Fortune's stroke

It is not possible! He is one of the most learned men in India! A scholar, as well a statesman!

She could picture them gobbling their disbelief. It is not possible! He is the peshwa of Andhra! How could great Satavahana-India's purest kshatriya-have been fooled by such a man? Not possible!

Irene's fight to restrain her humor became transformed into something much grimmer. Something cold, and calculating, and-in its own way-utterly ruthless. She, too, could be an executioner.

Studying the brahmin diplomats seated before the empress, Irene's eyes began to glint. I will show you what is possible. Fools!

It was time. The envoys had presented their offers. Dadaji had summarized the situation. It only remained for the empress to make her decision.

Irene could not have explained the little movements she made, of head and hands and eyes, which drew Shakuntala's attention. Neither could the young empress herself. But the two women had spent many hours in private and public discourse. Irene knew how to signal the empress, just as surely as the empress understood how to interpret those signals.

Shakuntala's head turned to Irene. The empress' eyes seemed as bright as ever, probably, to most observers. But Irene could sense the dull resignation in that imperial gaze.

'I would like to hear from the envoy of Rome,' stated Shakuntala. As always in public council, the empress' voice was a thing to marvel at. Youthful, true, in its timbre. But a fresh-forged blade is still a sword.

A faint murmur arose from the diplomats.

Shakuntala's eyes snapped back to them. 'Do I hear a protest?' she demanded. 'Is there one among you who cares to speak?'

The murmurs fled. Shakuntala's eyes were like iron balls. The Black-Eyed Pearl of the Satavahanas, she was often called. But black, for all its beauty, can be a terrifying color.

Black iron smote clay. 'You would protest?' she hissed. 'You? ' The statue moved, slightly. A goddess, with a little gesture of the hand, dismissing insects. 'After Malwa conquered Andhra, and flayed my father's skin for Skandagupta's trophy, what did you do?'

The statue sneered. 'You trembled, and quailed, and whimpered, and tried to hide in your palaces.' The goddess spoke. 'Rome-only Rome-did not cower from the beast.'

Shakuntala's next words were spoken through tight teeth. 'Doubt me not in this, you diplomats. If Malwa is slain, the lance which brings the monster down will be held in Roman hands. Not ours. Alone-not if all of us united- could we do the deed. Our task is to shield the Deccan, and do what we can to lame the beast.'

The diplomats bowed their heads. Those brahmins, for all their learning, were insular and self-absorbed to a degree which Irene, accustomed to Roman cosmopolitanism, often found amazing. But even they, by now, knew the name of Belisarius. A bizarre name, an outlandish name, but a name of legend nonetheless. Even in south India- even in southeast Asia-they had heard of Anatha. And the Nehar Malka, where Belisarius drowned Malwa's minions.

Shakuntala kept her eyes on their bowed heads, not relenting for a full minute. Black iron is as heavy as it is hard.

During that long minute, while Indian diplomats-again-quailed and hid their heads, Irene sent a mental message to a man across the sea. He would not receive it, of course, but she knew he would have enjoyed the whimsy. That man had spent hours and hours with her, in Constantinople-days, rather-counseling Irene on her great task. Explaining, to a woman of the present, the future he wanted her to help create.

Well, Belisarius, you wanted your Peninsular War. I do believe you've got it. And if we don't have Wellington, and the Lines of Torres Vedras, we have something just as good. We have Rao, and the hillforts of the Great Country, and-

Her eyes fell on a hard, harsh, brutal face.

— and we've got my man, too. Mine.

She gathered the comfort in that possessive thought, and transformed softness into hard purpose.

'Speak, envoy of Rome,' commanded Shakuntala.

Irene rose from her chair and stepped into the center of the large chamber. Dozens of eyes were fixed upon her.

She had learned that from Theodora. The Empress Regent of Rome had also counseled Irene, before she left for India. Explaining, to a spymaster accustomed to shadows, how to work in the light of day.

'Always sit, in counsel and judgement,' Theodora had told her. 'But always stand, when you truly want to lead.'

Irene, as was her way, began with humor.

'Consider these robes, men of India.' She plucked at a heavy sleeve. 'Preposterous, are they not? A device for torture, almost, in this land of heat and swelter.'

Many smiles appeared. Irene matched them with her own.

'I was advised, once, to exchange them for a sari.' She sensed, though she did not look to see, a pair of twitching lips. 'But I rejected the advice. Why? Because while the robes are preposterous, what they represent is not.'

She scanned the crowd slowly. The smile faded. Her face grew stern.

'What they represent is Rome itself. Rome-and its thousand years.'

Silence. Again, slowly, she scanned the room.

'A thousand years,' she repeated. 'What dynasty of India can claim as much?'

Silence. Scan back across the room.

'The greatest empire in the history of India, the Maurya, could claim only a century and half. The Guptas, not more than two.' She nodded toward Shakuntala. 'Andhra can claim more, in years if not in power, but even Andhra cannot claim more than half Rome's fortune.'

Her stern face softened, just slightly. Again, she nodded to the empress. The nod was almost a bow. 'Although, God willing, Andhra will be able to match Rome's accomplishment, as future centuries unfold.'

Severity returned. 'A thousand years. Consider that, noble men of India. And then ask yourself: how was it done?'

Again, she smiled; and, again, plucked at a heavy sleeve.

'It was done with these robes. These heavy, thick, preposterous, unsuitable robes. These robes contain the secret.'

She paused, waited. She had their complete attention, now. She took the time, while she waited, to send another whimsical, mental message across the sea. Thanking a harsh, cold empress named Theodora, born in poverty on the streets of Alexandria, for training a Greek noblewoman in the true ways of majesty.

'The secret is this. These are the robes of Rome, but they are not Roman. They are Hun robes, which we took for our own.'

A murmur arose. Huns? Filthy, barbarous-Huns?

'Yes. Hun robes. We took them, as we took Hun trousers, when our soldiers became cavalrymen. Just as we took, from the Aryans, the armor and the weapons and the tactics of Persia's horsemen. Just as we took from the Carthaginians-eight hundred years ago-the secrets of war at sea. Just as we took, century after century, the wisdom of Greece, and made it our own. Just as we took the message of Christ from Palestine. Just as we have taken everything we needed-and discarded anything we must-so that Rome could endure.'

She pointed her finger toward the north. 'The Malwa call us mongrels, and boast of their own purity. So be it. Rome shrugs off the name, as an elephant shrugs off a fly. Or, perhaps-'

She grinned. Or, perhaps, bared her teeth.

'Say better, Rome swallows the name. Just as a huge, half-savage, shaggy, mastiff cur of the street wolfs down a well-groomed, purebred house pet.'

A tittering laugh went through the room. Irene allowed the humor to pass. She pointed now to Shakuntala.

'The empress said-and said rightly-that if the monster called Malwa is slain, the hand which holds the lance