Destiny's Shield

Anywhere the hot sun of Egypt didn't blind them, glancing off the great brass tits of a giantess.

Anywhere else.

Antonina captured the would-be Emperor two days later. In a manner of speaking.

After negotiating safe passage, a small group of Ambrose's subordinates rode up to the Prefectural Palace where Antonina now made her headquarters, accompanied by perhaps a dozen cataphracts.

And a corpse, wrapped in a linen shroud.

Ambrose, it was. The former commander of the Army of Egypt had been stabbed in the back. Several times.

He made us do it.

Loyal Romans, we are. Honest.

He made us do it.

And we'll never do it again, neither.

Nevernevernevernever.

We promise.

Antonina let it pass. She even welcomed the "loyal officers" back into the ranks of the Army of Egypt. Reduced in rank, naturally. But even that punishment, she sweetened. Partly, with an explanation that room needed to made for the new officers whom the new commander had brought with him. Mostly, with a peroration on the subject of the future riches of Roman soldiers, from Malwa booty.

The officers made no complaint. They were glad enough not to be hanged.

The only grumbling at her lenient treatment of Ambrose's cataphracts, ironically enough, came from the other soldiers in his army. They were disgruntled that the same louts they had battled in the fortress—the stinking bums who had threatened their wives, even shot arrows at one of them—were let off so lightly.

But they didn't do more than grumble—and rather quietly, at that. Their own position, after all, was a bit precarious.

Best to let bygones be bygones. All things considered.

Someone, of course, had to pay the bill. Ambrose himself being dead—which didn't stop Antonina from hanging his corpse, and leaving it to sway in the wind from the fortress' battlements—the bill was presented to Paul and the former Prefect.

Both men had been found, after the cataphracts fled, huddling in one of the fortress' chambers. Paul, still defiant; the Prefect, blubbering for mercy.

Antonina hanged the Prefect immediately. His body swayed in the wind at the great intersection at the center of the city, suspended from one of the tetra-stylon pillars.

Paul—

"No martyrs," she pronounced, waving down the bloodthirsty chorus coming from all her advisers except Theodosius. "An executed prefect is just a dead politician. Nobody gives a damn except his cronies, and they won't grieve for more than a day. A religious leader, on the other hand—"

She straightened in the chair which, for all intents and purposes, served as her throne in the audience chamber of the Prefectural Palace. Officially, of course, authority was in the hands of the new Prefect. In the real world—

He was standing in the crowd before her. One among many.

Her officers almost winced, seeing that erect, chest-swelling motion. But there was no blinding flash, this time. Antonina had stopped wearing her cuirass. Just the firm posture of a small woman. Voluptuous, true. But no giantess.

Not that the sight of that familiar, very female form led them to think they could oppose her will. Giantess or no, brass tits or no, on that matter the question was settled.

Seated on her "throne," Antonina decreed.

"No martyrs."

Theodosius sighed with relief. Seeing the little movement, Antonina turned her gaze onto him.

"What do you recommend, Patriarch?" she asked, smiling now. "A long stay on the island of Palmaria, perhaps? Tending goats. For the next fifteen or twenty years."

"Excellent idea!" exclaimed Theodosius. Piously: "It's good for the soul, that sort of simple manual labor. Everyone knows it. It's a constant theme in the best sermons."

Off to Palmaria, then, Paul went. The very same day. Antonina saw him off personally. Stood on the dock until his ship was under sail.

He was still defiant, Paul was. Cursed her for a whore and a harlot all the way to the dock, all the way out to his transport, and from the very stern of the ship which took him to his exile.

Antonina, throughout, simply responded with a sweet smile. Until his ship was halfway to the horizon.

Then, and only then, did the smile fade. Replaced by a frown.

"I feel kind of guilty about this," she admitted.

Standing next to her, Ashot was startled.

"About Paul? I think that bastard's lucky—"

"Not him," she snorted. "I was thinking about the poor goats."

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Framed

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Chapter 35

THE EUPHRATES

Autumn, 531 A.D.

"So where's your flank attack?" demanded Maurice. "You remember—the one you predicted was going to happen that very night. About a week ago."

Belisarius shrugged. Reclining comfortably against the crude rock wall of one of the artillery towers on the dam, he returned Maurice's glower with a look of complacence.

"I forgot about the negotiations," he explained.

"What negotiations?"