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WHAT   HAS  GONE   BEFORE:

A scouting column of three cohorts of Roman legionaries,
led by military tribune Marcus Aemilius Scaurus and senior
centurion Gaius Philippus, was returning to Julius Caesar's
main army when they were ambushed by Gauls. To prevent
mass slaughter, the Gallic commander Viridovix offered single
combat, and Marcus accepted. Both men bore druids' swords,
that of Marcus being battle spoil. When the blades crossed, a
dome of light sprang up around them. Suddenly the Romans
and Viridovix were in an unfamiliar world with strange stars.

They soon discovered they were in the war-torn Empire of
Videssos, a land where priests of the god Phos could work real
magic. They were hired as a mercenary unit by the Empire and
spent the winter in the provincial town of Imbros, learning the
language and customs.

When spring came, they marched to Videssos the city, cap-
ital of the Empire. There Marcus met the soldier-Emperor Ma-
vrikios Gavras, his brother Thorisin, and the prime minister,
Vardanes Sphrantzes, a bureaucrat whose enmity Marcus in-
curred. At a banquet in the Romans' honor, Marcus met Mav-
rikios' daughter Alypia and accidentally spilled wine on the
wizard Avshar, envoy of Yezd, Videssos' western enemy. Av-
shar demanded a duel. When the wizard tried to cheat with
sorcery, Marcus' druid sword neutralized the spell, and Marcus
won.

Avshar tried for revenge with an enchanted dagger in the
hands of a nomad under his spell. The Videssian priest Nepos
was horrified at the use of evil magic. Avshar forfeited the
protection granted envoys.

Marcus was sent to arrest Avshar, accompanied by Hemond
and a squad of Namdaleni, mercenaries from the island nation
of Namdalen. But Avshar had fled, leaving a sorcerous trap

that killed Hemond. Marcus was given Hemond's sword to take
to his widow, Helvis.

Avshar's offenses served as justification for Videssos to
declare war on Yezd, which had been raiding deep into the
western part of the Empire. Troops—native and mercenary—
flooded into the capital as Videssos prepared for war. Tension
rose between Videssians and the growing number of Namdaleni
because of differences in their worship of Phos. To the reli-
giously liberal Romans, the differences were minor, but each
side considered the other heretics. The Videssian patriarch Bal-
samon preached a sermon of toleration, which eased the tension
for the moment.

But fanatic Videssian monks stirred up trouble again. Riot-
ing broke out, and Marcus was sent with a force of Romans
to help quell it. Going into a dark courtyard to break up a rape,
he discovered that the intended victim was Helvis. Caught up
in the moment, they made love. And after the riots subsided,
she and her son joined him in the Romans' barracks. Other
Romans had already found partners.

At last the unwieldy army moved west against Yezd, ac-
companied'by women and dependents. Marcus was pleased to
learn Helvis was pregnant, but shocked to discover Ortaias
Sphrantzes commanded the army's left wing; he was only slightly
mollified on finding the young man was a figurehead, hostage
for Vardanes Sphrantzes' good behavior.

More troops joined the army in the westlands, including
those of Baanes Onomagoulos and Gagik Bagratouni, a noble
driven from his home in mountainous Vaspurakan by Yezda.
Two other Vaspurakaners, Senpat Sviodo and his wife Nevrat,
were acting as guides for the Romans. All Vaspurakaners were
hated as heretics by a local priest, Zemarkhos. Zemarkhos
cursed Bagratouni, who threw him and his dog into a sack,
then beat the sack. Fearing a pogrom, Marcus interceded for
him.

The Yezda began hit-and-run raids against the imperial army
as it moved closer to Yezd. Then an advance force of Ono-
magoulos' troops was pinned down near the town ofMaragha.
Leaving the army's dependents behind at Khiiat, the Emperor
moved forward to rescue them.

In a great battle, Avshar commanded the Yezda. By sorcery,
he slew the officer who truly commanded the imperial army's
left wing. Ortaias Sphrantzes, suddenly thrust into real com-
mand, panicked and fled.

The whole wing collapsed. The battle, till then nearly a

draw, turned to disaster. Mavrikios fell fighting, and Thori
desperate counterattack from the right failed, though h(
manage to escape with a fair part of the army.

Roman discipline let the legionaries hold their ranks.'
withdrew in good order and encamped for the night. To'
midnight, Avshar taunted them by throwing Mavrikios'
into their camp. As Gaius Philippus commented, the wi
should have pursued the forces of Thorisin instead.

The game was not over yet.




THE ROMANS' TREK EAST FROM THE DISASTROUS BATTLE-

field where the Emperor of Videssos lost his life was a jour-
ney full of torment. The season was late summer, the land
through which they marched sere and burning hot. Mirages
shimmered ahead, treacherously promising lakes where a mud
puddle would have been a prodigy. Bands of Yezda invaders
dogged the fugitives' tracks, skirmishing occasionally and
always alert to pick off stragglers.

Scaurus still carried Mavrikios Gavras' severed head, the
only sure proof the Emperor was dead. Foreseeing chaos in
Videssos after Mavrikios' fall, he thought it wise to forestall
pretenders who might claim the imperial name to aid their
climbs to power. It would not be the first time Videssos had
known such things.

"Sorry I am I wasna there when that black spalpeen Avshar
flung you himself's noddle," Viridovix said to the tribune, his
Latin musically flavored by his native Celtic speech. "I had a
fine Yezda one to throw back at him." True to the fierce cus-
tom of his folk, the Gaul had taken a slain enemy's head for a
trophy.

At any other time Marcus would have found that revolting.
In defeat's bitter aftermath, he nodded and said, "I wish you'd
been there, too."

"Aye, it would have given the whoreson something to
think on," Gaius Philippus chimed in. The senior centurion
usually enjoyed quarreling with Viridovix, but their hatred for
the wizard-prince of Yezd brought them together now.

Marcus rubbed his chin, felt rough whiskers scratch under




2       AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

his fingers. Like most of the Romans, he had stayed clean-
faced in a bearded land, but lately there had been little time
for shaving. He plucked a whisker; it shone golden in the
sunlight. Coming as he did from Mediolanum in northern
Italy, he had a large proportion of northern blood in his veins.
In Caesar's army in Gaul, he had been teased about looking
like a Celt himself. The Videssians often took him for a Ha-

loga; many of those warriors forsook their chilly home for
mercenary service in the Empire.

Gorgidas worked ceaselessly with the wounded, changing
dressings, splinting broken bones, and dispensing the few
ointments and medicines left in his depleted store. Although

hurt himself, the slim, dark Greek doctor disregarded his pain
to bring others relief.

Covered by a screening force of light cavalry from Vi-
dessos' eastern neighbor Khatrish, the legionaries tramped
east toward the town of Khiiat as fast as their many injuries
would allow. Had he led a force in the lands Rome ruled,
Scaurus would have moved northwest instead, to join Thorisin
Gavras and the right wing of the shattered imperial army. Hard
military sense lay there, for the Emperor's brother—no, the
Emperor now, Marcus supposed—had brought his troops

away in good order. The fight against the Yezda would center
on him.

But here Marcus was not simply a legionary officer, with a
legionary officer's worries. He was also a mercenary captain.
He had to deal with the fact that the legionaries' women, the
families they had made or joined since coming to Videssos,
were left behind in the Vaspurakaner city that had been the
base for Mavrikios' ill-fated campaign. The Romans would
disobey any order to turn away from Khiiat. So, even more,
would the hundreds of stragglers who had attached themselves
to his troop like drowning men clinging to a spar.

For that matter, he never thought of giving such an order.
His own partner Helvis, carrying his child, had stayed in
Khiiat, along with her young son from an earlier attachment.

That was to say, he hoped she had stayed in Khiiat. Uncer-
tainty tormented the legionaries as badly as the Yezda did. For
all Scaurus knew, the invaders might have stormed Khiiat and
slain or carried into slavery everyone there. Even if they had
not, fugitives would already be arriving with word of the ca-
tastrophe that had overtaken the Videssian army.

Harry Turtledove              3

In the wake of such news', noncombatants might be fleeing
eastward now. That was more dangerous than staying behind
Khiiat's walls. Marcus ran through the gloomy possibilities
time after time: Helvis dead, Helvis captured by the Yezda,
Helvis struggling east with a three-year-old through hostile
country ... and she was pregnant, too.

At last, with a distinct effort of will, he banished the
qualms to the back of his mind. Not for the first time, he was
grateful for his training in the Stoic school, which taught him
to cast aside useless imaginings. He would know soon
enough, and that would be the time to act.

About a day and a half out of Khiiat, a scout came riding
back to the Roman tribune. "A horseman coming out of the
east, sir," he reported. His staccato Khatrisher accent made
him hard for Scaurus to understand—the tribune's own Vi-
dessian was far from perfect.

Interest flared in him when he realized what the scout was
saying. "From the east? A lone rider?"

The Khatrisher spread his hands. "As far as we could tell.
He was nervous and took cover as soon as he spotted us. From
what little we saw, he had the seeming of a Vaspurakaner."

"No wonder he was leery of you, then. You look too much
like Yezda." The invading nomads had ravaged Vaspurakan
over the course of years, until the natives hated the sight of
them. The Khatrishers were descended from nomads as well
and, despite taking many Videssian ways, still had the look of
the plains about them.

"Bring him in, and unhurt," Marcus decided. "Anyone fool
enough to travel west in the face of everything rolling the
other way must have a strong reason. Maybe he bears word
from Khiiat," the tribune added, suddenly hopeful in spite of
himself.

The scout gave a cheery wave—the Khatrishers were most
of them free spirits—and kicked his pony into motion.
Scaurus did not expect him back for some time; for someone
in the furs and leather of a plainsman, convincing a Vaspura-
kaner of his harmlessness would not be easy. The tribune was
surprised when the Khatrisher quickly reappeared, along with
another rider plainly not of his people.

The scout's companion looked familiar, even at a distance.
Before the tribune was able to say more than that, Senpat




4

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Sviodo cried out in joy and spurred his horse forward to meet
the newcomer. "Nevrat!" the Vaspurakaner yelled. "Are you
out of your mind, to journey alone through this wolves' land?"

His wife parted company from her escort to embrace him.
The Khatrisher stared, slack-jawed. In her loose traveling
clothes, her curly black hair bound up under a three-peaked
Vaspurakaner hat of leather, and with the grime of travel on
her, only her beardless cheeks hinted at her sex. She was
surely armed like a man. A horseman's saber hung at her belt,
and she carried a bow with an arrow nocked and ready.

She and Senpat were chattering in their throaty native
tongue as they slowly rode back to the marching legionaries.
The Khatrisher followed, still shaking his head.

"Your outrider has a head on his shoulders," she said,
switching to Videssian as she neared Scaurus. "I took him and
his comrades for Yezda, for all their shouts of 'Friends! Coun-
trymen!' But when he said, 'Romans!' I knew he was no
western jackal."

"I'm glad you chose to trust him," Marcus answered. He
was fond of the intense, swarthy girl. So were many other
Romans; scattered cheers rang out as the men realized who
she was. She smiled her pleasure, teeth flashing white. Senpat
Sviodo, proud of her exploit and glad beyond measure she had
joined him safely, was grinning, too.

The question Senpat had shouted moments before was still
burning in the tribune's mind. "In the name of your god Phos,
Nevrat, why did you leave Khiiat?" A horrid thought forced
its way forward. "Has it fallen?"

"It still stood yesterday morning, when I set out," she an-
swered. The Romans close enough to hear her cheered again,
this time with the same relief Scaurus felt. She tempered their
delight by continuing, "There's worse madness inside those
walls, though, than any I've seen out here."

Gaius Philippus nodded, as if hearing what he expected.
"They panicked, did they, when news came we'd been
beaten?" The veteran sounded resigned; he had seen enough
victories and defeats that the aftermaths of both were second
nature to him.

The Romans crowded round Nevrat, calling out the names
of their women and asking if they were all right. She told
them, "As I said, I left early yesterday. When last I saw them,

Ham/ Turtledove

5

they were well. Most of you have sensible girls, too; I think
they'll have wit enough to keep from joining the flight."

"There's flight, then?" Scaurus asked with a sinking feel-
ing.

Nevrat understood his fears and was quick to lay them to

rest. "Helvis knows war, Marcus. She told me to tell you
she'd stay in Khiiat till the first Yezda came over the wall."
The tribune nodded his thanks, not trusting himself to speak.
He felt suddenly taller, as if a burden had been lifted from his
shoulders. Helvis, he knew, had no such reassurance that he

lived.

There were messages from Khiiat for some of the other

Romans as well. "Is Quintus Glabrio here?" The junior centu-
rion was almost at Nevrat's side, but as usual quiet nearly to
the point of invisibility. He took a step forward; Nevrat
laughed in surprise. "I'm sorry. Your lady Damaris also told
me she would wait for you in the city."

"And much else besides, I'm sure," he said with a smile.
The Romans who knew Damaris laughed at that; the hot-tem-
pered Videssian girl was able to talk for herself and Glabrio

both.

"Minucius," Nevrat continued in her businesslike way,

"Erene says you should know she's stopped throwing up.
She's beginning to bulge a bit, too."

"Ah, that's fine to hear," the burly legionary replied. After
less than a week without a razor, his beard was coming in

thick and black.

Nevrat turned back to Marcus for a moment, amusement in
her brown eyes. "Helvis has no such message for you, my
friend. I'm afraid she's green as a leek much of the time."

"Is she well?" he asked anxiously.

"Yes, she's fine. There's nothing at all to worry about. You
men are such babies about these things."

She was so full of comforting, reassuring words from
Khiiat that someone finally called out, "If all's so well back
there, why are they fleeing the city?"

"All's not well," she said flatly. "Remember, the messages
I bring are from the folk with the wit to stay and the heart to
think I'd find you and they'd see you again. All too many are
of the other sort—they've been scurrying like rabbits ever
since Ortaias Sphrantzes came galloping into the city with
word all was lost."

6       AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Curses and angry shouts greeted the young noble's name.
Command of the Videssian army's left wing had been his, and
his terror-striken flight turned an orderly retreat into rout.
Nevrat nodded at the Romans' outburst. She might not have
seen Ortaias flee the battlefield, but she had been in Khiiat.

She said contemptuously, "He stayed just long enough to
change horses—the one he'd ridden died next day of misuse,
poor thing—and then he was flying east again. Good rid-
dance, if anyone cares what I think."

"And right you are, lass," Gaius Philippus nodded. A pro-
fessional soldier to the roots of his iron-gray hair, he asked,
"On your way hither, what did you see of the Yezda—aye,
and of our fellows, in the bargain?"

"Too many Yezda. They're thicker further east, but there's
no order to them at all—they're like frogs after flies, striking
at anything that moves. The only thing that brought them to-
gether was the imperial army. Now they've crushed it and
they're breaking up again, looking for new land to push into
... and all Videssos this side of the Cattle-Crossing lies open
to them."

Marcus thought of Videssos' western lands laid waste by
the nomads, the rich, peaceful fields put to the torch, cities so
long at peace they had no walls now the playthings of invad-
ing barbarians, smoking altars heaped high with butchered
victims for Yezd's dark god Skotos. Searching for any straw to
contradict that horrid picture, he repeated the second half of
Gaius Philippus' question: "What of the Empire's troops?"

"Most are as badly beaten as Ortaias. I watched three
Yezda chasing a whole squad of horsemen, laughing them-
selves sick as they rode. One broke off to follow me, but I lost
him in rocky ground." Nevrat dismissed two hours of ten-or in
a sentence.

She went on, "I did see what's left of the Namdalener regi-
ment still in good order, most of a day's ride ahead of you.
The nomads were giving them a wide berth."

"That would be the way of it," Viridovix agreed. "Tough
as nails, they are." The Romans concurred in that judgment.
The warriors from the island Duchy of Namdalen were here-
tics in Videssos' eyes and as ambitious for themselves as any
other mercenary soldiers, but they fought so well the Empire
was glad to hire them.

Harry Turtledove               7

"Did you see anything of Thorisin Gavras?" Scaurus
asked. Again he thought of linking with Thorisin's forces.

"The Sevastokrator? No, nor heard anything, either. Is it
true the Emperor's dead? Ortaias claimed he was."

"It's true." Marcus did not elaborate and did not mention
his grisly proof of Mavrikios' passing.

Gorgidas caught something the tribune missed. The physi-
cian said, "How could Sphrantzes know? He was long fled
when the Emperor fell." The Romans growled as they took in
the implications of that.

"Perhaps he wished it true so badly, he never thought to
doubt it," Quintus Glabrio suggested. "Men often believe
what they most want."

It was like Glabrio to put as charitable a light as possible
on the young noble's action. Marcus, who had been active in
politics in his native Mediolanum, found another, more omi-
nous interpretation. Ortaias Sphrantzes was of a house which
had held the imperium itself; his uncle, the Sevastos—or
prime minister—Vardanes Sphrantzes, was Mavrikios' chief
rival.

Gaius Philippus broke into Scaurus' chain of thought. He
demanded, "Have we chattered long enough? The sooner
we're to Khiiat, the sooner we can do something more than
beating our gums over all this."

"Give a body a bit of a blow, will you now?" Viridovix
said, wiping his sweaty, sunburned forehead with the back of
his hand. "You're after forgetting not everyone's like that
sleepless bronze giant I once heard a Greek tell of..."

He looked questioningly at Gorgidas, who gave him the
name: "Talos."

"That's it," the Celt agreed happily. He was excitable, en-
ergetic, in short bursts of strength well-nigh unmatchable, but
the senior centurion—indeed, many Romans—surpassed him
in endurance.

Despite Viridovix' groans, Marcus decided Gaius Phi-
lippus was right. Progress was too slow to suit him anyway;

there were many walking wounded, and others who had to be
carried in litters. If Khiiat still stood, the Romans had to get
there as fast as they could, before the Yezda mounted an as-
sault to overwhelm its feeble and no doubt demoralized garri-


son

That thought led to another. "One last question before we




8       AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

march," he said to Nevrat: "Is there any word of Avshar?" For
he was sure the wizard-prince was trying to organize the un-
ruly nomads he led to deliver just that attack.

But she shook her head. "None at all, no more than of
Thorisin. Curious, is it not?" She herself had seen war and
skirmished against the Yezda when they first conquered Vas-
purakan; she had no trouble following the tribune's logic.

By nightfall the Romans and their various comrades were
less than a day from Khiiat. Granted a respite by the Yezda,
the legionaries erected their usual fortified camp. The protec-
tion had served them well more times than Marcus could re-
call. Men bustled about the campsite, intent on creating ditch,
breastwork, and palisade. Eight-man leather tents went up in
neat rows inside.

The Romans showed the Videssians and others who had
joined them what needed to be done and stood over them to
make sure they did it. At Gaius Philippus' profane urging,
order was beginning to emerge again in the legionary ranks.
Now the newcomers, instead of marching where they would,
filled the holes fallen Romans had left in the maniples.

Scaurus approved. "The first step in making legionaries of
them."

"Just what I thought," Gaius Philippus nodded. "Some will
run away, but give us time to work on the rest, and they'll
amount to something. Being with good troops rubs off."

Senpat Sviodo came up to Marcus, an ironic glint in his
eye. "I trust you will not object if my wife spends the evening
inside our works." He bowed low, as if in supplication.

Scaurus flushed. When the Videssian army was intact, he
had followed Roman practice in excluding women from his
soldiers' quarters. As a result, Senpat and Nevrat, preferring
each other's company to legionary discipline, always pitched
their tent just outside the Roman camp. Now, though— "Of
course," the tribune said. "After we reach Khiiat, she'll have
plenty of company." He refused to say, or even to think. If we
reach Khiiat....

"Good," Senpat said. He studied the tribune. "You can
loosen up a bit after all, then? I'd wondered."

"I suppose I can," Marcus sighed, and the regret in his
voice was so plain he and Sviodo both had to laugh. So it's to
be our women with us wherever we go, is it? the tribune
thought. One more step along the way from legionary officer

Harry Turtledove               9

to head of a mercenary company. He laughed at himself again,
this time silently. In the Empire of Videssos, captain of mer-
cenaries was all he'd ever be, and high time he got used to the
notion.

The Yezda were thick as fleas round Khiiat; the last day's
march to the city was a running fight. But Khiiat itself, to
Scaurus' surprise, was not under siege, nor was any real effort
made to keep the Romans from entering it. As Nevrat had
remarked, in victory the nomads forgot the leaders who had
won it for them.

That was fortunate, for Khiiat could not have repelled a
serious attack. Marcus had expected its walls to be bristling
with spears, but only a handful of men were on them. To his
shock, the gates were open. "Why not?" Gaius Philippus said
scornfully. "There's so many running, the Yezda would be
trampled if they tried to get in." A gray-brown dust cloud lay
over everything eastward, the telltale banner of an army of
fugitives.

Inside, panic still boiled. Plump sutlers, calculating men
who could smell a copper through a wall of dung, threw their
goods at anyone who would take them, so they could flee
unencumbered. Singly and in small groups, soldiers wandered
through the city's twisting streets and alleyways, calling the
names of friends and lovers and hoping against hope they
would be answered.

More pitiful yet were the women who crowded close by
Khiiat's western gate. Some kept a vigil doomed to heart-
break, awaiting warriors who would come to them no more.
Others had already despaired of that and stood, bejeweled and
gowned, offering themselves to any man who might get them
safely away.

The Khatrishers were first into Khiiat. Most of them were
without women here, as they had taken service with Videssos
for the one campaign alone and thus left wives and sweet-
hearts behind in their forested homeland.

The tribune passed through the squat gray arch of stone and
under the iron-spiked portcullis which warded the city's west-
ern gate. He looked up through the murder-holes and shook
his head. Where were the archers to spit death at any invader
who tried to force an entrance, where the tubs of bubbling oil
and molten lead to warm the foe's reception? Likely, he




10       AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
thought bitterly, the officer in charge of such things fled, and

no one has thought of them since.

Then any concern over matters military was swept from
him, for Helvis was holding him tightly, heedless of the pinch
of his armor, laughing and crying at the same time. "Marcus!
Oh, Marcus!" she said, covering his bristly face with kisses.
For her, too, the agony of suspense was over.

Other women were crying out with joy and rushing forward
to embrace their men. Three, comely lasses all, made for Viri-
dovix, then halted in dismay and dawning hostility as they

realized their common goal.

"I'd sooner face the Yezda than a mess like that," Gaius
Philippus declared, but Viridovix met the challenge without
flinching. With fine impartiality, the big Gaul had kisses,
hugs, and fair words for all; the blithe charm that had won
each girl separately now rewon them all together.

"It's bloody uncanny," the senior centurion muttered en-
viously. His own luck with women was poor, for the most part
because he took no interest in them beyond serving his lusts.

"The Romans! The Romans!" Starting at the western gate,
the cry spread through Khiiat almost before the last legionary
was in the city. Their dependents flocked to them, and many
were the joyful meetings. But many, too, were the women
who learned, some gently from comrades, others by the sim-
ple brutal fact of a loved one's absence, that for mem there
would be no reunions. There were Romans as well, who
looked in vain for loved faces in the excited crowd and hung
their heads, sorrow sharpened by their companions' delight.

"Where's Makic?" Marcus asked Helvis. He had to shout

to make himself understood.

"With Erene. I watched her two girls yesterday while she

kept vigil here at the gates. I should go to her, to let her know

you've come."

He would not let her out of their embrace. "The whole city

must know that by now," he said. "Bide a moment with me."
He was startled to realize how much for granted he had come
to take her beauty in the short time they- had been together.
Seeing her afresh after separation and danger was almost like

looking at her for the first time.

Hers were not the sculptured, aquiline good looks to which
Videssian women aspired. Helvis was a daughter of Namda-
len, snub-nosed and rather wide-featured. But her eyes were

Harry Turtledove             11

deepest blue, her smiling mouth ample and generous, her fig-
ure a shout of gladness. It was too soon for pregnancy to mark
her body, but me promise of new life glowed from her face.

The tribune kissed her slowly and thoroughly. Then he
turned to Gaius Philippus with orders: "Keep the single men
here while those of us with partners find them—the gods
willing—and bring them back. Give us, hmm—" He gauged
the westering sun. "—two hours, then tell off a hundred or so
good, reliable men and rout out anyone fool enough to think
he'd sooner go it alone."

"Aye, sir." The grim promise on the centurion's face was
enough to make any would-be deserter think twice. Gaius
Philippus suggested, "We could do worse than using some
Khatrishers in our patrols, too."

"There's a thought," Marcus nodded. "Pakhymer!" he
called, and the commander of the horsemen from Khatrish
guided his small, shaggy horse into earshot. Scaurus ex-
plained with he wanted. He phrased it as request; the Kha-
trishers were equals, voluntary companions in misfortune, not
troops formally subject to his will.

Laon Pakhymer absently scratched his cheek as he consid-
ered. Like all his countrymen, he was bearded; he wore his
own whiskers full and bushy, the better to cover pockmarks.
At last he said, "I'll do it, if all patrols are joint ones. If one of
your troopers gets rowdy and we have to crack him over the
head, I want some of your men around to see it was needful.
It's easier never to have a feud than to stop one once started."

Not for the first time, Scaurus admired Pakhymer's cool
good sense. In shabby leather trousers and sweat-stained fox-
skin cap, he looked the simple nomad, a role many Kha-
trishers affected. But the folk of that land had learned
considerable subtlety since their Khamorth ancestors swept
down off the plains of Pardraya to wrest the province from
Videssos eight hundred years ago. They were like fine wine in
cheap jugs, with quality easy to overlook at a hasty drinking.

The tribune ordered the buccinators to trumpet "Attention!"
The legionaries stiffened into immobility. Marcus gave them
his commands, adding at the end, "Some of you may think
you can steal away and never be caught. Well, belike you're
right. But remember what's outside and reckon up how long
you're likely to enjoy your escape."

A thoughtful silence ensued. Gaius Philippus broke it with




12 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

a bellowed, "Dis-missed\" Partnered men scattered through
the city; their bachelor comrades stood at ease to await their
return. Some moved toward the women clustered at the gates,
intent on changing their status, permanently or for a little
while. Gaius Philippus cocked an interrogative eyebrow at
Scaurus. The tribune shrugged. Let his troops find what solace
they could.

"Minucius," he said, "come on with Helvis and me? Erene
is looking after Malric, it seems."

The legionary grinned. "I'll do that, sir. With three little
ones running around, I'm sure of my welcome—seeing me's
bound to be a relief."

Marcus chuckled, then translated for Helvis. Among them-
selves, he and his men mostly spoke Latin, and she had only a
few words of it. She rolled her eyes. "You don't know how
right you are," she said to Minucius.

"Oh, but I do, my lady," he answered, switching to Vides-
sian for her. "The little farm I grew up on, I was the oldest of
eight, not counting two who died young, and I still don't
know when my mother slept."

Even in the most troubled times, some things in Khiiat did
not change. As Helvis, Marcus, and Minucius walked through
the town's marketplace, they had to kick their way through the
pigeons, blackbirds, and sparrows that congregated in cheep-
ing, chirping hordes round the grain merchants' stalls. The
birds were confident of their handouts and just as sure no one
meant them any harm.

"They'll learn soon enough," Minucius said, sidestepping
to avoid a pigeon which refused to make way for him. "Come
a siege, there'll be a lot of bird pies the first day or two. After
that they'll know their welcome's gone, and you won't get
within fifty feet of one on the ground."

Beggars still lined the edge of the market place, though it
seemed most of the able-bodied vagabonds had vanished for
safer climes. In an expansive mood, Minucius dug into his
pouch for some money to toss to a thin, white-bearded old
man with only one leg who lounged in front of an open tavern
door.

"You'd give him gold?" Marcus asked in surprise, seeing
the trooper produce a small coin instead of one of the broad
bronze pieces Videssos minted.

"That's what they'd like you to think, anyway. It's that

Harry Turtledove             13

pen-pusher Strobilos' money, and it's not worth a bloody
thing." Ortaias Sphrantzes' great-uncle Strobilos had been Av-
tokrator until Mavrikios Gavras ousted him four years before.
His coinage was cheapened even beyond the lows set by pre-
vious bureaucratic Emperors; the "goldpiece" on which his
pudgy features were stamped was more than half copper.

Minucius flipped the coin to the beggar, who plucked it out
of the air. Debased or no, it was a finer gift than he usually
got; he dipped his head and thanked the Roman in halting,
Vaspurakaner-flavored Videssian. That completed, he popped
the coin into his mouth and dragged himself into the grog-
shop.

"I hope the old boy has himself one fine spree," Minucius
said. "He doesn't look like there's many left in him."

Scaurus gave the legionary an odd look. Minucius had
always struck him as sharing Gaius Philippus' single-minded
devotion to the army, without the senior centurion's years of
experience to give a sense of proportion. Such a thoughtful
remark was not like him.

"If you're as eager to see Erene as she is to see you,"
Helvis said to Minucius with a smile, "it will be a happy
meeting indeed. She hardly talks about anything but you."

Minucius' thick-bearded Italian peasant's face lit up in a
grin that lightened his hard features. "Really?" he said,
sounding shy and amazed as a fifteen-year-old. "These past
few months I've thought myself the luckiest man alive...."
And he was off, praising Erene the rest of the way to the small
house she and Helvis shared.

Listening to him as they walked along, Marcus had no
trouble deciding where his unexpected streak of compassion
came from. Here was a man unabashedly in love. In a way,
the tribune was a trifle jealous. Helvis was a splendid bed-
mate, a fine companion, and no one's fool, but he could not
find the flood of emotion in him that Minucius was releasing.
He was happy, aye, but not heart-full.

Well, he told himself, you'll never see thirty again, and it's
not likely Minucius has twenty-two winters in him. But am I
older, he asked himself, or merely colder? He was honest
enough to admit he did not know.

Helvis wore the key to her lodging on a string round her
neck. She drew it up from between her breasts, inserted it into
its socket, and drew out the bolt-pin. The door opened, inward;

14      AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Malric shot out, crying, "Mama! Mama!" and reaching up to
seize his mother round the waist. "Hello, Papa!" he added as

she lifted him and tossed him up in the air.

"Hello, lad," Marcus said, taking him from Helvis.
"Did you bring me a Yezda's head, papa?" Malric said,

remembering what he'd asked of Scaurus before the imperial

army left Khiiat.

"You'll have to ask Viridovix about that," the tribune told

him.

Minucius barked laughter. "There's a warrior in the mak-
ing," he said.

His voice brought a delighted cry of recognition from in-
side the house. Erene, a stocky little Videssian girl who barely
reached his shoulder, came running through the door and al-
most bowled him over with her welcoming embrace.

"Easy, darling, easy!" he said, holding her out at arm's
length. "If I squeeze you as tight as I want, I'd pop the baby
out right now." He stroked her cheek with a sword-callused

hand.

"Are you all right?" Erene asked anxiously. "You weren't

hurt?"

"No, hardly even a scratch. You see, what happened

was—"

Marcus gave a dry cough. "I'm afraid all this will have to

wait. Erene, round up your girls and pack whatever you can
carry without being slowed. I want to be out of this town P

before sunset."                                             |
Minucius looked at him reproachfully, but was too much a

soldier to argue. He expected a protest from Erene, but all she
said was, "I've been ready to leave for two days. This one—"
She squeezed Minucius' arm. "—knows how to travel light,
and I've done my best to learn from him."

"And I," Helvis said when Scaurus turned his head toward
her. "I've been with you long enough to know your craze for
lugging everything around on your men's backs. What you
have against supply wagons and packhorses I'll never under-
stand." Her own folk's warriors fought mounted and were far
more at home with horses than the unchivalric Romans.

"The more independent an army is of anything outside it-
self, the better it does. The Yezda show that only too well.
Now, though, we really could use extra beasts and cars, what

Harry Turtledove              15

with all the noncombatants we'll have along. Will Khiiat sup-
ply any, do you think?"

Erene shook her head. Helvis explained further: "Yesterday
it would have, but last night Utprand brought his regiment
through and emptied the horse-pens of what animals were left.
He headed south at dawn this morning."

Likely, Marcus thought, the Namdalener captain was lead-
ing his troops to Phanaskert, to join his fellow easterners who
were serving as a garrison in that city. From his own point of
view that was a logical move: best to link all the men of the
Duchy together. Utprand probably did not care—or even no-
tice—that his march out of the path of the oncoming Yezda
helped open Videssos to invasion. Mercenaries tended to think
of themselves before their paymasters. As do I, the tribune
realized, as do I.

His musing made him miss Helvis' next sentence. "I'm
sorry?"

"I said that I suppose we'll be going in the same direction."

"What? No, of course not." The words were out of his
mouth before he remembered her brother Soteric was part of
the garrison at Phanaskert.

Helvis' full lips thinned; her eyes narrowed dangerously.
"Why? From all I've heard, Utprand's men and yours fought
the Yezda to a standstill, even after others fled." The normal
contempt mercenary kin felt foi the folk they were hired to
defend was only made worse because Videssians and Namda-
leni saw each other as heretics. Helvis went on, "Phanaskert is
a stout city, stronger than Khiiat. Surely behind its walls you
could laugh at the scrawny nomads capering by."

The tribune swallowed a sigh of relief. He wanted no part
of going to Phanaskert, and Helvis unwittingly provided him
with a perfect military justification for not doing so. He also
did not want to quarrel with her. She was strong-willed; her
temper, once aroused, was fierce; and in any case he had no
time to argue.

He said, "City walls are less protection against nomads
than you think. They bum the fields outside, kill the peasants
who work them, and starve the town into yielding. Think," he
urged her. "You've seen it's true, in the Empire and here in
Vaspurakan. May they rot for it, the Yezda are no better bar-
gain in a siege than in the open field."

She bit her lip, wanting to disagree further but seeing

16

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Scaurus' mind was made up. "Very well," she said at last. Her
smile was wry. "I won't argue with you over soldierly matters.
Whether I'm right or not, it would do me no good."

Marcus was content to let it go at that. While what he had
said was true, he knew it was far from the whole truth. Great
events would be brewing in Videssos in the aftermath of
Mavrikios' defeat and death. He did not intend to be stranded
in a provincial town on the edge of nowhere while they took
place without him. In his own way, he was as ambitious as all
the other mercenary captains reckoning their chances of riding
chaos' wind to glory. But with only his few precious legion-
aries behind him, his hopes, unlike theirs, had to center on the
imperial government.

None of that calculation showed on his face. He mused
how much easier it would have been to remain one of Caesar's
junior officers, with clearly defined duties and with someone
else to do his thinking for him. He shrugged inside his mail
shirt. The Stoic doctrine he'd studied in Italy taught a man to
make the best of what he had and not wish for the impossible
—a good creed for a quiet man.

"If you're ready," he said to Helvis and Erene, "we'd best
head back."

"Sure and I'm baked to a wee black cinder," Viridovix said
as he tramped along. In fact he was not black, but red as any
half-cooked meat. His fair Celtic skin burned under the fero-
cious Vaspurakaner sun, but refused to tan. Gorgidas smeared
various smelly ointments on him. They sloughed away with
each new layer of peeling hide.

The Gaul swore as a drop of sweat drew a stinging track
down his face. "I have a riddle for the lot of you," he called.
"Why is even the silly seagull wiser than I?"

"I could think of a dozen reasons without trying," Gaius
Philippus said, not about to let such an opening slip by. "Tell
us yours."

Viridovix glared, but gave the answer he had prepared.
"Because it has the sense never to visit Vaspurakan."

The Romans, draggled and sun-baked themselves, chuck-
led in agreement. Senpat Sviodo, though, took offense to hear
his native land maligned. He said loftily, "I'll have you know
this is the first land Phos shaped when he made the world, and
the home of our ancestor Vaspur, the first man."

Harry Turtledove             17

Some of the Videssians who had joined the Romans
hooted. The Vaspurakaners might call themselves Phos'
princes, but no people outside the "princes'" land took their
theology seriously.

Viridovix cared nothing for theology of any sort. His ob-
jections were more immediate. Tilting his head back so he
could look down his long nose at the mounted Senpat, he said,
"About your being kin to the first man I'll not speak one way
or t'other. Of that sort of thing I ken nought. But I do believe
this land your Phos' first creation, for one look about would
tell anybody the puir fool needed more practice."

The legionaries whooped to see Sviodo speechless; the im-
perials—and Khatrishers, too—laughed louder yet at Virido-
vix' delicious blasphemy. "You've only yourself to blame for
the egg on your face," Gaius Philippus told the young Vaspur-
akaner, not unkindly. "Anyone with a tongue fast enough to
keep three lovelies—and keep them all happy with him—is
more than a match for a puppy like you."

"I suppose so," Senpat murmured. "But who would have
thought he could talk with it, too?" Sunburned as he was,
Viridovix could go no redder, but his strangled snort said the
Vaspurakaner had a measure of revenge.

The Romans and their comrades pushed east from Khiiat in
an order reminiscent of any threatened herd. As always, the
Khatrishers served as scouts and outriders, screening the main
body and warning of trouble ahead or to either side. At their
center marched a hollow square of legionaries, old bulls pro-
tecting the women, children, and wounded within.

The force's good order and obvious readiness to stand and
fight kept it from danger. A company of about three hundred
Yezda paralleled the Romans' course for more than a day, like
so many wolves waiting to pick off the stragglers from a herd
of wisent. At last they concluded there was no hope of catch-
ing their quarry unaware and rode away in search of easier
prey.

At nightfall now, Marcus could hardly protest women in-
side his camp. Helvis shared his tent, and he was glad of it.
Nonetheless, the principle of the thing still galled him. When
Senpat Sviodo began teasing him once more, the only answer
he got was a stare cold enough to end any further raillery
before it could start. Acquiescent Scaurus might be, but not
enthusiastic.

18      AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Late in the fourth morning out from Khiiat, a Khatrisher
scout came riding up from the south. Flipping Marcus the
usual offhand salute, he reported, "There's something funny
going on up in the hills—sounds pretty much like fighting,
but not quite. I didn't take a close look. It's better country for
foot than horse—the grade is steep, and there's all kinds of

loose rocks."

"Show me," the tribune said. He followed the Khatrisher's

pointing finger. Sure enough, he saw a small dust cloud and,
below it, occasional sparks of light as the sun flashed off a
blade. Even allowing that the action was a couple of miles

away, it did not seem very big.

Still, if it was Videssian stragglers or Vaspurakaners meet-
ing the vanguard of a major Yezda force, that was something
the Romans had to know. Scaurus turned to Gaius Philippus.
"Detail me eight men with a good, sensible underofficer to

find out what the skirmish means."

"Eight men it is, sir," the centurion nodded, quickly

choosing a tentful of legionaries. "And for the party's leader,"

he said, "I'd suggest—"

On impulse, Marcus cut him off. "Never mind. I'll take

them myself."

Gaius Philippus' face froze, except for one unruly eyebrow

that climbed toward his hairline in mute expression of the
scandalized feelings he was too well drilled to speak out loud.
But Scaurus' ears were sharper than most. As he turned to
take the reconnaissance squad away, he heard the senior centu-
rion grumbling to himself, "Fool amateurs, always think they

have to lead from the front."

Leadership, as it happened, had played almost no r61e in
the tribune's sudden decision. Curiosity was a much bigger
part of it, a curiosity piqued by the Khatrisher's odd descrip-
tion of what he had heard: "Pretty much like fighting, but not

quite." That deserved a closer look.

"Double march," he told his men and hurried south, his
long legs chewing up the distance. Though the legionaries
were shorter and stockier, they kept pace. At double march—
almost a trot, really—there was scant breath for chatter. The
two miles vanished in a silence broken only by hard breathing,
the slap of sandals on dirt, and the occasional clank of scab-
bards slapping off iron-studded military kilts.

The land began sloping up from the valley floor; loose

Harry Turtledove             19

rocks and gravel made the going hard. Marcus stumbled and
had to put his hands out to save a fall. To the rear, one of his
men cursed as the same thing happened to him. He realized
the Khatrisher had been right in his reluctance to take his
mount up the slope. Pour legs might be quicker than two, but
in this terrain two were far more agile.

He was close enough now to hear the noise the scout had
reported, though a jumble of boulders ahead still hid its
source. The Khatrisher had been right: at first it sounded like
any bit of sharp fighting heard from outside, but as the
Romans drew nearer they began cocking their heads and look-
ing at one another in puzzlement. Steel on steel did not sound
quite like this, nor did the shouts the combatants raised.
Where was the noise of booted feet stamping and leaping, and
what was me source of the high, almost inaudible keening that

took its place?

Marcus drew his Gallic longsword; its weight was com-
forting in his palm. Behind him, he heard his men's stubby
gladii rasp free of their brass scabbards. The Romans pushed
past the last obstructions and up onto a stretch of ground flat-
ter than that through which they had been struggling.

On the little plain, a dozen and a half Yezda, urged on by a
hard-faced man, in robes the color of dried blood, hewed and
chopped at a double handful of Videssians clustered protec-
tively around a plump, shave-pated fellow whose dusty gar-
ment might once have been sky blue. "Nepos!" Scaurus
shouted, recognizing the rotund little priest of Phos.

Nepos' head whipped round at the cry; the struggle, going
no better than most at odds of nearly two to one, promptly
grew more desperate yet, the circle round the priest tighter.
Neither the Videssian soldiers nor their foes appeared to notice
the Romans' arrival.

"At them!" Marcus shouted. If the Yezda chose to be fools,
it was none of his concern.

The red-robe who led them smiled thinly as the legionaries

charged.

His men did not divert a minim of their attention from the
enemy at hand, not even when the Romans were upon them.
And the legionaries shouted in amazement and dread, for their
swords drove through the Yezda as if through smoke, and their
bodies met no resistance from the solid-seeming foe.

The Videssian soldiers, for all their bellowed war cries, for




20

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harp/ Turtledove

21

all the ringing of their blades against those of the Yezda, were
as insubstantial as the wraiths they fought. Marcus' brain
stopped its brief terrorized yammering—Nepos was mage as
well as priest, and the tribune knew Yezda sorcerers wore
red-brown by choice. His men had stumbled across a wizards'
duel—and Nepos' opponent was no weakling, not if he could
force the fat priest to the defensive.

Then Scaurus' sword lashed across one of the phantom
Yezda warriors. The marks set into the blade flared golden as
it sheared through the sorcery. Like a doused candle flame, the
soldier's seeming ceased to be. Another vanished to a second
stroke, then another and another. The Yezda wizard's smile
disappeared with them.

As their foes blew out, Nepos' projections swung to the
attack, and it was his enemy's turn to draw his powers around
himself for defense. But Marcus' blade, enchanted by van-
ished Gaul's druids, had shown itself proof against the spells
of Avshar himself; an underling's magic was no match for it.
The tribune pushed forward remorselessly, striking the
Yezda's wraithly warriors out of existence.

Even when the last of them was gone, the red-robe proved
neither coward nor weakling. His spells were still potent
enough to hold off Nepos' assault; no phantom Videssian
sword reached him, though they missed now by hairbreadths.
Growling an oath in his own harsh tongue, he snatched out a
dagger and leaped forward to grapple with Scaurus.

That was a contest with but one possible ending, despite
the Yezda's courage. The Roman turned the wizard's stab with
his shield, thrust out and up with the killing stroke of the
legionaries. His blade bit flesh, not the filmy figments that
had so far stood against him. Blood ran from the Yezda's
mouth, to drown his dying curse half-uttered.

Nepos' seemings vanished when their creator's foe fell.
The little Videssian priest staggered himself, a man in the last
throes of exhaustion. Sweat was pouring from his shaven
crown; drops sparkled in his beard. He came up to clasp the
tribune's arm. "Praise Phos, who sends the light, for sending
you to me in my desperate need." The priest's voice was a
ragged, croaking caricature of his usual firm tenor.

He looked down at the crumpled form of the dead Yezda
wizard, murmuring, "He would have killed me, I think, had
you not come when you did."

"How did you get into a sorcerers' duel?" Marcus asked.

"We were dodging each other through these rocks. I saw he
had a knife and wanted to frighten him off with phantoms. But
he fought back—and he was strong." Nepos shook his head.
"And yet he seemed but a shaman like a thousand others,
while I, I am a mage of the Videssian Academy. Can it be
true, then—is his dark Skotos a mightier god than mine? Is
my life's work one long futility?"

Scaurus thumped his shoulder; Nepos was normally a jolly
soul, but liable to fits of gloom when things went bad. The
tribune said, "Buck up. He and all his kind are riding the hem
of Avshar's robe—one win and they think they bestride the
world." He studied the draggled priest. "And you, my friend,
are not at your best."

"That's so," Nepos admitted. He scrubbed at the sweat-
streaked dirt on his face with a grimy sleeve and shook his
head in dismay. It was as if he was looking at himself for the
first time in days. He managed a feeble smile. "I'm not in fine
fettle, am I?"

"Hardly," Marcus said. "I can't promise you any elegant
accommodations with my men, but they do beat straggling
home alone."

Nepos' smile grew broader. "I should certainly hope so."
He sighed, then turned to the legionaries. "I suppose that
means I'll have to tramp back with you long-shanked gentle-
men." The Romans grinned at him; they were all taller—and
leaner—than the tubby little priest.

He did his valiant best to keep pace with them, his short
legs churning over the ground. "Not bad," one of the soldiers
commended him as they approached the Roman column. The
trooper's smile turned sly. "There's plenty of Videssians with
us already. Maybe we'll find you a coat of mail and a pack
and make a real legionary out of you."

"Phos forfend!" Nepos panted, rolling his eyes.

"Or we could just lay you down and roll you along," an-
other Roman suggested. The look the priest sent Marcus was
so full of indignant appeal that the tribune coughed and put an
end to his troopers' fun.

Gaius Philippus had been pulling out a full maniple of sol-
diers to come to Scaurus' rescue. He waved when he saw the
squad coming back down into the valley. As soon as they were
in earshot, he bellowed, "Everything all right?"




22     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Marcus answered with the upraised thumb of the gladiato-
rial arena. The senior centurion gave back the signal and re-
turned the maniple to the ranks. Despite Gaius Philippus'
mutterings over amateurs and personal leadership, Scaurus
saw no signs that anyone but the centurion was going to take

that maniple forward.

A spare figure in chlamys and sandals loped out from the
Roman column toward the returning squad. Gorgidas ignored
Marcus; as for the legionaries, they might as well not have
been there. The Greek doctor's attention was solely on Nepos.
"Do you know your people's healing art?" he demanded. He
leaned forward, as if willing an aye out of the priest.

"Why, yes, a bit, but—"

Gorgidas allowed no protest. He and Nepos had had many
soul-searching talks, but the intense Greek would not spare
time for them now. He clutched the priest's shoulder and
dragged him toward the litters of the seriously wounded, say-
ing, "The gods know I've been praying for days to run across
a blue-robe with his wits about him. I've had to watch men
die, beyond the power of my medicine to cure. But you lads,
now—" He stopped short and shook his head, a rational man
compelled to acknowledge the power of forces past reason.

Curious Romans, Marcus among them, followed the oddly
matched pair. He had seen a healer-priest save Sextus Minu-
cius and another legionary just after the Romans came to Vi-
dessos. But miracles, he thought, did not go stale with

repetition.

Nepos was still protesting his unworthiness as Gorgidas

tugged him onward. His expostulations faded when he came
face to face with the horrid facts of injury. The worst-hurt
soldiers were already dead, either of their wounds or from the
sketchy care and jolting they had received during the Romans'

grinding retreat.

Many who still clung to life would not for long. Shock,
infection, and fever, coupled with scant water and constant
baking sun, made death almost an hourly visitor. The stench
of septic wounds turned the stomach even through the aro-
matic ointments Gorgidas had applied. Men witless from fever
shivered in the noonday heat or babbled anguished gibberish.
Here was war's aftermath at its grimmest.

In the face of such misery, Nepos underwent a transforma-
tion nearly as great as the one Gorgidas hoped he would work

Harry Turtledove             23

on the wounded. The rotund priest's fatigue fell from him.
When he drew himself upright, he seemed inches taller.
"Show me the worst of them," he said to Gorgidas, and sud-
denly it was his voice, not the Greek doctor's, that was filled
with authority.

If Gorgidas noticed the reversal, it did not faze him. He
was content to play a secondary role, should that be required
to save his patients. "The worst?" he said, rubbing his chin
with a slim-fingered hand. "That would be Publius Flaccus, I
think. Over this way, if you will."

Publius Flaccus was beyond thrashing and delirium; only
the low, rapid rise and fall of his chest showed he was still
alive. He lay unmoving on his litter, the coarse stubble of his
beard stark and black against tight-drawn, waxen skin. A
Yezda saber had laid his left thigh open from groin to knee.
Somehow Gorgidas managed to stanch the flow of blood, but
the wound grew inflamed almost at once, and from mere in-
flammation quickly passed to mortification's horror.

Greenish-yellow pus crusted the bandages wrapping the
gashed limb. Drawn by the smell of corruption, flies made a
darting cloud around Flaccus. They scattered, buzzing, as
Nepos stooped to examine the wounded Roman.

The priest's face was grave as he said to Gorgidas, "I will
do what I can. Unbandage him for me, please; there must be
contact between his flesh and mine." Gorgidas knelt beside
Nepos, deftly undoing the dressings he had applied the day
before.

Battle-hardened soldiers gagged and drew back as the huge
gash was bared. Its stench was more than most men could
stand, but neither priest nor physician flinched from it.

"Now I understand the Philoktetes," Gorgidas said to him-
self. Nepos looked at him without comprehension, for the
doctor had fallen back into Greek. Unaware that he had spo-
ken at all, Gorgidas did not explain.

Marcus also realized the truth in Sophokles' play. No mat-
ter how vital a man was, with this foul a wound his presence
could become intolerable enough to force his comrades to
abandon him. The thought flickered and blew out, for Nepos
was leaning forward to take Publius Haccus' thigh in his
hands.

The priest's eyes were closed. He gripped the mangled leg
so tightly his knuckles whitened. Had Flaccus been conscious,




24     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

he would have shrieked in agony. As it was, he did not stir.   |
Fresh pus welled up over the swollen- lips of the wound to foul   I
Nepos' hands. The priest ignored it, his spirit and will focused   '

on the injury alone.

Back at Imbros, a year before, Gorgidas had spoken of a
flow of healing from priest to patient. The words were vague,
but Scaurus had found none better then, nor did he now. The
short hairs on the nape of his neck tried to rise, for he could
feel the current passing between Nepos and Flaccus, though
not with any sense he could name.

To aid his concentration, Nepos whispered an endless
series of prayers. The Videssian dialect he used was so archaic
Scaurus only caught a word now and again. Even the name of
the priest's god shifted. The divine patron of good was Phos in
the modem tongue, but sounded more like "Phaos" in Nepos'

elder idiom.

At first Marcus wondered if it was his hopeful imagination,
but soon he had no doubt: the evil-smelling pus was disap-
pearing from the filthy gash, its swollen, inflamed lips visibly
shrinking. "Will you look there?" a Roman muttered, awe in
his voice. Other legionaries called on gods they had known

longer than Phos.

Nepos paid no attention. Everything around him might
have vanished in a clap of thunder, and he would have
crouched, oblivious, before the still form of Publius Flaccus.

The wounded legionary moaned and stirred, his eyes flut-
tering open for the first time in two days. They were sunk
deep in their sockets, but had reason in them. Gorgidas
slipped a steadying arm behind Flaccus' shoulder and offered
him a canteen. The Roman drank thirstily. "Thank you," he

whispered.

When nothing else had, his words penetrated Nepos' shell
of concentration. The priest relaxed ,his clenched grip on
Flaccus' thigh; like the legionary, he, too, seemed to become
aware of his surroundings once more. He reached out to take
one of Flaccus' hands in his own. "Phos be praised," he said,
"for allowing me to act as his instrument in saving this man."

Marcus and the rest of the Romans looked with marvel at
the wonder Nepos had wrought. The rotting, stinking wound
which had been about to kill Publius Flaccus was suddenly
clean, free of corruption, and showing every sign of being
able to heal normally. And Flaccus himself, the killing fever

Harry Turtledove             25

banished from his system, was trying to sit and trading gibes
with the soldiers crowding near him. Only the fly-swarming
pile of pus-soaked bandages gave any evidence of what had
just happened.

His face alight, Gorgidas came around Flaccus to help

Nepos up. "You must teach me your art," he said. "Anything I
have is yours."

The priest was wobbly on his feet; fatigue was flooding
back into him. Nonetheless he smiled wanly, saying, "Speak
not of payment. I will show you if I can. If the talent lies

within you, Phos' servants ask nothing but that it be wisely
used."

"Thank you," Gorgidas said softly, as grateful for the boon
Nepos offered as Flaccus had been for the simpler gift of
water. Then the physician grew brisk once more. "But for now
there is only the one of you, and many more men who need
your help. Cotilius Rufus, I think, is next worst off—his Utter

is over here." He tugged Nepos through the crowd round
Flaccus.

The priest took three or four steps before his eyes rolled up
in his head and he slid gently to the ground. Gorgidas stared in
consternation, then bent over his prostrate form. He peeled
back an eyelid, felt for Nepos' pulse. "He's asleep," the phy-
sician said indignantly.

Marcus laid a hand on his shoulder. "We've seen that this
healing of theirs takes as much from the healer as it puts into
the sufferer. And Nepos had been drawing heavily on his
powers before you grabbed him. Let the poor fellow rest."

"Oh, very well," Gorgidas conceded with poor grace. "He
is a man, after all, not a scalpel or a stick of collyrium to grind
up for eyewash. I suppose it wouldn't do to kill off my chief
healing tool from overwork. But he'd better wake up soon."

And the physician settled himself beside the softly snoring
Nepos to wait.

Soli, when the Romans and their companions reached it a
few days later, had already had a visit from the Yezda. The
ruins of the wall-less new town by the bank of the Rhamnos
River had been sacked yet again, probably for the dozenth
time in the two-score or so years since Yezd's nomads began
pushing into Videssos. Little gray eddies of smoke still spi-




26 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

raled into the air, though Scaums was hard-pressed to under-
stand what the invaders had found to bum.

On the bluff overlooking the river, the partially rebuilt Old
Soli had survived behind its walls. Cries of alarm and trumpet
blasts came echoing from those walls when lookouts spied the
approaching force. Marcus had trouble convincing the watch-
men his troops were friendly, the more so as the Yezda had
driven Videssian prisoners ahead of them to masquerade as an
imperial army.

When the town's stout gates swung open at last, its hypas-
teos or city governor came out through them to greet the
Romans. He was a tall, thin maa of about forty, with stooped
shoulders and a permanently dyspeptic expression. The tri-
bune- had not seen him on the army's westward march, but
remembered he was called Evghenios Kananos.

Kananos studied the newcomers with wary curiosity, as if
still unsure they were not Yezda in disguise. "You're the first
decent-sized bunch of our troops I've seen. Was starting to
think there weren't none left," he said to Marcus. He had an
up-country twang that matched his dour mien.

"Some regiments did get free," the tribune answered.
"We—"

Kananos kept right on, as if Scaurus had not spoken.
"Ayuh," he said, "I don't believe I've seen hardly a one, but
for the miserable little band that rode in with the Emperor
yesterday. On his way to Pityos, he was, and then by sea to
the capital, I suppose."

Marcus stared at the hypasteos, his mouth falling open.
Everyone close enough to hear stood similarly frozen in his
tracks. "The Emperor?" It was Zeprin the Red who asked the
question, elbowing his way up through the Roman ranks. The
burly Haloga had been one of the commanders of Mavrikios'
Imperial Guard, and his failure to save his overlord had
plunged the once-ebullient northerner so deep into depression
that he marched along day after day with hardly a word. Sud-
denly his face and voice were alive again. "The Emperor?" he
repeated eagerly.

"That's what I said," Kananos agreed. He used his words
sparingly; it seemed to pain him to have to go back over
ground once covered.

To the point as always, Gaius Philippus demanded, "How
could Thorisin Gavras have come through here without us

Harry Turtledove             37

getting word he was close? And I'd hardly call the troops he
had with him a 'miserable little band'—he got clear in orettv
fair order."                                              -

"Thorisin Gavras?" Evghenios Kananos stared at the centu-
rion in surprise and a little suspicion. "Didn't say a word
about Thonsm Gavras. I was talking about the Emperor—the
Emperor Ortaias. Par as I know, there ain't no other."







11

"YOUR HONOR, YOU'RE A RARE STUBBORN MAN," ViRIDOVTX

told Scaurus the day after Kananos' shattering news, "but you
can march the legs off the lot of us, and we'll still never catch

up to that omadhaun of a Sphrantzes."

Weary and frustrated, the tribune halted. His outrage over

Ortaias' gall in assuming the imperial title had made him fling
his small army north to drag the usurper to earth. But Virido-
vix was right. When looked at rationally and not through the
red haze of anger, the Romans had no chance to overtake him.
Sphrantzes was mounted, had no women and wounded to en-
cumber him, and had a day's lead. Moreover, the further north
Scaurus led his men, the more Yezda they met, and the more

hostile the nomads were.

The legionaries clearly saw the futility of pursuit. Roman

discipline kept them pushing toward Pityos, but their hearts
were not in it. They were harder to get moving after every
halt, and slower on the march. And only the fear that leaving
would be worse kept the men they had added since Maragha
with them. Everyone despised Ortaias Sphrantzes, but they all

knew they could not catch him.

Laon Pakhymer sensed this stop was different from the

ones before. He rode back to Marcus, asking, "Finally had
enough?" His voice held sympathy—he had no more use than
the Romans for Sphrantzes—but also a certain hardness,
warning that he, too, was running out of patience with this

useless hunt.

Marcus looked from him to the Gaul, then, as a last hope,

to Gaius Philippus, whose contempt for the would-be Emperor
28

Harry Turtledove             29

knew no bounds. "Are you asking what I think?" the senior
centurion said.

Marcus nodded.

"All right, then. There's not a prayer of catching up with
the worthless son of a sow. In your heart you must know that
as well as I do."

"I suppose so," the tribune sighed. "But if that's what you
think, why didn't you say so when we set out?" Roman disci-
pline or no, Scaurus rarely had doubts about Gaius Philippus'
opinion.

"Simple enough—whether or not we nailed Sphrantzes, I
thought Pityos a good place to head for. If Ortaias could sail
back to Videssos the city, so could we, and save ourselves
having to fight across the westlands. But from the look of
things, there are too bloody many Yezda between us and the
port to let us get there unmangled."

"I fear you're right. I wish we knew how Thorisin stands."

"So do I—or if he stands. Too many Yezda westward,
though, to swing back and find out."

"I know." Marcus clenched his fist. Now more than ever,
he wished for any word of the slain emperor's brother, but the
choice he was forced to only made getting that word more
unlikely. "We have to turn east, away from them."

They had spoken Latin; when the tribune saw Pakhymer's
blank look, he quickly translated his decision into Videssian.
"Sensible," the Khatrisher said. He cocked his head at the
Romans in a gesture his people often used. "Do any of you
know where you're headed? 'East' covers a lot of ground, and
you're not from these parts, you know." In spite of his gloom,
Marcus had to smile at me understatement.

Gaius Philippus said, "The Yezda can't have run everyone
off the land. There's bound to be a soul or two willing to show
us the way—if for no better reason than to keep us out oFhis
own valley."

Laon Pakhymer chuckled and spread his hands in defeat.
"There you have me. / wouldn't want this ragtag mob of ruf-
fians camped near me any longer than I could help it."

The senior centurion grunted. He might have been pleased
at gaining the Khatrisher's agreement, but hardly by his un-
flattering description of the legionaries.




30     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
* * *

The shrill sound of a squabble woke Marcus before dawn
the next morning. He cursed wearily as he sat up in his bed-
roll, still worn from the previous day's march through broken
country. Beside him Helvis sighed and turned over, fighting to
stay asleep. Malric, who never seemed to sleep when the tri-
bune and Helvis wanted him to, did not stir now.

Scaurus stuck his head through his tent flap. He was just in
time to see Quintus Glabrio's companion Damaris stamp from
the junior centurion's tent. She was still shouting abuse as she
angrily stode away: "—the most useless man I can imagine!
What I saw in you I'll never know!" She disappeared out of

the tribune's line of vision.

In fact, Scaurus was more inclined to wonder what had
attracted the Roman to her. True, she was striking enough in
the strong-featured Videssian way, with snapping brown eyes.
But she was skinny as a boy and had all the temper those eyes
foretold. She was, the tribune realized, as hotheaded as Thori-
sin's lady Komitta Rhangawe—and that was saying a great
deal. Nor did Glabrio have Thorisin's quick answering con-

tentiousness. It was a puzzler.

Glabrio, rather in the way of a man who pokes his head out
the door to see if a thunderstorm is past, looked out to see
which way Damaris had gone. He caught sight of Marcus,
shrugged ruefully, and withdrew into his tent once more. Em-
barrassed at witnessing his discomfiture, the tribune did the

same.

Damaris' last outburst had succeeded in rousing Helvis,

though Malric slept on. Brushing sleep-snarled brown hair
back from her face, she yawned, sat up, and said, "I'm glad
we don't fight like that, Hemond—" She stopped in confu-
sion.

Marcus grunted, his lip quirking in a lopsided smile. He

knew he should not be bothered when Helvis absently called
him by her dead husband's name, but he could not help the
twinge that ran through him every time she slipped.

"You might as well wake the boy," he said. "The whole
camp will be stirring now." The effort to keep annoyance from
his voice took all emotion with it, leaving his words flat and

hard as a marble slab.

The unsuccessful try at hiding anger was worse than none
at all. Helvis did as he asked her, but her face was a mask that

Harry Turtledove             31

did as little to hide her hurt as had his coldly dispassionate
tone. Looks like a fine morning already, just a fine one, the
tribune thought as he laced on his armor.

He threw himself into his duties to take his mind off the
almost-quarrel. His supervision of breaking camp was so mi-
nute one might have supposed his troops were doing it for the
first time rather then the three-hundredth or, for some, the
three-thousandth. He heard Quintus Glabrio swearing at the
men in his maniple—something rare from that quiet officer—
and knew he was not the only one with nerves still jangling.

The matter of guides went as Gaius Philippus had guessed.
The Romans were passing through a hardscrabble country,
with scores of rocky little valleys running higgledy-piggledy
one into the next. The coming of any strangers into such a
backwater would have produced a reaction; the coming of an
army, even a small, defeated army, came close to raising

panic.

Farmers and herders so isolated they rarely saw a tax col-
lector—isolation indeed, in Videssos—wanted nothing more
than to get the Romans away from their own home villages
before pillage and rape broke loose. Every hamlet had a young
man or two willing, nay, eager, to send them on their way...
often, Marcus noted, toward rivals who lived one valley fur-
ther east.

Sometimes the tribune's men got a friendlier reception.
Bands of Yezda, with their nomadic hardiness and mobility,
had penetrated even this inhospitable territory. When a timely
arrival let the Romans appear as rescuers, nothing their rustic
hosts owned was too fine to lavish on them.

"Now this is the life for me, and no mistake," Viridovix
said after one such small victory. The Celt sprawled in front of
a campfire. A mug of beer was in his right hand, a little
mountain of well-gnawed pork ribs at his feet. He took a long
pull at the mug, belched, and went on, "You know, we could
do a sight worse than kinging it here for the rest of our days.
Who'd be caring enough to say us nay?"

"I, for one," Gaius Philippus answered promptly. "This
place is yokeldom's motherland. Even the whores are
clumsy."

"There's more to life than your prick, you know," the Celt
said. His righteous tone drew howls from everyone who heard




32

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

33

•am; Gaius Philippus mutely held out a hand with three
iipraised fingers. With the ruddy firelight and his permanently
sunburned skin, it was impossible to tell if Viridovix blushed,
but he did tug at his sweeping mustaches in chagrin.

"But still," he persisted, "doesn't all this—" He reached
out a foot and toppled the pile of bones. "—make munching
marching rations a thought worth puking on? Dusty porridge,
stale bread, smoked meat with the taste of a herd of butchered
shoes—a day of that would gag a buzzard, and we eat it week
after week."

Gorgidas said, "You know, my Gallic friend, there are
times you're naive as a child. How often do you think this
miserable valley can supply feasts like this?" He waved out
into the dark, reminding his listeners of the poor, small, rocky
fields they'd come through, fields that sometimes seemed to
go straight up a mountainside.

"I grew up in country like this," the doctor went on. "The
folk here will eat poorer this winter for feasting us tonight. If
they did it two weeks running, some would starve before
spring—and so would some of us, should we stay."

Viridovix stared at him without comprehension. He was
used to the lush fertility of his northern Gallic homeland, with
its cool summers, mild winters, and long, gentle rains. Cut
firewood sprouted green shoots there; here in the Videssian
uplands, rooted trees withered in the ground.

"There are more reasons than Gorgidas' for going on,"
Marcus said, disturbed that the idea Viridovix put forward half
jokingly was getting serious attention. "However much we'd
like to forget the world, I fear it won't forget us. Either the
Yezda will flatten the Empire—which looks all too likely
right now—or Videssos will somehow drive them back.
Whoever wins will stretch their rule all through this land. Do
you think we could stand against them?"

"They'd have to find us first." Senpat Sviodo gave Virido-
vix unexpected support. "To judge from the run of guides
we've had, even the locals don't know the land three valleys
over."

There were rumbles of agreement to that from around the
campfire. Gaius Philippus muttered, "To judge from the run of
guides we've had, the locals don't know enough to squat
when they crap."

No one could dispute that, either. Glad to see the argument

diverted, Scaurus said, "This last one is better," and the centu-
rion had to nod. The Romans' latest guide was a solidly built
middle-aged man with a soldier's scars; his name was Lexos
Blemmydes. He carried himself like a veteran, too, and his
Videssian had lost some of its original hill-country accent.
Marcus had a nagging feeling he'd seen Blemmydes before,
but the guide's face did not seem familiar to any of his men.

The tribune wondered if Blemmydes was one of the refu-
gees from Videssos' shattered army. The man had attached
himself to the Romans a few days before, coming up to their
camp one evening and asking if they needed a guide. Whoever
he was, he certainly knew his way through this rocky maze.
His descriptions of upcoming terrain, villages, and even vil-
lage leaders ahead were unfailingly accurate.

He was, in fact, so much superior to earlier escorts that
Scauros looked from one campfire to the next until he spotted
Blemmydes shooting dice with a couple of Khatrishers.
"Lexos!" he called, and then repeated more loudly when the
Videssian did not look up. The guide's head whipped around;

Marcus waved him over.

He picked himself up from the game, though he still had
his stiff gambler's face on when he came to the tribune's side.
"What can I do for you, sir?" he asked. His voice had the
resigned patience of any common soldier's before an officer,
but the dice muttered restlessly to themselves in his closed
right fist.

"Not much, really," Marcus said. "It's only that you know
so much more of this country than other guides we've had,
and we're wondering how you learned it so well."

Blemmydes could not have been said to change expression,
but his eyes grew wary. He answered slowly, "I've made it my
business to know the best ways through the land I travel. I
wouldn't want to be caught napping."

Suddenly intent, Scaurus leaned forward. Almost he re-
membered where this frozen-faced soldier had crossed his
path before. But Gaius Philippus was chuckling at Blem-
mydes' reply. "Your business and no one else's, hey? Well,
fair enough. Go on, get back to your game." Blemmydes nod-
ded, still unsmiling, and strode off. Marcus' half memory
stayed stubbornly dark.

The senior centurion was still amused. "He's probably
some sort of smuggler, or a plain horse thief. More power to




34 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 35

him, says I; anyone with the imagination to get himself a
fifteen-hundrcd-man armed guard to cover his tracks deserves
to do well."

"I suppose so," Scaurus sighed, and shelved the matter.

That night the weather finally broke, a reminder summer
would not, after all, last forever. The wind shifted; instead of
the seemingly endless westerly from the baking plains of
Yezd, it blew clean and cool off the Videssian Sea to the
north. There was fog in the early morning, and the low gray
clouds did not bum away until almost noon.

"Well, hurrah!" Viridovix exclaimed when he emerged
from his tent and saw the murky daylight. "My puir roasted
hide won't fry today. No more slathering myself with Gor-
gidas' stinking goo, either. Hurrah!" he said again.

"Aye, hurrah," Gaius Philippus echoed, with a morose
look at the sky. "Another week of this and it'll start raining;

and it won't let up till it snows. I don't know about you, but
I'm not much for slogging my way through mud. We'll be
stuck in the boondocks till spring."

Marcus heard that with disquiet, still loath to be isolated
while uncertainty—and Ortaias Sphrantzes—reigned in Vi-
dessos. But Quintus Glabrio remarked, "If we can't move,
odds-on no one else can either." The manifest truth there
cheered the tribune, who had been thinking of his men as an
entity unto themselves and forgetting that nature laid its hand
on all alike—Roman, Videssian, Namdalener, or Yezda.

As requested, Lexos Blemmydes led Scaurus' band south-
east toward Amorion. The tribune wanted to reach the town
on the Ithome River before the fall rains made travel hopeless.
Amorion controlled much of the west central plateau and
would give him a base for the trouble he expected come
spring—if Thorisin Gavras still lived to brew it.

Gorgidas all but held Nepos prisoner. The priest used his
healing art on the legionaries and did his best to teach it to the
Greek. But his efforts there were fruitless, which drove Gor-
gidas to distraction. "In my heart I don't believe I can do it,"
he moaned, "and so I can't."

Scaurus came to rely on Blemmydes more and more. The
guide had an uncanny knowledge of which ways were open.
Not only was he intimately familiar with the ground himself,
but he also questioned everyone whose path he crossed—the
few traders still abroad, village headmen, farmers, and

herders. Sometimes the route he chose was roundabout, but it
was always safe.

At evening a couple of days later, the Romans reached a
place where what had been a single valley split into two. The
rivers that carved them were dry now, but Marcus knew the
fall downpour would soon make torrents of them.

Blemmydes cocked his head down each gap, as if listen-
ing. He paused a long time, longer than any similar decision
had taken him before. Scaurus gave him a curious glance,
waiting for his choice. "The northern one," he said at last.

Gaius Philippus also noticed the delay and looked a ques-
tion at the tribune. "He's been right so far," Marcus said. The
senior centurion shrugged and sent the Romans down the path
Blemmydes had chosen.

Scaurus thought at first the guide had betrayed them. The
valley was full of lowing cattle and their herdsmen—Yezda,
or so they seemed. Dogs followed their masters' shouted
commands, nipping at the cows' heels and driving them up the
rocky mountainsides as the herdsmen saw the column of
armed men coming toward them.

But the Romans' alarm proved unfounded. The herdsmen
were Videssians who had taken Marcus' soldiers for invaders.
Once they learned their mistake, they fraternized with the
newcomers, though warily. Imperial armies could plunder as
ruthlessly as any nomads. But when Scaurus actually paid for
some of their beasts, the herders came close to geniality.

"This isn't the sort of thing you want to do too often,"
Senpat Sviodo remarked, watching money change hands.

"Hmm? Why not?" The tribune was puzzled. "The less we
take by force, the better we should get along with the locals."

"True, but some may die from the shock of not being
robbed."

Marcus laughed, but Nepos did not approve. The priest had
finally managed to get away from Gorgidas for a few minutes
and was wandering about watching the Romans run up their
camp. He said to Senpat, "It's never good to mock a generous
heart. Our outland friend shows here the same kindness he
used in giving a disgraced man a chance to redeem himself."

The Vaspurakaner, not usually as cynical as his words sug-
gested, looked contrite. But the last part of what Nepos had
said made no sense to Scaurus. "What are you talking about?"
he demanded of the priest.




36     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Nepos scratched his head in confusion. He had not had any
more chance than the Roman to shave, and the top of his skull
was starting to get bristly. He said, "No need for modesty.
Surely only a great-souled man would restore to trust and self-
respect the soldier he himself ousted from the Imperial

Guards."

"What in the world do you—" Marcus began, and then

stopped cold, remembering the pair of guardsmen he had had
cashiered for sleeping at their posts in front of Mavrikios'
private chambers. Sure as sure, this was the elder of the two;

Scaurus even recalled hearing his name, now that Nepos had

made the association for him.

He also remembered the sullen insolence Blemmydes had
shown when called to account and the way the snoozing
guardsmen were ignominiously banished from the capital
when their effort to shift the blame to him fell through. It was
hard to imagine Blemmydes having any good will toward the

Romans after that.

Which meant... The tribune shouted for a sentry. "Find
the guide and bring him to me. He needs to answer some
questions." The legionary gave the closed-fist Roman salute

and hurried away.

Nepos and Senpat Sviodo were both staring at Scaurus.

The priest said, "You weren't taking Lexos on faith, then?"

Pretending not to hear his disappointment, Marcus an-
swered, "On faith? Hardly. The truth is, with everything that's
happened in the months since I saw him that once, I forgot the
whoreson existed. Why didn't you speak up a week ago?"

Nepos spread his hands regretfully. "I assumed you knew
who he was, and thought the better of you for it."

"Splendid," muttered the tribune. He wondered if his lapse
would cost the Romans, a worry that abruptly became a cer-
tainty when he saw the sentry returning alone. "Well?" he
barked, unable to keep from lashing out to hold his own alarm

at bay.

"I'm sorry, sir, he doesn't seem to be anywhere about," the

legionary reported cautiously—unlike Gaius Philippus, the
tribune usually did not take out his feelings on his men.

"That tears it," Marcus said, smacking fist into palm in
disgust. "Only a great-souled idiot would take in a man like
that." And if Blemmydes was gone, he must have thought he
had his vengeance.

Harry Turtledove             37

Marcus' failure to follow up on his half recognition of the
guide filled him with self-contempt. He could look at others'
mistakes with the easy tolerance his Stoic background gave
him—they were, after all, only men, and perfection could not
be expected from them. His own shortcomings, on the other
hand, brought a black anger fiercer in some ways than the one
he turned against battlefield foes.

With difficulty, he pulled himself free from that useless
rage and began thinking what he had to do to set things right.
First, plainly, he had to find out what the situation was. "Pa-
khymer!" he called.

The Khatrisher appeared at his elbow. "I've gotten to know
that tone of voice," he said with a lopsided smile. "What's
gone wrong now?"

The tribune's answering grin was equally strained. "Maybe
nothing at all," he said, not believing it for a minute. "Maybe
quite a lot." He quickly sketched what had happened.

Pakhymer heard him out without comment, whistling tune-
lessly between his teeth. "You think he's buggered us, then?"
he said at last.

"I'm afraid so, anyway."

Pakhymer nodded. "Which is why you called me. I really
should charge for this, you know." But there was no malice in
his words, only the amused mockery with which the Kha-
trishers so often faced life.

He went on, "All right, I'll send some of the lads out to see
what's ahead—aye, and another bunch to track down your
dear friend Blemmydes, if they can." Seeing Scaurus wince,
he added, "No one can think of everything, not even Phos—if
he did, Skotos wouldn't be here."

That thought consoled the tribune but dismayed Nepos; the
Khatrishers had a theology as free and easy as themselves.
Pakhymer left before Nepos could put his protest into words.
The priest was a good man, more tolerant than many of his
colleagues, but there were limits his tolerance could not over-
step.

Marcus wondered how Balsamon would have reacted to
the Khatrisher's remark. Likely, he thought, the patriarch of
Videssos would have laughed his head off.

There was nothing to do but wait for the scouts' return.
The party sent out in pursuit of Blemmydes came back first,
empty-handed. Marcus was not surprised. The terrain was




38 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 39

broken enough to give the disgruntled Videssian a hundred
hiding places in plain sight of the camp.

The unusual comings and goings set tongues wagging, as
Scaurus had known they would. For once, rumor might be an
ally: if the men suspected trouble, they would be quicker to
meet it. And if what the tribune was beginning to fear came
true, speed would count soon.

He saw the Khatrishers come riding back out of the east,
slide off their horses, and jog over to Pakhymer with their
news, whatever it was. They said not a word to the soldiers
who huried questions at them. The horsemen might not have
the Romans' stiff discipline, but they were all right, the tri-
bune decided for the hundredth time.

Their commander's scarred face had no trace of his usual
mirth as he came up to the tribune. "As bad as that?" Marcus
asked, reading the trouble in his eyes.

"As bad as that," Pakhymer agreed somberly. "The next
valley east is crawling with Yezda; from what my boys say,
they must have two or three times as many men as we do, the
damned cullions."

"It figures," Scaurus nodded bitterly. "Blemmydes has his
revenge, all right—he must have been looking for Yezda all
along, and run off when he found a band big enough to sink
us."

Pakhymer tried to keep him from falling into despair. "The
count's not very fine, you understand—just a short peek over
that ridge ahead to reckon up their tents and fires."

"Fires, aye," Marcus said—fires to eat the Romans up.
But something else about fire teased at the back of his mind.
The sensation was maddening and horribly familiar; he had
felt it when he tried without success to remember where he'd
seen Lexos Blemmydes. Now he stood stock-still, not forcing
whatever it was, but letting it come if it would.

Pakhymer started to say something; seeing Scaurus ab-
stracted, he was sensitive enough to keep silent a little longer.

The tribune drove his fist into his palm for the second time
in less than an hour, but now in decision. "The gods be
praised I learned to read Greek!" he exclaimed. It had no
meaning for Laon Pakhymer, but he saw the Roman was him-
self again.

He started to leave, but Scaurus stopped him, saying, "I'll

need your men again, and soon. They're better herders and
drovers than the legionaries ever will be."

"And if they are?" The Khatrisher was mystified.

Marcus started to explain, but Gaius Philippus strode up,
demanding, "By Mars' left hairy nut, what's going on? The
whole camp is seething like a boiled-over pot, but nobody
knows why."

The tribune spelled it out in a few sentences; his second-
in-command swore foully. "Never mind all that," Scaurus
said. Now that his wits were working again, haste drove him
hard. "Get a couple of maniples out there with Pakhymer's
men. I want every cow in the valley down here at this end
inside an hour's time."

Khatrisher and centurion stared at him, sure he'd lost his
mind after all. Then Gaius Philippus doubled over with laugh-
ter. "What a wonderful scheme," he got out between wheezes.
"And we won't be on the receiving end this time, either."

"You've read Polybius too?" Scaurus said, indignant and
amazed at the same time; the senior centurion found written
Latin slow going, and Marcus had not thought he could read
Greek at all.

"Who? Oh, one of your pet historians, is he? No, not a
chance." For once Gaius Philippus' smile had none of the
wolf in it. "There's more ways to remember things than
books, sir. Every veteran's known that trick since Hannibal
used it, and known his head would answer if he fell for it."

"Will the two of you talk sense?" Pakhymer asked irritably,
but the Romans, enjoying their common joke, would not en-
lighten him.

They did explain the scheme to Viridovix; Marcus had
thought of a special role he could play, if he would. The Celt
whooped when he'd heard them out. "Sure and I'd kill the
man you tried to put in my place," he said.

The herdsmen who had praised Scaurus to the skies while
the sun still shone cursed his name in the darkness as, without
mercy or explanation, their cattle were taken away. They car-
ried spears and knives to protect themselves against tax-col-
lectors and other predators, but were helpless in the face of the
legionaries' swords and mail shirts, and the Khatrishers'
horses and bows.

Lowing resentfully at the change in their routine, the cattle
shambled down the valley, prodded along by their confisca-




40

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

41

tors. Some of the herd dogs, unreasoningly gallant, leaped to
their defense, but reversed spearshafts drove them yelping

back.

At the camp, Marcus found Gains Philippus had been
right. When he ordered the legionaries still there to chop the
stakes of the palisade into arm-long lengths, they grinned
knowingly and fell to like so many small boys involved in a
mammoth practical joke. Their women and new non-Roman
comrades watched with the same caution one gave any group
of men suddenly struck mad.

The tribune did not need to give them the next set of
orders. As fast as cattle arrived from the west, the Romans
tied the newly made sticks to their horns.

"Marcus, if this is meddling I crave your pardon, but what
on earth is going on?" Helvis asked.

"Once your brother Soteric said my men had an advantage
fighting in this world because we had a bundle of tricks no one
here knows," Scaurus answered elliptically. "It's time to see if

he was right."

He probably would have given her the full explanation in
another minute or two, but a Khatrisher scout brought him bad
news: "Whatever you're playing at, it had better work soon. A
couple of Yezda just stuck their heads into the valley to see
what all the ruckus is about here. I took a shot at them, but in
the dark I missed."

Scaurus gave his preparations a last look. Not so many
cattle as he would have liked were festooned with sticks, but a
good two thousand head were ready. "This is all fascinating,"
Pakhymer said ironically. "Do you suppose the Yezda will run
from a stampeding forest?"

"I doubt it. But they just might, from a forest fire." The
tribune took a burning piece of wood from a campfire's edge
and walked toward the cattle.

Pakhymer's eyes got round.

"Strike them now, I say!"

"Rest easy, Vahush. They'll be there in the morning." The
speaker, a stocky, middle-aged Yezda, pulled a spit from the
campfire, and offered the sizzling meat on it to his nephew.

Vahush rejected it with an angry gesture. Hawk-nosed as
any Videssian, he had a zealot's narrow face and moved with
the barely controlled grace of a beast of prey. "When you find

your foe, Prypet, smite him!" he snapped. "So says Avshar,
and he speaks truly."

"And so we will," Prypet said placatingly. "It will be easy;

if the scouts tell no lies, the imperials are running about like
so many madmen. In any case, we outnumber them two to
one at least." He waved out into the darkness, where felt tents
dotted the valley like toadstools.

The flocks would grow fat in this wide new land, Prypet
thought. He pulled at a wine jug, another of the spoils of war.
True, he mused, Avshar had won the battle that gave the
nomads room to grow, but who had seen him since? In any
case, he, Prypet, led the clan, not this wizard whose face no
one knew... and not his own wife's sister's son, either.

Still, the lad showed promise and should not be squelched.
"We've had hard riding, these past weeks. We'll fight better
for the night's rest. Sit yourself down and relax. Have some
bread." He lifted the chewy, unleavened sheet from the light
griddle that served the nomads in place of an oven.

"You listen too much to your belly, uncle," Vahush said,
his confidence in his own lightness driving soft words from
him—and wrecking any hope of making the older man listen.

Prypet got deliberately to his feet, the mildness gone from
his face. Nephew or not, Vahush could go too far. "If you
like, boy, you can find a fight closer than the next valley," he
said quietly.

Vahush leaned forward. "Any time you—" He blinked.
"Avshar's black bow! What's that?"

Beginning in the valley to the west, the low rumble could
be felt through the soles of the feet as well as heard. Bass
bellows of pain and terror accompanied it. Prypet snorted his
contempt. "Get dry behind your ears, whelp. Don't you know
cows when you hear them?"

Vahush flushed. "Of course. Skotos, I'm edgy tonight."

His uncle relaxed, seeing the fighting moment was past.
"Don't worry about it. Farmers never could handle kine—
look at them letting a batch run loose like that. It might not be
a bad idea for a few men to saddle up at that, you know, and
round up the stragglers as they come through."

"I'll do that," the younger man said. "It'll let me work off
my nerves." He turned toward his horse, then stopped dead,
horror on his face.

Prypet looked west, too, and felt ice leap up his back. The




42 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

thunder was louder now, pounding its way into the valley
where the Yezda took their ease. Cattle? It was not, it could
not be cattle, but the great reverberation of a rolling, chopping
sea of flame washing toward them at the speed of a fast man's
run. And at the edge of the wave ramped a devil, his banshee
wail loud through the roar. The shirting fire struck scarlet
sparks from the sword he waved above the tide.

The clan leader was a warrior seasoned in countless fights,
but this was magic beyond his courage to face. "Flee for your
lives!" he screamed.

Yezda tumbled from their tents, glanced west, and leaped
for their mounts in panic. "Demons! Demons!" they shrieked,
and set spur to their horses without another backward glance.
Like an upset mug, the valley emptied of nomads. The fiery
sea rolled over their tents as if they had never been.

Vahush would have fled with his uncle and his clanmates,
but for long minutes his terror, far worse than Prypet's, held
him motionless. You wanted to attack them, fool, his mind
gibbered, when they've found a wizard who could blow Av-
shar out like a candle.

Nearer and nearer came the roaring ocean of flame. The
young nomad stared into the shattered darkness, waiting numb-
ly for it to sweep him away. And then at last it was close
enough for him to see the grinning riders driving the cattle on,
see the bare burning branches lashed hastily to horns, smell
their smoke and the reek of singed hair and flesh.

Rage exploded in him, freeing spirit and body from panic's
grip. He sprang onto his tethered horse. With a single slash of his
saber, he cut the rope that held it. Now his spurs bit; he darted not
away from the tortured herd but toward it, blade bright in his
hands.."Back! Come back! You've been tricked!" he cried to his
escaping comrades, but in the din and distance they did not hear.

Closer by, though, someone did. "Aren't you the noisy
one, now?" an oddly accented voice said. Too late, Vahush
remembered the devil-cries from the head of the stampede.
There was a man on a pony in front of those frenzied cattle. A
long straight blade leaped at the nomad's neck.

His last thought as he slid from his horse in death was that
the imperials did not fight fair.

Had the Yezda stopped their panic-struck flight and re-
turned to investigate, they likely would have routed the

Harry Turtledove             43

Romans from the valley they had vacated. In the relief their
deliverance brought them, Marcus' troops and Pakhymer's
danced with their women in whooping circles round the
campfires, clapping, stamping, snapping their fingers, and
shouting with glee for all the world to hear.

Pakhymer took no part in the celebration, wandering
through the camp like a man in a daze. When he found
Scaurus reveling with the rest of his men, he pulled the tri-
bune out of his circle, earning him a glare from Helvis as the
dance whirled her away. The tribune was ready to be angry,
too, until he saw the lost look in the Khatrisher's eyes.

"Cattle," Pakhymer said blankly. "Plainsmen who spend
their lives with cattle, heathens who kill for the sport of it,
running like frightened children from a harmless herd of
cows." He thumped his forehead with the heel of his hand, as
if trying to drive belief into it.

Marcus, who had taken on a good deal of wine, had no
better answer for him than a shrug and a wide, foolish grin.
But Gorgidas was close enough to hear Pakhymer's comment
and sober enough to try to deal with it. He had kept the Greek
habit of watering his wine and, moreover, found the pursuit of
understanding a sweeter fruit than any that grew on a vine.

"We may have driven cattle against the Yezda," he said to
the Khatrisher, "but do you think it was cattle the nomads saw,
charging out of the night aflame? Would you, in this magic-
steeped land? If you expect to find sorcery, you will—
whether it's there or not."

His mouth quirked upward in something that was not a
smile.

"Belief is all, you know. When I studied medicine I was
trained to hate magic and everything it stood for. Now I've
found a magic that truly heals, and it will not serve me."

"Perhaps you should serve it, instead," Pakhymer said
slowly.

"Does everyone here talk like a priest?" Gorgidas snarled,
but his eyes were thoughtful.

"Sure and they don't." Viridovix caught only what was
said, not its overtones. He looked most unpriestly, with each
arm encircling a girl's waist.

Marcus could not for the life of him remember which two
of his three they were. For one thing, the tall Celt mostly
called them "dear" or "darling," a part of his speech pattern

44     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

that served him well, lessening the chance of an embarrassing
slip. For another, while all three were of dainty, flowerlike
beauty, none had enough character to leave much other im-
pression on the mind.

Viridovix suddenly noticed Scaurus standing with the

Greek doctor and Laon Pakhymer. He loosed his hold on the
girls to fold the tribune into a bear hug; Marcus smelled the
wine fumes clinging to him even through his own drunken-
ness,

The Gaul held him at arm's length for a moment, studying

him with owlish intensity. Then he turned to Gorgidas, declar-
ing, "Will you look at him now, standing there so quiet and all
after the greatest joke any of us ever saw, the which saved all
our necks besides. And here I am a hero for sitting on some
smelly horse's back and scaring those poor omadhauns all to
bits, and where's the glory for the fellow who thought to put

me there in the first place?"

"You deserve it," Marcus protested. "What if the Yezda
had decided to ride toward you instead of away? One did, you

know."

"Och, that puir fool?" Viridovix gave a snort of scorn. "A

week and a half it seemed he gawped at me. It's probably only
when he pissed himself that he woke up. Who would have

thought I'd make a horseman?"

"Cowman might be better, thinking of the herd," Laon

Pakhymer said with a sidelong glance.

"Hmm. That's hardly a name for a man." But the Gaul's
eyes were twinkling. "If you'd called me bullman, now, you
might be closer to the truth. Isn't that right, loves?" he said,
leading the girls back toward the tent they shared. Their
bodies swayed toward his in mute agreement with the boast.

Pakhymer gave Viridovix' back a frankly jealous look.
"What does he do with them all?" he wondered aloud.

"Ask him," Gorgidas suggested. "He'll tell you. Whatever
else he may be, our Celtic friend is not shy."

Pakhymer watched three bodies briefly silhouetted by lan-
temlight as Viridovix pulled back his tent flap. "No," he
sighed, "I don't suppose he is."

Next morning, Marcus thought for a bleary moment the
noise of raindrops (buttering on the sides of his tent was his
pulse hammering in his ears. Pain throbbed dully through his

Harry Turtledove             45

head; the taste of sewers was in his mouth. When he sat up too
quickly, his stomach yelped, and his surroundings gave a
queasy lurch.

His motion woke Helvis, who yawned, stretched lithely,
and smiled up at him from the sleeping mat. "Good morning,
love," she said, reaching out to touch his arm. "How are
you?"

Even her smooth contralto grated. "Bloody awful," the tri-
bune croaked, holding his head in his hands. "Does Nepos
know how to heal a hangover, do you think?" He belched
uncomfortably.

"If there were a cure for nausea, I promise you pregnant
women would know it. We can be sick together," she said,
mischief in her voice. But then, seeing Scaurus' real misery,
she added, "I'll do my best to keep Malric quiet." The boy
was stirring under his blanket.

"Thanks," Marcus said, and meant it. A rambunctious
three-year-old, he decided, could be the death of him at the
moment.

The downpour meant no cooking fires; the Romans break-
fasted on cold porridge, cold beef, and soggy bread. The tri-
bune ignored his soldiers' grumbles. The thought of food, any
food, did not appeal.

He heard Gaius Philippus squelching his way from one
group of men to the next, instructing them, "Don't forget,
grease your armor, leather and metal both. Easier that than
grinding out the rust and patching over the rotted hide just
because you were too lazy to do what needed doing. And oil
your weapons, too, though the gods help you if you need me
to tell you that."

With Lexos Blemmydes vanished, there were no guides to
show Scaurus' force the way to Amorion. Save for the
Romans, the valley the invaders had held was empty of hu-
manity. The angry herders whose cattle had served to rout the
Yezda hid in the hills, unwilling to help the men who, from
their viewpoint, first befriended and then betrayed them.

Much later than was pleasing to Marcus' senior centurion,
the army finally began slogging southeast. The sky remained a
sullen, leaden gray; hour after hour the rain kept falling, now
in little spatters of drizzle, now in nearly opaque sheets driven
by a wind with the early bite of winter in it.

There was no way to steer a steady course in those dreadful




46

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

47

conditions. Drenched and miserable, the legionaries and their
companions struggled through a series of crisscrossing little
canyons more bewildering than Minos' labyrinth. They
trudged glumly on, trusting in dead reckoning.

The storm blew itself out toward evening; through tattered
clouds, the sun gave an apologetic peep at the world. And
when it did, some soldiers fearfully exclaimed it was setting in
the east, for it shone straight into their faces.

Listening to the men, Quintus Glabrio shook his head in
resignation. "Isn't that the way of the world? They'd sooner
turn the heavens topsy-turvy than face up to our own blunder-
ing."

"You spend too cursed much time hanging round Gor-
gidas," Gaius Philippus said. "You're starting to sound like
him." Scaurus had the same impression, though, thinking
back on it, he did not remember seeing the junior centurion
and the physician together very often.

"Worse things have happened," Glabrio chuckled. Gaius
Philippus was content to let it rest. If there were things he did
not understand in the younger officer, he approved of enough
to tolerate the rest.

Marcus was glad the chaffing went no further than it did.
His hangover was gone at last, but he had not eaten all day
and felt lightheaded. A real quarrel would have been more
than he was up to dealing with.

Only bits of scudding gray showed the storm's passage
when dawn came again—those, and the red-brown clinging
mud that tried to suck sandals from feet. It was, Marcus
thought with disquiet, almost the color of Yezd's banners. He
was strangely pleased to see tiny green shoots thrusting up
through it, fooled into thinking it was spring.

Gaius Philippus barked harsh laughter when he said that
aloud. "They'll find out soon enough how wrong they are."
He sniffed at the brisk northern breeze, weather-wise from a
lifetime lived in the open. "Snow's coming before long."

Quite by accident, for they were still guideless, they came
upon a town early that afternoon. Aptos, it was called, and
held perhaps five thousand souls. Peaceful, unwalled, un-
known to the Yezda, it nearly brought tears to the tribune. To
him, towns like this were Videssos' greatest achievement,
places where generation on generation lived in peace, never

fearing that the next day might bring invaders to rape away in
hours the fruit of years of labor. Such bypassed tranquil is-
lands were already rare in the westlands; soon, too soon, none
would be left.

Monks pulling weeds from the rain-softened soil of their
vegetable gardens looked up in amazement as the battered
mercenary company tramped past. True to the disciplined
kindness of their vocation, they hurried into the monastery
storehouses, returning with fresh-baked bread and pitchers of
wine. They stood by the side of the road, offering the refresh-
ments to any who cared-to stop for a moment.

Scaurus had mixed feelings about the Videssian clergy.
When humane, as these monks seemed to be, they were
among the best of men: he thought of Nepos and the patriarch
Balsamon. But their zeal could make them frighteningly, vio-
lently xenophobic; the tribune remembered the anti-Namda-
lener riots in Videssos the city and the pogrom the priest
Zemarkhos had wanted to incite against the Vaspurakaners of
Amorion. His mouth tightened at that—Zemarkhos was still
there.

The gilded sun-globes atop the monastery's spires disap-
peared behind the Romans. As they marched through Aptos
itself, a shouting horde of small boys surrounded them, danc-
ing with excitement and firing questions like arrows: Was it
true the Yezda were nine feet tall? Were the streets in Videssos
paved with pearls? Wasn't a soldier's life the most glorious
one in the world?

The boy who asked that last question was a beautiful child
of about twelve; flushed with the first dreams of manhood, he
looked ready, nay, eager to run off with the army. "Don't you
believe it for a minute, son," Gaius Philippus said, speaking
with an eamestness Marcus had rarely heard him use. "Sol-
diering's a trade like any other, a bit dirtier than most, maybe.
Go at it for the glory and you'll die too damned young."

The boy stared in disbelief, as if hearing one of the monks
curse Phos. His face crumpled. Tears come hard at twelve,
and scald when they fall.

"Why are you after doing that to the lad?" Viridovix de-
manded. "Sure and there's no harm in feeding his dreams a
mite."

"Isn't there?" The centurion's voice was like a slamming
door. "My younger brother thought that way. He's thirty years




48 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 49

dead now." He looked stonily at the Celt, daring him to take it
further. Viridovix reddened and kept still.

Despite the peregrinations of the day before, Scaurus
learned Amorion was only about four days' march southeast.
Aptos' adults pointed the way, though no one seemed eager to
lead the Romans there. Still, as one plump fellow declared
with the optimism of rustics everywhere, "You can't miss it."

"Maybe not, but watch us try," Gaius Philippus muttered to
himself. Marcus was inclined to agree with him. All too often
a landmark was a landmark because a local saw it every day of
his life. To a stranger, it was just another tree or hill or barn.

Worse, the rain returned at dawn the next day, not with the
vicious onslaught it had shown before, but a steady downpour
riding the seawind south. The road to Amorion, in bad shape
already, soon became next to impossible. Wagons and travel-
ing cars bogged down, axle-deep in greasy mud. Straining to
push forward nonetheless, two horses in quick succession
snapped legbones and had to be destroyed. The soldiers
worked with their beasts to move the wains on, but progress
was minute. The four days' journey promised in Aptos
seemed a cruel mockery.

"I feel like a drowned cat," Gorgidas complained. Dapper
by choice, the Greek was sadly disheveled now. His hair, its
curl killed by hours of rain, splashed down onto his forehead
and kept wandering into his eyes; his soaked mantle clung to
him, more like a parasite than a garment. He was spattered
with muck.

In short, he looked no different from any of his compan-
ions in wretchedness. Viridovix said so, loudly and profanely,
perhaps hoping to jar him out of his misery and into a good
soul-stirring fight. There was more subtlety to the Gaul than
met the eye; Scaurus recalled his using that ploy before and
succeeding.

But today the doctor would not rise to the bait. He
squelched away in glum silence, a person from a sunny land
hard-pressed to deal with foul weather. Viridovix, to whom
rain was an everyday likelihood, was better prepared to cope
with it.

The storm closed down visibility and pattered insistently
off every horizontal surface. Thus the Romans, intent on their
own concerns, were not aware of the newcomers until they
loomed out of the watery curtain ahead.

Marcus' sword was in his hand before he consciously
wished it there. His men bristled like angry dogs, leaping back
from their labors and likewise reaching for weapons. Gaius
Philippus' chest swelled as he gulped the air he'd need to
shout mem into battle formation.

Before the centurion could give the order, Senpat Sviodo
cried out in his own language and splashed forward to clasp
the hand of the leading horseman ahead. "Bagratouni!" he
exclaimed.

With the naming of that name, the fear fell from Scaurus'
eyes, and he saw the newly come riders as they were: not a
Yezda horde bursting out of the mist, but a battered squadron
of Vaspurakaners, as much refugees as the Romans.

Gagik Bagratouni almost jerked his hand from Sviodo's in
startlement. Like Marcus, the nakharar had seen what he
thought he would see and was about to cry his men forward in
a last doomed, desperate charge. Eyes wide, he, too, recon-
sidered. "It is the Romans, our friends!" he shouted to his
forlorn command. Weary, beaten faces answered with uncer-
tain smiles, as if remembering a word long unused.

As the tribune moved up to greet Bagratouni, he was
shocked to see how the nakharar had shrunken in on himself
since the battle before Maragha. His skin was looser over the
strong bones of his face; dark circles puffed below his eyes.
His nose seemed an old man's beak, not the symbol of
strength it had been.

Worst of all, the almost tangible power and presence once
his had slipped from his shoulders, leaving him more naked
than a mere loss of clothes ever could have.

He dismounted stiffly; his second-in-command, Mesrop
Anhoghin, was there to steady him. From the look of mute
misery the lanky, thick-bearded aide wore, Scaurus grew sure
his imagination was not tricking him. "Greetings," Anhoghin
said—thereby, Marcus knew, exhausting most of his Vides-
sian.

"Greetings," the Roman nodded. Senpat came to his side,
ready to interpret for him. But Scaurus spoke directly to Gagik
Bagratouni, who used me imperial tongue fluently, albeit with
heavy accent. He asked, "Are the Yezda between here and
Amorion too thick to stop us pushing on?"

"Amorion?" the nakharar repeated dully. "How do you
know we to Amorion have been?"




50 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harp/ Turtledove 51

"For one thing, by the direction you came from. For an-
other, well—" Scaurus waved at the ragged group before him.
Most of Gagik Bagratouni's men were Vaspurakaners driven
from their native land by the Yezda who settled in or near
Amorion with their women. They had left those women be-
hind when they took the Emperor's service, but some were
here now, looking as worn and beaten as the men they rode
with.

Some were here now... but where was Bagratouni's wife,
the fat, easygoing lady Marcus had met in the nakharar's for-
tresslike home? "Gagik," he asked, alarm leaping in him, "is
Zabel—?" He stopped, not knowing how he should continue.

"Zabel?" It might have been a stranger's name, the way
Bagratouni said it. "Zabel is dead," he said slowly, and then
began to weep, his shoulders shaking helplessly, his tears
washed away by the uncaring rain.

The sight of the stalwart noble broken and despairing was
somehow more terrible than most of the concrete setbacks the
Romans had encountered. 'Take care of him, can't you?"
Scaurus whispered to Gorgidas.

The compassion in the doctor's eyes was replaced by a
spark of exasperation. "You always want me to work miracles,
not medicine." But he was already moving toward Bagra-
touni, murmuring, "Come with me, sir. I'll give you some-
thing that will let you sleep." In Greek he told Scaurus, "I'll
give him something to knock him out for two days straight.
That may help a little."

The nakharar let himself be led away, indifferent to what
fate held for him. Marcus, who could not afford indifference,
began questioning the rest of the Vaspurakaners through Sen-
pat Sviodo to learn what had happened to them to bring their
leader to such a state.

The answer was the one he'd feared. He knew Bagratouni's
men had got free of the fatal field before Maragha; their fu-
rious despair at Videssos' failure to free their homeland helped
them beat back the Yezda time and again. The younger men
and bachelors scattered to Vaspurakan's mountains to carry on
the fight; the rest bypassed Khiiat and marched straight for
their families in Amorion.

After the rigors of the battlefield and a forced march
through western Videssos' ravaged countryside, what they
found there was the crudest irony of all. Videssians had

fought at their side against the nomads, but in Amorion other
Videssians, using the Vaspurakaners' heterodoxy as their pre-
text, turned on them more viciously than ever the Yezda had.

With sickening certainty, the tribune knew what was com-
ing next: Zemarkhos had headed the pogrom. Marcus remem-
bered the lean cleric's burning, fanatical gaze, his automatic
hatred of anyone who did not conform precisely to his con-
ception of how his god should be revered. And he remem-
bered how he himself had stopped Gagik Bagratouni just short
of doing away with Zemarkhos when the priest taunted the
Vaspurakaners by naming his dog for Vaspur, the prince they
claimed as their first ancestor. And the result of his magna-
nimity? A cry of "Death to the heretics!" and revenge exacted
from the absent warriors' defenseless kin.

The mob's fury blazed so high it even dared stand against
Bagratouni's men on their return. In street fighting, ferocity
carried almost as much weight as discipline, and the Vaspura-
kaners were already worn down to shadows of themselves. It
was all they could do to rescue their surviving loved ones; for
most, that rescue came far too late.

Mesrop Anhoghin, his face expressionless, gave the story
out flatly, pausing every few seconds to let Senpat translate.
Finally that impassivity was more than Scaurus could bear. He
was drowning in shame and guilt. "How can you stand to look
at me, much less speak this way?" he said, covering his face
with his hands. "Were it not for me, none of this might have
happened!"

His cry was in Videssian, but Anhoghin could understand
the anguish in his voice without an interpreter. He stumped
forward to look the tribune in the face; tall for a Vaspurakaner,
his eyes were almost level with Scaurus'. "We are Phos' first-
born," he said through Senpat Sviodo. "It is only just that he
test us more harshly than ordinary men."

"That is no answer!" the tribune moaned. Without strong
religious beliefs of his own, he could not comprehend the
strength they lent others.

Anhoghin seemed to sense that. He said, "Perhaps it is not,
for you. Think of this, then: when you asked my lord to spare
Zemarkhos, it was not from love, but to keep him from being
a martyr and a rallying cry for zealots. You did not—you
could not—force him to spare the swine. That he did himself,
for reasons he found good, no matter where they came from.




52 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

And who knows? Things might have been worse the other
way."

It was not forgiveness Anhoghin offered; it was better, for
he said none was needed. Scaurus stood silent for a long,
grateful moment, ankle-deep in doughy mud, suddenly not
minding the raindrops splashing against his face. "Thank
you," he whispered at last.

Fury blazed in him that the Vaspurakaners, sober, decent
folk who asked no more from the world than that it leave them
at peace, could find it neither in their conquered homeland nor
in the refuge-place round Amorion. About the first he could
do nothing; that had proved beyond all the Empire's power.

As for the other... The wolfish eagerness in his own voice
surprised him as he asked Anhoghin, "Shall we avenge you?"
The heat of the moment swept away weeks of careful calcula-
tion.

Senpat Sviodo instantly shouted, "Aye!" The headstrong
young Vaspurakaner could be counted on to press for any plan
that called for action.

But when he translated for Mesrop Anhoghin, Bagratouni's
aide shook his head. "What purpose would it serve? Those of
us who could escape have, and the dead care not for ven-
geance. This land has war enough without stirring up more;

the Yezda would laugh to see us fight among ourselves."

Scaurus opened his mouth to protest, slowly closed it
again. Were the occasion different, he might have laughed to
hear arguments he had so long upheld come back at him from
another. But Anhoghin, standing there in the muck with rain
dripping through his matted beard and only exhaustion and
defeat in his eyes, was not an object of mirth.

The tribune's shoulders slumped inside his mail shirt.
"Damn you for being right," he said tiredly, and saw disap-
pointment flower on Sviodo's mobile features. "If the way
forward is closed, we'd best go back to Aptos." Turning to
give the necessary orders, he felt old for the first time in his
life.

111

THE HILL TOWN NORTHWEST OF AMORION WAS NOT A BAD

choice for winter quarters; Scaurus soon saw the truth of that.
Where the Romans would have had to storm Amorion, Aptos
welcomed them. Not a Yezda had been seen in its secluded
valley, but the cold wind of rumor said they were about—a
friendly garrison was suddenly desirable.

More than rumor told the townsfolk of the disaster the Em-
pire had met. The local noble, a minor magnate named Skyros
Phorkos, had levied a platoon of farmers to fight the Yezda
with Mavrikios. None had yet returned; only now were friends
and kin beginning to realize none ever would.

Phorkos' son and heir was a boy of eleven; the noble's
widow Nerse had picked up the authority he left behind. A
woman of stem beauty, she viewed the world with coldly real-
istic eyes. When the Romans and their comrades struggled
back into Aptos, she received them like a ruling princess, to
the edification of the few townsmen who braved the rain to
watch.

The dinner to which she invited Scaurus and his officers
was equally formal. If the Romans noticed the large number
of guards protecting Phorkos' estate, they made no mention of
it—no more than did Nerse, at the double squad of legion-
aries escorting the tribune's party thither.

Perhaps as a result of those shared silences, the dinner—a
roast goat cooked with onions and cloves, boiled beans and
cabbage, fresh-baked bread with wild honey, and candied
fruits—went smoothly enough. Wine flowed freely, though

53




54 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Marcus, noticing his hostess' moderation—and recalling too
well the morning after his last carouse—did not drink deep.

When her servants had taken the last scrap-laden platter
from the dining hall, Nerse grew businesslike. "We are glad
you are here," she said abruptly. "We will be gladder yet when
we see you intend to treat us as a flock to be protected, not as
victims to be despoiled."

"Keep us supplied with bread and with fodder for our
beasts, and we'll pay for whatever else we take," Marcus re-
turned. "My troops are no plunderers."

Nerse considered. "Less than I hoped for; more than I ex-
pected—fair enough. Can you live up to it?"

"What would my promises mean? The only test will be
how we behave; you'll have to judge that." Marcus liked the
way she put Aptos' case without pleading. He liked, too, the
straightforward way she dealt with him. She did not try to use
her femininity as a tool, but treated the Roman as an equal and
plainly expected the same from him.

He waited for the tiny threat that was the sole pressure she
could bring to bear: that Aptos' inhabitants would only coop-
erate with his men to the extent they were well treated. In-
stead, she turned the conversation to less important things.
Before long she rose, nodded graciously, and escorted her
guests to the door.

Gaius Philippus had been almost silent during the dinner.
His presence, like that of Scaurus' other companions, was
more ceremonial than it was necessary. Once outside, though,
he paused only to draw his cloak round himself against the
rain before declaring, "There is a woman!"

He spoke so enthusiastically Marcus raised a quizzical eye-
brow. He had trouble imagining the senior centurion as any-
thing but a misogynist.

"Cold as a netted carp she'd be between the sheets, from
the look of her," Viridovix guessed, automatically ready to
disagree with the veteran.

"Not if properly thawed," Laon Pakhymer demurred. As
soldiers will, they argued it all the way back to the soggy
Roman camp.

The tribune was inside it before he realized that Nerse's
threat had in fact been made. It was merely that she had not
crudely put it into words, but let him make it himself in his
own mind. He wondered if she knew the Videssian board

Marry Turtledove             55

game that, unlike its Roman counterparts, depended only on a
player's skill. If so, he decided, he did not want to play
against her.

Wintering at Aptos, Marcus thought, was like crawling
into a hole and then pulling it in after himself. He and his men
had been at the center of events since spring; he had hob-
nobbed with Videssos' imperial family, sparred with the chief
minister of the Empire, made a personal foe of the wizard-
prince who led its foes, fought in a great battle that would
change Videssos' course for years to come... and here he was
in a country town, wondering if its store of barley meal would
hold out until spring. It was deflating, but gave him back a
sense of proportion he had been in danger of losing.

Aptos was lonely enough at the best of times. News of the
disaster before Maragha had reached it, aye; the distant king-
doms of Thatagush and Agder would know of that by now.
But the Romans brought word of Ortaias Sphrantzes' assump-
tion of the throne, and Aptos had been equally ignorant of the
persecution of the Vaspurakaners not five days' march away.

The tribune was unwilling to leave some news to chance.
He talked with Laon Pakhymer outside his tent one morning
not long after rain turned to snow. "I'd like to send a couple of
your riders west," he said.

"West, eh?" The Katrisher raised an eyebrow. "Want to
find out what's become of the younger Gavras, do you?"

"Yes. If all we have is a choice between Yezd and Ortaias,
well, suddenly the life of a robber chief looks better than it
had."

"I know what you mean. I'll get the lads for you." Pa-
khymer clicked his tongue between his teeth. "Hate to send
them out with so little hope of making it back, but what can
you do?"

"Making it back from where?" Senpat Sviodo's breath
puffed out in a steaming cloud as he asked the question—he
was just done with practice at swords and still breathing hard.

When Marcus explained, the handsome young Vaspura-
kaner threw his hands in the air. "This is foolishness! Would
you throw birds in a river when you have fish handy? Who
better to go to Vaspurakan than a pair of 'princes'? Nevrat and
I will leave within the hour."

"The Khatrishers will be able to get in and out faster than




56 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 57

you could. They have the nomad way of traveling light,"
Marcus said. Beside him, Pakhymer nodded reluctantly.

But Senpat laughed. "They'll be able to get killed faster,
you mean, likely mistaken for Yezda. Nevrat and I are of the
country and will be welcome wherever our people live. We've
gone in before and come back whole. We can again."

He sounded so certain that Scaurus looked a question at
Pakhymer. The Khatrisher said, "Let him go, if he wants to so
badly. But he should leave Nevrat behind—the woman is too
well favored to waste so."

"You're right," Senpat said, which surprised the tribune
until he went on, "I tell her so myself. But she will not have
us separated, and who am I to complain of that?" He turned
serious. "She can care for herself, you know."

After her long journey west from Khiiat, Marcus could not
argue that. "Go, then," he said, giving up. "Make the best
time you can."

"That we will," Senpat promised. "Of course, we may do a
little hunting along the way." Hunting Yezda, Marcus knew he
meant. He wanted to forbid it, but knew better than to give an
order he could not enforce. The Vaspurakaners owed Yezd
even more than Videssos did.

The tribune had his own troubles settling into semi-perma-
nent quarters. Campaign and crisis had let him pay Helvis and
Malric only as much attention as he wanted, something sud-
denly no longer true.

And, under settled conditions, Helvis did not always prove
easy to live with. Marcus, a lifelong bachelor before this at-
tachment, was used to keeping his thoughts to himself until
the time came to act on them. Helvis' past, on the other hand,
made her expect confidences from him, and she was hurt
whenever he did something that affected them both without
consulting her first. He realized her complaints held justice
and did his best to reform, but his habits were no easier to
break than hers.

The irritations did not run in one direction alone. As her
pregnancy progressed, Helvis grew even more prayerful.
Every day, it seemed, a new icon of Phos or some saint ap-
peared on the walls of the cabin she and Scaurus shared. By
itself, that would have been only a minor nuisance to the trib-

une. Not religious himself, he was willing to tolerate—that is,
to ignore as much as possible—others' practices.

In this theology-mad land, that was not enough. Like the
rest of the Namdaleni, Helvis added a phrase to the creed
Videssos followed; for the sake of half a dozen words, the two
lands' folk reckoned each other heretics. As the lone supporter
of her version of the true faith for many miles, she naturally
sought Marcus' support. But to give it took more hypocrisy
than was in him.

"I have no quarrel with what you believe," he said, "but I
would be lying if I said I shared it. Does Phos need worship-
pers so badly he would not resent a false one?"

She had to answer, "No." There the matter rested. Scaurus
hoped it was settled, not merely dormant.

If he and Helvis had difficulties, they managed to keep
them below the level of conflagration. Others were not so
lucky. One grayish-yellow morning when the fall rain had
turned to sleet but not yet to snow, the tribune was rudely
awakened by the crash of a pot against a wall, followed at
once by a shrill volley of curses.

He pulled the thick wool blankets over his ears to muffle
the fighting, but when a second pot followed the first to smith-
ereens, he knew it was in vain. He rolled over onto one side
and saw without surprise that Helvis was awake, too.

"They're at it again," he said unnecessarily, and added,
"This is the first time I've ever resented having my officers'
quarters close to mine."

"Shh," Helvis said. "I want to listen."

Asking him for quiet was hardly needful either; when pro-
voked, Damans' voice had a carry to it that any professional
herald would have envied. " 'Turn on your stomach'!" she was
shouting. "'Turn on your stomach'! I've rolled over for the
last time for you, I can tell you that! Find yourself a boy, or a
cow, or whatever suits your fancy, but you'll not use me that
way again!"

The door to Quintus Glabrio's cabin slammed with tooth-
rattling fury. Scaurus heard Damans splash away, still scream-
ing imprecations. "Even when I got you to put me on my
back, you were no damned good!" she cried from some dis-
tance. Then, mercifully, the wind's voice at last covered hers.

"Oh, dear," the tribune said, his ears feeling red-hot.

Unexpectedly, Helvis broke into giggles. "What's funny?"




58

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Marcus demanded, wondering how Glabrio was going to be
able to hold his head up in front of his men again.

The harshness in his voice reached her. "I'm sorry," she
said. "It's just one of those silly things you think of. You don't
understand women's gossip, Marcus; we've done nothing but
wonder why Damaris never got pregnant. Now I guess we
know."

That had never occurred to Scaurus. He felt a chuckle of
his own rising unbidden, sternly suppressed it. But even as he
did, he wondered again how many Romans were sniggering at
the junior centurion.

At breakfast Glabrio moved in the center of a circle of
silence. No one was quite able to pretend he had not heard
Damaris, but no one had the nerve to mention her to him.

He drilled his maniple with grim intensity. Usually he was
patient with the Videssians struggling to leam Roman ways of
fighting, but not today. And he pushed himself even harder
than his legionaries, not wanting to give them any opening to
mock him.

But every group of men has its wit, a fellow who takes
pleasure in amusing many at the expense of one. Marcus was
not far away when one of Glabrio's soldiers, in response to an
order the tribune did not hear, stuck out his backside with
deliberate impertinence.

Already tight-lipped, the junior centurion went dead pale.
Scaurus hurried forward to deal with the insolent Roman, but
there was no need. Quintus Glabrio, his face empty of all
expression, broke his vine-stave—a centurion's staff of office
—over the soldier's head. The man dropped without a sound
into the mud.

Glabrio waited until he moaned and shakily tried to sit.
The young officer tossed the two pieces of his staff into the
legionary's lap. "Fetch me a whole one, Lucilius," he
snapped, and waited over him until he staggered to his feet
and did as ordered.

Seeing Marcus approach, the junior centurion stiffened to
attention. "I'm more than capable of handling these things
myself, sir. No need to involve yourself."

"So I see," Scaurus nodded. He dropped his voice until
Glabrio alone could hear. "It does no harm for me to remind
the men you're an officer, not a figure of fun. What happened
to you could as easily have befallen one of them."

Harry Turtledove              59

"Could it? I wonder," Glabrio murmured, as much to him-
self as to the tribune. His manner grew brisk once more.
"Well, in any case I don't think I'll have any more trouble
from the ranks. Now if you'll forgive me—" He turned back
to his troops. "I hope you enjoyed the rest you got, for you'll
need it. And—one—!"

There was no further trouble from the maniple. Nonethe-
less, Scaurus was not happy. Quietly but unmistakably, Gla-
brio had made any further conversation unwelcome. Ah, well,
the tribune thought, that one usually has more on his mind
than he shows. He stood watching for another couple of min-
utes, but the junior centurion had everything well in hand. The
tribune shrugged, shivered in the cold wind, and found some-
thing else to do.

That afternoon Gorgidas sought him out. The Greek was
diffident, something so far out of character that Marcus sus-
pected he was about to announce a major calamity. But what
he had to say was simple enough: the cabin Glabrio and Da-
maris had been sharing was, in the junior centurion's opinion,
too big for one man by himself, and he had invited Gorgidas
to share it with him.

Scaurus understood the doctor's hesitation. Everyone with
more sensitivity than crude Lucilius had trouble speaking
straight out about Glabrio's misfortune. Still— "No reason to
come at me as if you thought I was going to bite," he said. "I
think that's all to the good. Better for him to have someone to
talk to than sit by himself and brood. From the way you went
about it, I thought you were going to tell me the plague had
broken out."

"I only wanted to make sure there would be no problems."

"None I can think of. Why should there be?" The tribune
decided Gorgidas' continuing failure with Nepos' healing
magic was making him imagine difficulties everywhere. "It
might do you both good," he said.

"I," Nepos announced, "need a stoup of wine." He and
Marcus were walking down Aptos' main street. Snow.
crunched under their boots.

"Good idea. Hot mulled wine, by choice," the tribune said.
He rubbed the tip of his nose, which was starting to freeze.
Like his men, he wore Videssian-style baggy woolen trousers

60     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

and was glad to have them. Winter in the westlands was not
weather for the toga.

Of Aptos' half a dozen taverns, the Dancing Wolf was the
best. Its proprietor, Tatikios Tomikes, enjoyed his work im-
mensely; he was stout enough to make Nepos seem underfed
beside him. "Good day to you, gentlemen," he called with a
smile when priest and Roman entered.

"And to you, Tatikios," Marcus replied, wiping his feet on
the rushes strewn inside the doorway. Tomikes beamed at him
—the tavemer was a stickler for cleanliness.

Scaurus liked the Dancing Wolf and its owner. So did most
of his men. The only complaint he'd heard came from Virido-
vix: "May his upper lip go bald."

The Celt had reason for envy. Going against usual Vides-
sian fashion, Tatikios shaved his chin, but his mustachios
more than made up for it. Coal-black as his hair, they swept
out and up; the tavemer waxed them into spiked perfection
every day.

The tribune and Nepos, glad of the roaring fire Tatikios
had going, sat down at a table next to it. A serving girl moved
out from behind the bar to ask what they cared for.

Staring into the flames, Marcus hardly noticed her come
up. His head jerked around as he recognized her voice. Some-
one had told him Damans was working at the Dancing Wolf,
he realized, but this was the first time he'd seen her here.

He frowned a little; for his money, Quintus Glabrio was
well rid of the hellcat. Today, though, he felt too good to be
petty. "Mulled wine, nice and hot," he said. Nepos echoed
him.

His nose twitched at the spicy scent. The handleless yellow
cup stung his hands as he picked it up. The Dancing Wolf did
things right. "Ahhh," he said, savoring the hot cinnamon bite
on his tongue. The wine slid down his throat, smooth as
honey.

"That calls for another," he said when the cup was empty,
and Nepos nodded. Now that they were warmed inside and
out, they could savor the second round at leisure. He waved
for Damans.

While she heated the wine, Tatikios wandered over to their
table. "What's the news?" he asked. Like every tavemer, he
liked to be on top of things. Unlike some, he did not try to
hide it.

Harry Turtledove             61

"Precious little, and I wish I had more," the tribune an-
swered.

Tomikes laughed. "I wish I did, too. Things get slow, once
winter sets in." He went back behind the bar, ran a rag over its
already gleaming surface.

"I wasn't joking, you know," Marcus said to Nepos. "I
wish Senpat and Nevrat would get back with word of Thorisin
Gavras, whether good or ill. Not knowing where we stand is
hard to bear."

"Oh, indeed, indeed. But friend Tatikios was perhaps
righter than he knew—everything moves slowly in the snow,
the Vaspurakaners no less than other men."

"Less than the nomads," Scaurus retorted. He shook his
head, smiled wryly. "I worry too much, I know. Likely the
two of them are holed up in some distant cousin's keep, mak-
ing love in front of a fire just like this one."

"A pleasant enough way to pass the time," Nepos chuck-
led. Like all Videssian priests, he was celibate, but he did not
begrudge others the pleasures of the flesh.

"It's not what I sent them out for," Marcus said, a little
stiffly.

Carrying an enameled tray in one hand. Damans took two
steaming cups from it and set them down. "Why should you
fuss over a man lying with a woman?" she said to Scaurus.
"You're used to worse than that."

The tribune paused with the hot cup halfway to his mouth.
His right eyebrow arched toward his hairline. "What might
that mean?"

"Surely you don't need me to draw you pretty pictures,"
she said. The undertone in her voice sent a chill through him,
crackling flames and warm wine notwithstanding.

Malice leaped into her eyes as she saw his confusion. "A
man who uses a woman as he would a boy would sooner have
a boy... or be one." Wine slopped in Marcus' cup as he
grasped her meaning. She drove the knife home: "I hear my
sweet Quintus has taken no new lover these past weeks—or
has he?" Her laugh was vicious.

The tribune looked Damaris in the eye. The vindictive
smile froze on her face. "How long have you been putting this
filth about?" he asked. His voice might have been one of the
winter winds gusting outside.

"Filth? This is true, it is—" As it had so often in arguments

62 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

with Quintus Glabrio, her voice began to rise. Heads all round
the tavern turned toward her.

But Scaurus was not Glabrio. He cut in: "If the slime you
wallow in spreads widely, it will be the worse for you. Do you
understand?" The quiet, evenly spaced words reached her
when a shouted threat might have been ignored. She nodded,
a quick, frightened movement.

"Good enough," the tribune said. He finished his wine at
leisure and held up his end of the conversation with Nepos.
When they were both done, he pulled coppers from his belt-
pouch, tossed them on the table, and strode out, Nepos at his
side.

"That was well done," the priest said as they walked back
toward the Roman camp. "No rancor matches a former
lover's."

"Too true," Marcus agreed. A sudden, biting breeze blew
snow into his face. "Damn, it's cold," he said, and pulled his
cape up over his mouth and nose. He was not sorry for the
excuse to keep still.

Once inside the ramparts of the camp, he separated from
Nepos to attend to some business or other. He did not re-
member what it was five minutes later; he had other things on
his mind.

He feared Damaris was not simply letting her spite run
free, but had truth behind her slurs. Frightening her into si-
lence was easier than quieting his own mind afterward. The
charge she hissed out fit only too well with too much else he
had noticed without thinking about.

The whole camp knew—thanks to Damaris and that shrill
screech of hers—more about Glabrio's choice of pleasures
than was anyone's business. In itself that might mean anything
or nothing. But the junior centurion was sharing quarters with
Gorgidas now, and the physician, as far as Scaurus knew, had
no use for women. Recalling how nervous Gorgidas had
seemed when he said he and Glabrio were joining forces,
Marcus suddenly saw a new reason for the doctor's hesitancy.

The tribune's hands curled into fists. Of all his men, why
these two, two of the ablest and sharpest, and two of his
closest friends as well? He thought of the fu.stua.riwn, the
Roman army's punishment for those who, in their full man-
hood, bedded other men.

He had seen a fustuarium once in Gaul, on that occasion

Harry Turtledove             63

for an inveterate thief. The culprit was dragged into the center
of camp and tapped with an officer's staff. After that he was
fair game; his comrades fell on him with clubs, stones, and
fists. If lucky, condemned men died at once.

Marcus visualized Gorgidas and Quintus Glabrio suffering
such a-fate and flinched away in horror from his vision. Easi-
est, of course, would be to forget what he had heard from
Damaris and trust her fear of him to keep her quiet. Or so he
thought, until he tried to dismiss her words. The more he tried
to shove them away, the louder they echoed, distracting him,
putting a raw edge to everything around him. He barked at
Gaius Philippus for nothing, swatted Malric when he would
not stop singing the same song over and over. The tears which
followed did nothing to sweeten Scaurus' disposition.

While Helvis comforted her son and looked angrily at the
tribune, he snatched up a heavy cloak and went out into the
night, muttering, "There are some things I have to deal with."
He closed the door on her beginning protest.

Stars snapped in the blue-black winter sky. Marcus still
found their patterns alien and still attached to the groupings
the names his legionaries had given them more than a year
ago. There was the Locust, there the Ballista, and there, low
in the west now, the Pederasts. Scaurus shook his head and
walked on, sandals soundless on snow and soft ground.

Like most cabins, the one Glabrio and Gorgidas shared was
shut tight against the night's chill. Wooden shutters covered its
windows, the spaces between their slats chinked tight with
cloth to ward off the freezing wind. Only firefly gleams of
lamplight peeped through to hint that the thatch-roofed hut
was occupied.

The tribune stood in front of the door, his hand upraised to
knock. He bethought himself of the Sacred Band of Thebes,
of the hundred fifty pairs of lovers who had fought to their
deaths at Chaeronea against Macedon's Philip and Alexander.
His hand did not fall. These were not Thebans he led.

But he hesitated still, unable to bring his fist forward.
Through the thin walls of the cabin, he heard the junior centu-
rion and the physician talking. Though their words were muf-
fled, they sounded altogether at ease with each other.
Gorgidas said something short and sharp, and Glabrio laughed
at him.

As Marcus stood in indecision, the image of Gaius Phi-

64 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 65

lippus rose unbidden to his mind. The senior centurion was
talking to him just after he brought Helvis back to the bar-
racks: "No one will care if you bed a woman, a boy, or a
purple sheep, so long as you think with your head and not
with your crotch."

Where dead Greek heroes had not stayed his hand, a
Roman's homely advice did. If ever two men lived up to
Gaius Philippus' standard, they were the two inside. Scaurus
slowly walked back to his own hut, at peace with himself at
last.

He heard a door open behind him, heard Quintus Glabrio
call softly, "Is someone there?" By then the tribune was
around the comer. The door closed again.

On his return, Scaurus took the scolding he got as one who
deserves it, which only seemed to irk Helvis more; sometimes
acceptance of blame is the last thing anger wants. But if ab-
sentminded, the tribune's apologies were genuine, and after a
while Helvis subsided.

Malric took his undeserved punishment in stride, Marcus
was thankful to see; he played with his adopted son until the
boy grew drowsy.

The tribune was almost asleep himself when he happened
to recall something he was sure he had forgotten: the name of
the founder of Thebes' Sacred Band. It was Gorgidas.

During the winter, Aptos' sheltered valley learned but
slowly what passed in the world outside. News of Amorion
came, of all things, from a fugitive band of Yezda. The
nomads, after a quick rcconaissance, had decided the town
was a tempting target. It had no wall, was empty of imperial
troops, and should make easy meat.

The Yezda suffered a rude awakening. Zemarkhos' irregu-
lars, blooded in the Vaspurakaner pogrom, sent the invaders
reeling off in defeat—and what they did to the men they
caught made it hard to choose between their savagery and the
Yezda's.

After listening to the tale spun by the handful of half-fro-
zen nomads, Gagik Bagratouni rumbled low in his throat,
"Here is something in my life new: to tenderness feel toward
Yezda. I would much give, to see Amorion bum, and Ze-
markhos in it." His great, scarred hands gripped empty air; the

brooding glow in his eyes gave him the aspect of a lion denied
its prey.

Scaurus understood his vengefulness and took it as a good
sign; time was beginning to heal the Vaspurakaner lord. Yet
the tribune did not altogether agree with Bagratouni. In this
winter of imperial weakness, any obstacle against the Yezda
was worth something. Zemarkhos and his fanatics were a
nasty boil on the body of Videssos, but the invaders were the
plague.

Near midwinter day, an armed party of merchants made its
way northwest from Amorion to Aptos, braving weather and
the risk of attack in hope of reaping higher profits in a town
where their kind seldom came. So it proved. Their stocks of
spices, perfumes, fine brocades, and elaborately chased brass-
work vessels from the capital sold at prices better than they
could have realized in a city on a more traveled route.

Their leader, a muscular, craggy-faced fellow who looked
more soldier than trader, contented himself with remarking,
"Aye, we've done worse." Even with his double handful of
guardsmen close by, he would not say more. Too many merce-
nary companies made a sport of robbing merchants.

He and his comrades were more forthcoming on other mat-
ters, sharing with anyone who cared to listen the news they
had picked up on their travels; To his surprise, Marcus learned
Baanes Onomagoulos still lived. The Videssian general had
been badly wounded just before Maragha. Till now, Scaurus
had assumed he'd perished, either of his wounds or in the
pursuit after the battle.

But if rumor was to be trusted, Onomagoulos had escaped.
Some sort of army under his command beat back a Yezda raid
on the southern town of Kybistra, near the headwaters of the
Arandos River.

"Good for him, if it's true," was Gaius Philippus' com-
ment, "but the yarn came a long way before it ever got to us.
Likely as not, he's ravens' meat himself, or else was a
hundred miles away bedded down with something lively to
keep the cold away. Good for him if that's true, too." He
sounded wistful, as odd from him as diffidence from Gor-
gidas.

Like towns all through the Empire, Aptos celebrated the
days after the winter solstice, when the sun at last turned north
again. Bonfires burned in front of homes and shops; people




66     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

jumped over them for luck. Men danced in the streets in
women's clothing, and women dressed as men. The local
abbot brought his monks down through the marketplace,
wooden swords in hand, to burlesque soldiers. Tatikios Tor-
cikes turned the tables by leading a dozen shopkeepers in a
wicked parody of fat, drunken monks.

Aptos' celebration was rowdier than the one the Romans
had seen the year before in Imbros. The latter was a real city
and tried to ape the sophisticated ways of Videssos the capital.
Aptos simply celebrated, and cared not a fig for the figure it

cut.

The town had no theater or professional mime troupe. The

locals put on skits in the streets, making up with exuberance
what they lacked in polish. Like the ones at Imbros, their
sketches were topical and irreverent. Tatikios did a quick
change with one of the monks and came out dressed as a
soldier. The rusty old mail shirt he had squeezed into was so
tight it threatened to burst every time he moved. Marcus took
a while to recognize his headgear. It might have been intended
for a Roman helmet, but the crest ran from ear to ear instead

of front to back—

Beside him, Viridovix chortled. Gaius Philippus' jaw was
tightly clenched. "Oh, oh," Marcus muttered. The senior cen-
turion wore a transversely crested helm to show his rank.

Tatikios had eyes only for a tall, fuzzy-bearded man who
wore a fancy gown much like one Nerse Phorkaina was fond
of. Every time the mock-noblewoman looked his way, though,
he pulled his cloak over his eyes, shivering with fright.

"I'll kill that whoreson," Gaius Philippus ground out. His
hand was on the hilt of his gladius; he did not sound as though

he was joking.

"Nay, fool, 'tis all in fun," Viridovix said. "Last year at
Imbros they were after scoffing at me for a tavern fight. The
bards in Gaul do the same to a man. There's twice the disgrace
in showing the taunting hurts."

"Is there?" Gaius Philippus said. After a while, to Marcus'
relief, he let go of the sword. He stood watching till the play-
let was done, but the tribune had seen his face less grim in

battle.

The next skit, luckily, brought back his good humor. It
showed what Aptos thought of Videssos' self-proclaimed Em-
peror. Posturing foolishly, a gorgeously dressed young man,

Harp/ Turtledove             67

plainly meant to be Ortaias, led a squad of monk-soldiers
down Aptos' main street. Suddenly a six-year-old in nomad's
furs leaped out from between two houses. The mock-Emperor
shrieked and clutched at the seat of his robes. Throwing
scepter one way and crown the other, he turned and fled,
trampling half his men in the process.

"That's the way of it! Faster, faster, you spalpeen!" Virido-
vix shouted after him, doubled over with laughter.

"Aye, and give 'em a goldpiece each as you go," Gaius
Philippus echoed. "No, don't, or they'll be after you them-
selves instead of leaving you for the Yezda!"

That crack drew cries of agreement from the townsfolk
around him. As soon as he reached Videssos the city, Ortaias
had set the mints churning out a flood of new coins to an-
nounce and, he hoped, popularize his reign. But his copper
and silver pieces were thin and ill-shaped, his gold even more
adulterated than his great-uncle Strobilos' had been. None of
his tax collectors had yet been seen so far west, but rumor said
even they would not accept his money, demanding instead
older, purer coins.

Marcus found that the differing real values of coins nomin-
ally at par made gambling devilishly difficult. After more than
a year in Videssos, though, he was used to the problem, and
evening saw him in front of a table in the Dancing Bear,
watching the little bone cubes roll.

"Ha! The suns!" exclaimed the leader of the merchant
company, and scooped up the stake. The tribune gave the twin
ones a sour look. Not only had they cost him three goldpieces
—one of them a fine, pure coin minted by the Emperor Rha-
sios Akindynos a hundred twenty years ago—to his mind they
were by rights a losing throw. When the Romans played at
dice they used three, and reckoned the best roll a triple six.
But to the Videssians, sixes lost. They called a double six "the
demons"; it cost a gambler his bet and the dice both.

One of the other merchants was sitting at Scaurus' right.
"He's hot tonight!" the trader crowed. "Three crowns says he
makes it again!" He shoved the bright coins forward. They
were not Videssian issue, but minted by some of the petty
lords of mine-rich Vaspurakan. In the Empire's westlands they
circulated widely, the more so because they were of purer gold
than recent imperial money.

Marcus covered him with two more from his dwindling




68

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

store of old Videssian coins; he would have needed six or
seven of Ortaias' wretched issue to match the stake. The mer-
chant captain threw the dice. Three and live—that meant
nothing. Nor did double fours. One and—Marcus had an anx-
ious second until the other die stopped spinning. It was a two.
"Whew!" he said.

More meaningless rolls followed, and still more. Side bets
multiplied. At last the trader threw twelve and had to surren-
der the dice to the man at his left. Scaurus gathered in the
other merchant's Vaspurakaner gold, along with the other bets
he'd put down. As was true of the "princes'" other arts, the
portraits on their money were executed in a strong, blocky
style. Some coins bore square Vaspurakaner letters, others the
more sinuous Videssian script.

Behind the tribune, a copper basin set on the tavern floor
rang like a bell from a well-tossed dollop of wine. He heard
cries of admiration, and the clink of money changing hands.
Without looking, he was sure Gorgidas was winning the ap-
plause. When the Greek had found the Videssians played kot-
tabos, his joy was undiluted. No one in the capital could
match him, and surely no one in this country town. If the
locals did not know it yet, they soon would.

The dice traveled slowly round the table. When they got to
Marcus, he held them to his mouth to breathe life into them.
The rational part of his mind insisted such superstitious fool-
ishness would do no good. But it could not hurt, so he did it
anyway.

His first several throws were meaningless; the Videssian
game could be slow. Someone pulled the door of the Dancing
Wolf open. "Shut that, will you?" Scaurus grunted without
turning around as frigid air knifed into the tavern's warmth.

"So we will, and wine for everyone to make amends!" The
tribune was on his feet even before a cheer rang through the
Dancing Wolf. Snow melting on his jacket and in his beard,
Senpat Sviodo grinned at him. Nevrat was right behind her
husband.

Marcus rushed over to them, hugged them both, and
pounded their backs. "What news?" he demanded.

"You might say hello first," Nevrat said, her dark eyes
sparkling with mischief.

"Your pardon, hello. Now, what news?" They all laughed.
But the tribune was not really joking. He had been waiting for

Harry Turtledove             69

the Vaspurakaners' return—and worrying over the word they
would bring—too long for that.

"Are you going to throw or not?" an annoyed gambler
called from the table where he had been sitting. "Give us the
dice back if you aren't." Marcus flushed, realizing he was still
holding them.

Nevrat pressed a coin into his hand; her fingers were still
cold. "Here," she said. "Bet this."

He looked at the goidpiece. It was good money, not pale
with silver or darkened by copper's blush—likely from a Va-
spurakaner mint, he thought. But the inscription on the reverse
was in Videssian letters: "By this right." Above the v/ords
stood a soldier brandishing a sword. Scaurus had not seen a
coin like it before. He turned it over, curious to learn what
lord had issued it.

The diemaker was skillful. The face on the obverse was no
stylized portrait, but the picture of a living, breathing man. He
was shaggy of hair and beard, with a proud nose, and a mouth
bracketed by forceful lines. The tribune almost felt he knew
him.

Scaurus stiffened. He did know this man, had seen his
mouth wide with laughter and straight as a sword blade in
wrath. The Roman looked Up at the ceiling and whistled, soft
and low.

He noticed the inscription under the portrait bust for the
first time. "Avtokrator," it said, and then a name, but he
needed no inscription to name Thorisin Gavras for him.

When the tribune got back to camp with his news, Helvis
took it like any mercenary's woman. "This has to mean an-
other round of civil war," she said. He nodded. She went on,
"Both sides will be wild for troops—you can sell our swords
at a good price."

"Civil war be damned," said Marcus, who remembered
Rome's latest one from his childhood. "The only fight that
counts is the one against Avshar and Yezd. Any others are
distractions; the worse they get, the weaker the Empire be-
comes for the real test. With Thorisin as Emperor, Videssos
may even have a prayer of winning; with Ortaias, I wouldn't
give us six months."

"Us?" Helvis looked at him strangely. "Are you a Vides-
sian? Do you think either Emperor would call you one? They

70

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

71

hire swords—you have them. That's all you can hope to be to
them: a tool, to be used and put aside when no longer needed.
If Ortaias pays you more, you're a fool not to take his
money."

The tribune had the uneasy feeling there was a good deal of
truth in what she said. He thought of his men and goals as
different from those of other troops Videssos hired, but did its
overlords? Probably not. But the idea of serving a poltroon
like young Sphrantzes was too much to stomach.

"If Ortaias melted down the golden globe atop the High
Temple in Videssos and gave it all to me, I would not fight for
him," he declared. "For that matter, I don't think my men
would take his side either. They know him for the coward he
is."

"Aye, courage speaks," Helvis admitted, but she added,
"So does gold. And do you think Ortaias runs affairs in the
city today? My guess is he has to ask his uncle's leave before
he goes to the privy."

"That's worse, somehow," Scaurus muttered. Ortaias
Sphrantzes was a fool and a craven; his uncle Vardanes,
Marcus was sure, was neither. But try as he might to hide it,
the elder Sphrantzes had a coldly ruthless streak his nephew
lacked. The Roman would have trusted him further if he did
not make such an effort to hide his true nature with an affable
front. It was like perfume on a corpse, and made Marcus'
hackles rise.

He made a clumsy botch of explaining, and knew it. But
the feeling was still in his belly, and he did not think any
weight of gold could make it leave.

He also knew he was far from convincing Helvis. The only
principle the Namdaleni who fought for Videssos knew was
expedience; the higher the pay and fewer the risks, the better.

She walked over to the small altar she'd lately installed on
the cabin's eastern wall, lit a pinch of incense. "However you
decide," she said, "Phos deserves to be thanked." The sweet
fumes quickly filled the small stuffy space.

When the tribune remained silent, she swung round to face
him, really angry now. "You should be doing this, not me.
Phos alone knows why he gives you such chances, when you
repay him nothing. Here," she said, holding out the little ala-
baster jar of incense to him.

That peremptory, outthrust hand drove away the mild an-


swer that might have kept peace between them. The tribune
growled, "Probably because he's asleep, or more likely not
there at all." Her horrified stare made him wish he'd held his
tongue, but he had said too much to back away.

"If your precious Phos lets his people be smashed to
bloody bits by a pack of devil-loving savages, what good is
he? If you must have a god, pick one who earns his keep."

A skilled theologian could have come up with a number of
answers to his blunt gibe: that Phos' evil counterpart Skotos
was the power behind the success of the Yezda, or that from a
Namdalener point of view the Videssians were misbelievers
and therefore not entitled to their god's protection. But Helvis
was challenged on a far more fundamental level. "Sacrilege!"
she whispered, and slapped him in the face. An instant later
she burst into tears.

Malric woke up and started to cry himself. "Go back to
sleep," Scaurus snapped, but the tone that would have chilled
a legionary's heart only frightened the three-year-old. He cried
louder. Looking daggers at the tribune, Helvis stooped to
comfort her son.

Marcus paced up and down, too upset to hold still. But his
anger slowly cooled as Malric's wails shrank to whimpers and
then to the raspy breathing of sleep. Helvis looked up at him,
her eyes wary. "I'm sorry I hit you," she said tonelessly.

He rubbed his cheek. "Forget it. I was out of turn myself."
They looked at each other like strangers; in too many ways
they were, despite the child Helvis carried. What was I think-
ing, Scaurus asked himself, when I wanted her to share my
life?

From the half-wondering, half-measuring way she studied
him, he knew the same thought was in her mind.

He helped her to her feet; the warm contact of the flesh of
her hand against his reminded him of one reason, at least, why
the two of them were together. Though her pregnancy was
nearly halfway through, it had yet to make much of a mark on
her large-boned frame. There was a beginning bulge high on
her belly, and her breasts were growing heavier, but someone
who did not know her might have failed to notice her bigness.

But when Marcus tried to embrace her, she twisted free of
his arms. "What good will that do?" she asked, her back to
him. "It doesn't settle things, it doesn't change things, it just
puts them off. And when we're angry, it's no good anyway."




72     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

The tribune bit down an angry retort. More times than one,
troubles had dissolved in love's lazy aftermath. But her desire
had grown fitful since pregnancy began; understanding that
such things happened, Scaurus accepted it as best he could.

Tonight, though, he wanted her, and hoped it would help
heal the rift between them. He moved forward, put the palms

of his hands on her shoulders.

She wheeled, but not in desire. "You don't care about me
or what I feel at all," she blazed. "All you can think of is your

own pleasure."

"Ha!" It was anything but a laugh. "Were that so, I'd have

looked elsewhere long before this."

Having swallowed his anger once, Marcus hit too hard
when he finally loosed it. Helvis began to cry again, not with
the noisy sobs she had used before but quietly, hopelessly,
making no effort to wipe the tears from her face. They were
running down her cheeks when she blew out the lamp and, as
the wick's orange glow died, slid beneath the covers of the

sleeping mat.

Scaurus stood in darkness some endless while, listening to

the careful sobs that let out grief without disturbing the sleep-
ing boy. At last he bent down to stroke her through the thick
wool, not in want but to give what belated comfort he might.

She flinched away, as if from a blow. Careful not to touch
her further, the tribune got under the blankets himself. The
scent of incense was still in his nostrils, sweet as death.

He stared up at the low ceiling, though there was nothing
to see in the darkness. Eventually he slept.

When he woke, the Roman felt wrung out and used up as
after a day in battle. Helvis' face was puffed and blotchy from
crying. They spoke to each other, moved around each other,
with cautious courtesy, neither wanting to reopen last night's
wound. But Scaurus knew it would be a long time healing, if

it ever did.

He was glad of the excuse of seeing to his men to leave

quickly, and Helvis seemed relieved to see him go. The sol-
diers, of course, were oblivious to their commander's private
woes. They buzzed with excitement over the goldpiece he had
come across. The tribune managed a wry smile at that; he had
almost forgotten the coin and its meaning.

He soon found he had accurately gauged their mood. To a

Harry Turtledove             73

man, they felt contempt for Ortaias Sphrantzes. "The mimes
had the right of it," Minucius said. "With Thorisin Gavras
alive, there'll hardly be a fight. The Other'11 run till he falls off
the edge of the world."

"Aye, the Gavras is much better suited for kinging it,"
Viridovix agreed. "A fine talker he is, a rare good-looking
wight to boot, and the stomach of him can hold a powerful lot
of wine."

Gorgidas gave the Celt an exasperated look. "What does
any of that have to do with kingship?" he demanded. "By your
reckoning, Thorisin Gavras would make an excellent sophist,
a pretty girl—" Marcus blinked at his choice of that figure,
but had to admit its aptness. "—or a splendid sponge. But a
king? Scarcely. What the state needs from a king is justice."

"Well be damned to you, you and your sponges," the Gaul
said. "Forbye, be your would-be king never so just, if he talk
like a sausage seller and look like a mouse turd, not a soul will
pay him any mind at all. If you're a leader, ye maun fit the
part." He preened ever so slightly, reminding his listeners he
had been a noble with a large following himself.

"There's something to that," Gaius Philippus said. Reluc-
tant as he was to go along with Viridovix on anything, he had
led enough men to know how much of the art of leadership
was style.

Gorgidas dipped his head in reluctant agreement. "I know
there is. But it's too easy to look the part without having
what's really needed to play it. Take Alkibiades, for instance."
The name flew past centurion and Celt alike. Gorgidas sighed
and tried another tack, asking Viridovix, "What good does it
do a king to be able to outdrink his subjects?"

"Och, man, the veriest fool should be able to see that.
After standing the yapping of nitpickers all the day—" Viri-
dovix stared at Gorgidas until the doctor, reddening, urged
him on with a rude gesture "—what better way to ease the
sorrows than with sweet wine?" He smacked his lips.

"I must be going senile," Gorgidas muttered in Greek. "To
be outargued by a red-mustached Celt..." He let the sentence
trail off as he walked away.

Marcus left the discussion, too, walking out to the frozen
'fields to watch his soldiers exercise. Laon Pakhymer's Kha-
trishers darted here and there on horseback, wheeling, twist-
ing, suddenly stopping short. Others practiced mounted




74 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

archery, sending shafts slamming through heaped-up mounds
of straw. For all their camaraderie with the Romans, they were
still very much a separate command.

The foot soldiers, now, were something else again. The
hundreds of stragglers who had joined the Romans after Ma-
ragha, as well as Gagik Bagratouni's refugees, were beginning
to blend into the legionaries' ranks. Their beards and the
sleeves on their mail shirts still gave Videssians and Vaspura-
kaners an exotic look, but constant practice was making them
as adept with pilwn and stabbing gladius as any son of Italy.

Phostis Apokavkos gave the tribune a wave and a leathery
grin. Scaurus smiled back. He still felt good about taking the
farmer-soldier out of the capital's slums and making a legion-
ary of him. But then, Apokavkos had adopted the Romans as
much as they him, shaving his face and picking up Latin to
become as much like his new comrades as he could.

His tall, lean frame almost hid Doukitzes beside him. They
were fast friends; Scaurus sometimes wondered why. Dou-
kitzes was the sort of man Phostis had refused to become
during his hungry time in Videssos the city: a small-time thief.
The tribune had saved Doukitzes from losing his hand to
Mavrikios' angry judgment not long before Maragha. Perhaps
in gratitude, he had not plied his trade—or at least had not
been caught—since joining the Romans after the battle. He
waved, too, a little more hesitantly than Apokavkos.

Marcus watched their maniple let fly with a volley of
practice-pi'/a. He had a good little army, he thought with
somber pride. That was as well; it would need to be good,
soon enough.

Out of the comer of his eye he caught a motion decidedly
not military. Arms round one another's waists, intent only on
each other, Senpat Sviodo and Nevrat were making their slow,
happy way to their cabin.

The sudden stab of envy was like a knife twisting in
Scaurus' guts. The feeling's intensity was frightening, the
more so because only weeks before he had been half of such a
pair.

The world of the legions was simpler, he decided. Private
life would not run by the brute simplicity of orders. He
sighed, shook his head, and turned back to make what peace
he could with Helvis.

IV

THE SWARTHY KHAMORTH SCOUT, WEARING GRAY-BROWN

foxskins and mounted on a dun-colored shaggy pony, was like
a lump of winter mud against the bright green of spring.
Studying the plainsman closely, Marcus asked him, "How do I
know you're from Thorisin Gavras? We've seen snares be-
fore."

The nomad gave back a contemptuous stare. He had no
more use than his distant Yezda cousins for towns, plowed
fields, or the folk who cherished them. But he had sworn
loyalty to Gavras on his sword, and his clan-chief and the
imperial contestant had drunk wine mixed with their two
bloods.

Therefore he answered in his bad Videssian, "He bid me
ask you what he say about excitable women, that morning in
his tent."

"That they're great fun, but they wear," the tribune an-
swered, instantly satisfied. He remembered the morning in
question only too well, having been afraid Thorisin was about
to arrest him for treason. He was surprised Gavras also re-
called it. The then-Sevastokrator had been very drunk.

"You right," the Khamorth nodded. He grinned, a male
grin that cut across all differences in way of life. "He right,
too."

"There's something to it," Marcus agreed, and smiled
back. By Thorisin's standards, though, Helvis hardly counted
as excitable. The truce between her and Scaurus, brittle at
first, had firmed as winter passed. If there were things they no

75

76 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 77

longer spoke of, the tribune thought, surely that was a small
enough price to pay for peace.

Any peace with a price on it, part of his mind said for 'the
hundredth time, is too dearly bought. For the hundredth time,
the rest of him shouted that part down.

The plainsman had said something while he was in his
reverie. "I'm sorry?"

The disdain was back on the nomad's face; what good was
this fellow, if he would not even listen? Scaurus felt himself
flush. Speaking as if to an idiot child, the Khamorth repeated,
"You be ready to break camp, three days' time? Thorisin, his
men, so far behind me. I ride west meet them, bring here to
you to join. You be ready?"

Excitement boiled in the tribune- Three days' time, and he
would be cut off from the world no longer. Three days' time
to break a camp that had housed his men for a season? If the
Romans could not do it, they did not deserve their name.

"We'll be ready," he said.

The plainsmen swept a skeptical eye over ditch, palisade,
and the townlet that had grown up inside them. To him and
his, getting ready to leave a place was a matter of minutes, not
hours or days. "Three days' time," he said once more. He
made it sound like a warning.

Without waiting for an answer, he wheeled his little horse
and trotted away. From his attitude, he had already wasted
enough of this fine riding day on fanner folk.

A Khatrisher posted at the eastern end of Aptos' valley
waved his fur cap over his head. Close by Marcus, Laon Pa-
khymer waved back to show the signal was understood. Thor-
isin Gavras' outriders were in sight. The picket came gallop-
ing back.

"Form up!" the tribune yelled. The buccinators' trumpets
and comets echoed his command. His foot soldiers, Romans
and newcomers together, quick-marched to their positions be-
hind the nine manipular standards, the signa. Even after a year
and a half without it, Scaurus still missed the legionary eagle
his detachment had not rated.

Beside the infantry assembled the Khatrisher horsemen.
Pakhymer did not try to form them into neat ranks. They
looked like what they were: irregulars, longer on toughness
than order.

Most of Aptos' population lined the road into town. Fa-
thers carried small boys and girls pickaback so they could see
over the crowd—Phos alone knew when next an Emperor,
even one with so uncertain a right to that title, would come
this way.

From the talk he'd heard since the Khamorth scout ap-
peared, Marcus knew half the rustics were wondering whether
the hooves of Thorisin's horse would touch the ground. Those
who knew better, like Phorkos' widow Nerse, were there, too.

"Ahhh!" said the townsmen. Still small in the distance, the
first pair of Thorisin Gavras' cavalry came into view. They
carried parasols, and Scaurus knew them for the Videssian
equivalent of Rome's lictors with axes and bundles of fasces,
the symbols that power resided here. Another pair followed,
and another, until a dozen bright silk flowers bloomed ahead
of Gavras' men—the full imperial number, right enough.

Straining his eyes, the tribune saw Thorisin himself close
behind them, mounted on a fine bay horse. Only his scarlet
boots made any personal claim to rank; the rest of his gear was
good, but no more than that. Not even assuming the imperium
could make him fond of its trappings.

His army rumbled down the road behind him, almost all
cavalry, as was the Videssian way. Of all the nations the Em-
pire knew, only the Halogai preferred to fight afoot; Roman
infantry tactics had been an eye-opener here. Gavras' troops
were about evenly divided between Videssians and Vaspura-
kaners—no wonder he had coined money to the "princes'"
standard of weight.

"Good-looking men," Gaius Philippus remarked, and
Scaurus nodded. The unconscious arrogance with which they
rode said volumes about the confidence Thorisin had drilled
into them. After the disaster in front of Maragha, that was no
mean feat. Marcus' spirits rose.

He tried to gauge how many warriors accompanied Gavras
as they came toward him. Maybe a thousand in the valley so
far... now two ... three thousand—no, probably not that
many, for they had a good-sized baggage train in their midst.
Say twenty-five hundred.

A good, solid first division, the tribune thought. In a mo-
ment the rest of the army would show itself, and then he
would have a better idea of its real capabilities. Thorisin spot-




78

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

79

ted him in front of his assembled troops and gave him quite an
un-imperial wave. Wanned inside, he waved back.

It was certainly taking enough time for the next unit's van
to appear. Marcus reached up to scratch his head, felt foolish
as fingers rasped on the iron of his helmet.

"Hercules!" Gaius Philippus muttered under his breath. "I
think that's all of them."

Marcus wanted to laugh or cry, or, better, both at once.
This was Thorisin Gavras' all-conquering horde, with which
he would reclaim Videssos from the usurper and drive the
Yezda out of the Empire? Counting Pakhymer's few hundred,
he had almost this many men himself.

Yet as Gavras' parasol bearers rode past the assembled in-
habitants of Aptos, they bowed low to give honor to the Em-
peror. And as Thorisin brought his forces up to the troops
Marcus had drawn up in review, Laon Pakhymer went to his
knees and then to his belly in a full proskynesis, giving him
formal reverence as sovereign. So did Gagik Bagratouni and
Zeprin the Red, who stood near Scaurus.

The Roman, true to his homeland's republican ways, had
never prostrated himself for Mavrikios. He did not do so now,
contenting himself with a deep bow. He remembered how fu-
rious the younger Gavras had been the first time he failed to
bend the knee to the Emperor. Now Thorisin reined in his
horse in front of the tribune and said with a dry chuckle, "Still
stubborn as ever, aren't you?"

Directly addressed, Marcus lifted his head to study the Em-
peror at close range. Thorisin still sat his stallion with the
same jauntiness that had endeared him to Videssos' citizenry
when he was but Mavrikios' brother, still kept the ironic
gleam in his eye that made one ever uncertain how seriously
to take him. But there was a harder, somehow more finished
look to him than the Roman remembered; it was very much
like Mavrikios come again.

"Your Majesty, would you recognize me any other way?"
Scaurus asked.

Thorisin smiled for a moment. His gaze traveled up and
down the silent Roman ranks, estimating their numbers just as
the tribune had reckoned his. "You give yourself too little
credit," he said. "I'd know you by the wizardry that let you
bring your troop out so near intact. You were there at the
worst of it, weren't you?"

Scaurus shrugged. The worst of it had been where Mavri-
kios' Haloga bodyguard had fought for the Emperor to the last
man and perished with him at the end. He said nothing of that,
but Thorisin read it in his eyes. His smile slipped. "There will
be a reckoning," he said quietly. "More than one, in fact."

The matter-of-fact promise in his voice almost made it pos-
sible to forget that Mavrikios had failed against the Yezda with
an army of over fifty thousand men. His brother was undertak-
ing that task, along with simultaneous civil war, and his
forces, even adding in the Romans and their comrades, were
less than a tenth as great.

"If you've a mind to," Thorisin said to Marcus, "you can
dismiss your troopers. A little ceremonial takes me a long
way. Gather your officers together, round up some wine, and
we'll talk."

"So the pipsqueak really did start the rout?" Thorisin
mused. "I'd heard it before, but it galled me to believe it, even
of Ortaias." He shook his head. "One more reason for dealing
with him—as if I needed another."

Bareheaded, a mug in his hand, his red-booted feet
propped on a table, he looked like any long-time soldier tak-
ing his ease after travel. His commanders, Videssians and
Vaspurakaners both, were as nonchalant. Mavrikios had used
the elaborate imperial ceremonies to enhance his own dignity,
though he thought them foolisn. Thorisin simply could not be
bothered.

He listened closely as Scaurus told of the Romans' wan-
derings, slapped his thigh with his left hand when the Roman
explained how he had used Hannibal's trick to free himself
from the Yezda. "Turning flocks back on the nomads, eh? A
fine ploy and only just," he said.

The tribune did not mention Avshar's parting gift to him.
As soon as the Khamorth scout let him know Thorisin was
nearby, he had buried Mavrikios' head. With a real Gavras
very much present, the risk of a false one seemed smaller.

"Enough of this chatter about us," Viridovix said to the
Roman. He turned to Thorisin, asking him, "Where was it you
disappeared to, man? For months not a one of us knew if you
were alive or dead or off in fairyland to come back a hundred
years from now, the which would be no use at all to anybody."

Thorisin took no offense, which was as well; Viridovix




80 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

curbed his tongue for no one. His tale was about what the
tribune had expected. His mauled right wing of the great Vi-
dessian army had been pushed back into Vaspurakan's moun-
tain fastnesses, terrain even more rugged than that which the
Romans had crossed. There, much of the army had melted
away, beaten soldiers slipping off singly or in small groups to
try to make their way eastward.

Gaius Philippus nodded, commenting, "It's what I would
have guessed, looking at the men you have with you. The
peasant levies and fainthearts are long gone, dead or fled."

"That's the way of it," Thorisin agreed.

In one important respect, the younger Gavras' troops had
had a harder time of it than the Romans. The Yezda made a
real pursuit after them, and it took two or three bitter rear-
guard actions to shake free. "It was that cursed white-robed
devil," one of the Videssian officers said. "He stuck tighter
than a leech—aye, and sucked more blood, too."

Marcus and his entire party leaned forward, suddenly alert.
"So Avshar was trailing you, then," the tribune said. "No
wonder there was no sign of him in these parts—we had no
idea what was keeping him out of Videssos."

"I still don't," Gavras admitted. "He disappeared a couple
of weeks after the battle, and I have no idea where he is. As
much as anything, his going saved us—without him the
Yezda are fierce enough, but a rabble. With him—" Thorisin
fell silent; from his expression, the words stuck in his mouth
were not to his taste.

The officer who had mentioned Avshar—Indakos Sky-
litzes, his name was—asked Marcus, "Has Amorion gone
mad? We sent a man there to proclaim Thorisin, and they
horsewhipped him out of town—for a day, we thought he
might not live. Phos' little suns, even in civil war, heralds
have some rights." As a Videssian baron, Skylitzes knew
whereof he spoke.

"It's Zemarkhos' city now, and his word is law there,"
Marcus said. He paused as a new thought struck him. "Was
your envoy a Vaspurakaner, by any chance?"

Skylitzes looked uncertain, but Thorisin nodded. "Haik
Amazasp? I should say so. What has that to do with—? Oh."
His scowl deepened as he remembered how Amorion's fanatic
priest had wanted to start his persecution of the "heretics" with

r

Harry Turtledove             81

imperial backing. "Ortaias is welcome to his support—not
that he'll get much use from him."

"You'll avenge us?" Senpat Sviodo exclaimed eagerly.
"You won't regret it—Amorion is a perfect place to push east.
You know that as well as I." The young Vaspurakaner came
halfway out of his seat in enthusiasm. Gagik Bagratouni began
to rise, too, more slowly, but with a frightening sense of pur-
pose.

Thorisin, though, waved them down once more. "No, we're
after Videssos the city, nothing else. With it, the whole Em-
pire falls to us; without it, none of the rest is truly ours."

Seeing their outraged disappointment, he went on, "If you
don't mind your revenge at second hand, I think you'll get it.
The Namdaleni are moving east out of Phanaskert, and I ex-
pect Amorion will be in their line of march. They'll bring the
town down around Zemarkhos' ears if he squawks of heresy at
them—and he will. He's bigot enough." Gavras contemplated
the meeting with equanimity, even grim amusement. So, after
a moment, did the Vaspurakaners.

Scaurus was ready to agree. Any trap that closed on the
Namdaleni would be kicked open from the inside by six or
seven thousand heavy-armed cavalry. So the men of the
Duchy were on the move, too, were they? he thought. Armies
were flowing like driblets from melting icicles after the winter
freeze.

Something else occurred to him: the Namdaleni had a good
many more soldiers hereabouts than Thorisin did. He asked,
"What sort of understanding do you have with the easterners?"

"Mutual mistrust, as always," Gavras answered. "If they
see their way clear, they'll go for our throats. I don't intend to
give them the chance."

"Maybe Onomagoulos' men can come up from the south to
help keep an eye on them," Marcus suggested.

It was the Emperor's turn to be startled. "What? Baanes is
alive?"

"If traders' tales can be trusted," Gaius Philippus said, still
doubting the merchants' rumor. He set it forth for Thorisin,
who did not seem to find anything improbable in it.

"Well, well, good for the old fox. There's tricks left in him
after all," Gavras murmured, but he did not sound overjoyed
to Scaurus.

82 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

*   *   *

When Aptos disappeared behind a bend in the road, Gaius
Philippus heaved a long sigh. "First time in full many a year
I'm sorry to be on the move once more," he said.

"By the gods, why?" Marcus asked, surprised. Marching
under a spring sky was one of the pleasures of a soldier's life.
The last rains had given the foothills a carpet of new grass and
were recent enough to keep Videssos' dirt roads from turning
into choking ribbons of dust. The air was fine and mild, al-
most tasty, and sweetly clamorous with the calls of returning
birds. Even the butterflies looked fresh, their bright wings not
yet tattered and tarnished by time.

"Canna you tell?" Viridovix said to Scaurus. "The puir
lad's heart is all broken in flinders—or would be, if he re-
membered where he mislaid it."

"Oh, be damned to you," Gaius Philippus said, the mea-
sure of his upset shown by his falling into the Celt's idiom.

For a moment Marcus honestly had no idea of what Viri-
dovix was talking about, or why the senior centurion took the
gibe seriously. When he stopped to think, though, an answer
did occur to him. "Nerse?" he asked. "Phorkos' widow?"

"What if it is?" Gaius Philippus muttered, plainly sorry
he'd said anything at all.

"Well, why didn't you court her, then?" the tribune burst
out, but Gaius Philippus was doing no more talking. The vet-
eran set his jaw and stared straight ahead as he marched, en-
during Viridovix' teasing without snapping back. After a
while the Celt grew bored of his unrewarding fun and went off
to talk about swordplay with Minucius.

Studying Gaius Philippus' grim expression, Marcus came
to his own conclusions. Strange that a man who was utterly
fearless in battle, and who took fornication and rape as part of
the warrior's trade, should be scared witless of paying suit to a
woman for whom he felt something more than lust.

Thorisin Gavras' army hurried northeast toward the shore
of the Videssian Sea. Gavras hoped to commandeer shipping
and swoop down on Ortaias in the capital before the usurper
could make ready to meet him. But at each port his troops
approached, shipmasters hurried their vessels out to sea and
sent them fleeing to bring young Sphrantzes word of his com-
ing.

Harry Turtledove             83

The third time that happened, at a fishing village called
Tavas, Thorisin's short temper neared the snapping point.
"For two coppers I'd sack the place," he snarled, pacing up
and down like a caged tiger, watching a bulky merchantman's
brightly dyed sails recede into sea mist as it drove north out of
the Bay of Rhyax before turning east for the long run to Vi-
dessos.

He spat in disgust. "Bah! What's left here? Half a dozen
fishing boats. Phos willing, I could put a good dozen men in
each."

"You ought to pillage these faithless traders and peasants.
Teach them to fear you," Komitta Rhangavve said, walking
beside him. The fierce expression on her lean, aristocratic
features made her resemble a hunting hawk, beautiful but
deadly.

Alarmed at the bloodthirsty advice Gavras' lady gave,
Scaurus said hastily, "Perhaps it's as well the merchant got
away; Ortaias must be forewarned by now in any case. If the
fleet in the city stands with him, he'd smash anything you
could scrape together here."

Komitta Rhangavve glared at even this indirect disagree-
ment, but Thorisin sighed, a heavy, frustrated sound. "You're
probably right. If I could have brought it off at Prakana,
though, four days ago—" He sighed again, "What was that
thing poor Khoumnos used to say? 'If ifs and buts were can-
died nuts, then everyone would be fat.'" Nephon Khoumnos,
though, was half a year dead, struck down by Avshar's sorcery
at the battle before Maragha.

Neither Gavras nor Marcus found that a pleasant thought to
dwell on. Returning rather more directly to rebutting Komitta,
the tribune said, "At least the people hereabouts are for you,
whatever the shipmasters do."

The Emperor's smile was still sour. "Of course they are—
we've come far enough east that folk have had a good taste of
Ortaias' taxmen; aye, and of his money, too, though they'd
break teeth if they tried to bite it." Sphrantzes' wretched coin-
age was a standing joke in his opponent's army. As for his
revenue agents, Scaurus had yet to see one. They ran from
Thorisin even faster than the navarchs did.

Five days later came an envoy of Ortaias' who did not flee.
Accompanied by a guard force of ten horsemen, he rode delib-

84 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

erately up to Thorisin's camp at evening. One of the troopers
bore a white-painted shield on a spearstaff: a sign of truce.

"What can the henhearted wretch have to say to me?"
Thorisin snapped, but let the emissary's party approach.

The soldiers with Sphrantzes' agents were nonentities—
the hard shell of a nut, good only for protecting the kernel
within. The envoy himself was something else again. Marcus
recognized him as one of Vardanes Sphrantzes' henchmen, but
could not recall his name.

Thorisin had no such difficulty. "Ah, Pikridios, how good
to see you," he said, but there was venom in his voice.

Pikridios Goudeles affected not to notice. The bureaucrat
dismounted with a sigh of relief. He'd sat his horse badly;

from the look of his hands, the reins would have hurt them.
They were soft and white, their only callus on the right middle
finger. A pen-pusher right enough, Scaurus thought, feeling
the aptness of the Videssian soldiery's contemptuous term for
the Empire's civil servants.

Yet for all his unwarlike look, the small, dapper Goudeles
was a man to be reckoned with. His dark eyes gleamed with
ironic intelligence, and the quality of his nerve was adequately
attested by his very presence in the rival Emperor's camp.

"Your Majesty," he said to Thorisin, and went to one knee,
his head bowed—not a proskynesis, but the next thing to it.

Some of Gavras' soldiers cheered to see their lord so ac-
claimed by his foe's ambassador. Others growled because the
acclamation was incomplete. Thorisin himself seemed taken
aback. "Get up, get up," he said impatiently. Goudeles rose,
brushing dust from the knee of his elegant riding breeches.

He made no move to speak further. The silence stretched,
At last, conceding the point to him, Thorisin broke it: "Well,
what now? Are you here to turn your worthless coat? What
price do you want for it?"

Beneath the thin fringe of mustache, so like Vardanes',
Scaurus noticed—perhaps irrelevantly, perhaps not—Gou-
deles' lip gave a delicate curl, as if to say he had noticed the
insult but did not quite care to acknowledge it. "My lord Se-
vastokrator, I am merely here to help resolve the unfortunate
misunderstanding between yourself and his Imperial Majesty
the Avtokrator Ortaias Sphrantzes."

Every trooper who heard that shouted in outrage; hands
tightened on sword hilts, reached for spears and bows. "String

Harry Turtledove             85

the little bastard up!" someone yelled. "Maybe after he's hung
a while he'll know who the real Emperor is!" Three or four
men sprang forward. Goudeles' self-control wavered; he shot
an appealing glance at Thorisin Gavras.

Thorisin waved his soldiers back. They withdrew slowly,
stiffly, like dogs whistled off a kill they think theirs by right.
"What's going on?" Gaius Philippus whispered to Marcus. "If
this rogue won't own Gavras as Emperor, by rights he's fair
game."

"Your guess is as good as mine," the tribune answered.
With Gavras' hot temper, Scaurus had expected him to deal
roughly with Goudeles, ambassador or no—in civil war such
niceties of usage were easy enough to cast aside. It was lucky
Komitta was not in earshot of all this, he thought; she would
already be heating pincers.

Yet Thorisin's manner remained mild. Though a warrior by
choice, he had known his share of intrigue as well, and his
years at his brother's right hand in the capital made him alert
to subtleties less experienced men could miss. Voice still
calm, he asked Goudeles, "So you do not reckon me rightful
Avtokrator, eh?"

"Regrettably, I do not, my lord," Goudeles said, half-
bowing, "nor does my principal." His glance at Thorisin
was wary; they were fencing as surely as if they had sabers to
hand.

"Just a damned rebel, am I?"

Goudeles spread his soft hands, gave a fastidious shrug.

"Then by Skotos' dung-splattered beard," Thorisin
pounced, "why does your bloody principal—" He made the
word an oath. "—still style me Sevastokrator? Is that his bribe
to me, keeping a title he'll make sure is empty? Tell your
precious Sphrantzes I am not so cheaply bought."

The envoy from the capital looked artfully pained at
Gavras' crudity. "You fail to understand, my lord. Why should
you not remain Sevastokrator? The title was yours during your
deeply mourned brother's reign, and you are still close kin to
the imperial house."

Thorisin stared at him as if he had started speaking some
obscure foreign tongue. "Are you witstruck, man? The
Sphrantzai are no kin of mine—I share no blood with
jackals."

Once again, the insult failed to make an impression on

86     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Goudeles. He said, "Then your Majesty has not yet heard the
joyous news? How slowly it travels in these outlying dis-
tricts!"

"What are you yapping of?" Gavras demanded, but his

voice was suddenly tense.

His quarry vulnerable at last, Goudeles thrust home with
suave precision. "Surely the Avtokrator will pay you all re-
spect due a father-in-law, putting you in the late Emperor's
place. Why, it must be more man a month now since his
daughter Alypia and my lord Ortaias were united in wedlock."

Thorisin went white. Voice thick with rage, he choked out,
"Flee now, while you still have breath in you!" And Goudeles
and his guardsmen, with no ceremony whatever, leaped on
their horses and rode for their lives.

Gaius Philippus took a characteristically pungent view of
the marriage. "It'll do Ortaias less good than he thinks," he
said. "If he's the same kind of lover as he is a general, he'll
have to take a book to bed to know what to do with her."

Remembering the military tome constantly under
Sphrantzes' arm, Scaurus had to smile. But alone in his tent
with Helvis and the sleeping Malric later that evening, he
burst out, "It was a filthy thing to do. As good as rape, joining
Alypia to the house her father hated."

"Why so offended?" Helvis asked. She was very bulky
now, uncomfortable, and often irritable. With a woman's bit-
ter realism, she went on, "Are we ever anything but pawns in
the game of power? Beyond the politics of it, why should you

care?"

"The politics are bad enough." The marriage, forced or
not, could only rob Thorisin Gavras of support and gain it for
Ortaias and his uncle. Helvis was right, though: Marcus'
anger was more personal than for his cause. "From the little I
knew of her, I rather liked her," he confessed.

"What has that to do with the price of fish?" Helvis de-
manded. "Since the day you came to Videssos, you've known
the contest you were in; aye, and played it well, I'll not deny.
But it's not one with much room for things as small as likes."

Scaurus winced at that harsh picture of his career in his
adopted homeland. In Videssos, scheming was natural as
drawing breath. No one who hoped to advance could escape it
altogether.

Harry Turtledove             87

But Alypia Gavra, he thought, should not fall victim to it
merely by accident of birth. Behind the schooled reserve with
which she met the world, the tribune had felt a gentleness this
unconsented marriage would mar forever. The image of her
brought miserable and defenseless to Ortaias' bed made cold
fury flash behind his eyes.

And how, he asked himself, am I going to say that to
Helvis without lighting a suspicion in her better left unkin-
died? Not seeing any way, he kept his mouth shut.

Sentries' shouts woke Scaurus at earliest dawn. Stumbling
to his feet, he threw on a heavy wool mantle and hurried out
to see what the trouble was. Gaius Philippus was at the ram-
part before him, sword in hand, wearing only helmet and san-
dals.

Marcus followed the veteran's pointing finger. There was
motion at the edge of sight in the east, visible at all only
because silhouetted against the paling sky. "I give you two
guesses," the senior centurion said.

"You can have the first one back—I know an army when I
see it. Shows how sincere Goudeles' talk of Thorisin being an
honored father-in-law was, doesn't it?"

"As if we needed showing. Well, let's be at it." The vet-
eran's bellow made up for the comets and trumpets of the
still-sleeping buccinators. "Up, you weedy, worthless good-
for-nothings, up! There's work to do today!"

Romans tumbled from their tents, pulling on corselets and
tightening straps as they rushed to their places. Campfires
banked during the night were fed to new life to light the run-
ning soldiers' paths.

Marcus and Gaius Philippus looked at each other and, in
looking, realized they were hardly clad for battle. Gaius Phi-
lippus cursed. They dashed for their tents.

When the tribune emerged a couple of minutes later, he led
his troops out to deploy in front of their fortified camp. Pa-
khymer's light cavalry screened their lines. The Khatrishers'
winter-long association with the Romans made them as quick
to be ready as the legionaries. The rest of Thorisin Gavras'
forces were slower in emerging.

There was no time to plan elaborate strategies. Thorisin
rode up on his highbred bay, grunted approval at the Romans'




88 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

quiet steadiness. "You'll be on the right," he said. "Stay firm,
and we'll smash them against you."

"Good enough," Marcus nodded. Less mobile than the
mounted contingents of standard Videssian warfare, his in-
fantry usually got a holding role. As Gavras' cavalry came
into line, the tribune swung Pakhymer over to his own right to
guard against outflanking moves from the foe.

"A rare lovely day it is for a shindy, isn't it now?" Virido-
vix said. His mail shirt was painted in squares of black and
gold, imitating the checkered pattern of a Gallic tunic. A
seven-spoked wheel crested his bronze helm. His sword, a
twin to Scaurus', was still in its scabbard; his hand held no-
thing more menacing than a chunk of hard, dry bread. He took
a healthy bite.

The tribune envied him his calm. The thought of food re-
pelled him before combat, though afterwards he was always
ravenous. It was a beautiful morning, still a bit crisp with
night's chill. Squinting into the bright sunrise, Scaurus said,
"Their general knows his business, whoever he is. An early
morning fight puts the sun in our faces."

"Aye, so it does, doesn't it? What a rare sneaky thing to
think of," the Celt said admiringly.

Ortaias' army was less than half a mile away now, coming
on at a purposeful trot. It looked no larger than the one back-
ing Thorisin, Marcus saw with relief. He wondered what part
of the total force of the Sphrantzai it contained.

It was cavalry, as the tribune had known it would be. He
felt the hoofbeats like approaching thunder.

Quintus Glabrio gave his maniple some last instructions:

"When you use your pila, throw at their horses, not the men.
They're bigger targets, less well armored, and if a horse goes
down, he takes his rider with him." As always, the junior
centurion's tone was measured and under firm control.

There was no time for more speechmaking than that; the
enemy was very close. In the daybreak glare, it was still hard
to see just what manner of men they were. Some had the
scrubby look of nomads—Khamorth or even Yezda—while
others... lanceheads gleamed briefly crimson as they swung
down in a disciplined flurry. Namdaleni, Marcus thought
grimly. The Sphrantzai hired the best.

"Drax! Drax! The great count Drax!" shouted the men of
the Duchy, using their commander's name as war cry.

Harp/ Turtledove             89

"At them!" Thorisin Gavras yelled, and his own horsemen
galloped forward to meet the charge. Bowstrings snapped. A
Namdalener tumbled from his saddle, unluckily hit below the
eye at long range.

The enemy's light horse darted in front of the Namdaleni to
volley back at Thorisin's men. But the field was now too tight
for their hit-and-run tactics to be used to full effect. More
.     sturdily mounted and more heavily armed, the Videssians and
!     Vaspurakaners who followed Gavras hewed their way through
the nomads toward the men of the Duchy who were the op-
posing army's core.

The count Drax was new-come from the Duchy. The only
foot worth its pay he'd seen was that of the Halogai. Of
Romans he knew nothing. He took them for peasant levies
Thorisin had scraped up from Phos knew where. Crush them
quickly, he decided, and then deal with Gavras' outnumbered
cavalry at leisure. With a wave of his shield to give his men
direction, he spurred his mount at the legionaries.

Dry-mouthed, Scaurus waited to receive the charge. The
pounding hooves, the rhythmic shouting of the big men rush-
ing toward him like armored boulders, the long lances that all
seemed aimed at his chest... he could feel his calves tensing
with the involuntary urge to flee. Longsword in hand, his right
arm swung up.

Drax frowned in sudden doubt. If these were drafted
farmers, why were they not running for their paltry lives?

"Loose!" the tribune shouted. A volley of pila flew for-
ward, and another, and another. Horses screamed, swerved,
and fell as they were hit, pitching riders headlong to the
ground. Other beasts stumbled over the first ones down.
Namdaleni who caught Roman javelins on their shields cursed
and threw them away; the soft iron shanks of the pila bent
with ease, fouling the shields beyond use.

Still, the legionaries sagged before the slowed charge's
momentum. Trumpets blared, calling squads from the flank to
hold the embattled center. The mounted surge staggered,
stalled, turned to melee.

The knight who came at Scaurus was about forty, with a




90     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

cast in his right eye and a twisted little finger. Near immobile
in the press, he jabbed at the tribune with his lance. Marcus
parried, ducking under the thrust. His strong blade bit through
the wood below the lancehead, which flew spinning. Eyes
wide with fear, the Namdalener swung the ruined lance as he
might a club. Scaurus ducked again, stepped up and thrust,
felt his point pierce chain and flesh. Sphrantzes* mercenary
gave a shriek that ended in a bubbling moan. Scarlet foam on

his lips, he slid to the ground.

Close by, Zeprin the Red raised his long-hafted Haloga war
axe high above his helmet, to bring it crashing down on a
horse's head. Brains flew, pink-gray. The horse foundered like
a ship striking a jagged rock. Pinned under it, its Namdalener
rider screamed with a broken ankle, but not for long. A sec-
ond stroke of the great axe silenced him for good.

An unhorsed mercenary slashed at Scaurus, who took the
blow on his shield. His scutum was bigger and heavier than
the horseman's lighter shield. Marcus shoved out with it. The
man of the Duchy stumbled backwards, tripped on a corpse's
upthrust foot. A legionary drove a stabbing-sword into his

throat.

Though the Namdalener charge was checked, they still

fought with the skill and fierceness Marcus had come to know.
Foul-mouthed Lucilius stood staring at his broken sword, the
hard steel snapped across by a cunning lance stroke. "Well,
fetch me a whole one!" he shouted, but before anybody could,

a man of the Duchy rode him down.

"By all the gods, why aren't these bastards on our side?
They're too bloody much work to fight," Gaius Philippus
panted. There was a great dent in the right side of his helmet,
and blood flowed down his face from a cut over one eye. The
tide of battle swept them apart before Scaurus could answer.

A Namdalener stabbed down at someone writhing on the
ground before him. He missed, swore, and brought his blade
back for another stroke. So intent was he on his kill that he
never noticed Marcus until the tribune's Gallic longsword

drank his life.

Marcus pulled the would-be victim up, then stared in dis-
belief. "Grace," said Nevrat Sviodo, and kissed him full on
the mouth. The shock was as great as if he'd taken a wound.
Slim saber in hand, she slipped back into battle, leaving him
gaping after her.

Hairy Turtledove             91

"Watch your left, sir!" someone cried. The tribune jerked
up his shield in reflex response. A lancehead glanced off it;

the Namdalener swept by without time for another blow.
Marcus shook himself—surprise had almost cost him his
neck.

With a banshee whoop, Viridovix leaped up behind a
mounted mercenary and dragged him from his horse. He
jerked up the luckless man's chin, drew sword across his
throat like a bow over a viol's strings. Blood fountained. The
Gaul shouted in triumph, sawed through windpipe and back-
bone. He lifted the dripping head and hurled it into the close-
packed ranks of the Namdaleni, who cried out in horror as
they recoiled from the grisly trophy.

The count Drax was not altogether sorry to see retreat
begin. These foot soldiers of Thorisin's, whoever they were,
fought like no foot he had met. They bent but would not
break, rushing men from quiet spots along the line to meet
threats so cleverly that no new points of weakness appeared.
Quite professional, he thought with reluctant admiration.

From his left wing, the Khatrishers were spraying his
bogged-down men with arrows and then darting away, just as
he had hoped his hireling nomads would to Thorisin Gavras'
heavy horse. But his clans of plainsmen were squeezed be-
tween his own men and the oncoming enemy. Soon they
would break and run—to stand against this kind of punish-
ment was not in them.

With a wry smile, Drax of Namdalen realized it was not in
him, either. When Gavras' cavalry broke through the nomads
and stormed into his stalled knights, the result would be un-
pleasant. And in the end, a mercenary captain's loyalty was to
himself, not to his paymaster. Without men, he would have
nothing to sell.

He reined in, tried to wheel his horse among his tight-
packed countrymen. "Break off," he shouted, "and back to
our camp! Keep your order, by the Wager!"

Marcus heard the count's shout to his men but was not sure
he understood it; among themselves, the Namdaleni used a
broad patois quite different from the Videssian spoken in the
Empire. Yet he soon realized what Drax must have ordered,
for pressure eased all along the line as the men of the Duchy




r

92 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Ham/ Turtledove 93

broke off combat. It was skillfully done; the Namdaleni knew
their business and left the legionaries few openings for mis-
chief.

The tribune did not pursue them far. In part he was ruled
by the same concern that governed Drax: not to spend his men
unwisely. Moreover, the notion of infantry chasing horsemen
did not appeal. If the Namdaleni spun round and counterat-
tacked, they could cut off and destroy big chunks of his small
force. In loose order the Romans would be horribly vulnerable
to the tough mounted lancers.

Gavras' cavalry and the Khatrishers followed Sphrantzes'
men for a mile or two, harassing their retreat, trying to turn it
to rout. But when the Romans were not added in, the Namda-
leni and their nomad outriders probably outnumbered the
forces opposed to them. They withdrew in good order.

Scaurus looked up in the sky, amazed. The sun, which had
but moments before—or so it seemed—blazed straight into
his face as it rose, was well west of south. Marcus realized he
was tired, hungry, dry as the Videssian plateau in summer,
and in desperate need of easing himself. A slash on his sword
hand he did not remember getting began to throb, the more so
when sweat ran down his arm into it. He flexed his fingers.
They all moved—no tendon was cut.

Legionaries were plundering the corpses of their fallen op-
ponents. Others cut the throats of wounded horses, and of
those Namdaleni so badly hurt as to be beyond hope of recov-
ery. Foes with lesser injuries got the same rough medical
treatment the Romans did—they could be ransomed later and
hence were more valuable alive than dead.

Seriously wounded Romans were carried back into camp
on litters for such healing as Gorgidas and Nepos could give.
Marcus found the fat priest directing a double handful of
women as they cleaned and bandaged wounds. Of Gorgidas
there was no sign.

Surprised at that, Scaurus asked where the Greek doctor
was. "Don't you know?" one of Nepos' helpers exclaimed,
and began to giggle.

The tribune, worn out as he was, could make no sense of
that. He stared foolishly. Nepos said gently, "You'll find him
at your own tent, Scaurus."

"What? Why is he—? Oh!" Marcus said. He began to run,

though a moment before simply standing on his feet had been
almost beyond him.

In fact Gorgidas was not in the tribune's tent, but coming
back the way Scaurus was going. Dodging the tribune, he
said, "Greetings. How went your stupid battle?"

"We won," Marcus answered automatically. "But—but—"
he sputtered, and ran out of words. For once there were more
urgent things than warfare.

"Rest easy, my friend. You have a son." His spare features
alight, Gorgidas took the tribune's arm.

"Is Helvis all right?" Marcus demanded, though the smile
on the physician's face told him nothing could be seriously
amiss.

"As well as could be expected—better, I'd say. One of the
easier births I've seen, less than half a day. She's a big-hipped
girl, and it was not her first. Yes, she's fine."

"Thank you," Scaurus said, and would have hurried on,
but Gorgidas kept the grip on his arm. The tribune turned
round once more. Gorgidas was still smiling, but his eyes
were pensive and far away. "I envy you," he said slowly. "It
must be a marvelous feeling."

"It is," Marcus said, startled at the depth of sadness in the
doctor's voice. He wondered if Gorgidas had meant to lay
himself so bare, yet at the same time was touched by the
physician's trust. "Thank you," he said again. Their eyes met
in a moment of complete understanding.

It passed, and Gorgidas was his astringent self once more.
"Go on with you," he said, lightly pushing the tribune for-
ward. "I have enough to do, trying to patch the fools who'd
sooner take life than give it." Shaking his head, he made his
way down to the injured men not far away.

Minucius' companion Erene was with Helvis, her own
daughter, scarcely two months old, asleep in the crook of her
arm. The inside of the tribune's tent smelled of blood, the hot,
rusty scent as thick as Scaurus had ever known it on the field.
Truly, he thought, women fought battles of their own.

Perhaps expecting to see Gorgidas again, Erene started
when Marcus, still sweating in his armor, pulled open the
tentflap. She knew at once why he had come, but had her own
concerns as well. "Is Minucius safe?" she asked anxiously.

"Yes, he's fine," Marcus answered, unconsciously echoing




94 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Gorgidas a few minutes before. "Hardly a scratch—he's a
clever fighter."

His voice woke Helvis, who had been dozing. Scaurus
stooped beside her, kissed her gently. Erene, her fears at rest,
slipped unnoticed from the tent.

The smile Helvis gave the tribune was a tired one. Her soft
brown hair was all awry and still matted with sweat; purple
circles were smudged under her eyes. But there was a triumph
in them as she lifted the small blanket of soft lambswool and
offered it to Scaurus.

"Yes, let me see him," Marcus said, carefully taking the
light burden from her.

" 'Him' ? You've already seen Gorgidas," Helvis accused,
but Marcus was not listening. He looked down at the face of
his newbom son. "He looks like you," Helvis said softly.

"What? Nonsense." The baby was red, wrinkled, flat-
nosed, and almost bald; he looked scarcely human, let alone
like anyone in particular. His wide gray-blue eyes passed
across the tribune's face, then returned and seemed to settle
for a moment.

The baby wiggled. Scaurus, unaccustomed to such things,
nearly dropped him. An arm came free of the swaddling blan-
ket; a tiny fist waved in the air. Marcus cautiously extended a
finger. The groping hand touched it, closed in a grasp of sur-
prising strength. The tribune marveled at its miniature perfec-
tion—palm and wrist, pink-nailed fingers and thumb, all
compressed into a space no longer than the first two joints of
his middle finger.

Helvis misunderstood his examination. "He's complete,"
she said; "ten fingers, ten toes, all where they should be."
They laughed together. The noise startled the baby, who began
to cry. "Give him to me," Helvis said, and snuggled him
against her. In her more knowing hold, the baby soon quieted.

"Do we name him as we planned?" she asked.

"I suppose so," the tribune sighed, not altogether happy
with a bargain they'd made months before. He would have
preferred a purely Roman name, with some good Latin prae-
nomen ahead of the Aemilii Scauri's long-established nomen
and cognomen. Helvis had argued, though, and with justice,
that such a name slighted her side of their son's ancestry. Thus
they decided the child's use-name would be Dosti, after her

Harry Turtledove             95

father; when heavier style was needed, he had a sonorous
patronymic.

"Dosti the son of Aemilius Scaurus," Marcus said, rolling
it off his tongue. He suddenly chuckled, looking at his tiny
son. Helvis glanced up curiously. "For now," he explained,
"the little fellow's name is longer than he is."

"You're out of your mind," she said, but she was smiling
still.

THE EARLY SUMMER SUN STOOD TALL IN THE SKY. THE CITY

Videssos, capital and heart of the Empire that bore its name,
gleamed under the bright gaze. White stucco and marble,
tawny sandstone, brick the color of blood, the myriad golden
globes on Phos' temples—all seemed close enough to reach
out and touch, even when seen from the western shore of the
strait the Videssians called the Cattle-Crossing.

But between the army on that western shore and the object
of its desire swung an endlessly patrolling line of bronze-
beaked warships. Ortaias Sphrantzes might have lost the
transmarine suburbs of the capital, but when his forces pulled
out they left behind few vessels larger than a fishing smack.
Not even Thorisin Gavras' impetuosity made him eager to risk
a crossing in the face of the enemy fleet.

Balked from advancing further, his frustration grew with
his army. He summoned an officers' council to what had been
the local governor's residence until that bureaucrat fled to Or-
taias. An east-facing window of clear glass gave a splendid
view of the Cattle-Crossing and Videssos the city beyond.
Marcus suspected Gavras had chosen the meeting place as a
goad to his generals.

Baanes Onomagoulos said, "Thorisin, without ships of our
own, we'll stay here till we die of old age, and that's how it is.
We could have ten times the men we do, and they wouldn't be
worth a counterfeit copper to us. We have to get control of the
sea."

He thumped his stick on the table; his wound had left his
right leg shrunken and lame.

Harry Turtledove             97

Thorisin glared at him, not so much for what he said but
for the patronizing way he said it. Short, lean, and bald, Ono-
magoulos had a hard, big-nosed face; he had been Mavrikios
Gavras' comrade since they were boys, but had never quite
got the idea that the dead Emperor's little brother was now a
man in his own right.

"I can't wish ships here," Thorisin snapped. "The Sphrant-
zai pay their captains well, if no one else. They know they're
all that's keeping their heads from going up on the Milestone."

Privately, Marcus thought that an exaggeration. Along with
Videssos' proud buildings and elegant gardens, its fortifica-
tions—the mightiest the Roman had ever seen—were visible
from this seaside house. Even with the Cattle-Crossing some-
how overleaped, an assault on that double line of frowning
dun walls was enough to daunt any soldier. One problem at a
time, he thought.

"Onomagoulos is right, I t'ink. Wit'out ships, you fail.
Why not get dem from the Duchy?" Utprand Dagober's son
entered the debate for the first time, his island accent almost
thick enough to pass for that of the Namdaleni's Haloga
cousins. His men were new-come to the seacoast, having
marched and fought their way from Phanaskert clear across
the Videssian westlands.

"Now there's a notion," Thorisin said dryly. Plainly he did
not much like it, but Utprand's forces had swelled his own by
a third. It behooved him to walk soft.

The Namdalener smiled a wintry smile; winter seemed at
home in his eyes, the chill blue of the ice his northern ances-
tors left behind when they took Namdalen from the Empire
two hundred years before. Matching Gavras irony for irony,
he asked, "You cannot misdoubt our good fait'?"

"Surely not," Thorisin replied, and there were chuckles up
and down the table. The Duchy of Namdalen had been a mom
in Videssos' flesh since its stormy birth. Its Haloga con-
querors did not stay rude pirates long, but learned much from
their more civilized subjects. That learning made their mixed-
blooded descendants dangerous, subtle warriors. They fought
for the Empire, aye, but they and their paymasters both knew
they would seize it if they could.

"Well, what would you?" Soteric Dosti's son demanded of
Gavras. Helvis' brother sat at Utprand's left hand; the young
Namdalener had risen fast since the tribune last saw him. He

98 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

went on, "Would you sooner win this war with our help, or
lose without?"

Scaurus flinched; Soteric always presented choices so as to
make yea unpalatable as nay. Save for a proud nose that be-
spoke partly Videssian ancestry, his features were much like
his sister's, but his wide mouth habitually drew up in a thin,
hard line.

Thorisin looked from him to the tribune and back again.
Marcus' own lips compressed; he knew the Emperor still car-
ried misgivings over the ties of friendship and blood between
Romans and Namdaleni. But Gavras' answer was mild
enough: "There still may be other alternatives than those."

His gaze swung back to Scaurus. "What say you?" he
asked. "Not much, so far."

The tribune was glad of a question he could deal with dis-
passionately. "That ships are needed, no one can doubt. As to
how to get them, others here know better than I. We Romans
always took more naturally to fighting on land than on the sea.
Put me on the other side of the Cattle-Crossing and you'll hear
advice from me in plenty, never fear."

Thorisin smiled mirthlessly. "I believe that—the day you
don't speak your mind is the day I begin to suspect you. And I
grant you, silence is better than breaking wind by mouth when
you've nothing useful to say."

But, having just disclaimed knowledge of naval warfare,
Marcus thought back to his lost homeland's past. "My people
fought wars with a country called Carthage, which at first had
a strong fleet where we had none. We used a beached ship of
theirs as a model for our own and soon we were challenging
them on the sea. Could we not build our own here?"

The idea had not occurred to Gavras, whose thinking had
dealt solely with ships already in existence. He rubbed his
bearded chin as he thought; Marcus thought the white streaks
on either side of his jaw were wider than they had been a year
ago. Finally the Emperor asked, "How long did it take your
folk to get their navy built?"

"Sixty days for the first ship, it's said."

"Too long, too long," Thorisin muttered, as much to him-
self as to his marshals. "I begrudge every day that passes.
Phos alone knows what the Yezda are doing behind us."

"Not Phos alone," Soteric said, but so low Gavras could
not hear. Few of the tales that the Namdaleni brought from

Harry Turtledove             99

their journey across Videssos were gladsome. Though they
had no love for Thorisin Gavras, they agreed that the sooner
he won his civil war—if he could—the better his hope of
reclaiming the westlands for Videssos.

The Emperor refilled his wine cup from a shapely carafe of
gilded silver—like the house in which the council sat, a pos-
session of the recently departed governor. Gavras spat on the
dark slate floor in rejection of Skotos and all his works, then
raised his eyes and hands on high as he prayed to Phos—the
same ritual over wine Scaurus had seen his first day in the
Empire.

He realized with some surprise, though, that now he un-
derstood the prayer. What Gorgidas had said so long ago was
true; little by little, Videssos was setting its mark on him.

Half an hour's ride south of the suburb the Videssians sim-
ply called "Across," citrus orchards came down to the sea,
leaving only a thin strand of white beach to mark the coast-
line. Scaurus tethered his borrowed horse to the smooth gray
branch of a lemon tree, then cursed softly when in the dark-
ness he scraped his arm on one of the tree's protecting spines.

It was nearly midnight on a moonless night; the men dis-
mounting near the Roman were but blacker shadows under
Videssos' strange stars. The light from the great city on the
eastern shore of the strait was of more use than their cold
gleam, or would have been, had not a war galley's cruel sil-
houette blocked most of it from sight.

Gaius Philippus nearly tripped as he dismounted. "A pox
on these stirrups," he muttered in Latin. "I knew I'd forget the
bloody things."

"Quiet, there," Thorisin Gavras said, walking out onto the
beach. The rest of his party followed. It was so dark the
members were hard to recognize. What little light there was
glistened off Nepos' smooth-shaved head and showed his
short, tubby frame; Baanes Onomagoulos' painful rolling gait
was also unmistakable. Most of the officers were simply tall
shapes, one interchangeable with the next.

Gavras unhooded a tiny lantern, once, twice, three times.
A cricket chirped in such perfect imitation of the signal that
men jumped, laughing quick, nervous, almost silent laughs.
But the insect call was not the response Thorisin awaited.

"There's too many of us here," Onomagoulos said ner-

100 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

vously. A few seconds later he added, "Your precious fellow
out there will get the wind up."

"Hush," Gavras said, making a gesture all but invisible in
the dark. From the bow of the silent warship came one flash,
then a second.

Thorisin gave a soft grunt of satisfaction, sent back a single
answering flash. All was dark and silent for a few moments,
then Marcus heard the soft slap of waves on wood as a boat
was lowered from that lean, menacing shape ahead.

The tribune's right hand curled round his sword hilt.
"Other alternatives"—he recalled Gavras' words of a week
before only too well. This parley struck him as suicidally fool-
ish; if the admiral aboard that bireme—drungarios of the fleet
was his proper title, Marcus remembered—chose treachery
and landed marines, the rebellion against the Sphrantzai
would be short-lived indeed.

Thorisin had only laughed at him when he put his fears into
words. "You never met Taron Leimmokheir, or you wouldn't
speak such nonsense. If he promises a safe meeting, a safe
meeting there will be. It's not in him to lie."

The boat was beyond its parent vessel's shadow now, and
Scaurus saw Gavras had been right. There were but three men
in it: a pair of rowers and a still figure at the stem who had to
be the drungarios. The rowers feathered their oars so skillfully
that they passed silently over the sea. Only the green-blue
phosphorescence that foamed up at each stroke told of then-
passage.

The little rowboat beached, its keel scraping softly against
sand. The rowers leaped out to pull it past waves' reach.
When it was secured, Leimmokheir came striding toward the
knot of men waiting for him by the trees. Either he was a
lucky man or his night sight was very keen, for he unerringly
picked out Thorisin Gavras from among his followers.

"Hello, Gavras," he said, clasping Thorisin's hand. "This
skulking around by night is a dark business more ways than
one, and I don't care for it a bit." His voice was deep and
hoarse, roughened by years of shouting over wind and wave.
Even at first hearing, Marcus understood why Thorisin Gavras
trusted this man; it was not possible to imagine him deceitful.

"A dark business, aye," Gavras agreed, "but one which can
lead toward the light. Help us pass the Cattle-Crossing and
oust Ortaias the fool and his uncle the spider. Phos, man,

Harry Turtledove            101

you've had half a year now to see how the two of them run
things—they aren't fit to clean the red boots, let alone to wear
'em."

Taron Leimmokheir drew in a slow, thoughtful breath. "I
gave my oath to Ortaias Sphrantzes when it was not known if
you were alive or dead. Would you forswear me? Skotos' ice
is the final home for oathbreakers."

"Would you see the Empire dragged down to ruin by your
scruples?" Thorisin shot back. There were times when he
sounded all too much like Soteric, and Scaurus instinctively
knew he was taking the wrong tack with this man.

"Why not work with them, not against?" Leimmokheir re-
turned. "They freely offer you the title you bore under your
brother, may good Phos shine upon his countenance, and de-
clare their willingness to bind themselves by any oaths you
name."

"Were it possible, I'd say I valued the oaths of the
Sphrantzai less even than their coins."

That got home; Leimmokheir let out a bark of laughter
before he could check himself. But he would not change his
mind. "You've grown bitter and distrustful," he said. "If noth-
ing else, the fact that you and they are now related by mar-
riage will hold them to their pledges. Doubly damned are
those who dare against kinsmen."

"You are an honest, pious man, Taron," Thorisin said re-
gretfully. "Because you have no evil in you, you will not see it
in others."

The drungarios half bowed. "That may be, but I, too, must
try to do right as I see it. When next we meet, I will fight
you."

"Seize him!" Soteric said urgently. At the edge of hearing,
Leimmokheir's two sailors snapped to alertness.

But Gavras was shaking his head. "Would you make a
Sphrantzes of me, Namdalener?" Close by, Utprand rumbled
agreement. Thorisin ignored him, turning back to Taron
Leimmokheir, "Go on, get out," he said. Marcus had never
heard such bitter weariness in his voice.

The drungarios bowed once more, this time from the waist.
He walked slowly down to his boat, turned as if to say some-
thing. Whatever it was, it did not pass his lips. He sat down at
the boat's stem; his men pushed it out until they were waist-
deep in the sea, then scrambled aboard themselves. Oars rose

102 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

and fell; the rowboat turned in a tight circle, then moved
steadily back to the galley.

Marcus heard a rope ladder creak as it took weight, the
sound faint but clear across the water. Taron Leimmokheir's
raspy bass rumbled a command. The bireme's quiet oars
awoke, sending it gliding south like some monster centipede.
It disappeared behind an outjutting point of land.

Thorisin watched it go, disappointment plain in every line
of his body. He said softly to himself, "Honest and pious, yes,
but too trusting by half. One day it will cost him."

"If it doesn't cost us first," Indakos Skylitzes exclaimed.
"Look there!" From the north, a longboat was darting toward
the lonely stretch of beach; no little ship's gig this, but a
twenty-footer packed to the gunwales with armed men.

"Sold!" Gavras said, disbelief in his voice. He stood frozen
for a moment as the longboat came ashore. "Phos curse that
basebom treacher for all eternity. Belike he landed marines
south of us, too, just as soon as he was out of sight, to make it
a good, thorough trap."

His sword rang free of scabbard. It glittered coldly in un-
caring starlight. "Well, as friend Baanes said, there's more of
us here than he reckoned on. We can give mis lot a fight.
Videssos!" he yelled, and charged the longboat, where sol-
diers were still climbing out onto the beach.

Scaurus among them, his officers pounded after him, sand
spraying up as they ran. Only Nepos and Onomagoulos hung
back—the one was no warrior, while the other could scarcely
walk.

It was four to three against Gavras' party, or something
close to that; there must have been twenty men in the
grounded boat. But instead of using their numbers to any ad-
vantage, they stood surprised, waiting to receive their foes'
onset.

"Ha, villains!" Thorisin cried. "Not the easy assassination
you were promised, is it?" He cut at one of the men from the
boat, who parried and slashed back. Lithe as a serpent, Thori-
sin twisted, cut again. The man groaned, dropped his blade to
clutch at the spurting gash below his left shoulder. A last
stroke, this one two-handed, ripped into his belly. He slumped
to the sand, unmoving.

Marcus never wanted to know another fight like this battle
in the darkness. To tell friend from foe was all but impossible,

Harry Turtledove            103

and it was not easy even to strike a blow. The beach sand was
as treacherous as the combat, sliding and shifting so a man
could hardly keep his feet planted under him.

An attacker slashed at Scaurus; his saber hissed past the
tribune's ear. He stumbled back, wishing for a cuirass or
shield. To hold the man off, he lunged out in a stop-thrust, and
his opponent, intent on finishing an enemy he thought at his
mercy, rushed forward to skewer himself on the blade he
never saw. He grunted, coughed wetly, and died.

If none of Gavras' companions wore armor, the same
seemed true of their assailants; few men who traveled by sea
would risk its perilous weight. And Thorisin's followers were
masters of war, soldiers who had come to their high ranks
through years of honing their fighting skills. When coupled
with their fury at this betrayal-caused battle, that balanced the
advantage their enemies' numbers gave them.

Soon the would-be assassins sought escape, but they found
no more than they would have granted. Three tried to launch
the longboat once more, but they were cut down from behind.

Long legs churning through the sand, Soteric raced down
the beach after the last of the fleeing bravoes. Finding flight
useless, the warrior whirled to defend himself. Steel rang on
steel. It was too black for Marcus to see much of that fight,
but the Namdalener beat down his foe's guard with hammer-
strokes of his sword and stretched him bleeding and lifeless on
the soft white strand.

Scaurus' eyes jumped everywhere looking for more ene-
mies, but there were none. A worse task began—seeing who
among Thorisin's men had fallen. Indakos Skylitzes was
down, as were two Vaspurakaner officers the tribune did not
know well and a Namdalener who had accompanied Utprand
and Soteric. The tribune wondered who would receive the
dead man's sword, and what lives would suddenly be
wrenched askew.

Gavras was jubilant. "Well fought, well fought!" he yelled,
his glee filling the beach. "Thus always to murderers! They—
here, stop that! What in Phos' holy name are you doing?"

Baanes Onomagoulos had been stumping up and down,
methodically slitting the throats of those attackers who still
moved. His hands gleamed, wet, black, and slick in the stars'
pale light.

"What do you think?" Onomagoulos retorted. "That ac-

104 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 105

cursed Leimmokheir's marines will be here any time. Should I
leave these whoresons to tell 'em where we've gone?"

"No," Thorisin admitted. "But you should have saved one
for questioning."

"Too late now." Onomagoulos spread his bloody hands.
"Nepos," he called, "make a light. I'd wager we'll have the
answer to any questions soon enough."

The priest came up to Onomagoulos' side. His breathing
grew deep and steady. Gavras' officers muttered in awe as a
pale, golden radiance sprang into being round his hands.
Marcus was less wonder-struck than some; this was a miracle
he had seen before, from Apsimar the prelate of Imbros.

For all the amazement Baanes Onomagoulos showed,
Nepos might have lit a torch. The half-crippled noble pain-
fully bent by one of the fallen attackers. His knife snicked out
to slit a belt-pouch. Goldpieces—a surprising number of
goldpieces—spilled onto the sand. Onomagoulos scooped
them up, held them close to Nepos' glowing palms. Thorisin's
marshals crowded close to look.

"'Ort. the 1st Sphr., Avt. of Vid.,'" Onomagoulos read
from a coin, not bothering to stretch the abbreviation full
length. "Here's Ort. the first again—again." He turned a
goldpiece over. "And again. Nothing but Phos-curse Ort. the
first, in fact."

"Aye, ahnd ahll fresh-minted, too." That flat-voweled ac-
cent had to belong to Utprand Dagober's son.

"What else would Leimmokheir use to pay his hired
killers?" Onomagoulos asked rhetorically.

"How could the Sphrantzai have infected him with their
treachery?" Thorisin wondered. "Vardanes must be leagued
with Skotos, to have suborned Taron Leimmokheir."

No one answered him; the crackle of brush pushed aside,
loud in the midnight stillness, came from the south. Swords
flew up instinctively. Nepos' light vanished as he took his
concentration from it. "The son of a manurebag did land ma-
rines!" Onomagoulos growled.

"I don't think so," Gaius Philippus said. Woods-wise, he
went on, "I think the noise was closer to us, made by some-
thing smaller than a man—a fox, maybe, or a badger."

"You are right, I think," Utprand said.

Not even the centurion of the Namdalener, though, seemed
eager to wait and test their guess. With their comrades, they

hurried back to their mounts. Soteric, Scaurus, and Nepos
quickly lashed the bodies of Gavras' slain commanders to
their horses. Moments later, they were trotting north through
the orchard. Branches slapped at the tribune before he knew
they were there.

If Leimmokheir's marines were behind the officers, they
never caught them up. When Thorisin and his followers
emerged from the fragrant rows of trees, the Emperor galloped
his horse a quarter of a mile in sheer exuberance at being
alive. He waited impatiently for his men to join him.

When they reached him at last, he had the air of a man who
had come to a decision. "Very well, then," he declared. "If we
cannot cross with Leimmokheir's let, we shall in his despite."

"'In his despite,'" Gorgidas echoed the next morning. "A
ringing phrase, no doubt." The Roman camp was full of ex-
citement as word of the night's adventure raced through
Gavras' army. Viridovix, as was his way when left out of a
fight, was wildly jealous and sulked for hours until Scaurus
managed to jolly him from his sour mood.

The tribune's men bombarded him and Gaius Philippus
with questions. Most were satisfied after one or two, but Gor-
gidas kept on, trying to pull from the Romans every detail of
what had gone on. His cross-questioning was sharp as a jur-
ist's, and he soon succeeded in annoying Gaius Philippus.

A more typical Roman than the thoughtful Scaurus, the
senior centurion had little patience for anything without obvi-
ous practical use. "You don't want us," he complained to the
doctor. "You want one of the buggers Onomagoulos let the air
out of, to go at him with pincers and hot iron."

The Greek took no notice of his griping, but said, "Ono-
magoulos, eh? Thank you, that reminds me of something else
I wanted to ask: how did he know he'd find Ortaias' monies in
the dead men's pouches?"

"Great gods, that should be plain enough even to you."
Gaius Philippus threw his hands in the air. "If their drungarios
hired murderers, he'd have to pay in his master's coins." The
centurion gave a short, hard laugh. "It's not likely he'd have
any of Thorisin's. And don't think you can ignore me and
have me go away," he went on. "You still haven't said the first
thing about why you're flinging all these questions at us."

The usually voluble Greek stood mute. He arched one eye-




106 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

brow and tried to stare Gaius Philippus down, but Marcus
came in on the senior centurion's side. "Anyone would think
you were writing a history," he told the physician.

A slow flush climbed Gorgidas' face. Scaurus saw that
what he had meant for a joke was in grim earnest to the
Greek. "Your pardon," he said, and meant it. "I did not know.
How long have you been working on it?"

"Eh? Since I learned enough Videssian to ask for pen and
parchment—you know as well as I there's no papyrus here."

"What language is it in?" the tribune asked.

"Hellenisti, ma Dial In Greek, by Zeus! What other tongue
is there for serious thought?" Gorgidas slipped back into his
native speech to answer.

Gaius Philippus stared at him in amazement. His own
Greek consisted of a couple of dozen words, most of them
foul, but he knew the name of the language when he heard it.
"In Greek, you say? Of all the bootless things I've heard, that
throws the triple six! Greek, in Videssos that's never heard the
word, let alone the tongue? Why, man, you could be Homer
or what's-his-name—the first history writer, I heard it once
but I'm damned if I recall it—" He looked to Scaurus for
help.

"Herodotos," the tribune supplied.

"Thanks; that's the name. As I say, Gorgidas, you could
be either of those old bastards, or even both of 'em together,
and who'd ever know it, here? Greek!" he repeated,
half-contemptuous wonder in his voice.

The doctor's color deepened. "Yes, Greek, and why not?"
he said tightly. "One day, maybe, I'll be easy enough in Vi-
dessian to write it, or I might have one of their scholars help
translate what I write. Manetho the Egyptian and Berosos of
Babylon wrote in Greek to teach us Hellenes of their nations'
past glories; it wouldn't be the worst deed to make sure we are
remembered in Videssos after the last of us has died."

He spoke with the same determination he might have
shown when facing a difficult case, but Marcus saw he had
not impressed Gaius Philippus. What happened after his own
end was of no concern to the senior centurion. He sensed,
however, that he had chaffed Gorgidas about as much as he
could. In his rough way he was fond of the doctor, so he
shrugged and gave up the argument, saying, "All this gabbing

Harry Turtledove            107

is a waste of time. I'd best go drill the men; they're fat and
lazy enough as is." He strode off, still shaking his head.

"The Videssians will be interested in your work, I think,"
Marcus said to Gorgidas. "They have historians of their own; I
remember Alypia Gavra saying she read them, and I think—
though I'm hot sure—she might have been taking notes for a
book of her own. Why else would she have been at Mavri-
kios' council of war?" Something else occurred to the tribune.
"She might be able to help you get yours translated."

He saw gratitude flicker in the doctor's eyes, but Gorgidas
was prickly as always. "Aye, so she might—were she not on
the far side of the Cattle-Crossing, married to the wrong Em-
peror. But who are we to boggle at such trivia?"

"All right, all right, your point's made. I tell you this,
though—if Alypia were on the far side of the moon, I'd still
want to see that history of yours."

"That's right, you read some Greek, don't you? I'd forgot-
ten that." Gorgidas sighed, said ruefully, "Truly, Scaurus, one
reason I started the thing in the first place was to keep myself
from losing my letters. The gods know I'm no, ah, what's-
his-name?" The physician's chuckle had a hollow ring. "But I
find I can put together understandable sentences."

"I'd like to see what you've done," Scaurus said, and
meant it. He had always found history, with its dispassionate
approach, a more reliable guide to the conduct of affairs than
the orators' high-flown rhetoric. Thucydides or Polybios was
worth twenty of Demosthenes, who sold his tongue like a
woman her virtue and sometimes composed speeches for pros-
ecution and defense in the same case.

Gorgidas broke into his musing. "Speaking of Alypia and
the Cattle-Crossing," he said, "did Gavras say anything of
how he planned to pass it by? I'm not asking as a historian
now, you understand, merely as someone with certain objec-
tions to being killed out of hand."

"I have a few of those myself," Marcus admitted. "No, I
don't know what's in his mind." Still thinking in classical
terms, he went on, "Whatever it is, it may well work. Thori-
sin is like Odysseus—he's sophron."

"Sophron, eh?" Gorgidas said. "Well, let's hope you're
right." The Greek word meant not so much having superior
wits but getting the most distance from those one had. Gor-

108 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

gidas was not so sure it fit Gavras, but he thought it a fine
description for Scaurus himself.

Black-capped terns wheeled and dipped, screeching their
disapproval at the armed men scrambling down a splintery   i
ladder into the waist of a fishing boat that had seen better   |
days. "A pox on you, louse-bitten sea crows!" Viridovix
shouted up at them, shaking his fist. "I like the notion no
better than yourselves."

All along the docks and beaches of Videssos* western sub-
urbs, troops were boarding by squads and platoons as motley a
fleet as Marcus had ever imagined. Three or four grain car-
riers, able to embark a whole company, formed the backbone
of Thorisin Gavras' makeshift armada. There were fishing
craft aplenty; those the eye could not pick out at once were
immediately obvious to the nose. There were smugglers'
boats, with great spreads of canvas and lines greyhound-lean.
There were little sponge-divers' vessels, some hardly more
than rowboats, with masts no thicker than a spearshaft. There
were keel-less barges taken from the river trade; how they
would act on the open sea was anyone's bet. And there were a
great many ships whose functions the tribune, no more nauti-
cal than most Romans, could not hope to guess.

He helped Nepos down onto the fishing boat's deck. "I
thank you," the priest said. Nepos sagged against the boat's
raised cabin. Timbers creaked under his weight, but he made
no move to stand free. "Merciful Phos, but I'm tired," he
said. His eyes were still merry, but there were dark circles
under them and his words came slowly, as if getting each one
out took effort.

"Well you might be," Scaurus answered. Aided by three
other sorcerers, the priest had spent the past two and a half
weeks weaving spells round the odd assortment of boats Thor-
isin had gathered from up and down the western coastlands.
Most of the work had fallen on Nepos' shoulders, for he held
a chair in sorcery at the Videssian Academy in the capital
while his colleagues were local wizards without outstanding
talent. At its easiest, sorcery was as exhausting as hard labor;

what the priest had accomplished was hardly sorcery at its
easiest.

Gorgidas descended, graceful as a cat; a moment later

Harry Turtledove             1 09

Gaius Philippus came down beside him, planting himself on
the gently rocking deck as if daring it to shake him.

"Viridovix!" It was a soft hail from the next boat down the
dock, a lateen-rigged fishing craft even smaller and grubbier
than the one the Celt was sharing with the Roman officers.

"Aye, Bagratouni?" Viridovix called. "Is your honor glad
to be on the ocean, now?" Coming from landlocked Vaspura-
kan, Gagik Bagratouni had professed regret that he knew
nothing of the sea.

The nakharar's leonine features were distinctly green.
"Does always it move about so?" he asked.

"Bad cess to you for reminding me," Viridovix said, gulp-
ing.

"Use the rail, not my deck," warned the fishing boat's cap-
tain, a thin, dark, middle-aged man with hair and beard sun-
and sea-bleached to the grayish-yellow color of his boat's
planking. The Gaul's misery mystified him. How could a man
be sick on an all but motionless boat?

"If my stomach decides to come up, now, I'll use what-
ever's underneath me, and that without a by-your-leave," Vir-
idovix said, but in Latin, not Videssian.

"What now?" Marcus asked Nepos, waving out to the pa-
trolling galleys, their broad sails like sharks' fins. "Shall we
be invisible to them, like the Yezda for a few moments during
the great battle?" He still sweat cold every time he thought of
that, though Videssian sorcerers had quickly worked counter-
spells that brought the nomads back into sight.

"No, no." The priest managed to sound impatient and
weary at the same time- "That spell is all very well against
folk with no magic of their own, but if any opposing wizard is
nearby one might just as well light a bonfire at the bow of the
boat." The captain's head whipped round; he wanted no talk
of bonfires aboard his ship.

Nepos continued, "Besides, the invisibility spell is easy to
overcome, and if it were broken with us on the sea, the
slaughter would be terrible. We are using a subtler measure,
one crafted in the Academy last year. We will, in fact, be in
full sight of the galleys all the way to the eastern shore of the
Cattle-Crossing."

"Where's the magic in that?" Gaius Philippus demanded.
"I could swim out there and accomplish as much, though I'd
have little joy of it."




110 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"Patience, I pray you," Nepos said. "Let me finish.
Though we'll be in plain sight of the foe, he will not see us.
That is the artistry; his eye will slide over us, look past us, but
never light on us."

"I see," the senior centurion said approvingly. "It'll be like
when I'm hunting partridges and walk past one without ever
noticing it because its colors blend into the brush and woods
where it's hiding."

"Something like that," Nepos nodded. "Though there's
rather more to it. We don't blend into the ocean, you know.
The eye, yes, and the ear as well, have to be tricked away
from us by magic, not simple camouflage. But it's a gentler
magic than the invisibility spell and nearly impossible to de-
tect unless a wizard already knows it's there."

"There's the signal now," the fishing captain said. Thorisin
Gavras' flagship, a rakish smugglers' vessel almost big
enough to challenge one of Ortaias' warcraft, was flying the
sky-blue Videssian imperial pennant. The steady northwes-
terly breeze whipped it out straight, showing Phos' sun bright
in its center.

A sailor undid the mooring lines that held the fishing boat
to the dock at stern and bow, tossed them aboard, and leaped
nimbly down into the boat. At the captain's quick orders, his
four-man crew unreefed the single square-rigged sail. The
sailcloth was old, sagging, and much patched, but it held the
wind. Pitching slightly in the light chop, the boat slid out into
the Cattle-Crossing.

Scaurus led his companions to the bow, both to be out of
the sailors' way and to see what lay ahead. The western part
of the channel was as full of boats as an unwashed dog with
fleas, but not one of the biremes ahead paid them the slightest
heed. So far, at least, Nepos' magic held. "What will you do
if your spell should fail in mid-crossing?" Marcus asked the
priest.

"Pray," Nepos said shortly, "for we are undone." But see-
ing it was a question seriously meant and not asked only to
vex him, he added, "There would be little else I could do; it's
a complex magic, and not one easily laid on."

As always, Viridovix was lost in a private anguish from the
moment the little fishing boat began to move. Knuckles white
beneath freckles from the desperation of his grip, he clutched
the boat's rail, leaning over it as far as he could. Gaius Phi-


Harry Turtledove            11 1

lippus, who did not suffer from seasickness, said to Nepos,
"Tell me, priest, is your conjuring proof against the sound of
puking?"

On firm ground such sarcasm would have sparked a quarrel
with the Celt, but he only moaned and held on tighter. Then
he suddenly straightened, amazement ousting distress. "What
was that, now?" he exclaimed, pointing down into the water.
The others followed his finger, but there was nothing to see
but the cyan-blue ocean with its tracing of lacy white foam.

"There's another!" Viridovix said. Not far from the boat, a
smooth, silver-scaled shape flicked itself into the air, to glide
for fifty yards before dropping back into the sea. "What man-
ner of fairy might it be, and what's the meaning of it? Is the
seeing of it a good omen, or foul?"

"You mean the flying fish?" Gorgidas asked in surprise.
Children of the warm Mediterranean, he and the Romans took
the little creatures for granted, but they were unknown in the
cool waters of the northern ocean that was the only sea the
Gaul knew.

And because they were so far removed from anything he
had imagined, Viridovix would not believe his friends' insis-
tence that these were but another kind of fish, not even when
Nepos joined his assurances to theirs. "The lot of you are
thinking to befool me," he said, "and rare cruel y'are, too,
with me so sick and all." His bodily woes only served to make
him ugly; his voice was petulant and full of hostility.

"Oh, for the—!" Gaius Philippus said in exasperation.
"Bloody fool of a Celt!" Flying fish were skipping all around
the boat now, perhaps fleeing some maruading albacore or
tuna. One, more intrepid but less lucky than its fellows,
landed on the deck almost at the centurion's feet. As it flopped
on the planks, he took his dagger, still sheathed, from his belt
and, reversing the weapon, struck the fish smartly behind the
head with the pommel.

He picked up the foot-long, broken-backed fish and handed
it to the Gaul. The broad gliding fins hung limply; already the
golden eyes were dimming, the ocean-blue back and silver
belly losing their living sheen and fading toward death's gray.
"You killed it," Viridovix said in dismay, and threw it back
into the sea.

"More foolishness," the centurion said. "They're fine eat-
ing, butterflied and fried." But Viridovix, still distressed,

112 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

shook his head; he had seen a dream die, not a fish, and to
think of it as food was beyond him.

"You should be grateful," Gorgidas observed. "With your
interest in the flying fish, you've forgotten your seasickness."

"Why, indeed and I have," the Celt said, surprised. His
quick-rising spirits brought a grin to his face. Just then a wave
a trifle bigger than most slapped against the fishing boat's
bow. The light craft rolled gently and Viridovix, eyes bulging
and cheeks pale with nausea, had to seek the rail once more.
"Be damned to you for making me remember," he choked out
between heaves.

Some of Thorisin's boats were by the patrolling galleys
now, and still no sign they had been seen. As it sailed toward
the agreed-upon landing point a couple of miles south of the
capital, the vessel Marcus rode passed within a hundred yards
of a warship of the Sphrantzai.

Spell-protected or not, it was a nervous moment. The tri-
bune could clearly read the name painted in gold on the ship's
bow: Corsair Breaker. Her sharp bronze beak, greened by the
sea, came in and out, in and out of view. There were white
patches of barnacles on it and on those timbers usually below
the waterline. A dart-throwing engine was on her foredeck,
loaded and ready to shoot; the missile's steel head blurred in
bright reflection.

Corsair Breaker's two banks of long oars rose and fell in
smooth unison. Even a lubber like Scaurus could tell her
rowers were a fine crew; indifferent to the wind, they drove
her steadily north. Over the creak of oars in their locks and the
slap of them in the sea came the bass roar of song they used to
keep their rhythm:

" Lit-tle bird with a yellow bill
Sat outside my windowsill—"

The Videssian army sang that song, too, and the Romans with
them as soon as they'd learned the words. There were, it was
said, fifty-two verses to it, some witty, some brutal, some
obscene, and most a mix of all three.

The hoarse ballad faded as Corsair Breaker's superior
speed swept the bireme away on her patrolling path. Under-
officers stood at the twin steering oars at her stem; a lookout
was atop her mast to cry danger at anything untoward. Marcus

Harry Turtledove             1 13

swallowed a smile. IfNepos' magic suddenly disappeared, the
poor fellow likely would have heart failure.

The tribune's smile returned—and not swallowed, either
—as he watched his Emperor's mismatched excuse for a fleet
sneak ita way over the Cattle-Crossing under the nose of the
imperial navy. Some of the faster boats were almost to the
shore; even the slow, awkward barges were past the galleys
loyal to Ortaias. With fortune, Videssos the city should be too
much stunned at the sight of Gavras' army appeared from
nowhere under its walls to put much thought to resistance.

"Aye, a splendid job," he said expansively to Nepos. "Puts
the whole war in hailing distance of being won."

Like all of Phos' priests, Nepos was pledged to humility.
He flushed under Scaurus' praise. "Thank you," he said shyly.
He was academic as much as priest and so went on, "This
success will take an important new charm out of the realm of
theory and into the practical sphere. The research, of course,
was the work of many; it's mere chance that makes me the one
to execute it. It—"

The priest lurched and turned purple: no blush of modesty
this, but a darkening as if strangler's hands were round his
neck. Marcus and Gorgidas darted toward him, both afraid the
fat little man's labor had brought on a fit of apoplexy.

But Nepos was suffering no fit, though tears rolled down
his cheek to lose themselves in his thicket of beard. His hands
moved in desperate passes; he whispered cantrips fast as his
lips could shape them.

"What's toward?" Gaius Philippus barked. Doubly out of
his reckoning on the sea and treating with magic, he nonethe-
less knew trouble when he saw it. His hand snaked to his
sword hilt, but the familiar gesture brought him no comfort.

"Counterspell!" Nepos got out between his quickly re-
peated charms. He was shaking like a man with an ague. "A
vicious one—aimed at me as much as my spell. And strong
—Phos, who at the Academy can it be? I've never felt such
strength—almost struck me down where I stood." He had
been incanting between sentences, sometimes between words,
and returned wholly to his sorcery once the gasped explana-
tion was through.

The priest's skill was enough to save himself, but could not
keep his spell intact. Still at his miserable perch over the rail,




114     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
Viridovix cried out, "Och, we're for it now! The cat's after

kenning there's mice in the cupboard!"

Including Corsair Breaker, there were seven galleys in
Mar is' sight. He could hardly imagine how Sphrantzes' ship
captains and sailors must have felt, with the ocean full of their
enemy's ships. Their reaction, though, was nothing like the
palpitations the tribune had jokingly wished on them a few
minutes before. They went charging against the small craft all
around them like so many bulls rampaging through a herd of

sheep.

Scaurus' heart leaped into his mouth to see one of the

cruel-beaked ships bearing down on the rearmost barge, a
craft that was, to his horror, filled with legionaries. But the
bireme's captain, at least, was unnerved enough by his foes'
apparition to make a fatal error of judgment. Instead of trust-
ing to his vessel's ram, his port oars swept up and out of the
way as he came gracefully alongside and demanded the

barge's surrender.

In his pride, though, he forgot there was more to the bar-
gain than his sleek ship against the slow-moving, clumsy river
scow: there were men as well. Ropes snaked up to catch on
belaying pins and the steering oar, binding ship to ship tight as
a lover's embrace. And up those ropes and over the galley's
low gunwales swarmed the Romans, whooping with wolfish
glee. They pitched the handful of marines on board over the
side; those splashes marked their end for, not true sailors, they
wore cuirasses which now were fatal, not protecting.

Seeing his ship taken from under him, the captain fled to
the high stern. He, too, wore armor: gilded, in token of his
rank. It flashed brilliantly for a moment as he leaped into the

sea to drown, too proud to outlive his folly.

That mattered little, as far as the outcome went. The
Romans, no sailors themselves, laid hold of the bireme's pilot
and put a sword against his throat. Thus encouraged, he
bawled orders to the crew. Oars came raggedly to life; the sail
spread and billowed. Like a race horse among carters' nags,

the galley sprinted for the beach.

Elsewhere, things went not so well. Warned by their

comrade's blunder, Ortaias' warships made no further unwise
moves. A fishing boat kissed by their sharp bronze simply
ceased to be, save as sodden canvas, splintered timbers, and
men struggling in the warm blue waters of the strait. Worse

Harry Turtledove            115

still, alarm bells were ringing in the city, and through the
boom of surf off sea walls Marcus could hear officers shouting
their men aboard fresh galleys.

But all that needed time, and the Sphrantzai had little time
to spend. Already Gavras' boats were beginning to beach,
soldiers jumping from them as fast as they could scramble.
And each attack run stole precious minutes from the warships,
for their targets jinked and dodged with all the desperate skill
their crews could summon. Even after a ram bit home, there
was more delay as the triumphant bireme backed oars to pull
itself free of its prey. Unspining was a delicate task, lest the
warships, like bees, were to leave stings behind in their
wounds, and with results as damaging to themselves.

Marcus shouted himself hoarse to see what seemed a surely
fatal stroke go wide. He was so intent on the sprawling sea-
fight that he almost did not hear the helmsman's frightened
cry: "Phos have mercy! One o' the buggers is on our tail!"

"Come a point north," the captain ordered instantly, gaug-
ing wind, coast, and pursuer in one comprehensive glance.

"'Twill lose us some of our wind," the helmsman pro-
tested.

"Aye, but it's a shorter run to the beach. Steer so, damn you!"
Pale beneath his sun-swarthied skin, the helmsman obeyed.

Scaurus bit his lip, not so much from fright but frustration.
His fate was being decided here, and not a thing he could do
but impotently wait. If that sea-bleached fishing captain knew
his business, the boat might come safe through it; if not,
surely not. But either way, there was nothing the tribune could
do to help or hurt. His skills were worthless here, his opinions
of no value.

The shore seemed nailed in place before him, while from
behind the galley came rushing up, shark-sure and swift. Too
fast, too fast, he thought; Achilles would surely catch this
tortoise.

Gaius Philippus was making the same grim calculation.
"He'll be up our arse before we ground," he said. "If we shed
our mail shirts now, we have hope to swim it."

Abandoning armor was an admission of defeat, but that
was not what set Marcus against it. There were archers on that
cursed bireme; already a couple of shafts had whistled past,
more swift and slender than any flying fish. To be shot swim-
ming defenselessly in the sea was not an end he relished.

116    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

If the bireme was in arrow range the end of the chase could
not be far away. With sick fascination, the tribune watched the
imperial pennant stiff in the breeze at the warship's bow.
Below it was another, this one crimson with five bronze bars,
the drungarios' emblem. So, Marcus thought, it was Taron
Leimmokheir himself who'd sink him. He would willingly

have forgone the honor.

But another ship was racing up alongside the imperial ves-
sel, not so big, but packed to the gunwales with armed men
... and also flying the imperial banner.  "Go on,
Leimmokheir, go on, you sneaking filthy knife in the night!"
Thorisin Gavras roared across the narrowing space of water,
his furious bellow like song in Scaurus' ears. "Ram, and then
you face me! You haven't the stones in your bag for it!"

No taunt, no insult could have moved the Videssian admi-
ral from his chosen course, but hard reality did. If he sank the
fishing boat ahead, Gavras would surely come alongside and
board—and with so many soldiers crammed into his ship, that
fight could have but one outcome. "Hard to port," Leimmok-
heir cried, and his ship heeled on its side as it twisted free

from danger.

Thorisin and his men yelled derision after him: "Coward!

Traitor!"

"No traitor I!" That was Leimmokheir's rough bass. "I said

I would fight you if I met you again."

"You thought that would be never, you and your hired mur-
derers!"

Wind and quickly growing distance swept away the admi-
ral's reply. Thorisin shook his fist at the retreating galley and
sent after it a volley of curses that Leimmokheir never heard.

Marcus waved his thanks to the Emperor. "So it was you I
rescued, was it?" Gavras shouted. "See, I must trust you after
all—or maybe I didn't know who was in your boat!" The
tribune wished Thorisin had not added that gibing postscript;

all too likely it held a touch of truth.

"Shoaling, we are," one of the sailors warned, and grabbed
the fishing boat's rail. Gorgidas and Nepos both had the wis-
dom to do the same. A moment later timbers groaned as the
boat ran hard aground. Marcus and Gaius Philippus fell in a
swearing heap; Viridovix, still leaning over the side, almost

went overboard.

"This salt water'll play merry hell with my armor," Gaius

Harry Turtledove            1 17

Philippus said mournfully as he splashed ashore. Marcus fol-
lowed, carrying his sword above his head to keep it safe from
rust.

A wave knocked Viridovix off his feet. He emerged from
the sea looking like a drowned cat, his mustaches and long red
locks plastered wetly across his face. But a grin flashed be-
hind that hair. "It's one man jolly well out of a boat I am!" he
cried. As soon as he got above the tideline, he carefully dried
his blade in the white sand. He was careless in some things,
but never with his weapons.

The whole fringe of beach was full of small units from
Thorisin Gavras' army, all trying to form up into larger ones.
A full maniple of Romans came marching toward the tribune
from the captured Videssian bireme a quarter of a mile down
the beach; Quintus Glabrio was their head.

"I thought you were done for when that whoreson came up
on you," Marcus said, returning the junior centurion's salute.
"'Well done' doesn't say enough."

As usual, Glabrio shrugged the praise aside. "If he hadn't
made a mistake, it wouldn't have turned out so well."

Gavras' ship went aground next to the boat that had carried
Scaurus and his companions. "Hurry, there!" the Emperor ex-
horted his men as they came up onto the land. "Form a perim-
eter! If the Sphrantzai have the wit to make a sally against us,
we'll wish we were on the other shore again. Hurry!" he re-
peated.

He co-opted Glabrio's maniple as part of his guard force.
Scaurus gave it to him without demur; he had been taking
constant nervous glances at Videssos' frowning walls and
great gates, wondering if the capital's masters would contest
their rival's landing.

But rather than vomiting forth armed men, the city's gates
were slamming shut to hold the newcomers out. The thunder
of their closing was audible where Gavras' men stood. "Pen-
pushers! Seal-stampers!" Thorisin said with contempt. "Or-
taias and his snake of an uncle must think to win their war
huddling behind the city's walls, hoping I'll grow bored and
go away, or that their next assassination scheme won't mis-
carry, or suchlike foolishness. There can't be a real soldier
among 'em, no one to tell them walls don't win sieges, not by
themselves. That takes wit and gut both. The young
Sphrantzes has neither, Phos knows; Vardanes I'll give credit




118 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

for shrewdness, aye, but the only guts to him are the ones
bulging over his belt."

Scaurus nodded at Gavras' assessment of his imperial foes,
though he suspected there might be more to Vardanes
Sphrantzes than Thorisin thought. But even after it was plain
there would be no sally from Videssos, the.tribune's eye kept
drifting back to that double wall of dour brown stone. How
much wit, he asked himself, would it take to keep men out,
fighting from works like those?

He must have spoken his thoughts aloud, for Gaius Phi-
lippus commented soberly, "Close, but not quite on the mark.
The real question is, how much wit will it take to get in?"

VI

TRUMPETS BLARED A FANFARE, THEN SKIRLED INTO A MARCH

beat. Twelve parasols, the imperial number, popped open as
one, bright flowers of red, blue, gold, and green silk. Thorisin
Gavras' army, formed in a great long column, lifted weapons
in salute of their overlord. A herald, a barrel-chested stentor
of a man, roared out, "Forward—ho!" and, with the usual
Videssian love of ostentatious ceremony, the column stamped
into motion. It slowly paraded from south to north just out of
missile range from the imperial capital's walls, a fierce spec-
tacle intended to give the city's defenders second thoughts on
their choice of masters.

"Behold Thorisin Gavras, his Imperial Majesty, rightful
Avtokrator of the Videssians!" the herald bellowed from his
place between Thorisin and his parasol bearers. The Em-
peror's bay stallion, his accustomed mount, was still on the
other side of the Cattle-Crossing. He rode a black, its coat
curried to dark luster.

Gavras waved to the city, doffing his helmet to let
Sphrantzes' troops on the wall see his face. For the occasion
he wore a golden circlet around the businesslike conical helm;

his boots were a splash of blood against the horse's jet-black
hide. Otherwise he was garbed as a common soldier—it was
to soldiers he would appeal, and in any case he had no pa-
tience with the jewel-encrusted, gold-stitched vestments that
were an Avtokrator's proper garb.

There were warriors aplenty to watch his progress before
the city. They lined the lower, outer wall; the greatest
numbers, as was natural, defended the gates. Except for gate-

119

120 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

house forces, the massive inner wall, fifty feet tall or even a
bit more, was not so heavily garrisoned.

"Why serve pen-pushers?" the herald cried to the troops
inside Videssos. "They'd sooner see you serfs than soldiers."
That, Marcus knew, was only the truth. Bureaucratic Em-
perors had held sway in Videssos for most of the past half-
century and, to break the power of their rivals, the provincial
nobles, the pen-pushers systematically dismantled the native
Videssian army and replaced it with mercenaries.

But that process was far-gone now, and the force defending
Ortaias Sphrantzes and his uncle was itself largely made up of
hired troops. They hooted and jeered at Gavras, crying, "All
your people are serfs! That's why they need real men to fight
for 'em!" The regiment of Namdaleni started its shout of
"Drax! Drax! The great count Drax!" to drown out Gavras'
herald's words.

One mercenary, a man with strong lungs and a practical
turn of mind, shouted, "Why should we choose you over the
Sphrantzai? They'll pay us and keep us on, and you'd send us
home poor!" Thorisin's lips skinned back from his teeth in a
humorless smile; his distrust of mercenaries was too well
known, even though his own army was more than half hired
troops.

Forgetting his herald, he yelled back, "Why prop up a
worthless tumtail rascal? For fierce Ortaias cost us everything
in front of Maragha by running away like a frightened mouse,
him and his talk of being 'ashamed to suffer not suffering.'
Bah!"

On the last few words Thorisin's voice climbed to a
squeaky tenor mockery of his foe's; he wickedly quoted young
Sphrantzes' speech to his men just before the disastrous battle.
His own soldiers were mostly survivors of that fight; they
added their shouts to Gavras' derision: "Aye, give him to us,
the coward!" "Send him to the amphitheater—he'd ride rings
round your jockeys!" "You'd best be brave, you on the walls,
if you have to fight after one of his speeches!" And Gaius
Philippus, loud in Marcus' ear: "Give him over—we'll show
him more than's in his book, I promise!"

The torrent of scorn that poured from Gavras' army seemed
to have an effect on Ortaias' soldiers. They were men like any
others, and sensitive to their fellow professionals' taunts.

Harry Turtledove             121

When the army's abuse died away, there was thoughtful si-
lence up on Videssos' walls.

But one of Sphrantzes' captains, a huge warrior who tow-
ered over his troops, roared out harsh, contemptuous laughter.
"You ran, too, Gavras," he bellowed, "after your brother lost
his head! How are you better than the lord we serve?"

Thorisin went red and then white. He dug spurs into his
horse until it screamed and reared. "Attack!" he shouted. "Kill
me that slime-tongued whore's get!" A few men took tentative
steps toward the wall; most never moved from their places in
column. Realistic with the stark good sense of men who risk
their lives for pay, they knew such an impromptu assault on
the city's works could only end in massacre.

While Gavras wrestled his stallion to stillness, Marcus hur-
ried forward to try to calm the Emperor. Baanes Onomagoulos
was already at his side, holding the horse's bridle and talking
softly but urgently to the furious Gavras. Between them they
brought his rage under control, but it did not abate for turning
cold. He ground out, "The scum will pay for that, I vow." He
shook his fist at the captain on the wall, who gave back a
gesture herdsmen used when they talked of breeding stock.

The officer's cynical challenge gave spirit back to his
comrades. They whooped at his obscene reply to Thorisin's
fist and sent catcalls after Gavras as his military procession
moved north.

As Scaurus returned to his place, he asked Baanes Onoma-
goulos, "Do you know that captain of Sphrantzes'? The bas-
tard has his wits about him."

"So he does, worse luck for us. They were wavering up
there until he opened his mouth." Onomagoulos shaded his
eyes, peered at the wall. "Nay, I can't be sure, his helm is
closed. But from the size of him, and that cursed wit, I'd
guess he's the one calls himself Outis Rhavas. If it's him, he
leads a real crew of cutthroats, they say. He's a new man, and
I don't know much about him."

Marcus found that strange. By his name, Outis Rhavas was
a Videssian, and the tribune thought Baanes, a fighting man of
thirty years' experience, should be familiar with the Empire's
leading soldiers. Still, he reminded himself, chaos was abroad
in Videssos these days, and perhaps this Rhavas was a bandit
chief doing his best to prosper in it.

122

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

123

Even as you are, he told himself, and shook his head, dis-
liking the comparison.

Ortaias and his uncle seemed willing to stand siege, and
Thorisin, after failing in his appeal at the city's walls, saw no
choice but to undertake it. His men went to work building an
earthen rampart to seal off the neck of Videssos' peninsula.

Some troops were almost useless for the task. Laon Pa-
khymer's Khatrishers dug and carried merrily for a couple of
days, then grew bored and tired of the entire process. "Can't
say I blame them," Pakhymer pointedly told Thorisin when
the Emperor tried to Order them back to their labor. "We came
to fight the Yezda, not in your civil war. We can always go
home again, you know—truth is, I miss my wife."

Gavras fumed, but he could hardly coerce the Khatrishers
without starting a brand new civil war in his own army. Not
wanting to lose the horsemen, he sent them out foraging with
his Khamorth irregulars—he had not even tried to acquaint
' the nomads with the use of shovel and mattock.

Rather to his surprise, Marcus found he, too, missed
Helvis, their storms notwithstanding. He was growing used to
the idea that those would come from time to time, the inevita-
ble result of attraction between two strong people, neither
much disposed to change to suit the other's ways. Between
them, though, they had much that was good, Malric and Dosti
not least. The tribune had come late to fatherhood and found it
more satisfying than anything else he had set his hand to.

In the first days of the siege of Videssos, he had scant time
for loneliness. Unlike Pakhymer's troops, his Romans were
men highly skilled in siege warfare. Spades and picks were
part of their regular marching gear, and they erected field for-
tifications every night when they made camp.

Thorisin Gavras and Baanes Onomagoulos rode up to in-
spect the work. The Emperor wore a dissatisfied look, having
just come from the amateurish barricade some of Onoma-
goulos' men were slowly throwing up. As ever since his
wounding, Onomagoulos' face was set and tight, though less
so now than Scaurus had sometimes seen him. Sitting a horse
pained him less than the rocking hobble that was the ruin of
his once-quick step.

Gavras' expression cleared as he surveyed the broad ditch
and stake-topped earthwork the legionaries already had nearly

done. The Romans held the southernmost half-mile of Thori-
sin's siege line. "Now here's something more like it," the
Emperor said, more to Onomagoulos than Marcus. "A good
deal better than your lads have turned out, Baanes."

"It looks well, yes," the older noble said shortly, not caring
for the criticism. "What of it? Outlanders have some few
skills: the Khamorth with the bow, the lance to the Namdaleni,
and these fellows with their moles' tricks. A useful talent now,
I grant."

He spoke offhandedly, not caring if the tribune heard, his
unconscious assumption of superiority proof against embar-
rassment. Nettled, Marcus opened his mouth to make some
hot reply. Before the words passed his lips, he remembered
himself in a Roman tent in Gaul, listening tp one of Caesar's
legates saying, "Now, gentlemen, we all know the Celts are
headstrong and rash. If we hold the high ground, we can
surely lure them into charging uphill...."

His mouth twisted into a brief, wry grin—so this was how
it felt, to be reckoned a barbarian. Helvis was right again, it
seemed.

But no, not altogether; catching the sour nicker on his
face, Thorisin said quickly, "One day Baanes will choke,
shoving that boot of his down his throat."

Scaurus shrugged. Thorisin's apology felt genuine, but at
the same time the Emperor was using him to score a point off
the powerful lord at his side. Nothing in this land ever wore
but one face, the tribune thought with a moment's touch of
despair.

He brought himself back to the business at hand. "We're
properly dug in," he said, "from here to the sea." He waved to
the walls of Videssos the city, their shadow in the late after-
noon sun reaching almost to where he stood. "Next to that,
though, all we've done is no more than a five-year-old playing
at sand castles along the beach."

"True enough," Gavras said. "It matters not so much,
though. They may have their castles, but they can't eat 'em,
by Phos."

"As long as they rule the sea, they don't have to," Marcus
said, letting his chief fret loose. "They can laugh at us while
they ship in supplies. Ships are the key to cracking the city,
and we don't have them."

"The key, aye," Thorisin murmured, his eyes far away.




124 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Scaurus realized after a few seconds that the Emperor was not
lost in contemplation. He was looking southeast into the
Sailors' Sea, at the island lying on the misty edge of vision
from Videssos. With abrupt quickening of interest, the Roman
recalled the Videssian name for that island: it was called the
Key.

But when he asked Gavras what was in his mind, the Em-
peror only said, "My plans are still foggy." He smiled, as if at
some private joke. Onomagoulos, Marcus'saw, had no more
idea of what his overlord meant than did the tribune. Some-
how, that reassured him.

By coincidence, that night was one of the misty ones com-
mon on the coast even in high summer, moon and stars swal-
lowed up by the thick gray blanket rolling off the sea at
sunset. Videssos' towers and crenelated walls disappeared as
if they had never been. Torch-carrying sentries moved in hazy
haloes of light; the taste of the ocean came with every indrawn
breath.

Viridovix prowled along the earthwork, torch in his left
hand and drawn sword in his right. "Sure and they can't be
failing to take a whack at us in this porridge, can they?" he
demanded when he ran into Scaurus and Gaius Philippus. "If
that were me all shut up in there, I'd give the tails of the
omadhauns outside a yank they'd remember awhile."

"So would I," Gaius Philippus said. His ideas of warfare
rarely marched with the Gaul's, but this was such a time. He
took the fog almost as a personal affront; it changed war from
a game of skill, a professional's game, into one where any
cabbagehead could make himself a genius with an hour's luck.

Marcus, though, saw what the centurion in his nervousness
and the aggressive Celt missed: it was as foggy inside the city
as out. "I'd bet Ortaias' marshals are pacing the walls them-
selves," he said, "waiting to hear scaling ladders shoved
against them."

Viridovix blinked, then laughed. "Aye, belike that's the
way of it," he said. "Two farmers, the each of 'em staying up
of nights to watch his own henhouse for fear the other raid it.
A sleepless, thankless job they both think it, too, and me
along with 'em."

"It may be so," Gaius Philippus conceded. "The Sphrantzai
haven't the imagination for anything risky. But what of

Harry Turtledove            125

Gavras? This should be a night to suit him—he's a gambler
born."

"There you have me," Scaurus said. "When the fog came
down, I expected something lively would happen, but it seems
I was wrong." He recounted the afternoon's conversation to
the Roman and the Celt.

"There's deviltry somewhere, right enough," Gaius Phi-
lippus said. He yawned. "Whatever it is, it'll have to get
along without me until morning. I'm turning in." His torch
held waist-high so he could see the ground ahead, he headed
for his tent; the Roman camp itself was set near the sea on the
flat stretch of land that had been the Videssian army's exercise
ground.

Scaurus followed him to bed a few minutes later and, to his
annoyance, had trouble falling asleep. The gods knew it was
peaceful almost to a fault without Dosti waking up several
times a night. But the tribune missed Helvis warm on the
sleeping-mat beside him. It was hardly fair, he thought as he
turned restlessly: not so long ago he'd found it hard to sleep
with a woman in his bed, and now as hard without one.

At the officers' conference the next morning Thorisin
Gavras seemed pleased with himself, though Marcus had no
idea why; as far as the Roman knew, nothing had changed
since yesterday.

"He probably found himself a bouncy girl who'd say yes
and not much more," was Soteric's guess after the meeting
broke up. "Compared to poison-tongued Komitta, that'd be
pleasure enough."

"I hadn't thought of that," Marcus laughed. "You may well
be right."

Businesslike but slow, the siege proper got under way. A
few of the military engineers who had accompanied Mavrikios
Gavras' army still survived to follow his brother. Under their
direction, Thorisin's men felled trees and knocked down a few
houses to get timber for the engines and ladders they would
presently need. The legionaries proved skilled help for the
artisans, as they were used to aiding their own engineer pla-
toons.

Save for the countermarching men visible on the walls,
Videssos did its best to ignore the siege. Ships moved freely
in and out of her harbors, bringing in supplies and men.
Scaurus wanted to grind his teeth every time he saw one.

126 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 127

"Next thing you know, the Sphrantzai will try to stir up a
storm behind us and use it to hammer us on the city's anvil.
That's the way Vardanes thinks, and it's far from a bad plan,"
the tribune said to Gaius Philippus.

The senior centurion, though, was for once an optimist.
"Let them try. We're getting more troops coming over to us
than they are."

That, Marcus had to admit, was probably true. The nobles
of Videssos' eastern dominions were not such great magnates
as their counterparts in the westlands, but all the grandees,
great or small, hated the bureaucrats who had seized the capi-
tal. They flocked to Thorisin's banner, this one leading sev-
enty retainers, that one forty, the next a hundred and fifty.

"Of course," Gaius Philippus went on, following Scaurus'
unspoken thought, "how useful such bumpkins will prove in
the fighting remains to be seen."

After four or five clear nights the fog came again, if any-
thing thicker than it had before. Again the tribune wondered
whether the besieged Sphrantzai would try to sally under its
cover, and doubled the sentries facing the capital.

It must have been near midnight when he heard shouts of
alarm coming from the north. "Buccinators!" he shouted. The
horns' bright music ripped through the murk. Cursing as they
scrambled from their bedrolls, legionaries poured out of the
tents in camp and, still buckling on armor, began to form up.

Hoofbeats pounded toward the camp. "Are all our lads up
there asleep? Sure and the spalpeens're behind himself's ram-
part, and it so much trouble to make and all," Viridovix said.

"How would you know that?" Gaius Philippus said. "You
didn't do a lick of work on it."

"And why should I, like some hod-toting serf? If you want
to work like a kem, 'tis your own affair entirely, but you'll not
see me at it. Give me a real fight, any day."

"I don't think those are Ortaias' men at all," Quintus Gla-
brio said suddenly, a statement startling enough to quell the
brewing quarrel at once. "There's no sound of fighting and no
more challenges from our sentries, either."

The young officer was proved right a few minutes later,
when a troop of about a hundred of Thorisin Gavras' best
Videssian cavalry rode south past the Roman camp. "Sorry
about the start we gave you," their captain called to Scaurus as

he went by. "We almost trampled one of your men up there in
this Phos-cursed gloom." The tribune believed that; even with
torches held high, the horsemen disappeared before they had
gone another fifty yards.

"Blow 'stand down,'" Marcus ordered his trumpeters. The
legionaries stood for a moment as if suspecting a trick, then,
shaking their heads in annoyance, went back to their still-
warm blankets.

"Wish he'd make up his bloody mind," grumbled one. And
another: "A good night's sleep buggered right and proper."
With a veteran's knack for making the best of things, a third
said cheerily, "No matter. I had to get up to piss anyway."

The camp settled back into peace. Scaurus yawned. It was
near high tide, and the boom of surf on the nearby beach was
lulling as smooth wine, as soft deep drums in the distance.

The tribune paused, half-stooped, a hand on his tentflap.
Why had he thought of drums, from the sound of sea meeting
sand? He jerked upright as he recognized the noise for what it
was: waves on wood. Ships offshore, and close!

The fear of treachery flooding through him, he shouted for
the buccinators once more. This time his men came forth
growling, as at any drill they disliked. He did not care; his
alarm blazed brighter than the mist-shrouded torchlight.

"Peel me off two maniples, quick," he said to Gaius Phi-
lippus. "I think the Sphrantzai are landing on the beach. Set
the rest of the men to defend here and send a runner to Gavras
—I think we're betrayed. In fact, send Zeprin the Red—
Thorisin's most likely to listen to him."

"I'll see to it he does," the burly Haloga promised, under-
standing Marcus' reasoning. Because of his former high rank
in Mavrikios' Imperial Guards, he was well-known both to the
younger Gavras and his men. Throwing a wolfskin cape over
his mail shirt, he vanished into the mist.

The senior centurion was barking orders. As the legion-
aries rushed to the places they were assigned, he turned back
to Scaurus. "Betrayed, is it? You think those dung-faced
horse-boys are there for a welcoming party?"

"What better reason?"

"Not a one, worse luck. What's the plan—hold them until
we get enough reinforcements to fling 'em back into the sea?"

"If we do. If we can." The tribune wished he knew more of




128

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

what he would face; ignorance's fog could be more dangerous
than the gray clammy stuff billowing around him.

Viridovix hurried up. He leaned his shield against his hip
to give himself two free hands with which to fasten his helmet
strap under his chin. "You'll not get away with another shindy
without me," he said to Scaurus.

"Well, come along then. From the way you talk, anyone
would think I did it on purpose."

"So they would," Viridovix agreed darkly. But when
Marcus looked to see if he was as serious as he sounded, the
Celt was grinning at him.

The legionaries quick-marched south, following the Vides-
sian cavalry. Marcus felt something soft squash under his san-
dal; even in the fog and dark he did not have to ask what it
was. He heard Viridovix swear in Gaulish, caught the name of
the Celtic horse-goddess Epona.

The tribune slid and almost fell as his feet went from dirt to
shifting sand. The Videssians were still invisible in the swirl-
ing mist ahead, but he heard their captain call, "Come
ashore!"

"Are you daft, landlubber?" a sailor's answer came thinly
back. "My leadsmen near wet their breeches getting this close.
We'll send boats!"

"Battle line!" the tribune said softly. Smooth as if on pa-
rade, the legionaries deployed from their marching column.
"Yell 'Gavras' when we charge," Scaurus ordered. "Let the
traitors know we know what they're at."

He feared he was come just too late. Already he could hear
oars splashing toward shore, hear the scrape of light boats
beaching. Well, no help for it. "Forward!" he said.

"Gavras!" The shout roared from two hundred throats.
Swords drawn, pila ready to fling, the Romans slogged for-
ward through the sand.

Down at the waterline there was a sudden chaos. Most of
the Videssians were dismounted, walking up and down the
beach holding torches to guide the boats in. Faintly through
the fog, Scaurus saw some of those torches drop when his
men bellowed out their war cry. A horse screamed off to one
side; some Roman had seen movement in the mist and let fly
with his javelin.

Full of asperity and command, an unseen voice demanded

Harry Turtledove            129

of the Videssian cavalry leader, "What sort of welcome have
you prepared for us, captain?"

"Hold up! Hold up! Hold up!" the tribune shouted franti-
cally, and blessed the legionaries' good discipline for bringing
them to a ragged halt.

"What now?" Gaius Philippus snarled, "So they've a bitch
with them—what of it? Sometimes I think the imperials can't
fight without their doxies alongside 'em."

The senior centurion's harsh voice ripped through the fog;

Marcus thanked the gods whose existence he doubted that his
comrade had spoken Latin. He answered in the same tongue;

"Bitch she may well be, but that's Komitta Rhangavve out
there, or I'm a Celt."

Gaius Philippus' teeth came together with an audible click.
"Thorisin's woman? Oh, sweet Jupiter! Wait, though—she's
on the other side of the Cattle-Crossing with all the other
skirts and their brats... begging your pardon, sir," he added
hastily.

Marcus waved the apology aside; in his confusion, he
hardly heard the words that made it necessary. Those ships out
there could not be Sphrantzes'—Komitta was a hellcat, but
never a traitor. But they could not be Thorisin's, either. The
boats in his makeshift flotilla had long since gone back to their
usual tasks. That left nothing... except the reality just off-
shore.

Two torches bobbed toward the Romans. Marcus stepped
out ahead of his men to meet them. The Videssian captain
stumped along under one, a short, stocky, red-faced man with
upsweeping eyebrows and an iron-gray beard. Carrying the
other was indeed Komitta Rhangavve, her pale, narrow face
beautiful and fierce as a falcon's.

The tribune gave them both his best courtier's bow, but
then, to his mortification, he heard himself blurting, "Will one
of you please tell me what in Skotos' name is going on?"

The captain frowned. He spat on the sand and looked
through the fog toward heaven, his hands upraised. I've
wounded his piety, Scaurus thought. Well, too bad for him.

Komitta looked down her elegant nose at the Roman. "The
Emperor has decided it is time for his soldiers' companions
and families to rejoin them," she said matter-of-factly. "Were
you not informed of the move? A pity." She was the perfect
aristocrat, asking a servant's pardon for some small oversight.

130

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

The tribune resisted an urge to take her by her sculpted
shoulders and shake information out of her. It was the devout
captain who came to his rescue: "The Key's ships have de-
clared for Gavras, now that he's put the city under siege. They
sailed up during the last fog; his Highness ordered them to
stay hidden so they could take advantage of the next one to
bring our kin across without interference from the Sphrantzai.
Worked, too."

"The Key," Scaurus breathed. Now that someone had
spelled it out for him in small simple words, he mentally
kicked himself for his stupidity. The fleets of the island of the
Key were second in importance in Videssos only to the capi-
tal's, something he had known for a year and more. But,
land-oriented foreigner that he was, the fact had held no
meaning for him, even after some broad hints from Thorisin

Gavras.

Viridovix, subject to no discipline but his own, had been
hanging back a couple of paces behind the Roman. Now he
came forward to lay an indignant hand on Marcus' arm. "Is it
that there's no fight here after all?" he said.

"So it would seem." The tribune nodded, still bemused.

"Isn't that the way of it?" the Gaul said loudly. "The first
one his honor gives me a fair chance at, and it turns out there's
not a fornicating thing for him to be giving, at all."

The Videssian captain, as much a professional at war as a
Roman veteran, looked at the Celt as he would at any other
dangerous madman. There was a smoldering interest in Ko-
mitta Rhangavve's eye, though, that Marcus hoped against
hope Viridovix would not pick up.

Luck rode with him; the Gaul's noisy complaint had caught
more ears than the ones close by. Guided by it, two of his
lemans came running up the beach to smother him with hugs
and squeals of, "Viridovix! Darling! We missed you so
much!" Viridovix patted them as best he could with a torch in
one hand and his shield in the other. To Scaurus' relief, Ko-
mitta's high-arched nostrils pinched as they might at a bad
smell.

Turning back to his men, the tribune quickly explained
what the real situation was. The Romans raised a cheer, ex-
cited both by the new strength the Key's fleet gave Gavras
and, probably more, by the prospect of seeing their loved ones
again. There was, Scaurus admitted reluctantly, something to

Harry Turtledove            131

this Videssian custom of keeping a soldier's family close by
him, however much it went against the Roman way. The men
stayed in better spirits and seemed to fight harder knowing
that their families' fate as well as their own depended on their
valor.

"We came for the wrong reason," he said to the legion-
aries, "but now that we're here we can be useful. Take your
torches down to the shore and help guide those boats in."

That was a task they set to with a will, some of them even
splashing out into the sea so the lights they carried would
reach further. As the small boats beached, the Romans kept
calling the names of their loved ones. A glad cry would ring
out every few minutes as couples reunited. Scaurus saw some
of these walk into the mist in search of privacy, but pretended
not to notice; after the tension of a few minutes before, that
sort of release was inevitable.

Then he heard a familiar contralto calling, "Marcus!" and
forgot about Roman discipline himself. He folded Helvis into
an embrace so tight that she squeaked and said, "Careful of
the baby—and of me, too, you and your ironworks." Dosti
was sound asleep in the crook of her right arm.

"Sorry," he lied; even through armor the feel of her roused
him. She laughed, understanding him perfectly. She leaned
against his shoulder, tilted her head up for a kiss.

Malric ran his hands over the tribune's mail. The excite-
ment of the trip had kept him wide awake. "Papa," he said, "I
was on the ship with the sailors and then on the little boat
going through the waves with mama, and—"

"Good," Marcus said, absently ruffling his stepson's hair.
Malric's adventures could wait. Scaurus' other hand was slid-
ing to tease Helvis' breast, and she smiling up from eyes sud-
denly heavy-lidded and sensuous.

Out of the fog came a volley of discordant trumpet blasts,
the metallic clatter of men running in mail, and loud shouts:

"Gavras! Thorisin! The Emperor!"

"Ordure," muttered the tribune, all thoughts of love-mak-
ing banished. He cursed himself for a fool. Somehow he had
managed to forget the warning Zeprin the Red had taken to
Thorisin. The Haloga had done his job only too well, it
seemed; from the sound of them, hundreds of men were rush-
ing the beach to meet the nonexistent invaders.

"Gavras!" he yelled at the top of his lungs, and the legion-

132    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

aries took up the cry, feeling at first hand the predicament in
which they'd put the Videssian cavalry an hour before. An
unpleasant prospect, being attacked by one's own army.

The Emperor's horsemen on the beach shouted as loudly as

the Romans.

"Are you handling the traitors out there, Scaurus?" Thori-

sin was quite invisible, but the tribune could hear amusement

struggling with concern in his voice.

"Quite well, thank you. We might have done better if we'd
known they were coming." Gavras had known that. "My plans
are foggy," Marcus remembered him saying. Foggy, forsooth!
But he had not seen fit to tell his commanders. The jolt he
must have got when Zeprin the Red stormed his tent shouting
treachery served him right, Scaurus decided; he must have   y
wondered if his scheme had turned in his hand to bite him.       (
The tribune gave him credit for taking nothing for granted;

he had come ready to fight at need, and quickly, too. Now that
they saw there was no danger, the troopers he had brought
with him came running down to the seaside to help the boats
in. It grew crowded and confused on the beach, but happy.

Komitta Rhangavve shrieked when Thorisin, mounted on
his borrowed black, scooped her up and set her in front of his
saddle like a prize of war. Gaius Philippus clucked in disap-
proval. "There's times when I wonder if he takes this war
seriously enough to win," he said.
"Remember Caesar," Marcus said.
The senior centurion's eyes grew sad and fond, as at the
mention of an old lover. "That bald whoremonger? Him and
his Gallic tarts," he said, pure affection in his voice. "Aye,
but you're right, he was a lion in the field. Caesar, eh?" he
echoed musingly. "If the Gavras does half so well, we'll get
our names in more histories than Gorgidas', and no mistake.
Along with a copper, that'll buy you some wine."

"Scoffer," the tribune snorted, but knew he'd made his

point.

Afterglow upon him, Marcus took some of his weight on
his elbows. Helvis sighed, an animal sound of content. He
listened to the ocean rhythm of his pulse, more compelling
than the surf muttering to itself in the distance.

"Why isn't it always like this?" he said, more to some
observer who was not there than to Helvis or himself.

Harp/ Turtledove            133

He did not think she heard him. His fingers curious now in
a new way, he touched her face, trying to bridge the gap
between them. It was no good, of course; she remained the
stubborn mystery anyone outside the self must always be,
however closely bodies join. He looked down at her in the
darkness inside their tent and could not read her eyes.

So he was startled when she shrugged beneath him, her
sweat-slick skin slipping against his. Her voice was serious as
she answered, "Much good can come from love, I think, but
also much evil. Each time we begin, we make Phos' Wager
again and bet on the good; this time we won."

He blinked there in the gloom; a thoughtful reply to his
question was the last thing he had expected. The Namdaleni
used their wager to justify right conduct in a world where they
saw good and evil balanced. Though they were not sure Phos
would triumph in the end, they staked their souls on acting as
if his victory was certain. The comparison, Marcus had to
admit, was apt.

And yet it did not bring Helvis closer to him, but only
served to make plain their differences. She reached for her
god in explanation as automatically as for a towel to dry her
hands.       ^

Then his nagging thoughts fell silent, for they were moving
together again, her arms tightening round his back. Her breath
warm in his ear, she whispered, "Too many never know the
good at all, darling; be thankful we have it when we do."

For once he could not disagree. His lips came down on
hers.

Once he had used the cover of fog to bring his soldiers'
households over the Cattle-Crossing, Thorisin Gavras un-
leashed his new-found navy against the city's fleet. He hoped
the sailors in the capital would follow those from the Key into
rebellion against the Sphrantzai. Several captains did abandon
the seal-stampers' cause for Gavras, bringing ships and crews
with them.

But Taron Leimmokheir, more by his example and known
integrity than any overt persuasion, held the bulk of the city's
fleet to Ortaias and his uncle. The sea fight quickly grew more
bitter than the stagnant siege before Videssos. Raid and coun-
terraid saw galleys sunk and burned; pallid, bloated corpses




134    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

would drift ashore days later, reminders that the naval war had
horrors to match any the land could show.

The leader of the Key's fleets was a surprisingly young
man, handsome and very much aware of it. Like most of the
Videssian nobles Scaurus had come to know, this Elissaios
Bouraphos was a touchy customer. "I thought we sailed to
help you," he growled to Thorisin Gavras at an early morning
officers' conference, "not to do all your bloody fighting for
you." He ran his hands through hair that was beginning to thin
at the temples, a habitual gesture; Marcus wondered if he was

checking the day's losses.

"Well, what would you have me do?" Thorisin snapped
back. "Storm the walls in a grand assault? I could spend five
times the men I have on that, and well you know it. But with
your ships aprowl, the seal-stampers can't bring a pound of
olives or a dram of wine into Videssos. They'll get hungry in

there by and by."

"So they will," Elissaios agreed sardonically. "But the
Yezda will be fat, for they'll have eaten up the westlands

while you sit here on your arse."

Silence fell round the table; Bouraphos had said aloud what
everyone there thought in somber moments. In the civil war
the Sphrantzai and Gavras both mustered what men they could
round the capital, leaving the provinces to fend for them-
selves. Time enough to pick up the pieces after the victory

was won... if any pieces were left.

"By Phos, he's right," Baanes Onomagoulos said to Thori-
sin. As was true of a good many of Gavras' officers, he had
wide holdings in the westlands. "If I hear the wolves are out-
side Garsavra, Skotos strike me dead if I don't take my lads

home to protect it."

The Emperor slowly rose to his feet. His eyes blazed, but
his temper was under the rein of his will; each word he spoke
might have been cut from steel. "Baanes, pull one man out of
line without my leave and you will be struck dead, but not by
Skotos. I'll do it myself, I vow. You gave me your oath and
your proskynesis—you cannot take them back at a whim. Do

you hear me, Baanes?"

Onomagoulos locked eyes with him; Thorisin stared back
inflexibly. It was the marshal's eyes that broke away, flicking
down the table to measure his support. "Aye, I hear you,
Thorisin. Whatever you say, of course."

Harry Turtledove            135

"Good. We'll speak no more about it, then," Gavras an-
swered evenly, and went on with the business of the council.

"He's going to let him get away with that?" Gaius Phi-
lippus whispered incredulously to Marcus.

"It's just Onomagoulos' way of talking," the tribune whis-
pered back, but he, too, was troubled. Baanes still had the
habit of treating Thorisin Gavras as a boy; Scaurus wondered
what it would take to make him lose that image of the Em-
peror in his mind.

Such nebulous concerns were swept away when the
Romans returned to camp. Quintus Glabrio met them outside
the palisade. "What's gone wrong?" Marcus asked at once,
reading the junior centurion's tight-set features.

"I—you—" Glabrio started twice without being able to go
forward; he could not control his voice as he did his face- He
made a violent gesture of frustration and disgust, then spun on
his heel and walked off, leaving his superiors to follow if they
would.

Scaurus and Gaius Philippus exchanged mystified glances.
Glabrio was as cool as they came; neither of them had seen
him anything but quietly capable—until now.

He led them south past the camp, down along the earth-
work the legionaries had thrown up to besiege Videssos. A
knot of men had gathered at one of the sentry posts. As he
came closer, Scaurus saw they all bore the same expression of
mixed horror and rage that well d up through Quintus Gla-
brio's impassive mask.

The knot unraveled at the tribune's approach; the legion-
aries seemed glad of any excuse to get away. That left two
men shielding what lay there, Gorgidas and Phostis Apo-
kavkos.

"Are you sure you want to see this, Scaurus?" Gorgidas
asked, turning to the tribune. His face was pale, though as
legionary physician he had seen more pain and death than a
dozen troopers rolled together.

"Stand aside," Marcus said harshly. The Greek and Apo-
kavkos moved back to show him Doukitzes' corpse. He
moaned. He could not stop himself. Was it for this, he
thought, that I rescued the little sneak thief from Mavrikios'
wrath? For this? The body there before him mutely answered

yes,

Splayed now in death, Doukitzes was even smaller than




136    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Scaurus remembered. He seemed more a doll cast aside by
some vicious child than a man. But where would any child, no
matter how vicious, have gained the horrendous skill for the
deliberate, obscene mutilations that stole any semblance of
dignity, of humanity, from the huddled corpse?

A pace behind him, he heard Gains Philippus suck in a
long, whistling breath of air. He did not notice his own hands
clenching to fists until his nails bit into his palms.

"He must have died quickly," Gorgidas said, showing the
tribune the neat slash that ran from under the little man's left
ear to the center of his throat. A couple of purple-bellied flies
buzzed indignantly away from his pointing finger. "He
couldn't have been alive for the rest of—that. The whole
camp—Asklepios, the whole whole city—would have heard
him, and no one knew a thing until his relief came out and

found him."

"A mercy for him, aye," Gaius Philippus grunted. "The

only one he got, from the look of it."

"The Sphrantzai have Yezda fighting for them," Marcus
said at last, groping for some sort of explanation. "This could
be their work—they kill foully to terrify their enemies." But
even as he spoke he doubted his own words. The Yezda were
barbarians; they killed and tortured with savage gusto. The
surgical precision of this butchery matched anything of theirs
for brutality, but was far beyond it in cruel, cold malice.

Phostis Apokavkos said, "The Yezda had nothing to do
with it, curse 'em. Almost wish they had—I'd come nearer
understandin' then." The adopted Roman spoke Latin with the
twang of Videssos' westlands; the accent only emphasized his
grief. Though he shaved his face like his mates among the
legionaries, he was still a Videssian in his heart of hearts. He
and Doukitzes, two imperials making their way among the
Romans, had been fast friends since the chaos after Maragha.

"You talk as if you know this wasn't sport for the nomads,"
Gaius Philippus said, "but at your folk's worst I can't imagine

any of them doing it."

"For which I give you thanks," Apokavkos said, rubbing
his long chin. More often than not he insisted on styling him-
self a Roman, but this once he accepted the Videssian label.
"Don't have to imagine it, though—it's true. See here." He

pointed to the dead man's forehead.

To Scaurus the wounds incised there had been just another

Harry Turtledove            1 37

sample of the hideous virtuosity Doukitzes' killer had dis-
played. He looked again; this time his mind's eye stripped
away the black dried blood and grasped the pattern the knife
had cut. It was a word, or rather a Videssian name: Rhavas.

"Sure and the son of a sow's a natural-born turnip-head to
be after doing such a thing," Viridovix said that evening by
the Roman campfire. "He must ken we'll not be forgetting
soon." He was eating lightly, bread and a few grapes; his
stomach, always sensitive save in the heat of battle, had
heaved itself up at the sight of Doukitzes' pathetic corpse.

"Aye," Gaius Philippus agreed, his square, hairy hands
closing as if round an invisible neck. "And a fool twice in the
bargain, for he's cooped up there in the city where getting
away won't be so easy."

"One more reason to take it," Marcus said. He held out his
apricot-glazed wine cup for a refill. Still shaken by what he
had seen, he drank deep to dull the memory.

"The worst of it, sir, is what you said this morning,"
Quintus Glabrio said to Gaius Philippus, "though not quite the
way you meant it. Doukitzes wasn't nomad's sport. To muti-
late him so after he was dead—there's purpose in it, right
enough, but may the gods spare me from too fine an under-
standing of such purposes." He put the heels of his hands to
his eyes, as though they had betrayed him by looking on Dou-
kitzes.

Scaurus drank again, stuck out his cup for yet another dol-
lop of the sweet, syrupy Videssian wine. His companions
matched him draught for draught, but their drinking brought
no cheer. One by one they sought their beds, hoping sleep
would prove a better anodyne than wine.

The tribune thrust the tent flap open, came out through it
still arranging his mantle about him. He let his feet take him
where they would; one path was good as the next, so long as it
led away from the tent. Phos' Wager, or any other, could be
lost as well as won.

Sentries gave Scaurus the clenched-fist Roman salute as he
walked out the camp's north gate and into the darkness. He
returned it absently, wishing no one at all had to see him; save
for a few men coming and going to the latrines, the camp was
quiet, its fires no more than embers.




138

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Every legionary sentry post was double-manned now, both
in camp and along Thorisin's besieging earthwork. The tri-
bune saw torches glowing all the way down to the sea. To-
night, he knew, no man would sleep at his station.

The night was clear and cool, almost chilly. The moon had
long since set behind Videssos' walls, leaving the sky to the
distant stars. Glancing up at their still-strange patterns,
Scaurus wondered if the Videssians used them to reckon des-
tinies. It seemed a notion that would fit their beliefs, but he
could not recall hearing of it in the Empire. Nepos would
know.

The thought was gone almost as soon as it appeared,
drowned in a fresh wave of resentment. The tribune wandered
on, still going north; before long he was past the Roman sec-
tion of line and coming up on the Namdalener camp. He gave
that a wide berth, too, not much wanting to see any of the
islanders right now.

He heard shouting in the distance ahead, a woman's voice.
After a moment he recognized it as Komitta Rhangavve's.
About now Thorisin was probably wishing she was back on
the western side of the Cattle-Crossing. Scaurus let out a sour
chuckle. It was a feeling he fully understood.

His laugh had startled someone nearby. He heard a sharp
intake of breath, then a half-question, half-challenge: "Who is
it?"

Another woman's voice, lower than Komitta's and more
familiar, too, with a guttural trace of accent. Marcus peered
into the night. "Nevrat? Is that you?"

"Who—?" she said again, but then, "Scaurus, yes?"

"Aye." The tribune briefly warmed to hear her. She and
her husband no longer camped with the legionaries, having
joined several of Senpat Sviodo's cousins among the Vaspura-
kaners who marched with Gavras. Marcus missed them both,
Senpat for his blithe brashness, his wife for her clear thinking
and courage, and the two of them together as a model of what
a happy couple could be.

She walked slowly toward him, minding each step in the
dark. As usual, she dressed mannishly in tunic and trousers; a
swordbelt girded her waist. Her shining hair, blacker than the
night, fell curling past her shoulders.

"What are you doing out and about?" Scaurus asked.

"Why not?" she retorted. "I feel like a cat prowling

Harr/ Turtledove            139

through the darkness, looking for who knows what. And the
night is very beautiful, don't you think?"

"Eh? I suppose it is," he answered; whatever beauties it
held were lost on him.

"Are you all right?" she asked suddenly, lifting a hand to
touch his shoulder.

He thought about it a moment. "No, not really," he said at
last.

"Can I do anything?"

Crisp and direct as ever, he thought; Nevrat was not one to
ask such a question unless she meant it to be taken seriously.
Here, though, there could be only one answer. "Thank you,
lady, no. This doesn't have that sort of cure, I fear."

He was afraid she would press him further, but she only
nodded and said, "I hope you solve it soon, then." Her grip on
his arm tightened for a second, then she was gone into the
night.

Marcus kept walking, still without much goal. He was well
among Gavras' Videssian contingents now. A couple of
troopers passed within twenty feet of him, unaware of his
presence. One was saying, "—and when his father asked him
why he was crying, he said, 'This morning the baker came
and ate the baby!'"

They both laughed loudly; they sounded a little drunk.
Without the rest of the joke, the punchline was so much gib-
berish to Scaurus. Somehow that seemed to march very well
with everything else that had happened that day.

A man on horseback trotted by, singing softly to himself.
Caught up in his song, he, too, failed to notice the tribune.

An awkward footfall ahead, a muttered curse. As the
woman approached, Marcus reflected there was scant need to
ask her why she was walking through the night. Her slit skirt
swung open with every step she took, giving glimpses of her
white thighs.

Unlike the soldiers, she saw the tribune almost as soon as
he knew she was there. She came boldly up to him. She was
slim and dark and smelled of stale scent, wine, and sweat.

Her smile, half-seen in the darkness, was professionally
inviting. "You're a tall one," she said, looking Marcus up and
down. Her speech held the rhythm of the capital, quick and
sharp, almost staccato. "Do you want to come with me? I'll
make that scowl up and go, I promise." Scaurus had not

1 40     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
known he was frowning. He smoothed his features as best he

could.

The lacing of her blouse was undone; he could see her

small breasts. He felt a tightness in his chest, as if he were
trying to breathe deep in a too-tight cuirass. "Yes, I'll go with

you," he said. "Is it far?"

"No, not very. Show me your money," she said, all busi-
ness now.

That brought him up short. Save for the mantle he was
naked, even his sandals left behind. But as he started to spread
his hands regretfully, a glint of silver on his right index finger
made him pause. He pulled the ring free, held it out to her.

"Will this do?"

She hefted it, held it close to her face, then smiled again

and reached for him with knowing fingers.

As she promised, her small tent was close by. Shrugging
off his cloak, Scaurus wondered if she was what he sought.
He doubted it, but lay down beside her nonetheless.

Vll

"WHAT? RESAINA FALLEN TO THE YEZDA?" GAIUS Pffl-

lippus was saying to Viridovix, astonishment in his voice.
"Where did you hear that?"

"One o' the sailor lads it was told me, last night over
knucklebones. Aye, it's certain sure, he says. What with their
moving around so much and all, those sailors get the news or
ever anyone else does."

"Yes, and it's always bad," Marcus said, spooning up a
mouthful of his morning porridge. "Kybistra in the far south
gone a couple of weeks ago, and now this." Resaina's loss
was a heavier blow. The town was perhaps two days' march
south of the Bay of Rhyax, well east of Amorion. If it had
truly fallen, the Yezda were getting past the roadblock the
latter city represented, in Zemarkhos' fanatic hands though it
was.

And while the westlands were falling town by town to the
invaders, the siege of Videssos dragged on. There were men
beginning to slip over the wall at night now, and others escap-
ing in small boats. They brought tales of tightened belts inside
the city, of increasingly harsh and capricious rule.

Whatever the shortcomings of the regime of the Sphrant-
zai, though, the capital's double walls and tall towers were
always manned, its defenders ready to fight.

"All Thorisin's choices are bad," the tribune brooded. "He
can't go back over the Cattle-Crossing to fight the Yezda
without turning Ortaias and Vardanes loose behind him, but if
he doesn't, he won't have much of an empire left even if we
win here."

141

142 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Gaius Philippus said, "What we need is to win here, and
quickly. But that means storming the walls, and I shake in my
shoes every time I think of trying."

"Och, such a pair for the glooms I never have seen," Viri-
dovix said. "We canna go, we canna stay, and we canna be
fighting either. Wellaway, we might as well the lot of us get
drunk if nothing better's to be done."

"I've heard ideas I liked less," Gaius Philippus chuckled.

The Celt's casual dismissal of logic annoyed Marcus. Giv-
ing Viridovix an ironic dip of his head, he asked him, "What
do you see left to us, now that you've disposed of all our
choices?"

"I haven't done that at all, Roman dear," the Gaul retorted,
his green eyes twinkling, "for you've left treachery out of the
bargain, the which Gavras'll never do. Too honest by half,
y'are."

"Hmp," Scaurus grunted—no denying Viridovix had a
point. But he did not much care for the label the Celt gave
him: "too credulous," it seemed to mean. Moreover, he did
not feel he deserved it. He had not repeated that angry night
with the whore, nor wanted to; even while she clawed his
back, he knew she was not the answer to his troubles with
Helvis. If anything, those had since grown worse. There were
times when his guarded silence hung between them like a
muffling cloak.

He was glad to have his unpleasant reverie broken by a tall
Videssian he recognized as one of Gavras' messengers. He
took a last pull of thin, sour beer; Videssian wine was too
cloying for him to stomach in the early morning. To business,
then. "What can I do for you?" he asked.

The soldier bowed as he would to any superior, but
Scaurus caught his slightly raised eyebrow, his delicately
curled lip—to aristocratic Videssians, beer was a peasant
drink. "There will be an officers' conclave in his Majesty's
quarters, to commence midway through the second hour."

Like the Romans, Videssos split day and night into twelve
hours each, reckoned from sunrise and sunset. The tribune
glanced at the sky; the sun was hardly yet well risen. "Plenty
of time to make ready," he said. "I'll be there."

"Would your honor care for a wee drop of ale?" Viridovix
asked the messenger, offering the little keg that held it.

Harry Turtledove            143

Marcus saw the beginnings of a grin lurking under his flame-
red mustaches.

"Thank you, no," Thorisin's man replied, his face and
voice now altogether expressionless. "I have others to in-
form." And with another bow he was gone, in almost un-
seemly haste.

As soon as he was out of sight, Gaius Philippus swatted
Viridovix on the back. "'Thank you, no,'" mimicking the
Videssian. Centurion and Celt broke up together, forgetting to
snarl at each other.

"And would your honor care for a wee drop?" Viridovix
asked him.

"Me? Gods, no! I hate the stuff."

"I'd best not waste it, then," Viridovix said, and swigged
from the cask.

It was easy to divide the commanders in Thorisin's tent
into two sets: those who knew of Resaina's fall, and the rest.
A current of expectancy ran through the first group, though no
one was sure what to look for. By contrast, the ignorant ones
mostly wandered in late, as to any other meeting where no-
thing much was going to happen.

For a time it seemed they were going to be proved right.
The first order of business was a fuzz-bearded Videssian lieu-
tenant hauled in between a pair of burly guards. The youngster
looked scared and a little sick.

"Well, what have we here?" Thorisin said impatiently,
drumming his fingers on the table in front of him. He had
more urgent things on his mind than whatever trouble this
stripling had found for himself.

"Your Highness—" the lieutenant quavered, but Gavras si-
lenced him with a look, turned his eyes questioningly to the
senior guardsman.

"Sir, the prisoner, one Pastillas Monotes, last evening did
most wickedly and profanely revile your Majesty in the hear-
ing of his troops." The soldier's voice was an emotionless,
memorized drone as he recited the charge against the luckless
Monotes.

The Videssian officers at the table grew still, and Thorisin
Gavras alert. To the Namdaleni, to the Khamorth, to the
Romans, a free tongue was taken for granted, but this was the
Empire, an ancient land steeped in ceremonial regard for the




144    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

imperial person. Not even an Emperor so unconventional as
Thorisin, perhaps, could take lese-majeste lightly without for-
feiting his respect among his own people. Marcus felt sympa-
thy for the frightened young man before him, but knew he
dared not interfere in this matter.

"In what way did this Monotes revile me?" the Emperor
asked. His voice, too, took on the formal tone of a court.

"Sir," the guard repeated, still from memory, "the prisoner
did state that, in failing to do more than blockade the city of
Videssos, you were a spineless cur, a eunuch-hearted block-
head, and a man with a lion's roar but the hindquarters of a
titmouse. Those were the prisoner's words, sir. In mitigation,
sir," he went on, and humanity came into his voice at last,
"the prisoner had consumed an excess of liquors."

Thorisin cocked his head quizzically at Monotes, who
seemed to be doing his best to sink through the floor. "Like
animals, don't you?" he remarked. Scaurus' hopes rose; the
Emperor's comment was hardly one to precede a routine con-
demnation. Honest curiosity in his voice, Gavras asked, "Boy,
did you really say all those things about me?"

"Yes, your Highness," the lieutenant whispered miserably,
his face pale as undyed silk. He took a deep breath, then
blurted, "I likely would've come up with worse, sir, if I'd had

more wine."

"Disgraceful," Baanes Onomagoulos muttered, but Thori-
sin was grinning openly and coughing in his efforts not to
snicker. After a moment he gave up and laughed out loud.

"Take him away," he said to the guards. "Run the wine-
fumes out of him, and he'll do just fine. Titmouse, indeed!"
he snorted, wiping his eyes. "Go on, get out," he said to
Monotes, who was trying to splutter thanks, "or I'll make you
wish I was one."

Monotes almost fell as the guards let him go; he scurried
for the tent flap and was gone. Gavras' brief good humor
disappeared with him. "Where is everyone?" he growled. Ac-
tually, only a few seats were still unfilled.

When the last Khamorth chieftain sauntered in, Thorisin
glared him into his chair. The nomad was unperturbed—no
farmer's anger could reach him, not even a king's.

"Good of you to join us," Gavras told him, but sarcasm
was as wasted as wrath. The Emperor's next words, though,
seized the attention of everyone up and down the long table.

r

Harry Turtledove            145

Still taken with Pastillas Monotes' phrase, he said, "I propose
to move my feathered hindquarters against the city's works at
sunrise, two days hence."

There was a moment's silence, then a babble louder than
any Scaurus had heard from Thorisin's marshals. Above it
rose Soteric's cry: "Then you are a blockhead and you've lost
whatever wits you had!"

Utprand Dagober's son echoed him a second later: "Ya,
what brings on t'is madness?" Where Soteric sounded furious,
a cold curiosity rode the older Namdalener's words. He gave

Thorisin the same careful attention he would a difficult text in
Phos' scriptures.

"Trust the islanders not to know what's going on," Gaius
Philippus said to Marcus, the uproar covering his voice. It had
faint contempt in it; to a professional, knowledge was worth
lives. The Namdaleni, mercenaries by trade, were taken by

surprise too often to measure up to the senior centurion's high
standards.

Scaurus understood his lieutenant's disapproval, but, more
sophisticated in the ways of intrigue than the blunt centurion,
also understood why the men of the Duchy were sometimes
caught short. Not only were they heretics in Videssian eyes,
but also subjects of a duke who would fall upon the Empire

himself if he thought the time right. No wonder news reached
them slowly.

Thorisin Gavras waited till the tumult subsided; Marcus
knew he was at his most dangerous when his anger was tightly
checked. "Lost my wits, have I?" the Emperor said coldly,

measuring Soteric as an eagle might a wolf cub on the ground
below.

Soteric's eyes eventually flinched away from that confron-
tation, but the tribune still had to admire his brother-in-law's
spirit, if not his sense. "By the Wager, yes," the Namdalener
replied. "How many weeks is it of sitting on our behinds to
starve the blackguards out? Now, out of the blue, it's up sword
and at 'cm. Idiocy, I call it."

"Watch your tongue, islander," Baanes Onomagoulos
growled, his dislike for Namdaleni counting for more than his

mixed feelings toward Thorisin. Other Videssian officers
rumbled agreement.

Had Soteric spoken to Mavrikios Gavras thus in Thorisin's
hearing, the younger of the brothers would have exploded.

146    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

When thorny speech came his own way, though, Thorisin met
it straight on—just as his brother had, Marcus remembered.

"Not 'out of the blue,' Dosti's son," the Emperor said, and
Soteric looked startled to hear his patronymic. Recalling the
elder Gavras' use of his own full name, Scaurus knew Thori-
sin was borrowing another of Mavrikios' tricks.

"Listen," Thorisin went on, and in a few crisp sentences
laid out his plight. He stared into Soteric's face once more.
"So, hero of the age," he said at last, "what would you have
me do?" He sounded very tired and finally out of patience.

The young Namdalener, sensitive to the mockery that made
up so much of Videssian wit, bit his lip in anger and embar-
rassment. The words dragged from him: "Storm the city—if
we can." He did not say—he did not need to say—that no
one, Videssian or foreign foe, had taken those walls by as-
sault. Everyone at the table knew that.

Utprand said to Thorisin, "Aye, storm t'city. You say that,
and it sounds so easy. But we from t'Duchy, we pay the bill to
win your Empire for you, and pay in blood." Scaurus could
not help nodding; a mercenary captain who wasted his troops

soon had nothing left to sell.

"To Skotos' frozen hell with you, then," Gavras snapped,

his temper lost now. "Take your Namdaleni and go home, if
you won't earn your keep. You say you pay in blood? I pay
double, outlander—every man jack who falls on either side of
this war diminishes me, friend and foe alike, for I am Av-
tokrator of all Videssos, and all its people are my subjects. Go
on, get out—the sight of you sickens me."

After that tirade Marcus looked to see Utprand stalk from
the tent. Indeed, Soteric pushed back his chair and began to
rise, but a glance from the older Namdalener stopped him. In
Thorisin's hot words was a truth that had not occurred to him
before, and he paused to give it the thought it deserved. "Be it
so, then," he said at last. "Two days hence." He sketched a
salute and was gone, sweeping Soteric along in his wake.

The council broke up swiftly, officers leaving a few at a
time, gabbling over what they had heard like so many washer-
women. As Marcus turned sideways to ease through the open
tent flap, his eyes happened to meet those of Thorisin, who
was still plotting strategy with Bouraphos the admiral. Thori-
sin's glance held unmistakable triumph in it. Scaurus suddenly
wondered how angry the Emperor had really been and how

Harry Turtledove            147

much he had made the Namdaleni talk themselves into doing
just what he had planned for them in the first place.

Gavras' army readied itself for the attack. Stone- and
arrow-throwers moved forward, ready to give covering fire for
the assault on the walls. Every archer's quiver was filled, to
the same purpose. Inside sheds covered with green hides,
rams swung on their chains.

"Very impressive," Gorgidas murmured, watching the bus-
tle of military preparation. "And inside, I suppose, they're
heating up their oil to give us the warm reception we de-
serve."

"Absit omen," Marcus said, but it was only too likely. Too
much of the readying process was visible from the walls to
leave Videssos' defenders in much doubt over what was about
to happen, despite the army's best efforts at secrecy.

"If there was a commander in there with his wits about him
and an ounce more guts than he needs to turn beans into wind,
he'd sally now and set us back a week," Gaius Philippus said.
He watched soldiers marching four abreast on the capital's
battlements, insect-small in the distance.

Scaurus said, "I don't think it's likely. The pen-pushers
inside must have their generals under their thumbs, or
they'd've hit us long before this. Ortaias may play at being a
warrior, but Vardanes' way of ruling is by taxes and tricks, not
steel. He distrusts soldiers too much to turn them loose, I
think."

"I hope you're right," the senior centurion said. Marcus
noticed him doubling patrols and sentry postings all the same.
He did not change the dispositions; watchfulness was seldom
wasted.

The Romans, then, were not surprised when at twilight a
raiding party came storming from a sally port all but hidden
by one of the outer wall's towers. The marauders carried
naming brands, as well as swords and bows, and flung them
at any pieces of materiel they saw. Flames clung and spread,
unnaturally bright; the Videssians were skilled incendiary-
makers.

Shouts of "Ortaias!" and "The Sphrantzai!" flew with the
raiders' missiles. So did the sentries' cries of alarm, their an-
swering yells of "Gavras!" and the first shrieks of the
wounded. Another war cry was in the air, too, one that made




148    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Scaurus, who normally faced battle without delight, jam his
helmet down over his ears and rush to the fight: "Rhavas!" the

marauders cheered, "Rhavas!"

Many of the attackers stopped short at the earthen breast-
work that sealed the city Videssos from Videssos the Empire.
These skirmished with the Roman pickets there, threw their
torches and shot fire arrows, then fell back when they saw the
defense ready for them. They fought, indeed, much like the
bandits Outis Rhavas was said to lead: a brave onset, but no

staying power.

One determined band, though, came scrambling over the

chest-high rampart to trade swordstrbkes with the Romans
beyond and hack at their siege engines with axes, crowbars,
and mauls. At their head was a tall, strongly built man who
had to be Rhavas himself. With a cry of, "Stand and fight,

murderer!" Marcus rushed at him.

To the tribune's disappointment, his foe wore a bascinet
with its visor down; he wanted to see this man's eyes as he
killed him. Whatever else he was, Rhavas was no coward. He
loped toward Scaurus, his longsword held high. The two
blades met with a ring of steel. Marcus felt the jolt clear to his
shoulder. The druids' marks on his Gallic sword flared
golden. They were hotter and brighter than he had seen them
since his duel with Avshar the wizard-prince just after he came
to the capital. His lips tightened—so Rhavas bore an en-
chanted blade, did he? It would do him no good.

But the fighting separated them after another inconclusive
passage. Before the tribune could come to grips with Rhavas
once more, Phostis Apokavkos attacked Ortaias' captain. In
his fury to avenge Doukitzes, all the careful swordplay the
legionaries had drilled into him was forgotten. He slashed and
chopped with his gladius, a blade far too short for such work.
Rhavas toyed with him like a cat with a baby squirrel, all the

while laughing cruel and cold.

At length he tired of his sport and decided to make an end.
His sword hurtled toward Apokavkos' helm. But the stroke
was not quite true; Phostis reeled away, hand clapped to his
head, but that head still rode his shoulders. With a bellow of

fury, Rhavas leaped after him.

Gaius Philippus stepped deliberately into his path. "Stand
aside, little man," Rhavas hissed, "or it will be the worse for
you." Behind the senior centurion, Apokavkos was down on

Harry Turtledove

149

his knees, blood running from one ear. Gaius Philippus
planted his feet to await the onslaught. He spat over the edge
of his shield.

A storm of blows rained down on him, furious as the fall
cloudbursts in the westland plateaus. The Roman, though,
was wiser by years of hard fighting than Phostis Apokavkos
and did not try to match Rhavas stroke for stroke. He stood on
the defensive, his own sword flicking out in counterattack
only when the thrusts brought no danger to himself.

Rhavas feinted, tried to spring around him. But the senior
centurion side-stepped quickly and kept himself between the
giant warrior and his prey. Then Marcus was hurrying forward
to give him aid, a dozen legionaries close behind. Viridovix,
as always an army in himself, stretched two of the skirmishers
in the din and bore in on Rhavas from another direction.

Still snarling curses, Rhavas had to retreat. He led the
rear-guard that held the Romans at bay while the rest of his
raiders made their way back over the besieging rampart. He
was the last to vault over it and, once on the other side, fa-
vored Scaurus with a mocking salute. "There will be other
times," he called, and the grim certainty in his voice sent a
thrill of danger down the tribune's back.

"Shall we give him a chase?" Gaius Philippus asked. The
bandit chieftain was standing there in no man's land, fairly
daring the Romans to pursue.

Marcus answered regretfully, "No, I think not. All he
wants to do is lure us into range of the engines on the walls."

"Aye, more lives than the whoreson's worth," Gaius Phi-
lippus conceded. He flexed his left shoulder, winced and said,
"He's strong as a bear, curse him. A couple of the ones he hit
me, I thought he broke my arm. This scutum will never be the
same again either." The bronze facing of the shield's upper
rim was all but hacked away, while the thick boards of the
frame beneath were chipped and split from the fierceness of
Rhavas' attack.

Water would not douse the fires the raiders had managed to
set; they had to be smothered with sand. Half a dozen dart-
throwers and one big stone-throwing engine were destroyed,
and several others had been wrecked by Rhavas' axemen and
crowbar swingers. Scaurus was surprised the damage was not
worse; luckily, the marauders had only had a few minutes to
carry out their assault.




1 50    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Casualties were similarly light. Viridovix had accounted
for half the enemy dead in his one brief flurry, a feat Marcus
was sure he would not hear the last of for weeks to come. Of
the Romans, it seemed no one had been killed, which glad-
dened the tribune's heart. Every legionary lost was one less
link to the world he would never know again, one more man
who shared his memories gone forever.

The worst-hurt man was Apokavkos. Gorgidas bent over
him, easing his helmet off and palpating the left side of his
head with skilled, gentle fingers. Apokavkos tried to speak,
but produced only a confused, stammering sound.

Scaurus was alarmed at that, but the Greek doctor grunted
in satisfaction, recognizing the symptom. "The blow he took
threw his brain into commotion, as well it might," he told the
tribune, "and so he's lost his voice for a time, but I think he'll
recover. His skull is not broken, and he has full use of his

limbs—don't you, Phostis?"

The Videssian moved them all to prove it. He tried to talk
again, failed once more, and shook his head in annoyance, a
motion immediately followed by a wince. "Head hurts," he

scrawled in the dust.

"So you can write, can you? How interesting," Gorgidas

said, ignoring what was written. For a moment he looked at
Apokavkos more as a specimen than a man, but caught him-
self with an embarrassed chuckle. "I'll give you a draft of
wine mixed with poppy juice. You'll sleep the day around,
and when you wake the worst of your headache should be
gone. You ought to have your voice back by then, too."

"Thanks," Apokavkos wrote. As with his last message, he
used Videssian; while he spoke Latin, he could not write it.
He climbed painfully to his feet and followed Gorgidas to his

tent for the promised medicine.

"It's a good thing Drax's Namdaleni and the regular Vides-
sian troops in the city didn't follow Rhavas' cutthroats out on
sally," Marcus said to Gaius Philippus later that night. "They
could have set things back as badly as you said, and we can't
afford it with things in the westlands as they are."

The centurion carefully gnawed the last meat from a
roasted chicken thigh, then tossed the bone into the fire. "Why
should they follow Rhavas?" he said. "You know the Namda-
leni, aye, and the imperials, too. Think they have any more
stomach for his gang of roughs than we do? Probably hoping

Harry Turtledove            151

we'd kill the lot of 'em. There wouldn't be many a tear shed
in there if we had, I'd bet."

Marcus stopped to consider that and decided Gaius Phi-
lippus was probably right. The men on the other side were
most of them soldiers like any others and no doubt despised
bandits the same way all regular troops did. It was their
leaders who chose such instruments, not the rank and file.
"The Sphrantzai," he said, the word sliding slimily off his
tongue. Gaius Philippus nodded, understanding him perfectly.

The morning Thorisin Gavras had chosen for his assault
dawned gray and foggy—not the porridge-thick blinding fog
that had masked the arrival of the ships from the Key, but still
a mist that cut visibility to less than a hundred paces. "Well,
not all my prayers were wasted," Gaius Philippus said, draw-
ing faint smiles from the legionaries who heard him. For the
most part they went about their business grim-faced, knowing
what was ahead of them.

"A big part of what we can do out there will depend on
your men and the covering fire they can give us," Marcus was
saying to Laon Pakhymer. The Khatrisher had brought his
archers back from their foraging duties to join in the effort
against the capital.

"I know," Pakhymer said. "Our quivers are full, and we've
been driving the fletchers crazy with all the shafts we've asked
for." He looked around, eyeing the murky weather with dis-
taste. "We can't hit what we can't see, though, you know."

"Of course," Scaurus said, suddenly less glad of the fog
than he had been. "But if you keep the top of the wall well-
swept, it won't matter that your bowmen aren't aiming at any-
one in particular."

"Of course," Pakhymer echoed ironically, and the tribune
felt himself flush—a fine thing, him lecturing the Khatrisher
on the tricks of the archer's trade, when Pakhymer had un-
doubtedly had a bow in his hand since the age of three. He
changed the subject in some haste.

The voice of a trumpet rang out, high and thin in the early
morning stillness. Marcus recognized the imperial fanfare, the
signal for the attack. Much of his apprehension disappeared.
No more waiting now. The event, whatever it held, was here.

The trumpet's last note was still in the air when the bucci-
nator's horns blasted into life. The Romans, shouting,




1 52    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"Gavras!" at the top of their lungs, rushed for the Silver Gate
and the postern gate through which Rhavas' sally party had
come. More legionaries flung hurdles, bundles of sticks, and
spadesful of earth into the ditch that warded Videssos, trying
to widen the front on which they could bring their arms to

bear.

The first protection the capital's gates had was a chest-high

work not much different from the one Gavras' men had
thrown up, save that it was faced with stone. The few pickets
manning it were quickly killed or captured; the Sphrantzai
were not about to throw open the gates to rescue them, not

with the enemy close behind.

High over the Silver Gate stood icons of Phos, reminders
that Videssos was his holy city. They were being rudely
treated now; buzzing over the Romans' heads like a swarm of
angry gnats came the arrow barrage the Khatrishers were lay-
ing down, along with the more intermittent crack of dart-cast-
ing engines and the thump of the stone-throwers' hurling arms

smacking into their rests.

"Reload there! Come on, wind 'em tight!" an artilleryman

screamed to his crew—the perfect Videssian incarnation,
Marcus thought, of Gaius Philippus. The senior centurion was
crying the legionaries on, ordering the rams forward to pound
at the Silver Gate's ironbound portals. The slope-sided sheds,
covered with hides to foil fire, hot oil, and sand, ponderously

advanced.

Looking up at the crenelated battlements over the gates,

Scaurus felt a surge of hope. Much against his expectations,
the missiles had briefly managed to drive the defenders from
their posts. The rams took their positions unhindered. The
passageway behind the gates echoed their first booms like a

great drum.

Gaius Philippus wore a wolfish grin. "The timbers may last

forever," he said, "but the hinges can only take so much."

Boom-boom, boom-boom went the rams.

But the Khatrishers could only keep up their murderous fire
so long; arms tired, bowstrings weakened, and arrows began
to run short. Soldiers appeared on the walls again. One of
Bagratouni's Vaspurakaners shrieked as bubbling oil found its
way through the joints of his armor to roast the flesh beneath.
Another defender was about to tip his cauldron of sizzling fat
down on the Romans when a Khatrisher shaft caught him in

Harry Turtledove

153

the face. He staggered backward, spilling the blazing load
among his comrades. The Romans below cheered to hear their
cries of pain and fear.

Stones and missiles shot from the towers of the inner wall
were now beginning to fall on the legionaries. There were not
enough Khatrishers, nor could they shoot far enough, to si-
lence the snipers and catapults atop those towers.

Loud even through the din of fighting, the cry of "Ladders!
Ladders!" came from the north. Scaurus stole a glance that
way, saw men climbing for their lives and knowing they
would lose them if the enemy tipped those ladders into space
before they reached the top. The legionaries carried no scaling
ladders—too risky by half, was the tribune's cold-blooded
appraisal.

The rams still pounded away. A chain with a hook on the
end snaked down to catch at one of the heads as it drove
forward, but the Romans, alert for such tricks, knocked it
aside. The huge iron clasps joining gate to wall creaked and
groaned at every stroke; the thick oak portals began to bend
inwards.

"Sure and we have 'em now!" Viridovix cried. His eyes
blazed with excitement. He waved his sword at the Videssians
on the walls, hot to come to grips with them at last. This
fighting at long range and the duel of ram and catapult were a
poor substitute for the hand-to-hand combat he craved.

Marcus was less eager, but still felt his confidence rising.
Ortaias' men were not putting up a strong defense. By rights,
he thought, the Romans should never have been able to get
their rams near the Silver Gate, let alone be on the point of
battering it down. He wondered how many men Elissaios
Bouraphos' ships were drawing off to ward the sea wall.
There were times when navies had their uses.

The fight at the sally port was not going so well for the
legionaries. A sharp dogleg in the wall protected it from en-
gines and let the troops inside fire at the attackers' flanks. As
casualties mounted, Scaurus pulled most of his soldiers back,
leaving behind a couple of squads to keep the besieged Vides-
sians from using the postern gate against them.

One last stroke of the rams, working in unison now, thud-
ded into the battered timbers of the Silver Gate. They sagged
back like tired old men. The Romans surged past the rams'
protecting mantlets, shouting that the city was taken.




154 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

It was not. The passage between inner and outer portals
was itself walled and roofed, and a stout portcullis barred the
way. From behind it, archers poured death into the legionaries
at point-blank range.

Brave as always, Laon Pakhymer's Khatrishers ran up to
return their fire. In their light armor they suffered for it, Or-
taias' bowmen on the walls taking a heavy toll. Watching his
men fall, Pakhymer remained expressionless, but his pock-
marks stood shadowy on a face gone pale. He sent his coun-
trymen forward nonetheless.

More archers shot down at the Romans from the murder-
holes above the passageway; unlike the ones at panicked
Khiiat the summer before, these were manned and deadly.
"Testudo!" Gaius Philippus shouted, and scuta went up over
the legionaries' heads to turn the hurtling darts. But worse
than arrows rained down. Boiling water, sputtering oil, and
red-hot sand poured through the death-holes, and the inter-
locked shields could not keep the soldiers beneath them alto-
gether safe. Men cursed and screamed as they were burned.

Still more terrible were the flasks of vitriol the defenders
cast down on the legionaries. The very facings of their shields
bubbled and smoked, and whenever a drop touched flesh it
seared it away to the bone.

Scaurus ground his teeth in an agony of frustration. Having
forced the Silver Gate, his men were caught in a crueler trap
than if they had failed at once. The rams, protected by their
mantlets, were still inching forward and might yet batter down
the portcullis, though, as he watched, a man inside the mantlet
fell, pierced by an arrow that found its way over his shield.

But after the portcullis lay the second set of gates, stronger
even than the ones already fallen. Could he ask his men to
claw their way through that gauntlet and have any hope they
could fight Ortaias' still-fresh troops afterward?

With unlimited manpower behind him, he might have tried
it. His force, though, was anything but unlimited, and once
gone, was gone for good. However much he wanted to aid
Thorisin, the mercenary captain's creed came first: protect
your men. Without them you can do nothing to help or hurt.

"Pull back," he ordered, and signaled the buccinators to
blow retreat. It was a command the legionaries were not sorry
to obey; they had charged to the attack in high excitement, but
they recognized an impossibility when they saw one.

Harry Turtledove            155

Again the Khatrishers did yeoman duty in covering the
Romans, especially the withdrawal of the rams and their
heavy shielding mantlets, of necessity a slow, painful busi-
ness. Laon Pakhymer brushed thanks aside when Marcus tried
to give them, saying only, "You did more for us, one day last
year." He was silent for a moment, then said, "Could we beg
use of your fractious doctor?"

"Of course," Scaurus said.

"Then I thank you. That arrow-pulling gadget of his is a

clever whatsit, and his hands are soft, for all his sharp
tongue."

"Gorgidas!" Marcus called, and the Greek physician came
trotting up, a length of bandage flapping in his left hand.

"What do you want now, Scaurus? If you must put out a
fire by throwing bodies on it, at least give me leave to cobble
them back together. Don't waste my time with talk."

"Tend to the Khatrishers too, would you? The arrow-fire's
hurt them worse than our men because they wear lighter pano-
plies, and Pakhymer here thinks well of your arrow-drawer."

"The spoon of Diokles? Aye, it's a useful tool." He pulled
one from his belt; the smooth bronze was covered with blood.
Gorgidas held the instrument up to the two officers. "Can
either of you tell whose gore's been spilled on this—Roman,
Khatrisher, or imperial for that matter?" He did not wait for an
answer, but went on, "Well, neither can I; I haven't really
stopped to look—nor will I. I'm a busy man, thanks to you
two, so kindly let me ply my trade."

Pakhymer stared at his retreating back. "Did that mean

yes?"

"It meant he has been tending them all along. I should have
known."

"There are demons on that man's trail," Pakhymer said
slowly. His eyes held a certain superstitious awe; he intended
his words to be taken literally. "Demons everywhere today,"
he murmured, "pulling the Balance down against us." In Vi-
dessian eyes, the Khatrishers were sunk deeper in heresy than
even the Namdaleni. Where the men of the Duchy spoke of
Phos' Wager with at least the hope that Phos would at last
overcome Skotos, Pakhymer's people held the struggle be-
tween good and evil to be an even one, its ultimate winner
impossible to know.

Scaurus was too tired and too full of disappointment to

156 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

exercise himself over the fine points of a theology he did not
share. With some surprise, he realized the sky was bright and
blue—where had the fog gone? His shadow was pointing
away from Videssos' works; the sun was in his eyes as he
looked toward them. The assault had lasted most of the day.
For all it had accomplished, it might as well not have been
made.

Jeers flew from the wall as the Romans retreated, loudest
among them the booming, scorn-filled laugh of Outis Rhavas.
"Go back to your mothers, little boys," the bandit chieftain
roared, his voice loaded with hateful mirth. "You've played
where you don't belong and got a spanking for your trouble.
Go home and be good and you won't get hurt again!"

Marcus swallowed hard. He had thought he was beyond
feeling worse, but found he was wrong. Defeat was five times
more bitter at the hands of Rhavas. His head hung as he led
the weary, painful trudge back to camp.

Inside Videssos the soldiers of the Sphrantzai celebrated
their defense far into the night. They had reason to rejoice;

none of Thorisin's other attacks had come as close to success
as the Romans', and Scaurus knew how far from victory the
legionaries had been.

The sound of the revels only made Gavras' defeated army
more sullen as it licked its wounds back behind its rampart.
The tribune heard angry talk round the Roman campfires and
did not blame his soldiers for it. They had fought as well as
men could fight; but stone, brick, and iron were stronger than
flesh and blood.

When the Namdalener came up to the Roman camp, ner-
vous sentries almost speared him before he could convince
them he was friendly. He asked for Scaurus, saying he would
speak to no one else. The tribune's sword was drawn as he
walked to the north gate; apart from his own troops, he was
not prepared to take anyone on trust.

But the islander proved to be a man he knew, a veteran
mercenary named Fayard who had once been under the com-
mand of Helvis' dead husband Hemond. He stepped forward
out of the darkness to take the tribune's hand between his two,
the usual Namdalener clasp. "Soteric asks you to share a cup
of wine with him at our camp," he said. Years in the Empire
had left his Videssian almost accent-free.

Harry Turtledove            157

"This is a message you were bidden to give to me alone?"
Scaurus asked in surprise.

"I had my orders," Fayard shrugged. He had the resigned
air of a soldier used to carrying them out whether or not he
found sense in them.

"Of course I'll come. Give me a moment, though." Marcus
quickly found Gaius Philippus, told him of Soteric's request.
The senior centurion's eyes narrowed. He stroked his chin in
thought.

"He wants something from us," was his first comment,
echoing Scaurus' guess. Gaius Philippus followed it a moment
later with, "He's not very good at these games, is he? By now
the whole camp'll know you're off on some secret meeting,
where if his man had just sung out what he wanted to the gate
crew, nobody would have thought twice about it."

"Maybe I should take you off combat duty," Marcus said.
"You're getting to be a fine intriguer yourself, you know."

Gaius Philippus snorted, knowing the tribune's threat was
empty. "Ha! You don't need to be a cow to know where milk
comes from."

Scaurus fought temptation and lost. "You're right—that
would be udderly ridiculous." He walked off whistling, some-
how feeling better than he had since the ill-fated attack began.

He and Fayard drew three challenges in the ten-minute trip
to the Namdalener camp and another at its palisade. Guards-
men who would have ignored a platoon the night before now
reached for spear or bow at the smallest movement. Defeat,
Marcus thought, made men jump at shadows.

Yet another sentry stood, armed, in front of Soteric's tent.
A trifle shortsighted, he peered closely into the tribune's face
before standing aside to let him pass. Fayard ceremoniously
held the tent flap open. "You aren't coming, too?" Marcus
said.

"Me? By the Wager, no," the man of the Duchy answered.
"Soteric pulled me out of a game of dice to fetch you, and just
when I was starting to win. So by your leave—" He was gone
before the sentence was complete.

"Come in, Scaurus, or at least let the flap drop," Soteric
called. "The wind will put out the candles."

If Marcus had had any doubts that Soteric's invitation was
not merely social, the company Helvis' brother kept would
have erased them. A bandage on his forearm, Utprand Da-

158 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

gober's son sat on the sleeping mat by Soteric, his bearing and
his cold eyes wolfish as always. Next to him were a pair of
Namdaleni the tribune did not know, save by name: Clozart
Leatherbreeches and Turgot of Sotevag, whose native town
was on the eastern shore of the island Duchy. The four of them
together spoke for most of the islanders who followed Gavras.

They shifted to give Scaurus room to sit. Turgot swore
softly as he moved. "My arse is bandaged," he explained to
the Roman. "Took an arrow right in the cheek, I did."

"He doesn't care a moldy grape for your arse," Clozart
rumbled. Marcus thought he looked foolish in the tight leather
trousers he affected—he was nearing fifty, and his belly
bulged over their fastening—but his square face was hard and
capable, the face of a man who acts and lets consequences sort
themselves out afterward.

"Have some wine," Turgot said, pouring from a squat
pitcher. "We wouldn't want Fayard forsworn, would we?"
Marcus shook his head, sipped politely. For all their ostenta-
tious contempt for Videssian ways, some Namdaleni played
the game of indirection even more maddeningly than the im-
perials who had taught it to them.

Soteric, though, was not one of those. Tossing his own cup
back at a gulp, he demanded bluntly, "Well, what did you
think of today's fiasco?"

"About what I thought before," the tribune answered.
"With those walls, a handful of lame old men could hold off
an army, so long as they weren't too old to remember to keep
dropping rocks on its head."

"Ha! Well said, t'at," Utprand said, baring his teeth in the
grimace that served him for a chuckle. "But ('question has
more behind it. Gavras sent us forward to be killed, against
works he had no hope of taking. Why should we serve such a
man as that?"

"So you're thinking of going over to the Sphrantzai?"
Marcus asked carefully. If their answer was aye, he knew he
would have to use all his guile to leave the islanders' camp,
for that was a choice he could never make. And if guile failed
... He shifted his weight, bringing his sword to a position
where it would be easier to seize.

But Clozart spat in fine contempt. "I fart in Ortaias
Sphrantzes' face," he said.

"A pox on the twit," Soteric nodded. "The seal-stamping

Harry Turtledove            159

fop's a worse bargain than Gavras ever would be, him and his
pot-metal 'goldpieces.'"

"What then?" Scaurus said, puzzled. "What other choice is
there?"

"Home," Turgot said at once, and longing filled his eyes at
the word. "The lads have had a bellyful, and so have I. Let the
damned imperials bake in their own oven, and may both sides
bum. Give me cool Sotevag again and the long waves rolling
off the endless gray ocean, and if the Empire's recruiters come
my way again I'll set the hounds to 'em like your Vaspura-
kaner friend did to the Videssian priest."

The tribune felt no longing, only a jealousy that by now
itself was tired. In this world he and his had no home, nor
were they likely to. "You make it sound simple," he said
dryly. "But what do you propose to do, march through the
Empire's eastlands until you come to your own country?"

His intended sarcasm fell on deaf ears. "Aye," Clozart
said, "or rather the sea across from it. Why not? What do the
imperials have between here and there to stop us?"

"It should be easy," Utprand agreed. "T'Empire stripped
('garrisons bare to fight the Yezda, and then again for t'is civil
war. Once we get clear of Videssos, there would be no army
dare come near us. And T'orisin has to let us go—if he tries
to hold us, the Sphrantzai come out and eat him up."

The chilly logic was convincing, as was Utprand himself;

if the bleak Namdalener said a thing could be done, it very
likely could. The only question Marcus could find was, "Why
tell me now?"

"We want you and yours to come with us," Soteric an-
swered.

The tribune stared, surprised past speech. The Namdelener
rushed on, "Duke Tomond, Phos love him, would be proud to
have such fighters take service with him. There's room and to
spare in the Duchy, enough to make your troops yeoman
farmers, each with his own plot, and you, I'd guess, a count.
How's the sound of that? 'Scaurus, Scaurus, the great count
Scaurus!' if ever you chose to go on campaign again."

Soteric's tickling at his vanity left Marcus unmoved; he had
more influence as a general in the Empire than he would with
a fancy title of nobility in Namdalen. But for the first time
since the Romans were swept to this world, he found himself
tempted to cast aside his allegiance to Videssos. Here, freely

160    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

offered, was the thing he had thought impossible: a home, a
place of their own in which they could belong.

The offer of land alone would seem like a miracle to his
troops. Civil wars had been fought in Rome to get discharged
veterans the allotments their generals promised. "Room and to

spare..."

"Aye, outlander, it's a lovely country we have," Turgot
said, still sentimental over the motherland he missed. "Sote-
vag sits on the coast, between oak woods and croplands, and I
spend much of my time there, I will say. But I have a steading
up in the moors as well—the high hills, all covered with
heather and gorse, and flocks of sheep on 'em. The sky's a
different color from what it is here, a deeper blue, almost
makes you think you can see through it. And the wind carries
music on its breath, not the smell of horseshit and dust."

The Roman sat silent, all but overwhelmed by his own
memories of Mediolanum lost forever, of the snow-mantled
Alps seen from a safe, warm house, of tart, pungent Italian
wine, of speaking his mind in Latin instead of picking through
this painfully learned other tongue...

All four Namdaleni were watching him closely. Clozart
saw his struggle for decision but, mistrusting everyone not of
his island nation, mistook its meaning. Dropping into the thick
patois the men of the Duchy used among themselves, he said
to his comrades, "I told you we never should have started this.
Look at him there, figuring whether to sell us out or no."

He did not think Scaurus could follow his speech; few Vi-
dessians would have been able to. But more than a year's time
with Helvis had given the tribune a grasp of the island dialect.
His quick-sprung optimism faded. He and his were as alien to
the Namdaleni as to the imperials.

Soteric knew him better than the other three and saw he
had understood. Giving Clozart a venomous glare, he apolo-
gized as handsomely as he could.

"We know your worth," Utprand agreed. "You would not

be here else."

Marcus nodded his thanks; praise from a soldier like this
one was praise to be cherished. "I'll put what you've said
to my men," he said. Clozart's hard face reflected only dis-
belief, but the tribune meant it. There was no point in keeping
the Namdalener offer from the legionaries, and no way to do
so short of shutting them all in camp and killing any islander

Harry Turtledove            161

who came within hailing distance. Better by far to lead events
than be led by them.

When the tribune emerged from his brother-in-law's tent,
Fayard was nowhere to be seen. The dice spoke loudly to
Namdaleni, and he doubtless decided Scaurus knew the way
back to his own quarters.

His mind was spinning as he walked back to the Roman
camp. His first feeling at Soteric's proposal still held true:

after a Roman upbringing and almost two years in the Empire
of Videssos, being a count in the Duchy seemed rather like
being a large wolf in a small pack. Nor was he eager to aban-
don the Empire. The Yezda were foes who needed fighting
once the civil war was won—if it could be won.

On the other hand, when thinking only of the Romans' best
interests, Namdalen looked attractive indeed. He still had a
hard time believing there could be land to offer freely to sol-
diers. In Rome the Senate kept a jealous grip on it; in the
Empire it was in the hands of the nobles, with small free-
holders taxed to the wall. Land—it would draw his men, right
enough.

And on another level altogether, Helvis would surely leave
him if he said Soteric nay, and that he did not want. What was
between them refused to die, batter it about as they would.
And they had a son... Was nothing ever simple?

Gaius Philippus waited just inside the north gate, edgily
pacing back and forth. His saturnine features lit as he saw
Scaurus. "About time," he said. "Another hour and I'd have
come after you, and brought friends with me."

"No need for that," Marcus said. "We have some talking to
do, though. Fetch Glabrio and Gorgidas.and meet me back
here—we'll take a stroll outside the palisade. Bring the Celt,
while you're at it; this affects him, too."

"Viridovix? Is it a talk you want, or a brawl?" Gaius Phi-
lippus chuckled, but he hurried away to do what the tribune
asked. Marcus saw how the Romans followed him with their
eyes; they knew something was afoot. Damn Soteric and his
amateur theatrics, he thought.

It was only a couple of minutes before the men whose
judgment he most trusted and respected were gathered round
him, curiosity on their faces. He led them into the night, talk-
ing all the while of little things, doing his futile best to make
the conference seem ordinary to his men.




162    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Out of earshot of the camp, though, he dropped the facade
and gave a bald recounting of what had passed. A thoughtful
silence followed as his comrades began to work the thing
through, much as he had on his way back from Soteric's tent.

Gaius Philippus was the first to break it. "Were it up to me,
I'd tell 'em no. I haven't a thing against the islanders—
they're brave men and fine friends to drink with, but I don't
want to spend the rest of my days living among barbarians."
The senior centurion had in full measure the sense of superior-
ity the Romans felt for all other peoples save Greeks. In this
world Videssos was the standard by which such things were
gauged, and he identified himself with the imperial folk here,
forgetting they reckoned him as barbarous as the Namdaleni.

Gorgidas understood that perfectly well, but his choice was
the same. He said, "I left Elis for Rome years ago because I
knew my home was a backwater. Am I to reverse that course
now? I think not—here I stay. There's too much I have yet to
learn, too much the men of the Duchy don't know them-
selves."

The other two were slower to answer. Viridovix said,
"Sure and it's not an easy choice you set us, Scaurus dear, but
I think I'm for the change, belike for all the reasons the last
two were against it. I'm easier with the islanders than with
these sly, haughty imperials, where you never know the
thought in a man's head until one day there's a hired dagger
between your ribs because he misliked the cut of your tunic.

Aye, I'll go."

That left only Quintus Glabrio; to judge by the pain on his
face, his was the hardest choice of all. "And I," he said fi-
nally. Gorgidas' sharp intake of breath only made him seem
more miserable, but he went on, "It's the land, more than
anything else. The hope of it was the only reason I took ser-
vice in the legions; it was the chance to be my own man one
day, not a slave to someone else's wages. Without land, no

one really has anything."

"You're a worse slave to land than to any human master,"
Gaius Philippus retorted. "I joined the eagles to keep from
starving at the miserable little stone-bound plot where I was
bom. You want to walk behind an ox's arse from sunup to
sundown, boy? You must be daft."

But Glabrio only shook his head; his dream was proof
against the senior centurion's harsh memories, proof even

Harry Turtledove

163

against his bond with Gorgidas. The physician looked like a
soldier doggedly not showing a wound pained him, but he
made no complaint against his companion's decision, what-
ever his eyes might say. Marcus admired him the more, think-
ing of his own private fears and wondering how much they
would sway his course.

The centurions were too well-disciplined and Gorgidas too
polite to ask the obvious question, but Viridovix put it square-
ly: "And what does your honor intend to do?"

Scaurus had hoped some consensus might show itself in his
comrades' answers, but they were as divided among them-
selves as he was in himself. He stood silent a long while,
feeling his inner balance sway now one way, now the other.

At last he said, "With this attack gone for nothing, I don't
think Gavras has any real chance to take the city, and without
it he'll lose the civil war. I'll go to Namdalen, I think; under
the Sphrantzai the Empire will fall, and in any case I would
not serve them. The Yezda, almost, are better, for they wear
no mask of virtue."

Even with the decision made, he was far from sure it was
right. He said, "In this I will give no man orders. Let each one
do as he will. Gaius, my friend, my teacher, I know you'll do
gallantly with the men who feel as you do." They embraced;

Scaurus was shocked to see tears on the veteran's cheeks.

"A man does what he thinks is right," Gaius Philippus
said. "A long time ago, when I was hardly more than a boy, I
fought on Marius' side in the civil war, while my closest
friend chose Sulla. While the war lasted I would have killed
him if I could, but years later I happened to meet him in a
tavern, and we drank the place dry between us. May it be so
with you and me one day."

"May it be so," Marcus whispered, and his own face was
wet.

Viridovix was hugging Gaius Philippus now, saying, "The
crows take me if I won't miss you, you hard-shell runt!"

"And I you, you great hulking savage!"

With their long habit of discretion, what Gorgidas and
Quintus Glabrio thought they kept to themselves.

"There's no point in throwing the camp into an uproar to-
night," Marcus said. "Morning muster will be the right time to
let the men know their choice; keep it to yourselves until
then."




164

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

165

There were nods all around. They walked slowly back to
the palisade, not one picking up the pace, all thinking this
might be the last time they were together. The raucous noises
from behind the city's walls were an intrusion on their
thoughts. Things sounded as much like a riot as a celebration,
the tribune thought bitterly. He cursed the Sphrantzai yet
again, for forcing him to a decision he did not want to make.

The sentries drooped like flowers in a drought when their
officers passed them by without a hint of what they had dis-
cussed. All through the camp, men stared toward them.

"Be damned to you!" Viridovix shouted. "I've not grown a
second head, nor a crest of purple feathers either, so dinna be
dragging your eyes over me so!" The Celt's short temper was
reassuringly normal; legionaries turned back to their food,
their talk, or their endless games of chance.

Gorgidas said, "You'll forgive me, I hope, but I have
wounded to attend to, crude as my methods are." Much to his
own dismay, he still fought hurts with styptics and ointments,
tourniquets and sutures. Nepos maintained he had the skill to
learn Videssian healing arts, but his efforts bore no fruit.
Scaurus suspected that was one reason, and not the least, he
had decided to stay in Videssos.

Quintus Glabrio followed the physician, talking in a voice
too low for Scaurus to hear; he saw Gorgidas dip his head in a
Greek affirmative.

Someone hefted a skin of wine. Viridovix ambled toward
it, drawn as surely as nails by a lodestone.

Helvis was sleeping when the tribune ducked into their
tent. He touched her cheek, felt her stir. She sat up, careful
not to wake Maine or Dosti. "It's late," she said, a sleepy
complaint. "What do you want?"

Scaurus told her of her brother's plan, speaking as tersely
as he had to his officers. She said nothing for a full minute
when he was through, then asked, "What will you do?" It was
a curiously uninflected question, all emotion waiting on the
answer.

He said only, "I'll go." Reasons did not matter now; the
essence of the thing was the choice itself.

Even in the darkness he saw her eyes go wide. She had
been braced for a no and for the explosion that would follow
it. "You will? We will?" she said foolishly. Then she laughed
in absolute delight, forgetting her sleeping children. She flung

her arms around the tribune's neck, planted a lopsided kiss on
his mouth.

Her joy did not make him any easier over his decision;

somehow it only brought into sharper focus the doubts he felt.
Caught up in that joy, she did not notice his somber mood.
"When will we leave?" she asked, eager and practical at the
same time.

"In three or four days, I'd guess." Marcus answered with
reluctance; putting a date to the departure made it painfully
real.

Malric woke up, and crossly. "Stop talking so much," he
said. "I want to go back to sleep."

Helvis scooped him up and hugged him. "We're talking so
much because we're happy. We're going home soon."

Her words meant nothing to her son, who had been born in
Videssos and known no life save that of the camp. "How can
we go home?" he asked. "We are home."

The tribune had to smile. "How do you propose to explain
that to him?"

"Hush," Helvis said, rocking the sleepy boy back and
forth. "Phos be thanked, he'll leam what the word really
means. And thank you, my very dear, for giving him the
chance. I love you for it."

Scaurus nodded, a short, abrupt motion. He was still fight-
ing his internal battle, and praise seemed suspect. But with his
choice made, what need was there to load his qualms on her?
Better, he thought, to hold them to himself.

He slid under the blanket; this day had drained him, and in
another way the one upcoming would be worse. But it was a
long time before he slept.

Turmoil outside woke him at first light of day. He knuckled
his eyes, cursed groggily, and then sat bolt upright. The first
cause for the uproar that crossed his mind was his men's
somehow learning what was afoot. He scrambled into his
cloak and dashed out of the tent. It would be all too easy for
hubbub to turn to riot.

But there was no sign of riot, though the legionaries were
not standing to muster in front of their eight-man tents. In-
stead they were packed in a shoving, shouting mass against
the western wall of the camp, peering and pointing over the




166 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

palisade in high excitement. More kept coming as the camp
awakened.

The tribune pushed through the crowd; his men gave way
with salutes as they recognized him. They were jammed so
close together, though, that he took several minutes to work
his way up to the palisade.

He did not have to be right by it—his inches let him see
over the last couple of ranks of men. Someone next to him
pounded him on the back: Minucius. The trooper's eyes were
alight with triumph, his strong features stretched in a grin.
"Will you look at that, sir?" he exclaimed. "Will you just look
at that?"

For a moment Marcus still did not know what he meant.
There ahead was Thorisin's earthwork and, beyond it, the cap-
ital's fortifications, silently indomitable as always.

That sentence had no sooner taken shape than it echoed
like a gong inside him. No wonder the great double walls
seemed silent in the dawn—not a defender was on them.

He felt giddy, as if he had gulped down a jug of neat wine.
"Step aside! Make room!" he cried, ramming his way to the
very front—he had to see as much as he could, be as close as
he could. Normally he would have been ashamed to use his
rank so, but in his excitement he did not give it a second
thought.

There were the Silver Gates straight ahead, the works that
had beaten back everything his men could throw at them.
They were wide open now, and in them stood three men with
torches, almost hopping in their eagerness to wave the be-
siegers into Videssos. Their shouts came thinly across the no
man's land between the city and the siege-works: "Hurrah for
Thorisin Gavras, Avtokrator of the Videssians!"

VIII

THE TORCH-WAVERS AND THEIR FRIENDS BEHIND THEM WERE

as unsavory a lot of ruffians as the tribune had ever seen.
Gaudy in street finery—baggy tunics with wide, flopping
sleeves and tights dyed in an eye-searing rainbow of colors—
they swarmed around the orderly Roman ranks, flourishing
cudgels and shortswords and shouting at the top of their lungs.

No matter who they were, though, their cries were what
Scaurus most wanted to hear: "Gavras the Emperor!" "Dig up
Ortaias' bones!" "To the Milestone with the Sphrantzai, the
dung-munching Skotos-lovers!"

As he looked north along the wall, the tribune saw Thori-
sin's army loping by squads and companies through every
wide-flung gate. The Namdaleni were moving up from their
stretch of siege line along with all the rest. If Gavras was a
winner after all, withdrawal suddenly looked foolish.

"Reprieve," Gaius Philippus said, and Marcus nodded,
feeling relief like a cool wind in his mind. He blessed the
mixed emotions that had made him hesitate before announcing
the pullout to his men. Never had he come to a decision more
reluctantly and never was he gladder to see events overturn it.

Helvis would be disappointed, but victory paid all debts.
She would get over it, he told himself.

The news grew wilder with every step he took into the city,
until he had no idea what to believe. Ortaias had abdicated,
taken refuge in the High Temple, fled the city, been
overthrown, been killed, been torn into seven hundred pieces
so even his ghost would never find rest. The rebellion had
started because of food riots, treachery among Ortaias'

167

1 68    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

backers, and anger at the excesses of Outis Rhavas' men, of
the great count Drax, or of the Khamorth. Its leader was
Rhavas, Mertikes Zigabenos—whom Scaurus vaguely re-
membered as Nephon Khoumnos' aide—the Princess Em-
press AIypia, Balsamon the patriarch, or no one.

"They don't know what's happening any more than we
do," Gaius Philippus said in disgust as he listened to the ump-
teenth contradictory tale, all of them told with passionate con-
viction. "You might as well shut your ears."

That was not quite true. On one thing, at least, all rumors
came together—though the rest of Videssos had slipped from
their hands, the Sphrantzai still held the palace quarter. Unlike
much of what he heard, that made sense to Scaurus. Many
buildings in the palace complex were fortresses in their own
right, perfect refuges for a faction beaten elsewhere.

It also decided Scaurus' course of action. The Silver Gate
opened onto Middle Street, the capital's main thoroughfare,
which ran directly to the palaces with but a single dogleg. The
tribune told the buccinators, "Blow double-time!" Above the
blare of horns he shouted, "Come on, boys! We've waited
long enough for this!" The legionaries raised a cheer and
quickstepped down the slate-paved street at a pace that soon
left most of the rowdies gasping far behind them.

The tribune remembered the Romans' parade along Middle
Street the day they first came to the capital. Then it had been
slow march, with a herald in front of them crying, "Make way
for the valiant Romans, brave defenders of the Empire!" The
street had cleared like magic. Today pedestrians got no more
warning than the clatter of iron-spiked sandals on the flag-
stones and, if Phos was with them, a shouted "Gangway!"
After that it was their own lookout, and more than one was
flung aside or simply run down and trampled.

Just as they had on that first day, the sidewalks filled to
watch the troops go by; to Videssos1 fickle, jaded populace,
even civil war could become entertainment. Farmers and
tradesmen, monks and students, whores and thieves, fat mer-
chants and sore-covered beggars, all came rushing out to see
what the new spectacle might be. Some cheered, some called
down curses on the Sphrantzai, but most just stood and stared,
delighted the morning had brought them this diversion.

Marcus saw an elderly woman point at the legionaries,
heard her screech, "It's the Gamblers, come to sack Vi-

Harry Turtledove            169

dessos!" She used city slang for the Namdaleni; even in the
language of insult, theology came into play.

Curse the ignorant harridan, thought Scaurus. The crowds
had just left off being a mob; they could become one again in
an instant. But the leader of the street toughs, a thick-shoul-
dered bear of a man named Arsaber, was still jogging along
beside the legionaries and came to their rescue now. "Shut it,
you scrawny old bitch!" he bellowed. "These here ain't Gam-
blers, they're our friends the Ronams, so don't you give 'em
any trouble, hear?"

He turned back to the tribune, grinning a rotten-toothed
grin. "You Ronams, you're all right. I remember during the
riots last summer, you put things down without enjoying it too
much." He spoke of riots and the quelling thereof with the
expert knowledge someone else might show on wine.

Thanks to a bungling herald's slip at the imperial reception
just after the Romans came to Videssos, much of the city still
mispronounced their name. Marcus did not think the moment
ripe for correcting Arsaber, though. "Well, thanks," he said.

The plaza of Stavrakios, the coppersmiths' district—al-
ready full of the sound of hammering—the plaza of the Ox,
the red-granite imperial office building that doubled as ar-
chives and jail, and a double handful of Phos' temples, large
and small, all flashed quickly by as the legionaries stormed
toward the palaces.

Then Middle Street opened out into the plaza of Palamas,
the greatest forum in the city. Scaurus nicked a glance at the
Milestone, a column of the same red granite as the imperial
offices. There must have been a score of heads mounted on
pikes at its base, like so many gruesome fruit. Nearly all were
fresh, but terror had not been enough to keep the Sphrantzai
on the throne.

The plaza market stalls were open, but Thorisin Gavras'
blockade had cut deeply into their trade. Bakers, oil sellers,
butchers, and wine merchants had little to sell, and that ra-
tioned and supervised by government inspectors. Ironically, it
was commerce in luxuries that flourished under the siege.
Jewels and precious metals, rare drugs, amulets, silks and
brocades found customers galore. These were the things that
could always be exchanged for food, so long as there was
food.

The eruption of more than a thousand armed men into the




170 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

plaza of Palamas sent the rich merchants flying for their lives,
stuffing their goods into pockets or pouches and kicking over
their stalls in their panic to be gone. "Will you look at the loot
getting away," Viridovix said wistfully.

"Shut up," Gaius Philippus growled. "Don't give the lads
more ideas than they have already." His vine-stave staff of
office thwacked down on the corseleted shoulder of a legion-
ary who had started to stray. "Come on, Paterculus—the
fight's this way! Besides, you bonehead, the pickings'll be
better yet in the palaces." That prediction was plenty to keep
the men in line—the troopers who heard him fairly purred in
anticipation.

They thundered past the great oval of the Amphitheater, the
southern flank of Palamas' plaza. Then they were into the
quarter of the palaces, its elegant buildings set off from one
another by artfully placed gardens and groves and wide
stretches of close-trimmed emerald lawn.

A Roman swore and dropped his scutum to clutch at his
right shoulder with his left hand. High overhead, an archer in
a cypress tree whooped and nocked another shaft. His triumph
was short-lived. Zeprin the Red's great two-handed axe was
made for hewing heads, not timber, but the muscular Haloga
proved no mean woodsman. The axe bit, jerked free, bit
again. Chips flew at every stroke. The cypress swayed, tot-
tered, fell; the sniper's scream of terror cut off abruptly as he
was crushed beneath the trunk.

"The gardeners will be angry at me," Zeprin said. A long-
time veteran of the Imperial Guard, he thought of the palace
complex as his home and mourned the damage he had done it.
For the dead enemy he showed no remorse.

"Dinna fash yoursel', Haloga dear," Viridovix told him
dryly. "They'll be after having other things on their minds."

He waved ahead—a barricade of logs, broken benches,
and levered-up paving flags scarred the smooth expanse of
lawn. There were helmeted soldiers behind it and bodies in
front—the high-water mark, it seemed, of the mob's attack on
the palaces.

The makeshift works might have been strong enough to
hold off rioters, but Scaurus' troops were another matter—and
a second look told him the defenders were not many. "Battle
line!"he ordered. His men shook themselves out into

Harry Turtledove            171

place, their hobnailed caligae ripping the smooth turf. His
eyes caught Gaius Philippus'; they nodded together.
"Charge!" the tribune shouted, and the Romans rolled down
on the barricade.

A few arrows snapped toward them, but only a few. With
cries of "Gavras!" and "Thorisin!" they hit the waist-high
rampart and started scrambling over. Some of the warriors on
the other side stayed to fight with saber and spear, but most,
seeing themselves hopelessly outnumbered, turned to flee.

"Don't follow too close! Let 'em run!" Gaius Philippus
roared out—in Latin, so the enemy could not understand.
"They'll show us where their mates are lurking!"

The command tested Roman obedience to the utmost, for
their foes used not only "The Sphrantzai!" and "Ortaias!" as
war cries, but also "Rhavas!" It was all the senior centurion
could do to hold his men in check. The battle-heat was on
them, fanned hotter by lust for vengeance.

But Gaius Philippus' levelheaded order proved its worth.
The enemy fell back, not on the barracks where Scaurus had
expected them to make their stand, but through the ceremonial
buildings of the palace complex and past the Hall of the Nine-
teen Couches to the Grand Courtroom itself, after Phos' High
Temple the most splendid edifice in all Videssos.

The Hall of the Nineteen Couches had walls of green-shot
marble and gilded bronze double doors that would have done
credit to a keep. It was useless as a strongpoint, though, for a

dozen low, wide windows made it impossible to hold against
assault.

Marcus wished the same was true of the Grand Courtroom.
It was a small compound in its own right, with outsweeping
wings of offices making three sides of a square. Archers stood
on the domed roof of the courtroom proper; others, looking
for targets, peered through windows in the wings. Those win-
dows were few, small, and high—the architect who designed
the thickset building of golden sandstone had made sure it
could double as a citadel.

"Zeprin!" Scaurus shouted, and the Haloga appeared be-
fore him, axe at port arms. The tribune said, "Since you've
already turned logger, hack me down a couple of tall straight
ones for rams."

"Rams against the Grand Gates?" Zeprin the Red sounded
horrified.

172    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"I know they're treasures," Marcus said with what patience
he could. "But do you think those whoresons'll come out by

themselves?"

After a moment the Haloga sighed and shrugged. "Aye,

there are times when it's what must be done, not what should
be." His thick muscles bunched under his mail shirt; he at-
tacked the stately pines with a ferocity that told something of
his dismay. The Romans were at the foot-and-a-half thick
trunks as fast as they fell, chopping branches away and then

tugging the trimmed logs up.

"All right, at 'em!" Gaius Philippus said. The men at the
rams clumsily swung their heavy burdens toward the Grand
Gates. Shieldmen leaped out on either side of them to cover
them from arrow-fire. The makeshift batterers, of course, had
no mantlets; Marcus hoped the enemy trapped inside the
Grand Courtroom had not had time to bring anything more

lethal than bowmen up to the roof.

The ram crews lumbered forward, warded by their

comrades' upraised scuta. The Grand Gates groaned at the
impact, as if in pain. The logs jolted from the Romans' hands.
Men tumbled, writhing as they fell to keep from being
crushed. They scrambled to their feet, lifted the rams once
more, and drew back for another blow.

More legionaries fanned out to deal with the few dozen
men who had fled to the Grand Courtroom too late to take
shelter inside. Soon only Romans stood erect in the courtyard.
Not one of Rhavas' men had asked for quarter—in that, at
least, they perfectly understood the temper of their foes.

Out of the comer of his eye Marcus noticed the upper
stories of the nearby Hall of Ambassadors. They were
crowded with faces watching the fighting. The tribune had
several friends among the foreign envoys. He hoped they were
safe. This, he thought, was a closer view of Videssos' govern-
ment in action than they were likely to want.

Rhavas' archers were hitting back. One sharpshooter high
on the courtroom dome scored again and again. Then he
crumpled, sliding down over the orange-red tiles to fall like so

many limp rags to the greenery far below.

The range and upward angle had made him a nearly impos-
sible mark. "Well shot!" Marcus cried, looking round to find
out who had picked off the bowman. He saw Viridovix
pounding a skinny, swarthy man on the back: Arigh Arghun's

Harp/ Turtledove             173

son, the envoy of the Arshaum to Videssos' court. His noma-
dic people dwelt on the steppe west of the Khamorth, and he
carried a plainsman's short, hom-reinforced bow. Bitter expe-
rience against the Yezda had taught Scaurus how marvelously
long and flat those bows shot; the dead sharpshooter was but
another proof.

"Isn't he the finest little fellow now?" Viridovix crowed,
gleefully thumping Arigh again. The big ruddy Celt and
slight, flat-faced, black-haired nomad made a strange pair, but
they had often roistered together when the Romans were sta-
tioned in the city. Each owned a fierce, uncomplicated view of
life that appealed to the other, the more so in the wordly-wise
capital.

The tribune's brief musing was snapped by a scream within
the Grand Courtroom, a woman's shriek of mortal anguish
that sent the hairs on his arms and at the nape of his neck
bristling upright. Hardened though they were, the Romans and
their foes both stood frozen in horror for a moment before
returning to their business of murdering one another.

Marcus' first thought after his wits began to work again
was that Alypia Gavra might well be in the besieged court-
room. If that scream had been hers— "Harder, damn you!" he
shouted to the men at the rams and shoved sword in scabbard
so he could take hold of a log.

The ram crews needed no urging; the cry had put fresh
spirit in them as well. They rushed forward. The Grand Gates
tolled like a sub-bass bell. Scaurus fell, scraping elbows and
knees and feeling the wind half knocked from him, almost as
if he had run full-tilt into the gates himself.

He leaped to his feet and ran back to the log, never notic-
ing the fist-sized stone that smashed into the grass where he
had sprawled. Then it was back and forward again, and yet
again. The rough bark drew blood from even the most cal-
lused hands.

Twice as tall as a man, the burnished gates were leaning
drunkenly back against the bar that held them upright. Quintus
Glabrio's clear voice rang out, "Once more! This one pays for
all." The rams crashed home. With the desperate sound a
great plank makes on breaking, the bar gave way. The Grand
Gates flew open, as if kicked. Cheering, the Romans surged
forward.

A fierce volley met them, but Scaurus, expecting such, had




174    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

put shieldmen in front of the ram crews to hold off the arrows.
Then it was savage fighting at the breached gate. The small
opening kept the Romans from bringing their full numbers
into play, and Rhavas' bandits fought with the reckless fury of
men who knew themselves trapped. Even so, the legionaries
were better armed and better trained; step by bitter step they
pushed their foes back from the entrance and into the court-
room.

As he fought his way past the Grand Gates, Marcus felt the

dismay Zeprin the Red had known when the tribune ordered
rams brought to bear against them. The high reliefs on them
were exquisite, a wordless chronicle of the Emperor. Stavra-
kios' conquest of Agder in the far northeast eleven hundred
years before. Here the imperial troops led back prisoners, the
bowed heads of the captive women agonizing portraits of de-
spair. A little higher, engineers carved a road along the side of
a cliff so the army could advance; a pack mule's hoof skittered
on the edge of disaster. At the join of the gates Stavrakios led
a counterattack against the Halogai. And over all stood the
Miracle of Phos, when hot sun in midwinter melted a frozen
river and trapped the barbarians without retreat. The Videssian
god appeared in brooding majesty above his chosen folk.

But Agder was lost to the Empire these last eight long
centuries, and now, the reliefs that showed its overthrow
themselves met war. The rams had flattened mountains and
crushed faces with impartial brutality. A tiny twisted bronze
ear was trampled in the grass at the tribune's feet. Nothing can
come into being without change, he told himself, but the

maxim did little to console him.

He shouldered past one of Rhavas' bravoes, thrust home
under the arm where his mail shirt was weak. The man
groaned and twisted away, enlarging his own wound. As he
fell, Scaurus tore his small round shield from him to replace
the scutum left outside the courtroom.

Marcus' eyes took a few seconds to adjust to the relative
gloom within. He had expected to face Outis Rhavas at the
entrance—had Ortaias Sphrantzes' foul captain fled? No,
there he was, by a seething iron cauldron in the very center of
the porphyry floor; the rude log fire kindled on that perfect
surface was a desecration in itself. A knot of men around him
jostled one another, each trying to dip a surcoat sleeve into
whatever mixture bubbled in the kettle.

Harry Turtledove            1 75

By it sprawled a gutted corpse, naked, female. The druids'
stamps on Marcus' blade flared into light, but he did not need
them to warn him of magic.

The fight was not the well-planned, carefully orchestrated
engagement in which Gaius Philippus could take pride. The
Romans perforce broke ranks to battle through the Grand
Gates; inside the courtroom it was a vicious sprawl of fight-
ing, one on one, three against two, up and down the broad
center aisle and around the tall columns of light-drinking ba-
salt. A hanging of cloth of gold and scarlet silk came tumbling
down to enfold a handful of warriors in its precious web. -

Marcus fought his way toward Rhavas. He moved cau-
tiously; his hobnailed caligae would not bite on the glass-
smooth flooring, and he felt as if he were walking on ice.

When one of Rhavas' men stumbled against him, they both
fell heavily. They grappled, so closely locked together
Scaurus could smell his enemy's fear. He could not stab with
his sword; it was too long. He smashed the pommel into the
brigand's face until the clutching arms around him relaxed
their grip.

The tribune staggered to his feet. There were shouts out-
side—more of Thorisin's men reaching the palace complex at
last through Videssos' maze of streets. Scaurus had no time
for them. Outis Rhavas loomed over him, a tower of enameled
steel from closed helm to mailed boots.

Most Videssians fought by choice from horseback and thus
preferred sabers. But as he had in the brush at the rampart,
Rhavas swung a heavy longsword. His giant frame made it a
wickedly effective weapon; even the tall Scaurus gave away
inches of reach.

"A pity you scrape your face bare," Rhavas hissed, his
voice full of venom. "It ruins the pleasure of shaving your
corpse."

The tribune did not answer; he knew the taunt was only
meant to enrage and distract him. Their blades rang together.
As Marcus had already found, Outis Rhavas was as skilled as
he was strong. Stroke by stroke, he drove the Roman back; it
was all Scaurus could do to parry the storm of blows. After
the protection of his lost scutum, the small shield he carried
seemed no more useful than a lady's powder puff.

But for all their fell captain's might, Rhavas' band was
falling back around him. They fought as bandits do, furiously

1 76    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

but without order. Though the legionaries' maniples were in
disarray, long training had drilled into them the notion that
they were parts of a greater whole. Like a constricting snake's
coils, they pressed constantly, never yielding an advantage

once gained.

Thus when Rhavas threatened Marcus, he was alone, while

Viridovix and half a dozen Romans leaped to the tribune's
defense. Balked of his prey, Rhavas cursed horribly. But he
gave ground, falling back until he was one of the last de-
fenders of the cauldron that still boiled and steamed in the

center of the courtroom.

Even through woodsmoke, Marcus caught its contents'

sick-sweet carrion reek, but a score of Rhavas' soldiers had
already wet their sleeves in the liquid. And not soldiers alone;

the sleeve that went into the pot now was purple satin shot
through with thread of silver and gold.

"Vardanes!" the tribune shouted, and at the cry the elder
Sphrantzes jerked as if jabbed with a pin. Scaurus had rarely
seen Ortaias' uncle other than perfectly composed or known
that round, ruddy face with its fringe of neat black beard to
reflect anything but what the Sevastos wanted seen. But now
he wore the furtive, guilty look of a man surprised at a per-
version.

The battle stiffened. Some of Rhavas' bandits, it seemed,

would not fall, no matter what blows landed on them. Marcus
heard Gaius Philippus snarl, "Go down, you bastard, go
down!", heard the soft, meaty sound of a blade driven home.

But the senior centurion's foe only grinned like a snake.
Scaurus saw the yellowish stain on his surcoat sleeve. He
slashed back at the Roman, a clumsy stroke Gaius Philippus
turned with his shield. But doubt clouded the veteran's eyes
—how was he to beat a man he could not wound?

That same doubt appeared on more and more Roman faces.
As Rhavas' anointed gained confidence in their invulnerability
to steel, they began running risks no warrior would have
thought sane, taking ten blows to land one. They taunted the
legionaries, as boys will taunt a savage dog when safely be-
hind a high fence. And, inevitably, they took their share of

victims. The Roman advance stumbled.

Smiling wickedly, a tall, jackal-lean Videssian engaged
Viridovix. The cutthroat swung his sword two-handed—what
need had he of shield? The big Gaul slid to one side, light on

Harry Turtledove

177

his feet as a great hunting cat. His blade, twin to Scaurus'
own, sang through the air, druids' marks flashing gold.

It bit through flesh and windpipe and bone. Before the
expression of horrified surprise could form on the brigand's
face, his head leaped from his shoulders, hitting the ground
with a warm, splattery thud. The spouting corpse collapsed,
its limbs thrashing, for a moment not realizing they were
dead.

Viridovix's banshee howl of triumph filled the courtroom.
He leaped forward. Another muck-sleeved ruffian fell, clutch-
ing at the guts the Celt's sword laid out into his hands, neat'as
an anatomical demonstration.

Marcus went hunting stained surcoats, too, realizing that,
as had always been true in Videssos, his good Gallic blade
was proof against sorcery. Like Viridovix, he killed his first
man with ridiculous ease. Not knowing the weapon he faced,
the bandit scarcely bothered to protect himself. He gasped as
the tribune's sword found his heart, then tried to breathe, but
coughed blood instead.

"Liar!" he whispered, slumping to the floor; his eyes were
on Rhavas.

The harsh captain's men wavered in their attack, new-
found confidence faltering as they watched their comrades die
so in surprise. Then Arsaber, the hulking street ruffian, felled
yet another of their number, his heavy club making a shattered
ruin of the left side of his opponent's face.

Gaius Philippus was no scholar, but in battle he missed
nothing. "It's only iron won't hurt 'em!" he shouted to the
legionaries. He snatched a pilum from one of the Romans,
grabbing the shank to wield it clubwise. He shouted in fierce
delight as the blow sent one of Rhavas' warriors spinning
back, sword flying from nerveless fingers. Marcus did not
think that man would rise again; the senior centurion had ex-
orcised all his fear of magic in one prodigious swing.

"Stand, you ball-less rabbits!" Rhavas bellowed, and Var-
danes Sphrantzes' well-trained baritone rose in exhortation:

"Hold fast! Hold fast!" But they were shouting against a gale
of fear roaring through their followers—sword and spear had
not held the Romans, and now sorcery failed as well.

One desperate band cut its way clean through the legion-
aries; its handful of survivors dashed through the Grand Gates,
intent only on escape. Marcus heard their cries of despair as

1 78    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

they ran headlong into more of Thorisin Gavras' troops out-
side. With agility bom of desperation, bandits clawed their
way up wall hangings to insecure refuges in window niches
ten feet above the floor. Others tried to surrender, but not
many of Scaurus' men would let them yield. Quintus Glabrio
kept more than one from being killed out of hand, but he
could not be everywhere.

Outis Rhavas cut down a bolting man from behind, and
then another, his own way of encouraging his bandits to stand
and fight. But even with the hardiest of his irregulars at his
side, the surging Romans at last drove him from his wizard's
cauldron. He fell back toward the imperial throne.

Marcus traded swordstrokes with one of his lieutenants.
The man was fast as a striking viper; he pinked Scaurus twice
in quick succession, and a vicious slash just missed the tri-
bune's eye. But the cutthroat's heel slipped in the great pool of
blood that had gushed from the serving wench his master had
killed. Before he could recover, Scaurus' blade tore out his
throat. He fell across the girl's outraged corpse.

As the tribune pushed forward, he glanced down into the
iron pot Rhavas had defended with such ferocity and found
himself looking at horror. Floating in the boiling, scum-filled
water was a dead baby, the soft flesh beginning to fall away
from its bones. No, he corrected himself, not even a baby—
the tiny body was no longer than the distance between the tips
of his outstretched thumb and little finger.

His eyes slipped to the serving wench's opened belly, back
in disbelief to the cauldron, and he was sick where he stood.
He spat again and again to clear his mouth of the taste and
wished he might somehow wipe his vision clear so easily.

Cold in him was the knowledge that there were, after all,
worse evils than Doukitzes' tortured death. He was tempted to
follow the creed of Videssos, for in Outis Rhavas surely

Skotos walked on earth.

That thought led to another, and sudden dreadful certainty
gripped him. "Rhavas!" he shouted; the name was putrid as
the vomit on his tongue. Then he solved the other's anagram,
his monstrous joke, and cried another name: "Avshar!"

It grew very still within the Grand Courtroom; blows hung
in the air, unstruck. Outis Rhavas' name brought with it rage
and hatred, but the wizard-prince of Yezd had struck cold
terror into Videssos' heart for a generation. Inside the ranks of

Harry Turtledove

179

Rhavas' men, Marcus saw Vardanes Sphrantzes' red cheeks
go pale as he understood his state's greatest foe had been a
chief upholder of his rule.

Across the thirty feet that separated them, Rhavas—no,
Avshar—dipped his head to the tribune in derisive acknow-
ledgement of his astuteness. "Very good," he chuckled, and
Scaurus wondered how he had not known that fell voice at
first hearing. "You have more wit than these dogs, it seems—
much good will it do you."

After that moment of stunned dismay, the legionaries
hurled themselves with redoubled fury at the backers of him
who had styled himself Outis Rhavas. The men they faced
threw down their swords in scores. Rhavas the brigand chief
was a captain they had followed in hope of blood and plunder,
but few were the Videssians who would willingly serve Av-
shar.

A bandit leaped at his longtime master's back, saber
upraised to cut him down. But Avshar whirled with the speed
of a wolf; his heavy longsword smashed through helm and
skull alike. "A dog indeed," he cried, "nipping at the heels he
followed! Are there more?"

The men who had been his flinched away in fright, all save
a black handful who still clove to him, who would have hap-
pily fought for him had they thought him Skotos enfleshed—
the worst of his band, but far from the weakest. Almost all
wore surcoats stained with his protective brew—no qualm of
conscience had kept them from dipping their sleeves in that
horrid pot.

Vardanes Sphrantzes stood in indecision, a spider caught in
a greater spider's web. He did not think of himself as an evil
man, merely a practical one, and he feared Avshar with the
sincere fear a far from perfect man can have for one truly
wicked. But the Sevastos was more afraid to yield himself to
Scaurus and, through him, to Thorisin Gavras. He knew too
well the common fate of losers in Videssos' civil wars and
also knew his actions in raising his nephew to the throne—
and since—were sure to doom him in the victor's eyes.

The wizard-prince saw Sphrantzes waver; he flayed him
into motion with the whip of his voice: "Come, worm, do you
think you can do without me now?" And Vardanes, who had
felt only contempt for soldiers, looked once more at the
Romans' crested helms and at their stabbing swords and long




180 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

spears. It seemed they were all bearing down on him alone.
His will failed him, and he fled with Avshar.

The way they chose—the only way they could have cho-
sen—was a narrow spiral stair that opened out into the Grand
Courtroom just to the right of the imperial throne's gold and
sapphire brilliance. It had not been part of the throne room's
original design, for it brutally abridged a delicate wall mosaic.
Marcus wondered what ancient treason caused some cautious
Emperor to put safety above beauty.

Once Avshar's few partisans had gained the stair, the le-
gionaries' advance was easy no more. Those steps had been
made so one man could hold back an army, and the wizard-
prince himself was rear guard, a cork not to be lightly pulled
from the bottle.

The tribune and Viridovix attacked by turns; not only were
they nearest Avshar in size and strength, but theirs were blades
to stand against his sorcery. At every stroke the druids' marks
incised upon them flashed golden, turning aside the banes
locked within his brand.

Legionaries, crowding close behind their champions,
jabbed spears over them at Avshar. Warded as he was, the
thrusts could not hurt him, but spoiled his swordstrokes and
threatened to trip him up. His heavy blade hewed clear
through more than one soft iron pilum-shsmk.; nevertheless he
was forced back, step by slow step.

"Let's the both of us fight him at the same time," Viridovix
panted. Marcus shook his head. The stairway was so narrow
two men abreast would only foul each other, but he would
have refused had it been wider. The first time his sword had
met the Gaul's, they were whirled here; were they to touch
again, only the gods knew what might befall.

The spiral wound through three complete turns. Then Av-
shar's massive frame was silhouetted against a background
lighter than the stairway's oppressive gloom. The wizard-
prince drew back away from the topmost step, as if inviting
his pursuers to come on.

That Marcus did, but warily, expecting deviltry. He re-
membered Avshar's escape from Videssos the year before—
the sea-wall arsenal's sudden-slammed door, the corpse of the
wizard's servant speaking with his master's voice, the swords
and spears that flew to the attack with no man wielding them.

r

Harry Turtledove            181

Avshar was never more dangerous than when seeming to give
way.

A blade slammed against his upraised shield, but there was
a ruffian back of it, a red-faced man with a great mat of greasy
black beard. Scaurus parried, countered. The thrust was
clumsy, but his reach and long blade made his stocky foe give
back a pace. He stepped up quickly, Viridovix only a single
stair behind him, legionaries jamming the stairway behind.

The suite above the throne room had to be the Emperor's
disrobing chamber, a private retreat from the ceremonial of the
Grand Courtroom. There had been, Marcus saw, six or eight
well-stuffed chairs and a couch set up in the outer room; Av-
shar's men had flung them against the seascape-painted walls
to gain fighting room. The rough treatment had burst one, and
gray feathers whirled in the air.

Even as he fenced with the black-bearded highbinder,
Scaurus wondered why Avshar had yielded the stair so easily
there at the end, why for the moment he was leaving the battle
to his henchmen. Where was he? Hardly time to see, with this
cutthroat hacking away like a berserker.

The tribune let his foe's slash hiss past, stepped forward
inside the saber's arc, and ran him .through the throat. Aye,
there was Avshar, in front of a closed door with Vardanes
Sphrantzes. He bent low to say something to the Sevastos,
who shook his head. Avshar smashed him in the face with his
gauntleted hand.

Vardanes, strong-willed in this ruin of all his hopes, still
would not do the wizard's bidding. With cold deliberation,
Avshar hit him again. Marcus saw something crumple inside
the proud Sevastos. All his life the bureaucrat had upheld his
faction by circumventing brute force, by bringing Videssos'
proud soldiers to heel without violence. Now at last he had to
confront it with no buffers, and found he could not. He pulled
a brass key from his belt, worked the lock, and slipped into
the room beyond.

Marcus forgot him almost as soon as he disappeared.
Fighting back to back, the tribune and Viridovix cleared
enough space to let the legionaries emerge, a couple at a time,
from the stairwell. Even with reinforcements constantly
added, the fight was savage. Save for Scaurus' sword and the
Celt's, Roman blades would not wound Avshar's men. They
had to be clubbed into submission with spearshafts and other

182 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

makeshift bludgeons, or else disarmed by a clever sword-
stroke and then wrestled to the floor and dispatched with bare
hands. They made the Romans pay dearly for each life.

The price would have been higher yet, but Avshar, as if
conceding all was lost, stood aloof from the struggle, watch-
ing his men die one by one. Only when a legionary drew too
near the door he was guarding did his blade flash forth,
wielded as always with skill and might to daunt a hero. There
was no shame in seeking easier prey, and so in the end the
wizard-prince stood all alone before that doorway.

Facing a lesser foe, the Romans would have rolled over
him and after Vardanes Sphrantzes. But Avshar was like a lion
brought to bay; the debased majesty in him carried awe min-
gled with the dread. Push forward, Scaurus thought—make
an end. But Avshar's gaze came baleful through visor slits,
and the tribune could not move. Even Viridovix, a stranger to
intimidation, stood frozen.

A strange silence fell, broken only by the legionaries'
panting and the moans of the injured. Without turning, Avshar
rapped on the door behind him. His iron-knuckled hand made
it jump on its hinges. Only silence answered him. He hit it
again, saying, "Come out, fool, lest I stand aside and let them
have you."

There was another pause, but as Avshar began to slide
away from the door, Vardanes Sphrantzes drew it open. The
Sevastos clutched a dagger in his right hand. His left cruelly
prisoned the wrist of a young girl; she wore only a short shift
of transparent golden silk that served but to accent her naked-
ness beneath.

For all its paint, her face was not a palace tart's; the knowl-
edge on it was of a different kind. But not until her calm
greeting, "Well met, Marcus Aemilius Scaurus," did the tri-
bune know her for Alypia Gavra.

Caught by surprise, he took an involuntary step forward.
Sphrantzes' dagger leaped for her throat. Light glinted off the
mirror-bright sliver of steel. The stiletto was only a noble's
jewel-encrusted toy, but it could let her life river out before
any man could stop it. Alypia stood motionless under its cold

caress.

Scaurus also froze, two paces away. "Let her go, Var-
danes," he urged, watching Sphrantzes closely. Vardanes'
plump face was unnaturally pale, save for two spots of red

Harry Turtledove            1 83

that marked the impact of Avshar's hand. A thin trickle of
blood ran from his left nostril into his beard. His pearl-be-
decked Sevastos' coronet sat awry on his head—for the dandy
Sphrantzes was, a telling sign of disintegration. His eyes were
wide and staring, trapped eyes.

"Let her go," Marcus repeated softly. "She won't buy your
escape—you know that." The Sevastos shook his head, but
the dagger fell—not much, but an inch or two.

Avshar chuckled, his mirth more terrible than a shriek of
hate. "Aye, let her go, Vardanes," he said. "Let her go, just as
you let Videssos go when it was in your hands. You took your
pleasure from it as from her, and then watched with drool
dribbling down your chin as it slipped through your fingers.
Of course, let her go. What better way to end your bungling
life? Even as a puppet you were worthless."

Marcus never knew whether Avshar's contempt was more
than the Sevastos could endure or whether, in some last calcu-
lation of his own, Vardanes decided—and perhaps rightly—
the wizard-prince's death might be the one coin to buy his
safety from Thorisin Gavras. Whatever his reasons, he sud-
denly shoved Alypia forward, sending her stumbling into the
tribune's arms, then whirled and drove his dagger into Av-
shar's armored breast.

The thin steel needle was the perfect weapon to pierce a
cuirass, and Sphrantzes' desperate stab was backed by all the
power his well-fed frame could give. Scaurus had always
thought there was muscle under that fat. Now he knew it, for
when Vardanes' hand came away, the stiletto was driven home
hilt-deep.

But Avshar did not crumple. "Ah, Vardanes," he said,
laughing a laugh jagged as broken glass. "Futile to the very
end. My magics proofed you against cold iron's bite. Did you
think they would do less for me, their maker? See now, it
should be done this way."

Swift as a serpent's strike, he seized the Sevastos, lifted
him off his feet, and flung him against the wall. Marcus heard
his skull shatter—the exact sound, he thought, of a dropped
crock of porridge. Blood sprayed over the painted waves; Var-
danes was dead before he slid to the floor.

Avshar drew the dagger from his chest, tucked it into his
belt. "A very good day to you all," he said with a last mock-
ing bow, and darted into the farther chamber.




184    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

His flight freed the Romans from the paralysis with which
they had watched the past minutes' drama. They rushed to the
door; but though the locks were on the outside, they would not
open. The Romans attacked the door with swords and their
armored shoulders, but the apartment over the throne room
was, among other things, a redoubt, and the portal did not

yield.

Through the noise of their pounding came Avshar's voice,
loudly chanting in some harsh tongue that was not Videssian.
More magic, Marcus thought with a twist of fear in his guts.
"Zeprin!" he shouted, and then cursed the confused pushing
and shoving that followed as the Haloga bulled his way up the

crowded spiral stair.

He burst puffing out of the stair well; the climb had left his
normally ruddy features almost purple. His head swiveled till
he spied Scaurus' tall horsehair plume. The tribune stabbed
his thumb at the door. "Avshar's on the other side. He—"

Marcus had been about to warn the Haloga that Avshar was
brewing sorcery, but found himself ignored. Zeprin the Red
had nursed his hatred and lust for vengeance since Mavrikios
fell at Maragha; now they exploded. He hurled himself at the
doorway, roaring, "Where will you run now, wizard?"

Legionaries scattered as his great axe came down. It was as
well they did; in his berserk fury the Haloga paid them no
heed. Timbers split under his hammerstrokes—no wood, no
matter how thick or seasoned, could stand up to such an as-
sault for long.

Scaurus realized his arms were still tight around Alypia
Gavra; her skin was warm through the thin negligee. "Your
pardon, my lady," he said. "Here." He wrapped her in his

scarlet cape of rank.

"Thank you," she said, stepping free of him to draw it
around her. Her green eyes carried gratitude, but only as a thin
crust over pain. "I've known worse than the touch of a
friend," she added quietly.

Before Marcus could find a suitable reply, Zeprin shouted
in triumph as the door's boards and bolts gave up the unequal
struggle. Axe held high, he shouldered his way past the riven
timbers, followed close by Scaurus and Viridovix, each with
his strong blade at the ready. Gaius Philippus and more

Romans pushed in after them.

The tribune had not got much of a glimpse beyond the

Harry Turtledove            185

shattered door when Vardanes opened it, nor again when Av-
shar took refuge behind it. He stared now in amazement. It
was a chamber straight from an expensive brothel: the ceiling
mirror of polished bronze, the obscene but beautifully exe-
cuted wall frescoes, the scattered bright silks that were donned
only to be taken off, the soft, wide bed with its coverlets
pulled down in invitation.

And he stared for another reason, the same which brought
Zeprin's rush to a stumbling, confused halt a couple of paces
into the room—save for the invaders, it was empty. The Ha-
loga's knuckles were white round the haft of his axe. Primed
to kill, he found himself without a target. His breath came in
sobbing gasps as he fought to bring his body back under the
control of his will.

Marcus' eyes flicked to the windows, tall, narrow slits
through which a cat could not have crawled, let alone a man.
Viridovix rammed his sword into its scabbard, a gesture elo-
quent in its disgust. "The cullion's gone and magicked us
again," he said, and swore in Gaulish.

For all the sinking feeling in his stomach, the tribune
would not yet let himself believe that. He ordered the soldiers
behind him, "Turn this place inside out. For all we know,
Avshar's hiding under the bed or lurking in that closet there."
They stepped past him; one suspicious legionary jabbed his
gladius into the mattress again and again, thinking Avshar
might somehow have got inside it.

"Nay, it's magic sure enough," Viridovix said dolorously
as the search went on without success.

"Shut up," Marcus said, but he was not paying much at-
tention to the Celt. He had just noticed the gilded manacles set
into the bedposts and reflected that Vardanes Sphrantzes'
death, perhaps, had been too easy.

"There's magic and magic," Gaius Philippus said. "Re-
member the whole Yezda battle line winked out for a second
until the Videssian wizards matched their spell? Maybe that's
the trick the whoreson's using here."

That had not occurred to the tribune. Though he had scant
hope in it, he sent runners through the palace complex and
others to Phos' High Temple, all seeking Nepos the mage. He
also posted legionaries shoulder to shoulder in the broken
doorway, saying, "If Avshar can make himself impalpable as
well as invisible, he deserves to get away."




186    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"No he doesn't," Gaius Philippus growled.

The sound of more fighting pierced the slit windows.
Scaurus went over for a look, but their field of view was too
narrow to show him anything but a brief glimpse of running
men. They were Videssians, but whether Thorisin's troops
advancing or followers of the Sphrantzai counterattacking, he

could not tell.

Worried, he decided to go downstairs to make sure the
legionaries were in position to defend the Grand Courtroom at
need. Their discipline should have been enough to make such
precautions automatic, but better safe; what with Avshar's
magic and the fight up the stairs, usual patterns could slip.

He left the doorway full of guards and put others in front of
the stairwell. Their eyes told him they thought their posts ab-
surd, but they did not question him; like Fayard the Namda-
lener, they carried out their orders without complaint.

Alypia Gavra accompanied the tribune down the spiral
stair. "So now you have seen my shame," she said, still out-
wardly as self-possessed as ever. But Marcus saw how tightly
she held his cape closed round her neck, how she tugged at its
hem with her other hand, trying to make it cover more of her.

He knew she meant more than the wisp of yellow silk be-
neath that cape. He spoke slowly, choosing his words with
care, "What does not corrupt a man's heart cannot corrupt his
life, or do him any lasting harm."

In Rome it would have been a Stoic commonplace; but to
the Videssians, deeds spoke louder than intentions, as suited a
folk who saw the universe as a war between good and evil.
Thus Alypia searched Marcus' face in the gloom of the stair
well, suspecting mockery. Finding none, she said at last, very
low, "If I can ever come to believe that, you will have given
me back myself. No thanks could be enough."

She stared straight ahead the rest of the way down the
steps. Scaurus studied the stair well's rough stonework, giving

her what privacy he could.

Alypia gasped in dismay as they came down into the throne
room. It no longer had the semblance of the Empire's solemn
ceremonial heart, but only of any battlefield after the fighting
is done. Bodies and debris littered the polished floor, which
was further marred by drying pools of blood. Wounded men
cursed, groaned, or lay silent, according to how badly they

Harry Turtledove            187

were hurt. Gorgidas went from one to the next, giving the aid
he could.

A glance told Marcus there would be no trouble at the
Grand Gates. Unobtrusively effective as always, Quintus Gla-
brio had a double squad of legionaries ready to hold off an
attack. But they were standing at ease now, their pila
grounded and swords sheathed. The junior centurion waved to
his commander. "Everything under control," he said, and
Scaurus nodded.

Avshar's accursed kettle still steamed in the center of the
hall, though the fire under it had gone out. The tribune tried to
lead Alypia by as quickly as he could, but she stopped dead at
the sight of the pathetic mutilated corpse beside it.

"Oh, my poor, dear Kalline," she whispered, making Phos'
circular sun-sign over her breast. "I feared it was so when I
heard your cry. So this is your reward for loyalty to your
mistress?"

She somehow kept her features impassive, but two tears
slid down her cheeks. Then her eyes rolled up in her head, and
she crumpled to the floor, her strong spirit at last over-
whelmed by the day's series of shocks. The borrowed cape
came open as she fell, leaving her almost bare.

"One of Vardanes' trollops, is she?" a Roman asked the
tribune, leering down at her. "I've seen prettier faces, maybe,
but by Venus' cleft there'd be a lively time with those long
smooth legs wrapped around me."

"She's Alypia Gavra, Thorisin's niece, so shut your filth-
filled mouth," Scaurus grated. The legionary fell back a pace
in fright, then darted off to find something, anything, to do
somewhere else. Marcus watched him go, surprised at his own
fury. The trooper had jumped to a natural enough conclusion.

At the tribune's call, Gorgidas hurried over to see to Aly-
pia. He put her in as comfortable a position as he could, then
folded Scaurus' cape around her again. That finished, he stood
and started to go to the next injured legionary. "Aren't you
going to do anything more?" Marcus demanded.

"What do you recommend?" Gorgidas said. "I could prob-
ably rouse her, but it wouldn't be doing her any favor. As far
as I can see, the poor lass has had enough jolts to last any six
people a lifetime—can you blame her for fainting? I say let
her, if that's what she needs. Rest is the best medicine the
body knows, and I'm damned if I'll tamper with it."




188    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"Well, all right," Scaurus said mildly, reminding himself
for the hundredth time how touchy the Greek was when any-
one interfered with his medical judgment.

Alypia was stirring and muttering to herself when Nepos
came bustling in behind one of Marcus' runners. Despite a
remorseful cluck at the damage the Grand Gates had taken,
the fat priest was in high good spirits as he entered the throne
room. He scattered blessings on everyone around him. Most
Romans ignored him, but some of the legionaries had come to
worship Phos; they and the Videssians who had taken service
with them bowed as Nepos went past.

He saw Scaurus and bobbed his head in greeting, smiling
broadly as he approached. But he was less than halfway to the
tribune when he staggered, as at some physical blow. "Phos
have mercy!" he whispered. "What has been done here?" He
moved forward again, but slowly; Marcus thought of a man
pushing his way into a heavy gale.

He looked into the cauldron with a cry of disgust, a deeper
loathing even than Scaurus' own. The tribune saw the torture's
wanton viciousness; but as priest and mage, Nepos understood
the malignance of the sorcery it powered and recoiled in hor-
ror from his understanding.

"You did right to summon me," he said, visibly gathering
himself. "That the Sphrantzai opposed us is one thing, but
this—this—" At a loss for words, he paused. "I never imag-
ined they could fall to these depths. Ortaias Sphrantzes,
from all I know of him, is but a silly young man, while Var-

danes—"

"Is lying dead upstairs," Scaurus finished for him. Nepos

gaped at the tribune, who went on, "The wizardry we dealt
with, but the wizard, now—" In a few quick sentences he set
out what had passed. "We may have him besieged up there,"

he finished.

"Avshar trapped? Trapped?" Nepos burst out when he was

through. "Why are you wasting my time with talk?"

"He may be," Marcus repeated, but Nepos was no longer
listening. The priest turned and ran for the stairway, his blue
robe flapping about his ankles. Marcus heard his sandals clat-
ter on the stairs, heard him run into a descending Roman.

"Get out of my way, you rattlebrained, slouching gowk!"
Nepos shouted, his voice squeaking up into high tenor in his
agitation. There were brief shuffling sounds as he and the

Harry Turtledove            189

trooper jockeyed for position, then he was past and dashing
upward again.

When the legionary emerged from the stairwell he was still
shaking his head. "Who stuck a pin in himT' he asked plain-
tively, but got no answer.

Alypia Gavra's eyes came open. Nepos had hardly spared
her a second glance; Avshar's foul sorcery and Scaurus' news
that the wizard-prince might still be taken drove from his mind
such trivia as the Emperor's niece.

She sat slowly and carefully. Marcus was ready to help
support her, but she waved him away. Though she was still
very pale, her mouth twisted in annoyance. "I thought better
of myself than this," she said.

"It doesn't matter," the tribune answered. "The important
thing is that you're safe and the city's in Thorisin's hands."
Why, so it is, he thought rather dazedly. He had been too
caught up in the fighting to realize this was victory at last.
Excitement flooded through him.

"Oh, yes, I'm perfectly safe." Alypia's voice carried a
weary, cynical undertone Marcus had not heard in it before.
"My uncle will no doubt welcome me with open arms—me,
the wife of his rival Avtokrator and plaything of—" She broke
off, unwilling to bring even the thought to light.

"We all knew the marriage was forced," Scaurus said
stoutly. Alypia managed a wan smile, but more at his vehe-
mence than for what he said. Some of his elation trickled
away. There could be an uncomfortable amount of truth in
Alypia's worries.

He was distracted by the sound of Nepos coming down the
spiral stairway. It was easy to recognize the priest by his foot-
falls; his sandals slapped the stone steps instead of clicking off
them as did the Romans' hobnailed footgear. It was also easy
to guess his mood, for his descending steps were slow and
heavy, altogether unlike his excited dash upwards.

The first glimpse of him confirmed the tribune's fears; the
light was gone from his eyes, while his shoulders slumped as
if bearing the world's weight. "Gone?" Marcus asked rhetori-
cally.

"Gone!" Nepos echoed. "The stink of magic will linger for
days, but its author is escaped to torment us further. Skotos
drag him straight to hell, is there no limit to his strength? A
spell of apportation is known to us of the Academy, but it




190    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

requires long preparation and will not let the caster carry chat-
tels Yet Avshar cast it in seconds and vanished, armor, sword_
and all Phos grant that in his haste he blundered and projected
himself into a volcano's heart or out over the open sea, there
to sink under the weight of his iron."    ,,,..,  , ....

But the priest's forlorn tone told how likely he judged that,
nor could Scaurus make himself imagine so simple an end tor
Avshar The wizard-prince, he was sure, had gone where he
wanted to go and nowhere else—whatever spot his malice
chose as the one that would ham Videssos worst. And with
that thought, what was left of the taste of triumph turned sour
in the tribune's mouth.

IX

VIRIDOVIX SAID, "IT ONLY GOES TO SHOW WHAT I'VE SAID

all along—there's no trust to be put in these Videssians. The
city folk stand by the Sphrantzai all through the siege and then
turn on 'em after they'd gone and won it."

"Things are hardly as simple as that," Marcus replied,
leaning back in his chair. The Romans had returned to the
barracks they occupied last year before Mavrikios set out on
campaign against the Yezda. The sweet scent of orange blos-
soms drifted in through wide-flung shutters; fine mesh kept
nocturnal pests outside.

Gaius Philippus bit into a hard roll, part of the iron rations
every legionary carried, as supplies inside the city were very
short. He chewed deliberately, reached out to the low table in
front of him for a mug of wine to wash the bite down. "Aye,
the bloody fools brought it on themselves," he agreed. "If
Rhavas'—no, Avshar's, I should say—brigands hadn't been
off plundering to celebrate beating us back, Zigabenos' coup
wouldn't have had a prayer."

"His and Alypia Gavra's," Marcus corrected.

A pail dropped with a crash and made Gaius Philippus
jump. "Have a care there, you thumb-fingered oafs!" he
shouted. The barracks were not in the same tidy shape the
Romans had left them. During the siege they had held Kha-
morth and, from the smell and mess, their horses as well.
Legionaries swept, scrubbed, and hauled garbage away; others
made up fresh straw pallets to replace the filthy ones that had
satisfied the nomads.

Reluctantly, the senior centurion returned to the topic at

191




1 9Z     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
hand. "Well, yes," he said grudgingly to Scaurus, slow as

usual to give a woman credit for wk and pluck.

But here credit was due, Marcus thought. Rumors still flew
through Videssos; like cheese, they had ripened through the
day and now at evening some were truly bizarre. But unlike
most of the city, Scaurus had talked with some of the people
involved in events and he had a fair notion of what had actu-
ally gone on.

"Lucky for us Alypia realized Thorisin would never take

the city from outside," he insisted. "The timing was hers, and

it could hardly have been better."

The princess and Mertikes Zigabenos—who had kept his
post as an officer of the Imperial Guard—were plotting
against the Sphrantzai before Thorisin's siege even began,
Alypia's handmaiden Kalline made the perfect go-between;

her pregnancy protected her from suspicion and, as it had
resulted from a rape by one of Rhavas' roughs, bound her to
the plotters' cause. But as long as it seemed Thorisin might
capture Videssos, the conspiracy remained one of words

alone.

After his assault failed, though, assault from inside the city

suddenly became urgent. Alypia managed to get word to Zi-
gabenos that Ortaias had closeted himself away in the isolation
of the private imperial chambers to compose a victory address

to his troops.

Gaius Philippus knew that part of the story, too. His com-
ment was, "The lady could have sat tight one day more. If
there wouldn't have been a mutiny after that speech, I don't
know soldiers." The senior centurion had endured more than
one of Ortais Sphrantzes' orations and exaggerated only

slightly.

Most of the regiments of the Imperial Guard had been lost

at Maragha. Though Mertikes Zigabenos kept his title, Outis
Rhavas' troopers actually warded the Sphrantzai. But the
Romans had given them a hard tussle at the walls, and after-
ward most of them went on a drinking spree which quickly led
to fist-fights and looting. Their victims, naturally, fought
back, which brought more of them out of the palace complex
to reinforce their mates—and gave Zigabenos his chance.

He only commanded three squads of men, but at the head
of one of them he descended on Ortaias' secluded retreat,

Harry Turtledove            193

seized the feckless Avtokrator at his desk, and spirited him
away to the High Temple of Phos; Balsamon the patriarch had
long been well inclined toward the Gavrai.

The other two squads attacked the Grand Courtroom to
rescue Alypia and use her as a rallying point for rebellion.
Their luck did not match their commander's. Kalline had been
caught returning to her mistress. Rhavas himself questioned
her; he soon tore through her protests of innocence.

"She started to scream an hour before midnight," Marcus
remembered Alypia saying, "and when she stopped, I knew
the secret was lost. I never thought Rhavas was Avshar, but I
was sure he was not one to let her die under torture till it
suited him." The princess' would-be rescuers walked into am-
bush. None walked out again.

But Zigabenos was either a student of past coups or had a
gift for sedition. From the High Temple he sent criers to every
quarter of the city with a single message: "Come hear the
patriarch!"

Everyone who claimed to be quoting Balsamon's speech
for Scaurus gave a different version. The tribune thought that
a great pity. He could all but see Balsamon on the High Tem-
ple's steps, probably wearing the shabby monk's robe he pre-
ferred to his patriarchal regalia. The moment's drama would
have brought out the best in the old prelate—torches held
high against the night, a sea of expectant faces waiting for
what he would say.

Whatever his exact words were, they swung the city to-
ward Thorisin Gavras in a quarter of an hour's time. Marcus
was sure the sight of Ortaias Sphrantzes trussed up and shiver-
ing at the patriarch's feet had a good deal to do with that
swing, as did Rhavas' thieving band rampaging through the
shops of Videssos' merchants. Once given focus by Balsa-
mon, the city mob was plenty capable of taking matters into
its own hands.

"Almost you could feel sorry for Vardanes," Viridovix
said, wiping grease from his chin with the back of his hand;

from somewhere or other in the hungry city he had managed
to come up with a fat roast partridge. "The puppet master
found he couldn't be doing without his puppet after all."

After what he had seen in the bedchamber over the throne
room, there was no room in Marcus for pity over Vardanes




1 94    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Sphrantzes, but the Celt's observation was astute. Much like
the Videssian army, the citizens of the capital found Ortaias'
foppish, foolish pedantry more amusing than annoying, and so
his uncle had no trouble ruling through him. But the elder
Sphrantzes, though a far more able man than his nephew, was
himself quite cordially despised throughout the city. Once Or-
taias was overthrown, Vardanes found no one would obey him

when he gave orders in his own name.

His messengers had hurried out of the palace with orders

for the regiments on the walls to put down the rising. But
some of those messengers deserted as soon as they were out of
sight, others were waylaid by the mob, and those who carried
out their missions found themselves ignored. The Sevastos'
Videssian troops liked him no better than did their civilian
cousins, and his mercenaries thought of their own safety be-
fore his—Gavras would likely pay them, too, if he sat on the

throne.

In the end, only Rhavas' bandits and murderers stood by

Sphrantzes. All hands were raised against them, just as they
were against him; neither they nor he could afford fussiness.

"Vardanes got what he deserved," the tribune said. 'There
at the last he was more Avshar's puppet than even Ortaias had
been his." Fish on a hook might be a better comparison yet, he

thought.

Gorgidas said, "If Rhavas and Avshar are one and the

same, we probably know why Doukitzes met the end he did."

"Eh? Why?" Marcus said foolishly, stifling a yawn. Two
days of hard fighting left him too tired to follow the doctor's

reasoning.

Gorgidas gave him a disdainful look; to the Greek, wits

were for use. "As a threat, of course, or more likely a prom-
ise. You know the wizard has hated you since you bested him
at swords that night in the Hall of the Nineteen Couches. He
must have wished that were you under his knife, not just one

of your men."

"Avshar hates everyone," Scaurus said, but Gorgidas'

words carried an unpleasant ring of truth in them. The tribune
had had the same thought himself and did not care for it; to be
a viciously skilled mage's personal enemy was daunting. He
was suddenly glad of his exhaustion; it left him numb to

worry.

195

Harry Turtledove
* * *

Despite the reassurances he had given himself that morn-
ing, Marcus was not eager to confront Helvis with the obvious
fact that they were staying in Videssos. He put off the evil
moment as long as he could, talking with his friends until his
eyelids began gluing themselves shut.

The cool night air did little to rouse him as he walked to
the barracks hall he had assigned to partnered legionaries. It
was not the same one of the Romans' four they had used the
year before. That hall, with its partitions for couples' privacy,
had been primarily a stable to the Khamorth, and the tribune
wished Hercules were here to run a river through it.

Though the hall he had chosen for partnered men was tidier
than that, he found Helvis busily cleaning, not satisfied with
the job the legionaries had done. "Hello," she said, pecking
him on the cheek as she swept. "On campaign I don't mind
dirt, but when we're settled, I can't abide it."

Under other circumstances that speech might have glad-
dened Scaurus, who was fairly fastidious himself when he had
the time. But Helvis' voice was full of challenge. "We are
going to be settled here, aren't we?" she pursued.

The tribune wished he had fallen asleep where he sat. Worn
out as he was, he did not want a quarrel. He spread his hands
placatingly. "Yes, for the time—"

"All right," Helvis said, so abruptly that he blinked. "I'm
not blind; I can see it would be madness to leave Videssos
now."

Marcus almost shouted in relief. He had hoped her years as
a soldier's woman would make her understand how the land
lay, but hadn't dared believe it.

She was not finished, though. The blue of her eyes re-
minded Scaurus of steel as she went on, "This time, well
enough. But the next, we do what we must."

There was no doubt in the tribune's mind what she meant
by that, but he was content to let it go. The issue was dead
anyway, he thought; with the civil war done, defection would
not come up again. He stripped off his armor and was asleep
in seconds.

Thorisin Gavras was Avtokrator self-proclaimed for nearly
a year; with Ortaias Sphrantzes beaten, no one disputed his




196     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
claim. Yet he remained a pretender in the eyes of Videssian

law until his formal coronation.

As with any other aspect of imperial life, formality implied

ceremony. Gavras was hardly inside the city before the cham-
berlains took charge of him; the Empire's topsy-turvy politics
had made them experts at preparing coronations on short no-
tice. Thorisin, for once, did not squabble with them—his le-
gitimacy as Emperor was too important to risk.

Thus Scaurus found himself routed from bed far earlier
than would have suited him, given hasty instructions on his
role in the upcoming ceremonial by a self-important eunuch,
and placed at the head of a maniple of Romans close behind
the sedan chair that would carry Thorisin from the palace
compound to the High Temple of Phos, where Balsamon was
to anoint and crown him Emperor of the Videssians.

Thorisin emerged, stiff-faced, from the Hall of the Nine-
teen Couches and walked slowly past his assembled troop con-
tingents to the litter. By custom, the procession should have
begun at the Grand Courtroom, but that building was already
in the hands of a swarm of craftsmen repairing the damage it

had suffered in the previous day's fighting.

In all other respects, though, the new Avtokrator followed
traditional usage. On this day he put aside the soldier's garb
he favored for Videssos' splendid imperial raiment. Above the
red boots, his calves were covered by blue-dyed woolen leg-
gings; his bejeweled belt was of links of gold, while the silken
kilt hanging from it was again blue, with a border of white.
His scabbard was similarly magnificent, but Marcus noticed
that the sword in it was his usual saber, its leather grip dark
with sweat stains. His tunic was scarlet, shot through with
cloth of gold. Over it he wore a cape of pure white wool,
closed at the throat with a golden fibula. His head was bare.

Namdaleni, Videssian soldiers, Videssian sailors, Kha-
trishers, more Videssians—as Thorisin Gavras strode by each
company, the troops went to their knees and then to their bel-
lies in the proskynesis, acknowledging him their master. That
was still a custom Marcus, used to Rome's republican ways,
could not bring himself to follow. He and his men bowed
deeply from the waist, but did not abase themselves before the

Emperor.

For a moment Thorisin the man peeped through the impe-
rial facade. "Stiff-necked bastard," he murmured out of the

Harry Turtledove            197

side of his mouth, so low only the tribune heard. Then he was
past, settling himself into the blue and gilt sedan chair that
was used only for the coronation journey.

Mertikes Zigabenos and seven of his men were the imperial
bearers, their pride of place earned by the coup that had top-
pled Ortaias. Zigabenos himself stood at the front right, a
thin-faced, lantem-jawed young man who wore his beard in
the bushy Vaspurakaner style. Slung over his back he bore a
large, bronze-faced oval shield. It was nothing like any a
present-day Videssian would carry into battle, but Marcus had
been briefed on the role it would soon play.

"Are we ready?" Gavras asked. Zigabenos gave a curt nod.
"Then let's be at it," the Emperor said.

A dozen bright silk parasols popped open ahead of the trav-
eling chair, further tokens—as if those were needed—of the
imperial dignity. Zigabenos' men bent to the handles at their
commander's signal, then straightened, raising Thorisin to
their shoulders. Their pace a slow march, they followed the
parasol bearers and Thorisin's strong-lunged herald out
through the gardens of the palace compound toward the plaza
ofPalamas.

"Behold Thorisin Gavras, Avtokrator of the Videssians!"
the herald roared to the multitude assembled there. The citi-
zens of the capital, like the court functionaries, knew their
role in the coronation. "Thou conquerest, Thorisin!" they
cried: the traditional acclamation for new Emperors, delivered
in the archaic Videssian of Phos' liturgy.

"Thou conquerest! Thou conquerest!" they thundered as
the imperial procession made its way through the square.
Marcus was surprised at their enthusiasm. From what he knew
of the city's populace, they would turn out for any sort of
spectacle, but would almost rather face the rack than admit
they were impressed.

He understood a few seconds later, when palace servants
began throwing handfuls of gold and silver coins into the
crowd. The Videssians knew the largess to which they were
entitled on a change of Emperors, whether the tribune did or
not.

"Hey, the money's real gold! Hurrah for Thorisin Gavras!"
someone yelled, startled out of formal responses by the quality
of Thorisin's coinage. The cheers redoubled. But Scaurus
knew the Vaspurakaner mines from which Thorisin had taken




198    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

that gold were now in Yezda hands, and wondered how long it
would be before the currency was cheapened again.

Still, this was no time for such gloomy thoughts, not with
the applause of thousands ringing in his ears. "Hurrah for the
Ronams!" he heard, and caught a glimpse of Arsaber standing
tall in the middle of a knot of prosperous-looking merchants.
One or more of them, he suspected, would go home lighter by

a purse.

More cheering crowds lined Middle Street; every window

of the three-story government office building had two or three
faces peering from it. "Look at all the damned pen-pushers,
wondering if Gavras'll have 'em for lunch," Gaius Philippus

said. "Me, I hope he does."

A few blocks past the offices, the imperial procession

turned north toward Phos' High Temple. The golden globes
atop its spires gleamed in the bright morning sun.

The High Temple's great enclosed courtyard was, if any-
thing, even more packed then the plaza of Palamas had been.
Priests and soldiers held a lane open in the crush and kept the
throng from flowing onto the broad stairs leading up to the

shrine.

At the top of the stairs, somehow not dwarfed by the loom-
ing magnificence of the temple behind him, stood Balsamon.
The partriarch was a fat, balding old man with a mischievous
wit, but it suddenly struck Scaurus how great his power was in
Videssos. Ortaias Sphrantzes was not the first Emperor he had
helped cast down, and Thorisin Gavras would be—what? the
third? the fifth?—over whose accession he had presided.

But his time was not quite come. Mertikes Zigabenos and
his guardsmen carried Gavras through the crowd, which grew
quiet, knowing what to expect. Followed by the ceremonial
contingents, the Emperor's litter climbed the stairs. It halted
two steps below the patriarch. The bearers lowered the chair
to the ground. Thorisin climbed out and waited while his

troops arranged themselves on the lower stairs.

Zigabenos unslung his shield and laid it, face up, before
the Emperor. Thorisin stepped up onto it; it took his weight
without buckling. Marcus was already marching up toward
him, as were the other commanders of the units he had chosen
to honor: the admiral Elissaios Bouraphos, Baanes Onoma-
goulos, Laon Pakhymer, Utprand Dagober's son, and a Nam-
dalener the tribune did not know, a tall, dour man with pale

Ham/ Turtledove           199

eyes that showed nothing of the thoughts behind them.
Scaurus guessed he had to be the great count Drax, perhaps
included here to show that his mercenaries were still wanted
by the Empire, even under its new master.

Once again, though, Zigabenos had precedence. He took
from his belt a circlet of gold, which he offered to Thorisin
Gavras. Following custom, Thorisin refused. Zigabenos of-
fered it a second time and was again refused. At the third
offering, Gavras bowed in acceptance. Zigabenos placed it on
his head, declaring in a !oud voice, "Thorisin Gavras, I confer
on you the title of Avtokrator!"

That was the cue Scaurus and Gavras' other officers had
awaited. They stooped and lifted the ceremonial shield to
shoulder height, exalting the Emperor atop it. The waiting,
expectantly silent crowd below burst into cries of "Thou con-
querest, Thorisin! Thou conquerest!"

Baanes Onomagoulos' lame leg almost gave way beneath
him as the officers lowered Thorisin to the ground once more,
but Drax and Marcus, who stood on either side of the Vides-
sian, took up the weight so smoothly the shield barely wa-
vered.

"Steady, old boy. It's all done now," Gavras said as he
stepped off it. Onomagoulos whispered an apology. Scaurus
was glad to see the two men, usually so edgy in each other's
company, behave graciously now. It seemed a good omen.

No sooner had Gavras descended from the shield than Bal-
samon, clad in vestments little less splendid than the Em-
peror's, came down to meet him. The patriarch performed no
proskynesis; in the precinct of the Temple, his authority was
second only to the Avtokrator's. He bowed low before Thori-
sin, the wispy gray strands of his beard curling over the impe-
rial crown which he held on a blue silk cushion.

As the patriarch straightened, his eyes, lively beneath
bushy, still-black brows, flicked over Thorisin's companions.
That half-amused, half-ironic gaze settled on Scaurus for a
moment. The tribune blinked—had Balsamon winked at him?
He'd wondered that once before, inside the Temple last year.
Surely not, and yet—

Again, as before, he was never sure. Balsamon's glance
was elsewhere before he could make up his mind. The patri-
arch fumbled, produced a small silver flask. "Not the least of




200    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Phos' inventions, pockets," he remarked. The top rank of sol-
diers might have heard him; the second one surely did not.

Then his reedy tenor expanded to fill the wide enclosure. A
younger priest stood close by to relay what he said, but there
was no need. "Bow your bead," Balsamon said to Gavras, and

the Avtokrator of the Videssians obeyed.

The patriarch unstoppered the little flask, poured its con-
tents over Thorisin's head. The oil was golden in the morning
sunlight; Scaurus caught myrrh's sweet, musky fragrance and
the more bitter but still pleasing scent of aloes. "As Phos'
light shines on us all," Balsamon declared, "so may his bless-
ings pour down on you with this anointing."
"May it be so," Thorisin responded soberly.
Still holding the crown in his left hand, Balsamon used his
right to rub the oil over Thorisin's head. As he did so, he
spoke the Videssians' most basic prayer, the assembled multi-
tude echoing his words: "We bless thee, Phos, Lord with the
great and good mind, by thy grace our protector, watchful
beforehand that the great test of life may be decided in our

favor."

"Amen," the crown finished. Marcus heard the Namdaleni

add their own closing to the Videssian creed: "On this we
stake our very souls." Utprand spoke the addition firmly, but
Drax, closer yet, was silent. Scaurus' head turned in surprise
—had the great count adopted the Empire's usage? He saw
Drax's lips soundlessly shaping the Namdalener clause and
wondered whether courtesy or expedience caused his discre-
tion.

The "Amens," fortunately, were loud enough to drown out

most of the sound of heresy; it would have been a fine thing,
Marcus thought, to have the coronation interrupted by a reli-
gious riot.

Balsamon took the crown, a low dome of gold inset with

pearls, sapphires, and rubies, and placed it firmly on Thorisin
Gavras' lowered head. The throng below let out a soft sigh. It
was done; a new Avtokrator ruled Videssos. The murmuring
died away quickly, for the crowd was waiting for the patriarch

to speak.

He paused a moment in thought before beginning, "Well,

my friends, we have been disabused of a mistake and abused
by it as well. A throne is only a few sticks, plated with gold
and covered by velvet, but it's said to enoble whatever funda-

Harry Turtledove            201

ment rests on it, by some magic subtler even than they work in
the Academy. Having a throne of my own, I've always sus-
pected that was nonsense, you know—" One bushy eyebrow
raised just enough to show his listeners they were not to take
this last too seriously. "—but sometimes the choice is not
between bad and good but rather bad and worse."

"Without an Avtokrator we would have perished, like a
body without its head." Marcus thought of Mavrikios' end and
shivered to himself. Coming from republican Rome, he had
doubts about .that statement as well, but Videssos, he re-
flected, had been an empire so long it was likely true for her.

Balsamon went on, "There is always hope when a new
Emperor sits the throne, no matter how graceless he may
seem, and a new sovereign's advisers may serve him as a
man's brains do his face, that is, to give form to what would
otherwise be blank."

Someone shouted, "Phos knows Ortaias has no brains of
his own!" and drew a laugh. Marcus joined it, but at the same
time he recognized the fine line Balsamon was treading, trying
to justify his actions to the crowd and, more important, to
Thorisin Gavras.

The patriarch returned to his analogy. "But there was a
canker eating at those brains, one whose nature I learned late,
but not too late. And so I made what amends I could, as you
see here." He bowed low once more; Marcus heard him stage-
whisper to Gavras, "Your turn now."

With a curt nod, the Emperor looked out over the throng.
"For all his fancy talk, Ortaias Sphrantzes knows no more of
war than how to run from it and no more of rule than stealing
it when the rightful holder's away. Given five years, he'd have
made old Strobilos look good to you—unless the damned
Yezda took the city first, which is likely."

Thorisin was no polished rhetorician; like Mavrikios, he
had a straightforward style, adapted from the battlefield. To
the sophisticated listeners of the capital, it was novel but ef-
fective.

"There're not a lot of promises to make," he went on.
"We're in a mess, and I'll do my best to get us out the other
side in one piece. I will say this—Phos willing, you won't
want to curse my face every time you see it on a goldpiece."

That pledge earned real applause; Ortaias' debased coinage
had won him no love. Scaurus, though, still wondered how




AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Z02

Thorisin planned to carry it out. If Videssos' pen-pushers,
with all their bureaucratic sleights of hand, could not keep up
the quality of the Empire's money, could a soldier like

Gavras?

"One last thing," the Emperor said. "I know the city fol-
lowed Ortaias at first for lack of anything better, and then
perforce, because his troops held it. Well and good; I'll hear
no slanders over who backed whom or who said what about
me before yesterday morning, so rest easy there." A low mut-
ter of approval and relief ran through the crowd. Marcus had
heard of the informers who had nourished in Rome during the
civil war between the Marians and Sulla, and of the purges
and counterpurges. He gave Gavras credit for magnanimous
good sense and waited for the Emperor's warning against

future plots.

Thorisin, however, said only, "You'll not get more talk
from me now. I said that was the last thing and I meant it. If
all you wanted was empty words, you might as well have kept

Ortaias."

Watching the crowd slowly disperse, a dissatisfied Gauis
Philippus said, "He should have put the fear of their Phos in

'em."

But the tribune was coming to understand the Videssians
better than his lieutenant, and realized the armored ranks of
soldiers on the High Temple's steps were a stronger precaution
against conspiracy than any words. An overt threat from the
new Avtokrator would have roused contempt. Gavras was
wise enough to see that. There was more subtlety to him than
showed at first, Scaurus thought, and was rather glad of it.

"What should we do with him?" That was Komitta Rhan-
gavve's voice, merciless and a little shrill with anger. She
answered her own question: "We should make him such an
example that no one would dare rebel for the next fifty years.
Put out his eyes with hot irons, lop off his ears and then his
hands and feet, and bum what's left in the plaza of the Ox."

Thorisin Gavras, still in full imperial regalia, whistled in
half-horrified respect for his mistress' savagery. "Well, Or-
taias, how does that program sound to you? You'd be the one
most affected by it, after all." His chuckle could not have
been pleasant in his defeated rival's ears.

Ortaias' arms were bound behind him; one of Zigabenos'

Ham/ Turtledove            203

troopers sat on either side of him on the couch in the patri-
arch's library. He looked as if he would sooner be hiding
under it. In Scaurus' mind the young noble had never cut a
prepossessing figure: he was tall, skinny, and awkward, with a
patchy excuse for a beard. Clad only in a thin linen shift, his
hair awry and his face filthy and frightened, at the moment he
seemed to the tribune more a pitiful figure than a wicked one
or one to inspire hatred.

There was a tremor in his high voice as he answered, "Had
I won, I would not have treated you so."

"No, probably not," Gavras admitted. "You haven't the
stomach for it. A safe, quiet poison in the night would suit
you better."

A rumble of agreement ran around the heavy elm table that
filled most of the floor space in the library—from Komitta,
from Onomagoulos and Elissaios Bouraphos, from Drax and
Utprand Dagober's son, from Mertikes Zigabenos. Nor could
Marcus deny that Thorisin likely spoke the truth. He could not
help noticing, though, the patriarch's silence and, perhaps
more surprisingly, Alypia Gavra's.

In a somber tunic and skirt of dark green, the paint
scrubbed from her face, the princess seemed once more to be
as Scaurus had known her in the past: cool, competent, almost
forbidding. He was pleased to see her at this council, a sign
that, contrary to her fears, Thorisin still had confidence in her.
But she kept her eyes downcast and would not look at Ortaias
Sphrantzes. The silver wine cup in her hand shook ever so
slightly.

Balsamon leaned back in his chair until it teetered on its
hind legs, reached over his shoulder to pluck a volume from a
half-empty shelf. Scaurus knew his audience chamber, on the
other hand, was so full of books it was nearly useless for its
intended function. But then, the patriarch enjoyed confound-
ing expectations, in small things as well as great.

Thus the tribune was unsurprised to see him put the slim
leather-bound text in his lap without opening it. Balsamon
said to Komitta, "You know, my dear, imitating the Yezda is
not the way to best them."

The reproof was mild, but she bristled. "What have they to
do with this? An aristocrat deals with his foes so they can
harm him no further." Her voice rose. "And a true aristocrat
pays no heed to such milksop counsels as yours, priest,




Z04     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
though as your father was a fuller 1 would not expect you to

know such things."

"Komitta, will you—" Thorisin tried, too late, to cut off
his hot-tempered mistress. Onomagoulos and Zigabenos stared
at her in dismay; even Drax and Utprand, to whom Balsamon
was no more than a heretic, were not used to hearing clerics

reviled.

But the patriarch's wit was a sharper weapon than outrage.
"Aye, it's true I grew up with the stench of piss, but then, at
least, we got pure bleached cloth from it. Now—" He wrin-
kled up his nose and looked sidelong at Komitta.

She spluttered furiously, but Gavras overrode her: "Quiet,
there. You had that coming." She sat in stiff, rebellious si-
lence. Not for the first time, Marcus admired the Emperor for
being able to bring her to heel—sometimes, at any rate.
Thorisin went on, "I wasn't going to do as you said anyway. I
tell you frankly I can't brook it, not for this sniveling wretch."

"Be so good as not to waste my time with such meetings
henceforth, then, if you have no intention of listening to my
advice." Komitta rose, graceful with anger, and stalked out of
the room, a procession of one.

Gavras swung round on Marcus. "Well, sirrah, what say
you? I sometimes think I have to pull your thoughts like teeth.
Shall I send him to the Kynegion and have done?" A small
hunting-park near the High Temple, the Kynegion was also
Videssos' chief execution grounds.

In Rome capital punishment was an extraordinary sen-
tence, but, thought Scaurus, it had been meted out to Catiline,
who aimed at overthrowing the state. He answered slowly,
"Yes, I think so, if it can be done without turning all the
seal-stampers against you."

"Bugger the seal-stampers," Bouraphos ground out.
"They're good for nothing but telling you why you can't have

the gold for the refits you need."

"Aye, they're rabbity little men, the lot of 'em," Baanes
Onomagoulos said. "Shorten him and put fear in all their

livers."

But Thorisin, rubbing his chin as he considered, was

watching the tribune in reluctant admiration. "You have a
habit of pointing out unpleasant facts, don't you? I'm too
much a soldier to like taking the bureaucrats seriously, but
there's no denying they have power—too much, by Phos."

Harry Turtledove            205

"Who says there's no denying it?" Onomagoulos growled.
He jabbed a scornful thumb at Ortaias Sphrantzes. "Look at
this uprooted weed here. This is what the pen-pushers have for
a leader."

"What about Vardanes?" That was Zigabenos, who had
been in the city while Ortaias reigned and his uncle ruled.

Onomagoulos blinked, but said, "Well, what about him?
Another coward, if ever there was one. Shove steel in a pen-
pusher's face, and he's yours to do with as you will."

"Which is, of course, why there have been bureaucrats or
men backed by bureaucrats on the imperial throne for forty-
five of the last fifty-one years," Alypia Gavra said, her mea-
sured tones more effective than open mockery. "It's why the
bureaucrats and their mercenaries broke—how many? two
dozen? three?—rebellions by provincial nobles in that time,
and why they converted almost all the peasant militia in Vi-
dessos to tax-bound serfs during that stretch of time. Clear
proof they're walkovers, is it not?"

Onomagoulos flushed right up to the bald crown of his
head. He opened his mouth, closed it without saying anything.
Thorisin was taken by a sudden coughing fit. Ortaias
Sphrantzes, with nothing at all to lose, burst into a sudden
giggle to see his captors quarrel among themselves.

Still beaming at his niece, the Emperor asked her, "What
do you want us to do with the scapegrace, then?"

For the first time since the meeting began, she turned her
eyes toward the man whose Empress, at least in name, she
had been. For all the emotion she betrayed, she might have
been examining a carcass of beef. At last she said, "I don't
think he could be put to death without stirring up enmities
better left unraised. For my part, I have no burning need to see
him dead. He in his way was as much his uncle's prisoner as
was I, and no more in control of his fate or actions."

From his wretched seat on the couch, Ortaias said softly,
"Thank you, Alypia," and, quite uncharacteristically, fell si-
lent again. The princess gave no notice that she heard him.

Baanes Onomagoulos, still smarting from her sarcasm, saw
a chance for revenge. He said, "Thorisin, of course she will
speak for him. And why should she not? The two of them,
after all, are man and wife, their concerns bound together by a
shared couch."

"Now you wait one minute—" Scaurus began hotly, but




206 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Alypia needed no one to defend her. Moving with the icy
control she showed on most occasions, she rose from her seat
and dashed her wine cup in Onomagoulos' face. Coughing
and cursing, he rubbed at his stinging eyes. The thick red
wine dripped from his pointed beard onto his embroidered silk
tunic, plastering it to his chest.

His hand started to seek his sword hilt, but he thought
better of that even before Elissaios Bouraphos grabbed his
wrist. Through eyelids already swelling shut, he looked to
Thorisin Gavras, but found nothing to satisfy him on the Em-
peror's face. Muttering, "No one uses me thus," he climbed
from his chair and limped toward the door, his painful gait an
unintentioned parody of Komitta Rhangavve's lithe exit a few
minutes before.

"You may be interested in knowing," Balsamon's voice
pursued him, "that last night I declared annulled the marriage,
if such it may be called, between Sphrantzes and Alypia
Gavra—at the princess' urgent request. You may also be in-
terested in knowing that the priest who performed that mar-
riage is at a monastery on the southern bank of the Astris
River, a stone's throw from the steppe—and I ordered that the
day I learned of the wedding, not last night."

But Onomagoulos only snarled, "Bah!" and slammed the
heavy door behind him.

An ivory figurine wobbled and fell to the floor. Balsamon,
more distressed than he had been at any time during the meet-
ing, leaped to his feet with a cry of alarm and hurried over to
it. He wheezed as he bent to retrieve it, peered anxiously at
the palm-high statuette.

"No harm, Phos be praised," he said, setting it carefully
back on its stand. Marcus remembered his passion for ivories
from Makuran, the kingdom that had been Videssos' western
neighbor and rival until the Yezda came down off the steppe
and conquered it less than a lifetime ago. More to himself than
anyone else, the patriarch complained, "Things haven't been
where they ought to be since Gennadios left."

The dour priest had been as much Balsamon's watchdog as
companion, Scaurus knew, and there were times when the
patriarch took unecclesiastical glee in baiting him. Now that j
he was gone, it seemed Balsamon missed him. "What became
of him?" the tribune asked, idly curious.

"Eh? I told you," Balsamon answered peevishly. "He's

Harry Turtledove            207

spending his time by the Astris, praying the Khamorth don't
decide to swim over and raid the henhouse."

"Oh," Marcus said. The patriarch had not named die priest
who married Alypia to Ortaias, but he was not surprised Gen-
nadios was the man. He had been the creature of Mavrikios'
predecessor Strobilos Sphrantzes and doubtless stayed loyal to
the clan. It would have been commendable, Scaurus thought,
in a better cause; he could not work up much regret at the
priest's exile.

"Are we quite through shilly-shallying about?" Thorisin
asked with ill-concealed impatience.

"Shilly-shallying?" Balsamon exclaimed, mock-indignant.
"Nonsense! We've trimmed this council by a fifth in a half
hour's time. May you do as well with the pen-pushers!"

"Hmp," the Emperor said. He plucked a hair from his
beard, crossed his eyes to examine it closely. It was white. He
threw it away. Turning back to Alypia, he asked, "You say
you don't want his head?"

"No, not really," she replied. "He's a foolish puppy, not as
brave as he should be, and a dreadful bore." Indignation
struggled for a moment with the fright on Ortaias Sphrantzes'
face. "But you'd soon run short of subjects, uncle, if you did
to death everyone who fit those bills. Were Vardanes here,
now—" Her voice did not rise, but a sort of grim eagerness
made it frightening to hear.

"Aye." Thorisin's right hand curled into a fist. "Well," he
resumed, "suppose we let the losel live." Ortaias leaned for-
ward in sudden hope; his guards pushed him back onto the
couch. The Emperor ignored him, growling, "Skotos can pull
me down to hell before I just turn him loose. He'd be plotting
again before the rope marks faded. He has to know—and the
people have to know—what a complete and utter idiot he's
been, and he'll pay the price for it."

"Of course," Alypia nodded; she was at least as good a
practical politician as her uncle. "How does this sound...?"

Almost all the units which accompanied Thorisin Gavras
on his coronation march had been dismissed to their barracks
while the Emperor and his councilors debated Ortaias
Sphrantzes' fate. Only a couple of squads of Videssian body-
guards waited for the Emperor outside the patriarchal resi-




208

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harp/ Turtledove

209

dence, along with the dozen parasol bearers who were an Av-
tokrator's inevitable public companions.

The streets were nearly empty of spectators, too. A few
Videssians stood and gawped at the shrunken imperial party as
it made its way back toward the palaces, but most of the city
folk had already found other things to amuse them.

Thus Marcus saw the tall man pushing his way toward
them at a good distance, but thought nothing much of him—
just another Videssian with a bit of a seaman's roll in his
walk. In the great port the capital was, that hardly rated no-
tice.

Even when the fellow waved to Thorisin Gavras, Scaurus
all but ignored him. So many people had done so much cheer-
ing and greeting that the tribune was numb to it. But when the
man shouted, "Hail to your Imperial Majesty!" ice walked up
Scaurus' spine. That raspy bass, better suited to cutting
through wind and wave than to the city, could only belong to

Taron Leimmokheir.

The tribune had met Ortaias' drungarios of the fleet but
twice, once on a pitch-dark beach and the other time when
being chased by his galley. Neither occasion had been ideal
for marking Leimmokheir's features. Nor were those remark-
able: perhaps forty-five, the admiral had a rawboned look to
him, his face lined and tanned by the sun, his hair and beard
too gray to show much of their own sun bleaching.

If Marcus, then, had an excuse for not recognizing Leim-
mokheir at sight, the same could not be said for Thorisin
Gavras, who had dealt with the drungarios almost daily when
his brother was Emperor. Yet Thorisin was more taken aback
by Leimmokheir's appearance than was the tribune. He
stopped in his tracks, gaping as at a ghost.

His halt let the admiral elbow his way through the remain-
ing guardsmen. Exclaiming, "Congratulations to you, Gavras!
Well done!" Leimmokheir went to his knees and then to his
belly in the middle of the street.

He was still down in the proskynesis when Thorisin finally
found his voice. "Of all the colossal effrontery, this takes the
prize," he whispered. Then, with a sudden full-throated bel-
low of rage, "Guards! Seize me the treacherous rogue!"

"Here, what's this? Take your hands off me!" Leimmo-
kheir struck out against his assailants, but they were many to
his one—and there could hardly be a worse position for self-


defense than the proskynesis. In seconds he was hauled
upright, his arms pinned painfully behind him—almost ex-
actly, Marcus thought irrelevantly, as Vardanes Sphrantzes had
held Alypia.

The drungarios glared at Thorisin Gavras. "What's all this
in aid of?" he shouted, still trying to twist free. "Is this the
thanks you give everyone who wouldn't fall at your knees and
worship? If it is, what's that snake of a Namdalener doing
beside you? He'd sell his mother for two coppers, if he
thought she'd bring so much."

The count Drax snarled and took a step forward, but Thor-
isin stopped him with a gesture. "You're a fine one to talk of
serpents, Leimmokheir, you and your treachery, you and your
hired assassins after a pledge of safe-conduct."

Taron Leimmokheir's tufted eyebrows—almost a match
for Balsamon's—crawled halfway up his forehead like a pair
of gray caterpillars. Amazingly, he threw back his head and
laughed. "I don't know what you drink these days, boy."
Gavras reddened dangerously, but Leimmokheir did not no-
tice. "But pass me the bottle if there's any left when you're
done. Whatever's in it makes you see the strangest things." He
spoke as he might to any equal, ignoring the guardsmen cling-
ing to him.

Scaurus remembered what he'd thought the first time he
heard the drungarios' voice—that there was no guile in him.
That first impression returned now, as strong as before. His
two years in the Empire, though, had taught him that deceit
was everywhere, all too often artfully disguised as candor.

That was how the Emperor saw it. If anything, his anger
was hotter at seeing himself betrayed by a man he had thought
trustworthy. He said, "You can lie till you drop, Leimmokheir,
but you're a tomfool to try. There's no testimony for you to
argue away. I was there, you know, and saw your hired man-
slayers with my own eyes—"

"That's more than I did," Leimmokheir shot back, but
Gavras stormed on.

"Aye, and fleshed my blade in a couple as well." The Em-
peror turned to the guards. "Take this fine, upstanding gentle-
man to gaol. We'll give him a nice, quiet place to think until I
decide what to do with him. Go on, get him out of my sight."
Holding the drungarios as they were, the troopers could not
salute, but they nodded and hauled him away.




210 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Only then did Leimmokheir really seem to understand this
was not some practical joke. "Gavras, you bloody nincom-
poop, I still don't know what in Skotos' frozen hell you think
I did, but I didn't do it, whatever it was. Phos have mercy on
you for tormenting an innocent man. Watch that, you clumsy
oafs!" he shouted to his captors as they dragged him through a
puddle. His protests faded in the distance.

Matters pertaining to Ortaias Sphrantzes had been sched-
uled for two days later, but it was pelting down rain, and they
had to be postponed. It rained again the next day, and the
next. Watching the dirty gray clouds rolling out of the north,
Scaurus realized the storm was but the first harbinger of the
long fall rains. Where had the year gone? he asked himself;

that question never had an answer.

At last the weather relented. The north wind still blew
moist and cool, but the sun was bright; it flashed dazzlingly
off still-wet walls and made every lingering drop of water into
a rainbow. And if it had not had enough time to dry every seat
in Videssos' huge Amphitheater, the people whose bottoms
were dampened did not complain. The spectacle they were
anticipating made up for such minor inconveniences.

"Sure and there's enough people," Viridovix said, his eyes
traveling from the legionaries' central spine up and up the
sides of the great limestone bowl. "The poor omadhauns in the
last row won't be after seeing what's happening today till next
week, so far away they are."

"More Celtic nonsense," Gaius Philippus said with a snort.
"I'll grant you, though, we won't be much bigger than bugs to
them." His own practiced gaze slid over the crowd. "Worth-
less, most of 'em, like the fat ones back home—" He meant
Rome, and Marcus winced to be reminded. "—who come out
on the feast days to watch the gladiators kill each other."

The tribune agreed with that assessment; the buzz of con-
versation floating out of the stands had a cruel undercurrent,
and on the faces in the first few rows, the ones close enough
to see clearly, the air of vulpine avidity was all too plain.

He caught a glimpse of Gorgidas in the contingent of for-
eign envoys some little distance down the spine. As an aspir-
ing historian, the Greek had wanted a close-up view of this
day's festivities, and preferred the ambassadors' company to
disguising himself as a legionary. He was listening to some

Harry Turtledove            21 1

tale from Arigh Arghun's son and scribbling quick notes on a
three-leafed wax tablet. Two more hung at his belt.

Taso Vones, the ambassador from Khatrish, waved cheerily
to the tribune, who grinned back. He liked the little Kha-
trisher, whose sharp, jolly wits belied his mousy appearance.

Horns filled the Amphitheater with bronzen music. The
crowd's noise rose expectantly. Preceded by his retinue of
parasol bearers, Thorisin Gavras strode into the arena. The
applause was loud as he mounted the dozen steps that led up
to the spine, but it fell short of the deafening tumult Scaurus
had heard before in the Amphitheater. The Emperor, for once,
was not what the populace had turned out to see.

Each unit of troops Gavras passed presented arms as he
went by; at Gaius Philippus' barked command the Romans
held their pila out at arm's length ahead of them. Gavras nod-
ded slightly. He and the senior centurion, both lifelong sol-
diers, understood each other very well.

Not so the bureaucrats Thorisin passed on his way to the
throne. They looked nervous as they bowed to their new sov-
ereign; Goudeles, for one, was pale against his robe of dark
blue silk. But Gavras paid them no more attention than he did
to the clutter of a millenium and a half of heroic art that he
passed: statues bronze, statues marble—some painted, some
not—statues chryselephantine, even an obelisk of gilded
granite long ago taken as booty from Makuran.

The Emperor grew animated once more when he came to
the foreign dignitaries. He paused for a moment to say some-
thing to Gawtruz of Thatagush, at which the squat, swarthy
envoy nodded. Then Gavras included Taso Vones in the con-
versation, whatever it was. The Khatrisher laughed and gave a
rueful tug at his beard, as unkempt as Gawtruz'.

Even without hearing the words, Marcus understood the
byplay. He, too, thought the fuzzy beard looked foolish on
Vones, who could have passed for a Videssian without it. But
his ruler still enforced a few Khamorth ways, in memory of
his ancestors who had carved the state from Videssos' eastern
provinces centuries before, and so the little envoy was
doomed to wear the shaggy whiskers he despised.

Thorisin seated himself on a high stool at the center of the
Amphitheater's spine; the chair was backless so all the specta-
tors could see him. His parasol bearers grouped themselves
around him. He raised his right hand in a gesture of command;




212

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

213

the crowd grew quiet and leaned forward in their seats, cran-
ing their necks for a better view.

They all knew where to look. The gate that came open was
the one through which, on most days, race horses entered the
Amphitheater. Today the procession was much shorter: Thori-
sin Gavras' deep-chested herald, two Videssian guardsmen
gorgeous in gilded cuirasses, and a groom leading a single
donkey.

Ortaias Sphrantzes rode the beast, but it needed a guide
nonetheless, for its saddle was reversed, and he sat facing its
tail. Long familiar with their own idiom of humiliation, the
watching Videssians burst into gaffaws. An overripe fruit
came sailing out of the stands, to squash at the donkey's feet.
Others followed, but the barrage was mercifully short; Vi-
dessos had been under siege too recently for there to be much
food to waste.

The herald, nimbly sidestepping a hurtling melon, cried
out, "Behold Ortaias Sphrantzes, who thought to rebel against
the rightful Avtokrator of the Videssians, his Imperial Majesty
Thorisin Gavras!" The crowd shouted back, 'Thou conquer-
est, Gavras! Thou conquerest!"—as heartily, Marcus thought,
as if they had forgotten that a week before they called Ortaias
their lord.

Accompanied by the crowd's jeers, Ortaias and his guard-
ians made a slow circuit of the Amphitheater, the herald all
the while booming out his condemnation. Marcus heard more
fruit splattering around Sphrantzes; the breeze brought him a
rotten egg's gagging stench.

Some of the hurled refuse found its target. By the time
Ortaias Sphrantzes came back into, the tribune's sight, his robe
was dyed with bright splashes of pulp and juice. The donkey
he rode, Scaurus decided, had to be drugged. It ambled on
placidly, pausing only to dip its head to nibble at a fragment of
apple in its path. Its leader jerked on the long guide rope, and
it abandoned the tidbit to move ahead once more.

At last it completed the course and halted in front of the
gate through which it had entered. The two guards came back
and lifted Ortaias off his mount, then led him up before Thor-
isin Gavras.

When they released his arms, he went to the ground in a
proskynesis. The Emperor rose from his stool. "We see your

submission," he said, speaking for the first time, and such
were the acoustics of the Amphitheater that his words, though
spoken in the tone of ordinary conversation, could be heard in
the arena's uppermost rows. "Do you then renounce, now and
forever, all claim upon the sovereignty of our Empire, pro-
tected by Phos?"

"Indeed yes, I yield the throne to you. I—" The moment
the answer Thorisin Gavras required was complete, he cut
Ortaias off with the same imperious gesture he had used to
summon him forth.

Gaius Philippus gave the ghost of a chuckle. "Some things
never change. I'd bet the scrawny bastard just had a two-hour
abdication speech nipped in the bud—and a good thing, too,
says I."

Thorisin spoke again. "Receive now the reward for your
treachery."

The guardsmen raised Ortaias to his feet. They quickly
pulled the robe off over his head. The crowd whooped; Gaius
Philippus muttered "Scrawny" again. One of the guards, the
larger and more muscular of the pair, stepped behind the luck-
less Sphrantzes and delivered a tremendous kick to his bare
backside. Ortaias yelped and fell to his knees.

Viridovix clucked in disappointment. "The Gavras is too
soft by half," he said. "He should be packing a wickerwork all
full of this spalpeen and howsoever many followed him, and
then lighting it off. There'd been a spectacle for the people to
remember, now."

"You and Komitta Rhangavve," Marcus said to himself,
slightly aghast at the Gaul's straightforward savagery.

'"Tis what the holy druids would do," Viridovix said right-
eously. That, Scaurus knew, was only too true. The Celtic
priests appeased their gods by sacrificing criminals to them
... or innocent folk, if no criminals were handy.

As Ortaias Sphrantzes, rubbing the bruised part, rose to his
feet, one of Phos' priests descended from the Amphitheater's
spine and approached him, carrying scissors and a long,
gleaming razor. The crowd fell silent; religion was always
respected in Videssos. But Marcus knew no blood sacrifice
was in the offing here. Another priest followed the first, this
one bearing a plain blue robe and a copy of Phos' sacred
scriptures, glorious in its binding of enameled bronze.




214 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Ortaias bowed his head to the first priest. The scissors
flashed in the autumn sun. A lock of stringy brown hair fell at
the deposed Emperor's feet, then another and another, until
only a short stubble remained. Then the razor came into play;

Sphrantzes' scalp was soon shiny bare.

The second priest stepped forward. Folding the monk's
robeover the crook of his arm, he held out the sacred writings
to Ortaias and said, "Behold the law under which you shall
live if you choose. If in your heart you feel you can observe it,
enter the monastic life; if not, speak now."

But Ortaias, with everyone else, was aware of the penalty
for balking. "I will observe it," he said. The great-voiced her-
ald relayed his words to the crowd. There was a collective
sigh. The creation of a monk was always a serious business,
even when the reasons for it were blatantly political. Nor
could faith and politics be neatly separated in the Empire;

Scaurus thought of Zemarkhos in Amorion and felt his mouth
compress in a thin, hard line.

The priest repeated the offer of admission twice more, re-
ceived the same response each time. He handed the holy book
to his colleague, then robed the new monk in his monastic
garb, saying, "As the garment of Phos' blue covers your
naked body, so may his righteousness enfold your heart and
preserve it from all evil." Again the herald boomed out the
petition.

"So may it be," Ortaias replied, but his voice was lost in
the thousands echoing his prayer. Despite himself Marcus was
moved, marveling at Videssos' force of faith. Almost there
were times he wished he shared it, but, like Gorgidas, he was
too well rooted in me perceptible world to feel comfortable in
that of the spirit.

Ortaias Sphrantzes left the Amphitheater through the same
gate he had entered, arm in arm with the two priests who had
made him part of their fellowship. Well satisfied with the
day's show, the crowd began to disperse. Venders took up
their calls: "Wine! Sweet wine!" "Spiced cakes!" "Holy
images to protect your beloved!" "Raiii—sins!"

Unhappy to the end, Gausi Philippus grumbled, "And now
he'll spend the rest of his stupid days living the high life here
in the city, but with a bald head and a blue robe to make it all
right."

Harry Turtledove            215

"Not exactly," Marcus chuckled; Thorisin might be blunt,
but he was hardly as naive as that. The tribune thought it
altogether fitting that Gennadios should gain some company in
his monastery at Videssos' distant frontier. He and the new
Brother Ortaias, no doubt, would have a great deal to talk
about.




Harry Turtledove             217

X

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, NO FUNDS ARE AVAILABLE?" THORI-

sin Gavras asked, his voice dangerously calm. His gaze
speared the logothete as if that financial official were an
enemy to be ridden down.

The Hall of the Nineteen Couches grew still. Marcus could
hear the torches crackling, hear the wind sighing outside. If he
turned his head, he knew he would see snowflakes kissing the
Hall's wide windows; winter in the capital was not as harsh as
in the westland plateaus, but it was bad enough. He pulled his
cloak tighter round himself.

The logothete gulped. He was about thirty, thin, pale, and
precise. His name, Scaurus remembered, was Addaios
Vourtzes; he was some sort of distant cousin to the city gover-
nor of the northeastern town of Imbros. He had to gather him-
self before going on in the face of the Emperor's hostility.

But go on he did, at first haltingly and then with more
animation as his courage returned. "Your Majesty, you expect
too much from the tax-gathering facilities available to us. That
any revenues whatsoever have been collected should be
praised as one of Phos' special miracles. The recent unpleas-
antness—" Now there, thought the tribune, was a fine, bur-
eaucratic euphemism for civil war. "—and, worse, the
presence of large numbers of unauthorized interlopers—" By
which he meant the Yezda, Marcus knew. "—on imperal soil,
have made any accrual of surplusage a manifest impossibil-
ity."

What was he talking about? the tribune wondered irritably.

216

His Videssian was fluent by now, but this jargon left him
floundering.

Baanes Onomagoulos' translation was rough but service-
able. "By which you're saying that your precious dues-takers
pissed themselves whenever they thought they saw a nomad,
and turned tail before they could find out if they were right."
The noble gave a coarse laugh.

"That's the way of it," Drax the Namdalener agreed. He
turned a calculating eye on Vourtzes. "From what I've seen of
you pen-pushers, any excuse not to pay is a good one. By the
Wager, you'd think the money came out of your purse, not the
peasants'."

"Well said," Thorisin exclaimed, his usual distrust for the
islanders quenched when Drax echoed a sentiment he heartily
shared. The count nodded his thanks.

Vourtzes proffered a thick roll of parchment. "Here are the
figures to support the position I have outlined—"

Numbers in a ledger, though, meant little to the soldiers he
faced. Thorisin slapped the scroll aside, snarling, "To the
crows with this gibberish! It's gold I need, not excuses."

Elissaios Bouraphos said, "These fornicating seal-stampers
think paper will patch anything. That was why I put in with
you, your Highness—I kept getting reports instead of repairs
—and sick I got of them, too."

"If you will examine the returns I have presented to you,"
Vourtzes said with rather desperate determination, "you will
reach the inescapable conclusion that—"

"—The bureaucrats are out to bugger honest men," Ono-
magoulos finished for him. "Everyone knows that, and has
since my grandfather's day. All you ever wanted was to keep
the power in your own slimy hands. And if a soldier reached
the throne despite you, you starved him with tricks like this."

"There is no trickery!" Vourtzes wailed, his distress wring-
ing a simple declarative sentence from him.

Marcus had no love for the harried logothete, but he recog-
nized sincerity when he heard it. "I think there may be some-
thing in what this fellow claims," he said.

Thorisin and his marshals stared at the Roman as if disbe-
lieving their ears. "Whose side are you on?" the Emperor de-
manded. Even Addaios Vourtzes' look of gratitude was wary.
He seemed to suspect some trap that would only lead to
deeper trouble for him.




218

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

219

But Alypia Gavra watched the tribune alertly; her expres-
sion was masked as usual, but Scaums could read no disap-
proval in it. And unlike the Videssian military men, he had
had civilian as well as warlike experience, and knew how
much easier it was to spend money than to collect it.

Ignoring Thorisin's half-accusation, he persisted, "Gather-
ing taxes could hardly have been easy this past year. For one
thing, sir, your men and Ortaias' both must have gone into
some parts of the westlands, with neither side getting all it
should. And Baanes has to be partly right—with the Yezda
loose, parts of the Empire aren't safe for tax collectors. But
even where there are no Yezda at any given moment, the lands
they've ravaged still yield no cash—you can't get wool from
a bald sheep."

"A mercenary with comprehension of basic fiscal reali-
ties," Vourtzes said to himself. "How extraordinary." Almost
as an afterthought, he added, "Thank you," to the tribune.

The Emperor looked thoughtful, but Baanes Onomagoulos'
face grew stormy; Scaurus, watching the noble's bare scalp go
red, suddenly regretted his chance-chosen metaphor.

Aiypia took another jab at Baanes. "Not all arrears are the
tax collectors' fault," she said. "If big landowners paid what
they owed, the treasury would be better off."

"That is very definitely the case," Vourtzes said. "Legiti-
mately credentialed agents of the fisc have been assaulted, on
occasion even killed, in the attempt to assess payments due on
prominent estates, some of them properties of clans repre-
sented in this very chamber." While he named no names, he,
too, was looking at Onomagoulos.

The noble's glare was hot enough to roast the bureaucrat,
Marcus, and Alypia Gavra all together. The tribune, seeing
Alypia's eyebrows arch, nodded almost imperceptibly in rec-
ognition of a common danger.

As he had in Balsamon's library, Elissaios Bouraphos tried
to ease Onomagoulos' wrath, putting a hand on his shoulder
and talking to him in a low voice. But the admiral was himself
a possessor of wide estates, and said to Thorisin, "You know
why we held back payments to the pen-pushers—aye, you did
the same on your lands before your brother threw Strobilos
out. Why should we give them the rope to hang us by?"

"I won't say you're wrong there," the Emperor admitted
with a chuckle. "Since I'm not a pen-pusher, though, Elis-


saios, surely you'll pay in everything you owe without a
whimper?"

"Surely," Bouraphos said. Then he whimpered, so con-
vincingly that everyone at the table burst into laughter. Even
Addaios Vourtzes' mouth twitched. Marcus revised his esti-
mate of the admiral, which had not included a sense of humor.

Utprand Dagober's son spoke up for the first time, and the
somber warning in his voice snuffed out the mirth. "You can
wrangle al! you like over who pays w'at. Wat needs to be
settled is who pays me."

"Rest easy," Thorisin said. "I don't see your lads on the
streets begging for pennies."

"No," Utprand said, "nor will you." That was not warning,
but unmistakable threat. The great count Drax looked pained
at his countryman's plain speaking, but Utprand ignored him.
They did not care much for each other; Scaurus suspected the
Namdaleni were not immune to the disease of faction.

Gavras, for his part, was one to appreciate frankness.
"You'll have your money, outiander," he said. Seeing Addaios
Vourtzes purse his lips to protest, he turned to the logothete.
"Let me guess," he said sourly. "You haven't got it."

"Essentially, that is correct. As I have attempted to indi-
cate, the precise situation is outlined—"

The Emperor cut him off as brusquely as he had Ortaias
Sphrantzes in the Amphitheater. "Can you bring in enough to
keep everyone happy till spring?"

Faced with a problem whose answer was not to his pre-
cious accounts scroll, Vourtzes grew cautious. His lips moved
silently as he reckoned to himself. "That is dependent upon a
variety of factors not subject to my ministry's control: the
condition of roads, quality of harvest, ability of agents to pen-
etrate areas subject to disturbances ..." From the way the bu-
reaucrat avoided it, Marcus began to think the word "Yezda"
made him break out in hives.

"There's something he's leaving out," Baanes Onoma-
goulos said, "and that's the likelihood the damned seal-
stampers are pocketing one goldpiece in three for their own
schemes. Oh, yes, they show us this pile ofturds." He pointed
contemptuously at Vourtzes' assessment document. "But who
can make heads or tails of it? That's how they've kept their
power, because no one who hasn't grown up in their way of




220    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

cheating knows he's swindled until it's too late for him to do
anything about it."

Vourtzes sputtered denials, but Thorisin gave him a long,
measuring stare. Even Alypia Gavra nodded, however reluc-
tantly; she might despise Onomagoulos, but she did not make
the mistake of thinking him a fool.

"What's needed then," Marcus said, "is someone to watch
over these functionaries, to make sure they're doing what they
say they are."

"Brilliant—you should join the Academy," Elissaios Boura-
phos said sardonically. "Who's to do it, though? Who can,
among the men to be trusted? We're the lot of us soldiers.
What do we know about the clerks' tricks the pen-pushers
use? I keep more records than most of us, I'd bet, having to
keep track of ships' stores and such, but I'd founder in a week
in the chancery, to say nothing of being bored out of my wits."

"You're right," the Emperor said. "None of us has the
knowledge for the job, worse luck, for it's one that needs
doing." His voice grew musing; his eyes, speculation in them,
swung toward the tribune. "Or is that so indeed? When you
came to Videssos from your other world, Scaurus, do I re-
member your saying you had held some sort of civil post as
well as commanding your troops?"

"Yes, that's so; I was one of the praetors at Mediolanum."
Marcus realized that meant nothing to Gavras, and explained,
"I held one of the magistracies in my home town, responsible
for hearing suits, publishing edicts, and collecting tribute to
send on to Rome, our capital."

"So you know something of this sharpers' business, then?"
Thorisin pressed.

"Something, yes."

The Emperor looked from one of his officers to the next.
Their smirks said more plainly than words that they were
thinking along with him. Few things are more pleasant than
seeing someone else handed a task one would hate to do one-
self. Thorisin turned to Scaurus again. "I'd say you just talked
your way into a job." And to Vourtzes he added, "Ha, pen-
pusher, what do you think of that? Try your number-juggling
now and see what it gets you!"

"Whatever pleases your Imperial Majesty, of course," the
logothete murmured, but he did not sound pleased.

Harp/ Turtledove            221

Scaurus said quickly, "It's not something I'll put full time
into; I have to pay heed to my men."

"Of course, of course," the Emperor agreed; Marcus saw
Drax, Utprand, and Onomagoulos nodding with him. Thorisin
continued, "That lieutenant of yours is a sound man, though,
and more than up to handling a lot of the day-to-day things.
Give it as much time as you can. I'll see if I can't come up
with some fancy title for the job and a raise in pay to go with
it. You'll earn the money, I think."

"Fair enough," the tribune said. Thorisin's marshals made
sympathetic noises; Marcus accepted their condolences and
countered their bad jokes with his own.

In fact, he was not nearly so displeased as one of them
would have been. A moderately ambitious man, he had long
since realized there were definite limits to how high an out-
lander infantry commander could rise in Videssos on the
strength of his troops alone. And his plans at Rome had been
ultimately political, not soldierly; the military tribunate was a
step aspiring young men took, but not one to stand on forever.

So he had made his suggestion; if Thorisin Gavras did not
act on it, nothing whatever was lost. But he had acted, and
now the tribune would see what came of that. Anticipation
flowered in him. Regardless of the contempt the soldier-
nobles had for the palace bureaucracy, it maintained Videssos
no less than they. Nor, as Alypia Gavra had pointed out, was it
necessarily the weaker party.

He saw her watching him with an expression of ironic
amusement and had the uneasy feeling that all his half-
formed, murky plans were quite transparent to her.

"I am extremely sorry, sir," Pandhelis the secretary was
saying to someone outside the office Marcus had taken as his
own, "but I have specific instructions that the epoptes is to be
disturbed on no account whatever." As promised, Thorisin
had conferred an impressively vague title on the Roman,
meaning approximately "inspector."

"Och, a pox take you and your instructions both." The
door flew open. Viridovix stomped into the little room, Helvis
just behind him. Seeing Scaurus, the Gaul clapped a dramatic
hand to his forehead. "I've seen that face before, indeed and I
have. Don't be telling me, now, the name'll come back to me

222 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 223

in a minute, I'm sure it will." He wrinkled his brow in mock
concentration.

Wringing his hands, Pandhelis said to the tribune, "I'm
sorry, sir, they would not listen to me—"

"Never mind. I'm glad to see them." Marcus threw down
his pen with a sigh of relief; a new callus was forming on his
right index finger. Shoving tax rolls and reckoning beads to
one side of the untidy desk, he looked up at his visitors.
"What needs doing?"

"Nothing needs doing. We're here to collect you," Helvis
said firmly. "It's Midwinter's Day, in case you've forgotten—
time for rejoicing, not chaining yourself up like some slave."

"But—" Marcus started to protest. Then he rubbed his
eyes, red-lined and scratchy from staring at an endless proces-
sion of numbers. Enough is enough, he thought, and stood up,
stretching till his joints creaked. "All right, I'm your man."

"I should hope so," she said, a sudden smoky glow in her
blue eyes. "I've started wondering if you remembered."

"Ho-ho!" Viridovix said with a wink. His brawny arm pro-
pelled Scaurus out from around the desk, out of the cubicle,
and into the corridor, giving the tribune no chance to change
his mind. "Come along with you, Roman dear. There's a party
laid on to make even a stodgy spalpeen like you frolic."

As always, the first breath of frigid outside air made the
tribune cough. His own breath sighed out in a great steaming
cloud. Whatever one could say against them, the bureaucrats
kept their wing of Grand Courtroom offices heated almost
summery-warm. It made the winter outside twice as hard to
endure. He shivered in his cloak.

Ice glittered on bare-branched trees; the smooth-rolled
lawns that were the palace gardeners' emerald delight in sum-
mer now were patchy and brown. Somewhere high overhead a
gull screeched. Most birds were long gone to the warm lands
of the unknown south, but the gulls stayed. Scavengers and
thieves, they were birds that fit the capital.

"And how's that bairn of yours?" Viridovix asked as they
walked back toward the Roman barracks.

"Dosti? He couldn't be better," Marcus answered proudly.
"He has four teeth now, two top and two bottom. He likes to
use 'em, too—he bit my finger the other day."

"Your finger?" Helvis said. "Don't complain of fingers,
my dear—high time the boy was weaned."

"Oww," Viridovix sympathized.

The big Gaul waved as soon as he was in sight of the
barracks; Scaurus saw a Roman wave back from a window.
"What sort of ambush are you leading me into?" he asked.

"You'll see soon enough," Viridovix said. The moment
they walked into the barracks hall, he shouted, "Pay up the
goldpiece you owe me, Soteric, for here's himself in the flesh
of him!"

The Namdalener flipped him the coin. "It's not a bet-I'm
sorry to lose," he said. "I thought he was too in love with his
inks and parchments to recall how the common folk cele-
brate."

"To the crows with you," Marcus said to the man he
counted his brother-in-law, aiming a lazy punch that Soteric
dodged.

Viridovix was biting the goldpiece he'd won. "It's not of
the best, but then it's not of the worst either," he said philo-
sophically and tucked it into his belt-pouch.

The tribune was not paying much attention to the Celt,
looking instead from face to grinning face around him. "This
is the crew you've gathered to carouse with?" he said to Viri-
dovix. Grinning too, the Celt nodded.

"Then the gods look to Videssos tonight!" Marcus ex-
claimed, and drew a cheer from everyone.

There was Taso Vones, arm in arm with a buxom Videssian
woman several inches taller than he was. Gawtruz of Thata-
gush stood beside him, working hard on a wineskin. "How
about some for the rest of us?" Gaius Philippus said pointedly.

"What's a skin of wine, among one man?" Gawtruz re-
torted, and kept drinking. He lowered the skin again a mo-
ment later, but only to belch.

Soteric had brought Fayard and Turgot of Sotevag with
him. Turgot needed no help from Gawtruz's wineskin; he was
already unsteady on his feet. His companion was a very blond
Namdalener girl named Mavia. Scaurus doubted she was out
of her teens. In a dark-haired land, her bright tresses gleamed
like a goldpiece among old coppers.

Fayard greeted Helvis in the island dialect; her dead hus-
band had been his captain. She smiled and answered in the
same speech.

Arigh Arghun's son was in the middle of telling a dirty
story to all three of Viridovix' lemans. Marcus wondered




224 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 225

again how the Celt kept them from catfights. Probably the
happy-go-lucky Gaul's own lack of jealousy, he thought. Viri-
dovix seemed altogether unconcerned when they exploded
into laughter at the end of Arigh's tale.

Quintus Glabrio said something low-voiced to Gorgidas,
who smiled and nodded. Next to them, Katakolon Kekau-
menos of Agder stirred impatiently. "Are we then assembled?"
he asked. "An it be so, let's to the revels." His accent was
almost as archaic as the sacred liturgy; Agder, though once
part of the Empire, had been severed from Videssos' more
quickly changing currents of speech for many years. Kekau-
menos himself was a solidly built, saturnine man whose jacket
of creamy snow-leopard pelts was worth a small fortune in the
capital.

Marcus also thought him something of a prig; as the party
trooped out of the barracks hall, he asked Taso Vones, "Who
invited the dog in the manger?"

Aesop meant nothing to the Khatrisher, as Scaurus should
have known. He sighed. There were times, most often brought
on by such trivial things, when he was sure he would never fit
this world. He explained himself sans metaphor.

"As a matter of fact, / invited him," Vones said. The
Roman's embarrassment seemed to amuse him; he shared with
Balsamon a fondness for discomfiting people. "I have my rea-
sons. Agder's a far northern land, you know, and the turn of
the sun at midwinter means more to them than to the Vides-
sians or me—they're always half afraid it won't come back.
When they see it start north again they wassail hard, believe
me."

Videssos might not have feared for the sun's return, but it
celebrated all the same. The two midwinter fests Marcus had
seen before were in provincial towns. The captial's holiday
was perhaps less boisterous than their uninhibited rejoicing,
but made up for it with more polish. And the city's sheer size
let the tribune imagine himself in the middle of a world bent
solely on pleasure.

Winter's early night was falling fast, but torches and can-
dles everywhere gave plenty of light. Bonfires blazed on many
street comers; it was reckoned lucky to jump through them.

Helvis slid free of Marcus' arm round her waist. She ran
for one of the fires, jumped. Her hair flew out around her head
like a dark halo; despite the hand she kept by her side, her

skirt billowed away from her legs. Someone on the far side of
the fire cheered. The tribune's pulse quickened, too. She came
back to him flushed from the run and the cold, her eyes bright.
When he put his arm around her again, she pressed his hand
tight against the top of her hip.

Nothing escaped Taso Vones' birdlike gaze. With a smile
up at his own lady—whose name, Scaurus learned, was Pla-
kidia Teletze—he said, "Better than crawling through co-
dices, isn't it?"

"You'd best believe it," the tribune answered, and tipped
Helvis' chin up for a quick kiss. Her lips were warm and alive
against his.

"It's a public disgrace you'll make of yourselves," Virido-
vix complained. To show how serious he was, he planted
good, thorough kisses on all his lady friends. They seemed
perfectly content with his gallant impartiality. From long prac-
tice, it had almost a polish to it, like a conjuror plucking his
ten-thousandth gold ring out of the air.

Waves of laughter came rolling out of the Amphitheater, a
sound like a god's mirth. Videssos' mime troupes, naturally,
were the best the Empire could offer. Eyeing the failing day,
Gorgidas said, "It's probably too dark for them to squeeze in
another show. What say we find an eatery now, before the
crowd coming out fills them all to overflowing?"

"Always is a good idea, food," Gawtruz said in the heavy
Khamorth-flavored accent he affected most of the time. The
envoy from Thatagush slapped his thick belly. His appetite
was real, but Scaurus knew the boorishness was an act to lull
the unwary. A clever diplomat hid beneath that piggish exte-
rior.

Gorgidas' good sense got his comrades into an inn a few
blocks off the plaza of Palamas while the establishment was
still only half full. The proprietor and a serving girl shoved
two tables together for them. Before they had finished their
first round of wine—Soteric, Fayard, and Katakolon Kekau-
menos chose ale—the room was packed. The owner hauled a
couple of battered tables from the kitchens out into the street
to serve a few more customers, planting fat candles on them to
give his guests light. "I wish I'd bought that bigger place,"
Marcus heard him say to himself as he bustled back and forth.

Delicious odors wafted out of the kitchen. Scaurus and his
friends nibbled on sweetmeats and drank, waiting for their




226

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

227

dinner to cook. At last a servingmaid, staggering a little under
its weight, fetched a fat, roast goose to the table. Steel flashed
in the torchlight as she expertly carved the bird.

The tribune liked most Videssian cooking, and when the
eatery's owner proclaimed goose "our specialty" he had gone
along without a qualm. His first bite gave him second
thoughts. The goose was smothered in a sauce of cinnamon
and sharp cheese, a combination piquant enough to bring tears
to his eyes. There were times when the Empire's sophisticated
striving for pleasure through contrasting tastes went beyond
what his palate could tolerate.

Gaius Philippus seemed similarly nonplussed, but the rest
ate with every sign of enjoyment. Stifling a sigh, the tribune
took a handful of shelled almonds from a dish by the half-de-
molished goose. They were sprinkled with garlic powder. The
sigh became a groan; why hadn't the garlic gone on the meat
instead?

"You're not eating much," Hevis said.

"No." Perhaps it was just as well. Being chairbound day in
and day out had made him gain weight. And, he thought,
raising his cup to his lips, he had more room for wine.

"Here, pretty one, would you care to sit by me?" That was
Gauis Philippus, greeting a courtesan in a clinging dress of
thin yellow stuffs. He stole a chair from a nearby table; its
owner had gotten up to go to the jakes. The fellow's compan-
ions glowered at the senior centurion. He stared them down;

long years of command gave him a presence none of the city
men could match.

The woman saw that, too. There was real interest on her
face as she sat, not just a whore's counterfeit passion. She
helped herself to food and drink. A pretty thing, Marcus
thought, and was glad for Gaius Philippus, whose luck in such
matters was usually poor.

The shade of yellow she wore reminded the tribune of the
diaphanous silk gown Vardanes Sphrantzes had forced on
Alypia Gavra, and of her slim body unconcealed beneath it.
The thought warmed and annoyed him at the same time. There
should have been no room for it with Helvis beside him, her
fingers teasing the nape of his neck.

Turgot stretched across the table to reach for the dish of
almonds. He popped a handful into his mouth, then tried to
curse around them. "Stinking garlic!" he said, washing out the

taste with a hefty swig of wine. "Back in the Duchy we
wouldn't foul good food with the stuff." He drank again, his
face losing its soldier's hardness as he thought of his home.

"Well, I like it," Mavia said with a flip of her head. Her
hair flashed gold-red in the torchlight, almost the color of
flame itself. To prove the truth of her words, she ate an al-
mond, then another one. Marcus guessed she'd come to the
Empire long ago as a mercenary's small daughter and learned
Videssian tastes as well as the Duchy's. Turgot, sitting
hunched over his wine cup, suddenly seemed sad and tired
and old.

The Videssian whose chair Gaius Philippus had annexed
returned. He stood in confusion for a moment, while his
friends explained what had happened. He turned toward the
Roman—an unsteady turn, for he had considerable wine on
board. "Now you shee—see—here, sir—" he began.

"Go home and sober up," the senior centurion said, not
unkindly. He had other things on his mind than fighting. His
eyes kept slipping hungrily to the courtesan's dark nipples,
plainly visible through the fabric of her dress.

Viridovix's admiring gaze followed his. Only when the
drunken Videssian started a further protest did the Celt seem
to notice him. He burst out laughing, saying to Gaius Phi-
lippus, "Sure and the poor sot's clean forgotten a prick's good
for more things than pissing through."

He spoke in the Empire's language so everyone round the
party's two tables could share the joke. They laughed with
him, but the man he'd insulted understood him, too. With a
grunt of sodden rage the fellow swung at him, a wild haymak-
ing right that came nowhere near the Gaul.

Viridovix sprang to his feet, quick as a cat despite all he'd
drunk himself. His green eyes glowed with amusement of a
new sort. "Your honor shouldn't ought to have done that,
now," he said. He grabbed the luckless Videssian, lifted him
off his feet, and hurled him down splash! into the great tureen
of sea-turtle stew that stood as the centerpiece of his
comrades' table.

The sturdy table did not collapse, but greasy greenish stew
and bits of white meat splattered in all directions. The drunk
feebly kicked his legs as he tried to right himself; his friends,
drenched by their dinners, swore and spluttered and wiped at
their faces.




228 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"What are you doing, you loose fish, you clapped-out poxy
blackguard, you beggarly, lousy, beetle-headed knave!" Gaius
Philippus' courtesan screeched as she daubed futilely at her-
self. A good-sized chunk of meat was stuck in her hair above
the gold hoop she wore in her right ear, but she did not notice
it.

Nor did the Celt pay her bravura curses any mind. The men
he'd swashed were coming at- him, with determination if no
great skill. Viridovix flattened the first of them, but the next
one dashed a cup of wine in his face. While he choked and
gasped, the fellow jumped on him, followed a second later by
a companion.

Gaius Philippus and Gawtruz of Thatagush hauled them
off. "Two against one's not fair," the senior centurion said,
still mildly, flinging his man in one direction. Gawtruz wasted
no words on his, but tossed him in the other. If they had hoped
to quell the fight, they could hardly have done a worse job of
it. The hurled men went careening into tables, bowling over
two men seated at one and a woman at the other. Food flew.
What had been a private quarrel instantly became general.

Viridovix's banshee howl of fighting glee rose over the
anguished cries of the inn's owner and the sound of smashing
crockery. The two tables were a bastion under siege, and it
seemed everyone else in the eatery was trying to storm them.

Marcus had heard reports of Viridovix's tavern brawling,
but until now had never been caught up in it himself. A mug
whizzed past his head, to shatter against the wall. A fat Vi-
dessian punched him in the belly. "Oof!" he said, and doubled
over. He swung back, felt his fist sink into flab.

"You will excuse me, I pray," Taso Vones said, and dove
under the table, pulling Plakidia Teletze with him. She let out
an unladylike squawk of protest as she disappeared.

It was, Marcus thought, the most good-natured fight he had
been in. Perhaps all the battlers were in holiday spirits, or was
it simply that Viridovix, at heart a good-natured soul, had set
the stamp of his character on the brawl he'd started? Whatever
it was, none of the scrappers showed the slightest desire to
reach for the knives that hung at most of their belts. They
pounded each other with high gusto, but no serious blood was
spilled.

"Yipe!" said Scaurus, thrashing frantically. Someone had
pulled open his tunic and poured a bowlful of syrup-sweetened

Harry Turtledove            229

snow down his back. It felt like a million frozen, crawling
ants.

The eatery's owner ran from one little knot of fighting to
the next, shouting, "Stop this! Stop this at once, I tell you!"
No one paid him any mind until the fat Videssian, annoyed at
his noise, hit him in the side of the head. He stumbled out into
the night. "The guard! The guard!" His cries faded as he ran
down the street.

A city man, fists flailing, charged Arigh Arghun's son,
who was not much more than half as big. There was a flurry
of arms and legs—Marcus could not see all that went on,
because he was trading punches with a man who reeked of
wine—and the Videssian thudded to the ground. He lay still;

whatever Arigh's handfighting technique was, it worked well.

A plate broke, almost in the tribune's ear. He whirled
round to see a Videssian stagger away clutching his head.
Helvis still had a piece of the plate in her hand. "Thank you,
dear," he said. She smiled and nodded.

Nor was she the only Namdalener woman able to handle
herself in a ruction. Mavia and Gaius Philippus' tart were
going at it hammer and tongs, screeching and clawing and
pulling hair, and it was easy to see the blonde was getting the
better of the battle. But her foe was still game; when the
senior centurion tried to drag her out of the fray she raked her
nails down his cheek, missing his eye by no more than an
inch. "Stay and fight, then, you mangy trollop!" he yelled, all
vestiges of chivalry forgotten.

Katakolon Kekaumenos sat sipping his wine, a bubble of
calm in the brabble around him. One of the brawlers was rash
enough to mistake his quiet for cowardice and started to tip his
chair over backward. Kakaumenos was on his feet and spin-
ning toward the Videssian almost before it began to move. He
punched him once in the face and once in the belly, then lifted
his sagging body over his head and threw him through a win-
dow. That done, he straightened the chair and returned to his
wine, quiet as a snow leopard just after it has fed.

"That'll teach you to be trifling with an honest man, won't
it now?" Viridovix yelled after the Videssian. He got no an-
swer.

The tribune took a punch over the ear. He saw brief stars,
but his assailant howled and clutched his left fist round a bro-
ken knuckle. Scaurus, too experienced to throw that kind of

230 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Ham/ Turtledove 231

punch, hit him in the pit of the stomach. He doubled over and
fell, gasping for air. Target and Gawtruz both jumped on him.

"All right in there, enough now!" an accented tenor called
from the doorway. "Break it up, or we'll use our spearshafts
on you!" The mail-shirted Vaspurakaners pushed into the
shambles that had been the inn's common room. "Break it up,
I said!" their officer repeated, and someone yelped as one of
the troopers carried out the threat.

"Hullo, Senpat," Marcus said indistinctly. One of his hands
was in his mouth, trying to find out if a back tooth was loose.
It was. Spitting redly, he asked, "How's your lady?"

"Nevrat? She's fine—" The young Vaspurakaner noble
broke off in mid-sentence, a comic expression of surprise on
his handsome features. "You, Scaurus, of all people, tavern
brawling? You, the sensible, sober fellow who keeps everyone
else out of trouble? By Vaspur the Firstborn, I'd not have
believed it without the seeing."

"Heresy," someone muttered, but softly; fifteen Vaspura-
kaners crowded the room, every one of them armed.

Embarrassed, the tribune so far forgot his Stoic principles
as to cast the blame elsewhere. "It's Viridovix' fault. He
started the thing."

"Don't listen to him for even a second, Sviodo dear," the
Celt said to Senpat. "He was enjoying himself as much as the
rest of us." And Marcus, wine and battle both still firing his
blood, could not say him nay.

The tavemer, staring in horrified dismay at overturned
tables, broken chairs, assorted potshards, and half a dozen of
his kitchen creations splashed everywhere, let out a baritone
shriek of despair. Not only was his eatery wrecked, but this
Phos-despised foreign guard captain turned out to be friends
with the wreckers! "Who's going to pay for all this?" he
moaned.

Abrupt silence fell. The men still standing looked at each
other, at their comrades unconscious on the floor, at the door
—which was full of Vaspurakaners. "Someone had better
pay," the innkeeper went on, his tone moving from despon-
dence to threat, "or the whole city'll know why, and then—"

"Shut up," Scaurus said; he'd seen enough anti-foreign
riots in Videssos never to want to see another. He reached for
his belt. The tavemer's eyes widened in alarm, but he was
seeking his purse, not his sword. "We share and share alike,"

he said, his gaze including his own party and everyone else in
the inn.

"Why add me in?" Gorgidas demanded. "I didn't help
break up the place." That was true enough; the Greek, not
caring for fighting of any sort, had stayed on the sidelines.

"Then call it your fine for a liver full of milk," Viridovix
hooted. "If you're after talking your way free, what's to stop
the rest of these omadhauns from doing the same?"

Gorgidas glared at him and opened his mouth to argue fur-
ther, but Quintus Glabrio touched his arm. The junior centu-
rion was another who did not brawl for sport, but a swollen lip
and a bruise on his cheek said he had not been idle. He mur-
mured something. Gorgidas dipped his head in acquiescence,
the Greek gesture giving his exasperation perfect expression.

There were no other arguments. Scaurus turned back to the
inn-keeper. "All right, what do you say this stuff is worth?"
Seeing an ignorant outland mercenary in front of him, the man
doubled the fair price. But the tribune laughed scornfully; it
was folly to think of gulling someone with his nose fresh out
of the tax rolls. At his counteroffer the tavemer flinched and
called on Phos, but grew much more reasonable. They settled
quickly.

"Don't forget the fellow lying out there in the snow," Sen-
pat Sviodo said helpfully. "The more shares, the less each one
pays." Three of his Vaspurakaners dragged the fellow back
and flipped water in his face until he revived. It took several
minutes; Marcus was glad Kekaumenos was a friend.

"Is that everyone?" he asked, scanning the battered room.

"Should be," Gaius Philippus said, but Gawtruz broke in,
"Vones, where is he?" His fat face was smug; he loved to
score points off his fellow envoy.

Heads turned. No one saw the little Khatrisher. Then Viri-
dovix remembered, "Dove clear out of the shindy, he did," the
Celt said, and lifted a tablecloth. Plakidia Teletze screamed.
Vones, quicker thinking, snatched the cloth out of Viridovix's
hand and yanked it down.

"Begging your honor's pardon, I'm sure," Viridovix said,
suave as any ambassador himself, "but when you're finished
the rest of us would be glad for a word with ye." Then the
effort of holding himself back was too much, and he doubled
over with a guffaw.

Vones emerged a moment later, urbane as ever. "Wasn't




232    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

what it seemed," he said blandly. "Merely a coincidence, you

understand, the way we happened to fall."

Grinning, Arigh interrupted, "Your breeches are unbut-
toned, Taso."

"Why, so they are." Not a bit nonplussed, Vones did them

up again. "Now then, gentlemen, what do I owe you for my
share in the festivities?" Plakidia scrambled out while he was
talking. She bolted away from him; at Senpat Sviodo's gesture
his men stood aside to let her pass.

"It's not us you should be after paying at all, at all," Viri-
dovix chuckled, and Vones got off free. Scaurus dug in his
pouch, filled his free hand with silver. He counted out seven-
teen coins. It took twenty-four to equal a goldpiece of pure
metal, but the tribune saw a couple of the city men spend two
of Ortaias' debased coins to pay their shares, and even then

the innkeeper looked unhappy.

Gaius Philippus saw that, too, and narrowed his eyes in
disgust. "You could be getting steel, not gold," he pointed
out, toying with the hilt of his shortsword. He had the look of
a man who had scores of taproom fights behind him and had
ended some of them just that way. The tavemer wet his lips
nervously as he counted the coins and pronounced himself
satisfied. In fact he was hardly lying; too often threats were all

he got after a brawl.

"Come by the barracks when you have the chance,"

Marcus urged Senpat Sviodo as they left the inn. "We haven't

seen much of you lately."

"I'll do that," the young noble answered. "I know I should
have long ago, but there's so much to see here in the city. It's
like another world." Scaurus nodded his understanding; next
to Videssos, Vaspurakan's towns were but backwoods vil-
lages.

The courtesan in yellow tried to make up to Gaius Phi-
lippus but, his cheek still smarting, he rounded on her with
advice more pungent than he'd had for the innkeeper. She
answered with a two-fingered gesture every Videssian knew,
and cast sheep's eyes at the fat man who'd hit Marcus in the

stomach. They strolled off arm in arm.

The senior centurion stared glumly after her. Viridovix
clucked. "Foosh, it's a rare wasteful man y'are," he said.
"That was a lass with fire in her; a rare ride she would have
given you." Scaurus thought that an odd sentiment, coming

Harry Turtledove            233

from the Gaul—his own companions were all of them lovely,
but none had any spirit to speak of.

"Women," Gaius Philippus said, as if the word was enough
to explain everything.

"Only take the time to know 'em, Roman dear, and you'll
find 'em not so strange," Viridovix retorted. "And they're
great fun besides—isn't that right, my dears, my darlings?"
He swept all three of them into his arms; the way they snug-
gled close spoke louder than any words of agreement.

Gaius Philippus did his best to stay impassive; Marcus was
probably the only one who noticed his jaw jet, saw his eyes
narrow and grow hard. The Celt's teasing, this time, had
struck deep, though Viridovix himself did not realize it. When
the Celt opened his mouth for another sally, the tribune
stepped on his foot.

"Ow! Bad cess to you, you hulking looby!" Viridovix ex-
claimed, hopping. "What was the point o' that?"

Scaurus apologized and meant it; in his hurry, he'd trod
harder than he intended.

"Well, all right then," the Gaul said. He stretched luxur-
iantly. "Indeed and the shindy was not a bad way to be starting
the evening, if a bit tame. Let's be off to another tavern and
do it ag—och, you black spalpeen, that was no accident!"
The tribune had stepped on his other foot.

Viridovix bent down and flung a handful of snow in his
face. Cheeks stinging and eyebrows frosted white, Marcus
retaliated in kind—as did Helvis, who had taken some of the
snow that missed the Roman. In an instant everyone was pelt-
ing everyone else, laughing and shouting and cheering each
other on. Marcus was just as well pleased; a snowfight was
safer than most things Viridovix reckoned entertainment.

Sitting secure in Videssos, it was easy to imagine the Em-
pire still master of all its lands—or it would have been, had
Scaurus not been wrestling with the imperial tax rolls. In his
office he had a map of the westlands showing the districts
from which revenues had been collected. Most towns and vil-
lages in the coastal lowlands had little bronze pins stabbed
through them, indicating that imperial agents had taken what
was due from them. The central plateau, though, the natural
settling ground for nomads like the Yezda, showed virtually a
blank expanse of parchment. Worse, a finger of that same

234

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

235

ominous blankness pushed east down the Arandos River val-
ley toward Garsavra. If the town fell, it opened the way for
the invaders to burst forward all the way to the shore of the
Sailors' Sea.

Baanes Onomagoulos was as well aware of the somber
truth as the imperial finance ministry. The noble's estates were
hard by Garsavra, and his patience with Thorisin, never long,
grew shorter with every report of a new Yezda advance.

The Emperor knew the reason for Onomagoulos' constant
reproaches and knew there was some justice to them. He bore
them with more self-control than Marcus had thought he
owned. He committed such aid as he could to the Arandos
valley; more, in Scaurus' eyes, than Videssos, threatened all
through the westlands, could readily afford to spend there. But
at every session of the imperial council Onomagoulos' cry was
always for more men.

Thorisin's patience finally wore thin. About six weeks after
the midwinter fest, he told his captious marshal, "Baanes, I
am not made of soldiers, and Garsavra is not Videssos' only
weak point. The nomads are pushing out of Vaspurakan to-
ward Pityos and they're raiding in the westlands' south as
well. And the winter's cold enough to freeze the Astris, so the
Khamorth'll likely poke south across it to see if we poke back.
The company I sent west ten days ago will have to be the
last."

Onomagoulos ran his fingers up over the crown of his
head, a gesture, Marcus guessed, bom when hair still covered
it. "Two hundred seventy-five men! Huzzah!" he said sourly.
"How many Namdaleni, aye, and these other damned out-
landers, too," he added with a glance at Scaurus, "are sitting
here in the city, eating like so many hogs?"

Drax answered with the cool mercenary's logic Marcus had
come to expect from the great count: "Why should his Majesty
throw my men away in a fight they're not suited for? We're
heavier-armed than you Videssians care to be. Most times we
find it useful, but in deep snow we're slow and floundering,
easy meat for the nomads' light horse."

"The same is true of my men, but more so, for we aren't
mounted," Marcus echoed.

The quarrel might have been smoothed over there, for Ono-
magoulos was a soldier and recognized the point the others
made. But Soteric happened to be at the council instead of

Utprand, who was ill with a coughing fever. Scaurus' head-
strong brother-in-law took offense at Baanes' gibe at the
Namdaleni and gave it back in kind. "Hogs, is it? You bloody
cocksure snake, if you knew anything about nomads you
wouldn't have let yourself get trapped in front of Maragha.
Then you wouldn't be sitting here carping about the upshot of
your own stupidity!"

"Barbarian bastard!" Onomagoulos shouted. His chair
crashed over backward as he tried to leap to his feet; his hand
darted for his sword hilt. But his crippled leg buckled, and he
had to grab for the council table to keep from falling. He had
taken the laming wound in the fight Soteric named, and the
Namdalener laughed at him for it.

"Will you watch that polluted tongue of yours?" Scaurus
hissed at him. Drax, too, put a warning hand on his arm, but
Soteric shook it off. He and Utprand bore the count no love.

Onomagoulos regained his feet. His saber rasped free.
"Come on, basebom!" he yelled, almost beside himself with
rage. "One leg's plenty to deal with scum like you!"

Soteric surged up. Marcus and Drax, sitting on either side
of him, started to grab his shoulders to haul him down again,
but it was Thorisin's battlefield roar of "Enough!" that froze
everyone in place, Roman and great count no less than the
combatants.

"Enough!" the Emperor yelled again, barely softer. "Phos'
light, the two of you are worse than a couple of brats fratching
over who lost the candy. Mertikes, get Baanes' chair—he
seems to have mislaid it." ZigaLcnos jumped to obey. "Now,
the both of you sit down and keep still unless you've some-
thing useful to say." Under his glower they did, Soteric a bit
shamefaced but Onomagoulos still furious and making only
the barest effort to hide it.

Speaking to Gavras as if to a small boy, the Videssian
noble persisted, "Garsavra must have more troops, Thorisin.
It is a very important city, both of itself and for its location."

The Emperor bridled at that tone, which he had heard from
Onomagoulos for too many years. But he still tried for pa-
tience as he answered, "Baanes, I have given Garsavra
twenty-five hundred men, at least. Along with the retainers
you muster on your estates, surely enough warriors are there
to hold back the Yezda till spring. They don't fly over the
snow themselves, you know; they slog through it like anyone




236    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

else. When spring comes I intend to hit them hard, and I
won't piddle away my striking force a squad here and a com-
pany there until I have nothing left."

Onomagoulos stuck out his chin; his pointed beard jutted
toward Gavras. "The men are needed, I tell you. Will you not
listen to plain sense?"

No one at the table wanted to meet Thorisin's eye while he
was being hectored so, but all gazes slid his way regardless.
He said only, "You may not have them," but there was iron in
his voice.

Everyone heard the warning except Onomagoulos, whose
angry frustration made him exclaim, "Your brother would
have given them to me."

Marcus wanted to disappear; had Baanes searched for a
year, he could not have found a worse thing to say. Thorisin's
jealousy of the friendship between Mavrikios and Onoma-
goulos was painfully obvious. Imperial dignity forgotten,
Gavras leaned forward, bellowing, "He'd have given you the
back of his hand for your insolence, you toplofty runt!"

"Unweaned pup, your eyes aren't open to see the world in
front of your face!" Baanes was not yelling at the Avtokrator
of the Videssians, but at his comrade's tag-along little brother.

"Clod from a dungheap! You think your precious estates
are worth more than the whole Empire!"

"I changed your diapers, puling moppet!" They shouted
insults and curses at each other for a good minute, oblivious to
anyone else's presence. Finally Onomagoulos rose once more,
crying, "There's one more man Garsavra will have, by Phos! I
won't stay in the same city with you—the stench of you cur-
dles my nose!"

"It's big enough," Thorisin retorted. "Good riddance; Vi-
dessos is well shut of you."

By now, Scaurus thought, I Should be used to the sight of
people stalking out of Thorisin's councils. Baanes Onoma-
goulos' stalk was in fact a limp, but the effect remained the
same. As he reached the polished bronze doors of the Hall of
the Nineteen Couches, he turned round for a final scowl at the
Emperor, who replied with an obscene gesture. Onomagoulos
spat on the floor, as Videssians did before wine and food to
show their rejection of Skotos. He hobbled out into the snow.
"Where were we?" the Emperor said.

Harry Turtledove            237

*   *   *

Marcus expected Baanes to be restored to Thorisin's good
graces; the Emperor's temper ran high at flood but quickly
ebbed. Onomagoulos' anger, though, was of a more lasting
sort. Two days after the stormy council he kept the promise
he'd made there, sailing over the Cattle-Crossing and setting
out for Garsavra.

"I mislike this," the tribune said when he heard the news.
"He's flying in the face of the Emperor's authority." Though
he was in the Roman barracks, he looked round before he
spoke and then was low-voiced—the price of living in the
Empire, he thought discontentedly.

"You're right, I fear," Gaius Philippus said. "If I were
Gavras, I'd haul him back in chains."

"The two of you make no sense," Viridovix complained.
"It was the Gavras who gave him leave to go—or ordered
him, more like."

"Ordered him to drop dead, perhaps," Gorgidas said, "but
not to go off and fight his own private war." He lifted an
ironic eyebrow at the Gaul. "When will you leam words can
say one thing and mean another?"

"Och, you think you're such a tricksy Greek. This I'll tell
you, though—if it was my home in danger, I'd go see to it,
and be damned to any who tried to stop me, himself in-
cluded." The Gaul folded his arms across his chest, as if dar-
ing the doctor to disagree.

It was Gaius Philippus, though, who snorted at him.
"Likely you would, and maybe lose your home and all your
neighbors' in the bargain. Think of yourself first and your
mates last and that's what happens. Why else do you think
Caesar's been able to fight one clan of Celts at a time?"

Viridovix gnawed at his drooping mustache; the senior
centurion's gibe was to the point. But he replied, '"Twon't
matter a bit in the end. Divided or no, we'll be whipping the
lot of you back home with your tails tucked into their
grooves."

"Not a chance," Gaius Philippus said, and the old dispute
began again. Ever since the Romans came to Videssos, he and
Viridovix had been arguing over who would win the fighting
in Gaul. They both took the question seriously, although—or
perhaps because—they could never answer it.

Not much caring to listen, Marcus left for his desk in the




238    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

pen-pushers' wing of the Grand Courtroom. The problems
there were new ones, but they did not seem to have solutions
more definite than his friends' debating topic.

Pandhelis fetched him ledgers and reports in an unending
stream. They further confused issues about as often as they
settled them. Videssian bureaucrats, with their rhetorical
training, took pride in making their meaning as obscure as
possible. Trying to thread his way through a thicket of allu-
sions he barely understood, Scaurus wondered why he had

ever wanted a political career.

He slept at his desk that night, stupefied by a pile of as-
sessment documents written in a hand so tiny as to defy the
eye. The legionaries were already at the practice field when he
got back to the barracks. He walked down Middle Street to
join them, breakfasting on a hard, square rye-flour roll dipped
in honey, that he bought in the plaza of Palamas.

It was another chilly day, with little flurries of snow blow-
ing through the streets. When the tribune came up to a bath-
house with an imposing facade of golden sandstone and white
marble, his enthusiasm for practice abruptly disappeared. He
wrestled his conscience to the mat and went in. Palling asleep
to the press of work, he told himself, was enough to make

anyone feel grimy.

The bathhouse's owner took his copper at the door with a
broad smile, waving him forward into the undressing
chamber. He gave another copper to the boy there to make
sure his clothes would not be stolen while he was bathing,
then shed his sheepskin coat, tunic, and trousers with a sigh of

relief.

The sounds of the bath drew him on. As was true at Rome,

Videssian baths were as much social places as ones devoted to
cleanliness. Hawkers of sausages, wine, and pastries were
crying their wares; so was the hair-remover, for those men
who affected such fastidiousness. He fell silent for a moment,
then Scaurus heard his client yelp as he began to pluck an

armpit.

Usually the tribune, with Stoic abstemiousness, limited

himself to a cold bath, but after coming in out of the snow that
was intolerable. He sweated for a while in the steam bath,
baking the winter out. Then the cold plunge seemed attractive
rather than self-tormenting. He climbed out of the pool when
the icy water began to bite, stretching himself on the tiles to

Harry Turtledove

239

relax for a few minutes before going on to soak in the pleas-
antly warm pool beyond.

"Scrape you off, sir?" asked a youth with a curved strigil in
his hand.

"Thank you, yes," the tribune said; he'd brought along a
little money for small luxuries tike this, as it was next to
impossible for a bather to scrape all of himself. He sighed at
the pleasant roughness of the strigil sliding back and forth
over his flesh.

Around him plump middle-aged men puffed as they exer-
cised with weights. Masseurs pummeled grunting victims,
now clapping hands down on their shoulders, now cupping
them to produce an almost drumlike beat. Three young men
played the Videssian game called trigon, throwing a ball un-
expectedly from one to the next. They feinted and shouted;

whenever one dropped the ball the other two would cry out as
he lost a point. Off in a comer, a handful of more sedentary
types diced the morning away.

There was a tremendous splash as someone leaped into the
warm pool in the hall beyond, followed closely by cries of
annoyance from the nearby people whom he'd drenched. The
splasher came up not a whit dismayed. After blowing the
water out of his mouth and nose, he started to sing in a reso-
nant baritone.

"Everyone thinks he sounds wonderful in the baths," the
youth with the strigil said, cocking his head critically. He fan-
cied himself a connoiseur of bathhouse music. "He's not bad,
I must say, for all his funny accent."

"No, he isn't," Marcus agreed; though his ear was so poor
he could hardly tell good singing from bad. But only one man
in Videssos owned that brogue. Tipping the youth a final cop-
per, he got up and went in to say hello to Viridovix.

The Celt was facing me entranceway and broke off his tune
in mid-note when he saw the tribune. "If it's not himself,
come to wash the ink off him!" he cried. "And a good deal of
himself there is to wash, too!"

Scaurus looked down. He'd felt his middle thickening from
days in a chair without exercise, but hadn't realized the result
was so plain to see. Annoyed, he ran three steps forward and
dove into the warm water a good deal more neatly than Viri-
dovix had. It was a shallow dive; the pool was no more than
chest-deep.




240    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

He swam over to the Celt. The two of them were strange
fish among the olive-skinned, dark-haired Videssians: Marcus
dark blond, his face, arms, and lower legs permanently tanned
from his time in the field but the rest of him paler; and Viri-
dovix, fair with the pink-white Gallic fairness that refused to
take the sun, his burnished copper hair sodden against his
head and curling in bright ringlets on his chest and belly and at

his groin.

"Shirking again," they both said at the same time, and
laughed together. Neither was in any hurry to get out. The
pool was heated to that perfect temperature where the water
does not register against the skin. Marcus thought of the sharp
wind outside, then chose not to.

A small boy, drawn perhaps by the Celt's strangeness,
splashed him from behind. Viridovix spun round, saw his
laughing foe. "Do that to me, will you now?" he roared,
mock-ferocious, and splashed back. They pelted each other
with water until the youngster's father had to go and take his
son, unwilling, from the pool. Viridovix waved to them both
as they left. "A fine lad, and a fine time, too," he said to

Scaurus.

"From the look of you, you had your fine time last night,"
the tribune retorted. He had been staring at Viridovix's back
and shoulders when the Gaul turned them during the water
fight. They were covered with scratches that surely came from
a woman's nails. One or two of them, Scaurus thought, must
have drawn blood; they were still red and angry.

Viridovix smoothed down his mustaches, fairly dripping
smugness. He said a couple of sentences in his own Celtic
tongue before dropping back into Latin, which he still pre-
ferred to Videssian. "A wildcat she was, all right," he said,
smiling at the memory. "You canna see it under my hair, but
she fair bit the ear off me, too, there at the end."

He was in so expansive a mood that Marcus asked, "Which
one was it?" He was hard pressed to imagine any of the Celt's
three women showing such ferocity. They seemed too docile

for it.

"Och, none o' them," Viridovix answered, understanding

the question and not put out by it: plainly he felt like boasting.
"They're well enough, I'll not deny; still, the time comes
when so much sweetness starts to pall. The new one, now!

Harp/Turtledove            241

She's slim, so she is, but wild and shameless as a wolf bitch in
heat."

"Good for you, then," Scaurus said. Viridovix, he thought,
would likely jolly this new wench into joining the rest. He had
a gift in such matters.

"Aye, she's all I hoped she would be," the Gaul said hap-
pily. "Ever since she gave me her eye, bold as you please
down there on the foggy beach, I've known she'd not be hard
for me to lure under the sheets."

"Good for—" the tribune started to repeat, and then
stopped in horrified amazement as the full meaning-of Virido-
vix' words sank in. His head whipped round to see who might
be listening before he remembered they had been speaking
Latin. One small thing to be grateful for, he thought—proba-
bly the only one. "Do you mean to tell me it's Komitta Rhan-
gavve's skirt you're lifting?"

"Aren't you the clever one, now? But it's herself lifts it, I
assure you—as greedy a cleft as any I've known."

"Are you witstruck all of a sudden, man? It's the Em-
peror's mistress you're diddling, not some tavern drab."

"And what o' that? A Celtic noble is entitled to better than
such trollops," Viridovix said proudly. "Forbye, if Thorisin
doesn't want me diddling his lady, then let him diddle her his
own self and not stay up till dead of night kinging it. He'll get
himself no sons that way."

"Will you give him a red-headed one, then? If no other
way, he'll know the cuckoo by its feathers."

Viridovix chuckled at that, but nothing the Roman said
would make him change his mind. He was enjoying himself,
and was not a man to think of tomorrow till it came. He
started singing again, a bouncy love song. Half a dozen Vi-
dessians joined in, filling the chamber with music. Marcus
tried to decide whether drowning him now would make things
better or worse.




XI

" PANDHELIS, WHERE HAVE YOU HIDDEN LAST YEAR'S TAX

register for Kybistra?" Scaurus asked. The clerk shuffled
through rolls of parchment, spread his hands regretfully. Mut-
tering a curse, Scaurus stood up from his desk and walked
down the hall to see if Pikridios Goudeles had the document
he needed.

The dapper bureaucrat looked up from his work as the tri-
bune came in. He and Scaurus had learned wary respect for
each other since the latter began overseeing the bureaucrats for
Thorisin Gavras. "What peculations have you unearthed
now?" Goudeles asked. As always, a current of mockery
flowed just below the surface of his words.

When Marcus told him what he wanted, Goudeles grew
brisk. "It should be around here someplace," he said. He went
from pigeonhole to pigeonhole, unrolling the first few inches
of the scrolls in them to see what they contained. When the
search failed to turn up anything, his mobile eyebrows came
down in irritation. He shouted for a couple of clerks to look in
nearby rooms, but they returned equally unsuccessful. His
frown deepened. "Ask the silverfish and the mice," he sug-
gested.

"No, you probably trained them to lie for you," Marcus
said. When the Roman first started the job the Emperor had
set him, Goudeles tested him with doctored records. The tri-
bune returned them without comment and got what looked to
be real cooperation thereafter. He wondered if this was an-
other, subtler snare.

But Goudeles was rubbing his neatly bearded chin in

242

Harry Turtledove            243

thought. "That cadaster might not be here at all," he said
slowly. "It might already be stored in the archives building
down on Middle Street. It shouldn't be—it's too new—but
you never can tell. I don't have it, at any rate."

"All right, I'll try there. If nothing else, I'll get to stretch
my legs. Thanks, Pikridios." Goudeles gave a languid wave of
acknowledgment. A strange character, Scaurus thought, look-
ing and acting the effete seal-stamper almost to the point of
self-parody, but with the grit to confront Thorisin Gavras in
his own camp for the Sphrantzai. Well, he told himself, only
in the comedies is a man all of a piece.

The brown slate flags of the path from the Grand Court-
room to the forum of Palamas were wet and slippery; most of
the snow that had blanketed the palace complex' lawns was
gone. The sun was almost hot in a bright blue sky. The tribune
eyed it suspiciously. There had been another of these spells a
couple of weeks before, followed close by the worst blizzard
of the winter. This one, though, might be spring after all.

The tribune had a good idea of the reception he would get
at the imperial offices that housed the archives—nor was he
disappointed. Functionaries herded him from file to musty file
until he began to hate the smell of old parchment. There was
no sign of the document he sought, or of any less than three
years old. Some were much older than that; he turned up one
that seemed to speak of Namdalen as still part of the Empire,
though fading ink and strange, archaic script made it impossi-
ble to be sure.

When he showed the ancient scroll to the secretary in
charge of those files, that worthy said, "You needn't look as if
you're blaming me. What would you expect to find in the
archives but old papers?" He seemed scandalized that anyone
could expect him to produce a recent document.

"I have been through all three floors of this building,"
Scaurus said, fighting to hold his patience. "Is there any other
place the scurvy thing might be lurking?"

"I suppose it might be in the sub-basement," the secretary
answered, his tone saying he was sure it wasn't. "That's
where the real antiques get stowed, below the prisons."

"I may as well try, as long as I'm here."

"Take a lamp with you," the secretary advised, "and keep
your sword drawn. The rats down there aren't often bothered
and they can be fierce."







244

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

245

"Splendid," the tribune muttered. It was useful information
all the same; though he had known the imperial offices held a
jail, he had not been aware there was anything beneath it. He
made sure the lamp he chose was full of oil.

He was glad of the lamp as soon as he started down the
stairway to the prison, for even that was below the level of the
street and had no light save what came from the torches nick-
ering in their iron brackets every few feet along the walls. The
rough-hewn blocks of stone above them were thick with soot
that had not been cleaned away for years.

It was time for the prisoners' daily meal. A pair of bored
guards pushed a squeaking handcart down the central aisle-
way. Two more, almost equally bored, covered them with
drawn bows as they passed out loaves of coarse, husk-filled
bread, small bowls of fish stew that smelled none too fresh,
and squat earthen jugs of water. The fare was miserable, but
the inmates crowded to the front of their cells to get it. One
made a face as he tasted the stew. "You washed your feet in it
again, Podopagouros," he said.

"Aye, well, they needed it," the guard answered, unper-
turbed.

The tribune had to ask his way down to the sub-basement.
He walked past the rows of cells to a small door whose hinges
creaked rustily as he opened it. As with many doorways in the
imperial offices, an image of the Emperor was set above this
one. But Scaurus blinked at the portrait: a roundfaced old man
with a short white beard. Who—? He held up his lamp to read
the accompanying text: "Phos preserve the Avtokrator Stro-
bilos Sphrantzes." It had been more than five years now since
Strobilos was Emperor.

Long before he reached the bottom of the stairway, Marcus
knew he would never find the taxroll, even if it was here. The
little clay lamp in his hand was not very bright, but it shed
enough light for him to see boxes of records haphazardly piled
on one another. Some were overturned, their contents half-
buried in the dust and mold on the floor. The air tasted dead.

The lamp flickered. Scaurus felt his heart jump with it.
There could be no worse fate than to be lost down here, alone
in the blackness. No, not altogether alone; as the flame blazed
up again, its glow came back greenly from scores of gleaming
eyes. Some of them, the tribune thought nervously, were
higher off the ground than a rat's eyes had any right to be.

He retreated, making very sure that little door was bolted.
Strobilos stared incuriously down at him; even the imperial
artist had had trouble portraying him as anything but a dullard.

Its torches bright and cheerful, the prison level seemed
almost attractive compared to what was below it. The guards
with their handcart had not moved ahead more than six or
seven cells. Their rhythm was slow, nearly hypnotic—a loaf
to the left, a bowl of stew to the right; a bowl of stew to the
left, a loaf to the right; a water jar to either side; creak forward
and repeat.

"You, there!" someone called from one of the cells. "Yes,
you, outlander!" Marcus had been about to go on, sure no one
down here could be talking to him, but that second call
stopped him. He looked round curiously.

He had not recognized Taron Leimmokheir in his shabby
linen prison robe. The ex-admiral had lost weight, and his hair
and beard .were long and shaggy; months in this sunless place
had robbed him of his sailor's tan. But as Scaurus walked over
to his ceil, he saw Leimmokheir still bore himself with mili-
tary erectness. The cell itself was neat and clean as it coul.d
be, cleaner, in fact, than the passageway outside.

"What is it, Leimmokheir?" the tribune asked, not very
kindly. The man on the other side of those rust-flaked bars had
come too close to killing him and was condemned to be here
for planning the murder of the Emperor the Roman supported.

"I'd have you take a message to Gavras, if you would."
The words were a request, but Leimmokheir's deep hoarse
voice somehow kept its tone of command, prisoner though he
was. Marcus waited.

Leimmokheir read his face. "Oh, I'm not such a fool as to
ask to be set free. I know the odds of that. But by Phos,
outlander, tell him he holds an innocent man. By Phos and his
light, by the hope of heaven and the fear of Skotos' ice below,
I swear it." He drew the sun-sign over his breast, repeating
harshly, "He holds an innocent man!"

The convict in the next cell, a sallow man with a weasel's
narrow wicked face, leered at Scaurus. "Aye, we're all inno-
cent here," he said. "That's why they keep us here, you know,
to save us from the guilty ones outside. Innocent!" His laugh
made the word a filthy joke.

The Roman, though, paused in some uncertainty. Barefoot
and unkempt Leimmokheir might be, but his speech still had




246 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

the oddly compelling quality Marcus had noted when he first
heard it on that midnight beach, still carried the conviction
that here was a man who would not, or could not, lie. His
eyes bored into the tribune's, and Scaurus lowered his first.

The food cart came groaning up. The tribune made his
decision. "I'll do what I can," he said. Leimmokheir acknowl-
edged him not with a nod, but with lowered head and right
hand on heart—the imperial soldier's salute to a superior. If
this was acting, Scaurus thought, it deserved a prize.

He began to regret his promise before he got back to the
palace compound. As if he didn't have troubles enough, with-
out trying to convince Gavras he might have made a mistake.
Thorisin was much more mistrustful of his aides than Mavri-
kios had been—with reason, Marcus had to admit. If he ever
learned the tribune had planned to defect...! It did not bear
thinking about.

If, on the other hand, he approached the Emperor through
Alypia Gavra, that might blunt Thorisin's suspicions, the
more so if she took his side. At least he could leam what she
thought of Leimmokheir, which would give better perspective
on how far to credit the ex-admiral. He smacked fist into open
palm, pleased with his own cleverness.

She might even know where that fornicating tax roll was,
he thought.

The eunuch steward Mizizios rapped lightly at the hand-
some door. Like most of those in the small secluded building
that was the imperial family's private household, it was orna-
mented with inlays of ebony and red cedar. "Yes, bring him
in, of course," Scaurus heard the princess say. Mizizios bowed
as he worked the silver latch.

He followed the tribune into the chamber, but Alypia
waved him away. "Let us talk in peace." Seeing the eunuch
hesitate, she added, "Go on; my virtue's safe with him." It
was, Marcus thought, as much the bitterness in her voice as
the order itself that made Mizizios flee.

But she was gracious again as she offered the Roman a
chair, urged him to take wine and cakes. "Thank you, your
Majesty," he said. "It's kind of you to see me on such short
notice." He bit into one of the little cakes with enjoyment.
They were stuffed with raisins and nuts and dusted lightly

Harry Turtledove            247

with cinnamon; better here than over goose, he thought. That
midwinter meal still rankled.

"My uncle has made it plain to both of us that the pen-
pushers' iniquities are of the highest importance, has he not?"
she said, raising her eyebrows slightly. Was that surprise at his
thanks, Scaurus wondered, or lurking sarcasm? He could not
read Alypia at all and did not think the reverse was true; he
felt at a disadvantage.

"If I'm interrupting anything..." he said, and let the sen-
tence drop.

"Nothing that won't keep," she said, waving to a desk as
overloaded with scrolls and books as his own. He could read
the title picked out in gold leaf on a leather-bound volume's
spine: the Chronicle of Seven Reigns. She followed his eye,
nodded. "History is a business that takes its own time."

The desk itself was plain pine, no finer than the one
Marcus used. The rest of the furnishings, including the chairs
on which he and Alypia sat, were as austere. The only orna-
ment was an icon of Phos above the desk, an image stem in
judgment.

At first glance, the princess seemed almost equally severe.
She wore blouse and skirt of plain dark brown, unrelieved by
jewelry; her hair was pulled back into a small, tight bun at the
nape of her neck. But her green eyes—rare for a Videssian—
held just enough ironic amusement to temper the harshness
she tried to project. "To what pen-pushers' inquiries are we
referring?" she asked, and Scaurus heard it in her voice as
well.

"None," he admitted, "unless you happen to know where
they've spirited away Kybistra's tax records."

"I don't," she said at once, "but surely you could have a
mage find them for you."

"Why, so I could," Scaurus said, amazed. The notion had
never entered his mind. For all his time in Videssos, down
deep he still did not accept magic, and it rarely occurred to
him to use it. He wondered how much sorcery went on around
him, unnoticed, every day among folk who took it as much
for granted as a cloak against the cold.

Such musings vanished as he remembered his chief reason
for seeing the princess. "I'm not here on account of the pen-
pushers, actually," he began, and set out the story of how

248 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Taron Leimmokheir had recognized him and insisted on his
own innocence.

Alypia grew serious as she listened, alert and intent. The
expression suited her face perfectly; Marcus thought of the
goddess Minerva as he watched her. She was silent for several
moments after he finished, then asked at last, "What do you
make of what he said?"

"I don't know what to believe. The evidence against him is
strong, and yet I thought the first time I heard his voice that he
was a man whose word was good. It troubles me."

"Well it might. I've known Leimmokheir five years now,
since my father won the throne, and never seen him do any-
thing dishonorable or base." Her mouth twitched in a mirth-
less smile. "He even treated me as if I were really Empress.
He may have been artless enough to think I was."

Scaurus rested his chin on the back of his hand, looked
down at the floor. "Then I'd best see your uncle, hadn't I?"
He did not relish the prospect; Thorisin was anything but rea-
sonable on the matter of Leimmokheir.

Alypia understood that, too. "I'll come with you, if you
like."

"I'd be grateful," he said frankly. "It would make me less
likely to be taken for a traitor."

She smiled. "Hardly that. Shall we find him now?"

The bare-branched trees' shadows were long outside. "To-
morrow will do well enough. I'd like to see to my men with
what's left of today; as is, I don't get as much chance as I
should."

"All right. My uncle likes to ride in the early morning, so
I'll meet you at midday outside the Grand Courtroom." She
stood, a sign the audience was at an end.

"Thanks," he said, rising too.

He took another little cake from the enamelwork tray, then
smiled himself as the memory came back. He'd had these
cakes before and knew who baked them. "They're as good as
I remembered," he said.

For the first time he saw Alypia's reserve crack. Her eyes
widened slightly, her hand fluttered as if to brush the compli-
ment away. "Tomorrow, then," she said quietly.

"Tomorrow."

Harry Turtledove

249

*   *   *

When the tribune got back to the barracks he found an
argument in full swing. Gorgidas had made the mistake of
trying to explain the Greek notion of democracy to Viridovix
and succeeded only in horrifying the Celtic noble.

"It's fair unnatural," Viridovix said. "'Twas the gods
themselves set some folk above the rest." Arigh Arghun's son,
who was there visiting the Gaul and soaking up some wine,
nodded vigorously.

"Nonsense," Scaurus said. The Roman patricians had tried
to put that one over on the rest of the people, too. It had been
centuries since it worked.

But Gorgidas turned on him, snapping, "What makes you
think I need your help? Your precious Roman republic has its
nobles, too, though they buy their way to the role instead of
being born into it. Why is a Crassus a man worth hearing, if
not for his moneybags?"

"What are you yattering about?" Arigh said impatiently;

the allusion meant nothing to him and hardly more to Virido-
vix. The Arshaum was a chieftain's son, though, and knew
what he thought of the Greek's idea. "A clan has nobles for
the same reason an army has generals—so when trouble
comes, people know whom to follow."

Gorgidas shot back, "Why follow anyone simply because
of birth? Wisdom would be a better guide."

"Be a man never so wise, if he comes dung-footed from the
fields and speaks like the clodhopper born, no one'11 be after
hearing his widsom regardless," Viridovix said.

Arigh's flat features showed his contempt for all farmers,
noble and peasant alike, but he followed the principle the Celt
was laying down. In his harsh, clipped speech he said to Gor-
gidas, "Here, outlander, let me tell you a story to show you
what I mean."

"A story, is it? Wait a moment, will you?" The physician
trotted off, to return with tablet and stylus. If anything could
ease him out of an argumentative mood, it was the prospect of
learning more about the world in which he found himself. He
poised stylus over wax. "All right, carry on."

"This happened a few years back, you'll understand,"
Arigh began, "among the Arshaum who fellow the standard of
the Black Sheep—near neighbors to my father's clan. One of




250    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

their war leaders was a basebom man named Kuyuk, and he
had a yen for power. He toppled the clan-chief neat as you
please, but because he was a nobody's son, the nobles were
touchy about doing what he told them. He was clever, though,
was Kuyuk, and had himself a scheme.

"One of the things the clan-chief left behind when he ran
was a golden foot-bath. The nobles washed their feet in it,
aye, and pissed in it, too, sometimes. Now Kuyuk had a gold-
smith melt it down and recast it in the shape of a wind spirit.
He set it up among the tents, and all the clansmen of the Black

Sheep made sacrifice to it."

"Sounds like something out of Herodotos," Gorgidas said,
little translucent spirals of wax curling up from his darting

stylus.

"Out of what? Anyway, Kuyuk let this go on for a while

and then called in his factious nobles. He told them where the
image came from, and said, 'You used to wash your feet in
that basin, and piddle in it, and even puke. Now you sacrifice
to it, because it's in a spirit's shape. The same holds true for
me: when I was a commoner you could revile me all you
liked, but as clan-chief I deserve the honor of my station.'"

"Och, what a tricksy man!" Viridovix exclaimed in admi-
ration. "That should have taught them respect."

"Not likely! The chief noble, whose name was Mutugen,
stuck a knife into Kuyuk. Then all the nobles gathered round
and pissed on his corpse. As Mutugen said, 'Gold is gold no
matter what the shape, and a basebom man's still basebom
with a crown on his head.' Mutugen's son Tutukan is chief of
the Black Sheep to this day—they wouldn't follow a nobody."

"True, your nobles wouldn't," Marcus said, "but what of
the rest of the clan? Were they sorry to see Kuyuk killed?"

"Who knows? What difference does it make?" Arigh an-
swered, honestly confused. Viridovix slapped him on the back

in agreement.

Gorgidas threw his hands in the air. Now, put in a more
dispassionate frame of mind by his ethnographic jotting, he
was willing to admit Scaurus to his side. He said, "Don't let
them reach you, Roman. They haven't experienced it, and
understand no more than a blind man does a painting."

"Honh!" said Viridovix. "Arigh, what say you the two of
us find a nice aristocratic tavern and have a jar or two o' the

Harry Turtledove            251

noble grape?" Tall Celt and short wiry plainsman strode out of
the barracks side by side.

Gorgidas' note-taking and his own visit to Alypia Gavra
reminded Marcus of the Greek doctor's other interest. "How is
that history of yours doing?" he asked.

"It comes, Scaurus, a bit at a time, but it comes."

"May I see it?" the Roman asked, suddenly curious. "My
Greek was never of the finest, I know, and it's the worse for
rust, but I'd like to try, if you'd let me."

Gorgidas hesitated. "I have only the one copy." But unless
he wrote for himself alone, the tribune was his only possible
audience for his work in the original, and no Videssian trans-
lation, even if somehow made, could be the same. "Mind you
care for it, now—don't let your brat be gumming it."

"Of course not," Scaurus soothed him.

"Well all right, then, I'll fetch it, or such of it as is fit to
see. No, no stay there, don't trouble yourself. I'll get it." The
Greek went off to his billet in the next barracks hall. He re-
turned with a pair of parchment scrolls, which he defiantly
handed to Marcus.

"Thank you," the tribune said, but Gorgidas brushed the
amenities aside with an impatient wave of his hand. Marcus
knew better than to push him; the physician was a large-
hearted man, but disliked admitting it even to himself.

Scaurus took the scrolls back to his own quarters, lit a
lamp, and settled down on the bedroll to read. As twilight
deepened, he realized how poor and flickering the light was.
He thought of the priest Apsimar back at Imbros and the aura
of pearly radiance the ascetic cleric could project at will.
Sometimes magic was very handy, though Apsimar would cry
blasphemy if asked to be a reading lamp...

Concentration on Gorgidas' history drove such trivia from
his mind. The going was slow at first. Scaurus had not read
Greek for several years—it was distressing to see how much
of his painfully built vocabulary had fallen by the wayside.
The farther he went, though, the more he realized the physi-
cian had created—what was that phrase of Thucydides'?—a
ktema es aei, a possession for all time.

Gorgidas' style was pleasingly straightforward; he wrote a
smooth koine Greek, with only a few unusual spellings to
remind one he came from Elis, a city that used the Doric
dialect. But the history had more to offer than an agreeable




252 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

style. There was real thought behind it. Gorgidas constantly
strove to reach beyond mere events to illuminate the principles
they illustrated. Marcus wondered if his physician's training
had a hand in that. A doctor had to recognize a disease's true
nature rather than treating only its symptoms.

Thus when speaking of anti-Namdalener riots in Videssos,
Gorgidas gave an account of what had happened in the partic-
ular case he had observed, but went on to remark, "A city
mob is a thing that loves trouble and is rash by nature; the
civil strife it causes may be more dangerous and harder to put
down than warfare with foreign foes." It was a truth not lim-
ited to the Empire alone.

Helvis came in, breaking Marcus' train of thought. She had
Dosti in the crook of her arm and led Malric by the hand. Her
son by Hemond broke free from his mother and jumped on
Scaurus' stomach. "We went walking on the sea wall," he said
with a five-year-old's frightening enthusiasm, "and mama
bought me a sausage, and we watched the ships sailing
away—"

Marcus lifted a questioning eyebrow. "Bouraphos," Helvis
said. The tribune nodded. It was about time Thorisin sent
Pityos help against the Yezda, and the drungarios of the fleet
could reach the port on the Videssian Sea long before any
force got there by land.

Malric burbled on; Scaurus listened with half an ear. Helvis
set Dosti down. He tried to stand, fell over, and crawled to-
ward his father. "Da!" he announced. "Da-da-da!" He reached
for the roll of parchment the tribune had set down. Remem-
bering Gorgidas' half-serious warning, Marcus snatched it
away. The baby's face clouded over. Marcus grabbed him and
tossed him up and down, which seemed to please him well
enough.

"Me, too," Malric said, tugging at his arm.

Scaurus tried hard not to favor Dosti over his stepson. "All
right, hero, but you're a bit big for me to handle lying down."
The tribune climbed to his feet. He gave Dosti back to Helvis,
then swung Malric through the air until the boy shrieked with
glee.

"Enough," Helvis warned practically, "or he won't keep
that sausage down." To her son she added, "And enough for
you, too, young man. Get ready to go to bed." After the usual

Harry Turtledove            253

protests, Malric slipped out of shirt and breeches and slid
under the covers. He fell asleep at once.

"What did you rescue from this one?" Helvis asked, heft-
ing Dosti. "Are you bringing your taxes to bed now?"

"I should hope not," Marcus exclaimed; there was a per-
version not even Vardanes Sphrantzes could enjoy. The tri-
bune showed Helvis Gorgidas' history. The strange script
made her frown. Though she could read only a few words of
Videssian, she knew what the signs were supposed to look
like, and was taken aback that a different system could repre-
sent sounds.

Something almost like fear was in her eyes as she said to
Scaurus, "There are times when I nearly forget from how far
away you come, dear, and then something like this reminds
me. This is your Latin, then?"

"Not quite," the tribune said, but he could see his explana-
tion left her confused. Nor did she understand his interest in
the past.

"It's gone, and gone forever. What could be more useless?"
she said.

"How can you hope to understand what will come without
knowing what's come before?"

"What comes will come, whether I understand it or not.
Now is plenty for me."

Marcus shook his head. "There's more than a little barbar-
ian in you, I fear," he said, but fondly.

"And what if there is?" Her stare challenged him. She put
Dosti in his crib.

He took her in his arms. "I wasn't complaining," he said.

It always amused Scaurus how students and masters of the
Videssian Academy turned to watch him as he made his way
through the gray sandstone building's corridors. They could
be priest or noble, graybeard scholar or ropemaker's gifted
son, but the sight of a mercenary captain in the halls never
failed to make heads swing.

He was glad Nepos kept early hours. With luck, the
chubby little priest could find his missing tax roll for him
before he was due to meet Alypia Gavra. At first it seemed he
would have that luck, for Nepos' hours were even earlier than
he'd thought; when he peered into the refectory a drowsy-
looking student told him, "Aye, he was here, but he's already




254    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

gone to lecture. Where, you say? I think in one of the
chambers on the third floor, I'm not sure which." The young
man went back to his honey-sweetened barley porridge.

Marcus trudged up the stairs, then walked past open doors
until he found his man. He slid into an empty seat at the back
of the room. Nepos beamed at him but kept on teaching.
His dozen or so students scribbled notes as they tried to keep

pace.

Now and then a student would ask a question; Nepos dealt

with them effortlessly but patiently, always asking at the end
of his explanation, "Now do you understand?" To that Scaurus
would have had to answer no. As near as he could gather, the
priest's subject matter was somewhere on the border between
theology and sorcery, and decidedly too abstruse for the unini-
tiated. Still, the tribune judged him a fine speaker, witty,
thoughtful, self-possessed.

"That will do for today," Nepos said as Marcus was begin-
ning to fidget. Most of the students trooped out; a couple
stayed behind to ask questions too complex to interrupt the
flow of the lecture. They, too, looked curiously at Scaurus as

they left.

So did Nepos. "Well, well," he chuckled, pumping the
tribune's hand. "What brings you here? Surely not a profound
interest in the relation between the ubiquity of Phos' grace and
proper application of the law of contact."

"Uh, no," Scaurus said. But when he explained why he
had come, Nepos laughed until his round cheeks reddened.
The tribune did not see the joke, and said so.

"Your pardon, I pray. I have a twofold reason for mirth."
He ticked them off his fingers. "First, for something so trivial
you hardly need the services of a chairholder in theoretical
thaumaturgy. Any street-comer wizard could find your lost
register for a fee of a couple of silver bits."

"Oh." Marcus felt his face grow hot. "But I don't know
any street-comer wizards, and I do know you."

"Quite right, quite right. Don't take me wrong; I'm happy
to help. But a mage of my power is no more needed for so
simple a spell than a sledgehammer to push a pin'through

gauze. It struck me funny."

"I never claimed to know anything of magic. What else
amuses you?" Feeling foolish, the tribune tried to hide it with
gruffness.

Harry Turtledove            255

"Only that today's lecture topic turns out to be relevant to
you after all. Thanks to Phos' all-pervading goodness, things
once conjoined are ever after so related that contact between
them can be restored. Would you have, perhaps, a tax roll
from a city close by Kybistra?"

Scaurus thought. "Yes, back at my offices I was working
on the receipts from Doxon. I don't know that part of the
Empire well, but from my maps the two towns are only a
day's journey apart."

"Excellent! Using one roll to seek another wills&engthen
the spell, for, of course, it's also true that like acts most
powerfully on like. Lead on, my friend—no, don't be foolish,
I have no plans till the afternoon, and this shan't take long, I
promise."

As they walked through the palace compound, the priest
kept up a stream of chatter on his students, on the weather, on
bits of Academy gossip that meant little to Scaurus, and on
whatever else popped into his mind. He loved to talk. The
Roman gave him a better audience than most of his country-
men, who were also fond of listening to themselves.

Marcus thought the two of them made a pair as strange as
Viridovix and Arigh: a fat little shave-pate priest with a fuzzy
black beard and a tall blond mercenary-tumed-bureaucrat.

"Do you prefer this to the field?" Nepos asked as the tri-
bune ushered him into his office. Pandhelis the secretary
looked up in surprise as he saw the priest's blue robe out of
the comer of his eye. He jumped to his feet, making the sun-
sign over his breast. Nepos returned it.

Scaurus considered. "I thought I would when I started.
These days I often wonder—answers are so much less clear-
cut here." He didn't want to say much more than that, not
with Pandhelis listening. He returned to the business at hand.
Doxon's cadaster was where he'd left it, shoved to one comer
of his desk. "Will you need any special gear for your spell?"
he asked Nepos.

"No, not a thing. Merely a few pinches of dust, to serve as
a symbolic link between that which is lost and that which
seeks it. Dust, I think, will not be hard to come by in these
surroundings." The priest chuckled. Marcus did, too; Pand-
helis, a bureaucrat born, sniffed audibly.

Nepos got his dust from the windowsill, carefully put it
down in the center of a clean square of parchment. "The man-




256

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

257

ifestations of the spell vary," he explained to Scaurus. "If the
missing object is close by, the dust may shape itself into an
arrow pointing it out, or may leave its resting point and guide
the seeker directly. If the distance is greater, though, it will
form a word or image to show him the location of what he's

looking for."

In Rome the tribune would have thought that so much hog-
wash, but he knew better here. Nepos began a chant in the
archaic Videssian dialect. He held Doxon's tax roll in his right
hand, while the stubby fingers of his left moved in quick
passes, amazingly sure and precise. The priest wore a smile of
simple pleasure; Marcus thought of a master musician amus-
ing himself with a children's tune.

Nepos called out a last word in a commanding tone of
voice, then stabbed his left forefinger down at the dust. But
though it roiled briefly, as if breathed upon, it showed no

pattern.

Nepos frowned, as Scaurus' imaginary musician might
have at a lute string suddenly out of tune. He scratched his
chin, looked at the Roman in some embarrassment. "My apol-
ogies. I must have done something wrong, though I don't
know what. Let me try again." His second effort was no more
successful than the first. The dust stirred, then settled mean-

inglessly.

The priest studied his hands, seemingly wondering if they
had betrayed him for some reason of their own. "How cur-
ious," he murmured. "Your book is not destroyed, of that I'm
sure, else the dust would not have moved at all. But are you
certain it's in the city?"

"Where else would it be?" Scaurus retorted, unable to
imagine anyone wanting to spirit off such a stupefying docu-
ment.

"Shall we try to find out?" The question was rhetorical;

Nepos was already examining the contents of his belt-pouch to
see if he had what he needed. He grunted in satisfaction as he
produced a small stoppered glass vial in the shape of a
flower's seed-capsule. He put a couple of drops of the liquid
within on his tongue, making a face at the taste. "Now this not
every wizard will know, so you did well coming to me after
all. It clears the mind of doubts and lets it see further, thus
increasing the power of the spell."

"What is it?" Scaurus asked.

Nepos hesitated; he did not like to reveal his craft's secrets.
But the drug was already having its way with him. "Poppy
juice and henbane," he said drowsily. The pupils of his eyes
shrank down almost to nothing. But his voice and hands,
drilled by years of the wizard's art, went through the incanta-
tion without faltering.

Again the finger darted at the dust. Marcus' eyes widened
as he watched the pinches of dead stuff writhe like a tiny
snake and shape themselves into a word. Successful magic
never failed to raise his hackles.

"How interesting," Nepos said, though his decoction
dulled the interest in his voice. "Even aided, I did not think
the cantrip could reach to Garsavra."

"Fair enough," Scaurus answered, "because I didn't think
the tax roll could be there either." He scratched his head,
wondering why it was. No matter, he decided; Onomagoulos
could always send it back.

The tribune dispatched Pandhelis to take Nepos to the
Roman barracks and put him to bed. The priest went without
demur. The potion he had swallowed left his legs rubbery and
his usually lively spirit as muffled as a drum beaten through
several thicknesses of cloth. "No, don't worry for me. It will
wear off soon," he reassured Scaurus, fighting back an enor-
mous yawn. He lurched off on Pandhelis' arm.

Marcus looked out the window, then quickly followed the ^
secretary and priest downstairs. By the shortness of the
shadows it was nearly noon, and it would not do to keep
Alypia Gavra waiting.

To his dismay, he found her already standing by the Grand
Gates. She did not seem angry, though. In fact, she was deep
in conversation with the four Romans on sentry duty for her
uncle.

"Aye, your god's well enough, my lady," Minucius was
saying, "but I miss the legion's eagle. That old bird watched
over us a lot of times." The legionary's companions nodded
soberly. So did Alypia. She frowned, as if trying to fix Minu-
cius' remark in her memory. Marcus could not help smiling.
He'd seen that expression on Gorgidas too often not to recog-
nize it now—the mark of a historian at work.

Spotting his commander, Minucius came to attention,
grounding his spear with a sharp thud. He and his comrades




258

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

gave Scaurus the clenched-fist Roman salute. "As you were.
I'm outranked here," the tribune said easily. He bowed to

Alypia.

"Don't let me interfere between your men and you," she

said.

"You weren't." Back in his days with Caesar in Gaul, the
least breach of order would have disturbed him mightily. Two
and a half years as a mercenary captain had taught him the
difference between spit and polish for their own sake and the
real discipline that was needed to survive.

The chamberlain inside the Grand Gates clicked his tongue
between his teeth. "Your Highness, where are your atten-
dants?" he asked.

"Doing whatever they do, I imagine. I have no use for
them," she answered curtly, and ignored the functionary's in-
dignant look. Scaurus noted the edge in her voice; her natural
leaning toward privacy could only have been exaggerated by
the time she spent as Vardanes Sphrantzes' captive.

The court attendant gave an eloquent shrug, but bowed and
conducted them forward. As the tribune walked up the colon-
naded central hall toward the imperial throne, he saw the dam-
age of the previous summer's fight had been repaired.
Tapestries hung untom, while tiny bits of matching stone were
cemented into chipped columns.

Then Scaurus realized not all the injuries had been healed.
He strode over a patch of slightly discolored porphyry floor-
ing, a patch whose polish did not quite match the mirrorlike
perfection of the rest. It would have been about here, he
thought, that Avshar's fire blazed. He wondered again where
the wizard-prince's sorcery had snatched him; through all the
winter there had been no report of him.

Alypia's eyes were fathomless, but the closer she drew to
the throne—and to the passageway beside it—the tighter her
mouth became, until Marcus saw her bite her lip.

Another chamberlain led Katakolon Kekaumenos back
from his audience with the Emperor. The legate from Agder
gave Scaurus his wintry smile, inclined his head to Alypia
Gavra. Once he was out of earshot, she murmured, "You'd
think he paid for every word he spoke."

Their guide fell in the proskynesis before the throne. From
his belly he called up to Thorisin, "Her Highness the Princess
Alypia Gavra! The epoptes and commander Scaurus the

Harry Turtledove            259

Ronam!" Marcus stifled the urge to kick him in his upraised
backside.

"Phos' light, fool, I know who they are," the Emperor
growled, still with no use for court ceremonial. The attendant
rose. He gaped to see the tribune still on his feet. Alypia was
of royal blood, but why was this outlander so privileged?
"Never mind, Kabasilas," Thorisin said. "My brother made
allowances for him, and I do, too. He earns them, mostly."
Kabasilas bowed and withdrew, but his curled lip spoke vol-
umes.

Gavras cocked an eyebrow at the tribune. "So, epoptes and
commander Scaurus, what now? Are the seal-stampers si-
phoning off goldpieces to buy themselves counting-boards
with beads of ruby and silver?"

"As for that," Marcus said, "I'm having some trouble find-
ing out." He told the Emperor of the missing tax register,
thinking to slide from an easy matter to the harder one that
was his main purpose here.

"I thought you know better than to come to me with such
twaddle," Thorisin said impatiently. "Send to Baanes if you
will, but you have no need to bother me about it."

Scaurus accepted the rebuke; like Mavrikios, the younger
Gavras appreciated directness. But when the Roman began his
plea for Taron Leimmokheir, the Emperor did not let him get
past the ex-admiral's name before he roared, "No, by Skotos'
filth-filled beard! Are you turned treacher, too?"

His bellow filled the Grand Courtroom. Courtiers froze in
mid-step; a chamberlain almost dropped the fat red candle he
was carrying. It went out. His curse, a eunuch's contralto,
echoed Gavras'. Minucius poked his head into the throne
room to see what had happened.

"You were the one who told me it wasn't in the man to
lie," Marcus said, persisting where a man born in the Empire
might well quail.

"Aye, so I did, and came near paying my life for my stu-
pidity," Thorisin retorted. "Now you tell me to put the wasp
back in my tunic for another sting. Let him stay mured up till
he rots, and gabble out his prayers lest worse befall him."

"Uncle, I think you're wrong," Alypia said. "What little
decency came my way while the Sphrantzai reigned came
from Leimmokheir. Away from his precious ships he's a child,
with no more skill at politics than Marcus' foster son."

260 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

The tribune blinked, first at her mentioning Malric and
then at her calling him by his own praenomen. When used
alone, it was normally a mark of close personal ties. He won-
dered whether she knew the Roman custom.

She was going on, "You know I'm telling you the truth,
uncle. How many years, now, have you known Leimmokheir?
More than a handful, surely. You know the man he is. Do you
really think that man could play you false?"

The Emperor's fist slammed down on the gold-sheathed
arm of his throne. The ancient seat was not made for such
treatment; it gave a painful creak of protest. Thorisin leaned
forward to emphasize his words. 'The man I knew would not
break faith. But Leimmokheir did, and thus I knew him not at
all. Who does worse evil, the man who shows his wickedness
for the whole world to see or the one who stores it up to loose
against those who trust him?"

"A good question for a priest," Alypia said, "but not one
with much meaning if Leimmokheir is innocent."

"I was there, girl. I saw what was done, saw the new-
minted goldpieces of the Sphrantzai in the murderers'
pouches. Let Leimmokheir explain them away—that might
earn his freedom." The Emperor laughed, but it was a sound
of hurt. Marcus knew it was futile to argue further; feeling
betrayed by a man he had thought honest, Gavras would not,
could not, yield to argument.

"Thank you for hearing me, at least," the tribune said. "I
gave my word to put the case to you once more."

"Then you misgave it."

"No, I think not."

"There are times, outlander, when you try my patience,"
the Emperor said dangerously. Scaurus met his eye, hiding the
twinge of fear he felt. Much of the position he had built for
himself in Videssos was based on not letting the sheer weight
of imperial authority coerce him. That, for a man of republi-
can Rome, was easy. Facing an angry Thorisin Gavras was
something else again.

Gavras made a dissatisfied sound deep in his throat. "Ka-
basilas!" he called, and the chamberlain was at his elbow as
the last syllable of his name still echoed in the high-ceilinged
throne room. Marcus expected some sonorous formula of dis-
missal, but that was not Thorisin's way. He jerked his head

Harry Turtledove            261

toward his niece and the tribune and left Kabasilas to put such
formality in the gesture as he might.

The steward did his best, but his bows and flourishes
seemed all the more artificial next to the Emperor's unvar-
nished rudeness. The other court functionaries craned their
necks at Scaurus and Alypia as he led them away, wondering
how much favor they had lost. That would be as it was,
Marcus thought. He laughed at himself—a piece of fatalism
worthy of the Halogai.

When they came out to the Grand Gates once more, Alypia
stopped to talk a few minutes longer with the Roman sentries
there, then departed for the imperial residence. Scaurus went
up to his offices to dictate a letter to Baanes Onomagoulos;

Pandhelis' script was far more legible than his own. That ac-
complished, he basked in a pleasant glow of self-satisfaction
as he started back to the barracks.

It did not last long. Viridovix was coming toward him, a
jar of wine in his hand and an anticipatory grin on his face.
The Gaul threw him a cheery wave and ducked into a small
doorway in the other wing of the Grand Courtroom.

Maybe I should have drowned him, Marcus thought an-
grily. Had Viridovix no idea what he was playing at? There
was no more caution in him than guile in Taron Leimmokheir.
What would he do next, ask Thorisin for the loan of a bed-
room? The tribune warned himself not to suggest that—Viri-
dovix might take him up on it.

With the Celt gone, Scaurus was surprised to see Arigh at
the barracks. The Arshaum was talking to Gorgidas again
while the Greek took notes. Gorgidas was asking, "Who sees
to your sick, then?"

The question seemed to bore Arigh, who scratched beneath
his tunic of sueded leather. At last he said indifferently, "The
shamans drive out evil spirits, of course, and for smaller ills
the old women know of herbs, I suppose. Ask me of war,
where I can talk of what I know." He slapped the curved
sword that hung at his side.

Quintus Glabrio came in; he smiled and waved to Gorgidas
without interrupting the physician's jottings. Instead he said to
Marcus, "I'm glad to see you here, sir. A couple of my men
have a running quarrel I can't Seem to get to the bottom of.
Maybe they'll heed you."

"I doubt that, if you can't solve it," the tribune said, but he




262 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

went with Glabrio anyhow. The legionaries stood stiff-faced
as he warned them not to let their dislike for each other affect
their soldiering. They nodded at the correct times. Scaurus
was not deceived; anything the able junior centurion could not
cure over the course of time would not yield to his brief inter-
cession. The men were on formal notice now, so perhaps
something was accomplished.

Arigh had gone when he returned. Gorgidas was working
up his notes, rubbing out a word here, a phrase there with the
blunt end of his stylus, then reversing it to put his changes on
the wax. "Viridovix will think you're trying to steal his friend
away," the tribune said.

"What do I care what that long-shanked Gaul thinks?"
Gorgidas asked, but could not quite keep amusement from his
voice. Sometimes Viridovix made his friends want to wring
his neck, but they remained his friends in spite of it. Less
pleased, the doctor went on, "At least I can learn what the
plainsman has to teach me."

There was no mistaking his bitterness. Marcus knew he
was still seeing Nepos and other healer-priests, still trying to
master their arts, and still falling short. No wonder he was
putting more energy into his history these days. Medicine
could not be satisfying to him right now.

Scaurus yawned, cozily warm under the thick wool blan-
ket. Helvis' steady breathing beside him said she had already
dropped off; so did her arm flung carelessly across his chest.
Malric was asleep on her other side, while Dosti's breath came
raspy from his crib. The baby was getting over a minor fever;

Marcus drowsily hoped he would not catch it.

But an itchy something in the back of his mind kept him
from following them into slumber. He rehashed the day's
events, trying to track it down. Was it his failure to gain Taron
Leimmokheir's release? Close, he thought, but not on the
mark. He had not expected to win that one.

Why close, then? He heard Alypia Gavra's voice once
more as she talked with the legionaries outside the Grand
Courtroom. Whatever else she knew about their ways, he real-
ized, she was perfectly familiar with the proper use of Roman
names.

He was a long time sleeping.

Xll

THE TRIBUNE SNEEZED. GAIUS PHIUPPUS LOOKED AT HIM IN

disgust. "Aren't you through with that bloody thing yet?"

"It hangs on and on," Marcus said dolefully, wiping his
nose. His eyes were watery, too, and his head seemed three
times its proper size. "What is it, two weeks now?"

"At least. That's what you get for having your brat." Re-
voltingly healthy himself, Gaius Philippus spooned up his
breakfast porridge, took a great gulp of wine. "That's good!"
He patted his belly. Scaurus had scant appetite, which was as
well, for his sense of taste had disappeared.

Viridovix strode into the barracks, splendid in his cape of
crimson skins. He helped himself to peppery lamb sausage,
porridge, and wine, then sank into a chair by the tribune and
senior centurion. "The top o' the day t'ye!" he said, lifting his
mug in salute.

"And to you," Marcus returned. He looked the Celt up and
down. "Why such finery so early in the morning?"

"Early in the morning it may be for some, Scaurus dear,
but I'm thinking of it as night's end. And a rare fine night it
was, too." He winked at the two Romans. '

"Mmph," Marcus said, as noncommittal a noise as he
could muster. Normally he enjoyed Viridovix in a bragging
mood, but since the Gaul had taken up with Komitta Rhan-
gavve the less he heard the better. Nor did Gaius Philippus'
incurious expression offer Viridovix any encouragement; the
senior centurion, Marcus was sure, was jealous of the Celt,
but would sooner have been racked than admit it.

Irrepressible as always, Viridovix needed scant prompting.

263




264 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

After a long, noisy pull at his wine, he remarked, "Would
your honor believe it, the wench had the brass to tell me to put
all my other lassies to one side and have her only. Not ask,
mind you, but tell! And me sharing her with himself without
so much as a peep. The cheek of it all!" He bit into the sau-
sage, made a face at its spiciness, and drank again.

"Sharing who with whom?" Gaius Philippus asked, con-
fused by pronouns.

"Never mind," Marcus said quickly. The fewer people who
knew of Viridovix's try sting, the longer word of it would take
to get back to Thorisin Gavras. Even Viridovix saw that, for
he suddenly looked sly. But his report of what Komitta had
said worried the tribune enough to make him ask, "What did
you tell the lady?"

"What any Celtic noble and gentleman would, of course: to
go futter the moon. No colleen bespeaks me so."

"Oh, no." Scaurus wanted to hold his aching head in his
hands. With Komitta's savage temper and great sense of her
own rank, it was a wonder Viridovix was here to tell the tale.
In fact— "What did she say to that?"

"Och, she carried on somewhat, sure and she did, but I
homed it out of her." Viridovix stretched complacently. The
tribune looked at him in awe. If that was true, the Gaul was a
mighty lanceman indeed.

Viridovix routed a piece of gristle out from between his
teeth with a fingernail, then belched. "Still and all," he said,
"if ye maun play the tomcat of evenings, then the day's the
time for lying up. A bit o' sleep'd be welcome now, so by
your leaves—" He rose, finished his wine, and walked out,
whistling cheerily.

"Enough of your 'never minds,'" Gaius Philippus said as
soon as the Celt was gone. "You don't go fish-belly color over
trifles. What's toward?"

So Marcus, his hand forced, told him and had the remote
pleasure of watching his jaw drop to his chest. "Almighty
Jove," the senior centurion said at last. "The lad doesn't think
small, does he now?"

He thought another minute, then added, "He's welcome to
her, too, for my silver. I'd sooner strop my tool on a sword
blade than go near that one. All in all, it's safer." The tribune
winced at the image, but slowly nodded; down deep inside he
felt the same way.

265

Harry Turtledove
* *

As spring drew on, Scaurus spent less time at tax records.
Most of the receipts had come in after the fall harvest, and he
was through most of the backlog by the time the days began to
grow longer once more. He knew he had done an imperfect
job of overseeing the Videssian bureaucracy. It was too large,
too complex, and too well entrenched for any one man, let
alone an outsider, to control it fully. But he did think he had
done some good and kept more revenue flowing into the impe-
rial treasury than it would have got without him.

He was only too aware of some of his failures. One after-
noon Pikridios Goudeles had mortified him by coming into the
offices with a massy golden ring set with an enormous emer-
ald. The minister wore it with great ostentation and flashed it
at the tribune so openly that Marcus was sure its price came
from diverted funds. Indeed, Goudeles hardly bothered to
deny it, only smiling a superior smile. Yet try as Scaurus
would, he could find no errors in the books.

Goudeles let him stew for several days, then, still with that
condescending air, showed the Roman the sly bit of jugglery
he'd used. "For," he said, "having used it myself, I see no
point in letting just anyone slide it past you. That would re-
flect on my own skill."

More or less sincerely, Marcus thanked him and said noth-
ing further about the ring; he had fairly lost this contest of wit
with the bureaucrat, just as he had won the one before. They
remained not-quite-friends, each with a healthy regard for the
other's competence. As Scaurus came less often to his desk in
the Grand Courtroom wing, he sometimes missed the seal-
stamper's dry, delicate wit, his exquisite sense of where to
place a dart.

Before long, only one major item was outstanding on the
tribune's list: the tax roll for Kybistra. Onomagoulos ignored
his first request for it; he sent out another, more strongly
worded. "That echo will be a long time returning, I think,"
Goudeles told him.

"Eh? Why?" Marcus asked irritably.

The bureaucrat's eyebrow could not have lifted by the
thickness of a hair, but he contrived to make the Roman feel
like a small, stupid child. "Ah, well," Goudeles murmured,
"it was a disorderly time for everyone."

Scaurus thumped his forehead with the heel of his hand,




266

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Harry Turtledove

267

annoyed with himself for missing what was obvious, once
pointed out. Onomagoulos had taken refuge at Kybistra after
Maragha; the tribune wondered what part of his accounts
would not bear close inspection. Thorisin, he thought, would
be interested in that question, too.

So it proved. The imperial rescript that went out to Gar-
savra all but crackled off its parchment. By that time Marcus
cared less than he had. He was working hard with his troops
as they readied themselves for the coming summer campaign.
As he sweated on the practice field, he was gratified to see the
beginning potbelly he had grown during the winter's inactivity
start to fade away.

Roman training techniques were enough to melt the fat off
anyone. The Videssians, Vaspurakaners, and other locals who
had taken service with the legionaries grumbled constantly, as
soldiers will over any exercises. Gaius Philippus, naturally,
worked them all the harder for their complaints. As for
Scaurus, he threw himself into the drills with an enthusiasm
he had not felt when he first joined the legions.

The troops exercised with double-weight weapons of
wood, and fought at pells until their arms ached, thrusting
now at the dummy posts' faces, now at their flanks, and again
at thigh level. They used heavy wicker shields, too, and prac-
ticed advancing and retreating from their imaginary foes.

"Hard work, this," Gagik Bagratouni said. The Vaspura-
kaner nakharar still led his countrymen and had learned to
swear in broken Latin as foully as in his hardly more fluent
Videssian. "By the time comes real battle, a relief it wiU be."

"That's the idea," Gaius Philippus said. Bagratouni
groaned and shook his head, sending sweat flying every-
where. He was well into his forties, and the drill came hard
for him. He worked at it with the fierce concentration of a
man trying to forget past shadows, and his countrymen
showed a spirit and discipline that won the Romans' admira-
tion.

The only thing that horrified the mountaineers was having
to leam to swim. The streams in their homeland were trickles
most of,the year, floods the rest. Learn they did, but they
never came to enjoy the water legionary-style, as a pleasant
way to end a day's exercises.

The Videssians among the legionaries were not quite at

their high pitch. A dozen times a day Marcus would hear
some Roman yelling, "The point, damn it, the point! A pox
on the bloody edge! It isn't good for anything anyway!" The
imperials always promised to mend their swordplay and
always slipped back. Most were ex-cavalrymen, used to the
saber's sweet slash. Thrusting with the short gladius went
against their instincts.

More patient than most of his fellows, Quintus Glabrio
would explain, "No matter how hard you cut, armor and
bones both shield your foe's vitals, but even a poorly deliv-
ered stab may kill. Besides, with the stabbing stroke you don't
expose your own body and often you can kill your man before
he knows you've delivered the stroke." Having nodded in sol-
emn agreement, the Videssians would do as they were or-
dered—for a while.

Then there were those to whom Roman discipline meant
nothing at all. Viridovix was as deadly a fighter as Scaurus
had seen, but utterly out of place in the orderly lines of the
legionaries' maniples. Even Gaius Philippus acknowledged
the hopelessness of making him keep rank. "I'm just glad he's
on our side," was the senior centurion's comment.

Zeprin the Red was another lone wolf. His great axe un-
suited him for action among the legionaries' spears and
swords, as did his temperament. Where Viridovix saw battle
as high sport, the Haioga looked on it as his cold gods' testing
place. "Their shield-maidens guide upwards the souls of those
who fall bravely. With my enemy's blood I will buy my stair-
way to heaven," he rumbled, testing the edge of his double-
bitted weapon with his thumb. No one seemed inclined to
argue, though to Videssian ears that was pagan superstition of
the rankest sort.

Drax of Namdalen and his captains came out to the practice
field several times to Watch the Romans work. Their smart
drill impressed the great count, who told Scaurus, "By the
Wager, I wish that son of a pimp Goudeles had warned me
what sort of men you had. I thought my knights would ride
right through you so we could roll up Thorisin's horse like a
pair of leggings." He shook his head ruefully. "Didn't quite
work that way."

"You gave us a bad time, too," the tribune returned the
compliment. Drax remained a mystery to him—a skilled war-
rior, certainly, but a man who showed little of himself to the




268

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

269

world outside. Though unfailingly courteous, he had a stiff
face a horse trader would envy.

"He reminds me of Vardanes Sphrantzes with the back of
his head shaved," Gaius Philippus said after the islander left,
but that far Marcus would not go. Whatever Drax's mask con-
cealed, he did not think it was the unmoumed Sevastos' cru-
elty.

However much the Namdaleni admired the legionaries, the
senior centurion remained dissatisfied. "They're soft," he
mourned. "They need a couple of days of real marching to get
the winter laziness out of 'em once for all."

"Let's do it, then," Marcus said, though he felt a twinge of
trepidation. If the troopers needed work, what of him?

"Full kits tomorrow," he heard Gaius Philippus order, and
listened to the chorus of donkey brays that followed. The full
Roman pack ran to more than a third of a man's weight; along
with weapons and iron rations, it included a mess kit, cup,
spare clothes in a small wicker hamper, a tent section, pali-
sade stakes or firewood, and either a saw, pick, spade, or
sickle for camping and foraging. Small wonder the legionaries
called themselves mules.

Dawn was only a promise when they tramped out of the
city, northward bound. The Videssian gate crew shook their
heads in sympathy as they watched the soldiers march past.
"Make way, there!" Gaius Philippus rasped, and waggoners
hastily got their produce-filled wains out of the roadway. Like
most of the Empire's civilians, they distrusted what little they
knew about mercenaries and were not anxious to learn more.

Marcus pulled a round, ruddy apple from one of the
wagons. He tossed the driver a small copper coin to pay for it
and had to laugh at the disbelief on the man's face. "Belike
their puir spalpeen was after thinking you'd breakfast on him
instead of his fruit," Viridovix said.

There was less room for good cheer as the day wore along.
The military step was something the Romans fell into with
unthinking ease, each of them automatically holding his place
in his maniple's formation. The men who had taken service
since they came to Videssos did their best to imitate them but,
here as in so many small ways, practice told. And because the
newcomers were less orderly, they tired quicker.

Still, almost no one dropped from the line of march, no
matter how footsore he became. Blistered toes were nothing to

the blistering Gaius Philippus gave fallers-out, nor was any
trooper eager to face his fellows' jeers.

Phostis Apokavkos, first of all the Videssians to become a
legionary, strode along between two Romans, hunching for-
ward a little under the weight of his pack. His long face crin-
kled into a smile as he nipped Scaurus a salute.

The tribune returned it. He hardly reckoned Apokavkos a
Videssian any more. Like any son of Italy's, the ex-farmer's
hands were branded with the mark of the legions. When he
learned the mark's significance, Apokavkos had insisted on
receiving it, but Scaurus had not asked it of any of the other
recruits, nor had they volunteered.

By afternoon the tribune was feeling pleased with himself.
There seemed to be a band of hot iron around his chest, and
his legs ached at every forward step, but he kept up with his
men without much trouble. He did not think they would make
the twenty miles that was a good day's march, but they were
not far from it.

Already they were past the band of suburbs that huddled
under Videssos' walls and out into the countryside. Wheat-
fields, forests, and vineyards were all glad with new leaf.
There were newly returned birds overhead, too. A blackcap
swooped low. "Churr! Tak-tak-tak!" it scolded the legionaries,
then darted off on its endless pursuit of insects. A small flock
of linnets, scarlet heads and breasts bright, twittered as they
winged their way toward a gorse-covered hilltop.

Gaius Philippus began eyeing likely looking fields for a
place to camp. At last he found one that suited him, with a
fine view of the surrounding area and a swift clear stream
running by. Woods at the edge of the field promised fuel for
campfires. The senior centurion looked a question toward
Scaurus, who nodded. "Perfect," he said. Even though this
was but a drill, from skill and habit Gaius Philippus was inca-
pable of picking a bad site.

The buccinators' horns blared out the order to halt. The
legionaries pulled tools from their packs and fell to work on
the square ditch and rampart that would shelter them for the
night. Stakes sprouted atop the earthwork wall. Inside, eight-
man tents went up in neat rows that left streets running at right
angles and a good-sized open central forum. By the time the
sun was down, Marcus would have trusted the camp to hold
against three or four times his fifteen hundred men.




270 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Some of the fanners hereabout must have reported the
Romans' arrival to the local lord, for it had just grown dark
when he rode up to investigate with a double handful of armed
retainers. Marcus courteously showed him around the camp;

he seemed a bit unnerved to be surrounded by so much orderly
force.

"Be gone again tomorrow, you say?" he asked for the third
time. "Well, good, good. Have a pleasant night of it, now."
And he and his men rode away, looking back over their
shoulders until the night swallowed them.

"What was all that in aid of?" Gaius Philippus demanded.
"Why didn't you just tell him to bugger off?"

"You'd never make a politician," Marcus answered. "After
he saw what we had, he didn't have the nerve to ask for the
price of the firewood we cut, and I didn't have to embarrass
him by telling him no right out loud. Face got saved all
around."

"Hmm." It was plain Gaius Philippus did not give a coun-
terfeit copper for the noble's feelings. The tribune, though,
found it easier to avoid antagonizing anyone gratuitously.
With the touchy Videssians, even that little was not always
easy.

He settled down by a campfire to gnaw journey bread,
smoked meat, and an onion, and emptied his canteen of the
last of the wine it held. When he started to get up to rinse it
out, he discovered he could barely stagger to the stream. The
break—the first he'd had from marching all day—gave his
legs a chance to stiffen, and they'd taken it with a vengeance.

Many legionaries were in the same plight. Gorgidas went
from one to the next, kneading life into cramped calves and
thighs. The spare Greek, loose-limbed himself after the hard
march, spotted Marcus hobbling back to the fireside. "Kai su,
teknonT' he said in his own tongue. "You too, son? Stretch
out there, and I'll see what I can do for you."

Scaurus obediently lay back. He gasped as the doctor's
fingers dug into his legs. "I think I'd rather have the aches,"
he said, but he and Gorgidas both knew he was lying. When
the Greek was done, the tribune found he could walk again,
more or less as he always had.

"Don't be too proud of yourself," Gorgidas advised,
watching his efforts like a parent with a toddler. "You'll still
feel it come morning."

Harry Turtledove            271

The physician, as usual, was right. Marcus shambled down
to the stream to splash water on his face, unable to assume any
better pace or gait. His sole consolation was that he was far
from alone; about one legionary in three looked to have had
his legs age thirty years overnight.

"Come on, you lazy sods! It's no further back than it was
out!" Gaius Philippus shouted unsympathetically. One of the
oldest men in the camp, he showed no visible sign of strain.

"Och, to the crows with you!" That was Viridovix; not
being under Roman discipline, he could say what the legion-
aries felt. The march had been hard on the Gaul. Though
larger and stronger than almost all the Romans, he lacked their
stamina.

However much Gaius Philippus pressed as the legionaries
started back, he did not get the speed he wanted. It took a
good deal of marching for the men to work their muscles
loose. To the senior centurion's eloquent disgust, they were
still a couple of miles short of Videssos when night fell.

"We'll camp here," he growled, again choosing a prime
defensive position in pastureland between two suburbs. "I
won't have us sneaking in after dark like so many footpads,
and you whoresons don't deserve the sweets of the city any-
way. Loafing good-for-naughts! Caesar'd be ashamed of the
lot of you." That meant little to the Videssians and Vaspura-
kaners, but it was enough to make the Romans hang their
heads in shame. Mention of their old commander was almost
too painful to bear.

When Marcus woke the next morning, he found to his sur-
prise that he was much less sore than he had been the day
before. "I feel the same way," Quintus Glabrio said with one
of his rare smiles. "We're likely just numb from the waist
down."

There were quite a few bright sails in the Cattle-Crossing;

probably a grain convoy from the westlands' southern coast,
thought Scaurus. A city the size of Videssos was far too big
for the local countryside to feed.

Less than an hour brought the legionaries to the capital's
mighty walls. "Have yourselves a good hike?" one of the
gatecrew asked as he waved them through. He grinned at the
abuse he got by way of reply.

It was hardly past dawn; Videssos' streets, soon to be
swarming with life, as yet were nearly deserted. A few early

272    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

risers were wandering into Phos' temples for the sunrise lit-
urgy. Here and there people of the night—whores, thieves,
gamblers—still strutted or skulked. A cat darted away from
the legionaries, a fishtail hanging from the comer of its

mouth.

The whole city was sweet with the smell of baking bread.
The bakers were at their ovens before the sun was up and
stayed till it was dark once more, sweating their lives away to
keep Videssos fed. Marcus smiled as he felt his nostrils dilate,
heard his stomach growl. Joumeybread fought hunger, but the
mere thought of a fresh, soft, steaming loaf teased the appetite

to new life.

The legionaries entered the palace compound from the
north, marching past the Videssian Academy. The sun
gleamed off the golden dome on its high spire. Though the
season was still early spring, the day already gave promise of
being hot and muggy. Marcus was glad for a granite colon-
nade's long,cool shadow.

Hoofbeats rang round a bend in the path, loud in the mom-
ing stillness. The tribune's eyebrows rose. Who was galloping
a horse down the palace compound's twisting ways? A typical
Roman, Scaurus did not know that much of horses, but it
hardly took an equestrian to realize the rider was asking for a

broken neck.

The great bay stallion thundered round the bend in the
track. Marcus felt alarm stab into his guts—that was the Em-
peror's horse! But Thorisin was not in the saddle; instead Aly-
pia Gavra bestrode the beast, barely in control. She fought it
to a halt just in front of the Romans, whose first ranks were
giving back from the seeming runaway.

Not liking the check, the stallion snorted and tossed its
head, eager to be given free rein once more. Alypia ignored it.
She stared down the long Roman column, despair on her face.
"So you've come to betray us, too!" she cried.

Glabrio stepped forward and seized the horse's head.
Scaurus said, "Betray you? With a training march?"

The princess and the Roman shared a long, confusion-
filled look. Then Alypia exclaimed, "Oh, Phos be praised!
Come at once, then—a band of assassins is attacking the pri-
vate chambers!"

"What?" Marcus said foolishly, but even as he was filling

Harry Turtledove            273

his lungs to order the legionaries forward he heard Gaius Phi-
lippus below, "Battle stations! Forward at double-time!"

Scaurus envied the senior centurion's immunity to surprise.
"Shout 'Gavras!' as you come," he added. "Let both sides
know help's on the way!"

The legionaries reached back over their shoulders for pila,
tugged swords free from brass scabbards. "Gavras!" they
roared. The Emperor's horse whinnied in alarm and reared,
pulling free of Quintus Galbrio's grasp. Alypia held her seat.
She could ride, as befitted a onetime provincial noble's daugh-
ter. Though Thorisin's frightened charger would have been a
handful for anyone, she wheeled it and cantered forward at the
Romans' head.

"Get back, my lady!" Marcus called to her. When she
would not, he told off half a dozen men to hold her horse and
keep her out of the fighting. They ignored her protests and did
as they were ordered.

Nestled in the copse of cherry trees just now beginning to
come into fragrant bloom, the private imperial residence was a
dwelling made for peace. But its outer doors gaped open, and
before them a sentry lay unmoving in a pool of blood. "Sur-
round the place!" Marcus snapped, maniples peeled off to
right and left.

For all his hurry, he was horribly afraid he had come too
late. But as he rushed toward the yawning doorway, he heard
fighting within. "It's a rescue, not revenge!" he yelled. The
legionaries cheered behind him: "Gavras! Gavras!"

An archer leaped out into the doorway and let fly. Close
behind Scaurus, a Roman clutched at his face, then skidded
down on his belly. No time to see who had fallen, nor could
the Videssian get off a second shot. He threw his bow to one
side and drew saber.

He must have known it was hopeless, with hundreds of
men thundering toward him. He set his feet and waited none-
theless. The tribune had a moment to admire his courage be-
fore their swords met. Then it was all automatic response:

thrust, parry, slash, riposte, parry—thrust! Marcus felt his
blade bite, twisted his wrist to make sure it was a killing blow.
His foe groaned and slowly crumpled.

The Romans spilled down the hallway, their hobnailed ca-
ligae clattering on the mosaic floor. The light streaming
through the alabaster ceiling panels was pale and calm, not the




274 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

right sort of light at all to shine on battle. And battle there had
already been aplenty: the corpses of sentries and eunuch ser-
vants sprawled together with those of their assailants. The red
tesserae of hunting mosaics were overlain by true blood's
brighter crimson; it spattered precious icons and portrait busts
of Avtokrators centuries forgotten.

Marcus saw Mizizios lying dead. The eunuch had a sword in
his hand and wore an ancient helmet of strange design, loot from
a Videssian triumph of long ago. He had been a quick thinker to
clap it on his head, but it had not saved him. A great saber cut
opened his belly and spilled his entrails out on the floor.

Shouts and the pounding of axes against a barricaded door
led the legionaries on. They rounded a last corner, only to be
halted by a savage counterattack from the squadron of assas-
sins. In the narrow corridor numbers were of scant advantage.
Men pushed and cursed and struck, gasping when they were

hit.

The assassins' captain was a burly man of about forty in a
much-battered chain-mail shirt. He carried a torch in his right
hand, and shouted through the door to Thorisin, "Your bully-
boys are here too late, Gavras! You'll be roast meat before
they do you any good!"

"Not so!" cried Zeprin the Red, who was fighting in the
first rank of legionaries. He still blamed himself for Mavrikios
Gavras' death, and would not let a second Emperor weigh on
his conscience. The thick-muscled Haloga flung his great war
axe at the torch-carrier. The throw was not good; quarters
were too close for that. Instead of one of the gleaming steel
bits burying itself in the Videssian's chest, it was the end of
the axe handle that caught him in the pit of the stomach. Mail
shirt or no, he doubled over as if kicked by a steer. The smok-
ing torch fell to the floor and went out.

Snarling an oath, one of the trapped attackers sprang at
Zeprin, who stood for a second weaponless. The Haloga did
not—could not—retreat. He ducked under a furious slash,
came up to seize his foe and crush him against his armored
chest. The tendons stood out on his massive arms; his oppo-
nent's hands scrabbled uselessly at his back. Scaurus heard
bones crack even through the din of combat. Zeprin threw the
lifeless corpse aside.

At the same moment Viridovix, with an enormous two-
handed slash, sent another assassin's head springing from his

Harry Turtledove            275

shoulders. The tribune could feel the enemy's spirit drain
away. A quiet bit of murder was one thing, but facing these
berserkers was something else again. Nor were the Romans
themselves idle. Their shortswords stabbed past the Vides-
sians' defenses, while their large scuta turned blow after blow.
"Gavras!" they shouted, and pushed their foes back and back.

Then the blocked door flew open, and Thorisin Gavras and
his four or five surviving guards charged at the enemy's
backs, crying, "The Romans! The Romans!" It was more gal-
lant than sensible, but Thorisin had an un-Videssian fondness
for battle.

Some of the attackers spun round against him, still trying
to complete their mission. Gaius Philippus cut one down from
behind. "You bloody stupid bastard," he said, jerking his gla-
dius free.

Marcus swore as a saber gashed his forearm. He tightened
his fingers on his sword hilt. They all answered—no tendon
was cut—but blood made the sword slippery in his hand.

Thorisin killed the man he was facing. The Emperor, not
one to relish having to flee even before overpowering
numbers, fought now with savage ferocity to try to ease the
discredit only he felt. When he had been Sevastokrator he
probably would have let his fury run away with him, but the
imperial office was tempering him as it had his brother. See-
ing only a handful of his assailants on their feet, he cried,
"Take them alive! I'll have answers for this!"

Most of the assassins, knowing what fate held for them,
battled all the harder, trying to make the legionaries kill them
outright. One ran himself through. But a couple were borne to
the floor and trussed up like dressed carcasses. So was their
leader, who still could hardly breathe, let alone fight back.

"Very timely," Thorisin said, looking Marcus up and
down. He started to offer his hand to clasp, stopped when he
saw the tribune's wound.

Scaurus did not really feel it yet. He answered, "Thank
your niece, not me. She lathered your horse for you, but I
don't think you'll complain."

The Emperor smiled thinly. "No, I suppose not. Took the
beast, did she?" He listened as the Roman explained how he
had encountered Alypia.

Thorisin's smile grew wider. He said, "I never have cared
for her scribbling away behind closed doors, but I won't com-




276 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 277

plain of that any more, either. She must have gone out the
window when the bamey started, and run for the stables. Fire-
foot's usually saddled by dawn." Marcus remembered Gavras'
fondness for a morning gallop.

Thorisin prodded a dead body with his foot. "Good thing
these lice were too stupid to throw a cordon round the build-
ing." He slapped Scaurus on the back. "Enough talk—get that
arm seen to. You're losing blood."

The tribune tore a strip of cloth from the corpse's surcoat;

Gavras helped him tie the rude dressing. His arm, numb a few
minutes before, began to throb fiercely. He went looking for
Gorgidas.

The doctor, Marcus thought with annoyance, did not seem
to be anywhere within the rambling imperial residence. How-
ever much the legionaries outnumbered the twoscore or so
assassins, they had not beaten them down without harm to
themselves. Five men were dead—two of them irreplaceable
Romans—and a good many more were wounded, more or
less severely. Grumbling and clenching his fist against the
hurt, the tribune went outside.

He saw Gorgidas kneeling over a man in the pathway—a
Roman, from his armor—but had no chance to approach the
physician. Alypia Gavra came rushing up to him. "Is my
uncle—" she began, and then stopped, unwilling even to
complete the question.

"Unscratched, thanks to you," Scaurus told her.

"Phos be thanked," she whispered, and then, to the tri-
bune's glad confusion, threw her arms round his neck and
kissed him. The legionaries who had kept her from the resi-
dence whooped. At the sound she jerked away in alarm, as if
just realizing what she had done.

He reached out to her, but reluctantly held back when he
saw her shy away. However brief, her show of warmth
pleased him more, perhaps, then he was ready to admit. He
told himself it was but pleasure at seeing her wounded spirit
healing, and knew he was lying.

"You're hurt!" she exclaimed, spying the oozing bandage
for the first time.

"It's not too bad." He opened and closed his hand to show
her he could, though the proof cost him some pain. True to his
Stoic training, he tried not to let it show on his face, but the
princess saw sweat spring out on his forehead.

"Get it looked at," she said firmly, seeming relieved to be
able to give advice that was sensible and impersonal at the
same time. Scaurus hesitated, wishing this once for some of
Viridovix' brass. He did not have it, and the moment passed.
Anything he said would too likely be wrong.

He slowly walked over to Gorgidas. The doctor did not
notice him. He was still bent low over the fallen legionary, his
hands pressed against the soldier's face—the attitude, Marcus
realized, of a Videssian healer-priest. The Greek's shoulders
quivered with the effort he was making. "Live, damn you,
live!" he said over and over in his native tongue.

But the legionary would never live again, not with that
green-feathered arrow jutting up from between the doctor's
fingers. Marcus could not tell whether Gorgidas had finally
mastered the healing force, nor did it matter now; not even the
Videssians could raise the dead.

At last the Greek felt Scaurus' presence. He raised his
head, and the tribune gave back a pace from the grief and
self-tormenting, impotent anger on his face. "It's no use,"
Gorgidas said, more to himself than to Scaurus. "Nothing is
any use." He sagged in defeat, and his hands, red-black with
blood beginning to dry, slid away from the dead man's face.

Marcus suddenly forgot his wound. "Jupiter Best and
Greatest," he said softly, an oath he had not sworn since the
days in his teens when he still believed in the gods. Quintus
Glabrio lay tumbled in death. His features were already loos-
ening into the vacant mask of the dead. The arrow stood just
below his right eye and must have killed him instantly. A fly
lit on the notching, felt the perch give under its weight, and
darted away.

"Let me see to that," Gorgidas said dully. Like an automa-
ton, the tribune held out his arm. The doctor washed the cut
with a sponge soaked in vinegar. Stunned or no, Scaurus had
all he could do to keep from crying out. Gorgidas pinned the
gash closed, snipping off the tip of each fibula as he pushed it
through. With his arm shrieking from the wound and the vine-
gar wash, Marcus hardly felt the pins go in. Tears began
streaming down the Greek's face as he dressed the cut; he had
to try three times before he could close the catch on the com-
plex ^te/a that secured the end of the bandage.

"Are there more hurt?" he asked Scaurus. "There must be."

"Yes, a few." The doctor turned to go; Marcus stopped him




278 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 279

with his good arm. "I'm sorrier than I know how to tell you,"
he said awkwardly. "To me he was a fine officer, a good man,
and a friend, but—" He broke off, unsure how to continue.

"I've known you know, for all your discretion, Scaurus,"
Gorgidas said tiredly. "That doesn't matter any longer either,
does it? Now let me be about my business, will you?"
Marcus still hesitated. "Can I do anything to help?"
"The gods curse you, Roman; you're a decent blockhead,
but a blockhead all the same. There he lies, all I hold dear in
this worthless world, and me with all my training and skill in
healing the hurt, and what good is it? What can I do with it?
Feel him grow cold under my hands."

He shook free of the tribune. "Let me go, and we'll see
what miracles of medicine I work for these other poor sods."
He walked through the open doorway of the imperial resi-
dence, a lean, lonely man wearing anguish like a cloak.
"What ails your healer?" Alypia Garva asked.
Scaurus jumped; lost in his own thoughts, he had not heard
her come up. "This is his close friend," he said shortly, nod-
ding at Glabrio, "and mine as well." Hearing the rebuff, the
princess drew back. Marcus chose not to care; the taste of
triumph was bitter in his mouth.

"Lovely, isn't it?" Thorisin said to Marcus late that after-
noon. He was speaking ironically; the little reception room in
the imperial chambers had seen its share of fighting. There
was a sword cut in the upholstery of the couch on which the
tribune sat; horsehair stuffing leaked through it. A bloodstain
marred the marble floor.

The Emperor went on, "When I set you over the cadasters,
outlander, I thought you would be watching the pen-pushers,
but it seems you flushed a noble instead."

Scaurus grew alert. "So they were Onomagoulos' men,
then?" The assassins had fought in grim silence; for all the
tribune knew, Ortaias Sphrantzes might have hired them.

Gavras, though, seemed to think he was being stupid. "Of
course they're Baanes'. I hardly needed to question them to
find that out, did I?"

"I don't understand," Scaurus said.

"Why else would that fornicating, polluted, pox-ridden son
of a two-copper whore Elissaios Bouraphos have brought his
bloody collection of boats back from Pityos? For a pleasure

cruise? Phos' light, man, he's not hiding out there. You must
have seen the galleys' sails as you marched in this morning."

Marcus felt his face grow warm. "I thought it was a grain
convoy."

"Landsmen!" Gavras muttered, rolling his eyes. "It bloody
well isn't, as anyone with eyes in his head should know. The
plan was simple enough—as soon as I'm dealt with, across
comes Baanes to take over, smooth as you like." Thorisin spat
in vast contempt. "As if he could—that bald pimple hasn't the
wit to break wind and piddle at the same time. And while he
tries to murder me and I settle him, who gains? The Yezda, of
course. I wonder if he's not in their pay."

The Emperor, Scaurus thought, had a dangerous habit of
underestimating his foes. He had done so with the Sphrantzai,
and now again with Onomagoulos, who, loyal or not, was a
capable, if arrogant, soldier. Marcus started to warn Gavras of
that, but remembered how the conversation had opened and
asked instead, "Why credit—" That seemed a safer word than
blame. "—me with Baanes' plot?"

"Because you kept hounding him for Kybistra's tax roll.
There were things in it he'd have done better not to write
down."

"Ah?" Marcus made an interested noise to draw the Em-
peror out.

"Oh, truly, truly. Your friend Nepos filled the assassins so
fall of some potion of his that they spewed up everything they
knew. Their captain, Skotos take him, knew plenty, too. Did
you ever wonder why friend Baanes did so careful a job of
slitting throats when we were waylaid last year after the par-
ley?"

"Ah?" Marcus said again. He jumped as several men in
heavy-soled boots tramped down the hallway, but they were
only workmen coming to set things to rights once more. Live
long enough in Videssos, he thought, and you'll see murderers
under every cushion—but the day you don't, they'll be there.

Caught up in his own rekindled wrath, Thorisin did not
notice the tribune's start. He went on, "The dung-faced mid-
wife's mistake hired the knives himself and paid a premium
for Ortaias' coin so no fingers would point his way even if
something went wrong. But he put everything down on parch-
ment so he could square himself with the Sphrantzai if he did
kill me—and put it down on Kybistra's register. Why not? He




280 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION Harry Turtledove 281

had the thing with him; after all, he'd collected those taxes,
when he ran there after Maragha. After that he could hardly
let you see it, but he couldn't send a fake either, now could
he?" The Emperor chuckled, imagining his rival's discomfi-
ture.

Scaurus laughed, too. Videssian cadasters were invalid if
they bore erasures or crossed-over lines; only fair copies went
to the capital. And once there, they were festooned with seals
of wax and lead and stamped with arcane bureaucratic stamps
—to which, of course, Onomagoulos had no access once he
was out in the provinces.

"He must have niched it as soon as he found out I was
going to look over the receipts," the tribune decided.

"Very good," Gavras said, making small clapping motions
of sardonic applause. Marcus' flush deepened. There were
times when the subtle Videssians found his Roman straight-
forwardness monstrously amusing. Even seemingly bluff,
blunt types like Thorisin and Onomagoulos proved as steeped
in double-dealing as candied fruit in honey.

He sighed and spelled things out, as much for himself as
for the Emperor: "A clerk, even a logothete, wouldn't have
made much of some money-changing—probably figured he
was lining his own purse and not worried much about it. But
he knew I was on that beach, and he must have thought I'd
connect things. I recall the fuss he made about its being Or-
taias' money, aye, but I'd be lying if I said I was sure a few
lines in a dull tax roll would have jogged my memory. He'd
have been smarter letting things ride."

This time humorlessly, Thorisin chuckled again. " "The ill-
doer's conscience abandons the assurance of Phos' path,'" he
said, quoting from the Videssian holy books like a Greek from
Homer. "He knew his guilt, whether you did or not."

"And if he is guilty, then that means Taron Leimmokheir is
innocent!" Marcus said. Certainty blazed in him. He could not
keep all the triumph from his voice, but did not think it mat-
tered. There was such perfect logical clarity behind the idea,
surely no one could fail to see it.

But Thorisin was frowning. "Why are you obsessed by that
gray-whiskered traitor? What boots is that he plotted with On-
omagoulos instead of Ortaias?" he said curtly. Recognizing
inflexibility when he heard it, Scaurus gave up again. It would
take more than logic to change Gavras' mind; he was like a

man with a writing tablet who pushed his stylus through the
wax and permanently scarred the wood beneath.

"Buck up, Roman dear, it's a hero y'are tonight, not the
spook of a dead corp, the which wouldn't be invited to dinner
at all, at all," Viridovix said as they walked toward the Hall of
the Nineteen Couches. He deliberately exaggerated his brogue
to try to cheer up Marcus, but spoke Videssian so Helvis and
his own three companions would understand.

"Crave pardon; I didn't realize it showed so plainly," the
tribune murmured; he had been thinking of Glabrio. Helvis
squeezed his left arm. His right, under its bandages, he
wished he could forget. The smile he managed to produce felt
ghastly from the inside, but seemed to look good enough.

The ceremonies master, a portly man—not a eunuch, for
he wore a thick beard—bowed several times in quick succes-
sion, like a marionette on a string, as the Roman party came
up to the Hall's polished bronze doors. "Videssos is in your
debt," he said, seizing Marcus' hand in his own pale, moist
palm and bowing again. Then he turned and cried to those
already present, "Lords and ladies, the most valiant Romans!"
Scaurus blinked and forgave him the limp handclasp.

"The captain and epoptes Scaurus and the lady Helvis of
Namdalen!" That one was easy for the fellow; worse chal-
lenges lay ahead. "Viridovix son of Drappes and his, ah,
ladies!" The Celt's name was almost unprounceable for Vi-
dessians; the protocol chief's brief pause conveyed his opinion
of Viridovix' arrangement. Marcus suddenly groaned—si-
lently, by luck. Komitta Rhangavve would be here tonight.

He had no time to say anything. The ceremonies master
was plowing ahead. "The senior centurion Gaius PhilippusJ
The junior centurion Junius Blaesus!" Blaesus was a longtime
underofficer and a good soldier, but Scaurus knew he was
hardly a replacement for Quintus Glabrio. "The underofficer
Minucius, and his lady Erene!" Not "the lady," Scaurus noted;

damned snob of a flunky. Minucius, proud of his promotion,
had burnished his chain mail till it gleamed.

Two more names completed the legionary party: "The na-
kharar Gagik Bagratouni, detachment-leader among the
Romans! Zeprin the Red, Haloga guardsman in Roman ser-
vice!" Despite persuasion, Gorgidas had chosen to be alone
with his grief.




282 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Bagratouni, too, still mourned, but time had dulled the
cutting edge of his hurt. The leonine Vaspurakaner noble
swept through the slimmer Videssians as he made his way
toward the wine. Scaurus saw his eyes moving this way and
that; no doubt Bagratouni was very conscious of the figure he
cut, and of the ladies among whom he cut it.

The tribune and Helvis drifted over to a table covered with
trays of crushed ice, on which reposed delicacies of various
sons, mostly from the ocean. "A dainty you won't see every
day," said an elderly civil servant, pointing at a strip of oc-
topus meat. "The curled octopus, you know, with only one
row of suckers on each arm. Splendid!" Scaurus didn't know,
but took the meat. It was chewy and vaguely sea-flavored,
like all the other octopus he'd ever eaten.

He wondered what the gastrophile beside him would have
thought of such Roman exotica as dormice in poppy seeds and
honey.

A small orchestra played softly in the background: flutes,
stringed instruments whose names he still mixed up, and a
tinkling clavichord. Helvis clapped her hands in delight.
"That's the same rondo they were playing when we first met
here," she said. "Do you remember?"

"The night? Naturally. The—what did you call it? You'd
know I was lying if I said yes." A lot had happened that
evening. Not only had he met Helvis—though Hemond had
still been alive then, of course—but also Alypia Gavra. And
Avshar, for that matter; as always, he worried whenever he
thought of the sorcerer-prince.

They drifted through separate crowds of bureaucrats, sol-
diers, and ambassadors, exchanging small talk. Scaurus was
unusual in having friends among all three groups. The two
imperial factions despised each other. The Videssian officers
preferred the company of mercenaries they distrusted to the
pen-pushers they loathed, which merely confirmed their boor-
ishness in the civil servants' eyes.

Taso Vones, an imposingly tall Videssian lady—not Plaki-
dia Teletze—on his arm, bowed to the tribune. "Where are
you come from?" he asked with a twinkle in his eye. "How to
shoe a heavy cavalry horse, or the best way to compose a
memorandum on a subject of no intrinsic worth?"

"The best way to do that is not to," Helvis said at once.

"Blasphemy, my dear; seal-stampers burn people who ex-


Harry Turtledove            283

press such thoughts. But then, I find cavalry horses no more
inspiring." With that attitude, thought Scaurus, it was easy to
see why Vones held aloof from warriors and bureaucrats alike.

"His Sanctity, Phos' Patriarch Balsamon!" the ceremonies
master called, and the feast paused for a respectful moment as
the fat old man waddled into the chamber. For all his graceless
step, he had a presence that filled it up.

He looked round, then said with a smile and a mock-rueful
sigh, "Ah, if only you paid me such heed in the High Tem-
ple!" He plucked a crystal wine goblet from its bed of ice and
drained it with obvious enjoyment.

"That man takes nothing seriously," Soteric said disap-
provingly. Though he did not shave the back of his head in
usual island fashion, Helvis' brother still looked very much

the unassimilated Namdalener in high tight trousers and short
fur jacket.

Marcus said, "It's not like you to waste your time worrying
over his failings. After all, he's a heretic to you, is he not?"
He grinned as his brother-in-law fumbled for an answer. The
truth, he thought, was simple—the Videssian patriarch was
too interesting a character for anyone to ignore.

Servants began carrying the tables of hors d'oeuvres back
to the kitchens and replacing them with dining tables and
gilded chairs. From previous banquets in the Hall of the Nine-
teen Couches, Marcus knew that was a signal the Emperor
would be coming in soon. He realized he needed to speak to
Balsamon before Thorisin arrived.

"What now, my storm-crow friend?" the patriarch said as
Scaurus approached. "Whenever you come up to me with that
look of grim determination in your eye, I know you've found
your way into more trouble."

Like Alypia Gavra, Balsamon had the knack of making the
tribune feel transparent. He tried to hide his annoyance, and
was sure Balsamon saw that, too. More flustered than ever, he
launched into his tale.

"Leimmokheir, eh?" Balsamon said when he was done.
"Aye, Taron is a good man." As far as Scaurus could re-
member, that was the first time he'd heard the patriarch judge
anyone so. But Balsamon went on, "What makes you think
my intercession would be worth a moldy apple?"

"Why," Marcus floundered, "if Gavras won't listen to

you—"




284

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

285

"—He won't listen to anyone, which will likely be the
case. He's a stubborn youngster," the patriarch said, perfectly
at ease speaking thus of his sovereign. His little black eyes,
still sharp in their folds of flesh, measured the Roman. "And
well you know it, too. Why keep flogging a dead mule?"

"I made a promise," Marcus said slowly, unable to find a

better answer.

Before Balsamon could reply, the ceremonies master was
crying out, "Her Majesty the Princess Alypia Gavra! The lady
Komitta Rhangavve! His Imperial Majesty, the Avtokrator of
the Videssians, Thorisin Gavras!"

Men bowed low to show their respect for the Emperor; as
the occasion was social rather than ceremonial, no proskynesis
was required. Women dropped curtsies. Thorisin bobbed his
head amiably, then called, "Where are the guests of honor?"
Servitors rounded up the Romans and their ladies and brought
them to the Emperor, who presented them to the crowd for

fresh applause.

Komitta Rhangavve's eyes narrowed dangerously as they
flicked from one of Viridovix' lemans to the next. She looked
very beautiful in a clinging skirt of flower-printed linen;

Marcus would sooner have taken a poisonous snake to bed.
Viridovix did not seem to notice her glare, but the Celt was
not happy, either. "Is something wrong?" the tribune asked as
they walked toward the dining tables.

"Aye, summat. Arigh tells me the Videssians will be send-
ing an embassy to his clan. They're fain to hire mercenaries,
and the lad himself will be going with them to help persuade
his folk to take service with the Empire. A half-year's journey
and more it is, and him the bonniest wight to drink with I've
found in the city. I'll miss the little omadhaun, beshrew me if I
won't."

Stewards seated the legionaries in accordance with their
prominence of the evening. Marcus found himself at the right
hand of the imperial party, next to the Princess Alypia. The
Emperor sat between her and Komitta Rhangavve, who was
on his left. Had she been his wife rather than mistress, her
place and the princess' would have been reversed. As it was,
she was next to Viridovix, an arrangement Scaurus thought
ill-omened. Unaware of anything amiss, the Gaul's three
longtime companions chattered among themselves, excited by
their high-ranking company.

The first course was a soup of onions and pork, its broth
delightfully delicate in flavor. Marcus spooned it down almost
without tasting it, waiting for the explosion on his left. But
Komitta seemed to be practicing tact, a virtue he had not as-
sociated with her. He relaxed and enjoyed the last few spoon-
fuls of soup and and was sorry when a servant took the empty
bowl away. His goblet of wine, now, never disappeared.
Whenever it was empty, a steward would be there to fill it
again from a shining silver carafe. Even if it was sticky-sweet
Videssian wine, it dulled the ache in his arm.

Little roasted partridge hens appeared, stuffed with sauteed
mushrooms. Balsamon, who sat next to Helvis at the tribune's
right, demolished his with an appetite that would have done
credit to a man half his age. He patted his ample belly, saying
to Scaurus, "You can see I've gained it honestly."

Alypia Garva leaned toward the patriarch, saying, "You
would not be yourself without it, as you know full well." She
spoke affectionately, as to a favorite old uncle or grandfather.
Balsamon rolled his eyes and winced, pantomiming being cut
to the quick.

"Respect is hard for a plump old fool like me to get, you'll
note," he said to Helvis. "I should be mighty in my outrage
like the patriarchs of old and be a prelate to terrify the heretic.
You are terrified, I hope?" he added, winking at her.

"Not in the least," she answered promptly. "No more than
you convince anyone when you play the buffoon."

Balsamon's eyes were still amused in a way, but no longer
merry. "You have some of your brother's terrible honesty in
you," he said, and Scaurus did not think it was altogether a
compliment.

Courses came and went: lobster tails in drawn butter and
capers; rich pastries baked to resemble peahens' eggs; raisins,
figs, and sweet dates; mild and sharp cheeses; peppery ground
lamb wrapped in grape leaves; roast goose—sniffing the fa-
miliar cheese and cinnamon sauce, Marcus declined—cab-
bage soup; stewed pigeons with sausage and onions... with,
of course, appropriate wines for each. Scaurus' arm seemed
far away. He felt the tip of his nose grow numb, a sure sign he
was getting drunk.

Nor was he the only one. The great count Drax, who wore
Videssian-style robes, unlike Soteric and Utprand, was sing-
ing one of the fifty-two scurrilous verses of the imperial




AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

286

army's marching song, loudly accompanied by Zeprin the Red
and Mertikes Zigabenos. And Viridovix had just broken up
the left side of the imperial table with a story about—Marcus
dug a finger in his ear, trying not to believe he was hearing the
Celt's effrontery—a man with four wives.

Thorisin roared out laughter with the rest, stopping only to
wipe his eyes. "I thank your honor," Viridovix said. Komitta
Rhangavve was not laughing. Her long, slim fingers, nails
painted the color of blood, looked uncommonly like claws.

Dessert was fetched in, a light one after the great feast:

crushed ice from the imperial cold cellars, flavored with sweet
syrups. A favorite winter treat, it was hard to come by in the
warmer seasons.

The Emperor rose, a signal for everyone else to do the
same. Servants began clearing away the mountains of dirty
dishes and bowls. But even if the food was gone, wine and
talk still flowed freely—perhaps, indeed, more so than before

dinner.

Balsamon took Thorisin Gavras to one side and began
speaking urgently. Marcus could not hear what the patriarch
was saying, but Thorisin's growled answer was loud enough
to turn heads. "Not you, too? No, I've said a hundred times
—now it's a hundred and one!" Rather muzzily, the tribune
wished he could disappear. It did not look as though Taron
Leimmokheir would see the outside of his dungeon any time

soon.

As the guests decided no further trouble was coming on the
heels of Gavras' outburst, the level of conversation picked up
again. Soteric came over to tell Helvis some news of Namda-
len he'd got from one of Drax' aides. "What? Bedard Wood-
tooth, become count of Nustad on the mainland? I don't
believe it," she said. "Excuse me, darling, I have to hear this
with my own ears." And she was gone with her brother, ex-
claiming excitedly in the island dialect.

Left to his own devices, the tribune took another drink.
After enough rounds, he decided, Videssian wine tasted fine.
The interior of the Hall of the Nineteen Couches, though,
wanted to spin whenever he moved his head.

"Piss-pot!" That was Komitta Rhangavve's wildcat
screech, aimed at Viridovix. "The son of a pimp in your joke
would be no good to any of his wives after he had his ballocks
cut off him!" She threw what was left in her goblet in the

Harry Turtledove            287

Celt's face and smashed the cut crystal on the floor. Then she
spun and stamped out of the hall, every step echoing in the
startled silence.

"What was that in aid of?" the Emperor asked, staring at
her retreating back. He had been talking with Drax and Ziga-
benos and, like Scaurus, missed the beginning of the scene.

Red wine was dripping from Viridovix's mustaches, but he
had lost none of his aplomb. "Och, the lady decided she'd be
after taking offense at the little yam I told at table," he said
easily. A servitor brought him a damp towel; he ran it over his
face. "I wish she had done it sooner. As is, I'm left wearing
no better than the dregs."

Thorisin snorted, reassured by the Celt's glib reply and by
what he knew of Komitta's fiery temper—which was plenty.
"All right, then, let's hope this is more to your taste." He
beckoned a waiter to his side and gave the man his own goblet
to take to Viridovix. People murmured at the favor shown the
Gaul; the room relaxed once more.

Gaius Philippus caught Marcus' eye from across the hall
and hiked his shoulders up and down in an exaggerated sigh of
relief. The tribune nodded—for a moment, he'd been fright-
ened nearly sober.

He wondered just how much he had drunk; too much, from
the pounding ache that was beginning behind his eyes. Helvis
was still deep in conversation with a couple of Namdalener
officers. The dining hall suddenly seemed intolerably noisy,'
crowded, and hot. Marcus weaved toward the doors. Maybe
the fresh air outside would clear his head.

The ceremonies master bowed as he made his way into the
night. He nodded back, then regretted it—any motion was
enough to give his headache new fuel. He sucked in the cool
nighttime air gratefully; it felt sweeter than any wine.

He went down the stairs with a drunken man's caution. The
music and the buzz of talk receded behind him, nor was he
sorry to hear them fade. Even the tree frogs piping in the
nearby citrus groves grated on his ears. He sighed, already
wincing from tomorrow's hangover.

He peered up at the stars, hoping their calm changelessness
might bring him some relief. The night was clear and moon-
less, but the heavens still were not at their best. Videssos'
lights and the smoke rising from countless hearths and fire-
places veiled the dimmer stars away.




288 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

He wandered aimlessly for a couple of minutes, his hob-
nailed caligae clicking on the flagstone path and then silent as
they bit into grass. An abrupt intake of breath made him real-
ize he was not alone. "Who the—?" he said, groping for his
sword hilt. Visions of assassins flashed through his head—a
landing party from Bouraphos' ships out there, perhaps, steal-
ing up on the Hall of the Nineteen Couches.

"I'm not a band of hired killers," Alypia Gavra said, and
Scaurus heard the sardonic edge that colored so much of her
speech.

His hand jerked away from the scabbard as if it had be-
come red-hot. "Your pardon, my lady," he stammered. "You
surprised me—I came out for a breath of air."

"As did I, some little while ago, and found I preferred the
quiet to the brabble back there. You may share it with me, if
you like."

Still feeling foolish, the tribune approached her. He could
hear the noise from the dining hall, but at a distance it was
bearable. The light that streamed through the Hall's wide win-
dows was pale, too, the princess beside him little more than a
silhouette. He took parade rest unconsciously, a relaxed stance
from which to savor the night.

After they stood a while in silence, Alypia turned to him,
her face musing. "You are a strange man, Marcus Aemilius
Scaurus," she said finally, her Videssian accent making the
sonorous sounds of his full name somehow musical. "I am
never quite sure what you are thinking."

"No?" Scaurus said, surprised again. "It's always seemed
to me you could read me like a signboard."

"If it sets your mind at ease, not so. You fall into no neat
category; you're no arrogant noble from the provinces, all
horsesweat and iron, nor yet one of the so-clever seal-
stampers who would sooner die than call something by its
right name. And you hardly make an ordinary mercenary cap-
tain—there's not enough wrecker in you. So, outlander, what
are you?" She studied him, as if trying to pull the secret from
his eyes.

The question, he knew, demanded an honest answer; he
wished his wits were clearer, to give her one. "A survivor," he
said at last.

"Ah," she said very low, more an exhalation than a word.
"No wonder we seem to understand each other, then."

Harry Turtledove            289

"Do we?" he wondered, but his arms folded round her as
her face tilted up.

She felt slim, almost boyish, under his hands, the more so
because he was used to Helvis' opulent curves. But her mouth
and tongue were sweet against his—for a couple of heart-
beats, until she gave a smothered gasp and wrenched herself
away.

Alarmed, Marcus tried to flog his brain toward an apology,
but her sad, weary gesture stopped him before he could begin.
"The fault is not yours. Blame—times now gone," she said,
casting about for a circumlocution. "No matter what I wish to
feel, there are memories I cannot set aside so easily."

The tribune felt his hands bunch into fists. Not the least of
Avshar's crimes, he thought once more, was the easy death he
gave Vardanes Sphrantzes.

He reached out to touch her cheek. It was wet against his
hand. She started to flinch again, but sensed the gesture was
as much one of understanding as a caress. Her wounded
strength, the mix of vulnerability and composure in her, drew
him powerfully; it was all he could do to stand steady. Yet
however much he wanted to take her in his arms, he was sure
he would frighten her away forever if he did.

She said, "When I was a painted harlot you showed me a
way to bear what I had been, but because of what I was then, I
can have no gift for you now. Life is a tangled skein, is it
not?" Her laugh was small and shaky.

"That you are here and healing is gift enough," Scaurus
replied. He did not say he thought he might be too drunk to do
a woman justice in any case.

But that was one thought Alypia missed. Her drawn fea-
tures softened; she leaned forward to kiss him gently. "You'd
best go back," she said. "After all, you are the guest of
honor."

"I suppose so." The tribune had nearly forgotten the ban-
quet.

Alypia stayed beside him no more than a second before
drawing back. "Go on," she said again.

Reluctantly, Marcus started back toward the Hall of the
Nineteen Couches. When he turned round for a last look at
Alypia, she was already gone. A trace of motion among the
trees might—or might not—have been her, slipping toward




290 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

the imperial residence. The tribune trudged on, his head
whirling with wine and thought.

He knew most mercenaries, if offered a chance at an impe-
rial connection, would cut any ties that stood in the way. Drax
would, instantly, he thought; the man who was too adaptable
by half. What was the nickname that Athenian had earned
during the Peloponnesian War? "The stage boot," that was it,
because he fit on either foot.

But Scaurus could not find it in himself to imitate the great
count. For all the attraction and fondness he felt for Alypia
Gavra, he was not ready to cast Helvis aside. They both some-
times strained at the bond between them, but despite quarrels
and differences it would not break, nor, most of the time, did
he want it to. Then, too, there was Dosti....

"We missed you, my lord," the ceremonies master said
with another low bow as Marcus stumbled back into the hall.
The Roman hardly heard. For a man who called himself a
survivor, he thought, he had an uncommon gift for complicat-
ing his life.

XI11

" PHOS BLAST THAT INSOLENT TREACHER BOURAPHOS INTO A

thousand pieces and roast every one of them over a dung fire!"
Thorisin Gavras burst out. The Emperor stood on Videssos'
sea wall, watching one of his galleys sink. Two more fled
back to the city, closely pursued by the rebel drangarios'
ships. Heads bobbed in the water of the Cattle-Crossing as
sailors from the stricken vessel snatched at spars or swam
toward Videssos and safety. Not all would reach it; tiny in the
distance, black fins angled toward them.

Gavras ran an irritable hand through his hair, ruffled by the
sea breeze. "And why have I no admirals with the sense not to
piss into the wind?" he grated. "A two-year-old in the bath-
house sails his toy boat with more finesse than those bullheads
showed!"

Along with the other officers by the Emperor, Scaurus did
his best to keep his face straight. He understood Thorisin's
frustration. Onomagoulos, on the western shore of the Cattle-
Crossing, led an army far weaker than the one Gavras had
mustered against it. What did it matter, though, when the Em-
peror could not come to grips with his foe?

"Now if you had some ships from t'Duchy—" Utprand
Dagober's son began, but Thorisin's glare stopped even the
blunt-spoken Namdalener in mid-sentence. Drax looked at his
countryman as if at a dullard. Everyone knew the Emperor
suspected the islanders, his eye seemed to say and to ask what
the point was of antagonizing him without need.

Cross as a baited bear, Gavras swung round on Marcus. "I

291




292     AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION
suppose you'll be after me next, telling me to turn Leimmo-

kheir loose."

"Why, no, your Majesty, not at all," the tribune said inno-
cently. "If you were going to listen to me, you would have

done that long since."

He scratched at his arm. It itched fiercely. Still, it was
healing well enough that Gorgidas had pulled the pins from it
the day before. The feel of the metal sliding through his flesh,
though not painful, had been unpleasant enough to make him

shudder at the memory.

"Bah!" Thorisin turned his gaze out to the Cattle-Crossing
again. Only scattered timbers showed where his warship had
sunk; Bouraphos' vessels were already resuming their patrol.
As if continuing an argument, the Emperor said, "What would
it gain me to let him go? He'd surely turn against me now,
after being shut up all these months."

Unexpectedly, Mertikes Zigabenos spoke up for Leimmo-
kheir. The guards officer had come to admire the older sailor,
who showed repeatedly while the Sphrantzai held Videssos
how a good man could keep his honor under a wicked regime.
Zigabenos said, "If he grants you an 0ath of loyalty, he will
keep it. No matter what you say, sir, Taron Leimmokheir
would not forswear himself. He fears the ice too much for

that."

"And besides," Marcus said, thrusting home with a plea-
sure for which he felt no guilt at all, "what's the difference if
he does betray you? You'd still be outadmiraled and hardly
worse off, whereas—" He fell silent, leaving Thorisin to work
the contrary chain of logic for himself.

The Emperor, still in his foul mood, only grunted. But his
hand tugged thoughtfully at his beard, and he did not fly into a
rage at the very notion of releasing Leimmokheir. His will was
granite, thought the tribune, but even granite crumbles in the
end.

"So you think he'll let him go?" Helvis said that evening
after Scaurus recounted the day's events. "One for you, then."

"I suppose so, unless he does turn his coat once he's free.
That would drop the chamber pot into the stew for fair."

"I don't think it will happen. Leimmokheir is honest,"
Helvis said seriously. Marcus respected her opinion; she had
been in Videssos years longer than he and knew a good deal

Harry Turtledove            293

about its leaders. Moreover, what she said confirmed every-
one else's view of the jailed admiral—except the Emperor's.

But when he tried to draw her out further, she did not seem
interested in matters political, which was unlike her. "Is any-
thing wrong?" he asked at last. He wondered if she had some-
how guessed the attraction growing between himself and
Alypia Gavra and dreaded the scene that would cause.

Instead, she put down the skirt whose hem she had been
mending and smiled at the tribune. He thought he should
know that look; there was a mischievous something in her
eyes he had seen before. He placed it just as she spoke, "I'm
sorry, darling, my wits were somewhere else. I was trying to
reckon when the baby will be due. As near as I can make it, it
should be a little before the festival of sun-turning."

Marcus was silent so long her sparkle disappeared. "Aren't
you pleased?" she asked sharply.

"Of course I am," he answered, and was telling the truth.
Too many upper-class Romans were childless by choice, be-
loved only by inheritance seekers. "You took me by surprise,
is all."

He walked over and kissed her, then poked her in the ribs.
She yelped. "You like taking me by surprise that way," he
accused. "You did when you were expecting Dosti, too."

As if the mention of his name was some kind of charm, the
baby woke up and started to cry. Helvis made a wry face. She
got up and unswaddled him. "Are you wet or do you just want
to be cuddled?" she demanded. It proved to be the latter; in a
few minutes Dosti was asleep again.

"That doesn't happen as often as it used to," Marcus said.
He sighed. "I suppose I'll have to get used to waking up five
times a night again. Why don't you arrange to have a three-
year-old and save us the fuss?" That earned him a return poke.

He hugged her, careful both of her pregnancy and his own
tender arm. She helped him draw the blouse off over her head.
Yet even when they lay together naked on the sleeping-mat,
the tribune saw Alypia Gavra's face in his mind, remembered
the feel of her lips. Only then did he understand why he had
paused before showing gladness at Helvis' news.

He realized something else, too, and chuckled under his
breath. "What is it, dear?" she asked, touching his cheek.

"Nothing really. Just a foolish notion." She made an in-
quisitive noise, but he did not explain further. There was no

294    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

way, he thought, to tell her that now he understood why she
slipped every so often and called him by her former lover's
name.

"Let's have a look at that," Gorgidas ordered the next
morning. Marcus mimed a salute and extended his arm to the
doctor. It was anything but pretty; the edges of the gash were
still raised and red, and it was filled with crusty brown scab.
But the Greek grunted in satisfaction at what he saw and again
when he sniffed the wound. "There's no corruption in there,"
he told the tribune. "Your flesh knits well."

"That lotion of yours does good work, for all its bite."
Gorgidas had dosed the cut with a murky brown fluid he
called barbarum: a compound of powdered verdigris, litharge,
alum, pitch, and resin mixed in equal parts of vinegar and oil.
The Roman had winced every time it was applied, but it kept a

wound from going bad.

Gorgidas merely grunted again, unmoved by the praise.
Nothing had moved him much, not since Quintus Glabrio fell.
Now he changed the subject, asking, "Do you know when the
Emperor intends to send his embassy to the Arshaum?"

"No time soon, not with Bouraphos' ships out there to sink
anything that sticks its nose out of the city's harbors. Why?"

The Greek studied him bleakly. Marcus saw how haggard
he had become, his slimness now gaunt, his hair ragged where
he had chopped a lock away in mourning for Glabrio. "Why?"
Gorgidas echoed. "Nothing simpler; I intend to go with it."
He set his jaw, meeting Scaurus' stare without flinching.

"You can't," was the tribune's first startled response.

"And why not? How do you propose to stop me?" The
doctor's voice was dangerously calm.

"I can order you to stay."

"Can you, in law? That would be a pretty point for the
barristers back in Rome. I am attached to the legions, aye, but
am I of them? I think not, any more than a sutler or a town
bootmaker who serves at contract. But that's neither here nor
there. Unless you choose to chain me, I will not obey your

order."

"But why?" Marcus said helplessly. He had no intention of

putting Gorgidas in irons. That the Greek was his friend
counted for less than his certainty that Gorgidas was stubborn
enough not to serve if made to remain against his will.

Harry Turtledove            295

"The why is simple enough; I plan to add an excursus on
the tribes and customs of the Arshaum to my history and I
need more information than Arigh can—or cares to—give
me. Ethnography, I think, is something I can hope to do a
proper job of."

His bitterness gave Scaurus the key he needed. "You think
medicine is not? What of all of us you've healed, some a
dozen times? What of this?" He held his wounded arm out to
the physician.

"What of it? It's still a bloody mess, if you want to know."
In his wretchedness and self-disgust, Gorgidas could not see
the successes his skill had won. "A Videssian healer would
have put it right in minutes, instead of this week and a half's
worth of worry over seeing if it chooses to fester."

"If he could do anything at all," Marcus retorted. "Some
hurts they can't cure, and the power drains from them if they
use it long. But you always give your best."

"A poor, miserable best it is, too. With my best, Minucius
would be dead now, and Publius Flaccus and Cotilius Rufus
after Maragha, and how many more? You're a clodhopper to
reckon me a doctor, when I can't so much as learn the art that
gave them life." The Greek's eyes were haunted. "And I
can't. We saw that, didn't we?"

"So you'll hie yourself off to the steppe, then, and forget
even trying?"

Gorgidas winced, but he said, "You can't shame me into
staying either, Scaurus." The tribune flushed, angry he was so
obvious.

The Greek went on, "In Rome I wasn't a bad physician,
but here I'm hardly more than a joke. If I have some small
talent at history, perhaps I can leave something worthwhile
with that. Truly, Marcus," he said, and Scaurus was touched,
for the doctor had not used his praenomen before, "all of you
would be better off with a healer-priest to mend you. You've
suffered my fumblings long enough."

Clearly, nothing ordinary would change Gorgidas' mind.
Casting about for any straw, Marcus exclaimed, "But if you
leave us, who will Viridovix have to argue with?"

"Now that one strikes close to the clout," Gorgidas admit-
ted, surprised into smiling. "For all his bluster, I'll miss the
red-maned bandit. It's still no hit, though; as long as he has
Gaius Philippus, he'll never go short a quarrel."




296 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Defeated, Scaurus threw his hands in the air. "Be it so,
then. But for the first time, I'm glad Bouraphos joined the
rebels. Not only does that force you to stay with us longer, it
also gives you more time to come to your senses."

"I don't think I've left them. I might well have gone even
if—things were otherwise." The Greek paused, tossed his
head. "Uselessness is not a pleasant feeling." He rose. "Now
if you'll excuse me, Gawtruz has promised to tell me of his
people's legends of how they overran Thatagush. A compari-
son with the accounts by Videssian historians should prove
fascinating, don't you think?"

Whatever Marcus' answer was, he did not wait to hear it.

The tribune stood at stiff attention, below and to the right
of the great imperial throne. For this ceremony he did not
enjoy the place of honor; Balsamon the patriarch was a pace
closer to the seated Emperor. Somehow Videssos' chief pre-
late contrived to look rumpled in vestments of blue silk and
cloth-of-gold. His pepper-and-salt beard poured down in a dis-
orderly stream over the seed pearls adorning the breast of his
chasuble.

At the Emperor's left side stood Alypia Gavra, her costume
as somber as protocol would permit. Scaurus had not seen her
save at a distance since the feast two weeks before; twice he
had requested an audience, and twice got no reply. He was
almost afraid to meet her eye, but her nod as they assembled
in the throne room had been reassuring.

With no official status, Komitta Rhangavve was relegated
to the courtiers who filed in to flank the long central colon-
nade. In that sea of plump bland faces her lean, hard beauty
was like a falcon's feral grace among so many pigeons. At the
sight of the Roman, her eyes darted about to see if Viridovix
was present; Marcus was glad he was not.

An expectant hush filled the chamber. The Grand Gates,
closed after the functionaries' entrance, swung slowly open
once more, to reveal a single man silhouetted against the
brightness outside. His long, rolling strides seemed alien to
that place of gliding eunuchs and soft-footed officials.

Taron Leimmokheir wore fresh robes, but they hung loose-
ly about his prison-thinned frame. Nor had his release robbed
him of the pallor given by long months hidden from sun and
sky. His hair and beard, while clean, were still un-

Ham/ Turtledove           297

trimmed. Scaurus heard he had refused a barber; his words
were, "Let Gavras see me as he had me." The tribune won-
dered what else Leimmokheir might refuse. So far as he knew,
no bargains had been struck.

The ex-admiral came up to the imperial throne, then
paused, looking Thorisin full in the face. In Videssian court
etiquette it was the height of rudeness; Marcus heard torches
crackle in the silence enveloping the courtroom. Then, with
deliberation and utmost dignity, Leimmokheir slowly pros-
trated himself before his soverign.

"Get up, get up," Thorisin said impatiently; not the words
of formula, but the court ministers had already despaired of
changing that.

Leimmokheir rose. Looking as if every word tasted bad to
him, the Emperor continued, "Know you are pardoned of the
charge of conspiracy against our person, and that all properties
and rights previously deemed forfeit are restored to you."
There was a sigh of outdrawn breath from the courtiers.
Leimmokheir began a second proskynesis; Thorisin stopped
him with a gesture.

"Now we come down to it," he said, sounding more like a
merchant in a hard bargain than Avtokrator of the Videssians.
Leimmokheir leaned forward, too. "Does it please you to
serve me as my drungarios of the fleet against Bouraphos and
Onomagoulos?" Marcus noted that the first person plural of
the pardon had disappeared.

"Why you and not them?" Prison had not cost Leimmo-
kheir his forthrightness, Scaurus saw. Courtiers blanched, ap-
palled at the plain speech.

The Emperor, though, looked pleased. His answer was
equally direct. "Because I am not a man who hires mur-
derers."

"No, instead you throw people into jail." The fat ceremo-
nies master, who stood among the high dignitaries, seemed
ready to faint. Thorisin sat stony-faced, his arms folded, wait-
ing for a real reply. At last Leimmokheir dipped his head; his
unkempt gray locks flopped over his face.

"Excellent!" Thorisin breathed, now with the air of a gam-
bler after throwing the suns. He nodded to Balsamon. "The
patriarch will keep your oath of allegiance." He fairly purred;

to a man of Taron Leimmokheir's religious scruples, that oath
would be binding as iron shackles.

298 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Balsamon stepped forward, producing a small copy of the
Videssian scriptures from a fold of his robe. But the drun-
garios waved him away; his seaman's voice, used to overcom-
ing storm winds, filled the throne room: "No, Gavras, I swear
no oaths to you."

For a moment, everyone froze; the Emperor's eyes went
hard and cold. "What then, Leimmokheir?" he asked, and
danger rode his words. "Should your say-so be enough for
me?"

He intended sarcasm, but the admiral took him at face
value. "Yes, by Phos, or what's your pardon worth? I'll be
your man, but not your hound. If you don't trust me without a
spiked collar of words round my neck, send me back to the
jug, and be damned to you." And he waited in turn, his pride
proof against whatever the Emperor chose.

A slow flush climbed Thorisin's cheeks. His bodyguards'
hands tightened on their spears. There had been Avtokrators
—and not a few of them—who would have answered such
defiance with blood. In his years Balsamon had seen more
than one of that stripe. He said urgently, "Your Majesty, may
I—-"

"No." Thorisin cut him off with a single harsh word.
Marcus realized again the overwhelming power behind the
Videssian imperial office in its formal setting. In chambers,
Balsamon would have rolled his eyes and kept on arguing;

now, bowing, he fell silent. Only Leimmokheir remained un-
cowed, drawing strength from what he had already endured.

The Emperor still bore him no liking, but grudging respect
slowly replaced the anger on his face. "All right, then." He
wasted no time with threats or warnings; it was clear they
meant nothing to me reinstated admiral.

Leimmokheir, as abrupt as Gavras, bowed and turned to
go. "Where arc you away so fast?" Thorisin demanded, suspi-
cious afresh.

"The docks, of course. Where else would you have your
drungarios go?" Leimmokheir neither looked back nor broke
stride. If he could have slammed the Grand Gates behind him,
Scaurus thought, he would have done that, too. Between
them, the stubborn admiral and equally strong-willed Emperor
had managed to turn Videssian ceremonial on its ear. The
assembled courtiers shook their heads as they trooped from the
throne room, remembering better-run spectacles.

Harry Turtledove            299

"Don't you just wander off," Thorisin said to the tribune as
he started to follow them out. "I have a job in mind for you."

"Sire?"

"And spare me that innocent blue-eyed gaze," the Emperor
growled. "For all the wenches it charms, it goes for nothing
with me." Marcus saw the comer of Alypia Gavra's mouth
twitch, but she did not look at him. Her uncle went on, "You
were the one who wanted that gray-bearded puritan loose, so
you can keep an eye on him. If he so much as breathes hard, I
expect to hear about it. D'you understand me?"

"Aye." The Roman had half expected that order.

"Just 'aye'?" Gavras glared at him, balked of the chance to
vent his anger further. "Go on, take yourself off, then."

As Marcus walked back to the legionaries' barracks, Aly-
pia Gavra caught him up. "I have to ask your pardon," she
said. "It was wrong of me to pretend I never got your requests
to see me."

"The situation was unusual," the tribune replied. He could
not speak as freely as he would have liked. The path was
busy; more than one head turned at the sight of a mercenary
captain, even one of the prominence Scaurus had won, walk-
ing side by side with the Avtokrator of the Videssians' niece.

"To say the least." Alypia raised one eyebrow. She, too,
used phrases with many meanings. Marcus wondered if she
had deliberately chosen to meet him in public to keep things
between them as impersonal as possible.

"I hope," he said carefully, "you don't feel I was, ah, tak-
ing undue advantage of the situation."

She gave him a steady look. "There are many benefits an
officer with an eye for the main chance might gain; some-
thing, I might add, I am as capable of seeing as any officer of
that stripe."

"That is the main reason I hesitated so long."

"I never believed here—" Alypia laid her hand on her left
breast "—you were such a man. It is, though, something one
considers." She cocked her head, still studying him. '"The
main reason'? What of your young son? What of the family
you've made since you came to Videssos? At the banquet you
seemed well content with your lady."

Scaurus bit his lip. It was chastening to hear his own
thoughts come back at him from the princess' mouth. "And




300 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

you claimed to have trouble reading me!" he said, embar-
rassed out of indirection.

For the first time Alypia smiled. She made as if to put her
hand on his arm, but stopped, remembering better than he
where they were. She said quietly, "Were those thoughts not
there to read, the, ah, situation—" Her mockery of the tri-
bune's earlier pause was gentle. "—Would never have arisen."

The path divided. "We go different ways now, I think," she
said, and turned toward the flowering cherries that concealed
the imperial residence.

"Aye, for a while," Marcus answered, but only to himself.

"Look what Gavras gives me to work with!" Taron Leim-
mokheir shouted. "Why didn't he tell me to go hang myself
from a yardarm while I was about it?" He answered his own
question, "He thought my weight'd break it, and he was
right!" He looked disgustedly about the Neorhesian harbor.

The capital's great northern anchorage was not a part of the
city Scaurus knew well. The Romans had patrolled near the
harbor of Kontoskalion, on Videssos' south-facing coast, and
had also embarked on campaign against the Yezda from there.
But Kontoskalion was a toy port next to the Neorhesian har-
bor, named for the long-dead city prefect who had supervised
its building.

There were ships aplenty at the docks jutting out into the
Videssian Sea, a veritable forest of masts. But all too many of
them belonged to fat, sluggish trading ships and tiny fishing
craft like the one Marcus had sailed on when Thorisin's forces
sneaked over the Cattle-Crossing. These, by now, rode high in
the water. Their cargoes long since unloaded, they were
trapped in Videssos by Elissaios Bouraphos outside. As had
been only proper—then—Bouraphos had taken the heart of
the Empire's war fleet when he sailed for Pityos and kept it
when he joined Onomagoulos in rebellion.

Leimmokheir had precious little left: ten or so triremes,
and perhaps a dozen smaller two-banked ships like the ones
the tribune knew as Libumians. He was outnumbered almost
three to one, and Bouraphos also had the better captains and
crews.

"What's to do?" Marcus asked, worried the drungarios
thought the task beyond him. After his outburst, Leimmokheir
was staring out to sea, not at the choppy little waves dancing

Harry Turtledove            301

inside the breakwater, but beyond, to the vast sweep of empty
horizon.

The admiral did not seem to hear him for a moment; he
slowly came back to himself. "Hmm? Phos' light, I truly
don't know, left here with the lees to drink. Wait and watch
for a bit, I expect, until I understand how things have gone
since I was taken off the board. I've come back facing a new
direction, and everything looks strange."

In the Videssian board game, captured pieces could be
used against their original owners and change sides several
times in the course of a game. It was, Scaurus thought, a
game very much in its makers' image.

Seeing the Roman troubled by his answer, Leimmokheir
slapped him on the shoulder. "Never lose hope," he said seri-
ously. "The Namdaleni are heretics who imperil their souls
with their belief, but they have the right of that. No matter

how bad the storm looks, it has to end sometime. Skotos lays
despair before men as a snare."

He was the living proof of his own philosophy, Scaurus
thought; his imprisonment had dropped from him as if it had

never been. But the tribune noted he had still not answered the
question.

The last clear notes of the pandoura faded inside the
Roman barracks. Applause, a storm of it, followed swiftly.
Senpat Sviodo laid aside his stringed instrument, a smile of
pleasure on his handsome, swarthy face. He lifted a mug of
wine in salute to his audience.

"That was marvelous," Helvis said. "You made me see the
mountains of Vaspurakan plain as if they stood before me.

Phos gave you a great gift. Were you not a soldier, your music
would soon make you rich."

"Curious you should say that,", he answered sheepishly.
"Back in my teens I thought about running off with a troupe of
strummers who were playing at my father's holding."

"Why didn't you?"

"He found out and stropped his belt on my backside. He
had the right of it, Phos rest him. I was needed there; even
then, the Yezda were thick as tax collectors round a man
who's dug up treasure. And had I gone, look what I would
have missed." He slid his arm round Nevrat beside him. The
bright ribbons streaming from his three-peaked Vaspurakaner




30Z AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

cap tickled her neck; she brushed them away as she snuggled
closer to her husband.

Marcus sipped from his own wine cup. He had nearly for-
gotten what good company the two young westerners made,
not just for Senpat's music but for the gusto and good cheer
with which he—indeed, both of them—faced life. And they
were so obviously pleased with each other as to make every
couple around them happier simply by their presence.

"Where is your friend with the mustaches like melted
bronze?" Nevrat asked the tribune. "He has a fine voice. I was
hoping to hear him sing with Senpat tonight, even if Videssian
songs are the only ones they both understand."

" 'Little bird with a yellow bill—"' Gaius Philippus began,
his baritone raucous. Nevrat winced and threw a walnut at
him. Ever alert, he caught it out of the air, then cracked it with
the pommel of his dagger.

The distraction did not make her forget her question. She
quirked an eyebrow at Scaurus. He said lamely. "There was
some business or other he said he had to attend to; I don't
know just what." But I can make a fair guess, he thought.

Nevrat's other eyebrow went up when she saw him hesi-
tate. Unlike most Videssian women, she did not pluck them to
make them finer, but they did nothing to mar her strong-
featured beauty.

In this case, Marcus was immune to such blandishments.
He wished he had no part of Viridovix' secret and would not
spread it further.

Nevrat turned to Helvis. "You're a big girl, dear. You
should do more than pick at your food."

Said in a different tone, the words could have rankled, but
Nevrat was obviously concerned. Helvis' answering smile was
a trifle wan. "There'djust be more for me to give back tomor-
row morning."

Nevrat looked blank for a moment, then hugged her. "Con-
gratulations," Senpat said, pumping Marcus' hand. "What is
it, the thought of going west that makes you randy? This'll be
twice now."

"Oh, more than that," Helvis said with a sidelong glance at
the tribune.

When the laughter subsided, Senpat grew serious. "You
Romans will be going west, not so?"

"I've heard nothing either way," Scaurus said. "For now,

Harry Turtledove            303

no one goes anywhere much, not with Bouraphos at the Cat-
tle-Crossing. Why should it matter to you? You've been de-
tached from us for months now."

Instead of answering directly, Senpat exchanged a few sen-
tences in guttural Vaspurakaner with Gagik Bagratouni. The
nakharar's reply was almost a growl. Several of his country-
men nodded vehemently; one pounded his fist on his knee.

"I would rejoin, if you'll have me," the younger noble
said, giving his attention back to Scaurus. "When you go
west, you'll do more than fight rebels inside the Empire. The

Yezda are there, too, and I owe them a debt." His merry eyes
grew grim.

"And I," Nevrat added. Having seen her riding alone
through them after Maragha and in the press when the legion-
aries fought Drax' men, Marcus knew she meant exactly what
she said.

"You both know the answer is yes, whether or not we
move," the tribune said. "How could I say otherwise to sea-
soned warriors and bold scouts who are also my friends?"
Senpat Sviodo thanked him with unwonted seriousness.

Still caught up in his own thoughts, Bagratouni said hun-
grily, "And also Zemarkhos there is." His men nodded again;

they had more cause to hate the fanatic priest than even the
nomads. Likely their chance for revenge would come, too, if
the legionaries went west. On the way to Maragha, Thorisin
had mocked Zemarkhos, and so the zealot acknowledged On-
omagoulos as his Avtokrator. His followers helped swell
the provincial noble's forces.

The hall grew silent for a moment. The Romans were loyal
to the state for which they fought, but it was a mercenary's
loyalty, ultimately shallow. They did not share or fully under-
stand the decades of war and pogrom which tempered the
Vaspurakaners as repeated quenchings did steel. The men who
styled themselves princes rarely showed that hardness; when

they did, it was enough to chill their less-committed
comrades.

"Out on the darkness!" Senpat Sviodo cried, feeling the
mood of the evening start to slide. "It's Skotos' tool, nothing

else!"

He turned to Gaius Philippus. "So you Romans know the
little bird, do you?" His fingers danced over the pandoura's




304 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

strings. The legionaries roared out the marching song, glad to
be distracted from their own thoughts.

"Are you well, Taron?" Marcus asked. "You look as if you
hadn't slept in a week."

"Near enough," Leimmokheir allowed, punctuating his
words with an enormous yawn. His eyes were red-tracked, his
gravelly voice hoarser than usual. The flesh he had begun
gaining back after his release looked slack and unhealthy. "It's
a wearing task, trying to do the impossible." Even his once-
booming laugh seemed hollow.

"Not enough ships, not enough crews, not enough money,
not enough time." He ticked them off on his fingers one by
one. "Outlander, you have Gavras' ear. Make him understand
I'm no mage, to conjure up victory with a wave of my hand.
And do a good job, too, or we'll be in cells side by side."

Scaurus took that as mere downheartedness on the admi-
ral's part, but Leimmokheir grew so insistent the tribune de-
cided to try to meet with the Emperor. Exhaustion had made
the drungarios of the fleet irritable and unable to see any
viewpoint but his own.

As luck would have it, the tribune was admitted to the
imperial presence after only a short wait. When he spoke of
Leimmokheir's complaints, Thorisin snapped, "What does he
want, anchovies to go with his wine? Any fool can handle the
easy jobs; it's the hard ones that show what a man's made of."

A messenger came up to the throne, paused uncertainly.
"Well?" Gavras said.

Recognized, the man went down in full proskynesis. When
he rose, he handed the Avtokrator a folded leaf of parchment.
"Your pardon, your Majesty. The runner who delivered this
said it was of the utmost urgency that you read it at once."

"All right, all right, you've given it me." The Emperor
opened the sheet, softly read aloud to himself: " 'Come to the
sea wall and leam what your trust has gained you. L., drun-
garios commanding.'"

His color deepened at every word. He tore the sheet in
half, then turned on Scaurus, shouting, "Phos curse the day I
heeded your poisoned tongue! Hear the braggart boasting as
he turns his coat!

"Zigabenos!" Gavras bellowed, and when the guards of-
ficer appeared the Emperor profanely ordered him to send

Harry Turtledove            305

troops hotfoot to the docks to stop Leimmokheir if they could.
He grated, "It'll be too bloody late, but we have to try."

The fury he radiated was so great Marcus stepped back
when he rose from the throne, afraid Thorisin was about to
attack him. Instead Gavras issued a curt command: "Come

along, sirrah. If I must watch the fruit of your folly, you can
be there, too."

The Emperor swept down the aisleway, an aghast Scaurus
in his wake. Everything the Roman had believed of Leim-
mokheir looked to be a tissue of lies. It was worse than be-
trayal; it spoke of a blindness on his part humiliating to
contemplate.

Courtiers scurried out of Gavras' path, none daring to re-
mind him of business still unfinished. Swearing under his
breath, he stalked through the grounds of the palace com-
pound; he mounted the steps of the sea wall like an unjustly
condemned man on his way to the executioner. He did not so
much as look at Scaurus.

What he saw when he peered over the gray stone battle-
ments ripped a fresh cry of outrage from him. "The pimp's
spawn has stolen the whole fleet!" Sails furled, the triremes
and lighter, two-banked warships were rowing west from the
Neorhesian harbor. Sea foam clotted whitely round their oars
at every stroke. Marcus' heart sank further. He had not known
it could.

"And look!" the Emperor said, pointing to the suburban
harbor on the far shore of the Cattle-Crossing. "Here comes
that cow-futtering Bouraphos, out to escort him home!" The
rebel admiral's ships grew swiftly larger as they approached.
Thorisin shook his fist at them.

Boots rang on the stairway. A swearing trooper trotted up
to the Emperor. He panted, "We were too late, your Majesty.
Leimmokheir sailed."

"Really?" Gavras snarled. The soldier's eyes went wide as
they followed his outflung arm.

Leimmokheir's ships shook themselves out into a line fac-
ing the rebels, his heavier galleys in the center with the Libur-
nians on either wing. Even in an element not his own, Marcus
knew a tactical maneuver when he saw one. "That's a battle
formation!" he exclaimed.

"By Phos, it is!" Thorisin said, acknowledging his pres-
ence for the first time. "What boots it, though? Treacher or

306    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

zany, your precious friend will wreck me either way. Boura-
phos'll toy with him like a cat with a grasshopper. Look at the

ships he has with him."

Whether or not Gavras thought Leimmokheir a turncoat,
plainly Elissaios Bouraphos did not. His entire fleet was there
to form a line of battle, its horns sweeping forward to flank
the smaller force it faced. The curses Thorisin had called
down on Leimmokheir's head he now switched to Bouraphos.
Zigabenos' messenger listened admiringly.

Marcus scarcely heard the Emperor. Watching a fight in
which he could take no part was worse than combat itself, he   i
discovered. In the hand-to-hand there was no time to reflect;   !
now he could do nothing else. His nails bit into his palms as   ''
he watched the rowers on both sides step up the stroke. Their
ships leaped at one another. The tribune wondered if Leim-
mokheir had in fact gone mad, if the egotism that seemed to
lurk in every Videssian's soul deluded him into thinking his

powers godlike.

The fleets were less than a furlong apart when one of
Bouraphos' two-banked craft swerved inward to ram the tri-
reme next to it square amidships. The heavier galley, taken
utterly by surprise, was ruined. Oars snapped; faint over the
water, Marcus heard screams as rowers' arms were wrenched
from their sockets. Water gushed into the great hole torn in the
trireme's side. Almost with dignity, the stricken ship began
to settle. The Libumian backed oars and sought another

victim.

As if the first treacherous attack had been a signal, a score
and more of the rebel admiral's ships turned on their
comrades, throwing Bouraphos' line into confusion. No
longer sure who was friend and who foe, ships still loyal lost
momentum as their captains looked nervously to either side.
And into the chaos drove Taron Leimmokheir.

On the sea wall Thorisin Gavras did three steps of a jig.
"See how it feels, you bastard!" he screamed to Bouraphos.
"See how it feels!" Scaurus abruptly understood Leimmo-
kheir's sleepless nights; the drungarios had been sowing this
field for many days and come to harvest it now that it was

ripe.

But for all the sowing, the sea fight was far from won.

Even with his suddenly revealed recruits, Leimmokheir was
still outnumbered, and Elissaios Bouraphos a resourceful corn-


Harry Turtledove            307

mander. It was his ships, though, that were pressed back into
a circle, with Leimmokheir's prowling round them. And when
he tried to strike outward, a galley of his that had bided its
time drew in its starboard oars and sheared away its neighbor's
portside bank with its projecting bulkheads. The crippled ship
wallowed helplessly; its conqueror joined the enemy; Boura-
phos' attacking squadron, daunted, pulled back.

To add to the disorder, both sides flew the imperial pennant
with its central sun. Tiny in the distance, Marcus saw another
banner at a trireme's bow, this one scarlet barred with gold—
the emblem of the drungarios of the fleet. Bouraphos must
have decided the only way out of his predicament was to kill
his rival admiral, for four of his own galleys surged toward
Leimmokheir's, sinking a Libumian as they came.

No ships were close by to help. The drungarios' trireme
spun in the water, backing oars to port while pulling ahead on
the starboard side. It turned almost in its own length and sped
away from the attackers. Some of Leimmokheir's fleet might
not be perfectly trained, but he tolerated no slackness on his
flagship.

The wake foamed up under the galley's bow; it was driving
almost straight back toward Scaurus, past the slowly settling
hulk of the first trireme sunk when Bouraphos' ships began
changing sides. One after the others, the rebels gave chase.

"Skotos and his demons take them, they're gaining," Thor-
isin said, his hands clutching the battlements until knuckles
whitened. Where minutes before he had been ready to dip
Leimmokheir an inch at a time into boiling oil, now he was in
an agony of suspense lest the drungarios come to harm.

But Leimmokheir knew what he was about. Even at a
range of more than a quarter of a mile, his mane of gray-white
hair made him recognizable. His arm came down to empha-
size an order. Twisting like a snake, the trireme darted round
the sinking galley and rammed its leading pursuer before the
startled rebels could maneuver. Bouraphos' other three ships
stopped dead in the water, as if Leimmokheir had shown him-
self to be a dangerous wizard as well as a seaman.

His daring put new heart into his fleet and seemed to be the
blow that broke his foes. In a desperate charge across the
water, about twenty of them broke through his line, but all
fight was out of them. They fled toward the suburbs of the
opposite shore. Another group, seeing the way the wind was




AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

308

blowing, went over to the winners and fell on their erstwhile
comrades.                                                   |

Thorisin began to dance in earnest. Heedless of the impe-
rial dignity, he pounded Marcus and the messenger on the
back and grinned as he was pummeled in return,

One squadron of about fifteen ships kept up the fight;

Scaurus was unsurprised to spot a-second drungarios' pennant
among them. Game to the end, Elissaios Bouraphos and his
surviving loyal followers gave their fellows the chance to
escape. They tried to be everywhere at once, whirling and
dashing forward to the attack like so many dogs at bay.

Facing so many, the battle could have had only one result,
but the end came quicker than die tribune had expected. All at
once the coordinated defense dissolved into a series of single-
ship actions. White shields came up on poles as the last of
Bouraphos' captains began to yield.

"Sink 'em all!" Gavras shouted, and then a moment later,
reluctantly, "No, we'll need them against Namdalen one day."
He sighed and said to Marcus, "I'll turn forethoughtful yet,
damn me if I won't. This wretched job will see to that." He
sighed again, remembering the freedom of irresponsibility.

By the time the Emperor reached the Neorhesian harbor he
was jovial again. The space by the docks was filled with a
nulling crowd of civilians and soldiers. To the people of the
city, Leimmokheir's triumphal return was a spectacle to make
the day pass more quickly. The soldiers knew how much more
it meant. Now at last they could face Baanes Onomagoulos;

the shield that had separated them was hacked to bits.

Thorisin nodded to every captain coming ashore. He care-
fully made no distinction between the men who had sailed out
with the drungarios and former rebels. The latter, knowing his
reputation for a swift temper, approached him warily, but
found their role in the victory outweighing earlier allegiance.
They left the imperial presence quite relieved.

Taron Leimmokheir's galley was among the last to put in.
It had taken damage, Marcus saw. Some oars trailed limply in
the water for lack of men to pull them, and a ten-foot stretch
of the port rail was smashed to stove-wood.

Gavras' soldiers cheered the admiral, who ignored them
until the trireme was tied up at the dock. Then a single short
wave sufficed him. With the agility of a much younger man,

Harp/ Turtledove            309

he scrambled up onto the pier. He elbowed through the press
until he stood before the Emperor.

He bowed low, saying, "I trust my message sufficed to lay
your concern to rest." Holding the bow, he tipped a wink to
Scaurus with his left eye, which Thorisin could not see.

The Emperor, coloring, inhaled ominously. But before he
could blast Leimmokheir, he spied Marcus trying to swallow a
grin. "Then you're too fornicating trusting by half," he
growled, but without sincerity. "I've said so for years, you'll
recall."

"So now my task is done, it's back to the cell, eh?" The
drungarios returned Thorisin's banter, but Scaurus heard noth-
ing light in his tone.

"After the scare you threw into me, you deserve a yes to

that." Gavras' eyes swung to the flagship. "What have we
here?"

Two corseleted marines brought their prisoner before the
Emperor. They had to half support him; the left side of his
handsome face and head was bloody from a slingstone's
glancing blow. "You would have done better to stay at Pityos,
Elissaios," Thorisin said.

Bouraphos glared at him, shaking his head to try to clear it.
"We were nearly holding our own till that cursed rock flat-
tened me, even with the bolters. I'd bolt 'em proper, I
would." The wordplay was feeble, but Marcus had to respect
the rebel's spirit for essaying it at all.

"You're not likely to have the chance," Thorisin said.
"I know." Bouraphos spat at Taron Leimmokheir's feet.
"When will you fight for yourself, Gavras? You used me to
counter this bag of turds, and then him against me. What sort
of warrior does that make you?"

"The master of you both," the Emperor replied. He turned
to the marines, who came to attention, expecting the order.
"Take him to the Kynegion."

As they began to lead Bouraphos away, Gavras stopped
them for a moment. "In memory of the service you once gave
me, Elissaios, your lands will not stand forfeit to the fisc. You
have a son, I think."

"Yes. That's good of you, Thorisin."

"He's never harmed me. We can keep your head off the
Milestone, too."

Bouraphos shrugged. "Do as you like there. I'll have no




310    AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

further use for it." He eyed the marines. "Well, let's go. I trust
I don't have to show you the road?" He walked off between
them, his back straighter and stride firmer at every step.

Unable to hold the thought to himself, Marcus said, "He
dies very well."

"Aye, so he does," the Emperor nodded. "He should have
lived the same way." To that the tribune had no good reply.

The small crowd studied the ship moored at the pier,
"What's that written on its stern?" Gaius Philippus asked.

The letters were faded, salt-stained. "Conqueror," Marcus
read.

The senior centurion pursed his lips. "It'll never live up to
that."

The Conqueror bobbed in the light chop. Beamier than the
lean Videssian warships, it carried a wide, square-rigged sail,
now furled, and a dozen carports so the crew could maneuver
in and out of harbors at need.

Gorgidas, who knew more of ships than the Romans,
seemed satisfied. "It wasn't built yesterday or the day before,
either, but it'll get us across to Prista, and that's what counts."
He stirred a large leather rucksack with his foot. Having
helped him pack it, Marcus knew that rolls of parchment,
pens, and packets of powdered ink make up a good part of its
bulk.

The tribune remarked, "The Emperor wastes no time. Less
than a week since he gained the sea, and already you're off to
the Arshaum."

"High time, too," Arigh Arghun's son said. "I miss the feel
of a horse's barrel between my legs."

Pikridios Goudeles gave a delicate shudder. "You will, I
fear, have all too much chance to grow thoroughly used to the
sensation, as, worse luck, will I." To Scaurus he said, "The
upcoming campaigns, both against the usurper and against the
Yezda, shall be difficult ones. Good Arigh's men will be too
late for the first of them, it seems, but surely not for the
second."

"Of course," Marcus said. That Thorisin had enough faith
in Goudeles to send him as ambassador surprised the Roman
—or was the Emperor clearing the stage of a potential danger
to himself?

Whatever Gavras' reasons, his trust for the smooth-


Harry Turtledove            31 1

tongued bureaucrat plainly was not absolute. Goudeles' fellow
envoy was a dark, saturnine military man named Lankinos
Skylitzes. Scaurus did not know him well and was unsure
whether he was brother or cousin to the Skylitzes who had
died in the night ambush the year before. In one way, at least,
he was a good choice for the embassy—the Roman had heard
him talking with Arigh in the nomad's tongue.

Perhaps knowledge of the steppe was his speciality, for he
said, "There's another reason for haste. A new set of dis-
patches came from Prista last night. Avshar's on the plains.
Belike he's after soldiers, too; we'd best forestall him."

Marcus exclaimed in dismay, and was echoed by everyone
who heard Skylitzes' news. In his heart he had known the
wizard-prince escaped Videssos when the Sphrantzai fell, but

it was always possible to hope. "You're sure?" he asked Sky-
litzes.

The soldier nodded once. No garrulous imperial here,
Scaurus thought with a smile.

"May the spirits let us meet him," Arigh said, pantomim-
ing cut-and-thrust. Marcus admired his bravado, but not his
sense. Too many had made that wish already and got no joy
when it came true.

Gaius Philippus undid the shortsword at his belt and
handed it to Gorgidas. "Take it," he said. "With that serpent's
spawn running free, you'll need it one day."

The Greek was touched by the present, but tried to refuse

it, saying, "I have no skill with such tools, nor any desire to
learn."

"Take it anyway," Gaius Philippus said, implacable. "You

can stow it in the bottom of your duffel for all of me, but take
it."

He sounded as if he were taking a legionary to task, not
giving a gift, but Gorgidas heard the concern behind his insis-
tence. He accepted the gladius with a word of thanks and
proceeded to do just what the senior centurion had advised,
packing it away in his kit.

"Very moving," Goudeles said dryly. "Here's something
with a sweeter edge to it." He produced an alabaster flask of
wine, drank, and passed it to Scaurus. It went down smooth as

cream—nothing but the best for Pikridios, the tribune
thought.

A gangplank thudded into place. The Conqueror's captain,




312 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

a burly man of middle years, shouted, "You toffs can come
aboard now." He wagged his head in invitation.

Arigh left Videssos without a backward glance, his right
hand on the hilt of his saber, his left steadying the sueded
leather bag slung over his shoulder. Skylitzes followed,
equally nonchalant. Pikridios Goudeles gave a theatric groan
as he picked up his duffel, but seemed perfectly able to carry
it.

"Take care of yourself," Gaius Philippus ordered, thump-
ing Gorgidas on the back. "You're too softhearted for your
own good."

The physician snorted in exasperation. "And you're so full
of feces it's no wonder your eyes are brown." He embraced
the two Romans, then shouldered his own rucksack and fol-
lowed the rest of the embassy.

"Remember," Marcus called after him, "I expect to read
what you say about your travels, so it had best be good."

"Never fear, Scaurus, you'll read it if I have to tie you
down and hold it in front of your face. It's fitting punishment
for reminding me you're my audience."

"That's the lot of you?" the captain asked when the Greek
came aboard. Getting no contradiction, he called to his crew,
"Make ready to cast off!" Two half-naked sailors pulled in the
gangplank; another pair jumped onto the dock to undo the fat
brown mooring lines that held the Conqueror fore and aft.

"Hold on, avast, belay, whatever the plague-taken sea-
man's word is!" The pier shook as Viridovix came thudding
up, his helmet on his head and a knapsack under his arm. He
was crimson-faced and puffing; sweat streamed down his
cheeks. He looked to have come from the Roman barracks on
the dead run.

"What's happened?" Marcus and Gaius Philippus asked to-
gether, exchanging apprehensive glances. Except in battle and
wenching, such exertion was alien to the Gaul's nature.

He got no chance to answer them, for Arigh shouted his
name and leaped out of the Conqueror to greet him. "Come to
see me off after all, are you?"

"Not a bit of it," Viridovix replied, dropping his bag to the
boards of the pier with a sigh of relief. "By your leave, I'm
coming with you."

The nomad's grin flashed white in his swarthy face. "What

Harry Turtledove            313

could be better? You'll learn to love the taste of kavass, I
promise you."

"Are you daft, man?" Gaius Philippus asked. Pointing to
the Conqueror, he went on, "If you've forgotten, that is a
ship. Your stomach will remember, whether you do or not."

"Och, dinna remind me," the Celt said, wiping his face on
a tunic sleeve. "Still and all, it's that or meet the headsman,
I'm thinking. On the water I'll wish I'm dead, but to stay

would get me the wish granted, the which I don't fancy ei-
ther."

"The headsman?" Scaurus said. Thinking quickly, he
shifted to Latin. "The woman turned on you?" As long as no

names were named, Arigh—and the listening sailors—could
not follow.

"Didn't she just, the fickle slut," Viridovix answered bit-
terly in the same tongue. His happy-go-lucky air had deserted
him; he was angry and self-reproachful. Catching the gleam in
Marcus' eye, he said, "I've no need for your told-you-so's,
either. You did that, and rightly. Would I were as cautious a
wight as you, the once."

That admission was the true measure of his dismay, for he
never tired of chiding the Romans for their stodginess. "What
went awry?" the tribune asked.

"Can you no guess? That one's green as the sea with jeal-
ousy—like a canker it eats in her. And so she was havering
after me to set aside my Gavrila and Lissena and Beline, and I
said her nay as I've done before. They'll miss me, puir girls,

and you must be after promising not to let herself's wrath fall
on 'em."

"Of course," Scaurus said impatiently. "On with it, man."
"Och, the blackhearted bitch started shrieking fit to wake a
dead corp, she did, and swore she'd tell the Gavras I'd had her
by force." A fragment of the Celt's grin appeared for a mo-
ment. "Belike she'd make himself believe it, too. She's after

seeing enough of me to give sic charge the weight of detail,
you might say."

"She'd do it," Gaius Philippus said without hesitation.
"The very thought I had, Roman dear. I couldna be cutting

her throat, with it so white and all. I had not the heart for it, to

say naught of the hurly-burly it'd touch off."

"What did you do, then?" Marcus demanded. "Let her go




314 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

free? By the gods, Viridovix, the imperial guards'll be on
your heels!"

"Nay, nay, you see me revealed a fool, but not a damnfool.
She's swaddled and gagged and tied on a bed in tile sleazy
little inn where we went. She'll be a while working loose, but
I'm thinking the exercise'll not improve her temper, and so it's
away with me."

"First Gorgidas, and now you, and both for reasons an
idiot would be ashamed to own," the tribune said, feeling the
wrench as his tightly knit company began to unravel. Again he
gave thanks that the Romans had not had to split themselves
between Namdalen and Videssos; it would have torn the hearts
from them all.

Impatient with the talk in a language he did not understand,
Arigh broke in, "If you're coming, come."

"I will that, never fear." Viridovix clasped Scaurus' hand.
"Take care o' the blade you bear, Roman. It's a bonny un."

"And you yours." Viridovix' long sword hung at his right
hip; he would have seemed naked without it.

The Celt's jaw dropped as he noticed Gaius Philippus
weaponless. "Wore it out, did you?"

"Don't be more foolish than you can help. I passed it on to
Gorgidas."

"Did you now? That was a canny thing to do, or would be
if the silly lown had the wit to realize what grand sport war is.
As is, like as not he'll lose it, or else slice himself." Virido-
vix' lip curled. A second later he brightened. "Och, that's
right, I'll have the Greek to quarrel with. Nothing like a good
quarrel to keep a day from going stale."

Marcus remembered his own words to Gorgidas when the
doctor told him he was leaving. At the time they had been a
desperate joke, but here they were coming back at him in all
seriousness from the Gaul's mouth. Viridovix lived to wran-
gle, whether with swords or with words.

The captain of the Conqueror made a trumpet of his hands.
"You there! We're sailing, with you or without you!" The
threat was empty—while Viridovix meant nothing to him, he
could hardly set off without the Arshaum, who meant every-
thing to the embassy.

The aggrieved shout underlined Arigh's unrest. "Let's do
it," he said, taking die Celt's arm. Viridovix' rawhide boots

Harry Turtledove            31 5

clumped on the planking of the dock; the nomad, shod in soft
calfskin, walked silent as a wildcat.

Looking like a live man going to his own funeral, the Gaul
tossed his duffel to a sailor. Still he hesitated before following
it down. He sketched a salute to Scaurus, waved his fist at
Gaius Philippus. "Watch yourself, runt!" he called, and
jumped.

"And you, you great bald-arsed lunk!"

To the captain's shouted directions, his crew backed water.
For a few seconds it seemed the Conqueror was too bulky to
respond to the oars, but then it moved, inching away from the
pier. When well clear, it turned north, ponderous as a fat old
man. Marcus heard ropes squeal in pullies as the broad sail
unfurled. It napped loosely, then filled with wind.

The tribune watched until the horizon swallowed it.

With regained mastery of the sea, Thorisin Gavras threw
Drax and his Namdalener mercenaries at Baanes Onoma-
goulos. Leimmokheir's galleys protected the transports from
rebel warships; the men of the Duchy landed in the westlands
at Kypas, several days' march south of the suburbs opposite
Videssos.

A great smoke rose in the west as Onomagoulos fired his
camp to keep Thorisin from taking possession of it. Baanes
retreated toward his stronghold round Garsavra. He moved in
haste, lest the Namdaleni cut him off from his center of
power, Thorisin, acting like a man who feels victory in his
grasp, retook the western suburbs.

Marcus waited for a summons from the Emperor, expect-
ing him to order the legionaries into action against Onoma-
goulos. He drilled his men furiously, wanting to be ready. He
still had doubts about the great count, despite the successes
Drax was winning for Gavras.

No orders came. Thorisin held military councils in plenty,
but to plan the coming summer campaign against the Yezda.

He seemed certain anyone fighting Onomagoulos had to be his
friend.

Scaurus tried to put his suspicions into words after one
officers' meeting, saying to the Emperor, "The nomads attack
Baanes, too, you know, but not in your interest. Drax wars for
no one but Drax; he travels under your banner now, but only
because it suits him."




316 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Thorisin frowned; the Roman's advice was clearly unwel-
come. "You've given me good service, outlander, and that
sometimes in my despite," he said. "There have been stories
told of you, just as you tell them now against the Namdalener.
A prudent man believes not all of what he sees and only a
little of what he hears. But this I tell you: no rumor-seller has
ever come to me with news that Drax purposed abandoning
me at the hour of my peril."

Scaurus' belly went heavy as lead—how had that report
reached the Emperor? Unsure how much Gavras knew, he did
not dare deny it. Picking his words with care, he said, "If you
believe such tales, why hold me and mine to your service?"

"Because I trust my eyes further than my ears." It was
dismissal and warning both—without proof, Gavras would
not hear charges against the great count. Glad the Emperor
was taking the other question no further, Marcus left hastily.

He had expected a great hue and cry after Viridovix, but
mat, too, failed to materialize. Gaius Philippus' misogyny led
him to a guess the tribune thought close to the mark. "I'd bet
this isn't the first time Komitta's played bump-belly where she
shouldn't," the veteran said. "Would you care to advertise it,
were you Gavras?"

"Hmm." If that was so, much might be explained, from
Thorisin's curious indifference to his mistress' tale of rape to
her remaining mistress instead of queen. "You're getting a feel
for the politics hereabouts," Marcus told the senior centurion.

"Oh, horseturds. When they're thick on the ground as
olives at harvest time, you don't need to feel 'em. The smell
gives them away."

In the westlands Drax kept making gains. When his dis-
patches arrived, Thorisin would read them out to his assem-
bled officers. The great count wrote like an educated
Videssian, a feat that roused only contempt in his fellow is-
lander Utprand.

"Would you listen to that, now?" the mercenary captain
said after one session. '"Goals achieved, objectives being
met.' Vere's Onomagoulos' army and w'y hasn't Drax
smashed it up? T'at's what needs telling."

"Aye, you're right," Soteric echoed vehemently. "Drax
greases his tongue when he talks and his pen when he sets ink
to parchment."

Harry Turtledove            31 7

Marcus put some of their complaint down to jealousy at
Drax' holding a greater command than theirs. From cold expe-
rience, he also knew how much such complaints accom-
plished. He said, "Of course the two of you are but plain,
blunt soldiers of fortune. That you were ready to set Videssos
on its ear last summer has nothing to do with intrigue."

Utprand had the grace to look shamefaced, but Soteric re-
torted, "If the effete imperials can't hold us back, whose fault

is that? Ours? By the Wager, they don't merit this Empire of
theirs."

There were times when Scaurus found the islanders' insis-
tence on their own virtues and the decadence of Videssos
more than he could stomach. He said sharply, "If you're

speaking of effeteness, then betrayal should stand with it, not
so?"

"Certainly," Soteric answered; Utprand, more wary than
his lieutenant, asked, "W'at do you mean, betrayal?"

"Just this," Marcus replied. "Gavras knows we met at the
end of the siege, and what befell. By your Phos, gentlemen,
no Roman told him. Leaving Helvis out of the bargain, only
four ever learned what was planned, and it never went beyond
them. Some one of your men should have his tongue trimmed,
lest he trip on it as it flaps beneath his feet."

"Impossible!" Soteric exclaimed with the confidence of
youth. "We are an honorable folk. Why would we stoop to
such double-dealing?" He glared at his brother-in-law, ready
to take it farther than words.

Utprand spoke to him in the island dialect. Marcus caught
the drift: secrets yielded accidentally could hurt as much as
those given away on purpose. Soteric's mouth was still thin
with anger, but he gave a grudging nod.

The tribune was grateful to the older Namdalener. Unlike
Soteric, Utprand had seen enough to know how few things
were certain. Backing what the officer had pointed out,
Marcus said, "I didn't mean to suggest deliberate treachery,
only that you islanders fall as short of perfection as any other
men."

"You have a rude way with a suggestion." Soteric had a
point, Scaurus realized, but he could not make himself regret
pricking his brother-in-law's self-importance.




318 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

"A priest to see me?" the tribune asked the Roman sentry.
"Is it Nepos from the Academy?"

"No/Sir, just some blue-robe."

Curious, Marcus followed the legionary to the barracks-
hall door. The priest, a nondescript man save for his shaved
pate, bowed and handed him a small roll of parchment sealed
with the patriarch's sky-blue wax. He said, "A special liturgy
of rejoicing will be celebrated in the High Temple at the eighth
hour this afternoon. You are bidden to attend. The parchment
here is your token of entrance. I also have one for your chief
lieutenant."

"Me?" Gaius Philippus' head jerked up. "I have better
things to do with my time, thank you."

"You would decline the patriarchal summons?" the priest
said, shocked.

"Your precious patriarch doesn't know my name," Gaius
Philippus retorted. His eyes narrowed. "So why would he in-
vite me? Hmm—did the Emperor put him up to it?"

The priest spread his hands helplessly. Marcus said,
"Gavras thinks well of you."

"Soldiers know soldiers," Gaius Philippus shrugged. He
tucked the parchment roll into his belt-pouch. "Maybe I'd bet-
ter go."

Putting his own invitation away, Scaurus asked the priest,
"A liturgy of rejoicing? In aid of what?"

"Of Phos' mercy on us all," the man replied, taking him
literally. "Now forgive me, I pray; I have others yet to find."
He was gone before Marcus could reframe his question.

The tribune muttered a mild curse, then glanced around to
gauge the shadows. It could not be later than noon, he de-
cided; at least two hours until the service began. That gave
him time to bathe and then put on his dress cape and helmet,
sweltering though they were. He ran a hand over his cheek,
then sighed. A shave would not be amiss, either. Sighing as
well, Gaius Philippus joined him at his ablutions.

Rubbing freshly scraped faces, the Romans handed their
tokens of admission to a priest at the top of the High Temple's
stairs and made their way into the building. The High Temple
dominated Videssos' skyline, but its heavy form and plain
stuccoed exterior, as always, failed to impress Scaurus, whose
tastes were formed in a different school. As he did not wor-

Harry Turtledove            31 9

ship Phos, he seldom entered the Temple and sometimes for-
got how glorious it was inside. Whenever he did go in, he felt
transported to another, purer, world,

Like all of Phos' shrines, the High Temple was built round
a circular worship area surmounted by a dome, with rows of
benches north, south, east, and west. But here, genius and
limitless resources had refined the simple, basic plan. All the
separate richnesses—benches of highly polished hardwoods,
moss-agate columns, endless gold and silver foil to reflect
light into every comer, walls that imitated Phos' sky in facings
of semiprecious stones—somehow failed to compete with one
another, but were blended by the artisans' skill into a unified
and magnificent whole.

And all that magnificence served to lead the eye upward to
contemplate the Temple's great central dome, which itself
seemed more a product of wizardry than architecture. Liber-
ated by pendentives from the support of columns, it looked to
be upheld only by the shafts of sunlight piercing its many-
windowed base. Even to Marcus the stubborn non-believer, it
seemed a bit of Phos' heaven suspended above the earth.

"Now here is a home fit for a god," Gaius Philippus mut-
tered under his breath. He had never been in the High Temple
before; hardened as he was, he could not keep awe from his
voice.

Phos himself looked down on his worshipers from the in-
terior of the dome; gold-backed glass tesserae sparkled now
here, now there in an ever-shifting play of light. Stern in
judgment, the Videssian god's eyes seemed to see into the
furthest recesses of the Temple—and into the soul of every
man within. From that gaze, from the verdict inscribed in the
book the god held, there could be no appeal. Nowhere had

Scaurus seen such an uncomprising image of harsh, righteous
purpose.

No Videssian, no matter how cynical, sat easy under that
Phos' eyes. To an outlander seeing them for the first time,
they could be overwhelming. Utprand Dagober's son stiffened
to attention and began a salute, as to any great leader, before
he stopped in confusion. "Don't blame him a bit," Gaius Phi-
lippus said. Marcus nodded. No one tittered at the Namda-
lener; here the proud imperials, too, were humble.

Fair face crimsoning, Utprand found a seat. His foxskin
jacket and snug trousers set him apart from the Videssians




320

AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

Harry Turtledove

321

around him. Their flowing robes of multicolored silks, their
high-knotted brocaded fabrics, their velvets and snowy linens
served to complement the High Temple's splendor. Jewels and
gold and silver threadwork gleamed as they moved.

"Exaltation!" A choir of boys in robes of blue samite came
down the aisles and grouped themselves round the central
altar. "Exaltation!" Their pure, unbroken voices filled the
space under the great dome with joyous music. "Exaltation!
Exaltation!" Even Phos' awesome image seemed to take on a
more benign aspect as his young votaries sang his praises.
"Exaltation!"

Censer-swinging priests followed the chorus toward the
worship area; the sweet fragrances of balsam, frankincense,
cedar oil, myrrh, and storax filled the air. Behind the priests
came Balsamon. The congregation rose to honor the patriarch.
And behind Balsamon was Thorisin Gavras in full imperial
regalia. Along with everyone else, Marcus and Gaius Phi-
lippus bowed to the Avtokrator. The tribune tried to keep the
surprise from his face; on his previous visits to the High Tem-
ple, the Emperor had taken no part in its services, but watched
from a small private room set high in the building's eastern
wall.

Balsamon steadied himself, resting a hand on the back of
the patriarchal throne. Its ivory panels, cut in delicate reliefs,
must have delighted the connoisseur in him. After resting for a
moment, he lifted his hands to the Phos in the dome, offering
his god the Videssians' creed: "We bless thee, Phos, Lord
with the right and good mind, by thy grace our protector,
watchful beforehand that the great test of life may be decided
in our favor."

The congregation followed him in the prayer, then chor-
used its "Amens." Marcus heard Utprand, Soteric, and a few
other Namdalener officers append the extra clause they added
to the creed: "On this we stake our very souls."

As always, some Videssians frowned at the addition, but
Balsamon gave them no chance to ponder it. "We are met
today in gladness and celebration!" he shouted. "Sing, and let
the good god hear your rejoicing!" His quavery tenor launched
into a hymn; the choir followed him an instant later. They
swept the worshippers along with them. Taron Leimmokheir's
tuneless bass rose loud above the rest; the devout admiral, his
eyes closed, rocked from side to side in his seat as he sang.

The liturgy of rejoicing was not commonly held. The Vi-
dessian notables, civil and military alike, threw themselves
into the ceremony with such gusto that the interior of the High
Temple took on a festival air. Their enthusiasm was conta-
gious; Scaurus stood and clapped with his neighbors and fol-
lowed their songs as best he could. Most, though, were in the
archaic dialect preserved only in ritual, which he still did not
understand well.

He caught a quick stir of motion through the filigreed
screening that shielded the imperial niche from mundane eyes
and wondered whether it was Komitta Rhangavve or Alypia
Gavra. Both of them, he thought, would be there. He hoped it
was Alypia.

Her uncle the Emperor stood to the right of the patriarchal
throne. Though he did no more than pray with the rest of the
worshipers, his presence among them was enough to rivet
their attention on him.

Balsamon used his hands to mute the congregation's sing-
ing. The voices of the choir rang out in all their perfect clarity,
then they, too, died away, leaving a silence as speaking as
words. The patriarch let it draw itself out to just the right
length before he transformed its nature by taking the few steps
from his ivory throne to the altar at the very center of the
worship area. His audience leaned forward expectantly to lis-
ten to what he would say.

His eyes twinkled; he plainly enjoyed making them wait.
He drummed his stubby fingers on the sheet silver of the al-
tartop, looking this way and that. At last he said, "You really
don't need to hear me at all today." He beckoned Gavras to his
side. "This is the man who asked me to celebrate the liturgy of
rejoicing; let him explain his reasons."

Thorisin ignored the irreverence toward his person; from
Balsamon it was not disrespectful. The Emperor began almost
before his introduction was through. "Word arrived this mom-
ing of battle just east of Gavras, Forces loyal to us—" Even
Gavras's bluntness balked at calling mercenaries by their right
name. "—decisively defeated their opponents. The chief rebel
and traitor, Baanes Onomagoulos, was killed in the fighting."

The three short sentences, bald as any military communi-
que, touched off pandemonium in the High Temple. Bureau-
crats' cheers mingled with those of Thorisin's officers; if the
present Avtokrator was not the pen-pushers' choice, he was a




322 AN EMPEROR FOR THE LEGION

paragon next to Onomagoulos. For once, Gavras had all his
government's unruly factions behind him.

Master of his own house at last, he basked in the applause
like a sunbather on a warm beach. "Now we will deal with the
Yezda as they deserve!" he cried. The cheering got louder.

Marcus nodded in sober satisfaction; Gains Philippus' fist
rose and slowly came down on his knee. They looked at each
other with complete understanding. "Our turn to go west
next," the senior centurion predicted. "Still some work to do
to get ready."

Marcus nodded again. "It's as Thorisin said, though—at
least we'll be fighting the right foe this time."

ABOUT THE

AUTHOR

HARRY TURTLEDOVE is that rarity, a lifelong southern Califomian.
He is married and has two young daughters. After flunking out of
Caltech, he earned a degree in Byzantine history and has taught at
UCLA and Cal State Fullerton. Academic jobs being few and
precarious, however, his primary work since leaving school has
been as a technical writer. He has had fantasy and science fiction
published in Isaac Asimov's. Amazing, Analog, and Fantasy Book.
His hobbies include baseball, chess, and beer.