Richard Blake - The Curse of Babylon

‘Tanais is a city on the far shore of Lake Maeotis,’ I said in a return of my lordly manner. What had her father taught her? ‘The lake is entered through a narrow strait from the north of the Black Sea. Since you live in Trebizond, I really thought you’d know that. It’s been there for over a thousand years,’ I went on with a mild frown — ‘very important for trade. The River Tanais leads straight into Scythia, and may be part of an alternative water route to a place called England.’

‘Oh, you mean Tanais! ’ She sounded annoyed, and didn’t seem to have picked up on the reference to England. ‘So, why are we on this side of the City?’

I reached forward and steadied her as she slipped on one of the smoother rocks. ‘That’s the reason I’m here,’ I said. ‘In itself, smuggling is something dealt with by subordinates of subordinates. But I’m told the detained ship is from Tanais. That raises the question of how it got through the narrow straits past the City.’ Yes, that was my concern. Now I was so wretchedly late, I was thinking about criminal charges as well as general sackings in the Tolls Office. I tried to look fierce. I was his Magnificence the Lord Senator Alaric, Lord Treasurer to Heraclius — but I wasn’t above getting my hands dirty, or my boots scratched, to make sure I ran a department as efficient and incorruptible as everyone knew I was.

I leaned forward and put my hand on a convenient lump of rock. Unless those unusually active seabirds overhead were lost, it was one more upward climb and then a descent to the shore. I recalled from my one previous visit that this was a narrow bay with a flat and sandy beach. I frowned and pulled my hand back. I looked at my hand. I rubbed my fingers together and sniffed them. I used my other hand to get out the napkin I’d soaked in perfume. I cleaned myself and stared at linen that was no longer white but stained with congealing blood.

Eyes suddenly wide, Antonia didn’t cry out. I tried for a smile. I wondered how long I had before she realised what a total dickhead I’d been.

There was a salty puddle at the foot of this depression in the rock, and I moved to a loose rock in an effort to keep my boots dry. I drew a deep breath and tried to ignore the sound of my own racing pulse. I took out the two halves of the papyrus sheet. The message looked absolutely right. It was in the right handwriting, and was expressed in the right stilted phrasing. I’d read it once in my hall of audience and got it straight by heart. Why was I fussing over a few spots of blood? Perhaps one of my own people had slipped here and cut himself. These rocks were buggery sharp. But it was more than a few spots of blood I’d just wiped off my hand. I looked up again and tried not to sneeze as I stared close by the sun. Those seabirds were very active. They might be feeding. Or they might have been disturbed.

I looked again at the message and blinked until my eyes had adjusted. Though possible, convincing forgery of a seal is difficult and therefore uncommon. But I held it closer and looked carefully at the wax. Was it my dazzled eyes? Or was there a slight variation of colour? I tried to reconstruct how the seal had been pressed into the wax. Shouldn’t it have left a full rather than a partial impression?

Put me before some commission of inquiry and I’d have persuaded everyone of how reasonably I’d acted throughout — how any other reasonable man would have found himself standing just outside the jaws of a trap. I might even have got away with a commendation for how I’d spotted things just in time. In the private turnings of my mind, however, there was no denying I’d been a dickhead — a total and culpable dickhead.

I turned to Antonia, who seemed to have picked up on my mood. ‘Listen,’ I said, keeping all urgency out of my voice. ‘I want you to get yourself as quickly and quietly as you can back to the road.’ I slipped off my signet ring. ‘Stop the first carrying chair that comes past with more than a dozen armed guards and give this to the owner. Tell him I need immediate support.’ I stared her into silence. ‘I may not need help,’ I went on. ‘You may find that you get to the road with me only a dozen yards behind you. But I do implore you to go.’

I turned away from her and took my sword out. Now I was looking, I could see where a stream of blood had run down from above to my right. If I stepped up to a narrow ledge on the rock, I could pull myself level with the top of the ridge. As I considered whether I should take off my cloak and outer tunic, I realised that Antonia was still behind me.

‘Go!’ I said, jerking my sword in her direction. ‘If I need to use this, having you about will only complicate things.’

She screwed her face up as if to start another of her objections. Suddenly, she pointed. ‘Look out — behind you!’ she hissed.

I’d already heard the scrape of shoe leather on rock. All clerical dithering over, I pushed her close against the ridge and got a fighting grip on my sword. The armed man didn’t have time to call out. He didn’t have time to stop. I braced myself as we made contact. I think he was dead before his breastbone had crunched against the pommel of my sword. Certainly, I had my sword back out of him and cleaned on his padded tunic before he was fully down. Unspotted by his blood, I was ready to fight again.

There was no need to fight again. He’d been alone. The brief sight I’d had of his face told me street thug. His clothing and the cheap sword he’d been carrying said much the same. He hadn’t been the sort who attacked without cover of darkness or plenty of support. I could guess he’d been running away and had found me in his path.

‘Did you see where he came from?’ I asked, very calm. There’s nothing like a quick and almost elegant kill to settle your nerves. Whatever my internal commission of inquiry might eventually decide, we’d reached the point of emergency. I managed a smile as I asked again. He must have jumped down from the shore side. Everything suggested that. But I needed to know beyond doubt. Not speaking, Antonia pointed at the shore side. She looked scared, but not on the point of collapsing in tears. I was casting about for the right form of words to get her scampering back in the direction of safety, when I heard a distant clash of weapons and a cry of what may have been pain. I now heard a much shriller cry, though also from a distance. There was a fight down on the beach.

Antonia found her voice. ‘Alaric — My Lord,’ she said with quiet intensity — ‘can’t you see this is a trap? Let’s both get out of here.’

She was no fool. That much was clear. I frowned as if to let her know she’d spoken out of place. I turned and looked up again. If I went carefully, I could stop at a point from where I could bob my head up very briefly. There was a chance that Lucas and his men were waiting on the other side. They might have had trouble with some smugglers. The man I’d killed might have been running away. Or they might be in trouble. I had a plain duty to have a look. As for Antonia, I’d given her the chance to get away. There’s a limit to the consideration you give women. I took off my outer clothes and arranged them where they wouldn’t be blown down by the breeze. Keeping my sword in hand, I climbed noiselessly up a ten-foot incline of jagged rock. The plan was to put my head up and then straight down. I took a deep breath and held it. I pushed my head up.

I was looking down a long incline towards a rocky beach. Thirty yards out from the shore, there was a small ship at anchor. The message had told me there was a ship — though this one wasn’t beached, and was plainly not a trading vessel. The beach itself was covered with a few dozen men who lay very still. I didn’t bother wondering if they were dead. I could see the dark splashes on their clothes. Here and there, I could see the shafts of arrows. I could see at least one man still alive near the water. He was held down by a small man who sat on his chest, and was twisting with pain as another man did something to his feet. He let out a long scream and what may have been a claim of ignorance. It could have been a cord twisting tighter about a couple of toes with a stone between them. It could have been a knife point into the sole. Sensitive things, feet — you can carry a most effective torture chamber about with you if you know what to do with feet. There was a dead man to my right. He was the one whose blood had run down. There was another six feet away from him, this one with an arrow in his throat. So far as I could tell, none of the dead was from customs enforcement.