The Gate of Fire (83 page)

"Why does it always seem colder now, when day approaches?" Despite a thick German-style cloak with a fur lining, Thyatis had her hands in her armpits, hoping that they would warm up. She always had cold hands and this was worse, since she had gotten very little sleep. She felt grainy and irritable. The yard was filled with muffled sounds of men moving about, checking their weapons and preparing to leave. "Night is almost done, it should be warmer."

"It's not that cold," said Nikos as he walked past with a bundle of long boar-spears on his shoulder. He was only wearing a light shirt and woolen breeches. Thyatis threw a glare in his direction, but the Illyrian ignored her. She entertained dark thoughts, watching him swing the heavy load into the back of their wagon. Centuries of forebears who had culled their living from the cold Adriaticum in open skiffs had thickened his blood.
And his skull
, she thought in disgust. Nikos loved the cold. But then, he liked it when it was hot, too. Thyatis found this very disturbing. The world, she thought, should be an even temperature all year round.

"My lady." Thyatis turned and saw that Jusuf had come down the steps from the house. Lanterns faced with panes of cut crystal had been put out to shed some light on the preparations. The Khazar's long face was half cast in shadow. Thyatis smiled in greeting; she had not had much chance to catch up with the Prince since her return.

"You will be leaving today?"

Jusuf nodded. He fingered his tunic. It was a dark indigo with subtle red edging in stitched silk and a faintly military cut. A cape of heavy green wool like the shade under forest trees hung from his shoulders. Thin bracelets of gold were clasped around his wrists. The Khazar seemed astonished at the soft nap of the fabric. He kept rubbing it between his broad fingertips.

"I will, but first I am to speak with this Emperor of yours. Anas' tells me that he was one of the last men to speak with Sahul, before he was killed. We will discuss 'friendship' between our peoples and give the embassy of the Eastern Court apoplexy."

Thyatis felt a strange sense of disassociation at the Prince's words. Everything seemed turned about and a giddy sensation of being outside of herself, looking down and seeing her body from above, overcame her. Thoughts tumbled like stones in a millrace; the Duchess referred to as an intimate, the lanky barbarian in exquisite clothes, the reminder of her old friend's death. She blinked, feeling choked up, and coughed, covering her mouth.

"You've come a little way since I met you crawling about in that thicket." Thyatis smiled sadly.

"Yes," he said, allowing his own grief to show in the shadow behind his eyes. "You have led me astray."

"Not as far as some, I see." Thyatis blushed at the tart sound of her words. "I'm sorry!"

"No need," said Jusuf quietly, looking down. Thyatis craned her neck and saw that he was blushing. "I will have a daredevil tale to tell when I return. I feel foolish... I was difficult and pigheaded for months while you drove us into the heart of Persia and then brought us out again."

Thyatis laughed softly, frost puffing from her mouth, and laid a gloved hand on his arm. He covered it with his own. "I could not have succeeded without you. I would never have met Shirin. Her children would have been quietly strangled by now and she a jeweled captive in the Eastern Court."

"So true. You've given my family and me a great deal, Thyatis. Even when I have returned to the open grasslands of Scythia and sit once more among the councils of our people, I will not forget you."

"You should not," said Thyatis, raising a haughty eyebrow. "We will be coming to visit you as soon as we can—Shirin and I and the children. When it is safer, we will sail to Tanaïs and come overland. If you have forgotten me when I arrive, I will be forced to thrash you soundly..."

Jusuf blushed again, and stood back, making the Roman salute. "Until we meet again, my friend."

"Yes," said Thyatis and she turned away, her thoughts already intent upon the business at hand.

The Duchess had culled her secret enterprises for men who could answer the unexpected with violence. There had been a short and bitter discussion between Thyatis and her patron about the composition of the team that would go to the south. Thyatis had balked at the addition of more fighting men—ones that she did not know and had not worked with before—but Anastasia had been insistent. The stakes were too high in this endeavor to arrive with too few men. There had been discussion of Krista and her place in the enterprise. Again, Thyatis had refused to take the girl. This time, with a wan face, Anastasia had relented and agreed. The dark-haired servant had not been seen since, though Thyatis knew that she was still in the house somewhere.

Seven more men had been added to the core group composed of Thyatis, Nikos, Efraim, Kahrmi, and Anagathios. They were Legion twenty-year men, scarred by fierce service, and patient as hunters. Thyatis had worked long hours to spar with each man in the gymnasium. As she expected, they were superbly skilled with their chosen weapons and quick as vipers. In particular, four of them were experts with the long hunting spear. The other three were archers of repute. There were still rough edges on the team, but she thought that she could make it work. As ever, she relied most on Nikos and the Khazars. The loss of her original team in the ambush at Van still rankled—it would take years to rebuild a maniple like that.

There was a sharp whistle in the courtyard and the mercenaries drew back from the wagon. They had piled the last of the
arcuballista
and bundles of arrows into the
reda
and laid a thick covering of thatch over the gear. Over that they had put two layers of blankets to make a soft cushion. Nikos and Anagathios came out of one of the half-buried storerooms that lined the courtyard. With the Duchess's villa sitting on the crest of the Quirinal, some of its rooms were cut into the slope of the hill. Each man carried a small oaken barrel, bound with straps of iron. They walked carefully, watching for loose paving stones or slippery places. It would not do for either of these items to be jarred sharply or fall.

Thyatis smiled, showing her teeth in the darkness. If this
homunculus
could not bleed and die like a man, then it would be rendered down into its very constituent atoms. The young Roman woman rocked back and forth on her heels, feeling immense satisfaction. It was good that the Duchess maintained an Empire-wide network of informers, spies, watchers, and messengers. Acquiring these barrels had stretched her power—it was absolutely forbidden by Imperial edict for a private citizen to possess the substance within those close-fitted oaken staves—but what use was power and influence without its exercise?

The Illyrian laid his barrel down carefully in the nest of blankets and wrapped another tightly woven wool quilt around it. Anagathios did likewise and then they piled more blankets on top of that. The jostling of the wagon would barely touch the nervous substance within. Two of the legionnaires climbed up onto the driver's seat. A team of four mules drew the wagon and they were impatient to go.

Thyatis looked around, seeing the rest of her men mounting up. It was time. The nervous tickling in her stomach faded, replaced by the cold certainty that infused her once action was imminent. Half a glass from now, the Via Appia gate would open and they would be on the road south. She counted heads. Everyone was present. A stable boy led her horse up and she took the reins. In defiance of city fashion, she was wearing long warm woolen trousers. She looked up, her eyes scanning the upper floors of the villa.

At one, silhouetted by the warm gold of dozens of candles, the Duchess looked down from a half-open window. The older woman was cowled in a white cape and hood. Thyatis raised a hand in salute and Anastasia answered it.

"Hey-yup! Open the gate." In the still, cold air her voice seemed loud, but the rattle of the gate chains and the rumble of wooden doors quickly drowned the sound as they swung open. Servants darted aside as the wagon rolled out into the black space of the alley. Two lanterns hung on metal posts at the front of the wagon bobbed and flickered, casting a fitful illumination on the road. Thyatis followed, her breath still frosting in the air. Nikos, Anagathios, and the others were close behind, their horses blowing and whickering in complaint.
Sensible creatures
, thought Thyatis moodily,
they want to be in their nice warm stable, asleep, at such an hour
.

"In a glass or so," Anastasia said, "they will be at the Appia gate and on the road south."

The Duchess turned, her violet eyes gleaming in the candlelight. She had kept Betia very busy at this atrocious hour, carefully anointing her long eyelashes with flecks of gold, accenting her cheekbones, and smoothing her skin with a fine dust of pearl and arsenic. The wearing demands of the Emperor had kept her on edge for months and blemishes had been her reward. Under the supple cloak—a pristine Sabine white—she wore a demure gown of layered charcoal-gray wool edged with silver. Galen's latest innovation of government was a sunrise meeting, accompanied by hot mulled wine and freshly baked bread and butter. The Duchess was all for catching the consuls, tribunes, and ministers at a disadvantage from a night of debauchery, but she preferred to do so while well-rested herself.

"And I?" Krista stood by the door of the little reading room, well away from the window. The young woman had bound her hair back in a tight braid, then wrapped it with a leather thong. Her tunic and cloak and kilt were a deep forest green that verged to black. The weathered brown leather of her girdle was almost invisible against the material. Like the Duchess, her cloak was hooded, though when pulled up, Krista's left her entire face in shadow. Long sleeves covered her arms and two long knives and a short sword were slung at her side from a Legion-style baldric. "Where will I be?"

The Duchess sighed, holding out her hand. Chains of pearls accented her arm, gleaming in the lamplight. Krista stepped up and took her hand. "You will be upon your way to the port at Ostia by a fast horse, my dear. A galley, the
Paris
, is waiting for you there. The captain is one of my couriers. He will take you to Cumae, within hours of the mountain and the villa. You will be ahead of Thyatis and her men by at least two days."

Anastasia pressed a wallet of tooled leather into Krista's hand. It was heavy and clinked as the younger woman hefted it.

"Coin enough," smiled the Duchess. "You can get whatever you need: horses, gladiators, slaves, weapons. Cumae caters to the estates of the rich. It has a sophisticated market." Anastasia paused, her lips pursed. "Are you sure of this?" The Duchess leaned forward a little, closing the space between her and the girl. "You need not put yourself at risk."

Krista laughed, a sharp, bitter sound. "While the handsome Prince lives, neither you nor I are safe. If we can kill him, then we can rest easy. My lady, please listen and understand me... I
must
kill him." The dark-haired girl clenched her fist hard, turning her knuckles white. "I must."

Anastasia opened her mouth, ready to press her servant for why and how but then relented. Something had transpired between the two, something more than the business of men and women. She could see the closely held determination that sustained Krista. Things were fragile enough already without provoking more trouble. She let it go. It did not matter how the beautiful Prince died.

"Very well," said the Duchess. "Do you need anything else?" Krista's mouth thinned into a sharp line. She shook her head. "I have what I need already," Krista said, tucking the wallet away. "Goodbye."

Anastasia inclined her head and let her fingers slip out of Krista's hand. "Good luck."

Without another word, the young woman slipped out the door and took the stairs to the lower floor two and three at a time. When she was gone, the Duchess sat at her desk, her heart heavy, and sighed. The day was only beginning. She flipped open the first briefing booklet and blinked, trying to clear her eyes.

Sunlight slanted across a table top of mottled travertine. The light brought out the whorls of cream and rust that penetrated the rock, mixing with a flux of darker red material. Mohammed's hands were pressed on the table, flat on the smooth cold surface. A pale green porcelain jug of water stood nearby and an arrangement of fresh-cut flowers held in a copper vase cast a shadow over his fingers. The gardens of the palace, watered by their own spring and culvert, were a wonder to behold. On this day, in the late morning, the scent of thousands of blossoms flooded the air, drifting through the high, arched windows on a light breeze.

Mohammed stood at the side of the table, his eyes staring blankly out the window over the rooftops of the city. His whole body, save for his hands, was trembling. The distant sounds of mules clattering through the streets of the city or the cries of hawkers in the market of Trajan went unheard. Sweat beaded his brow and ran in thin rivulets down the side of his neck. The thin cream-colored cotton shirt that he wore was damp with moisture and clung to the hard muscles of his shoulder and back. Tendrils of pure white striped his thick black beard. An almost inaudible hum trembled in the air.

The power released him and the Quraysh gasped softly, suddenly breathing again, seeing again. He staggered a little and groped for a chair.

"Lord Mohammed, I would speak with you." The voice was harsh and brittle, sounding very old for the youthful woman who strode into the room. She stopped, her eyes narrowing at the sight of the Arab chieftain slumping wearily in the wicker chair. "Are you ill?"

Mohammed looked up, his eyebrows bristling. The Palmyrene woman stood, arms akimbo, her legs firmly planted, staring down at him with piercing dark eyes. She was dressed in severe dark colors, a tunic of black cotton over the rippling metal of a scaled iron corselet. Desert robes draped her shoulders, though they bunched at her left shoulder where the hilt of a saber jutted up. She wore Roman-style riding boots and still maintained the thick leather belt of a legionnaire.