"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."
"Er-thank you, your Majesty." Warily, the patriarch sat down. He suited his tone to the one Maniakes had taken: "In what way may I be of service to your Majesty this morning?"
"We have thought the time ripe to abandon the single life and choose for ourself another bride," Maniakes answered. He couldn't remember the last time he had bothered with the imperial we, but he would try anything to overawe Agathios today, which was why he had summoned the patriarch to the palace quarter rather than visiting him at his own residence next to the High Temple.
"I rejoice at the news and wish you joy, your Majesty," Agathios said, fulsomely if without any great warmth. He hesitated, then asked, "And to whom have you chosen to yoke yourself for what I pray will be many happy and fruitful years?"
Maniakes didn't miss that hesitation. He wondered what sort of rumors the ecumenical patriarch had heard. None had got back to him yet from the plaza of Palamas, which did not mean they were not there. Carefully, he said, "We have chosen to wed Lysia the daughter of the most noble Symvatios." He made no mention of Lysia's relationship to him; if anyone was going to raise that issue, it would have to be Agathios.
The patriarch did raise it, in a sidelong manner. "Has the most noble Symvatios given this union his approval?"
"Yes, most holy sir, he has," Maniakes answered. "You may ask this of him yourself if you doubt me." He had spoken the truth; his uncle hadn't said no. But if Symvatios had been enthusiastic at the prospect of his daughter's becoming Empress, he had concealed that enthusiasm very well.
"Of course I rely on your Majesty's assurance." Agathios hesitated again, coughed, and looked this way and that. Maniakes sat silent, willing him to keep quiet. Here in the imperial residence, Agathios, a malleable soul if ever there was one, would surely be too intimidated to argue from a doctrinal standpoint… wouldn't he? After that long, long pause, the ecumenical patriarch resumed: "Be that as it may, however, I must bring it to your Majesty's attention that the bride you propose to wed is, ah, within the prohibited degrees of relationship long established in canon law and also forbidden under all imperial law codes."
He hadn't screamed incest at the top of his lungs, but that was what his polite, nervous phrases amounted to. And what he would do back at the High Temple was anyone's guess. Maniakes said, "Most holy sir, what pleases the Avtokrator has the force of law in Videssos, as you know. In this particular case, it pleases us to exempt ourself from the secular laws you mention. That is within our power. Similarly, it is within your power to grant us a dispensation from the strictures of canon law. So we ask and so we instruct you to do."
Agathios looked unhappy. In his boots, Maniakes would have looked unhappy, too. Had the patriarch had a little less backbone, he would have yielded, and that would have been that. As it was, he said, "Let me remind your Majesty of the pledge he gave on entering Videssos the city to assume the imperial dignity, wherein he promised he would make no alterations in the faith we have received from our fathers."
"We do not seek to alter the faith, only to be dispensed from one small provision of it," Maniakes answered. "Surely there is precedent for such."
"A man who lives by precedent alone can, should he search, find justification for almost anything," Agathios said. "Whether the results of breaking justify one doing so is, you will forgive me, debatable."
Maniakes glared at him. "Most holy sir, do you tell me straight out that you will not do as I instruct you?" He kicked at the floor in annoyance-he had fallen out of the imperial we.
Agathios looked even unhappier. "May it please your Majesty-"
"It pleases me not at all," Maniakes snapped.
"May it please your Majesty," the patriarch repeated, "I must in this matter, however much I regret doing so, heed the dictates of my conscience and of anciently established canon law."
"However much you regret it now, you'll regret it more later," Maniakes said.
"I daresay I can find another patriarch, one willing to listen to common sense."
"Avtokrators have indeed cast patriarchs down from their seats in the past," Agathios agreed gravely. "Should your Majesty undertake to do so in this instance, however, and for this cause, my opinion is that he will bring to birth a schism among the priests and prelates of the holy temples."
Maniakes bit into that one like a man stubbing his tooth on an unseen bone in his meat. "The Empire cannot afford such a schism, not now."
"Far be it from me to disagree with what is so self-evidently true," Agathios said.
"Then you will do my bidding and marry me to the woman I love," Maniakes said.
"She is your first cousin, your Majesty. She is within the degrees of relationship prohibited for marriage," the patriarch said, as he had before.