Amatu answered with a fresh flurry of obscenities. He aimed more of them at Krasta than at Skarnu. Maybe he thought that would make Skarnu angrier. If he did, he was wrong. In Skarnu's mind, he'd been calling his sister worse things than any Amatu came up with ever since he found out she was sleeping with an Algarvian.
"I'm leaving you your silver," Skarnu said when Amatu finally flagged. "As far as I'm concerned, you can buy a rope and hang yourself with it. It's the best thing you could do for the kingdom."
He walked away from Amatu even as the returned exile reviled him again. However much Amatu cursed, though, he didn't get up and come after Skarnu. Maybe he was too battered. Maybe he believed Skarnu's warning. If he did, he was wise, for Skarnu meant every word of it.
When Skarnu went round the bend in the road from which the Algarvian cavalrymen had come, he looked back over his shoulder one last time. Amatu was on his feet by then, but going in the opposite direction, the direction the men on unicornback had taken. Skarnu nodded in somber satisfaction. With any luck at all, he would never see Amatu again.
He also tried to make sure luck wouldn't be the only factor involved. Whenever he came to a crossroads, he went right or left or straight ahead at random. By the time evening approached, he was confident Amatu would have no idea where he was. For that matter, he had no sure idea where he was himself.
A couple of big, rough-coated dogs ran out from a farmhouse and barked at him. His hand went to one of the knives on his belt. He didn't like farm dogs, which would often try to bite strangers. Here, though, they subsided when the farmer came after them and shouted, "Down!"
"Thanks, friend," Skarnu said from the roadway. He glanced at the sun. No, he couldn't go much farther before darkness overtook him. He turned back to the farmer. "Will you let me chop wood or do some other chores for supper and a night in your barn?" He hadn't intended to end up here, nor anywhere very close to here.
The farmer hesitated. Skarnu did his best to look innocent and appealing. A lot of people didn't trust anyone these days. If the fellow said, "No," he'd have to lie up under a tree or wherever else he could find makeshift shelter. But the farmer pointed. "There's the woodpile. There's the axe. Let's see what you can do while the light lasts."
He didn't promise anything. Clever or just tight-fisted? Skarnu wondered. Aloud, he said, "Fair enough," and got to work. By the time the sun went down, he'd turned a lot of lumber into firewood.
"Not bad," the farmer allowed. "You've done it before, I'd wager." He brought Skarnu bread and sausage and plums and a mug of what was obviously home-brewed ale, then said, "You can stay in the barn tonight, too."
"Thanks." Skarnu chopped more wood in the morning, and the farmer fed him again. Never once, though, did Skarnu set eyes on the man's wife and whatever children he had. That saddened him but left him unsurprised. Things worked so these days.
He grimaced. Over by Pavilosta- not so far away- he had a child himself, or would soon. He wondered if he'd ever get to see it.
"Setubal!" the conductor shouted as the ley-line caravan slid into the depot at the heart of Lagoas capital. "All out for Setubal, folks! This is the end of the line."
To Fernao, newly arrived in the great city after months in the wilds of southeastern Kuusamo, that was true in more ways than one. He'd been staring out the window in astonished wonder ever since the caravan began gliding through the outskirts of Setubal. Were there really so many people, so many buildings, in the whole world, let alone in one city? It seemed incredible.
Leaning on his cane and carrying a carpetbag in his other hand, he made his way out of the caravan car. He knew no little pride in managing so well. His bad leg would never be what it had been before he was injured down in the austral continent, but he could use it. Aye, he limped. He would always limp. But he could get around.
Noise smote him like a bursting egg when he got down on the platform. "Powers above!" he muttered. Had Setubal always been like this? It probably had. No, it surely had. He'd lost his immunity to the racket by going away. He wondered how- and how fast- he could get it back. Soon, he hoped.
Through the din, he heard someone calling his name. His head turned this way and that as he tried to spot the man. He looked for someone waving, but half- more than half- the people on the platform were waving.
And then he did spy Brinco, the secretary to the Lagoan Guild of Mages. They fought their way toward each other through the crowd, and clasped each other's wrists in the traditional style of all Algarvic peoples when they finally came face-to-face. "Good to see you moving so well," Brinco said. A grin stretched across his plump face. More often then not, Fernao knew, the jolly fat man was a myth. In Brinco, the clichй lived.
"Good to be moving so well, believe me," Fernao told him.
"Let me take your bag," Brinco said, and did. "Let me clear a path. You follow along behind. A cab is waiting. We'll get you to the guild hall, and-"
"And Grandmaster Pinhiero will grill me like a bloater," Fernao said. Brinco laughed at that, but didn't deny it. The secretary shouldered a man out of the way. Fernao was perfectly content to follow him. He got the feeling Brinco could have cleared a path through the icebergs that swelled from the shores of the austral continent every winter.
Absently, he asked, "Do you know the name Habakkuk?"
"Aye," Brinco answered over his shoulder. "I also know you shouldn't, and that you shouldn't throw it around where others might hear it."
"Since I do know of it, will you tell me more?"
"Not here. Not now," Brinco said. "Later, perhaps, should the Grandmaster judge that wise." A skinny little fellow caromed off his chest. "I'm so sorry," he told the man, his voice oozing false sympathy. When Fernao tried to bring up Habakkuk again, Brinco didn't seem to hear him. His deafness was patently false, too, but Fernao couldn't do anything about it.
The cab had a closed body, but Fernao gritted his teeth at the racket that came through. He peered out the windows. Every so often, he noticed missing buildings or, a couple of times, blocks of buildings that had been standing when he left for the wilds of the Naantali district. "I see the Algarvians still keep paying us calls," he remarked.
"Aye, every now and again," Brinco agreed. "Not so much lately; they've sent a lot of the dragons they did have up in Valmiera west to fight the Unkerlanters." He was some years older than Fernao, but his grin made him look like a boy. "By all accounts, the dragons aren't helping them much there."
"Too bad," Fernao said.
"It is a pity, isn't it?" Brinco said, grinning still. But the grin slipped. "By what I hear, we were lucky they didn't get the chance to serve us as they served Yliharma."
"Not just Yliharma," Fernao said grimly. "They used that cursed magecraft against us, too, you know. That's why we haven't got Siuntio working with us anymore. If it hadn't been for him, I wouldn't be here talking to you now. None of the mages over there would be here talking to anybody now."
"How did he- how did the lot of you- withstand that vicious spell, even in so far as you did?" Brinco asked.
"Siuntio and Ilmarinen rallied us," Fernao answered. "Siuntio… seemed to carry the whole world on his shoulders for just long enough to give the rest of us a chance. I don't know another mage who could have done it."
Brinco grunted and gave him a sidelong look. For a moment, Fernao had trouble understanding why. Then he realized how he'd miffed the Guild Secretary: Siuntio, of course, wasn't a Lagoan. Fernao shrugged. For a long time now, he'd been the only Lagoan working on the largely Kuusaman project. They hadn't sneered at his blood, and he didn't care to sneer at theirs.