"That thought had crossed my mind, yes," Grus said.

Toward evening, scouts brought a lone Menteshe to the king. "He came up to us with a flag of truce, Your Majesty," one of them said. "He claims he's an ambassador from Prince Sanjar."

"Does he?" Grus eyed the nomad – a swarthy, bearded, hook-nosed man in a leather jacket, breeches, and boots. The Avornan scouts now held whatever weapons he'd carried, most likely one of the deadly Menteshe bows and a saber and dagger for close work. "Go on," Grus told him. "I'm listening."

"I am Qizil son of Qilich, Your Majesty," the Menteshe said in gutturally accented Avornan. "You will know, of course, that Prince Sanjar is the rightful heir and successor to his mighty father, Prince Ulash."

"I've heard that said, yes," Grus replied. Prince Korkut, of course, made exactly the same claim. Korkut was older, Sanjar the son of Ulash's favorite concubine. Neither could bend the knee to the other now, not without putting his own head on the block right afterwards.

"It is the truth," Qizil declared. "Prince Sanjar wishes to join you to help cast out the vile usurper. He will reward you well for your services."

Till Sanjar and Korkut went to war with each other, no Avornan had ever heard any Menteshe talk like that. The nomads always wanted to take, never to give. Now, voice studiously neutral, Grus said, "He will?" Qizil nodded emphatically. The king asked, "What will he give?"

Qizil son of Qilich swept out his arms in a grand, even theatrical, gesture. "Why, whatever your heart desires. Gold? It is yours. Herds of cattle and sheep out to the horizon? They are yours. Fine horses? We have a great plenty. Pretty women? Take them as well, and use them as you would." In a few words, he outlined the nomads' notion of the good life.

"Let him give me the Scepter of Mercy with his own hands," Grus said. "Then I will believe he is serious, not just telling lies to help himself."

Qizil's eyes went very wide. Whatever he'd expected the King of Avornis to ask for, that caught him by surprise. "Your Majesty is joking," he blurted.

"I have never been more serious in my life." Grus meant every word of that. If he could win the Scepter of Mercy by allying himself with Sanjar, he would do it. If he could win it by allying with Korkut, he would do that, too. And if winning it meant standing aloof from both of them, he would do that.

"It is impossible," Qizil said.

Grus folded his arms across his chest. "Then we have no more to say to each other, do we? The scouts will take you out beyond our lines. My compliments to your master, but there will be no alliance."

"You do not understand," Qizil said urgently. "The prince cannot give you what he does not have. The Scepter of Mercy is in Yozgat, and Korkut holds it."

The king had known where the Scepter was, of course. Yozgat still lay far to the south. He hadn't been sure which unloving half brother controlled what had been Ulash's capital. Some of the prisoners he'd taken claimed one did, some the other. But if Sanjar's envoy admitted Korkut held it…

"If you aid my master, we can speak of this again after he has triumphed," Qizil suggested.

"No," Grus said. "This is a price he would have to pay in advance. Once he'd won the war, he would surely try to do me out of it."

Qizil made elaborate promises that Sanjar was the very image of honesty. The more he promised, the less Grus believed him. "I'm sorry," the king said at last, which seemed more polite than saying he was bored. "I don't think we have anything to talk about. As I told you, you have a safe-conduct till you're outside of our lines. If things change farther south, maybe Prince Sanjar will talk to me again."

"If things change farther south, the prince will not need to talk to you," Qizil said venomously. "He will drive you from this country like the dog you are."

That sounded more like the Menteshe Grus was familiar with. "I love you, too," he said, and had the small satisfaction of startling Sanjar's emissary again. Qizil sprang up onto his pony's back. He rode away at such a pace, the Avornan scouts had a hard time staying with him. He was so angry, he might have forgotten his weapons.

"Too bad," Hirundo remarked. "That would have made things a lot easier."

"Well, so it would," Grus said. "I had to try. All right – he told me no. Now we go on the way we would have before."

"So Korkut holds Yozgat," Hirundo said musingly. "If he sends someone to you to ask for help against Sanjar…"

"Yes, that could be interesting," Grus agreed. "Both of them have sent envoys up to the city of Avornis, so I suppose it could happen. I'll know the right thing to ask if it does, anyhow."

"What will you do if Korkut says he'll send you the Scepter?" Hirundo asked.

Faint, was what crossed Grus' mind. "The first thing I'd do is make sure he sent me the real Scepter of Mercy and not a clever counterfeit," he said, and Hirundo nodded. The king went on, "If it was the real Scepter… If it was, I do believe I'd take it and go back to Avornis. It means more to me – and to the kingdom – than anything else down here."

"Even freeing the thralls?" Hirundo asked slyly.

Grus looked around. When he didn't see Otus, he nodded. "Even that. If we have the Scepter of Mercy, we can worry about everything else later." I think we can. I hope we can. How do I know for sure, when no King of Avornis has tried to wield it for all these years? He blinked when he realized he didn't know. What he had to go on was Lanius' certainty. No matter how fine a scholar the other king had proved himself, was that really enough? All at once, Grus wondered.

With a laugh, Hirundo said, "The Banished One wouldn't be very happy if Korkut sent you the Scepter to win his civil war."

He could speak lightly of the Banished One. The exiled god had never appeared in his dreams. He didn't know – literally didn't know – how lucky he was. Grus, who did, said only, "No, he wouldn't." His doubts left him. The Banished One wouldn't worry about losing the Scepter of Mercy if it weren't a weighty weapon against him.

Hirundo stared south. The dust Qizil and the Avornan scouts had kicked up as they rode away still hung in the air. "For now, I guess you're right – the only thing we can do is go on," the general said.

'There's nothing else to do," Grus said.

Lanius had a reputation as a man interested in everything. The reputation held a lot of truth, as he knew better than anyone else. It also came in handy in some unexpected ways. He knew that better than anyone else, too.

Had, say, King Grus poked his nose into one of the little rooms in the palace that held bed linens, any servant who came down the corridor and saw him would have been astonished. Gossip about Grus' odd behavior would have flashed from one end of the palace to the other before an hour went by.

But it wasn't odd for Lanius to go into a room like that. He poked around in the kitchens, and in the archives, and anywhere else that suited his fancy. A servant who saw him opening one of those doors would just shrug and go about his business. It had happened before, plenty of times.

No servants were coming down the corridor now. That did make things simpler. Lanius opened the door to the storeroom, and quietly closed it behind him. He smiled to smell the spicy scent of the cedar shelves on which the linens rested. The cedar was said to help hold moths at bay.

And he smelled another sweet scent – a woman's perfume.

"Why, hello, Your Majesty," Oissa said, as though they'd met there by chance.

"Hello, sweetheart," Lanius said, and took her in his arms. The serving girl was short and round, with curly, light brown hair, big gray eyes, cheeks always rosy even though she didn't seem to use rouge, and a dark beauty mark by the side of her mouth. She tilted her face up for a kiss. Lanius was glad to oblige.