The Tale of Krispos (77 page)

He went inside. Longinos approached him with the summons. He read it over, nodded, and signed and sealed it. The chamberlain took the parchment away. Krispos waited and worried. He knew he’d given the proper orders. But even the imperial power had limits. He needed others to turn those orders into reality.

The sun was low in the west when a messenger came from Rhisoulphos with word that the disturbances had been quelled. “Aye,” the fellow said cheerfully, “we broke some heads. The city folk don’t have the gear to stand against us and, besides, they keep on fighting each other. Civilians,” he finished with a sneer.

“I’ll want to see some prisoners, so I can find out what got these civilians started,” Krispos said.

“We have some,” the messenger agreed. “They’re sending them back to the jail in the government office building on Middle Street.”

“I’ll go there, then,” Krispos said, glad of something he could do. But he could not simply walk over to the big red granite building, as any private citizen might. Before he set out from the imperial residence, he required a squad of Halogai and the dozen parasol-bearers. Gathering the retinue took awhile, so that by the time he set out, he needed torchbearers, too.

One of the palace eunuchs must have sent word ahead of his procession, for the warders and soldiers at the government offices were ready when he arrived. They escorted him to a chamber on the ground level, one floor above the cells. As soon as he was settled, two warders hauled in a captive whose hands were chained in front of him. “On your belly before his Majesty,” they growled. He went to his knees, then awkwardly finished the prostration. One of the warders said, “Majesty, this here is a certain Koprisianos. He tried to smash in a trooper’s skull, he did.”

“Would’ve done it, too, Your Majesty, ’cept the bastard was wearing a helmet,” Koprisianos said thickly. He had an engagingly ugly face, though now his lip was swollen and split and a couple of teeth looked to be freshly gone.

“Never mind that,” Krispos said. “I want to know what started the fighting in the first place.”

“So do I,” Koprisianos said. “All I know is, somebody hit me. I turned around and hit him back—at least I think it was him; lots of people were running by just then, all of ’em screaming about heretics and Skotos-lovers and Phos knows what all else. I was giving as good as I got till some stupid soldier broke a spearshaft over my head. After that, next thing I know is, I wake up here.”

“Oh.” Krispos turned to the warders. “Take him away. He just looks to have found himself in the middle of a brawl and enjoyed it. Bring me people who saw the riot start, or who made it start, if you can find any who’ll admit to that. I want to get to the bottom of how it began.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the warders said together. One of them added, “Come on, you,” as they led away Koprisianos. They were gone for some time before they returned with an older man who wore the tattered remnants of what had been a fine robe. “This here is a certain Mindes. He was captured inside the forecourt to the High Temple. On your belly, you!”

Mindes performed the proskynesis with the smoothness of a man who had done it before. “May it please Your Majesty, I have the privilege of serving as senior secretary to the ypologothete Gripas,” he said as he rose.

A mid-level treasury official, Krispos thought. He said, “Having men sworn to uphold the state captured rioting pleases me not at all, Mindes. How did you come to disgrace yourself that way?”

“Only because I wanted to hear the most holy patriarch Pyrrhos preach, Your Majesty,” Mindes said. “His words always inspire me, and he was particularly vigorous today. He spoke of the need for holy zeal in routing out the influence of Skotos from every part of our lives and from our city as a whole. Even some priests, he said, had tolerated evil too long.”

“Did he?” Krispos said with a sinking feeling.

“Aye, Your Majesty, he did, and a great deal of truth in what he said, too.” Mindes drew the sun-sign as well as he could with his hands chained. He went on, “People talked about the sermon afterward, as they often do while leaving the High Temple. Several priests notorious for their laxness were named. Then someone claimed Skotos could also profit from too much rigor in the holy hierarchy. Someone else took that as a deliberate insult against Pyrrhos, and—” Mindes’ chains clanked as he shrugged.

“And your own part in this was purely innocent?” Krispos asked.

“Purely, Your Majesty,” Mindes said, the picture of candor.

One of the warders coughed dryly. “When captured, Your Majesty, he was carrying five belt pouches, not counting the one on his own belt.”

“A treasury official indeed,” Krispos said. The warders laughed. Mindes looked innocent—with the smoothness of a man who has done it before, Krispos thought. He said, “All right, take him back to his cell and bring me someone else who was there at the start of things.”

The next man told essentially the same story. Just to be sure, Krispos had one more summoned and heard the tale over again. Then he went back to the imperial residence and spent the night pondering what to do with Pyrrhos. Ordering the patriarch to wear a muzzle at all times struck him as a good idea, but he suspected Pyrrhos would find some theological justification for disobeying.

“He might not, you know,” Dara said when he mentioned his conceit out loud. “He might take it for some wonderful new style of asceticism and try to enforce it on the whole clergy.” She chuckled.

So did Krispos, but only for a moment. Knowing Pyrrhos, there was always the chance Dara was right.

T
HE GRAND COURTROOM WAS HEATED BY THE SAME KIND OF
system of ducts under the floor that the imperial residence used. It was far larger than any room in the residence, though; the ducts kept one’s feet warm, but not much more.

Krispos’ throne stood on a platform a man’s height above the floor; not even his feet were warm. Some of the courtiers who flanked the double row of columns that led up to the throne shivered in their robes. The Haloga guards were warm—they wore trousers. Back in his old village, Krispos would have been wearing trousers, too. He cursed fashion, then smiled as he imagined Barsymes’ face if he’d proposed coming to the Grand Courtroom in anything but the scarlet robe custom decreed.

The smile went away when Pyrrhos appeared at the far end of the hall. The patriarch advanced toward the throne with the steady stride of a much younger man. He was entitled to vestments of blue silk and cloth-of-gold, vestments almost as rich as the imperial raiment. All he wore, though, was a monk’s simple blue robe, now soaked and dark. As he drew near, Krispos heard his feet squelching in his blue boots; he refused to acknowledge the rain by covering himself against it.

He prostrated himself before Krispos, waiting with his forehead on the ground till given leave to rise. “How may I serve Your Majesty?” he asked. He did not hesitate to meet Krispos’ eye. If his conscience troubled him, he concealed it perfectly. Krispos did not think it did; unlike most Videssians, Pyrrhos had no use for dissembling.

“Most holy sir, we are not pleased with you,” Krispos said in the formal tone he’d practiced for occasions such as this. He stifled a grin of pleasure at remembering to use the first-person plural.

“How so, Your Majesty?” Pyrrhos said. “In my simple way, I have striven only to speak the truth, and how can the truth displease any man who has no reason to fear it?”

Krispos clamped his teeth together. He might have known this would not be easy. Pyrrhos wore righteousness like chain mail. Krispos answered, “Stirring up quarrels within the temples serves neither them nor the Empire as a whole, the more so as Harvas Black-Robe alone will profit if we fight among ourselves.”

“Your Majesty, I have no intention of stirring up dissent,” Pyrrhos said. “I merely aim to purify the temples of the unacceptable practices that have entered over years of lax discipline.”

What Krispos wanted to do was scream,
“Not
now,
you cursed idiot!”
Instead he said, “Since these practices you don’t approve of have been a long time growing, maybe you’d be wiser to ease them out of the ground instead of jerking them up by the roots.”

“No, Your Majesty,” Pyrrhos said firmly. “These are the webs Skotos spins, the tiny errors that grow larger, more flagrant month by month, year by year, until at last utter wickedness and depravity become acceptable. I tell you, Your Majesty, thanks to Gnatios and his ilk, Videssos the city is a place where the dark god roams free!” He spat on the polished marble floor and traced the sun-circle over the sodden wool above his heart.

Several courtiers imitated the pious gesture. Some looked fearfully toward Krispos, wondering how he dared ask the patriarch to restrain his attack on evil.

But Krispos said, “You are wrong, most holy sir.” His voice was hard and certain. That certainty made Pyrrhos’ eyes widen slightly; he was more used to hearing it in his own voice than from another. Krispos said, “No doubt Skotos sneaks about in Videssos the city, as he does all through the world. But I have seen a city where he roamed free; I see Imbros still in my dreams.”

“Exactly so, Your Majesty. It is to prevent Videssos the city from suffering the fate of Imbros that I strive. The evil within us, given time, will devour us unless, to use your phrase, we root it out now.”

“The evil Harvas Black-Robe loves will devour us right now unless we root it out,” Krispos said. “How do you propose to minister to the soul of an impaled corpse? Most holy sir, think which victory is more urgent at the moment.”

Pyrrhos thought; Krispos gave him credit for it. At length the patriarch said, “You have your concerns, Majesty, but I have mine, as well.” He sounded troubled, as if he had not expected Krispos to make him admit even so much. “If I see evil and do nothing to rid the world of it, I myself have done that evil. I cannot pass it by in silence, not without consigning my soul to the eternal ice.”

“Not even if other men, men of good standing in the temples, fail to see anything evil in it?” Krispos persisted. “Do you say that anyone who disagrees with you in any way will spend eternity in the ice?”

“I would not go so far as that, Your Majesty,” Pyrrhos said, though by the look in his eyes, he wanted to. Reluctantly he continued, “The principle of theological economy does apply to certain beliefs that cannot be proven actively pernicious.”

“Then while we are at war with Harvas, stretch it as wide as you can. If you did not go out of your way to make enemies in the temples, most holy sir, you would find many who might be your friends. But think again now and answer me truly: can you see stretching economy to fit Harvas or his deeds?”

Again Pyrrhos paused for honest thought. “No,” he admitted, the word expressionless. As much as he wanted to keep his face straight, he looked like a man who suspected, too late, he’d been cheated at dice. He bowed stiffly. “Let it be as you say, Your Majesty. I shall essay to practice economy where I can, for so long as this Harvas remains in arms against us.”

One or two courtiers burst into applause, amazed and impressed that Krispos had wrung any concession from Pyrrhos. Krispos was amazed and impressed, too, but did not let on; he also noted the qualifying phrases the patriarch used to keep those concessions as small as possible. He said, “Excellent, most holy sir. I knew I could rely on you.”

The patriarch bowed again, even more like an automaton than before. He started to prostrate himself once more so he could leave the imperial presence.

Krispos held up a hand. “Before you go, most holy sir, a question. Did the monk Gnatios ask leave of you to come out of his monastery not long ago?”

“Why, so he did, Your Majesty—and in proper form, too,” Pyrrhos added grudgingly. “I rejected the petition even so, of course: no matter what reasons he gives for wishing to come forth, no doubt he mainly seeks to work mischief.”

“As you say, most holy sir. I thought the same.”

Pyrrhos’ face twisted. For a moment he seemed about to smile. In the end, as befit his abstemious temperament, he contented himself with a sharp, short nod. He performed the proskynesis, rose, and backed away from the throne until he was far enough from it to turn his back on Krispos without giving offense. No sooner had he gone than a servitor with a rag scurried out to wipe up the rainwater that had dripped from his robe.

Krispos surveyed the Grand Courtroom with a broad, benign smile. The courtiers were not shouting, “Thou conquerest, Krispos!” at him, but he knew he’d won a victory, just the same.

P
HOSTIS ROLLED FROM BELLY TO BACK, FROM BACK TO BELLY
. The baby started to roll over one more time. Krispos grabbed him before he went off the edge of the bed. “Don’t do that,” he said. “You’re too smart to be a farmer, aren’t you?”

“‘Too smart to be a farmer’?” Dara echoed, puzzled.

“The only way a farmer ever learns anything is to hit himself in the head,” Krispos explained. He held Phostis close to his face. The baby reached out, grabbed a double handful of beard, and yanked. “Ow!” Krispos said. He carefully worked Phostis’ left hand free, then the right—by which time, the left was tangled in his beard again.