A narrow-faced Videssian named Petinos commanded the troop. He came to Rhavas' temple to pray. The prelate invited him back to his residence for some wine. "Yes, we were ordered out of the frontier forts," the officer said in response to Rhavas' question. "We left behind what garrisons we could, but . . ." He shrugged.
"How soon before the Halogai take advantage of the border's being stripped?" Rhavas asked. "It won't be long, will it?"
Petinos only shrugged once more. "No one will move fast on the northern frontier after winter closes down, not even the blond barbarians. If the good god is kind, we may have those forts manned again by spring. Plenty of time for fighting down in the south, and that may give us an answer before the Halogai start stirring."
"And if it doesn't?" Rhavas said.
The borderers' officer shrugged yet again. "If there is no answer by spring, very holy sir, my men and I will still be down in the south. What happens up here won't be our worry anymore. But, I'm afraid, it will be yours."
Rhavas glared at him. Petinos looked back, imperturbable. Rhavas said, "This is not the feeling you should show for your fellow man."
"My fellow man sent me to the chilblain capital of the world," Petinos retorted. Rhavas wondered what he'd done to deserve getting sent to the farthest northeast. Zautzes might know; he paid more attention to that kind of gossip than Rhavas did. Petinos went on, "Now that my fellow man has seen fit to call me back to something approaching civilization, what can I do but thank him kindly? As for folk still stuck up here . . . I am sorry for you. The difference is, now I don't have to be sorry for myself, too."
That sort of ruthless pragmatism struck Rhavas as more typical of the Halogai than of Videssians. More of the north had rubbed off on Petinos than he was willing to admit—more, perhaps, than he knew. Rhavas said, "You do know the border troops have been pulled not just from this frontier but also from the one facing the Pardrayan steppe?"
"What?" Petinos started. His hand jerked so that wine almost sloshed out of his cup. He needed what looked like a distinct effort of will to steady himself. Slowly, he said, "No, very holy sir, I did not know that. No one had seen fit to tell it to me. Are things really so bad?"
"They aren't good, by all the signs." Rhavas didn't want to say even so much, but he didn't want to lie, either. "Even the rebel would not have done such a thing without gravest need."
"Meaning no offense, but it could be a need that puts a lot of people in the grave," Petinos said. "The Khamorth won't care whether it's summer or winter. They're on the move the year around, and live off the flocks they drive with them. If the frontier is empty, what's to stop them from swarming into the Empire? Once they're in, they'd be bloody hard to drive out, too."
In a low, troubled voice, Rhavas answered, "I'm afraid this thought also crossed my mind. I was hoping you would tell me it was so much moonshine, all wind and air—shadow, not substance."
"Phos! I wish I could, not for your sake—meaning no offense again, I'm sure—but because this could be the worst thing that's happened to Videssos in a very long time." Petinos tilted back his head, emptied the silver winecup at one long draught, and then poured it full again. "If Maleinos and Stylianos keep hammering away at each other, who will drive the nomads back to the plains where they belong? Will anyone?"
He didn't answer his own question. He didn't have to; the answer hung in the air regardless of whether he came out and said it. No.
Rhavas reached for the jar of wine, too. Most of the time, he was as stern with himself on such indulgences as he was with anyone else. Today? Today another cup of wine seemed not an indulgence but an anodyne. He wouldn't have begrudged it to a man facing the surgeon's knife, and felt himself—and the Empire—in much the same predicament.
The wine did help steady him. Setting down the cup, he said, "Phos must have prepared this great test of life for the whole Empire."
"Either that or Skotos is working something particularly nasty against us." Petinos spat.
So did Rhavas. "May it not come to pass!" he said. "Skotos may win battles, but surely everything we see in life proves that the lord with the great and good mind will triumph in the end."
"Surely," Petinos echoed. Rhavas sent him a sharp look. Petinos didn't sound as if he agreed. He sounded like a man pretending to agree so he wouldn't have to argue, or maybe like a man who said one thing but meant exactly the opposite.
Most of the time, Rhavas would have lit into him for such hypocrisy. Today, he let it pass. If Petinos wanted to endanger his soul, if he wanted to risk falling down to Skotos' eternal darkness and ice, that was his affair. Rhavas had more urgent things to worry about himself.
He worried even more when the detachment of frontier troops Petinos led marched out of Skopentzana. The gates swung shut behind the soldiers. The thud of those two great valves closing sounded dreadfully final in Rhavas' ears. It might have said the city would never again see imperial soldiers.
As a matter of fact, it said just that. No one knew it, though, not even Rhavas. Sometimes, as Eladas the soothsayer could have testified were he still among the living, not knowing what lay ahead was the greater mercy.
Spring in Skopentzana always seemed to last longer than it really did. It stretched ahead to the promise of summer. Autumn, by contrast, felt foreshortened. All that lay ahead of autumn was winter, and everyone in Skopentzana knew winter much too well.
Firsts came thick and fast in autumn. First leaves changing color. First leaves falling from the trees. First frost. First bare trees. They all came together in a few hectic weeks.
Some years, a hailstorm would wedge its way into the schedule. That could mean disaster and famine if it came early and ruined the harvest. This year, no natural catastrophe visited itself among Skopentzana.
That reassured Rhavas less than it might have. Skopentzana and the Empire of Videssos needed no natural catastrophes to be miserable, not this year. They had far more than their fair share of man-made catastrophes.
The first snowfall, nearly two months before the winter solstice, was slight and soon melted. Some years, weather almost summery came hard on the heels of a snowstorm like that. Sometimes it lasted for quite a while, too.
Not here. Not now. After the brief, halfhearted thaw, a real blizzard rolled out of the northwest. It was the sort of storm that made people fret about firewood, the sort of storm that didn't usually come till much later in the year.
Most folk clapped shutters over their windows, which only made the inside of their homes and shops darker and grimmer. Rhavas didn't have to endure that. The prelate's residence was one of the very few buildings in Skopentzana boasting glazed windows. Even in Videssos the city, they were far from common. Rhavas didn't think Skopentzana had had any till he put these into the residence. A few rich people and a few people who wanted to be on the cutting edge of fashion had imitated him since.
Rhavas didn't get the clearest view when he looked outside. The glass was streaked and bubbled and set in small panes separated by strips of lead. That bothered him not at all. It would have been no different in the capital. Glassmaking was an uncertain art.
Before long, clearly or not, he could watch snow whipping almost horizontally past his window. When winter came to Skopentzana, it settled in and made itself at home. Rhavas knew not much news from the south would come till the weather warmed again. That didn't mean no news would be made down in the warmer parts of the Empire. As Petinos had said, campaigning down there didn't have to stop so soon as it would in these parts.
Would Petinos ever come back through Skopentzana on his way back to the northern border. Would Himerios and the city garrison ever come back to Skopentzana? Rhavas wished he hadn't asked himself that second question. The part of him that cared about good governance hoped he would soon see Himerios here again. The part of him that cared about . . . other things had . . . other ideas.