‘And the original accident was on the inside,’ said the Emperor, nodding again. He was smiling with satisfaction now, the grey eyes keen. ‘Rhodian, you understood all of this?’
Crispin shook his head quickly. ‘Not so, my lord. I guessed only the simplest part of it. I am . . . humbled to have been correct. What Scortius says he deduced, in the midst of a race, while controlling four horses at speed, fighting off a rival, is almost beyond my capacity to comprehend.’
‘I actually realized it too late,’ Scortius said, looking rueful. ‘If I had truly been alert, I’d not have been going by Crescens on the inside at all. I’d have stayed outside him around the turn and down the far straight. That would have been the proper way to do it. Sometimes,’ he murmured, ‘we succeed by good fortune and the god’s grace as much as anything else.’
No one said anything to this, but Crispin saw the Supreme Strategos, Leontes, make a sign of the sun disk. After a moment, Valerius looked over and nodded to his Chancellor. Gesius, in turn, gestured to another man who walked forward from the single door behind the throne. He was carrying a black silk pillow. There was a ruby on it in a golden band. He came towards Crispin. Even at a distance Crispin saw that this shining prize for an Emperor’s idle amusement at a banquet would be worth more money than he’d ever possessed in his life. The attendant stopped before him. Scortius, on Crispin’s right, was smiling broadly. Good fortune and the god’s grace.
Crispin said ‘No man is less worthy of this gift, though I hope to please the Emperor in other ways as I serve him.’
‘Not a gift, Rhodian. A prize. Any man-or woman-here might have won it. They all had a chance before you, earlier tonight.’
Crispin bowed his head. A sudden thought came to him, and before he could resist it, he heard himself speaking again. ‘Might I … might I be permitted to make of this a gift, then, my lord?’ He stumbled over the words. He was successful but not wealthy. Neither was his mother, aging, nor Martinian and his wife.
‘It is yours,’ said the Emperor, after a brief, repressive silence. ‘What one owns one may give.’
It was true, of course. But what did one own if life, if love, could be taken away to darkness? Was it all not just… a loan, a leasehold, transitory as candles?
Not the time, or the place, for that.
Crispin took a deep breath, forcing himself towards clarity, away from shadows. He said, knowing this might be another mistake, ‘I should be honoured if the Lady Styliane would accept this from me, then. I would, not have even had the chance to speak to this challenge had she not, thought so kindly of my worth. And I fear my own impolitic words earlier might have distressed a fellow artisan she values. May this serve to make my amends?’ He was aware of the charioteer beside him, the man’s drop-jawed gaze, a flurry of incredulous sound among the courtiers. ‘Nobly said!’ cried Faustinus from by the two thrones.
It occurred to Crispin that the Master of Offices, powerful in his control of the civil service, might not be an especially subtle man. It also occurred to him in that same moment-noting Gesius’s thoughtful expression and the Emperor’s suddenly wry, shrewd one-that this might not be accidental.
He nodded at the attendant-vividly clad in silver-and the man carried the pillow over to the golden-haired lady standing near the thrones. Crispin saw that the Strategos, beside her, was smiling but that Styliane Daleina herself had gone pale. This might indeed have been an error; he had no sure instincts here at all.
She reached forward, however, and took the ruby ring, held it in an open palm. She had no real choice. Exquisite as it was, beside the spectacular pearl about her throat it was almost a trifle. She was the daughter of the wealthiest family in the Empire. Even Crispin knew this. She needed this ruby about as much as Crispin needed … a cup of wine.