Harry Turtledove - Justinian

"With your beard and hair so long, you certainly have the mane of a mighty lion, Emperor," Gregory said- currying favor in the middle of a usurpation.

Torches and lamps and candelabra made the inside of the church of the Holy Wisdom bright as day, though morning twilight was just beginning to stain the eastern sky. Because I was where I was, I didn't see Kallinikos till one of the ruffians who was carrying me almost trod on his toes. The patriarch wasn't up at the ambo where you'd expect him. He stood down by the baptistery instead.

Seeing Leontios, he bowed to him. "Hello, Emperor, and God bless you," he said. Yes, he'd trim his sail to fill with any wind. "I-" I don't know what he said after that, not for a while, because I got dropped on the floor like a sack of garbanzos, and I was too busy hurting to pay him any heed. For good measure, a couple of people kicked me and a couple more stepped on me, I don't think knowing I was there till their feet found out.

I'd landed on my back. I could look up and see Leontios and Kallinikos kiss each other on the cheek, a pair of smiling Judases. Paul came up and said something to the patriarch. Kallinikos's head went up and down, up and down. Whoever said anything to Kallinikos, he'd nod. He'd do it. If you got to him last, he was yours.

People started yelling: "The patriarch will speak! The patriarch will speak!"

It got quiet. Kallinikos filled himself up with air like a frog about to croak. Then he let it out, all at once: "This is the day the Lord has made! Let us give thanks and rejoice!" After that, he couldn't go on for a while, not through all the cheering. When he did, it was with about the drivel you'd expect: "This is the day of change, of freedom, of hope, of justice, of-"

He probably could have gone on for hours, but somebody outshouted him. Now, it's just as rude to interrupt the ecumenical patriarch as it is to interrupt the Emperor. But Kallinikos didn't care, not this time, and neither did anyone else, because what the fellow yelled was, "We have Justinian!"

Iwoke to tumult, some time in the late hours of the night. Only the earliest hint of dawn showed in the window. Beside me, the girl I had taken to bed for my pleasure the evening before stirred and mumbled and rolled over; the soft tip of her bare breast brushed against the side of my arm. I sat up. The racket was very loud, louder than it should have been anywhere near the palace at that hour.

My sitting woke the girl. "What is it?" she asked.

"I don't know, Zoe," I answered. "Whatever it is, the excubitores should set it to rights before long." Assuming the guardsmen would do just that, I leaned over and began to caress her. She sighed, I hope with pleasure, and slid closer to me.

Then someone began pounding on the door to my bedchamber. I snarled an oath, wondering who dared presume to disturb the Emperor of the Romans at his sport. "Flee, my son!" my mother cried. "Foes are in the palace!"

Zoe cried out in fear. Her forgotten, I sprang to my feet. To ward against murderers in the night, I always kept a sword by the bed. Even in near darkness, finding it was no more than the work of a moment. I flung an undertunic over my nakedness and unbarred the door.

My mother stared at me in mingled surprise and dismay. "No, son!" she exclaimed. "Out the window"- she pointed-"and make what escape you can." Zoe came up behind me, wearing rather less than I was. My mother ignored her, sure proof of the depth of her alarm. "Flee!" she said again. "You have only moments- the palace is betrayed."

I thrust the sword out ahead of me, as if to run through an enemy. "Did my great-great-grandfather run from danger?" I demanded. "Did my grandfather? Did my father, when his brothers tried to overthrow him? If they want me, they will find me ready to fight. Where are the excubitores?"

My mother groaned. "Most of them stood aside and let the usurper's men into the palace."

"Who is the usurper?" I demanded, wondering upon whom I should have to avenge myself.

Before my mother could answer, I heard someone around a bend in the corridor say, "The Emperor's bedchamber is that way." Several men came running, their sandals pounding against the mosaic tiles of the floor. To this day, I wonder which of my servants thus betrayed me to my foes. I wonder if he serves me yet. If he does, I wonder how long I can make him last, how much I can make him suffer before dying, if ever I learn who he is.

I had no time to concentrate on the voice, though, for several low ruffians came dashing round the corner. They all had swords. "There he is!" one of them cried, pointing at me in the torchlight. Not wanting the fight to endanger my mother or even Zoe, I rushed toward the traitors, intending to cut my way through them and however many had invaded the palace.

They being many and I one, though, my success was less than I had wished. The first man I attacked fell with a groan, clutching at a gash in his side. But the second, being a better swordsman, kept me at play. "Don't kill him!" one of the other brigands shouted. "Leontios wants him alive." Thus I learned who craved to steal my throne.

"I want me alive," my opponent panted, parrying a blow that should have laid his face open.

But, as the ancient pagan saying has it, even Herakles could not fight two. That dog kept me too busy to deal with any of the others as they deserved. One of them tackled me and knocked me to the floor. Unable to slash him as I fell, I hit him in the side of the head with the heavy pommel of my sword. He groaned and went limp. Before I could do anything more, another man grabbed my arm and wrenched the sword from my hand.

"Now we've got him!" my assailants roared. I punched and kicked and butted and bit, learning the taste of their blood. No one came to my aid. Despite all I could do, they swarmed over me, binding me hand and foot. After that, they spent some little while beating and kicking me, whether out of general hatred or because of the fight I had put up I cannot say. I bent my head down, hoping to keep them from smashing my teeth or breaking my nose. Looking back, that seems funny.

"What do we do with him now that we've got him?" somebody asked.

"Take him to the great church," answered the man who had fought me sword to sword. "That's were Leontios is at, and that's where the patriarch, God bless him, is at, too." I cannot imagine why I was surprised to discover Kallinikos had joined those betraying me, but I was.

The ruffians hauled me to my feet. A couple of them thrust their arms through between my arms and my ribcage and hustled me along. Dawn was breaking. In the trees and bushes around the great palace, birds began to sing. I remember that quite clearly. Again, I cannot say why. God, Who knows everything, will know that as well.

Men came up to me and reviled me: like any other dogs, they snapped at what they thought weaker than themselves. I cursed them as foully as I knew how, foully enough to make some of them gesture to avert the evil eye. I hope the curses I sent their way bit anyhow.

As we drew near the church of the Holy Wisdom, a swarm of people came out of it. At their head strode Kallinikos and a man I recognized after a moment as Leontios. I cursed him, too, at the top of my lungs. He took no notice, having already assumed what he fondly imagined to be the imperial manner. "Bring him to the hippodrome," he told the men who had me, "to the stadium where the horses run." Even as usurping Emperor, he remained redundant.

To the hippodrome- and, I suppose, to the stadium where the horses run- we went. As we went, I saw that two of Leontios's followers carried between them a man suspended from a pole. He turned his head and saw me, too. I might have guessed faithful Myakes would not stand by without doing his best to keep me from being overthrown. His best, like my own, had not been good enough.