"I'd like to do a lot of things," Hirundo said. "That doesn't mean I'm going to do them, or even that I ought to do them. The nomads are dangerous even as their own men."
Grus stared at him. Usually the king was the one with the calm, cool, gray good sense, and Hirundo the smiling optimist, always sure things would turn out for the best. Here they'd reversed roles. Hirundo had spent his whole career worrying about the Menteshe as enemies; he didn't have an easy time changing the way he'd thought for so long. Grus could do it. But then, he had an advantage – he'd held the Scepter of Mercy in his hand.
Instead of a bridge, a river galley waited to take them over the Stura to Cumanus. That seemed fitting. He'd started his rise to the crown as captain of a river galley. Now he would bring the Scepter back to Avornis in one.
He held the talisman as he boarded the galley, and savored the awe on the faces of officers and oarsmen. When he began to savor it perhaps too much, the Scepter seemed heavier, as though warning him that, while it deserved all the respect they gave it, he didn't. He laughed. Humility evidently walked hand in hand with mercy. Well, fair enough.
At the captain's order, the oarmaster called the stroke. He used the tap of a drum to help the men at the bow hear the rhythm. It was all as familiar to Grus as a pair of old shoes. He could have given the commands himself. The skipper was a young man. Did he remember the days when Grus had walked the deck on a ship like this? Had he even heard of those days?
And did this young skipper have the same kind of ambition as Grus had once known? Did he dream of wearing the crown himself one day? Whatever he dreamed of, it wouldn't be as big as bringing the Scepter of Mercy back where it belonged. From now on, Kings of Avornis and those who longed to be kings would have to have smaller goals. The big one, the one that had eluded so many for so long, was finally done.
The galley arrowed across the river. The wharves and piers of Cumanus drew ever closer. Then, very smoothly, the ship came up to a pier. A sailor tossed a line to a waiting longshoreman who made the bow fast to the pier. By the river galley's stern, another burly longshoreman was doing the same.
"We're here, Your Majesty," the captain said softly, as though Grus wouldn't have noticed without being told.
"By the gods, we are," Grus agreed. Yes, with the Scepter of Mercy in his hands, those first three words were something more than a common figure of speech. Olor and Quelea and the rest of the gods in the heavens might not care much about what went on in the material world, but they'd cared enough – or worried enough – to give mankind the Scepter.
"Let out the gangplank," the skipper said, and grunting sailors scrambled to obey. The captain bowed to the king. "Go ahead, Your Majesty."
"Thanks," Grus said, and he did. The gangplank echoed under his boots. It shook a little from the motion of the river on the boat. The thudding continued when Grus stepped off the gangplank, but the motion ceased. He walked toward the open gate in the wall alongside the river. He wanted to be on true Avornan soil at last.
There. Now his boots thumped on hard-packed, sandy dirt. I've done it, he thought. I've brought the Scepter of Mercy home.
Soldiers trotted toward him. For an anxious moment, he wondered if he ought to have a sword in his hand, not the Scepter. If the Banished One had somehow suborned those men… Enormous grins on their faces, they crowded around him, shouting congratulations.
From behind him, Pterocles said, "Everyone rejoices to see the Scepter of Mercy return to its homeland."
"So it seems." Grus would have guessed the Scepter legendary at best to most people, or more likely all but forgotten.
He seemed to be wrong. Memory of the talisman and its power survived in more places than the palace in the city of Avornis.
Shadow swallowed him as he went through the gate. Then he was in the sunshine again, and inside the walls of Cumanus. That was another milestone. He saw more ahead – bringing die Scepter of Mercy into the capital, and then bringing it into the palace. Avornis had waited four hundred years to see that day.
"Your Majesty!" That wasn't a shout of congratulations. It was a woman's voice, high and shrill and urgent. She struggled to force her way past soldiers and plump officials, and wasn't having much luck.
"What is it?" Grus called to her. He gestured with his free hand to let her pass. No one seemed to notice. Then he gestured with the Scepter, and people scrambled to get out of the woman's way. He didn't know how it did what it did, but he couldn't doubt that it did it.
She fell to her knees before him. When he helped her up, mud stained her shabby wool skirt. She said, "Help me, Your Majesty! My little daughter has a terrible fever. She'll die if she doesn't get better soon. Can you… Can you use the Scepter to save her?"
"I don't know," Grus answered. The only thing he'd used the Scepter of Mercy for was putting the Banished One in his place and making him stay there. This… This struck him as more merciful. "Take me to her," he told the woman. "I'll do what I can."
"Quelea's blessing upon you," the woman said. "Come with me, then, and hurry. I only hope she'll last until we get back there."
Grus did go with her, soldiers and Pterocles and Hirundo and abandoned officials crowding along behind them. The woman led him through a maze of alleys to what was nearer a hovel than a proper house. That didn't surprise him; neither her clothes nor the way she talked suggested any great wealth. She threw open the door and pointed ahead.
Inside, the place was cleaner than Grus would have expected. The little girl lay on what was plainly the only bed. She writhed and muttered as fever dreams roiled her. The mother was right – she wouldn't last long, not like that.
"Please," the woman said.
Not certain what he was going to do or how he was going to do it, Grus pointed the Scepter's blue jewel – no, it was not a sapphire; it was ever so much brighter and more sparkling than the finest sapphire anyone had ever seen – at the sick girl. "Queen Quelea, please make her well," he said – and nothing happened.
When he confronted the Banished One, he'd felt power thrum through him. He didn't feel that now. He didn't feel anything special at all. Very plainly, neither did the dying little girl.
When he confronted the Banished One, he hadn't called on the gods in the heavens at all. He'd used the Scepter of Mercy to focus and strengthen his own will, his own determination. He tried that now, willing the sickness to leave the girl. Something thrummed along his arm. The hair on it stood, again as it might have with thunder and lightning in the air.
The little girl sat up in bed. By the way her mother gasped, that was a separate miracle all by itself. "Mama," the girl said. "I'm thirsty, Mama." She pointed at Grus. "Who's this old man in the funny clothes?"
With another gasp, the woman said, "She doesn't mean anything bad by it, Your Majesty. She's only six."
"It's all right." Grus stroked his beard. "This will never be dark again. And I am wearing funny-looking clothes."
"I'm thirsty," the girl repeated. "And I'm hungry, too. Can I have some bread and oil and some figs?"
"I'll get them for you, dear, and some watered wine with them." Her mother dashed away and returned with the food and drink. When she saw how the girl ate and drank, she burst into tears. "I don't have much, Your Majesty. Whatever you want of me, though – anything at all – it's yours." She dropped to her knees in front of him once more.
He raised her up. "If I take anything for helping a little girl, I don't deserve to wear these funny clothes, do I?" he said gently. I don't deserve to carry the Scepter of Mercy was what went through his mind at the same time.