Evil for Evil

by K. J. Parker

  After a thousand years or so, the tent flap opened again. Not a tall, slim young man in white this time; an older man, in a plain robe of sort-of-gray woolen cloth, wearing sensible boots that Valens would have traded his duchy for. The man looked at him for a moment as if he was something regrettable that couldn’t reasonably be avoided, and said, “This way.”

  This way proved to be the five yards or so to the tent next door, across a red, blue and purple carpet. Inside, the tent was pitch black; a clue, he decided, to the identity of his host.

  “You have rested.” Not a question. “Please sit down. You must try the orange and cinnamon tea; it’s stronger, but one needs a little stimulation in the morning.”

  Stimulation; the little man sounded so frail that Valens reckoned anything more stimulating than slow, shallow breathing would probably kill him. “Thank you,” he said.

  The cup was put into his hand.

  “I must apologize,” the little man’s voice went on, “about the rather dim light. I’m afraid that my eyes are rather sensitive.Direct sunlight gives me a headache.”

  “That’s quite all right,” Valens mumbled.

  “In fact,” the voice continued, quite matter-of-fact, “practically everything in my life hurts me these days — breathing, eating, drinking, sleeping, waking up, moving, keeping still, every kind and description of bodily function brings with it a different and complementary pain. I had hoped,” he added wistfully, “to have died earlier this year, but regrettably I realized that I could not permit myself to do so. My last surviving son, you see; quite suddenly, my doctors tell me it was his heart. With only my great-granddaughter left — you can appreciate the problem, I feel sure. At the best of times, a line of succession is such a slender thing, a single strand of spider’s web, and our enemies are so strong, so unrelenting.” A short pause, no doubt to gather strength. “The Rosinholet and the Bela Razo made a joint attack on us earlier this year; not just a cattle raid, but a concerted attempt to wipe us out. My son undertook the defense, but he had turned into an old man; too weak to ride a horse, too confused to manage all the intricacies of a serious war. I had to relieve him of command in the end. We saw them off, eventually, but I knew then that something had to be done. They will return, I feel certain of it; with them, I expect, they will bring the Aram no Vei and the Luzir Soleth. The simple fact is, there are too many of us; the Cure Hardy, I mean. We have bred too many cattle and too many children, and the pasture will not support us all. Some nations have tried sitting down — staying in one place all the time, I mean, as you do — but we simply can’t live like that. The only logical solution is for one of the nations of the confederacy to go away, or else be wiped out.”

  Silence; not expecting a reply or a comment, just a pause for breath and reflection. Nevertheless, Valens said, “You want to cross the desert and settle there?”

  “Precisely.” The little man sounded pleased that he wasn’t going to have to explain. “We heard about the annihilation of the Eremian people by the Perpetual Republic of Mezentia. Most regrettable, of course; but it stands to reason that if a nation is wiped out, their lands fall empty.”

  “But Eremia’s not big enough, surely,” Valens said without thinking.

  “No, of course not,” the old man sighed. “We should need the entire territory between the mountains and the sea. But if the Eremians have disappeared, and we allied ourselves with you, that would only leave the Mezentines to be disposed of — assuming,” he added, with the ghost of a chuckle, “that we could get across the desert without losing more than half our number of effective fighting men. That was the question that remained unanswered when my great-granddaughter left here to marry you.” He sighed again, a long, thin noise like the last exhalation of a dying animal. “And now you have brought us a safe, quick path across the desert; now, I need only live long enough to see Mezentia got rid of, and my duty will at last be done. My people will have a safe home, I will have my successor, and you …” A laugh like dry twigs snapping. “I assume you would like to be revenged on the murderers of your wife. Personally, I’ve never been able to see the merit in revenge, except as a deterrent to further offense, but my people think very highly of it. My great-granddaughter’s death will be all the pretext they need, without the prospect of a new home.” Pause. “I take it you would wish to see the Mezentines destroyed?”

  One thing you couldn’t do to the voice was lie to it. “Yes,”Valens said. “I’d like to see them butchered to the last man, woman and child. I’d like to stand and watch, when I get too tired to take part myself. But not if it means risking the lives of what’s left of my people. I’d rather let the Mezentines get away with what they’ve done completely unscathed.”

  Two hands too weak to clap patted each other. “Splendid answer,” the voice said. “Exactly what my successor should have said; and I have no doubts at all about your sincerity, let me stress that. Everything I have heard of you leads me to believe that you are a good king, like your father before you. Which is why,” he went on, “I shall have to live long enough to do the taking of revenge myself. I told you I don’t believe in it; I don’t believe in our gods, either, but my people do. On balance, it seems far more likely that they are right than I am. We will wipe out the Mezentines for you; you won’t have to make that choice. If you prefer, you are welcome to stay here and wait until the job is done and our army returns. You may regard it as a belated wedding present, if you wish. As reciprocation for the wonderful gift you’ve given us — the safe way across the desert — it is, I fear, wholly inadequate. Tell me,” and the voice quickened just a little, “how did you find out about it? There have been rumors, of course. Many of my people have claimed there was such a thing, over the years. Only recently a foolish young man called Skeddanlothi — a cousin of mine, unfortunately too distant to be able to succeed me — declared that he had found it and would prove his assertion by going there himself. Of course, he never came back, so presumably he was misinformed.”

  “A merchant,” Valens heard himself say. “A trader from my country found it, apparently. He came here several times to buy salt; when he died, he left a diary, and a map. One of my …” He couldn’t think of a word to describe Vaatzes. “One of my people found the map, and when the Mezentines were closing in on us, we took a chance and followed it; and here we are.”

  The noise that greeted these words didn’t sound at all like laughter, but what else could it be? “Remarkable,” the voice said eventually. “And salt, of all things. Well; I don’t suppose it matters how the way was found, so long as it really exists. Tell me about the oases; will they water an army of two hundred thousand, do you think? Of course, I have sent surveyors, men who know about that sort of thing; I shall know for sure soon enough. But I’m impatient. What do you think? Will there be enough water?”

  Valens heard a voice saying, “Yes,” and realized it was his own. “And water won’t be a problem once you reach the mountains on the other side; it’s how to transport the quantities of food you’ll need …”

  “Oh, don’t worry about that.” The voice sounded almost cheerfully dismissive. “We have vastly more experience in that sort of thing than you do, by all accounts.”

  Despite the dark, Valens’ eyes felt tired. He rubbed them before saying: “Can you really field an army of two hundred thousand?”

  The strange sound again, equivalent to laughter. “An expeditionary force of two hundred thousand light cavalry and lancers, followed by the heavy cavalry and dragoons — say three hundred and fifty thousand — would probably be adequate for the task and still leave a sufficient reserve here in case of further attacks from our enemies.” Short pause. “I should, of course, be asking your opinion, not purporting to state a fact. Do you think five hundred and fifty thousand cavalry would be enough to deal with the Mezentines? I understand that their field army is made up entirely of foreigners serving for money; a mixed blessing, at best, I should imagine. We could send a larger force, but my
experience is that once you pass a certain point, a large army is more of a hindrance than a help.”

  This time it was Valens who paused before speaking. “How many of you are there?” he said.

  Laughter again; a different sound, like the barking of a very small dog. “How delightful, that you feel sufficiently at ease already to ask such a direct question!” Then the pitch of the voice changed again; lower, quite businesslike. “I regret to say that I don’t have an up-to-date census to hand; five months ago, however, when we held the usual muster and games to celebrate my birthday, on the fifth day all the men of military age fit for active service paraded on the plain beside the Swallow River. As each regiment marched past its commander-in-chief, each man placed an arrow on a pile. When the parade was over, the arrows were gathered up into barrels, each holding one thousand. We filled seven hundred barrels, with a few hundred arrows left over. If you ask me what proportion of our people are fit for military service, I would estimate somewhere between an eighth and a tenth. Does that answer your question?”

  “Yes.” Valens thought for a moment, then said, “As far as I know, the total population of Mezentia is something around eight hundred thousand; it could be less, I’m pretty sure it’s not much more. So yes, I think half a million men would probably be enough.”

  “You think so? I wonder.” The voice was very faint. “Allow me to confess my ignorance. I have never seen a city. Come to that, I have never seen a stone-built house. Only a tiny handful of my people have seen anything of the kind. I admit to finding the whole concept both repellent and strangely fascinating; to live your entire life in a box, to see the same view every morning when you wake up; remarkable. But I understand that Mezentia has the highest, thickest walls in the world, with massive gates and high towers, and extraordinary machines that hurl rocks and spears to defend them. I am told that when an enemy shuts himself up in such a very strong box, the only way to deal with him is to keep him there until he starves, and either comes out or dies.” A click of the tongue, faint but perfectly clear. “I assume that this process takes time, and I think I have explained why I am in something of a hurry. Yes, I believe that five hundred thousand cavalry could shut the Mezentines up in their box, for a little while, until they themselves began to feel hungry and so were obliged to move on. Do you think the Mezentines’ city can be taken? I really don’t know enough about these things to form a sensible opinion.”

  Valens thought: I wonder who made the decision to start the war. I wonder what passed through his mind, just before the scales tipped slightly more one way than the other. He said: “I think it’s possible. You see, I have a man …”

  “Ziani Vaatzes.”

  “Yes, him. He nearly managed to defend Civitas Eremiae against them. I’ve come to know him, a little. I think, give him a long enough crowbar and he can pull apart any box on earth.”

  “I know a little about him,” the voice said softly. “And I would tend to agree.” Another pause, and Valens wished there was enough light to show him the little man’s face. “I must confess, I’m given rather to flights of fancy. I picture things in my mind that I have never seen; picture them the way they should be, if you follow me, rather than how they are. I have a very clear picture in my mind of Ziani Vaatzes. At some point, I suppose, I shall see him in the flesh, and be vastly disappointed. Of course, I have never seen a Mezentine. I understand that their skins are brown. I shall ask my soldiers to bring me some dead bodies from the oasis. Did you know that the Rosinholet are experts at curing and preserving dead bodies? When a particularly famous and valuable man dies, they cure his skin and stuff it with wool bound tight on a wooden frame, to simulate the bones. Sometimes they mount their illustrious dead on horses, or sit them on the boxes of their wagons. I shall see if we have any Rosinholet embalmers among our slaves, who could manufacture a dozen or so Mezentines for me. It would be appropriate, don’t you think? The Mezentines are wonderful makers of things, so I don’t see why they shouldn’t be made into things themselves. Perhaps, given his rather special skills, Ziani Vaatzes could build appropriate mechanisms to go inside them, so that they can do more or less everything they could do when they were alive. Who knows, maybe we could improve on the design a little in some respects, unless Foreman Vaatzes considers that would constitute an abomination.” A soft, dry sound, like a dusty carpet being beaten. “Forgive me, I wander off sometimes. Here’s an idea. Let’s send for Foreman Vaatzes and ask him for his professional opinion. What do you think of that?”

  “There you are,” Daurenja said, materializing suddenly in the doorway of the tent.

  Ziani looked up and scowled. “Not now,” he said. “I’m busy.”

  “Are you?” Daurenja ducked, his ridiculously long neck bending like a drawn bow, and stepped inside the tent, blotting out the light for a moment or so as he came. “Doing what?”

  “Resting. Go away.”

  Daurenja folded his legs and back and sat down on the ground next to him. “Really,” he said cheerfully. “That’s no way to talk to your business partner.”

  “I haven’t got one.”

  “Yes you have.” He was sitting unpleasantly close, his back to the tent’s center pole. His hair was wet and hung loose down his back in rat-tails. He was wearing a pristine white robe, like the ones the Aram Chantat nobles wore, and on his feet were a pair of curly-toed red velvet slippers. “That’s one of the things I wanted to talk to you about. Not the main thing, though. Mostly, I wanted a few quiet minutes to tell you how brilliant you are.”

  Ziani sighed and started to get up. A hand with a grip like a bench-vise grabbed his shoulder and pulled him down, so fast and so smooth that he had no chance to resist. “Please stay and listen,” Daurenja said. “Surely you can spare a few moments to hear a few nice things about yourself.”

  Ziani picked the hand off his shoulder; touching it was like drawing the guts out of dead poultry after it’s hung for a week. “If they’re nice,” he said, “they probably aren’t true. I’ve never gone much on fiction.”

  “Don’t worry on that score,” Daurenja said with a mild giggle. “Everything I’m about to say is perfectly true. Well, you can be the judge of that.”

  Ziani tried to get up again, but his knees were too weak. “I don’t want to talk to you,” he said.

  “In a minute you will.” Daurenja yawned. “Where’s the best place to start? Shall we begin with the Duke’s wedding day, when you betrayed the hunting party to the Mezentines?”

  Ziani felt cold, and all his joints appeared to have seized. “That’s bullshit,” he said. “And you know as well as I do, it was Duke Orsea who —”

  “Ah. Poor Duke Orsea. But I think we’ll come to him later. Actually, on reflection, I think we ought to start at the beginning, or as close to it as makes no odds. Tell me; after you ran away from the city, were you actually heading for the Eremian camp, or was running into them a fat slice of sheer good luck?”

  This time, Ziani lashed out. He was aiming for Daurenja’s chin, but when his fist reached the place where the target should have been, it met nothing but air. Almost simultaneously, something very hard and fast hit Ziani just above the right ear. More surprised than anything else, he folded his arms and legs, like a spider killed suddenly on its web, and dropped to the floor.

  “As I was saying.” Daurenja’s voice, blurred and distant, reached him through the pain like a far-off light glimpsed through mist. “Did you deliberately set out to find Orsea from the start? I suppose what I’m asking is, was the plan already more or less complete in your mind at that early stage, or were you still making it up as you went along?”

  Ziani felt sick and dizzy; it was like being very drunk and having the hangover at the same time. He tried to gauge the distance between Daurenja’s legs and himself, but it was too much effort.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he mumbled.

  “By all means lie if you want to,” Daurenja said pleasantly. “It doesn’t m
atter to me, because I know the truth. And yes, I know it’s true. The plan’s there for anybody to see, if he’s got the wit to know what he’s looking at. I’ve been studying it for months now, piecing it together. It’s been an education, and an honor. I was only able to figure it out because we’re so very much alike, you and me.” He shifted a little, moving slightly sideways, slightly back. There was some fencing move or other where you did that. “Ever since I saw it for what it is, I’ve been trying to take it apart, bit by bit, to figure out how it works. You know, you really are a clever man, Ziani. It’s the combination of imaginative flair and scrupulous attention to detail that does it. It’s odd, really; I mean, the Mezentine tradition hardly encourages innovative design, does it? There’s a set specification, you copy it exactly or they string you up. Really, when you think of a talent like yours being neglected like that, it’s a crying shame.”

  Ziani saw movement out of the corner of his eye, then felt the impact of a powerful blow; a kick in the ribs, which squeezed all the air out of his body.

  “Now I’m pretty clear in my mind about what happened up to the fall of Eremia,” Daurenja went on. “By arming the Eremians with scorpions, you made sure that the war escalated out of control, making the Republic commit itself far more deeply than it wanted to. The sideshow with Duke Valens and Orsea’s wife; clearly you didn’t set any of that up, but you did ensure that Orsea found out about it; that suggests you were planning a long way ahead by that point, so I’m assuming that most of the main elements were already clearly established in your mind.” He paused, as though waiting for a reply or some sort of comment. There was disappointment in his voice when he resumed. “Now I’m going to have to press you for an answer here,” he said, “because obviously the next bit is crucial to a clear understanding of the mechanism. Was it you who opened the gates and let the Mezentines in to Civitas Eremiae?”