Sailing to Sarantium (50 page)

Above the second tier of pillars the two arches east and west were
pierced by a score of windows each, and Crispin could already
envisage-standing here at night by candlelight-what the setting and
rising sun might do to this Sanctuary, entering through those windows
like a sword. And also, more softly, diffused, through the higher
windows in the dome itself. For, suspended like an image of Jad's
heaven, the dome had at its base a continuous ring of small,
delicately arched windows running all around. Crispin saw also that
there were chains, descending from the dome into the space below it,
holding iron candelabras aflame with their candles.

There would be light here by day and by night, changing and glorious.
Whatever the mosaicists could conceive for the dome and semi-domes
and arches and walls in this place would be lit as no other surfaces
in the world were lit. There was grandeur here beyond description, an
airiness, a defining of space that guided the massive pillars and the
colossal arch supports into proportion and harmony. The Sanctuary
branched off in each direction from the central well beneath the
dome-a circle upon a square, Crispin realized, and his heart was
stirred even as he tried and failed to grasp how this had been
done-and there were recesses and niches and shadowed chapels for
privacy and mystery and faith and calm.

One could believe here, he thought, in the holiness of Jad, and of
the mortal creatures he had made.

The Emperor had not replied to his whispered words. Crispin wasn't
even looking at him. His gaze was still reaching upwards-eyes like
fingers of the yearning mind-past the suspended candelabras and the
ring of round dark windows with night and wind beyond them, towards
the flicker and gleam and promise of the dome itself, waiting for
him.

At length, Valerius said, 'There is more than an enduring name at
stake, Rhodian, but I believe I know what you are saying, and I
believe I understand. You are pleased with what is on offer here for
a mosaicist? You are not sorry you came?'

Crispin rubbed at his bare chin. 'I have never seen anything to touch
it. There is nothing in Rhodias, nothing on earth, that can ... I
have no idea how the dome was achieved. How did he dare span so large
a ... who did this, my lord?' They were still standing near the small
doorway that led back through the wall to the rough chapel and the
Imperial Precinct.

'He'll wander by, I imagine, when he hears our voices. He's here most
nights. That's why I've had the candles lit since summer. They say I
do not sleep, you know. It isn't true, though it is useful to have it
said. But I believe it is true of Artibasos: I think he walks about
here examining things, or bends over his drawings, or makes new ones
all night long.' The Emperor's expression was difficult to read. 'You
are not. .. afraid of this, Rhodian? It is not too large for you?'

Crispin hesitated, looking at Valerius. 'Only a fool would be
unafraid of something like this dome. When your architect comes by,
ask him if he was afraid of his own design.'

'I have. He said he was terrified, that he still is. He said he stays
here nights because he has nightmares about it falling, if he sleeps
at home.' Valerius paused. 'What will you make for me on my Sanctuary
dome, Caius Crispus?'

Crispin's heart began pounding. He had almost been expecting the
question. He shook his head. 'You must forgive me. It is too soon, my
lord.'

It was a lie, as it happened.

He'd known what he wanted to do here before he was ever in this
place. A dream, a gift, something carried out from the Aldwood on the
Day of the Dead. He'd been granted an image of it today amid the
screaming of the Hippodrome. Something of the half-world in that,
too.

'Much too soon,' came a new, querulous voice. Sound carried here.
'Who is this person, and what happened to Siroes? My lord.'

The honorific was belated, perfunctory. A small, rumpled, middle-aged
man in an equally rumpled tunic emerged from behind the massed bank
of candles to their left. His straw-coloured hair stood up in random
whorls of disarray. His feet were bare on the ice-cold marble of the
floor, Crispin saw. He was carrying his sandals in one hand.

'Artibasos,' said the Emperor. Crispin saw him smile. 'I must say you
look every bit the Master Architect of the Empire. Your hair emulates
your dome in aspiring to the heavens.'

The other man ran a hand absent-mindedly through his hair, achieving
further disorder. 'I fell asleep,' he said. 'Then I woke up. And I
had a good idea.' He lifted his sandals, as if the gesture were an
explanation. 'I have been walking around.'

'Indeed?' said Valerius, with patience.

'Well, yes,' said Artibasos. 'Obviously. That's why I'm barefoot.'

There was a brief silence.

'Obviously,' said the Emperor a little repressively. This was a man,
Crispin already knew, who did not like being left in the dark. About
anything.

'Noting the rough marbles?' Crispin hazarded. 'One way to tell them,
I suppose. Easier done in a warmer season, I'd have said.'

'I woke with the idea,' Artibasos said, with a sharp glance at
Crispin. 'Wanted to see if it worked. It does! I've marked a score of
slabs for the masons to polish.'

'You expect people to come in here barefoot?' the Emperor asked, his
expression bemused.

'Perhaps. Not everyone who wishes to worship will be shod. But that
isn't it... I expect the marble to be perfect, whether anyone knows
it or not. My lord.' The little architect gazed narrowly up at
Crispin. His expression was owlish. 'Who is this man?'

'A mosaicist,' said the Emperor, still with a tolerance that
surprised Crispin.

'Obviously,' said the architect. 'I heard that much.'

'From Rhodias,' added Valerius.

'Anyone can hear that much,' said Artibasos, still glaring up at
Crispin.

The Emperor laughed. 'Caius Crispus of Varena, this is Artibasos of
Sarantium, a man of some minor talents and all the politeness of
those born in the City. Why do I indulge you, architect?'

'Because you like things done properly. Obviously.' It seemed to be
the man's favourite word. 'This person will be working with Siroes?'

'He is working instead of Siroes. It appears Siroes misled us with
regard to his reverse transfer ideas for the dome. Incidentally, had
he discussed them with you, Artibasos?'

Mildly phrased, but the architect turned to look at his Emperor
before answering and he hesitated, for the first time.

'I am a designer and a builder, my lord. I am making you this
Sanctuary. How it is garbed is the province of the Emperor's
decorative artisans. I have little interest in that, and no time to
attend to it. I do not like Siroes, if that matters, nor his
patroness, but that hardly matters either, does it?' He looked at
Crispin again. 'I doubt I'll like this one. He's too tall and his
hair's red.'

'They shaved my beard this evening,' said Crispin, amused. 'Else
you'd have been in no doubt at all, I fear. Tell me, had you
discussed how you were to prepare the surfaces for the mosaic work?'

The little man sniffed. 'Why would I discuss a building detail with a
decorator?'

Crispin's smile faded a little. 'Perhaps,' he said gently, 'we might
share a flask of wine one day soon and consider another possible
approach to that? I'd be grateful.'

Artibasos grimaced. 'I suppose I ought to be polite. New arrival and
suchlike. You are going to have requests about the plaster, aren't
you? Obviously. I can tell. Are you the interfering sort who has
opinions without knowledge?'

Crispin had worked with men like this before. 'I have strong opinions
about wine,' he said, 'but no knowledge of where to find the best in
Sarantium. I'll leave the latter issue to you, if you permit me some
thoughts on plaster?'

The architect was still for a moment, then he allowed himself a
small-a very small-smile. 'You are clever at least.' He shifted back
and forth from one foot to the other on the cold marble floor,
struggling to suppress a yawn.

Valerius said, still in his wry, tolerant tone, 'Artibasos, I am
about to command you. Pay attention. Put on your sandals-you do me no
good if you die of a night chill. Find your cloak. Then go home to
bed. Home. You do me no good half asleep and worn out, either. It is
most of the way to morning. There is an escort waiting outside the
doors for Caius Crispus, or there should be by now. They will take
you home as well. Go to sleep. The dome will not fall.'

The little architect made a sudden, urgent sign against evil. He
seemed about to protest, then appeared-belatedly-to recollect that he
was speaking with his Emperor. He closed his mouth and pushed a hand
through his hair again, to unfortunate effect.

'A command,' repeated Valerius kindly.

'Obviously,' said Artibasos of Sarantium.

He stood still, however, while his Emperor reached out and-very
gently-smoothed down the sand-coloured chaos of his hair, much as a
mother might bring some order to the appearance of her child.

Valerius walked them to the main doors-they were silver, and twice
the height of a man, Crispin saw-and then out onto the portico in the
wind. They both turned there and bowed to him, and Crispin noted that
the little man beside him bowed as formally as he himself did. The
Emperor went back inside, closed the massive door himself. They heard
a heavy lock slide home.

The two men turned and stood together in the wind, looking out at the
unlit square before the Sanctuary. The Emperor had assumed Carullus
would be here. Crispin didn't see anyone. He was aware, suddenly, of
exhaustion. He saw lights a long way across the square, by the Bronze
Gates, where the Imperial Guard would be. Heavy clouds blanketed the
sky. It was very quiet.

Until a scream tore through the night-a shouted warning-and a figure
could then be seen dashing madly across the debris-strewn square
straight towards the portico. Whoever it was bounded up, taking three
steps as one, landed a bit awkwardly and went right past Artibasos to
twist and pull at the bolted door.

The man turned, cursing savagely, a knife in his hand, and
Crispin-struggling to comprehend-recognized him.

His jaw dropped. Too many surprises in one night. There were
movements and sounds around them now. Turning quickly, Crispin drew a
breath of relief to see the familiar figure of Carullus striding up
to the steps, drawn sword in hand.

'Scortius of the Blues!' the soldier exclaimed after a moment. 'You
cost me a fortune this afternoon, you know.'

The charioteer, coiled and fierce, snapped something confusing about
the Emperor's protection applying to all three of them. Carullus
blinked. 'You thought we were here to harm them?' he asked. His sword
was lowered.

The charioteer's dagger drifted down, more slowly. The nature of the
misunderstanding finally came home to Crispin. He looked at the lithe
figure beside him, then back at his broad-shouldered friend at the
bottom of the steps. He performed some evidently necessary
introductions.

A moment later, Scortius of Soriyya began to laugh.

Carullus joined him. Even Artibasos permitted himself a small grin.
When the amusement subsided, an invitation was extended. It seemed
that, notwithstanding the absurd hour, the Blues' champion was
presently expected at the faction compound for a repast in the
kitchen. He was, Scortius explained, far too cowardly to cross
Strumosus the chef in this-and he happened to be, for no very good
reason, hungry.

Artibasos pointed out that he'd had a direct command from the Emperor
who had lately left them. He'd been ordered to his bed. Carullus
gaped at that, belatedly realizing who it was who had been on the
portico while he and the soldiers watched in the shadows. Scortius
protested. Crispin looked at the little architect.

'You think he'd hold you to that?' he asked. 'Treat it as a genuine
command?'

'He could,' said Artibasos. 'Valerius is not the most predictable of
men, and this building is his legacy.' One of them, Crispin thought.

He thought of his home then, and of the young queen whose message had
been exposed tonight. He hadn't actually done that himself, he
supposed. But alone with Valerius and Alixana he had been made to see
that they were so far ahead of anyone else in this game of courts and
intrigues that... it wasn't really a game at all. Which left him
wondering what his place was here, his role. Could he hope to
withdraw to his tesserae and this glorious dome? Would he be allowed?
There were so many tangled elements in the tale of this night, he
wondered if he'd ever unwind the skein, in darkness or at dawn.

Three of Carullus's men were detailed to take the architect home.
Carullus and two soldiers stayed with Crispin and Scortius. They
angled across the windy square, away from the Bronze Gates and
equestrian statue, through the Hippodrome Forum and towards the
street that led up to the Blues' compound. Crispin discovered, as
they went, that he was drained and over stimulated, in approximately
equal measure. He needed to sleep and knew he could not. The mental
image of a dome alchemized into that of the Empress, eliding the
memory of a queen's touch.

Dolphins, she wanted. He drew a breath, remembering the sallow
secretary delivering a necklace, the man's face as he looked from
Crispin-alone with the Empress, it would have seemed to him-to the
woman herself, with her long dark hair unbound in her intimate rooms.
There had been layers to that swiftly veiled expression, Crispin
thought. These, too, were beyond him just now.

He thought of the Sanctuary again, and of the man who had taken him
there along a low stone tunnel and through a door into glory. In the
eye of his mind he still saw that dome and the semi-domes around it
and the arches supporting them, marble set upon marble, and he saw
his own work there, one day to come. The Sanctuary behind them was
Artibasos's legacy, he thought, and it might end up being what the
Emperor Valerius II was remembered for, and it could be-it could
be-why the world might one day come to know that the Rhodian
mosaicist Caius Crispus, only son of Horius Crispus of Varena and his
wife Avita, had lived once, and done honourable work under Jad's sun
and the two moons.