Out of the Darkness

He found he could tell exactly how far the Algarvians had come. All at once, the countryside took on the battered look with which he’d grown so familiar during the war. How long would it take to repair? So many men were gone. Every glimpse he got of life in the fields confirmed that. The old, the young, the female: they labored to bring in the harvest. He shivered anew when the ley-line caravan passed through Herborn, the capital of the Duchy of Grelz. There among those ruins King Swemmel had boiled false King Raniero of Grelz alive. Thanks to me, Leudast thought, and wondered if he would ever get the smell of Raniero’s cooking flesh out of his nostrils.

Leiferde wasn’t on a ley line, but didn’t lie far from one. Leudast needed only half a day to get to the village. After so long cooped up on the wagon and the caravan, getting down and using his own legs felt good. The sun was sliding down the sky toward the western horizon when he strode up the dusty main street. Women peered at him from their vegetable plots and herb gardens. “A soldier,” he heard them murmur. “What’s a soldier doing here now?”

He knocked on the door at Alize’s house. He’d hoped she would open it herself, but she didn’t. Her mother did-a woman who looked much the way Alize would in twenty years or so. “Hullo, Bertrude,” Leudast said, pleased he remembered her name.

The woman’s jaw dropped. “Powers above!” she exclaimed. “You’re that lieutenant. How are you, your Excellency?” She curtsied.

“I’m fine, thank you.” Leudast had never said he was a nobleman. On the other hand, he’d never said he wasn’t. He asked the question that needed asking: “Is Alize anywhere about?”

“She’s out in the fields. She’ll be back for supper,” Bertrude answered. “That shouldn’t be long, sir. Won’t you come in and share what we have?”

“If it’s not too much trouble, and if you have enough,” Leudast said. “I know how things are these days.”

But Bertrude shook her head. “It’s no trouble at all, and we’ve got plenty,” she said firmly. “Come have something to drink while you wait.”

Leudast found the world a rosier place after pouring down most of a mug of spirits. He was fighting to stay awake when Alize and her father, Akerin, walked in. “Leudast!” Alize said, and threw herself into his arms. Her face against his shoulder, she added, “What are you doing here?”

“With the war over, I came back,” he said simply. It had been a long time since he’d had his arms around a woman, even longer since he’d had them around one who wanted to be held.

Alize stared at him. “Men say they’ll do that all the time. I didn’t think anybody really would, though.”

“Here I am,” Leudast said. She seemed glad to see him. That made a good start.

Before he could go on from there, Bertrude broke in: “Supper’s ready.” Leudast sat down with Alize and her mother and father. The stew Bertrude served was full of oats and beets, not wheat and turnips, as it would have been in Leudast’s village in the north. Mutton was mutton, though Bertrude flavored it with mint rather than garlic. Nothing at all was wrong with the ale she gave him to go with the supper.

After he’d eaten, Alize said, “I hoped you’d come back. I didn’t really think you would, but I hoped so. Now that you have come, what exactly do you have in mind? It can’t be just. . you know.”

You can’t have me for the sport of it, she meant. Leudast nodded. He’d already understood that. He said, “I came to wed you, if you’ll put up with me.”

“I think I can,” Alize said with a smile. Leudast grinned with relief; he hadn’t known how she would answer, though he wouldn’t have returned to Leiferde if he hadn’t had his hopes.

Her father asked, “You aim to settle down here and farm, then?”

The question went to the nub of things. “That depends,” Leudast said. “I might, but then again, I might not. My other choice is staying in the army. The way the world looks, there’ll always be jobs for soldiers.”

“That’s so,” Akerin said, and Bertrude’s head bobbed up and down. Alize’s father asked another question: “How do you aim to make up your mind?”

“Well, if you really want to know, a lot of it depends on what your daughter wants.” Leudast looked to Alize. “If you’d sooner stay in Leiferde, I know how to farm, or I did up north. It can’t be too different here.” He realized he’d just shown he was no noble. Shrugging, he went on, “Or if you’d rather be a soldier’s wife. .” Again, he shrugged the Unkerlanter peasant’s businesslike shrug, so different from the fancy Algarvian variety. “I can do that, too.”

“Go to a city?” Alize breathed. “Maybe even to Cottbus?” Her eyes glowed. “I’ve seen enough of a farming village to last me the rest of my days. However life turns out in a town, it has to be easier there than here.”