The Scepter's return

CHAPTER TWELVE

The last time Limosa had a baby, there'd been a small scandal when all the rumors about lash marks and scars on her back proved true. By now, that was old news. When she disrobed for the midwife this time, no one would get — too — excited about it.

Lanius had other things to worry about this time around, chiefly whether she would have a boy or a girl. Ortalis had the same worry, even if his hopes and the king's ran in opposite directions.

It had just started to snow when Limosa's bag of waters broke. That was a sure sign of labor beginning in earnest, and servants hotfooted it from the palace to bring back the midwife. Lanius listened to Ortalis burble and babble for a little while, then excused himself and got as far away from his brother-in-law as he could.

He started to head for the archives, but changed his mind. He'd needed years to teach the servants not to bother him there. Someone would have to come with news of Limosa's baby. Better not to be with the moncats, either. And he also couldn't go to his own bedchamber, because Sosia was there. She still didn't appreciate his company.

That left… what? He ended up in one of the palace's several small dining rooms. Instead of eating, he caught up on correspondence. He felt virtuous. He also rapidly grew bored. This was the part of governing that Grus did better than he did.

Someone opened the door and stuck his head into the room. "Oh," Grus said. "Sorry to bother you, Your Majesty. I was just looking for a quiet place where I could get a little work done until Limosa has her baby, however long that takes."

Laughing, Lanius answered, "That's exactly what I'm doing here."

"Oh," Grus said again, and then, "Mind if I join you?"

"Not a bit," Lanius told him. "And if you want to write some letters for me along with your own, I don't mind that, either. I was just thinking you're better at this part of being a king than I am."

"Well, I don't know about that," Grus said. "When something interests you, you get better at it than I ever could. When it doesn't, you don't bother with it so much, that's all."

Lanius thought about that. He didn't need long to decide Grus was right. "I should do better," he said.

"Probably," Grus said. "Everybody has some things he should do better — and if you don't believe me, you can ask either one of our wives."

"Ha!" Lanius said. "We don't need to ask them — they come right out and tell us."

"Wives do that sometimes. Husbands do it to wives, too, I expect." Grus sat down across the table from Lanius. He dumped a disorderly pile of letters and blank leaves of parchment on the table in front of him, pulled the stopper from a burnt-clay bottle of ink, dipped a goose quill, and began to write. The pile stayed disorderly. Lanius was much neater about the way he worked. But Grus dipped his pen and wrote, dipped his pen and wrote, dipped his pen… He wasn't neat, but he got the job done, turning out letter after letter.

"I'm jealous," Lanius remarked.

The other king only shrugged. "It's nothing very special," he said. "Most of the time, the simplest answer will do. Yes, no, tell me more, whatever the local official decided also seems right to me. It's only on the odd things that you really have to slow down and think." He passed a letter across to Lanius. "Will you read this to me, please? My sight hasn't lengthened too badly, but I have trouble when somebody writes as small as this."

Lanius read it. It was an appeal of a conviction for theft. "Thanks," Grus said. He wrote a few lines, set the letter aside, and went on to the next.

"What did you tell him?" Lanius asked.

"What would you have told him?" Grus asked in return.

"It doesn't seem likely that the victim and the captain and the city governor are all in league against the appellant," Lanius said. "They would have to be for him to be innocent, seems to me."

"Seems the same way to me," Gras replied. "So I told him no. Not worth wasting a lot of time on it."

"I suppose not." Lanius had come up with the same answer as his father-in-law. He would have fussed much more over the letter, though. He wanted things to sound good. Grus just wanted to make sure no one could misunderstand what he meant. Lanius had rarely seen him fail to live up to that standard.

After a while, Grus stopped writing. He looked at Lanius and said, "I wonder how much longer it will be."

"No way to know," Lanius answered, having not the slightest doubt about what Grus meant. "Babies come when they feel like coming, not when you tell them to."

"I'm not going to say you're wrong. I can't very well when you're right, can I?" The other king inked his pen, started another letter, and then stopped once more. "Here's something you haven't heard from me. If you tell anybody I said it, I'll call you a liar to your face. Have you got that?"

By the way he said it, Lanius knew he was liable to do worse than call him a liar. "I won't blab. I don't blab."

"Well, that's true, too — you don't." Grus leaned forward and dropped his voice to something not much above a whisper. "I hope it's a girl."

"Do you?" Lanius hoped he didn't squeak in surprise. Grus solemnly nodded. "Even though Ortalis is your legitimate son?" Lanius asked. Grus nodded again. Lanius couldn't believe he was telling anything but the truth. He also couldn't help asking, "Why?"

"It makes things simpler," Grus told him. "When you get as old as I am, you decide simpler is better most of the time."

His answer wasn't as simple as it might have been. Lanius had no doubt the other king knew as much. Had Grus been pleased with Ortalis, had he thought his legitimate son would make a good successor, he would have done whatever he needed to do to make sure the crown went to him and his descendants. If anyone — Lanius included — stood in his way, that would have been too bad for the person who proved an obstacle.

As things were, though… "Thank you," Lanius said quietly, though he knew Grus' choice wasn't so much praise for him as a judgment on Ortalis.

"Don't worry about it," Grus said. "You're not the boy I shoved aside to take the throne anymore. Don't think I haven't noticed. I don't believe you'll ever make much of a warrior — I don't see you taking the field and driving everybody before you. But except for that, you make a good king."

Lanius didn't see himself as much of a warrior, either. Fighting wasn't something he was or wanted to be good at. He nodded to Grus all the same. "You haven't made a bad king yourself." He wasn't sure he'd ever admitted even that much to the man who'd stolen more than half his throne.

Grus gave him a seated bow. "Thank you, Your Majesty."

"You're welcome, Your Majesty," Lanius responded, every bit as seriously.

Grus seemed to be casting about for something else to say. Whatever it was, he didn't find it. Instead, he went back to the letter that he'd stopped halfway through. He finished it and went on to the next. Lanius started writing again, too. He still couldn't match his father-in-law for speed.

An hour later, or maybe two, shouts in the corridor outside made them both look up from their work. Someone knocked on the door to the dining room. "Come in," the two kings said together.

"Your Majesty!" a servant said excitedly. He paused, blinked, and tried again. "Uh, Your Majesties, I mean. I have great news, Your Majesties! Princess Limosa has had a baby boy!"

Grus had to reward the servant who brought him word of Ortalis' son. He had to pretend it was good news. Things in the palace would have been even worse if he hadn't.

Ortalis gave money to every servant he saw. He kissed all the women, including those old enough to be his mother. He slapped all the men on the back. He didn't walk down the palace hallways. He danced instead.

"Marinus!" he said to anyone who would listen. "We'll call the baby Marinus!"

It wasn't a name from Grus' side of the family. Maybe it was connected to Petrosus' — or maybe Ortalis and Limosa had just decided they liked it. Grus didn't feel like asking. He said, "Congratulations," to his legitimate son, and hoped his face wasn't too wooden while he did it. Evidently not, for Ortalis only grinned at him. Seeing Ortalis grin felt almost as strange as congratulating him. Ortalis' face frequently wore a frown or a scowl or a sneer. A grin? Grus wondered where those usually sour features found room for one.

Lanius did somewhat better, saying, "I hope Limosa is well?"

"Oh, yes." Ortalis stopped cutting capers long enough to nod. "The midwife said she came through it as well as a woman can."

"Good," Lanius said.

"Wonderful," Grus agreed, thinking nothing of the sort. But then, that wasn't fair. Say what you would of Petrosus, Limosa was an inoffensive creature. Her worst failing up until now had been the unfortunate taste for pain that made her such a good match for Ortalis. But bearing an inconvenient boy came close to being an unforgivable sin.

Did she realize as much? If she did, she had the sense to hide the knowledge. Naivete, here, worked to her advantage. Ortalis understood what she'd done, all right. He started dancing again, dancing and singing, "I have an heir! Thank you, King Olor! I have an heir!"

Lanius showed none of what he was thinking. Grus admired that, and hoped his own features were under something close to as much control. He wouldn't have bet on it, though. And then something occurred to him that actually let him smile. He's calling on King Olor. He isn't calling on the Banished One.

That he should think such a thing about his own son… He shrugged. Yes, it was sad. But Ortalis had given him plenty of reason to worry about whose side he was on. Seeing and hearing such a worry come to nothing wasn't the worst thing in the world.

Grus studied his joyful legitimate son. Just because Ortalis didn't shout the Banished One's praises didn't mean he saw eye to eye with Grus and Lanius. The way he was carrying on showed he didn't, at least as far as the succession went. He could do the Banished One's work without acknowledging the exiled god as his overlord. He might work more effectively in the Banished One's behalf if he didn't acknowledge him. Few men got out of bed thinking, I'm going to do something evil today. Many more thought, I'm going to do something good, not seeing that what they reckoned good was anything but in the eyes of most of their fellows.

Prince Vasilko of Nishevatz, up in the Chernagor country, had been like that when he rose against his unloving and unlovable father. He saw all the things Vsevolod was doing, and didn't care where he looked for help to overthrown him. If men who backed the Banished One would help him overthrow Vsevolod, so much the better. And if they — and the exiled god — gained ever greater power in Nishevatz and then in the rest of the Chernagor city-states… well, Prince Vasilko hadn't worried about that. He'd gotten what he wanted, and nothing else mattered nearly so much to him.

Overthrowing him and others whom the Banished One had seduced had cost Avornis years of fighting. It also cost Grus the chance to take advantage of the civil war among the Menteshe for all that time. (Of course, the civil war down in the south cost the Banished One the chance to take advantage of Avornis' being busy in the north. Things evened out — except when they didn't.)

Would Ortalis lean toward the Banished One if he saw that as the only way to get what he wanted? Grus eyed his son again. He'd had that worry before, had it and dismissed it from his mind. Should he have? He didn't know. And asking Ortalis what he'd do would only put ideas in his mind — ideas that might not have already been there. Grus sighed. Nothing was as simple as he wished it were.

Ortalis, for his part, was glancing at Lanius. He didn't proclaim that Marinus was the rightful heir not just to him but also to the Kingdom of Avornis. If he had, he would have had trouble on his hands right away. But did the gloating look in his eyes say what Grus thought it did? He couldn't see what else it was likely to mean.

What Ortalis did say was, "It's a good thing the kingdom has another prince." He didn't say Lanius should father more children. If he had, Lanius couldn't have been too unhappy. As things were, Ortalis made it sound as though Prince Crex was liable to be in perilous health. If he was, Ortalis was all too likely to be the one who made his health perilous.

"Maybe it is," Lanius replied, in tones that couldn't mean anything but, You must be out of your mind.

"Can we see the baby?" Grus asked. That seemed harmless enough.

"If the midwife lets you." Ortalis rolled his eyes. Grus had all he could do not to laugh out loud. Ortalis and Limosa were no doubt using Netta, the midwife who'd also come when Sosia was brought to bed. She was the best in the city of Avornis. She was also probably the toughest woman Grus had ever met. She took no nonsense from anybody. Even Ortalis had figured that out. If he could, anybody and everybody could.

Sosia had given birth in a special palace room reserved for queens. Limosa, only a princess, had had to do it in her own bedchamber. They'll need new bedclothes in there, Grus thought. Ortalis knocked before presuming to go inside. He waited till he heard a gruff, "Come in," too — only then did he open the door.

He came out with Marinus in his arms. Like any newborn, his son could have looked better. Marinus' head seemed misshapen, almost conical, and was much too big for his body. His face looked smashed. His eyes were squeezed shut. He was redder than he should have had any business being. Netta had put a bandage over the stump of the cord that had connected him to his mother.

"Isn't he handsome?" Ortalis said, proving all new fathers are blind.

"Congratulations." Grus held out his hand not to his son but to his new grandson. Marinus' tiny hand brushed against his forefinger. The baby clung to the finger with a grip of sudden and startling strength. Grus laughed himself then. He'd seen that with other newborns. It faded after a little while.

Ortalis looked down at the tiny shape in his arms. "A boy. A son. An heir," he said softly. Grus would have been happier if he'd left out the last two words.

Gossip about Limosa's back and the scars on it had quieted down in the palace. It revived even before the midwife left. Naturally, a couple of servants had been in there with Ortalis' wife and Netta. They blabbed about everything they'd seen. By the way the news sounded to Lanius, they blabbed about quite a bit they'd made up, too. He didn't think a person could have as many scars as they said Limosa did and go on living.

Naturally, the servants paid no attention to his opinion. The scandals of their superiors were more interesting and more entertaining than the possibility that a couple of their own number were talking through their hats. He'd seen that before. It didn't bother him. It was part of palace life.

That evening, Sosia said, "You can sleep in the bedchamber — if you feel like it." Her voice held an odd note of challenge. She'd made it plain he wasn't welcome there ever since she found out about Oissa.

"I'm glad to," Lanius answered. He paused. "Are you sure?" His wife nodded. She didn't hesitate before she did it. He found himself nodding, too. "All right."

When he came to bed, she was already under the covers. That didn't surprise him; the night was chilly, and braziers did only so much to fight the cold. "Good night," he said, and blew out the lamp on his night table. That was all he did — she'd invited him to sleep in the bed, not to sleep with her. But when she slid toward him, as though for a good-night kiss, he almost automatically reached out to take her in his arms. He jerked back in surprise when his hands found soft, bare flesh.

Sosia laughed a brittle laugh. "It's all right," she said. "You can go on — if you feel like it." The challenge rang stronger now.

"Why?" he asked. "What made you change your mind?" "Two things," Sosia answered. "If you don't do it with me, you will do it with somebody else. Even if you do do it with me, you may do it with somebody else — but you may not, too." She clicked her tongue between her teeth; that might have been too bald even for her. After a moment, she went on, "And we really ought to have more than one son — especially now."

She wasn't wrong. Marriages for reasons of state sometimes held love. Theirs had, on and off. Whether love was there or not, though, duty always was. Not getting out from under the covers, Lanius wriggled free of his nightshirt. "I'm glad to," he said as he embraced her.

He wasn't even lying. He'd never stopped enjoying what the two of them did together, not through all his other liaisons. He didn't think she understood that or believed it, but it was true.

Now he took special care to please her, kissing and caressing her breasts and her belly for a long time before sliding down to the joining of her legs. If she was angry enough at him, of course, nothing he did would bring her pleasure. But she sighed and murmured and opened her legs wider. He went on until she gasped and quivered. Then he poised himself above her and took his own pleasure.

When they lay side by side again, she asked him, "Was that as good for you as it was for me?"

"Yes, I think so," Lanius said, adding, "I hope it was good for you."

"It was, and you know it was," Sosia said, which was true. After a moment, she went on, "If it was good for you, why do you want to look anywhere else?"

"I don't know," he answered, and muffled his words with a yawn. Sosia made a small, exasperated noise. Pretending he didn't hear it, he got up, used the chamber pot, and then lay down again. Before long, he was breathing deeply and regularly. Men had a reputation for rolling over and going to sleep afterwards.

But, reputation or not, Lanius wasn't asleep. He lay there on his side, not moving much. Sosia muttered again, more softly this time. Then she started breathing deeply and regularly. Maybe she was pretending, as he was. He didn't think so, though. He thought she really had dropped off.

Why do you want to look anywhere else? He knew the answer, regardless of whether he felt like giving it to Sosia, which he didn't. He knew it wouldn't make sense to her, and would only make her angry. Because I knew everything you were going to do before you did it. The serving girls he bedded weren't that much prettier than his wife, if at all. They weren't that much better in bed, if at all. But they could surprise him. He liked that.

He did love Sosia, as much as he could in their arranged marriage. Would he have chosen her if he could have picked from all the girls in the kingdom? He had no idea. For one thing, the idea of marrying for love and only for love was an absurdity. Most of him accepted that. The part that slept with maidservants didn't.

His deep, regular breathing became shallower and less regular for a moment. No doubt he had as much trouble surprising Sosia as she did surprising him. She'd threatened to take a lover now and again. He hadn't believed her or taken her seriously. He didn't think she was looking for variety, as he was.

Revenge? That might be a different story. He knew too well that it might.

But she could no more keep it a secret in the crowded world of the palace than he could. Servants always talked. It might take a while, but it always happened. He'd never heard anything that made him think she was doing anything of the sort.

A good thing, too. She was angry at him. He would have been much more angry at her. Maybe that wouldn't have been fair. He didn't care. It was how he would have felt.

Another child? He smiled and yawned, this time genuinely. Another child wouldn't be so bad, especially if it was a boy. He yawned again. If he had another son, what would he name him? He fell asleep before he found a name he liked.

Grus kept a wary eye on Ortalis. If his son was going to show signs of plotting, having Marinus to plot for might start him off. But he seemed no more than a new father happy at the birth of a son. Maybe I misjudged him, Grus thought. Or maybe he's just sneakier than I figured.

Every day that went by without word of trouble from the south, without word of pestilence or other natural disaster that might not be so natural, felt like a triumph to the king. He dared hope the Banished One was so weakened by everything that had gone wrong for him lately, he couldn't hit back at Avornis the way he would have a few years earlier. Grus didn't really believe that, but he dared hope. Hope marked progress, too.

He didn't need long to realize that Lanius and Sosia had reconciled. Neither his son-in-law nor his daughter said much about it, but their manner with each other spoke louder than words could have. Grus suspected Marinus' arrival had a good deal to do with that, but whatever the reason, he hoped it lasted. And so it would — till Lanius found another serving girl attractive and Sosia found out about it. Grus didn't know what he could do about that. Seeing trouble ahead didn't always mean seeing any way to stop it.

Grus had had that thought down south of the Stura, when Otus plucked his woman from a village of freed thralls and decided to bring her up to the city of Avornis. The king had nothing against Fulca, who seemed nice enough and very capable. He also had nothing against Calypte, with whom Otus had taken up while Fulca remained a thrall. And Otus himself was solid as the day was long. But when one of his women found out about the other one…

When that happened, it proved as hard on Otus as it would have on anyone else whose two women suddenly discovered neither of them was his one woman. A lot of men, in a mess like that, would have lost both of them. Otus didn't. While Calypte departed in a crockery-throwing huff, Fulca stuck by him. But she was furious, too.

"What was I supposed to do, Your Majesty?" Otus asked plaintively after the dishes stopped flying. "Was I supposed to act like a dead man while I was far away from Fulca and I thought I would never see her again? Once I'd found she'd been freed and found her, was I supposed to pretend I'd never known her?"

"I suppose not, and I suppose not." Grus answered each question in turn. "But I didn't think you would be able to keep both of them once they found out about each other. Things don't usually work that way."

"Why not?" Otus said. "They should."

"Well, suppose Calypte had taken another lover while you were south of the Stura with me," Grus said. "Would she have been able to keep two men?"

"I don't think so!" Otus sounded indignant.

'There, then. Do you see?" Grus said. Otus didn't, or didn't want to. Few men wanted to when the shoe was on the other foot. Grus set a hand on the ex-thrall's shoulder. "Be thankful Fulca is sticking by you. You don't have to start over from the beginning."

"Even she wants to knock me over the head with something," Otus said. "Shouldn't she be glad I came looking for her and took her out of the village?"

"Oh, I think she is," Grus said. Otus hadn't told her anything about his other woman when he took her out of the village. She'd thought — not unreasonably, as far as Grus could see — she was his only woman, and that he had no others. No wonder she was none too happy to discover she was wrong. "If the two of you really love each other, you'll figure out how to patch things up." And if you don't patch them up, it wouldn't be the first time things fell apart. Grus kept quiet about that. Otus wouldn't appreciate it.

"I don't know what to do," Otus said sorrowfully.

A lot of that sorrow was no more than self-pity. Grus knew as much. Even so, he soberly answered, "Congratulations."

Otus stared at him. Grus hadn't expected anything else. "Congratulations, Your Majesty?" the ex-thrall echoed. "I don't understand."

"Not knowing what to do, not being sure, needing to figure things out for yourself — all this is part of what being a free man is all about," Grus explained. "You wouldn't have said anything like that when you were a thrall, would you?"

"No, I don't suppose I would." Otus shook his head. "No, of course I wouldn't. I knew everything I needed to know then. It wasn't much, by the gods, but I knew it." He spoke with a certain somber pride.

"That's about what I thought," Grus told him. "You have more things to know and to try to figure out now that you're on your own. Not all of it's going to be easy. It won't be much fun some of the time, especially when you get yourself into a mess like the one you're in now. But this is part of what being free is all about. You're free to make an idiot of yourself, too. People do it every day."

"Freedom to get in trouble, I think I could do without," Otus said.

"I don't know how you're going to separate it from any other kind," Grus said. "You've done a good job of getting the hang of being your own person. You didn't have years and years to learn how, the way ordinary people do. You had to start doing it right away after Pterocles lifted the spell of thralldom from you. Now Fulca has to do the same thing, and do it just as fast as you did — maybe faster. Remember, it won't always be easy for her, either."

"I suppose not," Otus said, and then, "Thank you, Your Majesty."

"For what?" Grus said. "I don't have any real answers for you. I've landed in this exact same trouble myself, and more than once." So has Lanius, he thought. It's something that happens, all right.

"For listening to me," the freed thrall said with a rueful smile. "Just for listening to me. That was something neither of my women wanted to do."

"Oh. Well, you're welcome." Grus fought hard to hide a smile. "Between you and me, when a man's women find out about each other — or when a woman's men find out about each other, which happens, too — they aren't usually in a listening mood."

"Yes, I'd noticed that." By the way Otus said it, it was for him some strange natural phenomenon, like the fogs that afflicted the Chernagor country or the tides that swept the sea in and back along Avornis' coastline.

"Good luck," Grus told him. "Part of what makes being free, being a whole man, worthwhile is that it isn't simple. You may not always believe that, or want to believe it, but it's true."

Otus went on his way scratching his head. Grus hoped he would work things out with Fulca, for her sake as much as for his. She didn't know enough yet to have an easy time as a free woman. If she had to, though, Grus suspected she would get along. Just how much would Avornis gain from the suddenly released talents of so many thralls? More than a little — he was sure of that.

At the midwife's suggestion, Limosa had nursed Marinus for the first few days after he was born. Lanius remembered Netta giving Sosia the same advice after she bore Crex and Pitta. She'd said babies whose mothers did that ended up healthier. That had persuaded Sosia, and it persuaded Limosa, too.

After those first few days, Limosa let her own milk dry up and brought in a wet nurse. With Sosia as grumpy as she was, Lanius wondered how she would react to a woman who often bared her breasts in the palace. That turned out not to be an issue. The wet nurse Limosa hired was almost as wide as she was tall, and had eyes set too close together, a big nose, and a mean mouth. Maybe Limosa was taking no chances with Ortalis, too.

Not long after Marinus' birth, the winter turned nasty. Three blizzards roared through the city of Avornis one after another, snarling the streets, piling roofs high with snow, and making Lanius wonder whether the Banished One had decided to use the weather as a weapon after all. As the city began to dig out, several people were found frozen to death in their homes and shops. That happened after almost every bad storm, but it worried the king all the same.

And then the sun came out. It got warm enough to melt a lot of the snow — not quite springlike, but close enough. Here and there, a few prematurely hopeful shoots of grass sprouted between cobblestones.

Lanius laughed at himself. Plucking one of those little green shoots outside the palace, he held it under Grus' nose. 'This probably won't be a winter like that dreadful one," he said.

He must have held the shoot too close to Grus' nose, for the other king's eyes crossed as he looked at it. "I'd say you're right," Grus answered. "Of course, there's still some winter left. Other thing is, just because he's not sending snow and ice at us doesn't mean he won't do something."

"And here I wanted to be happy and cheerful," Lanius said. "How am I supposed to manage that when you keep spouting common sense at me?"

"I'm sorry, Your Majesty." Grus bowed almost double; he might have been a clumsy servant who'd dropped a pitcher of wine and splashed Lanius' robe. "I'll try not to let it happen again."

"A likely story," Lanius said, laughing. "You can't help being sensible any more than I can, and you know it."

"Well, maybe not," Grus said. "Between us, we make a pretty fair pair — now that each of us knows he can trust the other one with his back turned."

That had taken a while for Lanius. After Grus took more than his share of the crown, Lanius had feared the other king would dispose of him and rule on his own. Odds were Grus was strong enough and well enough liked to have gotten away with it. But it hadn't happened. For his part, Grus had taken even longer to learn to trust Lanius. Grus had kept him nothing but a figurehead for years. Little by little, though, when Grus went on campaign, Lanius began handling things in — and from — the capital.

"Here we are, getting along… well enough." Try as Lanius would, he couldn't make his agreement any warmer than that. Wanting to lighten things with a joke, he added, "And all we have to worry about is the Banished One."

Grus laughed — not the sort of laugh that says something is really funny, but more the kind that comes out when the choice is between laughter and a sob. The other king said, "I'm not worried about that. After all, you've got things all figured out, don't you? As soon as we get to Yozgat, the Scepter of Mercy falls into our hands." He laughed again.

"I wish things would be that simple," Lanius replied. "Still, though, there's no denying that some of the things we've both done have made the Banished One sit up and take notice."

He waited to see if Grus would try to deny that, or would try to deny him any credit for it. The other king didn't. He just said, "To tell you the truth, Your Majesty, I could do without the honor."

"So could I," Lanius said. "I've come awake in my bed too many times with the memory of… him staring at me." Grus nodded. As anyone who'd known them could testify, dreams from the Banished One seemed more vivid, more real, and certainly more memorable, than most things in the waking world. Lanius went on, "If he didn't worry about us, about what we're doing, he wouldn't trouble us so. That is an honor of a kind."

"Of a kind," Grus agreed. "Or we tell ourselves it is, anyhow. We don't know much about the Banished One for certain. Maybe he doesn't send dreams to some other people because he can't, not because he doesn't think they're important."

"Maybe." Lanius was usually polite. But he didn't believe it. If someone worried the Banished One in any real way, the exiled god threatened that person. Who the victim was — king or witch or animal trainer — didn't seem to matter.

Before they could take the argument any further — if that was what Grus had in mind — someone in the palace started calling, "Your Majesty! Your Majesty!"

Lanius and Grus looked at each other. They both smiled. Lanius said, "I don't know which one of us he wants, but I think he's going to get both of us."

They went toward the noise until a servant coming out from it ran into them and led them back to a weather-beaten courier who smelled powerfully of horse. Bowing, the man said, "Sorry it took me so long to come up from the south, Your Majesty — I mean, Your Majesties — but the weather's been beastly until a couple of days ago." He took a waxed-leather message tube off his belt and thrust it at the two kings — at both of them, but not quite at either one of them.

They both started to reach for it. At the last instant, Lanius deferred to Grus — things coming out of the south were the older man's province, and he'd earned the right to know of them first. With a nod and a murmur of thanks, Grus took the waterproofed tube and worked off the lid. He pulled out the letter inside, unrolled it, and began to read. His face got longer and longer.

"What is it?" Lanius asked. "Something's gone wrong — I can tell. Where? How bad is it?"

"Down south of the Stura," Grus told him. "And it's not good. Thralls and freed thralls… they're dying like flies."