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Harry Turtledove: Justinian

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Harry Turtledove Justinian

Justinian: краткое содержание, описание и аннотация

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One of the eunuch parakoimomenoi, Stephen the Persian, rubbed his hands together in delight and crooned, over and over again, "Three thousand pieces of gold a year," as if every one of them were to be delivered straight to his chamber.

He carried on for so long and acted so foolish that at last my mother, who hardly ever spoke up to rebuke anyone, reminded him, "The money goes to the fisc, not to you." Stephen turned red, then white. He bowed to my mother and took his leave, but he was still mumbling of nomismata. I never saw a man with a passion for gold to match his, but then, he had no other passions he could satisfy.

MYAKES

Justinian was wrong there, and he must have known it when he was writing, but you can't think of everything all the time. Only God can do that, eh, Brother Elpidios? There's another passion a lot of eunuchs have, and Stephen the Persian had it more than most: he was as nasty an item as I ever had the misfortune to meet.

What do I mean? What eunuchs hanker after, Brother, is revenge, revenge on the whole world. When you think about it, you can't hardly blame them, now can you? If somebody cut me like that, I would have- Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord? Oh yes, of course, Brother Elpidios. That is what the Holy Scriptures say. But not every man can follow them as well as we might like. If we could follow them better, we'd not need them so much, eh? Am I right or am I wrong?

No. Wait. Never mind. We can argue theology or you can read. We can't do both at once. I'd sooner you read, if you don't mind. Ah. I thank you, and may God bless you and keep you.

JUSTINIAN

News that the followers of the false prophet had agreed to make peace and pay tribute spread all throug h the world with amazing speed, proving to the lesser rulers that the Roman Empire, while diminished in extent from what it had been in the reign of Justinian my namesake, yet remained, as of course it shall forever, the grandest and mightiest empire of them all.

Realizing this once more, the lesser rulers hastened to send envoys to Constantinople to congratulate my father for what he had achieved and to confirm that he was also at peace with them. First, for their lands were nearest, came men from the Sklavinias, the little territories the petty kings and princes of the Sklavenoi have carved out of the land between the Danube and the sea. They brought bricks of beeswax and pots of honey to lay at my father's feet.

One of those feet was bandaged when he received the Sklavenoi, with myself, my uncles, and my little brother once more ranked beside him to lend ceremony to the occasion: he suffered from gout, and, when it flared, the slightest touch was to him like the fiery furnace into which the king of Babylon cast Daniel long ago. The whole of the Empire presently suffered from this, as I shall relate in its own place.

The Sklavenoi, fair-haired, round-faced men in linen tunics elaborately embroidered with colorful yarns, stared in awe at our crowns and the shimmering silk robes we wore and at the jewels and pearls decorating our raiment. Their pale eyes also went wide at the marble and gold and silver in the throne room, at our thrones of gold and ivory, at the precious and holy icons of Christ and the Virgin and the saints on the wall (although, being pagan, they appreciated the beauty and ornament that went into their creation, not the piety), and at the floor mosaics, which I believe they took for a moment to be real things rather than images.

While they spoke to my father in bad, mushy Greek, I turned to my uncle Herakleios and said, "It's as if they've never been inside a building before."

"They haven't, not a building like this," he answered. "They live in little huts with straw roofs, mostly by riverbanks. Christ crucified, if poverty is a virtue, they're the most virtuous people in the world. But they can fight."

I did not fully understand him, not then. How could I? I had spent all my life in the palaces. What did I know of huts made of sticks and straw? But I have learned. And when you are cold and wet and hungry, a hut is more a palace than a palace is when you have all you want.

Afterwards came emissaries from the khagan of the Avars- swarthy men with narrow eyes set on a slant, flat noses, and even flatter faces, all of them bowlegged from spending most of their time in the saddle. Their gifts to my father included a double handful of fair-haired young women: slaves taken from among the Sklavenoi, several of whose tribes were under the dominion of the khagan.

I reckoned them a paltry present- some of them looked to be only a couple of years older than I was myself. But my father and my uncles inspected them with scrupulous attention to detail. At last my father said, "I shall put them to work here in the palaces. I expect we'll get good use from them."

He laughed, something I had never heard him do at an audience, which is in most instances almost as formal and solemn as the celebration of the divine liturgy. My uncles laughed, too, and so did the Avar envoys.

Again, I did not understand. I had but nine years at the time.

We also received ambassadors from the Lombards, whose possessions in Italy were and are mixed promiscuously with our own. After all these years, I do not recall which of their dukes and princes sent us men along with those who came from their king. There were several; I remember that much. The Lombards fight among themselves and seek our support in their quarrels, just as we try to use them to our own advantage. As he had with the various Sklavenoi and the envoys of the Avar khagan, though, my father made peace with them and sent them away happy.

There also came to this God-guarded and imperial city an emissary from the king of the Franks, the blond tribe now ruling in Gaul. I was excited when I heard of his arrival, for, as I told my brother, "The kings of the Franks are called the long-haired kings, which means they have hair growing all down along their backs like hogs. Maybe their ambassador will, too."

Herakleios, who by then was four years old, received my news with the usual amount of fraternal trust: "You're making that up," he said.

"What? About the Frankish kings? I am not," I said, and hit him, whereupon the little wretch ran and tattled to my father, who hit me a good deal harder.

I still believe, though I have never seen one, the Frankish kings have hair growing down their backs like swine. Their ambassador did not. He had no hair on his cheeks and chin, either, though he let his mustache grow long and droop down over his mouth to show he was no eunuch. He could not even speak Greek, but had to mumble away in Latin while his interpreter- an Italian, I suppose- turned his words into ones we could understand. Once translated, those words seemed friendly enough. After an exchange of presents and of good wishes, he departed from Constantinople on the long road back to his cold, gloomy homeland.

When the Frank had left the throne room, my father, though still in full regalia, abandoned imperial solemnity for a moment. "We've got it!" he cried. "Full peace, complete peace, freedom from all care, north and south, east and west- we've got it!" He turned to me, to drive home the lesson. "Not since your great-great-grandfather's day, since Herakleios beat the Persians and the deniers of Christ had not yet burst out of Arabia to torment us, has the Roman Empire been at peace against all its many foes at once."

"Then it will probably be just as long," I said, "before we know such peace again."

He boxed my ears, right there in front of everyone. But I was right.


***

Having made peace with all our neighbors, my father decided to see if he could also create peace within the holy orthodox church. This was no easy task, for the clerics had been at strife with one another for as long as we had been at war with the Arabs and our other enemies.

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