The Dance of Time b-6

by Eric Flint

  "Damned if you're not right. But what would he be doing- Oh. Stupid question."

  The captain smiled, sardonically. "I guess we know who won the siege."

  He took a deep breath and let it out. "Well, thank whatever gods there are. After eleven thousand wasted miles and I don't want to think how many wasted hours, we've finally got something to do."

  Fortunately, they'd hauled their little bombard the whole way. For all their diminutive size, the Khmer assassins were deadly. But a blast of canister swept them away as neatly as you could ask for. The one who survived, unconscious and badly wounded, got his throat cut a few seconds later.

  They hadn't intended to hit the emperor or the girl, but the group had been tightly bunched and canister just naturally spreads.

  The girl wasn't too badly hurt. Just a single ball in the left arm. She might lose the arm, but it could have been worse.

  There was no chance, however, that Skandagupta would survive.

  "Gut-shot," the lieutenant grunted. "He'll die in agony, in a few days. Damodara might like that."

  The captain shook his head. "Not by reputation, and all we really need is the head, anyway. Or do you want to carry the fat little bastard?"

  The lieutenant eyed the distant walls of Kausambi. Night was falling, but he could still hear the sounds of scattered fighting.

  "Well. . it's only a few miles. But after eleven thousand, I'm not in the mood for any extra effort." He knelt down, and with a few expert strokes, severed the imperial head.

  The girl was still squalling at them, as she had been since the attack. It was a very strange sound, coming from such a small female. As if her voice emerged from a huge cavern of a chest.

  Consciously and deliberately, the assassins had blocked the actual words from their minds. You had to be careful, dealing with the witches. Which she obviously was, despite her youth. A witch-in-training, at least.

  The captain struck her on the head with the pommel of his dagger. Carefully, just enough to daze the creature.

  You never knew, with the witches and the imperial dynasty-of which Damodara was still a part, after all. The reward might be greater, if she were still alive.

  Alive, however, was good enough.

  "I'm sick of that squalling," said the captain. "Her eyes are creepy, too. Gag her and blindfold her, before she comes to."

  They decided to wait until the next day, before entering the city to seek their reward. By then, the fighting should have ended.

  Before long, however, the captain was regretting that decision. They were all very well-traveled, by now, and-alas-the lieutenant liked to read.

  "You know," he said, "the story has it that when some Persians presented Alexander the Great with the body of Darius, he had them all executed. For regicide, even though he was hunting the former emperor himself."

  Silently, the captain cursed all well-read men. Then, because maintaining morale was his duty, pointed out the obvious.

  "Don't be silly. Alexander the Great was a maniac. Everybody says Damodara is a level-headed, practical fellow."

  Lord Samudra learned the war was over that night, from a radio message sent from Kausambi.

  FALSE EMPEROR OVERTHROWN STOP TRUE EMPEROR DAMODARA SITS ON THRONE IN KAUSAMBI STOP YOU WILL OBEY HIM LORD SAMUDRA STOP WAR IS OVER STOP ESTABLISH LIAISON WITH MAURICE OF THRACE TO NEGOTIATE CEASE FIRE WITH ROMAN AND PERSIAN ARMIES IN PUNJAB STOP

  "What are you going to do?" asked one of his aides.

  Samudra let the message fall to the table in the bunker. "What do you think? I'm going to do exactly as I'm told. The Romans will have received the same message. By now, they've got us outnumbered. Between them and the Persians, we're facing something like two hundred thousand men."

  "And we're losing soldiers by the droves every day," said a different aide, gloomily. "As much by desertion as disease."

  There was silence, for a time. Then Samudra said: "You want to know the truth? I know Damodara pretty well. We're cousins, after all. He's about ten times more capable than Skandagupta and-best of all-he's even-tempered."

  There was further silence, finally broken by one of the aides.

  "Long live the new emperor, then."

  "Idiot," said Samudra tonelessly. "Long live the true emperor. The greatest army of the Malwa empire does not obey rebels, after all."

  It was several days before Belisarius learned the war was over. The news was brought to him by a special courier sent by Damodara.

  A Rajput cavalryman, naturally. The man was exceptionally proud-as well he might be-that he'd made the ride as fast as he had, without killing a single horse.

  "So, that's it," said Belisarius, rising from his squat across from Kungas.

  The two of them emerged from the hut and studied the Malwa army they'd trapped on the Ganges.

  There'd been little fighting, and none at all for the past four days.

  "You were right, I think," said Kungas. "The bitch did kill herself, days ago."

  "Most likely. We'll know soon enough. That army's looking at starvation, before too long. They slaughtered their last horses two days ago."

  "I'll send an envoy to them. Once they get the news, they'll surrender."

  The Kushan king eyed Belisarius. "You know, I don't think I've ever seen that crooked a smile on your face. What amuses you so?"

  "I've got a reputation to maintain. You do realize, don't you, that in the days when the final battle was fought and won in the greatest war in history, Belisarius spent his time doing nothing more than drinking lousy wine and gambling with dice?"

  Kungas chuckled. "You lost, too. By now, you owe me a small chest of gold."

  "Not all that small, really."

  But Kungas had stopped chuckling. Another thought had come to him, that caused his notoriously expressionless face to twist into a grimace.

  "Oh. You'll never stop crowing about it, will you?"

  When Maurice heard, it put him in a foul mood for a full day.

  Calopodius' mood was not much better. "How in the name of God am I supposed to put that in my history? You can only do so much with classical allusions, you know. Grammar and rhetoric collapse under that crude a reality."

  "Who gives a damn?" snarled Maurice. "You think you've got problems? I'm still in good health, and I'm only twenty years older than the bastard. Years and years, I'll have to listen to him bragging."

  "He's not really a boastful man," pointed out Calopodius.

  "Not usually, no. But with something like this? Ha! You watch, youngster. Years and years and years."

  Chapter 40

  Kausambi

  The damage Kausambi had suffered in the fighting was minimal, considering the huge size of the city. Belisarius had seen far worse before, any number of times. Damodara's forces had been able to breach the walls in two places, without having to suffer heavy casualties in the doing, because the gates had been opened from the inside. As a result, none of the three factors had been operating that, singly or in combination, usually produced horrible sacks.

  First, the troops pouring into the city were still under the control of their officers, because the officers themselves had not suffered many casualties and led them through the gates.

  Second, the soldiers were not burning with a desire for vengeance on those who had-often horribly, with the most ghastly weapons-butchered their mates while they were still fighting outside the walls.

  So, the sort of spontaneously erupting military riot-in-all-but-name that most "sacks" constituted, had never occured. Beyond, at least, a few isolated incidents-always involving liquor-that Damodara's officers had squelched immediately.

  And, third, of course-not all sacks were spontaneous-the commander of the victorious besieging army had not ordered one, after his troops seized the city.

  Skandagupta would have done so, of course. But Damodara ruled now, not Skandagupta, and he was a very different sort of man. The only thing of Skandagupta that remained was his head, perched on a spike a
t the entrance to the imperial palace.

  It was the only head there. Damodara had ordered all the other corpses and heads removed.

  After dismounting from his horse, Belisarius took a moment to admire the thing.

  Pity, though, he said to Aide. Agathius swore he'd someday see Skandagupta lying dead in the dust. I'm afraid there's not much chance of that, now.

  In garam season? No chance at all. Unless he'd be satisfied with looking at a skull. That thing already stinks.

  Aide, of course, was detecting the stench through Belisarius' own nostrils. As he had many times before, Belisarius wondered how the jewel perceived things on his own. He could do so, Belisarius knew, although the manner of it remained mysterious. Aide and the other crystal beings had none of the senses possessed by the protoplasmic branch of the human family.

  But whatever those methods were, Aide had not used them in years. He'd told Belisarius that he found it much easier to do his work if he restricted himself to perceiving the world only through Belisarius' senses.

  A courtier-no, a small pack of them-emerged from the palace entrance and hastened down the broad stone stairs at the bottom of which Belisarius was standing.

  "General Belisarius!" one of them said. "The emperor awaits you!"

  He managed to make that sound as if Damodara was bestowing an immense-no, divine-favor upon the Roman general. Which was laughable, really, since the same Rajput courier who had brought the news of Damodara's triumph had also brought a private message from the new Malwa emperor asking Belisarius to come to Kausambi immediately to "deal with a delicate and urgent matter." The tone of the message had been, if not pleading, certainly not peremptory or condescending.

  Courtiers, Belisarius thought sarcastically, handing the reins of his horse to one of the Rajputs who had escorted him to Kausambi. However else people in different lands may vary in their customs, I think courtiers are the same everywhere.

  Normally, Aide would have responded with a quip of his own. But the jewel seemed strangely subdued. He had said very little since they entered the city.

  Belisarius thought that was odd. Looked at in some ways-most ways, rather-this final triumph belonged to Aide more than it did to Belisarius or Damodara or anyone else. But he didn't press for an explanation. In the years that he and Aide had shared a mind, for all practical purposes, they'd both learned to respect the privacy of the other.

  The Malwa imperial palace was the largest in the world. So far as Belisarius knew, anyway. There might be something equivalent in one of the many kingdoms in China that were vying for power. "Largest," at least, in the sense of being a single edifice. The Roman imperial complex at Constantinople covered more acreage, but much of it was gardens and open walkways.

  He'd visited the palace before, a number of times, when he'd come to India years earlier in what amounted to the capacity of a spy. With the help of Aide's perfect memory, Belisarius knew the way to the imperial audience chamber. He could have gone there himself, without needing the guidance of the courtiers.

  But, perhaps not. Soon, the courtiers were leading him down a hallway he'd never been in. Old, ingrained habit made him check the spatha in its scabbard, to see that it was loose and would come out easily.

  Although the movement was subtle, he made no attempt at all to keep it surreptitious. The courtiers had irritated him enough that he felt no desire to accommodate them. Emperor Damodara had, after all, invited General Belisarius into his presence. Generals carried swords. Good generals with combat experience carried sharp swords, and made sure they weren't stuck in their scabbards.

  One of the courtiers who observed seemed brighter than the rest. Or, at least, didn't suffer from the usual moronic state of the courtier mentality, whose defining characteristic was to think that power emanated from itself.

  "The emperor is not waiting for you in the audience chamber, General," he explained quietly. "He awaits you in, ah. ."

  The hostile glances coming from several other courtiers caused him to falter. "Someplace else," he finished lamely.

  Aide spoke for the first time since they'd entered the palace.

  He's found the lair. Link's lair. That's where we're going.

  Belisarius nodded. And, again, made sure the spatha was loose. What about Link itself?

  Damodara's message had said nothing on that subject.

  I don't know. I think he must have Link also. Or his message would have been. . different.

  Belisarius thought about it. Yes, you're right. He wouldn't have called it a "delicate" matter as well as an "urgent" one.

  But they were entering a chamber, now, and speculation could come to an end. Damodara was there, waiting, along with Rana Sanga and a big Ye-tai officer whom Belisarius had never met before. The now-famous Toramana, he presumed.

  His eyes, however, were immediately drawn to the side. Two other men were standing there, who-for the moment-meant far more to Belisarius.

  "I'm glad you survived," he said. "I was worried you wouldn't, when I sent you off."

  Anastasius' huge shoulders moved in a shrug. "Wasn't really that bad, General. For starters, we didn't have to protect you. Mindouos and Anatha were worse-not to mention the battle at the Pass."

  Valentinian grinned, in his savage way. "Way worse," he chimed in, reaching up and running fingers through his coarse black hair. For a moment, a long scar was visible-the scar Sanga had given him in their famous duel. "We'll ask you to remember that, though, when it comes time to figure out our retirement bonus."

  Even with an emperor waiting, Belisarius would deal with this first.

  "Just tell me what you want. If I can manage it, I will. The two of you long ago stopped being in the category of 'common soldiers.' "

  The tall Rajput king standing a few feet away issued a snort. "The truth, that!" He gave the two cataphracts a look that Belisarius couldn't quite interpret. Deep respect was there, obviously, but there was something else. Not derision, exactly, but amusement of some kind.

  For the first time that day, Aide's voice had a trace of his usual good humor. I still don't understand how a man as smart as you can be such a dummy about some things.

  What do you mean?

  You didn't figure out what Agathius was doing, either, until your nose was rubbed in it. I figured it out right away. But I'll remind you that there's an emperor waiting, here-and the Malwa empire is still probably the most powerful empire in the world. Will be for sure, in a few years, once Damodara gets settled in. Best to stay on good terms with him.

  That was good advice. Belisarius turned to face Damodara and bowed.

  "You asked for me, Your Majesty. How may I be of service?"

  A quick smile flashed across Damodara's face. "Well, starting tomorrow, you can be of service by providing all of us with your good sense. We have a complicated peace settlement to make, you know. And we're already arguing over where to hold the conference. Fortunately-so far-it's been mostly an argument over the radio and telegraph."

  The Malwa emperor lifted his hand. "But that's for tomorrow. Today, there's a different decision that faces us. Probably a more important one. And it's not a decision I feel anyone but you can make."

  Belisarius took a deep breath. "You found Link. And its lair."

  "The first, yes. The second-" Damodara shrugged. " 'Found' is hardly the word. I already knew where it was. All the members of the dynastic clan-boys, at least-are taken to it at least once. I was there several times."

  "Take me there," Belisarius said. Commanded, rather.

  Belisarius could make no sense at all of the machines in the chamber far below the palace. The problem wasn't so much that, in their gleaming blankness, they seemed more like magic artifacts than what he thought of as "machines." It was that he knew he would never understand what they did or how they worked.

  I don't understand them either, really. I don't think even the Great Ones do, except in general terms. The new gods developed cybernetics far beyond any other branch of the
human race. The Great Ones took a different direction. One that led to us crystals. And while we share some of the characteristics of computers, we are very different in other ways.

  How could they bring all this here, through time, when all the Great Ones could do-and that, barely-was send you as a semi-conscious thing? Apologetically, he added: When you first arrived, I mean. You're hardly "semi-conscious" now.

  For one thing, the Great Ones aren't as ruthless. The energy expenditure required to send these machines back through time destroyed the new gods' own planet. Along with most of their people. Sub-species, it would be better to say. There were not many survivors.

  Sensing the question before Belisarius could ask it, Aide added: Yes, they knew that would happen. The ones who managed it, at least. Most of their people didn't, the ones who were destroyed. Even the new gods have factions. The faction that did this-which is all that is left-are. .

  Fanatics, Belisarius supplied. Fanaticism carried to the extremes you'd expect of "supermen." I understand.

  But it was time, now, to ignore the machines. Damodara had not brought Belisarius here to deal with them. Not principally, at least.

  He turned and studied the small female shackled to a chair. He couldn't see much of her, since there was a hood over her head.

  Don't look, said Aide.

  No. I must.

  Three strides and he was there; a quick movement of the hand, and the hood was removed.

  It was the face of a young girl, perhaps seven or eight years old. All but the eyes that stared up at him. Those belonged to no human being at all. Their brown color was irrelevant. The emptiness within overwhelmed it.

  The girl was gagged, too.

  Don't listen to it.

  No, I must.

  It took longer to remove the gag. The knot holding it in place was very tight. As he worked at the task, he could hear the indrawn breaths of the people behind him.

  As ever, Aide's ability to enhance Belisarius' senses was handy. There were five other men in the room, and four of them were holding their breath. The fifth one was breathing the same way he always did.