Justinian

MYAKES

Christian humility, Brother Elpidios? I wish I could take credit for it, but that's not what made me want to stay a simple soldier. Why did I? Nothing simpler: I was happy right where I was. The duty was easy, the pay was fine, I had plenty of good food to eat and good wine to drink, and the girls were just as impressed by a plain excubitor as they would have been by a fancy one, if you take my meaning.

Officers yelled, officers worried, officers had to keep track of a pack of wild men like me. From where I stood, it looked like too much work to be worth the bother. And when Justinian promoted me in spite of my squawks, I found out I was right: it was too much work to be worth the bother.

But he's right. Once he'd said yes, I couldn't say no.

These four men, then, hoisted me up on that shield for the crowd to see. Though no Emperor had been crowned for almost a generation, the people knew (and some, at least, had been rehearsed in) their role. "Tu vincas, Justinian!" they shouted, and then other acclamations, some of them quite antiquated, suitable for the occasion: "Many years, Justinian!" "Justinian, ruler of the world!" "Flourish, Justinian, bestower of honors!" Then came a new acclamation, one devised by Stephen the Persian: "Hail, Justinian, restorer of a rich name!"

I stood on the shield, supported by the stalwart shoulders of Myakes and of the three other officers of the excubitores, waving out to the people, letting them see me, and letting them get used to the idea that I rather than my father would be appearing on ceremonial occasions from now on. They waved back at me and kept on cheering, more, I daresay, for the diversion I represented than for any virtues inherent in myself. An elephant might have done even better, but we had no elephants, so they had to content themselves with me.

After the city mob had gawped at me long enough, I looked down at Christopher and hissed, "Get on with it!" The count of the excubitores, Myakes, Theodore of Koloneia, and that captain, whoever he was, slowly carried me into the church of the Holy Wisdom. The folk outside bore up philosophically at being deprived of my presence, for the palace servitors threw fresh handfuls of coins into the crowd.

The people inside the great church were of more consequence to me, for I would rule through the high-ranking bureaucrats and soldiers and clerics who packed it tight. Their robes made a bright rainbow of color within the church. These men- and their wives and daughters and, no doubt, concubines in the women's gallery above- shouted acclamations as the common people had outside.

I stared down from my high perch. Along with the army, these men had to acknowledge me their sovereign, as they were doing. Then one of my bearers missed a step. That, added to my own inattention, nearly made me fall off the shield- whose bronze surface was smooth, almost slick- and smash my head on the floor of the great church. A worse omen at a coronation I can hardly imagine. But Myakes, bless him, reached up with his free hand and caught me by the ankle till I steadied, just as he had stopped me from leaping off the city wall when the deniers of Christ besieged Constantinople.

We reached the ambo without further mishap. George the patriarch stood there waiting, leaning on a stick to take some of the weight from his legs. His vestments of silk and wool, worked with gems and pearls and gold threads in the shape of many crosses, rivaled the imperial regalia in splendor.

On the ambo rested a cushion of purple silk embroidered with eagles in gold thread. And on that cushion sat the crown that had for so many years been my father's. Its golden circle of bejeweled and enameled panels, the glittering prependoulia that dangled from it, and its surmounting cross were of surpassing magnificence.

Theodore of Koloneia caught the eyes of the rest of my bearers. At his nod- not that of Christopher, his nominal superior- all four men went to one knee, lowering the shield so I could descend. They rose once more. Having gained my full height by then, I was taller than any of them, though they were all thicker through the shoulders.

George the ecumenical patriarch beckoned. I went to him. Setting his hand on my head, he called out, "Holy!" in a voice so loud and dee p, no one would have guessed him ill. At the coronations of Frankish kings, I have heard, they are smeared with scented oil, in imitation of Biblical practice. No such ritual existing among us, the patriarch offered the customary prayers for the occasion, altering them slightly to stress Christ's two energies and two wills, as defined by the recently past ecumenical synod, and finishing, "May God bless His servant and our master, the Emperor Justinian!"

Had my father been crowning me junior Emperor, the patriarch would have stepped aside then and let him set the crown on my head; junior Emperors are made- and unmade- by the will of the Emperor. But my father was gone. George crowned me, a sign I was receiving the symbol of my new station by the will of God.

The crown was heavy, almost oppressively so. It surprised me; gold combines small bulk with great weight. I wondered how my father had put up with wearing it hour after hour, day after day, year after year. And now, having worn it so long myself, I take its weight altogether for granted. When the mad-dog usurpers mutilated me and exiled me to lonely Kherson, on the peninsula jutting down into the Black Sea from the north, my neck felt curiously limber for some weeks, so accustomed had it grown to supporting the crown along with my head. I had to get used to it all over again when I took back what was rightfully mine, a burden I assumed with pleasure.

No matter how heavy the crown felt there in the great church, I knew I had to bear it without complaint or flinching. And so I stood very straight and very still, looking a challenge out to the dignitaries who were looking in at me and trying to take my measure.

I do not know what they thought of me as they shouted for the acclamations-"Tu vincas, Justinian! Many years to the Emperor Justinian!"- that, with those of the people, with my being raised on a shield by the soldiers, and with the patriarch's coronation, formalized my accession to the throne. What I thought was, Now I rule you all- and you had better obey.