“Oh, yes,” Lepturus replied with a bland nod. “Royal bodyguards took care of that earlier this morning.” He smiled. His words meant, Your marines may watch you, but they can’t be everywhere at once.
“Thank you so much,” Grus said, as blandly. If anything happens to them, you pay.
“I’m sure they’ll be very comfortable there,” Queen Certhia said. For as long as we need you to do these things we can’t do for ourselves, she didn’t add. Again, Grus had no trouble hearing it even so. As soon as that’s taken care of, we’ll throw you out— if we decide to let you live, that is— and we’ll throw them out, too.
“I’m looking forward to doing everything I can,” Grus said.
For a wonder, King Lanius asked him a serious question. “How will you hold back Dagipert and the Thervings when Count Corvus couldn’t?”
“I’d be a liar if I said I knew all the answers yet, Your Majesty,” Grus replied. “The only thing I can promise is, I’ll do my best not to let Dagipert or anybody else catch me napping.”
“Good,” Lanius said. His mother and Lepturus didn’t seem to think it sounded quite so good. When Grus said he wouldn’t let anybody catch him napping, he’d included them along with everyone else. Plainly, they’d understood that.
Lanius had wondered whether having a protector in the palace would be like having his father back again. He didn’t remember King Mergus well; the older he got, the more he realized just how young he’d been when Mergus died. Grus didn’t remind him of the dead king, or try to fill Mergus‘—or even Lepturus’—place. He simply went about the business of trying to put Avornis back together again. Any kingdom that owed its survival only to the strong walls of its capital and to paying tribute needed rebuilding.
He wasted no time in summoning counts Corax and Corvus to the royal palace to account for themselves. He also summoned several other nobles close to the brothers. They all wasted no time in refusing him. Grus sent for them again, this time in King Lanius’ name.
As Lanius signed the orders, he asked Grus, “Why didn’t you summon them in my name in the first place?”
“Well, Your Majesty, if I’m the legal protector, my orders should be good on their own, shouldn’t they?” the naval officer replied. “The other side of the coin is, if they refuse me, it’s not quite treason. Now they’ve had that chance, and they’ve taken it when I wish they wouldn’t have. So we give it another try, this time with your signature. Maybe it won’t drive them into real rebellion. I hope it doesn’t.”
“Do you?” Lanius eyed him. “If you did, wouldn’t you not summon them at all? Wouldn’t you pretend nothing bad had happened?”
“Yes, I suppose I could do that, Your Majesty,” Grus said. “But if I did, who’d be running Avornis? Would you? Would I? Or would Corvus and Corax be calling the shots? If I’m going to play this part, I’ll play it to the hilt.”
“All right,” Lanius said. “That does make some sense. You’re not doing it just because you don’t get along with them.” He raised an ironic eyebrow.
“Why, Your Majesty!” Grus said, eyes widening. “Would I do such a thing?”
“Probably,” Lanius answered. “If people get to the top, one of the things they do is pay back their enemies.”
He watched Grus watching him. Grus’ mouth twitched. Anger? A suppressed smile? Lanius couldn’t tell. At last, the commodore said, “No, you’re no fool, are you?”
“I try not to be,” Lanius answered. “I’m never going to be a big, strong man. If I don’t use my head, what have I got going for me?”
“What? I’ll tell you what. You’re the king, that’s what,” Grus said.
“How long will I stay the king if I don’t know what I’m doing?” Lanius returned. He felt himself flushing, and hoped Grus wouldn’t see. “And even if I do stay king, what does it matter?”
Again, Grus thought before he spoke. When he did, he said, “The first part of that is a real question. As for the second, though, Your Majesty, being king matters a lot. Never doubt it. If it didn’t, why would so many people want the job?”
Lanius considered that. It was his turn not to answer for a while. He finally said, “There’s more to you than meets the eye, I believe. You think about these things.”
“Who, me?” Grus shook his head. “Not a chance. I’m just a tool your mother picked up on account of it was handy. She’ll use it till it does what she needs or till it breaks, whichever happens first. Then she’ll get herself another tool, and use that instead. If you don’t believe me, just ask her.”
Lepturus presumed to be sardonic in Lanius’ presence. So did his tutor. They both enjoyed an immunity based on long acquaintance. Grus didn’t. He spoke his mind anyhow. He spoke it as though he didn’t care what Lanius thought of him. Maybe he truly didn’t. Maybe he wanted Lanius to think he didn’t. The more Lanius saw of him, the deeper he seemed.
“What are you planning to do about the Thervings?” Lanius asked him. “That’s why you’re here, after all.”
“Can’t go fight ’em in their country, not the way things are,” Grus answered, and the king couldn’t disagree. “I can—I hope I can—pick generals who’re able to see past the end of their noses. And I can hold the city of Avornis, and King Dagipert knows I can, too. That means he can’t conquer the kingdom, no matter how much trouble he makes. It’s an edge for us.”
“Yes.” Lanius nodded. “You’re no fool, either.”
Grus only shrugged. “Like you said, I try not to be. If you don’t think I am, Your Majesty, I take that for a compliment. And now, if you’ll forgive me…” He bowed and left Lanius’ presence.
Before long, Queen Certhia came into Lanius’ room. “Well, you suggested him,” she said. “Now that he’s here, what do you think of him?”
“There’s more to him than meets the eye, isn’t there?” Lanius said after some thought.
“Yes, and I don’t know that I like it,” his mother answered. “He’s got a lot of his marines here inside the city of Avornis. They’re behaving most correctly, but they’re here, and that’s a worry.”
“Why?” Lanius said, and then, feeling the fool Grus had said he wasn’t, “Oh.” The walls of the capital could hold out Dagipert and the Thervings, yes. But they could also hold out anyone else who wanted—or needed—to get into the city of Avornis. That included soldiers who might need to come to the king’s rescue. “Can Lepturus do anything about it?”
Certhia shook her head. “I don’t think so. Grus’ men outnumber the royal guards. This is Grus’ city right now.” Her mouth tightened. “I didn’t intend for it to work out like that. He talks like a bumpkin, but he doesn’t act like one. That makes him more dangerous than I thought he was.”
“What are you going to do about it? What can you do about it?” Lanius asked.
His mother’s lips got even thinner and paler than they had been. “I don’t know, Son,” she said. “I don’t know that I can do anything, not when he has so many men here. Trying something and failing would be worse than not doing anything.”
“Yes, I think you’re right about that,” Lanius agreed. “Best you don’t try anything, then.”
“Best I don’t fail,” Queen Certhia said.
Grus drummed his fingers on the table in front of him. He glared across the table at his son. Ortalis glared back. That meant nothing. Ortalis always seemed to glare. Grus said, “Son, I don’t mind you bedding a serving girl. Boys do that, when they can. When I was your age, I got it wherever I could, too.”
“Then what are you bothering me for?” Ortalis asked sullenly.
“I’m bothering you because you had no business bruising her like that,” Grus snapped. “It wasn’t even that she said no, and you hurt her then. She said yes, and you hurt her just for the fun of it. Your fun, not hers.”
“So what?” Ortalis said. “She’s only a serving girl.”
“No. That’s not how it works,” Grus said. “For one thing, I got called here to p
rotect Avornis from the Thervings. If you think I won’t protect Avornans from my own son if I have to, you’re wrong. And there’s something more. If you hurt your women, people start talking about you. They start laughing at you behind your back. They start doing the same about me, because I’m your father. Or they would. This is not going to happen again. Do you understand me?”
“She just wants money, the little whore. Give her some silver. That’ll shut her up,” Ortalis said.
“I’ve already given her some,” Grus said. “But she won’t keep quiet. She’ll say why she got it. People do things like that. They aren’t toys. You can’t put one here or move another one there and expect them to stay where you leave them. You can’t hurt them for the sport of it, either.”
He might have been speaking Chernagor for all the sense he made to Ortalis—he could see as much. His son’s eyes were opaque as jet, hard as glass. You do see people that way, don’t you? Grus thought sadly. As your toys, as your puppets. But they aren’t, and you’ll be sorry if you try to make them so.
“Are you done?” Ortalis asked at last.
“No.” Grus shook his head. “The next time you hurt a girl like that, I’ll hurt you worse. I promise you, I will. Do you believe me?”
Ortalis’ eyes weren’t opaque enough to hide fear. His father had the strength to check his viciousness. If Grus promised he’d suffer for doing something, he knew he might suffer. Looking away, he muttered, “I believe you.”
“Good. You’d better, because I mean it. Now get out of my sight,” Grus said.
Ortalis stormed from the room. Grus let out a long, sad sigh. Hard when I can’t trust my son at my back— gods-cursed hard. But he couldn’t, and he knew it. Ortalis could be more dangerous to him than King Dagipert ever dreamt of being. Grus drummed his fingers some more. What went wrong with him? He shrugged. He doubted he’d ever know.
After a moment, he shook his head. One of the things that had gone wrong with Ortalis was that Grus himself had done so little to raise him. How could I? he thought. I was keeping the Menteshe and the Thervings out of Avornis. That was true. He knew it was true. Also true was that the job had desperately needed doing. But still, had I been there more, would Ortalis have turned out better? Grus shrugged. He could think that likely, and he did, but he knew it wasn’t something he could be sure of.
Sosia’s fine, he reminded himself. But it wasn’t the same. Estrilda had always been there for their daughter. She’d been there for Ortalis, too, but that wasn’t quite the same, either. A mother and a grandfather couldn’t make up for a father who wasn’t there. Maybe Crex hadn’t tried enough to make Ortalis behave. On the other hand, maybe he’d tried too hard. Either way, he was with the gods now.
And how many people with you were with the gods now? Grus asked himself. The list seemed depressingly long. King Dagipert, perhaps some folk here in the palace, Count Corvus, Count Corax, the Avornan nobles who leaned their way, Prince Ulash and the other Menteshe lords down in the south, perhaps the Banished One behind the Menteshe… The Banished One, of course, wasn’t a person, or wasn’t merely a person.
As Kings of Avornis and others who’d held or longed for power in the kingdom for the past four hundred years had done, Grus thought, I wish I held the Scepter of Mercy. They would have to take me seriously then. He closed his eyes, to make the wish seem more real.
When he opened them again, his first thought was that someone had blown out the lamps in his chamber, leaving it in darkness. Fear slammed down a couple of heartbeats later, when he remembered it was the middle of the afternoon and no lamps were lit. Someone had stolen the light from the room—or rather, from his eyes—even so.
Small, soft, hungry noises came from the clotted darkness. Grus didn’t know what the creatures that made those noises were hungry for. He didn’t know, but he could guess. If they were hungry for anything but him, he would have been astonished. And what would be left of him once they’d fed? He didn’t want to think about that. No, he didn’t want to think about that at all.
As quietly as he could, he got to his feet. The small, soft noises were getting louder, as though whatever made them was getting closer. Grus blinked and blinked, however little it helped. But even though he couldn’t see the things making the noises, that didn’t mean they weren’t there. Oh, no. It didn’t mean anything of the sort.
When Grus looked toward the doorway, he couldn’t see it. That left him unsurprised and also, somehow, unafraid. Plainly, he wasn’t meant to come out of this room alive. But just because he couldn’t see the door didn’t mean he didn’t know where it was. He started toward it, wondering if he would get there before the other things he couldn’t see tore him to pieces.
His hand scraped against the planks of the door. The latch was—where? He almost wept with relief when he found it and opened it. He could see no more out in the corridor than he could in his room. But his hearing, like his fingers, still worked. He’d put those small, hungry noises behind him, at least for a little while. Soon, though, they would come after him.
He blundered along the hallway, feeling for the wall like a blind man—which, at the moment, he was. “Commodore Grus!” someone exclaimed. “Is something wrong? Do you need a healer?”
“I need a wizard,” Grus answered hoarsely. “Someone’s… something’s… ensorcelled me. Quick!” He didn’t think he was hearing those noises with ears alone, but they were getting closer again.
The servant or soldier or whoever it was took off at a dead run. Grus did hear his sandals slapping against stone in the ordinary way. Grus went on down the corridor, too, still feeling his way along. Now, though, he was pursued. Whatever was after him had a good notion of where he was and in which direction he was moving. The noises still weren’t very loud, but they sounded hungrier than ever.
They’re going to catch me, Grus thought. Gods curse me if I’ll let them pull me down from behind. I’ll give them the best fight I can. He turned at bay. His right hand found the hilt of the knife he wore on his belt. Could it do any harm to these things? He didn’t know, but he intended to find out.
His left hand went to his throat. That was as much to protect a vulnerable place as for any other reason, but his fingers brushed against the amulet he wore under his shirt. Something close to hope caught fire in him. He’d worn that amulet for a long time, and it had warded him before. Turnix had said it was strong when he gave it to him. How strong was it? Grus knew he was about to learn.
He yanked out the amulet and clutched it tight. “Protect me, King Olor! Protect me, Queen Quelea! Protect me, all ye gods!” he gasped, hoping with every fiber of his being that Turnix hadn’t botched the spell. Turnix, unfortunately, had been known to do exactly that.
But not this time. The amulet didn’t completely return Grus’ sight—return Grus’ self—to what was known in the ordinary world. It gave him a glimpse of that world, though, as well as giving him a glimpse of the other world, the world into which the wizardry had cast him. It also gave him a glimpse of the creatures pursuing him in that world. The glimpse was blurry and shifting, as though through running water. He was glad it was no more distinct; most of him wished he hadn’t had it at all.
Those horrid creatures seemed to sense he could see them. They drew back in what might have been alarm. Was he as revolting to them as they were to him? He didn’t know. He didn’t much care, either. As long as they stayed away, what did why matter?
More running footsteps, these coming toward him. Some small part of him noted that the servant and the wizard—no, he realized after a moment; she was a witch—looked as fuzzy and indistinct as the creatures from the other plane of reality, and almost as appalling. But Grus had to rely on them, and especially on the witch. “Help me!” he cried. “I’m beset!”
The witch began a spell. Grus had no idea whether the woman could actually see the creatures or just sense them in some sorcerous way. That was one more thing he didn’t care about. He wished he couldn’t see them him
self.
Whether the witch could see them or not, she knew which charm to use. In that curious half-vision of Grus‘, he watched the creatures turn tail—though they didn’t exactly have tails to turn—and run away. As they did, the last of the darkness lifted from his sight. With an almost audible snap, he returned completely to the real world he’d taken for granted up till a few minutes before.
“Well!” The witch sounded pleased and surprised. “I didn’t think that would work so nicely. Someone put a nasty sending on you, sir, a very nasty sending indeed. You’re lucky you lasted long enough to cry for help, let alone till it got to you.”
Grus stood there shaking. Sweat dripped from him. He’d never felt so drained in all his life. “I have—a good—amulet.” He had to force the words out one or two at a time.
“You must, sir. Truly, you must.” The witch liked to repeat herself.
“My thanks,” Grus told her, a little slower than he should have. And then, again a beat late, he asked, “What’s your name?”
“Me, sir? I’m Alca.” The woman was a few years younger than Grus, her brown hair getting its first streaks of silver. Her face wore a look of intense concentration. Grus wondered whether that meant she was wise or simply shortsighted.
Alca was wise enough to have done the job. What else counted? Nothing Grus could see. He said, “Well, my friend, I can’t pay you back for what you did—who can give back fair payment for his life? But what I can give, believe me, I will.”
“Thank you, sir, but I didn’t do it for money,” Alca replied. “As I said, a very nasty sending. It deserved to be stopped, and I’m glad I could.”
“So am I, believe me!” Grus said. “Now the next question is, who would want me out of the way enough to try to get rid of me like that?”
“I… wouldn’t know, sir,” Alca said uncomfortably.
Grus needed a moment to realize why she sounded uncomfortable. When he did, he said, “Oh,” softly to himself. Then he asked Alca, “Whoever did this—the wizard, I mean, not the person who arranged for it—is here in the palace, isn’t he?”
The Bastard King tsom-1 Page 18