“I will be safe,” she said softly.
Kungas stopped his pacing and turned to face her. The little crack of a smile vanished without a trace.
“You will be in deadly peril, and we both know it. With the entire army gone from Begram—except for the handful of soldiers I will leave you for a bodyguard—you will be at the mercy of any sizeable force in the area. Doesn’t even have to be Malwa. Any Pathan tribe in the region could swoop down and take the city.”
Irene began to brush back her hair, from old habit, but halted the gesture midway. The long, flowing chestnut tresses she had once possessed had vanished along with the rest of the Greek noblewoman she had once been. The hair was still there—still chestnut and still long, in fact—but it was bound up tightly in the female equivalent of the Kushan topknot. What the Kushan women called a “horse tail.”
“You let me worry about the Pathans. There won’t be any danger from them immediately, no matter what. Begram is not a village, after all. It is a sizeable city, with walls, and a large population to guard it. An enthusiastic population, to boot.”
She inclined her head, indicating the riotous celebration going on in the streets below. “Any Pathan chief will know full well that, while he might take Begram, he will pay a hard price for it. And if the price is too hard—which it is likely to be; the populace is Kushan, after all—his tribe will be at the mercy of your army when you return.”
“If we return.”
” ‘If’ you return,” Irene allowed. “But the Pathans will wait to see what happens at the Khyber, Kungas. Not even the most hot-headed tribesman will make any attempt on Begram until they are certain your army is not something to be feared. And besides—”
Old habit triumphed. She reached back, drew the horse-tail over her shoulder, and began stroking it. “And besides,” she said softly, almost crooning with anticipation, “I will not be spending those weeks idly. Diplomacy, after all, can often accomplish greater wonders than feats of arms.”
* * *
“You must be joking,” hissed Valentinian. He stared at the implements in Ajatasutra’s hands as if they were so many cobras. In the moonlight, his narrow face and close-set features made him look not so much like a weasel as a demon.
And a greatly offended demon, at that.
Ajatasutra shrugged. “There is another alternative, if you prefer.”
Lifting his left hand, still holding one of the digging tools, he indicated Ajmer at the bottom of the slope which served the city for a cemetery. “I can purchase a suitable woman and three children in the slave market. A quick bit of blade work—much less effort than all this digging—and we’ll have what we need.”
He lowered the digging tool and gave Valentinian a hard-eyed stare. “Of course, you will have to do the work. Not me.”
Valentinian stared down at the city below, his face even sharper than usual. Clearly enough, he was considering the alternative . . .
Anastasius heaved up a sound which was as much of a sigh as a humorless chuckle. “Not even you, Valentinian. And you know it. So there’s no point postponing the inevitable.”
The giant cataphract stepped forward and took one of the tools from Ajatasutra. “You do know which graves we want, I hope. Or are we digging at random?”
Ajatasutra’s chuckle was quite full of humor. “Please! I am no fonder of labor than either of you. I did not spend my weeks here idly, I assure you.” Handing one of the tools he still had in his hands to Valentinian, he began working at the soil with the other. “One grave will do. This one. A big family, it was, although we will need only four of the bodies. One woman and three children. Two boys and a girl, of approximately the right age.”
Although he began sharing in the work, Valentinian was still sour. “Died of the plague? Wonderful. We’re digging up disease too.”
“No disease. Just an impoverished family—one of many, now—huddling in a shack on the outskirts of the city. Easy pickings for a street gang. So the bodies will even show suitable injuries.”