women feminine; it had never occurred to Abivard that eunuchs would refer to him—for so Abivard conceived of his deity—in the neuter gender. He turned to Pashang. «Make sure they feed you something better than oats.»
«The God go with you and keep you safe, lord,» Pashang said, and started to prostrate himself as if Abivard were King of Kings. With a snort of disgust the eunuch hauled him to his feet and led him away. Pashang waved clumsily, like a bear trained to do as much in hopes of winning a copper or two.
Another eunuch emerged from the stone fastness of the palace. «You will come with me,» he announced to Abivard.
«Will I?» Abivard murmured. But that question had only one possible answer. His family trailing behind him, he did follow the servitor into the beating heart of the kingdom of Makuran.
He knew—knew only too well—every turn and passageway that would lead him to the suite where he and his family had been politely confined the winter before. As soon as the eunuch turned left instead of right, he breathed a long if silent sigh of relief. He glanced over to Roshnani. She was doing the same thing.
The chambers to which the fellow did lead them were in a wing far closer to the throne room than the place they had been before. Abivard would have taken that as a better sign had not two tall, muscular men in mail shirts and plume-crested helms stood in front of the doorway.
«Are we prisoners here?» he demanded of the eunuch.
«No,» that worthy replied. «These men are but your guard of honor.»
Abivard plucked a hair from his beard as he thought that over. The winter before no one in the palace had pretended he was anything but a prisoner. That had had the virtue of honesty, if no other. Would Sharbaraz lie, though, if he thought it served his purpose? The answer seemed obvious enough.
«Supposed we go in there,» Abivard said. «Then suppose we want to come out and walk through the halls of the palace here. What would the guards do? On your oath by the God.»
Before answering, the eunuch held a brief, low-voiced colloquy with the soldiers. «They tell me,» he said carefully, «that if you came out for a stroll, as you say, one of them would accompany you while the other remained on guard in front of your door. By the God, lord, that is what they say.»
The guardsmen nodded and gestured with their left hands to confirm his words. «We have no choice,» Roshnani said. She had picked up Gulshahr, who was tired from all the walking she'd done.
«You're right,» Abivard said, though there had been that unspoken choice: rebelling rather than coming to Mashiz a second time after what had happened before. But rebellion was no longer possible, not here, not now. Lion trainers, to thrill a crowd, would stick their heads into the mouths of their beasts day after day. But the lions they worked with were tame. One could form a pretty good notion of what they would do from day to day. With Sharbaraz—
«Does it suit you, lord?» the eunuch asked.
«For now it suits me,» Abivard said, «but I want an audience with the King of Kings as soon as may be.»
Bowing, the eunuch said, «I shall convey your request to those better able than I to make certain it is granted.»
Abivard had no trouble translating that for himself. He might gain an audience with Sharbaraz tomorrow, or he might have to wait till next spring. No way to guess which—not yet.
«Please let me or another of the servitors know whatever you may be lacking or what may conduce toward your pleasure,» the eunuch said. «Rest assured that if it be within our power, it shall be yours.»
Abivard paused thoughtfully. No one had spoken to him like that last winter. Maybe he hadn't been summoned back here in disgrace, after all. Then again, maybe he had. He did his best to find out: «I would like to see my sister Denak, principal wife to the King of Kings as soon as I can, to thank her for her help.» Let the eunuch make of that what he would.
Whatever he made of it he concealed, saying as he had before, «I shall take your words to those better able to deal with them than I.»
One of the guardsmen in front of the door opened it and gestured for Abivard and his family to go through and enter the suite of rooms set aside for them. Full of misgivings, he went in. The door closed. The rooms had carpets and pillows different from the ones that had been in the suite of the winter before. Other than that, was there any difference from that year to this?
The latch clicked. Abivard opened the door. He stepped out into the corridor. The guards who'd been standing watch when he had gone into the chamber were gone, but the ones who'd taken their place looked enough like them to be their cousins.
He took a couple of steps down the hall. One of the guards came after him; the fellow's mail shirt jingled as he walked. Abivard kept on going. The soldier came after him but did not call him back or try to stop him. It was exactly as the eunuch had said it would be. That left Abivard disconcerted; he wasn't used to having promises from Sharbaraz or his servitors kept.
After a while he turned and asked the guard, «Why are you following me?»
«Because I have orders to follow you,» the fellow answered at once. «Don't want you winding up in any mischief, lord, and I don't want you getting lost here, either.»
«I can see how I might get lost,» Abivard admitted; one palace hallway looked much like another one. «But what sort of mischief am I liable to get into?»
«Don't ask me, lord—I've no idea,» the guardsman said with a grin. «I figure anybody can if he tries, though.»
«You sound like a man with children,» Abivard said, and the guard laughed and nodded. Seeing the people set to keep an eye on him as ordinary human beings was strange for Abivard.
And then, around a corner, came one who would never have children but who had assuredly gotten Abivard into mischief: the beautiful eunuch who'd escorted him first to his sister and then to Sharbaraz.
He gave Abivard a look of cold indifference. That was one of the friendlier looks Abivard had received from him. Abivard said, «You might thank me.»
«Thank you?» The eunuch's voice put Abivard in mind of silver bells. «Whatever for?»
«Because the Videssians didn't burn Mashiz down around your perfect, shell-like ears, for starters,» Abivard said.
The beautiful eunuch's skin was swarthy, like that of most Makuraners, but translucent even so; Abivard could watch the tips of those ears turn red. «Had you brought Maniakes' head hither or even sent it on pickled in salt, you might have done something worthy of gratitude,» the eunuch said. «As things are, however, I give you— this—as token of my esteem.» He turned his back and walked away.
Staring after him, the guard let out a soft whistle. «You put Yeliif's back up—literally, looks like.»
«Yeliif?» But Abivard realized who the fellow had to mean. «Is that what his name is? I never knew till now.»
«You never knew?» Now the guardsman stared at him. «You made an enemy of Yeliif without knowing what you were doing? Well, the God only knows what you could have managed if you'd really set your mind to it.»
«I didn't make him an enemy,» Abivard protested. «He made himself an enemy. I never laid eyes on him till the King of Kings summoned me here last winter. If I never lay eyes on him again, I won't be sorry.»
«Can't blame you there,» the guardsman said, but he dropped his voice as he did it. «Not a drop of human kindness in dear Yeliif, from all I've seen. They say losing their balls makes eunuchs mean. I don't know if that's what bothers him, but mean he is. And it might not matter whether you set eyes on him again or not. Sooner or later you're going to have to eat some of the food that goes into your room there.»
«What?» Abivard said, his wits working more slowly than they should, and then, a moment later, «Oh. Now, that's a cheerful thought.»
He didn't think the beautiful eunuch would poison him. Had Yeliif wanted to do that, he could have managed it easily the winter before. Then Sharbaraz probably would have given him anything this side of his stones back for doing the job. Abivard didn't think he was as deeply disgraced now as he had been then. Now the King of Kings might be annoyed rather than relieved at his sudden and untimely demise.
Or, on the other hand, Sharbaraz might not. You never could tell with the King of Kings. Sometimes he was brilliant, sometimes foolish, sometimes both at once—and sorting the one out from the other was never easy. That made living under him… interesting.
