The Dance of Time

With the resources available, in the time they had, there was no way for the assassins to forge documents good enough to pass Roman inspection. As for trying to claim noble Aryan lineage…

Impossible. Persian documents were fairly easy to forge, and it would be as easy for some of the assassins to pass themselves off as Persians as polyglot Romans. But if Persian bureaucrats were easy to fool, Persian retainers were not. Tightly knit together by kinship as the great Persian families were, they relied on personal recognition to separate the wheat from the chaff-and to those keen eyes, the Malwa assassins were clearly chaff. If nothing else, they'd certainly insist on searching their luggage, and they'd find the bombard-a weapon that had no conceivable use except assassination.

"No help for it," the commander said, as he watched the Axumite war fleet leaving the harbor, with their target safely aboard the largest vessel. "We'll have to try again at Barbaricum. No point even thinking about Chabahari."

His men nodded, looking no more pleased than he did. Leaving aside the fact that this mission had been frustrating from the very start, they now had the distinctly unpleasant prospect of voyaging down the Gulf in an oared galley. It was unlikely they'd be able to use sails, traveling eastbound, with monsoon season still so far away. And-worst of all-while they'd had enough money to afford a galley, they hadn't been able to afford a crew beyond a pilot.

Malwa assassins were expert at many things. Rowing was not one of them.

"Our hands'll be too badly blistered to hold a knife," one of them predicted gloomily.

"Shut up," his commander responded, every bit as gloomily.

Chapter 17

The Indus

The attack came as a complete surprise. Not to A

"What in the name of God do they think they're doing? " demanded Menander angrily.

He studied the fleet of small boats-skiffs, really-pushing out from the southern shore. The skiffs were loaded with Malwa soldiers, along with more than the usual complement of Mahaveda priests and their mahamimamsa "enforcers." The presence of the latter was a sure sign that the Malwa considered this project so near-suicidal that the soldiers needed to be held in a tight rein.

"It's an ambush," explained his pilot, saying aloud the conclusion Menander had already reached. The man pointed to the thick reeds. "The Malwa must have hauled those boats across the desert, hidden them in the reeds, waited for us. We don't keep regular patrols on the south bank, since there's really nothing there to watch for."

Menander's face was tight with exasperation. "But what's the point of it?" For a moment, his eyes moved forward, toward the heavily-shielded bow of the ship where the Victrix 's fire-ca

But even before he finished the last words, even before he saw the target of the oncoming boats, Menander understood the truth. The fact of it, at least, if not the reasoning.

" Why? They're all dead men, no matter what happens. In the name of God, she's just a woman!"

He didn't wait for an answer, however, before starting to issue his commands. The Victrix began shuddering to a halt. The skiffs were coming swiftly, driven by almost frenzied rowing. It would take the Victrix time to come to a halt and turn around; time to make its way back to protect the barge it was towing.

Time, Menander feared, that he might not have.

"What should we do?" asked A

Grim-faced, Illus glanced around the barge. Other than he and Cottomenes and Abdul, there were only five Roman soldiers on the barge-and only two of those were armed with muskets. Since Belisarius and Khusrau had driven the Malwa out of the Sind, and established Roman naval supremacy on the Indus with the new steam-powered gunboats, there had been no Malwa attempt to threaten shipping south of the Iron Triangle.

Then his eyes came to rest on the vessel's new feature, and his tight lips creased into something like a smile.

"God bless good officers," he muttered.

He pointed to the top of the cabin amidships, where a shell of thin iron was perched. It was a turret, of sorts, for the odd and ungainly looking "Puckle gun" that Menander had insisted on adding to the barge. The helmeted face and upper body of the gu

"Get up there- now. There's enough room in there for you, and it's the best armored place on the barge." He gave the oncoming Malwa a quick glance. "They've got a few muskets of their own. Won't be able to hit much, not shooting from skiffs moving that quickly-but keep your head down once you get there. "

It took A

After she sprawled into the open interior of the turret, the hard edges of some kind of ammunition containers bruising her back, A

I have got to design a new costume. Propriety be damned!

For a moment, her thoughts veered aside. She remembered that Irene Macrembolitissa, in her Observations of India, had mentioned-with some amusement-that Empress Shakuntala often wore pantaloons in public. Outrageous behavior, really, but… when you're the one who owns the executioners, you can afford to outrage public opinion.

The thought made her smile, and it was with that cheerful expression on her lips that she turned her face up to the gu

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

The man's face suddenly lightened, and he smiled himself.

"Damn if you aren't a prize!" he chuckled. Then, nodding his head. "Yes, ma'am. As a matter of fact, there is."

He pointed to the odd-looking objects lying on the floor of the turret, which had bruised A

He turned his head, studying the enemy vessels. "Better do it quick, ma'am. If those skiffs get alongside, your men and the other soldiers won't be enough to beat them back. And they'll have grenades anyway, they're bound to. If I can't keep them off, we're all dead."

A

"Just hand them to me, ma'am, that's all. I'll do the rest. And keep your head down-it's you they're after."

A

"Damned if I know. Doesn't make sense."

But, in truth, the gu