The Dance of Time

That caution, also, proved to be of no value.

"This is useless," snarled Skandagupta, after a quick study of the sketch. "They could have gone anywhere."

The emperor crumpled up the sketch and hurled it at the engineer. "Impale him," he commanded.

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Framed

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Chapter 28

Kausambi

"They'll be doing another search of the city," Anastasius said. "For sure and certain."

Lady Damodara looked around the stall in the stable that had been turned into her personal chamber. Then, she smiled very crookedly.

"Who would have thought the day would come that I'd regard a stable stall as luxurious surroundings?"

Lady Sanga was smiling just as crookedly. "Living in a tunnel gives you a sense of proportion. Anything is better than that. Still, Anastasius is right. We can't take the risk."

Lady Damodara sighed. "Yes. I know. The next search might be more thorough. There's really no way to keep soldiers out of this stable if they insist on coming in. As it is"—she gave Valentinian a sly glance—"we'll have to work hard and fast to remove any traces that we were here."

Valentinian returned the glance with a scowl. He'd argued against moving into the stable at all, preferring to remain the whole time in the enlarged tunnel below. Eventually, he'd given in, for the sole reason that providing the hideaways with enough edible food was too difficult if they stayed for very long in the tunnels.

The problem wasn't money. Lady Damodara had a fortune in coins and jewels, and had brought all of it with her into the tunnels. She had more than enough money to feed them all with the world's finest delicacies for years.

The problem was that large purchases of anything beyond simple foodstuffs would eventually be noticed by the city's authorities. And, unfortunately, the sort of cheap and readily available food that the stable-keeper's family could purchase without notice needed to be cooked.

Cooking in a stable was easy. Cooking in a tunnel was not.

Valentinian had then had to wage a mighty struggle to keep the Indians from decorating the stable so much that it would be impossible to disguise their occupancy.

Anastasius was more sanguine. "No problem. One full day of horse shit will disguise anything."

Both women laughed. The horses who'd formerly occupied that stable had been moved into adjoining ones, of course, but they could be moved back quickly and easily.

The stable-keeper had explained to the one customer who'd inquired that the move was due to his doubts regarding the structural soundness of the stable. Doubts which, truth be told, weren't entirely faked. The stable that the refugees were using as a hiding place was the most wretched and rickety building in the compound. Of course, that meant it was also the one it was impossible to see into, because of the extra bracing and shoring.

"No help for it," Lady Damodara stated firmly, when she was done laughing. "We'll make the move back into the tunnel this evening. And stop scowling, Valentinian! If we tried to move immediately, we'd be too careless in covering up all the signs that we've been here for weeks."

That was true enough, but it didn't stop Valentinian from scowling.

"Something will go wrong," he predicted.

* * *

In the event, nothing did go wrong. Skandagupta ordered another major search of the city. But, as with the initial search, the effort was undone by its very ambition.

"Scour Kausambi" was an easy order to give, from the imperial palace. From the viewpoint of the mass of soldiers on the ground who had to carry it out, the task looked very different. All the more so because they were never given any clear instructions or explanations as to exactly what they were looking for, beyond "the Lady Damodara and her entourage." Most of the soldiers who conducted the search were peasants, other than the Ye-tai, who were usually semi-barbarians and almost as likely to be illiterate. Their assumptions concerning where a "great lady" could expect to be found hiding simply didn't include stables.

A squad of soldiers searched the stables, to be sure. But their investigation was perfunctory. They didn't even enter the stall where the entrance to the tunnels below was located, much less give it the kind of search that might have uncovered the well-hidden trapdoor.

Not surprising, of course. That stall had more manure in it than any of them.

* * *

Still, Valentinian insisted that everyone stay below for three days following the search. Only after Tarun, the stable-keeper's oldest son, reported that the search seemed to have ended all over the city, did Valentinian let the people from the palace come up to enjoy the relative comforts of the stable.

* * *

"See?" demanded Anastasius, grinning.

Valentinian's scowl was just as dark as ever. "Don't be an idiot. This isn't going as well as we'd thought it would."