"I understand that." Lurcanio bowed again. "I shall do my best to persuade Amatu to be moderate. But I should be grateful if you would say aye. He needs to feel… welcome in Priekule."
"He needs to feel not quite everybody hates him, you mean." Krasta tossed her head. "If he curses Skarnu, I will hate him, and I will let him know about it. Even you don't do that."
"For which praise, such as it is, I thank you." Lurcanio bowed once more. "Professionally speaking, I quite admire your brother. He is as slippery as olive oil. We thought we had him again not long ago, but he slipped through our fingers again."
"Did he?" Krasta kept her voice as neutral as she could. She was glad the Algarvians hadn't caught Skarnu, but knew Lurcanio could and would make her unhappy for showing it. Changing the subject and yielding on the side issue struck her as a good idea; with a theatrical sigh, she said, "I suppose Amatu is welcome- tomorrow night, you said? -if he behaves himself."
"You are gracious and generous," Colonel Lurcanio said- qualities few people had accused Krasta of having. He went on, "Might I also beg one more favor? Would it be possible for your cook to serve something other than beef tongue?"
Krasta's eyes sparkled. "Why, of course," she said, and her prompt agreement made Lurcanio bow yet again. Krasta kissed him on the cheek and hurried into the kitchen. "Count Amatu will be coming for supper again tomorrow night," she told the cook. "Do you by any chance have some tripe in the rest crate there?"
He nodded. "Aye, milady. I do indeed." He hesitated, then said, "From what I know of Algarvians, the colonel will be less happy at eating tripe than Count Amatu will."
"But Amatu is our honored guest, and so his wishes must come first." Krasta batted her eyes in artful artlessness. She doubted she convinced the cook. If Lurcanio asked him why he'd prepared a supper unlikely to be to an Algarvian's taste, though, he had only to repeat what she said and she would stay out of trouble. She hoped she would stay out of trouble, anyhow.
The cook dipped his head. "Aye, milady. And I suppose you will want the side dishes to come from the countryside, too." He didn't quite smile, but something in his face told Krasta he knew what she was up to, sure enough.
All she said was, "I'm certain Count Amatu would enjoy that. Pickled beets, perhaps." Lurcanio wouldn't be happy with tripe and pickled beets or whatever else the cook came up with, but she didn't think he would be so unhappy as to do something drastic.
Still, having given the cook his instructions, Krasta thought she might be wise to get out of the house for a while. She ordered her driver to take her into Priekule. "Aye, milady," he said. "Let me harness the horses for you, and we'll be on our way."
He took the opportunity to don a broad-brimmed hat and throw on a heavy cloak, too. The slight sloshing noise Krasta heard between hoofbeats came from somewhere by his left hip: a flask under the cloak, she realized. That would also help keep him warm. Thinking of Lurcanio discomfited put Krasta in such a good mood, she didn't even snap at the driver for drinking on the job.
He stopped the carriage on a side street just off the Avenue of Equestrians. Krasta looked back over her shoulder as she hurried toward Priekule's toniest boulevard of shops. He'd already tilted the flask to his lips. It wouldn't slosh nearly so much on the way back to the mansion. It might not slosh at all. She shrugged. What could you expect from commoners but drunkenness?
She shrugged again, much less happily, when she started up the Avenue of Equestrians toward the park where the Kaunian Column of Victory had stood from the days of the Kaunian Empire till a couple of winters before, when the Algarvians demolished it on the grounds that it reflected poorly on their barbarous ancestors. She'd got used to the column's no longer being there, though its destruction had infuriated her. The shrug came from the sorry state of the shops. She'd been unhappy about that ever since Algarve occupied the capital of Valmiera.
More shopfronts were vacant now than ever before. More of the ones that still had goods had nothing Krasta wanted. No matter how many Valmieran women- aye, and men, too- wore Algarvian-style kilts these days, she couldn't bring herself to do it. She'd had kilts in her closet before the war, but that had been fashion, not compulsion. She hated compulsion, or at least being on the receiving end of it.
A couple of Algarvian soldiers ogled her. They did no more than that, for which she was duly grateful. She sneered at a Valmieran girl in a very short kilt, though she suspected the redheads would like the girl fine. And she started to sneer at a Valmieran man in an almost equally short kilt till he waved at her and she saw it was Viscount Valnu.
"Hello, sweetheart!" he cried, hurrying up to kiss her on the cheek. "How much of your money have you wasted this afternoon?"
"None, yet," Krasta answered. "I haven't found anything worth spending it on."
"What a tragedy!" Valnu exclaimed. "In that case, why don't you buy me a mug of ale, and maybe even a bite to eat to go with it?" He waved. They stood in front of an eatery called Classical Cuisine. "Maybe it'll have dormice in honey," he said.
"If they do, I'll get you a big plate of them," Krasta promised. But, since Valnu had made it plain she'd be doing the buying, she held the door open for him instead of the other way round. He took the point, and kissed her on the cheek again as he walked past her into the eatery.
She ordered ale for both of them, and- no dormice appearing on the bill of fare- strips of smoked and salted beef to go with it. "I thank you," Valnu said, and raised his mug in salute.
"It's all right," Krasta said. "It's rather better than all right, in fact."
"Really?" The tip of Valnu's rather sharp pink tongue appeared between his lips for a moment. "What have you got in mind, darling?"
He meant, Do you want to go to bed with me, darling? Krasta did want to, but didn't dare. She had to get in her digs at her Algarvian lover less directly. "I'm going to feed Lurcanio tripe tomorrow night," she answered, "and he'll have to eat it and make as if he likes it."
"You are?" Valnu said. "He will? How did you manage that?"
"I didn't, or not mostly. Lurcanio did it himself, and to himself," Krasta replied. "He's invited Count Amatu to supper again, and Amatu, say what you will about him, eats like a Valmieran. Do you know him?"
"I used to, back before the war. Haven't seen much of him since," Valnu said.
Krasta sighed and gulped down her ale. "I wish I could say the same. He's a bit of a bore these days. More than a bit, if you want to know the truth."
Valnu finished his ale, too. Instead of ordering another round for both of them, as Krasta expected him to, he got up and fluttered his fingers at her. "I'm terribly sorry, my love, but I must dash," he said. "One of my dear friends will beat me to a pulp if he thinks I've stood him up." He shrugged a comic shrug. "What can one do?"
"Pick different friends?" Krasta suggested. Instead of getting angry, Valnu only laughed and slid out of the eatery. Krasta bit down on a strip of smoked meat with quite unnecessary violence.
A waiter came up to her. "Will there be anything else, milady?"
"No," she snarled, and strode out of Classical Cuisine herself.
Not even buying a new hat made her feel better. The hat sported a jaunty peacock feather leaping up from the band- an Algarvian style, although that, perhaps fortunately, didn't occur to her. Her driver hadn't got too drunk to take her back to her mansion. The horse knew the way, whether the driver was sure of it or not.
Lurcanio praised the hat. That made Krasta feel a little guilty about the supper she'd planned for the next evening, but only a little: not enough to change the menu. If Lurcanio would inflict Amatu on her, she would inflict tripe on him.