Spira Mirabilis

by Aidan Harte

  ‘He’s a fraud.’

  Mik la Nan did not look in the least bit surprised. ‘So? It’s a useful lie. The other nasi believe it, or they pretend to, and that’s what matters. Your Sicarii have conventions that allow men of different tribes to live together, do they not? We nesi’im are no different.’

  ‘I won’t let you fight under false pretences, Mik la Nan. If you join me, you may die.’

  ‘And if I do not, I will die also. A few years later – and without the joy of cutting down my enemy today, be’ezrat HaShem.’

  ‘I tell you again: my quarrel is not against the Akkans. I just want to topple Catrina.’

  ‘And I have come to believe it might be possible. That – not some old fool’s tales or a dusty word like Radinate – that is why I’ll fight for you.’

  They talked into the night as the sickle moon sank behind the hill mourned by choirs of foxes, and when the sun came the foxes’ place had been taken by the little birds who sweetly hailed that daily miracle of the cold earth becoming warm.

  Before she left, Sofia asked, ‘What would you do if you ruled this land? Would you rebuild the Temple?’

  Mik la Nan took a long time to answer her. At last he said, ‘Countless kings have thought that in capturing Jerusalem they captured God. The Temple is gone. God remains. The Winds played upon the mountain before Man. Now that Man is gone, they have returned. Why should God find the prayers of the Jinn less pleasing than ours? He has the power to disperse them, but He does not. My people are slow learners, but we have learned to live without temples at last. No, I will not rebuild it.’

  CHAPTER 20

  The Jebusites lined the walls with the blind and lame and the Israelites took it for a threat of what would befall them if they attacked the city, but they were undaunted for their king was the Lord’s favourite, and only when David was old and out of favour did he understand that the Jebusites were trying to warn him how the city, the city he had made his capital, scourged the covetous.

  2 Samuel 7

  ‘My word, but it’s hot, isn’t it? Hot, I say. Yes, it certainly is hot. Now, about this heat …’

  East of Akka, the Esdraelon Plain erupted into an uninspiring set of rolling hills. The Byzantine prince had volunteered to accompany a scouting party into the badlands, but all his attempts to strike up conversation with his travel companions were as barren as the landscape. Some of them would have loved to hear the Prince of Green’s stories from the Hippodrome, but they knew too well that Basilius would disapprove.

  Jorge finally could bear it no longer. ‘You might be wearing a mask, Grand Master, but it’s obvious you’ve been frowning since we left Akka. If I have offended—’

  ‘You were free – very free – with the queen.’

  ‘Oh. That.’

  ‘That,’ said Basilius, ‘is a dangerous game.’

  ‘Bah! Byzant is full of such women. A little defiance leaves them wet as Etruria.’

  ‘She is not as other women you have known. She is a desert queen: the Sands have shorn her softness.’

  ‘I’ll submit to many indignities, but not a lecture on women from a pious virgin.’ He slapped his horse’s neck. ‘Simple creatures are happiest with a confident rider. Too much freedom and they grow proud.’

  Basilius suddenly grabbed Jorge’s arm.

  ‘Unhand me!’ he snarled.

  ‘Be still and look!’ He pointed to a spot where the gentle curve of the hill’s crest was broken by several vertical juttings.

  ‘It’s just a ruined Etruscan temple,’ Jorge said. ‘Thrace and Anatolia are littered with them—’

  ‘Look, I said.’ Basilius pointed to the tallest pillar. At the top sat a man, silhouetted so they could tell nothing about him except that he possessed a vast beard.

  ‘Oh,’ said Jorge breezily, ‘an anchorite.’ His confidence dwindled as he noticed the Lazars slowing to a stop. ‘Don’t tell me these mad bastards scare you too?’

  ‘We’ve heard whisperings’ – Basilius’ voice was hushed, awed – ‘that the Old Man wanders the land again.’

  ‘Truly you have grown feeble under that woman!’ Jorge galloped off laughing.

  Basilius ordered the rest to stay where they were. When he caught up with the prince, the anchorite was climbing down the pillar, as nimble as a gerbil.

  ‘Old Man indeed.’

  Basilius ignored Jorge’s sarcasm. ‘This is a Sicarii.’

  ‘Let’s see what he wants before we kill him, then.’

  Basilius’s axe was drawn before the bearded man had dropped to the ground before them. ‘I know you.’

  ‘And I you.’ Yūsuf pulled out his blade and dropped it at their feet. ‘I came to talk.’

  Jorge pushed Basilius aside. ‘And we’re here to listen.’

  Yūsuf drew himself up proudly. ‘Long have the Sicarii plagued your people. Still longer have you plagued mine.’

  ‘The Sicarii plague the Ebionites worse than we do,’ said Basilius scornfully.

  ‘That’s a lie you spread to sow dissension among God’s People!’ Yūsuf took a breath, and then continued smoothly, ‘You kill us and we kill you and there is in this a balance. Now there has come amongst us a woman.’ He ran his hair though his knotted hair and looked about wildly. ‘She is a harlot who defiles my caves by her presence, who like a Jinni has stirred my men to foolishness.’

  ‘They are easily stirred. The keraks will be easily retaken, if that’s worrying you.’

  ‘The captured towers,’ said Yūsuf with withering scorn, ‘are a means to an end.’

  ‘What end?’ said Jorge.

  ‘To impress the Napthtali. The first step to alliance.’

  ‘This fool got too much sun on his perch,’ Basilius scoffed. ‘The nesi’im could never agree.’

  Yūsuf did not react angrily, for he saw that the Byzantine understood his import. ‘But what if they did?’ He let the question hang a while. ‘Such an alliance will not be easily defeated. My people, chosen though we are, are also given to following false prophets. One calling himself the Old Man has convinced them that she is the Prophetess herself, returned to rid the land of corruption.’

  ‘Of us, in other words,’ said Basilius. ‘Is that not the prediction?’

  ‘Of course it is absurd,’ Yūsuf continued, unabashed, ‘for how could a franj be the Renewer?’

  ‘Enough,’ Jorge exclaimed. ‘What a perverse land this is. The dead command the living, and the women, men. You waste time exchanging childish tales. Reason as men, if you still remember how.’

  ‘Mock all you like, Byzantine. If this troublemaker succeeds, we all lose. More than any, I wish to push you infidels into the sea, someday. I’ve proceeded slowly and my men have mistaken prudence for cowardice. She cares only for her bastard but she’s leading my people over the precipice. Should I let them?’

  ‘No indeed,’ said Jorge with understanding. ‘You’ve shown true vision. I understand how difficult this must be.’

  Yūsuf smiled with pathetic gratitude. ‘The tribes have gathered in a place where they cannot readily disperse. If I tell you where to find them, promise me—’

  ‘We shall break up their gathering with a minimum of casualties. Only the ringleaders—’

  Yūsuf cut him off. ‘You may kill as many as you like, but the woman is mine.’

  ‘My word on that. Now, where are they?’

  *

  The queen stood on the palace battlements looking out to the Sands while Basilius reported the meeting, and the plan he had formulated.

  She hardly seemed to be listening, until she interrupted. ‘So you want to force a confrontation.’ After the débâcle in Wadi Aruna, she was more sceptical of his ability than she cared to admit. ‘Out in the Sands, the lizard-eaters will make you pay dearly.’

  ‘We can do it without much blood,’ Prince Jorge assured her.

  ‘What makes you think that is a consideration?’ she snapped.

  He realised from the venom that som
ething was awry. ‘I am a stranger here. If I have I done something to offend—?’

  ‘Yes, perhaps our quaint manners are to blame. In Byzant I suppose you allow unsupervised foreigners to explore your dungeons, to interrogate prisoners as they see fit. Did you think my men so incompetent that I wouldn’t find out, or did you not care?’

  Jorge had half-suspected that he was under surveillance since coming to Akka, and he recovered smoothly. ‘Forgive me. I should have gone through the correct channels. I was curious to see what manner of creature would betray the most sacred of bonds.’

  ‘Disgusting, isn’t he?’ she said, somewhat mollified. ‘There’s no better evidence of the time’s distemper than a son rebelling against his mother. I am still trying to devise an apt punishment.’

  ‘If you need someone to hold the axe—’ Basilius interjected.

  Catrina turned around slowly, ‘That will be all, Grand Master.’

  Jorge took the opportunity to push the ring hanging around his neck out of sight under his vest. Basilius retreated, leaving an awkward silence.

  Jorge sought to dispel it. ‘The desert is very beautiful.’

  ‘Do you find? It bores me terribly.’

  ‘Come then,’ he purred, ‘let’s look upon the sea instead.’ He offered his hand as she climbed onto the ramparts. They circumnavigated the sleeping city until the unsleeping activity of the harbour and shipyard lay below them. Shipwrights streamed over the skeletal ships like busy ants who’d had second thoughts about the corpse they’d just flayed. The fleet being brought to life required miles of rope, fields of canvas and endless supplies of dry wood, and Ariminumese, Byzantine and Sicilian galleys loaded to the rails clogged the harbour. The lantern ships were whales, surrounded by the darting dark fish that were the xebecs.

  With their shallow draft, the xebecs, tarred black as the gondolas that clogged Ariminum’s canals, could cross reefs the lantern could never dare. They were long and low, a hundred and twenty piedi stem to stern, with a distinctive forward-raking main mast from which green pennants lolled like a dragon’s forked tongue. They had two long curved yards, with sails furled tight to them. With twenty-five oars each side, they glided so effortlessly that one could forget the sweating men responsible.

  ‘It will be a magnificent fleet. I caught a glimpse of those lanterns the other day.’

  The queen raised her eyebrows as she realised that the prince’s lap of honour had not been entirely for show. ‘You’re very kind – but I could not afford a “magnificent fleet”. That is at best a simulacrum of one. If they were forced to fight, the only place my flagships’ lamps would lead is the seabed. On closer inspection you’ll find they are antiques.’

  ‘I prefer a mature beauty.’

  She touched his face gently. ‘You’re a good boy, but desist from flattery for a moment. I’m happy to listen to sweet lies but there are times when hard truths must be faced.’

  Jorge’s seductive smile vanished. ‘My eyes are open, as are yours. Whatever its fighting ability, that fleet tells me you realise the great dangers we face.’

  ‘The Sicarii?’

  ‘You’re joking! I mean Concord, of course. We have to bring the fight to Etruria, before they bring it here.’

  ‘Oh,’ she cried in amusement, ‘what an imagination the young possess! Is that why you brought this vast army, to compel me to join you in arms?’

  ‘On the contrary, they are a gift.’

  The queen stiffened. ‘Thank you, but I cannot accept.’

  Jorge was taken aback to be refused. ‘I can’t persuade you to reconsider?’

  ‘Concord isn’t going to venture across the water, and I’m certainly not going to Etruria. My family left that sodden land behind long ago – and good riddance. I am building a navy so I don’t have to fight. Don’t look so glum, dear boy. I’m not angry. Once we put down this rebellion, you shall have the confirmation you came here for.’

  Jorge smiled politely, wondering what exactly the queen was playing at. They both knew he didn’t give a damn about her endorsement.

  *

  A shadow was skulking through the tents on the outskirts of the Benjaminite camp. In the centre Roe de Nail had made a huge bonfire which threw a staggering dome of light against the stars. The skulker froze as he came unexpectedly upon Bakhbukh and Sofia, whispering together by the dim light of a dying fire on the perimeter.

  ‘Yūsuf! There you are.’

  ‘I was praying,’ he blurted in panic. ‘On the mountain, praying.’

  ‘We were discussing,’ Sofia said, ‘how to deal with Mik la Nan. He’ll seek to dominate the council of war.’

  ‘And Roe de Nail’s no match for him,’ said Bakhbukh. ‘What’s your opinion?’

  ‘My opinion,’ said Yūsuf, ‘is that it is unseemly for old men to gossip in the shadows with young women. I put my faith in God, not stratagems. You would do well to do likewise,’ he said, and stalked off.

  Bakhbukh watched him go and grief choked his voice when finally he spoke. ‘This is the second time you’ve used him for bait.’

  ‘Even fools have their uses.’

  ‘Promise me one thing, Contessa: it will be my knife that ends him.’

  *

  There was a tense silence as the queen told them Prince Jorge’s offer. Basilius said nothing, thinking it over. Finally the patriarch asked, ‘Is it wise to refuse? We are short of men.’

  She slapped his bearded face and he cowered like a whipped dog. ‘This gift is a measure of contempt, you idiot! What kind of queen would I be if I allowed an army of foreigners to bed down in my capital? Akka would be a garrison; I, a vassal.’

  With all the skill of a seasoned courtier, the patriarch changed tack. ‘The bumptious rogue pretends he cannot afford a weak kingdom at his flank, when really he seeks the same thing your uncle did.’

  ‘My throne,’ she hissed. ‘Grand Master?’

  Basilius knew what she had in mind. ‘I can make sure the Byzantines take the brunt.’

  ‘Some of your Lazars must be sacrificed if he’s not to suspect treachery,’ said the patriarch.

  ‘That is nothing. We consider our blood already spilled. We shall overwhelm their high places with numbers. The Sands will be quietened, Byzant humbled, Akka’s authority confirmed.’ Basilius took a moment to calm down. ‘What say you, Majesty?’

  ‘I say you’re not quite the blunt instrument I thought.’

  *

  The day of battle is generally, but for a few hours of fantastic vividness, duller than most. Aside from marching, it is a day of waiting, manoeuvring, checking arms, keeping horses watered, rechecking arms, and more waiting still. Inevitably and endlessly the soldiers talk of battles fought, anything to remind themselves that survival is possible. Their officers, in terms more elevated, do likewise.

  In the command tent, Jorge was telling the Grand Master of his part in the destruction of Concord’s Ninth Legion, though Basilius was so tense that he scarcely attended. He had persuaded Jorge to take only his elite troops on the raid, leaving the main body camped outside Akka, ‘to protect the city’. The queen would seize his men after Prince Jorge’s heroic death was confirmed..

  When Jorge had finished his tale, he asked, as if out of nowhere, ‘Who did you replace as Seneschal?’

  ‘A Northerner like you,’ Basilius answered without thinking, ‘slain by a Sicarii blade, ironically.’

  ‘Why is that ironic?’

  ‘He was something of an Ebionite lover.’ Suddenly Basilius started laughing. ‘One of us might be dead tomorrow, so there’s no harm telling the truth, is there? We Lazars don’t have the luxury of waiting to be promoted, and he was in my way, so – well, you get the idea.’ He slapped Jorge’s back. ‘Ha! You look as though you’ve seen a Jinni. Don’t be anxious; we’ll do fine today. It’s one thing for a woman to sit on a throne,’ he added, ‘but at the head of an army? Our victory is assured.’

  Yūsuf had revealed that the tribal confederation wa
s going to attack the Kerak de Chartres – which was far to the south – today. The plan was to fall on the undefended encampment left behind, which would both expose the Contessa as a false prophet and destroy Roe de Nail’s prestige in one fell swoop. A nasi who could not even protect his wives seldom ruled long. The inevitable recrimination would fracture the fragile tribal alliance.

  Jorge was not enthused. ‘It’s a clever scheme, but it does not seem—’

  ‘— chivalrous? You may have use for such fine notions at home but the Sands punish the deluded harshly. I’ve planned everything to the last detail.’

  Jorge smiled despite himself, ‘One thing I learned in the hippodrome was that no matter how well prepared you are, loose half a dozen chariots on a track and not even God knows what’ll happen. The love of strangers gets pretty tasteless after a while, but the beast turning left when you want him to go right, or a wheel coming off? Ah, that’s when you know you’re alive!’

  Beneath his helmet, Basilius smiled to himself as he clapped the prince on the back. ‘Oh, I’m confident that there’ll be a few surprises today, Prince,’ he promised warmly.

  CHAPTER 21

  Black, half-fallen towers cast porous shadows as dawn broke over the northside. Isabella danced through the enclosed garden, going through her sets obsessively. She had not slept peacefully since the abomination had first invaded her dreams; she’d become accustomed now to waking grinding her teeth. She could not sleep; she could not pray; only Water Style calmed her.

  Her trance was interrupted by an urgent pounding on the baptistery’s bronze door that didn’t stop until she had pushed it fully open.

  ‘You know you can’t be seen topside. What if you were spotted?’

  ‘This can’t wait,’ said Pedro. ‘Remember you said the buio were more sensitive than my instruments? You were right – I’ve only now picked up what had them spooked.’

  ‘You’d best come in.’

  Pedro emptied his satchel on the floor beside the font and grabbed a scroll. He unrolled a chart of measurements – daily, weekly and monthly. She could barely follow him in his excitement as he pointed out the trends. Then he dived into the pile on the floor and pulled out a small book with a calfskin cover. ‘This is Giovanni’s journal,’ he said, brandishing it. ‘I saved it when we fled Tartarus. It’s mostly Wave theory – too complicated for me, if I’m honest. Bernoulli used acoustics to torture the buio, and this describes how. It’s a dissection of sorts. There’s an essential binding agent in water – Bernoulli called it aether. He didn’t know where it came from, just its power. His Molè was a great mill that spilled water into its smallest parts. He realised that water without aether would collapse, leading to a chain-reaction, and that would—’