Lord of Emperors (33 page)

There was a silence. There was always silence when the King of Kings was speaking, but this was different. In all their wars with Valerius and his uncle before him and Apius before
him,
Eubulus had never been taken or even besieged. Neither had their own great northern city of Mihrbor. The battles between Sarantium and Bassania had been entirely about gold. Border raids to north and south for plunder, ransom, money for the treasuries on each side, payment for the armies. Conquest, the sack of major cities, had never been an issue.

Shirvan looked from one of his generals to another. He knew he was forcing them to change the way they thought-always a risk with soldiers. He saw Robazes, as expected, grasp the implications first.

He said, "Remember, if they
are
going to Batiara, Leontes will be in the west. He will not be at Eubulus to face you. And if we draw enough soldiers from his army of invasion because they must go north to meet you instead, he will fail in the west. He may… die." He said that last very slowly, giving it time to register. They needed to understand this.

Leontes would be west. Their scourge. The too-bright image of terror in
their
dreams, golden as the sun the Sarantines worshipped. The military commanders of Bassania looked at each other. Fear and excitement were in the room now, a slow dawning of comprehension, first awareness of possibility.

Awareness also came, after, of certain other things. How this breaking of the peace would put those Bassanids in western lands-merchants, most of them, a handful of others-desperately at risk. But that always happened when a war began, and there weren't so many in any case. Such considerations could not be permitted to alter anything. Merchants always knew there were risks in going west (or east, for that matter, into Ispa-hani). That was why they charged so much for what they brought back, how they made their fortunes.

As Shirvan gestured his dismissal and the gathering made obeisance and began to break up, one other man did venture to speak: Mazendar the vizier, who was always licensed to do so in the presence of his king. A small, round man, his voice light and dry as the king's was grave and deep, he offered two small suggestions.

The first was about timing. "Great King, did you propose we attack
before
they sail west?"

Shirvan narrowed his eyes. "That is one possibility," he said carefully. And waited.

"Indeed, my dread lord, "Mazendar murmured. "I see a glimmer of your mighty thoughts. We can do that, or wait until they have set off for the west and
then
cross the border for Eubulus. Leontes will be pursued by fast ships with panic-stricken tidings. He may be ordered to send some of his fleet home. The remainder will feel exposed and disheartened. Or he may press on, always fearing what
we
do behind him. And Sarantium will feel utterly exposed. Does the King of Kings prefer that, or the other approach? His advisers await the light of his wisdom."

Mazendar was the only one of them worth listening to. Robazes could fight, and lead an army, but Mazendar had a mind. Shirvan said, gravely, "It will take us some time to assemble our army north. We will attend upon events in the west and make our decision accordingly."

"How large an army, my lord?" Robazes asked the soldier's question. He blinked in astonishment when Shirvan gave him a number. They had never sent so many men before.

Shirvan kept his expression grim and hard. People should see the countenance of the King of Kings and remember it and report it. Valerius of Sarantium was not the only ruler who could send large armies into the world. The king looked back at Mazendar. He had spoken of two suggestions.

The second concerned the queen of the Antae, in Sarantium.

Listening, the king nodded his head slowly. Was graciously pleased to agree that this proposal had virtue. Gave his consent.

Men went forth from that room. Events began to move at speed. The first signal fires were lit at darkfall that same day, sending messages of flame from hilltop to fortress tower to hilltop beyond, in all necessary directions.

The King of Kings spent much of the day with Mazendar and Robazes and the lesser generals and his treasury officials, and the afternoon in prayer before the palace's ember of the Holy Fire. At the dinner hour, he felt unwell, feverish. He spoke of this to no one, of course, but reclining upon a couch to dine he suddenly remembered-belatedly- the unexpectedly competent physician who was to be coming to Kabadh in the summer. He'd ordered the man to Sarantium in the interval, until after his necessary elevation in caste. He'd been an observing sort of man; the king had sought a way to utilize him. Kings needed to do that. Useful men had to be put to use.

Shirvan sipped at a bowl of green tea and then shook his head. The movement made him feel dizzy and so he stopped. That doctor would have left for the west already. For Sarantium itself. An unfortunate place to have him now.

It couldn't be helped. A ruler's own health and comfort surely had to give way to the needs of his people. There were burdens that came with royalty, and the King of Kings knew them all. One's personal concerns had to yield at certain times. Besides which, there simply
had
to be more than one effective doctor in Bassania. He resolved to have Mazendar initiate a proper search… it was not something he'd ever done, in fact.

But one grew older, good health became less sure. Azal hovered with black wings. Perun and the Lady waited for all men in judgement. One didn't have to… rush to them before-times, however.

A thought came to him as the dinner ended and he retired to his private quarters. His head was still hurting. Nevertheless, he sent for Mazendar. The vizier appeared almost immediately. It seemed to Shirvan at times that the man lived his life poised on the other side of a door, so swift was he always to appear.

The king recollected to his vizier the thought Mazendar had voiced in the morning, about the Antae queen. Then he reminded him of that physician from the south who was in Sarantium, or would be soon enough. He'd forgotten the man's name. It didn't matter; Mazendar would know it. The vizier, by a very great deal the quickest of those around him, smiled slowly and stroked his small beard "The king is truly brother to the lords of creation," he said. "The king's eyes are as the eagle's eyes and his thoughts are deep as the sea. I shall act upon this, at speed."

Shirvan nodded, then rubbed at his forehead and finally had his physicians summoned. He didn't trust any of them very much, having had the three deemed best killed in Kerakek for their own failings, but
surely
those here at court were adequate to preparing a concoction of some kind that could ease this pain in his head and help him sleep.

They were, in fact. The King of Kings did not dream that night, for the first time in a long while.

In winter in Sarantium, when the enormous bulk of the Hippodrome stood quiet, the faction rivalry shifted to the theatres. The dancers, actors, jugglers, clowns vied in performance and the faction members in their assigned sections would produce acclamations (or loud denunciations) of an increasingly sophisticated nature. The rehearsals involved in achieving these spontaneous demonstrations could be quite demanding. If you knew how to follow directions, were willing to spend much of your free time practising, and had an acceptable voice, you could earn yourself a good spot for performances and privileged admission to the faction banquets and other events. There was no shortage of applicants.

The Blues and Greens were separated in the theatres as they were in the Hippodrome, standing off to the sides of the curved audience space, nowhere near each other. The Urban Prefecture was not deficient in rudimentary good sense, and the Imperial Precinct had made it abundantly clear that an excess of violence could darken the theatres for the whole of a winter. A grim prospect; sufficiently so to ensure a certain level of decorum-most of the time.

The court and visiting dignitaries, along with high-ranking civil servants and military officers, had the only seats, in the centre down front Behind them was standing space for the non-aligned theatre-goers, prioritized by guild seniority or military rank, and here, too, could be found the couriers of the Imperial Post. Farther up in the middle came ordinary soldiers and sailors and citizens and, in this enlightened reign (rather too much so for the more fiery of the clerics), even the Kindath in their blue robes and silver caps. The occasional Bassanid or pagan traders from Karch or Moskav with a curiosity about what happened here might find a few spots assigned them towards the very back.

The clergy themselves were never at the theatre, of course. Women were very nearly naked there sometimes. They had to be careful with the northerners, actually: the girls could excite them a little too much, a different sort of disruption ensuing.

While the Principal Dancers-Shirin and Tychus for the Greens, Clarus and Elaina for the Blues-led their colours in performance once or twice a week and the Accredited Musicians coordinated the acclamations and the younger partisans goaded and brawled with each other in various smoky cauponae and taverns, the leaders of the two factions spent the winter aggressively preparing for spring and what
really
mattered in Sarantium.

The chariots were the heart of the City's life and everyone knew it.

There was, in truth, a great deal to be done in a winter. Riders would be recruited from the provinces, dropped or sent away for various reasons, or subjected to additional training. The younger ones, for example, were endlessly drilled in how to fall from a chariot and how to arrange a spill if one was needed. Horses were evaluated, retired, groomed, and exercised; new ones were bought by agents. The faction cheiromancers still cast their attacking and warding spells (with an eye to useful deaths and fresh graves beyond the walls).

Every so often the two faction managers would meet at some neutral tavern or bathhouse and carefully negotiate, over heavily watered wine, a transaction of some kind or other. Usually this involved the lesser colours-the Reds and Whites-for neither leader would want to run the risk of losing such a exchange in an obvious way.

This, in fact, was how it came to pass that young Taras of the Reds, some time after the end of his first season in the City, found himself brusquely informed by the Green factionarius one morning after chapel services that he'd been dealt to the Blues and Whites for a right-side trace horse and two barrels of Sarnican wine, and was expected to clear out his gear and head for the Blues" compound that same morning.

It wasn't said in an unkind way. It was brief, utterly matter-of-fact, and the factionarius had already turned to discuss a new shipment of Arimondan leather with someone else by the time Taras had fully grasped what he'd been told. Taras stumbled out of the factionarius's very crowded office. No one met his eye.

It was true that he hadn't been with them for long, and had only been riding for the Reds, and he was shy by nature, so Taras was certainly not a well-known figure in the compound. But it still seemed to him-young and not yet accustomed to the hard ways of the City-that his former comrades might have shown a little less enthusiasm when word of the transaction reached the banquet hall and the main barracks. It wasn't pleasant to hear people
cheering
when they heard the tidings.

The horse was said to be a very good one, agreed, but Taras was a man, a charioteer, someone who'd had a bed in the room with them, had dined at the table, done his very best all year in a difficult, dangerous place far from his home. The celebration wounded him, he had to admit it.

The only ones who even bothered to come by to wish him luck as he was packing his things were a couple of the grooms, an undercook he'd gone drinking with on occasion, and one of the other Red riders. In fairness, he had to acknowledge that Crescens, their burly First, did pause in his drinking long enough to note Taras crossing the banquet hall with his things and call a jocular farewell across the crowded room.

He got Taras's name wrong, but he always did that.

It was raining outside. Taras tugged down the brim of his hat and turned up his collar as he went through the yard. He belatedly remembered that he'd forgotten to take his mother's remedy against all possible ailments. He'd probably get sick now, on top of everything else.

A horse. He'd been dealt for a
horse.
There was a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. He could still remember his family's pride when the Greens" recruiter in Megarium had invited him to the City a year ago "Work hard, and who knows what might happen," the man had said.

At the compound entrance one of the guards stepped out of the hut and unlocked the gates. He waved casually and ducked back in out of the rain. They might not yet know what had happened. Taras didn't tell them. Outside, two young boys in blue tunics were standing in the laneway, getting wet.

"You Taras?" one of them asked, chewing at a stick of skewered lamb.

Taras nodded.

"Let's go, then. Take you there." The boy flipped the remains of his skewer into the gutter, which was running with rainwater.

An escort. Two street urchins. How flattering, Taras thought.

"I
know
where the Blues" compound is," he muttered under his breath. He felt flushed, lightheaded. Wanted to be alone. Didn't want to
look
at anyone. How was he going to tell his mother about this? The very thought of dictating such a letter to a scribe made his heart beat painfully.

One of the boys kept pace with him through the puddles; the other disappeared after a while into the misty rain, obviously bored, or just cold. One urchin, then. A triumphant procession for the great charioteer just acquired for a horse and some wine.

At the gates to the Blues" compound-his new home now, hard as it was to think that way-Taras had to give his name twice and then explain, excruciatingly, that he was a charioteer and had been… recruited to join them. The guards looked dubious.