Chapter 30
A few minutes later, it was Arya's turn to step outside, this time carrying a coarse woolen cloak he had found lying near the back door.
He approached two older soldiers, veterans who likely knew more about the intricacies of life in Constantinople.
"Did you know the victim?" he asked directly, without preamble.
The two soldiers nodded almost simultaneously.
"Sometimes he drank here with us," replied one, a gray-bearded man with a scar along his temple.
"He was a good soldier, though somewhat stubborn."
Arya nodded, then lifted the cloak slightly higher.
"Did the victim ever mention this cloak specifically?"
"Perhaps speak of where he obtained it, or say that someone wished to take it from him?"
The two soldiers exchanged glances, and the gray-bearded one furrowed his brow, eyes narrowing as he searched his memory.
"Now that you ask…" he murmured softly.
"A few days ago, perhaps three or four nights before this one, I saw Étienne speaking with someone near the docks.
They were discussing something, and Étienne was holding his cloak—this one, I believe—while laughing.
I could not hear what they were saying; they were too far away. But the man he was speaking to…"
He paused, gaze drifting into recollection.
"He wore a fine robe, too fine for an ordinary soldier.
Perhaps a palace official, or perhaps a wealthy merchant with dealings among the crusaders."
Arya recorded everything swiftly upon his wax tablet, his letters as neat as Nirma's, noting the soldier's name, the information about the conversation at the docks, and the possibility of a well-robed figure who might prove to be a key element in this case.
After offering his thanks, Arya returned inside the Kapeleion and rejoined Nirma, who was examining another part of the chamber.
There was nothing more dangerous in Constantinople than unchecked curiosity, and Manuel Botaneiates, Prefect of the City of Byzantium—whose name whispered through every corridor of this investigation—was the very embodiment of that curiosity.
When he first received reports of two foreign investigators who had suddenly appeared and immediately gained the trust of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos, when he first heard the description of a woman with silver-gray hair and a bandage over her right eye and a man with an unblinking, piercing gaze, his instincts—honed through decades of governance—spoke at once.
There was something wrong about these two.
Something did not align.
Something was peculiar in a way he could not define, yet strong enough to deny him peaceful sleep.
When he ordered his men to uncover Nirma and Arya's identities, dispatching couriers throughout the city to gather information about their origins, what he received in return was suffocating emptiness.
Their biographies seemed swallowed by the earth.
There were no records of their births in any church of Constantinople, no witnesses who had known them since childhood, no family or kin to contact.
They existed.
They stood before him with tangible bodies and clear voices.
Yet their traces in this world were blank, like parchment untouched by ink.
Emperor Alexios I Komnenos, upon hearing the Prefect's report, merely nodded slowly with an expression difficult to decipher.
He had sat upon the throne too long not to recognize irregularity when he saw it.
Yet he had lived too long not to understand that sometimes irregularity carried unexpected blessing.
"Watch them," he ordered briefly, his voice echoing within the dim audience chamber.
"Observe every movement, every word they speak, every person they meet.
But do not interfere with their investigation.
Let them work, for thus far they are our only hope of resolving this string of murders that has remained untouched for months."
Manuel Botaneiates accepted the command with a respectful nod and immediately issued further instructions to the soldiers assigned to escort Nirma and Arya to the Kapeleion.
The instructions were clear, leaving no room for alternative interpretation.
Watch them.
Watch closely, as though your life depends upon it.
Do not let them out of your sight.
Do not allow them to do anything suspicious without your knowledge.
Report everything they do directly to me.
Thus the Prefect's soldiers, originally tasked merely with escorting, now bore a heavier, double burden.
They were not only to accompany Nirma and Arya to the site of murder, not only to ensure the investigators' safety during the inquiry, but also to scrutinize every movement with heightened vigilance, to note every detail that might otherwise escape notice, to be prepared to report anything unusual to the Prefect anxiously waiting within his palace.
Within their hearts, the same skepticism felt by Emperor and Prefect alike began to grow—skepticism toward two strangers who had appeared without warning and swiftly gained full authority to investigate the most sensitive case in Byzantium.
They regarded Nirma and Arya differently now, with caution they could not entirely conceal, with questions they dared not voice yet which echoed persistently in their minds.
Who truly were these two?
From where had they come?
And why did no one know anything about them?
Yet time, as always, possessed its own way of altering everything.
As the soldiers began carrying out their surveillance, as their eyes fixed upon Nirma and Arya within the silent Kapeleion, something strange began to unfold.
Gradually, unconsciously, without intention, their vigilance began to soften.
Not because they forgot their duty, not because they disregarded the Prefect's command, but because what they witnessed with their own eyes far exceeded their expectations of how an investigation should proceed.
They observed how Nirma and Arya moved among overturned tables and scattered chairs with caution nearly impossible to achieve, how they lifted objects scarcely visible and examined them meticulously before returning them with astonishing precision.
They saw how the two investigators could identify items left behind during the murder, distinguish what was relevant from what was not, uncover small clues overlooked by dozens of soldiers who had previously inspected the site.
And most remarkable of all—what caused the soldiers, without realizing it, to begin lowering their guard—was how Nirma and Arya could reposition themselves in search of further clues by following the exact placement of objects as they must have been during the unfolding of the crime.
They seemed able to read a story from the chaos, to reconstruct what had occurred hours earlier simply by observing the relative positions of scattered items.
They demonstrated expertise the soldiers had never before witnessed, skill no ordinary spy or conventional investigator could possess.
And when Nirma or Arya approached to inquire about a specific object, when they posed questions the soldiers themselves had never considered, when they patiently recorded each answer upon their wax tablets, something within the soldiers' hearts began to change.
To be continued…