Out of the Darkness

Twenty

Here, Vanai.” Elfryth held out a platter. “Would you like another slice of mutton?”

“No, thank you,” Vanai said. “I’m full.”

Her mother-in-law frowned. “Are you sure? Powers above, you haven’t even finished what you’ve got there. Now that we have enough food again, you really ought to eat.”

“I’m full,” Vanai repeated. She meant it, too. In fact, what she’d already eaten was sitting none too comfortably in her belly.

“I’ll have some more mutton,” Ealstan said. “And pass the porridge, too, please. Garlic and mushrooms and almonds.. ” He grinned and smacked his lips.

Hestan picked up the bowl and handed it to Vanai. “Pass this to your husband.”

“All right,” she said, and did. She’d had a helping of porridge herself, and liked it. But the odor of garlic wafting up from it now made her insides churn. “Here,” she told Ealstan. Then, gulping, she left the table in a hurry.

When she came back, she’d got rid of what was bothering her-got rid of it most literally. She took a cautious sip of wine to kill the nasty taste in her mouth. She swallowed it even more cautiously, wondering if her stomach would rebel again. But the wine gave her no trouble.

“Mama!” Saxburh said from her high chair. Vanai gave her a wan smile. The baby looked to be wearing more porridge than she’d eaten.

“Are you all right, dear?” Elfryth asked.

“I’m fine-now,” Vanai said.

Something in her tone made her mother-in-law’s eyes widen. “Oh,” she said, and then, ‘‘If I’m wrong, you’ll tell me, but… is Saxburh going to have a little brother or sister?”

So much for keeping it a secret a while longer, Vanai thought. Of course, bolting from the table in the middle of a good meal had a way of killing a secret dead. Vanai made herself nod. “Aye, I think she will.”

And maybe it hadn’t been such a secret after all. Hestan nodded and said, “You’ve been falling asleep pretty early lately. That’s always a sign.”

Ealstan said, “I thought so, too. I wasn’t going to ask you for another little while, though. So we’ll have a two-year-old and a baby in the house at the same time, will we?” He looked from his father to his mother. “How did you two manage?”

“It’s simple enough,” Hestan answered. “You go mad. Most of the time, though, you’re too busy to notice you’ve done it.” Elfryth nodded emphatically.

Saxburh plucked the spoon from her bowl of porridge and flung it on the floor. “Done!” she announced. Vanai grabbed the bowl before it followed.

Ealstan surveyed his daughter. “Before we turn her loose, I think we ought to take her to the public baths. They might have enough water to get her properly clean.”

“She’s not so bad as that,” Vanai said. “A wet rag will do the job just fine.” And so it did, though Saxburh liked getting washed no better than usual. Sometimes washing her face wasn’t much different from wrestling.

“Another grandchild.” Hestan smiled. “I like that.”

“So do I,” Elfryth said. “We can enjoy them, but Vanai and Ealstan have to do most of the work. What’s not to like about an arrangement like that?”

“Ha,” Ealstan said in a hollow voice. “Ha, ha, ha.”

“What makes you think your mother was joking?” Hestan asked, sounding as serious as he did most of the time.

No matter how serious he sounded, Vanai knew better than to take him seriously. “You-both of you-have given us lots of help with Saxburh. I know you’ll help some with the new baby, too. Of course we’ll do more-it’s our child, after all.”

“You married a sensible woman, son,” Hestan said to Ealstan. “My only question is, if she’s as sensible as she seems, why did she marry you?”

In a lot of families, a question like that would have been the opening blaze in a row. Here, Ealstan didn’t even blink. “I fooled her. I told her I was rich and I came from a good family. She hadn’t met you yet, of course, so she didn’t know what a liar I was.”

“Well! I like that!” Elfryth said. But her eyes twinkled, too.

“I’m sorry, Mother,” Ealstan said. “I guess I’m only half a liar.”

“Oh, stop, all of you,” Vanai said. She’d seen how Ealstan and his family teased one another without angering or hurting anybody. She’d seen it, aye, but she didn’t understand it or fully believe it. Had she and her own grandfather made cracks like that, the air around the two of them would have frozen for days. Brivibas appreciated a certain sort of dry wit, but he’d had no sense of humor to speak of. And I always meant everything I told him, too, Vanai thought. Looking back, some of the things she’d said didn’t make her proud, but her grandfather had always had the knack for infuriating her.

Saxburh banged both little fists down on the high chair’s tray, interrupting her mother’s gloomy reflections. “Out!” she said.

“She’s talking very well,” Elfryth said as Vanai turned the baby loose. “She’s going to be smart.” She shook her head. “No, she’s already smart.”

“Must take after her mother,” Hestan remarked.

“No doubt,” Ealstan agreed. “Do you suppose I’m an idiot because I got it from you, or just because you raised me?”

“Both, I’d say,” Hestan answered placidly. He turned to Vanai and shifted from Forthwegian to classical Kaunian: “When do you intend to teach the baby this language along with ours?”

“My father-in-law, I didn’t do it before because of the occupation,” Vanai said in the same language. “If she’d spoken the wrong tongue while we were sorcerously disguised, that could have been. . very bad.”

“Of course,” Hestan said. “But you can do it now-and you should, I think. With so many of your people gone on account of the cursed Algarvians, classical Kaunian is in danger of dying out as a birthspeech. After so many generations, that would be very bad, too.”

“I’ve had the same thought,” Vanai said. That a Forthwegian would feel as she did surprised her. Ealstan would. Ealstan does, she thought. But Ealstan was in love with her. His father wasn’t. But he gets a lot of his ideas from his father. She shook her head, bemused at arguing with herself.

Hestan plucked at his thick gray beard. “I’m not my brother, and I thank the powers above that I’m not,” he said. “We don’t all hate Kaunians and Kaunianity, even if the war let too many who do run wild.”

“I know that,” Vanai said. “If I didn’t know that, would I have married your son? Would we have a baby who’s not one thing or the other, with another one on the way?”

“No, indeed,” Hestan answered. “But sometimes these things do need saying.”

“Fair enough.” Vanai nodded. Saxburh scrambled up into her lap. The toddler looked curiously from her to Hestan and back again. They were talking, but they were using words she hadn’t heard much before and couldn’t understand. By her wide eyes, that was very interesting.

Ealstan said, “The next question is, how do I make enough money to feed a wife and two babies and maybe even myself?” He laughed. “After six years of questions like, How do I stay alive? and How do I keep the cursed redheads from murdering my wife? — after worrying about questions like those, thinking of money isn’t so bad.”

“I’ve never gone hungry, and neither did my children,” Hestan said. “I don’t think yours have much to worry about.”

“If this were real peace, I wouldn’t worry,” Ealstan said. “But with everything all torn to pieces by the war, business just isn’t what it used to be.”

“Not now,” his father agreed, “but it’s bound to get better. It could hardly get worse, after all. And we’re still willing to share, you know.”

“Haven’t we taken enough already?” Ealstan said.

“We’re a family. This is what families are for.” Elfryth nodded, most vehemently, toward Vanai. From personal experience, Vanai had only a vague notion of what families were for. She didn’t want to shrug, so she just sat still.

Her husband still seemed unhappy. “You’re not helping Conberge the same way you’re helping us.”

“So we’re not, and do you know why?” Hestan asked. Ealstan shook his head. His father went on, “Because Grimbald’s parents are helping the two of them-the three of them, soon-that’s why.”

“Oh,” Ealstan said in a small voice.

Vanai said, “Thank you very much for everything you’ve done for us. I don’t know what we would have done without you.”

“This is what families are for,” Elfryth repeated.

Hestan added, “And if you and Ealstan got by in the middle of Eoforwic in the middle of the war, I don’t expect you would have had much trouble here in Gromheort in peacetime.”

It’s because he says things like that, Vanai realized, that all his teasing doesn’t pack a sting. Ealstan couldn’t doubt he really was loved, no matter how sardonic his father got. And the ley line ran in both directions. That was obvious, too.

Saxburh screwed up her face and grunted. No matter how clever she was, she was a long way from knowing how to wait when she needed to go. Vanai eagerly looked forward to the day when she learned. But another baby’s coming, she thought in sudden dismay. Even after Saxburh knows what to do, her little brother or sister won’t.

She carried her daughter away to clean up the mess. “Come on, you little stinker,” she said. Saxburh thought that was funny. So did Vanai-but only after she’d washed her hands.

After Saxburh went to bed, Vanai soon followed. In this pregnancy as in the one before, she found herself sleepy all the time. “Another baby,” Ealstan said in wondering tones. “I had thought you might be expecting again-your courses hadn’t come.”

“No, they hadn’t,” Vanai replied around a yawn. “They won’t, not for a while now.” She laughed a little. “I miss nine months of cramps, and then I get to make up for it all at once, and then some.”

“If it’s a boy, I’d like to name him Leofsig, for my brother,” Ealstan said.

Vanai didn’t see how she could quarrel with that, especially not when Leof-sig, from all she’d heard, had got on with Kaunians as well as the rest of this remarkable Forthwegian family did-and when Sidroc, who’d gone into Pleg-mund’s Brigade, had killed him. Nodding, she said, “I would like to give him- or her, if it’s a girl-a Kaunian name, too.”

“Of course,” Ealstan said.

He hadn’t quarreled. He hadn’t even hesitated. He’d just said, Of course. Vanai gave him a hug. “I love you,” she told him.

“I love you, too,” he answered seriously. “That’s what makes it all worthwhile. By the powers above, I do hope I’ll be able to keep feeding everybody.”

“I think you will,” Vanai said. Ealstan still looked worried. She added, “Your father thinks you will, too. He’s a very sharp man. If he thinks you can manage, he’s likely right.”

Ealstan kissed her. “You’re the one who always knows the right thing to say.”

She yawned again. “What I’m going to say now is, ‘Good night.’“ She rolled over onto her side and felt sleep coming down on her like a soft, dark blanket. She yawned one more time. Tomorrow, life would go on. It was an utterly ordinary thought-for anyone who hadn’t been through what Vanai had. To her, the ordinary would never seem so again, not when she compared it to the years just past. Being able to have an ordinary life. . Who, really, could want much more than that? Not me, she thought, and slept.

Pekka had run the largest, most complex sorcerous project the land of the Seven Princes had ever known. Over in the Naantali district, mages by the dozen had leaped to obey her. Thanks to the project, the Gyongyosians had surrendered and the Derlavaian War was over.

“Aye? And so?” Elimaki said when Pekka went over her accomplishments.

“And so? And so?” Pekka threw her hands in the air and scowled at her sister. “And so you’d think I’d be able to put together a simple wedding. That’s and so. Wouldn’t you?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Elimaki said soothingly. “You’re doing fine. Everything will be wonderful. You’re only getting upset because it’s three days away.”

“And because the caterer and the florist haven’t got a clue-not even a hint-about what they’re supposed to be doing,” Pekka added. “They’re both idiots. How do they stay in business when they’re such idiots?”

“They’ve both been in business as long as we’ve been alive,” her sister pointed out. “Come the day, everything will be perfect.” Her mouth tightened. “A few years later, though, who knows?” Barristers and solicitors were still gnawing over the remains of her marriage, a marriage as much a wartime casualty as any wounded soldier.

Pekka wished Elimaki hadn’t said that. “I’m nervous enough as things are,” she said.

“If you don’t want to go through with it-” Elimaki began.

“It’s not that,” Pekka broke in, shaking her head. “It’s not that at all.” She hoped she wasn’t trying to convince herself as well as Elimaki. “But how can I help worrying about it? I worry about everything. I have to.”

“I hope you’re as happy ten years from now as you will be when you say your vows,” Elimaki told her. “Uto thinks the world of Fernao, if that means anything to you.”

“It means a lot,” Pekka said. “The only question I have is whether it should make me happy or scare me.”

Elimaki laughed. She knew Pekka’s son as well as Pekka did herself. She might know Uto better than I do, Pekka thought. The past few years, she’s seen a lot more of him than I have. “A little of both,” she said. “You don’t want him not to like Fernao. …”

“I certainly don’t,” Pekka said.

“But you wonder what he’s liking if he likes him too much,” her sister went on. “How much of a mischievous little boy can your fiance be?”

“Some, I expect,” Pekka answered. “Most men can, from everything I’ve seen.” She thought of Ilmarinen, who still had a wide streak of mischievous little boy in him at more than twice her age. He and Uto had recognized each other as two of a kind. That was another frightening thought.

“If Uto’s content with Fernao, that’s good,” Elimaki said. “A boy should have a man around, I think.” She hesitated, then nodded to herself and went on, “And you don’t have to tell him anything, either.”

“No,” Pekka said. “That crossed my mind, too.” As far as she was concerned, it was far better that Uto never find out she and Fernao had been lovers before Leino died. Her son would have a much easier time accepting Fernao as a stepfather this way than as someone who might have displaced his real father even if Leino hadn’t died.

“Simpler,” Elimaki said.

“Aye.” Pekka nodded. “And the world usually isn’t simple, either.”

“Don’t I know it!” Elimaki exclaimed. “It’s never simple once the solicitors get their claws into it, believe me it isn’t. Powers below eat Olavin, why didn’t he just walk in front of a ley-line caravan?”

Pekka thought she understood why Olavin had taken up with his secretary.

He’d been away from his wife for a long time, so he’d found someone else. She’d done something not far removed from that herself. Since she saw no way to tell Elimaki anything of the sort without making her sister burst like an egg, she prudently kept her mouth shut.

Elimaki asked, “What sort of trouble is the caterer giving you?”

That made Pekka want to burst like an egg. “The moron! The idiot! The imbecile! He’s telling me he can’t get enough smoked salmon for the feast.”

“Why not?”

“Why? I’ll tell you why! Because his illiterate, crackbrained assistant who does his ordering didn’t order enough, that’s why,” Pekka said. “He knew how much I’d asked for. He just forgot to get it. Incompetent bungler. Powers above, I wish we still took heads, the way our ancestors did in the old days. But his would be empty.”

Elimaki went out to the kitchen. When she came back, she was carrying two mugs of brandy. “Here.” She handed one of them to Pekka. “Drink this. You’ll feel better.”

“In the old days-”

“In the old days, this would have been fermented reindeer milk,” her sister said firmly. Pekka found herself nodding. She took a sip, and nodded again. Sure enough, civilization had made progress in the past thousand years. Elimaki went on, “Everything will be fine at the wedding. You’ll see. And I hope everything will be fine afterwards, but that’s up to you-you and Fernao, I mean.”

“We’ll do the best we can,” Pekka said. “That’s all anybody can do.”

By the time she’d finished the brandy, she did feel better. Her sister had poured her a hefty tot. She also felt sleepy, and let Elimaki put her to bed. She was sure she would be worried again in the morning, but she wasn’t-only frantic, which wasn’t quite the same thing. Frantic seemed to do the job. She approached the caterer with blood in her eye, and not only got a promise of all the smoked salmon she’d ordered, but got it at a reduced rate. “To make up for the problem our error caused you,” the fellow said. To get you out of the shop before you murder someone, was what he probably meant.

The day of the wedding dawned fair and mild. Pekka let out a long sigh of relief. With summer past and autumn beginning, weather in Kajaani was always a gamble. Aye, a canopy behind Elimaki’s house would have shielded the guests from the worst of it, but she didn’t want everyone to have to come swaddled in furs, and she especially didn’t want to bring the ceremony indoors. Old, old custom said weddings belonged outside, under the sun and the wind and the sky. If caught between old, old custom and an early snowstorm. .

I don’t know what I would have done, Pekka thought. I’m glad I don’t have to worry about it. We might almost be Gyongyosians talking about the stars.

She was just getting into her leggings and elaborately embroidered tunic, a good hour before people were supposed to start arriving, when somebody knocked on the front door. “If that’s Fernao, you can keep him,” she called to Elimaki. “Otherwise, hit him over the head and drag him off to one side.”

But it wasn’t Fernao, and Elimaki didn’t hit him over the head. “I need to speak to Pekka,” Ilmarinen declared.

Pekka threw her hands in the air, thinking, I might have known. Fastening the last couple of bone toggles, she went out to the front room. “What is it?” she snapped. “It had better be interesting.”

“Aren’t I always?” he asked, with one of his raffish smiles.

She folded her arms across her chest. “What you always are, without fail, is a nuisance. I haven’t got time for you to be a nuisance right now, Master Ilmarinen. Say your say and come back when you’re supposed to, or you’ll make me sorry I invited you.”

“Here. Let me show you.” He pulled a leaf of closely written calculations from his beltpouch and handed it to her. “It proves what I’ve been saying all along.”

“I really haven’t got time for this now.” But Pekka took the paper-it was either that or throw him out bodily. She glanced through it… and stopped after a moment. It went from straight sorcerous calculation to purporting to prove by the same kind of calculations that she and Fernao would have a happy marriage. Not a dozen people in the world could have followed all of it-and she could imagine only one who could have written it. She wondered how much labor and thought had gone into it. In spite of herself, she couldn’t stay annoyed. “Thank you very much,” she told him. “I’ll treasure it.”

“Do better than that,” Ilmarinen said. “Make it come true.” He ducked out of the house. Pekka hoped he’d remember to come back at the right time.

Fernao did show up a few minutes later, along with the burgomaster of Kajaani, who would recite the marriage vows. The burgomaster, who was a plump little man, only a couple of inches taller than Pekka, looked odd standing beside her tall, lean Lagoan fiance. “I hope you’ll be very happy,” the man kept saying.

“Oh, I expect we will,” Pekka answered. “In fact, I have proof.” She passed Fernao the paper Ilmarinen had given her.

He started looking through it, then did the same sort of double take she had. “Who gave you this?” he said, and held up a hand. “No, don’t tell me. I’m a Zuwayzi if it’s not Ilmarinen.” Pekka nodded. Fernao got down to the bottom and shook his head. “There’s nobody like him.”

“Nobody even close.” Pekka looked Fernao over. “How splendid you are!”

“Am I?” He didn’t sound convinced, where any Kuusaman man would have. His tunic, his jacket, his leggings were even fancier than hers. All the embroidery looked done by hand, though it had surely had sorcerous augmentation. “So your Jelgavan exile did a good job?”

“It’s-magnificent,” Pekka said.

“Good.” If anything, Fernao sounded amused. “It’s not what I’d wear back at home, but if it makes people here happy, that’s good enough for me.”

“You are. . most impressive,” said the burgomaster, looking up and up at Fernao. “You will make an imposing addition to our fair city.”

Someone else knocked on the door: an early arriving guest. There was always bound to be one. “Uto!” Pekka called. When her son appeared, she said, “Take the lady back out to the canopy.”

“All right,” Uto said, as docile as if he’d never got into trouble in his life. “Come with me, please, ma’am.”

“Aren’t you sweet?” said the woman, a distant cousin, which only proved how distant she was.

Before long, Pekka and Fernao walked up a lane through the seated guests and stood before the burgomaster. “As representative of the Seven Princes of Kuusamo, I am pleased to be acting in this capacity today,” the fellow said. “It is far more pleasant than most of the duties I am called upon to fulfill. …”

He went on and on. He was a burgomaster; part of his job, pleasant or not, was making speeches. Uto stood beside Pekka and a pace behind her. He soon started to fidget. A gleam came into his eyes. Pekka was keeping an eye on him, and spotted it. Ever so slightly, she shook her head. Her son looked disappointed, but, to her vast relief, nodded.

And then, at last, the burgomaster got to the part of his duties he couldn’t avoid no matter how much he talked: “Do you, Pekka, take this man, Fernao, to be your husband forevermore?”

“Aye,” Pekka said.

In Fernao’s eyes, the burgomaster of Kajaani was a ridiculous little man: not because he was a Kuusaman-by now, Fernao took Kuusamans altogether for granted-but because he was absurdly self-important. But he didn’t seem ridiculous at all as he asked, “Do you, Fernao, take this woman, Pekka, to be your wife forevermore?”

“Aye.” Fernao did his best to make his voice something more than a husky whisper. His best proved none too good. But the burgomaster nodded, and so did Pekka. They were the people who really counted.

“By the authority vested in me by the people of Kajaani and by the Seven Princes of Kuusamo, I now declare you man and wife,” the burgomaster said. Forevermore. That word seemed to roll down on Fernao like a boulder. He hadn’t come to Kuusamo intending to find a wife-especially not a woman who was then married to somebody else. He hadn’t even found Kuusaman women particularly attractive. But here he was. And what he’d just done did have certain compensations. Beaming, the burgomaster turned to him. “You may now kiss your bride.”

When Fernao did, all the Kuusamans among the guests-everyone, in other words, except for a few cousins and an old uncle of his and Grandmaster Pinhiero- burst into cheers and shouted, “They are married!” Somebody had told him they would do that, but he’d forgotten. It made him jump. In Lagoas, as in most places, passing a ring marked the actual moment of marriage. The Kuusamans did things differently, as they often did.

“I love you,” he told Pekka.

“I love you, too,” she answered. “That’s one of the better reasons for doing this, wouldn’t you say?” Her eyes sparkled.

“Well, now that you mention it. .” Fernao said. Pekka snorted.

“If I may take my usual privilege.. ” The burgomaster kissed her, too. From some of the things Fernao had read, in the old days a Kuusaman chieftain’s privilege had gone a good deal further than that. One more reason to be glad we live in the modern age, Fernao thought.

Where some Kuusaman customs were very different, the receiving line was just the same. He and Pekka stood side by side, shaking hands with people and accepting congratulations. “A pretty ceremony, my boy,” said his uncle, a bony man named Sampaio. “I didn’t understand a word of it, mind you, but very pretty.”

“I’m glad you could come,” Fernao answered. Speaking Lagoan felt distinctly odd; he didn’t do it much these days. But his uncle, a successful builder, knew no Kuusaman and had long since forgotten whatever classical Kaunian he’d learned.

Sampaio stuck an elbow in his ribs and chuckled. “And that’s one blaze of a suit you’ve got on, too,” he said.

Fernao also thought he was on the gaudy side of splendid. But he shrugged and forced a grin. “It’s what they wear here. What can I do about it?”

“Powers below eat me if I know.” Sampaio gave Fernao a hug. “I hope you’re happy with her, boy. She seems nice, even if we can’t talk to each other.”

“Well, I wouldn’t marry her if I didn’t like her,” Fernao said, which made his uncle laugh. He suspected Pekka spoke a little more Lagoan than she let on. No point telling that to his uncle, though; he didn’t think Sampaio would be coming down to Kajaani again anytime soon.

Elimaki came up to him and gave him a fierce hug. “You take good care of my sister,” she said. “You take good care of her, or you answer to me.”

“I will. I intend to,” Fernao said.

“You’d better.” Elimaki made it sound like a threat. Remembering how her marriage had collapsed not so long before, Fernao supposed he understood why she sounded that way, which didn’t make it any less unnerving.

Ilmarinen had a different take on things, as he usually did. Sidling up to Fernao, he said, “I hope it’s still as much fun now that you’ve gone and made it official.”

“Thank you so much for your good wishes,” Fernao exclaimed.

“Always a pleasure, always a pleasure.” Ilmarinen wagged a finger at him. “See what you get for saving me from myself? That’s not the best recipe for getting a man to love you forever, you know.”

“Don’t be silly,” Fernao said. “You didn’t love me even before then.”

Ilmarinen chuckled nastily. “Maybe we understand each other after all. Now I’m going to raid the feast. You have to stand here gabbing with the rest of these bores till half the good stuff’s gone.” And off he went, cackling like a broody hen.

Before Fernao could figure out what to say to that-not that it gave him much room for a comeback-he found himself clasping wrists with Grandmaster Pinhiero. The head of the Lagoan Guild of Mages said, “I didn’t remember meeting her before. Now I’ve got at least some notion of why you were willing to move to the back of beyond. I wish you were still in Setubal, but I hope you’ll be happy.”

“Thank you, sir.” Fernao hadn’t been sure the grandmaster would be even that gracious.

But Pinhiero, he discovered, had other things on his mind besides this wedding. He asked, “Do you know a third-rank mage named Botelho, from down in Ruivaes?”

“I know the town-miserable little place,” Fernao answered. “I’ve never heard of the man.”

“Neither has anyone else,” Pinhiero said grimly. “His documents are all perfect, he passed every obvious sorcerous test with ease-but he turned out to be an Algarvian on masquerade.”

“Powers below eat him!” Fernao said. “Spying for King Mainardo?”

“Worse,” Pinhiero replied. While Fernao was still wondering what could be worse, the grandmaster told him: “Spying for King Swemmel.”

Fernao wished he hadn’t cursed before. He really wanted to do it now. He contented himself with saying, “Swemmel really wants to know things, doesn’t he?”

“Just a bit.” Pinhiero’s voice was dry. “The other interesting question is, how many other Guild members aren’t what they’re supposed to be?”

“You’d do well to find out,” Fernao said. “Me, I’m just as well pleased to be down here, thank you very much.”

“Aye, have a good time while the world’s going down the commode around you,” Pinhiero jeered.

Fernao gave him a bright, cheerful, meaningless smile. “If you think you can make me feel guilty on my wedding day, you’d better think again.”

“Tomorrow won’t be your wedding day, and you’ll still be down here,” the grandmaster said sourly. “You ought to come back to a place where things happen once in a while.”

“If things didn’t happen here, I never would have started working with the Kuusamans in the first place,” Fernao pointed out. Grandmaster Pinhiero scowled at him. I don’t have to take his orders any more, or even listen to his complaints, Fernao thought. He turned away from Pinhiero just in time to see Pekka drop to one knee before a Kuusaman younger than she was. But her folk only do that for. . Fernao needed no more than half the thought before leaning on his cane to bow very low himself. “Your Highness,” he murmured.

“As you were, both of you,” Prince Juhainen said. Pekka rose; Fernao straightened. The prince went on, “Powers above grant that you spend many happy years together.”

“Thank you very much, your Highness,” Fernao and Pekka said together. They smiled at each other. Juhainen smiled, too, and moved on toward the reception inside Elimaki’s house. In a low voice, Fernao said, “Well, sweetheart, if you have any kin who haven’t been giving you enough respect, one of the Seven Princes at your wedding ought to do the job.”

“I don’t know,” Pekka said. “People like that would complain because I didn’t have two or three of the Seven down here.”

Eventually, the last cousins, friends, and colleagues went inside, which meant Fernao and Pekka could, too. The caterer came up to Pekka with something like panic on his face. “The smoked salmon-” he began.

She cut him off. “If anything’s gone wrong with that delivery-especially after all your promises-I won’t just take it out of your fee. I’ll blacken your name all over town. But don’t bother me about it now, not on my wedding day.” His face a mask of misery, the caterer fled.

“How much will it matter if you blacken his name?” Fernao asked.

His new bride looked surprised. “Quite a bit,” she answered, and then must have realized why he’d asked the question, for she went on, “This isn’t Setubal. There won’t be thousands and thousands of people here who’ve never heard of him. When folks here find out about a fiasco, it’ll hurt his business. And it should.”

It’s a small town, Fernao thought. That would take getting used to. As far as he could see, the caterer had set out a very respectable spread. Everything he ate was good, from prawns to slices of raw reindeer meat dipped in a fiery sauce. He didn’t particularly miss the smoked salmon. But if it was supposed to be on the menu and wasn’t there, the caterer deserved at least some of the trouble in which he’d landed.

A Valmieran wine washed down the delicacies. Fernao would have expected one from Jelgava, tangy with lemon and orange juice. Then he remembered that Pekka and Leino had gone on holiday to Jelgava. If Pekka didn’t want to remind herself of days gone forever, he understood that.

Someone not far away let out a startled squawk. Someone else exclaimed, “How in blazes did a hedgehog get loose here?” People shooed the little animal out the door.

Voice even grimmer than when she’d dealt with the caterer, Pekka said, “Where’s Uto?” Her son, once found, loudly protested his innocence-too loudly to convince Fernao. Pekka didn’t look convinced, either, but a wedding reception was no place for a thorough interrogation. Uto escaped with a warning just this side of a threat.

And then the carriage that would take Fernao and Pekka to a hostel for their wedding night pulled up in front of Elimaki’s house. Guests pelted them with little acorns and dried berries-symbols of fertility. “Careful,” Pekka warned Fernao as they went down the walk to the carriage. “Don’t slip.”

With his bad leg, that was advice to take seriously. “I won’t,” he said. Pekka protectively took his arm to make sure he didn’t.

At the hostel, another bottle of wine waited in a bed of snow. Pekka poured some for each of them. She raised hers in salute. “We’re married. We’re here. We’re by ourselves. It’s all right, or as all right as it can be.”

“I love you,” Fernao said. They both drank to that. He added, “What I’d bet you really feel like doing about now is collapsing.”

“That’s one of the things I feel like doing, aye,” Pekka nodded. “But there’s something else to attend to, too.”

“Is there?” Fernao said, as if he had no idea what she was talking about.

Before long, they were attending to it. It was nothing they hadn’t attended to a good many times before, but no less enjoyable on account of that-more enjoyable, if anything, because they knew each other better now, and each knew what the other enjoyed. And the first time after the ceremony made things official, as it were.

“I love you,” Fernao said again, lazy in the afterglow.

“A good thing, too, after we just got married,” Pekka replied.

“A good thing?” He stroked her. “You’re right. It is.”

A carpetbag by his feet, Ilmarinen stood on the platform at the ley-line caravan depot in Kajaani, waiting for the caravan that would take him back up to Yliharma. He was not very surprised when a tall Lagoan, his once-red hair now gray, walked up onto the same platform. “Hello, Pinhiero, you shifty old son of a whore,” he said in fluent classical Kaunian. “Come on over here and keep me company.”

“I don’t know that I ought to,” the Grandmaster of the Lagoan Guild of Mages replied in the same tongue. “You’d probably try to slit my beltpouch.”

“That’s what you deserve for wearing such a silly thing,” Ilmarinen said.

Unperturbed, Pinhiero set his carpetbag down next to Ilmarinen’s. “Besides, whom are you calling old? You were cheating people before I was even a gleam in my papa’s eye.”

“Don’t worry-you’ve made up for it since,” Ilmarinen said. “And you’re the one who needs to steal from me more than I need to steal from you.”

“A year ago, I would have,” the grandmaster said. “Not now. Now I have what I need. You boys did play fair on that one, and I thank you for it.”

“Don’t thank me. Thank Pekka and the Seven Princes,” Ilmarinen told him. “If I’d had my way, you’d still be out on the street corner begging for coppers. I wouldn’t even have told you my name, let alone anything else.”

He waited for Pinhiero to fly into a temper. Instead, the Lagoan mage said, “Well, maybe that’s not so foolish as you usually are. Did you hear what I was telling Fernao at the wedding last night?”

“Can’t say that I did,” Ilmarinen answered. Pinhiero spoke of the Algarvian in Swemmel’s pay whom the Lagoan Guild of Mages had unmasked. Ilmarinen scowled. “Oh, that’s just what we need, isn’t it? Might have known the Unkerlanters would try to steal what we’ve done. It’s a lot faster and a lot cheaper than sitting down and doing the work themselves.”

“I expected they would try to spy,” Pinhiero said. “I didn’t expect them to be so good at it. Who knows if this one whoreson is the only mage they planted on us? We’ll have to do some more digging, but this bastard’s credentials were good, and he speaks Lagoan as well as I do.”

“That’s not saying much,” Ilmarinen remarked.

Pinhiero glared at him. “To the crows with you, my friend,” he said, trotting out the curse as if he were a Kaunian from imperial days.

“Thank you so much.” Ilmarinen gave the grandmaster a little half bow, which made Pinhiero no happier.

“If you’re so confounded smart, what would you do about these fornicating Algarvians in Swemmel’s pay?” the Lagoan demanded.

“Oh, I can think of a couple of things,” Ilmarinen said lightly.

Pinhiero wagged a ringer at him. “And those are? Talk is cheap, Ilmarinen, especially when you don’t have to back it up.”

Ilmarinen bristled. “Why should I tell you anything, you old fraud? All you do is insult me. As far as I can see, you deserve spies.”

“Fine,” Pinhiero said. “My first guess is, you haven’t got any answers. My second guess is, you’d be happy to see Swemmel able to match our spells.”

Those both struck home. Nettled, Ilmarinen snapped, “It’d be just like you Lagoan bunglers to let him have the secrets to them.”

Before the grandmaster could answer, the ley-line caravan came into the depot from the north. Passengers got off. Along with the others waiting on the platform, Ilmarinen and Pinhiero got on. They went into an empty four-person compartment and glared so fiercely at the other people who stuck in their noses that they still had it to themselves when the caravan started back towards Yliharma. As soon as it began to move, they began to argue again.

“I’m tired of your hot air, Ilmarinen,” Pinhiero said.

“If you weren’t such a stupid clot, you’d be able to see these things for yourself,” Ilmarinen retorted.

“See what things?” the Lagoan mage said. “All I see is a fraud who talks fancy and doesn’t back it up. You say you have these magical answers”-he used the word with malice aforethought-”and then you don’t say what they are. And the reason you don’t say is that you haven’t really got them.”

“Five goldpieces say I do, and better than anything you’ve come up with,” Ilmarinen said.

Grandmaster Pinhiero thrust out his hand. “You’re on, by the powers above.” Ilmarinen clasped Pinhiero’s hand and then took his wrist in an Algarvic-style grip. Pinhiero gave him a seated bow. “All right, your Magnificence. We’ve made the bet. Now talk.”

“I will,” Ilmarinen said. “The first thing you need to do is, you need to get Swemmel thinking the Algarvians he’s hired to do his dirty work for him are going to pass whatever they find out to their own mages and not to him. If anything will give Swemmel nightmares, it’s the idea of Algarve getting strong again. Am I right or am I wrong?”

He knew perfectly well he was right. King Swemmel saw plotters everywhere, and he had plenty of reason to dread Algarve. Even Pinhiero didn’t deny it. All he said was, “You may be right.”

“What I may be is on the way to winning my bet,” Ilmarinen said, laughing. “Are you doing any of that now?”

“None of your business,” the grandmaster said.

“Ha! That means you’re not. I know you,” Ilmarinen said, and Pinhiero didn’t deny that, either. Ilmarinen went on, “The other thing you need to do is, you need to make some false results and put them where a spy who does a little work will come upon them. They can’t be out in the open, or he won’t trust them. But if he digs and digs and then finds them, he’s bound to think they’re real. And he’ll send them back to Swemmel, and the Unkerlanter mages will try to use them, and either they won’t work at all or they’ll be a disaster, depending on how much effort you put into dreaming them up. Either way, the Unkerlanters will stop trusting what their snoops are feeding them. You’re not doing that, either, are you?”

Grandmaster Pinhiero didn’t answer right away. He shifted his weight so he could get at his beltpouch, then took out five gold coins and passed them to Ilmarinen. “Here,” he said. “If I were wearing a hat, I’d take it off to you. You’re twistier than an eel dancing with an octopus.”

“Thank you very much,” Ilmarinen said smugly.

“How in blazes do you come up with these things?” Pinhiero asked. “With a little luck, they’ll tie the Unkerlanters in knots for months, maybe even years.”

“You’re supposed to think of them for yourself,” Ilmarinen said. “Why are you grandmaster, if not to think of things like that? It can’t be because you’re such a brilliant wizard. We both know you’re not. As far as magecraft goes, Fernao is worth ten of you.”

“He’s a clever fellow,” Pinhiero admitted. “I thought he would sit in my seat one of these years, and then you Kuusamans went and kidnapped him. Grabbed him by the prong, by the powers above.” He leaned forward and stared suspiciously at Ilmarinen. “Was that your idea, too?”

Ilmarinen shook his head. “Not a bit of it. I always thought he’d cause Pekka more trouble than he was worth. I hope I’m wrong, but I may be right yet.”

“A likely story,” Pinhiero said. “I don’t know whether you’re lying or not. You’ll never admit it if you are.”

“Who, me?” Ilmarinen did his best to look innocent. He hadn’t had much practice at it, and didn’t bring it off well. Pinhiero laughed raucously.

Ilmarinen muttered something under his breath. Here he’d told the unvarnished truth, and the Lagoan grandmaster hadn’t believed him. As far as he was concerned, that was just like Lagoans. As did their Algarvian cousins, they often thought they knew everything there was to know. They couldn’t get it through their heads that he and a lot of other Kuusamans trusted them no further than the Lagoans trusted folk from the land of the Seven Princes.

Of course, that cut both ways, as Pinhiero proved when he said, “Do you have any notion how much it galls us to follow your lead?”

“Some, maybe,” Ilmarinen said. “We’ve been stronger than you for a while now. You just didn’t notice, because most of what we did was out in the Bothnian Ocean and on islands in the Great Northern Sea where you don’t have an interest. And besides, we’re only Kuusamans-we don’t make a big racket about what we do, the way Algarvic folk enjoy so much. We just go on about our business.”

Grandmaster Pinhiero turned a dull red. He had to know Ilmarinen was right, however little he cared to admit it. He said, “The world is changing.” By the way he said it, he wished the world weren’t.

“Back in the days when the Kaunian Empire was tottering to a fall, a lot of nobles there would have said the same thing,” Ilmarinen observed. “They would have said it in the same language we’re using, as a matter of fact, so not everything changes.”

“Easy for you to say such things, Ilmarinen-you’re on the rising side,” Pinhiero replied. “Me, I have to look at my kingdom shrinking.”

“Not in size. Only in influence,” Ilmarinen said. “Things would have looked a lot worse for you had Mezentio won the war. For that matter, the Algarvians didn’t even manage a full sorcerous attack against Setubal. They did against Yliharma. I was there.”

“You’re always in the way of trouble,” Pinhiero said.

The grandmaster subsided into gloomy silence as the ley-line caravan went through over the Vaattojarvi Hills. The weather was milder and the land fairer on the north side of the hills, but Pinhiero seemed no happier. At last, not too long before the caravan got into Yliharma, he burst out, “Is this what we fought so hard for? Is this why we spent so many men and so much treasure? To hand leadership in the world over to you?”

“Well, if you hadn’t fought, you’d have handed it over to Algarve,” Ilmarinen answered. “And you may not have handed it to us. You may have handed it to Unkerlant instead.”

“You do so relieve my mind,” the Lagoan grandmaster said, and Ilmarinen threw back his head and laughed. Pinhiero glared at him. “If the world does turn out to be Unkerlant’s, you’ll laugh out of the other side of your mouth, by the powers above.”

“No doubt,” Ilmarinen said. “No doubt at all. But I, at least, won’t be wearing that foolish expression on my face, for it’ll come as no surprise. And, I assure you, Kuusamo will work as hard against the rise of Unkerlant as we did against Algarve, and for most of the same reasons. Can you Lagoans say as much, when you can’t even keep spies out of your guild of mages?”

“You cannot hold me responsible for the fact that Algarvians and Lagoans look much alike,” Grandmaster Pinhiero ground out.

“No, but I can hold you responsible for forgetting that that fact has consequences,” Ilmarinen said. “This is why, during the war, we were so reluctant to train Lagoans in the new sorcery. We weren’t sure they would all be Lagoans, if you take my meaning.”

Pinhiero’s glower grew darker than ever. Before he could say anything more, a conductor came through the caravan cars, calling, “Yliharma! Everybody out for Yliharma!” Ilmarinen laughed and clapped his hands. He’d managed to annoy the Lagoan grandmaster all the way up from Kajaani, and he’d got the last word. As the ley-line caravan slowed to a stop, he grabbed his carpetbag and hurried for the door.

The fields around Skarnu’s castle were golden with ripening grain. Some of the leaves on the trees were going golden, too, with others fiery orange, still others red as blood. From the battlements, he could see a long way. A mild breeze stirred his hair. Turning to Merkela, he said, “It’s beautiful.”

His wife nodded. “Aye, it is.” Her nails clicked as she drummed her fingers on the gray stone. “It’s harvest time. I ought to be working, not standing around here like somebody who doesn’t know a sickle from a scythe.”

“When I walked onto your farm five years ago, I didn’t know a sickle from a scythe,” Skarnu reminded her.

“No, but you learned, and you worked,” Merkela said. “I’m not working now, and I wish I were.”

“You’d make a lot of farmers nervous if you did,” Skarnu said.

“I know,” Merkela said unhappily. “I’ve seen that. All the fairy tales talk about how wonderful it is for the peasant girl to marry the prince and turn into a noblewoman. And most of it is, but not all of it, because I can’t do what I’ve been doing all my life, and I miss it.”

Skarnu had never worked so hard in his life as when bringing in the harvest. He didn’t miss it at all. Saying that would only annoy Merkela, so he kept quiet. She probably knew him well enough to understand it was in his thoughts. Valmiru came up on the battlements just then. Skarnu turned to the butler with something like relief. “Aye? What is it?”

“A woman with a petition to present to you, your Excellency,” Valmiru replied.

“A petition? Really? A written one?” Skarnu asked, and Valmiru nodded. Skarnu scratched his head. “Isn’t that interesting? Most of the time, people here just tell me what they’ve got in mind. They don’t go to the trouble of writing it out.” If nothing else had, that by itself would have told him he was in the country.

He went down the spiral staircase. The woman, plainly a peasant, waited nervously. She dropped him an awkward curtsy. “Good day, your Excellency,” she said, and thrust a leaf of paper at him.

She would have retreated then, but he held up a hand to stop her. “Wait,” he added. Wait she did, fright and weariness warring on her sun-roughened face. He read through the petition, which was written in a semiliterate scrawl and phrased as a peasant imagined a solicitor would put things: full of fancy curlicues that added nothing to the meaning and sometimes took away. “Let’s see if I have this straight,” he said when he was done. “You’re the widow named Latsisa?”

She nodded. “That’s me, your Excellency.” She bit her lip, looking as if she regretted ever coming to him.

“And you have a bastard boy you want me to declare legitimate?” Skarnu went on.

“That’s right,” Latsisa said, looking down at her scuffed shoes and flushing.

“How old is this boy?” Skarnu asked. “You don’t say here.”

Latsisa stared down at her shoes once more. In a low voice, she answered, “He’s almost three, your Excellency.”

“Is he?” Skarnu said, and the peasant woman nodded miserably. Skarnu sighed. Sometimes being a marquis wasn’t much fun. He asked the question he had to ask: “And does he have hair that’s as much red as it is blond?” Latsisa nodded again, her face a mask of pain. As gently as he could, Skarnu said, “Then why do you think I would be willing to make him legitimate?”

“Because he’s all I have,” Latsisa blurted. She seemed to take courage from that, for she continued, “It’s not his fault what color his hair is, is it? He didn’t do anything wrong. And I didn’t do anything against the law, either. All right-I slept with an Algarvian. He was nicer to me than any Valmieran man ever was. I’m not even sorry, except that he had to go. But it wasn’t against the law, not then. And it’s not like I was the only one, either-is it, your Excellency?”

She knows about Krasta, Skarnu thought, and had to work to hold his face steady. But her other arguments weren’t to be despised, either. He asked, “Didn’t you care that you were sleeping with an enemy, an invader?”

Latsisa shook her head. “All I cared about was that we loved each other.” Her chin came up in defiance. “We did, by the powers above. And if he ever came back here, I’d marry him in a minute. So that’s why I want the boy made legitimate, your Excellency. He’s what I’ve got.”

“Even if he were made legitimate, he won’t have an easy time growing up, not looking the way he does,” Skarnu said.

“I know that,” Latsisa answered. “But he’ll have a harder time yet if he’s a bastard. And you still haven’t told me why it’d be against the law to make him all proper just on account of his father had red hair.” Skarnu knew why he didn’t want to do it. But the peasant woman was right; that was different from finding a reason in law why an Algarvian’s bastard should be treated differently from any other. No sooner had that thought crossed his mind than Latsisa said, “Besides, the war’s supposed to be over and done with now, isn’t it?”

She was doing her best not to make things easy. Skarnu tried another tack: “What would your neighbors think?”

“One of my neighbors is Count Enkuru’s bastard,” Latsisa replied. “The count forced his mother, too, powers below eat him. He looks just like Enkuru, my neighbor does, but the count never gave his mother a copper for what he’d done. He was a noble, and his shit didn’t stink-begging your pardon, your Excellency.”

“That’s all right,” Skarnu said abstractedly. Aye, there were times when this job wasn’t easy at all.

Latsisa went on, “So my neighbors don’t get so up in arms about bastards as a lot of people would, maybe. Sometimes they happen, that’s all, and a person who’s a bastard doesn’t usually act any different than anybody else.”

Finding that ley line blocked, Skarnu went down another. He hardened his voice and said, “You do know that I was a Valmieran officer, don’t you? And that my wife and I were both in the underground after the kingdom surrendered?”

“Aye, I know that. Everybody knows that-and what happened to your wife’s first husband,” Latsisa said. “But I thought I’d come and ask you anyways, on account of you’d got a name for judging fair.” Her mouth twisted. “Maybe I heard that last wrong. Sure seems like I did.”

Skarnu’s cheeks and ears heated. “If you’re going to ask me to set aside the whole war, you’re asking a lot.”

“War shouldn’t have anything to do with it,” Latsisa said. “I just want to make my little boy legitimate. Wouldn’t have any trouble doing that if he was a blond like me, would I?”

I tried to get Merkela not to hate little Gainibu. I didn‘t have any luck, even though he’s my nephew-maybe especially because he’s my nephew, Skarnu thought. Now here’s a half-Algarvian bastard I’ve never even seen, and I’m ready to hate him, or at least to treat him differently from the way I would if he were all Valmieran.

How many bastards had Valmieran women borne to Algarvian soldiers during the occupation? Thousands, surely-tens of thousands. Right now, he supposed, Algarvian women were lying down with occupying soldiers; they’d raise up another crop of bastards before long.

But that had nothing to do with the questions at hand. Would Latsisa have had any trouble legitimating a blond bastard boy? Skarnu knew she wouldn’t; it would be a routine procedure, unless she had legitimate children who raised a fuss. Should her son’s case be any different in law just because he had sandy hair? Try as he would, Skarnu could see no legal justification for denying the petition.

He ground his teeth; there was nothing he more wanted to see. But he couldn’t find it. The peasant woman had argued him down. And why not? he gibed at himself. Merkela does it all the time. Thinking about Merkela made him wonder how he would explain himself to her. He didn’t care to contemplate that right now. He took the petition, scrawled I approve on it, and signed his name. Then he thrust it at Latsisa. “Here.”

Her jaw fell. Her eyes widened. “Thank you, your Excellency,” she whispered. “I didn’t think you would.”

Skarnu hadn’t thought he would, either. “I didn’t do it for you,” he said harshly. “I did it for honesty’s sake. Take that, do whatever you need to do to register it with the clerks, and get out of my sight.”

“Aye, your Excellency.” The peasant woman didn’t take offense. She dropped Skarnu another unpracticed curtsy. “What they say is true-you are a just man.”

“I hope so,” Skarnu said. “I do try.” He gestured brusquely toward the door to the audience chamber. Latsisa, quite sensibly, left in a hurry. Skarnu sat where he was for a while, wondering if he’d done the right thing. At last, he decided he had, however little he liked it. That fortified him. He had the feeling he’d need fortifying.

Later that afternoon, Merkela asked, “What did the woman want?”

He tensed. “She had a bastard she wanted me to declare legitimate.”

“A bastard?” Merkela was quick on the uptake. “An Algarvian’s bastard?” Skarnu nodded. She said, “I hope you sent her away with a flea in her ear, the miserable, stinking whore.”

“No,” Skarnu said, and braced himself for trouble. “It’s not the little boy’s fault who his father was. If his father were Valmieran, there wouldn’t be any question about making him legitimate. And so I did.”

Merkek gave him a poisonous glare. “That’s terrible,” she said. “It’s not just the boy. You might as well have told the woman it was all right for her to play the slut during the occupation.”

“Even a whore can make a child legitimate,” Skarnu said. “I know that for a fact. It hasn’t got anything to do with whether she’s good or not, only with whether the child is hers and whether anyone else in the family makes a stink. Here, there isn’t anyone else in the family but her and the boy-she was a widow before she took up with the Algarvian.”

“Did the redheads blaze her husband before she spread her legs for this one?” Merkela asked.

“I don’t know the answer to that,” Skarnu said. “I don’t think so.”

“Disgraceful,” Merkela said.

“Is it? I don’t think so,” Skarnu said. “There are thousands of these bastards all over Valmiera. There’s one in this castle-Bauska’s little girl, remember? What are we going to do? Hate all of them for as long as they live? That’s asking for trouble. The war is over. We can start to show a little pity.”

“You can, maybe.” No, Merkela had no yield in her.

With a sigh, Skarnu said, “I have to do things here as I think right. I would have caused more trouble by telling her no than I did by saying aye.”

“I still think you made a mistake,” Merkela told him. That was milder than most of the things she might have said. And she pushed it no further. Maybe, a tiny bit at a time, she was mellowing. If she was, she would never admit it. And Skarnu knew better than to say anything about it, which would only put her back up. Over these past five years, he’d learned to get along with his hot-tempered, stubborn wife. And if that doesn’t suit me for running a marquisate, powers below eat me if I know what would. He gave Merkela a kiss, and wouldn’t answer when she asked him why.

When Ealstan came out of the shop where he and his father had been casting accounts, he looked around in surprise. “School was right over there,” he said, pointing down the street. “I didn’t even notice when we got here this morning- my wits must be wandering.”

Hestan looked over to the ruins of the academy-the Algarvians had used it for a strongpoint. “Not much left there, so I’m not surprised you didn’t notice. And your wits were working fine. If they weren’t, how did you catch that depreciation allowance I missed?”

“Oh. That.” Ealstan shrugged. “I did plenty of those, casting accounts for Pybba-he was a born thief, and he had me run them all the time, whether he deserved them or not.” He shook his head in memory half fond, half furious. The pottery magnate turned underground leader had never done things by halves.

“You’ve spoken of him now and again,” his father said. “He must have been something.”

“Something, aye, but I still wonder what,” Ealstan answered. “I would have liked him better if he’d had any use for blonds, but he was an old-line Forthwegian patriot-Forthwegians against the world, if you know what I mean.”

“What finally happened to him?” Hestan asked.

“He surrendered when we couldn’t hold out in Eoforwic anymore,” Ealstan answered. “The Unkerlanters just sat there on the other side of the Twegen and let Mezentio’s men put us down. The redheads promised to treat the fighters who yielded as proper war captives, but I don’t know what became of him after he went into the captives’ camp. I wouldn’t care to bet whether he’s still alive.”

“Depends on how good the Algarvians are at keeping promises.” His father pointed toward some broadsheets printed in blue and white-Forthweg’s colors- on a nearby wall. “Those weren’t here this morning. I wonder what people are trying to convince us of now.”

Ealstan only shrugged. “I’ve seen a million different broadsheets. I’m not going to get excited about another one.” But, despite his words, he and his father both craned their necks toward the broadsheets as they came up to them.

king Beornwulf comes to Gromheort! the sheets declared. Below the caption was a portrait of Beornwulf, looking younger and handsomer and more kingly than Ealstan remembered him being back in Eoforwic. Of course, Ealstan had been dragged into the Unkerlanter army right after seeing Beornwulf, so his memories were liable to be biased.

“A parade,” his father said, reading the smaller print below the King of Forthweg’s picture. “A week from today.” He glanced over to Ealstan. “We’ll have to make sure we don’t get stuck in traffic-unless you really want to go see him.”

“No thanks-I have seen him,” Ealstan said. “What with what happened to me after I did, I’m not all that excited about doing it again.” As if in sympathy, his wounded leg twinged. He took another look at the broadsheet. “No, we don’t have to worry about it. The day will be a holiday, so nobody will go to work.”

“Nobody who’s looking for an excuse to stay home, anyway.” Hestan took work very seriously indeed.

When Ealstan got home, he found that Vanai and his mother had already heard about the royal visit. “A crier was going through the streets shouting the news,” Elfryth said. “Didn’t you hear him?”

“Uh, no,” Ealstan admitted. Maybe he took work too seriously himself. If the crier had gone by-and he probably had-he’d gone by unnoticed. Ealstan glanced over to his father. Hestan looked blank, too. Who would have imagined columns of numbers could be so alluring? Ealstan thought. He looked from his father to Vanai; at least he had good reason for finding her alluring. “How are you?” he asked.

“Not bad,” she answered. “Breakfast stayed down. So did lunch. If dinner does, too, it will be a good day.”

“Dada!” Saxburh said gleefully, and grabbed Ealstan by the leg, the only part of him she could reach.

He picked her up and gave her a big smacking kiss. She giggled. “Have you been a good girl today?” he asked.

“No.” She sounded proud of herself. Then, as if to prove her point, she reached out for his beard with both hands.

He put her down in a hurry. “What else has she done? Or don’t I want to know?” he asked Vanai.

“About what she usually does.” His wife put a hand up to her mouth to hide a yawn. “The only trouble is, I’m so tired all the time, chasing after her wears me out more than it did.”

Ealstan kissed her. “After you get through the first three months or so, you won’t be so worn out any more. That’s how it worked when you were carrying Saxburh, anyhow.”

“I know,” Vanai said. “But it’s different now. Before I had Saxburh, I didn’t have to chase a baby and keep an eye on her and nurse her. I’m still carrying Saxburh, even if she isn’t inside me anymore. I hope that won’t make too big*a difference this time around. It’s bound to make some.”

“You won’t have to stay in hiding, though, and it won’t matter if your masking spell wears off faster than it should because you’re going to have a baby,” Ealstan said. “You already found that out.”

“Well, so I did,” Vanai admitted. “No one bothered me at all. No one even yelled anything nasty at me. That surprised me. Maybe hating Kaunians has got to be bad manners for a while.”

“I hope so,” Ealstan said. “It always should have been. Kaunians are people, too.” After the words were out of his mouth, he realized he was quoting his father.

Vanai sighed. “I don’t think that has anything to do with why it might be out of fashion. If people thought like that, we never would have had much trouble. But the Algarvians hated Kaunians, and everybody hates the redheads right now, so whatever they did must have been wrong.”

With a sigh of his own, Ealstan nodded. “You’re probably right. I wish you weren’t, but you probably are.” Elfryth called them to supper then, which meant they dropped it. That also meant they had to capture Saxburh, who sometimes thought having to sit in a high chair was as cruel a punishment as going to the mines. This was one of those nights, which made supper, however tasty, something less than a delightful meal.

When Ealstan went off to cast accounts with Hestan the next morning, he noticed strangers on the streets of Gromheort-hard-faced, businesslike men who eyed how traffic went and who cast unhappy, suspicious glances toward every balcony and window above street level. After he spotted two or three of them, a lamp went on inside his head. “They must be King Beornwulf’s bodyguards, coming to make sure nothing goes wrong when he has his parade.”

“Mm, I daresay you’re right,” Hestan replied. “How-efficient of the new king.” He and Ealstan both made faces. Beornwulf was Swemmel’s puppet, and everyone knew it. The choice was between Swemmel’s puppet and Swemmel undiluted by a puppet, and everyone knew that, too. Swemmel was rumored to think his own shadow plotted against him. If Beornwulf imitated him there, too, why should anyone be surprised?

More and more of Beornwulf’s bodyguards came into Gromheort as the parade grew nearer. The afternoon before the King of Forthweg was supposed to go through the town, Ealstan stopped in surprise. “What is it, son?” Hestan asked.

“I know one of those fellows,” Ealstan answered. “Why don’t you go on ahead? I’d like to talk to him, but I don’t want him to see what any of my kin look like.”

His father plainly wanted to argue with him. After just as plainly wrestling with himself, Hestan didn’t. “You make altogether too much sense,” he said.

“I wonder where I got that from,” Ealstan said. “Go on. I won’t be long.” Shaking his head and muttering to himself, Hestan went up the street.

After his father had turned a corner and got out of sight, Ealstan walked up to the bodyguard, stuck out his hand, and said, “Hello, Aldhelm. It’s been a little while.”

The guard studied him in some concern; he obviously hadn’t expected to be recognized. Then his face cleared. “Ealstan, by the powers above!” He clasped Ealstan’s hand. “I didn’t know you were here. Last I saw you, we were both trying not to surrender to the cursed Algarvians back in Eoforwic.”

“That’s right.” Ealstan nodded. “I managed to stay out of their hands, but I, ah, went into the Unkerlanter army a little while later.” He didn’t want to say anything too nasty about that, not if Aldhelm served Beornwulf and Beornwulf served Swemmel.

“Knew you weren’t around.” Aldhelm nodded himself. He looked Ealstan up and down. “Don’t mean to pry, but did I notice a limp?”

“Aye,” Ealstan said. “I got blazed in the leg in the street fighting here, and the Unkerlanters discharged me. I’ve been here ever since.” He didn’t say that Gromheort was his home town. True, he had an eastern accent, but this wasn’t the only city in the eastern part of Forthweg. He went on, “It’s not so bad these days. I get around on it pretty well.”

“That’s good. Glad to hear it.” Aldhelm sounded more or less sincere. He continued, “You can guess what I’m up to these days.”

“Unless I’m daft, you’re one of Beornwulf’s men,” Ealstan said, and his former comrade in arms nodded again. Ealstan asked, “How does serving the king stack up against serving Pybba?”

“Ah, Pybba.” A reminiscent smile spread over the guard’s face. “He was a whoreson and a half, wasn’t he?”

“He sure was. But he was our whoreson.” Ealstan sighed. “I suppose the fornicating redheads blazed him once they got their hands on him, even if they promised they wouldn’t. You never could trust those bastards.”

“No, you couldn’t,” Aldhelm agreed, “but they didn’t break their word there. You’ve been here in Gromheort all this time, have you?” He waited for Ealstan to nod, then continued, “After the war ended, Pybba came back to Eoforwic. He was skinny as a pencil and he’d lost most of this teeth, but he came back.”

“Running his pottery again, is he? Good for him,” Ealstan said.

But Aldhelm shook his head. “No, he’s dead now. The Unkerlanters blazed him for treason, just a few weeks after he got home.” He scowled: the expression of a man who feared he’d said too much. Sure enough, the next words out of his mouth were, “Listen, it’s good to see you, but I’ve got business to take care of here. So long.” He hurried away.

Pybba, dead? Pybba, surviving Mezentio’s men to perish at the hands of Swemmel’s? Slowly, Ealstan nodded. Pybba had risen against Algarve without leave and without help from Unkerlant. If that didn’t make him a man who might rise against Unkerlant itself, what would? It was logical, if you looked at it the right-or was it the wrong? — way.

“Powers above,” Ealstan said softly. But it wasn’t the news of Pybba’s death that made him exclaim, or not that alone. Six years earlier, he’d been here, right here, when the news racing through Gromheort that Alardo, the Duke of Bari, was dead had caught up with him: the death that had sparked the Derlavaian War. A death before the war, a death after the war. Ealstan kicked a stone. It spun away. And too cursed many deaths in between.

He hurried after Hestan. Back at home, Elfryth and Saxburh and Vanai would be waiting.