Out of the Darkness

outside but also turn out her pockets and put whatever she had in them on a tray. “I’m not going to give this Algarvian anything except a piece of my mind,” she said.

With a shrug, the warder said, “These are the rules.” Against the rules, plainly, the powers above themselves contended in vain. Even Krasta, who was anything but shy about arguing regardless of whether or not she had a case, forbore to do so here. The warder said, “You wait. Someone will bring him.”

Krasta waited longer than she cared to. Staring at the wire mesh made her feel imprisoned herself. She drummed her fingers on her trouser leg, trying to fight down her annoyance. After about a quarter of an hour-it seemed much longer to Krasta-two guards brought in Lurcanio. They shoved him toward the chair on the far side of the mesh. “Here’s the whoreson,” one of them said as the other slammed the door.

Instead of sitting down on the hard chair, Lurcanio bowed to Krasta. “Good day, milady,” he said in his musically accented Valmieran. “Have you come to gloat, or perhaps to throw nuts to the monkey in the cage? I could use the nuts. They do not feed me very well-which, considering how you Valmierans stuff yourselves, is doubly a crime.”

“How dare you tell the news sheets you fathered my boy?” Krasta demanded. “How dare you?”

“Well, did I not?” Lurcanio asked. “I surely had more chance than anybody else. But did Valnu or whoever get there at the right time?”

“That has nothing to do with anything,” Krasta said, suddenly recalling little Gainibu’s unfortunate hair color. Lurcanio laughed out loud, which only infuriated her further. “How dare you say it?”

Lurcanio gave back a serious answer, perhaps the most annoying thing he might have done: “Well, for one thing, it is-or it appears to be-the truth.”

“What has that got to do with anything?” Krasta yelped, very conscious of the difference between what was said and what was.

“And, for another”-Lurcanio went on as if she hadn’t spoken-”I can still strike a blow of sorts by telling the truth here. You Valmierans are going to be as hard on me as you know how; I doubt that not at all. Why shouldn’t I make things as difficult as I can for you?” Malicious amusement sparked in his cat-green eyes.

Revenge Krasta understood. She didn’t care to have it aimed at her. “It’s not gentlemanly!” she exclaimed.

“I am not in a gentlemanly predicament, you stupid little twat,” Lurcanio snapped. “You were pleasant in bed, but you haven’t the brains the powers above gave a hedgehog. I fought a war here in Priekule, and they intend to murder me under form of law on account of the way I fought it. I cannot do much to stop them, either. Now, have you got that through your thick skull?”

“Futter you!” Krasta said shrilly.

“I would tell you to go right ahead, my former dear, but the mesh is too narrow to make it practical,” Lurcanio replied.

“Powers below eat you, you put my name in the news sheets,” Krasta said.

“And when have you ever complained about that?” Lurcanio asked.

“Futter you!” Krasta said again. This time, she didn’t wait for an answer, but flounced out of the visiting chamber. When she slammed the door behind her, an earthquake might have hit the building. The warder, who was waiting in the anteroom, jumped. “Get me out of this horrible place,” Krasta snarled, snatching up her chattels.

The warder started to say something, looked at her, and thought better of it. He led her back to the entrance. He did dare a, “Goodbye,” then.

Krasta ignored him. She stalked back to her driver. “Take me home this instant-this instant, do you hear me?” she said. The driver, sensibly, obeyed without a word.

Bembo threw away his cane and stood up on his own two legs in the middle of his flat. Actually, judging by what his kilt displayed, he stood up on about a leg and a half. The one that had been broken in Eoforwic was still only a little more than half as thick as the other. But he did stand, and he didn’t fall over.

“How about that, sweetheart?” he said to Saffa.

She looked up from her baby, who was nursing, to clap her hands. Seeing the baby at her breast never failed to make Bembo jealous, even though he knew how foolish that was: the baby wasn’t interested for the same reasons as his. “That’s good,” she said. “Pretty soon, you’ll be able to run like the wind.”

“Well. .” Bembo looked down at his portly form. He’d lost a good deal of weight since getting hurt, and he was still portly. I might be able to run like a slow breeze one of these days, he thought. That was about as much speed as he had in him. He said, “Maybe I will be able to start walking a beat before too long. Having some money coming in again would be good.”

“Aye.” Saffa nodded. Her little boy was falling asleep; her nipple slipped out of his mouth. She raised the baby to her shoulder to burp him, then set her tunic to rights. As she patted the baby’s back, she went on, “You know something?”

“I know all kinds of things,” Bembo said. “What have you got in mind?”

Saffa made a face at him. “I was going to say, you’re nowhere near as big a bastard as I thought you were before I let you get lucky. Maybe I ought to keep my mouth shut.”

“Maybe you should,” Bembo agreed. She made another face. He laughed. “You asked for that.”

“If you got everything you asked for, you wouldn’t think that was so cursed funny,” Saffa said hotly. Her temper would kindle on the instant, and then calm down again just as fast. Even when she was angry, she noticed people around her, which Bembo wouldn’t have done. When he gnawed on his lower lip instead of giving her a snippy answer, she asked, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” he said, and limped over to a chair. He was glad to sit down; standing hadn’t been easy, and walking without a cane made him feel as if he’d fall over at every step he took with his bad leg.

Saffa knew a lie when she heard one. How many lies had she heard, from how many men? Bembo didn’t want to think about that. She gave him an exasperated look and said, “I didn’t mean to bite you there. I didn’t think I had bitten you. Why do you think I did?”

“You don’t want to know,” Bembo answered. “Believe me, you don’t.”

Before Saffa said anything, she eased her son, who’d fallen asleep, down off her shoulder and held him in the crook of her arm. Then, with her free hand, she shook a finger at Bembo. “Why don’t I? What do you think I am, a baby myself?”

“Curse it, Saffa, I don’t want to think about this stuff myself, let alone talk about it with anybody else,” Bembo said.

“What stuff?” she said.

If I got everything I asked for. . Bembo shuddered. He remembered too well the old Kuusaman mage’s eyes piercing him like swords, looking at the memories he concealed from everyone-including, as best he could, from himself. “I told you, you don’t want to know. And I don’t want to talk about it.”

Saffa got up from the couch, using her free hand to help her rise. She went into the flat’s cramped kitchen. Bembo listened to her opening cupboards in there. When she came back, she was carrying a mug of spirits, which she set on the wooden arm of Bembo’s chair. “Drink,” she said. “Then talk.”

Bembo picked up the mug willingly enough. He rarely needed a second invitation to drink. “You poured that quick,” he said. “You’re good at doing things with one hand.”

“I’d better be,” she answered. “It’s like he’s attached to me all the time.” She joggled the baby, who never stirred. “Powers above only know what I’m going to do when he gets too big to carry in one arm, though. But never mind that.” She pointed imperiously to the mug.

He drank. “Do you really want to know?” he said. The spirits weren’t what made him ask. It was much more that he hoped to perform an exorcism, or perhaps to lance a festering wound. “If you really want to know, I’ll tell you.”

Saffa leaned forward. “Go on, then.”

“You know all the things the islanders and the blonds say we did?” he asked.

Her lip curled. “I’m sick of the lies they tell.”

“Those aren’t lies,” Bembo said. Saffa’s jaw fell. He went on, “As a matter of fact, they don’t know the half of it.” And he told her of clearing Kaunians out of the villages near Gromheort, of sending them off in packed ley-line