by Mary Reed
Theodora sighed, then went on in the same casual tones. “You are no doubt wondering if your freedom has a price and how high that price might be. Is it too high? Can a murderer such as you afford to haggle over the cost of his life?”
The empress stopped in her speech and looked at him expectantly but Anatolius remained silent. He reminded himself that he was a soldier of Mithra, that he had been anointed with the blood of the bull. He would not ask what ransom she had in mind. He would not give her the pleasure of forcing him to bargain for his life.
A look of disappointment momentarily marred Theodora’s perfectly painted face. So, thought Anatolius, she had thought he would grovel, beg for mercy, kissing the hem of her robe and weeping, like so many soft young men who had found themselves on the wrong side of justice.
Theodora, seeing he would not speak, went on in that husky whisper that some, and inevitably to their bitter regret, had found seductive but that others considered akin to the warning rumbling growls of the wolves that ran in the dark forests of Germania.
“You are such a handsome young man,” she remarked. “It would be a pity to see you executed. And of course the emperor speaks highly of your work for him. I know he relies upon you to keep account of his official correspondence and advise him on all those minute details of etiquette, how to address this ambassador or greet that statesman. Your duties for him are rather like those of your friend John, so far as that goes, but,” her tone hardened, “I hope you have never shared John’s desire to influence the emperor’s decisions.”
Anatolius could not hide his surprise at her mention of John.
“Ah, I see I have your interest at last! Well, then, to continue. As it happened, the emperor was originally of the opinion that it would be most unwise to allow the general populace to mistakenly conclude that a high born, handsome and,” she touched Anatolius’ chin lightly, “well-favored young man be permitted to murder with impunity. So he consulted those who are knowledgeable about these matters. They suggested that your punishment begin with the stripping of the skin from your knees right down to your toes.”
Anatolius felt faint.
“But as all his subjects are aware,” Theodora pointed out with a smile, “only Justinian as emperor has the right to wear scarlet boots, so of course he enjoyed their jest immensely. So much so that it persuaded him that, as a gesture of his renowned mercy, you will be granted a speedy death immediately after suffering the agony of being fitted for your new scarlet boots.”
Anatolius’ stomach heaved at her words. He silently invoked the name of Mithra, trying desperately to maintain control of himself. What was she saying now, something about signing documents giving his newly acquired estate to the imperial treasury?
“But surely it is the law that…” he croaked.
Theodora made a valiant effort to appear offended at the mere suggestion of illegality. She was almost convincing, having improved in the art of acting since her youthful years in the theatre.
“It would be a gift for the good of the empire and could well encourage others to follow your generous example. After all, who of your illustrious line will be left after you die? Your only relative now is your uncle Zeno, and he is aging and in any event rarely sets foot in Constantinople.” An unpleasant smile flitted bat-like across her face. “I seem to be unable to avoid the mention of feet, don’t I? But concerning your uncle, he will shortly be arriving in the city. I sent for him immediately you were arrested so he could arrange your father’s funeral rites. We must always observe the proprieties, Anatolius. It is regrettable that you cannot be present at your dear father’s funeral, but there it is.”
Was it an indirect threat against his uncle, Anatolius wondered, recalling the kindly old scholar who spent his days pottering about in his garden, a man whom John had once described as possessing eclectic credulity?
He could not be certain, but he would strive not to reveal his fear to Theodora. He would rely upon his god to protect him from those who dwelt in darkness and to give him the courage manfully to bear whatever obscene horrors awaited. He offered up a silent prayer that he would not succumb to the temptation of begging for death. Whatever path he took, he knew he was trapped in a snare as finely meshed as the gold chains spidering Theodora’s hair. He had no illusions as to his fate even if he agreed to sign over everything he owned to the imperial treasury.
It was as if Theodora could read his rapidly churning thoughts.
“Now it may be that you are relying upon the Lord Chamberlain to rescue you from this predicament, as he has done so often in the past. I hear that he visited you not long ago,” she said, moving towards the door. As she opened it, she revealed what Anatolius realized was the true reason for her extraordinary visit.
In a smiling Parthian shot, she said, “But my dear Anatolius, on this occasion and indeed for the rest of what remains of your life, the Lord Chamberlain can no longer assist you. The emperor, you see, exiled him. Another gesture of his boundless mercy, for he could have ordered him executed on the spot, but alas, it was fruitless. Word has just arrived that your eunuch friend was caught by the rabble. Apparently he sought to defy his emperor and remain nearby. I am supposing you begged him to help you, and perhaps that is why he disobeyed Justinian’s orders. Such a pity, really, and so predictable of him. He could not have saved you and now he is dead. It appears that his life ended neither quickly nor painlessly. I will spare you the details.”
The door banged behind her, the draft from its heavy closing extinguishing the small lamp’s flickering flame.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Dressed in elegant clothing, Peter stood on the grassy space in front of the shrine of St.
Michael, speaking with a similarly well-dressed pilgrim.
“Sarcerdus Rufus?” the man said, in response to Peter’s inquiry. “His wealth is exceeded only by his piety. He followed Michael from a distant land. In fact, it’s well known that Michael began his preaching on Sarcerdus’ very doorstep.”
Peter nodded thoughtfully and forced himself to stand upright, burdened as he felt by the unaccustomed weight of his embroidered robe.
The past hours had resembled a strange dream. First, he had fled Constantinople with his master. Then they had inexplicably disembarked from the ship taking them to safety and walked south alongside the Bosporos, back to the shrine. And finally John had insisted his servant pose as a wealthy pilgrim. At least this latter strangeness explained John’s sudden and final puzzling instruction to add a fine garment in the small bundle of clothing carried with them when they left the city.
As his master had explained it, since he had been to the shrine in his official capacity on two very public recent visits, it was entirely possible that he might be recognized if he tried to question pilgrims or acolytes himself. And it was necessary that they find out as much as possible about Michael-especially about his origins.
Peter had ventured the opinion that everyone in Constantinople knew about Michael. After all, everyone in the city had talked about nobody else for days.
“Perhaps we only think we know about him and his followers,” John had remarked, going on to tell Peter about Philo’s cryptic message.
The servant was appalled. Why would his master risk his life because of some nonsensical letter? It was just as likely to have been some odd game the man had been playing, like the one with the board and carved pieces.
But Peter, always dutiful, had done his best, not that it had taken much craft to learn about Sarcerdus Rufus.
Peter, or rather the pilgrim he was supposed to be, had traveled a long way to pay his respects? Well, hadn’t he heard Sarcerdus Rufus had traveled even further? Was Peter prepared to pour a stream of silver out for Michael’s charitable works? Praiseworthy indeed, but everyone knew Sarcerdus Rufus had pledged a river of gold.
As to where this paragon of far traveling and generous virtue was to be found, Sarcerdus Rufus was staying with the acolytes and a number of pilgrims at a ne
arby villa.
Unfortunately, John now insisted Peter must interview Sarcerdus Rufus. Fortunately, the villa was not far down the road.
The villa’s gate was guarded by a group of burly men who, Peter thought, did not look much like acolytes. The man who stepped forward to block his path had certainly not received the scar bisecting his face from poring over scripture.
The man studied Peter, a well-dressed elderly man looking very fatigued. His tall, stooped attendant-his servant, Peter explained upon requesting admittance-stood a pace or two behind, intently studying the stony ground.
“You aren’t likely to be granted an audience with Michael very soon,” the guard warned Peter.
“Indeed that is not surprising, but I was advised I should bring my offering here for safekeeping,” he replied. “Perhaps I might entrust a small portion of it to you immediately?”
“We do have procedures, of course,” acknowledged the guard as his hand, missing two fingers, rose toward the glint of the follis Peter offered. No doubt everyone knew that Sarcerdus Rufus had given a larger bribe, but to Peter’s relief the guard didn’t mention this fact and simply stood aside.
“You are welcome here, good sirs,” he said, waving them into the villa grounds.
Stepping through the arched gateway, Peter found himself surprised by the expanse of the gardens surrounding the dwelling. Even a cursory glance around revealed a guest house, stables, and outbuildings, all solidly built of cream colored stone and roofed with red tiles and set amidst decorative groves and fountains.
The Michaelite presence was obvious from numerous groups of people conversing as they strolled around. As Peter and John drifted among them, they passed by a fountain with a basin a woman was using to wash clothing. A ragged tunic hung drying over the shoulders of the fountain’s verdigrised statue of Neptune. Rivulets of water flowed in endless streams from the conch shells held by the god’s attendants.
Here and there children played outside small tents pitched beside decorative ponds. It was a peaceful scene.
The third pilgrim they consulted nodded enthusiastically and gestured toward a small building amid a stand of oak trees.
“He’ll be at the baths,” he said. “You can’t mistake him.”
When he entered the building’s caldarium Peter saw what the pilgrim had meant. Sitting in lonely majesty in the pool, Sarcerdus Rufus was the leanest man Peter had ever seen. His appearance was not improved by a head that had been shaved in the style favored by the pilgrims. His body was as hairless as a cod fish. He looked, Peter thought, like a skeleton, an animated saint’s relic.
Peter greeted the man and then trotted out the story he and John had concocted. He could sense his master standing silently behind him. It was discomfiting to be taking his place, playing his role in life. The whole venture was madness, he told himself.
“Of course, I’m always glad to tell my tale to a fellow pilgrim. Please feel free to join me. And perhaps your servant could bring refreshments?” Peter was startled by the booming voice that echoed like thunder around the marble chamber. How could an emaciated husk produce such an enormous noise?
Peter turned toward John, unsure whether he would be able to feign ordering him to carry out such a task, but his master was already slinking off in a most embarrassingly cringing manner. John was a much better actor than he could ever be, Peter thought.
In short time, Peter had stripped and lowered himself gingerly into the small pool. He was happy enough to bathe. Hesitantly he asked concerning the stories he had heard about the man sitting opposite him.
“Yes, yes, they are all true.” Sarcerdus nodded vigorously and leaned forward, causing hot water to slop in waves against Peter’s chest. “I journeyed here from very far off, from beyond the eastern end of the Euxine Sea. Months it took, and it’ll take months to soak off the dust of the journey.” He rubbed a finger along the bridge of his nose, which was as prominent as that of a shriveled Egyptian mummy. “But such is the lot of the pilgrim. Now, what business did you say you were in, Peter?”
“I provisioned the emperor’s armies.” And so he had, he thought, reminding himself of the years he had spent as a camp cook.
“Ah, of course, of course. Then you will be quite a wealthy man?”
“I fear I cannot match Sarcerdus Rufus in that regard, by all I have heard,” Peter replied truthfully enough.
The other man laughed much too loudly. “Nor do you need to, my friend, unless you are among those who feel any price is justified if it guarantees deliverance from the evil place!”
“But surely a devout person like yourself need not fear such a destination?” Peter did not have to mimic surprise.
“I wasn’t thinking of going there, but rather of deliverance from it. It may shock you to hear that, in fact, I have spent most of my life amidst the very fires of Hell.”
Peter expressed astonishment.
Sarcerdus smiled with delight at the prospect of telling his story once again. “Have you ever journeyed beyond Lazica, into the border regions?” he began. “A rhetorical question, I suppose, for few do. It’s an area always in upheaval and it’s such a long trip from anywhere civilized that the traveler can’t be certain whether he’ll arrive at his destination to find it an outpost of the empire or a recently annexed part of Persia.”
He splashed some of the seething water onto his face and rubbed vigorously at his nose.
“Now, I’m a Roman myself,” he went on. “My ancestors were captured by Shapur along with Emperor Valerian. I’m quite certain I am related to the latter, by the way, but that’s another story. Anyhow, my family settled out there. Our neighbors were happy enough to let us practice our own religion and we were even happier to make a few nomismata off them.”
Peter nodded wordlessly, trying to give the impression of being a man of the world and thus fully conversant with such situations.
“At any rate, since you haven’t been to those parts,” Sarcerdus Rufus went on, “I shall describe the area. I wish you could see it! There are places there where fire has burned endlessly throughout all of human memory. Mountains that smolder and give off a sulfurous stench like the pits of Hell. You would not dare set foot on them for the blistering heat, Peter, even if you had been brave enough to venture past the lakes of burning pitch boiling and bubbling at their feet.”
It was certainly easy to imagine such a place, sitting half submerged in the bath’s steaming cauldron. Peter wondered if someone had stoked the hypocaust too high.
“You can see the fires towering at night from many parasangs away,” his companion was saying. “You could read scripture by their infernal glow, provided you could keep it from bursting into flames first. I tell you, Peter, this place is so renowned that men go there to study its terrible qualities. Why, there are not only several sorts of pitch that burn but the very stones themselves are ablaze.”
“And Michael first began his ministry there, I hear?” put in Peter, who guessed the storyteller could spin out his tour of the nether regions for a long time if he was allowed to do so.
“Yes, indeed. It was on my land that he first gained prominence, and it was there also that I nearly forfeited my soul.”
Peter observed that he could scarcely believe such a thing.
“Why do you think I am here? To make amends, of course! To earn forgiveness!” Sarcerdus’ voice grew louder. Grape-like drops of sweat trembled, broke and rolled down the thin inclines of his face. “For when he first appeared, I ordered my servants to drive him away!” He slapped at the water as if it had offended him, sending more waves crashing around Peter.
“No! Impossible!” the latter exclaimed.
“But it was so, for I was blind, my friend. To be fair now, what did you think yourself, when you first heard rumors of his teachings, at the senate house perhaps or during one of the emperor’s banquets?”
“Well…”
“Exactly my point, Peter. But then you listened to his words and finally unde
rstood what he was saying.”
“That is true enough. I understood.”
“I was one who did not listen at first.” Sarcerdus ran a thin hand over the bald dome of his head as he stared up into the swirling steam gathering in the rafters above them.
“I own a great deal of land, Peter,” he went on. “There’s nothing I don’t grow or raise. Wheat, fruit, goats, cattle, but most of all I favor vineyards. One morning some time ago, one of my servants came riding up to the house to sound the alarm. ‘Master,’ he told me, ‘You must come at once, for we are being invaded.’”
“How terrible!”
“Oh, it isn’t unusual to be invaded where I lived. Sometimes it’s Persians, the next time it will be Romans and, if I recall aright, this particular time it was due to be Persians since there had been a Roman tax collector around the previous year, that being the usual way we know who is pretending to be in charge of the area. Aside from seeing who has the most soldiers out on the roads, of course. So I said to my man, ‘Get the wagon and I will take a tribute.’ As a man of the world, you’ll understand that’s what we call a bribe. They stop these minor skirmishes from escalating into invasions causing real damage. But he said, ‘No. It’s not that kind of invasion.’ I was intrigued, as anyone would be.”
He paused for a moment and Peter, genuinely entranced by the man’s story despite its length, urged him to complete the telling of it.
“As it happened, I had guests at the time,” Sarcerdus Rufus obligingly continued. “After my wife died, I enjoyed offering travelers hospitality for it made my house seem less lonely. I reveled in tales of far off places and was eager to have my ears filled with exotic stories. These particular guests had journeyed out to see the fires. Nothing unusual in that, for as I told you, the area is famous for it. They repaid my hospitality with some fine codices for my library, by the way. Codices are priceless, as I’m sure you’ll agree.”
