Strategos: Rise of the Golden Heart

by Gordon Doherty

  Just then, a fussing varangos tried to usher Dederic back to where Apion and Cydones sat, but Dederic ignored this, glancing to a brass sundial, then frowning and looking to the sky. The grey clouds were darkening in a portent of rain.

  ‘It must be close to noon, sir. Should we not be heading back, for the gathering?’

  Apion tossed the remaining peach to the Norman. ‘Aye, we should. And I must say, I do wonder if I’ve been anticipating anything with less joy.’

  Dederic grinned at this, catching the fruit.

  Cydones groaned as he stood, then a wry grin spread across his face. ‘Indeed! I’d rather face a hundred thousand Seljuks with a wooden sword – splinters on the handle, no less.’

  The three chuckled at this, then strode back through the crowd towards the palace, flanked by the varangoi. The first splodges of rain stained the streets before them as they walked.

  As the rain grew heavier, Apion snatched glances to the top of the portico from under a furrowed brow.

  The numeroi were watching his every footstep.

  ***

  The rain thundered on the palace roof and echoed throughout the main hall. But Eudokia’s words boomed over this din;

  ‘On the first day of the new year of our lord, the souls of God’s empire will gather to watch as noble Romanus Diogenes joins me in marriage. The empire will have a new leader, a new man who will act under God’s will to see our people prosper and our borders secure.’

  There were ninety men in her audience. They had set down their klibania, helms and weapons at the gates of the palace and wore only boots, tunics and cloaks. These were the doukes of the provincial tagmata and the strategoi of the themata together with their closest aides. Men who commanded armies of thousands, to victory or death. They listened intently.

  Apion stood with Cydones and Dederic. He watched Eudokia as she spoke frankly, her gaze icy. He wondered how many people had ever seen that gaze melt. Few, he reckoned. He had seen it for those precious few moments on the rooftop portico. He had seen it again when they had dined as a group and she had offered him a ghost of a warm smile. No wonder she was so guarded, he thought, given that she had lived in the presence of Psellos and his ilk for so long. Apion furtively eyed the squat, hawk-faced old man who was standing beside Eudokia, his hands clasped and a peaceable expression on his features. Ostensibly, the pair represented imperial unity. But his eyes – his eyes were scouring the room like a predator’s, as if seeking out those who had not yet pledged their allegiance to him.

  Beside Apion stood Nilos, the strategos of the Opsikon Thema. The big, bearded Greek had embraced him warmly when they had first been introduced over a week past. Ah, the Haga - the legend of the borderlands! But when Apion changed the subject to Psellos’ background, he became guarded, his eyes darting as he spoke.

  A leech! The strategos had hissed under his breath. The man is a damned leech who seeks puppets for the imperial throne! If you seek reasons for the decline of your borderlands, Haga, then the foremost of them is Psellos.

  Apion realised he was staring at Psellos, and that Psellos was staring back with added intensity. He turned to Eudokia and focused on her words.

  ‘There should be no doubt in your minds,’ Eudokia continued, ‘that imperial taxes will no longer be squandered on embellishment of the capital or bloating of imperial court bureaucracy.’ A rumble of approval broke the silence of the crowd.

  Apion could not help but notice Psellos’ eyes narrowing at this, darting to a handful of faces in the crowd. Apion glanced sideways to those targeted. One, a young doux, seemed cowed by Psellos’ glare and offered a faint nod. Another doux, a wiry, older man with an eyepatch, seemed to hold Psellos’ pinched glare momentarily. Apion felt a glow of hope at this, but then the wiry man’s forehead broke out in a sweat, then he gulped and dropped his gaze to the floor, offering another faint nod. Psellos then turned his gaze on Nilos, who returned the glare, squaring his jaw. Nilos did not yield, and Apion’s heart lifted at this. But Nilos was only one man.

  Apion leant to one side, where Cydones and Dederic stood. ‘It is as we thought,’ he whispered. ‘Psellos seeks to tip the balance.’

  Cydones’ sightless eyes gazed far into the distance. ‘Aye, treachery is in the air,’ he agreed, his nose wrinkling. ‘I can smell it.’

  ‘The armies of the themata will no longer be neglected and the outlying tagmata will be bolstered,’ Eudokia continued, ‘recruiting Byzantine souls and lessening the dependency on mercenary soldiers.’ Eudokia continued. This time, a cheer broke out from the crowd. But nearly half of them remained mute and wary of any show of support.

  Psellos’ lips tightened at this, as if resisting a satisfied sneer.

  Then, Eudokia brought her speech to a close, making sure to catch the eye of every man in the crowd; ‘I asked you here to welcome Romanus Diogenes to the city. Now,’ she hesitated for just a heartbeat, and Apion saw her lip tremble just a little, ‘I ask that you remain here to see us wed.’

  Apion’s eyebrows shot up at this. He looked to Dederic, who looked equally stunned.

  An unfortunately timed clap of thunder rippled through the air outside and reverberated through the hall.

  ‘Tell me I’m going deaf, Apion?’ Cydones croaked by his side. ‘Did she just say that we are to remain here until the year is out?’

  ‘Aye, unfortunately,’ Apion said in a muted tone, his gaze returning to Psellos. ‘I feel it will be a long, cold winter.’

  ***

  The rainstorm had raged for days, and the streets of the city were slick and shiny. A clap of thunder tumbled across the night sky and brought with it another sheet-like barrage. Many guttering torches hissed, spat and died at this.

  Wrapped in a brown hemp hooded cloak, Psellos splashed through the streets, past the Milareum Aureum, the gilded bronze pillar casting him momentarily in its ghostly golden light. When a pair of sunken-cheeked wretches emerged from an alley nearby, Psellos halted and raised one hand just a fraction. Then, as if spawned by the rainstorm, three gleaming numeroi spearmen stole from the shadows behind him and half drew their spathions. The screech of iron was enough to send the wretches scurrying back from whence they came.

  Psellos looked at his hand, marvelling at the power it wielded. The city was his. The empire would soon follow.

  Then he set off once more towards his destination – the Numera, the barracks of the Numeroi Tagma.

  But they’re so much more than a simple barracks, he grinned to himself.

  Two more numeroi stood in the gloom either side of the entrance, their helms and cloaks fending off the worst of the rain. When he approached they threw up a hand in salute.

  Then a komes, denoted by the white sash knotted at his right shoulder, emerged from the door to greet him. ‘I will take you to him, sir,’ he said.

  Psellos nodded in silence as he stepped out of the rainstorm and entered the barracks.

  The komes led him through a musty-smelling and dark corridor, until they emerged into the Numera muster ground. It was deserted apart from the sentries who looked down on them from the soaked, grey barrack walls and watchtowers. They skirted round the collonaded edge of the muster ground to stay clear of the rain. Then they came to an iron-lattice gate on the far side, behind which was a corridor lit by a flickering and faint orange torchlight. The komes nodded to the soldier posted here, who fumbled with keys then opened the gate. This revealed a worn stone staircase that descended steeply underground, slick with damp. The komes plucked a torch from the wall and they began their descent.

  ‘He struggled, sir. He killed one of my men. But a club to the back of his head put paid to his resistance. Now he is yours to dispose of as you see fit.’

  ‘Your continued distinction has been noted,’ Psellos enthused.

  They descended until they reached the prison complex, a series of pitch-black, stinking spaces gouged into the bedrock and fronted by rusting iron bars. Gaunt, sickly faces gawped as the torchlight bobb
ed past them, some scurrying to the backs of their cells in terror like rats, others lying like broken men, simply rolling their eyes to watch the passing pair.

  Then they came to a tall, timber chest that rested against the bedrock. The komes braced his shoulder against one end of the chest and then grunted, putting his full weight into shoving it to one side. The grating of timber on rock echoed around the prison.

  Psellos gazed into the opening and down the roughly-hewn stone staircase that was revealed. He could smell the rankness of burnt and rotting flesh, wafting up at them like a wolf’s breath. He could even taste the metallic tang of blood. As they descended the staircase, a muffled roar of agony escaped from the depths. Psellos’ face split into a grin at this.

  Then they finally reached the torture chamber of the Portatioi. The most devious of the Numeroi, some would say. The most efficacious, Psellos thought.

  The air was thin and hot in this small and enclosed chamber, probably composed of the dying breaths of the many hundreds he had consigned here.

  The only light came from the brazier in one corner, loaded with iron rods and tongs that glowed like hell itself. One torturer was dressed only in a loincloth, his muscular frame dripping with sweat in the stifling heat and the veins pulsing through his shaved scalp as he sharpened a sickle. Meanwhile, from the darker corner of the room, a ghostly figure lurked, his lank hair as white as his skin. This was Zenobius, his chief torturer and a man without a soul. He stoked at a cage in the shadows with a hot poker. This elicited animal grunting and screeching and illuminated fleeting glimpses of some inhuman form, wrinkled and glistening.

  Psellos frowned as he scanned the room, then he grinned as he turned round to the wall nearest the door. There his prize lay, like a goose awaiting the butcher. The huge and muscular figure of Nilos the strategos was chained to a table, on his back and spread-eagled, naked. His torso glistened with sweat and blood, and his muscles strained at the shackles. His face was a swollen mess.

  Psellos walked over to join him. ‘Ah, Nilos, you have inconvenienced yourself so,’ he bent over so his nose was inches from Nilos’ battered features. ‘How much less trouble I would have had with you if you had been as weak-willed as the others.’

  Nilos uttered an inhuman roar at this, straining at the irons that held him in place, and aiming a headbutt at Psellos. But the strike fell short as the irons clanked tight. Yet Nilos hovered there, the bulging masses of flesh that were his eyes cracking open just enough for him to glare at Psellos. ‘You’ll never buy my loyalty, you whoreson!’ he spat, his words slurred and rasping through his shattered teeth, blood and saliva spraying onto Psellos’ face.

  Psellos stood back, his nose wrinkling as took a silk cloth from his purse and dabbed at the mess. ‘Some I can buy. Some I cannot. I need only one thing from those in the latter group . . . I need you to die,’ he rubbed his hands together, his eyes glinting in the brazier-light, ‘and to die in an appalling manner. Then your corpse will serve to persuade the next of my targets.’

  At this, Nilos seemed to be fired with a fresh wave of fury. He wrenched up from the table, bawling from the bottom of his lungs.

  Psellos erupted in laughter at this.

  But then the shackle holding Nilos’ right wrist shattered.

  Shards of iron sprayed across the room, and the strategos’ fist swung round in a powerful hook.

  Psellos leapt back, the blow flashing only inches from his face. His bowels turned over and icy fear stabbed at his heart. A shrill cry leapt from his lips as Nilos then wrenched at the shackle on his left wrist.

  Then Zenobius stepped forward deftly, snatched the sickle from the big torturer and slashed at Nilos’ forearm, cleaving the limb clean off. Nilos crumpled back onto the table, writhing, mouth agape in silent agony, blood pumping from the wound.

  Zenobius stepped back, cleaning his sickle in silence, his blood-spattered face expressionless. At this, the bald torturer’s hoarse cackle rang out once more, the foetid stench of his breath cutting through the vile smell in the chamber.

  Psellos righted himself, then barked at Zenobius. ‘Staunch the wound, I want him to die as planned!’

  The albino wrenched at the haemorrhaging limb and wrapped a length of filthy cloth around it, tying it as if strangling a victim. Then he barked to his colleague.

  The bald torturer used the tongs to pluck an iron mask from the coals. It was glowing white, sparks spiralling and dancing from it.

  Nilos’ pained cries fell silent at this sight. Then Psellos grasped his jaw and glared at him. ‘The death mask is but the finishing touch, Strategos,’ he purred.

  Taking his cue, Zenobius lifted the bolts from the cage in the corner, and the pair of starved hogs were released from their prison. They immediately took to licking and gnawing at Nilos’ arm stump. Then Zenobius punched the sickle into Nilos’ gut and ripped it across the length of the strategos’ belly. As Nilos’ guts tumbled from the wound, the hogs leapt upon him, tearing at the steaming entrails.

  At that moment, footsteps sounded from the stairs, and another figure entered the chamber. John Doukas’ eyes glinted with bloodlust at the sight before him. That and disappointment at having missed some of the proceedings.

  ‘You have joined us just in time, master,’ Psellos enthused to John, before turning back to Nilos, writhing under the frenzied hogs. ‘Another stubborn strategos is about to breathe his last.’

  Nilos could not even utter a croak as the beasts feasted upon his innards. His only solace was that the darkness was closing in. All he could see before him was the trio of faces: Psellos, the man who would be the death of the empire; John Doukas, who looked on like a hungry wolf; and a pale and emotionless creature whose glare cut through him like a blade. This was surely the realm of the Godless.

  Then he heard the albino speak calmly to the bald, burly torturer; ‘Finish him.’

  Nilos’ mind swirled with confusion until the tongs and the golden mask filled his field of vision, and descended upon his face. With an untold agony and a stench of searing flesh, the blackness took him. The hoarse cackling of the big torturer was the last thing he heard.

  As Nilos’ body fell limp, the grin faded from John’s face. ‘Now we must turn the screw upon our more stubborn visitors.’

  Psellos nodded. ‘Ah, yes. The Strategos of Chaldia, yet to see sense.’

  John shook his head. ‘He is even more tenacious than this whoreson ever was.’

  ‘Give me one more chance to speak with him, master.’ Psellos’ face opened up into a wicked grin. ‘He will turn, or he will die.’

  ***

  It was the first morning of December and the rainstorms had abated at last. The air was crisp and a heavy frost had settled across the palace gardens. Near the centre, the parakeets squawked as Apion and young Konstantious played. Apion roared like a lion and stomped forward, arms outstretched, scooping the boy up and swinging him from side to side. Konstantious squealed in mock terror, then wriggled free of Apion’s grasp and stumbled towards the orange trees, giggling.

  ‘It is a blessing that I had a thick and restful sleep last night,’ Apion panted, doubling over and resting his palms on his knees. Indeed, his body was already tired after his extended morning run with Dederic. Still, this horseplay was refreshing, lightening his mind of troubles.

  ‘I thought you said you were a brave lion?’ Konstantious jibed. ‘You don’t seem very brave to me. My parakeets are bigger and stronger than you, and they eat only the seed I feed them.’ At this, one fledgling bird fluttered clumsily down to rest upon his shoulder.

  ‘Now the worst thing you can do,’ Apion wagged a finger, stalking around the orange trees with accentuated footsteps, ‘is to goad a wild creature.’ His footsteps slowed and he fell silent, then he sprung forward with another roar. Konstantious squealed and then sped away with only inches to spare, darting into the rhododendron bush. The parakeet fled back to its nest.

  Apion stood tall, then stalked around the bush. He co
uld see Konstantious hiding in there, waiting, but he pretended not to notice. Then, when he ‘carelessly’ turned his back on the bush, the youngster burst from the undergrowth, hoisting a thick twig in one hand and leaping into the air.

  ‘Ya!’ Konstantious yelled and thrust the ‘spear’ into Apion’s leg.

  Apion fell to the ground in an exaggerated fit of choking and thrashing, before falling limp, eyes closed. He held his breath and lay motionless.

  Then, when Konstantious stepped closer to inspect his kill, Apion burst back into life, grappling the boy and roaring, lifting him from the ground and swinging him round in circles once more. The pair collapsed into a giggling heap before Konstantious got up and darted to the far side of the garden, his laughter filling the place.

  Apion stood, still chuckling. Then, as he stretched his shoulders, his gaze snagged on something. High on the balcony overlooking the gardens.

  Eudokia looked back at him, the frosty veneer she wore like a klibanion was absent. She was smiling, and it illuminated her beauty.

  Apion found it infectious, and let out a hearty chuckle, resting his hands on his hips.

  But the moment was fleeting. A varangos’ hand on Eudokia’s shoulder and a whispered word in her ear saw her expression fall icy once more. She turned and left the balcony without a word. Apion felt his own smile wane at this.

  Then it dissolved completely as he heard a familiar voice behind him.

  ‘These gardens are truly compelling. Once a man knows such finery, he can only think with horror of leaving it behind.’

  Apion turned to Psellos. The shrivelled adviser wore a fur-lined purple cloak trimmed with gold thread, hands clasped behind his back.