Departures by Harry Turtledove Read Free Book Online

that. “I wonder if they settled everything they needed to decide on by counting potsherds.”
    “I would guess they probably must have, excellent
saris
,” Polydoros said. “All the inscriptions read, ‘It seemed good to the council and to the people.’ How would they know that—why would they write that?—if they had not counted potsherds to know what seemed good to the people?”
    “There you have me, good Polydoros. But what if something that ‘seemed good to the people’ was in fact bad for them?”
    “Then they suffered the consequences, I suppose. They certainlydid when they decided to oppose Xerxes.” Polydoros waved at the dark ruins all around.
    “But they were the leading Yauna power at the time, were they not? They must have been, or Khsrish would not have obliterated their city as a lesson to the others. Until they chose to fight him, they must have done well.”
    “A king can also make an error,” Polydoros said.
    “Oh, indeed.” Being a courtier, Mithredath knew better than the Hellene how gruesomely true that could be. “But,” he pointed out, “a king knows the problems that face his land. And if by some mischance he should not, why, then he has his ministers to point them out to him so that he may decide what needs to be done. How could the people—farmers, most of them, and cobblers and potters and dyers—how could they even have hoped to learn the issues that affected Athens, let alone what to do about them?”
    “There you have me,” Polydoros confessed. “They would be too busy, I’d think, working just to stay alive to be able to act, as you say, more or less as ministers in their own behalf.”
    Mithredath nodded. “Exactly. The king decides, the ministers and courtiers advise, and the people obey. So it is, so it has always been, so it always will be.”
    “No doubt you are right.” An enormous yawn blurred Polydoros’ words. “Your pardon, excellent
saris
. I think I will imitate your servants.” He unrolled his blanket and wrapped it around himself. “Will you join us?”
    “Soon.”
    Polydoros did not snore, but before long was breathing with the slow regularity of sleep. Mithredath remained some time awake. Every so often his eyes went to the bag of potsherds, which lay close by Raga’s head. He kept trying to imagine what being an Athenian before Khsrish the Conqueror had come had been like. If the farmers and potters and such ruled themselves by counting sherds, would they have made an effort to learn about all the things Athens was doing so they could make sensible choices when the time came to put the sherds in a basket for counting or whatever it was they did? What would it have been like to be a tavern keeper, say, with the same concerns as a great noble?
    The eunuch tried to imagine it, felt himself failing. It was as alien to him as lust. He knew whole men felt that, even if he could not. He supposed the Athenians might have had this other sense, but he was sure he did not.
    He gave it up and rolled himself in his blanket to get some rest. As he grew drowsy, his mind began to roam. He had a sudden mental picture of the whole vast Persian Empire being run by people writing on potsherds. He had visions of armies of clerks trying to transport and count them and of mountains of broken pottery climbing to the sky. He fell asleep laughing at his own silliness.
    Third-rate town though it was, Peiraieus looked good to Mithredath after some days pawing through the ruins of dead Athens. He paid Polydoros five gold darics for his help there. The Hellene bowed low. “You are most generous, excellent
saris.
”
    Mithredath presented his cheek for a kiss, then said, “Your assistance has but earned its fitting reward, good Polydoros.”
    “If you will excuse me, then, I’m off to see how much work has fallen on my table while I was away.” At Mithredath’s nod, Polydoros bowed again and trotted away. He turned back once to wave, then quickly vanished among the