Balkis and Anthony stared at one another in astonishment. Then Anthony broke off, blushing, to stare at his plate again.
Balkis' heart turned to lead. She turned to her own plate sadly, knowing that his taciturnity could mean only one thing—that he did not wish to spend so vastly lengthened a life with her. No doubt he had gone suddenly from thinking himself beneath her to thinking himself above her, for she saw clearly now that it was Anthony whose life was vital to the land and therefore to all the world.
Matt, though, watched Anthony's face and knew otherwise.
He had a chance to explain it to Balkis after dinner in her apartments, when she was done weeping bitterly on his shoulder. Then Matt dried her eyes and told her, “He's denying the truth about himself. That's why he's gloomy.”
“No, it is because he despises me as a deceitful woman and will never trust me again!” Balkis wailed. “Rightfully, too—I should have trusted him, should have taken the chance and been honest with him about my rank and station!”
“Yes, you should have,” Matt agreed, “but if you knew he'd react this way when he found out, you shouldn't be surprised at his gloom.”
Balkis stepped back, glaring at him from a tear-streaked face. “You speak as though there is hope!”
“I think he'll be able to understand that you were afraid to lose him,” Matt said, “but only after he's gotten over feeling like the lowest worm who ever crawled.”
“But he is not! He is a brave, loyal man of amazing talent and—” She caught her breath.”—amazing beauty!” Her eyes began to fill again. “I should have taken the chance to learn what I wish from him, and wish to learn from no other man! I should have tempted him into bedding me!”
“Yeah, then he could have hated himself for the rest of his life for seducing you, and that would have made him leave you for good,” Matt said. “Let him get over his self-esteem problem. If he's in love with you now, he'll be in love with you forever.”
“Not when he knows me for a deceiver, who did not tell him my true rank!”
“No, I think he simply doesn't believe he's good enough for you,” Matt protested. “I watched his face while we were talking about the fountain, and Anthony flatly did not believe he was worthy of it. Instead, he convinced himself that it was you who are the important one.”
Balkis stared at him, then demanded in a hushed voice, “How could he?”
Matt shrugged. “It confirms the tragedy that hit him this afternoon.”
“What tragedy is that?” Balkis asked in a quandary.
“Discovering that you're too good for him, of course,” Matt said, “that you're above and beyond him. Why else would he lapse back into gloom so quickly?”
Balkis' eyes glimmered with hope as well as tears. “Then— Then he may forgive me?”
“In an instant, if we can convince him that he's good enough for you.”
“But how can we do that?” Balkis wailed.
“Let me have a chat with him,” Matt said. “I can't guarantee results, mind you—but I can point out a few things that might change his mind.”
“Oh, Lord Wizard, would you?”
“Be glad to—and I have a notion that it's in my best interest anyway.” Matt thought of the Mongol conquests of his own universe, which had not happened here yet, and of the potential for mayhem posed by an animist spirit who was a Central Asian shaman's nightmare. “I think he'll believe me if he thinks it's for somebody else's benefit.”
“Anyone's but mine!” And Balkis was off into another storm oftears.
Matt sighed, pulled her close, and set himself to comforting, while he wished wildly for Alisande to take charge of the poor kid. By the time he had calmed Balkis enough for her to sleep, it was past midnight, and he thought he'd better leave Anthony alone until morning.
The next morning, though, when they'd finished breakfast and he was about to invite Anthony to go for a walk, the Lord Privy Minister brought the bad news—that there was a hooded stranger at the gates who refused to show his face but who claimed to be an emissary from Kala Nag, and who insisted on speaking with the emperor immediately.
“Bring him to the throne room, but hold him at the door until we arrive.” Prester John rose with a frown. “Send gentlemen to attire me in my court robes.” He nodded to Matt. “Let them attire you also, Lord Wizard—I shall have need of you by my left side, with Tashih by my right.” He turned to Balkis and Anthony. “Do you watch from the hidden chamber, that you may add the weight of your magic to the Lord Wizard's if there should be need.”
Anthony looked up, startled, then rose hastily and bowed. “Of course, Your Majesty.”
Balkis went with him to the small chamber high in the wall of the throne room, where they peered through spyholes. Her heart sang; when it was a matter of someone else's good, her Anthony never hesitated. His own good, though, he would ignore in a second. How could she make him understand that he was her good?
Looking down, she saw Prester John arrange himself on his throne, then call to the guards, “Admit him.”
The stranger came in, a tall and ominous figure in a gray hooded robe, the cowl pulled so far forward as to hide his face. He stepped up to the bottom step without a bow—an insult in itself—and said in a rasping voice, “We do not appreciate being kept waiting, foolish prince!”
Tashih uttered an exclamation of anger and started forward, but Prester John restrained him with a hand. “I see that you are as lacking in courtesy as you are ignorant of protocol. Are you also a coward, that you dare not show your face?”
“Nay. It is you who shall prove coward when you see it.” The emissary threw back his hood. Balkis gasped, and Anthony spat a whispered oath, for the stranger's head was that of a snake.
Below them, Tashih's hand went to his sword but froze there. “Be glad that your status as an emissary precludes attack!”
“Yes, you should be glad of it,” the snakeman hissed, “for thereby are you safe from me.” Then he focused his unwinking stare on Matt and said, “You have met two of my broodmates already, wizard. We shall remember that.”
“Good idea,” Matt answered, “and you might want to remember their fates, too.”
The snakeman's eyes flashed with anger. “You shall not always have your tame lizard with you!”
“Takes one to know one,” Matt said, “and you will always have your mistress with you, ready to burn you to a crisp if you fail her.”
The snake head hissed in anger, forked tongue darting out and back. “Do you treat your own failed warriors better?”
“Much,” said Prester John. “We may chastise, but we are more likely to console and heal, for we are too wise to waste warriors.”
“That is because you have no warriors to waste! Because there are too few of you! But a snake-mother can make dozens in a single hatching, and there can be dozens of snake-mothers—no, hundreds, thousands!”
“So you're planning to bury us in vipers?”
“If you have the courage to meet us in open combat, yes,” the ambassador said. “If you do not, we shall lay siege to your city and our young shall come up your drains and tunnel under your walls, then grow in a matter of months into warriors within your city.”
“They will not have the opportunity,” Prester John said evenly. “Name the time and place of your battle. We shall march to meet you.”
“Let it be on the Plain of Redest, then,” the snakeman said, “and the time an hour after sunrise tomorrow.”
“At Redest, then,” Prester John said in a voice that should have frosted the air. “Go now in safety, while we can still rein in our temper.”