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not far from Kyzikos, was a knife at Videssos' throat.
The Yezda, for his part, seemed no more happy to be in his enemies' camp than
Marcus was to have him there. He turned his head nervously this way and that,
as if looking for escape routes. "You Scaurus, leader of this peoples?" he
asked, his Videssian labored but understandable.
"Aye," the tribune said stonily. "What would you?"
"I Sevabarak, cousin to Yavlak, who is leaders of clans of Menteshe. He send
me to you to ask how much money you gets. You need plenties, I think."
"And why is that, pray?" Marcus asked, still not caring to have anything to do
with Yezda.
Sevabarak was not offended; indeed, he seemed amused. "Because we how you
say? whale stuffings out of oh-so-tough knightboys last week. Damn sight more
than pissworthy Empire can do," he said. Then, ticking off names on his
fingers, he went on, "We gots Drax, we gots Bailli, we gots what's-his-name
Videssian thinks he's Empire "
"Emperor," Scaurus corrected mechanically. Beside him, Senpat Sviodo's eyes
were round and staring. So, for that matter, were his own.
Sevabarak waved the interruption aside. "Whatever. We gots. We gots Turgot, we
gots Soteric, we gots Clozart no, I take back, him dead, two days gone.
Anyway, we gots shitpot full Namdalenis. You wants, you buy back, plenty
monies. Otherwise," and his eyes grew cruel and eager, "we see how long we
stretch them lives out. Some last weeks, I bet."
But Marcus paid no attention to the threat. Here was a broken rebellion handed
to him on a golden plate and if the legionaries moved quickly, they still
might keep the Yezda off the coastal plain. And thinking of gold. . .
"Pakhymer!" he shouted. This might cost more than the legionaries had, and he
was ready to swallow all the Khatrisher's "I-told-you-so's" to get it.
VIII
Great wain creaked, moving across the gently rolling steppe on wheels tall as
a man. Gorgidas sat cross-legged on the polychrome rug of goats' hair, paring
away at his stylus' point with the edge of his sword; not what Gaius Philippus
had hoped he'd use the weapon for, he thought, chuckling. He tested the point
on the ball of his thumb. It would do. He opened a three-leafed tablet,
frowned when he saw how poorly he'd smoothed the wax after transcribing his
last set of jottings onto parchment.
He tugged on his left ear as he thought. His stylus hurried across the tablet,
tiny wax curls spiraling up from it. "In sweep of territory, neither Videssos
nor Yezd compares favorably with the nomads to the north. Indeed, should those
nomads somehow unite under a single leader, no nation could stand against
them. They do not, however, govern themselves with great wisdom or make the
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best use of the vast resources available to them."
He studied what he had written not bad, something of a Thucydidean flavor to
it. His script was small and very neat. As if that mattered, he said to
himself with a snort. In all this world, only he read Greek. No, not quite:
Scaurus could stumble through it after a fashion. But Scaurus was in Videssos,
which seemed unimaginably far away from this wandering train of Arshaum
wagons.
Beside him, Goudeles was making notes of his own for an oration he intended to
give to Arigh's father Arghun, the khagan of the Gray Horse clan, when at last
they reached the chieftain. It would not be long now, a couple of days at
most. Lankinos Skylitzes, well padded with fat cushions, was sound asleep,
ignoring the occasional jounce of a wheel bumping over a rock. He snored.
Gorgidas set the stylus moving again. "It is not surprising, then, that the
Arshaum should have succeeded in driving the Khamorth to the eastern portion
of the steppe, which extends further west than any man's knowledge of it; the
former folk has adapted itself more completely to the nomadic way of life than
the latter. The very tents of the Arshaum, 'yurts,' in their dialect, are set
upon large wheeled carts. Thus no time is wasted pitching or breaking camp.
They followed their flocks forever, like dolphins in a school of tunny."
The comparison pleased him. He translated it into Videssian for Goudeles. The
pen-pusher rolled his eyes. " 'Sharks' might he better," he said, and followed
that with a muttered, "Barbarians!"
Gorgidas chose to think that remark was meant to apply to the Arshaum and not
to him. He resumed his scribbling: "Because the plainsfolk do not act as a [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]