The Shadow of Ararat

by Thomas Harlan

  "No," answered Abdmachus, handing the corpse the undershirt. "Put this on."

  The corpse dragged the cotton shirt over his head and patted it down. It looked down at the Prince lying at its feet. "I could break his neck right now, while he sleeps. Then I would be my own master."

  Abdmachus shook his head slowly, saying "If he dies, you go back to the worms. While he lives, and wills it, you live."

  The corpse accepted the tunic with a wry smile. Its dead eyes turned to Abdmachus.

  "Then he should live a long time, shouldn't he... Persian?"

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The Cisterns of Theodosius, Constantinople

  The slow gurgle of water slid past under the bow of the long boat. Thyatis crouched in darkness, her head just above the lip of the hull. She could barely hear the soft sounds of men breathing at her side or the faint swish of oars in water. Like Nikos and the two Turks that were rowing, she was clad in loose-fitting black robes with soot blackening her face and hair. The darkness around them was only fitfully broken by the light of a shuttered lantern that danced over the water ahead of them.

  Thyatis squinted, trying to make out the features of the men they were following. It was too dark and the light of the lantern too intermittent. She bit at her lip nervously. The chase was long and slow, wearing on her nerves. At first it had seemed it would be an easy operation—follow two of the Eastern lords who had slipped out of the Great Palace to their presumed meeting with Persian spies, then swoop down and bag the whole lot. She had not expected the quarry to descend into the depths of the half-abandoned cistern system that burrowed under the hill holding the palaces.

  The sound of the oars of the other boat echoed off the high ceiling. Intermittently, the murmur of a man speaking carried to Thyatis, but she could not make out the words. Behind her own craft, two more shallow-drafted boats carried the rest of her men.

  Around them, great pillars rose out of the cold waters, passing overhead like the branches of great stone trees. The air was chill, for the waters were fresh from springs in the hills beyond the city. Despite the Avar "siege" of the city, the aqueducts that fed the great public cisterns remained open and full. Nikos gently touched Thyatis' elbow. The boat ahead had pulled up to a jetty of stone jutting from one wall of the vast chamber. The distant lantern brightened as the man carrying it slid the hood aside and a set of steps were revealed, leading up into darkness. The thump of the boat coming to the jetty slithered across the water.

  Thyatis held up her hand and the two Turks gently backed their oars. The other two boats glided silently to a stop in the partial cover of one of the towering pillars. The Roman girl watched and waited as two men got out of the boat at the jetty and climbed up the stairs, leaving one man in the boat with a second lantern. After a few minutes there was a distant clang of metal and the last traces of the lantern the two men were carrying disappeared from the steps. Thyatis turned and her hand flickered in quiet-talk to Nikos. Go, she signed, quietly and take the boat.

  Nikos nodded and shed his cloak and shirt. Barefoot, he eased over the side of the boat. Thyatis and the two Turks subtly adjusted their seating so that the boat did not rock and make a noise as the Illyrian slipped into the dark water. Taking a long breath, he submerged and the water closed over him with barely a ripple.

  For a time, the men and woman in the three boats waited. Thyatis sat, still and quiet, watching, feeling the air around her and the breathing of her men. At last she felt the soft breath of Jochi as he breathed in and pushed his bow away from him, bringing the string taut. Ahead, in the pale light of the lantern on the jetty, she saw the dark waters part near the end of the boat and a lithe, stocky figure emerge. Nikos' hand blurred and the boatman's throat was suddenly crushed by iron fingers. The knife in the other hand slid through cloth and flesh with a whisper, and the body of the boatman jerked. There was no sound, but the boatman crumpled into the bottom of the boat. Nikos crouched over him, staring up the stairs.

  No sound came, no shouts of alarm. Nikos climbed out of the water onto the jetty. Moving quickly, he picked up the lantern and moved it to the bottom of the steps, pointing upward. On the lead boat, Thyatis motioned her men forward. Jochi reslung his bow and took up his oar. The three boats slid forward over the dark water to the dock.

  —|—

  Dwyrin was curled into as small a space as he could manage, well back in the little recess on the side of the chamber of candles. He practiced being invisible, his breathing faint, his thoughts concentrated on stone, rock, and tile. In the chamber, the dead man Khiron was sitting quietly, staring at the little table and the items upon it. From time to time he would reach out a gray hand and shuffle the items about, making little tinkling sounds. So he had been since Dwyrin had awoken. The air in the chamber seemed close and heavy. The dead man had not taunted the boy, or brought him any food or water. The ache in Dwyrin's stomach was growing, but there was nothing to be done about it. Dwyrin watched the dead man out of the corner of his eye.

  Suddenly Khiron stood, brushing his long cloak back from the little chair. He strode to the heavy doorway that led outside, to the long corridor, and paused as if listening. When he turned back, his face was drawn and grim. Then suddenly it stretched into the rictus of a smile.

  "An arrangement has been made for you, boy," he said, his voice gravelly.

  A tremor of fear rippled through Dwyrin and his eyes began to smart with tears. He scrunched himself smaller and pressed against the rough stone at the back of the recess. Khiron ignored this and unlocked the grate, reaching in and dragging the boy out with a long arm. He stood the Hibernian up and dusted him off.

  "I will miss you, little mouse," the dead man said, his voice light, like flayed skin flapping in the wind.

  "Come, it is time to meet your new master."

  —|—

  At the top of the long flight of stairs from the cistern, Nikos and Thyatis stood on opposite sides of the iron-bound door that closed off the top of the steps. One of the men, Ulfgar, stood before the door, carefully attired in the garb of the dead boatman. Anagathios had finished daubing color on his face and carefully smearing it to make an even surface. Done, the Syrian packed his small wooden case with precise, unhurried motions and then slipped back down the stairs. Thyatis nodded at Ulfgar and then quietly unshipped her shortsword from the sheath slung over her back. With the blade free in her left hand, she drew the fine-meshed silk veil of her hood over her face with her right. On the other side of the door, Nikos shook out a length of wire that had been threaded through a medium-length copper tube with knurled ends. His head, too, was shrouded in a hood of fine black silk.

  Ulfgar swallowed and then rapped sharply on the door. There was no answer. He rapped again, louder. A few grains passed and then there was a metallic scraping sound beyond the door and a small window swung open. A smoky yellow light shone through and Ulfgar raised his own lantern, illuminating his face.

  "What is it?" a heavy voice snarled in Walach. Through the edge of the small window, Thyatis could see part of a small room, lit by more than one lantern. A murmur of voices echoed off the walls—two, perhaps three more men.

  "Let me in," Ulfgar said, his voice sounding tired and worn. "I'm tired of sitting in this cold pit."

  The man in the window sneered and rubbed the top of his bald head, saying: "Too bad for you. You're supposed to stay with the boat."

  Ulfgar scratched the side of his eye with a finger of the hand holding the lantern and raised an amphora of wine with the other.

  "I'd rather not drink this alone," he said, mouth twisted to the side in a half grin. The eyebrows of the guard inside raised. Some kind of thought pattered through his head and he came to a decision.

  "Pass that through and we'll take care of it," he said, smiling.

  Ulfgar snorted and tucked the amphora under his arm. "Alone and cold I may be, but I'm not stupid." He turned and began making his way down the steps. The guard in the window looked after him
and sighed.

  "All right!" he called, laughing after the retreating back of the Saxon. "You and your wine are welcome!" There was a sliding sound of metal on metal, then the door opened a crack and the guard inside stepped partway out into the little landing at the top of the stairs.

  Nikos was quick, like a snake, and the wire loop was over the guard's head, around his throat, and being dragged savagely tight before the Walach could as much as take a breath. Nikos held the copper tube in one hand and had yanked the end of the wire, which was wrapped around a short crosspiece of old oak, with the other. Thyatis blurred past the choking guard with the crushed trachea and the blood bubbling out of his nose and was into the guardroom before the three men seated around the stone table could more than look up in mild amusement at the antics of their friend.

  The nearest one was looking over his shoulder at the doorway. His eyes widened as she rushed in. Her short-sword speared through his half-open mouth, cracked its point through the back of his skull, and then whipped back out like a bloody snake. He was still sliding sideways out of his chair, his spinal cord cut neatly in half and his mouth in ruins, when she ran past the man seated on the right side of the table and rotated her torso. The blade, spattering blood and white bits of bone across the room, rotated with her and sheared through the throat of the second man, carrying him and his chair over backward to sprawl across the floor with a clatter of wood.

  The third man had sprung up out of his campstool and had lunged toward the spears on a wooden rack next to the rear door of the guardroom. Thyatis, nearly turned all the way to her right by the follow-through of her swordstroke, plucked a throwing knife from the bandoleer at her belt with her free right hand, cocked and threw in one smooth, effortless motion. The heavy-tipped blade sank into his back below his right shoulder, hilt deep, even as two black-fletched arrows, fired through the doorway, punched into the side of his chest from the opposite angle. He crashed into the wooden frame holding the spears and other gear. It collapsed with a great clatter of wood and metal.

  Thyatis leapt over the body at her feet and to the far door. It was bolted on her side, which gave her pause for a thousandth of a second, and then she slammed the bolt open and rolled out into the passageway beyond. It was dark, and broad, with a musty smell. She glanced each direction and saw and heard nothing. The two Turks scuttled through the doorway behind her and took up positions facing each direction. Thyatis stepped back inside the guardroom.

  Anagathios and one of the Greeks were dragging the bodies of the dead guardsmen out of the room as she entered. Nikos had cleaned off his strangling loop and had slid the copper tube back into the holder slung over his back.

  Anything? he signed.

  No, she answered, also in finger-talk, a crossways corridor, empty and dark. We must be in the cellars of the building. Take your team and find the roof or a window. Alert the Imperials and then head for the fighting. I'll take my team into the main part of the building and find the Persian agent.

  Nikos nodded and then gathered the three Greeks, Anagathios, and Ulfgar to him. After a moment of silent discussion they faded off into the corridor outside and headed off to the left. Thyatis took stock of the room and then joined her team, comprised of the two Turks, a Yueh-Chu exile named Timur, and a hulking Goth named Fredric.

  Can you smell a kitchen? she signed at Jochi.

  The Turk smiled broadly, revealing a mouth filled with snaggly yellow teeth under a lank black mustache. He pointed to the right and up.

  Let's go, she gestured. The two Turks led off, their bows out and arrows on the string. Thyatis followed, with Timur behind her and Fredric at the rear. They trotted up the corridor.

  —|—

  This time, when Khiron dragged the foul-smelling leather bag off Dwyrin's head, they were not in the study. Instead they stood on a raised wooden deck that overlooked a garden of pale-white flowers and dark bushes with long narrow leaves. Above them arched a roof of iron slats with mottled glass between each support. A huge yellow-green moon wavered down through the glass. A heady scent filled the air. Dwyrin knelt on a thick rug. Sitting in wicker-backed chairs were the Bygar, the whiskered man, and the dark thing in flesh. Again, Khiron stood just behind Dwyrin and to one side, the fingers of one hand resting lightly on the boy's shoulder.

  The remains of a meal lay between the Bygar and Whiskers. Lord Dahak had only a partially full glass of wine in front of him. The smell of roast lamb, chickpeas, fresh bread, and resinated wine tickled at Dwyrin's nose. His hunger began to wake up, clawing at his stomach. It grumbled, loudly, and Whiskers laughed at the sound.

  The Easterner turned to the Bygar. "Ai, friend, do not deliver merchandise in such poor condition! At least a scrap of bread for the boy. He is thin enough already."

  The Bygar smiled and made a little half bow in his chair.

  "I fear that my servant may have forgotten his charge," said the Walach.

  Khiron knelt on one knee, his head low. "Forgive me, master, I did forget. Shall I call for the servants to bring him a meal?"

  The Bygar glanced at Dahak, who was observing Dwyrin with lidded eyes. The Eastern sorcerer looked back and shrugged. It was of little import to him. The Valach nodded to Khiron, saying, "Yes, the boy should eat before he leaves my house for his new home."

  Dwyrin quailed at the implication and sank lower on the rug. Fear filled his mind at the thought of departing from even the minimal sanctuary of Khiron's chambers to be with this... Creature. Dahak smoothed back his long hair and stood, pacing over to the Hibernian. Khiron slunk away at the approach of the Easterner and then went off through the moonflowers and bushes to find a servant. The sorcerer ran his hand just over Dwyrin's head, and the closeness of his touch was like standing in a frost-gale. Dwyrin shuddered and collapsed into a tightly curled ball on the floor.

  Dahak laughed, and the moonflowers wilted and closed at the sound of his voice. "Your pardon, Bygar. I did not mean to spoil the display of your flowers."

  The Easterner bowed to his host. While he did so, there was a sudden fall of light through the windows in the roof. White and orange sparkled in the sky for a moment, and the shadows danced across the deck. The Bygar looked up with puzzlement, but Whiskers stood quickly and dragged his cape, hat, and a longsword encased in battered leather wrapping from behind his chair.

  "An Imperial signal rocket," Whiskers rasped as he jammed the hat onto his head. "It is time to leave, my lords."

  Dahak spun slowly around on his heel, his brow furrowed in mild concentration. Dwyrin was forgotten at his feet.

  "There is nothing outside..." he began, then he rocked back as a black-fletched arrow sunk into his chest with a meaty thwack. For just an instant the Easterner stared down in puzzlement at the long shaft of the bolt, his hand raised to touch it. Then two more feathered into him, and he fell backward with a grunting sound.

  Dwyrin rolled away from the falling sorcerer and off the decking. He fell heavily into a moonflower bush by the side of the deck, crying out as thorns in the underbrush tore at him. There was a sound of running feet as a group of men charged out of the dimness. The Bygar shouted an alarm and then vaulted over the back of the deck and into the darkness of the garden. Whiskers, on the other hand, snatched up his cloak and spun it around his left arm. His right held a gleaming three-foot blade that had seemingly materialized there. He too shouted and sprang down the steps of the deck and into the midst of the charging men.

  To Whiskers' great surprise, his lopping overhand stroke was parried by a flicker-bright length of steel in the hands of the lead attacker. He danced back as the assailant, dressed from head to toe in black, lashed out at him, nearly catching the elbow of his left arm. He lunged back in and for a moment the air was a flutter of steel in the moonlight and the spark of clanging arms. The other two attackers split off, the largest bounding up onto the deck itself, while the other dashed left into the brush of the garden.

  Dwyrin rolled over and clawed at the thin metal chain
around his neck. It flashed cold and seemed to constrict around his throat, but this time he knew what would happen and fought to open his mind to the othersight. Then, suddenly, there was a huge booming sound and the assailant who had charged up onto the deck was blown backward by a gout of white-hot lightning. The attacker sailed back across the garden and smashed into a wooden wall, breaking the timbers even as every bone in the man's body was crushed to a pulp of blood and bone meal. The nimbus of the lightning stroke hung in the air, etching a blast that arced across the great chamber.

  On the deck, Dahak staggered to his feet, a halo of blue-white sparks leaping from his flesh and the remains of his clothing. The wooden shafts of the three arrows caught fire and smoked as they were consumed. Thunder boomed and echoed through the enclosed space like the rampage of the gods. High above, the glass panes shattered as the shock wave of the blast struck them and they came raining down in a thousand fragments.

  Dwyrin had been blown back as well, but the rush of power in the garden had torn at the ban around his neck as well and now he ripped it from his neck. His othersight flooded in and the great space of the room was a maelstrom of unleashed energies. The creature Dahak stood at the center of a vortex of rippling lighting and fire. The lines of force that crisscrossed the great city began to give up their power to the Easterner and a wall of lightning suddenly rushed out from him.

  To Thyatis, the world suddenly went pure white and there was a sound so large that it smashed into her like a wave. Her sword fight with the whiskered man was forgotten as she was flung backward into the ornamental pool of the garden. The foreigner was blown forward too, and he tumbled into the shallow water beside her. Distantly, part of Thyatis' brain was screaming sorcerer, sorcerer! Still stunned, she stared at the ceiling above her in amazement as the thousands of glass fragments that had been raining down into the garden were thrown back into the sky like tiny comets. The wooden walls of the garden chamber caught fire.