Harry Turtledove - Tale of the Fox

"Hello, Marlanz," Gerin called once he reached the walkway and could peer over the tops of the palisade timbers. "Come in and be welcome. I'll listen to whatever Aragis has to say, though I don't promise I'll do anything about it."

At his command, the gate crew let down the drawbridge over the ditch around the palisade. Marlanz's chariot rattled into Fox Keep. King Aragis' representative was a big, burly man in his late thirties; from previous encounters with him, Gerin knew he was smarter than he looked. "Hello, lord king," Marlanz said as the Fox came down to greet him.

When Gerin clasped hands with him, Marlanz's big paw (a word that came naturally to Gerin's mind, as Marlanz had a were streak in him) almost engulfed his own. "What brings you north this time?" the Fox asked, though he had the bad feeling he already knew.

And sure enough, Marlanz said, "Lord king, Aragis bids me tell you that he is not going to stand idly by if Balser Debo's son swears homage and fealty to you. He warns you not to pursue that further."

The Fox looked down his nose at Aragis' ambassador, no mean feat since Marlanz was three or four digits' width taller than he. "Aragis has no business telling either Balser or me what sort of relationship we can have. Balser was never Aragis' vassal, nor was his father before him. Balser styles himself baron, nothing more, but he's as free a man and as independent a lord as I am-or as Aragis is."

"Yes, and Aragis intends that he remain free, and not come under your influence," Marlanz said.

"If, of his own free will, he wants to declare himself my vassal, Aragis has not the right to forbid it."

Marlanz Raw-Meat folded thick arms across his broad chest. "Lord king, King Aragis is strong enough to enforce his will on Balser-and on you."

In the end, it came down to strength, Gerin thought. Adiatunnus the Trokm-, a rival now a vassal, had first declared the Fox king of the north after he'd beaten the Gradi pirates back to a single keep on the edge of the Orynian Ocean. Aragis had started calling himself king a little later, his claim springing from his being the only noble left in the northlands with strength enough to stand against Gerin.

"If Aragis tries that, he will get the war he's been saying he doesn't want ever since the days right after the werenight," Gerin answered. "Tell him that, Marlanz. Make sure he understands it. And tell him that, if he does try it, I believe he'll end up being the sorriest man ever born."

Marlanz scowled. He'd known Gerin long enough to know the Fox did not casually make such boasts. In Marlanz's younger days, he'd been more a bruiser than a diplomat. He'd gained skill with years. These days, Aragis probably trusted him further than anyone else-not that Aragis trusted anyone very far. Trying to strike a conciliatory tone, Marlanz said, "You have to see how things are, lord king. Balser's holding points like a knife straight at the heart of the lands that acknowledge King Aragis' suzerainty. If it comes under your control, you're halfway to invading his domain right there."

Gerin scowled back. In Aragis' sandals, his acquisition would look that way. "I don't want to use the holding as a knife. I want to use it as a shield against Aragis," the Fox said. "It's hardly less dangerous to me in his hands than it is to him in mine. You might remind him that he was the one who paraded chariots past Balser's border to frighten him into yielding. I can't help it if Balser started talking to me instead."

"It might be best if we could keep Balser neutral between you and Aragis, inclining neither to the one nor the other," Marlanz said.

"That would have been fine," Gerin said. "It was fine, while it lasted. I wasn't the one who changed it. Now Balser doesn't think he can trust Aragis to keep his hands where they belong. Am I supposed to tell him, `No, I'm sorry, I won't protect you from your neighbor, even if you want me to'?"

Marlanz looked unhappy. "I knew that was foolish," he muttered; Gerin didn't think he was supposed to hear. Aragis' envoy gathered himself. "Lord king, I'm sorry, but I don't have a lot of room to wiggle here. King Aragis has told me to tell you that, if Balser becomes your vassal, it will mean war between the two of you."

"Then it will be war." Gerin slapped Marlanz on the back and waved him toward Castle Fox. "We don't have to start killing each other quite yet, I don't think. Why don't you come into the great hall and drink some ale with me, eat some bread, and we'll see what else we can scare up for you."

"I'll do that right gladly," Marlanz said. "You brewed a fine ale the last time I was here, lord king, and you're not the sort to let something like that slip. And you have a name all through the northlands for feeding your guest-friends well."

"I probably earned it when I managed to get you out of my keep before you ate the larder empty-just before," Gerin said. Marlanz laughed, although, like most of Gerin's jokes, that one had a hard core of truth. "Come on," the Fox urged, and they walked into the great hall side by side.

Van of the Strong Arm, Rihwin the Fox, and Carlun Vepin's son sat at a table near the hearth, and near the altar to Dyaus Allfather in front of it. A tarred-leather jack of ale sat in front of each of them. Van was also gnawing a roast rib of mutton. As Gerin and Marlanz walked in, the big outlander tossed it into the rushes on the floor to watch a couple of dogs squabble over it.

"By all the gods, it's Marlanz Raw-Meat," Van rumbled, recognizing Aragis' envoy. He rose from the bench and strode up to clasp Marlanz's hand. As they did whenever they met, the two big men studied each other. Gerin studied them both. The golden-haired outlander was taller and broader through the shoulders, but he was also older, being within a year or two either way of the Fox's age. At his peak, he'd been stronger than Marlanz-he'd been stronger than anyone Gerin had ever known. But Marlanz, a decade younger, was closer to his own peak, which had also been formidable. If the two of them fought… Gerin didn't know what would happen. That was strange. In the more than twenty years since Van had come to Fox Keep, he'd always been sure his friend could best anyone merely human. Now-

Now we're getting old , Gerin thought. Strength goes . He smiled to himself. Guile, though, guile endures . Aloud, he said, "Marlanz says Aragis will go to war with us if Balser gives me homage and fealty."

"He's welcome to try it," Van said. "I don't think he'll be so happy afterwards, though." A few years earlier, he would have whooped with glee at the prospect of a fight. He still didn't shrink from it-Gerin couldn't imagine him shrinking from a fight-but he no longer rushed toward it like a man rushing toward his beloved.

"My king is not happy about it now," Marlanz answered, "but he will not shrink from it, not if that means seeing his own rights overthrown."

That made Rihwin the Fox speak up: "In good sooth, King Aragis has no right pertaining to the holding of Balser Debo's son, it never having been a fief of his."

"I said the same thing," Gerin told him, "but not half so prettily."

"You have not the advantages of a noble upbringing south of the High Kirs," Rihwin replied, as if forgiving his fellow Fox for flaws beyond his control. After two decades in the northlands, Rihwin still clung to the elaborate phrasing he'd learned at the heart of the Elabonian Empire, and to the gold hoop he wore in his left ear, an affectation to which the rest of Gerin's vassals had never quite accommodated themselves.

Marlanz looked from Rihwin to Gerin and back again. "As I have noted before, he has the right to keep a stronger neighbor from taking advantage of a weaker one."

"As I noted before," Gerin said pointedly, "if Aragis weren't a strong neighbor liable to take advantage of a weaker one, Balser wouldn't be interested in having me as his lord."