The Ghosts of Athens (Aelric)

by Richard Blake

  I looked out again over the constellation of flickering lights, and drew breath to recite:

  . . . Fires round about them shined.

  As when about the silver moon, when air is free from wind.

  And stars shine clear, to whose sweet beams, high prospects, and the brows

  Of all steep hills and pinnacles, thrust up themselves for shows.

  And even the lowly valleys joy to glitter in their sight,

  When the unmeasured firmament bursts to disclose her light,

  And all the signs in heaven are seen that glad the shepherd’s heart;

  So many fires disclosed their beams, made by the Trojan part,

  Before the face of Ilion, and her bright turrets showed.

  A thousand courts of guard kept fires, and every guard allowed

  Fifty stout men, by whom their horse ate oats and hard white corn.

  And all did wilfully expect the silver-throned morn.

  ‘Oh, well said!’ he cried. ‘Such memory – such careful distinction of long and short syllables! I never did get the whole of it flogged into me as a boy. Still, I suppose you had no choice but to memorise it all when you decided to pass yourself off as one of us.’

  Any need for reply was cut off by a low murmuring from somewhere behind us. I turned and saw the glimmer of lights. I thought for a moment that someone had let the barbarians in, and that they’d set fire to Athens. But the low murmuring was the sound of a purely civil disturbance. I helped Priscus down from the raised part of the roof on which we were standing, and we hurried along another of those leaded passageways to the front portico of the residency. Even before I pulled myself up to lean on my elbows and look down into the big Forum of Hadrian, I’d seen that the light was only the glow of many torches. ‘A couple of hundred men down there,’ I said to Priscus, who was sitting on a stack of unused tiles.

  ‘Well, dear boy,’ he drawled, ‘do you fancy shimmying up properly to ask what it is they want this time? I absolutely promise not to push you from behind.’

  How many promises the man had broken in his sixty-odd years wasn’t a subject I fancied considering. But I’d have to rely on his perception of his own interests and take the risk. I took hold of the smooth marble and pulled myself on to the apex of the portico. Just below me on a ledge that projected out was a mass of statuary that copied the old front pediment of the Temple of Athena. If I did pitch forward, I could trust in that to hold me until I could be recovered.

  Testing my balance, I stood carefully up. I looked over the gathering crowd. As yet, no one had looked up to see me, though the moon must be shining on my white tunic as it did on the uncoloured marble of the statues. I clapped my hands loudly together and waited for every head to turn upward.

  ‘Who dares disturb the counsels of their betters?’ I shouted.

  There was a long pause, broken only by a continued low muttering and a shaking of torches. Then someone shouted from the middle of the crowd: ‘Give us back Nicephorus!’ There was a ragged chorus of the name, and a rising babble of many other things that mixed together so I couldn’t follow them.

  Keeping my balance, I raised my arms again for silence. ‘You produce Nicephorus if you can,’ I shouted as loudly as I could. ‘He has deserted all of us. As of this evening, Athens is under direct rule by the Emperor’s Legate. And I tell you all again: there is an enemy at the gates of Athens that will make no distinction of rank or opinion if it manages to break in among us. I do not ask you to join in the defence of your lives and your homes. But I do suggest that you refrain from disturbing the counsels of those who are to defend you.’

  I was drawing breath to bid them good night, when there was a sudden scream of horror, and the forest of torches moved sharply back to the middle of the big square. It was impossible to see past those flaring lights into the crowd beneath. But I could see that those nearest the residency were no longer looking up at me. Their heads were now turned to somewhere below me on the right. I wiped sweaty hands on my tunic and stretched carefully forward. Just before I thought I’d overbalance, I caught sight of Euphemia. She’d got herself on to a balcony that looked over the square, and was leaning forward to see all that was happening.

  ‘For God’s sake, woman,’ I snarled softly, ‘get inside.’ If she’d heard me she didn’t turn. I saw her put up a hand to her cheek and continue looking over the ever-growing mass of torches. ‘Euphemia!’ I shouted. She did look round. The left side of her face was hid in shadow. The right side shone utterly blank in the moonlight. I wanted to shout again, but felt my balance going out of control. I put my arms out and struggled not to fall backwards to where Priscus had for some reason given way to loud giggles.

  As I finally steadied myself, I heard the dull noise of undrawn bolts from below me. I saw the glint of moonlight on swords as half a dozen armed slaves stood forward from the opened gate of the residency. ‘Piss off, the lot of you,’ I heard Irene shout in the shrill falsetto she used for repeating unobeyed orders. ‘Piss off home, or it’ll be the worse for you.’

  ‘Get those gates shut, you stupid old bitch!’ I shouted downwards. Even fully armed, twenty Slavs were no match for a determined rush. Little as I knew back then of siege warfare, I did know how the most apparently solid stone buildings could go up in fire, given the right determination.

  But, even as I drew breath to shout again, there was another shouted order from Irene. This was followed by the whizz and fluttering of a dozen flaming arrows. They flew across the twenty-yard gap separating the mob from the front of the residency. As they struck home, there was a great wail of terror and of pain. I saw torches fall and go out. The whole mob fell back still further, and I could see that every arrow had struck home. Some gone out, some still burning, their bright shafts gleamed beside the huddled shapes of the fallen. There was another order, and another volley of arrows, and then another. None of the armed slaves I’d seen below moved forward, but stood with glittering swords on either side of the gate. There would be no attempt now to force the gate. But volley after volley of flickering lights darted across the square.

  At last, I stood looking down over complete silence. The mob had dispersed. The breeze came softly from behind, and I could smell none of the smoke from the burning pitch of torches and of arrows. I was about to jump down beside Priscus and make my way to the gate, when there was yet another shrill order from Irene. It was now that the armed slaves hurried forward. They went from body to body. Sometimes, they kicked and moved on. More often, they stopped and bent low to cut the throats of those who’d survived the arrows. The bodies, I supposed, she’d leave to be collected come morning, and to stand as a warning against any further attempt on the residency.

  I leaned carefully forward again. The balcony was now empty.

  ‘Have you gone round the twist?’ I snarled at the large shape under the bedclothes where Euphemia cowered. ‘You could have got yourself killed. Without Irene, you might easily have sent the mob out of all control.’ I sat down and drank more wine. I reached forward on the bed and poked what might have been her back.

  She gave a little cry of fright and struggled to get her head free of the blankets.

  ‘What could have possessed you to show yourself like that?’ I asked, now gently. I looked into her tear-swollen face. As ever, one look at her set my loins twitching. But I put this aside and frowned. ‘I don’t want you ever to show yourself to the urban trash again,’ I said firmly. ‘Do you understand?’

  She swallowed and tried for a nervous smile. ‘They’ve always thought I was the witch who lurks in the residency and awaits her freedom at the hands of one who is without fear,’ she said quickly.

  I cut off her next remark with a loud snort. ‘Euphemia,’ I said with heavy emphasis, ‘you have lived in this building for three years. I won’t make myself look ridiculous by taking you through the undeniable evidence for this claim. But you are Euphemia of Tarsus, widow of some brother of Nicephorus whose name and business I’ve neve
r troubled to ask you. In addition, you are the adoptive mother of Theodore. You came here in the last year of Phocas. Whatever may have happened in this building was a hundred years ago – maybe two or three hundred years ago. Now, I want you to repeat all this to yourself and come back to your senses.’

  I waited. This time, she did manage a smile of sorts. ‘You don’t understand what it’s like to be all alone in this place,’ she said. ‘There are whole days when I can barely remember what it was like to live in Tarsus. Have you never walked through this building as the dusk was falling, and heard voices in the shadows?’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘and neither have you!’ I finished my wine and put the cup down on a table beside the bed. ‘There are three courtyards in the residency. One of them is rather large, if not particularly scenic. You should try walking about it in the full light of day. Now that you have some, you might set those maidservants to work on digging out a few of the flower beds. We’ll all be out of here long before they bloom. But even watching the work of others is all the medicine you need.’

  I got up on my knees and pulled my tunic off. I threw it at a chair on the other side of the room. It fell short and landed beside my sandals. I laughed and lay back naked on the bed. I stretched my arms full out and then over my head. I arched my back and stared up at where the brightest of the lamps shone in its bracket. ‘Talking of medicine,’ I sighed, ‘you’ll not believe the day I’ve had!’

  Chapter 45

  With a final smash of the crowbar, the lock disintegrated. I waited for the slaves to get out of the way and stepped into the cupboard. In my dream, the door had opened inward. I’d already guessed that it really opened outward. Now it was no longer secured, it had swung slightly out. I controlled myself and took hold of the door handle.

  There was a murmur of disappointment behind me as I found myself looking at a sheet of smoothed rock. ‘What a waste of fucking time!’ one of the slaves muttered in Slavic. I pretended not to have understood him and rapped hard on the rock. It was real enough and solid. I turned and nodded at the slave who was holding a polished mirror in readiness. He moved it gently in his hands, and sent a shaft of reflected sunlight from the opened window overhead on to the rock. Keeping myself out of the light’s path, I looked carefully round. Leave aside the question of why – there was nothing to suggest that a door had not been placed against solid rock and then locked shut.

  ‘We continue looking for deep cellars,’ I announced. There had to be something deeper than the ordinary storerooms and the dungeon Priscus had found. I’d never seen a palace yet without somewhere deep for storage of treasures or for the refuge of its owners. If this wasn’t the entrance, Irene could carry on searching. Even a day and half a night of frantic activity had left much of the residency unexplored in detail.

  ‘You do realise, dearie, all these men I sold you are Slavs?’ Irene tittered beside me. ‘Even if they don’t turn against us when the city gates open, can you trust them not to winkle us all out of hiding?’

  I led her over to a niche that had once contained a statue. The plinth remained. The statue itself must have been of bronze or even silver. This had been stripped out long before. So too the metallic letters of the inscription. ‘Irene,’ I said quietly, ‘I don’t expect you to know the politics of the northern tribes. But weren’t these men sold to you by the Avars?’

  She smiled and shook her head. ‘Oh no, dearie.’ She laughed. ‘These ones sold themselves to me last month. They turned up asking for bread. Since no one else wouldn’t do business with them, I had to take pity. I bought them all with a promise of food.’ She patted the leather breastplate she’d put on in honour of the siege and gave a thoughtful look at one of the bigger Slavs.

  This did put things in a different light. I’d have to see what steadying effect my own promise and their kiss of fealty might have. However it might be with the barbarians, there was no doubt any more of their loyalty against the Athenian lower classes.

  I stepped out into the garden for a breath of fresh air. Blinking in the full light of morning, I was met by someone with a stack of letters. Two of these were from the Dispensator. In one of them, he was complaining about a slight from another of the Greek bishops. In the other, he’d posed a set of questions about the Will of Christ that would take me a whole day of sophistry to answer. These he’d coupled with a reminder of how my confirmation of the Pope’s title was still outstanding. It was worth asking which of these he’d written first. The other letters were from locals – word had finally gone round that I ran Athens. I waved the messenger inside and continued across the hard mud to where Theodore was playing again with Maximin and with Martin’s child. The nice thing about being a child, I thought to myself, is that you don’t usually know until the last moment that someone is about to slit your belly open and pull out all your guts.

  ‘Come to Daddy!’ I cried with a passable smile. I picked the boy up and kissed him. Back in Alexandria, I’d noticed how he was growing with every day that passed to look like Priscus. This hadn’t been lost on Priscus, who’d now managed to claim some avuncular status. He’d even muttered about changes to his will. I put this out of mind and buried my face in the heavy clothing that Sveta had insisted he needed against the chill of an Athenian autumn. There was a faint smell of unchanged underclothes and of rather questionable dirt from the heaps left by all the cleaning.

  ‘If My Lord pleases,’ Theodore said beside me, ‘my mother has allowed me to beg permission to sit in the council hall. Your secretary has assured me it is the greatest religious gathering of our age, and that it will remain famous in all future ages.’

  I looked down at the boy. For all the sun was burning through my own tunic, Euphemia seemed to have the same idea of clothing as Sveta. If he’d been dressed like that ever since leaving Syria, no wonder he was sickly. Athens might have had a wretched summer. Even so, it was hardly some frigid desert of the north.

  ‘You are welcome to come along to the council sessions,’ I said grandly. I’d already established that he had no Latin. He’d be no danger to what I now had in mind. If he really believed this prolonged cloud of hot air would be so much as noticed by future historians, he had less faith than I in any recovery of the human understanding from its present low point.

  I gave Maximin into Sveta’s arms. Knowledge that we were under siege appeared to have settled her temper – or whatever time of month directed her moods may have altered in my favour. I thanked her and turned back to Theodore. ‘I feel I should continue with making your acquaintance,’ I said. That might take my own mind off the gathering horror beyond the walls.

  He bowed gravely, and the sleeves of his tunic brushed the ground.

  ‘Please do ask your mother if you can be allowed to join us for dinner. Afterwards, we can go up and sit in our much improved library until darkness calls you away to bed.’

  He bowed again.

  I nodded.

  There were a few white puffs of cloud in the sky. I didn’t suppose they would turn to rain. If they managed to cover the sun, however, it would make walking through Athens less sticky than it might otherwise be.

  We took a wrong turn after I’d taken a sharp left to avoid some petitioners. If dilapidated and mostly unoccupied, the buildings that lay between the residency and the old Areopagus courthouse did give the impression of a reasonably large city. But it was an impression only maintained by keeping to the main street. I thought we’d be going across the little bridge over the Ilissus. Instead, we took another turn, and found ourselves looking at the confused jumble of masonry that had once been the Baths of Marcus Aurelius. Beyond them was a fifty-yard clearing terminated by the city wall. This was now filled with tents and the beginnings of stone shacks put up by the refugees from outside Athens. I swore at myself for getting lost, and wished I’d just told my guards to shove the petitioners aside. I motioned at a side street that would take us into a huddle of small houses, and probably to the foot of the Areopagus hill.

/>   We’d barely set out along the street, though, when we came face to face with another gathering. This wasn’t more petitioners. Nor, I could be grateful, was it anyone looking for trouble. It was just a funeral procession of the lower classes. The two women in front were making a feeble show of crying out and tearing at their clothes. The dozen old men who shuffled along behind had their heads covered and were looking grim. I stared at the swathed bundle they were carrying, and I took off my hat and prepared to bow. Instead of passing by, though, on their way to whatever church had been appointed for the burial, they stopped directly in my path. One of the old men came forward and stepped through my armed slaves. He jabbered something I didn’t catch. He stamped his feet and pointed at me. Someone else pulled at the shroud covering the body. As it came off, the body itself was dumped without any respect on the ground, and everyone stood away from it.

  I looked at the body of old Felix. His face still carried a look of surprise, or perhaps of faint alarm.

  ‘Was he found in his bed?’ I asked with the slow clarity you use when addressing barbarian slaves. The old man who’d already spoken began jabbering again. I was beginning to get inside the local dialect. So long as you put out of your mind that these were in any sense the posterity of the ancients, and so long as you didn’t try to follow every single meaning, it was turning out easy enough. Certainly, it wasn’t hard to gather that he had been found in his bed. But my vague supposition that he’d shut himself in with a smoking brazier was crossed out by the news that all his windows had been left wide open.

  I bent down and stared at the withered corpse. There was a mottling on what I could see of the chest, and a smell of corruption that suggested the old man had been dead for at least a day and a night. I pulled at the smallest possible area of a stained sleeve. The arm moved easily. ‘No stiffness of death,’ I muttered. These things always depend on surrounding conditions. But if he’d lasted out the morning after we left him, it would have been a surprise. I’d assume it was a broken heart. There was no value in assuming otherwise. I looked again at the dead face and pursed my lips. ‘There are mysteries in life,’ I said in Latin, ‘that are best overlooked.’ I couldn’t tell if Martin had understood my full meaning. But he bowed piously and, with Theodore, went back to praying over the dead interpreter.