Scramasax (9 page)

Snorri greeted Solveig and spread his arms. ‘Your father and Harald are down at the harbour,' he told her. ‘It's been like this for days. To and fro, to and fro, readying everything.'

‘When are you leaving?'

‘Soon, I'd say, very soon. What do you think, Skarp?'

‘I don't know. Tomorrow?'

‘Ask Harald,' Snorri advised Solveig. ‘He'll be back before long.'

‘Birth pangs!' said Skarp. ‘They're always painful. All the gathering and counting, carting and carrying on board, all the stowing and storing. You've no idea, girl.'

‘You're forgetting,' Snorri told him, ‘Solveig has sailed from Sigtuna to Ladoga, and Ladoga to Kiev, and Kiev …'

Skarp ignored him. ‘Friends!' he called out. ‘Solveig here is missing her father. She's in need of company.'

Shuffling and grinning, half a dozen guards gathered round Solveig.

‘Not as much as what we are,' lamented one man. ‘Company.' His eyes were blackberry-bright and his cheeks hollow, and Solveig thought he would be more at ease in a monk's habit and cowl than chain mail and a scarlet cloak.

The guard reached out and took Solveig's hands between his own, and Solveig saw how bony they were.

‘Priskin,' he said.

‘Priskin,' repeated Solveig.

Then another guard offered himself to Solveig. His long, acorn hair was completely tangled, and somehow his expression was eager and hopeful, as if the world had not yet disappointed him, and maybe never would.

‘Tamas,' he told Solveig, and he gathered her hands between his own and lightly pressed them.

‘Tamas,' she repeated. Her heart skipped.

One by one the guards got to their feet and ranged themselves round Solveig, seeing in her every other Viking girl with pale skin and golden hair, and remembering how far away they were from their own families, the fjords where they fished, their farms.

One by one, Solveig listened to a whole litany of names, the shoulder-companions of Snorri and Skarp: not only Tamas and Priskin, but Karly and Ulf and Gissur and Gorm and Bolverk and Egil and Turgeis …

Rough, gruff music in Solveig's ears.

‘Grimizo,' said the last guard. He was clean-shaven, and his chin was square as a spade.

Solveig frowned.

‘He's German,' Snorri told her. ‘Now and then the Empress admits a foreigner to the ranks of the Varangians.'

Solveig smiled at the guard, but Grimizo didn't smile back. He just … regarded her.

‘But the Empress has other foreign guards, hasn't she?' asked Solveig.

‘Oh, yes!' Snorri said. ‘Bulgars, Georgians, Serbians …'

‘Southerners,' added Skarp. ‘Soft!'

‘Not the ones dragging out that chained man,' protested Solveig. ‘What happened to him?'

Snorri clamped his jaw.

‘He got trimmed,' Skarp told her. ‘That's what I heard. Topped and tailed, you might say.'

Solveig screwed up her eyes.

Skarp winked at Solveig. ‘You'll be all right. Here with Maria.'

You know I'm coming with you, thought Solveig,
and Snorri knows. But no one else does. Not Tamas … When they hear about it, what will they say?

‘Yes,' Snorri said thoughtfully. ‘Our beloved Empress will look after you. She won't do anything to upset Harald.'

‘Her darling,' declared Skarp in a scornful voice.

‘He's not!' exclaimed Solveig.

‘She wishes he was!' Skarp retorted.

Many of the guards laughed.

‘Instead of Michael, you mean?' Solveig demanded.

Snorri shook his head. ‘As well as Michael,' he said slowly.

‘Blazing fires need feeding,' added Skarp.

‘Harald would never agree to that,' said Solveig.

‘And neither would Michael,' Snorri replied. ‘He may look as fresh as a flower and blush like a young girl, but he's not as soft as he seems.' He gave Solveig a steely look.

‘Shall we tell her, lads?' asked Skarp.

For a moment no one replied. But then Priskin began. ‘Last year, the old Emperor Romanus died. But not before he had challenged the boy-man. He accused Michael of bedding the Empress, but Michael denied it. He denied it on the bones of saints.' The hollows of Priskin's cheeks were flaming.

‘Sometimes the gods madden Michael,' Skarp interrupted. ‘He hurls himself to the ground, and writhes around, and rolls his eyes. He keeps banging his head …'

‘Last year, the Emperor Romanus died,' Priskin began again. ‘But he did not choose to die.'

‘Few people do,' Snorri said in a dry voice.

‘What people believe,' Priskin continued, ‘is that he was … helped.'

‘You mean …' Solveig began.

‘I do,' said Priskin calmly. ‘He lost his appetite. He couldn't sleep. He'd always been quick to laugh, that's what people said, always friendly, but he became peevish and irritable.'

‘Was it a charm?' asked Solveig. ‘Was a spell put on him?'

‘His face became swollen,' Priskin intoned. ‘I saw him myself and his colour had changed. Grey. Grey-green. He looked like a man who'd been dead for three days.'

‘And his hair fell out,' added Skarp.

‘What some people say,' Priskin went on, ‘is that his own wife, Zoe, and the boy-man were poisoning the Emperor. One morning, Romanus went to the palace baths with some of his servants …' The guard paused and swilled saliva around his mouth. Then, using both his hands, Priskin pretended to push the old Emperor Romanus down, right down. ‘Several servants held his head under the water for a long time,' he told Solveig, ‘and then they ran away. After a while the Emperor's body rose to the surface – that was because of the air inside it – and he floated like a cork. Another servant put his arms around him, and pulled him out, and laid him on a bench. Romanus gave a long, long … first a moan, then a growl. His breathing quickened. Faster and faster. He gaped like a great fish. And out of his mouth there seeped thick … dark … goo …'

Solveig took a deep breath and swallowed loudly.

‘Whatever the truth of all this,' Priskin continued in his measured way, ‘there's no argument about what happened next. On the same day her husband had died, our beloved Empress married the boy-man.'

‘Fresh as a flower and blushing like a young girl,' said Snorri.

‘The same day! I was there. I was one of the guards!
And there and then,' Priskin completed his ghastly account, ‘Michael was crowned Emperor.'

Solveig was so shocked she didn't say anything.

‘You must keep your eyes skinned,' Priskin warned her. ‘And keep yourself to yourself.'

‘Yes, Solveig, you must,' Tamas repeated, eager and concerned.

‘No one's safe in this snake-pit,' Priskin went on. ‘Not you. No one. Not even the poor old Emperor.'

‘Honour,' said Tamas in a firm voice. He pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘Truth-telling. Loyalty …'

‘Life is much too easy in Miklagard,' observed Skarp. ‘Sunlight, sherbet, silks, spices.'

‘And what's easily won is easily thrown away,' Snorri agreed.

‘Maria,' said Priskin, ‘she may mean well, but the Empress can bend or break her. Be wary what you tell her.'

‘You will, won't you, Solveig?' Tamas asked her earnestly.

Solveig gave him a gentle smile and nodded.

Now there was a hammering at the door. A eunuch walked in. He crossed the hall to Solveig and informed her that she was to return to her quarters.

‘Why?' asked Solveig.

‘Empress Zoe has summoned you and Maria to Hagia Sophia,' the eunuch told her.

‘So you can help her and the Emperor,' Snorri added.

‘Help them?' said Solveig, looking alarmed. ‘How?'

‘And all the oily priests. So you and the whole court can pray for us and bless us before we set sail.'

Maria instructed her servants to dress Solveig in one of her own gowns. It was made of heavy silk, misty grey-blue.

‘It matches your eyes,' Maria told her. ‘Almost.'

But Solveig shook her head. ‘It's so stiff. Was it woven by those Jews in the market?'

‘No, I brought it back from Antioch.'

Solveig looked puzzled.

‘Across the Great Sea. The weaver said, “He wraps Himself in a cloak of morning light.”'

‘Who does?'

‘God, of course. And he told me that when I wore his gown, I too would be wrapping myself in morning light.'

Solveig gazed at Maria. ‘You should see the early light north from our farm. I wish you could.'

‘Let my servants dress you,' Maria told her. ‘At least this gown will cover what's beneath. Nothing but rags and tatters.'

‘My sealskin boots are all right,' Solveig replied. ‘In fact they're better now than when I left home. They fit like gloves.'

‘Webbed ones,' said Maria, and both girls laughed.

As soon as one of her servants had combed Solveig's golden hair and secured her hood, three rosy-cheeked eunuchs conducted the girls to Hagia Sophia, and on their way they passed through several halls Solveig hadn't seen before.

Maria read her thoughts. ‘In my Father's house are many mansions,' she intoned. ‘Many mansions … the Gospel according to Saint John. But in my aunt's palace are many halls – that's what I always think.'

In one hall there was a forest of slender columns, each a slightly different colour: trunks of ash, hornbeam, maple, beech.

At once Solveig was back in the forest that horseshoed round her farm, back with Blubba and Kalf, crouching, panting, knowing the least snap of a twig might give her hiding-place away.

‘Jasper,' Maria told her, ‘rock crystal, porphyry. Speckled marble from Phrygia, white marble from Prokonessos – that's quite near here – and this purple one, it's from Egypt.'

Solveig shook her head, but before she could ask any questions, the eunuchs had led the girls through the stone forest into another hall. And there, waiting for them, right in the middle of the room, stood a glorious golden lion.

Solveig broke her step and then shuffled forward; her thick silk gown rasped and rustled. She edged round the beast so she could look right up at its wild mane, its blood-orange eyes …

And at that moment, the golden lion opened his jaws and he roared. One stupendous, terrifying roar. A roar that ricocheted around the room and rose to heaven.

Solveig jumped back. She tripped on the hem of her cloak, stumbled and cracked her head against the tiles.

The golden lion snapped his jaws shut.

Solveig looked up at the beast, amazed, and the three eunuchs helped her to her feet. Maria laughed.

‘How … I mean … Is there a man inside?'

Maria shook her head.

‘How then?'

‘I can't explain exactly. It's a machine. This palace is full of machines.'

I want to find out, thought Solveig. I want to understand. I know some people can make magic with spells and charms, but some can with machines!

Hagia Sophia was just as gloomy and chilly as when Solveig had first entered it, searching for her father. But now the entrance hall was packed with Varangian guards, courtiers and townsfolk, as many women as men. The eunuchs had to use their sharp tongues and sharp elbows to force a way through to the concourse below
the great dome – the dome that Solveig had thought was floating halfway between earth and heaven when she first saw it.

The concourse was packed too, and everyone was talking, shouting, pointing, laughing. When the eunuchs had led the girls to their places, Solveig gazed all around her, trying to accustom her eyes to the shining gloom, incense-thick and incense-sweet, lit by candles and oil lamps.

Then she saw someone in the middle of the throng. Waving. Waving at her and calling, ‘Solveig! Solveig!'

But although Solveig stared and stared, and could see one pink hand waving, she wasn't at all certain who it was.

It could be, she thought. I mean, it might be! Solveig smiled a little secret smile. Well, it won't be Grimizo, anyhow!

Now there was a flourish of trumpets from the trumpeters stationed high up in a gallery.

The great crowd below began to draw back, even to jam themselves against the people behind them, until there was just room enough for a stream of priests to flow between them, carrying silver crosses and caskets and chalices, swinging their censers, singing-and-saying prayers.

Very last in this long gold-and-silver procession came the Empress and Emperor themselves and, as they passed, many people in the milling crowd tried to get to their knees but were unable to do so, let alone press their foreheads against the cold, shining tiles.

‘That purple!' whispered Solveig. ‘That purple they're wearing. I've never seen such a colour.'

Empress Zoe and Emperor Michael stepped up on to a white marble plinth. They sat down on two golden chairs and surveyed the vast crowd.

Then Empress Zoe raised her right hand and at once a man stepped forward. A very tall man.

‘Harald!' said Solveig in a husky voice.

Harald Sigurdsson strode up to the plinth and prostrated himself.

He has to do that? Even Harald, thought Solveig.

‘Shhh!' whispered Maria, as if she could hear the thoughts inside Solveig's head.

Now everyone in the concourse fell silent, many with heads cocked or half-turned, straining to hear what the Empress had to say.

‘Harald Sigurdsson, this is what we require of you. You are to lead my Varangian guard across the Sea of Marmara, across the Great Sea to the island of Sicily. You are to clean the whole island of filth. All the filthy Saracens who've swarmed in from north Africa. Drive them out. Better yet, put them to death.'

Ferocious as the Empress's instructions were, she uttered them in a soft voice that made them seem all the more terrible.

Harald Sigurdsson, still on his knees, gave a curt nod.