Darkness Descending

Pekka said, “As if you had nothing to do with this, Master Siuntio. You’ve done more work, and more important work, on the two laws and the relationship between them than anyone else. You deserve the bulk of the credit.”

Ilmarinen looked as if he might be inclined to argue that, but said only, “Or the bulk of the blame.”

“Aye, that is so,” Siuntio agreed imperturbably. “Power, any power, is not evil in itself, but surely may be used to evil ends.”

That soft answer also seemed to irk Ilmarinen. He said, “That’s why we do the experiment: to see how we can keep from wringing the truth from nature, I mean.”

Busy checking cages of rats, Pekka did her best to ignore the bickering. It wasn’t easy; Ilmarinen craved as much attention as her little son, Uto, and had as few scruples as Uto about going after it. She chose a pair of cages showing that the rat in one was the grandson of the animal in the other. If all went well, these rats would become as famous as the ones with which she’d experimented down in Kajaani. She shook her head. They’d become as important as those other rats. They’d be in no position to appreciate their fame. Pekka hoped she would be. If things went wrong . . .

Resolutely, she shoved that thought out of her mind, or at least down to its basement. She’d been working toward this moment her whole professional career. If she could draw useful sorcerous energy from the fusion of the laws of similarity and contagion, she would prove theoretical sorcery had some eminently practical uses. And, if she did get into difficulties, Siuntio and Ilmarinen would get her out of them if anyone could.

What if no one can? She forced that thought into the basement of her mind, too.

Turning to the senior mages, she asked, “Are we ready?” Siuntio nodded. Ilmarinen leered. She took that for an affirmative. Dipping her head to each of them in turn, she said, “I begin, then.”

Don’t make a mistake. She thought that whenever she went from her desk to the laboratory. No matter what Siuntio said about her experimental technique, she knew she was theoretician first, practical mage a distant second. Perhaps that made her more careful than a more practical mage would have been. She hoped so.

As she chanted the carefully crafted spell, as she made pass after intricate pass, confidence began to rise in her. She saw Siuntio smiling approval, silently cheering her on. Maybe she was borrowing the confidence from him. She didn’t care where it came from. She was glad to have it.

And then everything went wrong.

At first, as the chamber began to sway around her, Pekka thought she’d made a mistake after all. Even while she wondered whether she’d die in the next instant, she reviewed all she’d done. For the life of her--literally, for the life of her--she couldn’t see what she’d done wrong.

A heartbeat later, she realized the disaster had come from without, not from within. At that same moment, Siuntio gasped, “The Algarvians!” and Ilmarinen howled, “Murderers!” like a wolf in ultimate anguish.

When the Algarvians murdered Kaunians by the hundreds, perhaps by the thousands, to fuel their military sorcery against Unkerlant, Pekka had felt it, as had sorcerers throughout the world. She’d felt it, too, when the Unkerlanters fought back by murdering their own. But those slaughters, however horrific, had been far to the west. The massacre she felt now was close, close. It was like the difference between feeling an earthquake far away and one right under her feet.

She was feeling an earthquake right under her feet. Even as the building groaned, as cages flew through the air and shelves toppled, her mind leaped. “The Algarvians!” she cried, as Siuntio had before her. She could hardly hear herself through the din. “The Algarvians are turning their death-powered magic against us!”

The war against King Mezentio hadn’t come home to Kuusamo till now. Oh, a handful of Algarvian dragons flying from southern Valmiera had dropped a few eggs on the coast, and ships clashed in the Strait of Valmiera that severed Kuusamo and Lagoas from the mainland of Derlavai. But the Seven Princes had thought--as what Kuusaman had not?--they could prepare behind the Strait and strike at Algarve when they were ready. Algarve, unfortunately, had other ideas.

As earthquakes will, this one seemed to last forever. How long it really went on, Pekka couldn’t have said. At last, it stopped. Rather to her surprise, it hadn’t shaken the building down around her ears. The lamps had gone out, though. Everything in the chamber lay on the floor. Some cages had broken open; rats were scurrying for hiding places. The tremor had knocked Siuntio and Ilmarinen off their feet. Pekka had no idea how or why she was still standing.