Harry Turtledove - Krispos the Emperor

When she was through, she dried her eyes on the fabric of his surcoat. "Better?" he asked, patting her back as if she were a child.

"Who can say?" she answered. "I made the choice; I have to live with it. I love you. Phostis, I do, but I hadn't thought through everything that might happen after I got onto that fishing boat with you. My father—" She started to cry again.

"That would have happened anyhow, I think," he said. "You didn't have anything to do with it. Even when we were on the worst of terms—which seemed like much of the time—I knew my father did what he did well. I doubt the Thanasioi would have won the civil war even with us, and if they lost it ... Early in his reign, my father paid a price for showing his enemies more mercy than they deserved. One of the things that set him apart from most people is that he learns from his mistakes. He gives rebels no second chance these days."

"But my father wasn't just a rebel," she said. "He was my father."

To that, Phostis had no good answer. Luckily for him, he didn't have to grope for a poor one. From outside the tent, a Haloga guard called, "Young Majesty, here's a man would have speech with you."

"I'm coming," Phostis answered. To Olyvria, he added in a low voice, "Probably a messenger from my father. Who else would disturb me?"

He climbed to his feet. Tired as he was, the iron he wore felt doubly heavy. He blinked against the bright afternoon sunshine as he stepped outside, then stopped in surprise and horror. "You!" he gasped.

"You!" Syagrios roared. The ruffian wore a long-sleeved tunic to cover the knife he'd strapped to his forearm. He flipped it into his hand now, and stabbed Phostis in the belly with it before the Haloga guard could spring between them.

As Phostis remembered, Syagrios was strong as a bear. He cried out when the tip of the knife bit him and grabbed Syagrios' right arm with both hands.

"I'll get you," Syagrios panted. "I'll get you and then I'll get that little whore you're swiving. I'll—"

Phostis never did find out what Syagrios would do next. The guardsman's frozen surprise did not last longer than a heartbeat. Syagrios screamed hoarsely as the Haloga's axe went into his back. He broke free of Phostis and whirled, trying to come to grips with the northerner. The Haloga struck him again, this time full in the face. Blood sprayed over Phostis. Syagrios crumpled. The guardsman methodically smote him again and again until he stopped twitching.

Olyvria burst out of the tent, a knife in her hand, her eyes wild. The guardsman, however, needed no help. Olyvria gulped at Syagrios' dreadful wounds. Though an officer's daughter, she wasn't altogether accustomed to fighting's grim aftermath.

Then the Haloga turned to Phostis. "Are you yet hale, young Majesty?"

"I don't know." Phostis yanked up his mail shirt and surcoat together. He had a bleeding scratch a couple of inches above his navel, but nothing worse. He let the mail shirt fall back down with a clink of iron rings.

"Aye, here we are. Look, young Majesty." The northerner poked the mail shirt with a forefinger. "You had luck with you. The knife went into a ring—see the bright cuts here and here? It went in, but could go no farther. Had it slid between two rings, more of your gore would have spilled."

"Yes." Phostis started to shake. So much luck in life—a fingernail's breadth to either side and he'd be lying on the ground beside dead Syagrios, trying to hold his guts in. Maybe a healer-priest would have been able to save him, but he was ever so glad he didn't have to make the test. He told the guard, "My thanks for slaying him, Viggo."

The Haloga guardsman looked disgusted with himself. "I should never have let him draw near enough to stab you. I thank the gods you were not worse hurt." He lifted Syagrios' corpse by the heels and dragged it away. The ruffian's blood soaked blackly into the thirsty soil.

By then, curious and concerned faces pressed close; the fight and the outcries had raised a crowd as if by magic. Phostis waved to show he was all right. "No harm done," he called, "and the madman got what he deserved." He pointed to the trail Syagrios left behind, as if he were a snail filled with blood rather than slime. The soldiers cheered.

Phostis waved again, then ducked back into the tent. Olyvria followed. Phostis looked again at the little cut he'd taken. He didn't require much imagination to make it bigger in his mind's eye. If the knife had slipped between rings, or if he'd taken off the mail shirt, the better to comfort Olyvria ... He shuddered. He didn't even want to think about that.

"I fought with him during the battle," he said. "I guessed he'd flee, but he must have been wild for revenge."

"You never wanted to cross Syagrios," Olyvria agreed soberly. "And—" She hesitated, then went on, "And I'd known he wanted me for a long time."

"Oh." Phostis made a sour face at that. But it made sense— how doubly mortifying and infuriating to be struck down by someone you lusted after. "No wonder he didn't run, then." His laugh was shaky. "I wish he would have—he came too close to getting his vengeance and letting the air out of me in the process."

Katakolon stuck his head into the tent. "Ah. good, you still have your clothes on," he said. "Father's right behind me, and I don't suppose you'd care to be caught as I was."

Before Phostis could do more than gape at that or ask any of the myriad questions that suggested themselves, Krispos came in. "I'm glad you're all right," he said, folding Phostis into a bear hug. When he let Phostis go, he stood back and eyed him quizzically. "Someone didn't care for you there, son."

"No, he didn't," Phostis agreed. "He helped kidnap me—" He watched Krispos, but the Avtokrator's eyes never moved toward Olyvria: discipline and style. "—and he was my, I guess you'd say keeper, in Etchmiadzin. He couldn't have been very happy when I escaped."

"Your keeper, eh? So that was Syagrios?" Krispos asked.

Phostis nodded, impressed at his memory for detail. He said, "He was a bad man, but not of the worst. He played the board game well, and he drew the arrow from my shoulder when I got shot while I was along with the Thanasiot raiding party."

"A slim enough eulogy, but the best he'll get, and likely better than he deserves, too," Krispos said. "If you think I'll say I'm sorry he's gone, you can think again: good riddance, say I. I just praise the good god that you weren't hurt." He embraced Phostis again.

"I'm glad you're not ventilated, too," Katakolon said. "It's good having you back, especially in one piece." He ducked to get out of the tent. Krispos followed a moment later.

"What was that your brother said about getting caught with his clothes off?" Olyvria kept her voice low so no one but Phostis would hear, but she couldn't stop the giggle that welled up from deep inside.

"I don't know," Phostis said. "As a matter of fact, I don't think I want to know. Knowing Katakolon, it was probably something spectacular. Sometimes I think he takes after Anthimos, even if—" He'd been about to say something like even if I'm the one Anthimos might have fathered. That was just what he didn't want to say to Olyvria.

"Even if what?" she asked.

"Even if Anthimos was four years dead before Katakolon was born," Phostis finished, more smoothly than he would have thought possible.

"Oh." Olyvria sounded disappointed, which meant his answer had convinced her. He nodded to himself. Krispos would have approved. And he'd lived through a completely unexpected attack. He approved of that himself.

Krispos studied the gloomy stone pile of Etchmiadzin. It had been built to hold off men at arms, but the ones its designers had in mind came from Makuran. The stone, however, knew nothing of that. It would—and did—defy Videssians as readily as any others.