TLV - 01 - The Golden Horn (9 page)

1

After a time, an official informed Harald that he would indeed be the next commander of the Varangian Guard. Since that would require dignity of him, he decided to celebrate freely while he still could.

With pleasantly jingling purses, he, Ulf and Halldor pushed through the crowds and racket of the streets. It was a cool, sharp day, wherein a wind raised whitecaps on the Bosporus and rocked ships berthed in the Golden Horn. Almost, he thought with a little wistfulness, this was Norse weather.

The Hippodrome saw use only a few times a year, but there were always the theaters, and his band sought one. Never had he seen jugglers so skillful, acrobats so lithe, magicians so crafty; it was as if Elf Hill had opened before him. Lions, tigers, bears, elephants danced, balanced, bowed their heads at the will of one brightly clad man. Comely young women writhed onto the stage and disrobed while music tweedled lustfully. The Northerners beckoned again and again to wine sellers in the aisles.

When the show was done, Ulf led the way backstage. An attendant protested vainly; Harald
picked him up and set him in a corner with his face to the wall. Halldor flung open the door of the women's dressing room.

Ulf spread his arms grandly. "Who's for a barge on the water?" he called.

A tall girl did not coo and flutter like the rest, but drew nigh, smiling. "I've heard tales about a king among the Varangians, a mountain of a man," she said. Harald laughed and threw an arm around her waist.

Coin made the manager agreeable when he arrived. The Norsemen picked half a dozen lasses to come along. A pleasure boat, already hired, waited at the docks. Its cabins were rich with cushions, carpets, tapers, refreshments. Musicians played as oars sent the craft out upon the strait.

Harald led the tall girl into one room. "What is your name?" he asked.

A shadow crossed her. "I am called Bernice. But what does it matter?"

His hands fumbled at the clasps of her dress. "Why, one as fair as you matters greatly."

Bitterness edged her voice. "And when I am old and shriveled, and wait in my rags for whatever man may come by, down in the shadow of the Hippodrome arches? I could have wed once, but he seemed a dull sort. Now
..."
She snapped the words off and her mouth was suddenly hungry on his, as if she would draw forgetfulness from him.

But she was smiling again and combing tousled hair when they went out on deck to watch the shore slide by. In this wise did the day pass.

At dusk, when the land was growing starry with the lights of houses, the barge moored and the warriors said farewell to their partners. As the women left, Halldor wiped his mouth to get rid of the rouge that clung there. "I'm thirsty," he complained.

"Too much wine," said Ulf. "The cure for that is more."

"Belike so. Anyhow, I'd fain be among men for a while."

"Not all night, I hope. But follow me; I know a place."

Ulf guided his friends down broad avenues and lesser streets until they were in an alley where flat-roofed houses gloomed above muck and trash. There they found an inn, low-ceilinged, areek with charcoal braziers, its benches full of drinkers, a hard lot. "Hm," said Ulf, "where shall we sit?"

Harald stepped over to three who had been muttering to each other and tapped a shoulder. "I beg your pardon," he said politely, "but it's our turn for your seats."

"What?" Dark faces turned furiously up toward him . . . and up and up. Having no room in here to stand straight, he hulked as well as loomed over them. The Northerners were unarmed as law required, save for knives they had tucked under their tunics, but the hand that Harald laid around a man's neck was unfairly large.

A hush fell on the taproom, and quivered.

"Thank you so much," said Harald. He lifted the fellow with a single movement of one arm, dumped him on the floor, and took his seat. The two adjoining decided that it was not worthwhile making a fuss, and both slunk out. Elsewhere, folk eased; a few laughed.

"Wine!" roared Ulf. "And so help me Njordh, Frey, and almighty Thor, if you've watered it I'll drown you in it."

The landlord scuttled toward him, bearing a loaded tray. "Have you no goblets of a fit size?" Harald snorted. He took the nearest and drained it at a gulp. "Well, fetch us a jug and we'll pour for ourselves."

"At once, despotes," the innkeeper said. Oil dripped from every word. "May I ask who it is I have the honor of serving?"

"You may," Harald replied, "but you will get no answer." He turned to his companions and added in Norse: "I suppose my position requires I be nameless."

"It's not just easy to be nameless when you're seven feet tall and a prince of Norway," said Ulf. "Oh, well, here comes the jug. Skaal, everybody!"

Halldor clinked beakers with him. "Skaal
...
to victory for us, wherever we go."

"And to us ourselves," said Ulf.

"And to the damnation of Kalf Arnason, Thori Hound, and many more," added Harald.

"Skaal to the Emperor," said Ulf loyally, not being able to think of a better pledge at the moment.

"And the Empress," leered Halldor.

The landlord hovered nigh. "Urn, uh, despotes," he whimpered, "you have not paid."

Harald scowled. "You should pay us to drink this horse piss."

"Now, now, we want no trouble," said Ulf, and belched. "You know me, Alexis. And me, I know what the going prices are. Here. As for the goblets you first brought, I think they should be on the house, inasmuch as we rid it of those rowdies."

The landlord shrugged and departed. "Where were we?" Halldor wo
ndered. "Oh, aye. We were skaal
ing. Here's to
the early frying of John the Or
phanotrophos."

Ulf grinned. "How Hell's griddle will sizzle! They've a saying here: 'If you have a eunuch, kill him; if you haven't, buy one and kill him.' "

"Ah, pity the poor devil," said Harald. "He must do something with his time, right?" He refilled his cup. "To Olaf the Stout!"

"A man indeed, from what I've heard," remarked Halldor. "I think he died young because they needed a good captain for the Heavenly armies."

Harald nodded.

"We're in grave danger of becoming serious," warned Ulf. "Here's to good King—no,
Knjaz
Jaroslav."

"To his daughter Ellisif," Harald said afterward. "A sweet child, and her dowry won't be small."

They skaaled Ellisif, and they skaaled Ingigerdh, and they skaaled the kings of Norway since Harald Fairhair, and they skaaled Ingolf of Vik who had first settled Iceland, and they skaaled Eirik the Red because he won Greenland and his son Leif who found a country further west where grapes grew wild, and they skaaled St. George, and they skaaled the Pope and the Patriarch both so as not to be partial, and they skaaled the good men in the tavern with them and bought a round o.f drinks, and they skaaled Sighvat the skald for his fine verses, and about that time Harald stood up and bawled forth some of the Bjarkamaal for the company, who did not understand a word but cheered anyhow, and then Halldor said he needed fresh air as well as the alley for letting his water, and Ulf pointed out that if they kept on drinking they would be of no use for anything else they might find tonight, so they got up and bowed to their new friends and went out the door with Harald's head nearly taking the lintel along.

2

A salt mist blew through the darkness. Ulf said something about knowing where a good dice house was, if only he could be sure which way was north. As he groped his way toward the street, his hands closed on a face. He slipped his palms downward. "Male," he sighed, and let go.

A lanthorn bobbed around the edge of a wall, borne by one who peered ahead. Shadowy behind him came several more. "That's them, the barbarians!" he yelped. "Have at them!"

The band shuffled forward. There was just enough light for Harald to recognize one of the three whom he had sent from their bench. They must have fetched others to help them get revenge, and, of course, to plunder the well-filled Varangian purses. Knives gleamed, sticks twirled.

"Ha!" shouted Ulf joyously, and fed knuckles to the nearest face. A staff hit Harald's elbow. Pain flashed most of the drunkenness out of him. Angered, he snatched the rod away and brought it down himself. It broke on the crown of its owner, who fell loglike.

"Yuk-hai-saa-saa!"
chanted Ulf, the old viking war yell. His knife was out and his cloak twirled about his left arm as a shield. Halldor got back to back with him and they slashed unsteadily but with a right good will. Harald grabbed a ragged dalmatic, drew the wearer close, knocked out some teeth, picked him up by the ankles when he crumpled and swung him against the attackers.

The tavern door opened again and sailors erupted forth. They knew not who was fighting or why, but this seemed too good a brawl to miss. The alley roiled.

Feet tramped, weapons clashed. "The city guards," gasped Halldor. "Best we scramble out of here. Wouldn't do for you to get arrested, Harald, would it?"

"Up, then," said the prince, and raised the Icelander to his shoulders. "No, don't hang there like a slice of wet bread. Grab the roof here by us."

"I have it." Halldor chinned himself onto the flat top of the building, lay belly down, and stretched a long arm to help Ulf. Between them, those two got Harald up.

Heavy official feet clattered below, amidst sounds of breaking heads and cursing men. Harald groped to the far side of the roof. It was only a small jump to the next.

"That was fun!" panted Ulf. "What shall we do next?"

"Let's see how far aloft we can go," Harald proposed.

They went from roof to roof. "The guards will hear about three Varangian rioters," Halldor warned. "I'd not put it past them to stake out the
Brazen House for latecomers. We'd better go to earth somewhere until tomorrow."

They crossed the roofs till they reached a street too wide to overleap. A tomcat, crouching there, gave them what Harald thought was a look of understanding.

"'Shall we scramble back down?" he wondered aloud.

Halldor squinted into the mist, now whitened by a moon that it hid. Droplets glistened in his mustache. "Do I hear voices underfoot?" he asked.

Ulf put an ear to the deck. "Aye," he said. Prowling about, he found a trapdoor. "Well, well." He opened it. Light, noise, warm smoky air trickled forth. "Seems promising, eh, boys?"

A ladder led to a cubicle with a door. Beyond the door was a bedroom. The girl and the man in the bed seemed surprised when two strangers and one giant stalked past in search of a corridor. "What sort of place is this?" squalled the man.

"Do go on," said Harald politely, and closed the hall door behind his party. They took a stair down to a large chamber where more girls were, as well as men who fondled them, drank and gambled. "Greeting," said Harald to their astonishment.

"A kindly saint has been with us," Ulf decided. "Here we have everything we may need for the rest of this night."

The dice favored them, too.

3

As dawn stole thin and gray across the world,

Harald, Ulf and Halldor made their way toward Hagia Sophia, since it would be well if they offered some prayers for their sinful selves, and where better than in the cathedral?

Halldor walked unsurely, mumbling that his skull was athump and he should never have left the fells and firths of Iceland. Ulf sang to himself. Harald began reckoning up everything he must do later this day, yes, even paperwork, the eternal Byzantine paperwork. But how else could you steer an empire that reached from the Balkan Mountains to the plains of Mesopotamia?

The Church of the Sacred Wisdom stood immense in both size and age above its square. How many folk through the centuries had dwelt in sight of it, and prayed and wept and been gladdened by its presence, how many lives had it seen go from puling babes to trembling grandsires? Down in dust they were, Harald thought: down in darkness and silence, forgotten utterly on the earth that had claimed them; but the emperors who raised this house,
they
were remembered.