I looked over toward Justinian's head. His eyes were still open, but they were just dull glass. A fly was walking on one of them. I said, "He raised you up, too, Helias, and you bit his hand."
"He would have taken my head if I hadn't," he said. "You love him too well, Myakes- I don't want you running around loose. But I don't quite have the stomach to kill you, not when you did do something, anyhow, to make his evils less. I'll throw you in a monastery, and take your eyes to make sure you don't come out."
"If that's what you've got in mind, I'd sooner you did kill me," I told him.
He didn't listen. He didn't have to listen, not to the likes of me. He gave the orders, and his bully boys dragged me off to take care of 'em. It wasn't what you'd call a fancy job. They didn't bother with silver bowls and boiling vinegar, the way the executioner had with Felix. They hauled me over to a fire and heated up a couple of skewers, the kind you'd use to roast meat. Then one of them got a thick leather gauntlet from somewhere, grabbed a skewer, and burned out my left eye with it. He did that one first because it was on his right side, I guess.
What do you mean, what did I do? I did just what you'd think. I screamed and did my damnedest to get away, only I couldn't. Did it hurt? You bet your balls it hurt! It hurt worse than anything else that's ever happened to me. Then the fellow with the leather glove got the other red-hot skewer out of the fire. The very last thing I ever saw, Brother Elpidios, through the tears that were streaming down my face, was that glowing iron, coming right at me.
I heard the fellow who'd blinded me throw down the gauntlet. "Off to a monastery with him," he said, "and better than he deserves, too."
"Ahh, Myakes wasn't so bad," one of the others said, like I was dead instead of just wishing I was. "Here's his knapsack. Let him take it along." He must have opened it then, I suppose to see if anything in there was worth stealing. He saw the codex. "What's he doing with a book?"
The one who'd stuck skewers in my eyes- ugly bastard; I remember that, oh yes I do- he laughed like a jackal. "Who cares? He can keep it- it'll give him something to read." He thought that was the funniest thing in the world, and so did all his stinking chums.
But that's how Justinian's book got here, Brother Elpidios, in case you ever wondered. That's how you finally got to read it, even if I never have.
What can I say? The book is done. My story's done, because I haven't had any story to speak of since I came here. It's been the same thing over and over and over, and it'll keep on being the same thing till they wrap me in a shroud and lay me in the grave. I suppose, for a man with no eyes, it's better that way. No story, no, but no surprises, either.
And Justinian's done. Maybe it's better that way, too. I don't know. Justinian, he was nothing but surprises. For better and for worse, you never knew what he'd do next. Whatever it was, he went at it hard as he could. If he'd been better at choosing… ahhh, if he'd been better at choosing, he wouldn't have been Justinian.
And now that you've read the whole book and you've heard everything I've got to say about it, I suppose we're done, too, eh, Brother Elpidios? Brother? Are you there, Brother?
ELPIDIOS
I, Elpidios, the sinful monk, set down these words on the last leaf of the codex in which the Emperor Justinian recorded the deeds of his life, reckoning up and arranging what occurred in each period thereof without confusion, so that the reader might at once understand what events, whether warlike or ecclesiastical or of any other sort, occurred at any time during the Emperor's life on earth.
Not ignorant of my own lack of knowledge and paucity of expression, I hesitate now in the task I had previously set myself, of adding the events recounted in this life to the chronicle of the history of the world I have been contemplating. I hesitate also because of the multitude and variety of sins Justinian showed forth during his lifetime, sins of which any reader might better be left unaware.
For, as I think, in most circumstances one enjoys no small aid in reading of the deeds of those long ago. If I should write such a book and anyone was to find therein anything useful, he ought to give the appropriate thanks to God and pray for the Lord's aid to my lack of knowledge and sinfulness. Though I may be guilty in this regard of ignorance and of the laziness of a groveling mind, I think I shall set aside this life of Justinian, on the grounds that separating sin from virtue in the said life is beyond my poor talents. Let this codex go on a shelf in the monastic library, in the hope that, some day, a man with greater talent than mine may find for it a fitting use.
If I do come to write my chronicle, I shall craft it from sources more malleable and more in accordance with my own judgment and understanding. The Lord will surely forgive my errors, for working according to one's ability is pleasing to God. Amen.
HISTORICAL NOTE
Justinian II was born in 669 (or perhaps 668). He became Roman (as he styled himself) or Byzantine (as we would be more likely to call him) Emperor on the death of his father, Constantine IV, in 685, was ousted from the throne by Leontios in 695, regained it by overcoming Tiberius III Apsimaros in 705, and was again overthrown- and this time killed- by the forces of Bardanes Philippikos in 711.
Along with Justinian, the following people appearing in Justinian are actual historical personages: Abimelekh (Abd al-Malik, caliph, 685-705), Agathon (pope, 678-681), Anastasia, Apsimaros (Tiberius III- Emperor, 698-705), Arculf, Asparukh, Balgitzin, Bardanes Philippikos (Emperor, 711-713), Barisbakourios, Bas il (bishop of Gortyna), Benedict II (pope, 684-685), Boniface, Christopher, Constantine (pope, 708-715), Constantine IV (Emperor, 668-685), Cyrus (patriarch, 705-712[?]), Daniel, Epiphaneia (name fictional), Eudokia, Felix, Florus, George, George I (patriarch, 679-686), George the Syrian, Gregory the Kappadokian, Helias, Herakleios (Apsimaros's brother), Herakleios (Constantine IV's son), Herakleios (Constantine IV's brother), Ibouzeros Gliabanos, John (admiral), John (archbishop of Cyprus), John (bishop of Portus), John (eparch of the city), John Pitzigaudis, John Strouthos, John the cook (name fictional), John V (patriarch, 669-675), Kallinikos, Kallinikos I (patriarch, 694-705), Kyprianos, Kyriakos, Leo II (pope, 682-683), Leo (Leo III, Emperor, 717-741), Leo (mint functionary), Leontios (Emperor, 695-698), Makarios, Mauias (Muawiyah I- caliph, 661-680), Mauros, Moropaulos, Mouamet (Muhammad- Abimelekh's brother), Myakes, Neboulos, Nikephoros the patrician, Oualid (Walid I- caliph, 705-715), Papatzun, Patrikios Klausus, Paul (the monk), Paul III (patriarch, 688-694), Paul the magistrianos, Petronas, Polykhronios, Sabbatios, Sergios (officer), Sergios I (pope, 687-701), Sergios of Damascus, Sisinnios (pope, 708), Stephen the exarch, Stephen the patrician, Stephen the Persian, Stephen/Salibas, Tervel, Theodore I (patriarch, 677-679), Theodore of Koloneia, Theodore the patrician, Theodotos, Theophilos, Theophylaktos, Tiberius (Constantine IV's brother), Tiberius (Justinian II's son), Tzitzak/Theodora, Zachariah, Zoe (Helias's wife: name fictional), Zolos.
In addition, the following persons mentioned in the novel but dead before the time in which it is set are historicaclass="underline" Athalaric, Constans II (Emperor, 641-668), Constantine I (Emperor, 306-337), Eudokia (Herakleios's daughter), Herakleios (Emperor, 610-641), Herakleios Constantine (Emperor, 641), Heraklonas (Emperor, 641), Honorius I (pope, 625-638), John (bishop of Thessalonike), Justinian I (Emperor, 527-565), Kosmas, Leontios, Martin I (pope, 649-655), Martina, Maurice (Emperor, 582-602), Maximus the Confessor, Menander Protector, Mouamet (Muhammad), Paul II (patriarch, 64l-654), Peter (patriarch, 655-666), Phokas (Emperor, 602-610), Pyrrhos I (patriarch, 638-641, 655), Septimius Severus (Emperor, 193-211), Sergios (patriarch, 610-638). All others, including Brother Elpidios, are fictitious.