Filtration

“You obscene man!”

I dodged just in time as the guard’s sword nearly pinned me to the wall. It was crazy, but I ran with my eyes closed, relying only on my sense of smell to navigate my escape. That slip-up made me lose my footing as I rolled toward the waste drain.

Something worse than urine just trickled onto my head: the women’s bathwater. I muffled my own scream with my hand as I made my way deeper into the sewer, continuously seeking forgiveness from God.

“Where did the peeper go!?” Another guard bellowed. “This is what we get for hosting those warmongering desert people! He aimed to defile our women!”

Coming clean would not absolve my mistake. That was what it looked like, and I couldn't say I was looking for the privy. I went deeper, following whichever direction brought the stronger briny air, hoping it would lead me to the sea.

A crack caught my foot with a clang.

“He went to the sewer!”

I clawed at the corroded metal, anguished. Well… I had transgressed, so this must be God’s Justice. In my defense, I had not seen even a single strand of a woman’s hair. I did want to find a privy. Not just any privy, but the privy. I was truthful in my intention, so… I should be worthy of some of His Mercy, right?

The corroded metal gave way to my frustrated nails. I picked up the scraps. They were scraps: clumps of lead instead of copper. Copper did lace the outer layer, but the rest was even flimsier than a child’s clay doll. That explained the heat leaking down even here.

Footsteps closed in. I had two choices: coming in clean with all the rosewater from the women’s bath, or getting inside the leaked sewage, along with the piss and dung.

I prayed to God to bless me as I followed the path I considered cleaner.

I let myself be defiled.

***

As I crawled deeper inside the sewage, I noticed more flaws and sabotage in the plumbing. Heat that had nothing to do with the urine compressed the air, suffocating me. I had never feared narrow places, but being trapped inside the sewage was different. This was a coffin made of miasma, and courage would not save me from the toxin.

What would decide whether I lived, ironically, was whether the bathhouse’s original engineer was sincere or duplicitous. If the engineer were sincere, then the fake metals would continue as planned: up until the sea. I’d be food for the rats long before. If he had been duplicitous, he would have rerouted it, as he pocketed the project money to buy lead at the price of copper.

I took the first turn, flinging myself to a cistern. In the end, duplicity won.

Washing the grime as much as I could, I sprinted towards the closest exit—

—which opened up into an office. A woman was there, thankfully fully robed. Her veil was tied, but it fluttered anyway as she turned to me with cold eyes.

“Saracen,” she mused, before wrinkling her nose. “You did come.”

I moved as fast as I could—

“Don’t underestimate me just because I am a woman!” She brandished a mallet and lifted it. “We hunt spies like you!”

—and raised my hand in surrender. “I am not a peeper!”

“Huh?”

“Huh?”

Two guards poured in. They saw the absurd situation and immediately pushed me against the wall. “Search him!” one of them ordered; the other went to my belongings, which came to nothing but one soaked scroll. “Aha! Secret order!”

“There’s pee on it,” I commented in broken Greek, which probably sounded like I had peed on it, because the guards dropped the scroll.

“Wait,” the veiled lady said, “he speaks Greek. Only trained envoys do that. Who sent you, filthy intruder?”

I turned my head, breathing heavily. “Just look at the scroll, will you?”

I hoped my Greek did not sound like I was enjoying being pummeled.

They seemed to understand, though, because they unrolled the scroll. I could feel their eyes switching back and forth from the scroll to me. I inhaled sharply every time their swords clanged inside their sheaths.

“We can’t read this,” the guard said. “It is in Arabic. Lady Stamatia?”

“Let me see—no, just open it up for me. It reeks urine.” Stamatia clearly read that without touching; she drew herself up. “What is an expert doing in the bathhouse?”

“I was looking for the privy,” I said, too tired to invent an excuse. “And I fell into what drained the privy. Your bathhouse is compromised. The walls are not intact. It was not life-threatening, but it risked mixing waste with the clean water.”

It felt good to talk shop. The only question was whether I had said it properly in Greek.

“You have broken our walls and put dung into the cistern!?” the guard exclaimed. “You really are a filthy spy.”

“Hold it,” Stamatia said. “No spy would admit his goal that bluntly. He clearly meant something else. I take it that you are the engineer inspecting our bathhouse?”

“...Yes?” I was not sure what that meant, but I’d take anything that did not involve the word death.

“Then he was doing his work, even at the cost of his cleanliness.” Stamatia sighed. “Unhand him. Even if he turns out to be a spy, his stamp is genuine. Killing him without a trial risks war.”

I understood the word war. The guards understood it, too, because they settled me while Stamatia gave further orders. I received a hand towel, a bucket of clean water, and a new robe. The only thing they refused to touch was the pee-soaked scroll.

I returned to Stamatia’s room after cleaning myself in the cistern.

“Well met, then… Khabbab,” she hissed at my name, perhaps thinking speaking it would lacquer her tongue with piss. “I am Stamatia, daughter of Vasilios. I am an expert, just like you, though this is more like a side job.”

“Peace be upon you,” I greeted in my tradition. “I thank you for your hospitality and mercy.”

Stamatia’s eyes sparkled, as if my grammar had shocked her. She spoke in hurried Greek to the guards, and they left the room.

“Wait!” I caught one of the guards by the shoulder. “Can you stay here? I don’t want to be alone in a room with a lady.”

The guard looked affronted. “You’re asking us to dishonor Lady Stamatia along with you!?”

“No,” Stamatia said, smirking. “He wanted you two to be witnesses. How about this, Saracen? We left the door open, and the guards stayed outside the door.”

“Ooh,” the guard murmured in understanding. “Well, if he’s this scared of a lady, he can’t be the peeper we were looking for. Stay a coward, Saracen.”

Unfortunately, I understood the Greek for ‘coward.’ The guards exited.

“So, coiner,” Stamatia said the last word in Arabic, “did you come here to switch profession?”

There was no point making up stories; she had read the scroll.

“As I said earlier, Lady Stamatia, I was looking for the privy.” I made sure my emphasis was right. “I am studying coinage, because our dinar—your nomisma—is what circulates among our people now. Our Caliph wants to mint our own coins.”

Stamatia’s smile did not reach her eyes. “The same Caliph who surrendered his coins to our empire. How long until we return these coins to you, hands in chains?”

“That depends on how well I put my knowledge into practice, I fear,” I said, really tired of political mind games.

Stamatia barked a laugh. “You Saracens are really a riot!” She closed her mouth, recovering her manners. “I meant no offense, but the treaty breathed fresh air into my father’s empty skull, so it’s only courteous to thank you.”

I swallowed my rebuke about her lack of filial piety. Instead, I said, “Speaking of fresh air, the leaks in the bathhouse—”

Stamatia wiped her tears. “Oh, yes. You were wrong about that.”

Sweat pooled on my forehead. “I was?”

“Not about the compromise,” Stamatia said, pulling out a diagram with many crosses. “The magnitude of it. We have found more leaks. At this pace, the pipes will burst. You were wrong that it isn’t life-threatening.”

I shuddered. “I apologize.”

“What for?” Stamatia stood up and closed the door. “If anything, you deserve a reward.”

I had to revise myself: I was claustrophobic when I was in a closed space with a woman.

“Lady Stamatia!” I bolted to the door. “I already have a grandchild!”

That worked every time. She blinked, then realized I had misunderstood. “Were you raised by lionesses, that you think every woman will pounce on you?”

“N-no!” I looked the other way. “It’s just… our Mother was once slandered, and I learned to be careful.”

From the shadows, I knew Stamatia was burying her face in her hands. “A coiner,” she began with a very exhausted tone, “coming here, to a bathhouse, means you were not looking for a leak in the pipes. I lied for you, telling the guards that you are the expert we were waiting for, despite the permit letter stating otherwise.”

When she looked at me, her eyes were so fierce that I lowered my gaze.

“Either you are a spy,” Stamatia continued, “or a pervert, or you were stranded underground because you were looking for something else. Pick your next words carefully, since we wash corpses here, too.”

“This is the third time: I wanted to find the privy,” I repeated. “You, Qunstantiniyya, hold an interesting history. A history about, let’s say… treasure. My sources tell me that the last holder of the treasure died in a privy. When I asked where, they pointed me to the bathhouses.”

I had used the word apodyterium, and Stamatia snorted.

“You confused it with aphedron,” Stamatia said, giggling. “Next time, use hedra. I thank you for being honest about wanting to raid our grounds.”

“That’s not what I—”

“Yes, yes,” Stamatia said dismissively. “It does not change the fact that you bear ill intent. How many skirts must you crouch under until you find this treasure?”

“Ornaments!” I blurted. All of these accusations wounded me. “From three centuries ago, buried to cover up a man your people as good as killed. Not that you’d know. Am I in the clear now before I find other skirts to crouch for?”

Stamatia narrowed her eyes. “Someone died three hundred years ago, and apparently it offended you Muslims. Who was it?”

“Al-Arisiyyin,” I said. “Or, in your tongue, the follower of Arius.”

Stamatia moved quicker than running water. She pulled her mallet and smashed the oak table. I blinked back tiny flying splinters.

Guards poured in. They pointed at the weapons, then caught themselves as they saw Stamatia was the one hurting me.

“There were flies from the leak,” Stamatia lied. She then smiled at the guards. “Now, gentlemen, kindly catch other flies from other sites. We were speaking about private matters, and I fear eavesdroppers had best prepare their seats under the Propontis.”

The guards did the most reasonable thing upon seeing a lady brandishing a mallet: they scrambled.

“Now, Khabbab,” Stamatia continued when the guards vacated the room, “I don’t know whether this is a fortune or not, but I know where Arius died.”

Judging by how she tapped her mallet, she did not want any retort; I shut my mouth.

“Three days from now, Constantinople will hold an ecumenical council,” Stamatia explained. “My father is one of the chartoularioi—archivists—invited. The Council will examine every historical document to decide what we should do with our religion. Now, what would it mean if an… Ishmaelite suddenly dug out an artifact from a heretic that died under a divine retribution?”

“I don’t know,” I said honestly.

“It means you are coming with me tomorrow to Arius’ deathbed,” Stamatia said. She produced a signet with a garnet embedded in it, and pressed the ring onto my permit. “There. Now it is official that you will help me.”

Having fought in a battle or two, I was accustomed to the ending of a villain’s long-winded speech. “By dying?” I guessed.

“No, by destroying the very treasure you were looking for.”