Lord of Slaughter

16

Loys had been honoured to be given his own chamber with access to a bath and a slave to tend him. In the salon of the Lady Styliane, however, he felt as though he had been shortchanged.

The room was immense and decorated like a vine grove — creepers in mosaics rising to the ceiling, great pendulous bunches rendered vivid in purple and red. Slaves were everywhere, bringing food on silver plates, decanters of wine, parchments and books to courtiers on couches and chairs. One slave carried a little brush with which he swept the seat of anyone who rose and bowed their way into the lady’s presence.

The lady herself was striking. She was in her early twenties, quite small and dark, impeccably dressed in light yellow silk with a permanent marionette’s smile on her face. Beatrice had described her as beautiful, and she was certainly that with her clear complexion and vivid green eyes.

Loys sat next to Beatrice on a couch, where they were kept waiting interminably while the lady received her guests, who seemed mainly to comprise rich merchants, ladies of the court and various bureaucrats — all in couples. He sat self-consciously still, not quite knowing how to hold himself but glad he had bathed and dressed in fine robes. Here it was safer to be seen as an official than as a distinct person, particularly a foreigner. The court seemed to understand officials. It understood foreigners too — once it had incorporated them, given them their shoes of blue, red or gold and marked them as its own.

They had watched eight separate audiences when the doors opened and a new person was announced: ‘Logothetes Isais, master of the public post, and his wife the Lady Eudocia.’ Loys fought to control his surprise. It was the man who had accosted him in the corridor, the one who had offered him a way out of the city. Master of the public post? The postal service doubled as the emperor’s intelligence-gathering agency. So this was the head of the Office of Barbarians, the chief spy of the empire, standing so close he could touch him.

Isais bowed deeply, though he couldn’t help a glance towards Loys. Loys wondered if Isais was here for his benefit or if he was here for Isais’. His feet shifted on the carpet. He wanted to get out of there.

The lady spoke to Isais and his wife briefly and waved them away. Then she took a little water poured from a golden jug into a fine glass beaker as Isais backed out of the room. If Loys had had any illusions about the power of the woman he was about to meet, he had none now.

They had waited so long that the call, when it came, took Loys by surprise. ‘The scholar Loys of the Lord Chamberlain’s Office and his wife the Lady Beatrice of Normandy.’ Loys noted a slight hesitancy over ‘Lady’, as if nowhere in the servant’s experience had that ever been linked to ‘scholar’ before. He got to his feet and bowed deeply, all flustered. Beatrice rose effortlessly behind him.

‘You bow in front of her,’ whispered Beatrice.

Loys’ legs seemed made of stone and he approached the lady like a country clot before a king, which was not far from the truth. When he came level with her couch he bowed again, bending his knees and tipping forward at the waist. Beatrice, he noted, did not bow but merely inclined her head.

‘Welcome,’ said Styliane. ‘Please, lady, allow your husband to sit beside me. I have heard so very much about him that I’m fascinated to meet him.’

Beatrice sat down, leaving space for Loys on the couch, but her husband still stood.

‘Come, don’t look as if I’ve asked you to sit on an ants’ nest. The rules of plebeian society do not apply to the elite. A man can sit next to a lady without being consumed by lust and a lady can sit next to a man without being a whore. Sit.’ She patted the couch next to her.

Loys sat down by degrees, lowering himself slowly as if he expected a servant to run him through for his presumption at any moment.

‘There you are,’ said Styliane. ‘Still alive and no devils leaping out to punish you.’

‘No, lady.’

She raised a finger, and a slave brought them glasses of wine on a silver plate. Beatrice took hers elegantly, but when Loys picked up his glass, his hand shook and he rested it on his lap to steady it.

‘Devils are your speciality, are they not?’

‘Lady?’

‘The chamberlain has set you to investigate them.’ Around the room people withdrew, the servants melting away, the remaining people on the couches following them.

‘I…’ The chamberlain had given him no indication his mission was secret but Loys had no idea how much he was allowed to reveal.

‘It concerns the emperor’s affliction, does it not?’

‘Those matters are above my station, lady.’

She waved her hand. ‘I give you permission to speak freely. No one can hear us here.’ It was true: the room was now empty, though a servant stood directly behind him.

‘The servants-’

‘Are mutes and illiterate. And they are stupid. I am always served by stupid men; I find them more reliable than the intelligent variety.’

There was a long silence and Loys noticed a slight fading of the lady’s smile.

‘Do not make me ask you again, scholar. Perhaps I should ask your pretty wife. She seems amenable to frank conversation. You have said much, haven’t you, lady, but I think your Norman court is more open than is wise or safe here.’

Beatrice said nothing, just sipped at her wine and smiled. If she was intimidated, she didn’t show it. The threat to Beatrice brought a sharp pain to Loys’ stomach.

He kept his voice pleasant enough. ‘If you have spoken to my wife then you have no need of me.’

‘Your wife told me you were an intelligent man. You don’t speak like one.’

‘I am clever enough to stay out of politics.’ Loys was surprised at his sudden sharpness.

The lady’s smile brightened again.

‘You stand up for yourself. I like that. I didn’t bring you here to quiz you, anyway. The problem with this city is there is sometimes too much information. I confess I don’t know what to make of half of it. Your friends are interesting fellows.’

She spoke the last sentence almost as a throwaway but, however light her manner, this woman said nothing without calculation.

‘I have no friends here.’

The lady took a sip of her water.

‘Really?’ She turned to her servant. ‘That fellow we took today by the Magnaura. He is not a friend of dear Loys here. So he is lying. He will be punished for that.’

Styliane put her hand on the rear of the couch, almost scandalously close to Loys’ back. He supressed the impulse to writhe away. She went on, ‘I would be your friend. If you tell me a little of your endeavours then I may be able to help you. My husband took a great interest in matters of magic and divination, though it didn’t enable him to predict his death by poison. He was a student of the old religion of this city, that of Hecate — in order to combat the pagan menace, naturally. I have a little knowledge in that area myself. But then, what can my knowledge avail you? Your master the chamberlain knows all about these things. After all, his mother was a witch.’

Loys actually felt his jaw drop.

‘Our mother was a soothsayer, a disciple of the dark lady. Did he not tell you? Don’t look so surprised. Constantinople has always been open to men of ability, no matter how low their birth — though very few from where he and I began. The chamberlain is a remarkable man to rise so high. He was not always so favoured. He’s done his time in the Numera, believe me.’

Loys did not respond to this. The mention of soothsayers made him recall Isais’ threat to the street magicians.

‘I would ask a favour, lady.’

‘You who have given so little?’

‘Logothetes Isais has mentioned he intends to purge the fortune tellers and amulet sellers. I would ask you to prevent that from happening.’

‘I am a noble lady, not a bureaucrat — how can I help?’

Loys recalled the way Styliane had dismissed Isais with a wave of her hand. She could act if she wanted, he knew.

‘I thought you might…’ he searched for the right words ‘… speak to someone.’

‘Why not ask your master my brother? Although perhaps not. He has little tolerance for magicians.’

‘Even though his mother was a soothsayer?’

‘Some say because. Our mother died, you know. Don’t pay attention to any of the silly rumours surrounding that; she died as a result of her devil worship. Seeking oracles in the earth, so they say. The rumours concerning my brother’s role in it are just that. More rubbish from magicians and witches. No one wise pays attention to them. Would you like more wine? Come, you must drink. You’re hardly sipping.’

Loys took a swig of wine. He needed to — his mouth had become very dry.

‘My brother is plagued by rumours. His opposition to any investigation has always been on the grounds it would give credence to silly market talk.’

Loys swallowed. So the chamberlain had been forced into commissioning him. Right.

‘What talk?’

‘The sort that attends any man who rises quickly. People can’t believe a man rises on talent. There must always be someone to suggest something untoward. Half of this stuff is spread by his enemies and the other half by idiots. He and the emperor came up together to each other’s mutual benefit. The chamberlain is a holy and devout man. It’s what everyone says.’

‘I see.’

‘In fact, it might be argued they overthrew a witch to obtain power. You know our emperor’s dear mother Theophano seemed to have secured the throne through her lover the former emperor John. And then by God’s grace — it must have been God, who else could it have been? — John took ill suddenly and died.’

She smiled directly at Loys and took a sip of her water.

‘It was huge good fortune that the death brought a bitter, bitter dispute between the chamberlain and Basileios and Emperor John to an end. There is no doubt the death was natural. Why, none at all! People have said all sorts of treason — that Basileios and the chamberlain consorted with demons and are now paying the price. Rot, of course.’

The lady smiled again.

‘So I expect you have been told to direct your attentions to the foreigners.’

‘Yes.’

‘An excellent plan. It must be they who have caused all this fuss. Though they weren’t here at the start of Basileios’ illness. I am confident you’ll work out how they conjured something up five years before they got here. There are many powerful men in the palace who will sleep safer once blame has been apportioned.’

‘Yes.’ Loys felt like a puppet who had until that moment been under the illusion that he moved of his own accord but who had finally worked out what the strings were for.

The lady leaned forward and said very quietly, ‘Because if the sky and the comet and the death of the rebel and the emperor’s lamentable condition were shown to be the work of men in this palace… Well, imagine what their enemies would pay for such information. Imagine the privileges and position the scholar who presented such evidence would accrue.’

Loys was struck dumb. He had no idea of how to deal with this, no notion of how to survive caught between this woman and the chamberlain.

Beatrice looked at Styliane but past her, conspicuously making no effort to catch what the lady was saying to her husband.

‘Be careful,’ said Styliane in a low voice. ‘Many eyes are on you but you have a powerful protector in me. The time will come soon, scholar, when you will need to choose your friends from your enemies. Already people talk about the rightness of a lady being married to a scholar. Can her father have been happy with that marriage? Choose well and wisely.’

Loys bowed his head.

Styliane sat back. ‘Now, my dears, I have detained you long enough. Please, Lady Beatrice, you must attend me next week. I have a Bible study group and it’s quite the place to catch up on court gossip.’

Beatrice thanked the lady. The scholar stood, not knowing what to do with his glass. Beatrice took it from him and put it on a little table. She led him away. A eunuch opened the door and the couple went through. Their servant was waiting outside.

Loys could see no immediate way of handling the competing pressures he was under. Instead he concentrated on his discomfort in such high company. He didn’t want to show Beatrice he was concerned by the clear threat to him.

‘I’m sorry I embarrassed you in there,’ he said in Norman, ‘I’m not used to court niceties.’

‘You didn’t embarrass me.’ Beatrice used their native language too. ‘This place has ridiculous protocols. They’re only there to embarrass you — that’s why they exist.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘They make insiders feel more like insiders and outsiders feel more like outsiders. It’s a very elaborate way of looking down their noses. And listen to her with her veiled threats and clunking great hints. That was insupportable behaviour, Loys, I’m surprised she dared be so bold.’

‘We are in danger,’ he said.

‘A courtier is always in danger,’ said Beatrice. ‘It’s the price of opportunity. Escort us back to our room,’ she said to their eunuch, returning to Greek.

They made their way back through the corridors, stopping to exchange the formal greetings and replies required by the guards at each door. Loys was weary with it all. Even to a former monk whose life had been ruled by ritual, the demands of the Byzantine court seemed heavy and unnecessary.

They arrived at their room and went within. Loys immediately noticed all his papers and books were gone.

‘Did you clean this chamber?’ he asked the servant.

‘No, sir.’ The man didn’t seem quite sorry enough about the burglary for Loys’ tastes. He was about to shout at him, to ask him how this had been allowed to happen but, as he began to speak, he lost the thread of what he was saying and instead concentrated on seeing what had been stolen.

‘Is anything else missing?’ said Loys. Beatrice went to the small chest she kept by the bed. The lock had been prised apart.

‘My rings are still here,’ she said.

Loys leaned for support on the wall. Whoever had taken his papers had not even paid him the courtesy of pretending it was a robbery. Beatrice sat quiet and thoughtful on the bed. Loys wondered what her father would do in a situation like this. He would seize the initiative. But how? He had an idea.

‘We have been buffeted by hostile winds for long enough. It’s about time we created a storm of our own.’

‘What will you do?’

‘I am the chamberlain’s man, ordered to perform an investigation,’ said Loys, ‘so I will investigate and I will accuse, and we will see what fear brings us that pleasantness did not.’