towns in the Land of the Thousand Cities.
«We'd be able to run up more, your Majesty,» Ypsilantes said, «if the countryside had trees we could cut down and use. We can only carry so much lumber.»
«Do the best you can with what you have,» Maniakes told the chief engineer, who saluted and went back to his work.
From the walls of Serrhes, Makuraner soldiers watched dart-and stone-throwers spring up as if by magic, though Bagdasares had nothing whatever to do with them. They watched the Videssian engineers line up row upon row of jars near the catapults. They no doubt had their own store of incendiary liquid, but could not have been delighted at the prospect of having so much of it rained down on their heads.
Seeing all those jars, Maniakes summoned Ypsilantes again. «I didn't know we were that well supplied with the stuff,» he said, pointing.
Ypsilantes coughed modestly. «If you must know, your Majesty, most of those jars used to hold the wine we've served out to the troops when we weren't drawing supplies from a town. They're empty now. We know that. The Makuraners don't.»
«Isn't that interesting?» Maniakes said with a grin. «They fooled me, so I expect they'll fool Tegin, too.»
Ypsilantes also put ordinary soldiers to work dragging stones into piles. Those were perfectly genuine, though Maniakes wouldn't have put it past the chief engineer to have a few deceptive extras made of—what? stale bread, perhaps—lying around in case he needed them to befuddle an opponent.
A little before the appointed hour the next day, Tegin threw wide the gates of Serrhes. He came out and prostrated himself before Maniakes. «I would have fought you, Majesty. I wanted to fight you,» he said. «But when I looked at all the siege gear you have with you, my heart failed me. I knew we could not withstand your army.»
«You showed good sense.» Maniakes made a point of not glancing toward Ypsilantes. The veteran engineer had served him better in not fighting this siege than he had in fighting a good many others. «As I told you, you may depart in peace.»
Out filed the Makuraner garrison. Seeing it, Maniakes started to laugh. He wasn't the only one who'd done a good job of bluffing. If Tegin had even three hundred soldiers in Serrhes, he would have been astonished. He'd thought the garrison commander led three times that many, maybe more. Tegin might have fought an assault, but not for long.
Seriously, respecting the foe who had tricked him, Maniakes said, «If I were you, excellent sir, I'd keep my men out of the fight between Sharbaraz and Abivard. You can declare for whoever wins after he's won. Till then, find some little town or hilltop you can defend and stay there. That will keep you safe.»
«Did you find 'some little town or hilltop' during Videssos' civil wars?» Tegin's voice dripped scorn.
But Maniakes answered, «As a matter of fact, yes.» Tegin's jaw dropped. The Avtokrator went on, «My father was governor of the island of Kalavria, which is as far east as you can go without sailing out into the sea and never coming back. He sat tight there for six years. He would have thrown himself and his force away if he'd done anything else.»
«You and your father took the course you judged wise,» Tegin said tonelessly. «You will, I hope, forgive me if I say that this course goes straight against every Makuraner noble's notion of honor.»
«Makuraner notions of honor didn't stop you people from kicking Videssos when we were down,» Maniakes said.
«Of course not,» Tegin replied. «You are only Videssians. But I cannot sit idly by in a fight among my countrymen. The God would judge me a faintheart without the will to choose, and would surely drop my soul into the Void after I die.»
«There are times,» Maniakes said slowly, «when I have no trouble at all dealing with Makuraners. And there are other times when I think we and you don't speak the same language even if we do use the same words.»
«How interesting you should remark on that. Majesty,» Tegin said. «I have often had the same feeling when treating with you Videssians. At times, you seem sensible enough. At others—» He rolled his eyes. «You are not to be relied upon.» That sounded as if he were passing judgment.
«No, eh?» Maniakes knew his smile was not altogether pleasant. «I suppose that means nothing would stop me from ignoring the truce we agreed to and scooping up your men now that they're out from behind the walls of Serrhes.» Tegin looked appalled. Maniakes held up his hand. «Never mind, I think I have honor, whether you do or not.»
«Good,» Tegin said. «As I told you, sometimes Videssians are sensible folk. I am glad this is one of those times.»
At the head of his little army, the garrison commander rode off to the west. He had a jauntiness to him that Maniakes didn't usually associate with Makuraners. Maniakes hoped he wouldn't have to throw his small force into the fight between the King of Kings and his marshal.
Like many other provincial towns, Serrhes centered on a square with the city governor's residence and the chief temple to Phos on opposite sides. Maniakes settled down in the residence and, as he had in so many other towns, began sorting through the arguments left behind after Tegin and his troopers were gone.
Some of those quarrels were impressively complicated. «He cheated me, your Majesty!» one plump merchant exclaimed, pointing a finger at another. «By Phos, he diddled me prime, he did, and now he stands there smooth-faced as a eunuch and denies every word of it.»
«Liar,» the second merchant said. «They were going to make you a eunuch, but they cut off your brain instead, because it was smaller.»
«Ahem, gentlemen,» Maniakes said, giving both the benefit of a doubt neither seemed likely to deserve. «Suppose, instead of insulting each other, you tell me what the trouble is.»
«Actually,» Rhegorios murmured from beside him, «I wouldn't mind hearing them insult each other a while longer. It has to be more interesting than the case, don't you think?»
«Hush,» Maniakes said, and then, to the first merchant, «Go ahead. You say this other chap here cheated you. Tell me how.» The second merchant started to howl a protest before the first could begin to speak. Maniakes held up a hand. «You keep quiet. I promise, you'll have your turn.»
The first merchant said, «I sold this whipworthy wretch three hundred pounds of smoked mutton, and he promised to pay me ten and a half goldpieces for it. But when it came time for him to cough up the money, the son of a whore dumped a pile of trashy Makuraner arkets on me and said I could either take 'em or stick 'em up my arse, because they were all I'd ever see from him.»
Maniakes' head started to ache. He'd run into cases like this before. With many parts of the westlands in Makuraner hands for more than a decade, it was no wonder that silver coins stamped with the image of the King of Kings were in wide circulation thereabouts. The methodical Makuraners had even made some of the provincial mints turn out copies of their coins rather than those of Videssos.
«May I speak now, your Majesty?» the second merchant asked.
«Go ahead,» Maniakes said.
«Thank you,» the merchant said. «The first thing I want to tell you is that Broios here can give himself piles when he sneezes, his head is so far up his back passage. By the lord with the great and good mind, your Majesty, you must understand what money of account is. Am I right, or am I right?»
«Oh, yes,» Maniakes answered.
«Thank you,» the merchant said again. «When I told this chamberpot-sniffing jackal I'd give him ten and a half goldpieces, that was money of account. What else could it be? When was the last time anybody in Serrhes saw real goldpieces? Whoever has 'em, has 'em buried where the boiler boys couldn't find 'em. We all buy and sell with silver these days. We coin our silver at twenty-four to the goldpiece, so if I'd given Broios two hundred and fifty-two pieces of silver—Videssian silver, mind you—for his smoked mutton, that would have been right and proper. You see as much, don't you, your Majesty?»
Maniakes had a good education—for a soldier. He would sooner have given himself over to a torturer than multiplied twenty-four by ten and a half in his head. But, since Broios wasn't hopping up and down like a man who needed to visit the jakes, the Avtokrator supposed the other merchant—whose name he still didn't know– had made the calculation correctly.
