«He has the right: he is the King of Kings,» Abivard said. «After the King of Kings, no man in Makuran is powerful. I was the most powerful Makuraner outside Makuran, perhaps.» Now his grin came wry. «Once back within it, though… he may do with me as he will.»
«In your mind you have no power next to Sharbaraz,» Denak answered. «Every day courtiers whisper into his ear that you have too much. I can go only so far in making him not listen. He might pay me more heed if-»
If I had a son. Abivard filled in the words his sister would not say. Sharbaraz had several sons by lesser wives, but Denak had given him only girls. If she had a boy, he would become the heir, for she remained Sharbaraz' principal wife. But what were the odds of that? Did he still call her to his bed? Abivard could not ask, but his sister did not sound as if she expected to bear more children.
As if picking that thought from his mind, Denak said, «He treats me with all due honor. As he promised, I am not mewed up in the women's quarters like a hawk dozing with a hood over its eyes. He does remember-everything. But honor alone is not enough for a man and a wife.»
She did speak as if Ksorane weren't there. At last Abivard imitated her, saying, «If Sharbaraz remembers all you did for him-and if he does, I credit him-why, by the God, doesn't he remember what I've done and trust my judgment?»
«I'd think that would be easy for you to see,» Denak told him. «Come what may, I can't steal the throne from him. You can.»
«I helped put him on the throne,» Abivard protested indignantly. «I risked everything I had-I risked everything Vek Rud domain had-to put him on the throne. I don't want it. Till you spoke of it just now, the idea that I would want it never once entered my mind. If it entered his-»
He started to say, He's mad. He didn't, and fear of the maidservant's taking his words to Sharbaraz wasn't what stopped him. For the King of Kings was not mad to fear usurpation. After all, he'd been usurped once already.
«He's wrong.» That was better. Abivard reminded himself that he was speaking with Sharbaraz' wife as well as his own sister. But Denak was his sister, and how much he'd missed her over the years suddenly rose up in him like a choking cloud. «You know me, sister of mine. You know I would never do such a thing.»
Her face crumpled. Tears made her eyes bright. «I knew you,» she said. «I know the brother I knew would be loyal to the rightful King of Kings through… anything.» She held her hands wide apart to show how all-encompassing anything was. But then she went on. «I knew you. It's been so long… Time changes people, brother of mine. I know that, too. I should.»
«It's been so long,» Abivard echoed sadly. «I can't make Sharbaraz' years many; only the God grants years. But since the days of Razmara the Magnificent, who has increased the realm of the King of Kings more than I?»
«No one.» Denak's voice was sad. One of the tears ran down her cheek. «And don't you see, brother of mine, every victory you won, every city you brought under the lion of Makuran, gave him one more reason to distrust you.»
Abivard hadn't seen that, not with such brutal clarity. But it was clear enough-all too clear-when Denak pointed it out to him. He chewed on the inside of his lower lip. «And when I disobeyed him in Vaspurakan-»
Denak nodded. «Now you understand. When you disobeyed him, he thought it the first step of your rebellion.»
«If it was, why did I come here with all my family at his order?» Abivard asked. «Once I did that, shouldn't he have realized he was wrong?»
«So I told him, though not in those words.» One corner of his sister's mouth bent up in a rueful, knowing smile. «So many people tell the King of Kings he is right every moment of every waking hour of every day that when he was already inclined to think so himself, he became… quite convinced of it.»
«I suppose so.» Abivard had noted that trait in Sharbaraz even when he was a hunted rebel against Smerdis. After a decade and more on the throne at Mashiz he might well have come to think of himself as infallible. What Abivard wanted to say was, He's only a man, after all. But of all the things Ksorane could take back to Sharbaraz from his lips, that one might do the most damage.
Denak said, «I have been trying to get him to see you, brother of mine. So far…» She spread her hands again. He knew how much luck she'd had. But he also knew he still kept his head on his shoulder and all his members attached to his body. That was probably his sister's doing.
«Tell the King of Kings I did not mean to anger him,» he said wearily. «Tell him I am loyal-why would I be here otherwise? Tell him in Vaspurakan I was doing what I thought best for the realm, for I was closer to the trouble than he. Tell him-» Tell him to drop into the Void if he's too vain and puffed up with himself to see that on his own. «Tell him once more what you've already told him. The God willing, he will hear.»
«I shall tell him,» Denak said. «I have been telling him. But when everyone else tells him the opposite, when Farrokh-Zad and Tzikas write from Vaspurakan complaining of how mild you were to the priests of Phos-»
«Tzikas wrote from Vaspurakan?» Abivard broke in. «Tzikas wrote that from Vaspurakan? If I see the renegade, the traitor, the wretch again, he is a dead man.» His lips curled in what looked like a smile. «I know just what I'll do if I see him again, the cursed Videssian schemer. I'll send him as a present for Maniakes behind a shield of truce. We'll see how he likes that.» Merely contemplating the idea gave him great satisfaction. Whether he'd ever get the chance to do anything about it was, worse luck, another question altogether.
«I'll pray to the God. May she grant your wish,» Denak said. She got to her feet Abivard rose, too. His sister took him in her arms.
Ksorane, about whom Abivard had almost entirely forgotten, let out a startled squeak. «Highness, to touch a man other than the King of Kings is not permitted.»
«He is my brother, Ksorane,» Denak answered in exasperated tones.
Abivard did not know whether to laugh or cry. He and Denak had criticized Sharbaraz King of Kings almost to, maybe even beyond, the point of lese majesty, and the serving woman had spoken not a word of protest. Indeed, by her manner she might not even have heard. Yet a perfectly innocent embrace drew horrified anger.
«The world is a very strange place,» he said. He went back into the hall. If the eunuch had moved while he had been talking with his sister, it could not have been by more than the breadth of a hair. With a cold, hard nod the fellow led him back through the maze of corridors to the chambers where he and his family were confined.
The guards outside the chamber opened his door. The beautiful eunuch, who had said not a word while guiding him to his private Prison, disappeared with silent steps. The door closed behind Abivard, and everything was just as it had been before Denak had summoned him.
When Sharbaraz King of Kings did not call him, Abivard grew furious at his sister. Rationally, he knew that was not only pointless but stupid. Denak might plead for him, as she had been pleading for him, but that did not mean that Sharbaraz would have to hear. By everything Abivard knew of the King of Kings, he was very good at not hearing.
Winter dragged on. The children at first grew restive at being cooped up in a small place like so many doves in a cote, then resigned themselves to it. That worried Abivard more than anything else he'd seen since Sharbaraz had ordered him to Mashiz. Over and over he asked the guards who kept him and his family from leaving their rooms and the servants who fed them and removed the slop jars and brought fuel what was going on in Vaspurakan and Videssos. He rarely got answers, and the ones he did get formed no coherent pattern. Some people claimed there was fighting; others, that peace prevailed.
«Why don't they just say they don't know?» he demanded of Roshnani after yet another rumor-that Maniakes had slain himself in despair-reached his ears.