Krispos the Emperor (32 page)

"You're incorrigible," Krispos said.

"Now that you mention it, yes," Iakovitzes wrote. He beamed, taking it for a compliment. Then he covered his mouth with a hand while he yawned; the empty cavern within was an unpleasant sight, and he made a point of not displaying it. He wrote some more. "By your leave, your Majesty, I'll take my own leave now, to rest at home after my travels. Do you still take supper just past sunset?"

"I have enough years on me now to have become a creature of habit," Krispos answered, nodding. "And with which of your handsome grooms do you intend to rest until supper-time?"

Iakovitzes assumed a comically innocent look, then bowed his way out of the little dining chamber. Krispos guessed his barb had struck home—or at least given Iakovitzes an idea. Krispos finished his mulled wine, then set the silver goblet down beside Iakovitzes'. The wine hadn't stayed warm, but the ginger and cinnamon stirred into it nipped his tongue pleasantly.

Barsymes came in with a tray on which to carry away the goblets. Krispos said, "Iakovitzes will join me for supper this evening. Please let the cooks know he'll like seafood in as many courses as possible—he says he's tired of Makuraner mutton."

"I shall convey the eminent sir's request," Barsymes agreed gravely. "His presence will allow the kitchen staff to display their full range of talents."

"Hrmp," Krispos said
in
mock indignation.
"I
can't help being raised on a poor farm." While he enjoyed fancy dishes well enough, he more often preferred the simple fare he'd grown up with. More than one cook had complained of having his wings clipped.

Dusk was settling over the city when Iakovitzes returned, resplendent and glittering in a robe shot through with silver thread. Barsymes escorted him and Krispos to the small dining room where they'd taken wine earlier in the day. A fresh jar awaited them, cooling in a silver bucket of snow. The vestiarios poured a cup for each man. Iakovitzes wrote, "Ah, it's pale. Perhaps someone listened to me."

"Perhaps someone did, eminent sir," Barsymes said. "And now, if you will excuse me—" He glided away, to return with a bowl. "A salad of lettuce and endives, dressed with vinegar flavored by rue, dates, pepper, honey, and crushed cumin—a garnish said to promote good health—and topped with anchovies and rings of squid."

Iakovitzes rose from his chair and gave Barsymes a formal military salute, then kissed him on each beardless cheek. The vestiarios retreated in order less good than was his wont. Krispos hid a smile and attacked the salad, which proved tasty. Iakovitzes cut his portion into very small bits. He had to wash each one down with wine and put his head back to swallow.

His smile was blissful. He wrote, "Ah, squid! Were you to offer one of these tentacled lovelies to Rubyab King of Kings, your Majesty, without doubt he would flee faster than from an invading Videssian army. The Makuraners, when it comes to food, live most insular—or perhaps I should say inlandsular— lives."

"The more fools they." Krispos ate slowly, so as not to get ahead of Iakovitzes. Barsymes cleared away the plates. Krispos said, "Tell me, eminent sir, did you ever find out what was making Rubyab's mustaches quiver with secret glee?'

"Do you know, I didn't, not to be sure of it," Iakovitzes answered. He looked thoughtful. "Terrible, isn't it, when a Makuraner outdoes me in deceit? I must be getting old. But I tell you this, your Majesty: one way or another, it concerns us."

"I was sure it would," Krispos said. "Nothing would make Rubyab happier than buggering Videssos." He caught Iakovitzes' eye. "In the metaphorical sense, of course."

Iakovitzes gobbled laughter. "Oh, of course, your Majesty," he wrote.

Barsymes returned with a fresh course. "Here we have leeks boiled in water and olive oil," he declared, "and then stewed in more oil and mullet broth. To accompany them, oysters in a sauce of oil. honey, wine, egg yolks, pepper, and lovage."

Iakovitzes tasted the oysters, then wrote in big letters, "I want to marry the cook."

"He is a man, eminent sir," Barsymes said.

"All the better," Iakovitzes wrote, which sent the vestiarios into rapid retreat. He presently returned with another new platter along with a fresh jar of wine. This dish held peppered mullet liver paste baked in a fish-shaped mold and then sprinkled with virgin olive oil, as well as squashes baked with mint, coriander, and cumin, and stuffed with pine nuts ground with honey and wine.

"I shan't eat for a week," Krispos declared happily.

"But your Majesty, the main courses approach," Barsymes said in anxious tones.

Krispos corrected himself: "Two weeks. Bring 'em on." The tip of his nose was getting numb. How much wine had he drunk, anyhow? The rich flavor of the fish livers nicely complemented the squashes' sweet stuffing.

Barsymes bore away the empty mold from which the liver paste had come and the bowl that had held the squashes. Under the table, Krispos felt something on his leg, just above the knee. It turned out to be Iakovitzes' hand. "By the good god," the Avtokrator exclaimed, "you never give up, do you?"

"I'm still breathing," Iakovitzes wrote. "If I haven't stopped the one, why should I stop the other?"

"Something to that," Krispos admitted. He hadn't had much luck with the other lately, and he'd surely be too gorged after this banquet was done to try to improve that tonight. Just then Barsymes came back again, this time with a tureen and two bowls. Thinking about what the tureen might hold took Krispos' mind off other matters, a sure sign of advancing years.

The vestiarios announced, "Here we have mullets stewed in wine, with leeks, broth, and vinegar, seasoned with oregano, coriander, and crushed pepper. For your added pleasure, the stew also includes scallops and baby prawns."

After the first taste, Iakovitzes wrote, "The only thing that could further add to my pleasure would be an infinitely distensible stomach, and you may tell the cooks as much."

"I shall, eminent sir," Barsymes promised. "They will take pleasure in knowing they have pleased you."

The next course was lobster meat and spawn chopped fine, mixed with eggs, pepper, and mullet broth, wrapped in grape leaves, and then fried. After that came cuttlefish boiled in wine, honey, celery, and caraway seeds, and stuffed with boiled calves' brains and crumbled hard-cooked eggs. Only the expectant look on Barsymes' face kept Krispos from falling asleep then and there. "One entree yet to come," the vestiarios said. "I assure you, it shall be worth the wait."

"My weight's already gone up considerably," Krispos said, patting his midsection. He could have used an infinitely distensible stomach himself about then.

But Barsymes, as usual, proved right. When he set down the last tray and its serving bowl, he said, "I am bidden by the cooks to describe this dish in detail. Any lapses in the description spring from my lapses of memory, not theirs of talent. I begin: to soaked pine nuts and sea urchins, they added in a casserole layers of mallows, beets, leeks, celery, cabbage, and other vegetables I now forget. Also included are stewed chickens, pigs' brains, blood sausage, chicken gizzards, fried tunny in bits, sea nettles, stewed oysters in pieces, and fresh cheeses. It is spiced with celery seed, lovage, pepper, and asafetida. Over the top was poured milk with beaten egg. It was then stiffened in a hot-water bath, garnished with fresh mussels, and peppered once more. I am only too certain I've left out something or another; I beg you not to report my failing to the cooks."

"Phos have mercy," Krispos exclaimed, eyeing the big casserole dish with something far beyond mere respect. "Should we eat of it or worship it?" After Barsymes served Iakovitzes and him, he had his answer. "Both!" he said with his mouth full.

The feast had stretched far into the night; every so often, Barsymes fed charcoal to a brazier that kept the dining chamber tolerably warm. Iakovitzes held up his tablet. "I hope you have a wheelbarrow in which to roll me home, for I'm certain I can't walk."

"Something shall be arranged, I am certain," the vestiarios said. "Dessert will be coming shortly. I trust you will do it justice?"

Iakovitzes and Krispos both groaned. The Avtokrator said, "We'll deal with it or burst trying. I'd say it's about even money which." He'd taken an army into battle many times with better odds than those.

But the sweet scent of the steam gently rising from the pan Barsymes brought in revived his interest. "Here we have grated apricots cooked in milk until tender, then covered in honey and lightly dusted with ground cinnamon." The vestiarios bowed to Iakovitzes. "Eminent sir, the cooks apologize for their failure to include seafood in this one dish."

"Tell them I forgive their lapse," Iakovitzes wrote. "I've not yet decided whether to sprout fins or tentacles from tonight's fete."

The apricots tasted as good as they smelled. Krispos nonetheless ate them very slowly, being full far past repletion. He was only halfway through his portion when Barsymes hurried into the dining chamber. The Emperor raised an eyebrow; such a lapse was unlike the eunuch.

Barsymes said, "Forgive me, your Majesty, but the mage Zaidas would have speech with you. It is, I gather, a matter of some urgency."

"Maybe he's here to tell me Digenis dropped dead at last," Krispos said hopefully. "Fetch him in, esteemed sir. If he'd come sooner, he could have helped the two of us commit gluttony here, not that we haven't managed well enough on our own."

When Zaidas came to the doorway, he started to prostrate himself. Krispos waved for him not to bother. Nodding his thanks, the wizard greeted Iakovitzes, whom he knew well. "Good to have you back with us, eminent sir. You've been away too long."

"It certainly
seemed
too bloody long," Iakovitzes wrote.

Barsymes carried in a chair for the mage. "Help yourself to apricots," Krispos said. "But first tell me what brings you here so late. It must be getting close to the sixth hour of the night. Has Digenis finally gone to the ice?"

To his surprise, Zaidas answered, "No, your Majesty, or not that I know of. It has rather to do with your son Phostis."

"You found a way to make Digenis talk?" Krispos demanded eagerly.

"Not that either, your Majesty," the mage said. "As you know, till now I've had no success even learning the possible source of the magic that conceals the young Majesty from my search. This has not been from want of effort or diligence, I assure you. Till now, I would have described the trouble as want of skill."

"Till now?" Krispos prompted.

"As you know, your Majesty, my wife Aulissa is a very determined lady." Zaidas gave a small, self-deprecating chuckle. "She has, in fact, determination to spare for herself and me both."

Iakovitzes reached for the stylus, but forbore. Krispos admired Aulissa's beauty and her strength of purpose while remaining content she was his mage's wife, not his own. The two of them had been happy together for many years, though. Now Krispos just said, "Go on, pray."

"Yes, your Majesty. In any case, Aulissa, seeing my discontent at failing to penetrate the shield the Thanasiot sorcerers have thrown up to disguise Phostis' whereabouts, suggested I test that screen at odd times and in odd ways, in the hope of ascertaining its nature while it might be weakest. Having no more likely profitable notions of my own, I fell in with her plan, and this evening I saw it crowned with success."

"There's good news indeed," Krispos said. "I'm in your debt, and in Aulissa's. Tell her when you go home that I'll show I'm grateful with more than words. But for now, by the good god, tell me what you know before I get up and tear it from you."

Iakovitzes let out his gobbling laugh. "It's an idle threat, sorcerous sir," he wrote. "Neither Krispos nor I could rise for anything right now, in any sense of the word."

Zaidas' smile was nervous. "You must understand, your Majesty, I've not broken the screen, merely peeked behind one lifted corner of it, if I may use ordinary words to describe sorcerous operations. But this I can tell you with some confidence: the magic behind the screen is of the school inspired by the Prophets Four."

"Is
it?" Krispos said. Iakovitzes' eyebrows were eloquent of surprise. The Avtokrator added, "So the wind blows from that quarter, does it? It's not what I expected. I'll say that. Knowing how the screen was made, can you now pierce it?"

"That remains to be seen," Zaidas said, "but I can essay such piercing with more hope than previously was mine."

"Good for you!" Krispos lifted the latest wine jar from its bed of snow. It was distressingly light. "Barsymes!" he called. "I'd intended to make an end of things here, but I find we need more wine after all. Fetch us another, and a cup for Zaidas and one for yourself. Tonight the news is good."

"I shall attend to it directly, your Majesty," Barsymes said, and he did.

Occasional sleet rode the wind outside the little stone house with the thatched roof. Inside, a small fire burned on the hearth, but the chill remained. Phostis chafed his hands one against the other to keep feeling in them.

The priest who had presided over the Midwinter's Day liturgy at the main temple in Etchmiadzin bowed to the middle-age couple who sat side by side at the table where they'd no doubt eaten together for many years. On the table rested a small loaf of black bread and two cups of wine.