Lanius had never been so angry—not even, he thought, when Arch-Hallow Bucco sent his mother away for the first time. That had been a boy’s burst of temper. This was a man’s rage—the rage any man grown might feel at being condescended to, talked down to.
What made the rage worse yet was that Lanius knew how completely impotent it was. If he summoned soldiers to seize his fellow king, what would they do? He knew all too well. They would laugh, seize him, instead, and haul him before Grus.
What if I flee the camp? he thought. What if I go over to Corvus and Corax myself?
He stopped and rubbed his chin. His beard was still thin and scraggly, but it was a beard; that it might make Grus think him still a boy never crossed his mind. If he went over to the rebels, he would strike his father-in-law a heavy blow. Some of the soldiers who fought for Grus might follow him to Corvus and Corax. Others would surely waver in their loyalty to the new king.
A lot of youths would have thought so far and no further— except how to sneak out of camp and head south. But second thoughts, for Lanius, were as natural and automatic as first ones. King Mergus, his father, had been a man of headlong action. King Grus was cut from the same cloth. Lanius wished he were. Whatever he wished, he knew he wasn’t.
As things were, he stood rubbing his chin for some little while, thinking things through. The question he asked himself that most youths wouldn’t have was, If I go over to Corvus and Corax, and if Grus doesn’t catch me trying it, what happens next?
The more he thought about that, the less he liked the answers he got. Corvus had already declared himself king. Would he drop that claim because the legitimate king came into his camp? Lanius’ lips quirked in a bitter, mocking smile. Not likely. From everything Lanius could see, nobody ever dropped a claim like that as long as his head stayed on his shoulders.
What then? Lanius saw only one answer—Corvus would treat him the same way Grus was treating him, would use him as a puppet, as a mask. He himself would stay king in name, and Corvus would be king in fact. He had no particular illusions about Count Corvus’ character. If Corvus ever decided he wasn’t useful or wasn’t necessary anymore, he would suffer an unfortunate accident or illness in short order.
Grus could have slain him. Instead, Grus had married him to Sosia. Lanius had come to be fond of Grus’ daughter, no matter how furious he was at Grus himself. Would he stay—would he be allowed to stay—wed to her if he went over to Count Corvus and Corvus won? He shook his head. That answer was painfully obvious. You might not stay wed to her if you go over to Corvus and Corvus loses, he told himself.
Lanius started to laugh, though it wasn’t really funny. Here in half a minute, he’d talked himself out of running off to the rebels. I’ll have to avenge myself some other way.
Scowling, Grus peered across the Enipeus River. On the far side stood Count Corvus’ keep and, somewhat farther away, Count Corax’s. More to the point, drawn up on the far side of the river stood the rebels’ army, plainly determined to keep Grus and his men from crossing.
He turned to General Hirundo. “What do we do about this?” he asked.
“I presume we can get the boats and such we need to force our way across?” Hirundo asked in return.
Directed at the man who had been commodore, that was the next thing to an insult. “We can get them, yes,” Grus said shortly.
“All right, Your Majesty.” As usual, Hirundo sounded cheerful. “Once we do, we use them to run the rebels ragged. We get part of our army over the river someplace where they’re not patrolling very hard, and we make that part out to be bigger than it is, so they come pelting up with all their men to squash it. Then we put the rest of the army on the southern bank somewhere else and go after them hard from behind.”
“The risk being that they beat the one part and then come back and beat the other,” Grus remarked.
“Your Majesty, there is some risk of that, yes, but not a lot. The way I look at things, Corvus couldn’t beat a rug if you handed him a paddle.”
Grus snorted. “You’re probably right.” He grew a little more serious. “Don’t take too many chances, though. Remember— even though you’re probably right, you may be wrong, and you may make yourself wrong by being too sure you’re right.”
Hirundo contemplated that. At last, he said, “There are times when I think you’re wasted as King of Avornis, Your Majesty. You might have done better as arch-hallow instead.”
“No, thanks,” Grus said at once. “Let’s make the arrangements.”
He summoned Captain Nicator and told him what he wanted. Nicator’s beard had grown white as new snow, and Grus’ longtime comrade now had to cup a hand behind his ear to make out the king’s words. Once he did, though, he nodded. “I’ll take care of it, boss,” he said. “Don’t you worry about a thing.”
“I always worry,” Grus answered.
“Well, don’t—not this time,” Nicator told him. “When I say I’ll take care of things, don’t I do it?”
He proved as good as his word. He always had, for as long as Grus had known him. Along with river galleys, smaller boats started showing up on the Enipeus within a few days. Grus didn’t know where Nicator came up with them; by all he could tell, the captain might have pulled them out of his back pocket. They raced up and down the river. That was a game Nicator’s and Grus’ ships had played against the Menteshe down in the far south. The rebels’ horsemen galloped after the ships, now this way, now that. Some of Hirundo’s men started moving up and down the river, too.
“By the time we’re done, Corvus and Corax won’t dare sit down, for fear we’ll be standing behind their chairs with a knife.” Nicator sounded as though he was enjoying himself.
Grus grinned. “That’s what I want. That’s exactly what I want.”
Nicator proved as good as his word, or even a little better. He started landing little bands of soldiers on the southern bank of the river, some here, some there, some somewhere else. They would shoot a few arrows at the rebel scouts who came up to spy out how many of them there were, start a few fires, run off a few sheep and pigs, and then get back onto the boats and river galleys and recross the Enipeus. Corvus and Corax had nothing to speak of on the river. Some soldiers had gone over to them, and they’d raised more from the farmers on their estates. But sailors remained overwhelmingly loyal to Grus.
“Think they’re ripe yet?” Nicator asked one afternoon.
After weighing things, Grus nodded. “Yes. Let’s get this over with—if we can.”
When the sun rose the next day, Nicator ferried Hirundo’s force over the Enipeus. Corvus and Corax’s men needed longer than they should have to realize this wasn’t another pinprick raid. The first few scout companies that went up against the attackers vanished without trace. Then the whole rebel army began to move, in sudden, desperate haste. From the north bank of the river, Grus watched the pillar of dust that signaled where every force moving on land in summertime was.
As soon as he was sure Corvus and Corax had committed themselves, he ordered the rest of his own force onto Nicator’s fleet. Horns blared. Sergeants shouted and cursed. Horses neighed or simply snorted in resignation. And the fleet did what Grus had wanted from it—it put his men right in the rebels’ rear.