When Krasta did go downstairs, she found Lurcanio with his arms folded across his chest and a sour expression on his face. “Good of you to join me at last,” he said. “I was beginning to wonder if I should ask one of the kitchen women to go with me to the king’s palace in your place.”
From most men, that would have been annoyed bluster. Lurcanio was annoyed, but he did not bluster. If he said he’d been thinking of taking one of the kitchen wenches to the palace, he meant it.
“I’m here, so let’s be off,” Krasta said. Lurcanio did not move, but stood looking down his straight nose at her. She needed a moment to realize what he expected. It was more annoying than anything he required of her in bed. Grudgingly, very grudgingly, she gave it to him: “I’m sorry.”
“Then we’ll say no more about it,” Lurcanio replied, affable again now that he’d got his way. He offered her his arm. She took it. They went out to his carriage together.
His driver said something in Algarvian that sounded rude. Had he been Krasta’s servant, she would have struck him or dismissed him on the spot. Lurcanio only laughed. That irked her. Lurcanio knew it irked her and did it anyhow to remind her Valmiera was a conquered kingdom and she a victor’s plaything.
After the carriage began to roll, she asked him, “Have you ever been able to learn what became of my brother?”
“I am afraid I have not,” Colonel Lurcanio answered with what sounded like real regret. “Captain Skarnu, Marquis Skarnu, is not known to have been slain. He is not known to have been captured. He is not known to have been among those who surrendered after King Gainibu capitulated. It could be--and for your sake, my lovely lady, I hope it is--that the records of capture and surrender are defective. It would not be the first time.”
“What if they aren’t?” Krasta asked. Lurcanio did not reply. After a few seconds, she recognized the expression on his long, somber face as pity. “You think he’s dead!” she exclaimed.
“Milady, there at the end, the war moved very swiftly,” the Algarvian officer replied. “A man might fall with all his comrades too caught up in the retreat to bring him with them. Our own soldiers would have been more concerned with the Valmierans still ahead than with those who could endanger them no more.”
“It could be so.” Krasta did not want to believe it. But, with most of a year passed since she’d heard from Skarnu, she had a hard time denying it, too. As was her way, when a painful fact stared her in the face, she looked in another direction: in this case, around Priekule. “I don’t see so many Algarvian soldiers on the streets these days, I don’t think.”
“You are likely right,” Lurcanio said. “Some of them have gone west to join in the fight against King Swemmel.”
“He’s a nasty sort,” Krasta said. “He deserves whatever happens to him and so does his kingdom.” Civilization, as far as she was concerned, did not run west of Algarve. Not so long before, she would have said it did not run west of Valmiera.
Someone shouted at her from a dark side street: “Algarvian’s hired twat!” Running footsteps said the fellow who’d yelled had not lingered to note the effects of his remark. In that, no doubt, he was wise. Had she been able to catch him, Krasta would not have been gentle.
Colonel Lurcanio patted her leg, a little above the knee. “Just another fool,” he said, “so take no notice of him. I do not need to hire you, do I?”
“Of course not.” Krasta tossed her head. Had Lurcanio offered her money for the use of her body, she would have thrown everything she could reach at him. He’d done nothing of the sort. He’d simply made her afraid of what might happen if she said no. (She chose not to dwell on that; she did not care to think of herself as afraid.)
“Ah, here we are,” Lurcanio said a little later, as the carriage came up to the palace. “An impressive building. The royal palace in Trapani is larger, but, I think, less magnificent. One can imagine ruling all the world from here.” After that praise, his laughter sounded doubly cruel. “One can imagine it, but not all that one can imagine comes true.” He descended from the carriage and handed Krasta down. “Shall we pay our respects to your king, who does not rule all the world from here?” He laughed again.
“I came here the night King Gainibu declared war against Algarve,” Krasta said.
“Then he still ruled some of the world from here,” Colonel Lurcanio said. “He would have done better to keep silent. He would have gone on ruling some of the world. Now he has to ask the leave of an Algarvian commissioner before he takes a glass of spirits.”
“If Algarve hadn’t invaded the Duchy of Bari, he wouldn’t have had to declare war,” Krasta said. “Then everything would still be as it was.”
Lurcanio leaned over and brushed his lips across hers. “You must be an innocent. You are too decorative to be a fool.” He began ticking points off on his fingers. “Item: we didn’t invade Bari; we took
