"I am Heladikos, the son of Jad," said the bastard lying on the road. He appeared-amazingly-to be struggling with hilarity as much as anything else. He was bleeding. They could see dark blood on the road. "All men must die. Stab away, child. Two in a day? A Bassanid servant and a god's son? Makes you a warrior, almost." He'd kept the cloak about his face, somehow, even as he fell.
Someone gasped. Cleander made a startled movement.
"How the fuck do you know about-?"
Cleander moved closer, knelt. Sword to the wounded man's breast, he twitched the cloak aside. The man on the ground made no movement at all. Cleander looked at him for one instant-then let the cloak fall from his fingers as if it were burning to the touch. There was no light. The others couldn't see what he saw.
They heard Cleander, though, as the cloak fell once more over the downed man's face.
"Oh, fuck!" said the only son of Plautus Bonosus, Master of the Sarantine Senate. He stood up. "Oh, no. Oh, fuck. Oh, holy Jad!"
"My great father!" said the wounded man brightly.
This was followed, unsurprisingly, by silence. Someone coughed nervously.
"Does this mean we aren't singing?" Declanus asked plaintively.
"Get out of here. All of you!" Cleander rasped hoarsely over his shoulder. "Go! Disappear! My father will fucking kill me."
"Who is it?" snapped Marcellus.
"You don't know. You don't want to know. This never happened. Get home, go anywhere, or we're all dead men! Holy Jad!"
"What the-?"
'Go!
A light appeared in a window overhead. Someone began shouting for the watch-a woman's voice. They went.
Thanks be to Jad, the boy had a brain and wasn't hopelessly drunk. He had quickly covered Scortius's face again after their eyes locked in the darkness. None of the others-he was sure of it-knew who it was they'd attacked.
There was a chance to get out of this.
If he lived. The knife had gone in on his left side, and ripped, and then the kick in the same side had broken ribs. He'd had breaks before. Knew what they felt like.
They felt very bad. It was, putting it mildly, not easy to breathe. He clutched his side and felt blood pouring from the wound through his fingers. The boy with the knife had jerked it upwards after stabbing him.
But they left. Thanks be to Jad, they left. Leaving only one behind. Someone at a window was calling for the watch.
"Holy Jad," whispered Bonosus's son. "Scortius. I swear… we had no idea"
"Know you didn't. Thought… were killing just anyone." It was irresponsible to be feeling such hilarity, but the absurdity of this was so extreme. To die, like this? "No. We didn't! I mean Not really the time to be ironic, actually. "Get me upright, before someone comes." "Can you… can you walk?" "Of course I can walk." Probably a lie.
"I'll take you to my father's house," the boy said. Bravely enough. The charioteer could guess what consequences would await Cleander after he appeared at the door with a wounded man. Closeted with his wife and son.
Something became clear, suddenly. That was why they'd been together tonight. And then something else did, driving amusement entirely away. "Not your house. Holy Jad, no!"
He was not going to appear at Thenais's door at this hour of night, having been wounded by partisans after descending from the bed chamber of Shirin of the Greens. He winced at the image of her face, hearing this. Not at the outraged expression that would ensue: the lack of one. The detached, ironic coldness coming back.
"But you need a physician. There's blood. And my father can keep this-"
"Not your house."
"Then where? Oh! The Blues" compound! We can-" A good thought, but…
"Won't help. Our doctor was at the wedding today and will be drunk and unconscious. Too many people, too. We must keep this quiet. For… for the lady. Now be silent and let me-" "Wait! I know. The Bassanid!" exclaimed Cleander. It was, in fact, a good thought.
And resulted in the two of them arriving, after a genuinely harrowing progress through the city, at the small house Bonosus kept for his own use near the triple walls. On the way they passed the enormous dark litter again. Scortius saw it stop, was aware of someone watching them from within, making no movement at all to help. Something made him shiver; he couldn't have said what.
He had lost a fair bit of blood by the time they reached their destination. Every step with his left foot seemed to drive the kicked ribs inward, shockingly. He'd refused to allow the boy to get help at any tavern. No one was to know of this. Cleander almost carried him the last part of the way. The lad was terrified, exhausted, but he got them there.
"Thank you, boy," he managed to say, as the house's steward, in a nightshirt, grey hair disconcertingly upright in the glow of the candle he held, opened the door to their pounding. "You did well. Tell your father. No one else'
He hoped that was clear enough. Saw the Bassanid coming to stand behind the steward, lifted one hand briefly in apologetic greeting. It occurred to him that if Plautus Bonosus had been in this house tonight instead of the eastern doctor, none of this would have happened. Then he did, in fact, lose consciousness.
She is awake, in her room with the golden rose that was made for her long ago. Knows he will come to her tonight. Is looking at the rose, in fact, and thinking about frailty when she hears the door open, the familiar tread, the voice that is always with her.
"You are angry with me, I know."
She shakes her head. "Afraid of what will come, a little. Not angry, my lord."
She pours his wine, waters it. Crosses to the seat he has taken by the fire. He takes the wine, and her hand, kisses the palm. His manner is quiet, easy, but she knows him better than she knows anyone alive and can read the signs of his excitement.
"It was finally useful, "she says, "to have the queen watched all this time."
He nods. "She's clever, isn't she? Knew we weren't surprised."
"I saw that. Will she be difficult, do you think?"
He looks up, smiles. "Probably."
The implication being, of course, that it doesn't really matter. He knows what he wants to do, and to have others do. None of them will learn all the details, not even his Empress. Certainly not Leontes, who will lead the army of conquest. She wonders, suddenly, how many men her husband will send, and a thought crosses her mind. She dismisses it, then it slips back in: Valerius is, in fact, more than subtle enough to be careful, even with his trusted friends.
She does not tell him that she, too, had a warning that the Strategos was bringing Gisel to the palace today. Alixana believes, privately, that her husband does know she's watching Leontes and his wife and has done so for some time, but it is one of the things they do not discuss. One of the ways in which theirs is a partnership.
Most of the time.
The signs have long been present-no one will be able to claim to have been taken entirely by surprise-but without warning or consultation, the Emperor has just declared an intention to go to war this spring. They have been at war for much of his reign, to the east, north, south-east, far off in the Majriti deserts. This is different. This is Batiara. Rhodias. Heartland of the Empire. Sundered, then lost beyond a wide sea.
"You are sure of this?" she asks him.
He shakes his head. "Sure of the consequences? Of course not. No mortal can claim to know the unknown that might come," her husband says softly, still holding her hand. "We live with that uncertainty." He looks at her. "You are angry with me. For not telling you."