Chapter 77
Nirma nodded, her hands clutching the folds of her robe tightly, and for the first time that afternoon she felt a brief chill, a chill that did not come from the northern air that was growing ever more bone-piercing, but rather a coldness that crept from within, a cold born from uncertainty and fear of something they did not fully understand.
The captain of the household guards finally finished reading the letter, folded it carefully, and returned it to Arya's hand with a formal smile that could not hide his curiosity about the young pair who carried a letter directly from the Emperor.
"Please follow us, Sir and Madam. Lord Ioannis is waiting in his study."
He turned around, signaling two of his subordinates to open the main door, and without much conversation Nirma and Arya stepped forward, followed by eight Prefect soldiers who moved in a neat formation behind them.
They walked across the courtyard, passing rows of soldiers who saluted, passing a small pool with a fountain that did not spray under the scorching daylight.
The sound of footsteps echoing through the long stone corridor created a rhythm that felt strangely soothing, like a lullaby for those who were too tired to remain awake yet too wary to truly fall asleep.
Behind Nirma and Arya, small conversations began to grow among the soldiers, two groups who had previously not known one another slowly finding light topics to fill the journey toward the study of Ioannis Taronites.
One Prefect soldier spoke about his child who had been born just two weeks earlier, about how his wife cried with happiness even though the delivery had nearly taken her life, while a household guard beside him nodded along and replied with a story about his horse that had died last week from old age, about how he buried it himself behind the barracks because he could not bear to see its carcass taken by the butchers.
On the other side, two other soldiers exchanged recipes for traditional remedies against fever, one swearing by a mixture of olive leaves and honey, the other defending the effectiveness of crushed garlic applied to the chest.
Occasional laughter burst out, faded, then erupted again, creating a background noise that somehow made the silence among Nirma, Arya, and the captain feel even more pronounced, more evident, and heavier.
The captain walked beside Nirma on her right, his eyes fixed straight ahead, his posture upright like someone who had just stepped out of a military ceremony, yet Nirma could feel that the man sensed the same silence, that he too wondered when one of them would break the stillness.
Nirma herself was busy with her eyes, her remaining healthy left eye moving endlessly from side to side, catching every small detail that might escape ordinary notice.
Scratches on the wall at waist height that might have been made by a child running while holding a sharp toy, stains of lamp oil on the ceiling that suggested this corridor was often used until late into the night, footprints on the stone floor with different patterns of soles, telling stories about how many people passed through here each day.
Yet behind all those observations, behind every tiny detail she usually gathered as material for drawing conclusions, there was one image that kept spinning inside her head, one image that refused to leave no matter how many times she tried to distract herself.
That Padati, the ox cart from Nusantara, with its foreign carvings and its soft lanterns, stood in the courtyard of Ioannis Taronites' residence as though it had always belonged there.
Arya was the one who finally moved first.
Perhaps because he could no longer endure the silence that kept growing heavier, perhaps because he felt that if no one began speaking they would continue walking in silence until they reached Ioannis's study without gaining any answers.
He turned slightly toward the captain, not too much, just enough to show he was speaking to the man, and his voice came out in a flat yet curious tone, a tone Nirma had heard too often from her companion whenever they faced something that made no sense.
"Captain, may I ask something?"
The captain turned his head and gave a short nod, and Arya continued without waiting for further permission.
"The carriage in the front courtyard earlier, the strange one with foreign carvings and those paper lanterns.
As far as I remember, I have never seen a vehicle like that in Constantinople before.
Where did it come from, and why is it here, at Lord Ioannis's residence?"
"Forgive me, Sir, but I would like to ask something."
The captain of the guards suddenly slowed his steps, not fully stopping but reducing the rhythm of his walk until it nearly forced Nirma and Arya to match his pace.
He turned, looking at Arya with a sharp yet non-threatening gaze, more like the look of someone who had just realized something strange around him and wanted to make sure he had not misheard.
"Earlier you referred to that vehicle as Padati.
May I know how Madam came to know that name?
Because during the several hours that vehicle has been here, we guards have only heard Lord Ioannis's guest refer to it as an ox cart, never once did he call it Padati.
I thought it was simply an ordinary ox cart, one with strange carvings from a land I do not recognize.
But Madam called it by a different name, a name I have never even heard before."
Arya fell silent.
His hand, which had been resting casually on his waist, now rose to scratch his head, his fingers combing through hair that had begun to grow damp with cold sweat even though the air felt increasingly bone-chilling.
He glanced at Nirma from the corner of his eye, a desperate signal that said he did not know how to answer, that he was not prepared for this question, that any explanation he might give would sound like a fabricated lie.
Nirma took a deep breath, feeling the cold air fill her lungs, then in the flattest voice possible she spoke.
"In the place where we live, Captain, there was once a traveler who stopped by several years ago.
He claimed to work with a vehicle like that, a vehicle he called Padati, commonly used in his homeland to transport harvest goods and merchandise.
He told long stories about its carvings, about the oxen or buffalo that pulled it, about how its wheels were made from solid wood so they could endure rocky and muddy roads.
Perhaps that is why we recognized Lord Ioannis's vehicle as a Padati, because we had heard that story before."
Nirma paused for a moment, staring directly into the captain's eyes, trying to measure how much the man believed the explanation she had constructed within seconds.
"Ohhhhh…"
The captain's voice stretched out for nearly ten seconds, a long exhale of understanding that strangely made Nirma even more alert.
He nodded slowly, like someone who had just fitted together pieces of a puzzle in his mind, and when he spoke again his tone changed, lower and more secretive, as though he were sharing information that should not fall into the wrong ears.
"Speaking of travelers, Sir and Madam, I just remembered something.
A few minutes before your arrival, around the time when the sun began to blaze and the torches were lit along the road as a procession, two strangers came to meet us at the front guard post.
They claimed they had urgent business with Lord Ioannis, business that could not be delayed, business that, according to them, concerned the safety of many people."
To be continued…