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struggles in vain," Maniakes said. "And Genesios, curse him, was right to ask
if I'd do any better than he at holding back the Empire's foes. So far, the
answer looks to be no."
"You've done far better at everything else, though," Kameas said, "Videssians
no longer war with Videssians and, the present unpleasantness aside, we've not
had a single pretender rise against you. The Empire stands united behind you,
waiting for our luck to turn."
"Except for the people my brother, for instance who stand behind me so I won't
see the knife till it goes into my back, and the ones who think I'm an
incestuous sinner who ought to be cast into the outer darkness of
excommunication and anathema."
Kameas bowed. "As your Majesty appears more inclined today to contemplate
darkness than light, I shall make no further effort to inject with any undue
optimism." He glided away.
Maniakes stared after him, then started to laugh. The vestiarios had a knack
for puncturing his pretensions. This time, he had managed to pack a warning in
with his jibe. A man who contemplated darkness rather than light was liable to
end up contemplating Skotos rather than Phos. As he had when questioning
Parsmanios, Maniakes spat on the floor in rejection of the evil god.
Someone tapped on the door: Lysia. "I have news, I think," she said. Maniakes
raised an eyebrow, waiting for her to go on. She did, a little hesitantly:
"I I think I'm with child. I would have waited longer to say anything, because
it's early to be quite sure, but " Her words poured out in a rush. " you could
use good news today."
"Oh, by Phos, that is the truth!" Maniakes caught her in his arms. "May it be
so." Likarios remained his heir, but another baby, especially one that was his
and Lysia's, would be welcome. He resolved, as he had more than once before,
to pay more attention to the children he had already fathered.
He studied Lysia with some concern. Niphone had been thin and frail, while his
cousin whom he had wed was almost stocky and in full, vigorous health.
Nevertheless . . .
"It will be all right," she said, as if plucking the alarm from his mind. "It
will be fine."
"Of course it will," he said, knowing it was not of course. "Even so, you'll
see Zoïle as soon as may be; no point waiting." Lysia might have started to
say something. Whatever it was, she thought better of it and contented herself
with a nod.
Spring came. For Maniakes, it was not only a season of new leaf and new life.
As soon as he was reasonably confident no storm would send a ship to the
bottom, he took Parsmanios from the prison under the government offices and
sent him off to exile in Prista, where watching the Khamorth travel back and
forth with their flocks over the Pardrayan steppe was the most exciting sport
the locals had.
Maniakes, on the other hand, watched Lysia. She was indeed pregnant, and
proved it by vomiting once every morning, whereupon she would be fine . . .
till the next day. Any little thing could touch off the fit. One day, Kameas
proudly fetched in a pair of poached eggs. Lysia started to eat them, but
bolted for the basin before she took a bite.
"They were looking at me," she said darkly, after rinsing her mouth out with
wine. Later, she broke her fast on plain bread.
Dromons continually patrolled the Cattle Crossing. Maniakes watched Abivard as
well as Lysia. This spring, the Makuraner general gave no immediate sign of
pulling back from Across. Maniakes worried over that, and pondered how to cut
Abivard's long supply lines through the westlands to get him to withdraw.
But, when the blow fell, Abivard did not strike it. Etzilios did. A ship
brought the unwelcome news to Videssos the city. "The Kubratoi came past Varna
and they're heading south," the captain of the merchantman, a stocky,
sunburned fellow named Spiridion, told Maniakes after rising from a clumsy
proskynesis.
"Oh, a pestilence!" the Avtokrator burst out. He pointed a finger at
Spiridion. "Have they come down in their monoxyla again? If they have, our war
galleys will make them sorry."
But the ship captain shook his head. "No, your Majesty, this isn't like that
last raid. I heard about that. But the beggars are on horseback this time, and
looking to steal what's not spiked down and to burn what is."
"When I beat Etzilios, I'll pack his head in salt and send it round to every
city in the Empire, so people can see I've done it," Maniakes growled, down
deep in his throat. All at once, thinking of how fine he would feel to do that
to the Kubrati khagan, he understood what must have gone through Genesios'
vicious mind after disposing of an enemy or of someone he imagined to be an
enemy, at any rate. The comparison was sobering.
Spiridion seemed oblivious to his distress. "We'd be well rid of that khagan,
yes we would. But you've got all these soldiers sitting around eating like
there's no tomorrow and pinching the tavern girls. Isn't it time you got some
use from 'em? Don't mean to speak too bold, but "
"Oh, yes, we'll fight them," Maniakes said. "But if they're already down past
Varna, we'll have a busy time pushing them back where they belong."
Where they really belonged was north of the Astris, not on any territory that
had ever belonged to Videssos. Likinios had tried pushing them back onto the
eastern edge of the steppe, and what had it got him? Mutiny and death, nothing
better. And now the Kubratoi, like wolves that scented meat, were sharp-nosing
their way down toward the suburbs of Videssos the city.
Maniakes rewarded Spiridion with gold he could not afford to spend and sent
him on his way. That done, he knew he ought to have ordered a force out to
meet Etzilios' raiders, but hadn't the will to do it on the instant. After
Parsmanios and Tzikas had conspired against him, he had asked the lord with
the great and good mind what could possibly go wrong next. By now, he told
himself bitterly, he should have known better than to send forth such
questions. All too often, they had answers.
A couple of minutes after Spiridion left, Lysia came into the chamber where
Maniakes sat shrouded in gloom. "The servants say " she began hesitantly.
He might have known that the servants would say. Trying to keep anything
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