“Does that make it better or worse?” the other king asked.
Lanius thought it over. “I don’t know,” he said at last. “Do you?”
“What I know is… more about Ortalis than I wish I did,” Grus said—not a direct answer to what Lanius had said, but not an evasion, either.
The last soldiers passed into the city of Avornis. They were happy to be home, looking forward to beds in their barracks, to wine, and to women. What went on in the palace meant nothing to them. If they had to go fight, they would. Until then, they’d enjoy themselves.
Not for the first time, Lanius found himself jealous of men who could live for the moment. He sometimes wished he could do the same, without worrying about what would happen next. He laughed at himself. Given the nature he’d been born with, he might as well have wished for the moon while he was at it.
Even though Grus had lived softer in the field than his soldiers had, he was glad to return to the comforts of the palace. He was older than his soldiers, too, and needed to live softer. So he told himself, anyhow.
Estrilda greeted him cautiously, the way she did whenever he came back from campaign. Her look plainly said she wondered what he’d been up to in the land of the Chernagors. This time, he could look her straight in the eye, for he’d been up to very little. For one thing, the Chernagor women hadn’t much appealed to him. For another, he’d reached the age where conquests of that sort were less urgent than they had been in earlier years. That didn’t mean he didn’t enjoy them when they happened—Estrilda evidently hadn’t yet found out about his bastard boy by Alauda, for which he was duly grateful—but he didn’t go after them as energetically as he might have when he was younger.
Still somewhat suspicious, Estrilda said, “You were away for a long time.”
“So I was,” Grus said. “There was a lot to do, and doing it wasn’t easy. If you paid any attention to my dispatches, you’d know that.”
“Not everything you do ends up in your dispatches,” his wife answered. “I’ve seen that.”
He wanted to tell her she was wrong, or at least foolish, but she would know he was lying if he did. All he did do was shrug and say, “Not this time.” If Estrilda felt like quarreling, she would.
She didn’t. “It’s good to have you back,” she said.
“It’s good to be back,” Grus said. “If I had to right now, I do believe I’d kill for a hot bath.”
He soaked in a copper tub for more than an hour, scrubbing away the grime of the campaign and simply luxuriating in the water. Whenever it began to cool down, servants drained some and fetched in more jars of hot water from the kitchens. The king hated to get out. After scrubbing, he leaned his head back in the tub, wondering if he could fall asleep there. Not quite, he discovered, though he did come close.
After the bath, supper. He’d had his fill of seafood up in the Chernagor country. Roast goose stuffed with bread crumbs and dried apples stuck to the ribs. He’d drunk a lot of ale in the north—better that than water, which often brought disease—but sweet wine was better. And, after that, lying down in his own bed might have been best of all.
Estrilda lay down beside him. She had, he noticed, put on fresh perfume. He’d thought he would go straight to sleep. As things turned out, he didn’t. But when his eyes did close, he slept very soundly.
He woke up in the morning feeling, if not younger than the day before, then at least oiled and repaired. Now that he was back, he had to get on top of things again. Otherwise, who was the real king? Was he? Or was Lanius?
Before any of that, though, he saw his grandchildren. Crex and Pitta both wondered why he hadn’t brought them any presents from the Chernagor country. “Sorry, my dears,” he said. “I was worried about bringing me back. I didn’t worry much about presents.” He had tribute from Hisardzik and Jobuka, but he didn’t think silver coins with the faces of shaggy-bearded princes on them would fascinate children.
Capella didn’t ask for presents. She waved her arms and legs in Limosa’s arms and smiled up toothlessly at the king. “She’s a pretty child, Your Highness,” Grus said.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Limosa answered politely. “I wish her other grandfather could see her, too.”
“I’m sorry,” Grus said. “I
“Even if he isn’t why your son and I got married?” Limosa said. “Even if we got married because—” She didn’t go on. She turned red and looked down at her baby.
Grus had a pretty good idea of what she would have said. It made him want to blush, too, even if he hadn’t actually heard it. He was afraid she would show him her back. To his relief, she didn’t. He gathered himself. “Even then,” he told her. “If your father wasn’t plotting that, he was plotting something else. He’ll stay where he is.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Limosa whispered. She took Capella away, as though that was the only way she could find to punish Grus. And so it probably was.
Ortalis didn’t come to pay his respects. Grus sent a servant after him. When the king finally saw his son, he said, “Well, now that you’ve finally done it, how does it feel to kill a man?”
“I knew you were going to bother me about that,” Ortalis said sullenly. “I knew it. And I didn’t even enjoy sticking the knife in him. It just… happened, that’s all. I wish it hadn’t. But he got me angry, and then he said something really foul, and—” He shrugged.
Eyeing him, Grus decided it could easily have been worse. Ortalis wasn’t consumed by remorse, but at least he had some idea of what it was. Grus said, “You should have just punched him.”
“I suppose so,” his son said. “His woman and her brats are taken care of. Lanius made sure of that. Can I go now, or do you want to yell at me some more? I don’t kill servants for fun.”
“All right,” Grus said, and Ortalis left. Grus sighed. Considering what Ortalis did do for fun, was it any wonder that Grus had wondered? He didn’t think so.
“Where is he?” Grus asked.
“He’s got a lady friend. He’s with her,” the guard answered.
“At this hour of the morning?” Grus exclaimed. The guard smirked and nodded. Grus said, “If I were wearing a hat, I’d take it off to him. Shall I wait until he’s, ah, finished?”
“I can fetch him, if you like,” the guardsman said.
“No, never mind,” Grus said. “I’ll come back and visit him later. He wouldn’t thank me for interrupting him, would he?”
“I don’t know about that, Your Majesty, but /wouldn’t,” the guard replied, chuckling at his own cleverness.
“All right, then. I’ll try again in an hour or so,” Grus said, and left.
When he came back, the guard nodded to him. “He’s here now, Your Majesty,” the fellow said. “He’s waiting for you.”
“Your Majesty!” Otus said when Grus walked into his chamber. “It is good to see you again.”
“Good to see you,” Grus answered. “I’m more pleased than I can tell you at how well you’re doing.” That was the truth. Only Otus’ southern accent and a certain slight hesitation in his speech said that he had been a thrall. He looked bright and alert and altogether like a normal man. He evidently acted like a normal man, too. “Who’s your, ah, friend?” Grus asked.
“Her name is Calypte, Your Majesty.” Otus seemed less happy than Grus had thought he might. “She is very sweet. And yet… You know I have a woman down in the south, a woman who is still a thrall?”
“Yes, I know that.” The king nodded.
Otus sighed. “I do her wrong when I do this. I understand that. But I am here, and she is there—and she is hardly more than a brute beast. I loved her when I was a beast myself. I might love her if she were a beast no more. Your Majesty, so many thralls down there! Save them!”
Otus’ appeal didn’t surprise Grus. The power with which the ex-thrall phrased it did. “I’ll do what I can,” the king answered. “I don’t know how much that will be. It will depend on the civil war among the Menteshe, and on how well wizards besides Pterocles can learn to cure thralls.”
