The knock sounded again. This time the visitor was a man of less than average height, so ordinary-looking that he were hard to describe further.
"Your slave, Datas by name, awaits the Great King's command," murmured the man, touching his forehead to the floor.
"Good." Xerxes briefly described Bessas, Myron, and their quest, adding: "I trust not this Bessas. Not only is he a daring and hard-bitten rogue, but his father, also, was a factionary of my traitorous brother Masistes. So I wish you to follow them."
"Aye, Majesty?"
"You shall watch for three things. First: Bessas adheres to the outlawed cult of Mithraism, as did his father before him; Baron Phraates was a notorious coddler and fautor of heretics. Instead of joining the reformed and united true faith of Zoroastrian Mazdaism, he clings to the remnants of schismatic superstition. Were he some flea-bitten Syrian or Arab, that would not matter; but we cannot tolerate such heresy in an Aryan. I wish you to watch for evidence of his dealing with hidden Mithraists. Mayhap he will discover us their leaders, so that we can scotch this serpent of daiva-worship once and for all.
"Secondly, I hear rumors of a pretender: one Orontes, claiming to be a son of Cambyses. His emissaries approach daring and able Aryans to seduce them into conspiracy. Watch for signs of this plot, also.
"Lastly, some are displeased that Bessas should have escaped the stake. Bagabyxas the Daduchid, I am told, is one such. Knowing Bagabyxas, it would not astony me if he sought by subtle means to make away with Bessas and Sataspes ere they return. Watch for such an attempt and, if need be, do your utmost to thwart it. The final disposal of Bessas is mine, and I will not have one of my subjects take private vengeance upon him! Do you understand all?"
"Aye, sire."
"Then may God befriend you. Get yourself upon the road whilst the trail is still warm!"
As the agent departed, Xerxes turned again to the wizard. "Tell me, good Ostanas, why should any sane man wish to take my place as king? For twenty years I have striven to be a greater king than my noble sire; yet my loftiest schemes have gone awry." He held up a hand at Ostanas' protest. "Save your flattery, my friend. I would not admit this to any other, but I know fire from flood.
"I reformed the currency—and the plaints of the merchants that they can no longer make a profit are louder than ever. I reformed religion, uniting the quarreling sects of the Aryan faith according to the teaching of the Great Magus—and the Mithraists and Anahitists and others remain stubbornly outside the fold, worshiping in secret and plotting with would-be usurpers. I beat down two great rebellions, smashing mighty armies—and the barbarous brigands of Hellas cut two of my army corps to shreds and slay three of my brothers and my finest general. What have the gods against me?
"At first I worked myself nigh unto death, and the people said: What does this royal busybody, thrusting that long nose of his into our business day and night? Why does he not leave us alone to mind our affairs? Now that I rule through Artabanus and the rest, they say: What does the royal lecher, lurking slothfully in "his harem when he should be leading the Empire and smiting wrongdoers night and day? None values me at my true worth. Suspicion and hatred divide me from my family. Women have been my curse; I cannot wait to finish my new palace, to get away from the clack of their venomous tongues.
"Would the great Cyrus had remained a petty kinglet in the hills of Parsa, without imperial ambitions! Yet, having mounted the tiger, I must needs ride the, full nine circuits."
In the barren, rugged Ouxian mountains, where cold winds whistled through a vast blue sky and vultures and eagles circled forever on broad brown wings, a ring of hillmen squatted. They were a wild-looking lot with long tangled hair, ragged tunics, and patched pantaloons. One, however, was clad in new if dirty garments, with his hair confined by a low twisted turban. They listened to Zopyrus, who said:
"Tell me, friend Puzur, if it be not true that, when the Great King would have seated you on the stake, I prevailed upon him to let you go?"
"You speak sooth," said he of the turban. "And now, I doubt not, you wish a return for your boon. Have you fallen out with the Great King, so that you must hide in the hills?"
Zopyrus smiled thinly. "Not yet. I do but wish you to waylay a brace of travelers."
"As Lagamar is my witness, that were no favor at all!" cried the hill chief. "We do that anyway. Ask a boon worthy of Puzur the Ouxian."
"Fear not, this will do admirably. Moreover, you may keep all the loot that you find upon them, with one exception."
"And that is?"
"Their heads. These you shall send to me, at my house in Shushan."
"When will these travelers appear?"
"At any time, but I should think within the next day or two. Thus shall you know them ..."
Bessas and Myron rode up the valley of the Kurush. Rugged mountains towered to right and left in long brown ridges, running from southeast to northwest and seeming closer in the clear Iranian air than they really were.
Bessas wore a short Median jacket, baggy leathern riding breeches, and over his head a bashlyk, or cloth hood. This hood hid most of his beard and could be pulled up to the eyes at need. At his left side swung a straight horseman's sword of Indian steel, a full three feet long including the hilt. The teakwood scabbard bore a row of little silver tahrs, or Himalayan wild goats, and ended in a silver tiger's head. The pommel took the form of a gryphon's head of crystal. From his other side hung a dagger with a large turquoise roundel; a lacquered bow-and-arrow case bumped against his back.
With leathern trousers and boots on his legs and a bashlyk on his head, Myron looked like a Persian, except that his skin shone with fresh oil. As he rode, he felt pleased with himself for having kept his courage up, to the time of departure. This adventure was something of which he had long dreamt and talked. But, when it bade fair to come true, he approached it with hesitation and dread. A dozen times he had almost backed out; but now, thank Hera, he had taken the plunge.
He stared intently at the vast, dust-colored land, speck-led with the red and blue and yellow flecks of short-lived spring flowers. He gazed at the clouds and the birds and the mountaintops. He looked about him keenly for any odd fact or new phenomenon to add to his store of knowledge.
For Myron Perseôs was a collector of facts, as other men collected concubines or horses or gold. Sometimes he temporarily forgot them, as does a squirrel the nuts it has buried. But the facts were all there, locked away in his squarish skull, waiting for some reminder to call them forth. He secretly hoped that some day these facts would fall into a pattern—a pattern that should give a profound new insight into the nature of things and place his name with those of Thales and Herakleitos among the great lovers of wisdom. Although it had never occurred, and Myron sometimes feared he was simply not clever enough to build a noble edifice of thought from his myriad bricks of fact, he never completely gave up hope.
At the end of the first day out of Persepolis, Myron and Bessas crossed into the valley of the Ulai. Near its source the Ulai was a mere trickle, whose tributaries ran water only after a rain. The snows of winter still crested the higher ridges.
Once or twice a day a Persian post rider passed them, racing along at full gallop with his bashlyk pulled up to his eyes and his mailbags flapping against his horse's flanks. Now and then they encountered a string of camels, swaying slowly under high-piled loads, or a pair of road guards cantering by and watching the heights. Once they passed a knot of sullen peasants, lackadaisically filling holes in the road, while a royal officer barked himself hoarse at them.