The Emperors Knife - By Mazarkis Williams Page 0,75
Tuvaini wrinkled his nose at the sour whiff of Arigu’s ale. He’d picked up the taste on distant campaigns.
“Perhaps.” Arigu acknowledged the possibility. “But I’m right, aren’t I? It’s Nessaket.” Drops of amber glistened in the tight curls of his beard as he lowered his goblet again.
As Arigu grinned Tuvaini felt a pang of old hatred. So often he’d wanted to sink a fist into that broad, amiable face, though he’d probably break his hand on those raw-boned features. Rumour had it that the blood of Mogyrks flowed in the general’s veins; a grandmother raped when the Yrkmen rode the desert with sword and holy fire. The slander spread well; Arigu’s build and colouring fed the whispers. Tuvaini had never regretted starting that rumour.
I had Nessaket. Soon I will have the empire. “You mistake me, Arigu. I’m as loyal to the emperor as you are.” Let him play with that. He returned his gaze to the Settu tiles between them. The game had run to plan. The game always ran to plan: Arigu had never beaten him in all their years of play, and yet here he was again, accepting one more challenge, showing no surprise that Tuvaini had discovered his return to the palace, no fear that he might be arrested at any moment. He sat calm, patient, ready to stand the tiles once more.
Arigu had nothing, just the tenuous loyalty of soldiers camped in the desert. Even so, Tuvaini felt uneasy. His Fort tile and his Rock tile stood central to the board, dominant, flanked by Tulwars with a string of River tiles to the rear. Yet he felt disquiet.
“What game are you playing, Tuvaini?” Arigu pushed a Spy stone out to the furthest corner of the board.
Tuvaini placed the Tower, setting the tile squarely before the Rock. “Why, Settu, of course, Glorious General.”
He doesn’t play to win, he plays to learn. To learn me.
Tuvaini had his men waiting outside. He need only light the lamp in the window and they would rush in and seize the general. Yet he remained in his seat. Arigu led ten thousand loyal soldiers. What would they do, seeing their leader in chains? And he’d met no commander strong enough to take Arigu’s place. It troubled him, a loose thread against his finger. It did not escape his notice that he had cursed Beyon for the same hesitation. “So you have run back to the city alone.” Tuvaini waited for Arigu to admit the girl had died, that his plan had failed, but Arigu only fingered his tiles. Tuvaini continued, searching for the words that would provoke a reaction. “It would be a mistake to bring this Felting girl to the city with Beyon searching for her. And for you.”
Arigu smiled his broad and friendly smile. “You have not arrested me, old friend.”
“To ally yourself with the horse tribes is perilous. You risk the empire, and your throat, for your ambition,” he said.
Arigu’s smile widened. “Whereas you risk only the emperor?”
I risk nothing that has not already been lost.
Tuvaini set the fifth and last of his Army tiles, white, for the White Hat Army. Taller than any tile on the board, it stood now at the head of an unstoppable advance into Arigu’s heartland. Tuvaini steadied the tile and drew his hand away quickly, spreading his fingers. It had been a long time since accident had felled any of his tiles before the Push. Settu was a game for steady hands. All games were. “Tuvaini, old friend, no man can risk the empire.” Arigu set another Spy stone.
His tiles stood in scattered confusion. Tuvaini had the game. “The empire cannot be taken. It cannot be lost. It’s too strong,” Arigu said. He reached for his Dominants, the tiles he should have played at the start. They were useless now, but his to play if he chose. “The empire rests on three pillars, and each in turn could bear the load alone.” Arigu set out his own White Hat Army, the first pillar. “All the grass tribes, stretching out even to the trade lands of Kesh and the Vaulcan Marches, with the nomads from the dunes to sharpen their spears, would be held by the army at the Cerani gates. Not through numbers—there could be five Riders to each man of Cerani—but because war rests on the science of supply and method, not bravado and the application of warpaint.”
“I’m not a schoolboy,” Tuvaini said, but Arigu went on.