Belisarius nodded.
“Besides, I was making plans for the future. We are digging out great tunnels and rooms inside this hill. For food storage, and, I hope, ammunition. The food will not spoil quickly—the interior of the hill is much cooler than it is outside. And even if the Malwa eventually breach the outer fortifications, and can move their guns close enough to bombard Babylon’s interior, a direct hit on the hill would pose no danger to gunpowder stored deep within its depths.”
The Persian Emperor fell silent here, fixing Belisarius with his intense, intelligent eyes.
The Roman general met that gaze squarely. The moment had come, and it could be postponed no further.
“I have already argued in favor of giving gunpowder weapons to the Aryans, Emperor Khusrau. I have gone further, in fact. I have argued that we should give Persians the secret of their manufacture. But—”
“The Empress does not agree,” finished Khusrau.
Belisarius fluttered his right hand, indicating that the matter was not quite so simple. “Yes—and no. She agrees that it would aid the war against Malwa. Aid it immensely, in fact. But she fears the repercussions in the future.”
Khusrau nodded, calmly. The Emperor of Persia had no difficulty understanding the quandary which faced Rome’s ruler. Someday, hopefully, Malwa would be gone. Rome and Persia, on the other hand—those two great Empires had clashed for centuries.
Aide’s voice spoke. Belisarius could sense the agitation of the facets.
Stupid woman! She is so unreasonable about this!
The general had to physically restrain himself from making an actual calming gesture. Fortunately, from long experience, he had learned to keep his interchanges with Aide unnoticeable to the people around him. Still, it was distracting, and—
This is not the time for that, Aide!
The facets subsided, grudgingly. Belisarius brought his attention back to the Emperor. Khusrau was speaking.
“I understand her suspicions,” he mused. “And, unfortunately, there is nothing I can say or do that would alleviate them. We can swear to a Hundred Years’ Peace—we can swear to a Thousand Years’ Peace, for that matter. But Rome and Persia will still be there, long after Theodora and I are gone. Who is to know if that peace would be kept? Or if Persian and Roman armies would not clash again, on the field of battle, armed this time with cannons and rockets?”
Aide could not control his frustration.
So what? The problem is now—with Malwa! If that problem is not solved, Rome and Persia won’t be there a century from now to be worrying about this. And besides—
Be quiet! commanded Belisarius. It was one of the few times he had ever been abrupt with Aide. The facets immediately skittered in retreat.
Belisarius could sense the hurt feelings emanating from Aide. He was not concerned. They weren’t hurt much. Aide reminded him, in that moment, of a child obeying an adult’s command. Sulking, pouting; thinking dark thoughts about cosmic injustice.
But he needed to concentrate on the problem before him. And he already knew Aide’s opinion. During the days at Constantinople when this very question had been thrashed out by Theodora and her advisers, Aide had practically overwhelmed him with visions drawn from the human future.
A thousand visions, it had seemed. The ones he remembered best had been the portraits of the British Raj’s conquest of India. “Conquest” was not, even, the right term. The establishment of British rule would be a long and complex process which, in the end, would not primarily be decided by military factors. True, the British would have guns. But so, soon enough, would the Indian rajahs who opposed them. Yet those Indian monarchs would never match the superior political, social and economic organization of the British.
For the same reason, Aide had argued, giving the secret of gunpowder to Persia posed no long term threat to Rome. It was not weapons technology, by itself, which ever determined the balance of power between empires and nations. It was the entirety of the societies themselves.
Rome was a cosmopolitan empire, rich in traders, merchants and manufacturers. And, for all the elaborate pomp of its official aristocracy, it was a society open to talent. To a degree, at least.