Darkness Descending

By his expression, he half expected Cornelu to take the matter further, perhaps through seconds. But the exiled Sibian officer gave back the same sort of seated bow he had received. “You make good sense, sir,” he said, to Brinco’s obvious relief. “Lagoans have a name among us for loose talk.” Lagoan women had a name for looseness, too--but, after Costache, Cornelu preferred not to dwell on that. He went on, “I am glad to see this name is not altogether deserved.”

“No, not altogether.” Brinco’s voice was dry. “We do the best we can.”

“May it be good enough,” Cornelu said. His best back home hadn’t been good enough. Now he was back in the war. For that, at least, he’d been trained.

Back in Kajaani, Pekka wished she’d never gone north to Yliharma. It wouldn’t have made any difference, of course: the Algarvians would have sorcerously assailed the capital of Kuusamo even if she hadn’t been there to try her experiment. When she thought logically, she understood that. But logic went only so far. She still had the prickles-on-the-back-of-the-neck feeling that King Mezentio’s mages had known what she was doing and timed their attack to foil her.

“That’s nonsense,” her husband said. “If they’d been after you then, they’d still be after you. They haven’t been, so they weren’t.”

Leino was calm and logical, excellent traits in a mage--and an excellent mage he was, too, of a far more practical bent than Pekka. Most of the time, his solid good sense would have reassured Pekka, as it was meant to do. Now, though, it irritated her. “I know that,” she snapped. “Up here, I know it.” She tapped her forehead. “Down here, though”--she rubbed her belly--”it’s a different business.”

Wisely, Leino changed the subject. “When do you think you’ll be ready to run your experiment again?”

“I don’t know,” she answered. “I just don’t know. I’ll need Siuntio and Ilmarinen to back me up, and powers above only know when they’ll both be able to get down here. And even if they do . . .” Her voice trailed away. She looked unhappy.

“Things would be better if the fall of the palace up there hadn’t caught Prince Joroinen, wouldn’t they?” Leino asked gently.

Pekka nodded. That was part of what ate at her, sure enough. “He was the one who really brought us all together,” she said. “He was the one who believed we could do it, and who made other people believe it, too. Without him, our funds are liable to dry up.” She rolled her eyes. “Without him, I’m already starting to have trouble with the distinguished Professor Heikki again.”

The mage who presided over thaumaturgical studies at Kajaani City College was a specialist in veterinary sorcery. The next new idea she had would be her first. Irked that she couldn’t learn more about the work Pekka was doing, she’d tried to cut off the theoretical sorcerer’s experimental budget. Prince Joroinen had put a stop to that and made Heikki remember for a moment that there was more to being a mage than attending departmental meetings. With him gone, the department head was already starting to reexert her petty authority.

Before Pekka could say anything more, a crash from the other end of the house sent her and Leino running to see what had made it. They almost ran over their son--Uto was coming their way as fast as they were going his. He barely had the chance to assume his usual look of almost supernatural innocence before his father snapped, “What was that noise?”

“I don’t know,” he answered, sounding as self-righteous as only a six-year-old could.

Pekka took up the challenge: “Well, what were you doing in the kitchen?”

“Nothing,” Uto replied.

Leino took him by the shoulder and turned him around, saying, “That’s what you always tell us, and it’s never true. Let’s go have a look.”

Everything looked fine .. . till Pekka opened the pantry door. Somehow or other, a whole shelf had fallen down there, with all the groceries on it, and made quite a mess. “How did this happen?” she asked in tones of mingled horror and admiration.

“I don’t know,” Uto repeated in tones like a silver bell.

“You’ve been climbing again,” Leino said. “You knew what would happen if you went climbing again.”

Of course, Uto knew. Of course, he’d never thought it would matter. He’d no doubt managed to convince himself he’d never get caught no matter how often he did what he wasn’t supposed to do. Amazing how much like grownups children are some ways, Pekka thought.

And, now that he had been caught, Uto reacted just as an adult would have. “Don’t do it, Father!” he wailed, recalling all too well the promised punishment. “I’ll be good. I promise I will.”

“You’ve already promised,” Leino told him. “You broke your promise after you made it. That’s not something Kuusamans should ever do. And so your stuffed leviathan will go up on the mantel for a week.” He started for his son’s bedchamber.

“No!” Uto howled, and burst into tears. “It’s not fair!”