Empress & Soldier, Chapter 8 (part 1)
In which Eudekia learns a little about politics.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6 part I
Chapter 6 part 2
Chapter 7
I ACCEPTED THE LOAN PAYMENT from the last client of the day, remembering to ask about his family as I passed the coins to Mahir. The man assured me they were well, his newest child thriving, before he took his leave.
I sighed and stretched, reaching for the jug of water. I was always thirsty after dealing with our clients, the requests for assistance of all kinds now the business of my mornings. There were still a few—older men of higher status, or clients of a particular long-standing relationship—who insisted on seeing my father on the one morning a week he now set aside for this, but over the last four years, most had accepted me. Some even called me patrona.
My midday meal should be ready. The day was fine, or it had been when I had begun to see the petitioners. If it had remained so, I would eat in the atrium, as I preferred. After the confines of the office, I wanted the sky, and birdsong, and the splash of water.
Raised voices caught my attention: a woman’s voice, and upset. “I demand to see her!” I frowned, listening. It sounded like Clelia, mother to one of my friends.
Mahir went to investigate, and, after a minute’s indecision, I followed him. He was just escorting Clelia into the waiting room, her daughter Ennaia with her.
“Eudekia, I must talk to you,” Clelia said: a command, not a request. It was how she spoke to her steward.
I hadn’t seen Ennaia for a while: she was preparing to marry, and I was busy with my work. So, I had no idea of what might have upset her mother. Ennaia, I noted, was flushed, and not willing to meet my eyes.
“Come into the office,” I said, ushering them forward. “Wine,” I mouthed to Mahir.
Clelia refused to sit, so I didn’t either. Ennaia did. She looked close to tears. “What troubles you, Clelia?” I asked.
“You must speak to Varos!” she demanded. A knock at the inner door, and Mahir came in with wine.
“Leave it,” I murmured. I poured wine for us all, watering it a little, and handed the two women their cups. When Mahir had gone—although I suspected he would be listening just outside—I asked, “About what?”
“He has used his influence to block Kaeso’s appointment to the tax office,” Ennaia said, before her mother could speak. Kaeso was her betrothed.
“I know nothing of this,” I said. “Are you sure?” I saw my father so rarely now, his time taken up with his lessons for the prince, or in preparation for them. But why would he do this?
“I have it from another official,” Clelia said. “Varos spoke against the appointment, and now he tutors Prince Philitos his voice carries weight.”
“Clelia, please sit,” I said, hoping I sounded calm. She glared at me, but she sat. I did too, sipping my wine to give myself time to think. “Avidus had arranged the position?”
“Yes!” Tears shone in Ennaia’s eyes. “Your father had no right to stop it. I thought we were friends.”
If he had, he had done it for reasons he believed sound. That I knew. “We are,” I said, still stalling. “Perhaps your informant has it wrong? The fiscarius is also a tutor to Philitos. He has responsibility for the tax office; perhaps it was he who decided this?”
A hint of doubt crossed Clelia’s face. “But why would he?” she said, shaking her head. “No. Just this past week Avidus supported a suggested appointment of his. He would have reciprocated.”
As I understood the play of politics, this would be the expectation. “How did my father vote on that appointment?” I asked.
“My father says he was not present,” Ennaia said. “The vote was two days ago.”
One of the days set aside for Philitos. My father did not mind that his palace duties kept him from the tedium of appointments and contracts that had previous taken up much of his time. So why had he interfered with a minor nomination?
“It’s not fair,” Ennaia whined. She sounded, I thought, about ten, a little girl, for all that last time we had met she had been whispering to me about the delights of physical love. But her descriptions had had an underlying tinge of pity for virginal me. I was finding sympathy hard to muster.
“Was another appointment offered?”
“In the office of licences,” Clelia said. “A lesser office, I’m sure you understand.”
But a good source of unofficial fees paid to overlook irregularities, or expedite an application. Tax officials took their percentages too, settling overdue accounts or reducing tax bills. “Equally recompensed?” I asked.
“The salary, yes,” Clelia said. I heard the unspoken addition: ‘but not in status.’ Kaeso, I gathered, like the family he was marrying into, was ambitious. Or perhaps pushed forward by his soon-to-be mother-in-law?
“Will you speak to Varos?” Ennaia pleaded.
“I will,” I said, “but I cannot promise anything. Now, when is the wedding?” I filled their cups again, and the frustrated flush on Ennaia’s cheeks deepened.
“I don’t know,” she muttered.
“They are eager to marry,” Clelia said, when her daughter fell silent, “but until Kaeso’s future is more certain, the wedding must wait.”
With the blame for the delay falling on my father, and perhaps on me. I repeated my assurance I would investigate. After a minute or two more of awkward conversation, Clelia and Ennaia rose to leave.
Mahir waited for me when I returned from escorting them to the gate. “I expect you heard?” I said.
“I thought it advisable that I knew. The domina was clearly upset.”
“Why would my father oppose Avidus? He is influential, and we are friends.”
“He has said nothing to me about it.”
I wasn’t sure I believed him. “Did you know which appointments had been made?”
“I did.” His dark eyes met mine, impassive. “And before you ask, yes, I knew your father had used his influence to block that specific appointment. But not why.”
“Then I will have to ask him.” I left Mahir to his records and went to the atrium. The kitchen cat slept on the sunniest bench, her latest litter of kittens cuddled against her. I picked up a tiny tabby. It opened its eyes, stretched out its paws, yawned, and curled against me, purring itself back into sleep. I stroked it with one finger, thinking.
I didn’t know enough, I concluded. On the nights I sat with my father over xache, or just wine and conversation, our talk rarely turned to Casil’s politics, to the decisions made about its administration. That is, unless a new law or change in taxation affected our clients and would bring a line of petitioners to our door. Then I was advised, and given instruction in how to respond.
I only acted for my father; my decisions are really his, channelled through me. I knew the limits of what I could grant to our clients, and every day Mahir kept a list of men and women who had been told to return after he or I could consult with my father. I’d been pleased to be my father’s voice, but today I felt constrained, purposely uninformed. It rankled.
The kitchen girl brought my food. I returned the kitten to its mother, rinsed my hands in the fountain, and ate the light meal. I would ask my father his reasons tonight. And I would ask, too, for more instruction in how and why political decisions were made.
But my father sent word late in the afternoon that he was to dine at the palace. I resigned myself to the delay, but it left me restless. I had spent part of the afternoon at my studies, more translation of a Heræcrian text, but I’d found it hard to concentrate. Finally I’d pushed the book aside. “Nishan, who decides what I study? You, or my father?”
“Varos, of course,” he said.
“Why am I not learning politics?”
“Are you not?” he countered. “The histories we study are examples of how past leaders have approached relations with both allies and enemies. They serve as models.”
“Yes, but…” What was I trying to ask? “I want to know what is happening now. What the factions are in the city, and who sides with whom, and why. Cotta’s writings might tell me what he did, and why, but how can I use that to guide my thinking if I don’t know what there is to be decided?”
He sighed. “Politics are not usually a woman’s worry, Eudekia.”
“It was for Clelia and Ennaia today!”
“But only in a minor way. And I would guess they came at Avidus’s behest.”
I didn’t say anything more, but I was determined to convince my father I had good reason to learn the subtleties of Casil’s politics.
My father was late home. I was playing xache with Nishan when he came in, looking tired. He sat, heavily, and declined wine. I thought his face flushed, but in the lamplight it was hard to tell.
“Are you well?” I asked.
He waved his hand. “I am weary, that is all.” His eyes strayed to the gameboard. “Three moves,” he murmured. Then he pushed himself up again. “I will say good night.”
I watched him leave. There was an awkwardness to his gait, a hesitation, and one hand reached for supports. A thread of worry curled around my heart. Perhaps he had slipped, turned an ankle, I told myself. He’d be fine in the morning.
But in the night voices woke me, and then Matea was at my door. “Your father is ill,” she told me. I sat up, reaching for my robe.
“What’s wrong?” My throat didn’t want to allow the words out.
“Great pain in his foot, and a fever. Mahir has gone for the physician.” She put a hand on my arm. “He is being sponged to bring the fever down. You cannot see him.”
I made sure I was decent, my robe tied and my hair tidied and clasped, although my shaking hands meant I had to let Matea fasten the clip. “Stay here,” she urged me. “I will fetch you when the physician arrives.” But I couldn’t sit still. I paced the halls, glancing at the closed door to my father’s room, my stomach knotted. Fevers killed.
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