Fortune's Stroke

"Not Christians, no," mumbled Eon. "But—" Another shrug of those incredible shoulders. "Well . . . There are a lot of big animals here in Africa. Lions, elephants. And it seems that the old kings—"

There came yet another shrug. But the gesture, this time, contained neither apology nor embarrassment. It was the movement of the powerful shoulders of a young prince who, when all was said and done, was not really given to self-effacement.

"It's over, now," he stated. "We instituted Christian principles of rule two hundred years ago." He pointed to the enormous thing in front of them. "We keep that here as a reminder to our kings. Of the pagan folly of royal grandiosity."

Antonina's eyes returned to the object in question. Eon had brought her here, from the royal compound a mile to the southwest—the Ta'akha Maryam, it was called—as part of his sight-seeing tour of Ethiopia's capital city. He had started off, in the morning, by showing her the magnificent churches which adorned the city. The churches, especially the cathedral which the Ethiopians had named the Maryam Tsion, were the pride of Axum. But then, in mid-afternoon, the prince had insisted on showing her this as well.

It was an obelisk, lying on its side, broken into several pieces. The huge sections were crumpled over the tombs of pre-Christian kings, leaving the obelisk a rippling monument to ancient folly. More than anything else, to Antonina, it resembled an enormous stone snake, making its serpentine way across the landscape of the Ethiopian highlands.

The obelisk had fallen, Eon explained, as it was being erected. Staring at it, Antonina could well believe the tale. It was difficult to judge, because of its position, but she thought the obelisk was far larger than any created even by the ancient Egyptians. Only a king possessed by delusions of grandeur could have thought of ordering mortal men to erect such a preposterous structure.

She shivered slightly, thinking of the men who must have been trapped by the obelisk in its ruin. When the thing fell, it crushed several of the tombs beneath it. The blood and mangled flesh of slaves, for a time, would have decorated the sepulchres where royal bones lay buried.

Eon misinterpreted the motion. "You are cold!" he exclaimed. "I have been thoughtless. I forgot that you are not accustomed—"

She waved down the apology. "No, no, Eon. I'm not really cold. I was just thinking—"

She stopped, shivering again. She was cold, she suddenly realized. She had always thought of Africa as the quintessential land of warmth. But the heartland of Axum lay in the Ethiopian highlands. True, the capital city was situated in the broad, fertile plain called Hatsebo, well below the mountains which towered all about in stark majesty. But it was still over a mile above sea level.

"Perhaps we should return to the Ta'akha Maryam," she admitted. A bit hurriedly, to stave off another apology: "Your father will be growing impatient with our long absence."

Actually, she knew, Eon's father—the negusa nagast, "King of Kings," as he was titled—would not be in the slightest bit impatient. She was quite certain that King Kaleb had welcomed her daylong absence from the royal compound. It gave him time to consult with his advisers, before making a response to the Roman Empire's proposals.

Antonina and her entourage had arrived in the Ethiopian city of Axum a week earlier. Axum—the capital had given its name to the Ethiopian kingdom, just as had Rome—had never received such a high-level delegation from the Roman Empire. Since Ethiopia's conversion to Christianity under the tutelage of the missionaries who were revered as the "Nine Saints," the Axumites had maintained cordial relations with the great empire to their north. But, except for trade matters, there had been very little in the way of official diplomatic exchange. Until Antonina came, at the head of a small army, armed not only with the strange new gunpowder weapons but with a barrage of proposals from the Emperor of Rome.

As they began picking their way through the broken stones of ancient kings, Antonina found herself, once again, fighting down a smile. She could well understand how King Kaleb would have wanted a day—at least!—to mull over the Roman Empire's proposals.

Those proposals were, after all, hardly what you'd call vague and meaningless diplomatic phrasery.

Rome accepts Axum's offer of an alliance against the Malwa Empire. To further our joint aim of crushing that monstrous realm, we propose:

Rome will supply Axum with gunpowder weapons, and the technicians to train you in their use and manufacture.