Dark of the Sun (Saint-Germain #17)

Dark of the Sun (Saint-Germain #17) Page 33

With the lengthening days curtailing their hours of travel, it took eleven nights for Ragoczy Franciscus and Rojeh to go from Poranache to Olbshe at the mouth of the Dnieper. There, at sunset at the end of their first day in the town, Ragoczy Franciscus, in a heavy black silk kandys with a hood to protect his face, took the last of their gold to a money changer who kept a shop a few steps from the largest market-square in the town.

The money changer was a small, thin man made up of ferocious angles, with the permanent squint of the shortsighted. A Persian by lineage and a Byzantine by inclination, he was suitably impressed with Ragoczy Franciscus' finery, but said, "Elegant plumage does not mean the meat is wholesome."

"No, it does not," said Ragoczy Franciscus, setting down a long bar of gold. "However, this may improve the savor."

"Oho!" the money changer exclaimed, lifting the bar reverently. "This is from Cathay. Those scratchings are their way of writing, or so I am told."

"It is the name of the goldsmith-Chou Zhan-Wah-and the seal of his guild-master, and a statement of weight," Ragoczy Franciscus said.

"Chou Zhan-Wah! Dreadful names they give these foreigners," said the money changer, who was called Kurush Sadimatsrau. He weighed the gold carefully. "We don't see much metal from Cathay of late."

"Travel has slowed," Ragoczy Franciscus agreed.

Sadimatsrau waggled a finger at the black-clad foreigner. "You must know that I have to be careful. With so much hardship about, many have resorted to all manner of counterfeiting of gold and silver. I have to be sure-you understand."

"I understand that you do not want to accept lead for gold," said Ragoczy Franciscus.

"No, I do not," said Sadimatsrau. "You say you want to be given the worth of this in coins, mostly silver, a few gold, some copper, some brass?" The money changer was already reaching for his strongbox. "I charge twenty-five percent of the worth of this bar of gold."

"You will charge twenty, as is done in Constantinople, and you will not try to convince me that the value of gold has recently declined, making it impossible for you to assess this at a high rate," said Ragoczy Franciscus with a polite manner and steely purpose.

"How you merchants like to bargain," Sadimatsrau muttered, sighing. "This will be the ruin of me, charging so little and agreeing to higher prices than I can recoup."

"You will do very handsomely," Ragoczy Franciscus corrected him cheerfully.

"I am not a rich man," he began, fully prepared to launch into a lengthy self-justification.

Ragoczy Franciscus cut him short. "Possibly not rich, but you will be better off for making this exchange."

Sadimatsrau flung up his hands. "If you insist, then what can I do but comply?" He opened his strongbox furtively and stood so that Ragoczy Franciscus got no more than a glimpse of it. "Forty silver Emperors, five gold Angels, twenty copper Apostles, and thirty brass Empresses." He did his best to sound as if this were his highest offer.

"Fifty silver Emperors, ten gold Angels, thirty copper Apostles, and fifty brass Empresses," Ragoczy Franciscus countered promptly.

"You wish to beggar me," Sadimatsrau complained, then suggested, "Forty-five silver Emperors, eight gold Angels, twenty-five copper Apostles, and forty brass Empresses."

"Done," said Ragoczy Franciscus, disappointing Sadimatsrau, who had looked forward to a good haggle.

"All right," he grumbled, and began to count out the coins. "The gold bar had better be as pure as you claim. or I will have to ask the Master of Trade to demand recompense."

"Then satisfy yourself as to the quality quickly, for I am bound to the West in two days." Ragoczy Franciscus tried not to laugh at the money changer's dismay.

"If you are not here tomorrow, I will know you have cheated me."

"I will be here, and I will be pleased to accept your apology for the suspicions you harbor about me," said Ragoczy Franciscus, and left Sadimatsrau's shop to seek out a saddlery on the market-square where leather goods, hides, and furs were sold. There he purchased a Persian saddle, with a breast-collar and girth, and carried this back to the Inn of Many Lanterns, remarking to Rojeh as he entered their shared room, "I think the mare will be pleased."

"Not to have you riding bareback?" Rojeh suggested. "Perhaps. I know you will much prefer having a saddle. It would be better to have your native earth to add to the padding so we could ride in the day." He regarded Ragoczy Franciscus with determined optimism. "Well, we should reach your mountains more handily with you in a saddle: that's to the good."

Ragoczy Franciscus sat down, taking the saddle into his lap and looking it over carefully. "Unfortunately, there is no place to attach the straps for the Jou'an-Jou'an metal foot-loops. The frame has nothing to support them."

"You are not planning to fire a bow while riding, are you?" Rojeh laughed briefly. "Neither of us has such weapons, and so the foot-loops, metal or not, are hardly essential."

"Still, it eases the back, having those metal foot-loops." He put the saddle down, resting it on its pommel and the front of the short flaps. "Later tonight, I am going to see if there are any women I can reach who long for sweet dreams. It will not be much, but certainly preferable to taking more from the horses and the mule."

"A fine idea," Rojeh approved, and went on to provide an inventory of their remaining supplies.

It was after midnight when Ragoczy Franciscus left the inn, making his way along the narrow lanes that framed the four market-squares of Olbshe, listening intently to more than sounds; when he returned to the inn shortly before dawn, he was able to tell Rojeh that he had visited a youthful widow in her dreams and was feeling much stronger than he had been.

Rojeh took a handful of coins, announcing, "I will find more grain today, and dried fruit, if there is any to be had."

"A fine idea," said Ragoczy Franciscus. "If you find good saddle-pads, buy them, as well."

"I will," Rojeh promised. "Sleep well, my master." He let himself out of the room.

Two nights later, they were under way again, taking the road that followed the shore of the Black Sea. They kept on through three nights of high winds and one of spectacular thunderstorms. After eight nights they arrived on the outskirts of Odessus and found a barn in which to sleep for the day, wakening near sundown and preparing to enter the town. It was the first market-day of summer in Odessus and the first major market of the year, for the spring had come wet and late, making roads all but impassable for carts; peasants and travelers alike were reluctant to venture out. Now, with the first spate of clear weather holding for more than three days, the gates of the town had been thrown open at dawn, and men trooped through them with such wares and stock as they thought might be traded or sold. As the day waned, those among the marketers who could afford to dispersed into the inns and taverns for hectic revelry, so that as Ragoczy Franciscus and Rojeh entered the gates, they found a band of men celebrating their day's dealing by dancing to a tabor and bladder-pipe.

"Where are you bound?" the guard challenged as the dancers and musicians roistered by.

"We are looking for an inn," said Ragoczy Franciscus. "We want a place where we do not have to share beds and the stable has box stalls for our animals. We do not mind paving a bit more for such amenities."

The guard looked the two strangers over, taking visual stock of them. "There are four inns down that street that should suit your needs; one is much like another, and all are reckoned to be good, if you're willing to part with silver." He pointed past the celebrants. "Don't be put off by them; they may be a bit noisy now, but it won't last long. They will soon go to the brothels or the taverns or be too drunk to move." He rested his hand on the hilt of his short-sword. "If they get too frisky, we have ways to calm them."

"Is there a tax to enter the town?" Ragoczy Franciscus asked.

"Are you selling any goods or planning to buy them?"

"We need feed for our animals and a cask for water," said Ragoczy Franciscus.

"Those are not taxed. So long as you pay full price at your inn, there is no tax." He stepped aside to permit them to pass.

They settled on the inn set farthest back from the street, a fifteen-room establishment catering to Byzantine and Roman patrons, the Pelican's Nest. The landlord was a fellow of practiced joviality, a big-shouldered, square-bearded, once-hefty sort who took the coins Ragoczy Franciscus offered and explained, "We back up to a convent, and sometimes the women chant. If it bothers you, let me know and we'll move you to a front room."

Ragoczy Franciscus counted out the sum the landlord required. "Is there any way I might arrange to use your forge? I need to shape toe cleats for our horses."

"Going into the mountains, are you?" the landlord asked.

"That is our intention," Ragoczy Franciscus answered.

"The use of the forge for half a day will cost a silver Emperor, and that is if the smith is not working it," said the landlord, chuckling out of habit.

"Would your smith object to permitting me to fire the forge at night?" asked Ragoczy Franciscus with a genial half-smile to show he was prepared for a negative response.

"I'll find out," said the landlord.

The landlord snapped his fingers for a slave to come to escort the new arrivals to their rooms, which proved to be small and neat, each with a Byzantine bed and a stand for cases and chests. An Eastern Rite crucifix hung on the wall in each chamber, the only decoration.

Rojeh looked from his room to Ragoczy Franciscus' and back again. "Facing northwest-there should not be too much direct sunlight."

"My thought exactly," said Ragoczy Franciscus. He moved so another household slave could set down their clothes-chest on the stand in his room. "I think I will go out shortly."

Rojeh glanced at him. "Should I expect you back shortly?"

"I would hope not," said Ragoczy Franciscus. "It would mean I have not found sustenance."

"I will see if there are any chickens left in the market at this hour." Rojeh paused. "I suppose, if I bring one to the cook, he will dress one for me. I doubt the landlord would like me to fletch and gut a chicken in this room."

"I would imagine you are right." Ragoczy Franciscus opened the clothes-chest and took out a black-silk abolla and a fibula with which to fix it to his shoulder.

"Any finer and you would become the target of thieves," said Rojeh, his faded-blue eyes keen.

"I will endeavor to keep that in mind," said Ragoczy Franciscus as he left the room, closing the door behind him, and went down the stairs. Outside the revelry continued, and an ill-assorted group of sailors and peasants were playing an impromptu game involving groups of runners with linked arms: what few rules there were seemed to be casually enforced; Ragoczy Franciscus gave them a wide berth, making for one of the broader streets that led away from the square. He went at a steady pace, not too rapidly so that he could be attentive to things around him, but not too slowly. Two blocks along he came to a pair of churches, one with an impressive door with brass hinges and an extensive display of crucifixes on the facade, the other, opposite it, small and unadorned, all but the front enclosed in a wall. He stopped and studied the two buildings and concluded the more humble of the two had to be the convent the landlord had mentioned. Standing between the two churches, he was struck by the contrast-one elaborate and impressive, the other self-effacing; he wished he could see them by daylight, but knew that would be unwise. A bit reluctantly he moved on, following the wall of the convent, then crossing a street paved with ancient, cracked stones, going toward a well that stood on the far side, with a bucket for humans and a small trough for animals. As he approached, a small number of rats scattered into the night shadows; the strength of the water that tugged at him told him the well was deep and the water plentiful. He moved into the angle of one of the houses that faced the well and took stock of his situation, doing his best to work out some plan to find a sleeping woman whose dreams he could shape and share. He was so preoccupied that at first he hardly noticed the young woman in the faded, shapeless talaris who came from the side door of the convent carrying a yoke and two brass pails.

Setting down her yoke on the stone rim of the well, she began to draw up the bucket, tugging on the rope with surprising strength for so slight a woman. When finally she had the bucket in hand, she filled one of the pails, then dropped the bucket back into the well, preparing to repeat the process. Her face was set in unresponsive lines, and she stared listlessly about, her hands working as if of their own volition. When she had the bucket in hand again, she filled the second pail and once again let the bucket fall back into the well. Then, instead of shouldering her yoke and bearing the water back to the convent, she sat on the edge of the well and began silently to weep.

From his place in the protection of the housefront, Ragoczy Franciscus watched her, trying to decide if he should approach her; he could not remain indifferent to her distress. "Young woman," he said as gently as his throat would allow.

She gave a little shriek and jumped to her feet, almost stumbling over her pails as she did. "Go away! Go away!"

Ragoczy Franciscus did not approach her; he remained near the house, doing his utmost to reassure her. "I mean you no harm. You need not be worried."

"Go away," she repeated, but less emphatically than before.

Ignoring her dismissal, he said mildly, "I would not like to leave you here in so much despondency."

"I'm not despondent," she said in the accent of Troas, her stance a little too defiant to be persuasive; she wiped the tears from her face with a quick swipe of her hand. "You have startled me."

"I might say the same," he responded, remaining where he stood. "Whether or not you are despondent, something is troubling you."

"How can it be," she asked, acerbity coloring her question, "when it is my duties as an apprentice nun that aggrieve me?" Having said such an outrageous thing, she put her hands to her face in shock. "I didn't mean to say that."

"Your vocation is a burden?" he suggested, trying to discern the reason for her dissatisfaction.

"Vocation!" Tears filled her eyes but she did not sob. "My vocation." She came back to the well, wanting to talk to this kindly stranger. "If being given a choice of a brothel or a convent is a vocation, then that is mine."

"When did this happen?" He took a step closer to her.

"Almost a year ago, after my mother died." She shook her head and began to speak rapidly and softly, as if repeating something she had said many times before. "The crops failed twice, and there were only three pigs left. My father had to consider the farm and my brother, and so that left nothing for me. It wasn't his fault the crops failed-everyone's crops failed. And Mother died because she got the Bending Sickness; no one could do anything about that, either." Her hands tightened in her lap. "I must not decry my destiny," she said as if reciting a lesson. She dropped her head. "Who would offer for a dowerless girl in such a time as this?" Standing abruptly, she stared at him. "Why should I tell you this? You are a stranger."

"But you need to tell someone, and-"

"Only my Confessor and the nuns should hear these things," she said in mounting dismay.

"Do they hear them? Or do you keep them to yourself?" He saw he had guessed correctly. "Such unhappiness can fester if you do not speak of it, just as a boil must be lanced in order to heal."

She laughed mirthlessly. "Lancing boils. That is part of my work. Scrubbing floors where there is urine and vomit. Removing the bedding when someone has died. It is for humility and Christian example that I should do this, and do it gratefully." This last came quickly as if to cover over her disgust. "Apprentice nuns are given such tasks, and similar ones, in the hospital we keep for the sick and injured. It's so hard, with so much death."

"It offends you, doing those things?"

His question struck her and she thought about her answer. "I have worked on the farm since I was able to carry a hoe. I have tended birthings of calves and lambs and piglets. I have killed and dressed ducks and chickens and geese. I have milked cows and swabbed the floor afterward. I have dug for turnips in the mud and climbed trees to pick the fruit. I have pressed grapes with my feet for wine and turned barrels of mash for beer. I have sheared lambs and combed goats. I have treated cuts and fevers and cankers. But it was only a part of what I did. Here, it is expected that I will do the lowliest work every day and then pray to God to thank Him for permitting me to be the meanest of His servants. Some of the postulants do feel gratified, but I ..." Her voice dropped. "Better this than a brothel, I am told. At least I am not spat at in the streets."

"Is there no one who would be glad of your help on a farm? An uncle or a cousin, perhaps?" His dark eyes lingered on her face, at fine skin that had never known fine oils or unguents, at soft brown eyes, at well-arched brows, at a straight nose, at pretty lips marred only by a thin scar that ran to her cheek.

"I have only one uncle alive and he has four living children," she said slowly. "No farmer where I lived could afford to take on another person-worker or slave-until a good crop is brought in again." She blinked slowly, as if trying to understand why she had volunteered so much. "I should not speak with you. Why am I talking to you?"

"You want to talk to someone, and I have the advantage of being a stranger," he said, for he had had such experiences many times before. "I do not matter."

"But I have said such things to you-" She put her hands to her face.

"I am honored to listen," he said, still keeping his distance; his esurience was awakening but he felt only ill-defined interest coming from her.

"I am Ilea, but here at the convent I am called Joaquim to show my renunciation of the world and the acceptance of the life of the convent. I didn't want to give up my name."

"It is a good name, Ilea," said Ragoczy Franciscus, and told her his. "Franciscus is my gens name, and Ragoczy is my patronymic."

She considered this. "You have lands, then?"

"To the west of here," he answered incompletely. "In the mountains."

"Our farm is to the south, across the straits and in the hills." The nostalgia in her words was poignant. "At the end of a valley, hills rising behind it. We have two fields and a vegetable plot. There are trees on the hills, and only some of them have fallen. If I have to die, I want to die there, at home. Not here." She looked up at him. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, Ilea. I understand."

"My father said that if there is a good harvest this year, he may send for me. I know he won't." Her hands shook as she folded them together. "I have tried to resign myself. But I dream about making cheese and carding wool."

"Surely those skills would be useful in the convent. The nuns must keep a cow for milk and need someone to look after the chickens and the garden."

"There are three goats and a sheep," Ilea said, sniffing. "Sometimes I go and watch them when I should be at prayers. Sometimes I go there to sleep. I like the smell of the animals, and the way they go on together, not at all like the nuns, or those who come here for help or nursing. I'm told it is a sign of pride, staying with them instead of keeping to my prayers and my assigned work, and I must give up such things."

He moved nearer, aware of her sense of isolation. "Faith is supposed to end loneliness, not cause it."

She drooped where she sat. "If that were so, I would feel better about how I must live." Then she got up quickly. "I must get this water to the convent. They'll whip me if I take too long."

He picked up the yoke and helped her set it in place on her shoulders. "I am glad to have met you, Ilea."

Her smile was quick and genuine. "And I to meet you, Ragoczy Franciscus. You see, I remembered it: your name." She prepared to leave. "I'll pray for you."

"If you like." Ragoczy Franciscus stood beside the well for a short while, his mind on Ilea and how she had lost so much through mischance and circumstance. He looked toward the convent wall, trying to discern where the barn was.

Three men came stumbling along the street, a wineskin sloshing among them; one of them-a laborer by the look of him-gave Ragoczy Franciscus a truculent stare, but was dragged on by his companions. The street fell silent and empty for a little time, then a pair of jugglers trudged past Ragoczy Franciscus, both worn-out from performing and celebrating; they carried short oars painted bright colors, the tools of their trade. When they had gone, a small monk in a drab habit went by carrying a covered box. The street remained empty for a time, and at last a pair of guards came along, one of them holding an oil-lamp, the other carrying a pike; they scrutinized Ragoczy Franciscus in silence, and then went on about their rounds. The town was growing quiet, and the shine of lamp-light in the windows diminished. In the two churches hymns were being sung, the chanting creating an unexpected harmony in the deepening night. Then that, too, ceased, and the street sank into a hush broken only by the wind. At midnight the convent bell rang, and there were a few lamps lit in the chapel, and a few other parts of the compound; Ragoczy Franciscus waited until the place was still, then he made for the side gate and the barn, where goats could sustain him. As he went, he wondered if Ilea would be there, asleep, and if she would welcome a dream.

Text of a letter from Hormuzd Bashri, merchant from Ecbatana presently at Edessa, to Phemios the Byzantine at Palmyra, written in Persian, carried by merchant courier and delivered three months after it was dispatched.

To my dear colleague Phemios the Byzantine, Hormuzd Bashri sends greetings on this the longest day of the year and asks him to consider what he has to impart as well-intended advice and an alert to what likely lies ahead.

This autumn I will send to you two casks of seeds, which I urge you to arrange to be planted in the fields around Palmyra; these are grains from cooler regions, and with the cooler sun, they should flourish where you are, making it possible for all of us to have a bountiful crop at the next harvest. I no longer believe that the sun will be as warm as it was in a year or so: I am convinced that these cooler conditions will prevail for some time to come, and only by shifting our planting can we provide enough grain to prevent more hunger than we have already seen. I, myself, have contacted Goxach from the banks of the Vistula, to ask him to provide grain from his region that I might sell it from here at Edessa to the wide valleys north of the Caucasus Mountains. I will provide it for nothing if the peasants will agree to set aside twenty percent of their harvest for me as payment. You may find a similar agreement would be advantageous to you, as well.

In order to do this, I have taken on some riders as my representatives. I have doubts about them, but they have sworn a blood-oath to me and have declared they will do all that I ask so long as they are not abandoned to starve and wander. They are led by a young man who is known as the Kaigan of their clan. He is called Neitis Ksoka and his people are named the Desert Cats. There are about forty of them, thirteen able-bodied men, the rest women and children and two ancients, and they have come a very long way to escape the cold years and what they have described as yellow snow. I have provided the women and children and old men a plot of land to farm and graze, with the stipulation that they also care for my horses. These Desert Cats have ponies and they ride as if they were born in the saddle. Even the women are fine riders. They have flocks of goats as well as their pony herds, and these they have agreed to cull and then to provide me and my family with meat from their flock, and with cheese. From what they have said, I would expect more bands like theirs to move in from the East as time goes by, for if their accounts are accurate, many clans have been displaced by the cold and will be seeking lands more to their liking.

We have been having thunderstorms quite frequently, and I fear we may have a summer of them. Many of the merchants have complained that the roads are as muddy now as they are in spring, and that has slowed our already slow trade some more, making it likely that this will be another year of poor business. I have been told that three forest fires have been caused by the lightning, and that the devastation the fires have wrought will make foresters as unhappy as farmers by the time the year winds down. I, myself, have seen huge expanses of burned trees and blackened scrub, and I know that the rains will wash away much of the damaged land before spring comes. I can understand why the Christians are claiming that the world is nearing its end, and that soon all of earth will be gone, but I do not agree with their views. It seems to me that if the world were going to end, it would have done so two years ago, at the start of the cold sun, not now, when we see the first signs of improvement. In all my years as a merchant, I have not encountered such neatness, and in such times as we have now, I see less neatness, not more. But although they may be right, I will plan for the future and do what I can to ensure it will be less harrowing than these past years have been.

Extend my greetings to your brother and father, and tell any you think would want to participate in it of my proposal in regard to the grains and planting. The more who will join our venture, the greater our chance of success.

Hormuzd Bashri

(his mark)

By the hand of Josepheus the scribe from Ecbatana