He did that with such quick efficiency as to remove all doubt from Maniakes' mind as to whether he'd known this visit was coming. He even had several little wooden ships already made to symbolize the vessels of the fleet. Maniakes hid his smile. Had everyone served him as well as Bagdasares, he would have been the most fortunate Avtokrator in Videssian history.

Into the bowl went the ships carved from chips of wood. They rode the ripples there, as real ships would ride over the waves of the Sailors' Sea. Bagdasares began to chant; his hands moved in swift passes above the bowl.

Developments were not long in coming. Maniakes vividly remembered the storm the mage's spell had predicted for the return Journey from Lyssaion. The miniature tempest Bagdasares raised this time was worse, with lightning like sparks and thunder like a small drum. One of the little lightning bolts smote a sorcerous ship, which burned to the waterline.

«Your Majesty, I cannot in good conscience recommend that you undertake this course,» Bagdasares said with what struck Maniakes as commendable understatement.

«A pestilence!» Maniakes muttered under his breath. «All right– suppose we sail the Videssian Sea to Erzerum, then?» He didn't want to do that. It made for a longer journey to Mashiz, and one in which the Makuraners would have plenty of chances to slow and perhaps even stop him before he ever brought his army down into the Land of the Thousand Cities.

«I shall attempt to see what may be seen, your Majesty,» the wizard replied. Like most in his art, he had a sober countenance, but now his eyes twinkled for a moment. «As this route would bring you close to Vaspurakan, so will the sorcery become more precise, more accurate.»

«Really?» Maniakes asked, intrigued in spite of his annoyance at the earlier prediction; Bagdasares had never claimed anything like that before.

The Vaspurakaner mage sighed. «I wish it were true. Logically, it should be true, Vaspur the Firstborn and his descendants being the primary focus of Phos' activity here on earth. But if you order me to prove to you it is true, I fear I cannot.»

«Ah, well,» Maniakes said. «If you could, you'd have a lot of mages in the Sorcerers' Collegium—and in Mashiz, too, I shouldn't wonder—hopping mad at you. All right, you can't be more accurate about what happens on the Videssian Sea. If you can be as accurate, I'll take that.»

What he meant was, If you can show me how to do what I want to do, even if I have to do it in this inconvenient way, I'll take that. Bagdasares spent some little while incanting over the bowl and the water and the little ships he had made—except for the one that had burned—sorcerously persuading them they now represented a fleet on the Videssian Sea, not one on the Sailors' Sea.

When he was satisfied the components of his magic understood their new role, he began the spell proper. It was almost identical to the one that had gone before, name and description of the new sea and new landing place being substituted for those he had previously used.

And, to Maniakes' dismay, the results of the incantation were almost identical to those that had gone before. Again, the Avtokrator watched a miniature storm play havoc with the miniature fleet. None of the little chip ships caught fire this time, but more of them capsized than had been true in the previous conjuration.

He asked the only question he could think to ask: «Are you certain you took off all the influence from the earlier spell?»

«As certain as may be, yes,» Bagdasares answered. «But if it pleases you, your Majesty, I can begin again from the beginning. Preparing everything from scratch will take a bit more time, you understand, but—» «Do it,» Maniakes said.

Do it, Bagdasares did. He chose a new bowl, he prepared fresh– or rather, new—symbolic seawater, and he made a new fleet of toy ships. It did seem to take quite a while, though Maniakes reflected that his wizard was much swifter than his shipwrights. «I shall also use a different incantation this time,» Bagdasares said, «to reduce any possible lingering effects from my previous spells.» The Avtokrator nodded approval.

Bagdasares went about the new spell as methodically as he had with the preparations for it. The incantation was indeed different from the one he'd used before. The results, however, were the same: a tiny storm that sank and scattered most of the symbolic fleet.

«I am very sorry, your Majesty.» Bagdasares' voice dragged with weariness when the spell was done. «I cannot in good conscience recommend sending a fleet to the west by way of the Videssian Sea, either.» He yawned. «Your pardon, I crave. Three conjurations of an afternoon will wear a man down to a nub.» He yawned again.

«Rest, then,» Maniakes said. «I know better than to blame the messenger for the news he brings.» Bagdasares bowed, and almost fell over. Wobbling as if drunk, he took his leave. Maniakes stood alone in the sorcerous workroom. «I know better than to blame the messenger for his news,» he repeated, «but, by the good god, I wish I didn't.»

With a screech of rusty hinges, the postern gate opened. It was not the gate through which Moundioukh had come when Maniakes tried to detach the Kubratoi from their alliance to Makuran. That one had been made quiet. Now silence and stealth no longer mattered. Maniakes could leave Videssos the city without fear, without worry; no enemy stood nearby.

Maniakes could not leave Videssos the city, however, without his guardsmen or without his full complement of twelve parasol-bearers. He might have vanquished Etzilios, he might have kept the Makuraners on the west side of the Cattle Crossing, but against entrenched ceremonial he struggled in vain.

Rhegorios said, «Don't worry about it, cousin your Majesty brother-in-law of mine.» That he was using his whimsical mix of titles for Maniakes again said he thought the crisis was over for the time being. He went on, «They won't get in your way very much.»

«Ha!» Maniakes said darkly. But, even with the demands of ceremony oppressing him, he could not hold on to his foul mood. Being able to leave the imperial city, even with his escort, felt monstrous good.

Seeing the wreckage of Etzilios' hopes up close felt even better. Videssian scavengers were still going over the engines and towers for scraps of timber and metal they could use or sell. Before long, nothing would be left.

«On this side of the Cattle Crossing, we're our own masters again,» Rhegorios said, thinking along with him. The Sevastos' grin, always ready, got wider now. «And from where we are, the wall keeps us from looking over the Cattle Crossing at the Makuraners on the other side. We'll worry about them next, of course, but we don't have to do it now.»

For once, Maniakes didn't try to peer around the wall to glare at Abivard's forces. He wasn't worrying about them now, but not for the reason Rhegorios had put forward. His worries, for the moment, were closer to him. Pointing toward the base of the wall, he said, «It was right around here somewhere.»

«What was right around here?» asked Rhegorios, who hadn't asked why the Avtokrator was leaving Videssos the city before coming along with him. «That's right,» Maniakes said, reminding himself. «You weren't up on the wall then. Immodios and I were the ones who served the dart-thrower.»

«What dart-thrower?» Rhegorios sounded like a man doing his best to stay reasonable but one unlikely to stay that way indefinitely.

«The one we used to shoot at Tzikas,» the Avtokrator answered; he hadn't intended to thwart his cousin. «The renegade, may the ice take him, was showing the Kubratoi something—probably something he wanted them to know so they could hurt us with it. Whatever it is, I want to find it so we won't have to worry about it again.»

«How could it be anything?» Rhegorios sounded calm, logical, reasonable—more like his sister than the way he usually sounded. «If something were here, wouldn't we know about it?»