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again you can repay me. Just ask anyone at the docks for Nikodemos. I’m well known here. And please, give my best regards to your charming and talented wife.”
    He turned and started toward the bow, then paused. “You will find Mithra is no further from you in this land than He is in Constantinople.”
    John smiled wanly. If only that were true of his friends and family as well.

Chapter Eight
    “No, the emperor has not answered my request for an audience,” Anatolius told Hypatia. A week had passed since John’s departure, and Anatolius had begun to think he might as well have been sent off to Egypt himself. “I’ve become remarkably unwelcome at the palace.”
    Hypatia had placed his frugal breakfast on the scarred wooden table in John’s kitchen. Now she lingered near the brazier as if awaiting further orders, but really, Anatolius thought, to press him about his efforts on John’s behalf.
    He took a bite of his bread. It was stale. The cheese would not be much better. He ate the same thing every day. John’s storerooms contained little else except the horrid Egyptian wine the Lord Chamberlain favored.
    Hypatia spent her time tending to the sick in the hospice rather than visiting the markets Peter had frequented. Anatolius did not feel he had the authority to order her to do otherwise, even if the markets were still being held in the city. He wasn’t her employer. He was uncomfortably aware he was merely a guest in the house—and an uninvited guest at that.
    He wondered what sort of elaborate repasts Thomas was enjoying now he had arranged to stay temporarily with Francio.
    “Couldn’t you by any chance try to see Justinian again?” Hypatia persisted. “You’ve been his secretary for years. He knows you well, sir. Surely he would agree to give you an audience?”
    “Justinian can be very congenial, Hypatia, but imagining that confers privileges can be a fatal mistake. After a request is refused, the wise man waits a while to make it again.”
    “What about Captain Felix?” Hypatia’s jaw clenched, accentuating sculpted cheekbones in a tawny face framed by hair the color of a raven’s wing. “Surely there must be someone who can help.”
    Anatolius sighed inwardly. Few things cut him as deeply as the disapproval of an attractive woman. “Felix agreed to look into the senator’s murder when I asked him to give a hand, but I haven’t heard anything yet.”
    Hypatia pursed her lips in annoyance. “I could make a charm, sir, one that will make the emperor agree to talk to you. Something of the sort used attract the beloved, but not exactly the same. A slightly different combination of herbs.”
    Anatolius smiled. “Hypatia, how can I persuade Justinian to drink a potion? And if I’m supposed to imbibe it, well, I don’t think I’d care to have the emperor pining for me. Especially considering he’s married to Theodora.”
    Hypatia filled Anatolius’ wine cup and set the jug back down on the table with a loud thump, her thoughts plainly written on her face.
    Anatolius resolved to caution John about treating his servants with too much familiarity, if indeed he ever saw John again.
    “Have you seen Europa this morning?” he asked, changing the subject.
    “She intends to remain in her room, sir, as she doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
    “You’d think I was the one who’d sent them all away!” Anatolius blurted in exasperation.
    Anatolius had glimpsed Europa only once since his arrival. She had been walking at the far end of the garden, silent as a shade, finally to vanish into the far side of the building.
    “I see.” He tore another chunk from his bread, chewed, and swallowed.
    Thomas, he thought. Though it seemed everyone else did not wish to talk to him, Thomas would surely be happy to do so.
    ***
    Francio’s servant refilled Anatolius’ cup.
    “You’d think the Lord Chamberlain didn’t keep a single jug of wine in his house, the way you’re putting that down,” Francio