Theodore turned again to Heraclius, who now stood‘. He surveyed the assembled nobles and officers with a gimlet eye. He needed these men, their troops and their gold, to carry out his plan. In a moment of odd clarity, he understood that they were as surely his enemies as the Persians or the Avars, the more dangerous because he had to rely on them. In their faces he saw, in varying degrees, treachery in the desire for power, for gold, for dominance over their fellow men. For the moment, and only for the moment, he was their master. Slowly he took a battered iron dagger out of the folds of his brocaded robe and placed it on the ta-bletop.

“This is the blade of my father,” he said. “What you will now be told must remain in strict confidence among those assembled in this room. The plan that my brother has outlined is what we desire the Persians to learn, but what he will now tell you is what they must not learn. The betrayal of this confidence will earn you death, by my hand, by this blade. Do you swear secrecy in this?”

There was a moment of silence, and then the Western Emperor rose, his face stern, like a statue cut from Minoan marble. His men rose at his back.

“I, Martius Galen Atreus, Augustus Caesar Occidens, so swear.”

His men, as one voice, echoed their master. The Western contingent sat. Heraclius turned his gaze to the easterners. They were eyeing one another, uncertain of this new tack. At last, the drungaros of the fleet stood. He was a thick-bodied man with a thick black beard and beetling eyebrows. His garb was plain, a cotton tunic with the emblem of the fleet upon it, a mail shirt underneath. Alone among the commanders of the East, he had been elevated to his position by means of ability and skill. He turned to Heraclius.

“I, Mikos Andrades, drungaros of the fleet of the Eastern Empire, so swear.”

With some reluctance, the other nobles swore as well, finally sitting.

Theodore resumed.

“The fleet will sail south, rather than north, first to Cyprus and then to the port of Tarsus. We know that the Persians hold Tarsus only lightly, and the army will seize it. From this port the army will disembark the fleet and then march with good speed northeast to Samosata on the old border with the province of Osrhoene. If our reports are to the good, the Persian army that had been encamped at An-tioch will have already marched away south, to capture He-liopolis and then Damascus on its way to Egypt. Engaged as it is against the Palmyrenes and Nabateans, this army will then be unable to prevent the movement of our force deep into southern Armenia, to the Persian city of Tauris, beyond Lake Thospitis.

“At or before Tauris, our armies shall meet our allies in this expedition, the forces of the Khazar Kagan. From Tauris we shall strike farther east, towards Rayy in Tabar-istan, before turning south to come down upon Ecbatana and Khermanshah before striking at Ctesiphon not from the west, as we have always done, but from the* north. In this way the Persians will be cut off from their traditional retreat into the highlands. Their capital shall fall and their Empire with it.”

The Eastern lords looked on with a variety of sour expressions. Heraclius could see that they felt the plan far too ambitious. No matter, he thought, we will win this time or the East will fall into the same darkness that almost consumed the West.

Theophanes rose again, with a considering look upon his face. The Thracian glanced up and down the eastern side of the table speculatively. “Now, Avtokrator, this is a bold plan indeed, and I can see that there is both the possibility of victory as well as the possibility of considerable loot to be had. No Roman army has ever gone beyond Ctesiphon; the lands beyond it must be rich indeed. The Khazars are well feared for their horsemen. I agree that this is the plan to follow. I have only one small question.“

Heraclius sat up a little in his seat; he suspected what the Thracian would ask next, and inwardly he smiled in anticipation. He motioned for Theophanes to go ahead.

“Who will lead this expedition? Which general, which lord will carry out your plan?”

The shouting began immediately and Heraclius settled back in his high-backed chair to watch with interest as the great lords bickered with one another. On the left side of the table the Westerners, who already knew what Heraclius had decided, had called for wine and something to eat. It was going to take awhile at this rate. The Eastern Emperor let them argue among themselves for a time, carefully gauging who thought himself the strongest, who had the alliance of whom. At last he tired of the game and rapped on the tabletop again. He was ignored, so he nodded to Theodore. Theodore stood, took a breath, and then thundered, in his best battlefield voice:

“The Emperor would speak!”

Echoes died and the lords of the Eastern Empire slowly turned to their nominal master. Remaining seated, Heraclius toyed with the dagger for a moment, then he said simply: “I will take personal command of the expedition.”

For more than a mere moment, silence absolute reigned around the table. The faces of the thematic lords were studies in puzzlement, alarm, and outright fear. No Emperor had essayed to lead the armies of the Eastern Empire to battle in over two hundred thirty years. The very thought that the Emperor should stand on the field of battle at the side of the fighting men was unthinkable. Heraclius glanced over at Galen, who smiled a little, and spoke again.

‘These are desperate times, as has been repeatedly pointed out. The legionnaires, the people, expect their Emperor to defend them and their families. I can think of no better way to show that I mean nothing but victory than to go myself. It also resolves the question of who will lead, for Galen and I will command the armies of the Empire, as it was in the beginning.“

Behind Galen, the Western underofficers stood forward from the wall, raising their arms in salute. “Ave! Ave Caesar! Thou conquerest!” The Eastern lords stared back at them in puzzlement; in some the sense that a new and unexpected factor was forcing itself upon them began to grow. Theodore rolled up his map and, with his aides in tow, departed the room. The other lords milled about but then began to disperse as well. Heraclius continued to sit, watching their faces as they left. At his side, Andrades remained until all of the others were gone save the Western Emperor and two of his aides. The room was quiet and a servant entered and began blowing the lamps out.

“Avtokrator,” Andrades said quietly, “your oath was stirring, but I doubt that these words will stay in confidence for more than a day or pair of days.”

Heraclius nodded and looked to Galen and the two young men who stood behind him. The Western Emperor smiled. “Drungaros Andrades, sometimes it is necessary to set bait to find the fox. So we have done tonight. My hunters”-he gestured at the blond youth with only a trace of beard on his left-“are waiting to see what is flushed.”

Andrades stroked his beard, still lush though now shot with streaks of white, considering the poised young man at the western Emperor’s side. Then he eyed Heraclius. “A risk, Avtokrator. What if the Persians get wind of it? What if someone escapes the net? The Boar has at least one sorcerer in his camp across the water. They could send a message to Chrosoes in Ctesiphon and a new army could be raised to meet you in the highlands as you march to Tauris. There would be nowhere1 to retreat to.”

“The Persians will know sooner or later,” Heraclius answered. “Our ploy here is to see who in the city is in the pay of the Avars or their Persian allies. Despite the speed of a wizard, Shahr-Baraz still has to march himself and his men back to Syria. Our fleet is vastly faster. We can beat him to any location on the coast that he tries to reach. I am more concerned with treachery here, at home, than with the Persian army.“