Soldier of the mist

Spreading his hands, the regent whispered, "Speak or die. Who got your report?"

Though the time had been so brief, the woman had recovered her composure. "Believe me, most royal-"

As quickly as he might have thrust with his spear, Basias grasped her arm. She raised a hand to claw his face, but a blow to her head sent her reeling across the tent.

Basias drew his sword.

"Wait," the regent told him. To me he said, "I saw that step. You would have protected your friend, if only Basias were here. What if he were not? If you had only Pasicrates and me to deal with?"

I said, "If it weren't for the sentries, I would have killed all of you, or tried to."

Io gasped, "Master, no!"

The regent waved her fears away. "Your master's a man of courage. He'll need to be, living among us."

Awkwardly, the woman got to her feet. There were tears in her eyes, but something else too.

"I don't have time for more of this," the regent told her. "You may speak and live or remain silent and die. Choose."

"Then I choose to speak," the woman said. "Who would not?" She smoothed her cloak as women do, as women keep their clothes in order though the cities burn.

"Good. A confessed spy may be useful. Useful, you may live and even prosper. Who got your report?"

"Artabazus."

"Better and better. And that report was…?"

"That half a year and a few gifts would make any fighting u

"He did not believe you?"

The woman shook her head. "He believed me, but he couldn't convince Mardonius."

Basias dropped his sword. It fell point down, piercing the carpet where he stood and sticking upright in the earth beneath it. He lifted his arm and looked at his hand with unbelieving eyes. The fingers were swollen, and there was a gray pallor on the skin.

"Let me see that," the regent said. And then, when Basias did not obey, "Come here!"

Like a doll moved by strings, Basias walked to where the regent sat and held out his hand.

"He had a poisoned pin in his hair." The regent looked at the woman. "Tell us the antidote."

"I have no pin, Highness," she said. "You may search my person if you wish."

"You hid it when you fell. You may be worth something at that. What's your name?"

"Eurykles, Highness. Others have thought so."

The regent nodded absently. "Basias, tell the sentries one of them is to take you to Kichesippos, my healer. The rest of you, come here and sit before me. I'm tired of breaking my neck. Take cushions if you want."

I got a cushion for the woman and a long one for Io and me. As I put them down before the regent, I could hear Basias talking to the sentries outside.

"You too, Pasicrates," the regent said, and his messenger seated himself upon a cushion at his right hand.

"Eurykles, tell me why you gave Artabazus that advice."

"Because it was the best I could give," the woman said. She paused to gather her thoughts. "War is only the last recourse of politics; it has no sure victories, or so I think. A king who fights when he might gain his ends by a cupful of wisdom and a handful of gold is a fool."

The regent smiled. "You believe your Great King a fool?"

"The Great King was gone. Mardonius was a good soldier but a stupid man. If Artabazus had been in command… "

"If Artabazus had been in command, what then? What of the Hellenes? You're one, as you just reminded us."

"You'd be ruled by men of our race, just as you are now, and as our cities in the lesser Asia are. What difference would there be? Why should ten myriads die?"

"You know of others who think as you do? In Thought?"

"I'm certain such men exist."

"You're careful. So am I." The regent glanced at Io and me. "Let me suggest to all three of you something you may not have noticed. Perhaps I should say let us suggest it, because I've talked to Pasicrates and he feels as I do."

The woman leaned toward him, her fingers playing upon her cheek. "Yes, Highness?"

"We are four men whose interests run so close they're indistinguishable. Let me speak of Rope and this whole country first. We Rope Makers are the finest soldiers in the world, and the Great King knows that now. But men who know war know it's no game; a wise man dodges it if he can, just as you said. As for glory, my uncle Leonidas won enough at the Gates to the Hot Springs to last our family till Tantalus drinks-I say nothing of my own battle. An honorable peace, then, is our only desire."

The woman called Eurykles gave the slightest of nods, her eyes fixed upon the regent as a serpent transfixes a bird.

"Our country is divided into so many warring cities no one can count them all, or no one has bothered. Every clutter of huts on the mountainside makes its own laws, issues its own currency, and fields its tiny army to crush its tiny neighbor. Clearly, what we need is union under the noblest of our cities, which by a happy coincidence happens to be my own."

"By a coincidence even happier," the woman said, "I have before me a member of the elder royal house of that city, who is in addition its most renowned living leader."

"Thank you." The regent nodded graciously. "Unfortunately, our city is not strong enough to unite all the rest. More, it is not rich enough. I have often thought that if only we had found the silver, instead of Thought, or if we had seized the treasury of Croesus… " He shrugged and let the words trail away. "But suppose we had the help-or at least the threat-of additional troops. Cavalry, let us say, because there's so little here. With that threat and gold enough to make gifts to farsighted men, a great deal might be done."

The woman nodded. "It might indeed."

Pasicrates murmured, "Highness, do you think you should speak in this way before the child?"

"Speak in what way? Say that I seek an honorable peace with the Great King and a position for Rope commensurate with its virtues? She may repeat that to anyone she may meet."

Io said, "I won't repeat anything. I don't do that, except for telling Latro. But you said all our interests went together."

"Your master is fortunate in his slave; I've seen that already. As for our interests, let's take Eurykles here first. We'll get to you in a moment. Eurykles serves the Great King, as he admitted a moment ago. More directly, he serves Artabazus. He wishes to be rewarded for his work, like any other man. The Great King wants to recover the prestige he lost here and to add to his glory. Peace and union under a leader grateful to him-"

The woman said, "Would be all he could desire, Highness, I'm sure. Someone who has the king's ear would have to be consulted, naturally."

"Naturally. Now as to you, child. Your city is allied with the Great King already, and as your friend Pindaros told you, it would have been destroyed but for my own city and my acts in its behalf. Isn't it clear that anything that helps your strongest friends helps you?"

Io shook her head. "To tell the truth, I don't care about my city. I care about Latro."

I said, "Who is a soldier of the Great King's. You think I'm an idiot because I forget, Prince Pausanias, and perhaps I am. But I've always known that, even when I did not know my name."