"They, "said Ganesha, "do not. But others might, others for whom the learning of a strange tongue is as easy as the shifting of one robe for another."
"It is not only robes that can be shifted," he added darkly.
"We have no Phoenix, as you call it, but an Eagle," said Lucilius. "Our Legions follow them. If you listened to Ssu-ma Chao..."
"A provincial of no particular family—what has such as he to tell me? He brought you here; he brought the Eagle, as you call it. You saw how it blazed, even for him. What could it not do for ... for us?"
"What of it? A trick of the sunlight, nothing more," Lucilius drawled.
The Ch'in hissed. Quintus pondered Ganesha's words. As easy to shift from one robe to another ... as the Naacals had done. The man whom fire had consumed had died without a scream. But a deathscream had come from behind Quintus.
It was mad. It was pure lunacy beyond any wild fantasy that any man had ever had. What if two men in addition to poor Arsaces had died in Kashgar—the one man's body burnt by the power of the Eagle, and the spirit of the other destroyed when the first man's ego conquered and occupied his body. Madness, true. But how else to explain that scream or how an arrogant young officer now spoke polished Latin?
"It is no matter," Lucilius said, sullen. "This Eagle— oh, very well—the Phoenix lies in your power. Or in your commander's. And you and he are, as I observed, on the best of terms."
"It is no matter," said Wang Tou-fan or that which wore his flesh. "He will not permit you to remain here. He said as much while he was ... tired men drink too deeply, let us say. And, when they are tired and their guard is down ... I have had my piece of good fortune out of this: I am to return to Ch'ang-an with you. Bearing with us the Eagle."
Lucilius shrugged. Quintus did not even need to see his face to know that the patrician was wearing his "and what do I gain from this?" look. Dice, defeat, forced marches: They were all the same. Even this far from home. Lucilius might spy a future and the power he thought he had lost.
"How did he make the Eagle light?" demanded the Ch'in.
Quintus could have laughed at the baffled arrogance in Lucilius's voice. "I don't know. I never saw that happen before. I tell you, there is a strangeness ... I will be glad when we go to a place where family is respected and a man can be civilized."
"Mud huts and upstarts!" spat the Ch'in noble. Jupiter Optimus Maximus, he was speaking of his own capital! Or of the capital of the young man whose body had been usurped. Then he recovered self-control.
"The man who could teach me the secret of the Eagle's fire—the secret of the Phoenix itself—might find himself honored as if he were a prince, almost as the Son of Heaven himself."
Lucilius almost purred. "You begin to interest me."
"You, not—"
"That peasant? He would not listen to you. But it was. he for whom the Eagle lit. I must think...."
"I must see it," said Wang Tou-fan.
"And if you touch it? It may consume you as it consumed ... how shall we call your former ... yes, yes, I know. I am all discretion, not that I believe you. Will you risk the chance that the thing has bonded so to him that it will turn on all others?"
"It allowed Ssu-ma Chao to touch it."
"The risk, as I said, is yours."
"He has the place," said Wang Tou-fan, "that should be yours. That can be yours, with far more added to it. That choice, as I said, is yours. Remove him, and perhaps the Eagle will turn to you. And then you and I can talk again."
Quintus stiffened. They had never agreed, he and Lucilius, not from the moment that the patrician had eyed him and marked him as a bumpkin and his family's client; and Quintus had, in return, seen the other as responsible for his family's degradation. All this long round of service and exile, they had been like enemies manacled on a short chain and tossed into deep water, to drown together or, together, struggle onto dry land.
"Here is a blade," said Wang Tou-fan. "And here is a phial. They have fine poisons in the farthest East. But a scratch..."
Lucilius made a sound of revulsion.
"Do you want to be a fighting man all your life, one step up from a slave, when Ch'ang-an holds so much promise for a talented man who understands where his advantage lies. Take the knife!"
"He is not worthy of my attention," the Roman muttered. "To die at the hands of one of my gens is more honor than that rustic deserves."
"Can you be so sure? Or is it that you fear him—or that hulking oaf who marches behind him and serves him? As he should have obeyed you. Tell me, Lucilius, are you afraid?"
Afraid of Rufus? If Lucilius was not, he ought to be— if only for listening to this talk of betrayal. Quintus's belly chilled. He would not have thought...
"What's there?" Lucilius whispered and whirled about.
The Ch'in laughed softly. "Afraid? As I thought. Review your enemies; and what is there to fear? The oaf, the young fool, the old man from Hind, perhaps, and she who travels with him."
"She is of interest to me...." Lucilius purred.
"Take her if you wish," said Wang Tou-fan, as if throwing a coin to a whining beggar. "They are not ... unskilled, adepts like herself. As you may have observed. As your enemy the rustic doubtless has discovered."
The other laughed softly. "She is of interest to many."
"I'll kill him myself!" Quintus got the words out between gritted teeth.
"Quiet!" Draupadi hissed. She flung her arms about him as he started toward Lucilius and Wang Tou-fan and out of the range of the protective illusion she had cast. Her breath against his neck was warm and comforting.
"No, Quintus," Draupadi crooned it almost as if she cast another spell. Lady, you do bespell me with every move. "No. Caius. Dear one. Be still, please!" She seemed to rock him back and forth, as if seeking to relax his too-taut body. "I am here. Stay with me."
So it was treachery by Lucilius, was it? Knives in the back. And not just in his back, but Rufus's. Quintus had known Lucilius to be venal, known him to be ambitious, spoiled, too ready to assume that all good things were his for the asking. But not evil. Now—with a strangled moan, he let his head fall onto Draupadi's shoulder. Her body felt better in his arms than he could have dreamed. And this, he knew, was no illusion.
Nevertheless, he let her go. He needed to get closer, to see the two men, born half a world from each other yet united in treachery. Romans had shamed Rome before, but this ... this was somehow different. And there were so very few of them left this far from home.
"Who's that?" Lucilius's voice rang out sharply.
"How long have you been in the desert?" asked Wang Tou-fan. "Are you truly fool enough to believe the stories of demons and goblins?"
A hissing began to rise in the outermost range of Quintus's hearing, a hissing of great snakes, their jaws wide, draining the life through shining, hollow fangs until their prey were ancient-seeming, bled-out husks such as he had seen at Stone Tower.
"Yes," Draupadi whispered. "Yes. Surely, he has been touched by their power, promised..."
Surely, Lucilius had been promised—what? Draupadi herself? The gold he had always wanted? He would be lucky if he did not find himself, like his master the dead proconsul, with more gold than he could safely swallow—the mock of his enemies.
Still, Lucilius stood. "Why not do it yourself?" he demanded. "You could say he tried to escape. You could say he ran mad and tried to kill someone."
"Perhaps I require proofs of those in my hands. For example, you know, as does every man here, that as long as one of you Romans remains alive, he will not abandon him. He would not even, I imagine, abandon you."