Corvus (12 page)

The Empirion was a
vast domed amphitheatre which could house five thousand with ease. Nominally a
theatre, it was also used for public meetings in inclement weather. Karnos had
chosen it quite deliberately. He wanted a certain amount of chaos, a massed
crowd to speak to. He was always best when addressing a mob. It was how he had
become Speaker of Machran, though his father had been nothing more than a
stallholder of the third class, unable even to afford a spearman’s panoply.

The other members
of the Kerusia, all scions of the oldest families in Machran, regarded Karnos
with at best a certain patronising indulgence, and at worst with outright
loathing. He was a man who got things done, who took on all the dirty jobs and
accomplished them not only with relish but with a certain vulgar flair.

He was uncouth,
foul-mouthed and ostentatious, but when he spoke, men listened. He could cajole
a crowd, flirt with it, make people laugh and set them alight with outrage.
Those who thought him ill-educated and uncultured had never seen his personal
library, or heard him hold forth on drama or philosophy after dinner. He was
careful to keep it that way. He was everyman. That was his charm.

Kassander had done
his work well. Crowded though the streets were, there was a definite current of
movement to the north and the Mithannon Gate. The levies were gathering,
trusting that the machinery of the city was working with legal correctness.
Hundreds of men were bowed down under the weight of their wargear, and every
street was bristling with spears.

Karnos dismounted
in front of the Empirion. One of the marvels of the Macht world, the dome was
the height of fifty men, all in blazing white marble now tinted pink by the
light of dawn, hewn block by block out of the vast stone quarries around Gan
Cras and brought south on ox-drawn wagons with iron wheels. It was old as the
city itself, though it did not look it. The white marble was inviolate, austere
and dignified. Everything that Karnos was not.

They had lit the
great flambeaux inside and the place was a shadow-textured stage humming with
voices, row upon row of people lining the stone step-benches, those at the back
some eighty feet above the performer’s circle below. When Karnos walked in, a
roar went up, a wordless chorus of interrogation, greeting, and cat-calling.

The middle-men of
the city were on their way to the Mithannon. Those who were present here comprised
the two extremes of Machran society. Small tradesmen, freed slaves, and ne’er
do wells. And also the highest ranking families of the city: the Alcmoi, the
Terentians, the Goscrins and half a dozen more. The menfolk of these families
were not subject to the levy. They would don their armour when it suited them,
and provide the officers of the phalanx. That was their privilege. Whether or
not they had the ability to lead men in battle was irrelevant.

And waiting for
Karnos in the circle, three of the more dangerous members of the Kerusia.
Katullos, Dion, and Eurymedon. These three might have been Polio’s brothers,
all grey-bearded and stern, the folds of their himations draped over one
forearm in the classic style. They dripped anger; it shone out of their faces.

Karnos smiled. He
opened his arms, halted short of the other Kerusia members, and breathed in
deep the energy of the crowd.

Gestrakos had
lectured on this very spot, postulating the existence of other worlds. Ondimion
had staged his tragedies upon these stones. And here Naevios himself had
plucked his harp, singing the songs that were now buried deep in the souls of
the Macht, even the Paean they sang at the moment of death itself.

Some men made
music, some built in stone. Some led armies.

Karnos - he knew
how to work a crowd. It was the reason he had been put upon the world. This was
his moment.

“Brothers,” he
said. And such were the superb acoustics of the Empirion that he reached the
farthermost ranks of the crowd while barely raising his voice.

But he did raise
it, along with his arms, outspread as though he would embrace them all if he
could.

“Brothers! You
know me - you know my name. I am Karnos of Machran, Speaker of the Kerusia. You
put me here today by voting openly in the assembly of all free men at the
Amphion of Machran, the first time in a generation that a Speaker has been so
chosen. My brothers, you have honoured me beyond my deserts…”

He watched the
crowd closely, alert to their postures, his ears pricked for the start of muttered
conversations.

It was like
reeling in a fish too heavy for the line. The mood had to be taken, massaged,
guided and caressed to where he wanted it to go. A man could not storm the
crowd - Katullos, the last Speaker, had tried it, and failed miserably.

“I have no family
of note,” Karnos went on. “My father hammered out metal at a stall in the
Mithannon - I was born there, and I know those alleys like they were the veins
in my arm. He put me to work cross-legged in the street, tapping out dints in
people’s pots for an obol a day before I was ten years old -”

A growl of
appreciation from the crowd. They loved this stuff, the lower orders. Who
needed rhetoric, when one could work on their sentimentality, the
fellow-feeling of the urban poor?

“But he saw what
was in me, and hired a slave for an hour every night to teach me to read and
write, for he had no wish to see me back-bent and bowed and coughing up soot
for the rest of my life.”

The slave had been
Polio, a dark-haired, lanky young man who had found that teaching the bright,
eager son of the street-smith was one way to dull the pain of his own
servitude.

“When my father
died, I sold his stall and his tools, and bought a single illiterate highland
boy. I educated him in his turn, sold him at a profit, and never looked back.”

That had been
about the same time that the Ten Thousand had returned from their failed
expedition to the Empire. Karnos remembered it well. A few centons of them had
marched through Machran, invited by Dominian, Speaker at the time. The famous
Rictus had not been there, but all the same, the streets were clogged five deep
to see the heroes of the east in their scarlet cloaks.

Karnos still
remembered the lean and hungry look on their faces, their eyes still fixed on
some invisible horizon.

It was the first
time he had seen the mob of Machran in full voice on the streets, and he had
never forgotten it. What would it be like, to have that adulation thrown at him
- or to have those thousands hang on his words? It had been the beginning of
the slow fire of ambition that had burned in his gut ever since.

“But I will not
bore you with my life story - you’ve heard it all before. Brothers, it is
enough for me to say that I came from where you are.”

His gaze swept the
curved ranks of the amphitheatre. He let the statement hold the air a moment,
saw a stir of restlessness, and plunged on.

“I am an ambitious
man, that is true - were I not I would still be hammering pots in the
Mithannon. But I am a man of Machran - this is my city. My life has been and
always will be within her walls. I would never -
never
- do anything
that would harm this place. I would rather die first.” Now the richly clad men
near the bottom of the circle stirred. He saw some smirk.

“And brothers,
know this: I have never lied to you. You know I am no hypocrite. I like wine,
women, and as much amusement as I can pack into my life -this I have never
tried to hide -” Now the common folk were smirking, and a few laughed out loud.
“Aye, we know that all right!” someone cackled, and there was a buzz of
laughter.

He had to grip
them again, quickly. “So I am here today with no pretences, no defences. I come
to you with the truth in my hands, to give to you. It is your privilege to do
with it what you will.”

The baleful stares
of the other Kerusia members present could almost be felt on his back. An
irrational part of him twitched at the thought of a knife plunging into him,
unseen, unexpected. The Empirion had seen it happen before.

He took a few
steps forward, closer to the rising slope of the crowd, until he could smell
the perfumes and scented soaps of those near the floor, and the unwashed miasma
of those higher up in the dome.

“I hereby formally
convene this gathering as an emergency assembly, gathered in time of war, to
vote upon extraordinary measures taken this day by myself and the polemarch of
the host, Kassander of Arienus.” Phobos - now he had their attention all right.
In the next few minutes he would either have saved his career or would be
feeling that knife in his back for real.

“You have all
heard of the capitulation of Hal Goshen, after an eight-day defence by its
people and the leader of the Kerusia, Phaestus. The enemy of us all, Corvus the
warmonger, is on the march as I speak, barely a fortnight from our own walls.

“Brothers, on my
own authority, I called out the levies this morning; they are gathering now at
the Mithos River. I did this with the full support of our polemarch, but
without the consultation of my fellow Kerusia members. Hence, I acted
illegally.”

There it was. He
had admitted it publicly.

“I hereby ask now
for a vote on my actions. I did what I did for the good of the city and of us
all, with no thought of my own position or ambitions - this I swear to you by
Antimone’s Veil. I ask now that you vote to retrospectively legalise the
call-out, so that we can go on to organise an effective defence of this city
against he who would destroy your freedoms forever.

“According to
Tynon’s constitution, in time of war, extraordinary assemblies may be called to
pass laws by popular acclaim. Brothers, I need to hear your voices now. Forgive
me for my infraction of our codes, and let it be written that I did so only in
the city’s interest - in your interest.

“Brothers, will
you now formally legalise my actions of last night, the calling out of the
army, and the convening of this assembly? Let us hear what you say. All in
favour, say aye.”

The dome roared.

Karnos struggled
to be heard. “Those against -”

He could see the
mouths of the well-dressed men at the floor of the circle opening, but whatever
noise they made was drowned out by the thunderous wave of
ayes
that was
still shaking the Empirion. He raised his arms.

“I declare the
motion passed!”

The crowd kept
roaring. Gobbets of food were thrown down from the topmost circles of the
amphitheatre to land on the lower benches.

Men stood up. He
heard his name called out by thousands, arms lifted to him. He stood and raised
his own arm in salute.

I have you
,
he thought.
I have you.

One of the other
Kerusia members crossed the floor to stand at his side. It was Katullos, the
bull-necked, grey-bearded patriarch of the Alcmoi family who had been Speaker
himself at one time. He leaned close to be heard and said to Karnos:

“That was nicely
done.”

“Thank you.”

“You are safe for
now, my friend, with the mob shouting your name. Let us see how long it lasts.”
He set a massive hand on Karnos’s shoulder in what looked like a friendly
gesture. But Karnos could feel the fury in the grip of the older man’s fingers.

“One day they will
cheer the news of your fall, Karnos. And I swear I will be there to see it.”

Karnos smiled at
him with perfect affability.

“You must count on
living a long time, Katullos.”

THE
OBJECT LESSON

Druze halted, panting
, and held up
a hand. He made the hand into a fist. At once the column behind him bifurcated,
splitting to left and right of the road in a movement reminiscent of a shoal of
fish. The men formed a line, caught their breath, and began weighing the heft
of the javelins in their hands.

“Some stubborn
bastard has decided to make a stand,” he said.

The man to his
right, a gangling thatch-haired youth with eyes the colour of cobweb, tossed
his javelin up in the air and caught it again, out of sheer lightness of heart,
it seemed.

“I hope so, chief.
Antimone’s tits, I hope so. The last good fight I had was with a whore in
Maronen.”

Druze grinned. He
clapped the youth on the shoulder. “That’s right, brother - and I hear she won.”

A crackle of
laughter ran along the ranks. The Igranians stood easily, tightening their
belts, retying sandals, fingering the cruel iron points of their javelins. Each
man carried a bundle of them, and these they now untied, checking the shafts
for warp, stabbing them into the ground to clean the blades. They wore the felt
tunics of the inner mountains for the most part, and rough wool chlamys whose
folds they now tied up under their left armpits to leave their throwing arms
free.

A pasang away on
the road their path was blocked by a body of spearmen. These had formed up in
four ranks and extended four to five hundred paces. At least sixteen hundred
men, Druze thought, measuring them with his bright black eyes.

“They’ll be out of
Goron, that city on the crag to the west,” he said. All humour left his face.
He watched the enemy phalanx closely, noting their intervals, they way they
stood, how they held their spears. These small details meant something. If
spearmen kept their shields on their shoulders long before battle was joined,
it meant they were nervous. If they left the ranks to piss or shit instead of
doing it where they stood, it meant they were not well-drilled.

“These lads are
not bad,” he said, noting the stillness in the enemy formation, and the fact
that slaves to their rear were passing water-skins up the files.

The flanks of the
phalanx were protected by woods, half a bowshot on either side of the road.
Hazel woods, stark with winter but with enough brush remaining to act as a
concealer. There might be more men in those trees, hunkered down on the cold
ground with the snow numbing their bellies.