Romezan rose, that wolfish look still in his eye. «By this time tomorrow, the whole field army will be in arms against Sharbaraz. We'll march back to Mashiz, throw him out, get rid of him, put you on the throne, and—» His vision of the future ran out at that point. «And everything will be fine then,» he finished.

Abivard did indeed look farther ahead than the noble from the Seven Clans. He glanced toward Maniakes. «It's… not going to be quite that simple, I don't think,» he said.

«No, it's not,» Maniakes agreed. He had been hoping for, and been planning for, a moment like this ever since he became Avtokrator of the Videssians. He had also spent a large stretch of time wondering if it would ever come. He spoke not to Abivard but to Romezan: «What do you propose to do with your garrisons in the westlands while the field army goes up against Sharbaraz?»

«Leave them there,» Romezan answered at once. «Why not? We'll be back next year, and—» The difficulty Abivard had seen at once now became apparent to him, too. He looked at Maniakes with no great warmth. «Oh. If we leave, you'll start taking those cities back.»

The Avtokrator shook his head. «No, I won't do anything of the sort,» he answered. Romezan stared at him, angrily suspicious. Even Abivard looked surprised. He didn't blame them. Liberating the cities in the westlands after the Makuraner field force pulled out had been his first plan. Instead of using it, though, he said, «If you leave the garrisons behind, I'll burn everything in front of the field army and I'll attack it the first chance I get.»

«Why would you want to do a stupid thing like that?» Romezan burst out. «If you do, our campaign against Sharbaraz goes into the latrine.»

«He knows that,» Abivard said, as if to a child. «He doesn't care– or he doesn't care much. What he wants is to get the westlands back under Videssian rule.»

«That's right,» Maniakes said. «Agree to put the border back where it was before Likinios Avtokrator got murdered, and I'll help you every way I can. Try to fight your civil war and hold on to the westlands, too, and I'll hurt you every way I can—and I can hurt you badly now.»

«Suppose we don't march on Mashiz?» Romezan said. «Suppose we just stay where we are? What then?»

«Then Sharbaraz finds out you didn't execute Abivard,» Maniakes said, a touch of wolf in his own smile. «Then somebody– Kardarigan, maybe, or Tzikas—gets the order to execute you, not for failure, but for rebellion. You said as much yourself.»

Already swarthy, Romezan darkened further with anger. «You dare to take advantage of our squabbles among ourselves and use them to steal from as?»

Maniakes threw back his head and laughed in Romezan's face. The noble from the Seven Clans could not have looked more astonished had Maniakes dashed a bucket of cold water over him. The Avtokrator said, «By the good god, Romezan, how do you think you got the westlands in the first place? You marched into them when Videssos looked more like a catfight than an empire, after Genesios murdered Likinios and every general thought he could steal the throne for himself, or at least keep his neighbor from having it. Taking back what was mine is not stealing, not here it isn't.»

«He's right,» Abivard said, and Maniakes inclined his head to him, respecting his honesty. «I don't like him getting the westlands back, and if I can find any way to keep him from getting them back, I will use it. But trying to get them back doesn't make him a thief.»

«I don't think you can find such a way,» Maniakes said. «I don't think you have very long to spend looking for one, either of you. You can bargain with me or you can try to bargain with Sharbaraz. If you have any choices past those two, I don't see them.»

«You are enjoying this,» Romezan said, as if he were accusing the Avtokrator of lapping soup from a bowl like a dog.

Again, Maniakes met the challenge straight on. «Every minute of it,» he agreed. «You Makuraners have spent my whole reign, and the one before mine, humiliating Videssos. Now I get a chance to get my own back—literally. You can either give it up and go back to your own land to deal with the King of Kings who put you in this predicament, or you can try to keep it, try to go back, and get chewed up along the way. The choice is yours.»

«We have no choice,» Abivard said. «Let the borders be as they were before Likinios Avtokrator was murdered.» Romezan looked mutinous but said nothing.

«That was the start of the trouble between us,» Maniakes said. But Abivard shook his head. «No. Likinios paid gold to the Khamorth tribes north of the Degird to raid into Makuran. When Peroz King of Kings, may the God cherish his spirit, moved against them, he was defeated and slain, which let Smerdis usurp Sharbaraz's throne, which let Likinios interfere in our civil war, which… You know the tale as well as I. Finding a beginning for the strife between us is not easy.»

«Nor will finding an end to that strife be easy,» Romezan rumbled: a plain note of warning.

«For now, though, on these terms, we can stop,» Maniakes said. «For now.» Abivard and Romezan spoke together.

Abivard and Roshnani scrambled down into a boat from the Renewal. The sailors swiftly rowed them over the narrow stretch of water separating the imperial flagship from the beach at Across. When they got out of the boat on the beach, Rhegorios got into it. The sailors brought him back to the dromon.

«I am well,» he said to Maniakes. «Is all well here?»

«Well enough,» his cousin answered. The Avtokrator nodded to Romezan. «Your turn now.»

«Aye, my turn now,» the noble from the Seven Clans said heavily. «And I shall make the most of it.» He got down into the boat. So did Bozorg and Panteles. The Videssian mage in Makuraner pay looked as if he wished he could sit farther from Romezan than the boat permitted.

After Romezan and the two wizards had got out of the boat again and strode up the beach toward Across, Thrax spoke up: «I expect you'll want to get back to the imperial city now, eh, your Majesty?»

«What?» Maniakes said. «No, by the good god. Hang about here—a bit out of bowshot, if that suits you. This is where things that matter are going to happen today. I want to be here when they do.»

«Why not just hop out of the dromon and go on into the Makuraners' camp yourself, then?» Thrax laughed.

All Maniakes answered was, «No, not yet. The time isn't ripe.» The drungarios of the fleet stared at him; Maniakes was used to having Thrax stare at him. After the fleet had kept the Kubratoi from getting over the Cattle Crossing to join with the Makuraners, he begrudged Thrax his limitations less than he had.

«I presume we're waiting for the cheers that mean Abivard is reading the letter to a joyous and appreciative audience?» Rhegorios asked, grinning at his own irony.

«That's what we're waiting for, all right,» Maniakes said. «I asked Abivard to meet with his officers by the seaside, but he said no. He doesn't care to remind them they're going to be cooperating with us any more than he has to, not right now he doesn't. Put that way, he has a point.»

«Aye, likely so,» Rhegorios agreed. «I'll be glad when we do get back to the city, though; I'll tell you that. They wanted to honor me, so they gave me a Makuraner cook. I've been eating mutton without garlic ever since I traded myself for Romezan. I think the inside of my mouth has fallen asleep.»

«If that's the worst you suffered, you came through well,» Maniakes said. «I'm just bloody glad the Makuraners let you go again.»

Thrax pointed toward Across. «Looks like something's going on there, your Majesty. To the ice with me if I can make out what, though.»

Trees and bushes and buildings—some standing, others ruins– screened most of the interior of the suburb from view from the sea, but Thrax was right: something was going on there. Where things had been quiet, almost sleepy, before Abivard and Romezan returned to the Makuraner field force, now suddenly men were moving through the streets, some mounted, others afoot. As Maniakes watched, more and more soldiers started stirring.