Tom Harper: Siege of Heaven

‘So?’

He nodded up to the clouds. ‘So, if the storm breaks, where do you think all the water will go?’

I shouted ahead to Pakrad, ‘How much further?’

In answer, he stopped where he stood and pointed forward. Just ahead, the two sides of the valley curved together to close it off, like a vast natural hippodrome. A sheer buttress protruded where they met, as though the seams of the mountains had been pinched together. Perched on its summit I could see the remains of jagged walls and towers.

‘How do we get up there?’

‘We climb.’ Pakrad laughed, the first time I had ever heard a glimmer of humour from him. ‘It is not as steep as it looks.’

That was true: it was not completely sheer, as it had seemed from the distance, but only immensely steep. A thin path threaded its way back and forth across the mountain face: in many places steps had been carved out of the rock.

‘We’ll never get the donkeys up there,’ said Sigurd. ‘Make them fast to those trees. Everybody else, get your armour on.’ Pakrad made to protest but Sigurd silenced him with a glare. ‘I don’t want anyone losing his balance because he’s got a load on his back. And who’s to say what we’ll find in the monastery.’

The men threw down their sacks and pulled out their armour. High above us, I could see eagles wheeling against the darkening sky. I wriggled into my mail shirt and drew it snug over my shoulders, then helped Sigurd lace his arm greaves. I buckled my sword belt around my waist and slung my shield over my back. Finally, I pulled on my helmet. Suddenly, the world was a confined and muted place — and even more stultifying than it had been before.

Sigurd scowled at the path. ‘Up we go.’

As so often, the last part of the journey was the hardest. Despite the clammy heat inside the helmet, it at least trained my gaze straight ahead, always on the feet of the Varangian in front of me, preventing me from seeing the precipice by my side. The few times I did look out, I did not know whether to be terrified by the drop or dismayed by how far I still had to go. The shield on my back was forever unbalancing me, especially on the steps, which were worn smooth with age. Once the man behind me had to thrust out a palm to stop me toppling backwards.

At last, just when I feared my legs would give out completely and pitch me into oblivion, we halted. I had stopped even hoping for the path to end, and almost collided with the Varangian in front of me. At the head of the line, at the top of a last flight of stairs, Pakrad was standing in front of a door that seemed to lead into the cliff face itself. Only when I looked up did I see that, just above me, the rough rock of the cliff resolved itself into a sheer wall of square-chiselled stone. The masonry was so precise that I could hardly tell where nature’s work ended and man’s began.

‘Is this the monastery’s front gate?’ asked Sigurd sceptically.

‘Sometimes it is wiser to come in by the back door,’ said Pakrad.

With the mordant creak of long-unused hinges, the door in the cliff swung open. Just before I passed inside, I felt the first drops of rain begin to fall.

The Turks might have sacked the monastery but it would be many centuries — perhaps even to the great day of judgement — before the ruins were razed entirely. The foundations had not been erected by men: they had been carved out of the solid rock of the hilltop, so high that they towered over us as we walked through them. Together with the foundations they made a vast stone cauldron, crisscrossed with snatches of walls and strewn with megalithic rubble. They seemed even more mammoth in the wet gloom, while the walls stood stark against the leaden sky.

But someone must have been here since the Turks, for I gradually began to notice signs of repairs clumsily patched onto the mighty foundations. Cracks had been filled with bricks and mortar, while elsewhere wooden stockades had been erected in place of the old walls. A few of the chambers had even been re-roofed, with reed thatch instead of the shattered tiles that lay everywhere. I wandered through the ruins, frightening up a flock of nesting birds, but saw no one.

‘Where is this relic hidden?’ I called. The wind was stronger here on the summit, and colder, whistling through the glassless windows. My tentative words were snatched away almost before they passed my lips.

‘Here.’ Brother Pakrad’s face appeared in a doorway, beneath a broken arch whose two stumps reached towards each other like claws. ‘In here.’

I looked around. The rest of our company had scattered to search the ruins, not trusting our solitude, and I was alone. The rain was drumming harder now. Brother Pakrad beckoned me forward. ‘Come. The relic is in here.’ I ducked under the broken arch, though I did not need to, into a rounded apse where the monastery church had once stood. A part of its domed roof still arced overhead, fractured like an eggshell, but otherwise it was open. Weeds had driven cracks through the tiled floor and the icons on the walls had crumbled, so that they represented not whole men but a dismembered host, the army of the saints as they might have appeared in the aftermath of a terrible battle.

‘Over here.’

At least the remaining portion of the roof sheltered me from the rain. I followed where Pakrad led me, to a pedestal at the back of the church near where an altar must once have stood. It seemed far removed from God now.

‘Pull that stone,’ he ordered.

I knelt. It was easy to see the stone the monk meant. It had been cut to fit its niche, but not so perfectly as to hide the gaps where mortar should have held it in place. It rose slightly higher than the adjoining blocks as well, giving a purchase for my fingertips to press against. A small cross, weathered almost to invisibility, was carved in its centre.

It slid away easily when I pulled, revealing a small hollow behind. I reached in my hand and felt around in the darkness. The chamber was not large, no deeper than my elbow, and it took little time for me to establish its contents.

There was nothing there. The hole was empty.

Before I could wonder at it, a ticklish sensation under my chin caused me to raise my head. I suddenly went very still. Brother Pakrad had approached and was standing over me. He held a curved sword, pressing its blade so hard against my throat that I scarcely dared breathe.

My eyes locked on his. He carried the sword far more naturally than the cross: the blade barely trembled in his grip. In the distance, I heard sudden shouts of alarm, followed quickly by the ring of clashing steel, and the bellow of Sigurd shouting my name.

Pakrad moved the blade against my throat. It cut close as a razor — though thankfully no closer. ‘Answer him.’

I had no time to obey — or defy him. Before I could speak, a barrage of heavy footsteps ran up the passage outside the church, paused, and rushed in. Kneeling with my back to the door I could not see anything, but I heard the commotion that accompanied them, then an abrupt halt and Sigurd’s bewildered voice calling, ‘Demetrios?’

‘Put down your weapons,’ Pakrad shouted. ‘Put them down, or your friend will be the first to die.’

I could not hear if they obeyed, for suddenly the room became a pit of noise. Twisting back my head as far as I dared, I saw a small knot of Varangians surrounded on all sides by a press of armed men. More enemies were perched on top of the walls with bows in their hands, black as crows. Rain poured into the roofless church, plastering men’s hair to their heads and making their weapons slick in their hands. Those bows would be almost useless, but that would not turn the odds in our favour. Above me, the rain drummed on the fractured roof so hard I thought it might crack and bury me.