Pip Vaughan-Hughes - The Vault of bones

My jug of wine was where I had set it down, but later, as I lay upon my bed and drank, I knew that the sly palace ghosts had lapped at it like Aristotle tells us the shades of the dead heroes, feeble and squeaking, drank the warm blood of sacrifices. The haunted wine was suitable company, for if I had gone in search of wine to dull her memory and my grief, I had instead found Anna's fetch. For what else could that girl be? I knew it was not so, with my scholar's mind that shunned superstition and with the aching in my head, for I had butted a living man, and such oafs do not seek to violate spirits. But my bereaved heart had found a shred of relief, a piece of flotsam to cling to in the howling storm, and so I lay there and remembered how I had first found my love and saved her from a man who meant to kill her, how her black hair and white skin had pierced my soul. Only when the wine was all but gone, and I could taste clay from the jug in the dregs, did I banish such thoughts and tell myself that I had merely saved the virtue of an inconsequential servant, and made an enemy of Christ alone knew who. At last I slept, and the mothy ghosts of the palace swarmed about me, drawn to me, as to all who slept there, as if to flame. We draw them, we living souls, our hot blood and beating hearts as enticing as a lantern on a summer night, but the dead are never warm, and we cannot give them warmth; and they dash themselves against us as we dream our little, desperate dreams of life.

Two days later the Captain left on a Venetian galley that was guaranteed, by its eager master, to be the fastest in the port. The party made its way to the docks with all ceremony, and I trailed along, somewhat abjectly, for I was not relishing – nay, I am dissembling: I was frankly terrified of – the prospect of being left alone in this wretched city. I went down to the docks and waved the Captain off, feeling as if I were sawing through my lifeline with every wave. I watched his ship lose itself amongst the sun-shimmer and the teeming boats, then set off back to the palace. Before me stretched nothing but empty time to fill until the King of France's emissaries turned up, and who knew when that might be. So as I trudged back through the empty, hollow streets I trailed my spirits behind me in the gutter like a tattered cloak.

The palace was more gloomy and dispiriting – if such a thing were possible – without the Captain, and my days would have passed as though in a veritable purgatory of boredom and isolation had it not been for one thing. For after a morning spent wandering the empty halls, I returned to my chambers to find a maid turning down my bed linen. When she heard the door she jumped and turned to face me, shoulders clenched in anticipation of something – reprimand, or worse – and I saw that she was the girl I had rescued. When she realised it was me she blushed, more from consternation than embarrassement, bowed nervously and scuttled past me and out into the hall.

After this inauspicious start I saw her often, for – whether she had been assigned to me or had merely chosen the duty herself I could not discover – she was often in my chambers, bringing fresh linen and water, a jug of wine in the evening and a meal if I was in need of one. She was as light and pale as a ghost, and if I believed in such things I might have thought her a house-spirit of some kind. For she never spoke, no matter how I tried to draw her out. At first, when I addressed her, she would simply leave. But after some time had passed she decided that I merited a smile and a shy duck of the head, and sometimes I was honoured with a smile or a nod in answer to some question. I never even learned her name. I hoped, at least, that she knew how much I had come to treasure her silent ministrations.

Meantime I filled the next few days with wandering about Constantinople, finding its famous landmarks and finding each one in such horrible stages of ruin or neglect that each expedition left me more crestfallen than the last. It was after one such day that I was greeted, upon my return to the palace, by a summons to dinner at the high table. Someone had taken pity on me and, I guessed, wished to curry favour with the pope. Somewhat reluctantly I dressed in my finest Roman garb and made my way to the state rooms.

In truth, it was not a bad evening. As a stranger, I was somewhat left out of things, but that suited my mood and anyway, the food was excellent. Or rather, the dressings and accompaniments to the various dishes of meat were delicious, the joints themselves being of poor quality: old, ill-fed beasts had died to provide the barons' feast. And yet the Franks fell upon this meat with great joy and smacking of lips, all but ignoring the smaller dishes of greenstuff and vegetables which were cooked in the Greek style with plenty of oil, lemon and olives, and on which I fell greedily, to the surprise of my fellows. To fit in, I allowed them to serve me half a septuagenarian cockerel and a lump of mutton with all the appeal and texture of oakum. I choked this down with draughts of adequate wine, and, as I was enjoying its strengthening glow, I felt a dig in my ribs.

'Are you a priest, sir?' my neighbour asked me. He was a black-haired man a little older than myself, with a sharp nose and piercing eyes. 'God, no! I mean, no, sir, I am not. A lay brother only.' 'Hmm. D'you hunt?'

'Not habitually’ Not much of an answer, but better, I hoped, than a flat 'no’

'And yet you are a man of action, I perceive. A soldier, I hear, yes? Would you care to hunt the wild boar with us tomorrow?' I saw the black eyebrows rise in challenge. Was this man trying to pick a fight or make a friend? I picked a steely mutton fibre from my teeth and considered quickly. I had never enjoyed hunting, and yet I was bored almost to the point of sickness. What possible harm could there be: another wasted day at worst. 'I should be delighted!' I said.

'Good, then: I was sure you would be. The Regent has charged me with entertaining you while you are a guest here, and I took the liberty of organising a little hunt in your honour – sure you would not be offended, and you were not! We will meet at dawn, by the fountain in the square before the gate. And now, let us be strangers no more. I am called Aimery de Lille Charpigny. My lands are to the south of here, in the Achaea, but I have been at court since the siege last year. Lord, this place is dull…' 'Amen, sir,' I agreed with all my heart.

Thus commenced a pleasant few hours. Aimery had obviously appointed himself my host – or been so appointed, although I was glad of it either way. He kept my cup full and, with little prompting, told me much about court life, such as it was; the parlous state of the empire, and how much, he detested Greeks. He grew positively rapturous, however, describing his barony in the far south of the empire, a land of crags, miraculous wine and endless hunting. In turn I told him a bit about my own homeland, embellishing it a little and inventing a past for myself that left out my humble birth and career as a novice monk, embroidering matters instead with tales I had heard from my long-lost friends at school in Balecester. By the time the fire had died down and people had begun to drift away I was almost looking forward to my first boar hunt, for it sounded like no more than a jolly excursion to the woods. So I bid Aimery a grateful farewell, and promised to make the arranged rendezvous at dawn. He had been diligent in making my evening a pleasant one, and I was truly thankful for that. In the way of these Franks he was not truly friendly, for a suspicion, a chill, seemed to lie behind the smiling face. But we were both a little drunk, and so we clasped hands warmly and I took myself off to my bed.

The next day was the boar hunt that Aimery de Lille Charpigny had organised in my honour. It was still barely light when I found the company gathered in the open space before Hagia Sophia, horses snorting plumes of white breath, men passing flasks between them and cackling hoarsely in early-morning voices. Aimery, clad in green fustian and with a great horn slung across his shoulders, greeted me as if I were an old companion-in-arms and not simply a chance dinner companion. He showed me to my borrowed mount, a lovely white and dappled mare, and introduced me to the others. They were Franks all, bearing sturdy French names like Eudes and Raymond, and they all had the loose-limbed confidence that rank and privilege confer. I did not doubt that this lot would have been as happy hunting Greeks as wild pigs. One of them, Rolant, introduced as Rollo, seemed to be Aimery's particular friend. He was a tow-headed, round-faced young man whose mouth seemed perpetually open in laughter. He slapped me hard on the shoulder and made some jolly comment about Englishmen that was obviously meant to be funny. I smiled dutifully, and was relieved when, as the company made ready to leave, Aimery chose to ride by my side.