He wondered whether the men of Nishevatz would try to hold Varazdin against him, but his men found the fortress not only abandoned but destroyed, the keep wrecked and one of the outer walls pulled down. Maybe they thought he could quickly overcome whatever garrison they put into the place, or maybe they were saving everything they had to defend the walls of their city-state.
Either way, Grus thought they were making a mistake. Had he been in charge of Nishevatz, he would have defended the place as far forward as he could. If Vasilko was willing to let him get close, he would say thank you and do his best to take advantage of that. He pressed on into the land of the Chernagors.
Three days later, one of his scouts came riding back to the main body of the army, calling, “The sea! The sea!” The man pointed north.
Grus soon rode up over a low rise and spied the sea for himself. As always, he was struck by how different it was from the Azanian Sea on the east coast of Avornis. The waters there were blue and warm and inviting, the beaches made from golden sand. The beaches here were mud flats. The sea was greenish gray, a color that didn’t seem quite healthy to him. The sky was gray, too, the gray of newly sheared wool before it was washed. Wisps of mist kept the king from getting as good a view of either sea or sky as he would have wanted.
“No wonder the Chernagors like to turn pirate,” Hirundo said, gazing out at the bleak landscape. “If I lived in country like this, I’d do my best to get away from it, too.”
Sandpipers scurried along at the border between sea and land, poking their beaks into the mud to look for whatever little creatures they hunted. Gulls mewed overhead, soaring along on narrow pointed wings. The air smelled of moisture and salt and seaweed and faintly nasty things Grus couldn’t quite name.
Prince Vsevolod rode up to him. The Chernagors eyes shone, though his breath smoked each time he exhaled. “Is wonderful country, yes?” he boomed.
“I’m glad it pleases you, Your Highness,” Grus answered, as diplomatically as he could.
“Wonderful country,” Vsevolod repeated. “Not too hot like Avornis, with sweat all time in summer. Not cold all through winter, either. Just right.”
“To each his own,” Grus said.
“To each his own, yes.” Vsevolod seemed to cherish the cliche. “And Nishevatz—Nishevatz is my own.”
“May we soon set you back on the throne there, then,” Grus said, thinking,
They’d come to the sea east of the town, and moved toward it until they made camp for the night. Grus took care to post sentries well out from the camp, to bring back warning if the Chernagors tried to strike. And, remembering the disaster that had almost befallen his army while fighting the Menteshe, he summoned Pterocles. “Be sure you drink your fill of wine this evening,” he told the wizard. “If you have to ease yourself, you’ll beat any sleep spell the enemy sends your way.”
Pterocles smiled. “I will set up sorcerous wards, too, Your Majesty,” he replied. “They will not take me by surprise twice the same way.”
“Good.” Grus nodded. “Do you have any idea what new surprises they’ll try to use?”
“If I did, they wouldn’t be surprises, would they?” Pterocles held the cheerful expression.
“Do you sense the Banished One?” Grus asked.
Now the wizard’s smile blew out like a candle flame. “So far, I have not, except in a general way. This is a land where he has an interest, but it is not a land where he is concentrating all his attention, the way he did when he laid me low.”
“He has other things on his mind right now,” Grus said, and Pterocles nodded. The king went on, “As long as Sanjar and Korkut keep whacking away at each other, the Banished One ought to worry most about the south.” Pterocles nodded again. Grus finished, “In that case, I hope they fight each other for the next ten years.”
“That would be nice,” Pterocles agreed, and some of his smile came back.
The army went on toward Nishevatz the next morning. Offshore, far out of bowshot or even catapult range, tall-masted Chernagor ships sailed along, keeping an eye on the Avornans. Grus wished he had tall ships of his own in these waters; the little flotilla Lanius sent out had come back to Avornis during the winter, having lost one ship, sunk several, and earned what the Chernagors of Durdevatz said would be their undying gratitude. Every so often here, one of these ships would sail off to Nishevatz, presumably to report on whatever its crew had seen. The rest kept on shadowing Grus’ army.
After a while, he got fed up with that and called for Pterocles again. “You made a magic against the Chernagor transports,” he said. “Can you use the same spell against these snoops?”
The wizard eyed the clouds and swirling mist overhead. He spread his hands in apology—or started to. His mule chose that moment to misstep, and he had to make a hasty grab for the reins.
“I see.” Trouble was, Grus did; what Pterocles said made altogether too much sense. Now the king rode thoughtfully for a little while before saying, “Well, when you see the chance, take it.”
“I will, Your Majesty,” Pterocles said.
As though to mock Grus’ hopes, a fine drizzle began sifting down out of the sky. Grumpily, he put on a broad-brimmed felt hat to keep the water off his face and to keep it from trickling down the back of his neck. “Remind the men to grease their mail well tonight,” he called to Hirundo. “Otherwise, it will rust.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Hirundo promised.
But the drizzle also made it harder for the Chernagors aboard ship to watch the Avornan army. They had to come closer and closer to the shore, until finally they were almost within bowshot. Curses wafted across the water when one of them ran aground. Grus cursed, too, for he couldn’t do anything about it. There was no point to assembling his catapults to pound the ships when they would be as useless with wet skeins of hair as a bow with a wet string.
Hirundo shared his frustration, but said, “They’re still in trouble out there, whether we put them in trouble or not.”
“I suppose so,” Grus said. “I wish we could take better advantage of it, though.” He shrugged ruefully. “I wish for all sorts of things I won’t get. Who doesn’t?”
“Best way to take advantage is to take Nishevatz,” Vsevolod said. “When we take Nishevatz, we punish all traitors. Oh, yes.” He rubbed his hands together in anticipation of doing just that.
Grus wondered how much like Vsevolod his son Vasilko was. He wouldn’t have been surprised if Vasilko took after his father a great deal indeed. And if Vsevolod had followed the Banished One, would Vasilko have fled to the city of Avornis and bowed down to Olor and Quelea and the rest of the gods in the heavens? Grus wouldn’t have been surprised there, either. Whatever one of them chose, the other seemed to want the opposite.
That didn’t mean Vsevolod was wrong here. “We’ll do our best, Your Highness,” Grus said. “Then you should do your best.”
“Oh, I will,” Vsevolod said. “I will.” His tone suggested that what he meant by
He rode on toward Nishevatz for a while. Then something else occurred to him. If a lot of people in Nishevatz hadn’t already decided Vsevolod was intolerable, would they have banded together behind Vasilko and helped him oust his father? Grus sighed. He looked over to the white-bearded Prince of Nishevatz. The longer he looked, the more he wished he hadn’t thought of that.
“Excuse me,” Limosa said. Ortalis’ wife got up and left the supper table faster than was seemly. When she came back a few minutes later, she looked more than a little green.
“Are you all right?” Lanius asked.
