Demon King (30 page)

“Oh?”

“You don’t bloody a horse’s mouth when you first put a bit on him,” I said. “I want these new Guardsmen to come away proud, feeling that they’ve learned something. Then Petre’s instructors will show them how much more they’ve got to learn.”

“Good. Very good,” the emperor said. “Then real battle will make them learn they know absolutely nothing after all.”

I smiled ruefully, and nodded agreement.

“So then there should be no reason whatsoever
your
Guard won’t become
my
Guard three days hence,” the emperor said. He laughed and stretched.

“Ah, Damastes, my friend. It does me, does both of us, vast good to get away from that scrabbling nonsense of Nicias. I vow it was nothing but courtiers nibbling at me like rats, or listening to myself drone spells night and day. Sometimes I wondered if this was why we told the Rule of Ten to pack their ass with salt and piss up a rope.”

In this humor the emperor reminded me of the charming rascal I’d vowed to serve years ago.

“Nothing but courtiers and spells?” I asked in my most innocent manner. “Gods, but the nights must have been
dreadfully
dull.”

The emperor lifted an eyebrow. “Peering through bedroom windows ill becomes you, First Tribune. For one thing, it gives you bloodshot eyeballs. And from what I’ve heard,” he said slyly, “you have little reason to be sanctimonious about what anyone does when he retires.”

So the emperor had heard of our affair. I shrugged, and he clapped me on the shoulder.

“Speaking of court,” he went on, voice turning serious, “I gather some people think my palace has become decadent. I’m encouraging too many scoundrels in gold lace and whores in silk. But I know just what I’m doing. The people love spectacle, and I think it’s important to give it to them. Besides, I rule the greatest empire of all, and I think splendor must be part of that empire. Should we be mousing around in gray homespun and living in hovels?

“No,” he said. “Noblemen and -women, living nobly, are an inspiration to all, especially those who aren’t as favored. It’s much the same as the sound of marching boots and drumrolls. Anyone whose blood isn’t stirred by the sight of soldiers on parade is dead of soul, and should be returned to the Wheel as a favor.”

It was fortunate Domina Othman, Tenedos’s aide, bustled up with some question, or I might have had to respond to what the emperor had said. I might be a warrior, but I knew that most heard the drum snarl with fear and dread, seeing the dark blood to be spilled, the roaring flames that were now peaceful cities, the women left without husbands, the children without fathers or mothers, that Saionji’s manifestation, Isa the war god, brought.

My emperor, I feared, had forgotten the reality and, true to a worshiper of Saionji, had fallen in love with war.

• • •

The war games were an utter disaster — for the Guard. The plan was simple: The Guard Corps was to advance with three elements in line until it made contact with the “enemy.” Conventional tactics would have had the forward element hold the enemy in place while the second and third attempted to envelop the foe and destroy him.

But I had devised a different strategy, one more suitable for fast, mobile warfare in the vast, open reaches of Maisir. The first element was indeed to keep the foe pinned, but the second and third were to circle the struggle and strike hard for the rear headquarters. That would either make the enemy surrender, break, or form a defensive circle that the battle could move past. The Corps following the spearhead could pause to obliterate the stronghold.

But the first element fell back instead of holding firm. The second got entangled in the first, and the third swung wide but never returned to the ordered axis of advance.

The emperor and I stood in Corps General Aguin Guil’s command tent, and watched him lose control of fifteen thousand men. Our out-of-date maps were covered with symbols no one could understand, runners dashed about, staff officers shouted, and General Guil stood in the middle, mouth opening and closing without any words coming out.

He should have shouted silence and gone outside the tent for five minutes, breathing deeply, calming himself. Then he should have pictured the battlefield in his mind, imagined where his forces were, or should have been, and gone back inside and brought order.

But he just stood there helplessly, mouth moving as if he were a stranded fish. I wanted to help, but knew I must not. If the general was to become a general, he must learn I’d not be there to save him when matters went out of control — which is invariably what happens five minutes after a battle commences.

But the emperor didn’t realize that. “Silence,” Tenedos bellowed, and stillness spread like a wave, save for one wide-eyed captain who babbled on for a few seconds until he realized his voice was the only sound. “Now,” the emperor said, “we must try to save the day. Send for … Who’s the domina in charge of the First Wing?”

“Tanagra, sir.”

“Very well. You. Galloper. Ride down the road until you see Domina Tanagra’s battle flags. Tell him …”

What the emperor wished to have Tanagra do went unknown, for shouts, bellows, and screams rang, and fifty horsemen thundered into the camp, sabers slashing tent ropes, guards knocked spinning, and men running in all directions. Their leader slid from his horse, ran into the tent, and shouted, “You’re all my prisoners! Surrender or die!” It was one of Yonge’s legates. Three archers ran up beside the “enemy” officer, blunt arrows nocked.

“The hells we are,” Guil snapped, reaching for his sword. An arrow thunked lightly into his chest.

“Sorry, sir,” the legate said, no sorrow at all in his voice, “but you’re dead now.” He turned to the emperor and me. “Now, you two. Don’t — ” His voice went into a squeak as he recognized his emperor. For an instant, he almost knelt, then he remembered his role. “Your Majesty! You’re captured. Don’t move!”

Tenedos’s face reddened. His gaze lanced out. “This,” the emperor began, his voice like thunder, “is truly absurd! I …”

He must have seen my involuntary head shake, for he caught himself. He had his temper controlled instantly. The snarl on his lips became a smile, and a laugh came. Possibly I was the only one who knew how false it was.

“Absurd,” he went on. “And a fine piece of work, Legate. You seem to have won the battle and, I’d suppose, the war. Damned few armies fight on when their emperor’s in the hands of the enemy. Was this your idea?”

“Yessir.”

“You’re now a captain. Of the Upper Half.”

We lost a battle and the war game, but the emperor won the day.

• • •

“Men of the Guard, listen to your emperor.” Tenedos’s voice boomed across the plain. He stood on a small reviewing stand, ten feet above the drawn-up First Guard Corps. “I came to see what sort of soldiers you are,” he went on. “And now I know. You think you have done badly, and, in a manner, you have. But the blood that was shed was not real. The lives that were lost have not gone to Saionji.

“This battle can be replayed and won, if we so choose. What you should have gained in the past few days is knowledge of who you are. You are young, you are strong, you are learning. None of us — not you, not I — learn without making mistakes. Yesterday a mistake was made. Laugh about it, for it is worth laughing about. But learn from it, for it’s also a great lesson.

“You are the first to carry the name of Guards. There will be others that will come after you. Now you must train harder, work harder, so that so long as there is an army in Numantia, so long as there are Corps of Guards, any soldier will know that the greatest duty he can perform, the highest honor he can reach, is to fight as well as you will fight. I salute you, Numantians, Guardsmen. You are mine … and I am yours.

“This day is the beginning. Ahead there is nothing but glory and honor.”

He saluted, and the Guard Corps cheered him until I thought they’d rupture their lungs, as if disgrace would be buried in the wall of sound.

I’d seen another reason why the emperor was the emperor. This silly defeat in a war game in a desert state might steel the First Guard even more than a victory.

• • •

“I should’ve turned that limp-dick into a toad,” the emperor growled.

“I didn’t know you had that kind of power,” I said.

“I don’t. But I’d find a spell somewhere.”

“By the way, who are we talking about? The legate?”

“Him, too. But I meant Guil. I hope Saionji toasts his foreskin on a very hot fire when she takes him back to the Wheel!”

“Do you want him relieved?” I asked.

There was a long silence. The emperor sighed. “Do you think he should be?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “He lost his feel for battle. But I don’t know anyone who hasn’t done that. He just did it at a time that was a little embarrassing.”

“Embarrassing, my left testicle,” the emperor said. “Damned humiliating.”

“Especially for me,” I said. “Showed me what happens when I start following people like you into tents.”

The emperor glowered, then his mood broke, and he started laughing. “No. Don’t relieve him,” Tenedos decided. “My sister owes you a debt. But make sure he learns. I don’t want there to be a next time.”

“There won’t be,” I promised. “Not for him, not for his whole gods-damned Corps. I’ll have Mercia and his instructors drill them until they’re bleeding through their eyeballs and toenails. I’ll get an order out as soon as we get back to Nicias.”

“No, you won’t,” the emperor said. “You’re on two weeks’ leave.”

“Why? I’m barely back from the last one.”

“It seems a certain lady came calling before we left. A certain Countess Agramónte. She wished a boon. She said her lands have a certain feasting when they plant the corn. She said it’s a custom that goes back before there was an Agramónte, and the people feel it’s the worst of luck if their lord is not present.”

This was the first time Marán had ever asked a favor of the emperor. “That’s sort of the truth, sir,” I said. “But I’ve missed it three times since we’ve been married, off rooting around the frontiers for you.”

“Terrible,” the emperor said. “Custom is what binds the peasants closer to the lords. You’ll not miss it this year.”

“If you say so, sir.”

“Besides, I promised Marán. And Jaen knows your wife is very beautiful, and I’ve never broken a promise yet to a beautiful woman.”

He stared out at the Latane River, and once again his mood changed. “So the First Guard isn’t as ready as I hoped it to be,” he said gloomily. “Which means none of the other corps can even think about full-scale maneuvers.”

“I’m afraid not, sir,” I said.

He said something very odd: “Thank Saionji that I’ve bought us all some time.”

“I beg your pardon, sir?”

“Nothing,” he said, hastily changing the subject. “Look. Out there. Is that child on the world’s tiniest raft, or is she walking on water, in which case we should begin worshiping?”

• • •

Amiel and Marán were waiting at the dock when we disembarked — our departure from Amur had been signaled to the capital by heliograph. In spite of the weather — a light spring mist, almost a rain — their carriage was open except for an overhead canvas. Marán had a merry expression on her face; Amiel looked angry. I wondered what had happened. I looked closely and saw a thin film of sweat on Amiel’s face.

“Here,” Marán said, holding something out to me. I unrolled it, and saw it was a pair of women’s underpants.

“Your wife,” Amiel hissed, “is a hussy.”

“This is true,” I agreed. “What made you realize it?”

Marán started giggling, and said, “We’ve been good little girls while you were gone. Two whole weeks without doing anything with each other or even ourselves.”

“If you had to do without, we should do the same,” Amiel said. “So we did. Until this morning.”

Their outfits were as seductive as could be imagined, barely permissible beyond the bedroom. Marán wore a flaring skirt that hardly went below her crotch, and revealed matching underpants of the sheerest silk, and a single-button black jacket, its button between her breasts and navel. She wore nothing beneath the jacket.

Amiel wore a dress that buttoned high on her neck, then opened daringly in a crescent to below her cleavage. It clung close to her waist, then was slit high on one side.

Marán explained — she’d arranged to have a light rainproof robe in the carriage, “in case the weather worsened.”

“Liar,” Amiel put in, then took up the story. “As soon as we left our house, she pulled the robe over our laps. Then she ran her hand up my leg, under my dress, and began rubbing me. I, uh, well, I let her. It
has
been almost two weeks. Somehow she got my underpants off, and got her fingers in me.

“I was trying to keep from yelling, trying to keep from squirming and keep the damned coachman seeing what was going on. I told her to stop, but she wouldn’t. So I told her to go ahead, to help me finish. Just before I came, she did stop. The bitch!”

“I read in one of the books you loaned me,” Marán said, “that sex is always better when you’ve been anticipating it for a while. I’m just being helpful, and wanted to make sure we wouldn’t disappoint Damastes.”

“Then for Jaen’s sake, let’s get back to the house before I explode,” Amiel said plaintively.

• • •

Candles flickered on either side of our bed. Amiel half-lay on her back, propped against pillows, legs lifted and parted. Marán lay on her back, against Amiel’s sex, as Amiel rubbed Marán’s breasts hard. Marán’s legs were on my shoulders, her heels on either side of my head, and I held her buttocks in my hands, lifted clear off the mattress.

Marán cried out, twisted against me, then went limp. Her legs thumped down on the bed. Still inside her, still hard, I lay down across her body and Amiel’s legs, and found a pillow to support my weight.

“This,” I said when my breathing slowed, “may be the best welcome home I’ve ever had.”

“I’d say you should go away more often,” Amiel whispered. “But we don’t like doing without you.”

“What are we going to do if war comes?” Marán said. “You’ll have to smuggle us along. I can get a close haircut and pretend to be a drummer boy, maybe. But what about Amiel? How can she hide her titties?”