Justinian Read online

  The clamor in the hall got louder. "What shall I tell them?" Peter asked.

  "Tell them I had an attack of stone. Tell them it has passed, and I am well again." My father smiled a thin smile. "All that has the advantage of being true. Tell them also that in most cases the stone does not recur."

  From what Peter had said, that was not true. A physician, however, being able to do so little against illness, carries hope as a standard medicament. And Peter, with his big voice and bluff, blustering manner, was the perfect man to put forward what my father wanted everyone to believe. By the time he was done haranguing the servants and guardsmen out in the hall, they all sent up cheers and cries of thanksgiving to God that my father's trial had been so light and so fortunately ended.

  Also in the hall, close to the door, stood my brother. Despite Peter's glib, fluent speech, Herakleios's face, always pale and thin, remained tight with worry. He knew illness too well to believe it could be so casually dismissed.

  He looked a question at me. I nodded, as reassuringly as I could. After a moment, he nodded, too. I have always wondered whether he believed me.

  My father's next attack of stone came halfway through the spring.

  MYAKES

  Those last four years of his life, Constantine wasn't the same man he'd been before. Better? Worse? I don't know, but different. Maybe some of it had to do with losing to the Bulgars. Up till then, he must have thought he was invincible. And why not? He'd beaten every foe he faced, and the Arabs seemed more dangerous than anyone imagined the Bulgars could be. So what happened with the barbarians likely had something to do with clipping his feathers.

  But it wasn't only that Constantine didn't go to war with his neighbors any more. He softened, you might say: the bursts of temper he'd loose against anyone who got in his way- the same sort Justinian had and, from what I heard, the same sort Constans had had, too- they stopped coming.

  Again, part of the reason for that may be that he didn't have to worry about his brothers any more. But more of it, I do believe, sprang from his being sick so much of the time. He suffered a lot from stone. From all I've heard, there's no worse pain a man can know. A woman in childbed, maybe, but not a man.

  I must say I don't see the justice of it. Never have. He knew what he'd done. Justinian puts the words in his mouth: he'd saved the Roman Empire and reunited the church. And what did he get? Hell on earth and an early grave. No, I don't see any justice there.

  What's that, Brother Elpidios? Who am I, to question God's judgment? Nobody at all- just an old blind man. And I don't question, not really. But I don't understand, either.

  JUSTINIAN

  Between my father's first attack of stone and his second, I grew taller by the breadth of a couple of fingers, nor did my growth slow after that: I was entering my thirteenth year, and making the passage from boy to man. My shoulders thickened (though I have always been slim), my muscles hardened, I began to have more than down on my cheeks and around my private parts, and my voice, absurdly, was a boyish treble one moment and the next the deep note I have struck every since.

  In the course of those few months, the world became a different place. My brother Herakleios was suddenly not just smaller than I but on the the far side of what seemed an unbridgeable chasm. My father and I, by contrast, constantly butted heads, as if we were an old ram and a young charging at each other in springtime. If he said it, I was certain it was wrong, for it came from his lips. And what I was certain of, I said- in no uncertain terms. He did not take kindly to that, something I understand better now than I did at the time.

  And, like a young ram, I began to take notice of the ewes. I had known for some time what passes between man and woman, but when I was a boy it struck me as so absurd and unlikely that I could not take the notion seriously, though both my father and Myakes assured me it was true. Why on earth would any man want to do that, and why would any woman let him if he did?

  Then one day, in a hallway in the palace, I walked past a serving girl who was carrying some freshly washed bed linen out to dry in the sun. Being still wet, the bedclothes had also wet her tunic, which clung to and revealed the shape of her breasts and nipples. I gaped at them, and my body stirred in a way I had not known before.

  I stopped and stared after her. I had, of course, seen how women walk before that day, but I had never seen it till then. Perhaps noticing that my footsteps no longer sounded in the passage, the serving girl looked back over her shoulder. When she saw how I was looking at her, she smiled saucily, then turned a corner and disappeared.

  That night (or was it the night after?- so many years have gone by, I confess I am not certain) I had a dream unlike any I had ever dreamt. Not surprisingly, the serving girl was in it. Somehow she was dry and wet, in her tunic and bare, all at the same time. I moved toward hera160… and then I was awake, alone, in my bed in the darkness.

  My nightshirt and the bedding were wet. I thought for a moment I had pissed myself in the night like a baby, but quickly realized it was not urine that had spurted from me. My body still glowed with the remembered sweetness. Wishing I could remember the dream of the serving girl in more detail, I rolled over and went back to sleep.

  MYAKES

  Oh, don't cough and splutter so, Brother Elpidios. Yes, of course I know it's Satan who sends such dreams, seeking to lead men away from virtue and toward sin and lasciviousness. But they are sweet while they last, as Justinian says, aren't they?- and this was his first one.

  You say you don't think they are? Well, you can say what you like, Brother. God gave us free will, after all, didn't He? Aye, you can say what you like, but that doesn't mean you can make me believe it.

  Is there going to be more of such filth? How should I know? When Justinian gave it to me, I never saw anything but the outside, and I'm not likely to set eyes on anything more than that now, am I? Do you want to stop reading? Your purity and chastity wouldn't be challenged then.

  Ah, you think you can overcome any challenge you find? I'm glad to hear it, that I am. Read some more, then.

  Am I laughing at you? Brother Elpidios, like I said, I'm an old blind man. Would I do such a thing? I'll keep all my snorts to myself from now on, I promise.

  JUSTINIAN

  I had looked at the serving girl, and she had smiled at me. I wondered how to proceed from that point to the operation that, although it still struck me as preposterous, might in fact perhaps have had something to recommend it.

  Before this time, as I have written, the only times I had anything to do with the serving women in the palace was when I wanted them to fetch me something or to take something away. Except for those times, I had, like any foolish boy, done my best to pretend they did not exist.

  Now, awkwardly, I began to change my ways. Having gained one smile with a smile, I started smiling more, especially at those among the serving women whose smiles I most wanted in return. And, indeed, I did win some of those smiles. Looking back, I marvel that I should have been so anxious. Not only was I young and reasonably well favored, I was also the Emperor's son and likely heir. The combination should have made me irresistible. In fact, it did, but I took a while to reali ze that.

  About a week later, I had another of those disturbing, delightful, and messy dreams. I do not remember what happened in that one so vividly as I do the first, but when I awoke from it I understood what had happened more quickly and with less confusion than before. I vowed to myself that the next time I found such pleasure, it would not be in a dream.

  One of the serving girls at whom I had formed the new habit of smiling was the yellow-haired Sklavinian who had been baptized as Irene. She was, I think, closest to my age of all the servants the khagan of the Avars had given to my father three years before. She, to my disappointment, did not smile back, but would nod and say "Good day" in her halting Greek.

  Then one day a couple of days after that second dream, I happened to be coming back from the kitchen, where I had just absconded with a bun stuffed with ra
isins and honey and chopped nuts, when she came out of a storeroom and almost ran into me.

  "I sorry," she said nervously. Even the higher-ranking servants could beat her if she did something wrong; Stephen the Persian, no doubt among others, had taught her as much. If she displeased me, she must have thought I would have her tied in a sack and chucked into the Bosporos, as I suppose I could have.

  But I said, "It's all right. No harm done." And, indeed, none had been. To prove I meant it, I smiled at her. As usual, she did not smile back. Then I had a better idea. I tore the sweet bun in half, giving her the larger piece.

  She did smile at that; her whole face lit up. Our fingers brushed when I handed her the bun; mine, afterwards, felt as if they were on fire. "I thank you very," she said, and ate the bun in a couple of bites. "This good," she added with her mouth full, and then went on to chatter about food for a while, mostly in Greek but every now and then slipping back into her barbarous dialect. I gathered she did not much care for the pungent sauces and spices with which we Romans are in the habit of making our fish and vegetables and meat piquant.

  She could have been talking about the antipodes or stirrups or tadpoles. It would not have mattered to me. I was not listening to her, not with the tenth part of my mind. I was watching, entranced, the way her eyes shone; the way her pink lips moved, showing me every now and then her white teeth and the tip of her tongue; the curve of her jaw, the curve of her neck, and other curves covered but not hidden by the linen tunic she wore.

  Irene did not take long to notice how I was staring. She smiled again then, a different smile, one that made me think our ages had a large gap between them after all. It was, I realize now, a woman's smile, not a girl's. At the time, it alarmed me as much- almost as much- as it aroused me.

  "You give me, Prince," she said. "I give you, too. Come." She stepped back into the storeroom from which she had just emerged, and beckoned for me to follow. I do not know what I thought she had in there: some little trinket hidden away, perhaps.

  I went in there with her. It certainly was the ideal place in which to hide a trinket: shelves on all four walls reached from the floor almost to the ceiling and were crowded with pots and dishes on one side of the room, lamps and braziers on the other. Some were of brass, others of clay; the likes of Irene would not have been allowed to have anything to do with vessels of silver or gold.

  She walked around me and looked out into the hallway. I did not understand why, as no one had been out there, nor, as best my ears could tell, was anyone there now. Suddenly, she shut the door. The storeroom plunged into gloom, for only a small window above the shelves on the far wall let in any light.

  Alarm rose in me again. Had someone- my exiled uncles, perhaps- bribed her to try to stick a knife in me? I had a knife of my own on my belt. My hand went to it. I was lucky: she did not see me, for she was pulling her tunic off over her head.

  "I give you," she said again, tugging down her thin linen drawers and letting them fall to the floor. "Prince, I give you. You like?" She stood where she was for a moment, so I could see her. There was plenty of light for that.

  She was very fair, her skin where the light did not touch it white as milk, the nipples on her small, firm breasts a pale pink, the hair in her armpits and between her legs as light as that on her head, whereas mine in those places was several shades darker. I remember all this as vividly as if it were yesterday, yet how much of it I truly noticed in those first few stunned heartbeats I cannot say. She was a woman and she was naked in front of me, and that was- enough? Dear God, how much more than the imagination truth is!

  Seeing me gaping, she smiled that ancient, secret smile once more. "You no do before?" she asked. Numbly, I shook my head. It was a foolish question; had I had practice in such things, she would already have been down on the ground with her legs spread wide. But she said, "Never mind. No worry. I show you all things," and stepped forward into my arms.

  Between the two of us, we managed to get my robe and drawers off me in not much more than twice the time I would have needed were I undressing for bed alone. I almost brought my hands up to cover my privates; though Irene seemed to feel no shame at letting me see her, I was shy when she looked me up and down.

  She spread my robe and her tunic on the floor, then got down on them. I got down beside her, my heart pounding as if it would burst from my chest. Even with the clothes as makeshift mattress, the floor was hard. I did not care.

  As she had promised, she showed me all things: where my hands and mouth should go on her, and what they should do when they got there. In this, unlike the instruction I still endured from my pedagogue, I proved a quick study. Some of her sighs and little moans, no doubt, were to build my pride, but some of them, I think- I hope- were real.

  Nor were her hands and lips idle, though she did not grasp my manhood as I touched her secret place, fearing, no doubt, I would spurt too soon if she did. But then, as it became obvious our joining would not be much delayed, I wilted like a candle in a hot room. A boy's nerves: I did not know how to be a man, in this most virile way of all.

  "I fix," Irene murmured in a tiny voice, mindful of any passersby in the hall. She had me lie on my back, then crouched beside me and bent her head to the flagging part. In a moment, it flagged no more, but stood tall and stiff as the column in the Forum of Constantine, head poking proudly from the foreskin. Of such sensation I had never dreamt.

  But yet another lesson awaited me. Seeing me proud once more, Irene straddled me, took me in hand, and guided me into her. She sank down upon me with a soft sigh, and I was engulfed to the hilt.

  She raised herself, then lowered again. From my dreams, I had memories only of the explosion. Now I discovered how delicious reaching it was. When Irene found I would not spend myself on the instant, she moved more vigorously. I began to move, too; no doubt I was clumsy, but who is not, the first time?

  Presently her breath came in gasps, as mine had been doing for some little while. She took my hands in hers and brought them up to her breasts. I squeezed, and was afraid I had hurt her, for she whimpered deep in her throat. But she squeezed me at the same instant, down there where we were joined, several times, one right after another. And I, I spurted my seed deep into her.

  A moment later, as Irene scrambled off me, something hot and wet splashed down onto my leg. "Good," she said. "It fall out. Less chance baby." Now that our passage was done, she became all brisk practicality, getting into her drawers, tugging her tunic out from under me, and dressing with smooth haste. I did my best to imitate her.

  When we were both clothed, she opened the storeroom door, saw no one in the hallway, and tugged at my sleeve so I would go out first. That made sense: she might have had- indeed, had had- some legitimate business in there, which was not true of me. The precautions, though sensible, were needless; the hall was so quiet, it might have been deserted since the palace was built.

  She came out, closing the door behind her, and I- greatly daring, I thought- set a hand on her shoulder. "Can we do- this- again?" I asked.

  She looked astonished. "You a prince, I a servant, a slave," she said, pointing out the obvious, as if she were telling me, This is the sun; that is the moon. "How I say no?" Then she looked worried, no doubt fearing I would be offended to think she gave herself to me only because of the difference in our ranks. "I do anyhow," she added. "Sweet, good, make me feel good."

  Looking back, I still think some of that was true. At the time, I drank it down as if it were unwatered wine from Thasos. I felt nine cubits tall and five cubits wide, ready for anything, especially anything female. "Another time, then," I said grandly, and left her to get back to her work.

  MYAKES

  You did that very well, Brother Elpidios: only two or three coughing fits the whole time. What? Is that what my first time was like? Oh, not that different. I was a year or two older, and Maria was a maiden, too, so neither one of us was sure what we were doing, but we managed, so we did. I was on top, not the ot
her way round.

  How about you, Brother?… What? You never? Vowed chastity before you could even think about breaking your oath, you say? That's- very holy, Brother Elpidios. No wonder you're so curious about what the real thing is like.

  How does it compare to what, Brother Elpidios? I tell you frankly, I don't know. Sorry I can't tell you, but I've never found out, nor been curious, if you really want to know. Eh? What's that? No, of course the abbot doesn't have to know you asked the question. Nothing wrong with curiosity, I sa y. If you weren't curious, you wouldn't be reading Justinian's book, isn't that right, Brother?

  Yes, you can read some more now, if you've a mind to. When you read, I hear his voice inside my head. Isn't that strange? I remember it changing, just as he says.

  JUSTINIAN

  Not only did I seek out Irene whenever I found the chance, I also got in the habit of going around with a sweet bun or two from the kitchens. Having caught one fish with that bait, I went angling for others- and my luck, while not perfect, was good enough to make me a happy, or at least a sated, young man. Though the first lesson teaches most of all, I learned a good deal afterwards, too.

  That was a happy time for me, that little stretch of years beginning my manhood: the happiest time I have ever known, save these past few years when I have found revenge a pleasure surpassing the love of woman, as the Psalmist said with somewhat different meaning to the words.

  My father had the peace he desired, the peace he had bought and paid for. He took great delight in it, in spite of, or more likely because of, his growing bodily infirmity. Gout and stone continued to wrack him, though he was, or should have been, still in the prime of life, and he pissed blood after some of his attacks.