afterwards.”
“Sometimes that is all a man cares about.” Remembering some of the things that had happened in his own past, Fernao didn’t see how he could deny it. But he went on, “Sometimes, but not always.”
“I see that,” Pekka said. “Thank you. It’s… a compliment, I suppose. It gives me more to think about.”
“I love you. You’d better think about that, too,” Fernao said.
“I know. I do think about it,” Pekka answered. “I have to think about all the things it means. I have to think about all the things it might not mean, too. You’ve helped clear up some of that.”
“Good,” Fernao said.
What Pekka did say was, “You’re a brave man-powers above know that’s true. And you’re a solid mage. Better than a solid mage, in fact; I’ve seen that working with you. There are times I think I never should have gone to bed with you in the first place, but you always made me happy when I did.”
“We aim to please,” Fernao said with a crooked smile.
“You aim well,” Pekka said. “Does all that add up to love? It might. I thought it did before. . before Leino died, and I didn’t know what I was going to do. But that’s turned everything upside down.”
“I know.” Fernao kept the smile on his face. It wasn’t easy.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do.” Pekka smiled, too, ruefully. “Usually, the busier I am, the happier I am. When I’m doing things, I haven’t got time to think. And I don’t much want to think right now.”
“That makes sense,” Fernao agreed. He heaved himself to his feet without using the cane. That hurt, but he managed. He managed the couple of steps he needed to get over to the chair, too. Getting down beside it hurt more than standing up had, but he ignored the pain with the practice of a man who’d known much worse. “But there’s happy and then there’s happy, if you know what I mean.” To make sure she knew what he meant, he kissed her.
It was, he knew, a gamble. If Pekka wasn’t ready, or if she thought he cared about nothing but bedding her, he wouldn’t do himself any good. At first, she just let the kiss happen, without really responding to it. But then, with what sounded like a small surprised noise down deep in her throat, she kissed him, too.
When their lips separated-Fernao didn’t push the kiss as far as he might have, as far as he wanted to-Pekka said, “You don’t make things easy, do you?”
“I try not to,” Fernao answered.
“You’ve succeeded. And I’d better go.” Pekka rose, then stooped to help Fernao up and gave him his cane. He wasn’t embarrassed for the aid; he needed it. Even as Pekka unbarred the door and left, Fernao nodded to himself with more hope than he’d known for some little while.
But Qutuz repeated himself: “A delegation from the Kaunian refugees from Forthweg who have settled around Najran, your Excellency. Three of them are out in the corridor. Will you receive them, or shall I send them away?”
“I’ll talk with them,” the Zuwayzi foreign minister said. “I have no idea how much I’ll be able to do for them-I can’t do much for Zuwayzin these days-but I’ll talk with them.”
“Very well, your Excellency.” Qutuz made an excellent secretary. He gave no sign of his own approval or disapproval. He got his master’s instructions and acted on them-in this case by going out into the corridor and bringing the Kaunians back into the office with him.
“Good day, gentlemen,” Hajjaj said in classical Kaunian when they came in. He read the language of scholarship and sorcery as readily as Zuwayzi, but was less fluent speaking it.
“Good day, your Excellency,” the blonds chorused, bowing low. They all wore tunics and trousers; for men with their pale, easily sunburned skins, nudity was not an option in Zuwayza, even during her relatively mild winter.
“Two of you I have met before,” Hajjaj said. “Nemunas, Vitols.” He nodded to each of them in turn. Nemunas was older than Vitols, and had a scarred left hand. Before Forthweg fell to the Algarvians, they’d both been sergeants in King Penda’s army-unusually high rank for Kaunians-which made them leaders among the blonds who’d fled across the Bay of Ajlun to keep from ending up in one of King Mezentio’s special camps.
The third blond, the one Hajjaj didn’t know, bowed again and said, “I am called Kaudavas, your Excellency.”
“I am glad to meet you,” Hajjaj said. As long as he stuck to stock phrases, he was fine.
Both Nemunas and Vitols stared at him. “It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other, your Excellency,” the older blond said. “Thanks very much for recalling our names.”
“You are welcome,” Hajjaj replied-another stock phrase. A good memory for names and faces came in handy for a diplomat. When he went beyond stock phrases, he had to think about what he said and speak slowly: “And you and your countrymen are welcome in my kingdom, and all three of you are welcome here. Would you care for tea and wine and cakes?”
All three Kaunians from Forthweg chuckled. “We’d sooner just get down to business, sir, if you don’t mind,” Nemunas said.
Hajjaj allowed himself a small smile. The blonds had learned how some Zuwayzi customs worked, sure enough. “As you wish,” he said, and waved to the pillows piled here and there on the carpeted floor. “Sit down. Make yourselves comfortable. And then, please, tell me what I can do for you.”
His guests had got used to making do with pillows instead of chairs and couches, too. They all made nests for themselves. Nemunas, who seemed to be their spokesman, said, “Sir, you know we’ve been sailing east out of Najran back to Forthweg, to hit the cursed redheads a lick or two.”
“Officially, I do not know this,” Hajjaj replied. “Had I known it officially”- he wondered if he’d correctly used the subjunctive there-”Zuwayza’s former allies, the Algarvians you mentioned, would not have been pleased with me.”
Kaudavas said, “We never did understand how anyone could ally with Mezentio’s whoresons, if you don’t mind my saying so.” He was stamped from the same mold as his comrades; if anything, he was bigger and burlier than either of them, burly enough to make Hajjaj wonder if he had a little Forthwegian blood.
“Considering what the Algarvians did to you, I know why you say that,” Hajjaj replied. “Still, we had our reasons.”
“Now we’ve had something to do with the Unkerlanter navy men at Najran,” Vitols said. “Maybe we can figure out what some of those reasons are.”
“Ah?” Hajjaj leaned forward. “Dealing with Unkerlanters is often less than enjoyable. Does this have to do with your reasons for coming to Bishah to see me?”
“Aye,” the Kaunians said as one, loudly and angrily enough to make Qutuz look in to see that the foreign minister was all right. Hajjaj waved him back. Nemunas went on, “The thing of it is, we want to keep right on sailing back to Forthweg. Swemmel’s men haven’t driven the redheads out of all of it yet. We can do some good there.”
“And besides, we want revenge,” Kaudavas added.
“Indeed,” Hajjaj said. “Rest assured, I do understand this.” Among the Zuwayzin, vengeance was a dish to be savored. No other Derlavaian folk thought of it in such artistic terms, though the Algarvians came close.
Vitols said, “But the Unkerlanter navy men won’t let us go out. They say they’ll sink us if we try, and they mean it, curse ‘em.”
“Can you do something about that, sir?” Nemunas asked. “That’s why we came here, to find out if you could.”
“I … see. I do not know.” Hajjaj made a sour face. Najran was a Zuwayzi port, not one that belonged to King Swemmel. For the Zuwayzin not to be in full control of what happened there was galling. But Zuwayza, these days, kept only such sovereignty as Unkerlant chose to yield to her. Hajjaj drummed his fingers on his knee. “Let me ask a question. Are you loyal to this new king, this King Beornwulf, the Unkerlanters have named?” Forthweg, these days, kept even less sovereignty than Zuwayza did.
In almost perfect unison, the Kaunians from Forthweg shrugged. “Don’t care about him one way or the other,” Nemunas answered.
“He’s just a Forthwegian,” Vitols agreed.
