«Oh, I am,» Broios said with the same fulsome sincerity with which he invested every pronouncement. «Nothing too good for my little girl, that's the truth. Not that I've spoiled her, you understand,» he added hastily. «Nothing like that. She won't be difficult for his Highness the Sevastos, not in any way she won't.» He glanced over toward Rhegorios. «You've not said much tonight, your Highness.»
Rhegorios went on saying not much. Broios looked puzzled, but then shrugged and went back to his supper.
«Nothing too good for Phosia, you say?» Maniakes asked, as if unsure he'd heard correctly, Broios' emphatic nod said he had no doubts on that score. Thoughtfully, Maniakes went on, «Not even the Sevastos of the Empire of Videssos?»
«Your Majesty has been generous and gracious enough to let me believe such a match might not be impossible,» Broios said.
Since that was true, Maniakes nodded meditatively. And, meditatively, he asked, «Nothing is too good for Phosia, eh? Not even the—» He plucked the perfect word out of the air. «—magnifolent Kaykaus, second-in-command of the Makuraner garrison here?» Broios stared at him. When the merchant spoke, he might almost have had reproach in his voice: «Ah, your Majesty, where could you have heard about that?»
«Never you mind where I heard about it,» Maniakes answered. «That is not the point. The point, sirrah, is why I didn't hear of it from you weeks ago, when I asked if any obstacles or embarrassments stood between your daughter and my family. Wouldn't you say that an engagement to a Makuraner officer is an embarrassment of sorts?»
«If she'd been married to him, your Majesty, that would have been an embarrassment,» Broios said. Whatever he knew of embarrassments, he plainly knew at second hand, for he was impervious to them himself.
Maniakes said. «Having her engaged to this officer may not he so much of a much; you're right about that.» Broios looked relieved. But then the Avtokrator went on, «Not telling me about the engagement, though, is something else again. I asked you if there were problems. You said no. That was a lie. I don't think we want liars in our clan.»
«Your Majesty!» Broios cried. He turned to Rhegorios. «Your Highness!»
Rhegorios shook his head. «No. You have a lovely daughter, Broios, and I think she's a sweet girl, too. If I were marrying just her, I'd be more than happy enough. But you don't marry just a girl—you marry her whole family.» Maniakes had to keep himself from clapping his hands in glee. His cousin had listened to him after all! Rhegorios went on, «While I'd like to have Phosia for a wife, I'd sooner have a snake in my boot than you for a father-in-law.»
Maybe the strong wine Broios had drunk had loosened his tongue, after all. He shouted, «You're the Avtokrator's cousin, so you think you can pick any girl you want and she'll be glad to have you. If you weren't his cousin, there's not a woman in the Empire would look at you twice.»
«Yes, I am the Avtokrator's cousin,» Rhegorios agreed, «and you're right, the rules for me are different because of it. If I weren't the Avtokrator's cousin, I might even put up with the likes of you for the sake of getting Phosia. But I can pick and choose, and so I will.» He stood up and looked down his nose at Broios. «But I will say this, sir: when I was an exile on the island of Kalavria, I had no trouble at all getting women to look at me twice—or getting them to do more than that, either, when the mood took them. And it did.»
Maniakes knew that was true. One of the reasons Rhegorios remained unwed was precisely that he did so well for himself without making any permanent promises. «You are dismissed, Broios,» the Avtokrator said, more than a little sadly. «We'd have to watch you closer than the Makuraners, and that's all there is to it. If you like, once things settle down in Mashiz, you have my leave to write Kaykaus and see if you can bring that match back to life.»
«Bah!» Pausing only to empty his winecup one last time and pop a couple of candied apricots into his mouth, Broios stormed out of the dining hall. The city governor's residence shook as if in a small earthquake as he slammed the door behind him.
«I'm sorry, cousin of mine,» Maniakes said.
«So am I,» Rhegorios answered. «I am going to be a while finding someone who suited me as well as Phosia. But Broios—» He shook his head again. «No, thank you.» He suddenly looked thoughtful. «I wonder what Vetranios' daughter is like.» Seeing Maniakes' expression, he burst out laughing. «I don't mean it, cousin of mine. If Broios is a snake in my boot, Vetranios is a scorpion. We're well shut of both of them.»
«Now you're talking sense.» Maniakes sketched the sun-circle to emphasize how much sense Rhegorios was talking. Then he eyed the wine jar. «That is a good vintage. Now that we've started it, we may as well finish it. After all, you're drowning your sorrows, aren't you?»
«Am I?» Rhegorios said. «Well, yes, I suppose I am. And by the time we get to the bottom of that, I expect they'll be so drowned, I'll have forgotten what they are. Let's get started, shall we?»
Broios was not seen in public for the next several days. The next time he was seen, he sported a black eye and a startling collection of bruises elsewhere about his person. When Maniakes heard the news, he remarked to Lysia, «I'd say his wife wasn't very happy to have the betrothal fall through—or do you suppose Phosia was the one who did the damage?»
«I'd bet on Zosime,» Lysia said. «She knows what she lost, and she knows who's to blame for losing it, too.»
By her tone, she would have given Broios the same had she been married to him rather than to Maniakes. The Avtokrator suspected it wasn't the last walloping the merchant would get, either. Videssians breathed the heady atmosphere of rank almost as readily as they breathed the ordinary, material air. To have a chance at a union with the imperial family snatched away… no, Broios wouldn't have a pleasant time after that.
Maniakes kept waiting for news out of the west. He wondered again if one or more of Abivard's messengers had gone missing– if, perhaps, Tegin's garrison force, heading back toward Makuran from Serrhes, had waylaid the riders. If that was so, Tegin would have to know the King of Kings whose cause he still espoused had failed, and that he would be well advised to make whatever peace he could with the new powers in his land.
Tegin, at least, would know. Not knowing, Maniakes kept coming up with fresh possibilities in his own mind, each less pleasant than the one before. Maybe Sharbaraz had somehow rallied, and civil war raged across the Land of the Thousand Cities. That would account for no messengers' having reached Serrhes in a while. Or maybe Abivard had won a triumph so complete and so easy that he repented of his truce with the Videssians. Maybe he'd stopped sending messengers because he was gathering the armies of Makuran with a view toward renewing the war against the Empire.
«I don't think he'd do that,» Rhegorios said when Maniakes raised the horrid prospect aloud. The Sevastos looked west, then went on thoughtfully, «I don't think he could do that, not this campaigning season. We're too close to the fall rains. His attack would bog down in the mud before it got well started.»
«I keep telling myself the same thing.» Maniakes' grin conveyed anything but amusement. «I keep having trouble making myself believe it, too.»
«That's why you're the Avtokrator,» Rhegorios said. «If you believed that all of the Videssos' neighbors were nice people who wanted to do us a favor, you wouldn't be suited for the job.»
«If I believed that all of Videssos' neighbors were nice people who wanted to do us a favor, I'd be out of my bloody mind,» Maniakes exclaimed.
«Well, that, too,» Rhegorios said. «Of course, if you believe all our neighbors are out to get us all the time, the way it must sometimes look if you're sitting on the throne, that's liable to drive you out of your bloody mind, too, isn't it?»