Eight for Eternity Read online

  John ignored his entreaty. “Despite your lack of sight, can you observe much?”

  “Indeed, I am aware of all the comings and goings from the church, which is why I sit here. Also, I am safe from those fools who dash about knocking down innocent passersby in their hurry to get to the wine shop or brothel. It is a good place to ask for charity, being so near the church. Charity, good sir, is all too often overlooked by busy citizens and—”

  “Have there been any Blues or Greens around tonight? A group of them, perhaps? Or just one or two?”

  “None, thank the Lord. When the factions roam the streets nobody’s safe! When they come out to play and start wielding their blades, I go into the church. So far at least.” Maxentius raised his head slightly, as if listening. “I hope the guards have left the church before those ruffians arrive here again.”

  “You are able to identify faction members?”

  “Usually. Always when they are in groups, because of the way they talk. Both their manner and their words.”

  “I will instruct Sebastian you are to be allowed inside if the Blues and Greens turn up.”

  “You are interested in the Blues and the Greens, good sir? Have they wronged you? As they wronged me? If not for them I would not be sitting here in the cold begging.”

  “Is that so?”

  “I swear to it. I worked as a lamplighter in the Great Church. I came across some of those ruffians carving blasphemies into a wall. They grabbed the burning lamp I carried and threw the oil into my face. And that is why I am reduced to depending on the charity of good people like yourself.”

  John had not noticed any sign that the man had ever been burned, but the shadows on the stairs were so deep he could hardly make out the bristly face. He handed Maxentius a coin. “I realize you couldn’t have seen anything,” he said, cutting off the beggar’s profuse thanks. “But did you hear anyone run by within the past hour or so?”

  “Yes, good sir. I heard the church doors burst open and people raced out, heading in every direction, screaming and shouting.”

  That must have been after the alarm was raised and the search for the missing men began, John thought. “Did you hear anyone running earlier?”

  “Many people passed by. None were running.”

  Sebastian had insisted the prisoners had raced away, but since no one had seen them go that was only supposition. They might have left stealthily, but how could you ask a blind man whether anyone had crept by him quietly?

  “Did you hear anything unusual?” John asked.

  “Some military men went by.”

  “Military men? What made you think that?”

  “The sound. Heavy boots on the cobbles.”

  “Anyone can wear heavy boots.”

  “The noise a soldier’s boots make is unmistakable. And there’s the creak of the leather armor, the rattle of swords in scabbards. Even the smell of them.” Maxentius paused. He wrinkled his forehead and his eyelids closed briefly over his foggy eyes. “Ah. How can I describe it to a man fortunate to be sighted? I’m sure they were military men of some sort. When I heard them coming I scrambled into that doorway over there and hid. Just as well because they went up these stairs.”

  “And you say they weren’t running?”

  “No, excellency.”

  “Why did you think them unusual?”

  “Because they were grunting and cursing. ‘Hold on,’ they were saying. ‘Careful. I’ve got it.’ They must have been carrying something heavy.”

  Or two things, John thought. He was not hearing a description of two prisoners who had been freed and fled but rather of men who had been carted away. The stairs were steep and narrow enough that it would have been awkward carrying two bodies up them. Corpses were more difficult to handle than sacks of wheat.

  “How many of these men were there?”

  “At least two.”

  “At least? You think perhaps there were more?”

  “Yes, sir. There could have been three. Or four.”

  Enough to carry two murdered men, John thought to himself. “Where do the stairs go?” he asked.

  “To the cistern.”

  John muttered a curse. “Mithra!”

  ***

  John ran up the steeply ascending, staired alley, guiding himself with one hand on the brick walls of the buildings on his left.

  The darkness of the alley rendered him nearly as blind as the beggar he had left. Here and there an ill-fitting shutter high up in a wall revealed a thin orange line that did nothing to light the Stygian gloom.

  He was ready to draw his blade instantly if necessary. And it might well be needed. There were still roving bands of the factions to be met, particularly in darker reaches of the city such as this, and increasingly in public squares. As the marauders grew bolder there were more reports of them breaking into houses. In this quarter the residents had long since barred their splintered doors and closed the shutters of the mean houses leaning toward each other over the narrow byways, as if in confidential conversation.

  John was breathing hard by the time he reached the top of the incline. The long, heavy wool cloak he had worn over his usual light dalmatic for the chilly journey from the Great Palace to the Church of Saint Laurentius impeded his running. He cut across a packed dirt area, went past a tethered donkey, ducked under an archway, crossed a squalid courtyard, and stepped into a wider thoroughfare lit by a burning cart. Moving through the open area beyond, he became acutely aware of the immense starry dome that suddenly opened overhead. Glowing flecks of ash drifted into the sky.

  Abruptly he stopped. The empty space he had been about to traverse was in fact a black sheet of water. He could see reflections of firelight in the surface.

  John forced himself to approach the edge of the cistern. He did not like deep water. A long time ago, he had seen a military colleague drown.

  The water might have been polished black marble, reminding him of the floor of a palace reception hall. It beckoned him to step forward and test its illusionary surface. John’s lips tightened. He consciously slowed his rapid breathing, only the result of running, he told himself.

  He scanned the surface of the cistern.

  Something floated near the edge. He walked carefully along the verge until he could make out a lumpy half-submerged shape, then knelt down.

  The water’s surface was less than an arm’s length below ground level. He lay down and reached forward tentatively. The floating object remained beyond his reach. Bubbles began to escape from beneath it. Whatever the object was, it sank deeper.

  Gritting his teeth, John pushed the upper half of his body over the water. The black surface tilted up toward him as he stretched his arm out again. The tips of his fingers brushed cloth. He strained until his shoulder felt on fire. He tried to wriggle further forward, began to overbalance, and stopped.

  More bubbles gurgled up and the object begin to vanish into blackness.

  With a quick prayer to Mithra John grasped the edge of the cistern with one hand and let himself drop.

  The water was freezing. He gasped and fought back panic.

  Too late. The floating shape was gone.

  John plunged a hand into the water at the place he had last seen it. His fingers touched and tightened around what felt like a thick, slippery cord.

  He pulled himself clumsily out of the cistern with one hand, keeping his other gripped around the cord. He managed to get to his knees and tugged. Whatever the cord was attached to must have been heavy, judging from the resistance.

  He put his other hand on the cord as well and saw that he held a long braid of hair, the Hunnish style adopted by many of the Blue faction.

  The body finally bobbed to the surface. As John hauled it up onto the ground a brick fell out of its garments and hit the water with a splash.

  John turned away. He stayed on his knees, shaking and dizzy. He had managed to keep himself from thinking as he plunged into t
he cistern, concentrating only on his duty. Now he could feel the black water clutching at him.

  After what seemed a long time he composed himself enough to examine the corpse. The dead man’s neck showed marks of strangulation and one wrist still had a loop of rope around it. At least he had not drowned. To John that seemed like a mercy.

  The dead man was obviously one of the two prisoners. And since he was the Blue, then the other, a Green supporter, was still in the cistern.

  John surveyed the rippling water and shuddered. Perhaps the Green had been weighted more carefully. He must be lying on the bottom, staring up into the dark.

  Someone else would have to drag him out.

  Chapter Two

  “How could they have been murdered? It’s not possible, excellency. I stationed men at every exit from the vault in case the factions decided to attack and managed to get by the sentries outside the church.” Sebastian’s voice shook.

  The white-haired commander led the soaked John down a stone stairway from the vestibule and through a pillared vault to a heavy, nail studded door.

  “I had two guards right here,” Sebastian said.

  The room beyond served for storage. Stacks of oil-filled amphorae sat in the corners. A row of silver lamps occupied a shelf below which an icon, paint peeling, stared out from between piled crates.

  “You say that this young man with the sealed orders came down here and then it was discovered the two prisoners had gone?”

  Sebastian’s long face seemed to grow even longer and more mournful. “Yes. I sent him down the stairs after I saw his official seal. Before long someone shouted that the prisoners were gone and then all was chaos. Murderers were on the loose! Women started screaming they would be ravished and ran out. I asked the priest to help restore calm.”

  “The guards who were stationed at the door were sent out in pursuit?”

  “I sent all my men out to apprehend the criminals. I thought they had escaped you see. I didn’t realize they had been killed.” The man’s voice shook. John could see the growing panic in his face. Sebastian had barely been coming to terms with the disastrous possibility that he had allowed the escape of two men the emperor valued. Now he had to face the even more horrific fact that he had let them be murdered. “You can’t think my guards were involved? Maxentius is blind,” he said, voice shaking. “There are many military men in the city aside from those under my command. There are practically as many soldiers on the streets as beggars! Clearly the killers who dragged the bodies away weren’t from the urban watch.”

  “Were the prisoners already gone when the young man who had come for them went down into the vault?”

  “Yes, excellency.”

  “The guards down here confirmed that?”

  “Someone yelled that the prisoners had escaped. Other guards came in a rush. I was calling out orders, of course.”

  “Was it discovered that the prisoners were gone when the door to this room was opened, or was it open when the young man arrived at it?”

  “But…why would it be open, when my guards were posted right—”

  “What did the guards say?”

  “I didn’t have time to question the guards, excellency. When they return—”

  “And what about this man with the imperial seal? What did he tell you?”

  “I…I…well…I never saw him again. He must have gone after the two prisoners, or gone back to report to the emperor.” The thought of the emperor, whom he had failed so miserably, drained the blood from the old man’s face. “All was confusion,” he muttered. “All confusion.”

  John could believe it. The confusion in the commander’s head alone was apparently enough to confound a philospher.

  John looked around the small storeroom. Nothing seemed to be disturbed. It was ironic that two men should be saved from execution only to be murdered. And murdered and taken away just before the stranger with the seal arrived for them. If Sebastian were to be believed.

  “I would not have permitted anyone to enter the church but the priest insisted the faithful should never be barred from prayer, especially in these unsettled times,” Sebastian went on. “That’s why the entrance at the top of the stairs and storeroom door were guarded rather than the main doors to the church.”

  The vaults at the bottom of the stairs, from which the storeroom opened, surely stretched underneath the whole of the church. There were almost certainly exits other than the stairs they had just taken. Tradesmen and laborers would hardly be encouraged to be coming and going through the vestibule. It would have been easy to get two bodies out of the church without anyone noticing.

  A competent commander might have managed to see that every possible exit was guarded but he suspected Sebastian was not such a commander.

  John turned to leave but paused. He had the uneasy sensation he was being watched.

  He swung around. The damaged icon stared at him. The bearded face was lean and ascetic, his mouth set in a line. His great, black eyes reminded John of the eyes of a snake. Clearly the grim holy man did not approve of what he saw. Or was the icon’s anger directed at whatever had transpired in front of the painted eyes earlier that night?

  If only John could see what the icon had seen.

  ***

  “Please, excellency, warm yourself while we talk.”

  Leonardis, the priest in charge of the Church of Saint Laurentius, was a short, stout man with a voice so deep and resonant it might have been issuing from the vault beneath the church. He prodded coals in the brazier with an iron poker until flames leapt up.

  The tiny room at the back of the church contained a plain wooden desk and stool. Scrolls and codices were heaped in niches in the white-washed plaster walls. The brazier, which appeared big enough to heat the stables underneath the Hippodrome, occupied the space in front of the wall on which hung an equally oversized silver cross. John wondered if the finely wrought metal were too hot to touch. He felt sorry for the gentle Christian god doomed to suffer the searing heat as well as a tortured death.

  Even so he was glad of the heat beginning to dry his wet garments. Steam rose from his cloak and the odor of wet wool filled the air.

  “We often read of monks who prefer unheated cells for their devotions,” said Leonardis. “But Laurentius was broiled to death on an iron frame, as you doubtless know from your reading of the Holy Book. So it is only appropriate for his priest to mediate with the very means of the saint’s torment always before his eyes.” He wiped his perspiring forehead.

  “What do you know about the Green and the Blue who were brought here?”

  “Their rescue was a miracle. Or perhaps I should not call it a miracle, given they were common criminals. A sign from the Almighty. Twice they were hung and twice the ropes broke.” Leonardis rubbed his hands together briskly, though they could hardly have been cold. “And then notice too one from each faction was spared. What if they had been chosen for beheading like their companions in evil doing? A razor-sharp blade is not so likely to break, is it? Yet they did not escape judgment. The Lord has meted out justice before the emperor had the opportunity.”

  “Who were they?”

  “No names were mentioned. The Urban Prefect must know. He condemned them.” Leonardis paused and stared at the coals pulsing with heat. “It is not for us to question God’s will,” he continued, “but doubtless much could have been learnt from them. The emperor’s servants are said to be most persuasive. Yet could any dreadful suffering his torturers inflict be compared to the agony undergone by the blessed martyr Laurentius, broiled to death—broiled! Imagine! Broiled like a swordfish! The faithful call those fires that streak every year through the midsummer skies the tears of Laurentius, but can all the tears of the blessed cool those condemned to the fires of Hell, the endless pain? The unendurable, never ending pain….” The priest’s eyes glistened as he spoke.

  “Indeed,” John said, noting the relish with which Leonardis had posed h
is questions. Here was a man who enjoyed agony, provided it was kept at a safe distance. John had met a number of men with the same trait since his arrival in Constantinople, and it was notable none of them had seen military combat. Yet to hear a priest speak in the same way, with brightened eyes and quickened speech, was repugnant. To kill was sometimes necessary. As a youthful mercenary John had killed, but he never inflicted extended agony. Was Leonardis a man who was capable of violence?

  “It was early when they were brought here. The fog was still fairly heavy when the monks of Saint Conon appeared and demanded entry,” Leonardis went on. “As I understand it, they observed what happened, decided to rescue the pair, and then rowed them across the Golden Horn to this church. Christian charity is all very well but I have wondered…were they bribed to save these men or threatened that if they did not their monastery would be set ablaze?”

  Yes, thought John, either or both were possible.

  Leonardis laughed. “You from the palace are so familiar with such intrigues. How could the monks have known the ropes would break? And not once but twice. No, perhaps it is more simply explained, that those in the monastery saw the hand of the Lord in the incident and felt called upon to intervene. Remember, the monks had already seen others hung, dangling there, not to mention still others losing their heads. They must have felt the disgust we all feel when confronted with such dreadful reminders of mortality and human suffering.”

  John wondered if the priest would take so long to say so little under the ministrations of the emperor’s torturers. “This church has no affiliation with the monastery?”

  “No, but it possesses the privilege of sanctuary.” Leonardis stirred the coals violently again. “I wish they had not been brought here. Those who attend my church have had countless miseries heaped upon them by the factions to which these men belong. I cannot tell you how many of my flock, men and women both, have come to me wounded and sobbing about robberies, violence, vile acts perpetrated on the defenseless, yes, even murder. And guards were posted to keep those criminals safe! Where are they when these men and their like roam the streets?”