The Curse of Babylon by Richard Blake Read Free Book Online Page B

was currently a day past my twenty-fifth – that is, I was one day into my manhood, as these things are counted under the laws of the Empire. Of course, it had been a quiet joke throughout the City. But, if an emperor doesn’t notice or object, why should anyone else – in public, that is? I was only now eligible for the increasingly exalted offices I’d been occupying these past few years. Someone was having a laugh at me.
    I looked for support at the bizarre and probably impossible act Tiberius was committing on the far wall with a dolphin. No support there today. I looked again at the cup. It screamed every possible expense, tinged with an odd sense of humour. Who could have sent it? Heraclius? This was the sort of joke Emperors played on their friends. But it couldn’t be Heraclius. He had no visible sense of humour. Besides, he was a hundred miles away in Cyzicus, consulting some smelly old monks on pillars about how to beat the Persians. Even granting he’d discovered a playful side to his nature, he had other things on his mind. I gave up on questions. Doubtless, someone important would come up to me later in the day and give me a knowing slap on the back.
    I felt a returning trickle of moisture into my mouth and was able to stand forward. By now, the adoration of my gift had run its course. I gave my present back to the Master of the Timings and sat down. I closed my eyes for a moment. When you have a Secret, of course, any mention of secrets will set you off. This was hardly the first panic attack I’d had in the past year. But it was the oddest. None other had faded so fast without opium or cannabis to knock it on the head. If only I could think what to do about their cause . . .
    I leaned forward. ‘Let’s hear the petitioners in their own right,’ I said to the Listings Clerk, almost forgetting to hush my voice. I glanced over to where they’d been placed at the back of the hall. Dressed in shabby brown, they had been gawping all morning at a slow, heavy ceremonial they’d never guess had been laid on for their benefit. They were already being brought forward, when the Master of the Timings staggered over and tapped one on the head with his staff. He hissed something frantic at the Listings Clerk and opened his mouth so wide for air that I thought his false teeth would crash on to the floor. ‘I said to get those men forward!’ I snapped. The Master of the Timings shook his head, and the Listings Clerk stepped sideways, knocking over a basket of documents.
    ‘You can’t hear unlisted petitions while there is any other business,’ the Master of the Timings cried in a soft panic. ‘It’s listed petitions, then other business – and only then unlisted petitions.’ He leaned harder on his staff and rolled his eyes back till only the whites were visible. ‘It was ever thus,’ he whispered.
    ‘Oh, indeed, My Lord,’ the Listings Clerk added in the tone of one who reminds a child that the sun doesn’t set till dusk. ‘It was ever thus – from the very creation of the world.’
    ‘Then get on with it!’ I groaned. I knew I was making one of those surrenders even emperors make when eunuchs close ranks. But it was that or let everything fall into chaos.
    Looking relieved, the Master of the Timings turned and raised his voice. ‘A letter from His Magnificence the Lord Senator Nicetas, Commander of the East,’ he trilled in a fair approximation of his usual manner. A bearded messenger came forward and scowled at the pool of sunlight that was moving steadily down one of the columns. I’d been idly watching him all morning. He’d looked as impatient as I felt. He now took his place at a special lectern that set him at right angles to me and the crowd, and waited for the golden bell to be rung three times to indicate the quality of his employer. This done, he held out his knife and, with a dramatic flourish, slit the cords of the scroll he’d been wearing round his neck. He arranged his heavy