Harry Turtledove - Hammer And Anvil

"I know," Maniakes said. They also took the chance of having the scandal become all too dreadfully obvious in nine months' time-although actually, if that befell, it would become obvious rather sooner. With that worry in mind, he went on, "The best way I can think of to deal with this is for me to marry you now, in spite of everything… if that's what you want to do, of course."

"It's what I'd like," she said, nodding. "But will a priest marry us? If he does, will Agathios anathematize him? And what will our families say?"

"I'm sure I can find a priest who will do as I tell him," Maniakes answered.

"What Agathios will do… I don't know. He's a political beast, but this-We'll just have to find out." If Agathios thundered of sin, the city mob was liable to erupt. "We'll have to find out about our fathers, too, and our brothers." He had known this would complicate his life. Maybe he hadn't let himself think about how much.

And maybe the same thoughts were running through Lysia's mind. She said, "It really might be easiest to pretend this didn't-" She stopped and shook her head. Plainly, she didn't want to do that.

Neither did Maniakes. He said, "I've loved you as a cousin for as long as I can remember, and I've always thought a lot of your good sense. And now, with this-" Even after they had made love, he hesitated about openly saying so. "-I can't imagine wanting anyone else as my wife." He went over to her and took her in his arms. She clung to him, nodding against his chest.

"We'll just have to get through it, that's all," she said, her voice muffled.

"So we will," Maniakes said. "Maybe it won't be so hard."

After squeezing her once more, he went to the door and unbarred it. Then he opened it and looked up and down the corridor. He saw no one, heard no one. For a moment, he was relieved; we got away with it ran through his mind. Then he thought about how seldom the corridors of the imperial residence were so eerily quiet and deserted. Odds were that the servants were deliberately avoiding going anywhere near that door he had just unlocked.

He clicked his tongue between his teeth. A serving maid wouldn't have to see Lysia's drawers. The secret was already out.

The elder Maniakes took a long swallow of wine. He peered down into the depths of the silver cup, as if he were Bagdasares, using it as a scrying tool. "You aim to do what?" he rumbled.

"To marry my cousin," Maniakes answered. "We love each other, she has the best head on her shoulders of anyone in the family except maybe you, and… we love each other." His ears heated at the repetition, but it was done.

His father raised the cup again, draining it this time. He was careless when he set it down on the table, and it fell over, ringing sweetly as a goldpiece. He muttered to himself as he straightened it. To Maniakes' amazement, he started to laugh. "It does keep things in the family, doesn't it?"

"Is that all you have to say?" Maniakes demanded.

"No, not by a long shot," the elder Maniakes said. "Phos only knows what my brother will do-is Lysia telling him?" He waited for Maniakes to nod before continuing, "The patriarch will scream 'Incest!' at the top of his lungs, you know. Have you thought about that?"

Maniakes nodded again. "Oh, yes." Part of him was screaming the same thing. He was doing his best not to listen to it. The same probably held true for Lysia. That was one more complication he hadn't thoroughly thought through. And yet-"It didn't just… happen out of the blue, you know."

"Oh, yes, I do know that," his father answered. "One day back on Kalavria when Rotrude was pregnant with your boy-" He put one hand out in front of his own considerable belly. "-she told me she'd stick a knife in you if she ever caught you in bed with your cousin."

"Did she?" Maniakes said, amazed. He was, in fact, amazed for a couple of reasons. "I would have guessed she'd tell me that, not you."

"So would I," the elder Maniakes said. "I think being with child might have had something to do with her acting so weak and womanish." He rolled his eyes to show he did not intend that to be taken seriously. "But the point of it is, she'd noticed the two of you. I had, too, but I wasn't so sure. I'd known the both of you longer than she had, of course, and I knew you'd always been friendly. She was the one who saw it was something more than that."

"Rotrude always knew me pretty well," Maniakes said soberly. "Seems she knew me better than I knew myself there." He walked over to the pitcher of wine, which had on it a low relief of a fat old man drunkenly chasing a maiden who was neither fat nor old nor overburdened with clothing. After pouring his own cup full, he raised it to his lips and drank it down without drawing breath. Then he filled it again. "But, Father, what am I going to do?"

"Eh?" The elder Maniakes dug a finger in his ear. "You told me what you were going to do. You're going to marry her, aren't you? What do you expect me to do about it? Tell you I think you're a fool? I do think you're a fool-a couple of fools, I gather. But am I going to take a leather strap and turn your arse red? Send you to your room without supper? By the good god, son, you're a man now, and entitled to your choices, no matter how stupid I think they are. And you're the Avtokrator. I've read the chronicles, I have. Avtokrators' fathers who try giving them orders have a curious way of ending up shorter by a head."

Maniakes stared at him in genuine horror. "If you think I'd do such a thing, I'd better take off the red boots and shave my own head for a monk."

"No, son, the monastery is the other place for fathers who make their imperial sons unhappy," the elder Maniakes said. He studied the Avtokrator. "Are you sure this can't be settled somewhere short of marriage?"

"You mean, by keeping her as mistress?" Maniakes asked. His father nodded. He shook his head. "I wouldn't take honor away from her." His laugh held irony.

"Some would say falling in love with her did that, wouldn't they? Well, let them. But that's not the only problem I see. Suppose we don't wed, but I do take another wife one day. What would she and her family think about the arrangement Lysia and I have?"

"Nothing good, I've no doubt," the elder Maniakes said. "Suppose instead that you put your cousin aside now? What then?"

"Then my life looks cold and empty and dark as Skotos' icy hell," Maniakes answered, spitting on the floor in rejection of the dark god. "When I look out at the Empire, gloom is all I see. Must I see the same when I look here at the imperial residence?"

"I told you, son, you're a man grown," his father answered. "If this is what you want and what my niece wants-" He coughed a little at that, but went on gamely enough. "-then it's what you will have. Where we go from there is any man's guess, but I expect we'll find out before long."

Kameas said, "Your Majesty, the most holy ecumenical patriarch Agathios has arrived at the residence in response to your summons."

"Good." Maniakes' stomach knotted within him at the prospect of the meeting that lay ahead, but he did not show it. "Bring him to me. Full formality throughout here, mind you; he is not summoned for a friendly chat."

"I shall observe your Majesty's requirements in all particulars," the vestiarios replied with dignity. He swept away. The tiny, mincing steps he took under his long robe made him seem to float as he moved, like a ship running before the wind.

"Your Majesty," Agathios said at the doorway after Kameas announced him. He went down to his knees and then to his belly in full proskynesis. When he started to get up before Maniakes had given him leave, the Avtokrator coughed sharply. Agathios bent his back once more, touching his forehead to the marble floor.

"Rise, most holy sir," Maniakes said after a wait he judged suitable. "You may take a seat."