Harry Turtledove - Tale of the Fox

The very corner of the sharp edge of the axe kissed his arm with fire. He held on to his grip on the shield, though-the wound was not severe. And, when the Gradi captain tried to pull the axe free so he could strike again, he found he could not. It had twisted, and would not go back through the narrow hole it had made. He shouted in fury and alarm.

Gerin did not give him the chance to clear the axe from the shield. Instead of backing away, he moved close to the Gradi, so the fellow had no room in which to draw back his arm. The Gradi didn't like that. His lips skinned back from his teeth in a horrible grin.

He should have let go of the axe and run. Instead, he kept trying to jerk it loose, and to fend off Gerin's own left-handed blows. Since his left arm and the Fox's were on opposite sides, and since his right hand clutched the useless axe handle, he could not do it. After Gerin's second stroke got home, the Gradi groaned and his grip faltered.

The Fox hit him again, this time in the side of the neck. The Gradi let out a startled grunt. His eyes went very wide. He let go of the axe. His mouth shaped a word. Gerin thought it was "Voldar," but it had no breath behind it. The Gradi swayed, toppled, fell.

Gerin whirled to help Van and Duren. Van had his own man down, and was yanking his spear out of the Gradi's belly. A loop of gray-pink gut came with it. Duren was fighting a defensive battle against his foe. When Van and Gerin both rushed to his aid, the Gradi who opposed him turned to flee. He did not get far.

Another Gradi burst into the clearing, staring in shocked dismay at what he found there. He did escape before Gerin and his comrades could pursue.

"Come on," the Fox said. "This isn't the whole job. We can't just beat them here-we have to break them."

If he lived, he knew he'd want to sleep three days, and would wake up stiff and sore in every joint even if he did. He plunged into the woods nonetheless.

There was more hard fighting as the day wore along, but something seemed to have gone out of the Gradi when their chieftain fell. The sun was only a little more than halfway down toward the west when Gerin emerged from the woods and saw a few, a very few, Gradi running off toward the west past Bidgosh Pond. Behind him, the sounds of battle were ebbing. Such shouts and cries as he could hear were almost all in either Elabonian or the Trokm- tongue.

Half a bowshot north of him, someone else came out from among the trees: a Trokm-. He looked toward the Fox and waved. Gerin waved back. "Adiatunnus!" he called.

Slowly, Adiatunnus came toward him. The woodsrunner looked as tired as Gerin felt. "Diviciacus went down, puir wight," he said. "My own right hand he was, all these years. A rare sad thing. But-" He straightened. "Lord prince, we've beaten the buggers, and in a way I don't think they'll be over soon. From here, we can clear the northlands of 'em, right out to the edge o' the sea."

"I think that may be so," Gerin answered. More men, Elabonians and Trokmoi both, came out of the woods and gathered around their two leaders. Hardly daring to believe what he'd just said, Gerin repeated it: "I think that may be so."

"It is that, lord prince," Adiatunnus said positively. Then he paused, perhaps to weigh his own words. "Aye, it is so, lord prince, and 'twas you who made it real. I couldna ha' done it: I own as much. No man but your own self could ha' done it, lord prince." He shook his head. "Nay. That isna right."

"Who says it's not?" Van boomed angrily.

"I do," Adiatunnus answered. He sighed, then went, not to one knee, but to both. "No man but your own self could ha' done it… lord king."

From a hillock not far away, Gerin stared at the Orynian Ocean. It was not like the Greater Inner Sea, save in being a large body of water. The blue Inner Sea was calm, peaceful. The gray ocean rolled and pulsed and smashed against rocks, sending spray high into the air. It was, in its way, as barbarous and as vigorous as the Gradi who rode it.

A strong stone keep sat by the ocean, not far south of the Niffet. The Fox had driven the Gradi from most of the northlands. Their remnant lingered here. He did not think he could storm this keep. He could not properly besiege it, either, not with its back to the Orynian Ocean: the Gradi from the north could keep it supplied by a road he did not control.

Duren climbed to the top of the hillock. He looked out at the ocean for a while; he found it endlessly fascinating. Then he pointed toward the keep the Gradi still held. "What will you do about them, Father?" he asked, confident the Fox would come up with something even if he couldn't see for himself what it was.

Gerin gave him the only answer he could: "This year, nothing. We've done all we could. We've done more than I ever expected. As long as the Gradi gods are at war on their own plane, the Gradi themselves we can beat, or at least meet on even terms, which is good enough."

"What if they sally after we go away, though?" Duren said.

"I'll leave men behind-my vassals, Elabonians and Trokmoi both. The Gradi killed most of the local lords; their claims have lapsed. We'll restore some keeps, maybe build some new ones, and make this a harder land for them to overrun than it used to be. Before, all the lords were rivals to all the others. Now, they'll be able to call on one another against the Gradi-and on me, too."

"Aye," Duren said. "They can call on their king."

On his own, Gerin would not have claimed the title. Aragis the Archer, who styled himself grand duke, had stayed quiet this summer, probably hoping Gerin and the Gradi would wreck each other, leaving him to pick up the pieces-and the rank that went with picking up the pieces. What he would do when he found out Gerin was wearing the rank… remained to be seen.

But Adiatunnus had been a rival almost as dangerous as Aragis, and Adiatunnus had been the one to call him king. "Almost makes me think there is such a thing as gratitude," Gerin murmured.

"Father?" Duren asked.

"Never mind," the Fox answered. The Trokmoi had been as willing as his own men to acknowledge his kingship. How long that willingness would last also remained to be seen.

While it did, he would make the most of it. You could push people further if you moved them in the direction they were already going. And fear of a Gradi revival would make them want to pay attention to the man who had stopped the raiders the first time.

"We have to have ships of our own," he said. He knew he'd said that before. Without ships of his own, the Gradi would be able to rebuild their strength and assail the northlands again at a time of their choosing.

Duren had another thought: "What do we do if the Gradi gods end up overcoming Baivers and the underground powers?"

Gerin set a hand on his son's shoulder. "I'm less worried about that now than I was before I saw how potent Baivers could be when he chose. Even if Voldar beats him, she won't rout him. If she could do that, she would have done it already. And if she does beat him, well, we may be able to stir up other sleepy Elabonian gods against her and her friends. Baivers will let them know the fight is one they need to make."

"That will put the gods more in the world, if you know what I mean, than they have been since time out of mind," Duren said.

"I've thought the same thing," the Fox agreed. "I don't like the notion-in the face of the gods' powers, the ones we have look pretty small. But if that's what happens, then it is, that's all. We'll have to make the best of it we can. One way or another, I expect we'll manage."

"You will," Duren said. Remembering himself at the age when his beard had begun to sprout, Gerin knew how rare and precious his son's unalloyed approval was. Duren went on, "You always find a way."