Phostis watched the family join the stream of unwilling peasants shambling east. Soon they were gone from sight, as one drop of water loses itself in a river. For a little while longer, he could hear the goats bleating. Then their voices, too, were lost amid murmurs and complaints and lowing cattle and creaking axles from richer farmers' carts and the endless shuffle of feet.
This had to be the dozenth village he'd watched empty. He wondered why he kept making himself witness the process over and over again. The best answer he came up with was that he was partly responsible for what was happening to these people, and so he had the obligation to understand it to the fullest, no matter how pained and uncomfortable it made him.
That afternoon, as the sun sank toward the not so distant mountains of Vaspurakan, he rode with another company that descended on another village. As the peasants were forcibly assembled in the marketplace, a woman screamed, 'You have no right to treat us so. We're orthodox, by the good god. This for the gleaming path!' She spat in the dust.
'Is that so?' Phostis worriedly asked the officer in charge of the company.
'Young Majesty, you just wait till they're all gathered here and then you'll see for yourself,' the captain answered.
The people kept coming until at last the village marketplace was full. Phostis frowned. He told the officer, 'I don't see anything that makes them look either orthodox or Thanasiot.'
'You don't know what to look for, then,' the man replied. He waved at the glum crowd. 'Do you see more men or women, young Majesty?'
Phostis hadn't noticed one way or the other. Now he examined villagers with a new eye. 'More women, I'd say.'
'I'd say so, too, young Majesty,' the captain said, nodding. 'And note the men, how many of them are either graybeards or else striplings with the down just sprouting on their cheeks and chins. Not a lot of fellows in their prime, are there? Why do you suppose that is?'
Phostis studied the shouting, sweating crowd once more. 'I see what you're saying. Why, though?'
The officer glanced upward for a moment, perhaps in lieu of calling the heir to the imperial throne dense. 'Young Majesty, it's on account of most of the men in their prime were in Livanios' army, and we either killed 'em or caught 'em. So you can believe that skirt is orthodox if you choose, but me, I have to doubt it.'
Orthodox or heretic—and Phostis found the company commander's logic compelling—the villagers, carrying and leading what they could, shuffled away on the first stage of their journey to new homes at the far end of the Empire. Some of the company quartered themselves in abandoned houses. Phostis went back with the rest to the main imperial camp.
The place was becoming more like a semipermanent town than the encampment of an army on the march. Krispos' men fanned out from it every day to resettle villagers who followed—or might follow—the gleaming path. Supply wagons rumbled in every day—with occasional lapses as unsubdued Thanasioi raided them—to keep the army fed. Tents were not pitched at random, but in clumps with ways—almost streets—through them. Phostis had no trouble finding his way to the tent he shared with Olyvria.
When he ducked through the flap, she was lying on her bedroll. Her eyes were closed, but came open as soon as he walked in, so he did not think she'd been asleep. 'How are you?' she asked listlessly.
'Worn,' he answered. 'Saying you're going to resettle some peasants is one thing; it sounds simple and practical enough. But seeing what it entails—' He shook his head. 'Ruling is a hard, cruel business.'
'I suppose so.' Olyvria sounded indifferent.
Phostis asked, 'How are
Now she answered, 'All right,' as she had whenever he'd asked her since then. The response was as flat and unemphatic as everything else she'd said lately.
He wanted to shake her, to force some life into her. He did not think that was a good idea. Instead, he unrolled his own blanket. Under a surcoat, his mail shirt jingled as he sat down beside her. He said, 'How are you really?'
'All right,' she repeated, as indifferently as before. But now a small spark came into her eyes. 'I'll truly be all right in time; I'm sure I will. It's just that... my life has turned upside down these past weeks. No, even that's not right. First it turned upside down—I turned it upside down—and then it flipped again, when, when—'
She didn't go on, not with words, but she started to cry again, as she had not done since Krispos, sparing Phostis that duty, brought her word of what he'd ordered done to Livanios. Phostis thought there might be healing in these tears. He held his arms open, hoping she would come to him. After a few seconds, she did.
When she was through, she dried her eyes on the fabric of his surcoat. 'Better?' he asked, patting her back as if she were a child.
'Who can say?' she answered. 'I made the choice; I have to live with it. I love you. Phostis, I do, but I hadn't thought through everything that might happen after I got onto that fishing boat with you. My father—' She started to cry again.
'That would have happened anyhow, I think,' he said. 'You didn't have anything to do with it. Even when we were on the worst of terms—which seemed like much of the time—I knew my father did what he did well. I doubt the Thanasioi would have won the civil war even with us, and if they lost it ... Early in his reign, my father paid a price for showing his enemies more mercy than they deserved. One of the things that set him apart from most people is that he learns from his mistakes. He gives rebels no second chance these days.'
'But my father wasn't just a rebel,' she said. 'He was my father.'
To that, Phostis had no good answer. Luckily for him, he didn't have to grope for a poor one. From outside the tent, a Haloga guard called, 'Young Majesty, here's a man would have speech with you.'
'I'm coming,' Phostis answered. To Olyvria, he added in a low voice, 'Probably a messenger from my father. Who else would disturb me?'
