Darkness Descending

At last, the ley-line caravan got moving again. It glided across the snow-covered landscape. The forests and hills and fields of Kuusamo were very little different from those of Lagoas. Nor should they have been, not when the kingdom and the land of the Seven Princes shared the same island. The towns in which the caravan stopped might for the most part have been Lagoan towns as readily as Kuusaman. For the past hundred years and more, public buildings and places of business had looked much alike in the two realms.

But when the caravan slid past villages and most of all when it slid past farms, Fernao was conscious of no longer traveling through his own kingdom. Even the haystacks were different. The Kuusamans topped theirs with cloths they sometimes embroidered, so the stacks looked like old, stooped grannies with scarves on their heads.

And the farmhouses, or some of them, struck Fernao as odd. Before the soldiers and settlers of the Kaunian Empire crossed the Strait of Valmiera, the Kuusamans had been nomads, herders. They’d learned farming fast, but to this day, more than fifteen hundred years later, some of their buildings, though made from wood and stone, were still in the shape of the tents in which they had once dwelt.

The day was dying when the ley-line caravan pulled into the capital of Kuusamo. As Fernao used a little wooden staircase to descend from the floating car to the floor of the Yliharma depot, he looked around in the hope that Siuntio would meet him and greet him; he’d written ahead to let the famous theoretical sorcerer know he was coming. But he did not see Siuntio. After a moment, though, he did spot another mage he recognized from sorcerous conclaves on the island and in the east of Derlavai.

He waved. “Master Ilmarinen!” he called.

Ilmarinen, he knew, spoke fluent and frequently profane Lagoan. Here this evening, though, the theoretical sorcerer chose to address him in classical Kaunian, the language of magecraft and scholarship: “You have come a long way to accomplish little, Master Fernao.” He did not sound sorry to say that. He sounded wryly amused.

Ignoring his tone, Fernao asked, “And why is that?” If Ilmarinen told him the reason he was bound to fail, perhaps he wouldn’t.

But Ilmarinen did no such thing. He came up and waggled a forefinger under Fernao’s nose. “Because you will not find anyone here who knows anything, or who will tell you if he does. And so, you may as well turn around and go back to Setubal.” He waved a mocking good-bye.

“Can’t I eat supper first?” Fernao asked mildly. “I’d gladly have you as my guest in whatever eatery you choose.”

“Going to quibble about everything, are you?” Ilmarinen returned. But for the first time, he seemed amused with Fernao rather than amused at him. Stooping, he picked up one of the bags at the Lagoan mage’s feet. “That may possibly be arranged. Suppose you come with me.” And off he went. Fernao grabbed the other bag, slipped its carrying strap over his shoulder, and followed.

He had to step smartly; Ilmarinen proved a spry old man. For a moment, Fernao wondered if the Kuusaman was trying to lose him and make off with the bag--it was the one in which he’d brought what little sorcerous apparatus he had. He didn’t think Ilmarinen could learn much from the stuff, but Ilmarinen wouldn’t be able to know--he didn’t think Ilmarinen would be able to know--that in advance.

As they were leaving the large, crowded depot, the Kuusaman theoretical sorcerer looked back, saw Fernao right behind him, and said over his shoulder, “Haven’t managed to make you disappear, eh?” Was he grinning because he was joking or to hide disappointment? Fernao couldn’t tell. He didn’t think Ilmarinen wanted him to be able to tell.

Fernao looked around. Yliharma wasn’t one of the great cities of the world, as Setubal was, but it stood in the second rank. Buildings towered ten, some even fifteen, stories into the air. People dressed in almost as many different styles as they would have been in Setubal crowded the streets. They hurried into and out of fancy shops, sometimes emerging with packages.

As most Kuusaman towns did to Fernao, it all looked very homelike--except that he could not read any of the signs. He spoke Sibian and Algarvian, Forthwe-gian and classical Kaunian. He could make a fair stab at Valmieran. The language of the principality next door to his own kingdom, though, remained a closed book.

“Here,” Ilmarinen said, stilrin. Kaunian, after they’d walked a couple of blocks. “This place isn’t too bad.” The words on the sign hanging above the eatery were unintelligible to Fernao. The picture, though, made him smile: it showed seven reindeer in princely coronets, sitting around a table groaning with food. He followed Ilmarinen inside.