Out of the Darkness

“Ah,” Leudast said, and said no more. Ceorl’s comrade had been wasting his time worrying. If these captives were bound for the Mamming Hills, it was already about as bad as it could be. He didn’t need to fret about making it worse.

More captives cleared debris from a broad square in front of the royal palace. Leudast scowled at the burnt and shattered wreckage of King Mezentio’s residence. He’d been in on some of the fighting there, and the Algarvians had battled room by room, corridor by corridor. And then, when his own side had finally cleared them out, they’d found Mezentio already dead. If that wasn’t a cheat, what was? Capturing Mezentio’s cousin Raniero had made Leudast an officer. What would capturing Mezentio himself have gained some lucky Unkerlanter? Colonel’s rank? A duchy? Anything this side of the sky itself seemed possible.

But Mezentio, curse him, had taken the easy way out. What would King Swemmel have done to him, had he fallen alive into Unkerlanter hands? Mezentio hadn’t wanted to find out. Leudast didn’t think he would have wanted to find out, either, not in Mezentio’s shoes. He remembered how bravely Raniero had gone into the boiling water-and how he’d shrieked afterwards, for as long as he still kept life in him. And Mezentio, without a doubt, would have ended up envying Raniero his easy fate.

Several Unkerlanters came out of the palace, along with one Algarvian who towered half a head over them. The group walked toward Leudast without even noticing he was there: all the Unkerlanters were officers of age and rank exalted enough to make a young lieutenant seem no more important than any other chunk of rubble littering the ground.

One of the officers-a brigadier-was speaking to the redhead: “You had better understand, you will keep the job as long as you do as his Majesty commands. Disobey, and all you will be is very, very sorry.”

“I’m not likely to make a mistake about that, am I?” The Algarvian spoke fluent, almost unaccented Unkerlanter. His wave encompassed the whole of the capital, the whole of the kingdom. “Considering the example I have before me, I would have to be a madman to step out of line.”

“This does not always stop Algarvians,” the brigadier replied. “We have seen as much. I hope I am plain: if you are not pliable, you are dead. . slowly.”

“I told you once, I understand,” replied the redheaded-noble? Leudast supposed he had to be.

“You had better, that’s all,” the brigadier said. He and the other officers swept past Leudast. I won’t stare after them, Leudast thought. They might notice me, and I don’t want to be noticed now.

What sort of job did they have in mind for the Algarvian? By the way they were talking, it might almost have been king. But, with Mainardo, Algarve already had a king. Of course, if Swemmel decided not to recognize Mezentio’s brother and raised up a candidate of his own, who would, who could, stop him? He’d already done that in Forthweg. Why not here, too? The only drawback Leudast could see was that any redhead was likely to betray Unkerlant the instant he thought he could get away with it.

That wasn’t his worry. If the candidate looked like giving trouble, he expected King Swemmel would spot it before it got bad enough to be dangerous. Swemmel looked for trouble the way fussy old women looked for weeds in their garden plots-and when he found it, he yanked it up by the roots.

Not far beyond the royal palace stood a building so solidly made, it had come through the fierce fighting in Trapani almost undamaged. Men were carrying sacks-sacks obviously heavy for their size-out the front door and loading them into wagons. What looked like a regiment’s worth of guards surrounded the wagons.

“What’s going on here?” Leudast asked one of the guards.

“Sir, this is the treasury of the Kingdom of Algarve,” the man answered. His eyes were hard and alert, warning that Leudast would do well not to seem too interested.

Despite that warning look, Leudast couldn’t help letting out a low whistle. “Oh,” he said. “And it’s about to become part of the treasury of the Kingdom of Unkerlant?”

“You might say something like that, sir,” the guard replied.

“Good,” Leudast said. “The fornicating redheads cost us plenty. Only fair they should pay us back. I just wish gold and silver could really pay for all the lives they robbed us of.”

“Aye, sir.” Something of the guard’s humanity showed through the hard mask of his face. “I lost a brother last year, and my home village isn’t far from Durrwangen, so powers above only know if any of my kin are left alive.”

“I hope so,” Leudast answered. It was all he could say; some of the biggest and most important battles of the war had been fought around the southern city of Durrwangen a couple of summers before. Leudast had been there, on the eastern side of the bulge the Algarvians were trying to pinch off. He still marveled that he’d come through in one piece.