Rulers of the Darkness d-4

by Harry Turtledove

  "How come? I'll tell you how come," Skarnu said savagely. "Because you were with me when we came back to our building, that's how come. If you hadn't been, you would have strolled right up to the flat where we were staying- and right into the redheads' arms, too. Or had you forgotten that, your Excellency?"

  He used Amatu's title of respect with as much scorn as an angry commoner might have. And he succeeded in angering the returned exile, too. "I'd have done fine without you," Amatu snarled. "For that matter, I can still do fine without you. If you want me to go off on my own, I'm ready. I'm more than ready."

  Part of Skarnu- a large, selfish part of Skarnu- wanted nothing more. But the rest made him answer, "You wouldn't last an hour on your own. And when the Algarvians nailed you- and they would- they'd squeeze out everything you knew, and then they'd come after me."

  "You're not my mother," Amatu said. "I'm telling you they wouldn't catch me."

  "And I'm telling you-" Skarnu broke off. Two Algarvians on unicorns came around a bend in the road a couple hundred yards ahead. Skarnu lowered his voice: "I'm telling you to walk soft now, by the powers above, if you want to keep breathing."

  He wondered if Amatu would have the least idea what he was talking about. But the returned exile had spotted Mezentio's men, too. Amatu hunched his shoulders forward and pulled his head down. That didn't make him walk like a peasant. It made him walk like somebody who hated Algarvians and was trying not to show it.

  And, sure as sunrise following morning twilight, it made the redheads notice him. They reined in as they came up to the two Valmierans walking along the road. Both of them had their hands on their sticks. One spoke to Amatu in pretty good Valmieran: "What's chewing on you, pal?"

  Before Amatu could speak, Skarnu did it for him. "We just came from a cockfight," he said. "My cousin here lost more silver than he's got." He sadly shook his head at Amatu. "I told you that bird wasn't good for anything but chicken stew. Would you listen? Not likely."

  Amatu glared at him. But then, given what he'd said, Amatu had plausible reason to glare at him. The Algarvian who spoke Valmieran translated for his companion, who evidently didn't. They both laughed. Skarnu laughed, too, as he would have at the folly of a silly cousin. The redhead who knew Valmieran said, "Never bet on cockfights. You can't tell what a cock will do, any more than you can with a woman." He laughed again, on a different note. "I know what I want my cock to do."

  He tried to translate that into Algarvian, too, but the pun must not have worked in his own language, because his pal looked blank. Skarnu managed a laugh, too, to show he appreciated the trooper's wit. Then he asked, "Can we go on now, sir?"

  "Aye, go, but keep your cocks out of mischief." Like a lot of people, the Algarvian ran what had been a good joke into the ground. He laughed again, louder than ever. Skarnu smiled. Amatu kept on looking mutinous. The Algarvian cavalrymen dug their knees into their mounts' barrels and flicked the reins. The unicorns trotted on down the road.

  "Cocks!" Amatu snarled when the redheads were out of earshot. "I ought to put a curse on theirs."

  "Go ahead and try, if you want to waste your time," Skarnu answered. "You're no trained mage, and they're warded against all the little nuisance spells, same as we were. You want to kill a soldier, you have to blaze him or cut him."

  That wasn't strictly true. Sacrifice enough men and women- Kaunians from Forthweg, say, or Unkerlanter peasants- and you could power a spell that would kill plenty of soldiers. Skarnu knew as much. He preferred not to think about it.

  Amatu's mind traveled along a different ley line, one that ran straight toward the sewers. "The way you talked to those fornicating whoresons, anybody would think you wanted to suck their-"

  Skarnu knocked him down. When Amatu surged to his feet, murder blazed in his eyes. He rushed at Skarnu, fists flailing. He had courage. Skarnu had never doubted that. But, as a dragonflier, Amatu had never learned to fight in the hard and ruthless school of ground combat. Skarnu didn't waste time on fisticuffs. He kicked Amatu in the belly instead.

  "Oof!" Amatu folded up like a concertina. Skarnu did hit him then, with an uppercut that straightened him again. Amatu had grit. He didn't go down even after that. But he was in no condition to fight anymore. As he stood swaying, Skarnu hit him once more, a blow he could measure carefully. Now Amatu crumpled.

  He tried to get up again. Skarnu kicked him in the ribs, not quite hard enough to break them. So he gauged it, anyhow. If he was wrong, he wouldn't lose any sleep over it. Amatu still tried to get up. Skarnu kicked him yet again, rather harder this time. Amatu groaned and flattened out.

  Skarnu kicked him once more, for good measure, and got another groan. Then he bent down and took away Amatu's knife. "We're through," he said evenly. "I'm going my way. You find yours. If you come after me from now on, I'll kill you. Have you got that?"

  By way of reply, Amatu tried to hook an arm around Skarnu's ankle and bring him down. Skarnu stamped on his hand. Amatu howled like a wolf. When the howl turned into words, he cursed Skarnu as vilely as he could.

  "Save it for the Algarvians," Skarnu told him. "You came back across the Strait to fight them, remember? All you've done since you got here was make trouble for everybody else who's fighting them. Now you're on your own. Do whatever you bloody well please."

  Amatu answered with a fresh flurry of obscenities. He aimed more of them at Krasta than at Skarnu. Maybe he thought that would make Skarnu angrier. If he did, he was wrong. In Skarnu's mind, he'd been calling his sister worse things than any Amatu came up with ever since he found out she was sleeping with an Algarvian.

  "I'm leaving you your silver," Skarnu said when Amatu finally flagged. "As far as I'm concerned, you can buy a rope and hang yourself with it. It's the best thing you could do for the kingdom."

  He walked away from Amatu even as the returned exile reviled him again. However much Amatu cursed, though, he didn't get up and come after Skarnu. Maybe he was too battered. Maybe he believed Skarnu's warning. If he did, he was wise, for Skarnu meant every word of it.

  When Skarnu went round the bend in the road from which the Algarvian cavalrymen had come, he looked back over his shoulder one last time. Amatu was on his feet by then, but going in the opposite direction, the direction the men on unicornback had taken. Skarnu nodded in somber satisfaction. With any luck at all, he would never see Amatu again.

  He also tried to make sure luck wouldn't be the only factor involved. Whenever he came to a crossroads, he went right or left or straight ahead at random. By the time evening approached, he was confident Amatu would have no idea where he was. For that matter, he had no sure idea where he was himself.

  A couple of big, rough-coated dogs ran out from a farmhouse and barked at him. His hand went to one of the knives on his belt. He didn't like farm dogs, which would often try to bite strangers. Here, though, they subsided when the farmer came after them and shouted, "Down!"

  "Thanks, friend," Skarnu said from the roadway. He glanced at the sun. No, he couldn't go much farther before darkness overtook him. He turned back to the farmer. "Will you let me chop wood or do some other chores for supper and a night in your barn?" He hadn't intended to end up here, nor anywhere very close to here.

  The farmer hesitated. Skarnu did his best to look innocent and appealing. A lot of people didn't trust anyone these days. If the fellow said, "No," he'd have to lie up under a tree or wherever else he could find makeshift shelter. But the farmer pointed. "There's the woodpile. There's the axe. Let's see what you can do while the light lasts."

  He didn't promise anything. Clever or just tight-fisted? Skarnu wondered. Aloud, he said, "Fair enough," and got to work. By the time the sun went down, he'd turned a lot of lumber into firewood.

  "Not bad," the farmer allowed. "You've done it before, I'd wager." He brought Skarnu bread and sausage and plums and a mug of what was obviously home-brewed ale, then said, "You can stay in the barn tonight, too."

  "Thanks." Skarnu chopped more wood in th
e morning, and the farmer fed him again. Never once, though, did Skarnu set eyes on the man's wife and whatever children he had. That saddened him but left him unsurprised. Things worked so these days.

  He grimaced. Over by Pavilosta- not so far away- he had a child himself, or would soon. He wondered if he'd ever get to see it.

  ***

  "Setubal!" the conductor shouted as the ley-line caravan slid into the depot at the heart of Lagoas capital. "All out for Setubal, folks! This is the end of the line."

  To Fernao, newly arrived in the great city after months in the wilds of southeastern Kuusamo, that was true in more ways than one. He'd been staring out the window in astonished wonder ever since the caravan began gliding through the outskirts of Setubal. Were there really so many people, so many buildings, in the whole world, let alone in one city? It seemed incredible.

  Leaning on his cane and carrying a carpetbag in his other hand, he made his way out of the caravan car. He knew no little pride in managing so well. His bad leg would never be what it had been before he was injured down in the austral continent, but he could use it. Aye, he limped. He would always limp. But he could get around.

  Noise smote him like a bursting egg when he got down on the platform. "Powers above!" he muttered. Had Setubal always been like this? It probably had. No, it surely had. He'd lost his immunity to the racket by going away. He wondered how- and how fast- he could get it back. Soon, he hoped.

  Through the din, he heard someone calling his name. His head turned this way and that as he tried to spot the man. He looked for someone waving, but half- more than half- the people on the platform were waving.

  And then he did spy Brinco, the secretary to the Lagoan Guild of Mages. They fought their way toward each other through the crowd, and clasped each other's wrists in the traditional style of all Algarvic peoples when they finally came face-to-face. "Good to see you moving so well," Brinco said. A grin stretched across his plump face. More often then not, Fernao knew, the jolly fat man was a myth. In Brinco, the clichй lived.

  "Good to be moving so well, believe me," Fernao told him.

  "Let me take your bag," Brinco said, and did. "Let me clear a path. You follow along behind. A cab is waiting. We'll get you to the guild hall, and-"

  "And Grandmaster Pinhiero will grill me like a bloater," Fernao said. Brinco laughed at that, but didn't deny it. The secretary shouldered a man out of the way. Fernao was perfectly content to follow him. He got the feeling Brinco could have cleared a path through the icebergs that swelled from the shores of the austral continent every winter.

  Absently, he asked, "Do you know the name Habakkuk?"

  "Aye," Brinco answered over his shoulder. "I also know you shouldn't, and that you shouldn't throw it around where others might hear it."

  "Since I do know of it, will you tell me more?"

  "Not here. Not now," Brinco said. "Later, perhaps, should the Grandmaster judge that wise." A skinny little fellow caromed off his chest. "I'm so sorry," he told the man, his voice oozing false sympathy. When Fernao tried to bring up Habakkuk again, Brinco didn't seem to hear him. His deafness was patently false, too, but Fernao couldn't do anything about it.

  The cab had a closed body, but Fernao gritted his teeth at the racket that came through. He peered out the windows. Every so often, he noticed missing buildings or, a couple of times, blocks of buildings that had been standing when he left for the wilds of the Naantali district. "I see the Algarvians still keep paying us calls," he remarked.

  "Aye, every now and again," Brinco agreed. "Not so much lately; they've sent a lot of the dragons they did have up in Valmiera west to fight the Unkerlanters." He was some years older than Fernao, but his grin made him look like a boy. "By all accounts, the dragons aren't helping them much there."

  "Too bad," Fernao said.

  "It is a pity, isn't it?" Brinco said, grinning still. But the grin slipped. "By what I hear, we were lucky they didn't get the chance to serve us as they served Yliharma."

  "Not just Yliharma," Fernao said grimly. "They used that cursed magecraft against us, too, you know. That's why we haven't got Siuntio working with us anymore. If it hadn't been for him, I wouldn't be here talking to you now. None of the mages over there would be here talking to anybody now."

  "How did he- how did the lot of you- withstand that vicious spell, even in so far as you did?" Brinco asked.

  "Siuntio and Ilmarinen rallied us," Fernao answered. "Siuntio… seemed to carry the whole world on his shoulders for just long enough to give the rest of us a chance. I don't know another mage who could have done it."

  Brinco grunted and gave him a sidelong look. For a moment, Fernao had trouble understanding why. Then he realized how he'd miffed the Guild Secretary: Siuntio, of course, wasn't a Lagoan. Fernao shrugged. For a long time now, he'd been the only Lagoan working on the largely Kuusaman project. They hadn't sneered at his blood, and he didn't care to sneer at theirs.

  "Here y'are, gents," the hackman, reining in in front of the great neoclassical hall that housed the Lagoan Guild of Mages. Still looking unhappy, Brinco paid the fare; Fernao had wondered if he'd be stuck with it. But Brinco carried his carpetbag up the white marble steps to the colonnaded entranceway, and seemed in good spirits as he led Fernao back toward Grandmaster Pinhiero's office.

  The trip took longer than it might have. Fernao kept greeting and getting greetings from colleagues he knew. Once past greetings, though, conversations flagged. Fernao wasn't the only one who said, "I wish I could tell you what I'm working on these days." He'd heard half a dozen variations on the theme by the time Brinco ushered him in to see Pinhiero.

  "Welcome home," the Grandmaster said, rising and coming out from behind his desk to clasp Fernao's wrist. Pinhiero was in his sixties, his once-red hair and mustache mostly gray now. He wasn't a great mage; his name would never go into the reference books, as Siuntio's already had. But he had gifts of his own, not least among them political astuteness. After he poured wine for Fernao and helped him ease down into a chair, he asked, "Well, is it what we thought it was?"

  "No," Fernao answered, which made Pinhiero blink. Fernao sipped the wine, enjoying the Grandmaster's discomfiture. Then he said, "It's more- or it can be more, if we ever learn to control it."

  Pinhiero leaned forward, as a falcon might on catching sight of a mouse. "I thought so," he breathed. "If it were less, they would have said more." He blazed out a question as if it were the beam from a stick: "Will it match Mezentio's foul magics?"

  "In force, aye," Fernao said. "Again, though, the question is control. That will take time. I don't know how long, but it won't happen tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow, either."

  "And meanwhile, of course, the war grinds on," Pinhiero said. "Sooner or later, Lagoas and Kuusamo will be fighting on the mainland of Derlavai. Will these spells be ready when that day comes?"

  "Grandmaster, I haven't the faintest idea," Fernao answered. "For one thing, I don't know when that day will come. Maybe you know more about that than I do. I hope so- you could hardly know less."

  "I know what I know," Pinhiero said. "If you don't know, I daresay there are reasons why you don't."

  Arrogant old thornbush, Fernao thought. But he'd already known that. Aloud, he said, "No doubt you're right, sir. The other trouble, of course, is that no one has any sure knowledge of when the cantrips will be ready to use in war and not as an exercise in theoretical sorcery."

  "You had better hurry up," the Grandmaster warned, as if it were Fernao's fault and no one else's that the project wasn't advancing fast enough to suit him. "While you play with your acorns and rats and rabbits, the world around you moves on- aye, and at an ever faster clip, too."

  Fernao did his best to look wise and innocent at the same time. "That's what Habakkuk is all about, eh?"

  "One of the things," Pinhiero said, and then, too late, "And how do you happen to know of Habakkuk?"

  "I would have trouble telling you that, sir," Fernao answered, more inno
cently than ever. "The world has moved on so fast since I heard about it that I've forgotten."

  Pinhiero's green eyes flashed. He wasn't used to being on the receiving end of sarcasm, and didn't seem to like it much. His lips drew back from his teeth in what was as much snarl as smile. "You would have done better to forget the thing itself. But I don't suppose we could expect that of you."

  "Not likely," Fernao agreed. "Will Habakkuk be ready when we need to go back to the mainland?"

  "Oh, sooner than that," Pinhiero said. "Or it had better be- if not, some fancy sorcerous talent will find itself shorter by a head." He hadn't told Fernao anything about what Habakkuk actually was, merely that it was important, which the mage already knew. And now he continued, "Whether it is or it isn't, though, it's got nothing to do with you. This project you are working on is rather different, wouldn't you say? You do have some idea of what you're doing there? You'd bloody well better."

  "I think I may," Fernao said tightly.

  "Good," the Grandmaster told him. "Here's what we'll do: we'll put you up in a room in the guild hall here- with a cot and everything, mind- and you can draft a report for us, let us know what the Kuusamans are doing and how they're doing it. Start at the beginning and don't leave anything out."

  "That isn't why I came back to Setubal," Fernao said in something approaching horror. "It's not the only reason I came back, anyhow."

  Grandmaster Pinhiero was implacable. "Your kingdom needs you."

  It came close to a kidnapping. Pinhiero didn't actually have four burly mages drag Fernao off to the room, but he made it plain that he would unless Fernao went there on his own. When Fernao stuck his head out a little later, he discovered one of those burly mages standing in the hallway. He nodded to the fellow and withdrew again. He couldn't sneak away, then. And he couldn't very well magic his way free, either, not with so much of the sorcerous talent in the world right here. Master Ilmarinen might have tried- and, being Master Ilmarinen, might have succeeded. Fernao knew his own talents weren't up to such sorcery. Having no other choice, he settled down and wrote.