When she was securely planted on her feet, Baresmanas leaned over and whispered. "So. Who was right? I, or your mother?"

Tahmina's smile was faintly discernable through the veil. "I never doubted you, father. Even before I read the book you gave me."

Baresmanas started slightly. "Already? All of it? Herodotus?"

As Baresmanas handed the reins of the horse to one of his chief dehgans, Tahmina straightened. "All of it," she insisted. "My Greek has become almost perfect."

A moment's hesitation, before the girl's innate honesty surfaced. "Well . . . For reading, anyway. I think my accent's still pretty horrible."

Side by side, father and daughter walked slowly toward the aivan. The entrance to the aivan was lined with soldiers. Persian dehgans on the left, Roman cataphracts on the right.

"Then you understand," said Baresmanas. He did not have to gesture at the chanting crowd to make his meaning clear.

"Yes, father."

Baresmanas nodded solemnly. "Learn from this, daughter. Whatever prejudices you may still have about Romans, abandon them now. You will be their empress, before the day is done, and they are a great people worthy of you. Never doubt that for a moment. Greater than us, in many ways."

He studied the soldiers standing at their posts of honor alongside the aivan's entrance. To the Persians, he gave merely a glance. Baresmanas' dehgans were led by Merena, the most honorable of their number.

But it was the leader of the Roman contingent which was the focus of the sahrdaran's attention. An odd-looking soldier, in truth. Unable to even stand without the aid of crutches. The man's name was Agathius, and he had lost his legs at the battle of the Nehar Malka where Belisarius destroyed a Malwa army.

Agathius was a lowborn man, even by Roman standards. But he was counted a duke, now, by Persians and Romans alike. Merena's own daughter had become his spouse.