Debt of Ages (20 page)

"Aye," Corineus repeated, and clambered over the gunwale onto the pier. As soon as he was gone, Sarnac and Andreas went below decks to the cabin that the crew had been told, in no uncertain terms, was off-limits. They had barely entered when the portal glowed into existence. Tylar and Artorius emerged.

"That's cutting it pretty close," Sarnac observed. "Corineus only just left."

"No doubt." Tylar didn't sound too concerned. "But we have no time to lose. I want you and Andreas to proceed to the heir's apartments and bring his family back to this ship. Artorius and I will enter the palace and make contact with Ecdicius when the time seems ripe."

"Faustina and the children may not be willing to come with me," Andreas protested, "if I just show up unannounced and—"

"You must persuade them!" Tylar's voice was charged with urgency. "We have no time to lose. And when the conspirators move against Ecdicius, you can be sure they'll attend to his children as well. As I've already explained, we can't let them become hostages for Ecdicius's good behavior."

Of course,
Sarnac did not say,
if they were dead rather than captured they wouldn't provide the usurpers with any leverage. In fact, their deaths would just get Ecdicius seriously mad—which might well be to our advantage. I'm proud of you, Tylar, for not mentioning that. I'd be even prouder if I thought it had never crossed your mind.

I think there was a time when it wouldn't have crossed mine.
He was still thinking about it as they made their way through the gardens and entered the palace complex. "Andronicus" was evidently known to the few people they encountered, and no one questioned their presence. Twilight was gathering when they reached the courtyard-surrounding outbuilding that housed the heir's family.

An elderly male servant opened the door. Andreas cut off his greeting. "I must speak to your mistress, Chares. It's urgent."

"But, but," the old fellow sputtered, "the Lady Faustina is awaiting the return of the Noblissimus Ecdicius. We've received word that he has already entered the city . . ."

"What is it, Chares?" The voice was followed by Faustina herself, coming around a corner into the entrance hall followed by her three children. Andreas pushed past the outraged Chares with Sarnac in his wake. "Why, Andronicus! We didn't know you were in Constantinople! And this other gentleman . . . ?"

Faustina was younger than her husband—not uncommon, when a woman's life expectancy was considerably less than a man's provided that the latter avoided violent death. But she was in her late thirties, and had begun to put on weight as the women of this place and time tended to after a decade or two of repeated childbearing. Faustina had had another three children and buried them in early infancy, as was normal—so normal that for most of history people hadn't dared to let themselves become too attached to children.
Tylar once mentioned that in the late twentieth century, when it was first becoming possible to live like a human being, intellectuals used to bleat about the "dehumanizing" effect of advanced technology,
Sarnac recalled.
God, what silly jerk-offs they were in those days!

Still, Faustina remained a handsome woman, reflected in the slender eighteen-year-old replica who peeked over her shoulder and smiled at Andreas. The latter surprised Sarnac by not becoming tongue-tied.

"Lady Faustina, this is Bedwyr, a cavalry officer of your husband's staff."
Gee, not a hired bodyguard for once,
Sarnac thought.
Can it be that I'm picking up a little class?
"He's not in uniform because the Noblissimus Ecdicius and his escort have had to enter the city unnoticed," Andreas improvised freely. "We have reason to believe his life is in danger, now that the Divine Augustus is—I must speak bluntly—dying. The vultures are gathering, as must be expected. You know what this city is like."

"Oh, yes—
how
I know!" sighed the woman from the provinces.

"Is . . . is father all right?" Julia asked in a trembling voice. Eight-year-old Helena began to whimper, and ten-year-old Avitus strove to look like the man of the house.

"He is," Andreas assured them. "But he's sent Bedwyr to take all of you to a ship in the harbor, where he'll be meeting you soon. It's necessary for all of you to return to Italy."

"Leave Constantinople? With the Augustus on his deathbed?" Faustina shook her head in confusion. "Andronicus, what's your part in all this? I never knew you'd even
met
Ecdicius!"

Andreas was opening his mouth, and Sarnac was wondering what would come out of it, when a choked scream brought all their heads around to stare at old Chares, still standing in the doorway. He toppled forward, a dagger-hilt protruding from between his shoulder blades. The first of the bravos followed him through the door.

Sarnac and Andreas fumbled for their stunners, but the attackers swamped them. Andreas was clouted on the head and fell to his hands and knees. Sarnac managed to get the harmless-looking little rod out, only to have it knocked from his hand and sent spinning across the floor by a bravo who shoved him against a wall and levelled a short sword at his midriff. He forced calmness on himself and looked around the entrance hall, crowded with intruders. One stood over the slowly-recovering Andreas, idly swinging a cudgel. Three others had Faustina and her children backed into a corner. One of this group seemed to be the leader.

"What do we do with these two?" the man pointing the sword at Sarnac asked. The common Greek was one of the languages "Bedwyr" had picked up a smattering of in his mercenary days in the East.

"They may be wanted for questioning or something," the leader replied. "We'd better take them along with these." He indicated the three children and the woman trying to shield them.

"Nobody said anything about any big hurry to bring them back, did they?" another bravo asked with a leer in the direction of Helena. The child stood sucking her fingers in numb shock, as unable as her mother and siblings to understand a word of the gutter argot.

"Ah, you rotten bastard," the leader joshed indulgently. "Your crazy yen for young stuff has always gotten you in trouble! Now
there's
what a
real
man wants!" He swept the shrieking Faustina aside with one arm and lunged at Julia. "Come here, bitch!"

Julia screamed and twisted away from the groping hand. Avitus flung himself at the bravo, who smashed him aside with a backhand slap to the laughs and cheers of his comrades. Then he advanced, grinning, toward Julia, whose back was to a wall. Suddenly the girl's groping hand closed over a vase on a side-table. With a convulsive motion, she flung it at her tormentor's head. It missed him, but hit the man guarding Sarnac.

As the momentarily stunned bravo staggered, Sarnac kicked out at the short sword, sending it flying. Then he flung himself sideways and rolled along the floor toward his stun rod. He had just enough time after grabbing it to thrust it practically into the face of his nearest pursuer. Then he swept its beam across two others. As they collapsed in a heap, he had a split second to see that Andreas had revived and was grappling with the cudgel-wielding bravo, before the one remaining opponent got in under his stunner.

Sarnac let trained reflexes think for him. He dropped the useless stunner, blocked a blow with his left forearm and formed his right hand into a blade which he thrust into the man's solar plexus. As the bravo collapsed with a thin, whistling shriek, Sarnac clasped his hands behind his head and forced it down while bringing a knee up, hard. It was the man who'd indicated an interest in Helena. Sarnac brought his knee up twice more for good measure, feeling facial bones splinter. As he let the body fall to the floor, he saw Andreas release his grip from his motionless opponent's throat and stand up.

Helena's eyes were marbled with shock—hysteria might come later, but Sarnac was quite prepared to use the stunner. Julia stood against the wall, heaving as she sought to bring her breathing under control. Andreas ran to her, and in his arms she gave way to gasping sobs. Faustina looked up from Avitus, who was regaining consciousness, and gave Sarnac a calmer look than he would have believed possible.

"What
is
that?" she asked steadily, pointing at the stun rod.

"That's unimportant, Lady. At least, you don't need to know it just now. What you
do
need to do at once is get yourself and your children to our ship. Surely you can see now that there's no time to waste."

"Yes," she said matter-of-factly. "Come, children." She gathered them up and herded them out the door, shushing complaints of favorite toys left behind. Before the two of them left, Sarnac noted that Andreas gave each merely unconscious bravo a hard kick to the temple. He felt not even an abstract objection, though he would have rather left them to face their employers' displeasure at their failure.
Don't tell Andreas he's done them a favor,
he cautioned himself.
Why ruin his day?

As they proceeded through the darkling palace grounds, Sarnac reported to Tylar via implant communicator. "Oh, dear!" the time traveller exclaimed. "Was it
really
necessary to use the stunners? I fear that will take some explaining!"

"Tylar!" Sarnac saw Faustina's quizzical look and realized he'd spoken aloud. "We weren't exactly in a position to worry about 'intellectual contamination,' you know," he subvocalized. "It might have helped if you'd monitored us with your life-form sensor and let us know that those thugs were approaching!"

"Quite right, my dear fellow. I am in the process of remedying that omission even now." Sarnac could visualize the process, although he didn't pretend to understand it. The device Tylar was readying displayed on a small screen the returns generated as a byproduct by neural activity above a certain level. And it could tag the returns of individuals for whom it had a genetic scan—a simple, non-invasive matter for the time travellers' technology.

"Ah," came Tylar's voice after a moment. "Yes, I can identify you and Andreas, and the four with you. And . . . wait a moment." There was silence inside Sarnac's skull, then the voice resumed, this time in tones of repressed alarm. "I've also picked up the returns of Ecdicius and Sidonius, walking toward the Daphne Palace—they must have set out practically the instant Ecdicius arrived." Sarnac wondered how Tylar had obtained the genetic readings of heir and Pope, but he knew he'd get only evasion if he asked. "And seven unidentified individuals taking up positions alongside the pathway they're using! Robert, this is terrible—we weren't expecting matters to reach a crisis so quickly!"

Jesus Christ, what else can go wrong?
Sarnac chopped the thought off and subvocalized hurriedly. "Tylar, get a grip on yourself! Are we in a position to get to them before they reach the assassins, from where we are now?"

"No," Tylar replied. "But if you hurry you should be able to reach the location of the ambush shortly after they do."

"Give me the bearing."

"I'll do better. Turn about seventy degrees south of your present route." Sarnac stopped and did so, ignoring his companions' stares. A red dot seemed to appear in mid-air in front of his eyes. "I'm downloading data to your contact-lens display," Tylar explained. "As long as you're proceeding in the right direction, you'll see the dot. Send Ecdicius' family on ahead. I'll come as quickly as possible—I may be able to persuade Sidonius of the need for immediate flight."

"Faustina," Sarnac said aloud, "can you make it the rest of the way to the harbor?" He pointed ahead. The woman lacked his light-gathering contact lenses, but she could see the harbor lights through the trees. She nodded. "Good. Get the children down there—someone will meet you on the dock." He hoped they'd be too disoriented to recognize Artorius—this was
not
the time for lengthy explanations! "Andronicus and I have business, but we'll be along soon."

Faustina nodded again and shepherded the children along after a last eye-contact between Julia and Andreas. Sarnac slapped the latter on the shoulder, none too gently. "Come on! I'll explain as we go."

They ran through the gloom of the gardens, well-illuminated for them, and the ghostly dot seemed to constantly recede before Sarnac's eyes. Presently they heard shouts and clashing steel, and soon they saw Ecdicius hauling Sidonius away from the bravo he'd sapped with a rock and backing the two of them up against a tall thick hedge. Three bravos were on the ground, but four others closed in on the pair, clearly unconcerned by Sidonius' call for help.

Sarnac pulled out his stun rod. "Well, shall we?" Andreas nodded and they stepped forward.

Homer had sung of the "wine-dark sea," and Sarnac could see exactly what he'd meant as he looked into the swirling, foaming Aegean depths far below.

He stood on the footropes that the ever-practical Romans had first strung behind yards, and wrapped one arm around the swaying mast. The mainsail was taken up as per Corineus' orders and he could take a moment to gaze around from his high vantage, shielding his eyes from the Mediterranean sun with his free hand and letting the warm wind blow through his hair. The brilliance and clarity of the day, and the blueness of the sky, were just short of hurtful. Off the starboard bow he could glimpse Cape Sounion, its cliff topped by the white temple that was now in the first stages of the decay that would eventually leave only a few stark columns, lovingly preserved in his day because the worship of beauty had outlived that of Poseidon.

"Can we get down now?" Andreas pleaded. He stood on the other side of the mast, grasping the yard for dear life and resolutely not looking down at the ship—and the world—that seemed to swing back and forth like a pendulum. They had departed Constantinople in haste minus a couple of crew members, and when Sarnac had volunteered to help take up the slack the younger man had swallowed hard and stepped forward beside him. By now he'd learned enough to be useful, and his experience with other forms of motion sickness had helped ease him past his initial
mal de mer
. But he'd never like it.