Fortune's stroke b-4 Read online

  "Hold still," snarled Ousanas. He tucked his arm under Belisarius and began towing him to Antonina's ship. Belisarius instantly relaxed, using only his feet to help keep him afloat.

  "Nice to see you again, Ousanas," he said cheerfully.

  Ousanas snorted. "Tell me something, Belisarius." He paused for a breath. His powerful strokes had already brought them almost to the ship. "How did you Roman imbeciles manage to conquer half the world?"

  Pause for a breath. They were alongside, now. Eager hands were lifting Belisarius out of the water. "Personally, I wouldn't let you out of the house to fetch water from a well. You'd fall in, for sure."

  He got no answer. The Roman imbecile was already in the arms of Venus.

  About ten minutes later, Belisarius and Antonina finally pried themselves apart. Belisarius winced.

  "You have got to get rid of that cuirass," he muttered, rubbing his rib cage. He eyed the device respectfully. "It's even deadlier than it is obscene."

  Antonina grinned up at him. "So take it off, then. You can do it. I know you can." The grin widened. "Seen you strip me naked, I have, faster than-"

  "Hush, wife!" commanded Belisarius. He frowned with solemn, sober disapproval. The expression, alas, fell wide of its mark. Antonina's grin grew positively salacious.

  "Oh sure, soldier, tell me the thought never crossed your mind. That's just a cudgel, stuck in your trousers, in case you're ambushed by footpads."

  Belisarius burst out laughing. Antonina's eyes quickly studied the immediate area.

  "Bit primitive," she mused, "but we could probably manage on one of the rowing benches, as long as you refrain from your usual acrobatics." She cast a cold eye on the small crowd surrounding them. "Have to get rid of the spectators, though. Tell you what. You're the general. You order 'em overboard and I'll shoot the laggards."

  Her last remarks had not been made sotto voce. Rather the opposite. The small crowd grinned at her. Antonina tried to maintain the murderous gleam in her eye but, truth to tell, failed miserably. The giggles didn't help.

  "Guess not." The sigh which followed would have provided the world with a new standard for melancholy. If she hadn't kept giggling.

  Belisarius swept her back into his arms. Into her ear he whispered: "As it happens, love, I've arranged accommodations on the troopship. The captain's cabin, in point of fact. Reserved for our exclusive use."

  "Let's get to it, then!" she hissed eagerly. "God, am I glad I married a general. Love a man who can plan ahead."

  He sighed himself, now. There was genuine melancholy in the sound.

  "Not quite yet," he murmured. "Tonight, love, tonight. But there's still work to be done."

  Startled, she drew back her head and stared up at him. "It is done!" she protested.

  Antonina swiveled her head, scanning the ships which seemed to fill the delta. "Isn't it? Didn't you get everyone off the docks?"

  Belisarius smiled. "Oh, that's done. To perfection. Best planned and executed operation I've ever seen, if I say so myself." For a moment, he seemed a bit embarrassed. "I'll have to remember to compliment Maurice," he mumbled.

  He drove past that awkward subject. "But there's something left, yet. Something else." His smile changed, became quite cold and ruthless. "Call it dessert, if you will."

  Antonina was still staring at him in confusion. Belisarius turned his head. When he spotted Ousanas, he motioned him over with a little nod.

  "Are you in charge?" he asked.

  Ousanas grinned, as hugely as ever. "Is not King Eon a genius? Didn't I always say, when I was his dawazz, that the boy would go far? Make wise decisions-especially with regard to posts and positions?"

  Belisarius chuckled. "Did you notice anything odd, in those last moments before our escape?"

  Ousanas spoke without hesitation. "The signal rockets. Those galleys didn't flee. They were summoned to the shore. I did not understand that. I had expected them to launch a final desperate attack."

  Belisarius' smile was no longer cold. It was purely feral. "Yes. That is interesting."

  He said nothing further. But it only took Ousanas four seconds to understand. The aqabe tsentsen swiveled his head, staring at the far-distant piers where the five Malwa galleys were now moored.

  "It is well known," he murmured, "that wounded animals make easy prey." He turned back to Belisarius. Predator grin met carnivore smile. "Ask any hunter, Roman. The best way to hunt is from a blind."

  "Interesting you should mention that," purred Belisarius. "I was just thinking the same thing myself."

  Chapter 40

  The Great Country

  Autumn, 532 A.D.

  On the day of the wedding, Kungas took command of all military forces in Deogiri. Rao, being the groom, naturally did not object. Neither did the various envoys and military commanders from the many kingdoms now allied with Shakuntala. They were intimidated by the Kushan, first of all. But even if they hadn't been, they would have been more than happy to let him take the responsibility.

  More than happy. The truth was, the envoys were delighted. Now that they had had enough time to absorb the new reality, and get over their initial shock and outrage at Shakuntala's unexpected decision to marry Rao, the envoys were quite pleased by the whole situation. Well-nigh ecstatic, in fact.

  All of the kingdoms which they represented had been petrified by Malwa. Their decision to seek the dynastic marriage with Andhra had been driven by sheer necessity, nothing more. They had approached the project with all the enthusiasm with which a man decides to amputate a limb in order to save his life.

  Shakuntala had spurned their offers. Since the decision had been hers, she could hardly cast the blame on them. If they hadn't been diplomats, they would have been grinning ear to ear. They had the benefits of an alliance with resurgent Andhra-without the shackles of a dynastic marriage. If things turned out badly, they could always jettison Shakuntala in an instant. It wasn't as if their crown prince was married to the crazy woman, after all.

  So let the rude, crude, lewd and uncouth Kushan barbarian take the responsibility. A low profile suited them just fine.

  The forces now under Kungas' command were huge and motley. Deogiri was as crowded, that day, as any city in teeming Bengal. Under different circumstances, Kungas might have been driven half-mad by the chaos. But, probably not, given the man's unshakably phlegmatic disposition.

  And certainly not, under the circumstances which actually prevailed.

  His opponent, Lord Venandakatra, commander of the forces besieging Deogiri, was not called the Vile One by accident. A different man might have been called Venandakatra the Cruel, or Venandakatra the Terrible; or, simply, the Beast. But all of those cognomens carry a certain connotation of unbridled force and fury. They are the names given to a man who is feared as well as hated.

  A vile man, on the other hand, is simply despised. A figure of contempt, when all is said and done.

  On that day-that day-the Vile One was as thoroughly cowed as any commander of an army could be. And everybody knew it.

  Venandakatra's own soldiers knew it. Throughout the day-long festivities in Deogiri, the Vile One never emerged once from his pavilion. His soldiers, from his top commanders down to the newest recruit, were as familiar as any Indian with what had now become a staple of the storyteller's trade. The tale of how a great Malwa lord's lust for a new concubine slave had been frustrated by a champion. Unrequited lust, no less, to make the story sweeter.

  Today, that beautiful girl-once a slave and now an empress-would give herself to the man who had rescued her from Venandakatra. Right in front of the Vile One, dancing her wedding in his face. Taunting him with the virgin body that would never be his. Not now, not ever.

  The Vile One, in his pavilion, gnashed his teeth with rage. Rage, seasoned with heavy doses of shame and humiliation. His soldiers, who despised the man not much less than his enemies, found it difficult not to laugh. They managed that task, of course. None of them were so foolish as to
even smile-not with Venandakatra's spies and mahamimamsa prowling the camps and fieldworks. But they were about as likely to launch an assault on Deogiri, that day, as so many giggling mice would attack a lion's den in order to assuage Lord Rat's wounded vanity.

  Kungas spent a pleasant day rubbing salt into the wound. He rotated all the various troops under his command across the northern battlements facing Venandakatra's pavilion and the bulk of his forces. Allowing Malwa's soldiery, if not the pavilion-enclosed Vile One himself, to see the full panoply of forces which were now arrayed against them.

  By popular acclaim, the four hundred spearmen of the Dakuen sarwe were rotated through no less than three times. Partly, that was due to the exotic and splendid appearance of the Ethiopians. Black men from a far-off and fabled land-blacker than any Dravidian-sporting savage-looking spears and jaunty ostrich-feather headdresses. Mostly, however, it was due to the crowd's glee at the sight of four hundred bare asses, at Ezana's lead and command, hanging over the battlements in Malwa's face.

  Better was still to come. By mid-afternoon, the wedding ceremony itself was finished and the bride and groom began to dance.

  Shakuntala danced first. By custom, the husband should have done so. But the empress had decreed otherwise. Shakuntala was a wonderful dancer, in her own right, but she was not Rao's equal. No one was. So, she went first. Not because she was ashamed of her own skill, but simply because she wanted the people watching-and the world which would learn from their telling, in the years to come-to remember Rao in all his glory.

  Her dance, in truth, was glorious itself. Shakuntala did not dance in the center square of the city, where the wedding had taken place. She did so on the top battlements of the northern wall, on a platform erected the day before, after hurriedly changing her costume.

  When she appeared on the platform, the crowd gasped. Shakuntala had shed her elaborate imperial costume in favor of a dancer's garb. Her pantaloons, for all that they were tastefully dyed, bordered on scandal.

  Yet, the crowd was pleased. At first, as she began her steps, they assumed that Shakuntala was simply taunting her enemy. Prancing, in all her youth and beauty, before the creature who had once dreamed of possessing her.

  Which, of course, she was. Dancing, by its nature, is a sensuous act. That is as true for an elderly man or a portly matron, creaking and waddling their way through sober paces, as it is for anyone. But there is nothing quite as sensuous, dancing, as a young woman as agile as she is beautiful.

  Shakuntala was both, and she took full advantage. It was well for Venandakatra that he never saw that dance. The Vile One would have ground his teeth to powder.

  But, as Shakuntala's dance went on, and transmuted, the crowd realized the truth. Taunting her enemy was a trivial thing. Amusing, but soon discarded.

  The Empress Shakuntala was not dancing for the Vile One. She was not, even, dancing for Andhra. She was dancing for her husband, now. The sensuousness of that dance, the sheer sexuality of it, was not a taunt. It was a promise, and a pledge, and, most of all, nothing but her own desire.

  They had wondered, the great crowd. Now, they knew the truth. Watching the bare quicksilver feet of their empress, flashing in the wine of her beloved's heart, they knew. Statecraft, political calculation-even duty and obligation-were gone, as if they had never existed.

  Andhra had married the Great Country, not because its own past required the doing, but because that was the future it had chosen freely. The future that it desired. When she finished-in defiance of all custom and tradition-the crowd burst into riotous applause. The applause went on for half an hour.

  It was Rao's turn, now, and the crowd fell silent. His reputation as a dancer was known to all Marathas. But most of them had never seen it with their own eyes.

  They saw him now, and never forgot. The tale would be passed on for generations.

  He began, as a husband. And if his dance was not as purely sensual as Shakuntala's had been, no one who saw it doubted his own heart.

  The dance went on, and on. And, as it went, slowly transformed a man's desire for a woman-the life she would give him, the children she would give him-into a people's desire for a future.

  It was Majarashtra's dance, now. The Great Country was pledging its own troth. Love was there, along with desire. But there was also courage, and faith, and hope, and trust, and determination. Majarashtra danced to its yet-unborn children, as much as it danced for its bride. It was a husband's dance, not a lover's. Every step, every gesture, every movement, carried the promise of fidelity.

  Then, the dance changed again. The crowd grew utterly still.

  This was the great dance. The terrible dance. The long-forbidden but never-forgotten dance. The dance of creation. The dance of destruction. The wheeling, whirling, dervish dance of time.

  There was nothing of hatred in the dance. No longer. Love, yes, always. But even love receded, taking its honored place. This was the ultimate dance, which spoke the ultimate truth.

  That truth, danced for all to see, held the crowd spellbound. Silent, but not abashed. No, not in the least. Every step, every gesture, every movement, carried the great promise. The crowd, understanding the promise, swelled with strength.

  Empires are mighty. Time is mightier still. Tyrants come, tyrants go. Despots tread the stage, declaiming their glory. And then Time shows them the exit. People, alone, endure and endure. Theirs, alone, is the final power. No army can stand against it; no battlements hold it at bay.

  It was over. The dance was done. A husband, taking his bride by the hand, led her into the chamber of Time. The people, watching them go, saw their own future approaching.

  Once in the chamber, Rao's surety vanished. There was nothing left, now, of the superb dancer who had paced his certain steps. Stiff as a board, creaking his way to the bed, his eyes unfocused, Rao seemed like a man in a daze.

  Shakuntala smiled and smiled. Smiling, she removed his clothes. Smiling, removed her own.

  "Look at me, husband," she commanded.

  Rao's eyes went to her. His breath stilled. He had never seen her nude. His mind groped, trying to wrap itself around such beauty. His body, rebelling against discipline, had no difficulty at all.

  Shakuntala, still smiling, pressed herself against him, kissing, touching, stroking. His mind-locked tight by years of self-denial-was like a sheet of ice. His body, now in full and wild revolt, felt like pure magma.

  "You made a pledge to my father, once," Shakuntala whispered. "Do you remember?"

  He nodded, like a statue.

  Shakuntala's smile became a grin. She moved away, undulating, and spread herself across the bed. Rao's eyes were locked onto the sight. But his mind, still, could not encompass the seeing.

  "You have been neglectful in your duty, Rao," Shakuntala murmured, lying on the bed. " `Teach her everything you know.' That was my father's command."

  She curled, coiled, flexed.

  "I never taught you that," Rao choked.

  Arched, stretched. Liquid, smiling. Moisture, laughing.

  "You taught me how to read," she countered. "I borrowed a book." Coiled, again; and arched; and stretched. Promise, open.

  " `Hold back nothing,' " she said. "That is your duty."

  Denial shattered; self-discipline vanished with the wind. Rao moved, like a panther to his mate.

  In the corridors beyond the chamber, servant women waited. Older women, in the main; Marathas, all. When they heard Shakuntala's wordless voice, announcing her defloration, they grinned. In another virgin, there might have been some pain in that cry. But for their fierce empress, there had been nothing beyond ecstasy and eager desire.

  The thing was done. The pledge fulfilled. The promise kept.

  The women scurried through the halls, spreading the word. But their efforts were quite needless. Shakuntala had never been a bashful girl. Now, becoming a woman, she fairly screamed her triumph.

  The young men heard, waiting in the streets below. They had mounted their h
orses before the servants reached the end of the first corridor. By the time Majarashtra's women emerged onto the streets to tell the news, Majarashtra's sons and nephews had already left. By the time the dancing resumed, and the revelry began, they were carrying the message out of the gates and pounding it, on flying horseborne feet, in every direction.

  The land called Majarashtra had been created, millions of years earlier, when the earth's magma boiled to the surface. The Deccan Traps, geologists of a later age would call it; solemnly explaining, to solemn students, that it had been perhaps the greatest-and most violent-volcanic episode in the planet's history.

  Now, while Deogiri danced its glee, the Great Country began its new eruption. Dancing, with swift and spreading steps, the new time for Malwa. The time of death, and terror, and desperate struggle.

  Malwa's soldiers already detested service in Majarashtra. From that day forward, they would speak of it in hushed and dreading tones. Much like soldiers of a later army, watching evil spill its intestines, would speak of the Russian Front.

  Belisarius had planned, and schemed, and maneuvered, and acted, guided by Aide's vision of the Peninsular War.

  He already had his Peninsular War. Now, he got the Pripet Marshes, and the maquis, and the Warsaw Ghetto, and the mountains cupping Dien Bien Phu, and the streets of Budapest, and every other place in the history of the species where empires, full of their short-memoried arrogance, learned, again, the dance of Time.

  Time, of course, contains all things. Among them is farce.

  Shakuntala's eyes were very wide. The young woman's face, slack with surprise.

  "I thought it would- I don't know. Take longer."

  Looking down on that loving, confused face from a distance of inches, Rao flushed deep embarrassment.