Krispos the Emperor Read Free Page B

when he suddenly wondered, not for the first time, whether Barsymes knew him better than he knew himself.
    The trouble with the Hall of the Nineteen Couches, Phostis thought, was that the windows were too big. The ceremonial hall, named back in the days when Videssian nobles actually ate reclining, was cooler in summer than most, thanks to those large windows. But the torches, lamps, and candles needed for nighttime feasts were lodestones for moths, mosquitoes, water bugs, even bats and birds. Watching a crisped moth land in the middle of a bowl of pickled octopus tentacles did not inflame the appetite. Watching a nightjar swoop down and snatch the moth out of the bowl made Phostis wish he'd never summoned his friends to the feast in the first place.
    He thought about announcing it was over, but that wouldn't do, either. Inevitably, word would get back to his father. He could already hear Krispos' peasant-accented voice ringing in his ears: The least you could do, son, is make up your mind.
    The imagined scolding seemed so real that he whipped his head around in alarm, wondering if Krispos had somehow snuck up behind him. But no—save for his own companions, he was alone here.
    He felt very much alone. One thing his father had succeeded in doing was to make him wonder who cared for him because he was himself and who merely because he was junior Avtokrator and heir to the Videssian throne. Asking the question, though, often proved easier than answering it. so he had lingering suspicions about almost everyone he knew.
    "You won't need to look over your shoulder like that forever, your Majesty," said Vatatzes. who was sitting at Phostis' right hand. He trusted Vatatzes further than most of his friends; being only the son of a mid-level logothete, the youth was unlikely to have designs on the crown himself. Now he slapped Krispos on the shoulder and went on, "Surely one day before too long, you'll be able to hold your feasts when and as you like."
    One more word and he would have spoken treason. Phostis' friends frequently walked that fine line. So far. to his relief, nobody had forced him to pretend not to hear something. He. too, wondered—how could he help but wonder?—how long his father would stay vigorous. It might be another day, it might be another twenty years. No way to tell without magic, and even that held risks greater than he cared to take. For one thing, as was but fitting, the finest sorcerous talent in the Empire shielded the Avtokrator's fate from those who would spy it out. For another, seeking to divine an Emperor's future was in and of itself a capital crime.
    Phostis wondered what Krispos was doing now. Administering affairs, probably: that was what his father usually did. A couple of years before. Krispos had tried to get him to share some of the burden. He'd tried, too, but it hadn't been pleasant work, especially because Krispos stood behind him while he shuffled through parchments.
    Again, he could almost hear his father: "Hurry up, boy! One way or another, you have to decide. If you don't do it, who will?"
    And his own wail: "But what if I'm wrong?"
    "You will be, sometimes." Krispos had spoken with such maddening certainty that he wanted to hit him. "You try to do a couple of things: You try not to make the same mistake twice, and you take the chance to set one right later if it comes along."
    Put that way, it sounded so easy. But after a couple of days of case after complex case, Phostis concluded ease in anything—fishing, sword-swallowing, running an empire, anything—came only with having done the job for years and years. As most young men do, he suspected he was brighter than his father. He certainly had a better education: He was good at ciphering, he could quote secular poets and historians as well as Phos' holy scriptures, and he didn't talk as if he'd just stepped away from a plow.
    But Krispos had one thing he lacked: experience. His father did what needed doing almost without thinking