The Purple Shroud: A Novel of Empress Theodora (29 page)

‘We can be saddened, as well as pleased, by our memories.’

Having no coin for the boy, Justinian removed a gold ring and handed it to him. It was worth far more than anything the child had ever seen and the boy stared stupidly at what was being offered until the Emperor himself took the child’s fingers and curled them around the ring. ‘You may go now,’ he told him.

The boy leaped up then, ran past Theodora, returned at double pace to prostrate himself, scrabbled with the folds of her gown to find her foot so that he could kiss it, suddenly realised what he was doing, and worse, what it looked as if he was doing, blanched, and ran even faster from the great building.

In the slamming echo of the side door, the only door a eunuch would ever be permitted to use, Theodora burst out
laughing. The absurdity of the situation, her situation, her position, the echo of the child’s life with hers was too much. As was the foolish generosity of her husband – who had just realised he’d given away the only ring Theodora had ever had made for him, and was guiltily awaiting her reaction. She was sad and happy, moved and remembering, and she was with him.

‘I’ll have another made for you.’

‘Perhaps the child will put it to better use than either of us could.’

‘Yes, or offer it to his pimp for payment to make up for the work he didn’t do while he was singing for us.’

‘You think so?’

Theodora shook her head. ‘Maybe not, maybe you really did just change his life.’ She stopped then and turned, slowly, astonished by the sound of her own voice in the church, the way the dome magnified her words and yet held their clarity. ‘This is remarkable.’

Justinian was beside her, quietly moved, but there was no doubting his pride in the accomplishment.

‘What do you think?’ she asked.

Justinian shook his head and when he could speak he said, ‘There have been times when I despised Anthemius.’

Theodora caught her breath, nodded.

Justinian went on, ‘I always knew it was just a matter of waiting it out, that he would finish this project and go on to another.’

‘Young men’s passions quickly change,’ she offered quietly.

‘For which I am grateful.’

They turned together, taking in the size and scale, the delicacy of the gold and silver, the two shades of light that reflected from them, the care in the mosaics, the extraordinary detail topped by the vast rounded reach of the dome, the
splendid columns, and the light. Even with dark night outside, they stood in warm, sparkling, glittering light.

‘You know some in the City are comparing me to Solomon?’ Justinian asked.

‘Again?’ Theodora asked, grinning. ‘Was Gelimer’s comparison not enough?’

‘They say this will rival his temple.’

‘Ah. Yes. He’s a fine comparison for a leader.’

Justinian smiled. ‘And for a lawyer. Though his greatest wisdom may have been in what he didn’t do, his ability to wait for matters to come to fruition in their own time.’

‘Then this will be your monument.’

‘It is ours.’

Theodora smiled and took her husband’s hand, kissing the indentation where his gold ring had been. Tomorrow everything would be about ceremony; she would be up in the women’s gallery, surveying all; he would be down here in the main body of the building, and the church made by her onetime lover would be full of incense and priests. What really mattered was that Justinian, who had just given away a lifetime’s fortune to a eunuch child in a single gesture, was the one person who truly knew her.

The next day, nearing the end of the lengthy consecration service hosted by the almost six hundred religious who now staffed the new church, their numbers swollen to ten times that amount by guests and dignitaries and still more religious, Theodora remembered herself rejected, homeless in Apollonia. She stood in the gallery, while the dome appeared to float above them and winter light flooded in from the windows beneath it, and pictured herself almost twenty years earlier. Sleeping alone in the women’s gallery of a church she had broken into for shelter, she had dreamed that night of
standing on a green marble spot, in a glorious building, safe, warm, and home. And now she was doing exactly that, standing on the green marble Anthemius had found for her, marking the place of the Augusta. The building complete, her marriage safe, her role further confirmed. As she turned to lead her ladies from the church, to take the blessing of the consecration to the thousands more gathered outside, she shivered. This was a glorious dream come true, but not all her dreams were hopeful: she had also dreamed the Nika riots. At least now she had balance.

Two weeks later, when the January winds really began to bite, Macedonia accompanied Belisarius’ messengers back to Constantinople. She brought more depressing news for Theodora.

‘It’s hard there, Mistress, much harder than you might imagine.’

‘Justinian had hopes of a bloodless war,’ Theodora said, and shook her head: ‘almost bloodless.’

‘Impossible hopes. The Goth troops outside the city have cut off the water supply, there’s nothing coming through aqueducts, no drinking water, no baths. Women and children have been evacuated to towns between Naples and Rome.’

‘Those are towns we still hold?’ asked Theodora.

‘Yes. But there are only five thousand Roman troops in the city, and it’s not like here, where you were rebuilding even before the riots. The city is crumbling, shattered, tired. The old walls need reinforcement, and Goths are marshalling outside. A bloodless war is a dream, Mistress.’

At the end of January Justinian agreed to send troops from Greece, but the siege of Rome lasted a full year and a week, every one of those weeks bloody.

*

While the men were busy with war, Theodora was anxious not to let the religious tide slip completely. Macedonia was sent back to Rome with a letter to the new pope Silverius. The Empress intended to bring Anthimus out of hiding and wanted him made Patriarch of Constantinople again. Macedonia’s message arrived before Silverius’, sparing Theodora the frustration of having to be polite to the papal legate who carried the official response. Silverius had refused her request.

Less than a week later, Armeneus came to her rooms, his face solemn. Theodora frowned.

‘More rudeness from the Roman priest?’

‘No, Mistress …’

‘What then?’

‘Mistress, I’m sorry, Severus is dead.’

Theodora clenched her hands into fists to stop herself crying; there were too many people in the room, too many who believed that her support for the anti-Chalcedonians was dangerously strong.

‘How long ago?’

‘Three weeks.’

Theodora nodded. ‘The news has travelled slowly from Egypt.’

‘It’s still winter, Augusta.’

‘Yes, it is.’

Theodora knelt, forcing everyone else in the room to their knees, heads bowed. She knelt so they wouldn’t look at her, and Armeneus, knowing her so well, knowing she needed him now far more than she needed protocol, went to his old friend and held her shaking hands, shaking body, helped her to stand and lean against him as she staggered from the room.

Severus, old already when Theodora first knew him, was dead. The man who had guided her conversion was gone. She
held her emerald Virgin and prayed away her tears, aware that her grief was, as Severus would surely have said, selfish. There was far more at stake than her own sadness. The anti-Chalcedonians had lost strong leaders in Timothy and Severus, and union was even less likely. With each side decrying the other and suppression almost inevitable, she was glad Jacob Baradeus was off in Syria and Anthimus still safe in hiding. Safer, certainly, than her old friend John of Tella who died that same week, the messenger recounting how he had died in a prison cell, the Antioch authorities condemning him for preaching too loudly against the accepted Church.

Infuriated by Silverius, heartbroken over her losses, and with no spiritual mentor to counsel either patience or propriety, Theodora called for Peter Barsymes.

‘It’s all very well my praying that things will work out in the end, but our letters take too long to get to Italy. By the time the responses come back everything has moved on again and we’ve missed another chance for change.’

‘Diplomacy takes time, Mistress, inside the Church even more so. You can hardly travel to Rome yourself.’

‘I don’t need to. The Emperor has Belisarius to do his bidding, it’s time I gave Antonina a task of her own.’

Macedonia was briefly recalled to the City and gave Theodora the best advice on what she knew of Rome. Best, and most private. Then she was sent to Rome again, carrying letters, orders and a gift of good wine for Antonina. Just before Easter, Silverius was invited to a meeting with Belisarius.

Antonina’s letter reported the event to Theodora:

Theodora stopped reading, and frowned. She was sure she knew exactly how good an actor Belisarius was. She took up the letter again:

Theodora grinned, knowing both Macedonia’s faith, and also how likely it was she would find Vigilius’ bashful ambition attractive. She turned to the end of Antonina’s letter.

C
ontrary to Antonina’s hopes, troops were not out of Rome by summer, or even autumn, and it was only when reinforcements sailed in, five thousand men, that things began to go in Constantinople’s favour. To the surprise of all those stationed in Italy, Narses himself followed, commanding an army nine thousand strong. After long and tedious negotiations with Belisarius, when Narses declared he finally understood the Empress’s irritation with the younger man – and while the Goths laid siege to the Roman garrison of Milan – Narses returned to Constantinople and Belisarius marched on Ravenna. The Goths, furious with what they saw as the ineptitude of their own Witigis, proclaimed Belisarius their new king in his stead. Belisarius agreed in public, sending messages to reassure Justinian that it was a ruse to gain entry to the city – unlike Hypatius’ identical message during the Nika riots, Belisarius’ loyalty was believed. Finally, four years after the initial attack, while Constantinople celebrated its feast day, the gates of Ravenna were thrown open, Belisarius announced he was re-taking the city in Justinian’s name, and the women of Ravenna spat on their men who had refused to fight.

*

This time, when Belisarius returned to Constantinople, with Witigis and his wife Matasuntha, and a haul of royal treasures, there was no grand Triumph. The war had been too protracted and costly, with too many reputations and liaisons damaged in the process. Now that Narses was less convinced of the golden general’s infallibility, Belisarius had to content himself with his Italian conquest being celebrated as a victory for the Emperor, rather than himself. The treasures he brought back were displayed in the Great Hall, spoils of war for the Palace staff to view, but not for the City as a whole.

The low-key Triumph was quickly overshadowed by other news. Sittas, appointed Consul two years earlier, was killed in a rebel revolt in Armenia. Word first arrived that he had fallen in an ambush. When more details emerged it seemed he had been killed not by rebels, but by Artebanes, a fellow soldier with whom he was known to disagree on everything from tactics to theology. Narses instigated an inquiry but there were too many conflicting stories and no man prepared to swear that Artebanes was the culprit, though several voiced their suspicions. Artebanes continued his rise through the ranks while Comito was left widowed and Sophia fatherless.

‘I want Sophia at home,’ Comito said, ‘I need her with me, she’s my only link to Sittas.’

Comito had been happy to allow Theodora to keep Sophia with her much of the time, pleased to have her daughter groomed for succession, but she felt differently in her grief, wanted Sophia with her, wanted to see the father through his child.

‘Yes,’ Theodora agreed, ‘she’s a link to Sittas, but I’m giving her more than you or he could ever give her. If things work out as I hope, she’ll need to know the court, the Palace. You can’t keep Sophia to yourself to satisfy your grief.’

Comito stared at her sister. Since the religious problems and the war in Italy had kept Theodora so busy, they had spent less time together. She also suspected that Theodora had pulled away since her affair with Anthemius had ended, Comito could always see through Theodora’s deceptions, and the purple might prove a prettier cloak, but it couldn’t hide everything.

‘Sophia’s an eight-year-old girl,’ Comito tried again, ‘you don’t know what she may become. And you have Ana’s son to groom for succession.’