The Sheen of the Silk

Fifty-five

ANNA STOOD IN HER HERB ROOM MIXING OINTMENTS AND distilling tinctures. In each of the little wooden drawers of powders, she kept one whole leaf of each type so she would not mistake what it was.

She had watched Giuliano go from Zoe’s house almost blind with the pain of what she had told him, and Anna had known also that her own presence there had made it doubly agonizing for him. She did not expect to see him again in the next few weeks or perhaps even months. That hurt her with a persistent ache, like a hunger, but she knew of no way to heal it.

Zoe’s extraordinary admissions when she had been feverish made her certain beyond doubt. They had planned to kill Michael Palaeologus, and for Bessarion to usurp the throne and then deny the union and rally the country behind him to save the Orthodox Church from Rome.

But how had they thought to withstand the crusader armies? Or had they not even considered that? Were they so steeped in religious fervor that they believed the Virgin Mary would save them?

Justinian had been levelheaded in Nicea, self-mocking at times; he had far too sharp a sense of wit, and of the ironies of life, to trust a man like Bessarion without knowing exactly what he meant to do and how.

She stood with the leaves in her hand, breathing in their aromatic perfume, trying to steady her racing mind.

How had Justinian discovered the plot? Or had he been part of it from the beginning? Then how had he taken so long to realize it could not work?

She looked at the astrolabe on the table with its beautiful inlays and circles, orbits within orbits. Was the plot like that or far simpler: a desperate agreement by all of them, albeit from different priorities? Bessarion for faith, and perhaps-whether he recognized it or not-for ambition and glory for himself, the old power returned to his family. Helena quite simply for power. She had the honesty, or perhaps the lack of conscience, that she had never pretended faith.

Of Esaias, she still knew little. Others had spoken of him as shallow, but that did not have to be true. Knowledge of the plot made her realize everyone might be utterly different from the character they had presented for the purpose of achieving that one overriding aim.

She had finished putting away the herbs and began pouring the tinctures into vials and labeling them.

Antoninus might have been exactly what he now seemed: a man loyal to the Church even at the cost of his own life; a good friend to Justinian, acknowledging his part in it after torture and only when it was pointless to deny it.

But he had joined with Justinian to kill not Michael, in order to save the Church, but Bessarion, and for what? To save Byzantium, because Bessarion had neither the grasp of reality nor the nerve to do as Michael Palaeologus was doing and make the only peace possible?

Justinian had been devoutly against the union from the beginning. His allegiance to Constantine was witness to that. And Constantine’s loyalty to him in return? Was that not one passion that could be trusted?

She stopped working and began to wash her mortar, pestle, and dishes, then put them away.

Justinian was the first, as an outsider, to see Bessarion’s weaknesses as well as his dreams and to realize that far from saving Constantinople, he would seal its fate.

She tried to imagine how he must have felt as the evidence forced itself upon him and little by little he understood that Bessarion must not be allowed to take the throne. If Justinian withdrew from the plan, Demetrios would simply take his place. Bessarion must be stopped. He could have gone to him and tried to persuade him, more and more forcefully as Bessarion resisted. The quarrels had become deeper. In momentary desperation he had gone to others, even to Eirene, but not to Zoe. Why had Justinian and she not allied to serve the common cause?

The only one Justinian had trusted was Antoninus, who in the end had gone to his death tortured and alone. Then who had betrayed Justinian to the authorities?

If Bessarion had lived, the plot would have gone ahead. The next evening, they would have attempted to kill the emperor. Zoe had the courage and the skill to do it, whatever Bessarion’s failings. But had Zoe honestly believed that Bessarion had the courage and the fire to save both the city from the Latins and the Church from Rome?

And would Bessarion have obeyed her, or was his arrogance such that once on the throne he would have defied all advice, especially from a woman? How had she imagined she could manipulate him? Because she had more political intelligence than he, and more realism? Or more allies? Perhaps knowledge of Michael’s network of spies and agents of violence, information, and deceit? Then he could keep his hands clean and still reap the benefits.

Perhaps Zoe would have allowed Bessarion to take the throne and then helped Demetrios Vatatzes to usurp Bessarion. Or was that Eirene’s plan?

Justinian had prevented any of it from happening. If he had killed Bessarion, then far from being a conspirator against the emperor, he had saved his life. Had Michael known that? Had Nicephoras?

And a cold and ugly thought: Had Constantine allowed Justinian to be blamed as an act of revenge for his change of allegiance, his understanding of reality?