The Sarantine Mosaic (51 page)

She smiled sweetly, at both of them. There was a brief silence.

‘What poor man,' said the Emperor finally, shaking his head, his expression bemused, ‘may hope to be wise enough to have rejoinders for you?'

His Empress's smile deepened. ‘Good. I may do it, then? I do want dolphins here. I shall make arrangements for our Rhodian to—'

She stopped. An Imperial hand was uplifted across the room, straight as a judge's, halting her. ‘After,' said Valerius sternly. ‘
After
the Sanctuary.
If
he chooses to do so. It is a heresy, seasonal or otherwise, and the weight of it, discovered, would fall on the artisan not the Empress. Consider. And decide after.'

‘After,' said Alixana, ‘is likely to be a long time from now. You have built a very
large
Sanctuary, my lord. My chambers here are lamentably small.' She made a moue of displeasure.

Crispin had an emerging sense that this was both a normal byplay for the two of them
and
something
contrived to divert him. Why the latter, he wasn't sure, but the thought produced an opposite effect: he remained uneasy and alert.

And there came, just then, a knocking at the outer door.

The Emperor of Sarantium looked over quickly, and then he smiled. He looked younger when he did, almost boyish. ‘Ah! Perhaps I
am
wise enough, after all. An encouraging thought. It appears,' he murmured, ‘that I am about to win a wager. My lady, I shall look forward to your promised payment.'

Alixana looked put out. ‘I cannot believe she would do this. It must be something else. Something …' She trailed off, biting at her lower lip. The lady-in-waiting had appeared at the inner doorway, eyebrows raised in inquiry. The Emperor set down his drink and silently withdrew past her, out of sight into the interior room. He was smiling as he went, Crispin saw.

Alixana nodded to her woman. The lady-in-waiting hesitated, and gestured towards her mistress and then at her own hair. ‘My lady … ?'

The Empress shrugged, impatience flitting across her face. ‘People have seen more than my unbound hair, Crysomallo. Leave it be.'

Crispin stepped reflexively back towards the table with the rose as the door opened. Alixana stood not far away, imperious, for all the intimacy of her appearance. It did occur to him that whoever this was it could hardly be an intruder, else they'd not have gained entry into this palace, let alone caused the guards to tap on the door so late at night.

The woman stepped back a little and a man entered the room behind her, though only a pace or two. He cradled a small ivory box in both hands. He handed it to Crysomallo, and then, turning towards the Empress, performed a full court obeisance, head touching the floor
three times. Crispin wasn't certain, but he had a sense that such ceremony was excessive here, exaggerated. When the visitor finally straightened and then stood at Alixana's gesture, Crispin recognized him: the lean, narrow-faced man who'd been standing behind the Strategos Leontes in the audience chamber.

‘You are a late visitor, secretary. Could this be a personal gift from you, or has Leontes something private he wishes said?' The Empress's tone was difficult to read: perfectly courteous, but no more than that.

‘His lady wife does, thrice-exalted. I bring a small gift from Styliane Daleina to her thrice-revered and beloved Empress. She would be honoured beyond her worth should you deign to accept it.' The man looked quickly around as he finished speaking, and Crispin had the distinct sense that the secretary was memorizing the room. He could not miss the Empress's unbound hair, or the privacy of this situation. Clearly, Alixana did not care in the least. Crispin wondered, again, what game he'd become a small piece in, how he was being deployed now and to what end.

The Empress nodded at Crysomallo, who unclasped a golden latch on the box and opened it. The woman was unable to hide her astonishment. She held up the object within. The small gift. There was a silence.

‘Oh, dear,' said the Empress of Sarantium softly. ‘I have lost a wager.'

‘My lady?' The secretary's brow furrowed. It was not what he'd expected to hear.

‘Never mind. Tell the Lady Styliane we are pleased with her gesture and by the … celerity with which she chose to send it to us, keeping a hard-working scribe awake so late at night as a messenger. You may go.'

That was all. Courtesy, crispness, a dismissal. Crispin was still trying to absorb the fact that the staggeringly
opulent pearl necklace he'd seen on Styliane Daleina—the one he'd drawn unwanted attention to—had just been presented to the Empress. The worth of it was past his ability even to imagine. He had a certainty, though—an absolute conviction—that had he not spoken as he had, earlier, this would not have happened.

‘Thank you, most gracious lady. I shall hasten to relay your kind words. Had I known I might be interrupting …'

‘Come, Pertennius. She knew you would interrupt and so did you. You both heard me summon the Rhodian in the throne room.'

The man fell silent, his eyes dropped to the floor. He swallowed awkwardly. It was oddly pleasant, Crispin realized, to see someone else being discomfited by Alixana of Sarantium.

‘I thought … my lady. She thought … you might …'

‘Pertennius, poor man. You'll do better going with Leontes to battlefields and writing about cavalry charges. Go to bed. Tell Styliane I am happy to accept her gift and that the Rhodian was indeed still with me, as she wished him to be, to see her make a gift that outstripped the one he offered her. You may also tell her,' added the Empress, ‘that my hair still reaches the small of my back, unbound.' She turned deliberately, as if to let the secretary see, and walked over to the table where the wine flask stood. She picked up the cup Valerius had set down.

Crysomallo opened the door. In the instant before the man named Pertennius—where had he heard that name today?—turned to leave, Crispin saw something flash in his eyes and as quickly disappear as the man repeated his full obeisance and then withdrew.

Alixana did not turn around until the door closed.

‘Jad curse you with cataracts and baldness,' she said furiously, in that low, utterly magnificent voice.

The Emperor of Sarantium, so addressed by his wife as he came back into the room, was laughing with delight. ‘I
am
balding,' he said. ‘A wasted curse. And if I develop cataracts you'll have to surrender me to the physicians for treatment, or guide me through life with a tongue to my ear.'

Alixana's expression, seen in profile, arrested Crispin for a moment. He was pretty certain it was an unguarded look, something disturbingly intimate. Something caught in his own heart, the past snagging on the present.

‘Clever of you, love,' Alixana murmured, ‘to have anticipated this.'

Valerius shrugged. ‘Not really. Our Rhodian shamed her with a generous gift after publicly exposing an error of presumption. She ought not to have worn jewellery exceeding the Empress's and she knew it.'

‘Of course she knew. But who was going to say so, in that company?'

Both turned, as if cueing each other, to look at Crispin. Both smiled this time.

Crispin cleared his throat. ‘An ignorant mosaicist from Varena, it seems, who now wishes to ask if he is likely to die for his transgressions.'

‘Oh, certainly you are. One of these days,' said Alixana, still smiling. ‘We all do. Thank you, though. I owe you for an unexpected gift, and I do extravagantly admire a pearl like this. A weakness. Crysomallo?'

The lady-in-waiting, smiling with pleasure herself, walked over with the box. She withdrew the necklace again, undid the clasp, and moved behind the Empress.

‘Not yet,' said Valerius, touching the woman's shoulder. ‘I'd like Gesius to have it looked at before you put it on.'

The Empress looked surprised. ‘What? Really? Petrus, you think … ?'

‘No, I don't, in fact. But let it be examined. A detail.'

‘Poison is scarcely a detail, my heart.'

Crispin saw Crysomallo blink at that and hurriedly replace the necklace in its box. She wiped her fingers nervously against the fabric of her robe. The Empress seemed more intrigued than anything else, not alarmed at all—so far as he could tell.

‘We live with these things,' Alixana of Sarantium said quietly. ‘Do not trouble yourself, Rhodian. As for your own safety … you did discomfit a number of people this evening. I would think a guard might be appropriate, Petrus?'

She had turned as she spoke, to the Emperor. Valerius said simply, ‘It is already in place. I spoke with Gesius before coming here.'

Crispin cleared his throat. Things happened swiftly around these two, he was beginning to realize. ‘I should feel … awkward with a guard following me about. Is it permissible to make a suggestion?'

The Emperor inclined his head. Crispin said, ‘I mentioned the soldier who brought me here. His name is—'

‘—Carullus, of the Fourth Sauradian, here to speak with Leontes. Probably about the soldiers' payment. You did mention him. I have named him and his men as your guards.'

Crispin swallowed. By rights, the Emperor should not have even recalled the existence let alone the name of an officer mentioned once, in passing. But it was said of this man that he forgot nothing, that he never slept, that— indeed—he held converse, took counsel, with spirits of the half-world, dead predecessors, walking the palace corridors by night.

‘I am grateful, my lord,' Crispin said, and bowed. ‘Carullus is by way of being a friend now. His company
is a comfort here in the City. I will walk easier for his presence.'

‘Which is to my advantage, of course,' said the Emperor, with a slight smile. ‘I want your attention on your labours. Would you like to see the new Sanctuary?'

‘I am eager to do so, my lord. The first morning when it is possible to be allowed—'

‘Why wait? We'll go now.'

It was long past the middle of the night. Even the Dykania revels would be ended by now. The bakers at their ovens, the Sleepless Ones at their vigils, street cleaners, city guards, prostitutes of either sex and their clients, these would be the people still awake and abroad. But this was an Emperor who never slept. So the tale ran.

‘I
ought
to have expected this,' Alixana said, her tone affronted. ‘I bring a clever man to my rooms for such … skills as he may offer me, and you spirit him away.' She sniffed elaborately. ‘I shall take refuge in my bath and my bed, then, my lord.'

Valerius grinned suddenly, the boyish look returning. ‘You lost a wager, my love. Do
not
fall asleep.'

With real astonishment, Crispin saw the Empress of Sarantium's colour heighten. She sketched a brief, mocking homage, though. ‘My lord the Emperor commands his subjects in all possible things.'

‘Of course I do,' said Valerius.

‘I shall leave you,' said his Empress, turning. Crysomallo preceded her through the inner door. Crispin caught a glimpse of another fireplace and a wide bed beyond, frescoes and many-coloured fabric hangings on the walls. He realized in that moment that he was about to be alone with the Emperor, after all. His mouth grew dry again with the implications of that.

Alixana turned in the doorway. She paused, as if in thought. Then laid a finger against one cheek and shook
her head, as if in self-reproach. ‘I nearly forgot,' she said. ‘Silly of me. Too distracted by a pearl and the thought of dolphins. Do tell us, Rhodian, your message from the queen of the Antae. What does Gisel say?'

The sensation, after the apprehension of expecting to be private with Valerius to convey exactly this, was very much as if a pit had gaped open beneath his feet, sprung by the lever of that exquisite voice. Crispin's heart lurched; he felt as if he were falling into emptiness.

‘Message?' he echoed, wittily.

The Emperor murmured, ‘My love, you are capricious and cruel and terribly unfair. If Gisel gave Caius Crispus any message at all, it would have been for my ears alone.'

Holy Jad
, Crispin thought, helplessly. They
were
too quick. They knew too much. It was overwhelming.

‘Of course she gave him a message.' Alixana's tone was mild, but her eyes remained on Crispin's face, attentive and thoughtful, and there was no amusement in them now, he saw.

He took a steadying breath. He had seen a
zubir
in the Aldwood. He had walked into the forest expecting to die and had come out alive, having encountered something beyond the mortal. Every living moment that followed that time in the mist was a gift. He found he could master fear, remembering that.

He said quietly, ‘Is that why you asked me here, my lady?'

The Empress's mouth twitched wryly. ‘That, and the dolphins. I do want them.'

Valerius said matter-of-factly, ‘We have people in Varena, of course. A number of the queen's own guard were killed one night this autumn. Murdered in their sleep. Quite extraordinary. Such a thing only happens when you need a secret kept. Our people in Varena addressed themselves to the matter. It was not difficult
for them to learn about the much-talked-about arrival of the courier with our invitation. He conveyed its content publicly, it seems? And for reasons not immediately clear, it was an invitation you took upon yourself, by deception, instead of Martinian. That was of interest. Resources were deployed. You were evidently seen returning home that same night very late, with a royal escort. Meeting someone in the palace? Then came the deaths in the night. Conclusions were plausibly drawn from all of this and posted to us.'

It was spoken as calmly, as precisely, as a dictated military report. Crispin thought of Queen Gisel: beset on all sides, struggling to find a path, a space for herself, survival. Brutally overmatched.