Richard Blake - The Curse of Babylon

I could almost feel the Emperor’s blank stare at the back of my neck. ‘We haven’t yet taken a roll call of the survivors,’ I said quickly.

Still looking at me, Timothy nodded. ‘Of course not. And was not Cousin Priscus always the survivor? Did he never tell you how he was the only man alive out of Mantella after it fell to the Slavs?’ He paused. ‘That was where he first established his reputation for selfless heroism.’ I looked briefly at the dead monk. How long had he outlived the ripping open of his belly? I wondered. A shame it hadn’t been Timothy. Not that the barbarians would have got very far with him. His weight would have pulled him off the nails and it would have defeated our own executioners to find his entrails among the fat.

Someone came forward with a list of the survivors. Heraclius blinked short-sightedly at the impression of the names on wax. ‘I want to look inside,’ he said. With odd nimbleness, Timothy bounced on to a heap of fallen brickwork and we all passed through the gate.

The Emperor grunted and waited for me to reach out a hand to help him over the charred body of another barbarian. I could see the head had been knocked in from behind. I avoided making it obvious that I knew my way through the chaotic but largely intact front offices of the monastery. We stood together in the chapel as someone went ahead into the central courtyard to get all the survivors lined up for a prostration. I helped him balance himself on a scorched chair so he could stare out unobserved at the faces of the living.

‘So Priscus is finally answering to God for his crimes,’ he said softly. I said nothing, but looked across the room at what had to be the body of the Abbot. He lay face down before the altar. Anyone who turned him over would probably find his face was an unrecognisable mass of charred meat. But I didn’t need to lift the remnants of his cloak to see the shape of his body. It was enough that I recognised the hilt of the knife that had been rammed into the right killing spot between his shoulder blades. ‘I did think of pardoning him and sending him off to lead the armies in Syria.’ He paused and began to look into my face, before his eyes darted away again. ‘But that would have upset Nicetas and the whole Church. And would it have made any difference? It was surely the Will of God that we have lost Syria.’

‘Blessed be the Name of the Lord,’ I said. It was best never to say anything more to the point when the Emperor was going into one of his sad moods. I thought about the burned-out cloakroom beside the main gate. That contained several bodies that I could hope would never be recognised.

I helped him down from the chair. He did now look at me. ‘Alaric, I give you the job of arranging for the burial of the dead. Please also speak in my name to those poor souls in the courtyard. As an act of clemency, I release all surviving prisoners. As Lord Treasurer, you will make what provision you think proper for their needs. Tell the monks this building will be repaired by Christmas. They can remain here to await such other prisoners as I may condemn in the New Year.’

I bowed and listened as he picked his way back out of the monastery. I only stood upright when I heard the ragged cheer from the sightseers who’d followed us out of the City. It wouldn’t be long before Martin came in to see if I had any instructions for him. Before I went off to break the happy news to the survivors, we had various matters to discuss in Celtic. If he chose to collapse before me in a sobbing heap, I could let it be known he’d been overcome by the horror of a looted House of God. Even among these generally timid Greeks, Martin was noted for the infirmity in his upper lip.

I think that’s a natural end to my digression. Let’s return, then, to the main narrative. Thirteen months later, Priscus — no, the digression is ended: don’t ask me to explain how one night had stretched to nearly four hundred — stood up from a long inspection of the sleeping Antonia. ‘Not bad looking, if that’s the sort of thing you fancy,’ he conceded. ‘But, if you intend holding on to her, your brains really have migrated to your ball bag.’ He looked again at her closed eyes, and carried his lamp out into the antechamber. I followed him, closing the door as I went.

I suppressed another yawn and looked about for something to put on. Away from the endlessly shifting winds, though, it was a hot night. Besides, it was only Priscus with me. I sat down at the little table where he’d placed his lamp and waited for him to finish making sure that the main door to my sleeping quarters was locked. As silently as a cat, he came back to the table. Still silent, he stared at the wooden box I’d taken from the secret cupboard in my dressing room. At last, he sat down. He pushed the lamp to the edge of the table to get a proper look at me.

I smiled into his cold eyes. ‘Whatever you’re on tonight,’ I said with another and this time unsuppressed yawn, ‘I could fancy a bit for myself.’ He fished about in his tunic, before tutting softly and reaching behind him for a glass bottle. He put a drop of something sticky on my forefinger and watched as I licked it off and took a sip of wine. Unlike most of his potions, this one had no immediate effect. I didn’t question, though, it would perk me up.

‘Very well, dear boy,’ he said smoothly, ‘I will summarise today’s events. Do stop me if I get something wrong. But you’re the one who’s always insisted on getting the known facts straight before trying to move beyond them.’ He moved the lamp back to the middle of the table. ‘Your face has gone very pale. But I think you’ll be surprised at this latest blend. It shouldn’t even give you a headache tomorrow.’ He smiled brightly and continued in what I could see was a mocking parody of my own manner.

‘You were presented with a silver cup this morning by some person or persons unknown,’ he began. ‘Someone who announced himself as a messenger from the useless bastard Nicetas then appears to have slipped you a message, in correct form, to go off to a quiet spot outside the walls, there to be murdered. He was delayed in getting the message to you and you added to the delay by shambling about the City like a blind pilgrim. By the time you did get there, whatever ambush was arranged for you had been rumbled by Shahin, who is, by the way, one of my second cousins on the Persian side. Once you’d got yourself free, you overheard a conversation that revealed treason in high places. You also learned that Shahin is eager to lay hands on your silver cup. The girl you’d picked up along the way in your usual careless manner may indicate a connection of this plot with Nicetas.

He stopped and scratched his scalp. ‘Oh, but I’m losing track of things. Why don’t you carry on? You do these things so much better.’

I closed my eyes and stretched deliciously. He’d been right about his latest potion. Without ever announcing themselves, its effects had stolen over me as Priscus spoke. I fussed with the lamp until the flame came up brighter and took out the cup. ‘Though in good shape, this is very old,’ I said. I ran a thumbnail down the tiny lettering that covered it inside and out. ‘I saw characters a bit like these on some of the older monuments in Ctesiphon. They’d been pulled from the ruins of Persepolis and Ecbatana, and I was told they dated from the first Persian Empire — the one Alexander conquered, that is. No one can read them any more.’ I stopped and thought. ‘But I think they look more like the inscriptions I saw in the much older ruins of Babylon. No one can read those either.’ I looked harder at the cup. I was surely right. The picture, amid the writing, of a winged lion with a man’s head had a definite look of what I’d seen in the desolate silence that had been Babylon. I looked closer at the tiny face and a faint recollection of horror drifted through the back of my mind. This was my first real inspection of the cup. How could elements of it have featured in my dream? I pushed the question aside. I was drugged, and might be confusing present impressions with memory. Otherwise, hadn’t I just said I’d seen images like these before? I offered the cup to Priscus. ‘Any thoughts?’ I asked.