Nine for the Devil jte-9 Read online

  When the girl and the servant had vanished, Anatolius gave John a rueful grin. “The fair young ladies now only come to my house on business. Alas.”

  Chapter Five

  Antonina did not look up as Vesta entered the kitchen of the city house Antonina shared with her husband Belisarius on the few occasions they were both in Constantinople together and not on campaign.

  “The ingredients you requested, my lady,” the girl said, laying a fragrant basket on the table.

  “You took long enough.” Antonina was stirring a pot of boiling liquid set on the brazier. “I thought you were going straight to the market. Have you obtained only the freshest? It makes a difference and if you wish to learn how to make love potions, you must take care to use only the finest herbs and flowers.”

  She finally looked up, frowning, and continued. “And how is my daughter? Still thinks she’s in love with that young oaf Anastasius?”

  “I’m sorry,” Vesta faltered. “But-”

  “You won’t say,” Antonina replied, waving her spoon. Drops of scalding liquid fell on the other’s clothing. “You may be stupid, but you’re loyal. No wonder, if you get to wear your mistress’ jewelry!”

  Vesta’s hand went to one of the dangling silver earrings hung with blue pendants.

  “Her father and I gave her those earrings when she was only a baby,” Antonina said. “Valueless, in case she lost them. Just be certain you’re loyal to the right person, that’s my advice. Here, keep stirring this and don’t let it boil over. It’s a ginger preparation for ailments of the stomach.”

  She examined the contents of the basket. “You didn’t get as many rose petals as I need so you’ll have to get more. If my potion wasn’t so popular with the ladies of the court I wouldn’t need your assistance.”

  My assistance is an excellent opportunity to spy on your own daughter, Vesta thought, but on the other hand it also means I can tell my mistress what you say and do here. “I tried everywhere.”

  Antonina laughed. “You can steal roses from the palace grounds easily enough. Go out tonight, pick as many as you can, and bring them to me.”

  She paused for a heartbeat, staring out the window at the looming wall of the Hippodrome. “Now as to how to make rose water. The rose is a very prettily scented flower, sacred to Aphrodite so the pagans say. Which is probably how it came by its reputation as a kindler of love when used to anoint the skin.”

  “Yes, my lady.”

  “It’s effective with many men. I remember when Belisarius was-but never mind about that. Set that pot aside. I’ll give you instructions and when we have enough rose petals you can try your hand at making a batch.”

  As Antonina spoke it occurred to Vesta that Belisarius would be advised to be careful what he ate and drink when home on leave. With Theodora now gone and considering Antonina’s ambitious nature, she might well be planning to conquer Justinian.

  “Pay attention, Vesta!” Antonina was saying. “All you do is take several handfuls of petals and cover them with boiling water in a lidded bowl. When the mixture is cool, squeeze and remove the petals. As simple as that, but the women at court are too idle to make it themselves and too proud to admit their need of it. And that being so, they can hardly order their servants to make it for them. On the other hand, a visit to their old friend Antonina, a hint dropped, a gift given….”

  A sly look came into her eyes as she continued. “Does your mistress ever use it, I wonder? After all, it inflames ebbing passions. Perhaps that betrothed of hers has a wandering eye? Has he ever made any obscene suggestions to you, Vesta?”

  Vesta clenched her fists and began to wish she could poison Antonina to protect her mistress, or at the very least still the cold voice asking questions she had been ordered not to answer.

  Chapter Six

  During the night a thunderstorm broke the oppressive heat.

  John and Cornelia were startled awake by the crack of a lightning bolt. The strike was near enough to rattle the lamp on the bedside table and the water clock in the corner. John leapt up in time to force the shutters closed against a gust of wind. Then the skies opened. He and Cornelia lay awake, watching flashes of light flicker through gaps between shutters and window frame and listening to rain lash at the brick facade of the house.

  John could imagine sheets of water racing along the streets, wisps of straw, rotting vegetables, animal droppings, and other debris swirling and eddying into corners and soaking baked mud to a soft, clinging consistency. As the air cooled, he and Cornelia drew closer together.

  Around dawn John rolled reluctantly away from her warmth. Pulling on a light tunic, he went to the window and opened the shutters. Crows strutted around the square dragging long shadows behind them, pausing to peck at morsels washed there by the night’s downpour. Their eyes glistened like the wet cobbles.

  “I count nine,” John told Cornelia, as he turned away from the window. “Nine for the Deofil’s own self.”

  “Deofil?” Cornelia sat up in bed.

  “It’s the way they say ‘devil’ in parts of Bretania.”

  Cornelia ran a hand through her tousled hair and gave John a quizzical look. “Those crows are predicting the devil?”

  “It’s not much of a trick. Constantinople has always been full of them.”

  “That’s why we should move to that estate in Greece, the one you plan to retire to. I wish you were leaving the city with me today for good. Maybe the crows are telling you it’s time go.” She had let the sheet fall away and sat worrying at a knot in her hair. She smiled at him to show that her remarks had been meant teasingly.

  A shaft of morning light draped itself from her shoulder, across her breasts, and settled against the rumpled sheets under her thighs. John felt a momentary tightness in his chest, no different than he had felt seeing her in the light of dawn decades earlier when he was a young mercenary.

  He tried not to dwell on that other life.

  Cornelia said, “You remember after we had news that Europa was pregnant we walked in the garden and you saw four crows and told me that our grandchild would be a boy, because the rhyme said four was for a boy?”

  “We shall soon know if the crows are accurate.”

  “The day Theodora died I saw a single crow sitting on the fountain in our garden. One for sorrow, you said. But how many people were sorry Theodora was gone? I wasn’t.”

  “Perhaps the prediction was not for you. Perhaps the crow was meant to be seen by someone else. By Peter.”

  “What? Would Peter feel sorrow over Theodora?”

  “Maybe he is destined to overcook tomorrow’s diner. That would make him unhappy.”

  Cornelia had finished with her hair but she made no effort to get off the bed. “What a funny rhyme for you to carry around in your head, here in the capital so far from its home. It seems out of place.”

  “Like the head it is carried in,” John said. A secret Mithran serving a Christian emperor, the son of a Greek farmer, former mercenary, former slave, a man who had traversed the empire from Bretania to Egypt and Persia. He had spent almost three decades in Constantinople. He carried a map of the city in his mind. He knew the most intimate details of the imperial court and its intrigues. Even so, he did not feel he belonged.

  “I don’t remember you mentioning nine for a devil before. Is it the last verse?”

  “In some versions of the rhyme.”

  “Are there many versions?”

  “Probably as many as you care to make up. Julius was fascinated by fortune telling. He was the friend who introduced me to Mithra. We served together in Bretania. He used to talk to the natives whenever he had a chance. At night, in camp, he’d explain to me, for instance, how I should check the colors of the caterpillars to see if we’d have a cold winter. I’m not so sure some of the peasants weren’t just amusing themselves at his expense.”

  Cornelia leaned forward attentively. “You remembered all the rhymes about crows?”

  “Some of them.
The rain reminded me.” John turned back to the window. Crows still stalked across the cobbles but he didn’t count them. “We had had downpours for a week. If you have never been to Bretania you can’t imagine what it is like. The bitter chill, the icy fogs. Despite the cold, Julius returned from his patrol full of enthusiasm. He had struck up a conversation with an old farmer who recited this new rhyme. Others Julius knew went to seven, or to ten or eleven. This one, he said, had nine for the deofil’s own self and wasn’t that strange since there was another rhyme that had nine for a kiss. Not that women don’t sometimes turn out to be devils.”

  “And did he see ever nine crows after that?”

  “No. The next morning we forded a swollen stream. We must have done that a hundred times. This time he lost his balance or maybe a devil grabbed his leg and dragged him down. Before I could do anything he was carried away in the current and drowned.”

  He heard a soft footstep and then Cornelia’s bare arms encircled him. He felt her warmth press against his back.

  “Come back to bed, John. The carriage won’t be here for a while.”

  ***

  Cornelia left for Zeno’s estate before the sun had warmed the air. John had requisitioned one of the imperial carriages used to transport foreign dignitaries. Mist rose from cobblestones in pearly columns. John turned away before the carriage clattered out of sight beyond the corner of the barracks across the square. He did not like farewells. Under the circumstances he was glad to have Cornelia out of the city and not within easy reach of the emperor should things go wrong with the investigation.

  Peter served John bread and boiled eggs, his lips drawn tight in unspoken disapproval.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” John put his cup of Egyptian wine down on the scarred table. “If the mistress were here we would be having a proper breakfast. But when I was a young mercenary without a nummus to my name I would have been happy for such excellent fare.”

  “It would have been a proper breakfast indeed for a young mercenary,” Peter replied. “When I was a camp cook we usually made gruel.” He refilled John’s cup. “I intend to visit the market, master. I’m going to see if I can get a really fresh swordfish to grill.” The look he gave John was almost challenging.

  “Swordfish would be excellent, Peter.” John suspected his servant had recalled his fondness for the dish and thought it would cheer him with Cornelia away.

  As soon as Peter limped downstairs and shut the door with an echoing bang that emphasized the emptiness of the house, John went his study to contemplate the Gordian knot he had been ordered to unravel. He wished he could solve his problem by waving a sword at it.

  He glanced up at the little girl in the wall mosaic and sighed. Years ago he had named the solemn, dark-eyed child Zoe but now knew her real name had been Agnes and she was no more alive than the cut glass from which her double and the scene around her were constructed. Despite that, he continued to think of her as Zoe and she remained his confidante.

  In daylight, Zoe stood in a serene country landscape beneath billowing clouds. Later, illuminated by fitful lamplight, the cleverly angled tesserae would reflect satyrs cavorting in the fields and pagan gods rioting in the sky.

  “It’s fortunate you cannot see what’s going on behind you, Zoe,” John muttered. “And equally unfortunate I’m just as blind to whatever has been happening behind my back.”

  He stood at the window. The mists had evaporated, Below, excubitors went in and out of their barracks, whose rain-washed surface gleamed in strengthening sunlight. Beyond the barracks a line of cypresses marked out the perimeters of a garden, more trees embraced a small church, and in the distance lay the Sea of Marmara, above which gulls visiting from the docks and foreshore swooped to and fro.

  By now the carriage bearing Cornelia away would have passed through the Golden Gate at the southern end of the city on its way to Zeno’s seaside estate. He wondered how his daughter Europa was faring, if Peter would find an acceptable swordfish, then chastised himself for permitting his thoughts to wander. Cornelia would send news in due course, Peter would doubtless find what he sought, and meanwhile he must at least organize a plan of attack for his investigation.

  He couldn’t very well investigate everyone at court who had nursed a grievance against the empress, let alone everyone in Constantinople.

  Who had access to Theodora’s sickroom? Not many, so that might be the place to start. But what about those who had some connection with those who had been granted access? A servant, for example, might be working for anyone at court or in the city.

  Time slid away as he sank into thought. He was sitting at his desk, still pondering, when a thunderous knocking brought him to his feet. He hurried downstairs. It was Peter, laden down with a swordfish and a basket of produce.

  “Thank you, master. It is hardly proper for you to let me in. I was on the wrong side of the door to open it.” Peter said as he followed John upstairs.

  John was about to reply when Peter gasped. Before John could turn to catch him, Peter fell backwards. He went crashing down the stairs, coming to rest surrounded by pears and several surprisingly intact pots of honey. A large cabbage had rolled into a corner of the atrium and the swordfish reclined next to Peter’s out flung arm.

  Although he lay flat on his back with his legs stretched straight toward the door, the toe of his left boot pointed at the wall. The sickening angle made it obvious that, unlike the pots of honey, Peter’s left leg was broken.

  Chapter Seven

  “Get hold of his leg above the knee, John. When I tell you, pull as hard as you can.”

  The speaker, Gaius, the palace physician, had helped John get Peter up to his third floor room. Peter was positioned with his left leg extending past the edge of the bed. John clasped his servant’s upper leg while Gaius grasped the ankle.

  “Pull!”

  The physician was a stout, bald man. His big forearms corded with effort. John leaned backwards as he pulled in the opposite direction.

  Gaius’ rubicund face grew redder. With a grunt he twisted Peter’s leg until the grotesquely misplaced foot returned to its normal position. “I think we’ve got it. Let go.”

  John thought he could hear bones snap back into place, but surely that was his imagination. He looked with concern at Peter, whose face was calm but as waxen as that of a corpse.

  The servant smiled weakly. ““Don’t worry, master. For all I can feel, my leg might have been amputated.”

  “You still have your leg,” Gaius said gruffly, positioning the splint under it. “The tibia and fibula were both broken right through, but cleanly and that’s fortunate for you. Help me with these bindings, John.”

  “I am sorry for the trouble, master,” Peter said.

  “You’ll be back on duty in a few months,” Gaius told him. “Your leg will be good as new.”

  The servant sighed. “Can you make the rest of me new as well?”

  ***

  Seated at John’s kitchen table, Gaius looked up from his cup. “I’m grateful for your assistance in helping me set Peter’s leg, but not for this terrible wine of yours. Not that I would ever refuse to drink it,” he added truthfully. The physician had spent so much of his life with his bulbous nose buried in cups it had taken on a wine-dark color. “You’ll have to tie Peter to his bed for several weeks.”

  “That will be difficult,” John replied. “He’ll try to get up before you’re out of sight.”

  “For now, the draught of poppy potion I gave him will make him sleep. He may not be as difficult as you anticipate. After you left us alone I frightened him into agreeing not to get out of bed until I give him permission.”

  John asked how this remarkable feat had been accomplished.

  “Oh, quite easily. I told him he would probably faint if he did and if we found him apparently dead on the floor I would have to establish if he was still living by extreme methods, such as thrashing his chest with nettles or pouring vinegar into his mouth. Accor
ding to Peter, vinegar tastes no worse than your awful wine. So I went on to the possibility of onion juice squirted into the nose and horse-radish rubbed on the tongue. That got his attention. I didn’t have to mention any of the more stringent invasive tests. If the healing goes well, his leg should remain much the same length as it always has been. If not, it’ll be shorter than the other and he’ll limp.”

  “He’s already does, but thinks nobody’s noticed.”

  “It’s age gnawing at his joints. I’ll bring something for that tomorrow.”

  John nodded. His own joints ached on damp mornings like this. “You’ve heard Justinian has ordered me to find out who poisoned Theodora?”

  “Yes. Word gets around fast. I’m under suspicion, needless to say.” The physician drained his cup and reached for the jug. “I attended Theodora until the day before she died, and it was not an easy illness. That last week she was asking for more and more poppy potion and yet it hardly seemed to lessen the agony.”

  “Could anyone have poisoned it?”

  Gaius considered the question. “No. I make it myself from tears of poppy and it never left my hands between completion and delivery to the sickroom. I’ve served as palace physician long enough to know it’s the only way to avoid problems.”

  “Do you think she was poisoned?”

  “No. She was gravely ill. I saw no signs of poisoning. It would have been impossible. Who could have poisoned her? It’s not like anyone could walk in and invite her to have a drink or eat a honey cake. No, I’m certain it wasn’t that, despite what Justinian says. Though if the emperor says a thing is so, as far as we’re all concerned it is so.”

  “He expects me to prove it.”

  Gaius shook his head. “It was a wasting disease, John. There were all the characteristic signs as illness ran its course. Marked loss of weight, yellowing of the skin, increasing pain.”

  He shook his head and took a gulp of wine. “The pain was unimaginable. Several times Justinian summoned me, begging me to give her something stronger. You could hear her screaming all the way to the end of the corridor. I tried to explain to him that there was a limit to the amount of painkiller I could administer and that it could only deaden the agony so far. He was frantic.”