“I was on my honor,” he snapped back, bridling at the implication of poor behavior in her tone. “I treated her as one of my aunts, or my mother-though she is neither or young nor so nosy as that one.”
“Good,” Zoe said, looking over her shoulder for a moment. “The penalty for such familiarity, you know, is blinding, I believe, or perhaps just torture and death. But still, I suppose that the tribune will understand. He is a caring and forgiving soul.”
“Do you think trouble will come of it?” Odenathus tapped a long stick on the rocks at the edge of the fire, watching Zoe carefully. “I have heard that she is rather wise, even for her young age. Surely she saw what a lack-wit our Hibernian friend is…”
Zoe cut him off with a motion of her hand, turning back to the fire. Dwyrin looked from one to the other, a damp chill percolating in his stomach.
“The Empress is not my concern,” Zoe grated, “but rather the temper of her husband.”
“Empress?” Dwyrin squeaked, feeling dizzy and faint. “What Empress?”
Without sparing him a look, Zoe continued: “The Emperor of the East once had a man cut to bits and fed to swine for insulting her. Granted, he was an enemy of her house and a lying fool, but still… Or the matter of the usurper Phocas-there was a grisly death! He is a man, with a man’s rages. He loves her too much, I think, to be as good an Emperor as he might be…“ Zoe’s voice trailed off.
“Lady Martina is an Empress?” Dwyrin laid down on the cold pine needles. He felt quite faint.
“Yes,” Odenathus said, sighing as he removed the trout, now crisping in the heat of the coals, and slid them off the stick onto a wooden platter he had stolen from the ruin of Tauris. “I fear so. The only pregnant noble lady in this army would be the Empress Martina, the young and scandalous wife of the Emperor of the East, Heraclius of Carthage.”
“Scandalous?” Dwyrin perked up, leaving off from nervously chewing on the end of his thumb. “I didn’t hear! What did she do? Did she cavort with stableboys? With gladiators, shining with oil?” Maybe she talks to young barbarians all the time!
Odenathus cuffed the Hibernian gently on the head. “No, you idiot… she is his niece. These Greeks are beside themselves with outrage that the Emperor should follow his heart-it is said that he loves her, and no less because they have known each other for years. Some odd concept that they should spread their seed afar…”
“That,” Zoe said, her voice serious, “is not the issue. The problem is that fisher-boy here has poked his nose into a political hornet’s nest. We are more likely to be screwed by something political than killed by the Persians. You”- she stabbed a finger at Dwyrin, still lying on the ground, feeling overcome-“are not going anywhere without someone to watch you.” She grimaced. “Me, I suppose.”
Well, Dwyrin thought, watching the moon slide across the sky, it was a good day after all.
THE WALLS OF PALMYRA
Zenobia stood on the battlement of the Damascus gate. Above her the sun blazed, a giant brass disk in a bone-white sky. The valley was filled with terrible heat, raising shimmering waves from the stones and sand. The Queen was garbed in thin silk robes that fluttered around her in the forge-hot breeze, clinging to the curve of her body. Her hair was loose, a dark cloud cascading around her shoulders. She had forgone the heavy crown of the city in favor of a thin band of silver set with a single ruby the size of her thumb. She looked down upon the Persian embassy with narrowed eyes.
“I am the Queen,” she said, “if you would speak to the city, you speak to me.”
The Persian herald, a thin brown man with a long nose, returned her gaze amiably. He was comfortable in tan and white desert robes and kajfieh, though the men behind him were red-faced and dressed in heavy, ornamental robes and armor. Zenobia guessed that at least one of them would faint from dehydration and the sun if she kept them there long enough. She looked forward to that with a small malicious pleasure.
“My master,” the herald said, “bade me bring you his best wishes on this day. He inquires if you would considei yielding the city to the might of Persia and receiving his clemency and gratitude.”
Zenobia sneered, her full lips-outlined with dark henna-twisting into a semblance of a smile. “Give youi master my condolences for his imminent death. Assure hirr that after the buzzards and vultures have picked his bones clean, I will see that his widow receives the remains in a fine burlap sack. I will give honor.to his family and grind the bones to powder myself! The city does not desire the clemency of bandits and thieves. Tell your master that we will not bow our necks to him. He, however, may come to me and beg forgiveness of his trespasses. My mercy is well known throughout the whole of the world.“
The herald nodded, taking a moment to fix her words in his memory.
“My master,” he replied, “the great General Shahr-Baraz, he who is known as the Royal Boar, the favorite of the great King Chrosoes, the King of Kings, is well known for his mercy, O Queen, and for his honorable word.”
Zenobia cocked her head to one side, staring down at the brown man. “And what, pray tell, does his honor have to do with murdering my people and looting the tombs of the fathers of the city?”
Overnight there had been odd cracking and thudding sounds from west of the city. Mohammed’s men, having slipped out of the city at dusk, returned before dawn with news that the Persians had been looting the tower tombs and carrying off their contents to the Persian camp in the hills. Zenobia had been forced to isolate the scouts in the basement of the palace to keep the word from spreading. If the people of the city learned that the honored ancestors were being violated in such a way, they would have thrown the gates wide and charged out themselves with kitchen knives to take revenge upon the Persian army.
“My master’s honor is unimpeachable, O Queen. He has no quarrel with you or your city. His quarrel is with Rome and the murderers of his great and good friend, the Emperor Maurice. He does not desire to cause you harm-he desires only peace between the great and noble realm of Persia and the renowned city of Palmyra.”
“He expresses his friendship,” Zenobia said, her voice languid, “in a strange way. Thousands are dead in this
‘peace,’ and many more will die here in the dreadful heat before his peace is done.“
One of the Persian nobles began to breathe heavily, leaning sideways on his horse. The other nobles glanced at him out of the corner of their eyes, but no one moved to help him. The noble began to flush a bright red and his breathing became more labored.
The herald ignored the soft noises behind him, continuing to watch Zenobia with a mild expression on his face. “O Queen, if this disagreement is pursued to its conclusion, you and all of your people will be slain or driven into the desert. Your city, if it resists, will be utterly destroyed. No stone will remain on stone. Its name will disappear from history, buried by the sand. But peace… peace and friendship with Persia will make you mighty. The entire world will hear of the glory of Palmyra and wonder at the magnificence of it. Do you not chafe under the auspices of Rome? That mean, gray old man who clutches at you with greedy fingers? That miserly father who demands that you pay and pay, without hope of a return? Where is the investment in this? Where is Rome now? You stand alone, brave and glorious, against the might of Persia. None can say that you have not done your duty-the honor of the city is satisfied. Why continue to fight?”
Zenobia leaned forward, resting her palms on the hot ashlar stones of the battlement. “Tell your pig master, this Boar, that Zenobia will not be foresworn. His master is a whoring pustule of evil and his honor is worthless. Palmyra will stand against him.”