Onsumer shook his head. 'No, lord Gerin, nothing of the sort. I think the lot of them are too busy trying to slaughter one another to worry about outsiders, even ones they hate. We haven't had an attack on the fort in close to a year, but the strife among the brothers never ends.'
'You're probably right,' Gerin said. 'All the barons in the northlands squabbled among themselves and didn't pay heed to the Trokmoi till it was too late. I wonder if we Elabonians learned the joys of faction fighting from Sithonia.'
'I wouldn't have the faintest idea about that,' Onsumer said. He was a good enough soldier, and far from stupid, but all he knew of the wider world he'd heard in minstrels' songs.
He got the horses moving again. 'Good luck to you,' Onsumer called as the wagon rolled by. His comrades waved to Gerin. Then they turned around and headed back toward the fort.
An hour or so later, Van pointed to a column of black smoke rising in the distance. 'Somebody's burning his neighbor out there, or I miss my guess.'
'Better they battle each other than my men,' Gerin said, 'but better still if they didn't battle at all.'
'Honh! What are the odds of that?'
'On the face of it, not good,' Gerin admitted. 'Still, it used to happen. Elabon, not so long ago, was a single empire stretching from the Niffet east past the Lesser Inner Sea into the seething river plains of Kizzuwatna. Now it's falling apart. When the Emperor and his court think more of putting gold in their own belt pouches now than worrying about where the Empire will be a generation hence, that happens.'
'It's not just the ones at the top,' Van said. 'It's everyone who' s strong, out to get rich off the ones who aren't and to put a fist in his strong neighbor's eye.'
'Aye, that's the way of it,' Gerin said. 'In the early days, they say, Elabonian warlords would go back to the plow once they'd won a war.' He grinned wryly. 'Of course, who knows what tales of those early days are worth?'
Near the southern edge of Bevon's unhappy holding lay another belt of devastation from Balamung's sorcery. As before, the wagon bounced roughly over the equally rough repairs Gerin had had the local peasants make. Van said, 'Remember how Bevon's sons tried to stop you from fixing the road, each of them screaming he'd do it himself?'
'Oh, yes.' The Fox's laugh was less than mirthful. 'And if I'd waited for that, I'd be waiting still, and so would Duren's grandson.'
When Gerin had come into Ricolf the Red's holding five years before, only a couple of guards kept watch at the border. Now a fort like the one he'd built on Bevon's land stood strong to keep out bandits-and perhaps to keep out his own men as well. The thought saddened him.
A guardsman strode out from the open gateway of the fort to ask his business. The fellow started slightly when he recognized Gerin and Van. Gerin started slightly, too; he had no idea what this warrior's name was, but he'd been at the border on that other journey, too. The Fox remembered those first days when he'd known Elise and snuck her out of her father's keep as vividly as if they were just past. Now that only ashes lay between him and her, he often wished he could forget. Somehow that only made him remember more intensely.
'Lord prince,' Ricolf's man said, his voice polite but wary. 'What brings you to the holding of Ricolf the Red? Is it the matter your vassal-what was his name?-spoke of some days past?'
'Widin Simrin's son,' Gerin supplied. 'Yes, it has to do with my son-Ricolf's grandson. We've had no luck finding him-I'm for the Sibyl at Ikos, to see if Biton will grant her sight of where the boy might be.'
'May it prove so,' the guard said. 'Since it's but you and your comrade here, and no host in arms behind you, pass on, lord prince.'
'No host in arms behind me?' Gerin said angrily. 'Does Ricolf look for one? I've no quarrel with him, but I may, by Dyaus, if he keeps thinking that way.'
'You had no quarrel with Bevon, either, yet your men stay on his land against his will. We don't want that happening here.'
'Ricolf ought to get down on his knees and thank me for that,' Gerin ground out. 'If my men didn't keep order along the Elabon Way, you'd have more trouble spilling into this holding than you dream of. But Ricolf keeps his own house quiet, and needs no help from me.'
'Just pass on,' the guard said.
Gerin flicked the reins so violently, the horses sprang forward with startled snorts. Van said, 'A good thing we're away. I thought you were going to jump down and murder that fellow.'
'For a counterfeit copper, I would have.' Gerin rubbed at the scar over his eye. He was sure it was white now; it always went dead pale when he got furious. 'Worst of it is, the fool's only echoing what Ricolf says.'
'Would you sooner we didn't stop of Ricolf's holding, then?' Van asked.
'Now that you mention it, yes.' But the Fox sighed. 'Has to be done, though-as you say, Duren's his grandson, after all. I expect I' ll get through it. I wouldn't show my face in his holding if I thought he seriously meant me harm-not without that host in arms behind me, anyhow.'
'The gods grant it doesn't come to that.'
'Yes.' Gerin wasn't thinking of the gods alone. If he ever did have to take on Ricolf, his former father-in-law was only too likely to call on Aragis the Archer for aid. Having Aragis extend his power northward was the last thing Gerin wanted. For that reason as well as for Duren's sake, he'd speak softly to the older baron. So he told himself, anyhow.
The sun tinged the western sky with colors like the belly of a salmon. Gerin imagined he felt the ghosts stir, though they would not truly emerge until after sunset. And from the castle ahead came a boy' s cry from the watchtower: 'Who comes to the holding of Ricolf the Red?'
All was so much as it had been five years before that the hair on Gerin's arms tried to prickle up. He felt himself caught in time, like an insect in the sticky sap of a pine tree. Insects so stuck rarely got loose. The Fox knew the trouble here lay in his own mind, but knowing did little to help him get free, either.
He shouted back toward the keep, giving his own name and Van'sjust as he had then. But then Ricolf had been eager to let him in; they'd become friends on Gerin's earlier journeys south. Now? Who could say what Ricolf thought now?
Whatever it was, the drawbridge lowered, thick bronze chains rattling and squealing over the spokes of the winch as the gate crew turned it. The horses' hooves drummed like thunder when they walked across the timbers over the moat. Water plants added touches of green there, but the smell said that Ricolf's men used the barrier to empty their slop jars.
Ricolf the Red stood in the bailey near the gate, waiting to greet Gerin. He was a broad-shouldered, thick- bellied man heading toward sixty, his manner still vigorous and his hair still thick, though now mostly white rather than the Trokme-like shade that had given him his sobriquet. When he opened his mouth to speak, Gerin saw he'd lost a front tooth since the last time they'd met.
'Guest-friendship is a sacred trust,' Ricolf said, his deep voice younger than his years. 'With that trust in mind, I greet you, Fox, and you also, Van of the Strong Arm. Use my keep as your own while you stay here.'
'You are gracious as always,' Gerin said. Ricolf hadn't sounded particularly gracious; he sounded more like a man doing a duty he didn't much care for. Gerin thought more of him for that, not less. Sometimes his own sense of duty was all that kept him going.
'Pah! This for graciousness.' Ricolf kicked at the dirt. 'I hear something's amiss with my grandson, and I want to know everything there is to know about it. First Elise, now Duren-' He shook his big, hard-featured head. 'I wasn't the luckiest man born, to link my family to you.'
'That's not what you thought when you gave me your daughter,' Gerin answered as steadily as he could; as always, anger and longing surged in him when Elise came to the front of his mind. He went on, ' The gods know I am not a perfect man. Will you entertain the notion that Elise may not have been a perfect woman?'
'The notion does not entertain me.' Ricolf kicked at the dirt again. 'Well, we'll speak of that later. What's your pleasure for supper? We killed a sheep this afternoon, so there's mutton, or we can chop a couple of hens down to size if the two of you would rather.'
'Mutton,' Gerin and Van said in the same breath. The Fox added, ' We've been traveling a good deal these
