Rulers of the Darkness

They hadn't gone far before a dull roar sounded off to the north, and then another and another. "The Lagoans," Krasta said. "They're dropping eggs on us again." Yet another burst of sorcerous energy echoed through Priekule, this one quite a bit closer.

"Well, so they are," Lurcanio answered. "Dropping them at random, too, in this weather. Charming people, there on the other side of the Strait." If he knew he was in danger, he gave no sign of it. He'd never lacked for courage.

"Should we find a shelter?" Krasta asked.

She felt rather than seeing Lurcanio shrug. "If you like," he said. "I think the odds favor us, though. He spoke in Algarvian to the driver, who laughed and replied in the same language. Lurcanio also laughed, and translated: "He says he is fated to be blazed by an outraged husband at the age of a hundred and three, and so he is not worried about Lagoan eggs."

That made Krasta laugh, too. Then an egg burst close enough for her to see its flash, close enough that a piece of its thin metal casing whined through the air past the carriage. It had certainly come down on somebody's head. Krasta knew she could have been that somebody. And she, unlike Lurcanio and his driver, had no Algarvian bravado to sustain her. She cursed the Lagoans all the way back to her mansion. Did they care about the Valmierans one bit more than Mezentio's men did? If so, she wished they would have found a different way to show it.

***

Things could have been worse. A few weeks before, watching Algarvian soldiers stream out of Durrwangen without orders, against orders, Colonel Sabrino would have had a hard time saying that. Now… Now it looked as if something might be salvaged in the southwest after all.

The colonel of dragonfliers wasn't the only one with that thought. At supper one evening at the wing's dragon farm, Captain Domiziano raised a glass of ferocious Unkerlanter spirits in salute and said, "Here's to General Solino. Looks like he really did know what he was doing."

He knocked back the spirits, coughing a little as he did so. Along with the rest of the officers, Sabrino also drank to the toast. Captain Orosio said, "Aye. Turns out we're better off with that army loose and able to hit back than we would have been if we'd pissed it away like the one down in Sulingen."

"Pity Solino's head had to roll," Domiziano said. "Doesn't seem fair."

Orosio shrugged. "The price you pay for being right."

"Aye, that's how things work," Sabrino agreed. "If you advance against orders to hold and something good comes of it, you're a hero. If you retreat against orders to hold, they'll reckon you a coward no matter what happens. Even if you were right, they'll figure you're liable to run away the next time, too." He pointed to the big plate of pork ribs in the middle of the table. "Pass me a couple more of those, somebody, if you please."

Once he had the ribs, he smeared them with horseradish sauce and gnawed all the meat off the bones. Like his own glass of spirits, the sauce gave the illusion of warmth. In an Unkerlanter winter, even the illusion was not to be despised.

Domiziano also spread the sauce over another rib. In between bites, he sighed and said, "This cursed war is jading my palate so I'll never properly appreciate a delicate sauce again."

Sabrino chuckled at that. "There are worse problems to have. I was in the trenches in the Six Years' War, and I know." Domiziano had been making messes in his drawers during the Six Years' War, if he'd been born at all. He looked at Sabrino as if he'd started speaking Gyongyosian. Orosio was only a little older, but he understood such things. His nod and, even more, his knowing expression said as much.

A dragon handler stuck his head into Sabrino's tent and said, "Sir, that new wing is starting to land at the farm."

"The one that had been flying against Lagoas?" Sabrino asked, and the handler nodded. Mischief glinting in his eyes, Sabrino turned back to his squadron commanders. "Well, gentlemen, shall we help them settle in? I'm sure they'll be delighted at the accommodations they find waiting for them here."

Even Domiziano recognized the irony there well enough to chuckle. Orosio laughed out loud. Sabrino got to his feet. His subordinates followed him out.

Cold bit at his nose and cheeks. He ignored it; he'd known worse. Sure enough, dragons spiraled down out of the cloudy sky along with the occasional snowflake. Many, many dragons… "Powers above," Sabrino said softly. "If that's not a full-strength wing, then I'm a naked black Zuwayzi." Wings with their full complement of sixty-four dragons and dragonfliers simply didn't exist in the war against Unkerlant. Whenever he got his up over half strength, he counted himself lucky.