The Legion of Videssos (26 page)

Targitaus’ wolfskin cap kept wanting to slide down over the chief’s left eye. He pushed it back, looked owlishly at Viridovix. “You one with us,” he said again, his accent rougher than it had been a few minutes before. “You should be glad; it is the right of a man. Do you see a wench who pleases you?”

“Well, fry me for a sausage!” the Gaul exclaimed. “I never looked.” That he had paid no attention to the women in the tent was a measure of his anxiety.

Now he made amends for the lapse. There were times when loneliness stabbed like a knife, remembering the pale Celtic women with hair sun-colored or red to match his own. But he was not one to live in the past for long and took his chances where he found them. He grinned, thinking of Komitta Rhangavve.

It was not that he expected any such high-strung beauties in Targitaus’ tent. Like the Vaspurakaners, the Khamorth were heavier-featured than the Videssians. The faces of their men often held great character, but the women tended to have a stern, forbidding aspect to them. Their clothes did not soften their appearance, either; they wore trousers, tunics, and cloaks identical in cut to those of the plainsmen, and of the same furs and leathers. In place of the men’s inevitable fur caps, though, they wore conical headdresses of silk, ornamented with bright stones, and topped by crests of iridescent feathers from ducks and pheasants. That helped, but not enough.

Worse still, Viridovix thought as his eye roved, a good many of the women on the southern side of the tent had to be the wives of Targitaus’ officers: chunky, far from young, and some of them looking as used to command as the nomad chief. He had had enough of that last from Komitta. They
were surveying him, too, with a disconcerting frankness; he was as glad he could not understand their comments.

Then he paused. Not far from Targitaus’ couch was a girl whose strong features, as with Nevrat Sviodo, had their own kind of beauty. It was her eyes, the Celt decided—they seemed to smile even when the rest of her face was still. She met his glance as readily as did the older women by her, but without their coarse near-mockery. “That’s a likely-looking lass,” he said to Targitaus.

The Khamorth’s thick eyebrows went up like signal flags. “Glad you think so,” he said dryly, “but pick again, a serving-girl, if you please. That is Seirem, my daughter.”

“Och, begging your pardon I am,” Viridovix said, reddening. He was very much aware of his fragile place here. “How is it I’m to tell the wenches from some laird’s lady?”

“By the bughtaq, of course,” Targitaus answered. When he saw the Gaul did not know the word, he gestured to show he meant the Khamorth women’s headdress. Viridovix nodded, chiding himself for not noticing that detail. Along with jade and polished opals, Videssian goldpieces ornamented Seirem’s bughtaq; she was plainly no slavey.

The Celt’s gaze settled on a woman of perhaps twenty-five, without Seirem’s lively face, but attractive enough and nicely rounded. Except for a few reddish stones and a very small piece of jade, her headdress was plain. “She’ll do me, an it suit you,” he said.

“Who?” Targitaus put down the skin of kavass from which he had been slurping. “Oh, Azarmi. Aye, why not? She serves my wife Borane.”

Viridovix waved her over to him. One of the richly adorned women, a particularly heavy-set one, said something that set all her companions rolling in helpless mirth. Azarmi shook her head, which only made the old women laugh harder.

The Gaul offered her kavass from the skin Targitaus had laid aside. With no language in common, it was hard to put her at ease. She did not pull away when he touched her, but did not warm to him either.

So it proved later, too, when the bedding was spread round the banked fire. She was compliant and did not seem resentful, but he could not excite her. Piqued and disappointed, he
thought hungrily of Seirem asleep a few feet away until he drifted off himself.

“My father has it from his grandfather,” Arigh said, “that when the Arshaum first saw the Shaum, they took it for an arm of the sea.”

“I believe it,” Gorgidas said, looking down at the slate-blue river flowing majestically southwest toward the distant Mylasa Sea. He shaded his eyes; the reflection of the afternoon sun sparkled dazzlingly bright. He tried to guess how wide the river was, and failed—a mile and a half? Two miles? Whatever the answer, the Shaum made the Kouphis, the Arandos, any stream Gorgidas had seen in Gaul or Italy or Greece, into a pygmy by comparison.

He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, felt grit rasp his skin. Goudeles, still foppish even in plains costume, brushed a bit of dry grass from his sleeve. “As if reaching this stream was not trial enough, however shall we cross it?” he asked no one in particular.

A good question, the Greek thought. The nearest ford would be hundreds of miles north. It would take a demigod to bridge the Shaum, and who on the wood-scarce steppe knew anything of boatbuilding?

Skylitzes bared his teeth in a smile. “How well do you swim, Pikridios?”

“Over that distance? At least as well as you, by Phos.”

“The horses are better than either of you,” Arigh said. “Come on.” He led them down to the bank of the Shaum, dismounted and stripped, then climbed back on his horse. The rest of the embassy party did likewise. Arigh directed, “Ride your lead beast out until he has to swim, then slide off and keep a good grip round his neck. I’ll go last; here, Psoes, you lead my string with yours. I’ll take just the one animal and make sure nobody else’s horses decide to stay on land.” He drew his saber, tested the point with his thumb.

Gorgidas hefted the oiled leather sack in which he kept his precious manuscript. Catching the Arshaum’s eye, he said, “I’ll hold on with one hand—this has to stay dry.” The nomad shrugged; if the Greek cared to take chances for the sake of some scratchings, that was his affair.

Surveying Goudeles’ pudgy form, Lankinos Skylitzes said,
“You’ll float better than I do, anyhow, pen-pusher.” Goudeles sniffed.

Gorgidas twitched the reins and urged his mount forward. It tried to swerve when it realized he wanted it to go in the river, but he kicked it in the ribs and kept it on a straight course. It swung its head back resentfully. He booted it again. Like a bather testing the water with one toe, it stepped daintily in, then paused once more.
“Ithi!”
the exasperated Greek shouted in his own tongue. “Go on!” As he swung a foot free of the stirrups for another kick, the horse did.

It gave a frightened snort when its hooves no longer touched ground, but then struck out strongly for the far bank. Seen from only a few inches above the water, that seemed impossibly far away. Back on the eastern bank, a trooper’s remount balked at entering the Shaum. Arigh prodded it with his sword. It neighed shrilly and bolted in, dragging the two beasts behind it along willy-nilly.

The Shaum’s current was not as strong as Gorgidas had expected. It pulled the swimming horses and their masters south somewhat, making the journey across the river longer than it would have been, but did not really hamper their swim. The water was cool and very clear. The Greek could look down to the rocks and river plants on the bottom. About halfway through the crossing he started in alarm—the dun-colored fish rooting about on the bottom was longer from nose to wickedly forked tail than his horse was. “Shark!” he shouted.

“Nay, no sharks in the Shaum,” Skylitzes reassured him. “They call it a mourzoulin hereabouts; the Videssian name is sturgeon.”

“I don’t care what they call it,” the Greek said, frightened out of curiosity. “Does it bite?”

“No, it only has a little toothless sucker-mouth for worms and such.”

“Salted, the eggs are very fine,” Goudeles said with relish. “A rare delicacy.”

“The flesh is good smoked,” Prevails Haravash’s son added. “And from the swim bladder we make—what is the word for letting some light through?”

“Translucent,” Goudeles supplied.

“Thank you, sir. Yes, we make translucent windows to fit into tent panels.”

“And if it had a song, I suppose you’d use that, too,” Gorgidas said darkly. The ugly brute still looked dangerous.

Prevails took the Greek seriously. “On the plains we use everything. There is too little to waste.” Gorgidas only grunted, keeping an eye on the sturgeon, or mourzoulin, or whatever it was. It paid him no attention. After a while, he could not see it any more.

By the time the western bank drew near, his arms were exhausted from holding the mouth of his leather bag above water, even though he had taken to switching it from one to the other. That also meant his grip on his horse was not what it should have been. The shore was only about thirty yards away when he and the animal parted company. He thrashed frantically—and felt his feet scrape bottom; the steppe pony was still too short to touch. Now it was his turn to help his horse. Sighing with relief, he did so, and led the beast and his remounts up onto the land of Shaumkhiil. Save that the river was behind him, it seemed no different from Pardraya to the east.

Skylitzes splashed ashore a few feet away from him. He reached into the bag and dug out a stylus. “How do you spell ‘mourzoulin’?” he demanded. Looking resigned, Skylitzes told him.

Robes swirling about him, Avshar paced his tent like a caged panther. His great height and long strides made it seem cramped and tiny, built for a race of dwarfs. The sorcerer lashed out with a booted foot. A cushion flew across the tent, rebounded from the tight-stretched felt of the wall, and an image of a black-corseleted warrior hurling a brace of three-spiked thunderbolts thumped to the ground.

The wizard-prince swung round on Varatesh. “Incompetent!” he snarled. “Lackwitted, poxy maggot! You puling, milk-livered pile of festering dung, cutting your filthy heart out would be revenge too small for your botchery!”

They were alone; even in his rage, Avshar knew better than to revile the outlaw chief in front of his men. The wizard’s contempt, the lash of his words, burned like fire. Varatesh bowed his head. More than anything else, he wanted the regard of this man, and bore abuse for which he would have killed any other.

But he reckoned himself slave to no one and said, “I was not the only one to make mistakes on this venture. The man you sent me after was not the one I found. He—”

Avshar dealt him a tremendous backhand buffet that stretched him in the dirt of the tent floor. He rose tasting blood, his head ringing. He slid into fighter’s crouch. He had loved Kodoman, too, and Kodoman also stuck first … “Who are you, to use me so?” he whispered, tears stinging his eyes.

Avshar laughed, a laugh as black as the mail his icon showed. He swept aside the mantlings that always hid his face. “Well, worm,” he said, “who am I?”

Varatesh whimpered and fell to his knees.

“H
ERE,”
T
HEKLA
Z
ONARA SAID, HANDING A SERVANT A
silver candlestick. “This will fit in the load you’re packing.” When the man held it in confusion, she took it from him and stowed it away. “And this,” she added, edging in beside it a gilded silver plate decorated with a hunting scene in low relief.

“We must save these, too,” her sister-in-law Erythro cried, running up with an armload of brightly glazed earthenware cups. “They’re too lovely to be left for the Namdaleni.”

“Merciful Phos!” Sittas Zonaras said. “Why not pack up the pigs’ swill troughs while you’re about it? That’s worthless junk; the islanders are welcome to it. There’s little enough time for this move as is. Don’t waste it worrying over excess baggage.” He shook his head in mock annoyance.

“And don’t you waste it bickering with Erythro,” his daughter Ypatia told him.

The nobleman sighed and turned to Scaurus. “Women should never be allowed to be sensible, don’t you think, outlander?”

Still holding her cups, Erythro faced up to the Roman like a pugnacious sparrow. “Why ask him? What does he know of
sensible? He brought the Namdaleni down on us in the first place. Were it not for him, we’d still be snug here instead of trekking into the hills like so many Khamorth following their herds.”

“Enough!” Sittas said; now his irritation was real. “Were it not for him, I’d be dead in the woods or captive with all the estate for ransom. Had you forgotten that?”

“Well, yes, I had,” Erythro said, not a bit abashed. “This move has me all in a frenzy, and no wonder, too!” She bent and piled the cups on top of the candlestick and plate. Her brother rolled his eyes and looked pointedly at Ypatia, who pretended not to notice.

Though at first Marcus had thought Erythro’s comment monumentally unfair, on reflection he was not so sure. Plenty of nobles in the westlands were coming to terms with the Namdaleni and the “Emperor” Mertikes. “You might have been able to do the same, Sittas, were it not for my men being here,” the tribune finished. Erythro smirked.

“Don’t encourage her,” Zonaras said. He went on, “Me, make common cause with bandits and heretics? I’d sooner see this villa burned over my head than bend the knee to Drax and his straw man. Nay, I’m glad to be with you.”

The villa might burn regardless, the tribune thought unhappily. For all their entrenching, for all the manpower Pakhymer and his Khatrishers added, if Drax threw the whole weight of his army against the legionaries, they would be crushed. And that full weight was coming; Pakhymer’s scouts said the Namdalener column would cross the Arandos tomorrow. So it was retreat again, this time south into the hills.

Leaving the Zonarai still arguing over what was to go and what had to be left behind, Scaurus went outside. Lowing cattle and milling sheep streamed past; the herdsmen needed no urging to get their flocks out of the oncoming army’s way. “Come on, keep them moving!” the chief herder was shouting. “No, Stotzas, don’t let them drink now. Time enough for that later, when everyone’s passed through.”

Gaius Philippus, who already had the Romans ready to travel, watched the herder with respect. “He’d make a good officer,” he said to the tribune.

Marcus had an inspiration. “Well, why not make him one, then? Who better to lead your irregulars?”

The senior centurion stared. “By the gods, sir, that’s a triple six!” The two Romans smiled at each other briefly. In Videssian dice, sixes were the worst throw, not the best—the sort of little thing that left the legionaries permanently alien here. “You there!” Gaius Philippus called.