Out of the Darkness

“That’s so,” Dagaric said. Had he tried to deny it, Leudast would have ignored everything else he said. The captain went on, “A couple of things for you to think about, though. For one, nobody’s going to be blazing at you for a while. After what we just went through, do you think anyone wants another war any time soon?”

Who can tell, with King Swemmel? But Leudast didn’t trust Dagaric far enough to say that out loud. He did say, “You’ve got a point.”

“You bet I do,” Dagaric told him. “And my other point is, we need good officers, and you are one. Common soldiers and underofficers are conscripts. Officers are the glue that holds things together, especially in peacetime. Losing you after all you’ve done, all you’ve learned, would be a shame.”

“I’m still thinking, sir.” From his days as a common soldier and an under-officer, Leudast knew better than to come right out and tell a superior no.

“You should also remember, Marshal Rathar has his eye on you,” Dagaric said. “Who knows how high you could rise with him behind you?”

Leudast gave a truly thoughtful nod. In the army as anywhere else, whom you knew counted for at least as much as what you knew. That he should know the Marshal of Unkerlant-and that Rathar should know him-still left him astonished. No denying that Dagaric had a point. Officers without patrons were liable to watch their careers wither. He wouldn’t have to worry about that. But…

“Sir, I don’t know that I want to be a soldier at all,” Leudast said. “This isn’t my proper trade.”

“Well, what is your proper trade? Farmer?” Dagaric asked, and Leudast nodded again. The regimental commander snorted. “Do you really want to see nothing but your own village-whatever’s left of it-the rest of your days? Do you really want to push a plow behind an ox’s arse every year till you fall over dead?”

“It’s what I know,” Leudast answered. “It’s about the only thing I do know.”

Captain Dagaric shook his head. “You’re wrong, Lieutenant. You know soldiering. You were in the army at the start, and you came out alive at the end. Have you got any idea how unusual that is? Millions of men know farming. Not very many have experience to match yours.”

He was probably right. The only trouble was, Leudast didn’t want most of the experience he had. He knew how lucky he was to have come through all the dreadful fighting he’d seen with only two wounds. But the wounds weren’t all of it-in many ways, weren’t the worst of it. Terror and hunger and cold and exhaustion and filth and the agony of friends. . Did he want to stay in a trade that only promised more of the same?

Something else occurred to him, too, something that had been in the back of his mind ever since the Gyongyosians yielded. “Sir, there was this girl, back in a village in the Duchy of Grelz.” Would Alize even remember who he was if he showed up there now, or would she be married to some local man? Plenty of wartime romances didn’t mean a thing once the war was done. Some did, though. No way to find out which sort was which without going back there and seeing how things stood.

“A girl, eh?” Dagaric said. “You serious about her, or are you just looking for another excuse?”

“I’m serious, sir. I don’t know if she is. I’d have to go back to Leiferde to find out.”

“In peacetime, you know, a married officer isn’t necessarily at a disadvantage,” Dagaric remarked. “And who knows? She may be looking for a way to get off the farm and out of her village.” He rubbed his chin. “I’ll tell you what. You want to court her, do you?”

Leudast nodded. “Aye, sir, I do.”

“You don’t need to resign your commission to do that,” Dagaric said. “I think the most efficient thing to do would be to give you, oh, a month’s leave so you can sort out your personal affairs. At the end of that time, you’ll have a better notion of what you want to do-and you’ll have an officer’s travel privileges to get to this Leifer-wherever-in-blazes-it-is. Does that suit you, Lieutenant?”

“Aye, sir! Thank you, sir!” Leudast said, saluting. The military ceremonial let him hide his astonishment. Dagaric really must want me to stay in the army, or he wouldn’t go so far out of his way to help me. He still wasn’t sure he wanted to remain a soldier, but knowing his superior wanted him to was no small compliment.

Leave papers in his beltpouch, he was two days in a wagon making his way back to the nearest ley line. Then he spent another nine days traversing Unkerlant from west to east, as he’d gone across the kingdom from east to west not so long before. The month of leave Dagaric had given him suddenly seemed less generous than it had when he’d got it: it left him about ten days in and around Leiferde.