By the time the Prince reached the Ashara Temple, the crowd was thunderous and the incense of broken flowers hid the fact that no sacred incense rose from the holy terrace.
People burst across the square as Am Xai reined in. His guard held them back good-humoredly, for they were good-humored themselves, wanting only to come closer to their focal point.
The black bulls were led by their floral chains across to the temple and up the steps, the Prince and his guard following, and the crowd spilling after.
The priests, who had been watching from eyelets, were doubtless perturbed. None came forth.
Kesarh stood, with unflawed poise, calmly waiting, demonstrating that the fault was not his, but he would overlook it. The crowd, however, began to shout and yell at the temple. Eventually a solitary flustered priest scurried from the porch to be greeted by abusive applause. He was a Shansarian, or at least enough of one to fulfill the rigid strictures of the Ashara Temple.
He hurried to Kesarh, but before the priest could speak, as if he had been asked, Kesarh said, in his carrying actor’s voice: “I’m here to sacrifice to the goddess, in the sight of the people, for my victory at Tjis.”
The priest looked about him, decided, and ran away.
The crowd cat-called, protested. Then fell quiet, anxious to see what Kesarh would do.
What he did was to hesitate an instant, as if in thought, then walk directly up to the marble altar on the terrace.
He said nothing further, but a motion of his hand brought the pair of bulls to him, a man now at either side, the girls melted away.
Kesarh drew his knife. The edge was honed to a razor—he had been expecting this.
With a swiftness that was astonishing, and an atrocious accuracy, he swept his arm across the black taurian necks, slicing both throats before the stroke was ended.
Blood spouted, gushed. The great heads flopped, the bodies spasmed and sank, almost as one. Drowned in gore, the flowers unwove and streaked the steps with brackish red. But he had been so agile, there was not a splash on his fine clothes: even his hands were unmarked.
Long ago, in the past of the past, kings had sacrificed in such a way.
The priest, who had only gone for reinforcements, rushed out with his fellow officiates upon the terrace. Unneeded.
The King was stripped naked, save for the cloth about his loins. He had been at exercise with stave and bow, was en route to his bath, and that it was in this way and this state that he took the audience was significant. The insult was a blatant one. That the young man in the wine-red garments knew himself insulted, what rank he had totally ignored, must be certain.
“Well,” Suthamun said to him, letting the slave place a mantle at last across his shoulders. “Your explanation?”
Kesarh Am Xai looked at his King with enormous blankness.
“My explanation of what, my lord?”
“Your dance measure through my streets. Of that.”
“You gave us free entry, my lord. Your people chose to honor us, in your name.”
“My name? You flounced back into Istris as if you’d re-taken Zakoris herself, instead of a brace of boats.”
“Seven ships, my lord.”
Suthamun, wrapped in the robe, sat down and drank wine. None was offered elsewhere. There were a number of others in the room, watching with interest. The oldest son, Prince Jornil, ate figs and stared at Kesarh’s clothing. As the father had coveted kalinxes nearly a month ago, the son now coveted this elegant costume. It irked Jornil that Kesarh, who had, and deserved to have, no revenues, could procure such tailors and such dyes.
“Seven ships,” said the King. “Or were you seeing more than double the number?”
There was a long pause. The offensive question apparently required an answer.
“Seven, my lord,” said Kesarh. “If you fear my reckoning is out, you might ask the captains you yourself appointed, Lios, or Raldnor Am Ioli.”
“I’ll ask them nothing. They’re disgraced. With you.”
Another long silence. Kesarh kept his eyes down, knowing what Suthamun might behold in them, should they be raised.
“You must excuse me, my King. I thought, when you sent me to Tjis, I went with your blessing to gain some renown for myself.”
“Did you? Then you should have waited for me to tell you so. You were sent, you Visian dog, to burn refuse on the sea. No more.”
There was a vague murmuring about the room. Suthamun ran his eye over it, daring it to grow louder, and it died.
The talk had reached the palace, the talk of the streets. Kesarh had been set on in the coastal town by agents of some enemy, some high enemy, who was envious. Only the skills of Ankabek had saved him.
That the King did not mention the sojourn at Ankabek was also evidential.
Kesarh waited. He waited for Suthamun to see that regal unfavor toward him now could reek of villainy. But Suthamun did not, or would not, see this.
“You came in,” said Suthamun Am Shansar, “like a young leopard. You can creep out again like a mouse. You will go at once to your estates at Xai.” Kesarh’s head came up and his eyes flashed like drawn knives. And Suthamun smiled. “Yes, my Salamander. The fire’s out.”
The ragged man bowed low, the third time he had done so.
“They’re selling locks of black male hair, saying it’s yours, sir. And the poet made a fine job of the paean; he’s singing it over in the eastern city by now. And the women—women we never funded—mooning over you, refusing their lovers—”
“All right,” the shadow said from the chair. And then, to another, and to the ragged man’s great relief, “Pay him what I told you.”
When the paid man had gone out, Kesarh rose and filled a glass goblet with water. This indeed was no hour for wine.
The mistake had been in not realizing fully he played this game against a dolt. Suthamun, too much an idiot to make the correct move, the move which would have laid brick on brick—
Kesarh drank the bitter water.
“What else?”
His guard sergeant handed him a package. It had been opened, tested for its motive.
Kesarh examined the contents.
“Raldnor Am Ioli’s third best ring. A love-token?”
The sergeant showed his teeth.
“Better than writing it, my lord.”
“True. He doesn’t like Suthamun’s response. Rather than blame me, he blames the King. Another fool. This one more convenient, perhaps, if he keeps his promises. Are those men ready to ride?”
“Yes, my lord. One fifth, as you ordered. The lads we’ve had longest, and most often seem about you.”
“They won’t like Xai. But then, neither shall I. There’s another man. One of the Nines, Rem. A Karmian with light eyes and friends in the Ommos quarter.”
“I know him. We put Biter to him not long ago.”
“Find him and send him there. The King gave me just until sunset to get out of Istris.”
There was a sound beyond the apartment door, the man on guard there striking the floor with his spear. Next second the door was flung wide.
A servant stood fluting in Shansarian: “Through the will of Ashara, the First Heir, Prince Jornil of Istris,” while Jornil brushed by him and walked into the chamber.
Kesarh looked at him. Jornil beautifully returned the look. The light of late afternoon tumbled against him like a loving woman. The door was shut at his back.
“An honor,” Kesarh said shortly. “You’re here to wave me off.”
“I’m here to tell you to leave those clothes behind you when you go.”
Kesarh stared at him, then all at once he laughed, only one harsh note of it.
He pulled another flagon over and gestured to the sergeant. As the door closed a third time, Kesarh presented Prince Jornil with a drink of wine.