Scramasax Read Online Free Page B

shears.’
    â€˜What?’
    â€˜They’ll cut out his tongue.’
    Solveig screwed up her face.
    Snorri nodded. ‘The Empress and the Emperor, they hold court and they’re the judges.’
    â€˜I’ve heard terrible things about her,’ confided Solveig in a low voice. ‘Edwin told me. The Englishman.’
    â€˜You, Solveig,’ said Snorri with a reassuring smile, ‘you’re Harald Sigurdsson’s almost-sister. Your father is a Varangian guard. You have nothing to fear.’
    And yet I am afraid, thought Solveig. I never felt like this in the seven cataracts. No, not when I came between Edith and the Angel of Death. Not on my whole journey.
    A young boy appeared at the door. He was wearing crocus yellow, baggy silk trousers.
    He gave a little squeak, like someone learning to play a reed-pipe, and beckoned them. Then he turned on his heel, and Solveig and Snorri followed him through three connected halls.
    â€˜When the Empress receives us,’ Snorri instructed Solveig, ‘keep a careful eye on me. Do what I do.’
    I did meet King Yaroslav, Solveig told herself. I did. I should be all right.
    â€˜Flattery,’ Snorri said. ‘That’s what they want. They gorge themselves on it.’ He pulled up his hood.
    â€˜What are you doing?’
    â€˜What does it look like? Come on, pull yours up too. No man and no woman is allowed to be bareheaded before the Empress and the Emperor.’
    The pageboy led the two Vikings into an enormous golden hall, full of echoes, whispers, little knots of people.
    Solveig looked all around her, and up at the high arched roof, and back over her shoulders. Then, right ahead of her, she saw something astonishing.
    An almost bald elderly woman and a young man were sitting side by side in two high-backed seats on a stone dais. And as Solveig approached them, their seats very slowly began to ascend. On stout marble columns they rose until they were twice as high as the steepling fountain, well above Solveig’s head.
    Snorri got down on to his knees, and folded into himself.
    Solveig did likewise.
    Then Snorri pressed his forehead against the cold marble floor, and Solveig copied him.
    â€˜Long lives to our Empress and our Emperor,’ Snorri called out. ‘May God multiply your years.’
    â€˜Long lives to our Empress and our Emperor,’ repeated Solveig. ‘May God multiply your years.’
    But the Empress is an old woman, she thought. How old did Edwin say she was? Fifty-four! She’s got one foot in the grave. So what kind of prayer is that? She doesn’t want to live for hundreds of years.
    â€˜Stand up!’ said Snorri under his breath. ‘Do as I do.’
    Solveig scrambled to her feet. She stood with her head bowed.
    â€˜Girl,’ intoned the Empress, ‘you may look at me.’
    Solveig looked. Empress Zoe was swaddled and swathed in purple silk, up to her neck and down to her heels, and Solveig found it impossible to tell how tall she was, and whether she was fleshy or frail. But she could see her face was rather grey and unpleasantly wrinkled. Her eyes, though: they were dark, dangerous, not to be deceived.
    Black, thought Solveig. Black yet burning.
    She was aware of the boy-man sitting beside Empress Zoe, and she wanted to look at him too. But it was as if the Empress had Solveig under a spell, and she could do nothing but return her gaze.
    â€˜Girl,’ she said loftily, and in Norwegian, ‘Solveig. That’s your name.’
    Solveig was taken aback by how mild her voice was. Not at all like the Angel of Death, she thought.
    â€˜Well, is it or isn’t it?’ asked Empress Zoe.
    â€˜Oh!’ said Solveig. ‘Empress, Holy Mother—’
    â€˜What did you call me?’
    â€˜Holy Mother!’
    Empress Zoe gave a chilly little laugh. ‘Holy Mother!’ she repeated. Then she looked down her nose at Solveig. ‘Whatever I am,