Secrets of the Dead

by Tom Harper

  Michael tried to force a grin, a ghost of his old insouciance. He couldn’t quite make it. His face simply looked broken.

  ‘If you can’t beat them …’

  Dragović had lost interest. He barked an order: his men surrounded the sarcophagus, one on each point. Stubby crowbars came out of a backpack. They levered them under the lid, cursing and sweating.

  ‘How did they get that down here?’ Michael said again. He’d turned so that he had his back to Abby.

  Dragović pointed to a thin crack down the corner. ‘They bring it in as panels and cement it together. Like IKEA.’

  The four men leaned on their crowbars. They were large men, built like weightlifters, but they struggled to make an impact on the purple stone.

  ‘Maybe we use some detcord?’ grunted one.

  ‘No.’ Dragović was watching them intently, his whole body tensed. In that moment, Abby almost thought she could have slipped away without being noticed. She didn’t dare try.

  ‘We do nothing to damage the labarum.’

  The men heaved again. The bars strained, the stone resisted. Nothing gave. Abby felt the tension taut in the air, the quiver of something about to snap.

  The bars moved – first one corner, then spreading to all four. A deep rumble rolled around the room.

  The lid lifted and slid back. Dragović walked forward and peered into the open coffin.

  Constantinople – June 337

  The sun from the open door is a blinding, brilliant white. Porfyrius turns to me.

  ‘It’s time. Are you with us, or against us?’

  I’m alone, I want to say.

  ‘We can tie you up, leave you here until it’s over. Or you can join us.’

  There’s no choice. I have to see how this ends. ‘I’ll come.’

  I follow them up the stairs. In daylight, I can see that there are about twenty of them, mostly with the close-cropped hair and straight shoulders of military men. They’re dressed in white Schola uniforms, though that doesn’t mean anything. The man – I still can’t bring myself to call him Crispus – is near the front; all I can see is his back. His hair is curly, almost touching his collar – longer than he wore it eleven years ago, but still jet black. Is there a hunch to his left shoulder, a stiffness when he moves? Does he remember what I said to him on that beach? If only I could have five minutes alone with him, I could be sure one way or the other.

  The scaffolding’s still standing at the rear of the mausoleum, screened from the crowds who have gathered on the ground outside. I can hear their quiet roar as we climb the ladders, criss-crossing back and forth up the platforms. No one tries to stop us.

  Just below the copper dome, there’s a walkway around the outside of the rotunda. A stone balustrade guards it, with latticed metalwork in between the pillars. The outside is painted gold, though from behind all you see is iron.

  We crouch beneath the balustrade and wait. Peering through the lattice, I can see the audience settling. The senators and generals have taken their seats on the banked stands facing the pyre; the legions have drawn up in scarlet squares around them, with the great mass of people behind straining for a view.

  How many of them will be alive at sunset if Porfyrius has his way? He says he wants to unite the empire – but even Constantine needed twenty years of fighting to achieve it. Not everyone will accept Porfyrius’s miraculous proposition on faith.

  I try to get a glimpse of Crispus, but the walkway’s narrow and jammed with Porfyrius’s men. Crispus is out of sight, further around the curve of the building.

  Down in the city below, the funeral bier is still making its slow progress up the hill. I turn to Porfyrius, crouched beside me.

  ‘Did Alexander discover him? Your secret? Is that why you killed him in the library?’

  Porfyrius wipes sweat from his eyes. ‘He discovered it in the worst way possible. Crispus had come to meet me in the library that day – there were papers he needed to see. Alexander saw him and recognised him. Crispus panicked; he grabbed the first thing that came to hand and lashed out. He’s strong. One blow was all it took.’

  ‘He bludgeoned his old tutor to death?’ I shake my head. ‘The Crispus I knew would never have done that.’

  ‘Death changes a man. And these are desperate times.’

  Porfyrius turns away and studies the landscape below. The tail end of the procession has finally made it into the mausoleum compound. The crowds slow its path as it winds its way to the pyre – hundreds of arms reach across the barriers just to touch the hem of the shroud. The priests who accompanied the bier from the palace have suddenly melted away, even Eusebius. None of them wants to witness this ancient rite, the way Romans have buried their rulers since the time of the kings. Afterwards, when the ashes are cold and the army dispersed, they’ll perform their own Christian ritual in the sanitised presence of the holy apostles. Though by then, things might be very different.

  The bier reaches the pyre. Six guards lift the body off and carry it up a flight of stairs to the first floor of the wooden tower. From here, I can’t tell if it’s the wax effigy or the real man – not that it matters. A solitary figure in a golden robe mounts the dais in front of it. He’s got his back to me: I can only see the top of his head, sparkling from the pearls in his crown. I guess it’s Constantius.

  Shouts ring out – not from below, but from up on the rooftop behind us. A hidden door’s opened; palace guards are pouring out of it on to the walkway. Swords clash as Porfyrius’s men wake up to the danger and try to beat them back.

  The last battle for Constantine begins.

  Rome – Present Day

  Dragović stared into the open coffin. The beam from his head torch shone down like a lance. Standing in the back corner of the chamber, Abby couldn’t see his face, but she saw the change in his body. He seemed to sag; he gripped the rim and swung his head from side to side as if drunk.

  He turned back. All the venom had drained from his face.

  ‘It’s empty.’

  His men peered in. Michael stepped forward and joined them. He reached in his hand, shoulder deep, and felt around. It came out closed in a fist, but when he opened it, there was nothing there but dust. It trickled through his fingers.

  ‘All for nothing,’ he murmured. ‘No labarum. Not even a body.’

  Dragović rubbed his hand along the top edge of the sarcophagus. By his light, Abby saw chips and gouges chewed out of the lip.

  ‘Someone has been here before.’ He swung back towards Michael. Suddenly, the silver pistol was in his hand and aimed at Michael’s heart. ‘Maybe you thought you could cheat Zoltán Dragović?’

  Michael stepped back against the wall. Behind him, a forlorn Jonah disappeared into the mouth of a giant blue whale.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, it was bricked up hundreds of years ago.’

  ‘It’s true,’ Abby said desperately. ‘Dr Lusetti – the archaeologist who was with us – he said those bricks were Roman. If grave robbers were here, they were Roman grave robbers.’

  Michael held out his arms in innocence. Dragović looked at his gun. From the cave floor, an electric buzz sounded from one of the backpacks that had been laid beside the sarcophagus.

  The man beside it lifted the flap of the pack and pulled out a small handset, linked by a wire to an unseen antenna in the backpack. He read something off the display and swore.

  ‘That was Darko,’ he said in Serbian. ‘He says carabinieri have entered the catacomb.’

  Dragović nodded. Far from worrying him, the threat seemed to restore his energy.

  ‘Rig the explosives,’ he ordered.

  ‘What about the coffin?’

  ‘Leave it. It’s empty.’

  More of the plastic tubing came out. Working briskly, the men began punching nails into the roof of the chamber and attaching the explosives. Dragović turned to Michael.

  ‘You know the good thing about catacombs?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s n
o problem to dispose of the body.’

  Abby saw what he was going to do a split second before it happened. She launched herself at Dragović, but his finger was already on the trigger. The gun fired; the bullet tore open Michael’s chest. He slammed back against the wall.

  Abby screamed. Her momentum carried her on towards Dragović, but his men were faster. An outstretched arm blocked her progress; two hands wrapped around her waist and almost lifted her off the ground. Dragović spun around. His face glowed with savage delight as he raised the gun and put it against her forehead. The heat of the barrel scalded her. She struggled, but couldn’t move.

  By the wall, Michael slumped to the ground and lay still.

  ‘Are you going to kill me too?’ The words sounded sluggish, drowned in noise. Her ears were still ringing from the gunshot. Dragović couldn’t have been much better, but he understood the sense. He thumbed back the hammer. Anticipation lit up his eyes.

  Across the room, one of his men tapped his watch, muttering something about carabinieri. Dragović nodded and lowered the gun.

  ‘Later. Maybe for now we need a hostage to get out of here.’

  The men gathered their packs. The last of the explosives were rigged to the ceiling – heavy bricks, as well as the thin tube connecting them. It looked like enough to bring down the whole catacomb.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ Abby asked. A bleak numbness had settled over her, a fatalism that knew no fear because it knew no hope. She didn’t look at Michael’s body in the corner.

  ‘Sometimes it is useful for people to believe you are dead. Michael Lascaris should have obeyed that rule.’

  One by one, they crossed the brick rubble back into the main catacomb. On the threshold, Abby turned back. For a second, she saw the two symbols on the wall, the purple sarcophagus cracked open, and Michael’s corpse curled on the floor. Then it vanished.

  Constantinople – June 337

  This is the war Constantine wanted to avoid, played out in miniature sixty feet above his tomb. Roman against Roman, soldiers in identical uniforms, except the badges on their shields. It’s a small battle, more of a wrestling match – the narrow walkway makes it hard for the soldiers to wield their swords – but no less savage for that. That close, you can smell every drop of blood or oil on the blade that stabs you.

  Most extraordinary, the crowds on the ground have no idea it’s happening. We’re hidden behind the lattice; they can’t see through its dazzling mesh from the outside. Down below, Constantius is still giving his oration to his father; the senators and generals are listening in their seats; the captain of the guard is holding a burning brand, ready to light the pyre. They don’t know that the corpses are already piling up in Constantine’s mausoleum.

  Blood spatters the white stone. The battle slows as bodies choke the walkway. We’re being attacked from both sides, but we’re still moving. Flavius Ursus’s men – I assume they’re Ursus’s men – are edging us round to the back of the building where they can finish us off. Some of the guards have blocked the door; others are keeping us back from the scaffolding so we can’t escape.

  Porfyrius’s men make a human bulwark either side of us, but they’re slowly being whittled back. It occurs to me, quite calmly, that I’ll die here: a blood sacrifice at Constantine’s tomb. I can’t see Crispus. Is he dead already?

  Porfyrius is shouting something in my ear, pointing up. A roofer’s ladder leans against the rotunda, leading up to the dome. Ursus’s guards are hemming us ever closer. I start to climb. The ladder wobbles and sways under the press of men at its base. A sword flashes so close it almost severs my ankle. Hands try to pull me down, but I kick them off. From the corner of my eye, I see Porfyrius go down.

  I come over the lip of the roof and cry out in agony. The copper tiles are blinding, and when I touch them I feel my skin shrivel. I swallow the pain and haul myself up. Ahead, through the glare, I can see a crouched figure staggering up the pitched copper tiles to the top of the dome. I crawl after him, using the folds of my toga to try and stop the metal burning me. I think it might catch fire, but I don’t care. All I want with what’s left of my life is to ask him one question.

  Are you really him?

  Below, the spectators have begun to realise something is happening. A murmur sweeps the crowd, loud enough that I can hear it on the rooftop. Senators crane around in their seats to look up. Constantius, on the dais, seems to falter and look back.

  This is the moment.

  At the top of the dome, the roof flattens around an open circular hole: the oculus, the eye for the sun to peer in to the mausoleum. Crispus scrambles to the edge, turns and stands. He faces the crowd arms spread apart in divine embrace.

  On the dais, next to Constantius, Flavius Ursus grabs the burning torch from a guard’s hand and hurls it on to the pyre. It’s well primed with oil and pitch: the flames catch straight away, racing up the columns of the wooden tower. Inexorably, the fire draws the crowd’s attention away from the action on the roof.

  Crouched on my hands and knees, I stare up at Crispus. He looms over me like a god; like a god, I doubt he even sees me.

  ‘Are you him?’ My throat’s parched, my voice a burned-out whisper. But somehow, above the crackle of the pyre and the roar of the crowd, he seems to hear me. He looks down; he smiles at me, warm with forgiveness.

  A shadow darkens the blazing air. Crispus cries out and clutches his side. Blood blooms in his tunic; an arrow hangs from his ribs. Archers have appeared on the roof of the eastern portico surrounding the courtyard. Another arrow hits him in the shoulder. He staggers back.

  He hangs on the edge of the oculus. The copper tiles shimmer under his feet, creating the illusion that he’s hovering in the air. For a moment, I can almost believe he’ll rise above it, lifted by angels away from danger.

  Without a sound, he falls back through the hole. The arrows are still falling, clattering on the roof, but they don’t hit me. I crawl to the edge and peer down.

  Far below, in an alcove against the back wall, I can see the huge porphyry sarcophagus waiting to receive Constantine’s body. In front of it, sprawled in the very heart of the starburst sun laid into the floor, lies a corpse. The marble rays splay out around him; through the oculus, the sun makes an almost perfect circle of light around him.

  A fragment of shadow breaks the circle. After a moment, I realise it’s my own.

  Rome – Present Day

  They hurried along the passages, following the footsteps they’d left in the soft mud floor. The detonator wire unspooled behind them. They hadn’t quite reached the first staircase when the man at the back called a halt.

  ‘No more wire,’ he said.

  For the first time, Abby saw a hint of concern cross Dragović’s face. ‘Are we far enough?’

  The man pursed his lips. ‘This place is old – and we put a lot of plastic in there.’

  ‘You stay here,’ Dragović told him. ‘Give us two minutes.’

  The man pulled out the control box and plugged in the wires. Abby wondered if she could get at him, if she might detonate the explosives too soon and bring the roof down on Dragović. But there was another man between them, and the tunnel was too narrow to get past.

  ‘Maybe five minutes is safer?’

  ‘Two. The carabinieri must be close.’

  Dragović led them on. They all felt the urgency now. Heavy boots kicked at Abby’s heels; several times, a hand on her back pushed her forward when she started to falter. She tried to count off seconds in her head, but the remorseless pace disrupted any rhythm. How long was two minutes? Long enough? Perhaps she wasn’t ready to die after all.

  They reached the stairs and hurried up to the second level. Here there was a wider chamber, a sort of crossroads where four tunnels intersected. The floor was rocky, the footprints harder to make out. Dragović studied it for a second.

  He doesn’t know the way, Abby thought.

  ‘What’s that?’

  The man beside
Dragović pointed down one of the tunnels. Abby followed his gaze. Around a bend, a dim light glowed, getting steadily brighter.

  ‘Carabinieri.’

  ‘Split up,’ Dragović ordered. ‘We can lose them in the tunnels.’

  They moved apart. Abby made to follow the guard behind her, but Dragović grabbed her collar and pushed her in front of him.

  ‘You come with me. In case I need –’

  A muted roar rose out of the depths of the catacomb. Two minutes. The first thing Abby noticed was the air racing past her – not out of the catacomb but back, sucked in by the explosion. A moment later it came rushing back with interest, a pressure wave sharpened with a million pieces of grit and sand that stripped her skin raw. The earth shook so hard she thought it would split open the rock.

  She didn’t look; she didn’t wait. She turned her back – on the explosion, on Dragović, on the pieces of rock that were shaking loose from the roof – and ran. Down the nearest tunnel, without thought for where it led, just so long as it was away.

  But she wouldn’t escape that easily. Someone else had the same idea. Among the rumbling echoes of the explosion and shifting rubble, she heard the quickfire beat of footsteps chasing after her.

  She couldn’t outrun him. All she could think of was to hide. The walls here were lined with cubiculae, the narrow shelves where the dead had once been laid to rest. If it’s big enough for a corpse, it ought to be big enough for me. She turned off the lamp on her head torch, lay down on the ground and squeezed her way in.

  The rock pressed her like a vice. She turned her head ninety degrees, one cheek against the roof and the other against the floor. She pulled her arm as tight to her body as she could. She tried to breathe, but the rock beat down on her chest and forced the air out.

  The footsteps came closer. A beam of light, dulled by dust or dying batteries, played along the stone corridor. Abby prayed he wouldn’t look down.

  ‘Abigail?’ Dust slurred Dragović’s voice. ‘You think you can escape? You think Zoltán Dragović ever forgets his enemies?’

  He gave a cough that turned into a snarling laugh.

  ‘Let me give you a piece of advice, Abigail, from a man who has seen many dark places in this world. If you want to hide in the dark, you should not wear a reflective coat.’