The Tale of Krispos (103 page)

Krispos shrugged. She was still Dara. He still found himself wanting her. As he’d told Tanilis, it was rather more than a marriage of convenience. If he wanted it to remain so, he suspected he ought to stop thinking about what he’d told Tanilis. That seemed dreadfully unfair, but he’d learned a good deal of life was unfair. He shrugged again. Unfair or not, you went on anyway.

“Get up, please,” Dara said. When Krispos did, she pulled back the spread, leaving just the sheet and a light coverlet. “It’s a warm night.”

“All right.” He slid under the sheet and blew out the lamp that stood on the night table. A moment later Dara got into bed with him. She blew out her lamp. The bedchamber plunged into darkness. “Good night,” Krispos said.

“Good night,” she answered coolly.

The bed was big enough to leave a good deal of space between them.
Here I am, returned in triumph, and I might as well be sleeping alone,
Krispos thought. He yawned enormously. His eyes slid shut. He slept.

H
E WOKE AT SUNRISE THE NEXT MORNING WITH A BLADDER
full to bursting. He glanced over at Dara. She’d kicked off the covers some time during the night, but was still peacefully asleep. Carefully, so as not to wake her, he got out of bed and used the chamber pot. He lay down again. Dara did not wake.

He slid toward her. Very, very gently, his tongue began to tease her right nipple. It crinkled erect. She smiled in her sleep. All at once her eyes opened. She stiffened, then twisted away from him. “What are you trying to do?” she snapped.

“I thought that would be plain enough,” he said. “Your body answered mine, or started to, even if you’re angry with me.”

“Bodies are fools,” Dara said scornfully.

“Aye, they are,” Krispos said. “Mine was, too.”

She’d opened her mouth to say something, and likely something harsh. That made her shut it. Even so, she shook her head. “You think that if I lie with you, we’ll be fools together and I’ll forget about what you did.”

“I don’t think you’ll forget.” Krispos sighed. “I wish you could, but I know better. Not even the mages have a magic to make things as if they’d never happened. But if we do lie together, I hope you will remember I love you.” He nearly finished that sentence
I love you, too.
One hastily swallowed syllable stood between him and disaster, a nearer brush than in any fight against the Halogai.

“If we are to live as man and wife, I suppose we’ll have to be man and wife,” Dara said, as much to herself as to Krispos. Her lip curled. “Otherwise, you’d surely take your nets and go trolling for other women. Very well, Krispos; as you will.” She lay back and stared up at the ceiling.

He did not go to her. Sucking in a deep, irritated breath, he said, “I don’t want you just to be having you, curse it. That was Anthimos’ sport. I don’t care for it. If we can’t meet halfway, better not to bother when we’re angry at each other.”

She lifted her head from the mattress to study him. “You mean that,” she said slowly.

“Yes, by the good god, I do. Let’s just ring for the servants and start the new day.” He reached for the crimson bell pull by his side of the bed.

“Wait,” Dara said. His hand stopped. He raised a questioning eyebrow. After a moment she went on, “Let it be a—a peace-offering between us, then. I can’t promise to enjoy it, Krispos. I will do more than endure it.”

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“I’m sure…Be gentle, if you can. I’m not that long out of childbed.”

“I will,” he promised. Now he reached out to clasp her breast. Her hand closed on his.

Their lovemaking was, perhaps, the strangest he’d known—certainly the most self-conscious. Both her physical frailty and knowing she remained just this side of furious at him constrained him until he was almost afraid to touch her. Despite her pledge, she lay still and unstirred under his caresses.

Her jaw was clamped with apprehension when he entered her. “Is it all right?” he asked. She hesitated, considering. Finally she nodded. He went on, as carefully as he could. At last he gasped and jerked, even then cautiously. He realized he was lying with all his weight on her. He slid out of her, then away from her. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’d hoped to please you better.”

“Never mind—don’t worry about it,” she answered. He looked at her in some surprise, for she sounded serious. Then she nodded to show she was. She went on, “I told you I doubted I was happy enough with you to take full part in it now. But I noticed how you did what you did, how you were careful with me. Maybe I even noticed that more because I wasn’t swept away. You wouldn’t have been so…regardful if I were just so much convenient flesh to you.”

“I’ve never thought of you like that,” Krispos protested.

“A woman often wonders,” Dara said bleakly, “especially a woman who has known Anthimos, and most especially a woman who, when her husband goes away while she must stay behind, learns he’s found some other convenient flesh with which to dally for a while. Me, I mean.”

Krispos started to say, “It wasn’t like that.” But knowing when to hold his tongue had served him well through the years. This was as good a time as any, and better than most. He knew he was right—what he and Tanilis had done together was far more than dallying with convenient flesh. At the moment, though, being right mattered little; if he pressed it, being right was indeed liable to be worse than being wrong. Peace with Dara was worth giving her the last word.

What he did say, not even a beat late, was, “I’m no Anthimos. I hope you’ve noticed.”

“I have,” she said. “I was quite sure of it till you went on campaign. Then—” She shook her head. “Then I doubted everything. But maybe, just maybe, we can go on after all.”

“I want us to,” Krispos said. “I’ve packed a lifetime’s worth of upheavals into the last two years. I don’t need any more.”

Suddenly Dara made a wry face. She quickly sat, then looked down between her legs. Krispos took a few seconds to be sure the snort she let out was laughter. She said, “The maidservant who changes the bed linen will be sure we’ve reconciled. I suppose we may as well.”

“Good,” Krispos said. “I’m glad.”

“I…think I am, too.”

With that Krispos had to be content. Considering how Dara had greeted him the day before, it was as much as he could have hoped for. Now he did yank at the bellpull. Barsymes appeared as promptly and silently as if he’d been conjured up. “Good morning, Your Majesty. I trust you slept well?”

“Yes, thank you, esteemed sir.”

The vestiarios brought him a pair of drawers and pointed to a robe in the closet. Krispos nodded at his choice. Barsymes drew out the robe. Krispos let the eunuch dress him. Dara must have used her bellpull, too, for a serving maid came in while Barsymes was fussing over Krispos. She helped Dara into her clothes and combed out her shining black hair.

“And how would you care to break your fast this morning, Your Majesty?” Barsymes asked.

Krispos slapped his belly with the flat of his hand. “Seeing that I ate enough for three starving men last night, I hope Phestos won’t be put out if I just ask for a small bowl of porridge and half a stewed melon.”

“I trust he will be able to restrain his chagrin, yes,” the vestiarios agreed blandly. Krispos gave him a sharp look—Barsymes’ wit was drought-dry. The chamberlain turned to Dara. “And you, Your Majesty?”

“The same as for Krispos, I think,” she said.

“I shall so inform Phestos. No doubt he will be pleased to find the two of you in accord.” With that oblique comment on yesterday’s fight, Barsymes strode out of the imperial bedchamber.

When the vestiarios cleared away the few breakfast dishes, Krispos knew he ought to start in on all the scrolls and parchments that had piled up at the palaces while he was on campaign. The most pressing business had followed him even to Pliskavos, but much that was not pressing remained important—and would swiftly become urgent if he neglected it. But he could not make himself get up and attend to business, not on his first full day back in Videssos the city. Hadn’t he earned at least one day of rest?

He was still arguing with himself when Longinos brought Phostis into the dining room. “Dada!” Phostis exclaimed, and ran to him. Krispos decided the parchments could wait. He scooped up Phostis and gave him a noisy kiss.

Phostis scrubbed at his cheek with the palm of his hand. After a moment, Krispos realized the boy was not used to being kissed by anyone who wore a beard. He kissed him again. Phostis rubbed again.

“You’re doing that on purpose, just to confuse him with your whiskers,” Dara said.

“If he gets to know me, he has to get to know my beard, too,” Krispos answered. “The lord with the great and good mind willing, I’ll be able to stay in the city long enough now to keep him from forgetting me.”

Dara yielded. “May Phos hear that prayer.” Phostis stood up on Krispos’ lap. He wrapped his arms around Krispos’ neck and made a loud kissing noise. Krispos found himself grinning. Dara smiled a mother’s smile. She said, “He seems fond of you.”

“He does, doesn’t he? That’s good.” Krispos glanced to Longinos, then to the doorway. The eunuch, trained to the nuances of palace service, gave a half bow that turned his plump cheeks pink, then stepped into the hall. Krispos lowered his voice and said to Dara, “You know, at last I find I don’t care who his father really was. He’s a fine little boy, that’s all.”

“I’ve thought so all along,” she answered. “I never wanted to say it very often, though, for fear of making you worry more about that than you would have otherwise.” She studied him, nodding thoughtfully as if he’d passed a test.

He wondered if he had. Was he showing maturity about Phostis’ lineage, or merely resignation? He didn’t know himself. Whatever it was, it seemed to please Dara. That practical consideration carried more weight with him than any fine-spun point of philosophy.

He chuckled. “What?” Dara asked.

“Only that I’d never make a good sorcerer or theologian,” he said.

“You’re probably right,” she replied. “On the other hand, precious few sorcerers or theologians would make a good Avtokrator, and you’re shaping pretty well for that.”

He dipped his head to her in silent thanks. Then, all unbidden, Harvas rose to the surface of his mind. Harvas had been theologian and sorcerer both, and wanted to rule the Empire of Videssos. What sort of Avtokrator would he have made? Krispos knew the answer to that and shuddered at the knowledge.

But Harvas was menace no more, thanks to Tanilis; even if he could not speak of her to Dara, Krispos reflected, how could he erase her from his memory? Maybe one day the sorcerer would arise and threaten Videssos again, but Krispos did not think it would be any year soon. If it did happen, he would deal with it as best he could, or Phostis would, or Phostis’ son, or whoever wore the Avtokrator’s crown in some distant time.

With the infallible instinct palace servants develop, Longinos knew he could come back into the dining room. “Shall I take charge of the young Majesty again?” he asked Krispos.

Krispos expected Phostis to go to the eunuch, with whom he was far more familiar. But Phostis stayed close by. “I’ll keep him awhile, if it’s all right with you, Longinos,” Krispos said. “He’s mine, after all.”

“Indeed, Your Majesty. Phos has blessed you—blessed you twice now.” The chamberlain’s voice, not quite tenor, not quite alto, was wistful. Phos would not bless him, not that way.

When Krispos got up from the table and went out into the hall, Phostis toddled after him. He slowed his steps to let the little boy keep up. Phostis walked over to a carved marble display stand and tried to climb up it. Krispos didn’t think he was strong enough to knock it over, but took no chances. He lifted Phostis into his arms.

Displayed on the marble stand was a conical helm once worn by a Makuraner King of Kings, part of the spoil from a Videssian triumph of long ago. On the wall above the helmet hung a portrait of the fierce-looking Avtokrator Stavrakios, who had beaten the Halogai in their own country. Every time Krispos saw it, he wondered how he would measure up in Stavrakios’ uncompromising eyes.

Phostis pointed to the portrait and frowned in intense concentration. “Emp’ror,” he said at last.

“Yes, that’s true,” Krispos said. “He was Emperor, a long time ago.”

Phostis wasn’t finished. He pointed to Krispos, almost sticking a finger in his eye. “Emp’ror,” he said again, adding a moment later, “Dada.”

Krispos hugged the little boy. “That’s true, too,” he agreed gravely. “I am the Emperor, and your dada. Come to think of it, young Majesty, you’re an emperor yourself.” Now he pointed at Phostis. “Emperor.”

“Emp’ror?” Phostis laughed, as if that were the funniest thing he’d ever heard. Krispos laughed, too. It was a preposterously unlikely notion, when you got right down to it. But it was also true.

Krispos hugged Phostis tighter, till the boy squirmed. Every year, so many, many peasants left their farms and came to Videssos the city to seek their fortunes. Unlike almost all of them, he’d found his.

“Emperor,” he said wonderingly. He lowered Phostis to the floor. They walked down the hall together.

Book
III

K
RISPOS THE
E
MPEROR