Through the Darkness

running down. But then, unlike such a toy,

Ealstan somehow found the energy to say more: “My stinking cousin killed him. Beat him to death the way you’d beat… you’d beat… I don’t know what.” Tears started running down his cheeks and into his beard. Vanai didn’t think he knew he was crying.

She made herself keep reading the letter Ealstan’s father had sent. “They didn’t do anything to him,” she said in disbelief. “They didn’t do anything to him at all.”

“To Sidroc, you mean?” Ealstan asked, and Vanai foolishly nodded, as if she might have meant someone else. Ealstan went on, “Why should they do anything to him? Leofsig was just a Forthwegian, and Sidroc’s in Plegmund’s Brigade. They’ll probably pin a medal on him for it.”

“Didn’t you tell me Plegmund’s Brigade was training outside of Eoforwic?” Vanai answered her own question: “Of course you did. That singer you like went out with his band and performed for them.”

“Ethelhelm.” Ealstan sounded amazed he’d come up with anything so mundane as the musician’s name. “Aye, the Brigade is here-or some of it’s here. Some of it’s gone off to train somewhere else. I found out about that from him.”

“But.. won’t the soldiers do something to your cousin?” Vanai was faltering, and she knew it. “They can’t want somebody who’s nothing but a murderer. . can they?”

“What do you think soldiers are?” Ealstan answered bleakly. “Especially soldiers who fight for King Mezentio. But it doesn’t matter anyhow. Look at the date on the letter.”

Vanai hadn’t. Now she did. “That’s-three weeks ago,” she said. “And it just got here now?”

Another foolish question. Ealstan, fortunately, took it as a matter of course. He said, “Aye. What do the Algarvians care about how the post runs in Forthweg, or even if the post runs in Forthweg? We’re lucky it got here at all- if you call that luck. But you’re right, or I hope you’re right-I want to go out and see if I can get the Algarvians to do something about Sidroc. If he’s still here, I mean. He’s liable not to be.”

“Don’t do that!” Vanai exclaimed.

“Huh? Why not?” Ealstan asked, as if he intended heading for the encampment of Plegmund’s Brigade that very moment. Shock had to have dulled his wits.

Patiently, Vanai answered, “Because you still might be wanted in Gromheort, that’s why. Do you plan to show up there and have them arrest you?”

“Oh.” Ealstan sounded astonished. No, that hadn’t crossed his mind at all. When it did, he nodded. “You’re right, curse it. Well, he might not even be there. Powers above, I hope he’s not there. I hope he goes out and the Unkerlanters kill him first thing. I wish I could do it myself. I wish I had done, it, back there in Gromheort. A million Sidrocs aren’t worth one of my brother.”

“I’m sorry.” Vanai went to him and held him. They clung to each other for a while. Vanai hoped that did Ealstan some good. She doubted it would do much. But maybe if he thought she thought he felt better, he really would feel a little better. She shook her head. She wasn’t used to needing such convoluted thoughts.

“Oh,” Ealstan said again, this time as if remembering something. “There’s a piece of the letter right at the end that’s meant for you.”

“There is?” Vanai hadn’t read the whole thing; the crushing bad news that headed it had been enough. Now she pulled back so she could look at the rest. Sure enough, Ealstan’s father wrote, Your friend’s grandfather has been asking after her. We have said that, so far as we know, she is well. We shall say nothing more without your leave and hers. Vanai said, “I don’t want him knowing any more than that. I don’t even want him knowing that much, but it can’t be helped.”

“Don’t worry,” Ealstan told her. “My father knows how to keep his mouth shut-a bookkeeper has to. And my mother and sister won’t blab, either.” Thinking about her kept him from thinking about the rest of the news-but only for a moment. Then his face crumpled, for he went on, “Leofsig won’t say anything. Leofsig ca-ca-can’t say anything, not any more he can’t.” He started to weep again.

Vanai went into the kitchen, took down a bottle of spirits, and poured a full glass for Ealstan and half a glass for herself. “Here,” she said, handing him his. “Drink this.”

He knocked it back as if it were so much water. Vanai blinked: he didn’t usually drink like that. She sipped her own, letting the spirits slide hot down her throat. When Ealstan spoke, his voice held an eerie calm: “Maybe Ethelhelm can find out for me whether Sidroc is still in the camp near here. If he is …

“What could you do?” Vanai asked. She held up her hand, palm out, as if to stop him from doing whatever he was thinking, and she feared she knew what that was. As if to a child, she said once more, “You’re not going out there yourself.”

“All right,” he said, so readily that she looked at him in surprise and sharp suspicion. But he went on, “I’m a bookkeeper, too, remember? If you read the romances, bookkeepers don’t do their own dirty work. They hire somebody else to do it for them.” He plucked at his beard. “I wonder if I’ve got enough to have a man killed. Maybe Ethelhelm would know.” He still spoke very clearly. The spirits certainly weren’t affecting him much.

“Are you sure you want to ask him?” Vanai could feel what she’d drunk, which was a good deal less than what Ealstan had put down. She had to form her words with care: “He did go out and play for the Brigade, remember.”

“Aye, that’s so,” Ealstan said unhappily. “Don’t know who I can trust any more. Don’t know if I can trust anybody any more.” He sounded on the edge of tears again. That might have been the spirits working in him, but it might have been simple grief, too.

“You can trust me.” Vanai set down her glass and took his hands in hers. “And I can trust you. You’re the only person in the world I can trust, I think. You have your family, anyhow.”

“What’s left of it,” Ealstan said, and Vanai bit her lip. But then he nodded. “Aye. I know I can trust you, sweetheart.” This time, he reached for her.

He didn’t use endearments very often, which made them all the more welcome when they came. If he’d wanted to take her back to the bedchamber, to lose himself in her flesh for a little while, she would gladly have given herself to him. But he didn’t. He held her, then let her go. “Can you eat?” she asked, and he nodded. She went back to the kitchen. “I’ll fix something.”

Bread and olives and cheese and salt fish in oil weren’t very exciting, but they filled the belly. Ealstan methodically ate whatever Vanai set before him, but gave no sign of noticing what it was. She might have fed him earth and ashes and sawdust, and he would have disposed of those the same way. She gave him more spirits, too. Again, they could have been water by the way he drank them and for all the effect they had on him.

After he’d finished eating, he said, “I wish I could have been there for the memorial service. I can’t believe it’s done-it’ll be a long time done now. Curse the miserable slow post.”

Had he been able to go to the memorial service, he would have gone without Vanai. She couldn’t go out on the streets without fear now, let alone step into a caravan car. But Ealstan wasn’t even thinking about her. The only person on his mind was poor dead Leofsig.

She couldn’t blame him for thinking of his blood kin first. She kept telling herself that. He’d known them all his life, and her, really, only a few months. But she wished he would have shown a few more signs of recalling what her special problems were.

And she cursed the useless, worthless, hope-lifting, heartbreaking author of You Too Can Be a Mage. Had he really known what he was doing, she could have made herself look like a Forthwegian instead of turning Ealstan into a counterfeit Kaunian. She wondered if her curse would bite. She hoped so. She had been able to work some sorcery, even if it hadn’t turned out the way she wished.

“Do you want anything else?” she asked Ealstan. He shook his head. She got up and carried the few plates to the sink. Washing them took only a handful of minutes. When she turned back to Ealstan, she found him slumped down onto the table asleep, his head in his hands.

She shook him, but got only a snore. She shook him again, and roused him to a sludgy semi-consciousness, but nothing more: all the spirits had caught up with him at once. Half supporting him, she got him into the bedchamber. It wasn’t easy; she was as tall as he, but not much more than half as wide.

And when he landed on the bed, he sprawled diagonally across it, still wearing his shoes. That left no room at all for her. She thought about rearranging him, but decided not to bother. Instead, she took her own pillow and curled up on the sofa. It was cramped, but on a warm night she didn’t need a blanket. After a while, she fell asleep.