He did not like me, for I offended his ingrown sense of superiority. He was becoming aware of things he had not known, and the thought irritated him. Yet he studied me thoughtfully. “You appear to have some knowledge. From whence do you come?”
“From afar.” I did not like him, either.
“Do you wish to sell the mare?”
“No.”
“I might simply take her.” He measured me with cool attention, and I guessed him capable of trying.
“I would not,” I said, “for we understand each other, and I shall have her until one of us dies.”
“That might be arranged.”
That brought a smile, and the smile surprised him. “Then plan it well, Byzantine, for death is a visitor who can call upon any man.”
“You dare to threaten me?”
“Threaten?” My surprise was as genuine as I could make it. “I but made a philosophical comment.”
He tried to stare me down, to make my eyes yield. “I have thought”—he spoke coldly—”education to be a dangerous thing.”
“How would you know?” I asked. He went white to the lips and stepped as if to strike me, but I did not move. “I would not,” I said, “unless you are prepared to accept the consequences.”
For a moment we were eye to eye, then he swept his cloak about him and walked away. Nearby, a young man had stood listening. “You make enemies easily. The fat storyteller is nothing, but this man is dangerous.”
He seemed friendly, and I needed friends. “I am Kerbouchard, a wanderer.”
“And I am Phillip.”
“Of Macedon?” I smiled.
“Strangely enough … yes.”
My audience, if such they could be called, were drifting away.
“You are dusty from travel,” Phillip suggested, “why don’t you come with me?”
There was little I wanted more than a bath and a change of clothing, and the gold coins would help me to some simple dress at least. We walked away, leading Ayesha, who had been very happy near the bazaar. Phillip spoke of the young aristocrat with whom I’d had words. “He is named Bardas, a close friend of Andronicus Comnenus, the cousin of the Emperor, Manuel I.”
A brilliant, erratic man, Andronicus was handsome, witty, and elegant, an athlete and warrior, beloved by the people who knew little of his true nature. He had been called the “Alcibiades of the Byzantine Age” and was adored by women, yet he was a perjurer, a hypocrite, and an intriguer.
He had gathered about him what was considered by many to be the intellectual and artistic elite … actually a group of bored men and libertines who were glib-tongued, talking much of art, literature, and music but without any deep-seated convictions upon any subject aside from their own prejudices. Mainly concerned with their own posturing, they were creatures of fad and whim, seizing upon this writer or that composer and exalting him to the skies until he bored them, then shifting to some other. Occasionally, the artists upon whom they lavished attention were of genuine ability, but more often they possessed some obscurity that gave the dilettantes an illusion of depth and quality. In the majority of cases what was fancied to be profound was simply bad writing, bad painting, or deliberately affected obscurity.
Suspected by Manuel of plotting against him, Andronicus had spent most of his life in exile. Now, at sixty, he had returned to the capital. “Do not misunderstand,” Phillip warned. “Bardas not only has power but he is vindictive, and he is close to Andronicus, who can be fiendishly cruel.”
“It is unlikely I shall see him again,” I said. “I must find a way to earn money, and I shall rarely be in parts of the city where I am likely to meet him.”
“He prowls the markets,” my friend explained, “and might be anywhere. He dislikes women of his class and seeks out ugly, often dirty women from the slums. Except when with Andronicus, he avoids those who might be considered equals.
“He prefers women he despises and to whom he can be cruel without fear of retaliation. There has been talk of him in all quarters of the city.
“He maintains a group of ruffians who protect him. They are perjurers as well.”
Phillip’s house was a comfortable one, but ancient. The bath was a relic of Roman times, huge and luxurious. While I bathed he went to the market and bought clothes for me with the gold coins given by Bardas.
My problems were such as to discourage any man. My father was enslaved, suffering I knew not what indignities and torture. I was powerless against a castle that had defied the strongest kings, and the Old Man of the Mountain had spies everywhere. Even now they might know of me.
First, I must have a means to income. Behind lay the wreck of all I had done. Had our goods been sold, I should have been a wealthy man, free to move as I chose, even to hiring a group of mercenaries to assist me.
The Hansgraf was dead, all the members of the company I presumed dead, and if Suzanne lived, how could I go to her again with empty hands?
44
My two pieces of gold provided me with adequate clothing, and for that I owe thanks to Bardas, whatever else I thought of him or he of me. After giving myself over to pure enjoyment of the hot, scented water, I began to consider my problem. My Druidic training taught me the basic principles of reasoning: to first define the problem, for a problem clearly defined is already half solved, to gather evidence pro and con, to discard the irrelevant, to formulate a tentative solution, and finally to put the solution to the test.
My problems were several. To recover my strength and health, for I would need them to bring about my father’s escape; to obtain money to pay my way; to rescue my father from the Valley of the Assassins.
First, I must consider my route from Constantinople to the Elburz Mountains and the fortress of Alamut. Also, there was the question of the identity I must assume to conceal my purpose. Furthermore, I must explore all the methods of entering the fortress itself.
The man who was Safia’s source of information must be reached.
A slave brought food and wine, and wrapped in a thick robe, I seated myself on a marble bench and began to eat. Phillip joined me, bringing two books, the Chrono-graphia and the Alexiad. The former I had read, the latter I had not.
The first was by Michael Psellus, a young man whose life was devoted to scholarship and court affairs in the great years of the Byzantine Empire. Born in 1018, he spent his life at the imperial court, often in positions of importance. The Alexiad was an account of Emperor Alexius I from 1069 to 1118, written by his daughter, Anna Comnena, one of the most brilliant women of her time.
Phillip broke bread and gestured to the books. “Books are rare in Byzantium now, but it was not always so. Once we had great schools, and books were plentiful, but the schools were abolished for religious reasons.”
“And now?”
“We have schools again, but not such as they used to be.”
He was a tall young man of slender, athletic build, with a narrow head and a long face. It was an austere face, but when he broke into a sudden smile it lighted up with humor. His was an ancient family, although his father had been a mercenary soldier from Macedon. The house in which he lived had once belonged to Belisarius, Justinian’s great general.
Phillip was an attractive sort but of a type I could not understand, for he did nothing. To one of my energy, this was beyond belief. Moderately wealthy, he had family position and a possibility of office, yet he preferred to while away his time. There were things he thought of doing. Travel to the Nile, to the Phoenician ports, to write … he did none of them.
When I told him of my experiences beyond the Black Sea, he said, “You were fortunate to get into the city. Every effort is being made to keep those away who have no definite purpose for coming or money to pay their way.
“You will be unable to find anything to do, Kerbouchard. Business is closely regulated by guilds and the government.”
Manuel I, the present emperor, ruled well, but the city was past its era of greatness. I found much grandeur in the city, but sections were in ruins, inhabited only by thieves and beggars. The most elegant shopping district lay away from the Golden Horn and the Bosphorus. The great central avenue with arcades on either side extended for two miles through the forums and past the shops. Clothiers, goldsmiths (who were also moneylenders), silversmiths, jewelers, potters, leatherworkers, all had shops in the arcades. The House of Lights, where the silk market was carried on, was a noted place and lighted all night long. Silk had been an imperial monopoly for many years, but weavers not under imperial control had moved into the field.