‘We’re nearly there, Barka. They can rest all they like when we reach the town.’
‘As you wish, my lord.’ Barka’s high spirits withered. He was again the grim-faced guardian.
They dismounted in a tawny square of mud-brick buildings. Kinamish was not important enough to need a wall, and this far into the Heart of Empire it would not have occurred to the inhabitants to build one. Asuria had not known the footfall of war for generations, and only the greatest of her cities still maintained defences, more out of tradition than anything else.
There was a tavern, with a vine-shaded loggia. Leaving Barka with the steaming horses, Kouros sat himself there. He dropped his komis from his face and slapped the dust from his clothes with his riding-gauntlets. Slowly, as the local drinkers, farmers and ne’er-do-wells watched, the colours emerged from his garments. Kingfisher blue, imperial purple, and the silver embroidered horse heads of the royal house. The loggia cleared around him, and he smiled again, clicking his fingers for service.
‘Wine, and cold water,’ he said without looking up.
‘At once, my lord.’
He did not seem surprised when he was joined at his table by another traveller, who sat down beside him without ceremony and reached for the communal olive-bowl, wetting his fingers on the oil and then applying it to sunburnt patches on his nose. With the same hand the newcomer dropped the folds of his own komis, and sighed. He was a broad-faced Kefre with a cropped head and eyes as bright as cornflowers. His skin and his clothes were all the colour of the dust that puffed in pale zephyrs around the little square. When the water arrived he drank straight from the jug, and, wiping his mouth, he left on his face a smear of clean skin the colour of new wood.
‘Straight from the well, none better. My thanks to your honour.’
Kouros sipped his wine, grimaced, then swallowed half the cup. ‘Tell me you have news, Kuthra.’
‘I have. Maybe not the type you’d like to hear, but useful nonetheless.’ The dusty Kefre stared at Kouros expectantly, and with a sliver of mockery folded into his smile. ‘You’ve put on weight, brother.’
‘The hazards of palace living.’
‘Ah, of course. It’s been so long I had forgotten. How long has it been, Kouros, since I shared the heights with you?’
Kouros shifted in his chair, though his gaze never left the other’s face, and there was a strange glimmer in his eyes. ‘I am here for information, not to reminisce.’
‘Indulge me. We see each other so rarely, these days.’
Kouros reached into his blue robes and brought forth a doeskin purse, a beautifully made thing which looked to have been chosen with some care. As it settled on the table it clinked heavily. Kuthra did not once look at it, but continued to study Kouros’s face.
At last, Kouros said, ‘It is seventeen years.’
‘Seventeen years! How fast they have flown. Do you remember how we used to meet in the darkest corners of the gardens to lie under the trees and talk of all the great things we would do when we were grown? You would be King and I would be at your side. I would look out for you, and keep the jackals from your back. I wanted nothing more.’
Quietly, Kouros said, ‘Neither did I.’
Deliberately, Kuthra raised his right arm and set it on the table. The folds of his travelling gear fell back to reveal a stump at the wrist, an old wound long seamed shut in a swirl of flesh.
‘Such a pity your mother did not agree.’
The two men looked at one another. Finally they both leaned close in the same second and embraced, burying their faces in each other’s shoulders.
Kouros took Kuthra’s face in his hands. There were tears in his eyes. They brimmed, and spilled over onto his cheeks. ‘It was the price for your life.’
‘I know. She should not have made you watch, though. She knew you would blame yourself for it, when it was her doing alone.’ Kuthra wiped the tears from Kouros’s face with his only hand.
‘She has mellowed since then.’ They both began to laugh. Kuthra thumped the table with his stump. ‘More wine here! Are you all asleep? Landlord, step quick now!’
‘Don’t draw attention to us,’ Kouros hissed urgently. ‘This is risky enough as it is.’
‘We sit face to face once every four or five years, if we are lucky. The rest of the time it is letters and notes and whispers in the dark. Let me drink with my brother Kouros — let us raise our cups together for a little while at least, like normal folk.’
‘If Orsana knew — ’
‘Fuck Orsana. She will not live forever.’ Kuthra leaned in and set his hand on Kouros’s. ‘Brother, one day you will be King, and on that day and every other after you will have me by your side, and I will always keep the jackals from your back.’
‘You shall be a prince again, Kuthra.’
‘Once a prince, always a prince,’ Kuthra grinned.
The wine arrived. It was a dry, bitter vintage from the foothills of the Magron, but it quenched the thirst.
‘Let us speak of princes, since we’re here,’ Kuthra said casually. At once, Kouros’s face changed. Some of the old rancour settled into it, dragging it down.
‘You have located them?’
‘I have located them three times, brother, but on each occasion I have been like the slow fox, snapping at the tail feathers and missing the meat. They left Ashur on foot, which was clever of them, and then bought nags from a dealer in Goronuz, twenty pasangs up-river of the city. After that they disappeared for a while. I have our people watching the Asurian Gates like vultures at a hanging, but the Gates are not the only way over the mountains. There are many lesser routes that a small party might manage.’
‘Kuthra, are you telling me — ’
‘I picked up their trail again west of Hamadan. They showed sense enough to avoid the city and went straight up into the highlands. I know they swapped horses for mules, and they may even be on foot again by now. But they have disappeared, brother. We have no agents that far into the Magron.’
‘Bel’s blood. You’re telling me we’ve lost them.’
‘Only for now. They cannot stay up in the mountains forever, and we have as many eyes in the Middle Empire as we have here. When they descend again they will be easily traced, for they will be wanting horses again, no doubt. That is if they make it through the mountains. Rakhsar and Roshana are creatures of the city; they may not find the heights to their taste. They could become truly lost, or die in an avalanche or a snowdrift, or fall prey to the Qaf.’
Kouros shook his head. ‘Rakhsar will survive. He always does. Three times over the years my mother has tried to have him killed, and each time he has lived, through his absurd luck as much as anything else. Kuthra, you must get back on his trail. My father has not stood in our way until now, but if Rakhsar were to suddenly appear in front of the Imperial tent and beg to accompany him on campaign, the old fool might weaken. He doesn’t like me; he knows I am the only sane choice as heir, but he has this damnable attachment to the memory of that Niseian bitch he tried to supplant my mother with. He grows sentimental in old age. There’s no telling how he might let things go, not any more.’
Kuthra nodded, face hard. ‘Brother, you need not concern yourself. Unless Rakhsar can grow wings, I will have him, in the end.’
‘If anyone can, it will be you.’
‘You know that your mother has people out on the same errand. A horde of them, sniffing around every bolt-hole in the empire.’
‘You must get there first. I want Rakhsar and Roshana brought in front of me, alive.’
Kuthra raised an eyebrow. ‘Both of them, or just Roshana?’
Kouros’s face darkened, blood filling it. ‘Just do as I ask.’
‘They must both die, brother. It has gone too far for that. There was a time when perhaps you could have spared the girl, but that time is gone. It is simply a question of whose hand they perish at. You must not make it personal.’
