The horses moved slowly through Dariel’s narrow, winding streets. Small boys stared and pointed and called out, as small boys will anywhere. Some of them were touts for inns. After some haggling, Argyros went with one. From the way the lad described it, his master Supsa’s place was what God had used as a pattern for making heaven.
The magistrianos carefully did not ask which god the boy meant. Dariel held both Christian churches with domes in the conical Caucasian style and fire-temples sacred to the good god Ormazd whom the Persian prophet Zoroaster praised. Churches and fire-temples alike were thick-walled, fortress-like structures; most had armed guards patrolling their grounds. Nowhere but in this region that both empires coveted did their faiths have such evenly balanced followings; nowhere else was there such strife between them. Goarios was a Christian (or at least had been, the last time Argyros heard), but it would not do to count on that too far.
Native Georgians and their Alan overlords were both on the streets, usually giving one another wide berths. Language and dress distinguished them. Not even Satan, Argyros thought, could learn Georgian, but the Alan tongue was a distant cousin of Persian. And while the natives mostly wore calf-length robes of wool or linen, some Alans still clung to the leather and furs their ancestors had worn on the steppe. They also let their hair grow long, in greasy locks.
Some real nomads, slant-eyed Kirghiz, were also in the market square. They stared about nervously, as if misliking to be so hemmed in. Their fine weapons and gold saddle-trappings marked them as important men in their tribe. Argyros almost wished he had not spotted them. They gave him one more thing to worry about, and he had plenty already.
Supsa’s inn proved more than adequate. The stableman knew his business, and the cellar was big enough to store the winejars. Argyros, who from long experience discounted nine-tenths of what he heard from touts, was pleased enough. He did his best not to show it, dickering long and hard with Supsa. If he had more money than a run-of-the-mill merchant, that was his business and nobody else’s. The mound of pillows he found in his chamber made a strange but surprisingly comfortable bed. The next morning, fruit candied in honey was not what the magistrianos was used to eating for breakfast, but not bad, either. He licked his fingers as he walked toward Goarios’s palace, a bleak stone pile that seemed more citadel than seat of government.
One of Goarios’s stewards greeted him with a superciliousness the grand chamberlain of the Roman Emperor would have envied. “His highness,” the steward insisted, “favors local wines, and so would have scant interest in sampling your stock.”
Argyros recognized a bribery ploy when he heard one. He did not mind paying his way into Goarios’s presence; he was not, after all, operating with his own money. But he did want to take this fellow’s toploftiness down a peg. He had brought along a jar of yperoinos. “Perhaps you would care to see that its quality meets your master’s standards,” he suggested, patting the jar.
“Well, perhaps, as a favor for your politeness,” the chamberlain said grudgingly. At his command, a lesser servant fetched him a cup. Argyros worked the cork free, poured him a good tot, and watched, gravely silent, as his eyes crossed and face turned red when he drank it down at a gulp. The steward came back gamely, though. “I may have been in error,” he said, extending the cup again. “Pray give me another portion, to let me be sure.”
Goarios’s great hall was narrow, dark, and drafty. Petitioners worked their way forward toward the king’s high seat. The magistrianos waited patiently, using the time in which he occasionally lurched ahead to examine the others in the hall who sought the king’s favor.
He did not like what he saw. For one thing, the Kirghiz nobles he had spied in the market were there. For another, while one Christian priest, plainly a local, waited to make a request of Goarios, a whole delegation of Ormazd’s clerics in their flame-colored robes sat a few paces ahead of the magistrianos. He could hear them talking among themselves. Their Persian was too pure to have been learned in the Caucasus.
As he drew closer, Argyros also studied the king of the Alans. Goarios was close to his own age, younger than he had thought. His face was long, rather pale, with harsh lines on either side of his mouth that disappeared into his thick beard. His eyes were black and shiny; he had somehow the air of a man who saw things no one else did. Whether those things were actually there, Argyros was not sure. Goarios spent some time with the Kirghiz, even more with the Persian priests. The rumbles of Argyros’s stomach were reminding him it was time for the noon meal when at last the steward presented him to the king. He stooped to one knee and bowed his head; only before the Emperor of the Romans or the Persian King of Kings would he have performed a full prostration, going down on his belly. The steward addressed Goarios in Georgian. The king made brief answer in the same tongue, then spoke to Argyros in Persian: “You have, Tskhinvali here tells me, a remarkable new potation, one I might enjoy. Is this so?”
“Your majesty, it is,” the magistrianos answered in the same tongue. He handed the jar to the steward to pass on to Goarios. “Please take this as my gift, to acquaint you with the product.”
Those opaque eyes surveyed Argyros. “I thank you. You must have great confidence, to be so generous.” Goarios still used Persian. Argyros had heard he knew Greek, and suspected he was the victim of a subtle insult. He showed no annoyance, but waited silently while the king, as his steward had before him, had a cup brought. Unlike Tskhinvali, Goarios drank from silver. The king drank. His eyes widened slightly, and he rumbled deep in his throat, but he tolerated his first draught better than anyone else Argyros had seen. “By the sun!” Goarios exclaimed, a strange oath if he still followed Christ. He drank again, licked his lips. Suddenly he switched languages: he did speak Greek. “This is something new and different. How-many jars have you to sell, and at what price?”
“I have several hundred jars, your majesty.” Argyros also shifted to Greek. “They cannot, I fear, come cheap: not only is the preparation slow and difficult, but I have incurred no small expense in traveling to you. My masters back in Constantinople would flay me for accepting less than twenty nomismata the jar.”
He expected dickering to begin then, or Goarios to dismiss him to bargain with Tskhinvali or some other palace dignitary. He would have been satisfied to get half his first asking price. But the king of the Alans simply said, “Accepted.”
Disciplined though he was, Argyros could not help blurting, “Your majesty?” The first confused thought in his mind was that his might be the only government-financed expedition in the history of the Empire to turn a profit. He had never heard of any others; he was certain of that. Goarios took another pull. “Agreed, I said. Rarity and quality are worth paying for, in wine or women or—” He let his voice trail away, but his eyes lit, as if for an instant his inner vision grew sharp and clear. The moment passed; the king returned his attention to Argyros. “I have a banquet planned this evening—I am pleased to bid you join me. Perhaps to further the pleasure of all those present, you will consent to bring with you ten jars of your brew.”
“Certainly, your majesty.” Argyros had hoped the super-wine would make him popular at court, but had not expected to succeed so soon. He regretted having to stay in character. Any failure, though, might be noticed, so he said, “Your majesty, ah—” He made what he hoped was a discreet pause.
“You will be paid on your arrival, I assure you,” Goarios said dryly. He added, “If you have found a companion, you may bring her to the feast. We do not restrict our women to their own quarters, as the tiresome custom is in Constantinople.”