Justinian

by Harry Turtledove

  "So he says," I replied. "If he will not help his brother-in-law, whom will he help?" Myakes might have answered me. I do not know. The next thing I remember, it was morning.

  MYAKES

  I don't think I've ever seen anyone so drunk as Justinian was that night, Brother Elpidios. Believe me, that's saying something, too. You make your life as a soldier, you'll run into a lot of people who can pour down the wine. Justinian, though, I'm just amazed he woke up the next morning to remember anything. How did he get from the palace to that tent? Divine providence, you ask me.

  And do you know, Brother, from that day to this I've never figured out whether Justinian got that drunk because he was glad he'd finally get the help he'd wanted for so long or because he was disgusted that he'd have to marry a Khazar to finally get the help he'd wanted for so long.

  Matter of fact, I was hoping he'd tell me, but he doesn't, not really, does he? Maybe he didn't know himself. Maybe it was both at once. Here in the monastery, life is simple. It's not like that out past the walls.

  JUSTINIAN

  When I did wake, I wished I would die. I had not spewed up any of the wine I drank the night before, which meant it all remained inside to finish the job of poisoning me. I staggered out of the tent in search of cool, fresh air. In finding it, though, I also found the sun. It sank spears of agony into my head through my eyes.

  A new set of Khazar guards stood outside the tent. They had no trouble figuring out what was wrong with me and, I being merely a visitor and not their Emperor, they made scant effort to hide their mirth.

  Most of the guards Ibouzeros Gliabanos gave me understood some Greek. This was for his benefit, not mine, but I used it then. "Cabbage," I croaked piteously. "Can you get me a raw cabbage and pure cold water?"

  They found me a cabbage. The water came from the nearby river. It was not very cold and tasted of mud, but it had to do, there being no other. I methodically devoured the entire cabbage, washing it down with long draughts of the water. After a while, my headache and the remaining symptoms of imminent bodily dissolution receded.

  Presently, Barisbakourios came out of the khagan's palace and toward the tents where my companions and I were quartered. He looked the way I felt, though rather worse. Seeing me, he said, "Emperor, do I rightly remember that-?"

  "You do indeed," I answered. "How is the khagan?"

  "Wretched," he answered succinctly. I smiled in much the same way as I had done on learning of Leontios's mutilation: misery does indeed love company.

  One of the guards was a decent soul. Without being asked, he fetched the same cure for Barisbakourios as he had for me. While Barisbakourios was imitating a rabbit in a farmer's garden, Cyrus emerged from his tent, rubbing his eyes. I daresay our chatter had awakened him. At the sight of him, that part of my hangover the cabbage had not cured did disappear. "Just the man I was looking for!" I exclaimed, which was true, even if I had not known it until he came before my eyes. Ibouzeros Gliabanos had said there were Christian priests in Atil, but here was my own loyal follower. "I shall want you first to save a soul by converting a pagan to Christianity and then to yoke the two of us together in marriage."

  Cyrus might not have drunk too much wine the night before, but he had not been awake long, and his wits still moved slowly. "You want me to- what?" he said, and dug a finger in his ear, as if certain he could not have heard rightly.

  I explained. Then I explained again, for Stephen and Theophilos came out of their tens and also had to be brought up to date. Myakes kept on sleeping. But then, of course, he had already heard the news.

  Cyrus's eyes glowed. "Emperor, this is the best news I have heard for you sincea160…" His voice trailed away. In the long years of my exile, bits of good news had been few and far between.

  I found one, though: "This is the best news I have had since I got my nose back." I touched the member I had named. That put into my mind the thought of another member. "Going through with this will be more enjoyable than that was, too."

  Everyone laughed except Cyrus, who permitted himself a smile. Then he said, "Emperor, I shall go the the palace now, to see what arrangements need be made to bring the young woman to our true and holy orthodox faith. I promise I shall be most diligent in instructing her, too, that the marriage may be celebrated as quickly as possible."

  "That is good," I told him. "After you meet her, will you do one other thing for me?" He nodded, plainly anxious to please. Being anxious myself, I blurted out my question: "Will you tell me if she's pretty?"

  ***

  Until such time as Tzitzak was baptized into the holy and saving Christian faith, I could not wed her, nor, by the customs of the Khazars (which are in this regard even more stringent than our own), even set eyes on her. I waited with such patience as I could muster: more, perhaps, than I had possessed before my exile, but no great amount nonetheless. Having concluded the bargain with Ibouzeros Gliabanos, I wanted it sealed.

  As he had vowed, Cyrus did teach Tzitzak our beliefs at the best pace he could manage, finding her a willing pupil. The wife of a Roman merchant in Atil served as his interpreter, as chaperone, and also as another witness to the truths inherent in our creed.

  "She is ready to be baptized, and to take a proper Christian name in place of the heathen appellation with which she was born," Cyrus said after what seemed forever but was in fact a matter of about three weeks. "Have you any suggestions, Emperor, for what that name might be? Zoe, perhaps, symbolizing the new life she is beginning? Or Anastasia, to honor your mother?"

  This question having been in my mind since not long after Ibouzeros Gliabanos proposed the marriage alliance, I had an answer ready: "Neither of those, Cyrus. No, if it please her, let her be called Theodora."

  "a160'The gift of God,'a160" Cyrus said, and nodded in agreement. "That is indeed a fitting name for a convert to the holy and orthodox faith, and-" He broke off, his eyes widening, and began again in a new tone of voice: "And she will bear the name of the first Justinian's consort."

  "Just so. If I am named for the great Emperor, let her name recall that of his great Empress. You are a learned man, Cyrus; speak to her somewhat of the first Justinian's Theodora, that she may gain some understanding of the fame and honor accompanying the name."

  "I shall do as you say, Emperor," Cyrus assured me. He looked sly. "And when news of this wedding, and of the name of the bride, reaches the Roman Empire, I have no doubt that it will create considerablea160… excitement there."

  "It had better," I said. "I intend that it should." I wanted Apsimaros to feel himself assailed by great names from out of the Roman past, and thus to feel himself all the more a parvenu, all the more illegitimate, all the more a usurper. Any means I could find to fill him with uncertainty and fear, I would use.

  Tzitzak accepted the name Theodora without hesitation, and henceforth I shall refer to her by that name. Her baptism, at a small church used by Christian merchants in the Khazar capital, was by Cyrus's account and that of Ibouzeros Gliabanos a splendid affair (though not so splendid, unfortunately, as to tempt the khagan himself toward Christianity). The Khazar custom I have mentioned precluded my presence.

  That accomplished, no impediment remained to our marriage. By the standards of Constantinople, it was celebrated with almost indecent haste. I, however, cared little for the standards of Constantinople, having been away from the imperial city for most of a decade. What I cared about was the chance to return to Constantinople. The marriage seeming necessary for that, I allowed no further delays.

  Next to the church of the Holy Wisdom, even next to the churches of Kherson, that in which I was wed was a hovel. I think it was a furrier's warehouse before acquiring its present purpose. The crowns of marriage that went on my head and Theodora's were made of tin, the marriage belt I slipped round her waist (publicly here, again yielding to Khazar usages) of brass.

  And yet, somehow, none of that mattered. With Cyrus officiating and the priest whose church it was assisting, the cere
mony struck me as even more solemn and splendid than it had when I had wed Eudokia all those years before. I had been but a youth then. Now, half a lifetime later, I brought more of myself to the wedding, so to speak. That may have had something to do with it.

  Here, too, I had caused a new soul to accept our saving Christian faith. That mattered very much to me. I also strongly felt the importance of renewing the alliance with the Khazars that had helped save the Roman Empire in the days of my great-great-grandfather and would now, God willing, help save it from the clutches of the usurper.

  At last came the moment when, Theodora and I having given each other our vows, I could part her veil and see for myself what sort of bargain I had made with her brother the khagan.

  Cyrus had told me I would find her acceptable. Taking another man's word in such matters, though, and especially the word of a celibate, is in itself a sort of act of faith, and not one I could easily or casually make. And so I examined her with no small curiosity and, at first, with something approaching dread.

  By the standards of Constantinople, she was not a beauty. She had something of her brother's aspect: her face was flat and round, with high cheekbones, a rather low nose, and dark, narrow eyes set almost at a slant. But, having been in Atil for some time by then, I realized that, by the standards of Khazaria, she was, as Cyrus had assured me, an attractive woman. Her eyes, though narrow, were bright and clear, and she had a fine pointed chin (if Ibouzeros Gliabanos had the same, his beard concealed it).

  She was also studying me, as no doubt she had been throughout the ceremony. She had not seen me until then, either, and must have heard of my mutilation and its repair. I wondered what she thought.

  She surprised me by speaking in Greek obviously memorized and now parroted: "I shall try to be a good wife for you, Justinian Emperor of the Romans."

  I wished I had learned more of the language she spoke. I had picked up a few words since arriving at her brother's court, but for the most part had relied upon Barisbakourios and Stephen to interpret for me: what point to the Emperor of the Romans' acquiring a barbarous tongue? Since the bargain with her brother, I had seen a point, and tried to gain more knowledge of the Khazar speech. "Good," I said now. "I too. For you. Thank you."

  It was not a whole sentence, as hers was, but she understood and nodded and smiled, perhaps in some relief. Women of high blood know they are tokens in a game their menfolk play, passing from one house to another as suits the needs of the moment. This marriage, unusually, had been required of me no less than of her. We would both have to make the best of it.

  The feast following the ceremony was lavish, in the nomad style: roast mutton and beef, a great plenty of fermented mare's milk and wine both, and a honeycomb which, by their ritual, Theodora and I shared in the hope that our union would be sweet.

  Presently I took my bride to the tent appointed for the first night. My companions shouted the usual bawdy advice in Greek. The Khazars were also shouting. I had come to understand a couple of those words, too, from the women Ibouzeros Gliabanos had furnished me before yoking me to his sister. As best I could tell, they were saying the same sorts of things as Myakes and Theophilos and the rest.

  A couple of lamps burning butter lighted the inside of the tent, which was piled thick with carpets. In the center, though, lay a square of white cloth about a cubit on a side. All nations except the utterly depraved cherish the proof of a bride's maidenhead.

  Pointing to the lamps, I mimed blowing them out and asked, "Yes? No?" in her language. With my scarred forehead and flat, repaired nose, I knew I was no longer handsome. The whores at Kherson had let me couple with them in the light after Auriabedas cut on me, but Theodora might well have had taste more refined than theirs.

  But she said, "No," in Greek and then something in the Khazar tongue I did not understand. She tried to turn that into Greek, but could not; her face twisted in frustration. Then she started to laugh. So did I. We would, I was sure, face the struggle often in times to come.

  There are, though, ways of gaining understanding that require no words. I set my hand on her shoulder. She came to me. I held her. She felt like a woman in my arms. Her eyes closed when she kissed me. I thought- I made myself think- nothing of that, it being common among women.

  Running over her body, my hands were pleased with what they found. And, when I took from her the long coat and tunic she wore, my eyes discovered my hands had not been mistaken. She was slim, with small breasts and nipples surprisingly dark for those of a woman who had not borne a child. I would have been more surprised- and more suspicious of her virginity- had the Khazar girls with whom I had amused myself not been similarly made. Like them, too, she had only a small, thin tuft of dark hair at the joining of her legs.

  Having undressed her, I undressed myself as well. I was ready for her. Her narrow eyes widened to see how ready for her I was. I waved for her to lie down on the square of white cloth. Still nervously watching me, she did so. I knelt beside her, caressing her bare body as I had done while it was clothed.

  Patience came easier than it had on my first wedding night, not least because I did not burn so hot as I had in my youth. I took my time, trying to excite Theodora or at least to make her less afraid both of me and of what we were about to do. After a while, clumsily and in unpracticed fashion, her hands began to imitate what mine were doing.

  My mouth eventually went where my hand had gone. She sighed. Women encountering that caress for the first time, I have found, are astonished at how sweet it can be. I thought at first to give her full pleasure that way before taking her maidenhead, but then had a different notion. Bringing her nearly to the brink, I kept her there for some little time before entering her.

  She was well and truly ready; I slid in with ease until the membrane stopped me. I thrust hard then. Beneath me, her face twisted in pain, but not for long: breaking through, I fleshed myself to the root. As I drew back and then thrust home once more, her face twisted again, this time in a way with which I had long been intimately familiar. She gasped and quivered; her inner muscles squeezed me.

  Her eyes, which had been closed, opened. She looked up at me. I was intent on my own pleasure then, having given her hers, but not so intent that I failed to worry whether the sight of my face would curdle her joy. Perhaps my rhythm faltered. She smiled at me, and I stopped worrying.

  Having completed the act, I got up off her and looked at the square of cloth. Sure enough, she had been a virgin; she had not bled much, but enough to confirm that. She burrowed under furs while I put my tunic back on and went out into the night to display the proof of what we had done.

  Loud, drunken cheers greeted me. "How many rounds tonight?" Barisbakourios whooped, ready to translate my answer for the nomads without Greek.

  "The Khazar language doesn't have numbers so big," I boasted. He translated that. The khagan and the other Khazars standing there laughed loud and long. That kind of bragging on that kind of night amused them rather than insulting them, as it might have done under different circumstances at another time.

  I went back into the tent, as I had gone back into the palace bedchamber with Eudokia. Then I had gone several rounds before bothering to come outside and display the bloody trophy of conquest. Now, while confident of a second round, I was anything but for the third and beyond. Thus time robs us of our powers, my brash words to the men waiting outside the tent notwithstanding.

  When I returned to her and let the tent flap fall behind me, Theodora flipped off the furs under which she had hidden. I took her willingness to show herself to me naked as a good sign; she might easily have retained a larger portion of virginal modesty- or, indeed, she might have been repelled by what we had just done and wanted no part of it thereafter, or as little part of it as she could manage.

  That proving not to be the case, I wasted no time in divesting myself of the tunic once more. I caressed her with hands and mouth, as I had done before. Proving slower to rise than I had then (ah, the years!), I ta
ught her what a woman could do with her mouth. That was a time when I wished we had more words in common, although, after some initial hesitation, she grasped the principle with pleasing- very pleasing- speed.

  When I went into her, I stroked her tender little button with my finger while thrusting in and out. After a very short time, she gave a mewling cry so loud, I feared the torn edges of her maidenhead pained her. It was not pain, though, but pleasure. I spent myself a moment later, groaning half with delight, half with exhaustion.

  We lay side by side afterwards. Her skin was slick with sweat, as was mine. I fell asleep for a while. When I woke, the lamps were guttering. Theodora's motion had disturbed me. She was pouring wine into two cups. I think she would have wakened me once it was poured, had I not stirred sooner. Seeing my eyes open, she smiled and handed me one of the cups.

  We managed a third round then, with her proving she had not forgotten the lesson I had given her not long before. I managed thanks to that, coupling with her in the laziest fashion possible, her on her side and me taking her from behind. I gasped, sighed, pulled out of her, and fell back to sleep. She may have tried to waken me again that night. If she did, she failed.

  ***

  We have done well together, Theodora and I, from our wedding night onward. She took to lovemaking as if, having gone so many years without (for I do not think she was far from thirty when we married), she intended making up the lost time as quickly as she could. With that at bedrock, we found we got on well in other ways, too.

  Out of need, we soon learned to speak to each other. She picked up Greek fast, and I learned such Khazar words as I could. I still found the nomads' speech ugly, but now I also found it useful, which made a great difference.

  "Now I will give you everything I can," Ibouzeros Gliabanos promised when I spoke to him a couple of weeks after having wed his sister.