Three for a Letter

by Mary Reed

  More than anything else John noticed the quiet. Instead of Sunilda’s constant chatter flowing like a river in his ears, there was only the sound of his footsteps, his breathing, the slight susurration of his robe as it brushed past twigs encroaching on the path.

  “Sunilda!” He called again but there was no answer. Would he, or anyone else, ever hear her voice again?

  He continued at a brisk pace, half-hoping to see her sitting on the marble bench where they often paused for a while or beside the fountain where she invariably insisted on throwing a pebble into the water. The visions of her in all these places leapt so vividly from his memory that when he turned this corner and that to find only shadows, her absence seemed all the more foreboding.

  He returned to where Felix was stationed. The captain had a grim reply to John’s inquiry about the progress of the search. While his excubitors could be relied upon to conduct it diligently, he pointed out, it was now almost certainly too late.

  “If someone wishes to harm the girl, they’re not going to lurk around in the vicinity waiting to be apprehended, are they? I’d guess she’s nowhere near here. It’s more likely she’s half way to Constantinople by now.”

  “If she’s even still alive,” John responded somberly.

  “It’s as if the intruder entered the villa by magick.” Felix sounded uneasy. “Even so, with Theodora breathing down our necks we’d better be seen to be searching.” He lowered his voice as a pair of Zeno’s servants passed by, torches in hand, calling Sunilda’s name. “So just in case I’ve dispatched several of my men back towards the city, John. With everyone milling around, even Theodora won’t notice a few guards are gone, assuming she even knows how many were here to begin with.”

  “Theodora never misses anything but I agree you’re right to look beyond the estate. I’m off now to talk to Minthe. She was friendly with the girl and could well know something useful.”

  Felix gestured toward a nearby group of excubitors waiting for orders but John shook his head. “No. I’ll go alone.”

  In a short while John was on the shore road, looking down towards the village. He could see bobbing lights marking progress from hut to hut as the search for the girl continued. The murmur of breaking waves formed a peaceful lullaby as he loped swiftly down the hill toward Minthe’s house. An observer might have mistaken him for a young man running to meet his lover at this late hour, anticipation quickening his stride.

  No lamplight shone through the window of the woman’s strange dwelling. John cut across the herb beds, whose crisp, clean smell of thyme mingled with the musky smell of decaying seaweed lying on the beach.

  He stepped carefully around the fallen column Minthe used as a bench. It was not hard to imagine the resident of such a strange house practicing magick. Perhaps there lingered in the remaining pieces of the original building’s walls some trace of the power of whatever god had once been worshipped here.

  His flickering torchlight glanced off the glossy, blackberries hanging heavily on a bush under the dark window. The house door stood open to the surrounding night and the mournful sound of the sea.

  John drew his blade, tossed his torch through the door and then leapt inside after it.

  His caution was unnecessary, however, for the small room was empty, its atmosphere even more pungent than that hanging above the herb beds outside.

  John scooped the torch from the stone-flagged floor, sending shadows slithering around the walls and across the bundled herbs hanging from the ceiling beams. The flickering light passed over a low bench and an array of clay pots on a table.

  An arm extended from the shadows under the table.

  His torch revealed a rotund figure clothed in a worn but finely made orange dalmatic, sprawling limply, its limbs twisted at unnatural angles. Its head was a shapeless mass.

  For a heartbeat John feared it was Zeno. Then realization flooded in and with it the grim prospect of returning to the villa to inform the empress that all he had been able to locate was the straw man.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  “So, Lord Chamberlain, you have failed in your search.” Theodora was seated on a red couch by the window in Zeno’s main reception room.

  John bowed his head wordlessly, wondering if the two dismissed ladies-in-waiting were listening outside the door. The only people now in the room were himself, the empress, and her unfortunate host, Zeno.

  Theodora gave a particularly unpleasant smile. “Yes, Justinian will not be pleased to hear that our dear young guest has disappeared while in your personal charge.” She paused. “Not to mention while she was also under the guard of Captain Felix.”

  John’s face remained impassive. He well knew that, despite the truth of any given situation, punishment was commonly meted out according to imperial whim. Thus quite often the innocent suffered along with those who, if not guilty by design, had failed in their duty—or had been judged to have failed.

  “Highness,” he replied curtly, “no punishment would be sufficient for my neglect of my duty.”

  He was pleased to see that his answer surprised Theodora, although few except him would have noticed the transitory narrowing of her eyelids or the almost imperceptible tightening of her reddened lips.

  “I am quite certain an appropriate punishment can be devised, Lord Chamberlain,” she replied coldly. “However, I will admit that I am curious. Why do you admit to this negligence?”

  John squared thin shoulders and looked her directly in the eye, a liberty that few attempted. Of those who had, most had soon regretted it. “I neglected my duty because I allowed anger to control my actions, highness. That is never acceptable.”

  Theodora’s hard expression changed to thoughtfulness. “That’s true enough, and that you should admit it makes me almost respect you. Yes, almost.”

  In the ensuing heavy silence, John spared a quick thought for Felix, hoping he did not need to be reminded of the danger in which he also stood.

  Then his mind turned to Sunilda, so young and far from her home and family. She might well already be dead. The thought sickened him.

  The truth of the matter was, he admitted to himself, that he had become fond of the girl. Now she was gone, perhaps forever, he felt as if he had first gained, and then lost, another daughter. The thought caused him more pain than he would ever have anticipated.

  Theodora suddenly smiled. For an instant John imagined she had somehow read his morbid thoughts and was reacting to them with pleasure.

  “At least you managed to find the straw man the herbalist was commissioned to make for the festival,” she commented ironically.

  “We will have no need of it, highness,” Zeno spoke up at last. “Obviously all these frivolities will have be put aside while we search for the child. In all fairness, I should like to say that not all of the blame should be laid on the Lord Chamberlain and Captain Felix, for I have realized as the hours have gone by and Sunilda has not come home that I’ve been too caught up with my automatons and not attentive enough to my responsibilities to her.”

  Theodora rose from her seat. “I admire your loyalty to your friends, Zeno. However, we will not compound your errors by disappointing the villagers. I ordered that the festival go on. I do not repeat orders. Indeed, why should the sorrows of the rulers of the empire ruin their subjects’ quaint little joys? They’ve worked long and hard and the festival I have come here to witness will be held for that, if for no other, reason. Who knows, perhaps we shall be able to find a companion to accompany their straw man on his watery journey.”

  Her gaze lingered on John’s face as she spoke.

  ***

  “John!”

  John turned to see Anatolius hurrying toward him.

  His friend’s expression was troubled. “I heard about the girl when I arrived. When did you sleep last? You look half dead. And why is your face all scratched?”

  “Never mind about that, Anatolius. We have bigger worries to cope with
right now.”

  As John spoke, he briskly strode down the corridor, leaving Anatolius to follow close behind. Navigating the vestibule without incident, they crossed the threshold and set off across the garden. Around them, figures could be dimly seen moving through the shrubbery in the graying darkness that heralds dawn.

  “There is someone I must speak to,” John said. “I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me earlier, but something Theodora said made me think of it.”

  “I’m coming along with you, John. You look as if you’re hardly fit to cross a cart track by yourself right now.”

  They cut through the olive grove. It lay under the chill, empty silence that gathers at the very end of the night and in the shadowed interiors of mausoleums. Gnarled roots along the way caught at John’s feet. He had never noticed such obstacles before. His legs felt as heavy as his eyelids. He thought of relating to Anatolius what Balbinus had revealed about Castor but decided it was not the time. There were more pressing concerns. Besides which, he knew his friend would immediately blame himself for not seeing through the senator’s lies.

  Anatolius quickly described the results of his most recent visit to Constantinople. “I fear I learned more about the price of parchment than I did about Castor.” As Anatolius related his futile interviews with various city merchants first one bird sleepily called, then another. From the direction of the village there came the confident crow of a rooster.

  When the young man’s report began to approach epic proportions, John halted him with a word of thanks. “Clearly you were very thorough in your inquiries.”

  “I did learn something from Pulcheria, but even then it was about Barnabas and not Castor.”

  “Pulcheria?”

  “She came to your house and nearly scared Hypatia to death.”

  “Pulcheria’s scars are visible. In that regard, Fortuna treated her less kindly than some. But what were you doing at my house?”

  “Checking on Hypatia’s safety, nothing more than that, John. You know I have cast myself at Calyce’s feet.”

  “Only too well. Now, what is this about Barnabas?”

  Anatolius related the entire conversation, something for which John noted the young man had a particular facility. It was doubtless born from several years’ experience in accurately recording Justinian’s words, a task requiring an excellent listener and a better memory than most.

  They had reached the headland where Paul’s stone hut overlooked the sea. Their feet stirred silvery wisps of mist hovering here and there just above the rough grass.

  “So that’s how Barnabas assembled his collection of scrolls and codices, by stealing them? That’s very interesting.”

  “At the prices mentioned to me he could hardly have afforded to buy very many, I assure you. But what’s so interesting about that?”

  John was distracted from their conversation. Was that a movement? The faint moonlight limned bushes along the coast road but failed to penetrate into their dark mass of leafy branches. Even so, he could distinguish a shape, a figure, the pale oval of a small face.

  “Sunilda!”

  He ran forward.

  Suddenly the ground disappeared from under his feet. He had just enough time to realize he had stepped into the ditch but not enough to extend his arms to fully break the impact of his fall before he slammed down on one knee, then onto his hands, their palms scraping painfully on stony ground.

  For an instant he was dazed. Then he pushed himself up to his knees, the burning wetness of blood soaking through his garment and grit stinging in his abraded skin.

  What had attracted his attention was not a small, pale face but rather a clump of white seabird feathers clinging to a branch waving slightly in the sea breeze.

  ***

  Paul shuffled out of his stone dwelling carefully carrying three cups of wine. The steady breeze from the sea carried the tang of salt. The three men might have been standing at the prow of a great ship instead of on a weedy outcropping.

  “If I knew where Minthe’s gone, I’d suggest you consult her about a poultice for that, excellency.” Paul handed a cup to John, who took it gingerly in his injured hand.

  John looked in the direction of Minthe’s house. Already the air was noticeably warmer. Soon the night would be gone. Rays from the still invisible sun rising beyond the island caught its jagged peaks, tinting them with reddish gold.

  He asked the former fisherman to tell him more about Minthe, now that Sunilda was not present to eavesdrop.

  “Well, Minthe certainly knows every use for all the herbs and healing plants the Lord has given us,” Paul replied slowly, “although she also thinks she can interpret the future, which is another matter entirely. Only the Lord knows our futures.”

  John said that he was interested in the woman’s personal history.

  Paul shrugged. “I’m not one to put my nose uninvited into the affairs of others, sir.”

  “You’ve lived here a long time?”

  “That’s so.” Paul drained his cup and then wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Even so, no one seems to know very much about her.”

  “People always gossip,” put in Anatolius.

  “They do indeed. One thing that’s caused a lot of talk is that she never goes near the church. Some claim she wouldn’t dare, that she’s a demon. Mind you, more than one person who’s whispered that abroad has asked her to put a question to those goats she pretends to speak for.” He held up his hand, extending a crooked forefinger. “But you see that? I ran a fishing hook through it. Minthe pulled it out and dressed the wound with some strange-looking mess. Three days later the skin was healing, yes, even though I’ve seen more than one man lose a finger after an injury like that.”

  “Has she been accurate when interpreting the messages of the goats?” Anatolius wondered, looking toward the sea. “Is that why people consider her a demon?”

  “I think she’s encouraged that rumor herself,” Paul admitted. “Fear keeps people away from that blasphemous hovel of hers and she has always liked her privacy.”

  “But she doesn’t seem to mind Sunilda’s visits,” John pointed out.

  “I can’t explain that, excellency. She’s a woman, of course. Women like children, don’t they? Or perhaps she’s getting lonely, living on her own for so long. Me, now, I’ve spent most of my life out there on the water, so solitude and I are old friends. What some may fear, others love. Many men are afraid of the tempest, but sometimes I wake up during the night in a panic because my pallet is lying still. I’m afraid I’ve run aground, you see. I suppose in a way I have.”

  Strange to imagine, John reflected, that someone might actually fear not sailing on the vast bosom of the sea. “So Minthe has no family?”

  “No. She’s not from the village,” Paul said, “and now I think about it, it must be twenty years since she showed up here. That house she lives in was once a temple. It had been in ruins for as long as anyone can remember. You can probably find bits of it in walls all over the village. A stone here, a stone there, very handy indeed it was. In fact, it’s said the marble for the path to the church came from there as well.”

  “Just think of that, John,” commented Anatolius. “All those devout worshippers treading on stones that once echoed to blasphemous abominations.”

  John silenced his tactless young friend with a glance.

  “The Lord triumphs over all,” Paul replied simply, ignoring the young man’s attempt at humor.

  “So Minthe simply appeared and moved into the ruin?” John prompted him.

  “That’s right, sir. Let’s see, it was at the end of the winter, a very wet winter it was, with rain pouring down day after day and keeping people indoors more than usual. I’d mended all my fishing nets twice over.”

  Paul squinted toward the sea, whose swells were beginning to flash in the strengthening sunlight. “One day the rain stopped,” he continued, “and there was smoke blowing along the beach. The wom
an had moved in. During the rains she’d transformed the place. Piled up stones, boarded up gaps, repaired the roof. It was like magick, which is probably what she wanted us all to think because she immediately started healing with potions and herbal remedies. She’s lived there ever since.”

  “And did she wear her hair exceedingly long then as she does now?”

  Paul gave John a puzzled look. “I suppose she did. She’s still a striking looking woman, even though she’s aged. I can’t deny that.”

  John was already turning to go back to the coast road. He had to speak to Poppaea again.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  “Potions? Do you mean Poppaea has been subjected to the ministrations of an ignorant village herbalist without her mother’s knowledge?” Godomar had risen from the chair in which he had been seated reading scripture aloud when John and Anatolius entered Poppaea’s room.

  “I thought everyone knew, Godomar,” stammered Anatolius. “In fact, Calyce predicted Minthe’s potions would make the girl stronger and you can’t deny they have.” He gestured toward Poppaea, who was sitting up in bed, looking pale but alert.

  “You may attribute her recovery to magick,” Godomar told them. “But I drove the unclean spirit from her frail body.” He glared at Anatolius.

  “I must speak to Poppaea concerning Sunilda,” John said sharply, too fatigued to practice the civility he prized.

  “I doubt you’ll ever find her,” Godomar returned.

  “You know something useful concerning her disappearance?”

  The prelate’s bloodless lips tightened into a smile suitable for a death mask. “I fear the demon was too willful and I could not drive it out of her, Lord Chamberlain. Isn’t it obvious? It would have been better for her poor soul had she died with Gadaric. Now the foul spirit has taken her away somewhere beyond our reach.”