CHAPTER SEVEN

Grus and Pterocles took turns looking through a peephole in the ceiling of the palace room where the remaining thralls the king had brought back from the south were confined. The winter before, two thralls had gotten out. One of them had almost killed Lanius. The other had almost killed Estrilda, though Grus had no doubt the thrall wanted him dead and not his queen.

The thralls paid no attention to the peephole. They might not have paid any attention even if he’d stood in the room with them. What made them thralls made them less than fully human. Their wits were dulled down to the point where they barely had the use of language. They were more than domestic animals that happened to walk on two legs and not four, but they weren’t much more than animals.

They could, after a fashion, manage farms. Down south of the Stura River, in the lands the Menteshe ruled, they raised the crops that helped feed the nomads. The Menteshe didn’t have to worry about uprisings from them, any more than they had to worry about uprisings from their cattle.

And yet, the thralls’ ancestors had been Avornans who were unlucky enough to dwell in the south when the Menteshe conquered the land. The magic that made them thralls came from the Banished One. Human wizards had had little luck reversing it. Avornan armies had tried to reconquer the lost southern provinces a couple of times—tried and failed, with most of the defeated soldiers made into thralls. After the last such disaster, more than two hundred years before (Lanius knew the exact date), Avornis had given up trying.

Without some way to make thralls back into men and women of the ordinary sort, any reconquest was doomed to fail. Grus realized that, however much he wished he could have gotten around it. And so, leaning toward Pterocles, he asked, “What do you see down there?”

Even if the Chernagor wizard in Nishevatz—or was it the Banished One himself?—had not laid Pterocles low, Grus would have had no enormous confidence that he had the answer. Avornan wizards had wrestled with curing thralls for centuries—wrestled with it and gotten thrown, again and again and again. Alca seemed to have had the beginnings of some good new ideas… but Alca was gone, and she wouldn’t be coming back. Pterocles was what the king had to work with.

“What do I see?” the wizard echoed. Grus hadn’t bothered holding his voice down. Pterocles spoke in a hoarse, worried whisper. “I see emptiness. I see emptiness everywhere.”

That didn’t surprise Grus. He asked, “How do we go about filling the emptiness with everything people have and thralls don’t?”

“Fill the emptiness?” Pterocles laughed. That wasn’t mirth coming out, or no sort of mirth with which Grus wanted to be acquainted. Pterocles went on, “If I knew how to fill emptiness, Your Majesty, don’t you think I would fill my own? I wish I could. I wonder if I ever will.”

“Have you learned anything by watching the thralls?” Grus asked. “Would you like to go in among them and study them at close quarters?”

“Empty. So empty,” Pterocles said, and then, “If I went in, how would you tell me apart from them?”

“It wouldn’t be hard,” Grus answered. “You would be the one acting like an idiot. They wouldn’t be acting. They really are idiots.”

Again, the laugh that came from Pterocles only raised Grus’ hackles. The wizard bent, backside in the air, and peered down at the thralls again. His face bore an expression of horrified fascination. He might have been asking himself whether he was or was not one with them.

After a little while, Grus elbowed him out of the way and looked down at the thralls again on his own behalf. He expected them to be doing what they usually did, which was not very much. Like cats, they spent a lot of time sleeping. Several of them stretched out on couches, snoring or simply lying motionless. One, though, stared up at the peephole with as much interest as Grus showed looking in the other direction.

Alarm ran through Grus. This wasn’t the way thralls were supposed to behave. Thralls that acted like thralls were harmless, pitiable things. Thralls that didn’t were deadly dangerous, not least because no one expected them to strike.

This one turned away after meeting his eye. It was as though the thrall cared nothing for him. It had been interested when Pterocles was looking down at it, though. What did that mean? Grus hoped it didn’t mean the Banished One looked out through the thrall’s eyes.

When he asked Pterocles about it, the wizard gave back a vague shrug and answered, “We understand each other, he and I.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Grus demanded. Pterocles only shrugged again.

Grus asked more questions, but Pterocles’ answers only got vaguer. At last, the king threw his hands in the air. He went off to his desk to get some work done. If he didn’t keep a thumb on Avornis’ pulse, who would? Lanius? Grus didn’t want his son-in-law getting experience at running the kingdom. He also didn’t want Pterocles staying close to the thralls if he wasn’t there. He made sure the wizard came away with him. Pterocles looked unhappy, but didn’t argue.

When Grus sat down behind the great marble-topped desk from which Kings of Avornis had administered their realm for years uncounted, he found a leather courier’s sack on top of it. A note on a scrap of parchment was tied to it. Brought back from the land of the Chernagors, it said. Letters inside with seals still intact.

“What the…?” Grus muttered. Then he snapped his fingers. This had to be the bundle he’d gotten just before learning the Chernagors from the eastern city-states were marching on his army. What with everything that had happened since, he’d forgotten all about it. Some diligent clerk hadn’t.

He thought about chucking the sack. What were the odds any of the letters would matter? In the end, though, sighing, he poured the parchments out onto the broad desktop. I can go through them in a hurry, he told himself, and popped the wax seal off the first one with his thumbnail.

A moment later, that letter lay in the trash bin by the desk. It touched on something Lanius had long since dealt with. The second letter followed the first. So did the third. The fourth had to do with a land-tenure case down in the south that had dragged on for years. Grus set it aside to add to the stack he already had on that case.

The fifth letter was from Pelagonia, a medium-sized city down in the middle of the southern plains. From a king’s point of view, Pelagonia’s chief virtue was that not much ever happened there. Rulers needed places like that, places they didn’t have to worry about. Grus couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten a petition from Pelagonia. And yet the script on the outside of the parchment, the script that addressed the letter to him, looked somehow familiar.

“No,” he said as he broke the seal. “It can’t be.” But it was. Estrilda had insisted that he send Alca away from the city of Avornis when she discovered his affair with the witch. He’d picked Pelagonia for her, not least because it was such a quiet, sedate town.

Your Majesty, Alca wrote, I send this as from a worried subject to her king, not because of anything else that may have happened between us. Grus grunted at that. As soon as Alca mentioned it, even to disclaim it—maybe especially to disclaim it—she also claimed it. He sighed. He couldn’t do anything about that. And if he’d known how big a disappointment Pterocles would prove, he would have thought twice about sending Alca away at all.

She continued, I am afraid the investigation of the thralls may not be going as well as it should. I should have left more behind in writing, to guide those who would come after me. I would have, if I had known I was leaving the capital so suddenly. Grus mumbled something under his breath. If that wasn’t a dig, he’d never run into one.

I hope that all is well for you and for yours (the last three words were inserted above the line, with a caret to show where they should go) in the city of Avornis. I hope also that wizards are still studying the thralls. I have heard how two thralls turned on you and Lanius. I rejoice that you are both safe. The thralls still in the palace, I think, can be as dangerous as the ones who already attacked. Unless I am altogether mistaken, the Banished One reaches them in this way.

The sorcerous charms and calculations that followed meant nothing to Grus. He hadn’t expected them to. He knew nothing of magic. Alca went on, I hope you will show this to a wizard you trust. He will be able to judge whether I am right.

“I can do that,” Grus said, as though she stood there before him. He wondered what Pterocles would make of those scribbled symbols. He also wondered if Pterocles was in any condition to make anything of them.

What I have shown here may also give new hope to returning thralls to true humanity, Alca finished. The spells will not be easy to shape. Here is a new road, though, and Avornis has long needed that. What I need… is something I may not have. I knew that when we began. I cannot imagine why, all this time later, it comes as such of a surprise. With — A scratched-out word, and then a scrawled signature.

He stared at it for a long time. Because of the calculations, he couldn’t even throw the letter away. He made a fist and brought it down hard on the marble desktop, over and over again.


“What did you do to yourself?” Lanius asked Grus; his father-in-law’s right hand was puffy and bruised.

“Banged it,” Grus said uninformatively.

“Well, yes, but how?” Lanius asked.

“Oh, I managed,” Grus answered.

Lanius sent him an exasperated look. Why couldn’t Grus just say he’d dropped something on it or caught it in a door or whatever he’d really done to himself? How could you be embarrassed about hurting your hand? Grus evidently was.

Too bad he didn’t hurt it knocking some sense into Ortalis, Lanius thought. But then he remembered Grus had done his best to knock sense into Ortalis. He probably would have done better if he’d started years earlier. He had tried this time, though. And Ortalis had done his best to stay invisible ever since. That suited Lanius fine.

He tried another question, asking, “What are you going to do when spring comes around again?”

Grus didn’t evade there. “Go back to the country of the Chernagors with a bigger army,” he answered. “I’m not going to let Vasilko keep Nishevatz any longer than I can help it. That would be like letting someone carrying a plague set up shop across the street from the palace. Life hands you enough troubles without your asking for more.”

“Can you take enough soldiers north to beat all the Chernagors?” Lanius inquired.

“You’re full of questions today, aren’t you?” Grus gave him a quizzical look. “While you’re at it, why don’t you ask me about my love life, too?”

“How’s your love life?” Lanius said, deadpan.

“Certainly nice weather we’re having, isn’t it?” Grus answered, just as deadpan.

They eyed each other. Then they both started to laugh. “All right,”

Lanius said. “I asked for that, and I think you enjoyed giving it to me. I assume you have something in mind against Prince Vasilko and the rest of the Chernagors and the Banished One?”

“Certainly nice weather we’re having, isn’t it?” Grus repeated.

That annoyed Lanius. Maybe Grus didn’t have anything in mind but didn’t want to admit it. Maybe he did, but didn’t want to tell his fellow king for fear that Lanius might use it against him or for some other reason, darker still. “What is it?” Lanius snapped. “Do you think I’ll take whatever you’ve got in mind straight to… to the Banished One?” He almost said Milvago, but decided he didn’t want to voice that particular name.

This time, Grus paid him the courtesy of a serious answer. “No, Your Majesty, I don’t think that,” he said. “What I do think is, the Chernagors and the Banished One are bound to have plenty of spies and plenty of wizards trying to find out what I’ve got in mind. The more I talk, the more help I give them. I don’t want to do that, thanks.”

“Oh.” Lanius considered. Reluctantly, he nodded. “Yes, all right.” It wasn’t altogether; he still suspected Grus feared he would use the knowledge himself, and didn’t want to give it to him for that reason. That being so, he went on, “But we’re the ones who worry the Banished One, aren’t we? The ones he comes to in dreams. The two of us, and Alca the witch.”

Grus slammed his bruised hand against the wall. He hissed in pain, and then cursed. “Sorry,” he said in a gray voice. “You caught me by surprise there. I don’t want to remember those dreams.”

“Or Alca?” Lanius asked.

Instead of replying, Grus turned away. Did that mean he didn’t want to remember Alca or that he didn’t want to forget her? Lanius could guess, but a lot of his guesses about Grus had turned out to be wrong. Maybe this one would, too.

Lanius also guessed Grus would storm out of the chamber. That turned out to be a mistake. In fact, the other king turned back. He said, “For whatever it may be worth to you, you have my sympathy on Queen Certhia’s passing.”

Now Lanius was the one who got angry. “You say that? You’re sorry my mother’s dead?” he said, his voice rising with every word. “You’re the one who sent her to the Maze!”

“I’m sorry she’s dead anyhow,” Grus answered. “She might have died if she’d stayed in the city of Avornis, you know. She wasn’t an ancient granny, but she wasn’t a young woman, either.” That was true, and hadn’t occurred to Lanius. Even so, it did very little to quell his fury. But Grus went on, “I know you don’t care to be reminded of it, but she tried to slay me by sorcery—nasty sorcery, too. If it weren’t for a strong amulet and Alca’s magic, I wouldn’t be here now.”

Again, Lanius imitated Grus, this time by turning his back. Remembering Alca had probably made Grus remember Queen Certhia. He hadn’t said anything about her death up until now. Lanius started to blame him for that, but then checked himself. His mother had tried to kill Grus, and Grus hadn’t killed her in return. Didn’t that count for anything?

With a long, wary sigh, Grus said, “Politics only make families more complicated. You’ve seen that since you were a baby.”

“Politics, yes.” If not for politics, Lanius wouldn’t have wed Sosia, wouldn’t have had Ortalis as brother-in-law or Grus as father-in-law, wouldn’t have seen Grus’ bastard as Arch-Hallow of Avornis… wouldn’t have had the Banished One for an enemy.

Grus is the Banished One’s enemy, too, Lanius reminded himself. However much he sometimes detested Grus, that was worth remembering. Nobody the Banished One wanted horribly dead could be all bad. One way to know people was by the friends they made. Another was by their foes. Lanius often thought the latter gave the clearer picture.

Then Grus said, “And speaking of politics, how did you like sending soldiers out against that noble last summer?” His voice was oddly constrained.

He’s as nervous with me as I am with him, Lanius realized. That was something new. Up until now, Grus had effortlessly dominated him. I’m growing. The balance between us is shifting. Lanius answered, “It needed doing.” He didn’t want Grus too nervous about him. That could prove hazardous.

“I never said it didn’t,” Grus told him. “I asked how you liked it.”

How much do you want power? How much do you enjoy using it? Lanius gave back a shrug. “I wish the nobles didn’t cause trouble in the first place.”

That drew a laugh from Grus. “Wish for the sun to rise in the west while you’re at it. They wish we weren’t on the throne, so they could do as they please.”

“Yes, no doubt,” Lanius said. “They can’t always get what they want, though.”

“You’re right.” Now Grus spoke with complete assurance, and addressed Lanius as one equal to another. “What we have to do is give them what they need. And do you know what else?” He waited for Lanius to shake his head, then finished, “When we do, they’ll hate us for it.” Lanius wanted to tell him he was wrong. His experience and reading, though, suggested Grus was only too likely to be right.


When the first snows of winter fell, Grus wondered whether the Banished One would send blizzard after blizzard against Avornis, as he’d done more than once in the past. Had the king had it in his power, he knew he would have used the weather against his enemies.

But winter was only… winter—nothing pleasant, but nothing out of the ordinary, either. Changing the weather couldn’t have been easy, even for a being who’d once been a god. The couple of times the Banished One tried it, Avornis had come through better than he’d expected. Grus knew that was largely Lanius’ doing; thanks to the other king, the capital and the rest of the cities had laid in supplies well ahead of time. The smaller towns and the countryside didn’t need to worry so much.

Because the winter stayed on the mild side, Grus used it to gather soldiers and horses and supplies around the city of Avornis. This time, when he went up into the land of the Chernagors, he would lack nothing a general could possibly bring with him. An afterthought also made him summon wizards from the provinces to the capital. He didn’t know how much good they would do him—from what he’d seen, most wizards from small towns and the countryside knew a lot less than those who succeeded in the city of Avornis—but he didn’t see how they could hurt.

If anything, the tent cities that sprang up around the walls of the capital were healthier in winter than they would have been in summer. Sicknesses that would have flourished in the heat lay dormant with snow on the ground. Latrines didn’t stink the way they would have when the sun shone high and bright and warm in the sky. Flies were nowhere to be seen.

When spring came, Grus was ready to move. He hoped he would catch Prince Vasilko by surprise. Even if he didn’t, he thought he could beat Prince Vsevolod’s ungrateful son. If I can’t beat him with what I’ve got here, I can’t beat him at all, he thought. He knew what Vasilko and the other Chernagor princes could throw at him. He thought his chances were good.

“Gods keep you safe,” Estrilda said in the quiet of their bedchamber the night before he left for the north.

“Thanks.” Grus set a hand on her hip. They lay bare in the royal bed. They’d just made love, which had left both of them almost satisfied. Something had broken after Estrilda found out about his affair with Alca. It was repaired these days, but the broken place and the rough spots where the glue held things together still showed, were still easy to feel. Grus wondered if they would ever smooth down to where he couldn’t feel them. After more than a year, he was beginning to doubt it.

She said, “Be careful. The kingdom needs you.”

Grus grunted. Estrilda didn’t say anything about what she needed. There were bound to be good reasons for that. Almost too late, he realized ignoring her words except for that grunt wouldn’t be good. He said, “The one thing that worries me is, I won’t be able to lay proper siege to their cities, the way I could to Avornan towns.”

“Why not?” Estrilda asked. Talking about cities and sieges was impersonal, and so safe enough.

“Because I can’t take a fleet north with me,” Grus answered. Here, at least, he could talk. Estrilda wouldn’t blab, and the royal bedchamber was as well warded against wizardry as any place in Avornis. “The Chernagors can fill their big seagoing ships with more than trade trinkets, curse them. When my army stood in front of Nishevatz last summer, Prince Vasilko brought grain in by sea, and I couldn’t do a thing about it. I don’t see how I’ll be able to stop it this year, either. I’ll have to take their cities by storm. I won’t be able to starve them out.”

“That will cost more men, won’t it?” Estrilda said. “That’s… unfortunate.”

“Yes it will, and yes it is,” Grus agreed. “I don’t see any way around it, though. Most of our galleys sail the Nine Rivers. Some of them scuttle along the coast, but I don’t see how I could bring them up to the Chernagor country. One storm along the way and…” He shook his head.

“Wouldn’t storms wreck the Chernagor ships, too? Then you wouldn’t have to worry about them.”

Moodily, Grus shook his head. “It’s not that simple. Their ships are made to sail on the open sea. Ours mostly aren’t. Ours are fine for what they do, but sailing on the Northern Sea isn’t it. For the Chernagors, it is. They build stronger than we do. They need to, traveling from one little island to the next the way they do.”

“You’ll find something.” When it came to ships, Estrilda had confidence in the onetime river-galley captain she’d married. When it came to women—she had confidence there, but confidence of the wrong sort.

When Grus thought about it, he had to admit he’d given her reason.

Lanius came out of the city to see him and the army off. “Gods go with you,” the other king told him. “We both know how important this is, and why.” Again, he didn’t say the name Milvago, or even suggest it. Even so, it was there.

Prince Ortalis came out, too. He said not a word to Grus. Grus said nothing to him, either. Each of them looked at the other as though he hoped never to see him again. That was likely to be true.

“Gods bless this army and lead it to victory.” Arch-Hallow Anser sounded more cheerful than either Grus or Lanius. If he noticed the way Grus and Ortalis eyed each other, it didn’t show on his smiling face.

With a resigned sigh, Grus swung up into the saddle of his horse. Another summer of riding lessons, he thought. I’m turning into a tolerable horseman in spite of myself.

The only ones who looked eager to return to the land of the Chernagors were Prince Vsevolod and his countrymen who’d gone into exile in Avornis with him. “I will see my son again,” Vsevolod said, in tones of fierce anticipation. Grus realized that, as badly as he got along with Ortalis, the two of them were perfect comrades next to Vsevolod and Vasilko.

“Are we ready?” Grus asked General Hirundo.

“If we’re not, by Olor’s beard, we’ve certainly wasted a lot of time and money,” Hirundo answered.

“Thank you so much. You’ve made everything clear,” Grus said. Hirundo bowed in the saddle. Grus laughed. Prince Vsevolod scowled. Vsevolod, as Grus had seen, spent a lot of time scowling. Grus waved to the trumpeters. The sun flashed golden from the bells of their horns as they raised them to their lips. Martial music filled the air. The Avornans began moving north.


King Lanius wore shabby clothes when he went exploring in the archives. That kept the palace washerwomen happy. It also let him feel easier about putting on hunting togs to go hunting with Arch-Hallow Anser. Was he in perfect style? He neither knew nor cared. If anyone but Anser had invited him out on a hunt, he not only would have said no but probably laughed in the other mans face. But he really liked Anser, and so he’d decided to see just what it was the arch-hallow so enjoyed.

Grus joked about being uncertain on a horse. Lanius really was. He felt too high off the ground, and too likely to arrive there too suddenly. He also felt sure he would be saddlesore come morning. If Olor had meant men to splay their legs apart like that, he would have made them bowlegged to begin with.

Anser took his bow from the case that held both it and a sheaf of arrows. He skillfully strung it, then set an arrow to the string, drew, and let fly. The arrow quivered in the trunk of a tree, a palm’s breadth above a prominent knot. “A little high,” he said with a rueful shrug. “You try.”

Clumsily, Lanius strung his own bow. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d held a weapon in his hand. Even more clumsily, he fitted an arrow to the string. Drawing the bow made him grunt with effort. The shaft he loosed came nowhere near the tree, let alone the knot.

Some of the beaters and bodyguards riding along with the king and the arch-hallow snickered. “Oh, dear,” Anser said. It wasn’t scornful, just sympathetic. There were reasons why everyone liked him.

“I’m in more danger from the beasts than they are from me,” Lanius said. If he laughed at himself, maybe the rest of the hunting party wouldn’t, or at least not so much.

“You will not be in any danger, Your Majesty,” one of the bodyguards declared. “That’s why we’re along.” He had a thoroughly literal mind. No doubt that helped make him a good guard. No doubt it also helped make him a bore.

Bird chirped in the oaks and elms and chestnuts. Lanius heard several different songs. He wondered which one went with which bird. “Look!” He pointed. “That one has something in its beak.”

“Building a nest,” Anser said. “It’s that time of year.”

Sunlight came through the leaves in dapples. The horses wanted to stop every few steps and nibble at the ferns that sprang up at the bases of gnarled tree trunks. Lanius would have let them, but Anser pressed on, deeper into the woods. The city of Avornis was only a few miles away, but might have lain beyond the Northern Sea. City air stank of smoke and people and dung. The air here smelled as green as the bright new leaves on the trees.

Wildflowers blazed in a meadow. Butterflies, flitting jewels, darted from one to another. A rabbit nibbled clover. “Shoot it!” Anser said.

“What?” Lanius wondered if he’d heard straight. “Why?”

“Because you’re hunting,” Anser replied with such patience as he could muster. “Because we want the meat. Rabbit stew, rabbit pie, rabbit with pepper, rabbit… Rabbit’s run off now.”

Lanius almost said, Good. If he’d been out with anyone but Anser, he would have. He was more interested in watching the rabbit than in shooting it or eating it. Alive and hopping about, it was fascinating. Dead? No.

Anser made the best of things. “Not easy to shoot a rabbit anyhow. They’re best caught with dogs and nets.”

“You chase them with dogs?” Lanius knew he should have kept quiet, but that got past him. Weakly, he added, “It doesn’t seem sporting.”

“The idea is to catch them, you know,” Anser said.

“Well, yes, but…” Lanius gave up. “Let’s ride some more. It’s a nice day.”

“So it is,” Anser said agreeably. On they rode. If they were going to hunt something, Lanius had imagined bear or lion—something dangerous, where killing it would do the countryside good. When he said as much to the arch-hallow, Anser gave him an odd look. “Aren’t deer and boar enough to satisfy you? A boar can be as dangerous as any beast around.”

They saw no bears. They saw no lions. They saw no boar, which left Lanius not at all disappointed. They saw a couple of deer. Anser courteously offered Lanius the first shot at the first stag. He thought about shooting wide on purpose, but then decided he was more likely to miss if he aimed straight at it. Miss he did. The stag bounded away, spoiling any chance Anser might have had of hitting it.

Anser didn’t say anything. If he thought Lanius had intended to miss, he was too polite and good-natured to start a quarrel by accusing him of it. The next time they saw a deer, though, Anser shot first. “Ha! That’s a hit!” he shouted.

“Is it?” Lanius had his doubts. “It ran away, too.”

“Now we track it down. I hit it right behind the shoulder. It won’t go far.” Anser rode after the wounded animal. Wounded it was, too— he used the trail of blood it left to pursue it. The blood came close to making Lanius sick. When he thought of shooting an animal, he thought of it falling over dead the instant the arrow struck home. He’d seen one battle. He knew people didn’t do that. But, no matter what Anser said, the trail of blood was much too long to suit Lanius. He tried to imagine what the deer was feeling, then gulped and wished he hadn’t.

When they caught up with it, the deer was down but not dead. Blood ran from its mouth and bubbled from its nose. It blinked and tried to rise and run some more, but couldn’t. Anser knelt beside it and cut its throat. Then he slit its belly and reached inside to pull out the offal. How Lanius held down his breakfast, he never knew.

“Not such a bad day,” Anser said as they rode back toward the city of Avornis. Lanius didn’t reply.

But he also didn’t refuse the slab of meat the arch-hallow sent to the palace. Once the cooks were done with it, it proved very tasty. And he didn’t have to think of where it came from at all.


As they had the year before, the farmers along the path Grus’ army took toward the north fled when it came near. The army was bigger this year, which only meant more people ran away from it. They took their livestock, abandoned their fields, and ran off to the hills and higher ground away from the road.

Prince Vsevolod seemed surprised that bothered Grus. “Is an army,” he said, waving to the tents sprouting like mushrooms by the side of the road.

“Well, yes,” Grus agreed. “We’re not here to churn butter.”

General Hirundo snickered. He took himself even less seriously than Grus did. “Churning butter?” Vsevolod said with another of his fearsome frowns—his big-nosed, strong-boned, wrinkled face was made for disapproval. “What you talk about? Is an army, like I say. Army steals. Army always steals.”

“An army shouldn’t steal from its own people,” Grus said.

Vsevolod stared at him in even more confusion than when he’d talked about butter. “Why not?” the Chernagor demanded. “What difference it make? No army, no people. So army steal. So what?”

“You may be right.” Grus used that phrase to get rid of persistent nuisances. Vsevolod went off looking pleased with himself. Like most nuisances, he didn’t realize it wasn’t even close to the agreement it sounded like.

The breeze brought the odors of sizzling flatbread, porridge in pots, and roasting beef to Grus’ nostrils. It also brought another savory odor, one that sent spit flooding into his mouth. “Tell me what that is,” he said to Hirundo.

Hirundo obligingly sniffed. “Roast pork,” he answered without hesitation.

“That’s what I thought, too,” Grus said. “Now, did we bring any pigs up from the city of Avornis?”

They both knew better. Pigs, short-legged and with minds of their own, would have been a nightmare to herd. Grus couldn’t imagine an army using them for meat animals, not unless it was staying someplace for months on end. The only place soldiers could have gotten hold of a pig was from farmers who hadn’t fled fast enough.

“Shall I try to track down the men cooking pork?” Hirundo asked.

“No, don’t bother,” Grus answered wearily. “They’ll all say they got it from someone else. They always do.” Vsevolod hadn’t been wrong. Armies did plunder their own folk. The difference between the Prince of Nishevatz and the King of Avornis was that Grus wished they didn’t. Vsevolod didn’t care.

When morning came, the army started for the Chernagor country again. Day by day, the mountains separating the coastal lowlands from Avornis climbed higher into the sky, notching the northern horizon. Riding along in the van, Grus had no trouble seeing that. Soldiers back toward the rear of the army probably hadn’t seen the mountains yet, because of all the dust the men and their horses and wagons kicked up. When the king looked back in the direction of the city of Avornis, he couldn’t see more than half the army. The rest disappeared into a haze of its own making.

The army had come within two or three days’ march of the mountains when a courier rode up from the south. “Your Majesty! Your Majesty!” he shouted, and then coughed several times from the dust hanging in the air.

“I’m here,” Grus called, and waved to show where he was. “What is it?” Whatever it was, he didn’t think it would be good. Good news had its own speed—not leisurely, but sedate. Bad news was what had to get where it was going as fast as it could.

“Here, Your Majesty.” The courier came up alongside him. His horse was caked with dusty foam. It was blowing hard, its dilated nostrils fire-red. The rider thrust a rolled parchment at Grus.

He broke the seal and slid off the ribbon that helped hold the parchment closed. Unrolling it was awkward, but he managed. He held it out at arm’s length to read; his sight had begun to lengthen. Before he got even halfway through it, he was cursing as foully as he knew how.

“What’s gone wrong, Your Majesty?” General Hirundo asked.

“It’s the Chernagors, that’s what,” Grus answered bitterly. “A whole great fleet of them, descending on the towns along our east coast. Some are sacked, some besieged—they’ve caught us by surprise. Some of the bastards are sailing up the Nine Rivers, too, and attacking inland towns by the riverside. They haven’t done anything like this in I don’t know how long.” Lanius could tell me, he thought. But Lanius wasn’t here.

Hirundo cursed, too. “What do we do, then?” he asked.

Grus looked ahead. Yes, he could cross into the land of the Chernagors in two or three days. How much good would that do him? Nishevatz was ready, more than ready, to stand siege. While he reduced it—if he could reduce it—what would the Chernagor pirates be doing to Avornis? What did he have to put into river galleys and defend his own cities but this army here? Not much, and he knew it. Tasting gall, he answered, “We turn around. We go back.”

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