talk about personalities in indirect terms, a surprisingly difficult exercise. She had to talk about the work in which they were engaged in even more indirect terms. She hadn't been able to tell Leino all that much about it even when they'd been together. He hadn't asked, either. He'd known when silence was important, and respected the need for it.
We've had simply appalling weather lately, she wrote. If it were better, we could do more. That seemed safe enough. Most of Kuusamo had appalling weather through most of the winter. Hearing about it wouldn't tell an Algarvian spy where she was. And bad weather could interfere with any number of things, not all of them things in which a spy would be interested.
I hope to be able to see you before long. She'd been told she might be able to leave for a little while in the not too indefinite future. But even if she did manage to get away, could Leino escape his training as a proper military mage at the same time? She thought he should have stayed in a sorcerous laboratory, improving the weapons Kuusaman soldiers would take into battle. But the Seven Princes thought otherwise, and their will counted for more than hers.
Sighing, she stared down at the page. She wanted to tear it up and throw the pieces in the wastebasket. She had to be able to do better than the words she'd put down, the words that seemed so flat, so useless, even so stupid. What would Leino think when he saw them? That he'd married a halfwit?
He'll understand, she thought. I'm sure he's learning plenty of things he can't tell me, too. Most of her believed that. Just enough had doubts, though, to leave all of her upset and worried.
She jumped when someone knocked on the door. Springing away from her letters was something of a relief. Even arguing abstruse theoretical calculations with Ilmarinen seemed more appealing than trying to say things she couldn't say without having them cut out of her letter before Leino ever saw it.
But when she opened the door, she found Fernao standing there, not Ilmarinen. The Lagoan mage leaned on his stick and had his crutch stuck under his other arm. 'I hope I am not disturbing you,' he said in careful classical Kaunian.
'Not even a little bit,' Pekka said in Kuusaman. She started to repeat that in the scholarly tongue, but Fernao's nod showed he'd followed her. 'Come in,' she went on, in Kaunian now. 'Sit down. What can I do for you?'
'I thank you,' he said, and made his slow way into her chamber. She took a couple of steps back, not only to get out of his way but to keep him from looming over her quite so much: Lagoans were almost uncouthly tall.
Maybe Fernao sensed what she felt, for he sank onto one of the stools in the room. Or maybe he's just glad to get off his feet, Pekka thought. Had she been injured as Fernao was, she knew she would have been. She turned the chair on which she'd been sitting to write away from the desk. 'Shall I make you some tea?' she asked. She couldn't be much of a hostess here, but she could do that.
Fernao shook his head. 'No, thank you,' he said. 'If you do not mind, I can talk with you without thinking I am once more a student bearding a professor in his den.'
Pekka laughed. 'I often have that feeling myself around Siuntio and Ilmarinen. I think even the Grandmaster of your kingdom's Guild of Mages would have it around them.'
'Grandmaster Pinhiero is not the most potent mage ever to come out of our universities,' Fernao said, 'but he would speak his mind to anyone, even to King Swemmel of Unkerlant.'
Lagoans had always had a reputation for speaking their minds, regardless of whether doing so was a good idea. Pekka asked, 'Would that make Grandmaster Pinhiero a hero or a fool?'
'Without a doubt,' Fernao answered. Pekka chewed on that for a little while before deciding it was another joke and laughing again. Fernao continued, 'Every time I see how far you Kuusamans have come, it amazes me.'
'Why is that?' Pekka knew her tone was tart, but couldn't help it. 'Because you Lagoans do not think Kuusamo worth noticing at all most of the time?'
'That probably has something to do with it,' he said, which caught her by surprise. 'We did notice you when it came to declare war against Algarve- I will say that. We would have done it sooner had we not feared you might take Mezentio's side and assail us from behind.'
'Ah.' Pekka found herself nodding. 'Aye, I knew people who wanted to do exactly that.' She remembered a party at Elimaki's house. Some of the friends of Elimaki's husband, Olavin the banker, had been eager to take on Lagoas. Olavin was serving the Seven Princes these days. Pekka suspected most of those friends were doing the same thing.
'Did you?' Fernao said, and Pekka nodded again. He shrugged. 'Well, I can hardly say I am surprised. It would have been… unfortunate had that happened, though.' Even as Pekka wondered how he meant the word, he explained: 'Unfortunate for Lagoas, unfortunate for the whole world.'
'Aye, you are likely to be right.' Pekka glanced over her shoulder at the letters to Leino and Uto, then back to Fernao. 'May I ask you something?'
As if he were a great noble, he inclined his head to her. 'Of course.'
'How do you stand it here, cut off not just from your family but from your kingdom as well?'
Fernao said, 'For one thing, I have not got much in the way of family: no wife, no children, and I am not what you would call close to either of my sisters. They never have understood what being a mage means. And, for another, the work we are doing here matters. It matters so much, or may matter so much, I would sooner be here than anywhere else.'
That was a more thoughtful answer than Pekka had expected. She wondered how long Fernao had been waiting for someone to ask a question like hers. Quite a while, she guessed, which might also be a measure of his loneliness. 'Why have you not got a wife?' she asked, and then, realizing she might have gone too far, she quickly added, 'You need not answer that.'
But the Lagoan didn't take offense. Instead, he started to laugh. 'Not because I would rather have a pretty boy, if that is what you mean,' he said. 'I like women fine, thank you very much. But I have never found one I liked enough and respected enough to want to marry her.' After a moment, he held up his hand. 'I take it back. I have found a couple like that, but they were already other men's wives.'
'Oh,' Pekka said, and then, half a beat slower than she might have, 'Aye, I can see how that would be hard.' Was he looking at her? She didn't look over at him, not for a little while. She didn't want to know.
'You have things you were doing, I see.' Awkwardly, Fernao levered himself to his feet. 'I shall not keep you. May you have a pleasant evening.' He made his slow way to the door.
'And you,' Pekka said. She had no trouble looking at his back. But, when he had gone, she found she couldn't continue the letter to Leino. She put it aside, hoping she'd have more luck with it in the morning.
Ealstan enjoyed walking through the streets of Eoforwic much more these days than he had a few weeks before. True, the Algarvians still occupied what had been the capital of Forthweg. True, King Penda still remained in exile in Lagoas. True, a Kaunian whose sorcerous disguise as a Forthwegian was penetrated still had dreadful things happen to him. And yet…
SULINGEN was scrawled in chalk or charcoal or whitewash or paint on one or two walls or fences in almost every block. Up till now, a lot of Forthwegians had been sullenly resigned to Algarvian occupation. King Mezentio's men looked like winning the war; most people- most people who weren't Kaunians, anyhow- had got on with their lives as best they could in spite of that ugly weight hanging over them. Now, even though the Algarvians still held every inch of their kingdom, some of them didn't.
A couple of Algarvian constables strode past Ealstan. Their height and red hair separated them from the Forthwegians their kingdom had overcome. So did the pleated kilts they wore. And so did their swagger. No matter what had happened to their countrymen down in Sulingen, they showed no dismay.
But a Forthwegian behind Ealstan shouted, 'Get out of here, you whoresons! Go home!'
Both Algarvians jerked as if stuck with pins. The shout had been in Forthwegian, but they'd understood. They whirled, one grabbing for his club, the other for his stick. For a dreadful moment, Ealstan thought they thought he'd yelled. Then, to his vast relief, he saw they were looking past him, not at him. One of them pointed toward a Forthwegian whose black beard was streaked with gray. They both strode purposefully by Ealstan and toward the older man. He stared this way and that, as if wondering whether flight or holding still was more dangerous.
