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brightly colored sack from under his arm, preparing to present it as custom required.
    “She will be pleased to see you in her private reception room,” said the slave, taking care not to look at him directly, or the gift he carried.
    “Thank you,” Sanct’ Germain said as he handed her a silver coin. He climbed the narrow stairs quickly, and stepped into the central hall of the house. The private reception room was on the left; he paused before entering the room.
    Viridia sat on an upholstered bench near the fireplace; she was dressed in Byzantine splendor; her dalmatica of mulberry silk and fine woollen palla were heavily embroidered with gold thread, and her elaborate gold earrings—gifts from Sanct’ Germain—set off her lovely face and russet hair. She had been waiting for him, and now she smiled, extending her arms to him without rising. “I did not know whether or not you would come,” she said, chiding him gently.
    “Nor did I,” he responded with more candor than she had expected. “The Praetorius is making matters difficult for me just now.”
    “I had heard something of that,” she said, still waiting for him to approach her.
    Finally Sanct’ Germain went to her, and made a proper presentation of the sack. “I regret only that this is not sufficiently fine for you,” he said, as good manners required.
    “I am sure you honor me too much,” she said, equally formulaically. “I am humbled by your high opinion.” Taking the sack, she opened it, and for the first time her smile was wholly genuine. “Oh,
oh,
Sanct’ Germain, it’s beautiful. Where did you ever get such silk?” she exclaimed as she ran her hands over it. “Let me look at it,” she went on before he could answer.
    “I brought it from the other side of the world,” he said, recalling his long journey on the Old Silk Road.
    She laughed as she spread out the shining fabric, measuring it with care. “There are lengths and
lengths
of it,” she approved as she caressed the silk as she spread it out around her. “Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you.” Wrapping herself in the fabric, she flung herself into his arms. “This is wonderful.
Wonderful.
” She kissed his chin. “How did you know to bring me this?”
    “You have said you like silk,” he said indulgently.
    “Well, yes; who does not?” She slipped away from him, almost dancing. “I will have the most
beautiful
dalmatica made from it. I have fifteen gold coins that can be sewn into a tablion for it. That would be magnificent.”
    “I am pleased you are satisfied with my gift,” he said, making her a reverence.
    “I am
delighted,
” she told him as she came back to his side. “You make me sad that you are leaving.”
    Sanct’ Germain shrugged. “I am not wholly jubilant about it, either,” he said, his eyes enigmatic. “But it would not be wise for me to remain. It would be dangerous for you, as well.”
    “The Praetorius is not interested in women like me,” she said, dismissing his concern. “If I sold myself in the marketplace, he might imprison me, but I am discreet, I have only a few lovers and I see them here. What danger is there in that?”
    “There could be, if the Praetorius believed you were . . .” His voice trailed off as he watched Viridia gather up the silk he had given her, put it into a chest against the wall, and then begin to remove her palla. “The Praetorius is not the only danger you face.”
    She let the palla drift to the floor. “If you mean the Episcus, I do not fear him.”
    “No,” he said as she slowly shrugged out of her dalmatica, letting it puddle around her feet in a shimmering mass; now all she wore were her felt house-shoes and her earrings. “I mean that I can be dangerous to you, that even if I were not leaving this place, it would not be wise for me to continue to . . . visit you.”
    “What nonsense you talk,” she said as she stepped out of the pool of silk and came toward him. “You have done nothing to