Michael Ennis - Byzantium

The Jarl pointed out two silk-sheathed figures. He straightened his own tunic and fastened the top two buttons of Haraldr’s jacket. His voice returned to its usual gravity. ‘Haraldr, the Grik trade ambassador will have an interpreter with him, a Grik likewise, but this man speaks our tongue as well as you or I. Like many Grik court-men, this interpreter has been gelded so that he may serve the Emperor without aspiring to his throne. He will have a face as smooth as a woman’s. Please do not stare at him. He still has his dignity.’

The Byzantine trade ambassador wore an ankle-length tunic of red silk; dark, tightly-ringed hair and a curling beard framed his high, feminine cheek-bones. He seemed to peer through the Norseman as if he were looking through a pane of glass. The little hairless man beside the ambassador, robed in plainer silk, smiled broadly. The ambassador still evidenced no awareness of the two Norsemen. After an awkward moment the eunuch spoke in a high, humming voice. ‘Greetings, Jarl Rognvald.’ Haraldr was astonished at the flawless pronunciation and undetectable accent. The eunuch cleared his throat for ironic emphasis and his eyes sparkled conspiratorially. ‘We both greet you. At least I am certain that the august ambassador would greet you if he were not so busily engaged in ignoring you.’

‘Gregory,’ offered Jarl Rognvald, ‘I want you to meet Haraldr Nordbrikt. I ask you to treat him as you would my son. You’ll find him different from most young men of our race. He has a special passion’ – Jarl Rognvald pounded his breast – ‘strong but gentle. He writes verse.’ The Jarl rustled Haraldr’s long silky hair. ‘Sometimes we say that our skalds “drink the ale of Odin.” Well, tonight Haraldr has drunk only ale.’

‘A poet,’ said Gregory appreciatively. ‘Then he must learn of Homer.’

The ambassador wiped his mouth, as if trying to remove some contamination, and spoke sharply to Gregory in the flowing, interminably circuitous rhythm of the Greek tongue. His comments went on for several minutes. Gregory nodded respectfully from time to time.

‘Jarl Rognvald, it is sometimes argued that in our government a man rises on the accumulation of his words,’ said Gregory when the ambassador had finished. The little eunuch struggled to combat a smile. ‘Of course, that is not true. If it were, our august ambassador already would have ascended to the Imperial throne. What he has said is this. First, I am not to exchange inessential pleasantries with you “northern barbaroi ”. Forgive me, but I am afraid you will have to become accustomed to that term. More pertinently, the documents for the entire fleet of four hundred and eighty-six ships are now in order. There is nothing to prevent our departure. Unless, of course, the august ambassador decides to deliver an address to inaugurate our voyage.’

Jarl Rognvald forced himself not to laugh; he presumed that the ambassador would be only too eager to take offence. ‘Have you seen Hakon? I don’t want to wait until the morning to speak with him.’

Gregory lifted a wry eyebrow. ‘I am afraid I have seen more of the Manglavite than I had hoped.’

‘Manglavite?’ asked Haraldr.

‘Hakon Fire-Eyes holds the official title of Manglavite. He symbolically clears the path for the Emperor in official processions,’ said Gregory. ‘It is an extraordinary honour.’ He did not add that it was a particularly extraordinary honour for a barbaros, and a frightening testament to the enormous, malignant power of Hakon’s patron, Mar Hunrodarson.

Gregory led the Jarl and Haraldr to the Varangian encampment. It seemed as if all of the five hundred swaggering young warriors had assembled in a rollicking mob around some central attraction. Haraldr reluctantly followed the Jarl into their midst; though he was taller and broader than all but a few, he felt as if his cowardice were a physical defect they would immediately recognize and ridicule.

At the centre of the crowd was a naked woman, a coarsely ruddy farm girl with short-cropped slave’s hair, firm heavy buttocks, and small breasts with boyish nipples. She stared numbly at a man sitting on an ale barrel; he was huge even by Norse standards. He wore a short lacquered gold byrnnie but was naked below the waist; his legs were so thickly muscled, they seemed like the pillars of some colossal temple. His head slumped towards his chest, and his long golden hair concealed his face. He held a hand to his crotch, as if he had been injured. It was a moment before Haraldr realized that the giant was actually stroking his own genitals, apparently trying to coax an erection so that he could publicly penetrate the unfortunate slave girl. Then Haraldr noticed the other naked slave, a slender girl who sat forlornly in the sand; blood smeared her inner thighs. She was no doubt the reason for the giant’s temporary impotence. Several more slave girls, roped together and wearing coarse wool tunics, stood behind her, dreadfully waiting their turn.

The giant looked up. His long golden beard was plaited into dozens of tiny braids and spangled with shimmering bits of gold. The eponymous orange flecks in his blue irises were clearly visible. Hakon’s fire-eyes swept about crazily, as dangerous as weapons, and finally targeted Jarl Rognvald. Hakon’s thick, brutish lips parted, offering a huge ivory grin. ‘Jarl Rognvald,’ he said casually. ‘It seems my quiver is temporarily empty.’ His head slumped again, and he returned his attention to his limp penis.

Jarl Rognvald was rigid with disgust. To capture, own and trade in slaves was accepted in the north, but to abuse them, particularly in this fashion, was an outrage. But there was trouble enough waiting for him on the Dnieper, and he could not afford a row with the leader of the five hundred most able warriors under his overall command. ‘I’ll speak with Hakon in the morning,’ he told Haraldr wearily.

A young man with wispy chin whiskers bounded from the crowd and began a recitation in the strident tones of the skald. ‘Sater-of-ravens! Full-strong arm of the Great King! He whose forehead-moons glow with the stars-of-hearth!’ He raised his arm and flourished his hand as if scattering gold dust into the sky.

Hakon looked up at the young skald. ‘Grettir!’ He chortled. ‘Have you found me fresh meat? Something to temper my Frey-spike?’

‘Yes, heretic-hewer.’ Grettir moved his hands in suggestion of a woman’s curves. ‘Itrvaxinn!’ Good lines, like a well-crafted Norse dragon-ship.

The naked farm girl was pushed aside. Two Varangians dragged the next victim through the crowd. At the sight of her Haraldr knew he could not leave.

Though she was cloaked in a dirty burlap tunic and bound at her wrists and ankles, this young woman obviously had not been born to accept slavery. Her skin was as lustrously white as her uncropped hair was black. She snapped like a badger at Grettir’s hand, and he had to wrestle her chin up for Hakon’s inspection. Her agate eyes were brightly polished with anger; her nose was long and fine with a delicate, sharp tip. Even in the face of the humiliation that awaited her, she had an unmistakable nobility. Haraldr’s breast ached with her loveliness and her terrible fate. A voice whispered at him, then faded. He did not know what it said. A torrent of obscene speculation followed from the crowd.

‘Imagine the dark foliage that garlands her thigh-gorge, heretic-hewer.’ Grettir grimaced as he struggled to steady the girl’s writhing head. ‘You had better expect a fight if you try to sail up this fjord.’

Hakon grinned. ‘The blood from the wound Freyja hews will bless our journey!’ His disproportionately small penis now stood with plum-hued stiffness. He reached out with an enormous apelike arm, seized the girl’s long black mane, and forced her to stumble between his massive, spread thighs; she became curiously acquiescent, and merely glared as he brought her mouth to his. There was a moment of contact, and then her head jerked violently. Hakon bellowed and almost pitched backwards off his perch. Blood streamed from his lacerated nose.