“I gather you are not overly fond of your family,” he said.
“Oh?” she said.
“Are my informants reliable?” he asked.
“Perhaps,” she said.
“Nor they of you,” he said.
“Perhaps,” she said.
“You have been repudiated, disowned,” he said, “save, of course, for a not ungenerous allowance.”
“It is a pittance,” she said.
“They do not care in the least for what happens to you,” He said.
“Nor I for them,” she snapped. “They are all fools, fools!”
“You would have no objection to becoming independently, and fabulously, wealthy, I would suppose.”
“I think I might manage to accommodate myself to such a modality,” she said.
“You could even look down upon your family, and ruin it, if you wish, with the power I could give you.”
“Ah!” she said, her eyes sparkling.
“It would be a splendid vengeance, would it not?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“I owe you nothing,” she said.
“But you are interested, are you not?” he asked.
“Perhaps,” she said. “What would I do?”
“You must serve the empire,” he said.
“The empire has, of course, my undivided allegiance,” she said.
“Your allegiance is only to yourself,” he said.
“As yours is only to yourself?” she inquired.
“In my case,” smiled Iaachus, “the interest of the empire, and my own interest, coincide perfectly.”
“A most happy coincidence,” she observed.
“Precisely,” he said.
“As I mentioned earlier,” he said, “the greatest danger faced by the empire comes not from without, but from within, from traitors.”
“Of course,” she said.
“And, particularly,” said he, lowering his voice, “from traitors of insatiable ambition, villains who, with the help of barbarians, would aspire to seize the throne itself.”
Her eyes widened.
“You have heard of the Aurelianii?” he asked.
“Of course,” she said. “They are kin even to the emperor.”
“Which makes them even more dangerous,” he said.
“Their loyalty is unquestioned,” she said.
“No,” confided Iaachus.
She reached for the tiny bowl of kana, but her hand shook.
“Julian, of the Aurelianii,” said he, “has designs upon the throne. He plans to enlist barbarians in the mobile forces, as mercenary companies, with ships, with weapons, at their disposal. They will owe their allegiance only to him, not to the empire.”
“Have him seized,” she said. “Confiscate his property. Surely it is considerable.”
The Aurelianii were one of the oldest, and richest, families in the empire. They traced their roots back to the original Telnarian world, the home world of the empire itself.
“He is too powerful, we must be careful how we proceed, we do not wish to precipitate civil war. There are portions of the navy which are loyal to him.”
“What are we to do?” she asked.
“We must drive a wedge between him and his barbarian cohorts, we must frustrate his scheme of enlisting barbarians in the regular forces. That is crucial. That is the first step. We must deprive him of these allies, and, in doing this, cast discredit entirely upon his probity, and the feasibility of his plan to defend the empire.”
“Can the empire defend itself?” she asked.
“Of course,” he said.
“Who is the barbarian, or barbarians, in question,” she asked.
“First, and primarily, one whom he encountered, it seems, on the forest world of Varna, a chieftain of the Wolfungs.”
“I have never heard of them,” she said.
“They are a tribe of the Vandals,” he said.
“I have not heard of such a people,” she said.
That was, of course, a genuine possibility at that time. At that time, you see, few in the empire had heard of the Vandals. Indeed, at that time, few outside of the administration and the military had heard even of the Alemanni, or, as the imperial records have it, the Aatii. And even in the war office such peoples tended to be dismissed, much as one might think little of rumblings in the distance, the darkenings of far skies, the occasional flash of lightning over distant mountains, such things, things far away.
“His name,” said Iaachus, “is Ottonius.”
She moved the bowl of kana a bit on the table with her finger, turning it a little, watching the ruby fluid move in the shallow container.
“I am a woman,” she said.
“But one highborn, one of lofty family, of noble station, one who may be relied upon.”
She looked up at him.
“And one, one supposes, of great beauty,” he said.
She stiffened again, slightly, as she had once before. She regarded him, irritably.
She was vain of her striking beauty, and took great pleasure in it. She enjoyed the effect, too, which it seemed to have on men, as it seemed to put them much at her mercy. She enjoyed using it to tantalize, and frustrate, men. It was pleasant to taunt them, and arouse them, and then, with cold pleasure, deny them.
“And one of great wealth?” she asked.
“That is for you to decide,” he said.
“It is said,” she said, “that Iaachus is the most powerful man in the empire.”
“I am only the humble Arbiter of Protocol,” he said, “a modest office, an ancillary office, with little authority or power affixed thereto.”
“It is said you have the ear of the empress mother,” she said.
“She consults me on small matters,” said he, “having to do with the arrangements, and etiquette, of the court.”
“What is to be the fate of this Ottonius?” she asked.
“He is leaving in two days for Tangara, to recruit a comitatus, a company, among Otungs. I shall see to it that our beloved Julian, scion of the Aurelianii, will be unable to accompany him.”
“Tangara is far away,” she said.
“Its provincial capital is Venitzia,” he said.
“And what is to happen on Tangara?” she asked.
Iaachus rose to his feet, went to a cupboard at the side of the room, opened it, moved some small objects on a shelf to one side, and pressed a button, that actuating a panel which, sliding back, revealed a small recess. From this recess he withdrew a flat, rectangular leather case. He placed this on a table at the side of the room, returning to the cupboard to close the recess, rearrange the articles on the shelf, and shut the cupboard door. He then brought the leather case from the table at the side of the room and returned to his seat at the table near the center of the room. He placed the leather case on this table, between them.
She looked at him, and then, with two hands, lifted up the lid of the leather case.
“It is beautiful,” she said.
“Who knows what may happen on a primitive world such as Tangara,” he said, “particularly once one is outside the fences of the capital?
“Be careful,” he said.
In the container there lay a dagger, or poniard, small, and delicate, with a slender, gleaming blade, some seven inches in length, and an oval, yellow handle, some five inches in length, with a swirled design in black wrought within it.
“It is a woman’s dagger,” she said.
“Yes,” he said.
Between the hilt and the slender blade there was a guard, one of its terminations scrolled toward the point, the other back, toward the hilt.
The guard, of course, aside from permitting resources of additional leverage, if needed, would prevent the hand from slipping down the blade. In certain situations that is a not negligible advantage of this sort of tool. Such guards, with their capacity to protect the hand, are common in certain forms of weapons, where the strike might be made through silk or velvet, a silk or velvet concealing, say, a lining, or a coat or jacket, of interwoven metal links.