 According to later and possibly fictional accounts, driven by lust for a nun, he had forced her to marry him.Her brothers protested to Emperor Michael II, and the Byzantine ruler ordered the island's "strategos", Constantine Soudas, to investigate the matter and if the charges were found true, to cut off Euphemius' nose as punishment.Thus it came that Euphemius, returning from a naval raid against the African coast, learned that he was to be arrested.