«If it's all the same to you, lord, we'll do that,» the soldier said. «I'm just a farm boy and not used to having so many people around all the time. I might kill the wrong one by mistake, and that would be a shame.» His comrade nodded. Abivard shrugged.
But Tzikas did not return to his quarters when the sun went down. When he didn't, Abivard sent soldiers—farm boys and others—through the bazaars and brothels of Qostabash looking for him. They did not find him. They did find a horse dealer who had sold him—or at least had sold someone who spoke the Makuraner language with a lisping accent—a horse.
«Drop me into the Void!» Abivard shouted when that news reached him. «The rascal saw his head going down on the block, and now he's gone and absconded—and he has most of the day's start on us, too.»
Romezan was there to hear the report, too. «Don't take it too hard, lord,» he said. «We'll run the son of a whore to earth; you see if we don't. Besides, where is he going to go?»
That was a good question. As Abivard thought about it, he began to calm down. «He can't very well run off to Maniakes' army, now, can he? Not anymore he can't, not with the Videssians gone to Lyssaion and probably back to Videssos the city by sea already. And if he doesn't run off to the Videssians, we'll hunt him down.»
«You see?» Romezan said. «It's not so bad.» He paused and fiddled with one spike of his mustache. «Pretty slick piece of work, though, wasn't it? Him figuring out the exact right time to slide away, I mean.»
«Slick is right,» Abivard said, angry at himself. «He never should have had the chance… but I did trust him, oh, a quarter of the way, because the warning he gave us was a real one.» He paused. «Or I thought it was a real one. Still, the magical screen the Videssians had set up was just that—a screen, nothing more But it delayed us almost as much as it would have if it had had deadly sorcery concealed behind it. We always thought Tzikas didn't know it was only a screen. But what if he did? What if Maniakes sent him out to make us waste as much time as he possibly could and help the Videssian army get away?»
«If he did that,» Romezan said, «if he did anything like that, we don't handle him ourselves when we catch him. We send him back to Mashiz in chains, under heavy guard, and let Sharbaraz' torturers take care of him a little at a time. That's what he pays them for.»
«Most of the time I'd fight shy of giving anyone over to the torturers,» Abivard said. «For Tzikas, especially if he did that, I'd make an exception.»
«I should hope so,» Romezan replied. «You're too soft sometimes, if you don't mind my saying so. If I had to bet, I'd say it came from hauling a woman all over the landscape. She probably thinks it's a shame to see blood spilled, doesn't she?»
Abivard didn't answer, convincing Romezan of his own right-ness. The reason Abivard didn't answer, though, was that he was having to do everything he could to keep from laughing in his lieutenant's face. Romezan's preconceptions had led him to a conclusion exactly opposite the truth.
But that wouldn't matter, either. However Abivard had reached his decision, he wanted Tzikas dead now. He offered a good-sized reward for the return of the renegade alive and an even larger one for his head, so long as it was in recognizable condition.
When morning came, he sent riders out to the south and east after Tzikas. He also had dogs brought into the Videssian's quarters to take his scent and then turned loose to hunt him down wherever he might be. The dogs, however, lost the trail after the time when Tzikas bought his horse; not enough of his scent had clung to the ground for them to follow it.
The human hunters had no better luck. «Why couldn't you have turned bloodthirsty a day earlier than you did?» Abivard demanded of Roshnani.
«Why couldn't you?» she returned, effectively shutting him up.
Every day that went by the searchers spread their nets wider. Tzikas did not get caught in those nets, though. Abivard hoped he'd perished from bandits or robbers or the rigor of his flight. If he ever did turn up in Videssos again, he was certain to be trouble.
XII
Mashiz grew nearer with every clop of the horses' hooves, with every squealing revolution of the wagon's wheels. «Summoned to the capital,» Abivard said to Roshnani. «Nice to hear that without fearing it's going to mean the end of your freedom, maybe the end of your life.»
«About time you've been summoned back to Mashiz to be praised for all the good things you've done, not blamed for things that mostly weren't your fault,» Roshnani said, loyal as a principal wife should be.
«Anything that goes wrong is your fault Anything that goes right is credited to the King of Kings.» Abivard held up a hand. «I'm not saying a word against Sharbaraz.»
«I'll say a word. I'll say several words,» Roshnani replied.
He shook his head. «Don't. As much as I've complained about it, that's not his fault… well, not altogether his fault. It comes with being King of Kings. If someone besides the ruler gets too much credit, too much applause, the man on the throne feels he'll be thrown off it It's been like that in Makuran for a long, long time, and it's like that in Videssos, too, though maybe not so bad.»
«It isn't right,» Roshnani insisted.
«I didn't say it was right. I said it was real. There's a difference,» Abivard said. Because Roshnani still looked mutinous, he added, «I expect you'll agree with me that it's not right to lock up noblemen's wives in the women's quarters of a stronghold. But the custom of doing that is real. You can't pretend it's not there and expect all those wives to come out at once, can you?»
«No,» Roshnani said unwillingly. «But it's so much easier and more enjoyable to dislike Sharbaraz the man doing as he pleases than Sharbaraz the King of Kings acting like a King of Kings.»
«So it is,» Abivard said. «Don't get me wrong: I'm not happy with him. But I'm not as angry as I was, either. The God approves of giving those who wrong you the benefit of the doubt.»
«Like Tzikas?» Roshnani asked, and Abivard winced. She went on, «The God also approves of revenge when those who wrong you won't change their ways. She understands there will be times when you have to protect yourself.»
«He'd better understand that,» Abivard answered. They both smiled, as Makuraners often did when crossing genders of the God.
With the wind coming off the Dilbat Mountains from the west, Mashiz announced itself to the nose as well as to the eye. Abivard had grown thoroughly familiar with the city stink of latrines, moke, horses, and unwashed humanity. It was the same coming from the capital of Makuran as it was in the land of the Thousand Cities and the same there as in Videssos.
For that matter, it was the same in Vek Rud stronghold and the town at the base of the high ground atop which the stronghold sat. Whenever people gathered together, other people downwind knew about it.
Once the wagon got into Mashiz, Pashang drove it through the city market on the way to the palace of the King of Kings. The going was slow in the market district. Hawkers and customers clogged the square, shouting and arguing and calling one another names. They cursed Pashang with great panache for driving past without buying anything.
«Madness,» Abivard said to Roshnani. «So many strangers, all packed together and trying to cheat other strangers. I wonder how many of them have ever before seen the people from whom they buy and how many will ever see them again.» His principal wife nodded. «There are advantages to living in a stronghold,» she said. «You know everyone around you. It can get poisonous sometimes—the God knows that's so—but it's for the good, too. A lot of people who would cheat a stranger in a heartbeat will go out of their way to do something nice for someone they know.»