Sabazel

by Carl, Lillian Stewart

  The sparks were reflected in Mardoc’s eyes. He opened his mouth, said nothing, closed it. Adrastes smiled. “How well you learn the ways of statecraft, my lord. Indeed, better to have her here. And who better to watch this heretic than the talon of Harus, the inquisitor of Sardis?”

  “So watch her, then,” Bellasteros said. For a moment his gaze locked with Adrastes’s, and it was the priest who looked away first. An indefinable air, a god-touched certainty, hung like a numinous cloak about the king.

  “I am pleased, lord,” Adrastes purred, “that I may serve you.”

  Bellasteros waved him away with an imperial gesture even as his mind counseled caution. I challenge him; how will he respond? But Adrastes, ever cool and courteous, took his leave, and Mardoc bowed and followed.

  But I need you, Bellasteros thought angrily; no matter how we fence and parry, we are still caught together in this game, in games within games …

  For a long count of ten neither Patros nor Bellasteros spoke. Solifrax glimmered, humming with a latent power. The general’s shouts, the answering shouts of the centurions, and the quickening pace of the camp filtered through the fabric of the tent.

  At last Bellasteros exhaled, slumping in his chair. His cavalier manner melted, his arrogance slipped away. “Ah, Patros,” he said. “For a moment even Mardoc and Adrastes sensed my divinity …” He laughed quietly, a laugh that had little humor in it. “Have I raised their suspicions?”

  “I think not. Not yet. Not until the Sabazians come.”

  “Until the Sabazians come, and the high priest seeks to assert his power. Over them and over me.” Bellasteros seized the sheath and slipped the sword into it, concealing its light. “The world changes, Patros. It shifts and takes new forms before our very eyes. Those like Mardoc and Adrastes …”

  “Yes?” Patros said encouragingly. His face glowed, reflecting his king’s subtle illumination.

  But Bellasteros could only lean back, closing his eyes, shaking his head. It hurts, he thought. The learning hurts. Learning that of all the women I could have I want only the one I cannot have, the woman who holds my life and death in her hands, in her belly, the woman I trust … It would be so much easier to cling, blind and unquestioning, to a tarnished doctrine; it would be so much easier not to choose. And yet, he thought, and yet I have seen the falcon sitting on Ashtar’s arm.

  “Marcos,” Patros said warningly. “Someone … is here.”

  Bellasteros lazily opened one eye. His stomach plunged into some dizzying depth and he leaped to his feet. “Chryse! How in the name of the god did you come here?”

  She hesitated in the doorway, her cheeks flushed pink, her eyes huge and glistening. “My lord, if I am not intruding …”

  “Of—of course not,” Bellasteros gulped. He turned questioningly to Patros, who could reply only with an eloquent shrug. “Please,” he said, grasping the tatters of courtesy, “sit here, rest yourself. Patros …”

  Patros was already gone. Chryse tiptoed across the tent, keeping far away from the length of Solifrax; she sat on the edge of the chair, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes downcast. Even she was awed by the power of the sword, by his own power … Bellasteros brushed a couple of maps aside and laid it across the table. An onyx ring rolled from behind a pen box and fell to the floor; odd, he thought … but Chryse was speaking and he turned to her.

  “My lord, I had hoped you would be pleased to see me.”

  “I am surprised, and pleased as well.” Gallantly he knelt before her, took her hand, pressed it to his lips. “You came with His Eminence?”

  “Yes.”

  So Adrastes would use you, too, a gentle sparrow to break the bond of the star-shield … She looked up at him in open adoration, hoping only for some sign of affection. “Our daughter is well?” he asked.

  Her face glowed with a smile. “Yes, well indeed; my father would have her wedded soon.”

  “Wedded? At her age?” He cast his mind back to that flying visit in the spring, and he saw only a girl-child.

  “She is almost twelve, my lord.”

  Gods! So the child was that old, the plump, quiet babe, the fruit of his impetuous youth. But it was Danica who carried his heir, carried the rest of his life in her grave green eyes. “Whatever you think best, my lady,” he said. He kissed her hand again, released it, stood. The sword lay across the maps and he reached out to stroke it. It thrilled to his touch, but still a yawn caught him unaware.

  Immediately Chryse was on her feet, fussing over him, urging him toward the bed. “You should sleep, my lord. Your duties are many, and many are those who depend on you.”

  Too many, he thought, but he let her push him down and brush the tendrils of dark hair from his forehead. “If you require anything, my lord …” She blushed and her lashes fluttered over her eyes.

  “Thank you,” he said with a crooked smile. No, the falcon has no wish to fall upon the sparrow—your meek submission would be a mockery, and it would shame me to rend you. Gently, he told himself; she deserves respect. He took her soft, rounded chin between thumb and forefinger and lifted it to his gaze. “I ask only your contentment, Chryse.”

  “I am the first wife of the king, of the emperor; how could I not be content? Only to serve you, lord …” Her lips tightened; she knelt at the side of the bed and rested her head on the coverlet, hiding her face again.

  And it hurts, he thought, learning that I injure those who love me. Chryse, Mardoc—it is I who change, I who choose to change …

  He wondered suddenly how many people watched him—his wife, his general, his priest, certainly; those spies who would be his friends were more dangerous than any sent by Bogazkar.

  *

  The Sabazians camped on an easily defended hilltop an hour’s ride from the Sardian encampment. Atalia, with many cautionary words, set extra sentries; she feared not only Bogazkar’s soldiers but the Sardians themselves.

  It was at sunset, at the dark of the moon, that she brought the messengers to Danica’s tent.

  The queen looked up from the map she sketched and laid down her pen. Lyris set down the lamp she held and stepped away, into her usual position at Danica’s back. The visitor was young, beautiful, ebony ringlets cascading down her back and full breasts thrusting forward her cloak. “Theara,” Danica stated.

  The courtesan fell to her knees. “I am honored to be in your presence at last, my queen. All my life have I bowed to Ashtar in her temple in Farsahn, a bastard daughter, surely, but …”

  “A true one,” Danica finished for her. She smiled a welcome. “Please, rise. You did us all great service by attaching yourself to the Sardians when they took your city.”

  “Indeed,” stated Atalia. She glanced over her shoulder. “A Sardian soldier waits outside …”

  “He is Aveyron.” Theara rose and brushed off her silk-clad knees. “He was with the king in Sabazel and so was not afraid to escort me here; he is not overly fond of Harus since the high priest had his mother burned for heresy.

  “Ashtar!” Danica exclaimed.

  “Not this time,” said Theara. “It was a provincial deity, I believe. Now the poor lad would believe in nothing.”

  “I shall find some food for him,” Atalia said, and she left. Lyris’s gaunt face, washed by guttering shadow, tightened.

  “Is it safe for you to come here?” Danica asked Theara.

  The courtesan chuckled richly, deep in her throat. “Bellasteros has long since realized which god I served. Now Patros seizes the moment to send me here; it was I who intercepted the secret messages between Mardoc and Adrastes Falco, the grand inquisitor, and now that Adrastes has arrived in the camp Patros asks in the king’s name your protection for me.”

  “Gladly, gladly,” said Danica.

  “He asks that you take care; Adrastes thinks you a witch, and he will be watching you. And Mardoc is not your friend.”

  “Are Mardoc and Adrastes plotting against the king, do you think, or only against me?”

&
nbsp; “As yet, only against you, my lady. They meant for Adrastes to take Bellasteros by surprise, but that plan failed. The priest brought the king’s wife Chryse with him, though, and no one expected that. Perhaps not even Mardoc… but I was unable to discern that.”

  “Chryse,” Danica said with a sigh. Was she the one Bellasteros had named a placid cow? A waste, a shameful waste … Theara and Lyris both were watching her. “Theara,” she said, “I thank you. I would be pleased to have you with us here; ask Atalia to lead you to Shandir, our healer.”

  “I am pleased to be in Sabazel at last,” Theara murmured, and turned to the doorway. As she passed through she glanced back over her shoulder. “Your image has been much before me, lady …” She was gone.

  Danica grimaced. So she was that much on the conqueror’s mind? How many more knew? Patros, probably; Mardoc? Adrastes? She turned to Lyris; the woman was so stiff she trembled. “Well?” she asked softly.

  “Let me go to her,” Lyris spat. “Let me show her what she has done to me, and to her precious husband. Let me show the high priest for the beast he is.”

  “And would anyone believe you? No, Lyris; the priest used Chryse as surely as he used you. Leave her be. Leave your memories behind, and ride proudly at my side.”

  Lyris bent her head obediently, but still her shoulders trembled. Danica reached again for her pen.

  Mother, she sighed, are we all pawns on your game board? Did you plan this all, long before our births, setting the Sardian oracle into play, and Viridis and Gerlac and Kallidar and my own fleshly mother? Or do you, like we mortals, scramble from fortified position to fortified position, playing as best you can with the pieces you have? Is it truly my own will? …

  That was not a question she dared to consider. The lines of the map wavered before her, and the breeze that touched her back was cold.

  *

  Declan listened attentively as Chryse told him of her visit to her husband. “Truly,” she concluded, “I know not why His Eminence brought me here. My lord is polite—always he is polite—but his desire is for his sword, and for battle, and for …” She bit her lip so hard that it bruised.

  Declan waited, but she did not complete her sentence. She raised her hands toward a tiny gilt statue of the falcon. “If I can serve my lord, I am content …”

  He joined her in her prayer. But his eyes again and again strayed beyond the image of the deity toward the great gold pavilion of the king, and on his face doubt and thought were mingled.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Sardians had their orders; the next day they would move. The encampment hummed with anticipatory talk. Bellasteros the conqueror, the emperor, king of kings—he bore the sword Solifrax into battle. So confident was he of victory that he brought his first wife to his side. And the talon of Harus walked among the centuries, Sardian and formerly imperial alike, his long, thin hands holding a blessing for all who would bow to the name of the god.

  The arrival of the Sabazians added piquancy to the occasion.

  Danica left the packhorses, Shandir and Theara, and a guard on the far side of a rocky outcropping, out of sight of the sentries on the embankment but close enough to be counted by Bogazkar’s scouts as part of the main armed body. She rode, with Atalia and Ilanit on either side and Lyris just behind, among her hundred picked Companions through the gate of the encampment.

  Here there was no woodland, no squawking seabirds, and the sun was a watery gleam in a winter sky. But the main avenue of the encampment stretched here, as it had last summer by the sea, to the shadow of the gold pavilion; it was an avenue lined with curious men, filled with the scent of men and with men’s voices. Their suggestions were, as before, unimaginatively explicit. And yet their voices were now tinted with humor; they would mock the daughters of Ashtar, but they no longer hated them.

  Have we earned that much? Danica asked herself. She glanced behind her; Lyris was pale and hollow-eyed, her cheekbones as sharp as cutting edges. She looked straight ahead, seeing nothing. Perhaps it had not, after all, been wise to bring her here. The names of Chryse and Adrastes had reopened her wounds … Danica raised her chin even higher, set her shoulders more squarely. It is my decision now, she thought, wise or foolish. My choice, how to finish this game that cannot be won, this game that leaves scars like epitaphs across our faces … I must be strong. Her shield lay against her, burnished with starshine. The pavilion was before her.

  This time the pages stood back respectfully; the guards by the falcon standards barely woke from their boredom. But the gold-encompassed dimness stirred with a current of danger, words unspoken, and secret compromises.

  Again Danica strode to the foot of the dais, Atalia and IIanit at her back. Again she braced one foot on the step, removed her helmet, and shook free her golden hair. But this time she kept her cloak draped loosely about her body.

  He sat, lazily arrogant, in his chair beneath the tapestry, the outspread wings of Harus protecting him. Harus, who had preened himself in Ashtar’s embrace …

  “Greeting,” Danica said. “You are well?”

  “Greeting,” said Bellasteros. “Well enough, thank you.” Their eyes met, snapped, passed on in feigned indifference.

  Patros stood at the king’s right hand, holding Solifrax. His knuckles were white on the snakeskin sheath, his eyes staring just beyond Danica’s shoulder—Ilanit, yes. His face was very carefully set with no expression at all. Let him look, Danica thought. A look is little enough.

  Bellasteros spoke again, cool, controlled. “Patros, lead our allies to my tent and instruct them in the morrow’s strategy.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Patros plunged off the dais.

  Bellasteros waved his hand in casual dismissal. Danica turned in casual disdain. Atalia’s and Ilanit’s steps kept close behind her, in unison. The conqueror’s dark eyes burned into her back, their look like fingertips stroking her flesh, drawing it into quivering tautness. She inhaled, stilling her importunate thoughts. Please, she thought, let no one read our thoughts.

  She noted the Companions ranged in good order before the pavilion, alone, the Sardians having wearied of their sport and gone back to work. A centurion hovered just beyond the periphery of their circle, no doubt detailed to guard them. They ignored him.

  Danica was ducking into the tent when she realized that Lyris had not been with the others. Her nerves pricked cold, sending gooseflesh over her body—foolish, to bring her here —but she could do nothing. To her astonishment Atalia greeted the young soldier stationed beside the doorway; Aveyron, she realized, who had brought Theara to her the night before.

  The sudden dimness of the tent swirled around her, hissing. Mardoc stood waiting by a table spread with maps. He did not bow.

  Danica regarded him evenly, and evenly she greeted him. He was already her enemy; mocking him would serve no point.

  Patros bustled around the table, still holding the sword, his eyes downcast. Ilanit looked eagerly at everything in the tent but Patros’s face. Mardoc and Atalia eyed each other like rival panthers, circling, searching for a weak point, preparing to strike.

  Then Bellasteros threw back the tent flap. He paused, letting his eyes adjust, taking in the exact placement of everyone in the chamber like a player assessing the game board. He extended his hand, and Patros laid the sword in it. He drew Solifrax, a rush of flame tearing the dimness, lighting his eyes, and turned the shining blade admiringly. “My thanks for your aid,” he said to Danica.

  The star-shield rang gently in response and she willed it to silence. “You are welcome,” she replied. She pulled from her cloak a rolled parchment and handed it to Bellasteros. “A map of the approaches to Iksandarun. I was there some time ago, but I remember it well. See if this agrees with those maps provided by your imperial allies.”

  Atalia growled deep in her throat, also remembering—the surprise attack on the Sabazian embassy, the queen, Danica’s mother, dead … You would bear your arms in my presence, Kallidar had said at Azervinah, befor
e she killed him. Her vengeance? Ashtar’s? Or part of the game that would place the world in Bellasteros’s strong hands?

  “My thanks.” He sheathed the sword and passed the map to Mardoc, who took it as one would take a poisonous viper. “Here,” he said, unrolling another parchment, “the southern plains and the great river Jorniyeh. Here Iksandarun and here the pass leading to its plateau. A few days’ journey, if Bogazkar will wait to meet us there.”

  “My scouts say that he is here,” Danica said, placing a forefinger on the paper.

  “Your scouts?” asked Bellasteros. A glint from the corner of his eye reached her; yes, she thought, scouts like the one I had here, in your camp, in your very arms, I daresay … “Yes,” he said, clearing his throat. “Just where we thought. And no doubt Bogazkar’s spies in this camp have told him that we ready ourselves to meet him; we must be doubly cautious whom we trust. Mardoc?”

  The general’s baleful glare asked if the Sabazians could be trusted. His eye turned to Patros and darkened further; the young man toyed with an onyx ring, elaborately, his body held with that careful poise of one being watched. But it was IIanit’s eye he courted, not Mardoc’s. Danica glanced around to see her daughter transfixed with open hunger, just as Atalia was transfixed with open distaste.

  The moment’s oppressive silence stretched on into infinity; the tension spun itself out, tighter, tighter— I cannot bear this, Danica thought suddenly. I shall laugh at the absurdity of it, this game the gods play with us—or surely I shall cry. She dared to look at Bellasteros, dared to let one corner of her mouth twitch in a rueful black humor.

  He caught her look, returned it. He laid the gleaming blade of Solifrax across the table, slowly, carefully, not crushing even one rolled parchment and yet drawing every eye in the chamber to himself. “In the name of the god,” he declaimed, calling no god by name, “do we have the stomach for battle or do we not!”