by Mia Marlowe
Landina's escape put Valdis in a tenuous position. Mahomet would surely demand to know, as Publius had, why she hadn't foreseen the girl's plan. Or at least why Valdis and Landina had parted company long enough for the Frank to make good on her escape. Mahomet's wrath would be terrible.
And yet, when Valdis thought of the Frankish girl, she could only pray her attempt would prove successful.
“Sprout eagle's wings, my friend,” she murmured under her breath. “May they bear you home.”
* * *
“Explain yourself,” Mahomet demanded after he summoned Valdis to his chambers. Publius cringed in the corner, a fresh red weal rising on his quivering cheek. Mahomet held a thin lash in his hand, a drop of blood trembling on the tip. “I want an account of everything that happened in the infidel's house of worship. Leave nothing out.”
Valdis drew a deep breath to calm her shivering spirit. “Landina and I—”
Mahomet cracked the whip at her, missing her by an eyelash. “Use that odalisque's name again and I shall not stay my hand a second time.”
Valdis dipped her head in deference, but steeled herself not to tremble. “We entered the church together. As you know, I am no follower of Kristr. I seek the spirit realm where ever it may be found. There is a Presence there.”
That much at least was true. Valdis decided to deviate from the truth as little as possible. It might save her from being tripped up under rigorous questioning.
“The one who was with me showed me a relic she called the Splinter of the True Cross. She knelt to pay homage to the object,” Valdis said as she straightened her spine.
“As a pagan, you surely did not.”
“No, but after that, the spirits who speak to me chose to reveal a vision of the future.” This too was true, for wasn't Erik her future?
“Let us pretend for a moment that I believe you.” Mahomet scowled at her, his thick brows meeting over his knife-sharp nose. “What did you see, my oracle?”
“I looked through the mist and there I saw a great sea battle, and yet not a battle,” Valdis began. The more she could spin out her narrative, the more likely she'd convince him of her vision. “The emperor's eagle crested the waves, yet the waves were not so high as to suggest the drommond was on the open sea. Then I saw another craft, one not belonging to the Empire. It was low and sleek, like the ship which bore me from my homeland here to the Empress city. A dhow.”
Mahomet glared at Publius, who looked as if he might melt into a lardy puddle at any moment. Valdis caught a whiff of urine, the stench of fear emanating from the eunuch.
“Publius has been filling your head with news of the upcoming spectacle,” Mahomet said. “So far, you tell me nothing.”
Publius seemed to realize the threat to his own skin might be mitigated by Valdis's successful vision. “No, my master,” he hesitantly spoke up. “I have said nothing to the seeress about the spectacle. Neither to her nor to any of the women of the zenana. Why should they desire to know anything which happens beyond these walls when the light of your presence radiates so strongly upon us here that even the sun is pale by comparison?”
Mahomet waved away the eunuch's fulsome praise, but his moustache twitched with satisfaction. Publius's cringing and groveling fed the silk merchant's vanity. Mahomet turned back to Valdis.
“How fared this battle that was not a battle?”
“At first, the drommond and the dhow moved like a pair of dancers on the waves, circling and dipping. It was as if the turns were prearranged,” she said, pressing her momentary advantage. “But then something happened which the eagle did not expect.”
“What?” He all but pounced on her.
“The dhow diverted from its plan, confounding the drommond.” Vagueness was essential to an oracle. “And as I was watching, a thick cloud covered both vessels and they were hidden from my sight.”
One corner of his mouth curved like a scythe. “A cloud? Would you say it was smoke, perhaps?”
“Yes, very like smoke,” she conceded, pleased to have pulled him into her tale. “And then my mind was drawn back from my wanderings with the spirits, back to the Hagia Sophia. I found myself where my vision began. But alas, all that remained of my companion”—Valdis was careful not to call Landina by name—“was her discarded burka.”
“You saw nothing else?”
“No, master, I did not see when she rose up or when—”
“No, no, forget her. Tell me more of the vision. You saw no more of the battle?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “There was no other vessel?”
“There may have been another hidden in the mist,” she said uncertainly. Like all fortune tellers, she hoped to hit upon what would most please her audience. She couldn't say that Erik's crew would best the Greek ship. Given the unequal nature of the contest, the finest drommond in the Byzantine fleet against a much smaller craft, the most Erik hoped to accomplish was to embarrass an overconfident admiral. “The outcome is shrouded, but this much is certain. The course of the prearranged battle will not go as planned. There will be an unpleasant surprise for the Emperor's force.”
“Unpleasant, yes.” Mahomet sank into his favorite chair, tugged his beard in thought and raised a brow at her. “I believe your vision. There will be a surprise for the emperor. You will accompany me, my Northern blossom, to the Harbor of Theodosius to view this spectacle.”
Valdis fought to contain her joy. She doubted she'd be allowed to return to the Hagia Sophia any time soon after this disaster, but at least she'd be able to watch Erik pilot the dhow in circles around the Greek ships.
“But if the eagle does not disappear into the mists as you said, then I will know your prescient abilities are of no consequence,” Mahomet said, motioning her to come closer. Valdis forced herself to walk calmly toward him. When she came within reach, he snaked out a hand and grasped a handful of her long hair, pulling her to her knees.
Valdis gritted her teeth, determined not to cry out. Mahomet cocked his head at her, regarding her with amused interest.
“Publius told me you have an unusually high tolerance for pain. You wouldn't cry out when your feet were whipped with the bastinado. With the Frankish girl gone, my garden of delights is minus one flower. If your vision proves false, I shall enjoy plumbing the limits of your resistance to exquisite agony.”
“In the fog of battle, it is important to know the location of both your allies and your enemies.”
—from the secret journal of Damian Aristarchus
Chapter 26
* * *
“I don't like it,” Haukon said as he helped Erik don his breastplate and back armor. “Why can't these Byzantines be satisfied with a dancing girl and a horn of ale? That's all the entertainment a man really needs.”
Erik laughed in agreement with his friend.
“Don't the Greeks have skalds to tickle their ears?” Hauk wondered. “A sea battle is many things, but entertaining is not one of them. This smells wrong.”
“You sound like an old woman. The emperor wants a spectacle. I intend to give him one. It's as simple as that.”
“Just be sure you don't give him more than you bargain for,” Hauk said morosely. “I tell you, couriers have been flying to and from Mahomet's house since last week. I followed one and guess where he ended up?”
“At the estate of Leo Porphyrogenito,” Erik said as he fastened bronze greaves to his shins. Even though the plan didn't call for hand to hand fighting, it was necessary that the participants look ready for anything.
“Porphyro—what?”
“Porphyrogenito. Don't frown. It only means 'purple-born.' Leo is one of the few nobles fortunate enough to have been birthed in the royal marble chamber,” Erik explained. “He had no say in the matter, but the circumstances of this birth certainly gives the man deluded ideas of his own worth.”
“But how did you know Mahomet has been in contact with the emperor's nephew?”
“I kept my eyes open while I was in the Arab's househ
old. It's obvious that Mahomet hopes to be a kingmaker when the time comes for the Bulgar-Slayer to die, and he's thrown his lot with Leo. It's all politics with these Byzantines. You know that.” Eric slung his battle ax over his shoulder, enjoying the familiar weight against his back. Even though the battle was staged, the weapons were real enough. He hoped he wouldn't lose any men today in this farce. “The Greeks don't take a piss without first wondering which faction will be incensed and which will be pleased with it.”
“Just make sure you're not standing under the wrong balcony when they decide to release their water,” Hauk said, crossing his beefy arms over his chest.
Erik cocked his head at his comrade. “That's not exactly an ill-wish, but it's still no way to send a friend into battle, even a sham one.”
“You're right,” Hauk said. “I wish I was going with you to watch your back.”
Erik clapped a hand on Hauk's shoulder. “So do I, but you're doing something even more important for me. You're watching my heart. See that Valdis comes to no harm today.”
“Depend upon it.” Haukon clasped a hand on Erik’s shoulder. “Luck in battle.”
“Strength and honor," Erik said repeating the time-worn response. For the first time in years, the words felt right.
His honor was intact again. He'd kept faith with his pledge to the emperor and he'd not stooped to opportunistic murder of Mahomet's assassin when it might have been the safer path. He never regretted killing that slayer of innocents in fair combat, but remorse over his brother's death still dogged him. Erik suspected there was no expunging that guilt, no matter how honorably he lived.
Strange how whenever he thought of his brother of late, Erik didn't see Olaf in bed with his wife anymore. He saw his brother as he was when they were boys— hunting together in the forests, stealing honey cakes when their mother wasn't looking, standing back to back, taking on all comers when someone insulted one of them.
Olaf, his brother. His partner in a thousand youthful adventures. The traitor in his marriage bed.
Victim of Erik's berserkr rage.
Erik shook off the morbid reverie. No good would come from mulling over the past. Especially when today held such promise.
He would tweak the admiral's nose, win fame for his crew and hopefully distinguish himself well enough to earn a boon from the emperor. It was not unheard of. Basil II routinely rewarded those who entertained him well in the Hippodrome, granting the most grasping request with Imperial lavishness.
Why not one who gave good sport on the waters of the harbor?
Erik would ask for Valdis, the seeress belonging to Habib Ibn Mahomet, to have her as his wife. The emperor had more gold and silver than any man in all the nine worlds. He could give life to the most outlandish wish. Erik's desire was a simple one by Byzantine standards.
For now though, he banished all thoughts of Valdis from his mind. A warrior couldn't afford a moment's distraction.
With hopeful determination, Erik stepped out of the tent near the harbor and gazed out on the cerulean water. On the open sea, a man might show his true mettle. After all the artifice, all the political intrigue in the great city, finally, he was engaged in something he understood. On the far side of the harbor, he saw the tall mast of the drommond, the ship his much smaller dhow would square off against.
But he knew it wasn't a contest between ships. This was a combat of captains, a test of wills, a clash of strategies.
And Erik knew some tricks that would startle the stodgy Greek admiral to the toes of his gilt sandals. He leapt over the low gunwale and took his place at the steering oar.
“All right, men,” he bellowed to his crew. “Let's show these sons of noseless mothers what seamanship really is!”
In the original battle, the pirate dhow had fled from the Greek ship, and so it was planned in this exercise. Erik adhered to orders as he steered his vessel away from the ponderous adversary. With relentless precision, the Byzantine ship with its eagle standard emblazoned on every surface pursued the smaller craft. The rhythmic pounding of the drums to signal oar strokes steadily increased.
When the dhow was captured before, the pirate crew wore itself out trying to outrow the better equipped Greeks. Erik would not make the same mistake.
“To the mast,” Erik shouted. “Now!”
With a sharp salute, a crewman wiggled up the main mast and loosed one of the modifications Erik had made to his craft. It was a new sail—a large square of tightly woven wool. The dhow might not be a sleek dragonship, but Erik was determined she should be as well-dressed as one. The extra cloth caught the wind and the dhow pulled away from the drommond with ease.
Cries of dismay from the Greek ship carried over the water. Now the drommond’s crew would expend more energy trying to catch him than he would with his evasion tactics.
“Archers, prepare to loose,” he heard the drommond’s commander bellow, frustration making his voice ragged.
Erik turned his eyes skyward. A black arc of arrows soared into the brilliant blue. They disappeared in the sun and he could no longer track their path.
“Up shields,” he ordered. To a man, his crew huddled beneath their circular discs of hardened leather. Like an incoming swarm of hornets, the volley of arrows buzzed toward them. All around him, the harbingers of fletched death slapped into the wooden ship, quivering upright along the gunwale like the hackles on a dog's back. Once the hail of arrows ended, Erik and his crew threw back their heads and roared their defiant survival to the sky.
A quick glance around the ship told him a couple of men had been nicked with flesh wounds, but no one was grievously wounded. All of them grinned wolfishly at him, ready for his next command.
“Bring her around,” he shouted. “We're going to shear a few sheep.”
Where the pirate dhow captain's strategy had been flight, Erik's would be a surprise attack.
“Ramming speed!” he bellowed from his place at the steering oar. His crew rowed in concert without need of a drummer. Their hearts pounded as one.
“Axes to the ready,” Erik yelled.
The dhow plowed the waves toward the eagle figurehead, presenting a small target for arrows as they bore down on the drommond’s prow. It must appear to the admiral that the dhow was about to crash into the drommond in a suicidal attack.
“Portside, up oars,” Erik called at the last possible moment. The crewmen stood their oars on end and shipped them in one fluid movement. The dhow veered away from the snout of the Greek ship and clattered alongside the drommond. Erik had reinforced the prow of the dhow with a strip of metal. The sharp nose splintered all the drommonds oars on one side while giving the rowers a nasty jolt.
“Axes to hand.” Erik pulled out his double-headed battle-ax and sliced away at every rope and rigging that passed within his reach. The drommond’s sails went slack, dangling limply from the spars.
Some of the Greek sailors offered stunned resistance, but most watched in horror as the smaller ship disabled their proud vessel. As Erik expected, the admiral had salted his crew with noblemen and courtiers who wanted to bask in the glory of a prearranged naval conquest. The sight of Varangian barbaroi wielding battle-axes in earnest took them aback.
But just before the dhow won clear of the drommond, Erik was forced to duck beneath the swipe of an Imperial gladius. He felt the rush of air as the blade swept over his head. He turned in time to see a man with iron-gray hair and a fierce, deeply lined face leaning over the side of the ruined drommond, still brandishing the gladius and shouting imprecations after the retreating dhow. He was arrayed in a white linen robe, studded with gems and shot with purple.
The Bulgar-Slayer himself.
Even as the dhow's crew cheered Erik's cunning, his gut churned. He'd just led an attack on the ruler of the Byzantine Empire. Why had no one told him the Lord of All the Earth would be aboard the drommond?
He was a dead man.
“They are as good as becalmed,” his lieutenant said. “Shall we fir
e a volley of arrows first or do you wish to board her, captain?”
Erik sank to his knees. In his arrogance, he'd killed his crew as well. They didn't realize it yet, but to a man, they'd all be hanged from the city walls before the sun sank behind the hills.
His dreams of glory and winning a life with Valdis, his honor secure, sank into the depths of the harbor like an anchor stone. He'd condemned the woman he loved to live out the rest of her days behind the zenana walls, the plaything of a vicious tyrant.
“What's wrong, captain?” his lieutenant asked. “Are you injured?”
Before Erik could rise and give an answer, a member of his crew shouted, “Look! Another drommond.”
A second Greek ship had slipped her moorings and was rushing to the center of the harbor. It was fitted out with the same Imperial eagles as the first, but from the top of the mast, a pennant with a lion stood out stiffly in the breeze.
A ship loyal to Leo Porphyrogenito was coming to the aid of his beleaguered uncle. Erik had been duped by the Greeks again. This whole scenario was designed to make Leo look strong and the Emperor weak and ineffectual.
The sight stiffened Erik's spine. If they wanted to take him in battle, so much the better. At least, he'd give his crew a chance to win a seat in the Hall of the Slain.
But to his surprise, the ship didn't swing toward the dhow. The drommond bearing the lion's standard bore down on the crippled Eagle. A black cloud of arrows, a few of them tipped with flame, rose up from the lion bound toward the emperor's vessel.
This was no political trickery. This was a coup in the making. With the emperor dead, Leo might well be named the new ruler.
Erik leaped to his feet. “Man the oars! The Bulgar-Slayer is aboard the first ship. We're sworn to protect the emperor and by the gods, that's what we'll do.”
He grasped the steering oar and muscled the dhow into a tight turn, heading back toward the eagle. Perhaps there was yet a way to seize honor from this day of deception.
