Belisarius waited until the very end, before he mounted up and followed. It was odd, he realized, how much he was going to miss the mountains. Odd, when he thought of the many times he had cursed them. But the Zagros had been good to him, when all was said and done. And he was going to miss the clean air.
He drove out all regrets. Aide helped.
Think of the sea breeze. Think of gulls, soaring through blue skies. Think of The hell with all that! came Belisarius' cheerful retort.All I want to think about is Venus rising from the waves.
And that was the thought that held him, through the miserable days ahead. His wife, coming to meet him from across the sea.
Dearest love.
At a place called Charax. A place where Belisarius would lance a dragon's belly; and show the new gods that they too, for all their dreams of perfection, still needed intestines.
Charax. Belisarius would burn that name into eternity.
But the name meant nothing to him. It was just the place where his Venus would rise from the waves. A name which was only important because a man could remember embracing his wife there, like so many men, over so many years, at so many places, had embraced their wives after a long separation. Nothing more.
So is eternity made,said Aide gently.Out of that simple clay, and no other.
Chapter 24
Majarashtra
Summer, 532 A.D.
Irene whispered a few words into her agent's ear. The man nodded, bowed, and left the room. Irene closed the door behind him.
Kungas had ignored the interchange. Bent over the reading table in Irene's outer chamber, carefully writing out the assignment she had given him, Kungas had seemed utterly oblivious to the spy's arrival or his whispered conversation with Irene. But, the moment the spy was gone, Kungas raised his head and cocked an eye toward her.
Seeing the expression on her face, he turned away from the table completely.
"Is something wrong?" he asked.
Irene stared at him, blank-faced. Kungas rose from the chair. A faint frown of worry creased his brow.
"What is wrong?" he demanded.
Irene shook her head. "Nothing," she replied. "Nothing iswrong."
With the air of a woman preoccupied by something, she drifted toward the window. Kungas remained in place, following only with his eyes.
Once at the window, Irene placed her hands on the sill. She leaned into the gentle breeze coming from the ocean, closing her eyes. Her thick, lustrous, chestnut hair billowed gently in the wind.
Behind her, unseen, Kungas' hands moved. Coming up, cupping, as if to stroke and caress. But the movement was short-lived. In seconds, his hands were back at his side.
Irene turned away from the window. "I need your advice," she said softly.
Kungas nodded. The gesture, as always, was economical. But his eyes were alert.
For a moment, as her mind veered aside into the hot place in her heart, Irene reveled in her own words.I need your advice. Simple words. But words which, except for Belisarius and occasionally Justinian, she had never spoken to a man. Men, as a rule, did not give advice to women. They condescended, or they instructed, or they babbled vaingloriously, or they tried to seduce. They rarely simply advised.
She could not remember, any longer, how many times she had said the words to Kungas. And how many times, in the weeks since the battle where they destroyed the guns, he had simply advised.
By sheer force of will, she jerked her mind back from that place in her heart. The fire was there, but it was banked for a time.
She shook her head, smiling.
"What is so amusing?" asked Kungas.
"I was just remembering the first time I met you. I thought you were quite ugly."
His lips made the little movement which stood Kungas for a grin. " No longer, I hope?"
She gave no answer. But Kungas did not miss the little twitch of her hands. As if she, too, wanted to stroke and caress.
Irene cleared her throat. "There is news. News concerning Dadaji's family. The location of his son has been found. The location where hewas, I should say. It seems that several months ago Dadaji's son was among a group of slaves who escaped from his master's plantation in eastern India. The ringleader, apparently. Since then, according to the report, he has joined one of the rebel bands in the forest."
Kungas smacked his hands together. For an instant, the mask vanished. His face shone with pure and unalloyed delight.
"How wonderful! Dadaji will be ecstatic!"
Irene raised a cautioning hand. "He is in great danger, Kungas, and there is nothing I can do to help him. The Malwa have been pouring troops into the forests, since they finally realized they can no longer dismiss the rebels as a handful of brigands."
Kungas shrugged. "And so? The boy dies, arms in hand, fighting the asura who ravages his homeland. That is the worst. You think that would break Dadaji's heart? You do not really understand him, Irene. Beneath that gentle scholar is a man of the Great Country. He will do the rites, weeping-while his heart sings with joy."
Irene stared at him. Skeptically, at first. Then, with a nod, she deferred to his judgement. (And reveled, also, in that deferral.)
"There is more," she added. "More than news." She took a deep breath. "My spies found his wife, also. A slave in a nobleman's kitchen, right in Kausambi itself. Following my instructions, they decided it would be possible to steal her away. In Malwa's capital," she snorted, half-chuckling, "noblemen do not guard their mansions too carefully."
Kungas' eyes widened. In another man, they would have been practically bulging.
Irene laughed. "Oh, yes. She ishere, Kungas. In Suppara." She nodded toward the door. "In this very house, in fact. My man has her downstairs, in the salon."
Now, even Kungas' legendary self-control was breaking. "Here?"he gasped. He stared at the door. Then, almost lunging, he began to move. "We must take her to him at once! He will be so-"
"Stop!"
Kungas staggered to a halt. For a moment, staring at Irene, he frowned with incomprehension. Then, his expression changed, as understanding came. Or so he thought.
"She has been disfigured," he stated. "Dishonored, perhaps. You are afraid Dadaji will-"
Irene blew out a breath-half-laugh, half-surprise. "No-no." She smiled reassuringly. "She is quite well, Kungas, according to my agent. Very tired, of course. He says she was asleep within seconds of reaching the couch. The journey was long and arduous, and her life as a slave was sheer toil. But she is well. As for the other-"
Irene waved her hand, as if calming an unsettled child. "My spy says she was not abused, not in that manner. Not even by her master. She was not a young woman, you know. Dadaji's age."
She looked away, her jaw tightening. "With so many young slaves to rape, after the conquest of Andhra, men simply beat her until she was an obedient drudge." Her next words were cold, filled with the bitterness of centuries. Greek women had been raped, too, often enough. And listened to Greek men, and Greek poets, boasting of the Trojan women. "Not even Dadaji will count that as pollution."
"That is not fair," said Kungas harshly.
Irene took a deep breath, almost a shudder. "No, it is not," she admitted. "Not with Dadaji, at least. Although-" She sighed, shaking her head. "How can any man as intelligent as he be so stupid?"
It only took Kungas a second, perhaps two, to finally understand her concern.
"Ah." He stared out the window for a moment. "I see."
He looked down at his hands, and spread wide his fingers. " Tonight, the empress has called a council. She will finally decide, she says, which offer of marriage to accept."
The fingers closed into fists. He looked up at Irene. "You will state your opinion, then, for the first time. And you do not want Dadaji to refrain from arguing his, because he feels himself so deeply in your debt."