Chapter 72
The noble who is betrothed to my sister is now of age and so they get married. He is fourth in line for that duchy, so there is not much hope of our dynasty inheriting any additional land from this union, but at least it will be another ally to call up on in time of war. I am not sure how helpful that ally will be for some time, however, as the forces of his father the Doux are currently being pummeled by Ioanna the Great.
The silver lining is, of course, that this one is celibate.
This is the kind of Monophysite riffraff I must constantly deal with in my court. Garyphallia hates me with a passion. She is the lying, zealous daughter of the psychopath from Sennar whom my Great-Great Grandfather had to kill by throwing off a cliff. Must I really keep here in my court?
A lone infidel army wonders at the insanity of Byzantium to head towards Sennar, of all places.
My army is taking losses of attrition in the hot African sun. Soon they will reach Sennar and put down this rebellion. I have big plans for the place of my youth. Nobody has ever had the resources to invest in infrastructure there. Now that I a duchy behind me I can raise Sennar up so that it is an asset to my domain rather than a liability. But first the rebels must be shown the error of their ways.
You did it. You made me put on my angry face.
Mayor Bagrat’s news is a thunderbolt in my life. All of those responsible for the murder of my father will die. I am a kind person to those loyal to me. My elevation of so many lowborns is evidence of that. But when someone is my enemy I show them no mercy as I set out to do what must be done.
Unfortunately the proof of the murder plot against my father is second hand from a source who is now dead, so I cannot simply have the murderers imprisoned. We shall have to tread carefully, then, especially given how important several of them are to my rule. Mayor Bagrat and I shall put on unknowing faces, while secretly we conspire to bring all of them under our heel.
Mayor Bagrat argues that we should only kill my step-mother, who was the one who started the plot, and Spymaster Artemios. Bagrat feels that others, such as Marshal Laurentios are too useful for my dynasty’s future to kill simply for revenge. I admit his advice is reasonable and tempting, but I cannot imagine living alongside these people. They must all die.
My plotting obtains a higher degree of urgency when Zena—one of the plotters—dies a natural death. Passing away quietly of natural causes is not the kind of revenge I was hoping for. Their lives must be cut short as my father’s was. I will target the oldest plotters first, then. I do not want them to escape me behind the white shroud of death.
I summon Spymaster Artemios to a game of chess. I have him sit across from me on the porch at a section where there is not much room around the table. He has come thinking we would remain indoors so he is underdressed and cold. I wear furs. Because of the lack of room around the chess table, my chief bodyguard stands immediately to my right and to Artemios’ left. The bodyguard is a former Varangian Guardsman who was released from service because the Viking when provoked was too ferocious, of all things. I can see myself clearly in his highly-polished axe.
After Artemios and I start the game, I wait until he is several pieces ahead—I have never been a very good player—and in deep concentration on a move before I turn my head away and mention that I now know who all of the people were in the murder of my father. If I had any doubts about Artemios’ role in the murder, they are dispelled in this instant, because as I watch him in the reflection of the axe, I see the surprise and horror clearly on his face, which he allows to appear there because I am not looking. “Oh, yes, my liege? That is wonderful news. I was making substantial progress myself on that front. May I ask how you come to this… information?” I ignore his question and ask him if he is ready to move. After several more moves, Artemios’ game quickly becomes unraveled, with him shivering and making involuntary glances at my bodyguard’s axe. I tell Artemios that I don’t mind that he did not reach this information about my father first. I tell him that much more important than getting the information is what we are going to do with it. He nods vigorously, while leaving a knight undefended. I take Artemios’ knight with my rook and then bring the knight thoughtfully to my lips as I look silently at the shivering Artemios for several moments. “You are going to murder each one of them,” I say then, “starting with Laurentios.”
One thing that I remember learning from watching the baboons under my dear father’s eccentric tutelage was that the weaker baboon could oftentimes trick the stronger baboon into fearing the weaker one if the weaker animal acted not just a bit stronger but enormously stronger. It is almost as if one will see the flaws in a small deceit, but one cannot believe that someone else would have the audacity to present a large and clearly false deceit. Artemios is a much better player at this sort of game than I, so I need to use the big ruse to have a chance: I tell him that under the elective laws we now have governing I can pick anyone I wish to be my heir. My half-brother is currently my heir, but his mother is the one who initiated the murder of my father, so I cannot tolerate her son getting my duchy. “Artemios, nobody else can carry this off but you, and this means the world to me. So much that if you do this for me I will name you as my successor. You will be Doux of Armenia if I die.” I can see immediately that he is hooked, and part of what hooks him are the calculations of how to kill me immediately as soon as he is voted my heir. Clearly he feels that I couldn’t believe him to also be guilty of father’s death, or I wouldn’t reveal my information to him. He agrees wholeheartedly to murder Laurentios “and the whole bunch of them that were involved” as soon as possible.
Artemios becomes my eager assassin, working with gusto to murder his previous conspirator, Laurentios. The plotters each agree to join.
The plotters have now all been gathered and are fully sufficient as a group to bring the deed to pass. I find it darkly amusing that more than one person backing the plot is on my hit list for their involvement in my father’s murder.
Is it any wonder that it is Garyphallia that finds the snake? She probably has them on hand for unholy heretical rites.
One of the conspirators obtains a poisonous snake and plants the snake in Laurentios’ bed. He is dead by morning, but he did not die quietly. The sounds of his death have unnerved me. I thought I would enjoy them, but it was quite the opposite. I will need to instruct Artemios to find painless ways to kill the next targets. Or at least kill them when I am not around.
I appoint Appollonios as marshal to replace Laurentios. Appollonios is also slated for death, but as he has the highest martial ability in my domain, he will be useful to be until I decide it is time to murder him.
I receive news that my half-brother heir’s future wife, Eugenia, has her duchy threatened by one of their vassals, Count Mikhael Limisol, who wants to usurp Cyprus from his liege. Eugenia’s older brother was easily crushing the count’s rebellion until Duchess Aikaterine of Achaia decided to join Count Mikhael’s war on his behalf.
You would think Duchess Aikaterine’s troops would be more useful putting down the rebellion against Byzantium as a whole, since their armies are marching right past her duchy. But instead, she sends her levees to Cyprus and routs Eugenia’s family’s army. This is not a good thing. My brother is going to inherit my lands and I want his future wife to inherit two duchies, not just one. I decide to come to the aid of Eugenia’s family. My interest in especially piqued when I learn that Anna, Eugenia’s older sister, who was next in line to inherit the two duchies, had died some time ago in a suspicious accident. That puts Eugenia next if her older brother, the underage Doux, should himself met an unfortunate end. Then my half-brother’s offspring would inherit not just my duchy but two more. I am not going to let some greedy half-wit duchess from Achaia stop my dynasty from suddenly becoming one of the more powerful in Byzantium. She will also learn not to mess with the Zagwe dynasty.