King's Man Read Online Free PDF Page B

them fair and square. We burned them to cinders with the Fire. They never knew what hit them. Less than a hundred of them returned home. It was a massacre. My grandfather told me that burned bodies were washing up on the shore, and you could smell the stench of burned flesh . . .' At that moment he must have remembered how Pelagia's husband had died, for his voice trailed away in embarrassment and he looked down at his feet before finding an excuse to turn away and attend to the display on his stall.
    I was about to ask Pelagia what the man had meant by 'the Fire', when I heard my name called out, and turned to see Halfdan pushing through the crowd towards me. Close behind him was a palace messenger.
    'There you are, Thorgils. Thought I might find you here with Pelagia,' Halfdan exclaimed, though without the innuendo that normally accompanied his mention of Pelagia's name. 'There's some sort of flap on at the palace, and it involves you. You are to report at once to the office of the Orphanotrophus. It's urgent.'
    Panic gripped me as I glanced across at Pelagia. There was no mistaking the alarm in her expression too.
    I quickly followed the messenger to the palace. He brought me to the office of the Orphanotrophus, where I noticed that the emperor's eunuch brother had appropriated for himself the chambers immediately beside the staterooms of the Basileus. My colleagues who were on duty glanced at me curiously as I passed them. Never before had any of them seen a mere guardsman sum moned in this way.
    A moment later my stomach was churning with anxiety as I stood in front of John. He was sitting at an ornate desk, reading through a document, and when he raised his head to look at me, I thought how very tired he seemed. His eyes were sunk even deeper than usual. Perhaps the cares of state were weighing more heavily than he had expected, or maybe the rumours in the marketplace were true: that the Orphanotrophus never slept, but in the night dressed up as a monk and walked the streets of the city, eavesdropping on conversations, questioning ordinary citizens and learning the mood of the people. It was little wonder that people feared him. Certainly I felt sick with apprehension as I waited for him to speak. And his first words told me that he remembered exactly who I was.
    'I have summoned you because you speak excellent Greek as well as Varangian,' he said. 'I have a mission for you.'
    The tight knot in my stomach began to relax, but only for a moment. Was this another court deceit? Was the Orphanotrophus putting me at ease before revealing his true intention?
    'My agents tell me that a large force of Rus is approaching. It appears that there are about five hundred of them travelling in monocylon, the vessels which traders from Rus normally use, and they are coming by the same route.'
    Five hundred Rus did not amount to an invading force, I thought to myself. The market rumour was greatly exaggerated. It would take at least ten times that number to pose a threat to Constantinople's well-tried defences.
    As though reading my mind, the Orphanotrophus added, 'I'm not concerned about the safety of the city. What does interest me is that my informants tell me these men are not merchants. They do not carry trade goods, they are heavily armed and there is a report that their leader is some sort of prince or nobleman. His name is Araltes, or something like that. Do you know anyone by this name?'
    'No, your excellency,' I replied. 'It's not a name that I am familiar with.'
    'You soon will be,' the Orphanotrophus replied dryly. 'I have given orders that the foreigners are to be intercepted at the entrance to the straits. They will be escorted to the district of St Mamas on the opposite side of the Golden Horn and held there, well away from the city, pending an investigation of their intentions. That is where you come in. I want to know who they are and why they have come here. If they are Rus, you will understand their language when they