Darkness Descending

Ilmarinen looked east. “Arpad of Gyongyos has able mages, too.” He looked west. “And Fernao is not the only good one in the stable of Vitor of Lagoas. Gyongyos hates us because we block her way across the islands of the Bothnian Ocean.”

“Lagoas does not hate us,” Siuntio said.

“Lagoas doesn’t need to hate us,” Ilmarinen answered. “Lagoas is our neighbor, so she can covet what we have without bothering to get excited about it. And we and the Lagoans have fought our share of wars over the years.”

“Lagoas would have to be mad to fight us at the same time as she wars with Algarve,” Pekka said. “We outweigh her even more than Mezentio’s kingdom does.”

“If she were ahead of us on this path you mentioned, that might not matter so much,” Siuntio said.

“And she is at war, and kingdoms at war do crazy things,” Ilmarinen added. “And the Lagoans are cousins to the Algarvians, which gives them a good head start on craziness by itself, if anyone wants to know what I think.”

“Kaunians are proud because they’re an old folk, as we are,” Siuntio said. “Algarvic peoples are proud because they’re new. That doesn’t make them crazy, but it does make them different from us.”

“Anyone who’s enough different from me is surely crazy--or surely sane, depending,” Ilmarinen said.

Pekka declined to rise to that. She went on with Siuntio’s though: “And Unkerlanters are proud because they aren’t Kaunian or Algarvic. And Gyongyosians, I think, are proud because they aren’t like anyone else at all. When it comes to that, they’re like us, but no other way I can think of.”

“They’re much uglier than we are,” Ilmarinen said. Siuntio sent him a reproachful look. He bore up under it. “They cursed well are--those overmuscled bodies, that tawny yellow hair sprouting every which way like dried-out weeds.” He paused. “Their women do look better than their men, I will say that.”

And what do ou know of Gyongyosian women? The question stood on the end of Pekka’s tongue, but she didn’t ask it. Something in Ilmarinen’s expression warned her that he would tell her more than she wanted to hear. He had, after all, been attending mages’ meetings longer than she’d been alive. Instead, she said, “We have to learn more ourselves, and we have to be careful while we’re doing it.”

“Oh, indeed,” Siuntio said. “There you have in the compass of an acorn shell one of the reasons for our journey from Yliharma.”

Ilmarinen glanced over to him. “Aside from gulping down Mistress Pekka’s excellent food and guzzling her ale, I thought that was the reason we came to Kajaani.”

“Not quite,” Siuntio said. “I have been pondering the implications of your truly astonishing insight into the inverse nature of the relationship between die laws of similarity and contagion.” He bowed in his seat. “I would never have thought of such a thing, not if I examined the results of Mistress Pekka’s experiment for a hundred years. But once furnished with the insight that sprang from a mind more clever than mine, I have tried to examine some of the avenues down which we may hope to follow it.”

“Look out,” Ilmarinen said to Pekka. “The more humble he sounds, the more dangerous he is.”

Siuntio took no notice of Ilmarinen. Pekka got the idea that Siuntio had a lot of practice taking no notice of Ilmarinen. From his belt pouch, Siuntio drew out three sheets of paper. He kept one and gave one to each of his fellow theoretical sorcerers. “I hope you will not hesitate to point out any flaws you may find in the reasoning, Mistress Pekka,” he said. “I do not give Ilmarinen the same warning, for I know he will not hesitate.”

“Truth is truth,” Ilmarinen said. “Everything else is fair game.” He donned a pair of spectacles to help him read. After a little while, he grunted. After another little while, he grunted again, louder, and looked over the tops of the spectacles at Siuntio. “Why, you old fox.”

Pekka made slower going of the lines of complex symbols Siuntio had given her. About a third of the way down the closely written sheet, she exclaimed, “But this would mean--” and broke off, for the conclusion to which Siuntio was leading her seemed one only a maniac could embrace.

But he nodded. “Aye, it would, or I think it would, could we but find a way to do it. Believe me, I was quite as surprised as you.”

“You old fox,” Ilmarinen repeated. “This is why you’re the best in the business. Nobody pays attention to the details the way you do--nobody. If I had a hat on, I’d take it off to you.”