An army moves like a caterpillar thinning itself out over the day, with the guns pulled by teams of twenty and forty horses dropping farther and farther behind, and as the army passes it leaves the road in worse condition for men and wagons that follow. Every ford stops progress for hours. Every cart that gets stuck slows every one behind it. The head must always halt while there is still time in the day to allow the long body to slowly contract again. Sometimes actual caterpillars move faster.

We were already falling behind Pegistus’s best predictions.

Every day after the day’s march, trailed by his attendants and his guards, the king walked through the camp, so that the sight of him might reassure those worried about his health.

“What is it, Gen?” Eddis asked, breaking the silence between them. She and the king had walked more than a mile back along the course of their march, and they’d have to turn back soon.

“I am useless,” said the king, throwing up his hand. “Worse than useless. I could be in the capital, drinking wine and eating cheese. I could do it there as well as here, and I wouldn’t have slowed everything down even further by sweating in that hideous padded jacket.”

Eddis hid her smile. So much changed, and so much remained exactly the same. She tipped her head at the men all around who were watching their king as he passed. “They believe in you. They need to see you.”

“We’ve had this conversation before,” said the king. “Last time, I was just getting over being sick in the shrubbery outside the hospital.”

“And I think I told you pull yourself together then, too.”

“I hate being a symbol.”

“I thought you wanted to be a figurehead?”

“That’s entirely different,” he said haughtily, and Eddis dug an elbow into his side.

“It is,” said the king. “I was not raised to be sovereign. You and Irene and even Sophos were. I would have made a fool of myself if I’d tried to seize the reins from Irene. Still would.”

“You’re not an utter failure,” Eddis said, deliberately condescending, and he smiled at the backhanded compliment.

“I cannot prosecute a war, Helen,” he said, his smile quickly gone. “But I can fight in one. It’s because I can that I think I should. If I’m not willing to fight in this war, how is that just?”

“I have lived through too many winters in the mountains, seen too many men willing to fight to the death over a spilled cup of wine, to think dying for a cause makes that cause just,” answered Eddis. “You went again to Hephestia’s temple and the high priestess gave you an answer you didn’t want to hear. Xanthe told me.”

The king grumbled. “I should have asked the goddess privately.”

“You could have been in the hypocausts, Gen, and everyone would have known all about it. You should be used to that by now.”

Seeking a clearer answer to his question, the king had gone back to the temple. Again, he had steered me through the curtains, though this time as I pushed through them, his hand had fallen away. I’d arrived in the treasury alone to find the high priestess waiting. The king did not appear for a long time, and when he did, he seemed deeply shaken. The Oracle had looked him over in smug satisfaction. In that sonorous, resounding voice that sent chills down my back, she’d said something in the archaic language I didn’t understand. In plain language she added, “Do not overreach. That is your answer, Eugenides.”

The king had returned very subdued to the palace.

“The gods’ messages are known for their opacity,” he complained to Eddis. “Except, of course, in hindsight, when it’s too late.”

“Stop whining,” said Eddis. “Go to bed. Do not overreach. That seems clear.”

“The Oracle is Attolian. The only archaic she knows is from temple ceremonies. Peris upus s’tatix. It doesn’t mean ‘Don’t overreach.’”

Eddis reluctantly agreed. “It’s . . . danger in . . . excess?” she translated hesitantly.

“You’re almost as bad. Did you pay no attention to your tutors?”

“Not if I could help it,” she said, unembarrassed. “I was outside chasing your brothers with a stick.”

“Well, rest assured that the gods are not interested in how many pieces of cake I eat. You missed the reflexive. It’s a warning against self-indulgence.”

“I think you’re quibbling.”

“Helen,” he said, exasperated. “I don’t want to go into battle. I am afraid of what I might become. What if I’ve let you and Irene and Sophos tell me I shouldn’t fight because that’s what I wanted to hear?”

She had to think about that for a while. “You have to trust yourself,” she said finally.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Then you’ll have to trust us.”

Eddis returned to the council tent.

“Is it his pride?” Attolia asked without looking up from the counters she was sliding across a map.

“No,” said Eddis. Standing beside her to lean over the map, she pointed to an area of high ground. Attolia moved a marker.

“It is only that he doubts himself, as we all do. As we should,” said Eddis.

“I thought he might measure himself against his brothers or his cousins.”

“He has never done that.”

“Do you?” Attolia asked, genuinely curious.

“I did once. I outgrew it, and I understood my cousins better when I did.”

“But you can fight.”

“We both can, Irene. We both will, if we have to.” She laid an arm around Attolia’s shoulder. “But the call of life is as powerful as the call of death, and it is no weakness to answer to it,” she said quietly.

It was another week or more when one of the queen’s attendants gave the secret away. It was nothing, only a second cushion for the seat she brought for the queen, but the king noticed and Eddis noticed him noticing. As the discussion of the army’s route for the next day went on uninterrupted, Eddis dropped her eyes. She’d suspected earlier, but had said nothing. Sounis was looking from Eddis to Eugenides to Attolia, and he too guessed.

By the end of the meeting, everyone present was desperate to excuse themselves. Most of those in the council, including his father, thought the king’s temper was rising because of frustration with our slow progress. The queen’s attendants knew better. There were apologetic glances cast at the queen and worried ones cast elsewhere. Attolia remained impassive.

After excusing themselves so hastily, the royal councilors lingered outside the tent. The king of Sounis and the queen of Eddis made no bones about the fact that they were eavesdropping.

The king of Attolia was at his most childish.

“Why didn’t you say something before we marched?”

Unusually, Attolia was no more reasonable. “What difference do you think it would have made if I had?” she said snappishly.

“I can’t go into battle, but you can march to war? The king may not risk his life, but the queen can?”

“It isn’t easy for anyone to stand helplessly by while someone invades their country. It is not easier for me because I am a woman. It is not a special burden you alone bear that you cannot fight in this war.”