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They spoke politely of trivial matters until finally Zoe mentioned that she had been badly burned in an accident. She told how A
From then on, the conversation was less comfortable. Helena was sharp, walking across the room with an exaggeratedly graceful movement as if to display her youth in front of the two older women. She did not even glance at Demetrios, but she might as well have stared at him. It was for his attention; she clearly did not care in the least what A
Suddenly, A
She saw Zoe looking at her with bright, clever eyes. Too much understanding.
The conversation turned to religion, as sooner or later every conversation in Byzantium did. Helena had no particular faith, which was clear from her ma
She listened to them, averting her eyes slightly so as not to be noticed.
“Very tedious,” Zoe said with a shrug. “But it all comes to money, in the end.” She was looking at Eirene.
Helena looked from her mother to Eirene and back again. “With Bessarion, it was the faith, pure and simple,” she contradicted.
Eirene’s face flickered with impatience, but she kept it in check. “To organize a faith and keep it alive you need a Church, and to keep a Church you need money, my dear.” The words were gentle, even affectionate, but there was a condescension in them of the highly intelligent to the intellectually shallow. “And to defend a city we need both faith and armaments. Since the Venetians stole our relics we have far fewer pilgrims, even since our return in 1262. And most of the silk trade has gone to Arabia, Egypt, and Venice. Trade may be tedious to you, and perhaps to many of those who buy the artifacts, the games, and the fabrics. Perhaps you find blood messy, it smells ugly, it soils the linen, it attracts flies-but try living without it.”
Helena wrinkled her nose in slight revulsion at the simile, but she did not dare argue.
Amusement flashed in Zoe’s eyes. “Eirene understands finances better than most men do,” she observed, not entirely with kindness. “In fact, I have sometimes wondered if Theodorus Doukas really runs the Treasury, or if it is you, most discreetly, of course.”
Eirene smiled, a faint flush in her sallow cheeks. A
Conspicuously, Helena said nothing.
A
“Do we bore you with our talk of doctrine and politics?” Zoe asked her. “Perhaps we should ask Demetrios for some tales of his Varangian Guard? Colorful men, from all sorts of barbarous places. Lands where the sun shines at midnight in the summer, and it is dark all winter long.”
“One or two of them,” Demetrios agreed. “Others are from Kiev, or Bulgaria, or the principalities of the Danube, or the Rhine.”
Zoe shrugged. “You see?”
A
“Well, if you’ve learned that, I suppose you have achieved something,” Helena said waspishly.
Zoe did not hide her laughter, but there was a crackle of ice in her voice when she turned to Helena. “Your tongue is sharper than your mind, my dear,” she said softly. “Anastasius knows how to dissemble, and mask his intelligence with humility. You would do well to learn the same trick. It is not always wise to appear clever.” She blinked. “Even if you were.”
Eirene smiled, then instantly looked away, and the moment after, A
Helena was talking again, looking at Demetrios.
Antoninus might have loved her because he alone could find the tenderness in her. A
A
“He is begi
“Yes,” Eirene said tersely.
A
Zoe seemed amused. “Is he still in Alexandria? I see no reason for him to remain there now. Or does he believe we are going to be decimated by the Latins again? I never knew him to care a jot about the intricacies of religion.”
“Really?” Eirene said with raised eyebrows, her brilliant eyes ice cold. “But then perhaps you did not know him nearly as well as you imagined.”
The color was brighter in Zoe’s cheeks. “Perhaps not,” she agreed. “We had some wonderful conversations, but I ca
“Hardly the circumstances conducive to matters of the spirit,” Eirene agreed. She turned to look at Demetrios again. “Yes, he does look like his father,” she said. “A pity you did not have a son… by any of your… lovers.”
Zoe’s face tightened as if she had been slapped. “I would not advise allowing Demetrios to admire Helena too much,” she said softly, in little more than a whisper. “It could be… unfortunate.”
Eirene lost the last trace of blood from beneath her skin. She stared at Zoe, then turned with a freezing look to A
Helena looked at her mother, appeared to consider picking a quarrel over the issue, and decided better of it. “So much for your further clientele,” she said to A
A
She spent a long evening turning over and over in her mind what bound these people together who seemed to have so little in common. A
The following morning was Sunday, and she walked alone to the Hagia Sophia to attend the Mass. She wanted to be where neither Simonis nor Leo could see her or question her mood. Perhaps the glory of the building and the power of the familiar words would comfort her, remind her of the certainties that mattered.
On the steps almost in the shadow of the dome, she nearly bumped into Zoe. It was impossible to avoid her without being both rude and slightly absurd.