Sailing to Sarantium (6 page)

As another rote eulogy of the dead, thrice-exalted, luminous,
never-to-be-equalled Emperor came to a platitudinous close, Oradius
gestured with deference towards the Chancellor. Gesius bowed
graciously and moved to the white marble speaker's circle in the
centre of the mosaics on the floor.

Before the Chancellor began, however, there came another rapping at
the door. Bonosus turned, expectantly. This was remarkably well
timed, he noted with admiration. Flawlessly, in fact. He wondered how
Gesius had done it.

But it was not Flavius Daleinus who entered the room. Instead, an
extremely agitated officer of the Urban Prefecture told the assembled
Senate about Sarantine Fire loosed in the City and the death of an
aristocrat.

A short time after that, with a grey-faced, visibly aged Chancellor
being offered assistance on a bench by Senators and slaves, and the
Master of Offices displaying either stupefied disbelief or brilliant
acting skills, the august Senate of the Empire heard a mob outside
its much-abused doors for the second time that day.

This time there was a difference. This time there was only one name
being cried, and the voices were ferociously, defiantly assertive.
The doors banged open hard, and the street life of the City spilled
in. Bonosus saw the faction colours again, too many guilds to count,
shopkeepers, street vendors, tavern-masters, bathhouse workers,
animal-keepers, beggars, whores, artisans, slaves. And soldiers.
There were soldiers this time.

And the same name on all their lips. The people of Sarantium, making
known their will. Bonosus turned, on some instinct, in time to see
the Chancellor suddenly drain his cup of wine. Gesius took a deep,
steadying breath. He stood up, unaided, and moved towards the marble
speaker's circle again. His colour had come back.

Holy Jad, thought Bonosus, his mind spinning like the wheel of a
toppled chariot, can he be this swift?

'Most noble members of the Imperial Senate,' the Chancellor said,
lifting his thin, exquisitely modulated voice. 'See! Sarantium has
come to us! Shall we hear the voice of our people?'

The people heard him, and their voice-responding-became a roar that
shook the chamber. One name, again and again. Echoing among marble
and mosaic and precious stones and gold, spiralling upwards to the
dome where doomed Heladikos drove his chariot, carrying fire. One
name. An absurd choice in a way, but in another, Plautus Bonosus
thought, it might not be so absurd. He surprised himself. It was not
a thought he'd ever had before.

Behind the Chancellor, Adrastus, the suave, polished Master of
Offices-the most powerful man in the City, in the Empire-still looked
stunned, bewildered by the speed of things. He had not moved or
reacted. Gesius had. In the end, that hesitation, missing the moment
when everything changed, was to cost Adrastus his office. And his
eyes.

The Golden Throne had been lost to him already. Perhaps that dawning
awareness was what froze him there on a marble bench while the crowd
roared and thundered as if they were in the Hippodrome or a theatre,
not the Senate Chamber. His dreams shattered-subtle, intricate
designs slashed apart-as a beefy, toothless smith howled the City's
chosen name right in his well-bred face.

Perhaps what Adrastus was hearing then, unmoving, was another sound
entirely: the jewelled birds of the Emperor, singing for a different
dancer now.

 

Valerius to the Golden Throne!'

The cry had run through the Hippodrome, exactly as he'd been told it
would. He'd refused them, had shaken his head decisively, turned his
horse to leave, seen a company of the Urban Prefect's guardsmen
running towards him-not his own men-and watched as they knelt before
his mount, blocking his way with their bodies.

Then they, too, raised his name in a loud shout, begging that he
accept the throne. Again he refused, shaking his head, making a
sweeping gesture of denial. But the crowd was already wild. The cry
that had begun when he brought them word of Daleinus's death
reverberated through the huge space where the chariots ran and people
cheered. There were thirty, perhaps forty thousand people there by
then, even with no racing this day. A different contest was
proceeding towards its orchestrated end. Petrus had told him what
would happen and what he had to do at every step. That his reporting
of the second death would bring shock and fear, but no grief, and
even some vindication following hard upon the too-contrived
acclamations of Daleinus. He hadn't asked his nephew how he'd known
those acclamations would come. Some things he didn't need to know. He
had enough to remember, more than enough to keep clearly in sequence
this day.

But it had developed precisely as Petrus had said it would, exact as
a heavy cavalry charge on open ground, and here he was astride his
horse, the Urban Prefect's men blocking his way and the Hippodrome
crowd screaming his name to the god's bright sun. His name and his
alone. He had refused twice, as instructed. They were pleading with
him now. He saw men weeping as they roared his name. The noise was
deafening, a vail, pumshingly loud, as the Excubitors-his own men
this time-moved closer, and then completely surrounded him, making it
impossible for a humble, loyal, unambitious man to ride from this
place, to escape the people's declared will in their time of great
danger and need. He stepped down from his horse. His men were around
him, pressing close, screening him from the crowd where Blues and
Greens stood mingled together, joined in a fierce, shared desire they
had not known they even had, where all those gathered in this white,
blazing light were calling upon him to be theirs. To have them now.

And so, in the Hippodrome of Sarantium, under the brilliant summer
sun, Valerius, Count of the Excubitors, yielded to his fate and
suffered his loyal guards to clothe him in the purple-lined mantle
Leontes happened to have brought with him.

Will they not wonder at that? ' he had asked Petrus.

'It won't matter by then,' his nephew had replied. 'Trust me in
this.'

And the Excubitors made way, the outer ring of them parting slowly,
like a curtain, so that the innermost ones could be seen holding an
enormous round shield. And standing upon that shield as they raised
it to their shoulders-in the ancient way soldiers proclaimed an
Emperor-Valerius the Trakesian lifted his hands towards his people.
He turned to all corners of the thundering Hippodrome-for here was
the true thunder that day-and accepted, humbly and graciously, the
spontaneous will of the Sarantine people that he be their Imperial
Lord, Regent of Holy Jad upon earth.

Valerius! Valerius! Valerius!

All glory to the Emperor Valerius!

Valerius the Golden, to the Golden Throne!

His hair had been golden once, long ago, when he had left the
grain-lands of Trakesia with two other boys, poor as stony earth, but
strong for a lad, willing to work, to fight, walking barefoot through
a cold, wet autumn, the north wind behind them bringing winter, all
the way to the Sarantine military camp, to offer their services as
soldiers to a distant Emperor in the unimaginable City, long, long
ago.

 

'Petrus, stay and dine with me?'

Night. A western sea breeze cooling the room through the open windows
over the courtyard below. The sound of falling water drifted up from
the fountains, and from farther away came the susurration of wind in
the leaves of the trees in the Imperial gardens.

Two men stood in a room in the Traversite Palace. One was an Emperor,
the other had made him so. In the larger, more formal Attenine
Palace, a little way across the gardens, Apius lay in state in the
Porphyry Room, coins on his eyes, a golden sun disk clasped between
folded hands: payment and passport for his journey.

'I cannot, Uncle. I have promises to be kept.'

'Tonight? Where?'

'Among the factions. The Blues were very useful today.'

'Ah. The Blues. And their most favoured actress? Was she very useful?
' The old soldier's voice was sly now. 'Or is she to be useful later
this evening?'

Petrus looked unabashed. 'Aliana? A fine dancer, and I always laugh
during her comic turns upon the stage.' He grinned, the round, smooth
face free of guile.

The Emperor's gaze was shrewd, undeceived. After a moment he said
quietly, 'Love is dangerous, nephew.'

The younger man's expression changed. He was silent a moment, by one
of the doorways. Eventually he nodded his head. 'It can be. I know
that. Do you . . . disapprove?'

It was a well-timed question. How could his uncle's disapproval
attach to anything he did tonight? After the events of the day?

Valerius shook his head. 'Not really. You will move into the Imperial
Precinct? One of the palaces?' There were six of them scattered on
these grounds. They were all his now. He would have to learn to know
them.

Petrus nodded. 'Of course, if you honour me so. But not until after
the Mourning Rites and the Investiture, and the Hippodrome ceremony
in your honour.'

'You will bring her here with you?'

Petrus's expression, directly confronted, was equally direct. 'Only
if you approve.'

The Emperor said, 'Are there not laws? Someone said something, I
recall. An actress . . .?'

' You are the source and fount of all laws in Sarantium now, Uncle.
Laws may be changed.'

Valerius sighed. 'We need to talk further on this. And about the
holders of office. Gesius. Adrastus. Hilarinus-I don't trust him. I
never did.'

'He is gone, then. And Adrastus must also be, I fear. Gesius... is
more complex. You know he spoke for you in the Senate?'

'You said. Did it matter?'

'Probably not, but if he had spoken for Adrastus-unlikely as that may
sound-it might have made things. . . uglier.'

'You trust him?'

The Emperor watched his nephew's deceptively bland, round face as the
younger man thought. Petrus wasn't a soldier. He didn't look like a
courtier. He carried himself, more than anything else, Valerius
decided, like an academician of the old pagan Schools. There was
ambition there, however. Enormous ambition. There was, in fact, an
Empire's worth of it. He had cause to know, being where he was.

Petrus gestured, his soft hands spreading a little apart.
'Truthfully? I'm not certain. I said it was complex. We will, indeed,
have to talk further. But tonight you are allowed an evening of
leisure, and I may permit myself the same, with your leave. I took
the liberty of commanding ale for you, Uncle. It is on the sideboard
beside the wine. Have I your gracious leave to depart?'

Valerius didn't really want him to go, but what was he to do? Ask the
other man to sit with him for a night and hold his hand and tell him
being Emperor would be all right? Was he a child?

'Of course. Do you want Excubitors?'

Petrus began shaking his head, then caught himself. 'Probably a wise
idea, actually. Thank you.'

'Stop by the barracks. Tell Leontes. In fact, a rotating guard of six
of them for you, from now on. Someone used Sarantine Fire here today'

Petrus's too-quick gaze showed he didn't quite know how to read that
comment. Good. It wouldn't do to be utterly transparent to his
nephew.

'Jad guard and defend you all your days, my Emperor.'

'His eternal Light upon you.' And for the first time ever, Valerius
the Trakesian made the Imperial sign of blessing over another man.

His nephew knelt, touched forehead to floor three times, palms flat
beside his head, then rose and walked out, calm as ever, unchanged
though all had changed.

 

Valerius, Emperor of Sarantium, successor to Saranios the Great who
had built the City, and to a line of Emperors after him, and before
him in Rhodias, stretching back almost six hundred years, stood alone
in an elegant chamber where oil lanterns hung from the ceiling and
were set in brackets on the walls and where half a hundred candles
burned extravagantly. His bedroom for tonight was somewhere nearby.
He wasn't sure where. He wasn't familiar with this palace. The Count
of the Excubitors had never had reason to enter here. He looked
around the room. There was a tree near the courtyard window, made of
beaten gold, with mechanical birds in the branches. They glittered in
the flickering light with jewels and semi-precious stones. He
supposed they sang, if one knew the trick. The tree was gold. It was
entirely of gold. He drew a breath.

He went to the sideboard and poured himself a flask of ale. He
sipped, then smiled. Honest Trakesian brew. Trust Petrus. It occurred
to him that he should have clapped hands for a slave or Imperial
officer, but such things slowed matters down and he had a thirst.
He'd a right to one. It had been a day of days, as the soldiers said.
Petrus had spoken true-he was entitled to an evening without further
planning or tasks. Jad knew, there would be enough to deal with in
the days to come. For one thing, certain people would have to be
killed-if they weren't dead already. He didn't know the names of the
men who'd wielded that liquid fire in the City-he didn't want to
know-but they couldn't live.

He walked from the sideboard and sank down into a deep-cushioned,
high-backed chair. The fabric was silk. He'd had little experience of
silk in his life. He traced the material with a calloused finger. It
was soft, smooth. It was... silken. Valerius grinned to himself. He
liked it. So many years a soldier, nights on stony ground, in bitter
winter or the southern desert storms. He stretched out his booted
feet, drank deeply again, wiped his lip with the back of a scarred,
heavy hand. He closed his eyes, drank again. He decided he wanted his
boots removed. Carefully, he placed the ale flask on an absurdly
delicate three-legged ivory table. He sat up very straight, took a
deep breath and then clapped his hands three times, the way Apius-Jad
guard his soul!-used to do.