Thrake – Aeskepiles
‘My father will never agree to outright assassination,’ Demetrius said.
Aeskepiles poured him more hippocras. ‘This is the time, Your Grace. If we allow the usurper to hold the city through the winter, we have lost.’
Demetrius sat back. Despite his temper, he had the quick eyes of the thinking man, and they rested on Aeskepiles’ own. ‘My father said we had already lost. That all that remained of our cause was to see how much of the north we can hold.’
Aeskepiles shook his head. ‘You father is merely despondent. It was a local defeat – a mere matter of marching-’
Demetrius cursed. ‘Listen, Magister. Perhaps the person we needed most was you. This Red Knight – he had all sorts of sorcery. He tied my two praeceptors in knots as soon as the action started. He moved a storm front the way a goodwife moves a curtain.’
Aeskepiles nodded. ‘I agree. So let’s be rid of him.’
Demetrius took another drink. ‘The world is full of sons who plot against their fathers. I am not one such. I dislike to betray my father’s trust.’
Aeskepiles could feel his audience wavering. ‘We are not betraying your father, but saving his cause. Was the Emperor a good ruler? No. He was a weak fool who made concessions to every foreigner. May I be frank? Even the usurper is better at ruling the Empire than the Emperor. I know it is blasphemy, but listen, Your Grace. I did not join this rebellion to win more power, or wider estates. There are greater issues at hand. We must win. So let’s send that message. When the usurper is dead, we can cry mea culpa to your father.’
Demetrius drank again. ‘We’ll need his signet.’
Aeskepiles nodded. ‘And the messenger leaves tomorrow for the city. We must be quick.’
Liviapolis – Kronmir and Mortirmir
More than a week after his return to the city, Kronmir stood at the Gate of Ares and watched the Imperial Army march in from the snow. They had been announced the night before, and it was widely held that they had won some great victories and had with them a fortune in furs. He might have cursed, but he didn’t bother. Kronmir lived his life successfully by concerning himself only with elements that he could control. However, it must be said that the Megas Ducas’ month-long winter campaign and its results had caused Master Kronmir to think certain thoughts about his employer and the likely durability of the cause which he was representing, and Kronmir had spent a day or two taking certain precautions.
The army, led by the Megas Ducas, looked triumphant, and far warmer than they should have. The troopers looked thin; a month of winter campaigning had shed any fat they might have had. But their white surcoats hid any deficiencies of clothing, their animals looked healthy enough, and the long train of wagons behind them spoke volumes for their triumph – Kronmir counted a hundred and sixty wagons. Enormous wagons, many drawn by oxen.
The master spy stood in the frozen evening, his hands deep in the sleeves of his fur-lined cote, and pondered how much advance planning and logistics his agents had missed which had allowed this army to march a thousand miles in winter.
He also couldn’t help but notice that the crowd – ten deep at the gate and six deep even in the squares – cheered the army like madmen. They cheered the weather-beaten stradiotes, who looked proud as Pilate, every one of them, and they cheered the spry Vardariotes and their wind-reddened faces that matched their cotes, and they cheered the magnificent Scholae, who looked a little less magnificent in white wool, but still bore themselves like elven princes. They roared for the Nordikans, who rode by, hauberks swinging, tattoos almost black against their winter-white and sun-reddened skin, and singing a hymn to the Virgin Parthenos. And, most disturbing, they roared themselves hoarse for the Megas Ducas on his tall black horse, wearing what appeared to be a cloak of white ermine – entirely of white ermine. He had a rod in his hand – a command staff – and he used it to salute the crowd, like an emperor of old.
At the back of the convoy of wagons there were forty further vehicles – just pairs of axles carrying heavy loads of lumber, pulled by oxen.
Kronmir went back to his inn, closed the door on his expensive private room, and wrote a long coded missive for his new communications service to carry. He went out towards evening and dropped the whole parchment scroll into a lead pipe strapped to the underside of a farmer’s cart – right where it was supposed to be.
After latching the pipe closed, Kronmir walked back to his inn through the falling snow and listened to the sound of a city triumphant. He ordered a cup of mulled wine, sat down with his back to a wall, and warmed his feet on a stool while he contemplated the new reality.
And wondered if it was time to change sides.
Kronmir sat in the common room of his inn, enjoying a steaming tankard of hot cider and warming his toes at the fire. His tall boots hung over a frame with a dozen other pairs, and one of the inn’s urchins turned them from time to time for a copper sequin.
He’d had a busy week, and a fruitful one. His most reliable palace contact had what might prove a useful resource among the Nordikans. The Nordikans were almost impossible to seduce from their allegiance, but he suspected that there must be some disaffection with the Emperor a prisoner. Although their payment by the Megas Ducas had killed the interest of the two who had considered his earlier offers. Or perhaps all that had been a trap.
He sighed. It was worth a try, although the latest victories by the Megas Ducas had solidified his support almost beyond saving. The Alban merchants had sailed away in the hardy round ships despite winter storms, loaded to the gunwales with the cream of the fur market – but the Etruscan League, having paid its fine, had been allowed to pick and choose among the furs, and had even made private deals with the Alban merchants. Kronmir didn’t have a first-rate source, but his impression was that the Etruscan houses had avoided ruination, and now owed the Megas Ducas for their survival.
He took his eating knife from his purse and stirred his cider.
He felt someone’s regard, and lifted his eyes to see the young artist from the temple outside the city. He remembered the boy well, and his own impulse to kill him.
The boy smiled on meeting his eyes.
Kronmir returned the smile. No spy or hired bravo would flash such an ingenuous smile on his way to strike his target. Nonetheless, Kronmir flipped a slim blade out of the back of his belt and held it along his left arm.
‘Stephan!’ called the young man. He had the air of a student, but he wore a sword on a belt of silver and gold plates, like an Alban knight or a mercenary.
Kronmir knew a moment’s confusion before he settled that he had, indeed, told the young man his name was Stephan. He rose and bowed.
A potboy brought a second chair and bowed to the student.
‘Are you a resident in this inn?’ Kronmir asked.
The student nodded. ‘Red wine – Candian, if possible. What I had yesterday? Yes?’ His Archaic was superb – far better than anything Kronmir had heard from other mercenaries, and that further suggested the boy was a student. He sat. ‘Yes, this is my inn. And you, sir?’
Kronmir groaned. Killing the boy would only lead to complications. But he couldn’t share an inn with a person of wealth and property who could identify him to a magistrate. ‘Just another day or two,’ he said with an inward sigh. I liked it here. ‘You are, I take it, a student at the Academy?’
The young man bowed again, while seated. He had very good manners. ‘Yes. I am Morgan Mortirmir, Esquire, of Harndon. I am Scholasticus Affector at the Academy. And you?’