The door opened before them; a high-ranking ecclesiastic was ushering out a Videssian noble in white linen trousers and a tunic of lime-green silk. “I trust his Sanctity was able to help you, my lord Dragatzes?” the priest asked courteously.
“Yes, I think so,” Dragatzes replied, but his black-browed scowl was not encouraging. He strode past Marcus, Helvis, and Soteric without seeming to notice them.
Nor did the priest pay them any heed until his gaze, which was following Dragatzes’ retreating back, happened to fall on them. “Is there something I can do to help you?” he said. His tone was doubtful; Helvis and her brother were easy to recognize as Namdaleni, while Marcus himself looked more like a man of the Duchy than a Videssian. There was no obvious reason for folk such as them to visit the head of a faith they did not share.
And even after Marcus asked to speak with Balsamon, the priest at the door made no move to step aside. “As you must know, his Sanctity’s calendar is crowded. Tomorrow would be better, or perhaps the next day …” Go away and don’t bother coming back, Marcus translated.
“Who is it, Gennadios?” the patriarch’s voice came from inside the residence. A moment later he appeared beside the other priest, clad not in his gorgeous patriarchal regalia but in a none too clean monk’s robe of simple blue wool. Catching sight of the four outside his door, he let loose his rich chuckle. “Well, well, what have we here? A heathen and some heretics, to see me? Most honored, I am sure. Come in, I beg of you.” He swept past the spluttering Gennadios to wave them forward.
“But, your Sanctity, in a quarter hour’s time you are to see—” Gennadios protested, but the patriarch cut him off.
“Whoever it is, he’ll wait. This is a fascinating riddle, don’t you think, Gennadios? Why should unbelievers care to see me? Perhaps they wish to convert to our usages. That would be a great gain for Phos’ true faith, don’t you think? Or perhaps they’ll convert me—and wouldn’t that be a scandal, now?”
Gennadios gave his superior a sour look, clearly finding his humor in questionable taste. Soteric was staring at the patriarch in disbelief, Helvis in delight. Marcus had to smile, too; remembering his last meeting with Balsamon, he knew how much the prelate relished being outrageous.
Malric was in his mother’s arms. As she walked by Balsamon, her son reached out for two good handsful of the patriarchal beard. Helvis stopped instantly, as much in alarm at what Balsamon might do as to keep him from being tugged with her.
Her fright must have shown, for the patriarch laughed out loud. “You know, my dear, I don’t eat children—at least not lately.” He gently detached Malric’s hands from their hold. “You thought I was an old billy goat, didn’t you?” he said, poking the boy in the ribs. “Didn’t you?” Malric nodded, laughing in delight.
“What’s your name, son?” the patriarch asked.
“Malric Hemond’s son,” Malric answered clearly.
“Hemond’s son?” The smile slipped from Balsamon’s face. “That was a bad business, a very bad business indeed. You must be Helvis, then,” he said to Malric’s mother. As she nodded, Marcus was impressed—not for the first time—with the patriarch’s knowledge and memory of detail. Balsamon turned to Helvis’ brother. “I don’t think I know you, sir.”
“No reason you should,” Soteric agreed. “I’m Soteric Dosti’s son; Helvis is my sister.”
“Very good,” Balsamon nodded. “Come with me, all of you. Gennadios, do tell my next visitor I’ll be somewhat delayed, won’t you?”
“But—” Realizing the uselessness of any protest he might make, Gennadios gave a sharp, short nod.
“My watchdog,” Balsamon sighed as he led his visitors to his chambers. “Strobilos set him on me years ago, to keep an eye on me. I suppose Mavrikios would take him away if I asked, but somehow I’ve never bothered.”
“It must amuse you to bait the ill-humored fool, besides,” Soteric said. Marcus had thought the same thing, but not in the cruel way the Namdalener said it.
Helvis laid her hand on her brother’s arm, but Balsamon did not seem disturbed. “He’s right, you know,” the patriarch told her. He looked musingly at Soteric, murmuring, “Such a pretty boy, to have such sharp teeth.” Soteric flushed; Marcus was reminded that the patriarch could care for himself in any battle of wits.
Balsamon’s audience room was even more crowded with books than Apsimar’s had been back at Imbros, and far less orderly in the bargain. Volumes leaned drunkenly against the shabby chairs that looked like castoffs from the Academy’s refectory. Others jammed shelves, swallowed tables, and did their best to make couches unusable for mere human beings.
Peeping out from the few spaces parchment did not cover was a swarm of ivories, some no bigger than a fingernail, others the size of a big man’s arm. They were comical, ribald, stately, furious, what have you, and all carved with a rococo extravagance of line alien to the Videssian art Scaurus had come to know.
“You’ve spied my vice, I fear,” Balsamon said, seeing the tribune’s eye roam from one figurine to the next, “and another, I admit unjust, cause for my resentment against Yezd. These are all the work of the Kingdom of Makuran that was; under its new masters, the craft does not flourish. Not much does, save only hatred.
“But you didn’t come to hear me speak of ivories,” the patriarch said, clearing things enough for them to sit. “Or if you did, I may indeed become a Gambler, from sheer gratitude.” As usual, what would have been a provoking name in another’s mouth came without offense from his. His hands spread in a gesture of invitation. “What do you think I can do for you?”
Helvis, Soteric, and Marcus looked at each other, none of them anxious to begin. After a few seconds of silence, Soteric took the plunge, blunt as always. “We’ve had reports the people of Videssos are thinking of violence against us because of our faith.”
“That would be unfortunate, particularly for you,” Balsamon agreed. “What am I to do about it? And why ask me to do anything, for that matter? Why should I? After all, I am hardly of your faith.” He pointed at the patriarchal robe draped untidily over a chair.
Soteric drew in a breath to damn the prelate for being the stiff-necked fool he’d thought him, but Helvis caught the gleam of amusement in Balsamon’s eye her brother missed. She, too, waved at the crumpled regalia. “Surely your flock respects the office you hold, if nothing else,” she said sweetly.
Balsamon threw back his head and laughed till the tears came, clutching his big belly with both hands until his wheezes subsided. “One forgets what a sharp blade irony has—until stuck with it, that is,” he said, still chuckling. “Yes, of course I’ll pour water on the hotheads; I’ll give them ecumenism enough to choke on. For your presumption, if nothing else, you deserve that much. We have worse enemies than those who could be our friends.”
The patriarch turned his sharp black stare on Marcus. “What are you, the silent partner in this cabal?”
“If you like.” Unlike either of the Namdaleni, Scaurus had no intention of being drawn into a verbal duel with Balsamon, knowing it could only have one outcome.
Helvis thought he had little to say out of modesty, not policy, and came to his defense. “Marcus brought us word of trouble brewing,” she said.
“You have good sources, my quiet friend,” Balsamon told the Roman, “but then I already know that, don’t I? I thought that was your role here—it’s too soon for externs like the islanders to have caught the smell of riot. I haven’t been working on this sermon more than a day or two myself.”
“What?” Marcus shouted, jolted from the calm he’d resolved to maintain. Soteric and Helvis simply gaped. Malric had been almost asleep in his mother’s arms; startled by the sudden noise, he began to cry. Helvis calmed him automatically, but most of her attention was still on Balsamon.
“Give me some credit for wits, my young friends.” The patriarch smiled. “It’s a poor excuse for a priest who doesn’t know what his people are thinking. More than a few have call
ed me a poor excuse for a priest, but that was never why.”
He rose, escorting his astounded guests to a door different from the one they’d used to enter. “It would be best if you left this way,” he said. “Gennadios was right, as he all too often is—I do have another visitor coming soon, one who might blink at the company some of you keep.”
Thick hedges screened the side door from the front of the patriarchal residence. Peering through the greenery, Marcus saw Gennadios bowing to Thorisin Gavras. Balsamon was right—the Sevastokrator would not be pleased to see the tribune with two Namdaleni.
“Right?” Soteric exclaimed when Scaurus remarked on it. The islander was still shaking his head in wonder. “Is he ever wrong?”
The tribune elbowed his way through the thick-packed crowd surrounding Phos’ High Temple. In his hand was a small roll of parchment entitling him to one of the coveted seats within the Temple itself to hear the patriarch Balsamon’s address. A priest had delivered it to the Roman barracks the day before; it was sealed with the sky-blue wax that was the prerogative of the patriarch alone.
In his outland gear, Marcus drew some hard looks from the Videssians he pushed by. A disproportionate number of them seemed to be city toughs of the sort Scaurus had seen on the day he first met Phostis Apokavkos. They did not take kindly to foreigners at the best of times, but the sight of the Roman’s blue-sealed pass was evidence enough for them that he stood high in the regard of their well-loved prelate, and he had no real trouble making headway.
Videssian soldiers at the bottom of the broad stairways leading up the Temple kept the mob from crowding rightful seatholders out of their pews. They were nonplussed to find a mercenary captain with a token of admission, but stood aside to let him pass. At the top of the stairs a priest relieved him of his parchment and lined through his name on a roll of expected attenders. “May the words of our patriarch enlighten you,” the priest said.
“He enlightens me every time I hear him,” Marcus replied. The priest looked at him sharply, suspecting derision from this manifest unbeliever, but the Roman meant what he said. Seeing that, the priest gave a curt nod and waved him into the High Temple.
From the outside, Marcus had found the Temple rather ugly, impressive for no other reason than sheer size. He was used to the clean, spare architecture the Romans had borrowed from Greece and found the Temple’s heavy projecting buttresses clumsy, cluttered, and ponderous. Inside, though, its architects had worked a miracle, and the tribune stood spellbound, wondering if he had been suddenly whisked to the heaven Phos’ followers looked to in the life to come.
The structure’s basic plan was like that of Phos’ main temple in Imbros: at its heart was a circular worship-area, surmounted by a dome, with rows of benches projecting off in each of the cardinal directions. But Imbros’ shrine was the work of a not very gifted child when compared to this great jewel of a building.
First and most obvious, the craftsmen of the imperial capital had the advantage of far greater resources to lavish on their creation. The High Temple’s benches were not of serviceable ash but sun-blond oak, waxed and polished to glowing perfection and inset with ebony, fragrant red sandalwood, thin layers of semi-precious stones, and whole sheets of shimmering mother of pearl. Gold leaf and silver foil ran riot through the Temple, reflecting soft sheets of light into its furthest recesses. Before the central altar stood the patriarch’s throne. For Balsamon that throne alone should have made the High Temple a place of delight, for its tall back was made up of a score of relief-carved ivory panels. Scaurus was too far away to see their detail but sure only the best was tolerated in this place.
He tried to calculate what sum the erection of this incredible edifice must have consumed. His mind, however, dazzled by this Pelion on Ossa of wonders, could make no coherent guess, but only continue to marvel at the prodigies his eyes reported.
Dozens of columns, sheathed in glistening moss agate, lined the Temple’s four outthrusting wings. Their acanthus capitals, while more florid than the ones Marcus was familiar with, were in keeping with the extravagance of the Temple as a whole. Its interior walls were of purest white marble, turquoise, and, at east and west, pale rose quartz and orange-red sard, reproducing the colors of Phos’ sky.
Halfway up the eastern wall was a niche reserved for the imperial family. A screen of elaborate filigreework drawn around the enclosure allowed Emperors and their kin to see without being seen themselves.
For all the treasure lavished on the Temple, it was its splendid design that emerged triumphant. Columns, walls, arches, ancillary semidomes—all smoothly led the eye up to the great dome, and that was a miracle in itself.
It seemed to float in midair, separated from the real world echoingly far below by flashing beams of sunlight streaming in through the many windows which pierced its base. So bulky from the outside, it was light, soaring, graceful—almost disembodied—when seen from within. It took a distinct effort of will to think of the tremendous weight that freestanding dome represented, and of the massive vaults and piers on which it rested. Easier by far to believe it light as a soap-bubble, and so delicately attached to the rest of the Temple that the faintest breeze might send it drifting away and leave Phos’ shrine open to the air.
The play of light off the dome’s myriad tesserae of gold-backed glass further served to disembody it, and further emphasized the transcendence of Phos’ image at its very zenith. The Videssians limned their god in many ways: kind creator, warrior against the darkness, bright youth, or, as here, severe almighty judge. This Phos watched over his congregation with a solemn yet noble face and eyes so all-seeing they seemed to follow Scaurus as he moved beneath them. Videssos’ god held his right hand upraised in blessing, but in his left was the book wherein all good and evil were recorded. Justice he would surely mete out, but mercy? The tribune could not find it in those awesome eyes.
More than a trifle daunted, he took a seat. He could not help sneaking glances toward the stern omnipotence high above and noted hard-faced Videssian nobles, who must have seen that Phos hundreds of times, doing the same thing. It was, quite simply, too powerful to ignore.
The Temple filled steadily; latecomers grumbled as they slid into seats far from the central altar. Yet the floor sloped almost imperceptibly down toward the center, and no one was denied a view.
Soteric strode in, wearing his dignity as proudly as the wolfskin cape and tight breeches that marked him for a Namdalener. Catching Scaurus’ eye, he sketched a salute. But even his sangfroid showed signs of cracking when he locked eyes with the god in the dome. Under the weight of that gaze his shoulders’ proud set lowered a touch, and he sat with evident relief. Marcus did not think less of him for it; he would have been beyond humanity’s pale to remain unmoved by first sight of that omniscient, commanding frown.
The low mutter of conversation in the Temple died away as a choir of blue-robed monks filed in to range themselves round the altar. Joined by their audience and the pure tones of handbells from behind the tribune, they sang a hymn in praise of Phos.
Marcus had to content himself with listening, as he did not know the words. Nor did listening profit him much, for the canticle was in so archaic a dialect of Videssian that he could understand only a word here and there. A trifle bored, he wanted to crane his neck rudely to watch the bell players perform; he forbore only with reluctance. They were wonderfully skilled, their music clean and simple enough to appeal even to the tribune.
The High Temple’s thick walls had muffled the noise of the crowd outside. As the hymn’s last sweet notes faded, the throng’s clamor swelled, growing like the roar of the surf when the tide walked up the beach. All questions as to the reason for the increasing uproar disappeared when Balsamon, preceded by a pair of censer-swinging acolytes, came into the Temple. His face was wreathed in smiles as he made his way toward the altar.
Everyone rose at first sight of the patriarch. Out of the corner of his eye Marcus caught a flicker of motion from behind
the screen guarding the imperial family’s box. Even the Emperor paid homage to Phos’ representative, at least here in the Temple, the heart of Phos’ domain on earth.
The tribune would have sworn Balsamon winked at him as he walked past. He doubted himself a second later; with every step the patriarch took toward his throne, he assumed a heavier mantling of distinction. He did not contradict the figure he cut in private, but there was more to him than his private self.
He sank into the patriarchal throne with a silent sigh. Marcus had to remind himself that Balsamon was not a young man. The patriarch’s mind and spirit were so vital it was hard to remember his body might not always answer.
Balsamon pushed himself up out of the throne in less than a minute; the packed Temple had remained on its feet for him. He raised his hands to the mighty image of his god on high and, joined by his entire congregation, intoned the prayer Marcus had first heard from the lips of Neilos Tzimiskes northeast of Imbros, though of course he had not understood it then: “We bless thee, Phos, Lord with the right and good mind, by thy grace our protector, watchful beforehand that the great test of life may be decided in our favor.”
Through the murmured Amens that followed, Scaurus heard Soteric firmly add, “On this we stake our very souls.” Glares flashed at the Namdalener from throughout the Temple, but he stared back in defiance—that the men of the Empire chose to leave their creed incomplete was no reason for him to do likewise.
Balsamon lowered his arms; the worshippers took their seats once more, though necks still turned to catch sight of the bold heretic in their midst. Marcus expected the patriarch, no matter how forbearant his personal beliefs were, to take some public notice of Soteric’s audacity.
And so, indeed, he did, but hardly in the way the Roman had looked for. Balsamon looked to the Namdalener almost in gratitude. “ ‘On this we stake our very souls,’ ” he repeated quietly. His eyes darted this way and that, taking the measure of those who had stared hardest at Soteric. “He’s right, you know. We do.”
Videssos Cycle, Volume 1 Page 21
