Lord of Emperors. Guy Gavriel Kay

caste, had appeared entirely content when informed of this development—as soon as she was told of the promise that she was to be given an appropriate, kindly husband. Her only request was that this happen in Kabadh.

      It seemed that his second, delicate wife, had a greater dislike for desert sand and heat than she had ever revealed, and an equally strong interest in seeing and dwelling within the bustle and excitement of the royal city. Rustem, nonplussed, had indicated that it was likely she could be accommodated in this wish. Jarita had kissed him happily, even passionately, and gone off to see her baby in the nursery.

      Katyun, his first wife—calm, composed Katyun, who was being honoured, as was her son, by elevation to the highest of the three castes, with the prospect of unimagined wealth and opportunity—had erupted in a storm of grief upon hearing these same tidings. She had refused to be consoled, wailing and distraught.

      Katyun did not have any liking for the great cities of the world, never having seen—or having felt any desire to see—any of them. Sand in clothing or hair was a trivial affliction; the heat of the desert sun could be dealt with if one knew the proper ways to live; small, remote Kerakek was an entirely pleasant place in which to dwell if one were the wife of a respected physician and had the status that came therewith.

      Kabadh, the court, the famous water gardens, the churka grounds, the flower-laden, crimson-pillared hall of dance . . . these were places where women would be painted and perfumed and garbed in exquisite silks and in the manners and malice of long practice and familiarity. A woman from the desert provinces among such . . . ?

      Katyun had wept in her bed, squeezing her eyes tightly shut, refusing even to look at him, as Rustem strove to comfort her with talk of what opportunities this royal munificence offered for Shaski—and any other children they might now have.

      That last had been an impulsive, unplanned comment, but it did produce an ebbing of tears. Katyun wanted another baby and Rustem knew it. With a move to Kabadh, in the lofty role of royal physician, there would be no further arguments about living space or resources that could be applied against the idea of another child.

      Inwardly, he had still been wounded, however. Jarita had been much too matter-of-fact about being set aside with her daughter; Katyun gave no evidence of realizing how astonishing this change in their fortunes was, no sign of pride in him, of excitement in their shared new fate.

      The suggestion about a second child did calm her. She dried her eyes, sat up in the bed, looked at him thoughtfully and then managed a brief smile. Rustem spent what was left of the night with her. Katyun, less delicately pretty than Jarita, was also less shy than his second wife and rather more skilled in arousing him by diverse means. Before dawn he had been induced, still half-asleep, to make a first assay at engendering the promised offspring. Katyun’s touch and her whispering voice at his ear were balm to his pride.

      At sunrise he’d returned to the fortress to determine the status of his royal patient. All was well. Shirvan healed swiftly, signs of an iron constitution and the benign alignment of auspices. Rustem took no credit for the former, was at pains to monitor and adjust for the latter.

      In between visits with the king, he found himself closeted with the vizier, Mazendar, others joining them at intervals. Rustem received an education, at speed, in certain aspects of the world as they knew it that winter, with particular emphasis on the nature and the possible intentions of Valerius II of Sarantium, whom some named the Night’s Emperor.

      If he was going there, and was to do so to some purpose, there were things he needed to know.

      When he finally did depart—having made hasty arrangements for his students to continue with a physician he knew in Qandir, even farther to the south—the winter was well advanced.

      The most difficult parting—and this was entirely unexpected—was with Shaski. The women were reconciled to what was happening, could understand it; the baby was too young to know. His son, too soft by far, Rustem thought, was visibly struggling not to cry as Rustem finished tightening the drawstrings on his pack one morning and turned to bid a last farewell to all of them.

      Shaski had come forward a few steps down the walk. He rubbed at his eyes with bunched fists. He was trying, Rustem had to acknowledge. He was attempting not to cry. But what little boy grew so absurdly attached to his father? It was a weakness. Shaski was still of an age when the world he ought to know and need was that of the women. A father was to provide food and shelter and moral guidance and ensure discipline in the home. Perhaps Rustem had made a mistake, after all, in allowing the child to listen to his lessons from the hallway. Shaski had no business reacting this way. There were even soldiers watching; an escort from the fortress would go with him the first part of the way, as a sign of favour.

      Rustem opened his mouth to admonish the boy and discovered that—shamefully—he had an awkward lump in his own throat and a constriction of feeling in his chest that made it difficult to speak. He coughed.

      ‘Listen to your mothers,’ he said, more huskily than he’d expected.

      Shaski nodded his head. ‘I will,’ he whispered. He still wasn’t crying, Rustem saw. His small fists were clenched at his sides. ‘When will you come home, Papa?’

      ‘When I have done what I have to do.’

      Shaski took another two steps towards the gate where Rustem stood. They were alone, halfway between the women by the door and the military escort a little down the road. He could have touched the boy if he’d reached out. One bird was singing in the bright, crisp winter morning.

      His son took a deep breath, visibly summoning courage. ‘I don’t want you to go, you know,’ said Shaski.

      Rustem strove for outrage. Children were not to speak this way. Not to their fathers. Then he saw that the boy knew this, and had lowered his eyes and hunched his shoulders, as if awaiting a reprimand.

      Rustem looked at him and swallowed, then turned away, saying nothing after all. He carried the pack a few steps until one of the soldiers jumped down from his mount and took it from him, fastening it efficiently to the back of a mule. Rustem watched him. The leader of the soldiers looked at him and raised an eyebrow in inquiry, gesturing at the horse they’d given him.

      Rustem nodded, inexplicably irritated. He took a step towards the horse, then suddenly turned around, to look back at the gate. Shaski was still there. He lifted his hand to wave to the boy, and smiled a little, awkwardly, that the child might know his father wasn’t angry about what he’d said, even though he should have been. Shaski’s eyes were on Rustem’s face. He still wasn’t crying. He still looked as though he might. Rustem looked at him another moment, drinking in the sight of that small form, then he nodded his head, turned briskly and accepted a hand up onto his horse and they rode off. The uncomfortable feeling in his chest lingered for a time and then it went away.

      THE ESCORT RODE with him to the border but Rustem continued west into Sarantine lands—for the first time in his life—alone save for a dark-eyed, bearded man -servant named Nishik. He left the horse with the soldiers and continued on a mule, now; it was more suited to his role.

      The manservant was another deception. Just as Rustem was not, for the moment, simply a teaching physician in search of manuscripts and learned discussions with western colleagues, so was his servant not really a servant. Nishik was a veteran soldier, experienced in combat and survival. In the fortress it had been impressed upon Rustem that such skills might be important on his journey, and perhaps even more so when he reached his destination. He was, after all, a spy.

      They stopped in Sarnica, making no secret of their arrival or Rustem’s role in saving the life of the King of Kings and his forthcoming status. It had been too dramatic an event: the tidings of the assassination attempt had already run before them across the border, even in winter.

      The governor of Amoria requested that Rustem attend upon him and seemed appropriately horrified to learn further details of deadly perfidy within the royal family of Bassania. After the formal audience, the governor dismissed his attendants and confided privately to Rustem that he had been encountering some difficulties in fulfilling