The Chernagor Pirates

As it did, Pouncer began to purr. Lanius had been waiting for that. It was a sign he could pick up the moncat without getting his hand shredded. He did. Pouncer kept on purring.

Feeling more than a little triumphant, Lanius carried the moncat— and the serving spoon it had stolen—out of the royal archives. The tax registers he left where they were. They dated from the early years of his fathers reign. No one had looked at them since; Lanius was sure of that. They weren’t going anywhere for the time being. And one of these days he would have to have a peek inside that crate Pouncer had been hiding behind.

Pouncer started twisting in the king’s arms and trying to get free before Lanius reached the moncats’ chamber. Lanius still had one strip of meat left. He offered it to the moncat, and bought just enough contentment to keep from getting clawed the rest of the way there. Pouncer even let him take away the wooden spoon.

Cucullatus clapped his hands when Lanius brought the spoon back to the kitchens. “Well done, Your Majesty!” he said, as though Lanius had just captured Yozgat and reclaimed the Scepter of Mercy.

“Thank you so much,” Lanius said.

“Kidney pie,” Cucullatus went on, ignoring or more likely not noticing the king’s irony. Lanius frowned; the commotion with the moncat had almost made him forget why he’d come to the kitchens in the first place. The chief cook went on, “Her Majesty will enjoy it. You wait and see.”

“Ah.” Lanius nodded. “Yes, I hope she does.”

Sosia did. When she sat down to supper on her birthday, she smiled and wagged a finger at Lanius. “Somebody’s been talking to the kitchens,” she said as a servant gave her a big helping of the pungent dish.

“Why would anyone talk to a kitchen?” Lanius asked. “Ovens and pots and skewers don’t listen very well.”

His wife gave him a severe look. “You know what I mean,” she said. “You’ve been talking to the people who work in the kitchens. There. Are you happier?”

“I couldn’t be happier, not while I’ve got you,” Lanius answered.

Sosia smiled. “That’s sweet,” she said. But then the smile slipped. “In that case, why—?” She stopped and shook her head. “No, never mind. Not tonight.”

Lanius had no trouble figuring out what she’d started to say. In that case, why did you take Cristata to bed? Why did you want to make her your second wife? To Lanius, it made good enough sense. He hadn’t been unhappy with Sosia. He’d just wanted to be happy with Cristata, too. He still didn’t see anything wrong with that. Grus’ daughter, however, had a decidedly different opinion.

And what about Zenaida? Lanius asked himself. He knew what Sosia’s opinion of her would be. He didn’t think he was in love with her, the way he had with Cristata. Maybe seeing that he didn’t would keep Sosia from getting so furious this time. On the other hand, maybe it wouldn’t do him any good at all. She’d better not find out about Zenaida, the king thought.

He smiled at Sosia. “Happy birthday,” he told her.

“You’re even eating the kidney pie yourself,” she said in some surprise.

And so Lanius was. His thoughts full of maidservants, he’d hardly noticed he was doing it. Now that he did notice, he was reminded again that this was not his favorite dish—too strong for his taste. Still, he shrugged and answered, “I don’t hate it,” which was true. As though to prove it, he took another bite. What he did prove, to himself, was that he didn’t love it, either.

“I’m glad,” Sosia said.

Later that evening, Lanius made love with his wife. He didn’t hate that, either. If Zenaida was a little more exciting… well, maybe that was because she wasn’t as familiar as Sosia—and maybe, also, because the thrill of the illicit added spice to what they did. Nothing illicit about Sosia, but nothing wrong with her, nothing that made him want to sleep apart. He did his best to please her when they joined.

By the way she responded, his best proved good enough. “You are sweet,” she said, as though reminding herself.

“I think the same thing—about you,” he added hastily, before she could tease him about thinking himself sweet. That was what he got for being precise most of the time.

He waited there in the darkness, wondering if Sosia would ask why he’d gone after Cristata if he thought she was sweet. But she didn’t. She just murmured, “Well, good,” rolled over on her side, and fell asleep. Lanius rolled over, too, in the opposite direction. His backside bumped hers. She stirred a little, but kept on breathing slowly and deeply. A few minutes later, Lanius also drifted off, a smile on his face.

A lieutenant from one of the river galleys on the Stura stood before King Grus. “Your Majesty, an awful lot of the Menteshe are sneaking south across the river. More and more every day, and especially every night. We’ve sunk half a dozen boats full of the stinking buggers, and more have gotten by us.”

This wasn’t the first such report Grus had heard. He scratched his head. Up until a few days before, Prince Ulash’s men hadn’t been doing anything of the sort. Sudden changes in what the Menteshe were up to made the King of Avornis deeply suspicious. “What have they got in mind?” he asked, though the lieutenant wasn’t going to know.

As he’d expected, the young officer shrugged and answered, “No idea, sir. We don’t get the chance to ask them a whole lot of questions. When we ram ’em, we sink ’em.” By the pride in his voice, he wanted to do nothing but sink them.

That suited Grus fine. He wanted his river-galley officers aggressive. He said, “Thank you, Lieutenant. I’ll see what I can do to get to the bottom of this.”

The officer bowed and left. Grus scratched his head again. He didn’t shake any answers loose. He hadn’t really thought he would. Being without answers, he summoned Pterocles. The wizard heard him out, then said, “That is interesting, Your Majesty. Why would they start going over the river now when they had seemed to want to stay on this side and fight?”

“I was hoping you could tell me,” Grus said. “Has there been a magical summons? Has the Banished One taken a hand in things?”

“I haven’t noticed anything out of the ordinary.” Pterocles spoke cautiously. Grus approved of that caution. Pterocles recognized the possibility that something might have slipped past him. He said, “I have spells that would tell me if something has gone on under my nose. A summons like that lingers on the ether. If it was there, I’ll find out about it.”

“Good,” Grus said. “Let me know.”

When Pterocles came back that afternoon, he looked puzzled and troubled. “Your Majesty, if any sort of sorcerous summons came north, I can’t find it,” he said. “I don’t quite know what that means.”

“Neither do I,” Grus said. Had the Banished One deceived his wizard? Or was Pterocles searching for something that wasn’t there to find? “If you know any other spells, you ought to use them,” Grus told him.

Pterocles nodded. “I will, though I’ve already tried the ones I think likeliest to work. You ought to try to take some Menteshe prisoners, too. They may know something I don’t.”

“I’ll do that,” Grus said at once. “I should have sent men out to do it when I first called you. A lot of the time, the Menteshe like to sing.”

He gave the orders. His men rode out. But Menteshe were starting to get scarce on the ground. Even a week earlier, discovering so few of them on the Avornan side of the Stura would have made Grus rejoice. He would have rejoiced now, if his men were the ones responsible for making the nomads want to get back to the lands they usually roamed. But his men hadn’t driven the Menteshe over the Stura, and he knew it. That left him suspicious. Why were the Menteshe leaving—fleeing— Avornis when they didn’t have to?

“I know what it is,” Hirundo said when a day’s search resulted in no prisoners.

“Tell me,” Grus urged. “I haven’t got any idea why they’re going.”

“It’s simple,” the general answered. “They must have heard you were going to put a tax on nomads in Avornis, so of course they ran away from it.” He grinned at his own cleverness. “By Olor’s beard, I would, too.”

“Funny.” Grus tried to sound severe, but a smile couldn’t help creeping out from behind the edges of his beard—it was funny, even if he wished it weren’t. He wagged a finger at Hirundo, who kept right on grinning, completely unabashed. Grus said, “Do you have any real idea why they’re doing it?”

“No,” Hirundo admitted. “All I can say is, good riddance.”