Mary Reed - Nine for the Devil

John smiled. “No, I confess I do not. Did I act rashly? Remind me.”

***

All the way back home John tried to recall the incident Isis had described. How could he forget emptying a jug of scorpions into someone’s bed?

It struck him he had a vague recollection of Isis and himself creeping around dark alleys collecting the scorpions. Then again, hadn’t she told him that story at length during earlier visits? Didn’t the alleys he recalled have the perfumed scent of Isis’ private rooms?

Though he could have employed a carriage or a litter or taken a horse from the imperial stables, John usually preferred to walk. Constantinople was not large. He had often been advised that it wasn’t safe to traverse the streets without a bodyguard, but having fought from one end of the empire to the other there was nothing in Constantinople that frightened him. Besides, he thought best while on his feet. Walking also gave him the chance to observe the mood of the city. One did not overhear conversations while clattering along in a carriage.

What he observed during this walk was not especially enlightening. The city invariably grew tense when change loomed. People spoke more loudly. They argued. They debated what might happen-was the empire doomed or was it worse than that? The factions did not seem to be out in force, the so-called Greens and Blues, supporters of competing chariot teams, gaudily dressed young men whose increased presence in the street signaled violence to come the way flocks of gulls in the squares announced storms approaching from the sea. That was good news.

The news at home was not so good.

John saw tears in Hypatia’s eyes when she opened the door. Was it Peter? Or had there been bad news from Cornelia?

“Gaius has been here,” Hypatia said. “He told me Peter isn’t doing well. The fall was a blow to his system. He said falls are the beginning of the end for many elderly people.”

John felt a rush of relief. For an instant he had steeled himself to hear that he had lost his grandchild or his daughter. Immediately the relief was replaced by guilt, for Peter was also a family member.

Hypatia wiped at her eyes. “He seemed fairly well this morning. We were talking about old times. He was threatening to chop onions in bed. Then he dozed off and slept a long time. He didn’t respond when I tried to wake him. I was ready to go and get Gaius when he arrived to see how Peter was.”

“When was Gaius here?” John asked her.

“He just left.”

“I’ll see if I can catch him. Try not to worry about Peter. What’s true for many isn’t necessarily true for a tough old boot like him.”

As the door shut behind him and he hurried across the square, John wished he believed his own reassuring words.

Vesta, lady-in-waiting to Joannina, plopped down on the bed next to Kuria, former lady-in-waiting to Theodora. “Who do you think I saw just now rushing toward the administrative building? The Lord Chamberlain! I made sure he’d gone by before coming inside. If he was coming to see me again, I didn’t want to be found. He makes me nervous. It’s almost like talking to the emperor.”

“They say he has bags and bags of gold even though he lives like a holy hermit,” Kuria replied.

The two young women sat in Kuria’s room, a few doors down the hall from Vesta’s, deep in the interior of the empress’ portion of the palace. The residences allotted to attendants of the most powerful members of the court were luxurious. Without moving from her perch on the end of the bed, Kuria could have touched more silk, silver, gold, perfume, jewelry, and fine glassware than most people in Constantinople would ever possess in their lifetimes.

“The Lord Chamberlain’s not only rich, he’s awfully tall, like Anastasius,” Vesta mused. “I might find him attractive if he were twenty years younger.”

“And actually a man.”

“Oh, don’t be mean!” Vesta giggled. “Anastasius called him a eunuch to his face, can you imagine? I was leaving and overheard.”

“If Anastasius doesn’t control his tongue he might end up missing an even more important part of his anatomy than the Lord Chamberlain. The part that sits on top of his neck.”

The two friends looked strikingly different, Kuria, exceedingly short, had a small pointy face, referred to by the unkind sons of aristocrats as rat-like, while the tall, gangly Vesta possessed features those same spoiled young men mocked as horsey. Kuria wore a stola of dark green to compliment her auburn hair. Vesta was dressed in a garment of the same light blue favored by her mistress Joannina.

“No one is going to harm the empress’ grandson!” Vesta said firmly. Suddenly she wrinkled her nose. “Do you know the Lord Chamberlain lives with a woman. Despite him being the way he is. Isn’t that the most disgusting thing? And what’s the point?”

Kuria gave her a sly look. “What a little innocent you are. There are other things….”

Vesta turned red. “I’m not all that innocent, Kuria. But I’m glad I don’t know everything you had to learn.”

Kuria’s gaze flickered around her sumptuous living quarters, as if she were taking inventory. “It’s just as well I learned some skills when I came to this city. I expect I’ll be back on the streets before long.”

Vesta leaned over and clutched her friend’s arm. “Oh, surely you won’t go back to the streets?”

“What else? No one but the empress would have a former whore for a lady-in-waiting. Don’t fret about me. I’ll get along. It was so terrible, when Theodora died. I adored her. I couldn’t think straight. I’m afraid I made a spectacle of myself in front of the Lord Chamberlain. Now I’ve calmed down. I’ll think of something.”

“You’re so brave. I wish I were as brave as you.”

“Whatever happens, it won’t be that bad. It was a lot worse growing up on the farm. And almost as bad after father sold me to be a city whore.”

“How could a man sell his own daughter?”

“Easily, when he’s paid enough to buy a donkey.”

“How dreadful it must have been.”

“Coming to the city wasn’t so bad. Father beat me all the time and barely fed me. My first owner in the city beat me too, but he fed me. After a while I escaped and found a new place. Isis fed me and never beat me.”

Vesta squeezed Kuria’s arm more tightly. “Oh, but I shall miss you if they make you leave the palace. Look, I’ll tell father to take you in. We have a huge house. There’s plenty of room.”

“I’m sure he’d be pleased to have someone like me under his roof.”

“He wouldn’t know. Father doesn’t know about anything except the Praetorian Prefecture or care about anything else.”

“Didn’t you tell me he’s some sort of official there?”

“Yes. Quite important, I suppose, but he wouldn’t be connected with the court exactly, except for my service to Joannina. That suits his sense of self-importance. Can you imagine, he’s writing a history of the Prefecture. As if it matters. He used to read parts of it to me, all about its regalia, buildings, organization.”

“I’d rather be beaten!”

“Listening to him you’d think Romulus and Remus suckled at the teat of some boring old bureaucrat with an account book. He faults Constantine for abandoning Rome.”

“There’s nothing in Rome these days but Goths and ruins.” Kuria laughed. “You’ve convinced me I would never want to stay at your father’s house even if he’d have me.”

Vesta drew away from her friend, a look of distress crossed her long face. “I didn’t mean to-”

“Anyway, never mind what I’m going to do with myself. What about you? Do you think Antonina is going to let that pair of doves you’re looking after continue billing and cooing now that Theodora’s gone?”