Rulers of the Darkness

The captain said, "There is service, and then there is service. You are trying to tell me that one kind is worth as much as another. In this, you…" Then, to Talsu's astonishment, he grinned. "In this, you may be right. I do not say you are; I say you may be. Someone of higher rank than I will make the final decision." He bowed and strolled out of the shop.

Talsu gaped at his father. "That was one of the bravest things I ever saw," he said.

"Was it?" Traku shrugged. "I don't know anything about that. All I know is, I was too little to go off and fight the redheads in the last war, and I get bloody sick of bending my neck and going, 'Aye, sir,' whenever they come through the door. So I told this son of a whore a couple of plain truths, that's all."

"That's not all," Talsu said. "You know the risk you were running."

"What risk?" Traku didn't want to take him seriously. "You went after the Algarvians with a stick in your hands. That, now, that was running a risk. This isn't so much, not even close." He coughed once or twice. "There've been times when I've sounded like it was your fault Jelgava didn't lick those Algarvian buggers. I know there have. I'm sorry for it."

Talsu tried to remember if he'd ever heard his father apologize for anything before. He didn't think so. He didn't quite know how to respond, either. He finally said, "Don't worry about it. I never have."

That was true, though perhaps not in a way Traku would have cared to know. Talsu discounted everything his father had to say about the war precisely because Traku hadn't seen it for himself. What soldier ever born took seriously a civilian's opinions about fighting?

They went back to work in companionable silence. After a while, Ausra appeared on the stairs again, Laitsina behind her. When the two women didn't see the Algarvian, they came all the way down. "Is everything all right?" they asked together.

"Everything is fine," Traku said gruffly. "Sometimes it's a little harder to make people see sense than it is other times, that's all."

"You made… an Algarvian see sense?" Laitsina sounded as if she couldn't believe her ears.

"He sure did." Talsu thumped his father on the shoulder. Traku, to his astonishment, blushed like a girl. Ausra came over and kissed her husband on the cheek. That made Traku blush more than ever.

Ausra and Laitsina went upstairs again. Talsu and Traku looked at each other before they started work again. Maybe the Algarvian captain had seen sense, aye. But maybe he'd just gone for reinforcements- more redheads, or perhaps some Jelgavan constables. Or maybe his superiors would overrule him. Having been in the army, Talsu knew how easily that could happen.

But the Algarvian didn't come back, with or without reinforcements. As the day wore on toward evening, Talsu began to believe he wouldn't. When Gailisa came back from the grocer's shop, Talsu told her how brave Traku had been. She clapped her hands together and kissed Traku on the cheek, too. That made Talsu's father turn even redder than the kiss from his own wife had.

Supper was barley porridge enlivened with garlic, olives, cheese, raisins, and wine: food for hard times. Talsu remembered that huge piece of mutton he'd eaten with Kugu. Then he shrugged. The company was better here. When he went off to his cramped little bedchamber with Gailisa, that thought occurred to him again, rather more forcefully. He kissed her.

"What was that for?" she asked, smiling.

"Just because," Talsu answered. Because you're not Kugu struck him as the wrong thing to say. He did add, "I like kissing you."

"Do you?" Gailisa gave him a sidelong look. "What else would you like?"

They found something they both liked. As a result, they were sleeping soundly when eggs started falling on Skrunda. The first bursts made Talsu sit bolt upright, instantly wide awake. After his time in the army, he would never mistake that sound, and never fail to respond to it, either.

"Downstairs!" he exclaimed, springing out of bed. "We've got to get downstairs! Powers above, I wish we had a cellar to hide in." He heard his parents and sister calling out in their bedrooms. "Downstairs!" he cried again, this time at the top of his lungs. "We'll hide behind the counter. It's good and thick- better than nothing."

Only later did he stop to think that going downstairs in pitch blackness was liable to be more dangerous than having an egg burst close by. But the whole family got down safe. They huddled behind the counter, chilly and frightened and crowded and uncomfortable. "The news sheets will be screaming about air pirates tomorrow," Traku predicted.

"Not if one of these eggs bursts on their office, they won't," Laitsina said.

"I hope some of them burst on the Algarvians here in town," Talsu said. "Otherwise, the Lagoans or Kuusamans up there on those dragons are just wasting their eggs."

"Why are they bothering us?" his mother wailed as an egg came down close by and made the building shake. "We haven't done anything to them."