“He’ll never agree!”
“He will agree, for his need to marry this girl and make her his empress will override everything else for him. I will see to it. The emperor believes himself secure and safe upon his throne. But once his wealth is halved he will be weakened.”
“Gaius’s one great talent,” Vilia said, “is his ability to gain profit. He will rebuild his wealth quickly.”
“Not quickly enough,” Jonah replied. “I have amassed a small fortune during my years of service to Gaius Prospero, and you have also amassed a small fortune of your own. Our combined assets added to the settlement Gaius Prospero will fix on you will make us more powerful than the emperor. And that is when we will act to seize his throne. After all, the throne is part of his wealth and he has stolen it from you in order to put another in your place.”
“How do you know I have amassed a small fortune?” Vilia asked him.
He smiled. “I know everything about the emperor and his family, my darling. I would not have survived this long did I not. You possess almost five million gold cubits along with considerable land holdings.”
She nodded in acknowledgement of his words and then said, “And what do you possess, Jonah?”
“More. Much more,” he said and the corners of his mouth turned up just faintly in reply to her question.
“How much more?” she demanded.
“Do not be greedy, Vilia. I am going to help you to become the richest woman in Hetar-as well as its empress,” Jonah told her. “But since I see you cannot be satisfied until you know what you will know, I
“How in the name of the Celestial Actuary did you ever amass such a fortune?” Vilia wanted to know. She did believe him and she was enormously impressed.
“Mostly from the Razi kiosks,” he told her. “Remember, I hold the monopoly on Razi in Hetar. And I have more kiosks throughout the country than anyone else. And if someone wishes to open a kiosk they must come to me first and apply. Of course I gain a fee when an application is filed. And then another fee when I issue a license. And the kiosk builder must pay me a fee for every kiosk he builds and there are only two builders who may build kiosks in the land. And the independent Razi vendors cannot own their kiosks. They must pay me a monthly rental, as well as thirty percent of their profits-collected daily so they may not cheat me. Razi has turned out to be a very lucrative business for me, my darling. And of course my vineyards are profitable and becoming more so each year.”
“And my husband has more than that?” Vilia wanted to know. She had never paid a great deal of attention to Gaius’s wealth. She had her own and her husband had never denied her anything she wanted for herself or their children.
“My wealth is equal to the emperor’s now although he does not know it, my pet. But when you gain half of what is his and we combine our assets, we will be able to gain control. Cubits are power and the more one has the more powerful one is. We will marry, my dear Vilia, and you shall be Hetar’s empress.”
“When will we wed?” she wanted to know.
“I must consider the timing,” Jonah told her. “It would appear suspicious should you divorce your husband, then turn about and wed too quickly.”
“Will it not look suspect under any circumstances, Jonah, my love? If I aid you in gaining your goal I will not allow you to set me aside.”
“Never!” he swore to her. “You will be my empress and my wife, Vilia, but be patient. First you will divorce Gaius Prospero and retire to your villa in the Outlands province. You and I both know that the only way to gain the throne must include the disposal of the emperor and his empress. And when I have been acclaimed Hetar’s new emperor, my darling, I shall announce to all that as I have admired you from afar for many years, I have now asked you to be my wife and sit by my side as Hetar’s empress. You are of an old and distinguished Hetarian family, Vilia. And your charities among the poor as Gaius Prospero’s wife are well-known. Many gossip now that it is a disgrace he has not made you empress. You will be welcomed as my empress.”
“What will happen to my children when Gaius is overthrown?” Vilia wanted to know. “Especially my son, Aubin?”
“Aubin has no taste for the political life,” Jonah said. “He is merchant-born as his father once was. And he enjoys a slightly decadent life, as do many young men of wealth. I will never harm any of your children, my darling. I swear it! But I will want you to give me an heir of my blood, Vilia. You are young enough yet.”
“Aye, I am,” she agreed. “I love my children, Jonah, but Aubin reminds me too much of his father. He is already running to fat.”
“Then we are agreed as to the order of things,” Jonah said. “You will obtain your divorce and retire to the country. After I have overthrown Gaius Prospero and gained the throne, we will wed and you will be my empress.”
“We are agreed, my love,” Vilia told him. But she did not agree. She would wed him sooner. “I had best return to my apartments, Jonah. Sleep well, my lord.” She kissed him softly, running a finger down his narrow face.
Jonah remained seated, staring into the fire burning in the hearth. His time was coming. He could smell it! He could taste it! Within two years he would be Hetar’s ruler and Vilia would be by his side. He was surprised to realize that he really did want her with him. Was it love? He had no idea, but she was beautiful and clever and would make a perfect empress. But Vilia was also impatient. It would take all of his own skills to keep her from ruining everything. He would be more at ease once the divorce had been settled and she was back in the Outlands.
During the next few days Jonah carefully steered Gaius Prospero toward the emperor’s goal. He coached his master carefully as to his meeting Vilia in order to tell her that he was divorcing her. “You must lay no blame for this decision upon her,” he advised the emperor.
“I am bored with her,” Gaius Prospero whined. “She does not excite me any longer and she is unable to take pleasures with me. Only Shifra can please me.”
“And how fortunate you are, my lord, to have found this wonderful maiden,” Jonah enthused. “But on the rare occasions I have been in the lady Shifra’s company she has appeared a gentle and kind girl, my lord. I know she would not want you to hurt the lady Vilia.”
“My Shifra is the soul of courtesy, Jonah. No, she would not want me to harm Vilia in any way. Ahh, Jonah, may you one day find such perfection,” the emperor enthused with a gusty sigh.
“Indeed, my lord, I wish it myself. But we must also consider the people in this matter of your divorce, for what they think is important to you,” Jonah continued.
“How shall I please the people, then? They love Vilia,” Gaius Prospero said.
“The first step must be to speak with your wife,” Jonah advised.
The emperor visited Vilia. Her delight in his arrival within her apartments almost made him feel guilty. She was still a handsome woman and far younger than he, Gaius Prospero considered silently. Was he doing the right thing? And then a vision of Shifra arose in his head and he knew that right or wrong, he must have Shifra for his wife and for his empress. If he kept Vilia and then supplanted her with Shifra as his empress the people would not stand for it. No. He had to divorce Vilia. There was no other way.
They were seated in the privacy of Vilia’s dayroom. She had dismissed the serving women and was serving him herself. She poured him a large goblet of sweet wine and placed a wooden board with bread and fine Midlands cheese before him. “I am certain you are famished after your long day, my lord,” Vilia said pleasantly. “We have hardly spoken since Anora’s tragic death. You seem to have born up well, Gaius.”
“I have had Shifra to comfort me,” he answered her.
“It was kind of you to free her from her slavery in Anora’s honor. The people very much liked such a generous gesture on the part of their beloved emperor,” Vilia remarked with a small smile.
He drank half his goblet down and she quickly refilled it. “I have come, my dear Vilia, to speak with you on a most sensitive and serious matter,” the emperor began. Tiny beads of moisture were beginning to dot his smooth forehead. “Over the past months we have barely seen one another and it is long since we took pleasures together. Your life seems to be spent more and more at your villa in the Outlands province, Vilia, while mine must of necessity be spent here in The City.”
“You wish to divorce me,” Vilia said and she almost laughed when he paled at her words. But then she reached out and put a comforting hand on his arm.
“I have not said it!” he cried.
“But it is what you wish,” she answered. “If you wanted me to spend more time with you, Gaius, you would
