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Vaspurakan. Were Sharbaraz to accept what Likinios wanted, that holding would
shrink to less than half the disputed country.
Abivard said, "Tell him no, your Majesty. What he asks is robbery, no other
word for it."
"That is not true," Likinios said. "It is a price for a service rendered. If
you do not wish the service, your Majesty, you need not pay the price."
"It is still too high a price," Sharbaraz said. "As I warned you when we first
met, did I pay it, I should feel honor-bound to try to recover it when my
strength allowed. I tell you this again, your Majesty, so you may be
forewarned."
"You'd start that war of revenge for this, eh?" Likinios frowned and paced
back and forth. "It could be so."
"It is so," Sharbaraz answered. "I pledge my word on it, and the word of a
Makuraner noble unless he be Smerdis is to be trusted. If you insist, I will
pay this price, but we shall have war afterward."
"I cannot afford more war now," Likinios said irritably, spitting out afford
as if it were a curse. "However much I should like a friendly King of Kings in
Mashiz, you tempt me to think an ineffectual one will serve as well."
Abivard studied the map once more. He also listened again in his mind to the
way Likinios had spoken. He pointed to a symbol in one of the valleys Likinios
sought to claim. "These crossed picks represent a mine, not so?" Likinios
nodded. Abivard continued, "What would your Majesty say to a boundary that
marched more like this?" He drew his own zigzag line, this one taking in
several valleys with mines but not the great stretch of territory to which the
Avtokrator wanted to lay claim.
"It still gives away too much," Sharbaraz said.
At the same time Likinios said, "This is not enough."
The two men of royal blood looked at each other. Abivard took advantage of
their hesitation: "Your Majesties, isn't a plan that leaves both of you less
than happy better than one that satisfies Videssos too well and Makuran not at
all, or the other way round?"
"Ah, but if I am not satisfied, I have only to withhold aid and my life goes
on anyway, much as it would have without these talks," Likinios said.
"While that's true, your Majesty, if you don't give me aid, you lose the
chance to put a King of Kings beholden to you on the throne in Mashiz, and you
leave a usurper there as a temptation to every ambitious man in Videssos,"
Sharbaraz said. "And if you think Smerdis will be grateful to you for not
backing me, remember how he treated me."
Likinios scowled and studied the map again. Encouraged because he did not
reject the proposal out of hand, Abivard said, "If the precise border I
suggested fails to please you, your Majesty, perhaps you will propose one
along similar lines. Or perhaps my master the King of Kings, may his years be
many and his realm increase, might offer one of his own?"
"How do you speak of the realm's increasing in one breath and ask me to take
away a great slice of Vaspurakan in the next?" Sharbaraz asked. But, to
Abivard's relief, he did not sound angry. Instead, he walked over and gave the
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map a long, hard look himself.
Abivard thought serious talk, as opposed to posturing, began then between the
King of Kings of Makuran and the Avtokrator of the Videssians. The next time
he tried to suggest something to move the talks along, both men stared at him
as if he were a drooling idiot. He felt humiliated, but not for long: two days
later, they reached an agreement not very far from the one he had outlined on
the map with his finger.
* * *
Tanshar bowed low to Abivard. "May it please you, lord," the fortune-teller
said, "you are being spoken of complimented, to make myself clear by our
people and the Videssians alike." He bowed. "Always an honor to serve you, and
doubly now. What is your wish?"
"Were I to suggest what I propose to you in aid of a King of Kings rather than
an Avtokrator, I should be guilty of treason," Abivard answered.
The fortune-teller nodded, unsurprised. "You want me to learn what I can of
the Videssian royal house?"
"Just so," Abivard said. "I want you to scry out, if you can, how long
Likinios will remain on the throne and how long Hosios will rule after him."
"I shall try, lord, but I make no guarantees as to the results," Tanshar
answered. "As you say, you would be committing treason if you sought to learn
these things about the royal house of Makuran. Not only that, you would have a
hard time learning them even if you had no fear of treason: the King of Kings
will normally surround himself with spells that make divining his future as
difficult as possible, in my judgment a sensible measure of self-preservation.
I would be most surprised if the Avtokrator did not similarly ward himself."
"I hadn't thought of that," Abivard said unhappily, "but yes, you're likely to
be right. Do your best all the same. Perhaps you will have better luck than a
Videssian mage might, for I'd guess the Avtokrator would be best protected
against the kind of sorcery usual in his own country."
"No doubt that's so, lord," Tanshar agreed, "but we, plainly, are the next
greatest magical threat to the Avtokrator's well-being, so his future may be
shielded against our magecraft, as well."
"I understand," Abivard said. "If you fail, we're no worse off than we would
be otherwise. But if you succeed, we'll have learned something important about
how far we can rely on the Videssians. Do the best you can; that's all I can
say."
"Fair enough," Tanshar said. "I appreciate your not expecting the impossible
of me. What I can do, I shall do. When do you want me to make the attempt?"
"As soon as may be."
"Of course, lord," Tanshar said, "although you may not find it exciting to
watch. The charms involved have little drama to them, I confess, and I may
have to go through several of them to find one that works if, indeed, any of
them succeeds. As I said, I have no assurance of success in this undertaking.
But if you like, I will begin trying this evening after you return from the
latest talks between his Majesty and the Avtokrator Likinios."
"That will be fine," Abivard said. Having haggled over what Sharbaraz would
yield in exchange for aid, the two men were now dickering over how much aid he
would get; Likinios would indeed have made a marvelous rug seller. In the end,
Abivard suspected Sharbaraz would make most of the concessions once more.
Having the royal blood without ruling Makuran ate at him.
When Abivard went back to Tanshar's tent, he found the fortune-teller waiting
for him. "I have assembled a number of means for looking into what may be,"
Tanshar said. "The God willing, one will pierce not only the veil of future
time, but whatever the Videssians may have thrown up around their Avtokrator."
He tried scrying with water, as he had when Abivard brought him Ardini's curse
tablet. Since Abivard had touched and dealt with Likinios, Tanshar reckoned
him an appropriate link to the Avtokrator of the Videssians. But no matter how
still the water in the scrying bowl became, it never gave the fortune-teller
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and Abivard any picture of what Likinios was doing or how long he might go on
doing it.
"I might have known," Tanshar said. "Scrying with water is the simplest way of
looking into the future. If the Videssians warded against any of our styles of
divination, that would be the one."
He tried again with a clear, faceted crystal in place of the bowl of water.
The crystal turned foggy. Abivard did not need to ask anything of the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]