Felix hesitated. For no reason he could name he had a terrible premonition.
Something was waiting inside for him.
Antonina’s guards? Excubitors? Porphyrius’ murderous Blues? Or something much worse?
He clutched at the chains around his neck. His fingers brushed past the cross and touched the amulet Anastasia had given him. The irrationality of his reaction shamed him, brought him back to his senses.
Inside Maria’s home a clay lamp burned atop a table made from an overturned crate. The body of a chariot served as a couch. The walls were draped with ragged, stained hangings.
Before Felix could assimilate all the details, Maria ushered them through another opening and into a smaller chamber, similarly lit by a guttering flame.
“Make yourselves comfortable,” she told the pair, with no hint of irony. “I will be back soon with something to eat.”
Felix blinked in the shifting light and fingered his amulet.
He glanced around and abruptly realized he was staring into two black, bottomless vortexes. The eyes in the stern face of the Christian’s crucified god.
His fingers left the amulet for the cross.
Chapter Fifty-four
As the day passed the icon’s baleful stare never wavered.
Or at any rate Felix hoped and believed the day was passing. How much time had gonne by he couldn’t say. Now it seemed an eternity, now only a few heartbeats.
As a young soldier he had often waited for battle, sometimes in the darkness of a tent, other times in the open under night skies. Now he felt the same unbearable tension, every muscle in his body, every thought, screaming to get on with the fight, to be done with it, to feel the sweet relief of victory or perhaps to feel nothing at all ever again. But at least to have it over.
The future was always more frightening than the present. The present you grappled with as best you could. The future was a mocking, unreachable phantom.
But this waiting was worse because Felix did not know what it was he waited for. What sort of fight? Or would he have any chance to fight?
Felix tried not to stare at the icon, an image of Christ painted on a plank by an amateur hand. It had been half consumed by fire. The face wore a pointed beard, as black as the charred edges of the plank. The thin-lipped mouth evidenced cruelty and the enormous eyes were demonic in the flickering lamplight. Anastasia insisted her god looked into men’s souls. This god seemed to be skewering Felix’s soul. His head pounded.
“It’s such a comfort to me,” came Maria’s voice from the doorway. “It reminds me that He is forever looking after us.”
The bear-keeper had brought bread, cheese, and olives, along with a jug of wine. Felix thanked her. Perhaps if he got something into his stomach his headache would go away. Was it from being kicked or from the sleeping potion Antonina had slipped him?
“I found the icon shamefully abandoned in the ruins of a burnt house.” Maria tapped the dented jug from which she had poured wine into a pair of mismatched ceramic cups. “The same place I found this jug.”
“The authorities tend to frown on upon theft,” Felix noted
“Theft? Rescuing useful items, you mean. Anyway, Hercules loves taking walks with me and no one seems to care if we pick up an item or two along the way.”
“You take a bear out into the streets?”
“On a chain, naturally.”
Recalling the animal cages they had passed, Felix supposed Hercules could use the exercise. “Apes,” he said. The story of the watchman at Theodora’s mausoleum had come into his thoughts. “Do you have apes?”
“We had an ape, but it escaped. Don’t look so alarmed. That was years ago. The ape’s long dead by now, or else married a rich woman and became a senator.” She gave a hearty guffaw.
In speaking to her, Felix noticed the colorful wall hanging behind her shoulder. It showed several angels in flight. “Did you find that in a burnt-out building as well?”
“Oh, no. My girls sent that to me. The sisters, you know. They have never forgotten their old friend Maria. I refused to let them be put out on the street. Imagine the cruelty of the Greens, refusing to help the family of their own bear-keeper after he died so untimely. The Blues will show they are better than that, I said. And so we did. Not that we were not benefited. The girls turned out to be splendid performers.”
Indeed, their performances were the subject of a thousand salacious rumors, some of which might even be true, Felix thought.
“They often sent me gifts,” Maria continued. “Alas, poor Theodora has left us already.”
“Maybe not,” muttered Dedi, who had been keeping silent.
Maria glanced at him with grim disapproval before turning her attention back to Felix. “I am happy to find you so much better. When I looked in before you were dozing and muttering about strange events. I fear you may have a demon inside you, sir, contending for your soul. I have been praying and I am sure you are doing the same.”
Felix grunted in a noncommittal manner.
Maria smiled at the icon. “You could not have come to a better refuge, unless it were the Great Church. Our Lord will surely expel any evil creatures that dare to come within His sight.” She frowned at Dedi again. “I will leave you and your servant alone for now. If you should kill any rats, I collect them for Hercules, so throw them into the box beside the outer door.” She lumbered away.
Felix squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them the icon was still glaring at him. Or was it glaring at an evil creature inside him? “Did I doze off?” he asked Dedi.
“Yes. Probably you are still feeling the effects of whatever Antonina put you to sleep with. She could as easily have put you to sleep forever. You’ve been lucky.”
“Lucky. That’s my name, isn’t it?”
Or was he only slow-witted? Maybe he should have taken Antonina’s offer. He’d have been safely away from Constantinople. Dedi was right, if she had wanted to kill him he’d already be dead. What would be the point of ordering her servants to kill him before they reached the city gates when it could have been done in private at her house?
Well, Felix was often a step behind. But it didn’t matter so long as you kept going. If your opponent stopped before the end of the race, you’d end up ahead. Still, Felix wished his head would stop pounding. Would Julius Caesar have crossed the Rubicon if he’d had a bad headache that day?
“Don’t excite yourself,” Dedi said. “Whatever vile potion Antonina’s given you will take hold of your thoughts if you let them get out of control.”
“You know a lot about such potions?”
“I studied much ancient lore when I lived in Egypt. How do you think I pass by guards as though I were invisible? A bit of powder in their wine, or tossed into the air and they are oblivious to the world.”
“Do you have a powder that will tell me what to do next instead of sitting here, rotting away in this dark hole while half the city is hunting me?”
“I have explained how I shall bring Theodora back to save us.”
“It seems to me you’ve already failed twice. An Egyptian amulet and frogs! Why frogs?”
“Because frogs are sacred to the frog-headed goddess Heqt, who represents resurrection. Just as scarabs are involved with resurrection.”
“But they didn’t work to resurrect the empress.”
Dedi’s mouth puffed in and out in annoyance. “It is more efficacious to place the scarab directly on the body, which I could not do. Also, I stood on a frog. Since they were sacred in Egypt at one time that was a capital crime. I hope I have not offended the goddess.”
Felix shook his head. “I’d hate to be hanged for a frog. I saved your life, Dedi. The least you can do is tell me the truth even if nobody else will!”