Aekir has fallen.

The Vizier burst in followed by a pair of tulwar-wielding guards. He shouted something, and they grasped the kneeling Kolchuk by the shoulders. But Aurungzeb held up a hand.

“Aekir has fallen?”

The Kolchuk nodded, and for a second the inscrutable soldier and the silk-clad Sultan smiled at each other, men sharing a triumph only they could appreciate. Then Aurungzeb pursed his lips. It would not do to press the man for information; that would smack of eagerness, even gracelessness.

“Akran,” he barked at his glowering, uncertain Vizier. “Quarter this man in the palace. See that he is fed, bathed, and has whatever he wishes.”

“But Highness, a common soldier—”

“Do it, Akran. This common soldier could have been an assassin, but you let him slip past you into the very harem. Had it not been for Serrim”—here the eunuch coloured and simpered—“I would have been taken totally by surprise. I thought my father had taught you better, Akran.”

The Vizier looked bent and old. The guards shifted uneasily, contaminated with his guilt.

“Now go, all of you. No, wait. Your name, soldier. What is it and with whom do you serve?”

The Kolchuk gazed at him, remote once more. “I am Harafeng, Lord. I am one of the Shahr’s bodyguard.”

Aurungzeb raised an eyebrow. “Then, Harafeng, when you have eaten and washed, the Vizier will bring you back to me and we will discuss the fall of Aekir. You have my leave to go, all of you.”

The Kolchuk nodded curtly, which made Akran splutter with indignation, but Aurungzeb smiled. As soon as he was alone in the chamber his smile turned into a grin which split his beard, and it was possible to see the general of men that he had briefly been in his youth.

Aekir has fallen.

Ostrabar was counted third in might of the Seven Sultanates, coming after Hardukh and ancient Nalbeni, but this feat of arms, this glorious victory, would propel it into the first rank of the Merduk sultanates, and Aurungzeb at its head. Centuries hence they would talk of the sultan who had taken the holiest and most populous city of the Ramusians, who had broken the army of John Mogen.

The way lay open to Torunn itself now; there remained only the line of the River Searil and the fortress of Ormann Dyke. Once they fell there was no line of defence until the Cimbric Mountains, four hundred miles further west.

“Ahrimuz, all praise to thee!” the Sultan whispered through his grin, and then said sharply, “Gheg.”

A homunculus sidled from behind one of the embroidered curtains, flapped its leathery little wings and perched on a nearby table.

“Gheg,” it said in a tiny, dry voice, its face a picture in cunning malevolence.

“I wish to speak to your keeper, Gheg. Summon him for me.”

The homunculus, no larger than a pigeon, yawned, showing white needle-teeth in a red mouth. One clawed hand scratched its crotch negligently.

“Gheg hungry,” it said, disgruntled.

Aurungzeb’s nostrils flared. “You were fed last night, as fine a babe as you could wish. Now get me your keeper, hell-spawn.”

The homunculus glowered at him, then shrugged its tiny shoulders. “Gheg tired. Head hurts.”

“Do as I say or I’ll spit you like a quail.”

The homunculus smiled: a hideous sight. Then a different light came into its glowing eyes. In a deep, human tone it said, “I am here, Sultan.”

“Your pet is somewhat sullen of late, Orkh—one of the reasons I use him so seldom nowadays.”

“My apologies, Highness. He is getting old. I shall consign him to the jar soon and send you a new one . . . What is your wish?”

“Where are you?” It was odd to hear petulance from such a big, hirsute figure.

“It is no matter. I am close enough. Have you a boon you would ask of me?”

Aurungzeb struggled visibly to control his temper.

“I would have you look south, to Aekir. Tell me what transpires there. I have had news. I wish to see it substantiated.”

“Of course.” There was a pause. “I see Carcasson afire. I see siege towers along the inner walls. There is a great burning, the howls of Ramusians. I congratulate you, Highness. Your troops run amok through the city.”

“Shahr Baraz. What of him?”

Another moment’s silence. When the voice came again it held mild surprise.

“He views the crucified body of John Mogen. He weeps, Sultan. In the midst of victory, he weeps.”

“He is of the old Hraib. He mourns his enemy, the romantic fool. The city burns, you say?”

“Yes. The streets are crawling with unbelievers. They fire the city as they go.”

“That will be Lejer, the dastard. He will leave us nothing but ashes. A curse on him and his children. I’ll have him crucified, if he is taken. Is the Ormann road open?”

The homunculus had come out in beads of shining sweat. It trembled and its wing tips drooped. The voice which came out of it did not change, however.

“Yes, Highness. It is clogged with carts and bodies, a veritable migration. The House of Ostrabar reigns supreme.”

Eighty years before the House of Ostrabar had consisted solely of Aurungzeb’s grandfather and a trio of hardy concubines. Generalship, not lineage, had reared it up out of the eastern steppes. If the Ostrabars could not win battles themselves, they hired someone who could. Hence Shahr Baraz, who had been Khedive to Aurungzeb’s father. Aurungzeb had commanded troops competently in his youth, but he could not inspire them in the same way. It was a lack he had never ceased to resent. Shahr Baraz, though originally an outsider, a nomad chief from far Kambaksk, had served three generations of Ostrabars honestly and ably. He was now in his eighties, a terrible old man much given to prayer and poetry. It was well that Aekir had fallen when it did; Shahr Baraz’s long life was near its close, and with it would go the last link between the Sultans and the horse-borne chieftains of the steppes who had preceded them.

Shahr Baraz had recommended that the Ormann road be left open. The influx of refugees would weaken and demoralize the men who manned the line of the Searil river, he said. Aurungzeb had wondered if some outdated chivalry had had a hand in the decision also. No matter.

“Tell the—” he began, and stopped. The homunculus was melting before his eyes, glaring at him reproachfully as it bubbled into a foul-smelling pool.

“Orkh! Tell the Khedive to push on to the Searil!”

The homunculus’ mouth moved but made no sound. It dissolved, steaming and reeking. In the nauseous puddle it became it was possible to make out the decaying foetus of a child, the wing-bones of a bird, the tail of a lizard. Aurungzeb gagged and clapped his hands for the eunuchs. Gheg had outlived its usefulness, but no doubt Orkh would send him another of the creatures soon. He had other messengers—not so swift, perhaps, but just as sure.

Aekir has fallen.

He began to laugh.

TWO

“S WEET God!” Hawkwood said. “What is happening?”

“Vast heaving there!” the boatswain roared, eyeing a flapping sail. “Brace round that foretopsail, you God-damned eunuchs. Where do you think you are, a two-copper curiosity show?”

The Grace of God, a square-rigged caravel, slid quietly into Abrusio at six bells in the forenoon watch, the water a calm blue shimmer along her sides dotted with the filth of the port. Where the sun struck the sea there was a white glitter, painful to look at. A faint north-west breeze—the Hebrionese trade—enabled her to waft in like a swan, with hardly a rope to be touched by the staring crew despite the outrage of the boatswain.

Abrusio. They had heard the bells of its cathedral all through the last two turns of the glass, a ghostly echo of piety drifting out to sea.

Abrusio, capital of Hebrion and greatest port of the Five Kingdoms. It was a beautiful sight to behold when coming home from even a short coasting voyage such as the Grace’s crew had just completed; an uneasy cruise along the Macassar coast, haggling with the Sea-Rovers over tolls, one hand to their dirks and the slow-match burning alongside the culverins all the while. But profitable, despite the heat, the flies, the pitch melting in the seams and the marauding river lizards. Despite the feast drums at night along the bonfire-studded coast and the lateen-winged feluccas with their cargoes of grinning corsairs. Safe in the hold were three tons of ivory from the skeletons of great marmorills, and fragrant Limian spice by the hundredweight. And they had lost only one man, a clumsy first-voyager who had leaned too far out over the rail as a shallowshark passed by.