After the Downfall

As the sun set and darkness deepened, Hasso looked westward again. He didn’t think the Lenelli would be able to spot the fire’s glare over the rise ahead. Even if they did, odds were they wouldn’t make much of it. They had to know the Bucovinans were keeping an eye on them. That wouldn’t impress them, not for beans. Nothing the Bucovinans did impressed them. Bucovinans were only Grenye, after all.

Softly, Hasso began to chant. Some of the charm was in German, some in Lenello. He faced away from Rautat and the rest. They wouldn’t hear his spell, or make anything of it if they did. He snorted – in rhythm with the spell. He wasn’t sure there would be anything to make of it if they did. For one thing, he was an altogether untrained wizard. For another, he was still in Bucovin, even if he’d come back close to the border with Bottero’s kingdom. If it didn’t work … then it didn’t, that was all. He would take a different tack in that case.

But it worked, all right. When he turned around, Rautat and Dumnez and Peretsh and the rest lay sprawled close to the little fire, all of them snoring softly. I really can do this! he thought, excitement surging in him. Along with the excitement went a little bit of shame. Bucovinans were only Grenye, after all – they couldn’t work magic, and had no defense against it.

His knees clicked when he got to his feet. He wondered if he ought to cut the natives’ throats before he went west. He couldn’t make himself do it. They could have killed him, but they hadn’t. He also wondered whether to take the powder wagon with him. They’d already unhitched the horses, though. He doubted he could harness them by dim firelight. He also feared that the noise would wake the Bucovinans, spell or no spell.

“By myself,” he murmured in German. And wasn’t that the sad and sorry truth? Wherever he went in this world, he was irrevocably by himself. Joining with Velona the way he had disguised the truth for a while, but it was there. Still and all, he came closer and closer to fitting in among the Lenelli than with the Bucovinans. And so … “Auf wiedersehen” He started west – by himself

He went up the road till he got close to the crest of that rise – no point making things hard on himself. Then he ducked into the undergrowth, for he didn’t want any Lenello sentries to spot him coming up to the top of the high ground. Back in Russia, a sniper would make you pay if you did something stupid like that. The Lenelli didn’t have scope-sighted rifles or machine guns, but he didn’t want them thinking somebody was sneaking up on them in the dark. They could lay a trap for him before they realized he wasn’t a Bucovinan.

He leaned against the trunk of a scrubby oak. Just for a second, he told himself. Or maybe a little longer – why not? He didn’t want to sneak through the bushes toward King Bottero’s men in pitch darkness. Maybe an Indian could do that in a movie and not make a godawful racket. Or maybe a Bucovinan hunter – or a Lenello poacher – could do it for real. Hasso knew damn well he couldn’t.

And he didn’t just want to tramp up the road in the dark, either. That was asking to get killed. And so … He yawned. He slumped down against that tree trunk. As he yawned again, he wondered if he was getting caught in the backwash of his own sorcery. He also wondered if he could do anything about it. As his eyes slid shut, he was – sleepily – doubting it.

The next thing he knew, it wasn’t altogether dark. And the light filtering through the bushes was coming from the east, from behind him. “Christ!” he said. He was awake now, awake and sweating bullets. If Rautat and the rest had come after him, they could have gutted him like a trout.

Were they still sleeping? Hasso nodded to himself. They just about had to be. Otherwise, they damn well would have come after him, and he would have woke up with his innards ventilated one way or another. So his magic still had to be holding back there.

“Oh, yeah, I’m one hell of a wizard, I am,” he muttered as he got to his feet. “I’m so good, I put a goddamn spell on me.”

It might work out for the best, he thought, and tried to make himself believe it. Now he could approach the Lenelli in broad daylight. They would see he was no dark little Grenye. That would let him get close enough to explain what he was and who he was and how he’d escaped the barbarians. From then on, everything ought to go smooth as motor oil on a camshaft.

His stomach rumbled, almost as loud as Rautat’s had the day before. He had a length of garlicky pork sausage in a belt pouch. The Lenelli would know he was coming out of Bucovin just by the smell. They ate onions, but to them garlic was fit only for Grenye. Hasso wasn’t wild about it himself, but eating it made him feel like an Italian, not a savage.