A physician owed a duty to his patient.

In his best robe and carrying his walking staff, he attended at the guild the next morning, conducted by one of the household servants, bearing a note of introduction offered him by the Senator over the last wine of the evening.

Rustem made all the necessary gestures and remarks, and found himself welcomed with courtesy. It was peacetime, and these were members of his own profession. He wasn't about to stay long enough to represent a threat, and he might be useful to them. It was arranged that he would deliver a lecture in two weeks" time here at the guild-hall. They sanctioned his treatment of a handful of patients a day in the rooms he'd set up, and he was given the names of two apothecary and herbalist shops where accurately mixed medicines could be obtained. The matter of students was deferred (a bit too much permanence implied?) but Rustem had already decided that would have to wait in any event, as long as the charioteer was in the house.

And so he set in motion-more easily than he could have expected- a life, a pattern to his days, as springtime flowered in Sarantium. He paid a visit to a public bathhouse with the Bassanid merchant of the night before and established that the man had access to messengers going to Kabadh. Nothing was said explicitly, much exchanged by inference.

A few days after that a message arrived from Kabadh, and a great deal was altered.

It came by way of yet another Bassanid. At first, when the steward informed Rustem of the presence of one of his countrymen in the morning line of patients, Rustem had simply assumed that an eastern merchant had chosen to be treated for some ailment by a physician familiar with eastern regimens. The fellow was his third patient of the day.

When the man entered, soberly garbed, neatly barbered, Rustem turned to him with an inquiring glance and asked after his health in their own tongue. The patient said nothing, merely withdrew a parchment from within his clothing and extended it.

There was no formal seal that might have given warning. Rustem opened the parchment and read. He sat down as he did so, felt himself going pale, was aware that this ostensible patient was watching him closely. When he finished, he looked up at the other man.

It was difficult to speak. He cleared his throat. "You… know what this says?"

The man nodded. "Burn it now," he said. His voice was cultured.

There was a brazier in the room; the mornings were still cold. Rustem went over to it and put the parchment in the flame, watching until it was consumed.

He looked back at the man from Kabadh. "I was… I thought I was here as an observer."

The man shrugged. "Needs change," he said. He rose. "Thank you for your assistance, doctor. I am sure your help will address my… difficulty." He walked out.

Rustem remained where he was for a long time, then remembered that the servants of Plautus Bonosus were almost certainly reporting on him and he forced himself to move, to reassume the movements of normality, though all had changed.

A physician, by his oath, was to strive to heal the sick, to do battle with Azal when the Enemy laid siege to the bodies of mortal men and women.

Instead, his king, the Brother to the Sun and Moons, had just asked him to kill someone.

It was important to conceal the signs of his disquiet. He concentrated on his work. As the morning passed, he persuaded himself that his having any opportunity to do what had been asked of him was so remote that surely he could not be faulted for a failure. He could say as much when he went home.

Or, more correctly, he almost persuaded himself of that.

He had seen the King of Kings, in Kerakek. It could not be said that Great Shirvan had conveyed any sense of indulgence towards those who might claim… difficulty in executing orders he conveyed to them.

In the small house of Plautus Bonosus he finished with his morning patients and went upstairs. He decided it was time to stitch the charioteer's wound. By now he had proper fibulae with clips for the ends. He performed that procedure. Routine, effortless. Requiring no thought at all, which was good.

He continued to watch for and was relieved not to see the green oozing of pus. After a number of days had passed with the wound healing, he had just about decided it was time to bind the ribs more firmly. The patient had been entirely cooperative, if legitimately restless. Active, physical men took confinement badly, in Rustem's experience, and this man wasn't even able to have regular visitors, given the secrecy surrounding his presence here.

Bonosus had come twice, on the pretence of seeing his houseguest from Bassania, and once, at night, a cloaked figure appeared who turned out to be a man named Astorgus, evidently of significance in the Blues" group. It appeared that some unhappy results had transpired on the first day of the racing. Rustem didn't ask for details, though he did mix a slightly stronger sedative for his patient that night, noting signs of agitation. He was prepared for such things.

He wasn't prepared, at all, to go along the hall one morning, in the second week after the charioteer had arrived in the dead of night, and find the bedroom empty and the window open.

There was a folded note, set beneath the urine flask. 'Do come to the Hippodrome," it read. "I owe you some amusement.

Above the paper, the flask had been dutifully filled. His brow furrowed, Rustem noted with a quick glance that the colour was satisfactory. He walked over to the window, saw a tree quite close to hand, thick branches, not yet hidden by budding leaves. It wouldn't have been hard for a fit man to get out and down. For someone with inadequately wrapped, badly broken ribs and a deep, still-healing stab wound…

Glancing at the window ledge Rustem saw blood.

Looking more closely down on the small courtyard he observed a thin trail of it crossing the stones to the wall by the street. Suddenly angered, he looked up at the sky. Perun and the Lady knew, surely, that a physician could only do so much. He shook his head. It was a beautiful morning, he realized.

He decided that after seeing his patients he would attend at the Hippodrome that afternoon for the second day's racing. I owe you some amusement. He sent a runner to the Master of the Senate, asking if Bonosus might assist him in obtaining admission.

He was being very naive, of course, though excusably, as a stranger in Sarantium.

Plautus Bonosus was already at the Hippodrome by then, in the kathisma, the Imperial Box, the servant reported when he returned. The Emperor himself was attending the morning's races, would retire at midday to deal with larger affairs in the palace. The Master of the Senate would remain all day, a representative of the state.

Larger affairs. From the harbour the sound of shouts and hammering could be heard, even this far inland towards the walls.

Ships were being made ready to sail. It was said that there were ten thousand foot-soldiers and cavalry assembled here and in Deapolis across the straits. As many were reported to be gathering in Megarium to the west, Rustem had been told by a patient a few days ago. The Empire was clearly on the brink of war, an invasion, something indescribably dramatic and exciting, though nothing, as yet, had been announced.

Somewhere in the City a woman Rustem had been ordered to kill was going about the rhythm of her days.

Eighty thousand Sarantines were in the Hippodrome, watching chariots run. Rustem wondered if she would be there.