"Then I do request it. I am not wanton." She went to the low pallet which had served as her bed. "Will Belisarius be notified?"
"He has been already," Captain Vlamos confessed. "I sent him word myself. He requested it—"
"You needn't apologize," Olivia told him with a faint smile. "I'm grateful to you." There was a very slim chance, she thought, that Belisarius would inform Niklos, and if Niklos learned of her fate, he would do everything he could think of to aid her.
"It's not enough for gratitude," Captain Vlamos said, not able to look at her. "If it had been up to me, I would not have issued the orders. It was the Censor's doing. He had to prove to Belisarius—"
"I know," Olivia said, cutting him short. "And he certainly has. At least Simones didn't escape; that's something."
"The Emperor would not—" Captain Vlamos began, then broke off. "Belisarius has filed three petitions on your behalf. He has said that all the charges against you are lies and that it is only the self-serving interests of those close to Justinian that have made it possible for this to happen." He looked at Olivia with remorse. "They would not permit me to testify."
Olivia did her best to look unconcerned. "It was good of you to make the offer. There are many others who would not, who did not."
"Do you blame them?" Captain Vlamos asked.
"Not really," Olivia said. There was an unreality to her situation. After so many, many years, she could not make herself comprehend that it was ending. This time it would be the true death, not that other. The five centuries she had survived were over. She shook her head at the idea; it was not possible.
"Great lady?" said Captain Vlamos.
"It's nothing," Olivia responded. "I… was remembering. There won't be much more time for memories, will there?"
"If it had been my decision, you would have left this place the day we brought you here." He paused. "I knew Captain Drosos before he went to Alexandria. He told about you, a little, and I thought he was a very lucky man."
Olivia lowered her head. "Thank you, Captain. And when Drosos returned, what then?"
"He was not himself," Captain Vlamos said with difficulty.
"Yes." She turned away, but said, "If you know where he is, tell him what happened, will you? If Belisarius does, it will be too painful for him. You need not say more than a few words. You might mention that I would never forget him." Then she shook her head. "No; don't say that. It would only trouble him."
"Great lady, I will be back… shortly." He was finding it impossible to speak.
"I will be here, Captain Vlamos." Her hopes were fading, but she was determined not to let him know it. She stared at the locked door when he left, as if the power of her eyes alone could open it. Then she lay back on the pallet and let her thoughts drift.
When had it been, that time when she was convinced she would die? Three hundred years ago? Commodus or Servius called himself Caesar then; Olivia was living in Ravenna, and there had been a riot. The reason for the riot escaped her, and she could not bring it to mind. She had been trying to return from the emporia where she was expecting goods to be delivered. She was by herself in an open chariot, and when the crowd began to throw rocks, she had been more worried for her horses than herself. And then she saw two men dragged from their chariots and trampled, reduced to a terrible flattened smear on the cobbles, and she knew that unless she was very careful and unusually lucky, she would suffer the same fate. She had pulled the chariot to the side of the road and cut the harness. She had ridden her lead horse through the streets at a gallop, her legs holding tight and her hands holding both reins and mane in a tangle. She had been cut and bruised, but she had escaped. If Niklos had not taught her how to handle horses so well, she would have been lost.
There would be no chariot, no horse for her now. She was facing water, the one irresistible force. At least, she thought in ironic consolation, it would be night, and they would let her keep her shoes, so that she would be able to swim, at least for a little while. Eventually she would lose strength, and when the sun rose, it would sap her vitality, and she would sink, to lie in the depths, paralyzed by the water.
As she forced her mind to other thoughts, she became aware of a distant voice singing one of the chants of Saint Ambrose. She listened to the droning melody with half her attention, and then sat up, for the first time realizing what the text of the chant was: "Lord God lend Your protection to those who venture on the deep waters." A single spurt of laughter escaped her before she was able to control that impulse, and she chided herself for clinging to forlorn dreams. The chant was repeated, and this time Olivia took heart from it.
"I am… not dead." The sound of her words in the little room startled her; she sounded resolute, determined. "All right," she said, "until the crabs nibble my toes, I—"
The distant chant changed to one in praise of the Virgin Mary and began with the words "Magna Mater."
"Very well, Niklos," Olivia said to the dim light of the little window. "I will not succumb yet." She stretched out on the pallet, her apprehension and fear belied by her apparent languor.
By the time Captain Vlamos returned, she had worked out a skeleton of a plan. It was so inauspicious that at another time she might have found it absurd; now she hoped that she would have enough good fortune to attempt it.
"Are you… prepared?" Captain Vlamos was more upset this time than he had been earlier.
"I hope so," said Olivia, getting to her feet unsteadily.
Captain Vlamos reached out to her, pity in his heart. He let Olivia lean against him. "You have courage, great lady, but there is no shame in faltering at a time like this."
"You're very kind, Captain," she said, stepping back to adjust the single wide sash she had tied around her waist. The little ornamental dagger she had removed from his belt was concealed as swiftly and as efficiently as she had taken it. "Do you have the sack with you?"
"It is in the rear courtyard." He indicated the two torches in the hall. "You will have a full escort that far; two of my men will walk with us."
"But you are in no danger from me," she said pleasantly. "I do not know my way about this place. If I escaped I would not know where to go, and most likely you would need to find someone who would help me while I was lost." She went ahead of him into the hall. "Tell me one thing if you can, Captain Vlamos."
"If I can," he agreed.
"I left writs of manumission for my slaves—have they been honored?"
"Belisarius has petitions with the magistrates. It is assumed that they will be granted. That way there will be fewer questions asked about… this." He signaled the soldiers'to fall in, one ahead of and one behind them.
"That pleases me," said Olivia truthfully. No matter what happened to her, she wanted to believe that she had treated her slaves the way a Roman matron ought to. Especially Zejhil, she added to herself, for her loyalty and bravery.
"Is there anything… you want me to say? To anyone?" Captain Vlamos could not look at her as he extended this offer.
"Tell Belisarius that I know he has done more than anyone could expect of him, and that I thank him for what he has done. There is no one else in… Constantinople I wish to bid farewell." She did not try to keep track of the turns the soldiers took, nor the placement of doors and halls. No matter what happened to her, she would never return to this place.
By the time they reached the rear courtyard, Captain Vlamos was visibly distressed. "You do not have to sew her in until just before you throw her overboard," he told the men who waited for them. "Let her have that at least. She is not a sack of onions."
The naval officer, an old man with a puckered scar where most of his ear should have been, shrugged. "If the orders don't say otherwise, it's all one to me."