Fortune's stroke

trying to break the reef. Flesh became red ruin; blood everywhere; a severed arm, here; a coil of intestines, there; a piece of Malwa brain, crushed under an Ethiopian sandal.

Irene's eyes watched Satan spread his carpet across a dusty road in India. She saw, but her mind could not encompass the seeing.

A powerful hand seized her shoulder and drove her to her knees.

'Down, woman!' Her ears heard Ezana's voice, shouting further commands. Her eyes saw five sarwen, surrounding her like a wall. Her mind understood nothing. She was no more than a child, now, recognizing shelter.

She closed her eyes and pressed her hands over her ears. Finally, darkness and relative quiet brought back a modicum of reason. In that small eye of the storm, Irene sought herself.

After a time-seconds? minutes? hours? — she began to recognize herself.

Courage, foundation of all virtues, came back first.

I will not do this. Firmly, she opened her eyes and removed her hands from her ears.

She could see nothing, on her knees, except a few glimpses through the legs of the sarwen standing guard over her. And what little she could see was still obscured by smoke. After a moment, she stopped trying to make sense of the battle. She simply studied the legs of the soldiers shielding her.

Excellent legs, she concluded. Under the black skin, powerful muscles flexed calves and thighs. The easy movement of men watching, not fighting themselves, but ready to spring into action at an instant's notice. Human leopards. Horny, calloused feet rested firmly in sturdy sandals. Toes shaped in Ethiopia's mountains fit stony Majarashtra to perfection.

She listened to their banter. Her Ge'ez was good enough, now, to understand the words. But her mind made no attempt to translate. Most of the words were profanity, anyway-nothing more than taunting curses hurled down on the invisible enemy. She simply listened to the confidence in those voices. Human leopards, growling with predator satisfaction.

Two phrases, only, did she ever remember.

The first, howled with glee: 'And will you look at those fucking Kushans? God- damn!'

And the response, growling bemused wonder: 'I'm glad Kungas is on our side, boys. Or we'd be so much dog food.'

So am I. Oh, dear God, so am I.

In the time which followed, as a Malwa army was ripped to pieces between Ethiopia's shield wall and a Kushan avalanche, Irene went away. This was not her place. She had no purpose here.

She needed to find herself, again. For perhaps the first time in her life.

Herself appeared, and demanded the truth. Don't ask why you came, woman. You know the answer. And don't tell me lies about clever stratagems, and ruses, and battle plans. Tell others, but not me. You know why you came.

'Yes,' she choked, closing her eyes. Tears leaked through the lids. 'I know.'

A sarwen, hearing the soft sobs, glanced down at her. For a moment, no more, before he looked away. A woman, her wits shattered. Nothing to puzzle over. Women were fragile by nature.

But he was quite wrong. The tears streaking Irene's cheeks were tears of happiness, not fear. Fear there was, of course, and fear aplenty. But it was not fear of the moment. No, not at all. It was the much greater fear-the deep terror, entwined with joy-of a human being who had finally, like so many others before her, been able to give up a hostage to fortune. A woman who, finally, understood her friend Antonina and could-finally-make the same choice.

'He would have gone into the fire, anyway,' she whispered to herself. 'No matter what I did.'

Herself nodded. And you could not bear the thought. Of staying behind, staring at a horse.

Then, he was there. She saw the legs of the sarwen around her ease and stretch. Saw them move aside. Heard the shouts of greeting and glee. In the distance, a muted roar. The first of the Malwa guns was being destroyed-overcharged powder blowing overcharged shot, rupturing the huge weapon like a rotten fruit.

He squatted next to her, where she knelt. 'Are you all right?'

Irene nodded. Smiled. He placed a hand on her shoulder.

He had never touched her before. She reached up and caressed the hand with her own. Feeling, with her long and slender fingers, the short ones, heavy with flesh and sinew, which held her shoulder so gently.

She pressed her face into his thick chest. His hand slid down her arm, his arm became a shield, his touch an embrace. Suddenly, fiercely, she pressed open lips against his muscular neck. Kissing, nuzzling. Her breath came quick and short. She flung her arms around him and drew him half-sprawling across her. Her left leg, kicking free of the long tunic, coiled down his out-thrust right leg. Her sandal scraped the bare skin of his calf.

For a moment-pure heat, bolting out of a stable like a wild horse-Irene felt Kungas respond. His hard abdomen pressed her own, desire meeting desire. But only for a moment. Kungas chuckled. The sound carried more delight than humor. Much more. Much more. It was the choked laugh of a man who discovers, unexpectedly, that an idle dream has taken real form. Yet, despite that little cry, his strong arms and body went rigid, pinning her-not like a wrestler pins an opponent, but simply like a man restrains a child from folly. Seconds went by, while his lips nuzzled her lovely, thick, chestnut hair. Irene felt his breath; heavy, hot at first, but cooling quickly.

She chuckled herself, then, as his restraint brought her own. 'I guess it's not a good idea,' she mumbled. 'The Ethiopians would probably insist on watching.'

'Worse, I'm afraid,' he responded dryly, still kissing her hair. 'They'd accompany us with drums. Placing bets, all the while, on when we'd stop.'

Irene laughed outright. The sound was muffled against his chest.

'No,' whispered Kungas gently. 'Not for us, and not now. Passion always comes, after death's wings flap away. But it is cheap, and gone with the morrow. And you will wonder, afterward, whether it was you or your fear.'

He chuckled again. Delight was still in that sound, but it was warm rather than ecstatic. 'I know you, Irene. You would resent me. And what's worse, you would study books trying to find the answer.'

'Think I couldn't find it?' she demanded.

She heard his soft laugh, rustling through her hair. Felt the little movement of his chest. Knew the economic subtlety she had come to cherish so. 'I don't doubt you would. But reading takes so much time. I don't want to wait that long.'

Smiling, she raised her head. The clear brown eyes of Greek nobility, looking past a long and bony nose, stared into eyes of almond, in a flat and barbarous face. 'How long, then?' she asked.

Another muted roar swept the pavilion; and then another. But the Kushan's eyes never left her own. The destruction of Venandakatra's guns-the rubble of Malwa's schemes-the salvation of a dynasty-these were meaningless things, in that moment, for those two people embracing on a road.

'First, I must learn to read,' he said. 'Not before.' His face was stiff, and solemn, but Irene did not miss the little twitch in his lips.

She smiled. 'You are a good student, you know. Amazingly good.'

Kungas' smile could have been recognized by anyone, now. 'With such an incentive, who could fail?'

There was another roar, as a siege gun ruptured; and another. This time, Kungas did look.

'That's the last of them,' he said. 'We must be off, now, before they rally and Venandakatra sends more. We can make the coast, if we don't dawdle.'

With easy grace, he rose to his feet and extended his hand. A moment later, Irene was standing at his side.

The realities of war had returned. Irene could see the sarwen and the Kushan troops forming their columns in preparation for the forced march to the sea, and the Ethiopian ships waiting there to carry them back to Suppara.