'Why?' The Fox considered that. 'I can think of a couple of reasons. One is, I may be just a mortal, but I've been around a lot longer than you have. I know more about the world than you do.'
The first of those statements was undoubtedly true. The second would undoubtedly have been true were Ferdulf an ordinary four-year old. Were Ferdulf an ordinary four-year-old, though, he wouldn't have tried flying off with the Fox, and he wouldn't have tried decorating him with a mallard's head, either.
Whatever else Ferdulf was, he wasn't trained to catch logical flaws. He accepted what the Fox told him more readily than Gerin would have. 'That's one,' he said. 'What's two?'
'Two is very simple,' Gerin answered. 'I just showed you I'm strong enough to do it, didn't I?'
Besides being Aragis' argument over Balser's allegiance, that also had its logical flaws. How long would Gerin go on being stronger than Ferdulf? What would happen when he wasn't stronger any more? Gerin didn't know the answers to those questions. He could think of things liable to be more pleasant than discovering what those answers were.
But Ferdulf, though a demigod, was a four-year-old demigod. As with any other four-year-old, things as they were now seemed close to the way they would be forever. 'Yes, you're stronger,' he said, angry resignation in his voice. 'But not everybody is.'
If that aside didn't want to make Herris, and maybe Fulda, too, run somewhere far, far away, maybe it should have. Gerin carefully chose a different issue. 'I'm not the only one who's stronger than you, Ferdulf. What about Selatre, my wife?' Despite her disclaimer to Marlanz, Ferdulf had been known to heed what she said.
'That's not fair!' he exclaimed now. 'The god she knows still keeps an eye on her, and my father won't pay any attention to me.'
'You can tell that farseeing Biton still holds Selatre in his mind?' Gerin asked.
'Of course,' Ferdulf said. 'Can't you?'
He didn't altogether grasp how limited the ordinary human sensorium was. He'd also said something else interesting, though he probably didn't know it. So Mavrix was less than attentive to his offspring, was he? That didn't surprise Gerin, though he hadn't known it before. A god of unbridled fertility didn't strike the Fox as likely to make the most devoted parent for any one child.
'Will you behave yourself?' he demanded of the little demigod.
'I suppose so,' Ferdulf answered.
'No more pigducks or duckpigs?' Gerin said. Having Dagref in his household, he'd learned better than to leave loopholes open: 'And no more mixing any other creatures-or people-together, all right?'
'All right,' Ferdulf said, not too much sulk in his voice. Gerin didn't trust his promise very far, but didn't altogether discount it, either. From what he'd seen of Ferdulf, the promise was worth about as much-and as little-as that of any other child of the same age. Sooner or later, the demigod would forget he'd made it and do something else appalling. That was how children behaved, even children of large powers. But the Fox didn't think Ferdulf would go out and deliberately break his word.
'Fair enough,' he said. 'We have a bargain, then.' Ferdulf nodded and went off to play. Gerin didn't think he walked a couple of feet off the ground intending to intimidate. More likely, he just wasn't thinking about what he was doing.
Herris Bigfoot, by now, took such minor impossibilities in stride. He said, 'Thank you, lord king. We are grateful to you, believe me, for keeping him under what control you do.'
Gerin looked him straight in the eye. 'Quack,' he answered seriously. 'Quack, quack, quack.' Herris looked horrified. Fulda gasped in dismay. Gerin let both of them stew for a moment, then started to laugh.
'That wasn't nice, lord king,' Fulda said, sounding more sorrowful than angry.
He thought about it. When Ferdulf terrorized the villagers, he didn't know any better. Gerin did. 'You're right, of course,' he told Fulda. 'I shouldn't have done it. I'm sorry.'
If anything, the apology-the second in the space of a few minutesdisconcerted her more than the quacks had. 'You're the king,' she blurted. 'You don't have to say you're sorry to the likes of me.'
He shook his head. 'No, you're wrong. It's Aragis who never needs to say he's sorry. That's the difference between us, right there.' Fulda didn't understand. He hadn't expected she would.
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Contents
II
'Who comes to Fox Keep?' called the sentry up on the palisade.
'I am Balser Debo's son,' came the reply from the chariot outside the keep. 'I am here to give homage and fealty to Gerin the Fox, the king of the north, to acknowledge him as my suzerain and overlord of my barony.'
The sentry whirled to see where Gerin was. As it happened, he was standing in the courtyard not far away. 'Did you hear that, lord king?' he exclaimed, his voice going high and shrill with excitement. 'Did you hear that?'
'I heard it,' the Fox answered. He'd been waiting for this moment for some time, waiting for it and at the same time half hoping-maybe more than half hoping-it would not come. Now that it was here, though, he would have to make the most of it. He raised his voice: 'Balser Debo's son is welcome at Fox Keep. Let him enter!'
Bronze chain clattered as the gate crew lowered the drawbridge. Balser's chariot rolled into the courtyard. The driver reined in the fine two-horse team. Balser got down from the car and walked over to the Fox. He was a young man, dark, slim, not very tall but well put together, who wore his beard in the forked style that had long been out of date but was suddenly all the rage again.
Like the first stone sliding down a mountain to start an avalanche (Gerin remembered how the Elabonian Empire had blocked the last pass through the High Kirs with just such an avalanche, leaving the northlands to their own devices when the Trokmoi invaded), Balser was going to cause a lot more trouble than he ever could have accounted for by himself. His coming here, in fact, was no doubt the beginning of the rockslide.
Well, no help for it. Gerin hurried to meet him halfway. The two men clasped hands. 'I greet you, Balser Debo's son,' the Fox said as his men gathered to watch the drama unfold. 'Use my keep as your own as long as you are here.'
'I thank you, lord king,' Balser replied. 'If you should ever come south, my keep is likewise yours.'
Gerin nodded. He was glad to make a new guest-friend. Webs of host and guest, guest and host, each bound by the sacred ties of friendship to do no harm to the other, stretched across the northlands. Without them, feuds among barons would have been even worse than they were.
But Balser had not traveled here to become a guest-friend, however pleasing that might have been for the southern baron. 'You're certain you want to become my vassal?' Gerin said. 'You don't care to stay your own lord, as your father and grandfather were before you?'
'My father and grandfather never had to worry about Aragis the Archer.' Balser sent Gerin a curious look. 'Is it that you don't want my vassalage, lord king? That's not what you gave me to understand before.'
'No. It isn't that. Aragis has threatened you. Aragis has tried to scare you out of your breeches, as a matter of fact.' The breeches in question were dyed in bright checks of maroon and yellow, a Trokm? mode that had grown fashionable among men of Elabonian blood, too. Scaring Balser out of them would, in Gerin's opinion, have improved his wardrobe. That, however, was not of the essence. 'I don't blame you for wanting me to protect you from him, and I'll do just that.'
'The gods be praised-and you, too, lord king, for your generosity,' Balser said. 'That's exactly what I want. I'm not strong enough to hold him off on my own-he's shown me that. You let your vassals remember they're men; I'd sooner go with you than have him swallow me down.'
'For which I thank you.' The Fox didn't want to thank Balser, not really. He wanted to kick him. He wanted to kick Aragis, too, for frightening Balser into his own arms. He wanted to kick Aragis for being too arrogant to blame himself for frightening Balser, too. Had Aragis shown only a little more restraint, Balser would have stayed neutral.
But the only man in all the northlands who had ever made the Archer show restraint was Gerin. Precisely because Gerin worried him, he could not bear to have the Fox ruling Balser's barony, which lay close to his own.
