Darkness Descending

“To give people something to complain about, more than anything else,” the taverner answered. Skarnu laughed. The other fellow held out his hands. “What? D’you think I’m joking? See for yourself--you’ll find out.”

“I don’t need to read it to know it’ll be full of all the things the Algarvians want us to hear and empty of the ones they don’t,” Skarnu said.

“Right the first time,” the taverner said. “Some people believe the manure the news sheets print, if you can believe that, pal.” Skarnu nodded but said nothing. He would have bet that, while talking to people who got on well with the redheads, the taverner praised the news sheet to the skies. With him, the fellow went on, “Take a look at this here, for instance. Go on, just take a look at it.”

BALL IN THE CAPITAL CELEBRATES ALGARVIAN-VALMIERAN AMITY, the headline read. The subscription fees for the ball had gone to pay for relief for wounded Algarvian soldiers. Skarnu hoped die redheads needed to collect lots and lots of money for such a worthy cause.

The list of those who attended the ball showed what the Algarvians meant by amity, too. Pointing to it, Skarnu said, “It’s all their officers and our women.”

“Oh, aye--did you expect anything different?” the taverner said with a scornful sneer. “These noblewomen, they’re all whores, every cursed one of’em.”

Skarnu started to bristle at that slur against his class. He had to remind himself that he wasn’t, at the moment, a member of his class. His eyes kept sliding down the list. It was always Brigadier and Viscount So-and-so, a redhead, coupled with Countess What’s-her-name, a Valmieran. He had no doubt that most of the pairs named were coupled literally as well as metaphorically.

Colonel and Count Lurcanio and Marchioness Krasta. Skarnu almost missed that one pairing among so many. He stared and stared, wishing his eyes had gone on past without catching his sister’s name. What was she doing? What could she be doing? But that had an all too obvious answer.

He stared so hard, the taverner noticed. “What’s the matter, pal?” he asked. “See somebody you know?” He threw back his head and laughed uproariously at his own wit.

What would he do if Skarnu said aye? Call me a liar, I hope, Skarnu thought; every other possibility struck him as worse. “Likely tell,” was all he answered, which made the taverner chuckle, but not chortle again.

Worst was that Skarnu couldn’t just up and leave. He had to hang around and finish his ale and keep on chatting while he was doing it. Anything else would have been out of character and drawn notice.

Concealing his anguish was as hard as hiding a physical wound would have been. He’d always known Krasta was headstrong and willful, but what could have possessed her to take up with an Algarvian officer? He wondered if she knew; she’d never been long on self-examination.

After he could finally start back to the farm with propriety, he heaved a long sigh. His sister had made, or more likely unmade, her bed; now she would have to lie in it... with this Colonel Lurcanio. Skarnu sighed again. Whatever Krasta had done, he couldn’t do anything about it.

He walked on for a while before realizing that wasn’t true. If he and his comrades did somehow manage to expel the Algarvians from Valmiera, Lurcanio would go and Krasta, presumably, would stay. What would happen then? He couldn’t imagine. Nothing pleasant--he was sure of that.

“My own sister,” he muttered as he tramped along the road. It was safe enough; he could see a good long blaze in every direction. “My own sister?’ He’d never dreamt of being on opposite sides of a civil war with Krasta.

When he got back to the farm, he told Raunu and Merkela the news straightaway. He knew he didn’t have to; no one else was likely to associate his name and that of a noblewoman in Priekule. But he preferred not to take the chance: better they should hear it from him than from anybody else.

Raunu had been repairing the steps that led up to the farmhouse porch. He paused to pound in a couple of nails, using what struck Skarnu as needless force. Then he said, “That’s hard, sir. Aye, that’s about as hard to choke down as anything I can think of.”

Merkela took Skarnu by the hand. “Come upstairs with me,” she said. Raunu’s ears went red. He drove one more nail in a tearing hurry, then almost ran out of earshot of the farmhouse; Skarnu listened to the veteran’s footfalls fade as he himself followed Merkela up the stairs to her bedchamber. If this was how she wanted to make him feel better, he had no doubt she’d succeed.

In the bedchamber, she turned his way. He held out his arms to her. She stepped toward him--and slapped him in the face almost hard enough to knock him off his feet.

He staggered back, one hand coming up to his cheek, the other grabbing for the door frame to help him stay upright. “Powers above!” he exclaimed, tasting blood in his mouth. “What was that for?”