The Belt of Gold by Cecelia Holland Page A

offense to everyone. I wouldn’t talk like that to your little barbarian King.”
    â€œI don’t see any offense in talking honestly to anybody, even a Basileus.”
    They were inside a long corridor that led off through the dark. On one side was a series of doors, and on the other the wall was broken up into great windows that let in the light from the terrace outside. Theophano went swiftly along the corridor opening each door as she came to it, looking through and moving on. After she had inspected three or four rooms this way, she found one she liked and went in, motioning to Hagen to follow her.
    â€œHere. You can stay here, if it suits you.”
    The room was large and airy, the wall opposite the door being open to another terrace; the golden light of more torches outside spilled into the room, showing Hagen the square lines of a table and the foot of the bed. He nodded. “Help me find a candle.”
    Instead, she clapped her hands, and at once a man with an embroidered coat appeared from the corridor, bowing. She gave him crisp orders and he hurried off. Theophano loitered in the doorway, her hands behind her.
    â€œDid you—” Her voice quivered. “Bring my clothes?”
    He sat down on the bed. The light from the terrace glowed on her face, gilding her cheekbones and nose, leaving her wide-spaced eyes deep in the shadow. “As it happens, I did. They’re in my packs, at the inn where I was staying. What about my horses? Where can I stable them here?”
    â€œOh—take them to the Hippodrome.” She discarded that topic with a little twitch of her right hand, which dove away immediately behind her again. She touched her lower lip with her tongue. He thought, She wants to ask me something, but she’s afraid of telling me too much, and guessed it was the paper he had found that was on her mind. He smiled at her.
    She said, “Well, I’m glad you did. Did you bring—my shoes, too?”
    He said, “I brought everything.”
    She moved a little, bringing her face more fully into the light; her eyes were bright with a sudden desperate interest. The servant came in with a candle, a pile of linen, a jug, a bowl, a chamber pot. Quickly he dispersed these things around the room.
    â€œGood night,” Theophano said, but she did not go.
    Hagen got up and went to the far wall, which opened on to the terrace beyond. The air was warm and smelled of the sea. A door stood ajar under a hanging drapery, so that he could close the room if he wished. From here he could see all the way to the tip of the headland, where a lighthouse stood, its great flame curling and leaping into the night sky.
    â€œWill that be all, my lord?” the servant murmured.
    Hagen glanced around him. Theophano had gone. He nodded to the old man behind him. “Yes, thank you.”

7
    He had the list. She was sure of it, as sure as if he had told her outright.
    She walked down the slope past the Triclinium, through the grove of mulberry trees that fed the palace silkworms, her hands winding together as she thought. If she could retrieve the list somehow she might restore herself in the Empress’s sight.
    With the help of some of the guards she could probably take it back by force. She imagined that, the fighting, and remembered with a cold shiver the fierce fighting in the little room of the inn at Chrysopolis and knew at once that was not the way. Besides, he had said something about his packs; he did not have the list with him, and in fact from the way he had phrased things she guessed he understood, in some dim brute fashion, that the paper was of value, and would conceal it.
    At the edge of the mulberry trees, she paused to look down over the lawns and gardens before her. The large important buildings of the Palace were nearly all above the place where she was standing; this area below was given up to pavilions and fountains and walkways among the plantings. At the very