Because he couldn't quite yet, he was interested in what Pekka had been up to. 'The Algarvians must think so,' he said. 'If they didn't, they wouldn't have bothered attacking you. How did they do it? Dragons?'
Pekka shook her head. She didn't want to think about that, either, but the question gave her no choice. 'No. Another Kaunian sacrifice. I don't know whether they just grabbed the first however many Valmierans they saw, or if they brought Kaunians east out of Forthweg. Whichever, it was very bad.' She shuddered, recalling just how bad it had been.
Leino held her and stroked her. She could tell he was bursting with curiosity. She'd known him a good many years now; if she couldn't tell such things, who could? But he did his best not to let any of it show, because he knew that would bother her. And if a mage's suppressing his curiosity wasn't love, what was it? As much in gratitude as for any other reason, she slid down and took him in her mouth, trying to hurry things along. That wasn't magic, but it worked as if it were. Before long, they both stopped worrying about what Habakkuk was or why Mezentio's mages chose to assail Pekka and her colleagues.
But lovemaking never resolved things; it only put them off for a while. After they'd gasped their way to completion, Pekka knew Leino wouldn't be trying yet another round any time soon. That meant his thought would turn elsewhere. And sure enough, he said, 'You must be working on something truly big, if the Algarvians used that spell against you.'
'Something, aye.' Pekka still didn't want to talk about it.
Leino said, 'They tried to use that same spell to drive us off the austral continent, you know.' Pekka nodded; she'd heard something about that. Her husband continued, 'It went wrong. It went horribly wrong, and came down on their heads instead of ours and the Lagoans'. Magecraft that works fine here or on the mainland of Derlavai has a way of going wrong down in the land of the Ice People.'
'That's what they say.' Pekka nodded again, then laughed. 'Whoever they are.' Because she found worrying about her husband's problems easier than worrying about her own, she quickly found another question to ask: 'Will that cause trouble for Habakkuk?'
'It shouldn't.' Leino used an extravagant gesture. 'Habakkuk is… something else.' He chuckled ruefully. 'I can't talk about it, any more than you can say much about whatever it is you're working on.'
'I know. I understand.' Pekka wanted to tell him everything. Just for a moment, she wished Fernao were there so she could talk shop. Then she shook her hair, and had to brush hair out of her eyes. He was part of what she'd come here, come away from the project, to escape.
'I love you,' Leino said, and Pekka reminded herself he'd come a long way to escape hard, dangerous work, too. She clung to him as he clung to her. They didn't make love again; Leino wasn't so young that he could do it whenever he wanted. But the feel of him pressed against her was about as good as the real thing for Pekka, especially when they'd been apart so long. She hoped holding her was as good for him, but had her doubts. Men were different that way.
The next morning, Uto woke both of them at an improbably early hour. With Kajaani so far south, spring days lengthened quickly: the sun rose early and set late. Even so, Pekka's sleep-gummed eyelids told just how beastly early it was. 'You don't treat Aunt Elimaki this way, do you?' she asked, wishing either for tea, which she could get, or another couple of hours' sleep, which she wouldn't.
'Of course not,' her son said virtuously.
That, as Pekka knew, might mean anything or nothing. 'You'd better not,' she warned. 'Aunt Elimaki is going to have a baby of her own, and she needs all the sleep she can get.'
'She won't get it later, that's for sure.' Leino sounded as sandbagged as Pekka.
'All right, Mother. All right, Father.' Uto, by contrast, might have been the soul of virtue. He patted Pekka on the arm. 'Are you going to have another baby, too, Mother?'
'I don't think so,' Pekka answered. She and Leino smiled at each other; if she wasn't, it was in spite of last night's exertions. She yawned and sat up in bed, somewhat resigned to being awake. 'What would the two of you like for breakfast?'
'Anything,' Leino said before his son could speak. 'Almost anything at all. Down in the land of the Ice People, I counted for a good cook, if you can believe it.'
'I'm so sorry for you,' Pekka exclaimed. The horror of that idea was plenty to rout her out of bed and into the kitchen. She got the teakettle going, then folded fat, fresh shrimp into an omelette. Along with fried mashed turnips and bread and butter (olive oil was an imported luxury in Kuusamo, not a staple), it made a fine breakfast.
Uto inhaled everything. He wasn't picky in what he ate; he chose other ways to make himself difficult. Leino ate hugely, too, and put down cup after cup of tea. 'That's so much better,' he said.
'Will you be able to sleep at all tonight?' Pekka asked him.
He nodded and opened his eyes very wide, which made Uto laugh. 'Oh, aye,' he said. 'I won't have any trouble. I may have to eat seal every now and again down in the land of the Ice People, but there's plenty of tea. The Lagoans drink even more of it than we do. They say it lubricates the brain, and I can't argue with them.'
'Seal?' Uto sounded horrified, but looked interested. 'What does it taste like?'
'Greasy. Fishy,' his father answered. 'We eat camel, too, sometimes. That's better, at least for a while. It sort of tastes like beef, but it's fatter meat. The Ice People live on camel and reindeer almost all the time.'
'Are they as ugly as everybody says?' Uto asked.
'No,' Leino said, which obviously disappointed his son. Then he added, 'They're uglier,' and everything was right with the world as far as Uto was concerned.
'Hurry up and get ready for school,' Pekka told him. He greeted that with moans and groans. Now that his parents were back in Kajaani, he wanted to spend as much time as he could with them. Pekka was inflexible. 'You'll be back this afternoon, and you need to learn things. Besides, you're the one who got us up early.' That produced as many more groans as she'd thought it would, but Uto, wearing a martyred expression, eventually went out the door and headed for school.
'Privacy,' Leino said when he was gone. 'I'd almost forgotten what it means. There in the little sorcerers' colony east of Mizpah, everybody lives in everybody else's belt pouch all the time.'
'It's not quite so bad over in the Naantali district.' Pekka started to laugh. 'And now we've both said more than we should have.'
Leino nodded. He took keeping secrets seriously. His voice was thoughtful, musing, as he said, 'The Naantali district, eh? Nothing but empty space in those parts- I can't think of anybody who'd want to go there or need to go there- which probably makes it perfect for whatever you're doing.' He held up a hand. 'I'm not asking any questions. And even if I did, I know you couldn't give me any answers.'
'That's right.' Pekka sent him a challenging stare. 'Well, now that we've got this privacy, what shall we do with it?'
'Oh, maybe we'll think of something.' Leino pulled his tunic off over his head.
Pekka didn't know if either of them had been so ardent even on their honeymoon. They'd spent that at a small hostel in Priekule, and had alternated making love and sightseeing. Now they just had each other, and they were intent on making the most of it before they both had to return to the war.
'I'm not quite so young as I used to be,' Leino said at some point that morning when, after several days of horizontal exercises, he failed to rise to the occasion.
'Don't worry about it,' Pekka said. 'You've done fine, believe me.' Her body felt all aglow, so that it seemed they would hardly need the bedchamber lamp that evening.
'I wasn't worried,' Leino said. 'The people who worry about things like that are the ones who think there's only one way to get from hither to yon. Mages know better- or if they don't, they ought to.' With fingers and tongue, he showed her what he meant. He was right, too- that road worked as well as the other one.
When Pekka's breathing and heartbeat had slowed to something close to normal, she said, 'They talk about women wearing men out. This is the other way round.' She ran a hand down his smooth chest- Kuusamans weren't a very hairy people. 'Not that I'm complaining, mind you.'
'I hope not,' Leino said. 'This is like putting money in Olavin's bank.' Elimaki's husband, these days, was keeping the finances of the Kuusaman army and navy straight, but Pekka understood what her own husband meant. He went on, 'We don't get many chances now, so we have to make the most of them, put them away in our memory bank. They may not earn interest, but they're interesting.'
'That's one word,' Pekka remarked. Leino's hands had started wandering again, too. But when one of them found its way between her legs, she said, 'Wait a bit. I really have done everything I can right now. Let's see what I
