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"We have a saying in my country, Your Excellency. 'Once you pay the Danegeld, you will never be rid of the Dane.'
"What does that mean? Like the history of your own home, beautiful, water-washed Diaspra, our history goes back for thousands of years. But unlike the peaceful history of your city, ours is a history drenched in blood. This invasion which is so unusual for you, which makes your skin dry in fear, would be no more than a single bad day in the distant history of my country. Many, many times we have had to face the depredations and devastation of barbarian invasions-so often that our priests once created special prayers for deliverance from specific barbarian tribes. Like the Danes.
"The Danes, like the Boman, were raiders from the North. But they came in lightning-fast boats along the seashore, not by land, and they swooped down upon the coastal villages, killing and enslaving the locals and despoiling their temples. They had particularly gruesome ways of butchering the priests, and mocked them as they died, for they had called upon their god and been greeted only with silence.
"So, in desperation, one of the lands they raided offered up its gold and silver objects, even the reliquaries which had been created to show its people's love for their god, as Danegeld. As a bribe to the Danes, a desperate effort to buy immunity for their own land and people. Lords from all across their land contributed to the goods offered to the Danes in hopes that they might stay far from their shores.
"But their hopes failed. Instead, the Danes, finding that they were offered such tempting wealth without even a fight, moved in. They took lands about the area and became the permanent overlords and imposed their gods and their laws upon the people they'd conquered. All that society, that beautiful shining land of abbeys and monasteries, of towns and cities, fell into darkness and is forgotten. Of all their great works and art and beauty, only a few scattered remnants have come down to us over the years, preserved from the Danes. Preserved not by the Danegeld, but by the few lords who stood up to the Danes and defended their lands with the cold, keen steel of their swords rather than soft gold and silver and so preserved their people, their gods, and their relics.
"So if you wish to gather your own Danegeld, gather it well. But don't expect to be rid of the Dane."
Gratar considered the prince levelly for a moment, then turned back to the petitioners.
"This measure will be considered by the full Council in ten days. And this audience is now closed."
With that, he turned away from the petitioners and the humans alike, and left the temple by a side entrance, followed by his guards.
"Captain," Roger said as they watched the petitioners begin to file out of the temple, "you remember what I just said about intelligence and eavesdropping?"
"Julian's pretty busy drilling the troops," the captain replied thoughtfully as he pulled out a slice of bisti root.
"He couldn't get in to see the councilmen, anyway," Roger said. "But I know who can."