'So much effort, you see; and there was always the risk that something would go wrong, someone in the government I'd bought would let me down or betray me. I needed a second weapon: one that I could control directly, one that could be trusted on its own without my having to think of every little thing. So I bought the Amathy house, and had you installed as heir presumptive to its leader. Then I got rid of him, and you became Feron Amathy.
'For a while, everything went very well. On my behalf, you led the House on a series of raids, burning and butchering, leaving no survivors, all the blame being laid on the savages. At the same time, you were coordinating operations with the savages-I thought I was being so wonderfully economical, using you for both functions; since I had to trust someone besides myself (which I hated doing, for obvious reasons), at least I only had to trust one man, and I'd done everything humanly possible to make you secure. I trusted you. That was-' He frowned. 'A pity.'
Poldarn nodded slowly. 'What happened?' he said.
'You betrayed me,' Tazencius replied. 'Unfortunately, I'd overlooked a detail or two. I'd underestimated the Deymeson Order, and its self-appointed mission as guardian of the Empire. But one of the Order's senior officers-your former tutor, indeed-worked out what I was up to and resolved to stop me. It was while you were still at school, which only goes to show how perceptive your old tutor was, and how patient, too. It was fortunate for him that you were part of a small clique of friends-almost unheard of at Deymeson, where friendship is understandably fraught with problems-who'd formed one of those unshakeable adolescent bonds of loyalty that tend to last for life. He recruited two of your clique; their devotion to the Order was the only thing that was more important to them, you see. One of them was this woman here, Xipho Dorunoxy. You were in love with her, and would be, for life. The other-wonderful serendipity-was the boy whom everybody else in your gang was sure you'd callously murdered when a prank went wrong: Cordomine. Understandably, he now hated you almost as much as he loved the Order. Your tutor forged him, so to speak, into a weapon to use against me; he was to become the Chaplain in Ordinary, in effective control of the civil administration, just as my other enemy, Cronan, was in charge of the military. Meanwhile, as you were going about my business in an admirably efficient way, Cordomine wrote to you.
'He wasn't dead, he told you, and he was prepared to forgive you for what you'd tried to do when you'd stabbed him in the library. All he asked in return was that you should betray me, wreck my plans, and deliver me into the hands of my enemies.
'You were delighted to oblige, since you were being eaten alive by guilt for what you thought you'd done-and also by the knowledge that you could never have Xipho Dorunoxy because you'd murdered her friend; but if he came back to life and forgave you-well, who knows?'
Poldarn looked round at Copis. She lifted her head and looked back at him. It was like staring down a well.
'Cordomine arranged for you to send the savages-your flesh and blood-into an ambush. Cronan would slaughter them like sheep, and the survivors would confess and incriminate me as the most unspeakable traitor in history. You would also lead the Amathy house into a similar trap, and they'd be wiped out too.'
Tazencius paused, and grinned. 'Betrayal comes easily to you, Ciartan; I'd never fully appreciated how easily. I sincerely believed that once you were mine, you'd be mine for ever. I think that was the worst mistake I ever made; because look at you, my dear boy. I know you can't answer this because you can't remember; but is there anybody in the world you haven't betrayed at some point in your distinguished career? Your dearest friends: when Elaos Tanwar found out that you were passing military secrets to the savages, you killed him. When you were faced with disgrace and expulsion because of your foolish escapade in the library, you stabbed your friend Cordomine. Your own people: you'd have sent them to be wiped out by Cronan. Likewise the Amathy house, who'd followed you with absolute loyalty, done everything you'd asked of them. Me-after I'd given you everything. You've never made a promise you didn't break, been loved by anybody you haven't hurt or been the death of. There are clear definitions of evil; I suppose I meet most of the criteria, in that I've caused the deaths of tens, hundreds of thousands of innocent strangers in furtherance of my ambition and my hatred for Cronan Suilven. I chose my path and followed it single-mindedly, loyally, without any illusions about myself. That, I believe, is why you're worse than me, more dangerous, capable of doing more damage. Because, you see, you hardly fit the criteria of evil as established in dictionaries and textbooks. You sided with me because the Empire was your people's ancient enemy-you were sent here in the first place to spy on them, help your people to punish them, and steal the precious materials your people so desperately need, marooned on an island with no metal and precious little timber. You did your duty cheerfully; and when it became apparent that my interests coincided perfectly with theirs, you joined me. Soldiers do worse things in a war; you were a spy, and spies cause the deaths of thousands. It doesn't matter, because the thousands are the enemy. But then, because of one terrible error of judgement, in the Deymeson library, when you were trying to do the best for your friends whom you'd led into disaster, you were chained by guilt to one man, Cordomine. Guilt never bothers me, we evil men are immune to it. Guilt made you abandon your people, your followers, your wife, me, without a moment's hesitation.' He smiled, wide and bleak. 'If you'd been an evil man like me, Ciartan, thousands of people who died in pain and fear would still be alive. But you're worse than I am, because you're part evil and part good-as most people are, I suppose. Still, in their cases, it doesn't matter.'
Tazencius shrugged; so much for all that.
'Anyway,' he went on, 'you made the usual arrangements with the savages for the coming season; and then you reported back to Cordomine. The idea was, as I've told you, that you would send them strolling blithely into an ambush. But by this stage, I'd found out, from spies of my own in the Amathy house, that you'd turned traitor on me. I gave orders for my agent in the House to kill you-his reward was to be Feron Amathy in your stead-but he failed. You escaped and turned to Cordomine for protection. He was in an awkward position. Needless to say, he hadn't dared to let Cronan in on the secret; Cronan was far too straightforward to play the game out quietly, he'd have told the Emperor all about me and the Amathy house being in league with the savages, and I'd have been forced to mobilise both of my allies against the government in a straightforward civil war-and together, the House and the savages would probably have won, but not conclusively; we'd have seized the Bohec valley, perhaps, and I'd have set myself up as a rival Emperor, hated as a despicable traitor in the city, and everything would have descended into a chaotic mess. So although Cordomine needed you to deliver the savages and the House into Cronan's hands for execution, he couldn't save you openly from your outraged followers in the House. The best he could do was smuggle you to safety, using the resources of the Order; he sent his bodyguards to escort you from Josequin to Torcea, and Father Tutor sent his best agent, Xipho Dorunoxy, just in case something went wrong.
'Something did go wrong: the House's trackers, who'd been following you, caught up with you and your escort beside the river. There was a fight; the trackers and the escort wiped each other out, you were knocked over the head and lost your memory. Xipho Dorunoxy found you and sent a message to Deymeson for instructions. That was the moment when everything began to fall apart.'