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  "Will be dealt with by the Theodoran Cohort," stated Belisarius.

  The announcement brought dead silence to the room. All eyes turned to Antonina.

  The little Egyptian woman shrugged. "I'm all we've got, I'm afraid."

  "Not quite," said Belisarius. He looked at Hermogenes. "I think we can spare one of your legions, to give Antonina's grenadiers an infantry bulwark. And I'm going to give her five hundred of my cataphracts for a cavalry force."

  Hermogenes nodded. Frowning, Germanicus looked back and forth between Belisarius and Antonina.

  "I would have thought you'd want to use the grenadiers in Persia," he commented.

  Before Belisarius could reply, Theodora spoke up. "Absolutely not. Other than Belisarius' small unit of rocketeers, Antonina's cohort is our only military force equipped with gunpowder weapons. They've never been in a real battle. I'm not going to risk them in Persia. Not this early in the war."

  Germanicus' frown deepened. "Then who-?"

  "Me," said Belisarius. "Me, and whatever troops we can scrape up." He scratched his chin. "I think we can spare five or six thousand men from the Army of Syria, along with my own bucellarii."

  "I can give you two thousand cataphracts," interjected Sittas. He glanced at Germanicus.

  The Illyrian army commander winced. "I can probably spare five hundred. No more than that, I'm afraid. There's bound to be trouble with the northern barbarians within the next year. The Malwa will be spreading their gold with a lavish hand."

  Hermogenes finished counting on his fingers and looked up.

  "That doesn't give you much of an army, Belisarius. You've got, what-a thousand cataphracts, after you give five hundred to Antonina?"

  Belisarius nodded.

  Hermogenes blew out his cheeks. "Plus two thousand from Sittas and five hundred from Germanicus. That's three and a half thousand heavy cavalry. The Army of Syria can probably give you three or four thousand infantry and a couple of thousand cavalry. But the cavalry will be light horse archers, not cataphract lancers."

  "Ten thousand men, at the most," concluded Germanicus. "As he says, that's not much of an army."

  Belisarius shrugged. "It's what we've got."

  "I'm not happy at the idea of Belisarius personally leading this army," stated Chrysopolis. "He's the Empire's strategos. He should really stay here in the capital."

  "Nonsense!" barked Justinian. For the first time since the meeting began, he too broke into a grin. And, like that of his wife's, the expression was utterly humorless.

  "You want an alliance with Persia, don't you?" he demanded. "They won't be happy at our counter-offer of ten thousand men. But Belisarius' reputation will make up the difference." Now, a bit of humor crept into that ravaged face. "Stop frowning, Chrysopolis. I can see your sour face as if I still had eyes."

  He leaned forward, gripping the armrests of his chair. His head scanned the entire circle of advisers. For just a fleeting moment, everyone would have sworn Justinian could actually see them.

  "I made that man a general," said the former emperor. "It's one of the few decisions I made that I've never regretted."

  He leaned back in his seat. "The Persians will be delighted. Believe it."

  Chapter 3

  The next morning, when the Empress Regent gave Baresmanas the Roman response to Persia's proposal, he was delighted. He had hoped for a larger army, true. But neither he nor Emperor Khusrau had really expected the Romans to send them forty thousand troops.

  The Roman generosity in not demanding territorial concessions in the borderlands also pleased him immensely. That was quite unexpected.

  But, best of all-Belisarius.

  Not every member of the Persian delegation shared his attitude-including his own wife, the Lady Maleka. As soon as Baresmanas returned to the small palace in which the Persians had been housed, right in the middle of the imperial complex, she strode into the main salon, scowling fiercely.

  "I do not approve," she told her husband, very forcefully. "We should not be currying favor from these wretched Roman mongrels, as if we were lowborn beggars."

  Baresmanas ignored her. He stood before the flames burning in the salon's fireplace, warming his hands from the chill of an April morning.

  "I do not approve!" repeated Lady Maleka.

  Baresmanas sighed, turned away from the fire. "The Emperor approves," he said mildly.

  "Khusrau is but a boy!"

  "He most certainly is not," replied her husband firmly. "True, he is a young man. But he is in every respect as fine an Emperor as ever sat the Aryan throne. Do not doubt it, wife."

  Lady Maleka scowled. "Even so- He is too preoccupied with the Malwa invasion! He forgets our glorious Aryan heritage!"

  Her husband bit off a sharp retort. Unlike his wife, Baresmanas was well-educated. A scholar, actually, which was unusual for a sahrdaran. Lady Maleka, on the other hand, was a perfect specimen of their class. Like all Persian high noblewomen, she was literate. But it was a skill which she had never utilized once she reached adulthood. She much preferred to learn her history seated on rich cushions at their palace in Ctesiphon, listening to bards recounting the epics of the Aryans.

  Baresmanas studied the angry face of his wife, trying to think of a way to explain reality that would penetrate her prejudiced ignorance.

  The truth of history, he knew, was quite different from her fantasy version of it. The Iranians who ruled Persia and Central Asia had originated, like their Scythian brethren, from the steppes of Asia. They, too, had been nomadic barbarians once. Over a millennium ago, the Aryan tribes had marched south from the steppes, in their great epic of conquest. The westward-moving tribes had become known as the Iranians and had created the glory of the ancient Medes and Persians. Their eastward-bound cousins had conquered northern India and created the Vedic culture which eventually permeated the entire sub-continent.

  And then, having done so, both branches of the Aryans had invented a new history for themselves. A history full of airy legends and grandiose claims, and precious little in the way of fact.

  Myths and fables, grown up in the feudal soil of the east. The real power of the Iranians, now as before, lay on the Persian plateau and the great rich lands of Mesopotamia. But the Aryans-the nobility, at least-chose to remember the legends of the northeastern steppes.

  And then, he thought sourly, remember them upside down. They don't remember the military strength of barbarian horsemen. Only the myth of pure blood, and divine ancestry.

  Studying his wife, Baresmanas recognized the impossibility of penetrating her prejudices.

  So be it. The Aryans had other customs, too.

  "Obey your husband, wife," he commanded. "And your Emperor."

  She opened her mouth.

  "Do it."

  Lady Maleka bowed her head. Sullenly, she stalked from the room.

  Baresmanas lowered himself onto a couch near the fire. He stared into the flames. The hot glow seemed to lurk within his dark eyes, as if he saw a different conflagration there.

  Which, indeed, he did. The memory of a fire called the battle of Mindouos. Where, three years before, a Roman general had shattered the Persian army. Outfoxed them, trapped then, slaughtered them-even captured the Persian camp.

  Belisarius.

  Baresmanas had been at that battle. So had his children, in the Persian camp.

  He looked away from the fire, wincing.

  His children would never have been at Mindouos had Baresmanas not brought them there. He, too, for all his scholarship, had lapsed into Aryan haughtiness. It was the long-standing custom of noble Persians to bring their families to the field of battle. Displaying, to the enemy and all the world, their arrogant confidence in Aryan invincibility.

  His wife had refused to come, pleading her health. (Not from the enemy, but from the heat of the Syrian desert.) But his children had come, avidly-his daughter as much as his son. Avid to watch their famous father, second-in-command to Firuz, destroy the insolent Rom
ans.

  Baresmanas sighed. He reached up with his left hand and caressed his right shoulder. The shoulder ached, as always, and he could feel the ridged scar tissue under the silk of his tunic.

  A Roman lance had put that scar there. At Mindouos. Baresmanas, like all the charging noble lancers, had been trapped in the center. Trapped, by the cunning of the Roman commander; and, then, hammered under by the force of his counter-blow.

  Belisarius.

  Baresmanas could remember little of the battle's final moments. Only the confusion and the choking dust; the growing, horrible knowledge that they had been outwitted and outmaneuvered; the shock and pain, as he lay dazed and bleeding on the trampled ground, his shoulder almost severed.

  Most of all, he remembered the terror which had coursed through his heart, as if hot iron instead of blood flowed through his veins. Terror, not for himself, but for his helpless children. The Persian camp was unprotected, then, from the triumphing Romans. Baresmanas had known the Roman soldiers would ravage it like wolves, especially their Hun auxiliaries, raping and murdering.

  And so they had; or, at least, had started to do.

  Until Belisarius, and his cataphracts, had put a stop to the atrocities. He had been as decisive and ruthless toward his own Huns as he had been toward the Persians.

  Weeks later, after he had been ransomed by his family, Baresmanas had heard the tale from his daughter Tahmina. Seeing the oncoming Huns, she and her brother had hidden themselves under the silk cushions in their tent. But the savages had not been fooled. A squad of Huns had found Tahmina soon enough, and dragged her out of the tent. Her brother had tried to come to her rescue, but it had been a futile gesture. The Huns had not killed the boy-alive, he would bring a good price on the slave market. They had simply split his scalp with a blow, casually, while they began stripping off his sister's clothing.

  The Roman general had arrived then, accompanied by his cataphracts, and ordered the Huns to cease. Tahmina had described to Baresmanas how the Hun who held her by the hair had taunted Belisarius. And how the general, cold-faced, had simply spoken the name of his cataphract. A cataphract whose face was even colder, and as wicked-looking as a weasel. The cataphract had been as quick and deadly as a weasel, too. His arrows had slaughtered the Huns holding Tahmina like so many chickens.

  Belisarius.

  Strange, peculiar man. With that odd streak of mercy, lying under the edge of his ruthless and cunning brain.

  Baresmanas turned his head, staring back at the fire. And now, for the first time since he learned of the Malwa butchery of Mesopotamia, could see the enemy roasting in the flames.

  Belisarius.

  Chapter 4

  It was the most beautiful cathedral Justinian had ever seen. More beautiful, and more majestic, than he had even dreamed. The capstone to his life. The Hagia Sophia that he had planned to build.

  The Mese, the great central thoroughfare of Constantinople, began at the Golden Gate and ended at the base of the cathedral. Down its entire length-here in scatters; there, mounded up in piles like so much offal-were the bodies of the plague victims.

  Half the city was dead, or dying. The stench of uncollected rotting bodies mingled with the sickly smell of burning cadavers to produce a thick miasma, hanging over Constantinople like a constant fog. The same miasma that he had seen hanging over Italy, and North Africa, and every province which Belisarius had reconquered for him.

  Justinian the Great. Who, in the name of restoring the greatness of the Roman Empire, had bankrupted the eastern half to destroy the western. And left the entire Mediterranean a war-ravaged breeding ground for the worst plague in centuries.

  Justinian the Great. Who, more than any other man, caused the final splintering of Greco-Roman civilization.

  Justinian jerked erect in his chair.

  "No more," he croaked. "I can bear it no longer."

  He leaned forward and extended his arm, shakily. In the palm of his hand rested a shimmering, glowing object. A jewel, some might have called it. A magical gem.

  Belisarius took the "jewel" from Justinian and replaced it in its pouch. A moment later, the pouch was once again suspended from his neck.

  The "jewel" spoke in his mind.

  He is not a nice man.

  Belisarius smiled crookedly.

  No, Aide, he is not. But he can be a great man.

  The crystalline being from the future exuded skepticism.

  Not sure. Not a nice man, at all.

  "Are you satisfied, Justinian?" Belisarius asked.

  The former emperor nodded.

  "Yes. It was everything you said. I almost wish, now, that I had never asked for the experience. But I needed-"

  He made a vague motion with his hand, as if to summon up unknown words.

  Belisarius provided them:

  "You needed to know if your suspicions were warranted, or not. You needed to know if the elevation of my stepson to the imperial throne stemmed from motives of personal ambition and aggrandizement, or-as I claimed at the time-from the needs of the war against the Malwa."

  Justinian lowered his head. "I am a mistrustful man," he muttered. "It is rooted in my nature." He opened his mouth to speak again. Clamped it shut.

  "There is no need, Justinian," said Belisarius. "There is no need."

  The general's smile grew more crooked still. He had had this conversation once before, in a nightmare vision. "It would take you hours to say what you are trying to say. It will not come easily to you, if at all."

  Justinian shook his head. "No, Belisarius. There is a need. For my sake, if not yours." Harshly: "I sometimes think losing my eyes improved my vision." He took a deep breath. Another. Then, like a stone might bleed:

  "I apologize."

  The third occupant of the room chuckled. "Even in this," he said, "you are still arrogant. Do you think you are the world's only sinner, Justinian? Or simply its greatest?"

  Justinian swiveled his head.

  "I will ignore that remark," he said, with considerable dignity. "And are you certain, Michael of Macedonia? Of this-creature-you call the Talisman of God?"

  "Quite certain," replied the stony voice of the monk. "It is a messenger sent by the Lord to warn us all."

  "Especially me," muttered Justinian. The blind man rubbed his mangled eye-sockets. "Has Theodora-?"

  "No," replied Belisarius. "I offered, once, but she declined. She said she preferred to take the future as it comes, rather than seeing it in a vision."

  "Good," stated Justinian. "She does not know about the cancer, then?"

  It was Belisarius' turn to jerk erect in his chair, startled. "No. Good God! I never thought of that, when I offered to give her the jewel."

  "Seventeen years," stated Justinian. His voice was very bleak. "She will die, then, from cancer."

  The Macedonian cleared his throat. "If we succeed in defeating the Malwa-"

  Justinian waved him off. "That's irrelevant, Michael. Whatever other evils the Malwa will bring, they are not responsible for cancer. And don't forget-the vision which the jewel gave me was of the future that would have been. The future where the Malwa were never elevated to world mastery by this demonic power called Link. The future where I remained emperor, and we reconquered the western Mediterranean."

  He fell silent, head bowed. "I am right, Belisarius, am I not?"

  Belisarius hesitated. He cast his thoughts toward Aide.

  He is right, came the reply. Aide forestalled the next question:

  And there is no cure for cancer. Not, at least, anything that will be within your capability for many, many years. Centuries.

  Belisarius took a deep breath.

  "Yes, Justinian. You are right. Regardless of what else happens, Theodora will die of cancer in seventeen years."

  The former emperor sighed. "They burned out my tear ducts, along with my eyes. I damn the traitors for that, sometimes, even more than my lost vision."

  Shaking himself, Justinian rose to his feet and
began pacing about the room.

  The plethora of statuary which had once adorned his room was gone, now. Theodora had ordered them removed, during Justinian's convalescence, worried that her blind husband might stumble and fall.

  That fear had been quickly allayed. Watching the former Emperor maneuver through the obstacles littering the floor, Belisarius was struck again by the man's uncanny intelligence. Justinian seemed to know, by sheer memory, where every one of those potential obstructions lay, and he avoided them unerringly.

  But the obstacles were no longer statuary. Justinian had no use, any longer, for such visual ornament. Instead, he had filled his room with the objects of his oldest and favorite hobby-gadgets. Half the floor seemed to be covered by odd contrivances and weird contraptions. Justinian even claimed that his blindness was an asset, in this regard, since it forced him to master the inner logic of his devices. Nor could Belisarius deny the claim. The general stared at one of the larger mechanisms in the room, standing in a corner. The device was quiescent, at the moment. But he had seen it work. Justinian had designed the thing based on Belisarius' own description of a vision given to him by Aide.

  The first true steam engine ever built in Rome-or anywhere in the world, so far as he knew. He had not seen its like even during his long visit to Malwa India. The thing itself was not much more than a toy, but it was the model for the first locomotive which was already being planned. The day would come when Belisarius would be able to shuttle his troops from one campaign to another in the same way he had seen Aide describe in visions. Visions of a terrible carnage in the future which would be called the American Civil War.

  A voice drew him back to the present.

  "Seventeen years," mused Justinian sadly. "Whereas I, according to the jewel, will live to a ripe old age." Pain came to his ravaged face. "I had always hoped she might outlive me," he whispered. Justinian squared his shoulders.

  "So be it. I will give her seventeen good years. The best I can manage."

  "Yes," said Belisarius.

  Justinian shook his head. "God, what a waste. Did the jewel ever show it to you, Belisarius? That future that would have been, had the Malwa never risen? The future where I had you ravage the western Mediterannean in the name of reconstituting Roman glory? Only to see half the Empire die from the plague while I used the royal treasury to build one grandiose, useless monument after another?"