An Empire for Ravens

by Eric Mayer

  “It seems we are fated to meet when I am soaked to the skin. This time I have brought along a different companion who is, however, just as wet.” John shivered. As his terror ebbed he felt the cold wind that was dispersing the tendrils of mist on the water.

  “Indeed,” came the reply with a hint of a smile and a quick dismissal of the guards. “Do you require assistance? Blankets?”

  John shook his head and, gesturing to Julius, struck out at a fast pace for their lodgings.

  Although he was cold, his face burned with shame. He hoped the boy hadn’t noticed his fear.

  “That water was cold enough to invite death to creep into your bones,” the boy muttered.

  It was an accurate comment, but John didn’t like hearing it put that way.

  They walked rapidly, trying to keep warm, through streets becoming peopled, if sparsely, by ill-clad residents emerging to curse the new day. None looked surprised at the sight of a man and boy squelching along in waterlogged clothing except a passerby who followed them for a short way. John turned, hand on blade, and glared at him until he slunk down an alley that was merely a cleft between two buildings.

  “It’s our clothing, sir,” Julius told him. “We’re better clad than many, and men have been murdered for a pair of boots before now.”

  John wondered if Julius was speaking from experience and glanced down at his companion’s footwear. The boy caught the look and flushed. “Took them off a dead man I found in a ruined church,” he mumbled. “He didn’t need them anymore and I did.”

  Viteric would not be needing to don his boots, given he would not be walking for a while.

  If he survived.

  That was the thought that flashed through John’s mind as he stared at the young soldier lying facedown in the hallway near the kitchen. Clementia sat beside him, pale and shaking, valiantly attempting to staunch the flow of blood from his back.

  It was strange. John couldn’t remember entering the house or even spotting the gravely wounded man whom John had particularly wanted to prevent following him to the Goth encampment, partly to keep the young soldier safe.

  No, try as he might, John could not recall the moments prior to his standing there, looking down at Viteric and Clementia.

  Eutuchyus lurked nearby, exuding the impression of someone wringing his hands and shaking without actually doing so. John noticed Julius staring fixedly at the steward with undisguised hatred.

  “Julius, run as fast as you can and inform General Diogenes about this. He’ll send a physician so Viteric may yet be saved. He’s lost a lot of blood.” John’s voice sounded far away to himself. “Clementia, I’ll take over.”

  He knelt down, ripped Viteric’s tunic open, folded its sides into a pad to cover the wound, and applied pressure to stop the bleeding.

  The boy ran off.

  “It was him!” said Eutuchyus in a high, whining tone. “Crept up to Viteric in the dark and stabbed him. He’s the sort who would kill his mother for a couple of coins. You saw him throw his knife at me not so long ago!”

  “You saw the boy attacking Viteric, Eutuchyus?” John grunted with the effort he was making.

  “Not exactly, but—”

  “I should think not, because Julius was with me!”

  Eutuchyus shrank back and now John was certain the creature really was trembling.

  As he worked over the unconscious man, John began to consider those who had been in the house while he and Julius were away. Eutuchyus, Clementia, and the cook Maxima.

  Not to mention whoever might have accompanied Viteric here or followed him. Or an intruder who had managed to get into the house before or after Viteric arrived to look for John.

  If Viteric had, in fact, arrived for John before dawn.

  Why else would he have come here, alone or with another?

  And did the attack have anything to do with whatever Felix had been seeking, or with the matter that had brought Felix to Rome in the first place? Or both?

  Footsteps clattering down the hall announced the arrival of the garrison physician who worked with efficiency and speed. Extra layers of padding were bandaged tightly in place, the blanket he had brought thrown over Viteric, and the four husky soldiers who arrived with him were instructed to carry the wounded man in their sling as gently as possible.

  John watched them go, Clementia at his side. As they stood there, a number of possibilities rushed through John’s mind. For an instant he was back on the battlefield, in the middle of a bloody chaos in which he somehow was aware of the smallest of details simultaneously, the flash of a sword, a shattered helmet flying through the air, one fighter struggling against two, a man falling in a shower of blood, individual screams and oaths.

  “I found him like that, John.” Clementia’s voice shook.

  John glared at her. “A blade is often a woman’s weapon. Easy to conceal and even a weak woman can kill with it if it’s inserted in the right spot. I know you own a dagger. You used it when we were attacked in the temple, although not very well.”

  All he had seen and learned during the previous days, puzzling details, seemingly unrelated matters and his endless ponderings, often vague and contradictory, seemed to be coalescing. He could not have explained how, could not have forced the process. It was more than placing one fact after another into an evolving mosaic. The connections took place in some deep part of his mind that remained as mysterious to him as to any stranger.

  He glanced down at the ceremonial knife tucked in his belt. “I removed this from Felix’s chest.”

  “What’s that to do with me?”

  “You see how Zeus’ thunderbolt on the hilt has been overlaid with a cross? Archdeacon Leon considers this to be a holy relic, the sort of sacred artifact your family helped to conceal many years ago. Perhaps one of your ancestors helped himself to an item or two in the process? That reliquary that was broken, for instance. What is that, if not to house a relic?”

  “The church doesn’t own every relic. The devout can buy them too, as you well know. And what about that knife? You are carrying it with you. I couldn’t have stabbed Viteric with it.”

  “But you could have left it in Felix’s chest. Not far from where he died I found this.” John produced a silver earring from which hung a miniature dolphin of the same precious metal.

  “So I stand condemned by an earring? The jewelry Felix gave me betrayed our relationship to you. But this earring isn’t mine! I’m not the only woman in Rome who wears earrings!”

  “If we were to investigate your jewelry, do you suppose we would find a matching earring?”

  “I tell you it’s not mine!” she responded, her voice rising in panic.

  John disregarded her protests. “Women are forbidden to set foot where I discovered it. But you could easily have passed for a man while wearing a mask.”

  “Mask?” Clementia was puzzled. “Where would I obtain a mask? And for what reason? Only actors wear masks and I have had nothing to do with the theater.”

  “You knew that Felix was a Mithran. You were close to him. Men tell their lovers everything. Knowing Felix, he probably told you exactly where the mithraeum is located. Secret, but not to you. Did you insist he take you to a ceremony or follow him without his knowledge?”

  John silently asked Mithra to forgive him for impugning Felix’s honor by suggesting such a shocking betrayal of their religion’s beliefs. Yet it was necessary to gather enough information to find Felix’s murderer.

  Then he would consider the matter of the attack on Viteric.

  “I can see you don’t believe a word I say. I have owned a great deal of jewelry and I can’t immediately remember every item. A number of possessions were stolen from my house, including jewelry. But consider this. If I wanted to disguise myself as a man by wearing a mask, would I be so stupid as to also wear earrings?”

  No
, she wouldn’t be that stupid, John thought. Not Clementia. Yet under stress, people often acted without thinking. In a rush to follow Felix she might well have forgotten. The solution John had been certain was coalescing was suddenly fading instead. Whatever inexplicable deductive processes had been at work came to a wrenching halt.

  Clementia smiled.

  Before John could speak again Julius burst into the room.

  “Sir, Diogenes is sending men to arrest you!”

  Chapter Thirty-three

  “When I got to his command post, Diogenes immediately ordered the physician be sent,” Julius said, panting and holding his side. “I was just leaving when I overheard his second order that several soldiers be dispatched separately to arrest you for stabbing Viteric.”

  “I’ll leave by the back way,” John told him. “See if you can distract them.”

  “Where will you go, sir? Are you leaving the city?”

  “No.”

  Clementia grabbed John’s arm. “I’m coming with you.”

  “No.” He tried to pull away but she clung desperately.

  “What if they kill everyone in the house again? I must come with you!”

  “As a senator’s daughter you should be safe. Julius, hurry!” John pushed Clementia’s hand away while Eutuchyus looked on in apparent terror.

  Clementia followed John down the hall. “I’m coming with you. I haven’t come this far to fall at the final turn!”

  The ragged denizens of the city sided with the man and woman fleeing the authorities through the dawn-lit streets. Children threw rocks at the pursuers and three ill-dressed women blocked the entrance to an alley after John and Clementia ducked into it. That afforded a short delay before the soldiers pushed through the little group using the flats of their swords as persuasion, enough time for the pair to turn down an even narrower passageway at the point where three converged.

  “How close are we to the Forum of the Bull?” John risked a glance back as they continued to run. There was no sign of their pursuers for the moment.

  “Not far!” Clementia was breathing hard. She had managed to keep up with John, aided by his grasp on her wrist and shortened strides, but looked near the end of her endurance.

  John wondered whether he was protecting Viteric’s attacker but there was no time to consider the question now. Once he had agreed to take Clementia with him he felt obligated to keep her safe.

  He slackened his pace as they approached daylight spilling into the end of the narrow way, halted at its mouth, and peered out. A giant bronze bull stood not far off. A thin man with straggling red hair perched on the statue’s shoulders, haranguing a small crowd.

  “Walk slowly,” John muttered. “We don’t want to draw attention.” He forced himself to cross the open space at a snail’s pace. They ducked into the Church of Saint Minias just as the first of the soldiers emerged from the alley. No one tried to stop them. Apparently, Basilio had not managed to pay his guards after all.

  John remembered the way down to the cistern where he had first emerged into Rome. They descended stairs and passed through the archway flanked by a pair of mismatched granite lions. The clatter of boots not far behind echoed in the dim, cavernous space.

  Clementia glanced around fearfully. “Where are we going? We’ll be trapped here!”

  “There’s an entrance to the catacombs. Unfortunately, it’s on the other side of the cistern.”

  He yanked her forward to one of the walkways that led through the forest of columns. On both sides lay inky black water. A blackness one could sink into for eternity. John had to force himself to continue.

  Their way was faintly illuminated by light falling from above—by design or on account of damage to the vaulted roof, it was impossible to say. They heard shouting and could see torches moving along the water’s edge as their pursuers searched for some sign of their prey. Reverberating around the vast space, the voices could be made out with disconcerting clarity, sounding nearer than they were.

  “There must be another way out,” someone said. “Search the walls on all sides.”

  Clementia squeezed John’s hand. “They’ll have the entrance blocked by the time we get there.”

  “It’s not in a wall. It’s concealed in a column. Almost impossible to find unless you know where it is.”

  As they crept along, John glanced up occasionally. Watery reflections trembled in the vaulted ceiling, revealing the variegated capitals of columns scavenged from celebrated public buildings and temples for this humble and invisible work.

  They came to a place where impenetrable shadows fell. John slowed. He had to feel his way along with his foot.

  Suddenly, shockingly, he brought his foot down on empty space.

  He fell forward, pulling Clementia with him.

  He was going into the water!

  Then he realized he was lying on the walkway, Clementia prone beside him.

  He took several deep breaths. Calmer, he groped around in the darkness until his fingers found water, then broken concrete. “Part of the walkway’s crumbled but it’s still crossable. The water barely covers it.”

  He shuddered and ordered himself to crawl forward. For John, it was hellish, aware of Clementia’s now desperately grasping one of his boots, knowing if she panicked they would both fall into the greedy waiting water.

  But which of them was more likely to panic, he wondered grimly?

  Once his hand slipped and his face fell forward into the shallow water covering the damaged masonry. He jerked his head back up, blinking blind eyes, sputtering, stifling a scream.

  By concentrating on their slow progress and constantly whispering reassurances he pretended were solely for Clementia but were as much for himself, John guided them safely across the broken stretch.

  Clementia refused to get back to her feet. “I have to rest. I just can’t go on.”

  Reluctantly John sat with her against a column.

  He listened to the voices of their pursuers. Luckily, none of Basilio’s men were at work. Had they abandoned him for lack of pay too?

  Clementia squeezed his hand. “It won’t be long until they realize we’re in the middle of the cistern. What then?”

  “We’ll be in the catacombs.”

  He heard her sharply indrawn breath.

  “And how will you get out without walking right into the arms of Diogenes’ men? Are we supposed to hide until we’ve starved to death?”

  “The catacombs run beyond the city walls. That’s how I entered Rome in the first place.”

  “Your plan is for us to escape the city?”

  A wavering ray of light flickered across the spot where they sat. He noticed she was peering at him quizzically. Or was her gaze calculating?

  “You’re an intelligent man,” she continued. “What Felix was seeking…is it in the catacombs? Is that why you’ve brought us here? You’ve found the key to the list, haven’t you?”

  She was right. The church above them held the key to the location of the missing artifacts rather than the items themselves. Not surprisingly, Basilio had guessed that piece of the puzzle wrongly. It was amazing how swiftly family histories became distorted. The poor man had been looking at the key every day without grasping its significance.

  The truth had begun to come to John the day he and Viteric saw the raven perched on the philosopher’s statue. It had reminded him of something, but he couldn’t say what. He only remembered later, thanks to the raven in the pines he and Julius had camped beneath. There were those who said that seeing a single raven meant sorrow. But for John two solitary birds had meant revelation.

  When John spoke to Basilio in the sacristy of his church he had noted a curious fresco depicting Solomon’s reception hall. A statue of Thanatos with a raven on his shoulder sat on a gilded column near the throne. The god was pointing out a not-quite rectangul
ar window towards what the painter had rendered as a structure with only three sides.

  The combination of Solomon and a pagan god would have been unusual anywhere but particularly so in a church. Solomon had been a wise man. Was he offering an answer? The raven represented a Mithraic rank. Thanatos was the Greek god of death. The three-sided structure was not a crude depiction of a four-sided building but rather an accurate painting of a pyramid.

  John had entered a mausoleum of that shape while fleeing pursuit on his way to Rome. Inside the pyramid lay an entrance to the catacombs, the land of Thanatos. Just outside the entrance sat a sarcophagus on which was carved an image of Mithra. He had seen other Mithraic imagery on burial plaques during his flight.

  Archdeacon Leon had mentioned a story he believed to be mere legend to the effect that the ecclesiastical possessions hidden from the Goths had been entrusted to the care of the dead. John had guessed that Felix’s list might consist of names on the tombs in which the artifacts had been hidden. But the catacombs which contained the tombs—countless thousands of them—formed a seemingly endless maze, impossible to fully search.

  Thanatos was pointing the way into the section of the catacombs where the appropriate tombs could be found. Pointing to the entrance to ancient Mithran catacombs.

  Under the guise of making repairs, Basilio must have ordered his workers to search, thinking the valuables had been concealed in the church or the catacombs beneath. He had learned of the secret door into the catacombs from the cistern and assumed the treasure must be hidden nearby. He was mistaken. The catacombs stretched far away from the church, as far as the Appian Way.

  John recalled that Basilio had told him how he had found Veneria, the chariot-mender’s daughter, and Hunulf, the man with whom she was involved, pretending to examine the fresco of Thanatos. According to Basilio it had been a pretense, given the embarrassing state in which he came upon the couple. But had they also grasped they should be looking in the catacombs near a mithraeum while not fathoming the meaning of the pyramid? Certainly Hunulf had been attacked near the mithraeum where he and Felix worshiped, as evidenced by his trail of blood.