Harry Turtledove: Krispos of Videssos

"What is the name of this monk?" Krispos demanded.

This time Gnatios stood mute. His reflection answered for him nonetheless. "Harmosounos."

Krispos nodded to Trokoundos. "This is an excellent magic." The wizard's heavy-lidded eyes lit up.

Gnatios shifted from foot to foot, awaiting the next question. "Where did Petronas plan to go?" Krispos asked him.

"I do not know," he answered, out of his own mouth.

"A moment, your Majesty," Trokoundos said sharply. He fiddled with the mirrors again. "He sought to move enough to shift his image from the second mirror."

"Don't play such games again, most holy sir. I promise you would regret it," Krispos told Gnatios. "Now I will ask once more, where did Petronas plan to go?"

"I do not know," Gnatios repeated. This time, strangely, Krispos heard the words both straight from him and from the mirror at his back. He glanced toward Trokoundos.

"He speaks the truth, your Majesty," the wizard said.

"I was afraid that was what that meant," Krispos said. "Let's try something else, then. Answer me this, most holy sir: you being kinsman to Petronas, where would you go in his boots?"

Gnatios plainly tried to lie again; his lips moved, but no sound came out of his mouth. Instead, his doubly reflected image replied, "Petronas' greatest estates are in the westlands, between the towns of Garsavra and Resaina. There he would find the most support for any bid to take the crown."

"You expect him to do that, eh?" Krispos said.

The answer to that question was so obvious, Krispos did not expect Gnatios to bother giving it aloud. And, indeed, the patriarch stayed silent. But under Trokoundos' spell, his second image spoke for him. "Don't you expect it, your Majesty?"

Krispos' chuckle was dry. "Well, yes, as a matter of fact." He turned to Trokoundos. "I'm in your debt once more, it seems."

Trokoundos waved that away. "I'm happy to do what I can for you, your Majesty. Your warning saved me from Anthimos' wrath a couple of years ago."

"And your wizardry let me live through the enchantment with which Petronas would have killed me otherwise," Krispos said. "Don't be shy when you name your fee for today."

"Your Majesty, people have accused me of many things, but never of being shy about my fees," Trokoundos said.

Whether anxious over his fate or simply resentful at being forgotten for me moment, Gnatios burst out, "What will you do with me, your Majesty?"

"A good question," Krispos said musingly. "If helping to set up a rival Emperor isn't treason, what is? Shall I put your head on the Milestone as a warning to others, Gnatios?"

"I'd rather you didn't," the patriarch answered, coolly enough to win Krispos' reluctant admiration.

"I think you should, Krispos," Dara said. Gnatios winced as she went on, "What does a traitor deserve but the axe? What would Petronas do to you, and to me, and to our child, if—Phos prevent it—he beat you?"

Gnatios missed very little. Though he could not have known of Dara's pregnancy before she mentioned it, he used it at once, saying, "Your Majesty, would you slay the man who performed your marriage ceremony and so made your heir legitimate?"

"Why not," Dara shot back, "when part of the reason you married us was to draw attention away from the holy Skirios' monastery so you could loose Petronas against us?" The patriarch winced again.

"I don't think I'll kill you now," Krispos said. Gnatios looked delighted, Dara disappointed. Krispos went on, "I do cast you down from the patriarchal throne. In your place I intend to propose the name of the abbot Pyrrhos."

Gnatios winced a third time. "I'd almost rather you killed me, if afterwards you named in my place someone not a fanatic."

"I can trust the clerics of his faction. If I thought I could trust one from yours, I'd take you up on that."

"I did say 'almost,' your Majesty," the patriarch reminded him quickly.

"So you did. Here's what I will do. Till the synod names Pyrrhos, I will send you to the monastery of the holy Skirios. There you will be under his hand as abbot. That should be enough to keep you out of mischief for the time being." Krispos watched Gnatios open his mouth to speak. "Think twice if you are about to say again that you'd rather be dead, most holy sir—no, holy sir, for you are but a monk now. I just may oblige you."

Gnatios glared at him but said nothing.

Krispos turned to Tyrovitzes. "You heard what I ordered?" The eunuch nodded. "Good. Take this monk to the monastery, then, and tell the abbot he is not to leave no matter what happens. Take the Halogai with you as you go, too, to make sure the man doesn't get stolen on the way."

"As you say, your Majesty." Tyrovitzes nodded to Gnatios. "If you will come with me, holy sir?" Unlike Krispos, Tyrovitzes adjusted to changing honorifics without having to think twice. Still in his patriarch robe, Gnatios followed the chamberlain away.

"I wish you'd slain him," Dara said.

"He may still have some use alive," Krispos said. "Besides, I don't think he'll be going anywhere, not now. He and Pyrrhos have despised each other for years. Now that he's in Pyrrhos' clutches, he'll be locked up tighter and watched better than if he was in prison—and fed worse, too, I'd wager."

He sighed. "All this would be much easier if I really believed the soldiers would turn up Petronas still inside the city. If they don't—" Krispos stood thinking for a while, trying to work out what he would have to do to hunt down Petronas loose in the countryside.

"I fear they won't," Dara said.

"So do I," Krispos told her. Petronas was both clever and nervy. The only flaw Krispos had ever noted in him was a streak of vanity; because he could do so much, he thought he could do anything. Some time in the monastery might even have cured him of that, Krispos reflected gloomily.

"You should proclaim him outlaw," Dara said. "A price on his head will make folk more likely to betray him to you."

"Aye, I'll do that," Krispos said. "I'll also send a troop of cavalry out to the estates that used to be his. Though Anthimos took them over, I expect most of the men on them will still be people Petronas chose, and they may still be loyal to him."

"Be careful of the officer you choose to command that troop," Dara warned. "You won't want anyone who served under him."

"You're right," Krispos said. But Petronas had headed the imperial army while his nephew frittered away the days. That meant every Videssian officer had served under him, at least indirectly. The commanders in the city had sworn oaths of loyalty to Krispos. Those in the field were sending in written pledges; a couple arrived every day. How much would such pledges mean, when measured against years of allegiance to a longtime leader? Krispos was convinced oaths and pledges were only as reliable as the men who gave them. He wished he'd had time to learn more about his officers before facing a challenge like this.

As is the way of such things, wishing failed to furnish him the time he needed. He sighed again. "I'll pick as carefully as I can."

Days passed. The search of the city failed to yield any trace of Petronas. At Krispos' order, scribes calloused their fingers writing scores of copies of a proclamation that branded Petronas outlaw, rebel, and renegade monk. They posted them in the plaza of Palamas, in the lesser square called the forum of the Ox, in the forecourts to the High Temple, and at each of the gates in Videssos the city's walls. Before long, dozens of people claimed to have seen Petronas. So far as Krispos could tell, no one really had.

Imperial couriers galloped east and west from the city with more copies of the proclamation. A cavalry troop also galloped west. Other couriers took ship to carry word of Petronas' escape to coastal towns more quickly than horses could reach them.