Gunpowder God (42 page)

Phidestros was making his own dynasty, starting here in Greater Beshta; therefore, they needed a name now. He definitely didn’t want to name the baby after his own father, whom he hated—or anyone in his dynasty. Arminta’s oldest brother had already named his son after her father, so that was not a choice. He wanted a dignified name, but also one that represented power; after all, his son would one day be a Great King if his plans worked out. As a child, he had always loved to hear the stories of the greatest of the Great Kings, Simocles the Great, the Warlord who had led the Zarthani people to victory over the Ruthani Confederation.

Simocles
, he thought, now that’s a name to command respect; also a lot to live up to.
Not that that will be an obstacle to any son of mine.
The only possible impediment would be Arminta; she might have already picked out a name while wintering in Syriphlon. He hoped she hadn’t as he didn’t want anything to come between them on this joyous occasion.

Mynos stuck his head into the audience chamber, announcing, “They’re inside the castle, sire!” He had been announcing every step of the Princess’ journey since her party was first spotted. “Shall I decant a wine keg?”

“Not yet,” he answered. Phidestros could feel his own excitement mounting; however, it was not seemly for a Prince to show his deep emotions in public. Mynos had no such prohibition. Once again, Phidestros was struck by how far Arminta had wormed her way into his subjects’ hearts. Just one of the many things he admired about his wife.

Finally, he heard footsteps outside the door.
Ceremony be damned!
he thought, as he ran to the doorway, almost running down Mynos, who made a quick sidestep as he opened the door. Phidestros wrapped his arms around his wife, carefully navigating around the bundle she cradled in her arms.

After a long deep kiss, she pulled away, saying, “Don’t you want to meet your son?”

“Yes! Of course, my love.”

She peeled back several layers of blankets to reveal a tiny red face.

So this is my son, my future.
“He…he’s…beautiful,” he stammered.
Someday you will be the greatest of Great Kings
.

“I think so, too. I’ve missed you so much, my husband.”

A nursemaid came alongside the Princess to take the baby.

“For now, he will be staying in our chamber,” Arminta said.

He raised his eyebrows in question.

“There were no nursemaids in Kothos. It was a small town and I had to nurse the baby myself.” She smiled. “It brings us closer.”

“Whatever you want, my love. I’m just happy to have you and the baby safe again.”

She nodded. “I’m so happy to be back home. I hated staying with those priests. Some of them looked at me the way a cat eyes a small bird.”

“Traitorous scum! After all I’ve done for them, to steal the woman I love” He ran through a string of curses until his breath ran out.

Arminta put her hand over his mouth. “It is done. We must not let emotion rule our heads. They did not lay a hand on me and I was treated courteously enough…. We must find a way to use them as they used me.”

Phidestros nodded. “You’re right. Although it is tempting to take my army down to Balph and murder every last one of those dung eaters. Still, it would not help our own plans.”

“No, it would not. If we topple Styphon’s House, which at this moment is quite possible since most of their forces are in Hos-Agrys, who will it aid most? Your father, who will be relieved of his debts, and King Kalvan, who will return with his army to have his former lands restored. Lands where we now reside.”

“You’re right. I know this to be true, but my blood, my honor, all cry out for revenge.”

Arminta’s eyes turned as hard as gemstones. “I, too, would love to hurt the Temple, and we shall…in time. I give you my blood-oath. However, first, and foremost, is our plan.”

“To be Great King and Queen of Hos-Zygros!”

“Yes, that has always been your dream. And your father has brought it much closer by murdering his brother.”

“Yes, my intelligencers tell me that Great King Sopharar died shortly after the arrival of Archpriest Danthor and his party. There is little doubt in my mind, or anyone else’s, that King Sopharar was poisoned. My agents have helped spread rumors to that effect and there are many who are calling Eudocles a regicide.”

“I told you, my husband, that crowns spent on agents-inquisitory were coins well spent.”

“You were right.”

“It was Kalvan who taught me thus. Even our own chief agent-investigatory in Argros Town admitted that Kalvan’s intelligencers in Harphax City knew more about events there than the late King Kaiphranos. For that and many other reasons, I wish he was not our deadliest enemy.”

Phidestros nodded. “Kalvan, like Grand Master Soton, is a man of honor as well as a great warlord. However, Kalvan will never forgive me for sacking his capital and destroying Tarr-Hostigos. Nor taking his lands. Too much blood has been spilled and gold spent for us to sheathe our swords.”

“I fear you are right. Another reason why the Kingdom of Hos-Zygros is a better home for our dynasty than Hos-Harphax. What we need to do next is decide when to strike.”

“Yes, my warrior queen, but first I want to discuss something far more important.”

“Yes?”

“A name for our son.”

Arminta’s brow furrowed. “Do you know, well—of course you do—that Great King Geblon and Lavena had named their baby
Sirna!
How dare they name the princess after that red-headed harlot.”

Phidestros quickly brought his hands up, palms out. “My darling, first off, it was not meant as a slight to you or us. And, you know that Lady Sirna is no slut. She did the Iron Band good service as a healer in Hostigos Town—”

“Yes, and sharing your bed was: What?”

“I did not know you then…she was a companion. I never loved her.”

Arminta shook her head. “I know that…It must be me, my blood boils at the slightest excuse. Even before the baby was born….”

Phidestros had suffered under several of those tantrums even before she was kidnapped. But, as Kyblannos had so often pointed out, this was the price men paid for their heirs. He hoped she returned to her former level-headed self quickly.

“I received a letter from Geblon and he told me that it was Sirna who helped bring them together, which was
Our
plan after all.”

Arminta nodded sheepishly.

“It was Lady Sirna who convinced Geblon to court Lavena, and convinced Lavena that Geblon was the right man for her. I don’t know how she pounded sense into the Queen’s head, but she did. It turns out she has become Lavena’s good friend, if not only friend. By bringing them together, Sirna may have saved the Kingdom from both Styphon’s House and internecine war. Thus, they named the princess after her as a tribute to her labors on their behalf. Plus, they made her a duchess.”

He could practically hear Arminta’s teeth grind. “Every time I hear that poor baby’s name, I will have to think of you and that—”

“As you always say, my love, time heals all wounds.”

The punch she delivered to his upper arm convinced him that she was completely recovered from childbirth. “Ouch!”

“Sorry, my love. That was meant for
Duchess
Sirna.”

“Better there, than elsewhere,” he said, thinking of his privy parts.

They both laughed.

“Now, back to neutral ground. I’ve been thinking over names for our son.”

“Yes,” she replied. “So have I.”

“My first thought was of your father, but your oldest brother has already named his son Soligon. And your other brother has named his son after your grandfather.”

“True. I was thinking of naming our son after
his
father.”

“Me! No, I would not lay that burden on anyone. I was thinking of naming him Simocles.”

“After the Great Warlord. Now, that’s a name impossible to live up to.”

Phidestros smiled, “Not for our son.”

“You’re crazy, I swear to all the True Gods. He will hate us both.”

“No, it will inspire him to greatness.”

She nodded. “Like his father. Fine, but if he blames us for his name, it’s on your head.”

Kalvan was resting in his easy chair, in front of the hearth, smoking his pipe with his foot up on an ottoman he’d had specially designed. One advantage to being Great King was that people went out of their way to please you, especially if they saw a profit in it. He was sure the Master Carpenter that he’d commissioned to make the ottoman was now selling knock-offs advertised as “the same as the footrest used by Great King Kalvan in his own chambers.” He hoped he made a good profit, although demand wouldn’t be great except among the newly rich merchant and manufacturing classes that were beginning to emerge.

Inflation had reared its ugly head in Thagnor and the nobles were beginning to complain that their rents weren’t high enough to allow them to live in the style in which their parents had lived. They got short shrift with those complaints from him.
Let them get jobs, or take a commission in the Royal Cavalry
, was his answer.

He was just thinking of calling his manservant for another cup of chicory when Cleon came into his study.

“Sorry, Your Majesty, but Grand Duke Vinaldos is here to see you.

“Cleon, please bring the Duke a goblet of wine and another cup of chicory for me.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Cleon returned with the beverages and Duke Vinaldos. “At your service, Your Majesty.”

“And what service brings you here this afternoon?” Kalvan asked.

“A packet arrived from Agrys City, sire. It contains urgent information on the state of the Host of Styphon’s Deliverance and other matters relating to the war in Hos-Agrys.”

His head of intelligence offered Kalvan a packet containing a dozen or more parchments. Some were ripped or torn and others were stained by travel. All were in the substitution code he’d written. “I assume you’ve already deciphered all the messages. Can you summarize their contents? I’ll go over them with Rylla later at my convenience.”

“Yes, Your Majesty. It appears that Grand Master Soton is bringing some fifteen to twenty thousand new troops into Agrys City from Hos-Ktemnos, many of them Knights and Styphon’s Temple Guard. With the addition of the Princely armies of Cythor, Arbelon and Kryphlon, he will be fielding an army between fifty to sixty thousand men.”

“Dralm-damnit! That is bad news,” Kalvan replied. “That means the League will be outnumbered by two to one, maybe more, even after we send them the five thousand men we promised. After Warlord Sargos’ invasion last year, I thought Soton would be more concerned about reinforcing his forts than fighting Styphon’s war of conquest in Hos-Agrys.”

Vinaldos frowned. “Your Majesty, as much as it pains me to say this, you will be sending those men to their deaths unless you send the Royal Army. I believe you could muster forty thousand men without calling up the reserves, and still leave ten thousand at home to keep our neighbors out of mischief. Fifty thousand, if we took the Army of Rathon with us. I’m sure King Chartiphon would be more than willing to provide as many men as he could spare, as will Prince Phrames and Prince Sarrask.”

“Yes, and to what purpose?” Kalvan returned. “To save a bunch of weak sisters who couldn’t be bothered to send troops to Hos-Hostigos when the Grand Host was on the march in Our Kingdom. I’m not going to sacrifice the Hostigos Army and Our gains here to pull their bacon out of the fire—TO REGWARN WITH THE ENTIRE LEAGUE OF DRALM!”

All Kalvan’s anger, pent-up rage and disappointment with Xentos and the League of Dralm came boiling up out of his guts like poison. He paused to take a deep breath when he realized he’d been shouting. Fortunately, here-and-now doors were made of hardwood planks, reinforced with iron stays, and solid as rocks.

Vinaldos had stepped back as though facing a drawn sword.

Kalvan hadn’t blown up like that in a long time. In some of the here-and-now kingdoms, it wasn’t uncommon for messengers bearing bad news, like his intelligence chief had just brought, to have their heads taken off or be thrown in the dungeon. So he understood the Duke’s trepidation.

He raised his hands, palms out. “I’m not angry with you, Vinaldos. Just the terrible position this news has put the Kingdom in. If we send enough troops to guarantee success, which would be almost the entire armed forces of Nos-Hostigos, what will we have purchased with their blood? A new home, unlikely. A graveyard is the most likely answer.

“Because—and, believe me, there is no guarantee we’ll win—Soton’s men are as tough as horseshoe nails, most of them veterans of the Fireseed Wars. And all we’ll have fought for is the survival of the League of Dralm.”

“I understand, Your Majesty. However, if we just send the soldiers you’ve promised to send the League, they will not come back.”

“I do not believe that sending more men to their death for a bunch of ingrates will solve the problem. On the other hand, I won’t become a king who doesn’t stand behind his word.”

“That’s good, but not in this situation,” Vinaldos intoned. Suddenly his blue eyes brightened. “I’ve got an idea. I’ve got files on certain noblemen and soldiers who are dissatisfied with life here in Thagnor and complain that you have not attempted to restore their lost lands in Hos-Hostigos.”

“I know that faction well,” Kalvan said.
In fact, my lovely wife is its unofficial head. Were it not for Demia and baby Ptosphes, Rylla would demand to be the commander of the Army of Hos-Agrys
.

“Instead of allowing them to spread their rancor, why don’t we include the dissidents among the soldiers that will be going into Hos-Agrys?”

“Duke, that’s a Dralm-damned good idea! I will ask for volunteers and many of them will demand to be in the rescue force. Then I will personally pick the officers from among my worst critics.”

Vinaldos all but rubbed his hands in joy. “This will not only get rid of a lot of chronic complainers, but will make my job much easier.”

Of course, it also meant abandoning one of his best officers and friends, Captain-General Hestophes, to certain defeat. No matter what the outcome, he would have a heavy load of guilt resting on his shoulders
.