‘Yes, yes, of course. Very witty. Let’s assume I’ve now made a pointed suggestive response. So can we just come to the point, please, Tam?’
The older man, Tamlath Rhyl, Lord of the Far Waters, Dweller in the House of the Sun in Shadow, Nithque of the Ever Living Emperor and the Undying City, the Emperor’s True Counsellor and Friend, smiled blandly. ‘There’s always a point, Orhan. If you think about it.’ He pushed his cup aside and spread his hands on the table, rings glittering. ‘Very well, then. You are of course quite correct, I did not ask you here simply to compare tasting notes. Or indeed to discuss the failings of the current incarnation of His Eternal Eminence, oenologically or otherwise. Ten years, I’ve held this post. Ten years! And now March Verneth is dripping poison in the Emperor’s ear. We can’t wait, Orhan. We need to make it happen now.’
The younger man, Orhan Emmereth, Lord of the Rising Sun, Dweller in the House of the East, the Emperor’s True Counsellor and Friend, sighed. ‘We’ve been over this, Tam. We can’t make it happen any quicker. It’s not exactly easy as it is.’
‘If March persuades the Emperor to dismiss me—’
‘If March persuades the Emperor to dismiss you, it hardly matters. We’ll just reappoint you afterwards.’
‘March—’
‘March is an irrelevance.’ The younger man, Orhan Emmereth, Lord of the Rising Sun, thought: Your post is an irrelevance. We’re all irrelevant. That’s why we’re doing this. You still don’t see that, do you? He tried to keep his irritation out of his voice. ‘The Immish have raised another troop levy. Another five thousand men. Who gets to hold your titles is of no concern if the city’s burning.’ You haven’t managed to persuade anyone in the palace to do anything except laugh, he thought. Your great power and authority as Nithque! So it hardly matters whether you hold on to your power or not. As I would have thought was obvious. A wise man who’s ignored is about as effective as an idiot who’s listened to.
‘All the more reason to act more quickly, then,’ said Tam waspishly.
‘Quickly, yes. Too quickly, no. The last thing we want is chaos.’
Tam sipped his wine. ‘Sometimes I still wonder whether this is even real, Orhan. Anything more than your mind looking for excitement and a desire for something to interest you since Darath … well … Oh, don’t frown like that! Twenty years, the Long Peace has held. Why would the Immish be looking to cause trouble now? And even if they are, why should it be directed at us?’ His eyes flicked to the map on the wall. ‘Surely one of their northern borders – Theme, say, or Cen Andae.’
Orhan sighed. Because they can. Because they see no reason not to. Because they’ve finally looked at the graveyard of our Empire with open eyes. Because they’re fools and madmen and like the art of war. Because their children go hungry and we piss gold and jewels into the dust.
‘Twenty thousand troops, now, they’ve raised in two years … Don’t you feel it, Tam?’ he said after a moment. ‘A new mood coming? You hear the same things I do. A fight in Grey Square between apprentice boys and Immish caravan guards, four men killed. The Immish were mocking us, the apprentice boys said. Mocking our fidelity to the God. Three of our merchants stoned to death in Alborn, accused of false trade.’
‘And a firewine drunk stood in the centre of the Court of the Fountain yesterday and proclaimed himself the true incarnation of the Emperor, before his drinking companion knifed him in the heart. These things happen, Orhan. You’re oversensitive.’
‘God’s knives, Tam, it’s a bit late to start questioning things now, isn’t it?’
Tam smiled again. ‘Oh, I’m not questioning anything, Orhan. Just suggesting you look at your own motives for what you’re doing, and why.’ He drained his cup. ‘Another drink? As I said, fifty years old and the estate no longer produces. A shame to waste it.’
‘I’m fine, thank you.’
‘You’re sure? Yes? You refuse to move the timetable up, then? Even by a few days?’
Orhan sighed again. ‘A few days. Just a few days. No more.’
‘Now you sound like a fish merchant. Shall we start haggling over the price again?’ Tam refilled both their cups anyway and sipped from his. ‘You always look so morally aggrieved, Orhan. This was your idea, remember, not mine. You only brought me in to hide your own squeamishness. Someone else to blame.’ He bent forward, drawing his head closer to Orhan. Old man smell on his breath beneath the wine. Sour and fat. ‘I’ll tell you something, Orhan. Something I know. Something the Emperor doesn’t. You’re quite right. The Immish are planning something.’ A smile and a wink, the small chewed hands moving. ‘Does that make you feel any better about it all?’
Orhan started. ‘What?’
‘Oh, just March. Irrelevance that he is. He’s had … meetings. With someone who I have it on very good authority is a close agent of the Immish High Council. Money has been exchanged. Promises of aid. He wants more than my role as Nithque, I should think. The Immish want more than to give it to him, I should also think.’
‘What authority? You have proof?’
The small hands moved again. Lamplight flashed on the rings. Thin curls bobbed as the old man’s head shifted. ‘My dear Orhan, I know the man is an agent of the Immish High Council because he’s been paying me for years as such. Ah, don’t look so shocked! He could have been paying you too, if you’d let yourself be open to such things. As you know perfectly well. He’s probably been paying March for years too. But recently he started paying him a lot more.’
Orhan looked at him. Angry. Humiliated. All this dancing around, even though they were on the same side, seeking the same ends. He frowned and drank his wine. ‘A week, then. We’ll bring the timetable forward by one week. No more.’
‘I knew you’d see sense.’
‘If you’d started this conversation telling me that …’
Tam drained his cup and rose. Pale silk swirled around him, making the lamp flicker, as though a moth had flown into its flames. ‘But that wouldn’t have been how we do this, would it, Orhan? You had to decide for yourself, not because I asked you to. It’s your idea, remember, not mine. What I know or don’t know is … irrelevant.’
‘I am aware it’s my idea, Tam, thank you.’ Impossible to forget, indeed. Might as well engrave it in letters of fire over his bed. Orhan sipped his wine. It was too dry, now he’d had a couple of cups of it. Tam could probably have chosen better, if he didn’t believe quite so much in thrift.
‘I’ll be leaving then. You’re going to March’s party, I assume?’
‘It seems a good idea, in the circumstances.’ Though he’d rather not. But he’d better, now. ‘Are you?’