Harry Turtledove: The Thousand Cities

«To the ice-uh, to the Void-with me if I know what you're talking about,» Tzikas told the eunuch.

«Nor does that surprise me.» Yeliif looked at the renegade as if he were something pallid and slimy that lived in the mud under flat stones by the bank of a creek that did not run clean. Abivard loathed Tzikas with a loathing both pure and hot, but that stare made him feel a moment's sympathy for the Videssian. «Your function is solely to serve the King of Kings, not to be privy to his plans.»

«If we're going to be part of his plans, we ought to have some idea of what those plans are,» Abivard said, and found Tzikas nodding along with him. Accusingly, he went on, «You've known for some time. Why haven't we gained the same knowledge?»

«Until the return of the ambassadors, the King of Kings judged the time unripe,» Yeliif answered. Abivard found the hand that wasn't on his sword tightening into a fist. Yeliif knew the answers, while he didn't even know the questions. Until moments before he hadn't known there were any questions. It all struck him as most unfair.

«Now that the ambassadors are back, will the King of Kings let us know what they were doing while they were away?» Tzikas sounded as if he didn't care for having been left in the dark, either.

Not that that mattered to Yeliif. «In his own good time the King of Kings will inform you,» he said. «It is, then, your task-and I speak to each of you in this instance-to be here to be informed at the time of the King of Kings' choosing and not to eliminate each other before that time. Do you understand?»

He sought to shame them, to make them feel like brawling boys. In no small measure he succeeded. Nevertheless, Abivard new a stir of anger at being considered only insofar as he fit into Sharbaraz' plans. He said, «I do hope the King of Kings will let us know what he intends us to do before we have to do it, not afterward.»

«He will do as he chooses, not as you seek to impose upon-»

The perfect apologist for the King of Kings, Yeliif started to defend him before hearing everything Abivard had had to say. When he realized he'd made himself look foolish, the eunuch bared small, white, even teeth in something closer to a snarl than to a smile. «I don't know why you want to kill this Videssian,» he said, pointing at Tzikas. «Living among his folk for so long has taught you to play meaningless games with words, just as they do.»

«You insult me,» Abivard said.

«No, you insult me,» Tzikas insisted. «Twice, in fact. First you call me a Videssian when I am one no longer, and second you call him-» He pointed at Abivard."-one when he manifestly is not. Were I a Videssian yet, I'd not want him as one.»

«He didn't call me a Videssian,» Abivard said, «and if he had, he would have insulted me, not you, by doing so.»

Tzikas started to raise his sword. The palace guards made ready to pincushion him and Abivard both if they started fighting again. Coldly, Yeliif said, «Do not be more stupid than you can help. I have told you that you and Abivard are required in the future plans of the King of Kings. When those plans are accomplished, you may fight if you so desire. Until then you are his. Remember it and comport yourselves accordingly.» He swept away, the hem of his caftan brushing the floor.

«Put up your swords,» the guards' leader said as he had before. Abivard and Tzikas reluctantly obeyed. The guard went on, «Now, I'm gonna do like I said before, split my men in half and take you noble gentlemen back where you belong.»

«You wouldn't know about these ambassadors, would you?» Abivard asked him as they walked down the hallway.

«Who, me?» The fellow shook his head. «I don't know anything. That's not what I'm here for, knowing things. What I'm here for is to keep people from killing other people they're not supposed to kill. You know what I mean?»

«I suppose so,» Abivard said, wondering where Sharbaraz had found such a magnificently phlegmatic man. A court officer who did not want to know things surely ranked as a freak of nature.

When Abivard walked into the suite of rooms, the soldiers stayed out in the hallway, presumably to make certain he did not go out hunting Tzikas. Roshnani stared at them till he shut the door after himself; too often in the past couple of years soldiers had stood in the hallways outside their rooms. She pointed past Abivard to the guards and asked, «What are they in aid of?»

«Nothing of any great consequence,» he answered airily. «Tzikas and I had a go at settling our differences, that's all.»

«Settling your-» Roshnani scrambled to her feet and took great care in inspecting him from all sides. At last, having satisfied herself almost against her will, she said, «You're not bleeding anywhere.»

«No, I'm not. Neither is Tzikas, worse luck,» Abivard said. «And if we go after each other again, we face the displeasure of the King of Kings-so I've been told, at any rate.» He lowered his voice. «That and a silver arket will make me care an arket's worth.»

Roshnani nodded. «Sharbaraz would have done better to take Tzikas' head himself.» She tossed her own head in long-standing exasperation. «No plan of his could possibly be clever enough to justify keeping the renegade alive.»

«If you expect me to argue with you, you'll be disappointed,» Abivard said, to which they both laughed. He grew thoughtful. «Do you know anything about ambassadors returning?»

«I didn't know any ambassadors were out,» his principal wife answered, «so I could hardly know they've come back.» That was logical enough to satisfy the most exacting, finicky Videssian. Roshnani went on, «Where did you hear about them?»

«From Yeliif, after the guardsmen kept me from giving Tzikas everything he deserved. Whoever they are, wherever they went, however they came back here, they have something to do with Sharbaraz' precious plan.»

«Whatever that may be,» Roshnani said.

«Whatever that may be,» Abivard echoed.

«Whatever it is, when will you find out about it? Roshnani asked.

«Whenever Sharbaraz King of Kings, may his days be long and his realm increase, finds a day long enough for him to have the time to give to me,» Abivard answered. «Maybe tomorrow, maybe next spring.» On that cheerful note conversation flagged.

Nine days after Abivard and Tzikas tried to kill each other, Yeliif knocked on the door to Abivard's suite. When Abivard opened the door to let him in, he stuck his head out and looked up and down the hall. The guardsmen had been gone for a couple of days. «How may I help you?» Abivard asked warily; Yeliif as anything other than inimical still struck him as curious.

The beautiful eunuch said, «You are bidden to an audience with Sharbaraz King of Kings, may his days be long and his realm increase. You shall come with me this moment.»

«I'm ready,» Abivard said, though he wasn't, not really. It was, he thought sadly, typical of the King of Kings to leave him on a shelf, as it were, for weeks at a time and then, when wanting him, to want him on the instant.

«I am also bidden to tell you that Tzikas shall be there,» Yeliif said. When Abivard did nothing more than nod, the eunuch also nodded thoughtfully, as if he'd passed a test. He said, «I can tell you-» Not I am bidden to tell you, Abivard noted. «-that Tus and Piran are attending the King of Kings.»

«I'm sorry, but I don't know those names nor the men attached to them,» Abivard said.

«They are the ambassadors whose recent return has provoked this audience,» Yeliif answered.

«Are they?» Abivard said, interest quickening in his voice. Now, at last, he would get to find out just how harebrained Sharbaraz' grandiose plan, whatever it was, would turn out to be. He had no great expectations for it, only the small one of having his curiosity satisfied. In aid of which… «Ambassadors to whom?» he asked. «I didn't know we'd sent an embassy to Maniakes, even if he has been closer to Mashiz lately than he usually gets.» He also remembered the Videssian ambassador Sharbaraz had imprisoned and let die but did not find mentioning him politic.