The Emperor looked at her a moment. He turned back to Crispin. ‘I had an impression in the throne room earlier that you were of the same cast of mind as I am, solving Scortius’s challenge. Are your tesserae not . . . pieces of a puzzle, as you put it?’ Crispin shook his head. ‘They are glass and stone, not mortal souls, my lord.’ ‘True enough,’ agreed Valerius, ‘but then you aren’t an Emperor. The pieces change when you rule. Be grateful your craft spares you some decisions.’ It was said—had been said quietly for years—that this man had arranged the murder by fire of Flavius Daleinus on the
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