out the bodies and burying them in mass graves. But there were thousands of those bodies, many of them—as Hermogenes had said—not much more than meat paste smeared across the stone floors and walls. Fortunately, it was winter, but even so the bodies were rotting faster than they could be removed.
For another, the vengeful glee of the common folk was beginning to abate. Second thoughts were creeping in, especially as those people sat in their little apartments in the evening, enjoying the company of their families. Reservations, doubts, hesitations—as fathers began wondering about the future, and mothers worried over their children.
The death of arrogant lordlings was a thing to be treasured, true. But, at bottom, none of Constantinople's commoners thought Death was truly a friend. They were far too familiar with the creature.
No, better to go and enjoy Antonina's parades. There was nothing, there, to frighten a child. Nothing, to worry a mother or bring a frown to a father's face. There was only—
Triumph, in the victory of humble people.
Enjoyment, in the constant and casual conversations with those simple grenadiers, and their wives. And their children, for those of an age—who gazed upon those lads and lasses with an adulation rarely bestowed upon rustics by cosmopolitan street urchins. But those were the children of grenadiers—a status greatly to be envied.
And, most of all, a feeling of safety. Safety, in the presence of—her.
She—the closest friend of the Empress. Whom all knew, or soon learned, was striving to hold back the imperial madness.
She—who smote the treason of the mighty.
She—who was of their own kind.
She—who was the wife of Belisarius. Rome's greatest general, in this time of war. And Rome's sanest voice, in this time of madness.
Belisarius