by Jamie Buxton
Then he understood one more thing. The truth had been so big and so obvious he’d missed it.
“That’s the whole point,” Jude said. He sounded old and tired. “Flea, I would have told you but—”
“You said you would. You promised to share everything and now because you hid the truth from me, the Romans are coming. And do you know why? I brought them here! Me!” Flea was almost dancing with anger. “It’s the opposite of what you wanted because you … because I … They took the gang! They said that if I didn’t do what they wanted, the gang would be tortured. I should have found a way of telling you, but I didn’t. I should have just stuck to what you asked.” He subsided, his throat hoarse.
“Take comfort, Flea,” Yesh said. “This was meant to be. You see how everything comes together, how your efforts to stop this—and Jude’s—only made it happen. Destiny, my destiny, is impossible to resist.”
That brought Flea back to life. “Oh, well done. That’s made your oldest friend feel better. Anyway, I don’t believe you. You could stop this if you wanted. Me and my friends, we spend every minute of every day trying to stay alive. How can anyone work so hard to get himself killed? How can you want to die?”
Yesh stood straighter, lifted his chin, and fixed his eyes on a point past Flea and Jude. “I am the Chosen One. I am the prophecy. I am dying for you, Jude, and you, Flea, and for all the world.”
“Don’t do any favors for me, please!” Flea yelled. “I don’t want it and neither does Jude, and anyone who does want it, well, they’re not worth dying for.”
That seemed to hit home. Yesh’s face twisted and he took Jude by the arms.
“Jude. You are my oldest friend. Help me. I need your strength.”
Flea looped his hand into Jude’s belt and pulled in the other direction. “Forget him, Jude! You did what you could. He doesn’t want your help. You’ve got to get away now. The Romans are coming. Come with me. We just have time to run.”
Jude looked down. “Oh, Flea. What have you done?”
But Yeshua, on Jude’s other side, drew strength from somewhere and was suddenly stronger and brighter. “You cannot fight it!” he said. “What has been foretold, has to be. The end of days is coming. The end of time. Join me, Jude, old friend, before it’s too late.”
“No! Come with me,” Flea said. “Forget him.”
Jude sighed and looked down at him. “Dear Flea, how did I get you mixed up in this disaster? You deserve better, but you’ll have to get there on your own. I’m not who you think I am. We’ve only known each other for two days. I’ve known Yesh almost all my life.”
“But he doesn’t care about you! All he cares about is himself and he doesn’t care about that enough to live. He’s not worth saving!” Flea found he was crying.
“I’m sorry, Flea. There’s so much about me that you don’t understand. I have to see it through.”
“That’s it? You’re just going to drop me?”
Jude gave a sigh. “Look, if we both get through this, meet me at the tree outside the city walls by the dump.”
“When?”
“Later. As soon as you can.”
“You really mean it?”
“I surely do.” But he was looking at Yesh as he spoke.
Then, all around, Flea heard the sound of men breaking through undergrowth. Orders were shouted.
Someone shouted “Run,” but Flea was held. He thought it was Jude, but Jude was sprinting from the clearing, a man in a white robe following him. Flea wriggled free and threw himself at Jude’s pursuer, hanging on to his robe, wrapping himself in it until the man had to shrug it off. He crashed through the cordon of soldiers wearing only his loincloth and Flea was left with Yesh in the clearing, holding the torn robe, surrounded by glittering spear points.
Yesh stood still, waiting patiently, and Flea felt something freeze inside him. He was cold. He was hard. He would not yield.
“Well, well, well,” the Results Man said, brushing aside a low olive branch and stepping into the ring of soldiers. “What have we got here?”
Flea jerked himself free so he could point at Yesh. “This is the man you want,” he said. “And he deserves all you’re going to give him.”
“Thank you, Flea,” Yesh said. “You’re the only person here with the guts to do this incredibly simple thing. You were the only one prepared to help me.”
THE DAY
37
Flea was carried back from the Pleasure Gardens slung over a soldier’s back, a shoulder beating time in his gut. Yesh, glimpsed behind him, was a jagged blur surrounded by Imps.
They stopped on the bridge. Flea could hear the chatter of the Black River below. Yesh’s face was puffy and swollen—hitting prisoners around the face was a standard Roman greeting. The followers were nowhere to be seen and Flea hoped they were rotting in hell. The Imps breathed and stamped like horses.
The Results Man was giving orders. “I want a vanguard clearing the streets. Any trouble, kill it. Wake up the governor. It’s been arranged.”
“What about this one?” The soldier slipped Flea off his shoulder and held him efficiently by the hair.
“Keep him close. I want him to see the results of his actions. It’s important for his moral development.” The Results Man turned his attention to Yesh, whose head was down, chest heaving. “So, shall we talk before we enter the city?”
Yesh did not look up.
“Am I being too polite?”
“He won’t say anything,” Flea said. “It’s no use. You might as well—”
“Shut up. This is where you entered the city in triumph, is it not? This is where the plan started, so to speak. But do you have the courage to see it through?”
Yesh lifted his head and seemed to be trying to read the Results Man’s smiling face.
“Oh yes. I know you have a secret. I know you have something up your sleeve like every half-decent trickster and I intend to find it out. My guess is that by the end of tonight you’ll be singing like a little bird. You people. You arrogant little people. It’s not enough to think you can defy Rome. You think you can use us. But here’s the thing: you’re in my power now. You don’t use me. I use you.”
They marched on through the choked streets. Someone shouted that the Imps had the magician, and the crowd swelled. The soldiers pushed down into the Lower City, then up the narrow, zigzagging streets on the other side. Flea had a sense that they were all on display and tried to imagine himself anywhere else. They would stop. The soldier would put him down. He’d worm his way down back alleys, get out of the city, and find Jude waiting by the tree. They’d escape to that place the Results Man had told him about—the green place where blue people lived—and if the Romans really were there, he’d go farther and farther and farther and farther because there must be a place where they could be free.
He blinked and shook his head. Through a blur of pain he saw the skinny girl flitting in and out of the crowd as she kept pace with them. Hadn’t she warned him? Hadn’t she told him to be careful? Why hadn’t he listened to her?
In the Upper City the marble buildings glowed like bones. They were outside the high priest’s palace and the Imps were beating on the door with their sword hilts. When it opened a crack, they bullied their way into the courtyard and turned to stop the crowd following them.
A shutter banged open above them and a man stuck his head out a window. “What is it? What’s going on?”
“Delivering a blasphemer to the high priest,” the Results Man called back. “We could have taken him to the Temple, but it’s late and we thought we’d save him the trouble of getting there. Who am I talking to?”
“One of the high priest’s secretaries. You say you have a blasphemer? Have you any idea of the time, or what sort of schedule the high priest has tomorrow? It’s the Passover feast—the busiest day of the year.”
“Like I said, we’re here to save him trouble, which he’s brought down on his own head. This man offered a direct challenge
to your rule and you did nothing. He threatened to rouse the people, turn the social order upside down, and tear down your Temple. That’s sedition, revolution, and sorcery. You may not care about small matters like that, but we do.”
“But the high priest can’t decide on it alone. He needs the council, and the council—”
“You’re stalling,” the Results Man interrupted. “Get him now.”
“You’re taking the law into your own hands.”
“Just do it.”
The secretary blinked, withdrew his head, and closed the shutters. Flea looked across to Yesh and shook his head desperately. Yesh looked back at him through bruised eyes. His teeth were bloody and his lips were swollen, but he smiled.
Then a door opened and they were let into a long, vaulted room.
The high priest was small and clever-looking. There were creases on his cheek from his pillow but his eyes looked sharp under heavy eyebrows. He waved away a fussing priest who was trying to straighten his heavy robe.
“The governor will hear of this,” was the first thing he snapped. “You may be head of his secret police but even you have exceeded your duties tonight. Where are the lights? Get me light and then throw them out.”
“The governor has been informed,” the Results Man said evenly. “He is fully aware of the situation.”
Now the secretary arrived, holding a candle. He stooped to whisper in the high priest’s ear. The older man looked down, then asked the Results Man suddenly, “Why should I do anything?” Flame twisted in his eyes.
“If you spent less time purifying yourself and burning animals, you’d know the streets are buzzing with talk of an uprising that you have done nothing to prevent. This man wants a revolution.”
The high priest’s eyes slid away from the Results Man and rested on Yesh.
“What have you got to say for yourself?” he snapped.
Just as he had done in the Temple when confronted by the priest, and just as he had done on the bridge when challenged by the Results Man, Yesh looked down and said nothing.
He does that when he’s planning, Flea thought. He closed his eyes and wondered what he had started.
One by one, more sleepy priests wearing rich, hastily thrown-on robes had joined them. They now stood in a huddle at one end of the room. The soldiers had been sent out when two of the new arrivals made a fuss about them being impure. Flea began to shiver.
Eventually the priests finished their conference and formed a rough semicircle. One stepped forward to address Yesh. The young priest towered over him and Yesh’s body seemed to fold itself around his narrow chest. He kept his eyes lowered.
“You are Yeshua Ben Yusuf and you have been accused by this agent of the Imperium of blasphemy.”
When Yesh remained silent, the priest shrugged and turned to the Results Man. “We know things he’s claimed, and to be honest, it’s no worse than the sort of nonsense spouted by any of these northern prophets. They all offer change, a better life, wine with every meal, and an end to poverty and disease. But they’re like fireflies. They flit about and then they’re gone. This one’s no different.”
“Even though he has claimed to be able to throw down the Temple…”
“And build it up again. I know. Does it look like he can? I ask you.”
“He claims to be the Chosen One: a king in exile come to claim his throne in the Holy City.”
“Again, look at him. A half-starved tramp with bloody toes. I’m sorry, but if you want us to take him and you seriously, then you’ll have to do a lot better than this. We had a perfectly viable containment plan in place, which you have ruined. I suggest you let us take things from here, and the next time you wake up the high priest in the middle of the night, please have a better reason.” He gave a patronizing smile as he turned. “Oh, and I’m sure you know this, but traditionally Temple and Imperium work together to avoid trouble in the run-up to the feast. It’s quite a good system.”
He turned to leave and the Results Man said, “Wait,” in a voice as flat and cold as a skinning knife. “You’ll just leave things like this? You’ll do nothing?”
Flea felt himself tense.
The young priest said, “That is the view of the council.”
“Then you will have no problems handing this minor troublemaker over to us for judgment?” the Results Man said. “After all, if such an eminent council can find no guilt, what could anyone else find? No risk of trouble if we find him innocent. Just a tiny embarrassment for Rome.”
The young priest started to bluster. “I don’t think I quite meant…”
“You meant you thought you could get out of bed, outwit the Imperium, then hop back into it so you’d be fresh to stuff your face for tomorrow’s feast. Not so, I’m afraid. You see, we value order, and this man has said he wants the lowest in society to be elevated to the highest. It may be my suspicious mind, but I think that also means the highest are suddenly in the position of the lowest. Now, let’s paint a picture. You out on the street and the lowest slave in the city is running the Temple. More important for us, it means this little brat”—he pointed at Flea—“will be sitting in the governor’s palace while the governor works in the tanneries. No. This will not do. If the Temple does not see the threat or is too scared to act, the Imperium must. We’re off to the governor’s palace, and if you want to have any say in proceedings I suggest that you come too.”
“You don’t think that will happen…”
“Rebellion starts in the heart. We must stop the uprising or stop a lot of hearts.”
“But, for better or worse, this man has a considerable following,” the priest said. “Put him in front of the governor and the mob will go mad. It’s a disaster waiting to happen.”
“At last we get to the truth,” the Results Man said. “Now you admit he has a following, but have grown so fat and lazy up on your rock that you think this little problem will go away if you do nothing.”
“We had a plan in place…” the young priest repeated. “We were handling it.”
“You were not.” Again, Flea was pushed forward and held in full view of the priests. “Your plan, as you call it, was undone by this … beggar thing and has been a disaster from day one. I repeat: Yeshua is calling for revolution. Yet again the Imperium must stand as the bulwark between order and chaos. Idiots.”
The Results Man spat out the final word and stalked away.
38
The governor’s palace was only a hundred paces from the high priest’s.
They were expected. Flaring torches painted fire and darkness on marble walls. A mob had gathered. It seethed angrily behind a hedge of soldiers. In front of it a clear space had been left, then there were wide, even steps and the balcony of the palace.
Flea was released. But there was nowhere for him to run, and he pushed through into the soldiers so he could see Yesh waiting at the foot of the steps. Yeshua’s eyes were closed and he rocked slowly from foot to foot. Flea felt exposed. He didn’t want Yesh to see him. He couldn’t face his steady smile again. He pushed back through the soldiers and suddenly was face-to-face with the skinny girl.
“How did you get in here?” he hissed. She didn’t answer immediately but beckoned to him, and they pushed through the crowd to a mounting block by the wall. They stood on it, out of the crush and out of the way.
“I squeezed behind the guards when the crowds outside started pushing. No one ever sees me,” the girl whispered.
Flea sized her up. She was stick thin and her face had shadows where there shouldn’t be, but she didn’t look starved. What’s more, she must have crossed the city today, and starving people couldn’t do that. Her eyes were big and under them her face narrowed to a small chin. Her hair was close-cropped where his was long and matted. That was partly why she looked so vulnerable.
“Have a good look, why don’t you?” she said when she noticed him staring.
“Why are you following me?” Flea asked.
“Following you?
I’m following the action. I warned you to stay away.”
“You thought this would happen?”
She looked around. “This? No one thought this would happen. I was just trying to save you from a beating from the Temple Police.”
“But why?”
“I hate cruelty to dumb animals.”
Flea couldn’t even think of a retort. “Dumb animal is just about right,” he said. “Everything’s my fault. I messed everything up.”
“I tried to warn you.” The girl’s mouth closed primly.
“You never told me the world was about to end!” Flea snapped back. “You didn’t tell me the Romans were involved.”
The girl stared him down. “You just ran away. From me. Whenever I tried to help you.”
Flea flushed hot. He looked into the black sky. It had started to snow again; flakes swirled in the torchlight then melted with a hiss. He shivered. Instead of the hard brilliance of stars, there was shifting chaos. A singed moth patted his feet and spiraled off.
The girl exhaled. “Look, don’t go all soft,” she said. “Truth is, no one knew. I hang out on the other side of the Temple, near the kitchens? Sometimes they let me sweep the floors and move the rubbish in the dining hall. You hear all sorts of stuff, if you listen. Anyway, the other day, the Temple Police were going on about this magician who was coming to town and how they wanted to stop something from happening. I never heard what. But that’s why I warned you.”
“But the Police were trying to do the right thing and I stopped them,” Flea said. “The priests thought that if people ignored Yesh, then no one would listen to him. When the Imps arrested him, that’s when it would all kick off. But get this: Yesh wanted to be arrested.”
“So he wanted it. So then it wasn’t your fault,” the girl said.
“What’s it to you?” Flea asked. “I mean…”
But he couldn’t finish because at that moment the governor of the city, the Roman in charge of them all, appeared on the balcony of his palace. He was wearing a purple cloak. His thinning hair was pushed forward on his forehead and you could see the gray stubble on his fat cheeks.
