But I heard more shouting behind me, and I forced myself up on hands and knees to crawl across the void that separated me from the far building. Other slats disintegrated as I passed over them. I thought, the whole way, I’d tip over or go through. I focused on the slats a foot in front of my nose and did my best not to see the impossible distance they kept me from falling. Men shouted from the building I’d left. Because no one dared follow me, the cries grew fainter as I made my way steadily forward. Below in the yard Simon was in sight again and was ordering men into the far building.
I’d not be staying in the far building. I pushed past a couple of curious boys and an old woman, who’d woken from their siesta, and made for the next walkway. I was already a quarter across it and wondering if the next building would allow a choice of further escapes, when on the far side two men with the dark beards of Syrians stepped forward from the shade and raised their swords in silent warning.
I turned back. I was still on the last slats when another man appeared in front of me. ‘You’re going nowhere, my lad!’ he snarled. He spoke to an accompaniment of approaching feet on the stairs. ‘You’ll come quietly if you know what’s good for you.’ He would have spoken more. But I now had my sword out. As he went for his own, I lunged forward and ran him through in the lower belly. I got up unsteadily, grabbed him by his beard and kicked him downstairs. Screaming and tumbling head over heels as he went, he crashed into more men who’d been hurrying up to join him. I was having a good day with the body on the staircase blocking move!
I turned back to the walkway. One of the men at the far end had a better sense of balance than I had and was already halfway towards me. I wheeled about and looked frantically for some other escape. I could go up the last flight of stairs to the roof but I didn’t expect there to be any way off that. I could hear more men coming upstairs to join the two who were untangling themselves from the dying man I’d thrown at them. I went down a step and slashed at them with my sword. They fell back and looked round for the approaching support. I put my sword away and jumped back to the entrance to the walkway. I bent down and took hold of the two ropes that secured all the slats. I lifted and pulled them, and watched the Syrian I’d surprised throw himself forward to catch hold of the walkway. I pulled again and sent an undulating motion towards him. He missed his hold and fell headfirst, screaming all the way. He landed in a mass of filth and, alive though injured, cried piteously for help. His colleague stepped back to safety and waved his sword again.
‘Simon wants me alive,’ I said softly in a voice that shook like sobs. ‘He wants me alive.’ I waited for the swaying walkway to stabilise, then made myself get down again on all fours and crawl carefully forward. The seam of my inner tunic had split and its silk was slithering down my forearms. If only I’d been brave enough to lift my hands off the ropes, I’d have pulled it free and sent it billowing towards the ground — even in the state I’d put it, it was another windfall for some lucky pauper.
I was ten feet away from the building I’d left, when I heard Simon’s voice behind me. ‘And does My Lord think he’ll get very far?’ he sneered.
Chapter 29
I stopped and sat astride the walkway. As Simon barked an order at the man far behind me, I swung my legs until no one with any sense in his head would have dared follow. The ropes creaked alarmingly and there was a sound of snapping wood far behind me. I pretended not to hear this. ‘Hello, Simon,’ I said with a bright smile. ‘Do you fancy joining me? You get a lovely view from out here.’
He looked at the swaying walkway and moved back a step. ‘You can’t stay on that thing forever,’ he said with a nasty smile of his own. ‘You might as well make it easy for all of us. You have the power to make this a very civilised transaction. If you come over and take my hand, you can seal a note to your secretary telling him where the object is and directing him to bring it to us. You can then go free. If you want to make it hard for yourself, I can send a message of my own — wrapped about your left hand.’ He brought out a villainous laugh and looked round to make sure his men had heard him.
‘Either way, you’d have to wait for a reply,’ I said. ‘You see, my secretary’s on Lesbos at the moment. I doubt he’ll be back till June at the earliest.’ I pulled off the rags of my inner tunic and used it to wipe my sweaty face. I looked at the dirt and another man’s blood that I left on it. I found a cleaner patch of silk and wiped again. Like a spider at the centre of its web, I felt the walkway shake slightly behind me. I kicked my legs and leaned sideways and back. There was a cry of alarm but no horrified wail. More to the point, the shaking stopped. I looked at Simon. I could have sworn he’d gone up the night before like a bundle of rags soaked in pitch. Such a pity he’d been put out in time! Then again, his beard was singed right out of shape and there was none of it left under his chin. He wasn’t dead or even seriously injured. But I could hope he was in roaring pain under his robe.
‘Tell me, Simon,’ I asked, ‘how you forged that note from my own people so quickly and so convincingly. I’ll grant I was stupid not to have had a closer look. But it really was an impressive production.’
‘You don’t owe Heraclius your life,’ he said. ‘You don’t owe him anything. Come off that thing before it collapses.’ I smiled at him and set the walkway swaying again. He scowled, then rearranged his face into a smile of his own. ‘See reason, Alaric,’ he pleaded. ‘Once he’s back from Cyzicus, do you think the Emperor will be grateful for any of this? You know things you have no business to know. Consult your own best interest, and join us.’
At last the man had come out with something worth listening to. What was I supposed to do with the cup? ‘Here you are, Caesar,’ I was supposed to say when Heraclius got home. ‘Here’s evidence of the one crime that could get you deposed. And, by the by, I think Nicetas has been plotting to get the Purple for himself.’ At best, that might get me a room of my own in the Fortified Monastery. At the worst — well, if he was no Phocas, Heraclius did order summary executions now and again. And who would dare put in a good word for me? Who’d want to?
On the other hand, why shouldn’t Simon go back to Plan A once I’d given him the cup? The only doubt would be whether he or one of him men would put a knife into my back. But I did listen while he explained the obvious. I glanced down at the yard, and found myself begin very gently to waver.
Bloody fool Simon, though — he’d not seen the effect of his words. While I still sat looking down, and feeling progressively more queasy at the distance between me and the ground, he went and spoiled the effect. ‘I saw you touch the Horn of Babylon yesterday,’ he said with an upward stab of both arms. ‘Did the old ones tell you what that means?’ He laughed and stared away from me. ‘I’ll tell you what it means. You have six days before the full horror descends upon you. Give it to me while you still have time. You can’t wait for Heraclius to come back. You must pass it to someone else before the seven days’ grace is up.’