Fox and Empire

**

Aragis the Archer studied Gerin's assembled forces. "I'll tell you this much, Fox," he said: "I'm gladder to have you with me than I would have been fighting you. You've got more men here than I thought you could raise."

"I've never picked a quarrel with you," Gerin answered. "I wasn't picking a quarrel with you over Balser's holding, either, however you chose to take it. But I wasn't going to back away, either."

"Leave that aside, since I'm not such a fool as to call my ally a liar," Aragis said, which let him call the Fox a liar even as he said he was doing no such thing. "You've put a lot of men on horseback here, too. You always were one to try things no one would have looked for."

"Maybe." Gerin raised an eyebrow. "You came here all by your lonesome, and you say I do things nobody would look for? What would have kept me from dropping you off Balser's wall on your head?"

Aragis shrugged. "I counted on your good sense. Biggest worry I had was that some of your troopers would do me in before I got the chance to tell you what the Empire was up to. But your men are well disciplined, too-maybe not quite so tight as mine, but well enough."

"Your idea of discipline is to make your men fear you worse than any foe," the Fox said.

"Well, of course," Aragis said, as if surprised Gerin contemplated discipline of any other sort. "It's worked, too. Tell me it hasn't."

Gerin couldn't tell him that. Whether it would work for Aragis' successor was a different question. Maybe Aragis didn't care. Maybe he thought one of his sons was as fierce as he-an alarming idea if ever there was one.

"My way works, too," Gerin said, and Aragis could not deny that. The Fox went on, "We'll see-or our sons will see, or our grandsonswhose way ends up working better."

By way of reply, Aragis only grunted. Gerin hadn't expected much more from him. Other times he'd talked with Aragis about anything further away than the immediate future, he'd got only incomprehension in return. Within Aragis' range of vision, he was most effective; beyond it, he didn't seem to see at all.

"How determined did the imperials seem to be about taking back the northlands?" the Fox asked Aragis. "If we give them one set of lumps, or maybe two, will they go back over the High Kirs and leave us alone? Or do you think they'll keep coming after us no matter what we do?"

"I don't know the answer to that," Aragis answered. "I do know one thing: if we don't give them a set of lumps, we've lost the cursed fight." He paused, as if waiting for Gerin to disagree with him. When Gerin didn't say anything, the Archer picked up again: "They're every bit as arrogant as I remember them being, and that's saying a lot."

"So it is," Gerin agreed. "Down in the City of Elabon, they'd look down their noses at you for wearing trousers instead of robes, and for coming straight out and saying what you mean instead of talking all around it from four different directions at once." He looked up at the sound of hoofbeats. "And a good day to you, Rihwin. What can I do for you?"

Atop his horse, the noble from the City of Elabon tossed his head in anger more assumed than real. "I heard that last remark of yours, lord king, and I desire you to know that it filled my heart with resentment, that I reject it as a slanderous and scurrilous assault on my former homeland, that it bears not even the slightest relation to truth of any sort, and that, furthermore, your syntax in framing the said remark, being both slipshod and leaden, causes me to-"

"-Prove the point of everything I was saying?" Gerin suggested.

"Oh, I am wounded. Wounded!" Rihwin cried, clapping a hand over his heart. Gerin snorted. By the expression on Aragis' face, he wouldn't have put up with Rihwin's flamboyant nonsense for a moment. There were times when Gerin wondered why he put up with his fellow Fox's nonsense himself. But, over years, Rihwin had-narrowly-convinced him he was worth keeping around.

And then his friend did his best to unconvince him. Rihwin's face took on a look almost of transfiguration. In soft, reverent tones, he said, "With the Empire returned to the northlands once more, surely commerce between us and the long-sundered south will soon revive."

As soon as Rihwin spoke of commerce, Gerin knew what he had in mind. Gerin would have liked to see commerce revived, too, commerce in books and fine cloth and other such luxuries the northlands had trouble producing for itself. Rihwin, however, would be thinking of only one such luxury. "You don't mean commerce. What you mean is wine."

"And wherefore, I pray you, should I not?" Rihwin demanded.

"For one thing, you get into trouble when you drink wine," Gerin answered. "You get into trouble when you drink ale, too, but you get into worse trouble when you drink wine. For another, with wine comes Mavrix, lord of the sweet grape. Do you truly want more dealings with him?"

That did give Rihwin pause. The first time he'd ever invoked Mavrix, just before the werenight, the Sithonian god had permanently taken away his ability to work magic. Their meetings since had not been marked with any great warmth, either; Mavrix disliked and distrusted not only Gerin but also anyone who had anything to do with him.

But Rihwin was made of stern stuff-either that or he had a marvelously selective memory. He said, "It should be all right, lord king, and for the chance to taste wine once more, what risk could be too great?" He struck a melodramatic pose on horseback.

"I like wine well enough," Aragis said, "but ale suits me." He stuck out his chin and folded his arms across his chest in a different sort of melodrama, the pantomime of demanding obedience.

As Gerin could have told him, getting obedience out of Rihwin the Fox was an uphill fight. Loftily, Rihwin observed, "Some people are of the opinion that, for no better reason than something's suiting them, it should suit everyone, a proposition easily demonstrated to be fallacious."

Aragis blinked. Gerin watched him sort through Rihwin's sentence a clause at a time. He watched him scowl when he got to the end of it. " Some people," Aragis rumbled, "are of the opinion that anyone else cares about their opinions to the extent of dumping a pisspot."

"Yes, some people are," Rihwin agreed. He and Aragis glared at each other. Gerin would have bet the two of them were likely to rub each other the wrong way. When he made bets of that sort, he usually proved right. When he bet something would go well, on the other hand, he was wrong dishearteningly often.

That afternoon, his army reached the border between Balser's holding and the lands Aragis the Archer ruled. The border guards cheered. "Kick Aragis the Arrogant's arse!" one of them shouted. The rest offered even more creative advice. They all cheered Gerin.

Aragis tapped his driver on the shoulder. His chariot broke out of the swarm and rattled over to the border station. One of the guards recognized him, and went from jeering to white-faced and shaky in the space of a heartbeat. At his whispered comment, the other warriors shut up one by one.

"I thought I would give you the chance to say to my face what you say to my back," Aragis told them. "I see you have not the belly for it. This surprises me not at all." At his order, his driver took him back up alongside Gerin.

"That took nerve," the Fox said. In his own cold-blooded way, Aragis had style.

The Archer shrugged. "Most men are dogs. They yap loud enough when nothing bigger and fiercer is around. When challenged, though, they sniff your backside and then roll over."

"Use them as men and you'll find them likelier to behave as men," Gerin said. Aragis shook his head. They rode on in silence after that. Gerin would have been happier had he been more nearly certain he was right and his royal rival wrong.

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