"Not many Raumsdalians would be able to do it," Liv said. "You, though—once you learn, I think you'll do as well as if your hair weren't dark."
"Thank you so much," he said. Many Raumsdalians sneered at the Bizogots because they were so fair—though not many Raumsdalian men, from all Hamnet Thyssen had seen, sneered at Bizogot women. Amusing to find the mammoth-herders looking down their noses at their southern neighbors.
Most of the time, Liv recognized his irony for what it was. She took him seriously here. "I mean it," she assured him. "You can do the work. Ulric Skakki, I think, could do the work—but he would rather find ways to get out of it instead. The rest of the Raumsdalians who traveled with us? The ones I've seen here?" She shook her head.
"Each cat his own rat," Hamnet said. "Up in the north, everyone has to be able to do everything, near enough. You said that yourself. Here, we pick one thing and get good at it. That leaves a lot of us not so good at other things. It's the price we pay."
"If the Rulers come this far. . ." Liv said.
"If the Rulers come this far, they'll see that some of us make good soldiers, too," Count Hamnet said.
"I hope so." Liv didn't sound convinced. "From what I saw of Jesper Fletti and the other Raumsdalian soldiers who came north, though . . ." Her voice trailed away again.
"No, no, no, no." Hamnet Thyssen shook his head. "Don't judge our soldiers by them. They're imperial guards. Part of their job is to look pretty while they take care of Sigvat. They can fight some, or they'd be useless. But they have to be impressive while they're doing it. Most soldiers don't bother with that nonsense."
"I hope so," Liv repeated, still seeming dubious.
"Look at it like this," Hamnet said. "Never mind the Rulers. If all our soldiers were like the ones you saw, who'd stop the Bizogots from overrunning the Empire?"
Liv grunted thoughtfully, the way a man would. She squeezed his hand. "Fair enough. You have a point. I always thought it was because the southern Bizogots were too weak and puny to be worth much themselves, but your soldiers have to be able to fight, too. Do you think they'll be able to fight warriors who ride mammoths?"
It was Hamnet's turn to grunt. "I don't know," he admitted. "The Bizogots will have to worry about that, too."
"At least we know mammoths," Liv said.
Hamnet Thyssen started going on, in Raumsdalian, about two Bizogots and two mammoths gossiping about the clan that lived next door to theirs. For a little while, Liv didn't understand what he was doing. When she did get it, she was affronted at first. Then, in spite of herself, she started to giggle. "I didn't mean we know them like that," she said.
In the voice of one of the mammoths—a snooty one—Hamnet said, "Well, we don't say we know Bizogots like that, either." He made an indignant gesture with his arm, as if it were a trunk. Giggling still, Liv hit him. It was a most successful shopping trip.
It was snowing when Count Hamnet and Liv and Trasamund set out from the imperial palace. That seemed fitting to Hamnet. It also seemed fitting to Trasamund, who said, "Now we go back to a land with proper weather, by God."
"If you say so, your Ferocity." Hamnet didn't feel like arguing with him.
One of the stablemen said, "Good fortune go with you, your Grace."
"Why, thank you, Tyrkir." Hamnet Thyssen was surprised and touched. "I thought everybody here was glad to get rid of me."
"Oh, no." Tyrkir shook his head. "You know how to take care of a horse, and you always treat us like people when you come to the stables. We aren't just—things that can talk, not to you. Not like some I could name."
Another attendant hissed at him. He left it there. Hamnet found himself wondering as he rode off. Was Tyrkir talking about the Emperor like that? He couldn't very well ask, but it made for an interesting question all the same.
"Nidaros is a fine place to visit. Nidaros is a wonderful place to visit, in fact," Trasamund said as they rode out, with a smile like a cat's that has fallen into a pitcher of cream. "I wouldn't want to have to stay here, though."
"Neither would I," Hamnet Thyssen said.
"Plainly not, or you wouldn't come with me," the jarl said.
Count Hamnet shook his head. "I've always thought so. Too many people crowded together. Too many ambitious people crowded together. Whenever I could stay away from the place, I would. Sometimes you can't help it, though."
"It's not just the people crowded together. It's all the things crowded together, too," Liv said. "The houses and the shops and everything in the shops . . ." Her shiver had nothing to do with the weather. "It's marvelous, I suppose, but I'd go mad if I stayed here much longer."
As if to prove her point, they got stuck behind a wagon that had overturned on the icy road, spilling sacks of beans or barley or something of the sort. The driver tried to keep people from darting in and stealing the sacks, but some would distract him while others did the taking.
"We Bizogots don't steal inside the clan," Trasamund said loftily.
"Why do these people do it?" Liv asked.
"Maybe to sell what they grab. More likely because they're hungry and they need something to eat," Hamnet answered.
"Here, some have too much and many have not enough. That is not good," Liv said. "Among the Bizogots, if someone goes hungry, it's because everyone in the clan goes hungry. That way is better, I think."
"Maybe so," Hamnet said. "Things are more equal among you—you're right. But you've seen we can do things you can't."
"Oh, yes." The shaman nodded. "We talked about the price you pay for being able to do them. This is another part of that price, wouldn't you say?"
Although Hamnet Thyssen hadn't thought of it like that, he found himself nodding, too. "Yes, I'd have to say it is."
"Let's turn around and take another road," Trasamund said. "Otherwise, we'll be here till they steal the wheels off that poor fool's wagon and the tail off his horse."
"I can get us to the north gate on side streets, I think," Hamnet said. "We'll have to do some zigzagging, but we would anyway." A boulevard that ran straight north would have given the Breath of God a running start. Raumsdalian winters were milder—or at least less regularly frigid—than the ones the Three Tusk clan knew, but people still had to do all they could to fight the cold.
Hamnet would have embarrassed himself if he’d got lost in the maze of lanes and alleys that sprouted from the main road. He knew more than a little relief when he got back onto it. With luck, neither of the Bizogots with him noticed.
If it was snowing here, what was it like up by the Glacier'! Do I really want to know? he wondered. He shrugged. Ulric Skakki had gone that way, and gone by himself, without the Bizogots' knowing. What he can do, I can do, by God. Hamnet Thyssen muttered under his breath. He still wished Ulric were coming along. The adventurer was a good man to have beside you when you ran into trouble—or when it ran into you.
He pointed. "There's the gate."
"So it is." Trasamund nodded in satisfaction. "On the way home at last. Even getting out of Nidaros, getting into the countryside here, will feel like an escape. It's not the plains, but I won't feel closed in all the time, either, the way I do now."