Grus shook his head. “Not at all. I came to ask you a question.”
“Go on,” Lanius said. Spider squirmed. He let the moncat go. It scrambled over to its mother. Bronze scooped up the kitten and held it in an amazingly humanlike embrace.
“You’ve met my daughter, Sosia,” Grus said. Lanius nodded, puzzled—that wasn’t a question. When Lanius did no more than nod, Grus did ask a question. “What do you think of her?”
In truth, Lanius hadn’t thought much of Sosia, for good or ill. He’d noticed she wasn’t far from his own age, and that was about all. He didn’t much care for her brother, but he got the notion Grus didn’t much care for Ortalis, either. “What do I think of your daughter?” he echoed now. “She’s… very nice.” That seemed as safe an answer as he could give.
But it turned out not to be safe enough. Grus beamed at him.
“I’m glad to hear you say so, Your Majesty. By the gods, I’m very glad. I’ll announce the betrothal tomorrow.”
“Betrothal?” Lanius squeaked. He hadn’t even seen the trap till it flipped him up into the air and left him dangling upside down.
Grus nodded vigorously. “Certainly, a betrothal. What better way to tie our two houses together than a wedding between them?”
“King Dagipert wanted to marry me to his daughter, too,” Lanius said.
Had Grus wanted to take that the wrong way, he could have made Lanius sorry—very sorry—he’d ever said it. As things were, the other king answered mildly, saying, “Dagipert is a foreigner, a barbarian, an enemy to Avornis. I hope you’ll agree I’m none of those things.”
You’d better agree I’m none of those things, his tone warned. And he was an Avornan, no doubt of that. Still… “I’m not sure I want to marry at all,” Lanius said, trying to escape the snare.
“Oh, of course you do,” Grus said. “You’ve found out about women, haven’t you?” He was gentle. He was genial. He was also implacable. Lanius hadn’t imagined how formidable he could be.
I can’t even lie. He knows better. “Yes,” he said unhappily.
“Well, then.” Grus smiled a wide, cheerful smile. Lanius supposed it was a father-in-lawish kind of smile. He didn’t have standards of comparison there, though. He’d never seen Dagipert smile, although he supposed Arch-Hallow Bucco had. Grus went on, “Don’t you think it would be better to get yourself a wife and not have to worry about chasing after serving girls when you’re in the mood?”
“I don’t know,” Lanius answered honestly. Then he asked a question of his own. “Didn’t you do some chasing of your own even after you got yourself a wife?”
By the look Grus gave him, the other King of Avornis hadn’t expected that. But Grus soon steadied himself. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. As you’ll probably have heard—you seem to have heard all sorts of things—I have a bastard boy in the south. He’s not far from your age, as a matter of fact. I spent a lot of time away from home, you know.”
Lanius didn’t know. Except for his one brief campaigning foray, he’d never spent any time away from home. “What’s his name?” he asked. That wasn’t just his usual curiosity. Grus’ illegitimate son might soon become a sort of relative by marriage.
“He’s called Anser,” Grus replied. “He seems a likely lad, or reasonably so. I’ve been giving his mother money to raise him for years. Now that I’ve… come up in the world a bit, I’ll have to do more than that.”
Lanius didn’t say anything. If this Anser was a likely lad, he could fill one of any number of posts, and perhaps fill it well. If he turned out not to be so likely, would that stop Grus from appointing him to a position where what he did mattered? Lanius filed that away. He’d have to see what Grus did, and what Anser did after Grus decided where to put him.
Meanwhile, Grus wasn’t about to ease the pressure on Lanius himself. “What do you say?” he asked. “I want to announce the betrothal as soon as I can.”
I’m sure you do, Lanius thought. The more tightly Grus grafted his family to the longtime reigning dynasty, the harder he’d be to pry loose. Lanius considered simply telling him no. Then he looked at Grus’ face. On second thought, that didn’t seem so wise. What kind of accident or illness would you arrange for me? he wondered. Bucco had tried it. Lanius had managed to foil him. He didn’t think he could foil Grus, who seemed alarmingly capable. Maybe I’d better become his son-in-law. He might not want to arrange any misfortune for me if I’m married to his daughter.
But despite that thought, Lanius asked, “What does Sosia think about marrying me?”
“She thinks you’re very nice,” Grus answered, which might have meant his daughter thought Lanius was very nice, or might have meant Grus hadn’t bothered getting his daughter’s opinion. But then Grus added, “And I believe she also thinks joining our two houses would be a good idea.”
That, if true, interested Lanius. Unlike the other, it wasn’t something Grus had had to say. “Does she?” Lanius asked.
His fellow king nodded. “Yes. Sosia’s a clever girl. She’ll do what needs doing.”
Had he said she was beautiful, Lanius would have known he was lying. He’d seen her himself. She was pleasant, but far from gorgeous. Cleverness, though… Cleverness did pique Lanius’ curiosity. He didn’t know much about what he wanted in a wife, but he didn’t think he could put up with a stupid woman. “Well,” he said, “let’s see what happens.”
“Do we really have to do this?” Estrilda asked.
Grus stared at his wife. “Where do you think we’ll get a better match for Sosia? How can you get a higher match than the King of Avornis?”
“I don’t say you can get a higher match. Of course you can’t. But better?” Estrilda shrugged. “How can you know? I wouldn’t have wanted to marry anybody like Lanius when I was a girl. He thinks too much.”
“Well, you never said I did anything like that,” Grus answered, trying to tease a smile from Estrilda. It didn’t work. Frowning himself, Grus went on, “It’s the best thing we can do for the family.”
“How often do men ‘help’ the family by making their women miserable?” his wife returned. “You didn’t even ask Sosia if this was what she wanted to do. You just went and told Lanius he’d wed her. That’s no way to do things.”
“All right, then—we’ll ask her,” Grus said. “If she tells us yes, we’ll go ahead. If she says no…” His voice trailed away. He didn’t know what he’d do if Sosia said she didn’t want to marry Lanius. Probably see if he could talk her into changing her mind. He’d have to do that when Estrilda wasn’t listening.
When he and Estrilda walked into Sosia’s chamber, he found his daughter embroidering a unicorn on a square of linen. He thought unicorns were imaginary beasts, but wasn’t quite sure. After the Chernagors had brought those moncats to the city of Avornis, he wasn’t so positive what could be real and what couldn’t.
He wasted no time on preliminaries, but asked Sosia, “What do you think of being betrothed to Lanius?”
Sosia only shrugged; she seemed less worried about it than her mother. That’s something, anyhow, Grus thought. Then his daughter answered, “I think it will be all right. He’s not ugly, and I don’t think he’s mean.”
She looked around after she said that. So, automatically, did Grus and Estrilda. But Ortalis, wherever he was, wasn’t in earshot. Grus said, “I’m sorry I didn’t talk more with you about the match before I went and made it.” He was willing to throw Estrilda a sop if he could. Why not? Sosia seemed willing to marry Lanius, if not bursting with enthusiasm at the prospect.