think- I'm pretty sure- this place has been betrayed to the Algarvians.' In three or four sentences, he told of Amatu and what the other noble had done.
Raunu cursed, too, with a sergeant's fluency. 'You're right- we can't stay. Come on back to the house with me, and tell your lady.'
Merkela and Pernavai were kneading bread dough when Raunu and Skarnu walked in. Merkela looked up in surprise. 'Why aren't you out in the-?' She broke off abruptly when she saw Skarnu behind the veteran sergeant. 'What are you doing here?' she whispered, and then hurried to him.
She moved awkwardly; she was, as Raunu had said, very great with child. When Skarnu took her in his arms, he had to lean forward over her swollen belly to kiss her. She was almost as tall as he. 'You have to get away,' he said. 'The Algarvians know about this place- or they may, anyhow.' And he told the story of Amatu again.
Merkela cursed as vividly as Skarnu had. 'Nobles like that… If the redheads had smashed them, plenty of people would be glad to follow Mezentio.' Her fury made Skarnu ashamed of his own high blood. Before he could say anything, she went on, 'Aye, we have to leave. Pernavai, fetch Vatsyunas.'
The woman from Forthweg nodded. She'd come to understand Valmieran well enough, even if she still spoke much more classical Kaunian. She hurried off to get her husband.
'We'll need to take the wagon,' Skarnu said to Merkela. 'You can't get far on foot.' He too cursed Amatu with all the venom he had in him. That did no good.
'It'll make us easy to spot, easy to catch,' Merkela protested.
'So would having you die by the roadside,' Skarnu growled, and she subsided. They didn't run into a squad of Algarvians rushing to seize them as they rattled away from the farm. As far as Skarnu was concerned, that put them ahead of the game right there.
Sixteen
Count Lurcanio bowed to Krasta. 'By your leave, milady, I should like to invite a guest to supper with us tonight,' he said. 'A nobleman- a Valmieran nobleman, to be perfectly plain.'
He was scrupulous about remembering that the mansion and the serving staff were in fact Krasta's. He was more scrupulous about such things than a good many of his countrymen; had he chosen to commandeer rather than ask, what could she have done about it? Nothing, as she knew all too well. That was the essence of being occupied. And so she said, 'Well, of course. Who is it?' She did hope she wouldn't have to endure one of the savage backwoods boors who seemed so fond of Algarve's cause. The idea of Valmierans fighting under Mezentio's banner still left her queasy.
But Lurcanio answered, 'A count by the name of Amatu- affable fellow, I find, if a bit full of himself.'
'Oh. Amatu. I know him, aye.' Krasta didn't sigh in relief, but she felt like it. 'He's from right here in Priekule. But…' Her voice trailed away. She frowned a little. 'I haven't seen him- or I don't recall seeing him- in a very long time.'
That held an unspoken question, something on the order of, If he hasn't come to any of the functions that have gone on since Algarve occupied Valmiera, what's he doing here now? Some nobles in the capital still stubbornly kept themselves aloof from Mezentio's men. Krasta wondered how Lurcanio would have gone about inviting one of them for supper.
'He's been away from the capital for some time,' Lurcanio replied. 'He's very glad to be home again, though, I will say.'
'I should certainly hope so,' Krasta exclaimed. 'Why would anyone who could live in Priekule care to go anywhere else?'
Lurcanio didn't answer, from which she concluded he agreed with her. Though nothing else in Valmiera seemed to, her sense of superiority remained invincible. She went off to browbeat the cook into outdoing himself for a noble guest.
'Aye, milady, nothing but the best,' the cook promised, his head bobbing up and down with a show of eagerness to please. 'I've got a couple of fine beef tongues in the rest crate, if those would suit you for the main dish.'
'The very thing!' Krasta's smile was not without a certain small malice. Algarvians had a way of looking down their noses at robust Valmieran cooking. Lurcanio could eat tongue tonight and like it- or at least pretend. She made sure the rest of the menu was along the same lines: fried parsnips with butter, sour cabbage, and a rhubarb pie for dessert. 'Nothing spare and Algarvian tonight,' she told the cook. 'Tonight the guest is a countryman.'
'Just as you say, milady, so it'll be,' he replied.
'Well, of course,' Krasta said. As long as she wasn't dealing with Lurcanio, her word remained law on her estate.
Having made sure of the cook, she went up to her bedchamber, shouting for Bauska as she went. The maidservant never got there fast enough to suit her. 'I'm sorry, milady,' she said when Krasta shouted at her rather than for her. 'My little girl had soiled herself, and I was cleaning her off.'
Krasta wrinkled her nose. 'Is that what I smell?' she said, which was unfair: Bauska took good care of her bastard by an Algarvian officer, and the baby was not only cheerful and happy but gave promise of good looks. Krasta, however, worried very little about fairness. She went on, 'Count Amatu is coming to supper tonight, and I want to impress him. What shall I wear?'
'How do you want to impress him?' Bauska asked. Krasta rolled her eyes. As far as she was concerned, only one way mattered. Bauska set out a gold silk tunic that looked transparent but wasn't quite and a pair of dark blue trousers in slashed velvet with side laces to get them to fit as tightly as possible. She added, 'You might wear the black shoes with the heels, milady. They give your walk a certain something it wouldn't have otherwise.'
'My walk already has everything it needs,' Krasta said. But she did wear the shoes. They were even more uncomfortable than the trousers, which Bauska took savage pleasure in lacing till Krasta could hardly breathe. The serving woman looked disappointed when Krasta condescended to thank her for her help.
The way Colonel Lurcanio's eyes lit up when Krasta came downstairs was its own reward. He set a hand on the curve of her hip. 'Perhaps I should send Amatu away and keep you all to myself tonight.'
'Perhaps you should,' she purred, looking up at him from under half-lowered eyelids.
But he laughed and patted her and shook his head. 'No, he'll be here any moment, and I truly do want the two of you to meet… so long as I am chaperoning. You may have more in common than you think.'
'What does that mean?' Krasta asked. 'I don't like it when you make your little jokes and I don't know what's going on.'
'You'll know soon enough, my sweet; I promise you that,' Lurcanio said: more in the way of reassurance than he usually gave her.
Count Amatu knocked on the door a few minutes later. He bowed over Krasta's hand, then clasped wrists, Algarvian style, with Lurcanio. He was thinner than Krasta remembered, thinner and somehow harsher. He knocked back a brandy and nodded. 'That opens your eyes,' he said, and then, 'I've had my eyes opened lately, by the powers above. That I have.'
'How do you mean?' Krasta asked.
Amatu glanced over to Colonel Lurcanio, then asked her, 'Have you seen your brother lately?'
'Skarnu?' Krasta exclaimed, as if she had some other brother, too. Count Amatu nodded. 'No,' she said. 'I haven't seen him since he went off to fight in the war.' That was true. 'I've never been sure since whether he was alive or dead.' That was anything but true, though she didn't think Lurcanio knew it. She knew her brother was alive and still doing something to resist the Algarvians. But what did Amatu know? She did her best to sound intrigued and pleased as she asked, 'Why? Have you seen him? Where is he?'
'Oh, I've seen him, all right.' Amatu didn't sound pleased about it, either. After muttering something under his breath that Krasta, perhaps fortunately, didn't catch, he went on, 'He's down in the south somewhere, mucking about with those miserable bandits who don't know a lost cause when they see one.'
'Is he? I had no idea.' Krasta was very conscious of Lurcanio's eye on her. He'd invited Amatu here to see what she would do when she got this news. She had to let it seem a surprise. 'I wish he'd chosen differently.' And part of her did. Had he chosen differently, she wouldn't have had to think about how she'd chosen. One way and another, she'd learned too much about what the Algarvians were doing. That left her unhappy with herself: not a feeling she was used to having.
'They're hopeless, useless, worthless- the bandits, I mean,' Amatu said with fine aristocratic scorn. 'But your brother's having a fine time slumming, I will say. He's knocked up some peasant wench, and he couldn't be
