“I don’t want to have to think about that right now,” Pekka said. “I don’t want to have to think about anything right now.” But she couldn’t help it; what ran through her mind was, Oh, powers above-I’m going to have to let Uto know his father isn‘t coming home from the war. That was another jolt, almost as bad as hearing the dreadful news from Juhainen. “For now, can you just. . leave me be?”
“All right,” he said, but the look in his eyes-so like a Kuusaman’s eyes in shape, set in an otherwise purely Lagoan face-showed she’d hurt him. “Whatever you want me to do, or don’t want me to do, tell me. You know I’ll do it… or not do it.”
“Thank you,” Pekka said raggedly. “I don’t know what the etiquette is for the wife’s lover when the husband dies.” Spoken in a different tone of voice, that might have been a joke. She meant it as a statement of fact, no more.
Fortunately, Fernao took it that way. “Neither do I,” he admitted, “at least not when-” Several words too late, he broke off. At least not when the lover has nothing to do with the husband’s demise, he’d been about to say: that or something like it. Lagoans weren’t quite so touchy or so much in the habit of taking other men’s wives for lovers as Algarvians, but some of the romances Pekka had read suggested they did have their rules for such situations.
She didn’t want to think about that now, either. In the romances, the wife was often glad when her husband met his end. She wasn’t glad. She felt as if a ley-line caravan had just appeared out of nowhere, run her down, and then vanished. Leino had been one of the anchors of her world. Now she was adrift, lost, at sea.. .
Had Fernao chosen that moment to try to embrace her, in sympathy either real or something less than real, she would have hit him. Maybe he sensed as much, for he only nodded, said, “I’ll be here when you need me,” and went down the hall, the rubber tip of his cane tapping softly on the carpet at every stride.
Pekka had never imagined she would have to compare a dead husband and a live lover. She found she couldn’t do it, not now. She dissolved in tears again. Tomorrow-perhaps even later today-she would start doing everything that needed doing. For the time being, grief had its way with her.
Colonel Sabrino had been at war more than five years. In all that time, he could count on the fingers of one hand the number of leaves he’d got. The ley-line caravan glided to a stop. “Trapani!” the conductor called as he came through the cars. “All out for Trapani!”
Grabbing his duffel bag and slinging it over his shoulder, Sabrino left the caravan car. No one waited for him on the platform: no one here knew he was coming. I’ll surprise Gismonda, he thought, and hoped he wouldn’t surprise his wife in the arms of another man. That would prove embarrassing and complicated for all concerned. One thing-he wouldn’t surprise his mistress in the arms of another man. That would have proved even more embarrassing and complicated, but Fronesia had left him for an officer of footsoldiers who she’d thought would prove more generous. Absently, Sabrino wondered if he had.
The depot had seen its share of war. Planks stretched across sawhorses warned people away from a hole in the platform. Boards patched holes in the roof, too, and kept most of the cold rain off the debarking passengers and the people waiting for them.. The sight saddened Sabrino without surprising him. All the way back from eastern Yanina, he’d seen wreckage. Some of it came from Unkerlanter eggs; more, by what people said, from those dropped by Kuusaman and Lagoan dragons. Now that the islanders were flying off the much closer islands of Sibiu, they could pound southern Algarve almost at will.
Our dragonfliers are as good as theirs, Sabrino thought bitterly. A lot of our dragonfliers are better than any of theirs. Anyone who s stayed alive since the beginning has more experience than a Kuusaman or a Lagoon could hope to match. But we haven’t got enough dragons, and we haven’t got enough dragonfliers.
Stretched too thin. The words tolled like a mournful bell inside Sabrino’s mind. Algarvian dragons had to be divided among the west-where King Swemmel’s men swarmed forward yet again-Valmiera, Jelgava, and the defense of the south against the air pirates flying out of Sibiu. How was one kingdom supposed to do all those jobs at the same time? It was impossible.
If we don’t do all those jobs, we’ll lose the war.
That was another painfully obvious truth. It had been obvious to soldiers since the battles of the Durrwangen bulge, perhaps since the fall of Sulingen. Any civilian with eyes to see would surely have noted the same thing after Kuusamo and Lagoas gained their foothold on the mainland of Derlavai in Jelgava. Now armies came at Algarve from the west and from the east. On which front will we lose ground faster?
Outside the depot, cabs waited in neat ranks, as in the old days. Sabrino waved to one. The cabby waved back. He hurried toward the cab. The driver descended, opened the door for him to get in, and asked, “Where to?”
Sabrino gave his address, or rather half of it, before stopping and staring. The cabby’s black uniform was the one he remembered, from heavy shoes to high-crowned cap with shiny patent-leather brim. But.. “You’re a woman!” he blurted.
“Sure am,” the cabby agreed. She was middle-aged and dumpy, but that wasn’t why he’d needed a moment to know her for what she was. Smiling at his confusion, she went on, “You haven’t been home for a while, have you, Colonel?”
“No,” Sabrino said numbly.
“Plenty of women doing all kinds of things these days,” the driver told him. “Not enough whole men-or crippled men, come to that-left to do them, and they’ve got to get done. Hop in, pal. I’ll take you where you’re going. You want to tell me again where that is, without choking this time?”
Still astonished, he obeyed. When he got into the passenger compartment, she closed the door behind him, then scrambled up to her seat. The cab began to roll. Sure enough, she could manage a horse.
Streets were rougher than Sabrino remembered. That wasn’t the cab’s elderly springs; it was poorly repaired holes in the roadway. Some of them hadn’t been repaired at all. Jounces made his teeth click together.
Everything seemed more soot-stained than Sabrino remembered, too. The reason for that wasn’t hard to find, either. Charred ruins were everywhere, sometimes a house or a shop, sometimes a block, or two, or three. The air stank of stale smoke. Just breathing made Sabrino want to cough.
There was the jeweler’s shop where Sabrino had had a ring-booty he’d taken in Unkerlant-repaired for his mistress. No, there was the block where the shop had stood, but only wreckage remained. He hoped Dosso had got out. He’d been doing business with the jeweler since just after the Six Years’ War.
Most of the people on the street were women. Sabrino had seen that on earlier leaves. It stood out even more strongly now. Even some of the constables were women. The rest were graybeards who looked to have been summoned from retirement. Most of the men not in uniform limped or went on crutches or had a sleeve pinned up or wore a patch over one eye or had some other obvious reason for not being at the front. Everyone seemed to be wearing somber clothing-some the dark gray of mourning, others shades of blue or brown hard to tell from it in the sad winter light. Women’s kilts had got longer, too. Sabrino let out a silent sigh.
The cab rattled to a stop. “Here you go, Colonel,” the driver said. Sabrino got out. The driver descended to hand him his bag. He tipped her more than he would have if she were a man. She curtsied and climbed up again to go look for her next fare. Sabrino went up the walk and used the brass knocker to knock on his own front door.
When a maidservant opened it, she squeaked in surprise and dropped him a curtsy more polished than the one he’d got from the cabby. “Your Excellency!” she exclaimed. “We had no idea …”