Darkness Descending

tell you what’s the trouble. That’s the trouble.” She pointed in the general direction of the kilt. On a man even more than on a woman, it seemed an admission--even a celebration--of defeat.

Valnu pretended not to understand. “What, my knees?” Wicked laughter filled his thin, handsome face. “My pet, you’ve seen a great deal more of me than my knees.”

“Never on the street,” Krasta ground out.

“Oh, you have so,” Valnu said. “That time you ended up shoving me out of your carriage--we weren’t just on the bloody street, we were in it.”

“That’s different,” Krasta said, though she couldn’t have told him how. Then she asked the question that was really on her mind: “How can you stand to wear it?”

“How can I stand it?” Ever the opportunist, Valnu rested a hand on her hip. “Sweetling, the way things are, I should hardly dare not to don the kilt, wouldn’t you say? It’s protective coloration.”

Krasta might have heard the phrase once or twice, but it made no sense to her here. Impatiently, she said, “What are you talking about?”

“What I said,” Valnu answered. “You know, the butterflies that look like dry leaves when they fold up their wings and the bugs that look like twigs, all so the birds can’t eat ‘em. If I look like an Algarvian ...” His voice trailed away.

“Oh.” Krasta wasn’t the cleverest woman in Valmiera, but she saw what he meant. “They aren’t really doing that. I don’t think they’re really doing that. Lurcanio says they aren’t doing that. If they were, we’d have heard about people who went missing, don’t you think?”

“Not if they didn’t go missing from Valmiera,” Valnu said.

“We’d have heard about Jelgava, too, or the Jelgavan nobility would have, and they would have started screaming their heads off. We’d have heard that,” Krasta said. It was Lurcanio’s argument, but it had convinced her, and she made it her own.

If it didn’t convince Valnu, it made him thoughtful. “Maybe,” he said at last. “Just maybe. By the powers above, how I wish it could be true. Still and all, though”--he ran the hand that wasn’t on Krasta’s hip down his kilt--”better not to take chances. Law of similarity and all that. And don’t I look splendid?”

“You look grotesque.” Krasta exercised tact only around Colonel Lurcanio. “As grotesque as an Algarvian in trousers. It looks unnatural.”

“You say the sweetest things. I’ll tell you what it is, though.” Valnu leaned toward her, almost close enough for his tongue to touch her ear as he whispered, “It’s bloody drafty, that’s what.”

He startled a laugh out of Krasta, despite her best intentions. “Serves you right,” she said. This time, when Valnu tried to kiss her on the cheek, she let him. He went on his way cheerfully enough, but she found she could get no more pleasure out of shopping and rode back to her mansion in a glum and dour mood.

“Coming on!” an Algarvian soldier shouted in bad Unkerlanter. “More firewoods!”

“Aye, more firewood,” Garivald said, and dumped his bundle at the redhead’s feet. Every branch the Algarvians burned was one the villagers of Zossen couldn’t, but anyone who complained got blazed. No one complained, then--not where the Algarvians could hear.

It could have been worse. Only a squad or so of Algarvians garrisoned the village. The men of Zossen could have risen and wiped them out. The men of a village a few miles away had risen and killed all of Mezentio’s soldiers there. That village was gone now. The Algarvians had brought in more soldiers, behemoths, and dragons, and wiped it off the face of the earth. The peasant men were dead. The women . . . Garivald didn’t want to think about the women.

His friend Dagulf thumped a load of firewood at the Algarvian’s feet. The fellow nodded and gave a theatrical shiver. He might not speak much Unkerlanter, but, like a lot of redheads Garivald had seen, he had a gift for gestures. “Cold,” he said. “Very cold.”

Garivald nodded; disagreeing with the occupiers didn’t pay. Dagulf nodded, too. They caught each other’s eye. Neither laughed or even smiled, though Garivald knew he felt like it. It was only a little below freezing, and might even get about it by the middle of the day. If the Algarvian thought this was cold, he hadn’t seen anything yet.

After they’d got out of earshot of the redhead, Dagulf said, “He hasn’t got the clothes he needs for this kind of weather.”

“No,” Garivald said, and then, “Too bad.” He and Dagulf did laugh now. Garivald scratched. His calf-length wool-tunic was twice as thick as the one the Algarvian wore. Beneath it, he had on a wool undertunic, wool drawers, and wool stockings. He was perfectly comfortable. When winter came on, he’d add a thick wool cloak and a fur hat. He wouldn’t be perfectly comfortable then, but he’d manage.