Rulers of the Darkness

Talsu did his best to think like a general, and a foreign general at that. "If they strike at Jelgava," he said, "that makes it harder for the Algarvians to pull men out of our kingdom and send them to Unkerlant." He paused. "That means Father and I won't sell the redheads so many cloaks."

"Curse the foreigners, in that case!" Traku exclaimed. Maybe he meant it. Maybe he was joking. Maybe he was doing both at once. Any which way, Talsu laughed in spite of the death raining down on his home town. May it strike the Algarvians indeed, just as my sister said, he thought, and hoped the powers above were listening.

***

Colonel Spinello's ley-line caravan glided to a stop in a battered city in eastern Forthweg- not that there were any cities in Forthweg, eastern or western, that weren't battered. The corporal doing conductor duty bawled, "This here is Gromheort. Two-hour layover- we're picking up some men and some horses here. Two-hour layover."

"Gromheort," Spinello murmured. He'd been through this place before, when he was posted in Oyngestun back in the days when the war was easy. When he thought of Oyngestun, he thought of the Kaunian girl he'd enjoyed there. He'd whiled away a lot of bitter hours in Unkerlant telling stories about Vanai.

Gromheort was the biggest Forthwegian town near the Algarvian border. Almost without a doubt, the Kaunians from Oyngestun would have been brought here, to make it easier for the Algarvians to ship them west for sacrifice. If Vanai was here, if he could find her and bring her back… She won't be sacrificed, and I won't have to sleep with some dumpy Unkerlanter peasant wench, Spinello thought. It'll work out fine for both of us.

He got up and limped to the door of the caravan car. His leg still wasn't everything it might have been. But he could use it. And Algarve, these days, needed every man even remotely able to fight to throw into the battle against King Swemmel.

Outside the depot, a news-sheet vendor was waving a copy of his wares and shouting in Forthwegian. Spinello had only a smattering of Forthwegian, but he got the gist: Algarvian dragons striking hard at Sibiu. His mouth twisted. Some of the more ignorant or more forgetful Forthwegians might take that as an Algarvian victory. But if Lagoas and Kuusamo hadn't swooped down on the island kingdom, Algarvian dragons would have had no need to set upon it.

He saw no obvious Kaunians on the street. But what did that prove? He'd heard about the sorcery that let them look like Forthwegians, and about the trouble it had caused the occupying authorities. When he spotted a plump, redheaded constable in tunic and kilt, he waved to the man. "You, there!"

For a moment, he thought the fat constable would pretend he hadn't heard, but the fellow didn't quite dare. "Aye, Colonel?" he said, coming up. "What do you want?"

"Do you by any chance know for a fact whether the Kaunians from a no-account village called Oyngestun were brought here for safekeeping?" Spinello asked.

"I do know that." The constable's chest swelled with self-importance, till it stuck out almost as far as his belly. "Helped bring those blonds in myself."

"Did you?" That was better than Spinello had hoped for. "Good! Do you chance to recall a girl named Vanai, then? She'd be worth recalling."

And sure enough, the constable nodded. "She live with an old foof named Brivibas, didn't she? Cute little piece."

"That's right," Spinello agreed. "His granddaughter. I'm bound for Unkerlant, and I want to get her out of the Kaunian quarter here and take her along to keep my bed warm."

"Don't blame you a bit," the constable said, "but I don't think you can do it."

"Don't tell me she's been shipped west!" Spinello exclaimed. "That would be a horrible waste."

"I can't prove it one way or the other," the constable replied. "I'll tell you this, though: that Brivibas whoreson is dead as shoe leather. I caught him myself- me, Bembo. Bastard put on his sorcerous disguise- you know the blonds do?" He waited for Spinello to nod, then, looking smug, went on, "That disguise doesn't do anything for a voice, and I recognized his. He hanged himself in his gaol cell, and nobody misses him a bit, not so far as I can see."

Spinello missed Brivibas- he missed him a good deal. Brivibas was a key to getting Vanai to do what he wanted. Sooner than watch her dusty old granddad kill himself as a roadbuilder, she'd peeled off her clothes and opened her legs. Spinello sighed. "So you don't think anybody could find Vanai in a hurry?"

"Not a chance." The constable- Bembo- paused again, frowning. "In fact, come to think of it, she never got hauled into Gromheort at all. If I remember right, she ran off before we cleaned all the Kaunians out of Oyngestun."

"Powers above!" Spinello glared at him. "Why didn't you say that sooner? Who'd she run off with? Some boy?" Maybe that fellow from Plegmund's Brigade had known what he was talking about after all.