The Vault of bones

Chapter Twenty-Two

I do not care for churches, and I like cathedrals even less. They are forever bound up in my mind with the bloody event which wrenched my quiet, unimpeachably mundane life from its pleasant, dull cage and sent it flying into the teeth of the world's storms, a homing pigeon who no longer possessed a home. I saw a man butchered like a hog inside the cathedral that stood in the little English city where I was a student, saw his blood splash and steam on the tiles and caught it in my nostrils as it overwhelmed the comfortable church smells: old stone, beeswax, incense, dust and piety (piety has a smell known to every cleric: a subtle distillation of clothes kept long in chests, boiled food, the hair of infants and the soiled breeches of the elderly; priests afflicted by a congregation of the very pious will always be profligate burners of incense). I had thought to find this one a miracle, for Anna had talked of it as the very navel of the world, but in reality it hunkered bleakly over the ruined city like a heap of giant skulls. So I had avoided the place until now, fearing that the city's melancholy decay would be unbearable here. But when I crept through the great doors, I was amazed.

English cathedrals are generally somewhat sombre. They amaze with their avenues of stone pillars that rear up and divide like tree trunks – so delicate and yet so deceiving – but their great vaults are shadowy and even when the day is bright outside the dust motes dance sombrely in the perpetual twilight within. And so I walked through the grand doors of Hagia Sophia expecting to enter such a night-in-day, to be greeted instead by light: candlelight and lamp light reflecting from the polished stone, gold, and twinkling glass of the mosaics that covered the walls. If from the outside the sheer mass of the church was terrifying, inside there was so much luminous space that I felt almost weightless, as if I were about to rise like a transfigured soul up into the embrace of the dome, where Christ waited with open arms, an indulgent young father perched on a rainbow.

I made my way up to the southern gallery and cast about for the mosaic Zoe had described, and found it easily, for it was quite new and dazzlingly bright even by candlelight. I sank down on a shadowed bench nearby and watched the candles flickering. Every so often a black-swathed crone would shuffle over to light another taper, but otherwise I was blissfully alone. After a time, my eyelids drooped and I fell into a sort of deep daydream, in which ravens circled over Dartmoor tors and little trout flicked through amber water while sedge waved against an empty sky.

There was a loud, wet sniff, and it came from very nearby. I straightened up and looked about me. There was no one there, and I was about to lapse into my daydream, assuming my imagination had conjured an intruder, when the sniff came again, just by my left elbow. With a start I turned my head, and found myself looking at a grey head. A low marble sill ran around the base of the walls, and perched uncomfortably on this sat a man in the black robes of a cleric. The cloth was very dusty and full of rents and patches, and the man’s hair was thinning and dirty. His scalp showed through here and there, angrily painted with ringworm, and drifts of scurf salted his shoulders. Feeling my gaze, he turned and looked up into my face. I beheld red-ringed eyes, a doughy boozers nose and ashy skin. A long beard the colour of neglected silver spilled down his front. His neck was knobbed with scrofula, and he evidently had caught cold, for he sniffed again and wiped his nose with a sleeve that was already glistening with mucus. I gave a thoughtless shudder, then remembered myself and stood up. The man looked up at me, pulled at his nose and, using the smooth marble of the wall, slid himself upright. He regarded me with the intense gaze of a moth-eaten owl. 'My name is Walter,' he said.

'Salve, goodman Walter,' I replied, carefully. The man had spoken to me in English. Walter's red and rheumy eyes explored my face with great care.

What are you doing here?' he asked brusquely, after an uncomfortable pause.

Taking comfort in your beautiful Hagia Sophia,' I said, as politely as I could.

'My Hagia Sophia? Mine’ he replied. I could not tell if he was amused or angry. And I could see that his robes were neither those of a Greek nor of a Latin priest, but seemed to be a somewhat disreputable confection of elements culled from both. An ordinary madman, I suddenly thought. Well, no peace here, then, and he might scare off whoever was coming to find me. Time to go. I was turning, when a gnarled hand shot out and caught my sleeve.

Wait, Devon lad,' Walter said. I turned and stared at him, mouth open like a codfish. 'Devon?' I gasped.

'Certainly. Devon. Devonshire. Well, you are not from Dorset, are you? Or a bloody Cornishman, against whom God defend us all?'

'No, no -I am from Devon, right enough,' I said, shaking my head. 'But what… what do you know of Devon, good-man Walter?'

'None of your "goodman",' he snapped. Walter will do well enough. Quite well enough, thank you kindly. I know of Devon because I am of Devon.'

'Ah. From whereabouts?' I enquired, knowing as I did so that entering into discourse with the mad can have many consequences, the commonest being deathly boredom. But I could not help myself, for the name of my homeland was a charm strong enough to loosen my tongue even in this strange circumstance. But instead of answering, Walter began to throw furtive glances about the vast cavern of the church. Then he turned back to me, eyes twinkling. He laid a finger alongside his nose.

'Nothing is what it appears, boy,' he rasped. Then he snapped his fingers gently and pointed to the far side of the church. I looked over and saw nothing but a Frankish cleric peering up at the rainbow-perched Christ in the cupola. He was far enough away that, in the hazy golden light, I could make out nothing save that the man was poised and seemed to be concentrating very hard on whatever he was regarding. And he was very well dressed in dark robes, like a scholar or a man of law. 'Another sightseer,' I shrugged. 'Perhaps he would be happier to join you. As a matter of fact, I have things…' What things?' asked Walter blandly. I shrugged. 'Business.'

'Oh. Business.' He sniffed damply. 'He knows about all kinds of business. Perhaps you'd care to talk to him! I glanced down into the church again, but the man had gone. Only a priest, I thought, or a monk.

Would you care to talk more?' asked Walter. Then, not waiting for a reply, he added, ‘I must retrieve my hat. Wait here.' And he shuffled off with surprising speed, and disappeared through one of the many stone-framed doors. His hat, for God's sake? Was I to lose my chance of escape, because of a madman's hat? Cursing my luck, or the ruins thereof, I stood up and padded over to the stairs. Descending into the lambent gloom I cast about for signs of danger, but the body of the church was empty save for a few tardy crones busy with their candles. It occurred to me that I was a fool, for I knew but one way in and out of this place, but there was no choice, and so, skirting the walls and colonnades, I gained the main door. Out of pure habit I glanced behind me before I stepped outside, and noticed a Greek priest watching me a few paces off, arms folded. I gave him a quick, respectful bow, another habit; and when I raised my head, I saw it was Walter. He had donned a priest's high, toadstool-shaped hat. So he truly was a madman. Without further ado I turned tail and trotted – for I did not want to attract any more attention – out into the dusk.

The square that lies before the Hagia Sophia is a dismal and deserted place dotted with ruins and missing huge areas of flagstones so that gorse and other wild trees and plants have pushed their way into the sunlight. That night it was even more desolate, although the fog was clearing, and the sky was fretted with rags of black cloud fleeing westward from a brisk wind out of Asia. There was not a soul about, and, wrapped in my black cloak, I felt little more than a ragged cloud myself, scudding, dissolving. It gave me an odd feeling of safety, but a slow, creeping dread also, as if I had stepped out of this world altogether into the kingdom of shadows.

I resolved to make my way back to the ruined chapel. Perhaps the serving girl would come to look for me there. Perhaps, though, the serving girl had been caught, or killed, or worse. I shuddered, the hoar frost of guilt settling upon me. The Golden Horn glittered under a bright sliver of moon to my left, so I turned right. Blocking my way was a thicket of scrubby elder bushes that had grown up around a broken pillar and I stepped into its shadow. There was, I remembered, an alleyway that gave off the square and led towards the sea, and through it -I had trailed around all these streets to fend off creeping boredom these past weeks – I could wind my way through ruins and dead houses to the wall of the palace, and there to the chapel.

Footsteps sounded behind me. A priest was leaving the church. I guessed it was Walter, and stepped back into the thicket, letting the thin, pithy trunks of the elder bend against my weight. A bird fluttered and scrabbled behind me. Do not sing, I begged it, silently. It did not, but flapped its way free and whirred away. 'Thank you’ I muttered. The priest had stopped twenty or more paces away, and seemed to be gazing up at the stars. I sank back a little further into the elder bushes, feeling a branch dig into my back. Then another, and then before I could flinch a hand wrapped itself around the handle of the knife that lay against my spine, and another was clamped over my mouth. I felt the knife being tugged out and I bellowed into the suffocating hand, waiting for the butcher's blade to enter my back. But instead a dry voice hissed into my ear.

'Keep silent, boy. Turn around’ it ordered, in English. I obeyed. As I turned, there was a crackle of twigs and the hand left my mouth, to land upon my shoulder, thumb digging into the soft flesh beneath the collarbone. I… I did nothing. Perhaps I was too tired and hungry to resist. I do not – choose not, it may be – recall what I thought in those instants. Be done with me, mayhap: do it fast, and do not turn me over to the braying Franks for their sport. So I did not bolt or even raise my hands, but turned like a child turns to face its father. And found the grey eyes of Michael Scotus staring into mine.

'I have cut myself on your bloody knife’ he murmured, and held it up, handle foremost. I took it, as if in a dream, and he put the ball of his thumb to his lips and sucked.

'Did Walter not tell you to wait?' he asked, when he was done. It was too dark to be sure, but I fancied his lips were flecked with blood.

You? I was waiting for you?' I managed to choke out the words, but I was so dazed that I could manage no more.

'Aye’ The Scot was inspecting his thumb again. 'And I for you. For some days. Come quick, now’ he said. Walter will lead us’

The mention of Walter cut into my torpor a little, enough to rouse a pinprick of resistance. 'I will not!' I said, my voice no more than a strangled bleat.

'Do you perceive that you have a choice?' said Michael with a half-smile. You may think this is but a dream, or some horrid chance, but it is not. Come: I will explain.'

He clapped his hands twice, and the sharp reports echoed back and forth across the square until it seemed to me as if the air were full of a thousand wooden birds clacking their wings, and I cringed. But the square was still empty when I looked up and here came Walter, trotting over stiffly. 'Said you would wait for me’ he muttered, testily.

'Never mind, old friend’ said Michael Scot. 'Lead on now: we will not lose the night if we are quick.' And to my amazement I found myself walking between Walter, the lunatic Greek priest from Devon, and Michael Scotus, physician to the pope or perhaps imperial necromancer, and who could not possibly be here in Constantinople, down a steep, empty street towards the sea, which sparked and burned with reflected moonlight and with the lights of the fishing boats setting out for a night's work. We had almost reached what was left of the city wall when Walter made a sharp turn to his left, and we followed him, ducking under a low, tottering archway and through a passageway barely wider than myself, that was heavy with the soft, cloying smell of dead fig leaves, like sweetmeats left to moulder. At the end was blackness – or a door, for Walter had stopped and rapped upon it twice, then twice again, then once more. He stepped aside, and Michael nudged me on. There was a creak and a complaint of worm-eaten timber, and I went forward, for I had no choice. The darkness within was damp and silent. Then a tiny light flared very close to my face, and passed, like a firefly, across and around my head. 'Ela’ said an ancient voice. Come.

As Walter and Michael pressed in behind me, the flame moved away and, like the Easter miracle, touched into life first one candle, then another and another, until we were standing in a blaze of light. Stone walls rose around us to a great height, and far above a vault of stone curved over us like a cupped hand. We are inside the walls’ I thought, and then I saw the man who had let us in.

He was very old, and his body was twisted like a tree that has stood for many lifetimes in a merciless wind. He had a long beard of yellowish white, and he wore a black cowl. His eyes were sunk deep into his head, so deep that the sinews that held them in place showed through the withered flesh of his eyelids. He was watching me, his head cocked like a bird, and I realised that he could not straighten it. Nonetheless he smiled at me, and it was a warm and welcoming smile. He pointed at a chest that stood near the wall.

'Katsi,’ he said. Sit. And I did, for I was tired as a plough-horse, and the man’s smile had made me less afraid. Michael was busying himself over by the door, and Walter, after embracing the old man and shooting me a reproachful glance, slipped outside and shut the door behind him.

We will eat’ said Michael, in Greek. ‘Petroc, you speak the tongue of this city, do you not?' I nodded, thinking only of the food. The Scot carried a covered clay pot and a basket over to us, produced a rickety chair for the old man and a stool for himself, and sat down. The pot contained boiled beans and pig fat, tepid, bland and uncommonly good. There was bread in the basket, and some hard-boiled eggs, and an apple. We set to – or rather I set to, and my elders watched. When the beans were all but gone, and the eggs, and the bread as well, and I was taking the first sweet bite of the apple, Michael whispered something to the old Greek and nodded at me.

'Now I will talk, and you will listen. You are shocked to see me. I am not surprised. Why am I here in Constantinople? Simply told. I am on an embassy from the Emperor Frederick to John Vatatzes in Nicea. My route led me through this city. Or rather I planned it thus, for I wished to see you. Do not gawp, lad: we are not strangers, are we?'

I shook my head. Then I nodded it. 'I do not know you at all’ I told him. 'And… you are in the employ of the pope – of old Gregory. I mean… thank you for the food.' Somewhat unnerved by this unchecked flow of words, I plugged my mouth with the apple and regarded Michael. He did not seem to be planning to kill me, at least – and the old man: he seemed friendly enough.

'Oh! Did the pope send you?' I burst out again, struck by this thought. 'Or… or Baldwin?'

'No’ said Michael with a dry chuckle. 'No, and no. I am in no one's employ, as you put it: neither pope nor emperor – and I mean the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick, not that callow little kinglet, Baldwin. I am in the privileged and uncomfortable position of being a friend to both men, and I have acted on both their behalfs at times, as I am doing now for His Majesty Frederick. The good Captain does not know I am here either. It goes back to business’ he explained. 'I needed to gather some information about Genoese interests at the palace, for the Genoese are the emperor’s allies and hate Venice like the devil. It so happened that the pro-Genoese faction – for there are more factions in that place than there are rats in its walls – is made up of those men who hail from the Duchy of Athens, and chief among them was the duke's nephew, the unfortunate Rolant de la Rouche’

'So Rollo was killed on purpose? I thought it was I they intended.. ‘

'They wanted both of you dead’ said Michael, shaking his head. 'Or rather they required your death, and Rolant… perhaps it was planned, perhaps a lucky accident.' He made a revolted face. 'They are little more than children, these impecunious tyrants. Now then, when I found out about Rolant's demise I went looking for whoever else might proffer me assistance, and found Aimery de Lille Charpigny. From him I learned about your… your teetering position here, and indeed all about your impending arrest and execution.

'Aimery – he lives, do not fear, although he has a sore head – came to warn you of the Regent's intentions. He found Zoe cleaning your chambers.' 'Zoe? The chambermaid?'

'She is the daughter of a friend. You are reeling, my lad. Too much happenstance for you, I would guess. But rest assured: the only happenstance in the whole tale was that you rescued Zoe from a vile… a detestable fate. But even then, she was near your room because I had instructed her to keep an eye on you.' I blinked at him, struck utterly mute, so he went on: 'Now Zoe, who is as keen of wit as any man or woman I have ever met, could have forfeited her life when Aimery chanced upon her, for she had the temerity to question a strange Frank, in his own tongue, about the business he had with you. But it seems that your friend has goodness or sense, or perhaps both, for he told her what was to happen, and there and then they made their alliance – to save you, lad, for their different reasons’

Well then, Zoe…' I tugged at my hair in confusion. 'And Walter…'

'Ah, Walter. The poor man was a jolly crusader who came to sack this city thirty-and-more years ago. He has been trying to atone for what he saw and did ever since. Like a ghost, he has become invisible to his own people, but the Greeks have taken him in, and he is almost one of them now. Almost. He lives, sometimes, in Zoe's household, where I have taken my lodgings, by the way. But I have wandered from the answer to your first question. Yes, I came to find you. You see, I know why you are here, and I was wondering if… if you might do me a favour’

‘What kind of favour? I mean, yes, of course. Anything’ I babbled. The apple was gone, and I had nothing now to hide behind.

‘Would you break into the Pharos Chapel?' enquired Michael lightly, as if he were asking if I would like to go out to buy a few more eggs. 'Umm’ I began, and then my tongue ran out of words.

'Because you were planning to, were you not? Have I mistaken the situation? Querini the Venetian has taken the Crown of Thorns, and will doubtless take the rest…'

'Querini has killed Captain de Montalhac!' I burst out. 'I heard him say so! My master left on a Venetian galley the day before the hunt. The crew must have cut his throat the moment they were beyond the harbour!'

Michael Scot looked at me levelly. 'I know that also. De Montalhac dead? Very possibly. Probable, in fact – I am heartily sorry for it, and for you, my son. Now I am sorry to deny you your grief, but please pay attention’ It was what the Captain would have said, I realised, so I shut my mouth.

'So. Querini has the Crown, you say. But you have an Inventarium of the chapel – I know, I have seen one, for Emperor Baldwin has been shopping it around every court in Christ's lands. Gregory has one, and Frederick, and God knows who else. Now the saintly King of France has nothing to… I was about to say buy, but that is not the word – you would know better than I. He will receive nothing from Baldwin and will give nothing in gratitude. You and your companions will be denied your commission. And so, if I were in your place, I believe I would indeed rob the chapel’

'But how did you.. ‘ I began. 'I mean, I was planning no such thing. But yes, things are how you have described them otherwise’ I told him hurriedly.

'Very politic, lad’ smiled Michael. 'Very well. Let us say I have deduced that it would be a very good idea for someone standing in your boots to rob the Pharos Chapel of certain relics sequestered there, relics that you know of but which are unknown to the Regent and indeed to the emperor himself’ 'I have no idea what you mean’ I muttered.

'Ah. So you do not possess the Inventarium of Nicholas Mesarites’ said Michael, laying a finger against the pewter stubble on his cheek. 'I thought I gave it to you, but perhaps that was someone else’

'I..’ My mind was not working fast enough. It was barely working at all. I stared past Michael's head, desperately searching for something, anything to say. Instead I saw that someone long ago had taken chalk and drawn a stick man fucking a stick woman. In another place reared a cock, gigantic and gushing, and a pair of gaping thighs. I shook my head, trying to clear it. 'It is too late’ I said at last. 'I am sorry, Sir Doctor. Do not give me back to the Franks, I beg you.'

'There is a window, quite high up.' It was the old man. He was leaning forward, hands gnarled and white-knuckled, gripping his knees, staring at me. 'Quite high up. A man could fit through it – a young man’

I remembered the window, a square of iron grillework above the head of Christ crucified. 'It is bricked up’ I said without thinking.

'No, not bricked’ said the old man. 'There was a sheet of agate there, but it broke, and I had them put a piece of slate in its place, thinking I would find more agate. I never did’

'Who are you, kyrios? I said carefully, searching the seamed face. The sunken eyes glared back at me. 'The grandfather of Zoe’ he muttered.

'This is His Eminence Nicholas Mesarites, late Archbishop of Ephesus’ said Michael, standing up and walking to the old mans side. He laid his hand gently on the twisted shoulder, and the old man smiled. 'And indeed, grandfather to Zoe Argyrina Mesaritissa’ 'But I thought’

'That he was long dead. And you thought the same about me, no doubt, for the world seems to believe me mouldering in my grave while I walk around, hale as a lamb’ said Michael. 'Such is the fate of the old: we die by reputation long before our hearts are stilled’

'But this makes no sense to me’ I protested. ‘Your Excellency Nicholas, I am ashamed, for yes, the doctor is right: I had planned to rob the chapel of those things… those holy relics which you detailed, but which Baldwin does not know he owns. I suppose I thought that King Louis might buy them – your pardon, it is simony, I know, but as you must know, in my profession we do not much bother with the niceties of canon law. I was attempting to salvage something from the ruins of my mission and of my life, and to avenge my beloved master. It seems I have failed’

'Not yet’ said Nicholas Mesarites. 'Not if you can steal the Mandylion of Edessa’ 'So are you not the pope's doctor? ' I had asked Michael Scotus. We had studied a rough-drawn map of the Bucoleon Palace that Mesarites had produced, and he had told me how I might go about entering the Pharos Chapel from outside. It did not seem easy, or indeed possible, but as nothing seemed real any more, and indeed I had begun to wonder again if I might be dead and this some purgatory designed just for me, I went along with the plan, such as it was.

'No, although I have treated him. I live between two worlds, you see’ I looked at him. I knew what worlds he meant, but then again, perhaps I did not. The air seemed to swim faintly before his face, as if I beheld him from a very great distance. Then I blinked, and he was just an old man sitting at my side.

'But I thought you were His Holiness' doctor’ I said, confused. 'It is well known that you used to be the Emperor's…' I was about to say necromancer, but prudence caught my tongue just in time. 'Astrologer’ I went on. 'But also that His Holiness recommended you for the Archbishopric of Canterbury. So…'

A shadow flitted across Michael Scot's face. Then he smiled, wearily. 'Both true’ he said. 'I was with the pope these last few years, but when the Emperor Frederick came down into Italy this year he summoned me. I go where I may serve’ he added, piously. 'Really?' I asked, surprised. Michael laughed. 'No, not really. I no longer need to act out of duty. My motive is love, alas, for I am a friend to both men, though they do not love each other.'

'I have heard that Frederick seeks an alliance with John Vatatzes in Nicea,' I said. 'He knows that this leaking tub of an empire will not last long.'

'Aha. There you have it. I should have expected no less, from the company you keep’

'And Gregory seeks the opposite, for he would like Venice to be a staunch ally in the north against Frederick’

'Right again. And why does Gregory wish to broker the translation of Byzantium's holy relics?'

'To buy the friendship of King Louis, most pious of monarchs,' I said. And to bolster up poor Baldwin.'

Again right. And why should a man ride a skittish war-horse down a busy London street of a winter's morning?'

The silence was absolute. I saw Michael Scot, and yet I did not see him. I saw Anna dead in London. I saw flames dance, and then they became bobbing rafts of ice upon the Sea of Darkness. I was not here. I was a statue, yet uncarved, nothing but silent grains within a block of stone.

'Do you know that, Petroc of Auneford? You do not, and that is as it should be. Still, the answer is on your hand.'

I looked down, as if through a poppy trance, at Anna's ring where it circled my finger.

'But it was an accident. She was kicked by a horse, good Master Michael. Do not say such things. Please do not’ You do not believe that, lad.'

'I… No!' Shaking with fear of what I was about to learn, I looked up into Michael's steady eyes. ‘I cannot believe it, and yet… I know it may be so.'

'Listen to me. When Gregory's interest is aroused, wondrous or terrible things happen. He heard that there was an unmarried – you were not married, were you? – relation of John Vatatzes of Nicea at loose in the world, and thought what a fine match she would make for his poor, weak Baldwin. He would make John into Baldwin's ally, not his deadly foe. This is a terrible thing to tell you, lad, but…'

'Baldwin is married,' I said, desperately, my head spinning. ‘If the pope cannot annul a marriage, who can?' 'No! That cannot be! It is… monstrous!'

'Querini found out, for he has eyes and ears in the pope's court. He could not allow Baldwin's fortunes to change. And so…'

The man at the door of the Blue Falcon, a soldier with a scarred face. I closed my eyes and saw Fulk de Grez waiting for Anna at the noon hour with his message from a place dear to her heart. We had thought Fulk's letter had hinted at Nicea, but it had not: it had spoken of that city at the centre of every Greek's world: Constantinople. Then the great horse reared up in my mind's eye, and I clapped my hands to my head to drive out the image of Anna's hair, blue-black against the Cheapside mud.

‘I could have been a corpse by now,' I told Michael at last. 'Nothing more than a skin drying on some door. I wish with all my heart that I was, and not alive to hear this.'

'But you have heard it, and you still live. Which is good. I have need of you.' ‘I do not wish to be… I wish to die,' I said.

'That is not allotted to you, not yet,' said Michael sadly. You have suffered much in the last few days. There has been a battle, an arrest. You have become another ghost in this terrible city. And you have seen your hopes dashed. Nicholas Querini carried off the Crown of Thorns under your very nose. Now I am offering you restitution.' 'There is no restitution.' 'Then what about revenge?'

What manner of revenge do you mean? Stealing back a relic for this Mesarites, if that is who he really is? Anna would not care. She detested superstition and the worship of… of icons and suchlike.'

‘I am talking about money,' said Michael Scotus, giving me a grey stare. 'More money than one man has ever seen. For you alone, or for your Captain de Montalhac. And with it the ruin of Nicholas Querini.'

'Ruin? What good is ruin? He should be made to feel what Anna felt! He will…'

'To lose his wealth and his power would be worse for him than death, and you can strip him of both. And here as well is the chance to snap your fingers under Gregory's nose. Do not mistake me: I am a churchman, but I have no illusions about one thing: the Lateran is a great beast with iron jaws and flaming lips, and a terrible thirst that can only be slaked with gold.'

'Gregory knew what he had caused,' I whispered. 'He made mention of something, that day in Viterbo, but I thought nothing of it. I thought…'

'Even a pope cannot bring about the death of a princess without feeling some prick of guilt,' said Michael, gently. 'It was he who sent you the Inventarium. At my suggestion. Some little gesture to make amends: no doubt he has forgotten all about it by now. But you, my boy, can use that little gift against him, against Querini – nay, against the whole of Christendom, if your rage is hot enough.' He set his chin upon his finger-ends and regarded me.

I tried to make sense of what I had heard. What did I care for money, or any of it? I wanted to kill Nicholas Querini, nothing more. My rage, kindled more by despair than anger, was as simple as my desire to eat the last apple on the plate before me. Use the pope's gift? Christ, I was become more an animal than a man! There would never again be a time for gifts. And… and yet there was something in Michael's watchful stillness that calmed the turmoil in my head.

'As to that, why do you want the Mandylion? I asked reluctantly, for misery had begun to curdle into anger, and with it a sullen trace of hope. 'Old Gregory is your friend – you said so yourself.'

'And I meant it. The war that is coming: Guelfs against Ghibellines, spiritual against temporal, brother against brother. It will consume the world, gobble it whole. It is the Apocalypse. I will not take sides.' 'But the Mandylion? I insisted.

'There is yet a chance that the war can be averted, for the beast's jaws are not yet locked. The Mandylion is a thing beyond worth: the holiest of the holy. I intend to give it to Frederick, so that he may present it to Gregory as a peace offering. Although you will not have heard this in Rome, Frederick does not seek war in Italy. He wishes to rule, not to destroy.'

'But you, Your Eminence,' I protested, turning to Mesarites. 'You are robbing yourself. Why would you help us Franks to finish the ruin of your city?'

'Mikaili and I have known each other for half a lifetime,' he replied slowly. We met here, in this city, when I was sent to debate with the emissaries of Pope… I do not remember which pope. It was thought that the two Churches, Greek and Latin, might be reconciled, and this has always been my dearest wish. It was not Constantine's vision, nor Justinian's, that the Empire of the Romans should be divided for ever, or that Christian should revile Christian over matters of mere custom. Mikaili had come with the papal delegation, and we became friends over…' 'Over Aristotle’ Michael prompted.

Just so. I have kept abreast of matters in Rome and at the imperial court these many years through my friend. And so I know that Gregory truly desires unity between the Churches, but on his own terms. Frederick desires the same thing, but he loves the Greeks, and he would have our rights upheld. If there could be peace between pope and prince, brokered by our greatest treasure, it is my hope that the schism might be healed, perhaps in my lifetime – although that I do not dare expect’

'But what, then, is this Mandylion! I have heard it is something like the Veronica, with a painting of Christ's face. There are many such icons, though.'

'The Mandylion is not one of those!' snorted Mesarites. He seemed to straighten up a little. A painting? It is… acheiropoietos. Not made by human hands. And not just the face…' he paused, and crossed himself. 'The whole of Our Lord's precious body, laid out in death.' 'Or life’ said Michael.

'Ach. We disagree. The impression – it is a miraculous imprint, Frankish boy, not a painting – is of a dead man. There are the stains of blood, around the head, in the side, in the hands and feet.' 'And you have seen this?'

'Oh, many times’ he cried. 'Our Lord was revealed every Friday in the Church of Blachernae, rising as if from the tomb. Resurrected in glory.'

'But it is a face’ I persisted. 'In a picture. It says so in the inventories.'

'Oh dear, Petroc’ sighed Michael, shaking his head like an exasperated schoolmaster. 'It is folded. Folded so that only the face shows, and so that it fits into a picture frame. That was its secret, and until a few years before the sack, known only to the archbishops of Blachernae. And because it vanished when the Franks took the city, that secret is not known in the West. Imagine the revelation, the… the universal wonderment when it is revealed. The pope will declare a jubilee!'

I looked at these two men, so agog at the wonder of it all. It was not so strange in the Greek, perhaps, for he was a churchman; but Michael Scotus… I was surprised that his dark and shadowy person should be so suffused with superstitious joy. I felt, all at once, utterly different from them, a goat amongst sheep or an ape amongst men. What cared I for their jubilee? If men could kill a blameless woman on a whim, in the name of holy Mother Church, was it not equally unbelievable that a piece of old, stained cloth would stop the same men from destroying each other? I did not care. But, I realised as I watched the burning eyes of the two old men, if something could be salvaged, some scrap for Captain de Montalhac, for Gilles and for the rest of us who lived outside the world of both pope and emperor, then I would gladly die in the attempt.

There was another door, an old postern that let out on to the beach below the walls. Michael led me through it and out into the night. The sea lapped and gurgled very near us, and the air was sharp with the rot of weed and flotsam that had once been alive. I trudged after Michael, to where a huge old plane tree, half dead, was growing out of the wall and hanging its branches far out over the water.

'Help me,' he said, beckoning. He was tugging at a pile of driftwood. When I reached it I saw that the pile was disguising a small fishing boat, short, pointed fore and aft, with a pronounced rocker and two rowlocks. We heaved it over. It looked seaworthy enough in the moonlight, for the timbers were sound and the paint was not old. It had a mast, folded flat against the deck, and a tighdy furled sail. Then Michael led me back to the postern. Just inside were two ladders, lying propped lengthwise against the wall.

'Scaling ladders from the siege’ said Mesarites, shuffling over with a light. 'There were legions of them, a forest. Afterwards, some who were left alive picked them up and saved them, thinking they might have a use when pruning time came. But it has never come. Here: these are not long enough, but you can lash them together.'

To my astonishment, he produced a coil of thin rope, thin as string, and gave it to me. It was black and oily.

'Eel skin’ he said. 'It will take your weight, never fear.' As I was pondering this, Michael Scotus handed me a pack, with two straps for the shoulders, roughly stitched from what looked like sailcloth. I hefted it and looked inside: it held a chipping hammer and a chisel. 'Come now: it is getting late’ muttered the doctor.

With the growing sense that I was no more in control of things than a ball launched down a hill, I found myself clambering into the boat. Michael shoved me off as I fumbled the oars into the rowlocks.

'Do not dally, lad’ hissed Michael. And then: 'Be careful, Petroc. Be very, very careful.'

I raised my hand in a half-hearted salute and began to row, clumsily at first, the blades biting too deep or jumping across the surface. But in a minute I found my rhythm, and the little boat began to surge eagerly, happily across the still water. Soon Michael was swallowed up in the tree-shadows, and I was alone. I bent my shoulders into the work of rowing, feeling my hands grow sore with the labour, my spirits rising with each little rush across the water. I was propelling myself, at last, beyond the reach of both persecutors and those who called themselves my friends, but whom I knew it would be madness to trust. A faint breeze was blowing from the west, from Greece and beyond, and catspaws hissed against the side of the boat. There was the crouched, crumbled mound of the Bucoleon Palace, over my right shoulder. No lights showed anywhere to seawards. The home of emperors lay humped upon the shore like a great, dead beast. I set my feet on the bench in front of me and pulled, pulled away, my wake a pathway showing faint and pale. But there was no path ahead of me, by sea or by land. I had no life beyond the next dip of my oars. How tempting to ship them and simply drift, alone in the dark. But that would be death, and now I could see the dim flash of foam where the sea was breaking under the palace. There was no escape: I would wash up sooner or later. Well, I knew how to row, and so I kept to it, the corpse of Constantinople sliding by on the port side.