Rulers of the Darkness

In an odd way, Fernao found himself agreeing with her. He would do. "How are you?" he asked, knowing sudden shame that he'd let her serve him. "You are the one who is truly hurt. This" -he patted his own forehead- "this will be nothing at all in a few hours. But you have real injuries."

"My head hurts," Pekka said matter-of-factly. "I have a little trouble remembering things. I would not want to try to work magic right now. I do not think it is the yellow decoction. I think you are right. I think it is the blow to the head. As with you, time will set it right. With the yellow liquid, it is not too bad."

He suspected she was making light of what had happened to her. If she wanted to do that, he wouldn't challenge her; he honored her courage. There was something he'd meant to tell her the night before. He was surprised he recalled it. He was surprised he recalled anything from the night before. But he realized now that it didn't matter. He couldn't say what he'd meant to, anyhow.

Pekka went on, "Alkio and Raahe and Piilis will be coming here now. You will know of them, if you do not know them."

"I met them in Yliharma," Fernao said. "Good theoretical sorcerers, all three."

"Aye." Pekka nodded carefully. "And the first two, husband and wife, work very well together. Add up the three of them and they are… not too far from Siuntio."

"May it be so." Fernao wondered if three good mages could match one towering genius.

"And now, the Seven Princes will give us everything we need or might need or imagine we need," Pekka said. "If we have done enough to alarm the Algarvians, to make them strike at us, we must be doing something worthwhile- or so the Princes think. This assault may prove the greatest mistake Mezentio's mages ever made."

"May it be so," Fernao repeated.

"And Siuntio saved us," Pekka said. "He and Ilmarinen- had they not resisted as best they could, we would all have died in the blockhouse." Fernao could only nod at that. Pekka rose and picked up the tray. "I will not disturb you anymore. I hope you feel better soon."

"And you," he called as she left the room. No, he couldn't very well tell her she'd made one small mistake. When the Algarvians assailed the blockhouse out in the wilderness, he'd been several strides closer to Siuntio than to her. But he'd turned one way, done one thing, and not the other… and now he and everyone else, everyone save poor Siuntio, would have to live with the consequences of that.

***

Before he'd got blazed, Major Spinello had served in southern Unkerlant. Now he'd been sent to the north of King Swemmel's realm. He found he loathed this part of the kingdom at least as much as he'd despised the other.

Blizzards seemed less common here, but cold, driving rain went a long way toward making up for them. Most of his regiment was holed up in a little town called Wriezen, with the rest on a picket line west of the place. Nothing would be coming at them quickly, not today- and not tomorrow or the next day, either. Here in the north, the muddy season lasted most of the winter.

Naturally, Spinello had commandeered the finest house in Wriezen as his own. It had probably belonged to the firstman of the place, but he'd long since fled. Spinello turned to his seniormost company commander, a dour captain named Turpino, and said, "How do we give the Unkerlanters a good boot in the balls?"

"We wait till the ground dries out, and then we outmaneuver them," Turpino answered. "Sir."

Spinello hopped in the air in annoyance. "No, no, no!" he exclaimed. "That isn't what I meant. How do we boot 'em in the balls now?"

Turpino, who was several inches taller than he, looked down his nose at him. "We don't," he said. "Sir."

Spinello carefully didn't notice how slow Turpino was with the title of respect. "Do Swemmel's men think we can't do anything in this mess, too?" he demanded.

"Of course they do," Turpino answered. "They're no fools." By his tone, he wasn't sure the same applied to his superior officer.

"If they think it can't be done, that's the best argument in the world for doing it," Spinello said. "Now we have to consider ways and means."

"Excellent." Turpino gave him a stiff bow. "If you transform our soldiers into worms, they can crawl through the mud and take the Unkerlanters by surprise coming at them from behind."

If I transform my troopers into worms, you'll be a bloodsucking leech, Spinello thought resentfully. "With the south in chaos, we ought to keep moving forward here in the north."

"If the moves serve some strategic purpose, certainly," Turpino said.

Spinello snapped his fingers to show what he thought of strategic purpose. Part of him knew the gloomy captain had a point of sorts. The rest, the bigger part, craved action, especially after so long flat on his back. He said, "Anything that throws the foe into confusion and either forces him back or forces him to shift troops here serves a strategic purpose, would you not agree?"