Belisarius I Thunder at Dawn

by David Drake

  It seemed bitterest of all, to her, in that bitterest of all nights, that she had finally come to understand the one lesson he had despaired of ever teaching her.

  Only the soul matters, in the end.

  A slave and a master

  That same night, in another tent, a slave also seized his soul and dedicated it to a purpose. The decision to do so had been long in the making, and did not come easily. There is nothing so difficult, for a soul which has resigned itself to hopelessness, than to reopen the wound of life.

  His master's purpose was now clear to the slave. Some part of that purpose, at least—the slave suspected there was more to come. Much more. From experience, the slave had learned that his master's mind was a devilish thing.

  The slave would dedicate himself to that deviltry.

  Though it was late, the lantern was still lit. Rolling over on his pallet, the slave observed that his master was still awake. Sitting on his own pallet, cross-legged, his powerful hands draped over his knees, staring at nothingness. As if listening to some inner voice, which spoke to him alone.

  Which, the slave knew, was true. The slave even thought he could name that voice.

  As always, despite his preoccupation, the slave's master missed nothing in his surroundings. The slight motion of the slave rolling over drew the master's attention. He turned his head and gazed at his slave. Cocked his eye quizzically.

  "My name is Dadaji Holkar," said the slave softly. He rolled back and closed his eyes. Sleep came, then, much more quickly than he would have thought possible.

  A general and an aide

  For a moment, Belisarius stared at the back of his slave's head. Then, half-stunned, looked away.

  The slave's unexpected announcement had not caused that reaction. It had simply jolted the general into a recognition of his own blindness.

  His thoughts raced back to the breach in the barrier. This time he made no effort to clear away more rubble. Simply called across:

  What is your name?

  The facets flashed and shivered. What?—More meaningless—it was impossible! The mind was too—

  aim brought the facets into order, harried them into discipline.

  It was not impossible! The mind was not—

  The struggle broke loose meaning. At last—at last!—some part of the message sent back by the Great Ones came into focus. The very end of the message, which was still obscure due to the absent body, but no longer incomprehensible. The facets glittered crystalline victory. aim transmuted triumph into language:

  Then:

  Find the general who is not a warrior.

  Give all into his keeping;

  Give aim to his purpose and assistance to his aim.

  He will discover you in the purpose,

  You will find us in the aim,

  Find yourself in the seeking,

  And see a promise kept

  In that place where promise dwells;

  That place where gods go not,

  Because it is far beyond their reach.

  The thought which came to Belisarius then was a burst of sweet pride. Like the smile of a child, taking its first step:

  Call me Aide.

  A lady and a rogue

  "Ready?" asked Maurice.

  Antonina and John of Rhodes nodded. The hecatontarch knocked out the pole bolt with his mallet.

  The arm of the onager whipped forward, driven by the torsion of the twisted cords which held its base. The arm slammed into the cushion of hair-cloth stuffed with fine chaff resting on the crossbeam. The clay jar which had been held in the sling at the tip of the arm flew through the air.

  The three people standing to the side of the artillery piece followed the trajectory of the jar. Within two seconds, the jar slammed into a stone wall some distance away and erupted into a ball of flame.

  "Yes! Yes!" howled John, prancing with glee. "It works! Look at that, Antonina—spontaneous eruption!"

  She herself was grinning from ear to ear. The grin didn't vanish even after she caught sight of Maurice's frown.

  "Oh, come on, you damned Cassandra!" she laughed. "I swear, you are the most morose man who ever lived."

  Maurice smiled faintly. "I'm not morose. I'm a pessimist."

  John of Rhodes scowled. "And what are you pessimistic about this time?" The retired naval officer pointing to the wall, which was still burning hotly.

  "Look at it! And if you still don't believe, go and try to put it out! Go ahead! I promise you that fire will last—even on stone—until the fuel burns itself up. The only way you'll put it out is to bury it under dirt. You think an enemy is going to march into battle carrying shovels?"

  Maurice shook his head.

  "I'm not contesting your claims. But—look, John, you're a naval officer. No big thing for you, on a nice fat ship, to haul around a pile of heavy clay pots. Carefully nestled in cloths to keep them from breaking and bursting into flame. Try doing that with a mule train, sometime, and you'll understand why I'm not jumping for joy."

  John's scowl deepened, but he said nothing in reply. Antonina sighed.

  "You're being unfair, Maurice."

  The hecatontarch's scowl made John's look like a smile.

  "Unfair?" he demanded. "What's that got to do with anything? War is unfair, Antonina! It's the nature of the damned beast."

  His scowl faded. The hecatontarch marched over and placed his hand on John's shoulder.

  "I'm not criticizing you, John. There's no doubt in my mind you just revolutionized naval warfare. And siege warfare, for that matter. I'm speaking the plain, blunt truth, that's all. This stuff's just too hard to handle for an army in the field."

  The naval officer's own scowl faded. He looked down and blew out his lips. "Yes, I know. That's why I made sure we were all standing back and to the side. I wasn't sure the impact of hitting the crossbeam wouldn't shatter the pot right here."

  He rubbed his neck. "The problem's the damn naphtha. It's still the base for the compound. As long as we're stuck with that liquid, gooey crap we're not going to get any better than this."

  Maurice grunted. "What did you add this time?" He nodded toward the distant flame, still burning. "Whatever it was, it makes one hell of a difference."

  John peered at the flame. His blue eyes seemed as bright as diamonds, as if he were trying to force the flames into some new shape by sheer willpower.

  "Saltpeter," he muttered.

  Maurice shrugged. "Then why don't you try mixing the saltpeter with something else? Something that isn't liquid. A clay, or a powder. Anything else that'll burn but isn't hard to handle."

  "Like what?" demanded John crossly. With a sneer: "Brimstone?"

  "Why not?" asked Antonina brightly. As usual, she found herself cheering the naval officer up after another long effort had fallen short of its mark.

  John made a face. "Give me a break. Have you ever smelled burning sulfur?"

  "Give it a try," said Maurice. "Just make sure you stand upwind."

  John thought for a moment, then shrugged. "Why not?" Then, with a smile: "As long as we're at it, why not make it a regular salad? What else burns easily but doesn't make old soldiers grumpy?"

  "How do you feel about coal, Maurice?" asked Antonina. (Brightly, of course. Men were such a grumpy lot. Like children with a permanent toothache.)

  Maurice grumped. "Too heavy."

  John of Rhodes threw up his hands with exasperation.

  "Charcoal, then! How's that, damn you?"

  Before Maurice could form a reply, Antonina sidled up to John and put her arm around his waist.

  "Now, now, John. Be sweet."

  John began to snarl at her. Then, catching movement out of the corner of his eye, transformed the snarl into a leering grin.

  "Sweet, is it? Well! As you say, as you say. Let's to the workshed, shall we, and mix up this unholy mess of Maurice's."

  His own arm slid around Antonina's waist. The two of them began walking toward the workshed. On their way, Joh
n's hand slid down slightly, patting Antonina's hip.

  Maurice didn't bother to turn around. He knew what he would see. Procopius, emerging from the villa, his eyes ogling the intimate couple.

  Maurice puffed exasperation and stared up at the heavens.

  Someday you're going to outsmart yourself, Belisarius, playing it too close. You might have told me, young man. If I hadn't figured it out fast enough and passed the word to the boys, your mechanical genius would have been found with a dagger in his back.

  Maurice turned back toward the villa.

  Sure enough. Procopius.

  Another little puff of exasperation.

  And since then it's all I can do to keep the boys from sliding a blade into this one's back.

  Generals and their damned schemes!

  A dagger and a dance

  Weeks later, Raghunath Rao decided he had finally eluded his pursuers. The key, as he had hoped, had been his turn to the west. The enemy had expected him to continue south, in the straightest route to Majarashtra. Instead, he had slipped west, into the Rann of Kutch.

  In the days which followed, making his way through the salt-marshes, he had seen no sign of his pursuers. Now that he had finally reached the sea, he was certain he was no longer being pursued.

  He decided to camp that night on the shore. True, there was a chance of being spotted, but it was so small that he decided to take the risk. He was sick of the marshes. The salt-clean air would be like a balm to his soul.

  He had had nothing to eat for two days, but ignored the pangs. Fasting and austerity were old friends. Tomorrow he would begin making his way around the coast of the Kathiawar peninsula. Soon enough he would encounter a fishing village. He spoke Gujarati fluently, and had no doubt he would find a friendly reception. Jainism still retained a strong hold in Gujarat, especially in the small villages away from the centers of Malwa power. Rao was confident that he could gain the villagers' acceptance. And their silent, quiet assistance.

  Rao was not a Jain himself, but he respected the faith and knew its creed well. He had studied it carefully in his youth, and, although he had not adopted it for his own, he had incorporated many of its teachings into his own syncretic view of God. Just as he had done with the way of the Buddha.

  It would take him time to work his way around the peninsula. And then more time, to find a means to cross the Gulf of Khambhat. Once across the Gulf, the labyrinth of the Great Country was easily within reach.

  He began to speculate on the methods he might use, but quickly put the thoughts aside. There would be time to make plans later, based on the reality which emerged.

  A smile came to his face.

  Indeed, on this one point Ousanas was quite right. Good plans, like good meat, are best cooked rare. Such a marvelous man! Even if he does believe in the most preposterous notions. "Eternal and unchanging Forms," if you would!

  The smile faded. Rao wondered how the treasure of his soul was faring. She was in the best of hands, of course. But, still, she was in the very heart of the asura's domain.

  Again, he pushed the thoughts aside. He had agreed to the plan of the foreigners, and he was not a man given to useless doubts and second thoughts. Besides, it was a good plan—no, it was an excellent plan. Shakuntala was hidden in the one place the Malwa, full of their arrogance, would never think to look for her. And there had been no alternative, anyway. Remembering the past weeks, Rao knew for a certainty that he would never have been able to escape if Shakuntala had been with him. It had been a very close matter as it was.

  And now? Now the future was clear. Once he reached the Great Country, the Panther of Majarashtra would begin to roar. Word would spread like lightning. Again, the Wind had struck the enemy. A deadly blow! Satavahana freed! The Wind himself sweeping through the hills!

  The new army he would create would make Majarashtra a name of woe to Malwa. In the Great Country, the asura's rule would become a wraith—a thing seen only by day, in large cities. The land would become a deathtrap for Ye-tai and Rajputs and all the motley hordes of the demon.

  He began to think of his stratagems and tactics, but again, put the thoughts aside. There would be time enough for that. More than time enough.

  Again, he smiled, remembering his last conversation with Shakuntala. As he had expected, the princess had been utterly furious when he explained the plan to her. But she had acquiesced, in the end.

  Not from conviction, of course. She had not believed that she would be an encumbrance in his escape. No, she had acquiesced from duty. Duty which he had hammered into her stubborn, reluctant soul.

  She was no longer a princess. No longer a girl, for whom life could be an adventure. She was the empress, now, the ruler of broken Andhra. The sole survivor of great Satavahana. Upon her shoulders—her very soul—rested the fate of her people. Her life was not hers to risk. So long as she survived, rebellion against the asura could find an anchor, a point of certainty around which to pivot and coalesce. Without her, rebellion would become simple brigandry.

  Hers was the duty of surviving and forging such alliances as bleeding Andhra needed. For now, no better alliance could be imagined than one with the very men who risked their lives to free her. Those men, and their purpose, might prove the key which unlocked the demon's shackles. Duty. Duty. Duty.

  In the end, she had agreed, as Raghunath Rao had known she would. Her soul could do no other.

  An old ache began to surface; he forced it down with long-practiced habit. But then, as he had never done before, allowed it to rise up anew.

  This time, this one and only time, I will allow it. And never again.

  He spent some minutes, then, lost in reverie. Pondering the vastness of time, wondering if there might ever be, in some turn of the wheel, a world where his soul and its treasure might not be forever separated by dharma.

  Perhaps. What man can know?

  Soon enough, reverie fell away. His life had been one of harsh self-discipline and great austerity, habits which now came automatically to him. So an old ache was driven under, again, and more ruthlessly than ever before.

  Due, perhaps, to the effort that task demanded—greater than ever before—his thoughts turned to sacrifice. He was not given to the ancient rites, as a rule. The Vedas themselves he treasured, but the old rituals held little sway over his mind. Long ago he had embraced the way of bhakti, of devotion to God, even before the Mahaveda had turned honorable rituals into rites of cruelty and barbarism.

  The sun was beginning to set over the Erythrean Sea, bathing the waters and the shore with lambent glory.

  Yes, he would sacrifice.

  Quickly, he constructed the three ritual fires. Once the flames were burning, he drew forth his offering from its leather container.

  He had saved the last sheet, only. The others he had destroyed in his fire in the forest, weeks earlier. The other sheets, had they been found on his body in the event of his death or capture, could have led to the discovery of the man who wrote that message. But the last sheet, even if found by the Malwa, would have been simply a thing of myth and mystery.

  That message was the most precious thing he had ever owned. He would sacrifice it now, in devotion to the future.

  Before casting the sheet into the flames, he read it one last time.

  —as you may imagine. More I cannot say, for a certainty. He is a strange fellow. Like a child, often, filled with mute hurt and fumbling grievance. Great hurt and grievance, that I doubt not. And just ones, as well, I believe.

  But power also he possesses, of that I am equally certain. The greatest power of all, the power of knowledge.

  His name I do not know. I do not think he knows it himself.

  Yet, I have a belief. It comes not from my faith—though I do not see where it is forbidden by it, nor do the holiest of men that I know. It comes from a vision. A vision I had, once, of you yourself, dancing on the rim of destruction.

  I believe he is Kalkin. The tenth avatara who was promised, sent to b
ind the asura and slay the asura's minions.

  Or, at the least, teach us to dance the deed.

  Raghunath Rao cast the papyrus into the flames and watched until it was totally consumed. Then he drew the dagger. The dagger, too, he would sacrifice.

  Truly, an excellent dagger. But the time for daggers was past.

  But, just as he prepared to place it in the flames, an impulse came upon him. An irresistible impulse; and, he thought, most fitting.

  Aching pain and joyful wonder merged in his soul, and Raghunath Rao leapt to his feet.