from my wineskin.
I picked my way through the rubble, trying to figure out where our house once was. Eventually, I found the ruined walls outside the courtyard,
and stepped over the stones that had made up the archway at the entrance.
The house itself was a pile of charred stones and ashes. I stirred through them, finding only a few copper pots, and even these were twisted and deformed by the conflagration whose fading heat I could feel even now through the soles of my boots. I stood where I thought our bedroom had been, where our child had been conceived. I wished the bed had survived. What I wanted to do more than anything at the moment was sleep.
“Twas the heat of our passion that caused all this,” said Aglaia lightly as she came up behind me.
I turned around and pulled her to me.
“You live,” I whispered.
“So I do,” she said, and she kissed me hard to prove it.
“Looks like we lost everything,” I said when we finally separated.
“Things, Feste,” she said, wrapping her arms around me. “We lost things, not everything. Things can be replaced. And speaking of things that need replacing, Philoxenites wants you back at Blachernae.”
“He does? Why?”
“To help replace the emperor.”
“I don't want to be the emperor.”
“Why not? At least we'd have somewhere to live. Come, Fool.”
She led me toward Blachernae.
 
The throne room had been stripped of its finery. The remaining bureaucrats milled about, while some I recognized as senators peeked into the imperial bedchamber as if they were gawking tourists.
Niketas Choniates came up to me and shook my hand warmly.
“Well done!” he whispered. “I don't know half of it, and I suspect that's the half I don't want to know, but well done, Feste. And you, Mistress Aglaia. If there's anything I can do—”
“We need a place to stay,” she said bluntly. “We were burnt out of ours.”
“You shall stay with me,” he said firmly. “And that other fool as well. It will be a vast improvement over my usual dinner companions. Now, go over to the eunuch. We have work to do.”
Philoxenites was leaning against the far wall, watching everyone. He grimaced when he saw me.
“You look like hell,” he observed.
“They have fires there, I think,” I replied.
“You're friendly with that Varangian captain, aren't you?” he asked.
“Henry,” I said. “Yes, I am.”
“Get him here as quick as you can,” he ordered. “Smooth things out with him on the way. I've sent for the other captains already. Euphrosyne and Laskaris are trying to assert their authority. We need Isaakios on the throne by dawn.”
“I'll meet you back here,” I said wearily.
I left Aglaia with Nik and trotted out of Blachernae. There was a ramp going up to the top of the seawall. I climbed it and ran along the top, glancing out at the fleet as I did. The Venetians had anchored for the night, but they kept long torches projecting from the sides of their vessels to prevent any low boats or rafts from floating up by them under the cover of darkness.
The Varangians at the walls and towers had been up as long as I and had been in heavy fighting to boot. They looked close to death but kept up the watch while teams of laborers repaired the damage to the Petrion Gate. It was here that I found Henry, supervising the work. He looked at me bleakly as I approached.
“You're wanted at Blachernae,” I said.
He spat. “Who wants me?” he asked. “Who is left there with the authority to tell me what to do? Who should order a captain of the Varangians by using a fool as an intermediary?”
“You swore an oath to an emperor once,” I said.
“And that emperor has betrayed us all. That oath no longer binds us.”
“Not that emperor,” I said.
He looked at me. “What are you talking about?”
“Please come with me, Henry. I am appealing to you as a friend, not as an intermediary.”
“There is no place for friendship here,” he said. “Cnut's dead. He was as good a friend and as valiant a soldier as any man could be, but he's dead nonetheless.”
“I know,” I said. “I'm sorry. Come with me, Henry. There isn't much time left.”
He picked up his axe and gave orders to one of his men, then walked with me to Blachernae.
 
The assembled captains of the Varangian Guard gathered in the office of Constantine Philoxenites. Six burly axe-bearers stood suspiciously on one side of the room. On the other sat the fat, bald eunuch. Between them was a fool, sitting on the windowsill, wondering why he was still here.
“My good friends,” Philoxenites began.
“We're no friends of yours,” said one of them.
“No fancy words, no appeals to our sense of duty if you don't mind,” said another.
“Very well,” said Philoxenites. “The usurper has fled.”
“Usurper?” scoffed Henry. “You called him Lord until a few hours ago.”
“To my everlasting shame,” said Philoxenites, hanging his head. “I acted dishonorably. Now, I seek to make amends. I do not intend to turn this city over to that French-loving boy. But the people of Constantinople will not have any of Alexios's heirs on the throne. That
leaves only one solution. We must restore the Emperor Isaakios to his rightful place.”
There was shock and anger in the expressions of the captains. Henry stepped forward.
“Let me get this straight,” he said. “We forswore our most sacred oath to Isaakios on your representation that the Greeks would not allow a blind man to rule them. Now, you're telling us that we should put him back on the throne, just like that, and forget all about the oath and the renunciation and the oath we swore to the man you now call a usurper. Do I understand you correctly?”
“Oaths are just formalities, Captain,” said Philoxenites.
“Not to Varangians!” shouted Henry, and the others nodded.
“All right, Captain. You have convinced me that our actions dishonored you. Obviously, reparations must be made.”
“You're trying to buy us off?” asked Henry in disbelief.
Philoxenites shrugged.
“We cannot change the past,” he said. “We can only make amends. Will you let a matter of honor stand between you and the safety of this city?”
“We don't give a rat's ass about this city,” said Henry. “We fight for honor.”
“Honor alone?” exclaimed the eunuch. “If only I had known from the beginning that there was no need for paying you.”
Henry glowered, his fingers playing along the handle of his axe.
“What shall it be, Captain?” asked Philoxenites. “How shall honor be placated?”
Henry held up his forefinger. “One,” he said. “There will be no oath sworn to the Emperor.”
“Done,” said the eunuch.
“Two,” said Henry. “We protect Blachernae from now on. What's left of the Imperials will be under our command.”
“Agreed.”
“Increase our pay by half again as much.”
“I'll have to see what's left in the Treasury,” said Philoxenites. “If there's enough, I will see to it.”
“Four,” said Henry. “When Isaakios dies, the Varangians are consulted as to who becomes Emperor.”
Philoxenites smiled. “As you are being consulted now, Captain. I agree to your terms, and here is my hand in pledge of it.”
I have seen Varangians take on ten times their number with less reluctance than Henry displayed in shaking the eunuch's hand. But the deal was struck, and soon after, I found myself walking with him at the head of a Varangian company back down to Chalke.

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