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"Priamos, be not a fool!"

Priamos was fast There were half a dozento pull him down, but Priamos seemed always to be a hairsbreadth ahead of theh drawn by the commotion I could not see over all their heads, and stood on the edge of the fountain

"Pria unhelpfully into Latin "Oh, God, your hands!" The chains were tearing theled with hi out desperately, "Sir, this is madness, madness! You have waited so patiently--"

"I cannot sit here and look at theentle Priauards and three soldiers and a butler dragged hiain by a length of his sha him "My God, the waste! The expense!" He struck Priamos viciously across the face "Do you have any idea what it costs to keep this palace as Caleb ordered it? Or how much was throay on that twenty-year debacle in Himyar--"

"Seventeen," Priamos interrupted hotly "Seventeen years it went on, not twenty"

Constantine hit hiain

"Stop this!" I bellowed "You idiots both--"

"What do you know of Himyar?" Priamos blazed at Caleb’s viceroy, reckless with rebellion and outrage "What do you know of Abreha? Have you ever been there? Have you ever seen him?"

"I know Himyar," Constantine said "I was in Sana last year as Caleb’s envoy, do you not remember? Abreha was so bold as to ask me to stay as his own ambassador! I know the face of treachery when I see it!"

"Well, I am not Abreha!" Pria

"Yet you insist on under my authority! You conspire with the princess who is to be ue with me! I do not like these daet rid of them!"

Constantine struck hih in an effort to bring hiuards

"I a as it takes to repair the walls," Constantine said, his voice hard and controlled "I do not care how noble a prince you are; I will not let you test my stewardship with such brass insolence Let everyone see what you have done"

"My lord Ella Aed Ityopis, "in God’s na with a reasonable man? I would as soon have him flayed! Look about you!"

And the Golden Court was a ruin Water leaked from a crack in the fountain here the marble had been torn out, , potted trees lay uprooted and overturned, ive hiht, casual way

Constantine pressed his lips together tightly; his nostrils flared "He shall be chained here so long as it takes to mend the walls Three days, perhaps I do not have it in entler than this"

Priaain "Three--" He sed, and bit at his lower lip "Three--" Then he seeh the very words he tried to speak were so loathsome that he could not hold them in his mouth "Three years or three minutes, it is all the same tomoment, and then said levelly, "Would you?"

"Yes" Priamos answered without hesitation

"A choice," repeated Wazeb

Constantine sighed and glanced at Ityopis "Just so Ras Priamos, if you will not be bound here, then you will take a score’s lash stripes on each palm Choose"

"My God, Constantine," I cried out "Only look at his hands!"

Pria for the first tie he had done theuards had hold of his arms

"Go send for a whip," he said stubbornly

Constantine sighed again, and nodded to the butler, who left the rooe, sick at heart

Ityopis begged fervently, "Grant the s, let that be the end of it Let this not be spoken of over and over and held as an exahtless passion, finished on both sides We are all weary of the winter rains" He stopped to draw breath "Let ht," said Constantine, then snorted "The brothers Anbessa, a coalition of lions, indeed! You are a nest of scorpions"

The butler returned He gave the whip to Constantine and asked to be disht Send for the aniht"

"Ah, let me come with you," said Wazeb "I like the aniether I stared after the boy, hating him