Harry Turtledove - Jaws of Darkness

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Fernao replied, and Ilmarinen laughed raucously. Ignoring him, the Lagoan mage switched to classical Kaunian: “And suppose-just suppose, mind-that you were right about what you tried to do. Suppose the sorcery does have a true timelike component. I do not think it does, but suppose as much for the sake of argument.”

“I have supposed as much,” Ilmarinen said in the same language. “That is why I tried to do what I did. And if I had succeeded, the world would be a different place, and a better place, right now. Because of Pekka, that wouldn’t make you so happy, I know, but it’s still true.” He spoke the language of scholarship as fluently and idiomatically as he used Kuusaman.

“Different? Aye. Better?” Fernao shrugged. “Perhaps you would have changed things to your heart’s desire. But what would the next person who meddled in the past have done? What about the fellow afterhint! How long before we had no true past at all, only an endless war of changes? If the Kaunian Empire had beaten the Algarvians at the Battle of Gambolo, would it have fallen? If Sibiu had beaten Lagoas in our sea wars two hundred and fifty years ago, the Sibs would have got more from Siaulia and the islands in the Great Northern Sea than they did, and we less. And so on, with every kingdom trying to set its lost cause to rights. Do you see?”

He spoke classical Kaunian like most scholars and mages: well enough, but without real liveliness. But that didn’t matter so much here. All he wanted to do was get his point across. And he did. Ilmarinen didn’t answer right away. “You’ve given this a good deal of thought, haven’t you?” he said at last.

“Aye,” Fernao answered. “Pekka and I had little else to do while going out to the blockhouse but think and worry. The other thing we worried about was how much energy your spell would release if it went wrong.”

“Nothing you could have done about that-except jumping on me and stopping me the way you did, I mean,” Ilmarinen said. He added, “I saw the carriage you came in. You should have spent your time screwing-the driver wouldn’t have known. If you were going to die, at least you would have died happy.”

Fernao got to his feet. “You are impossible,” he said. “Fortunately, the spell you tried is also impossible.” He wanted to warn Ilmarinen not to try it again, but refrained once more. He wished he could have strutted away with his nose in the air. His permanent limp and the stick he used prevented that. He did the best he could, given his physical limitations. It was good enough to make Ilmarinen laugh at his retreating back.

And he got his nose high enough in the air to keep him from paying much attention to where he was going. He almost ran over Pekka before he realized she was there. “What did I do to you?” she asked.

“You?” he replied. “Nothing, sweetheart.” Her expression warned him not to say such things. It always had, ever since he’d fled his own bedchamber after they’d made love. But this time, he was able to go on. “Ilmarinen, on the other hand…”

Pekka’s face cleared. She was always ready to be annoyed at the elderly theoretical sorcerer, even if he was her own countryman. “What now?” she asked.

“Oh, nothing new,” Fernao said. “But he still thinks he’s right in spite of the evidence, and-” He broke off again.

“And what?” Pekka asked. When Fernao didn’t answer right away, she drew her own-accurate-conclusion. “He’s teasing you about what we did, is he?” Fernao nodded. Pekka wagged a finger at him. “You see? Going to bed didn’t stop the gossip. It didn’t slow it down. It didn’t solve anything.”

“But it was wonderful,” Fernao said.

That didn’t solve anything, either; it just brought the annoyed look back to Pekka’s face. “It made things more complicated,” she said. “We don’t need things to be more complicated right now. The most important thing we can do is work on this magecraft. Anything that gets in the way-anything at all-we have to push aside.”

She didn’t deny that they’d had a good time in bed. She’d never denied it. But she did keep on behaving as if it hadn’t happened. That might not have been calculated to drive Fernao out of his mind, but it certainly had that effect.

“What are we going to do?” he said.

“When I get the chance, I’m going back to my husband and my son,” Pekka answered. “As for you, I hope you find a wonderful Lagoan woman-or even a wonderful Kuusaman woman, if you find your tastes running that way.”

“I already have,” Fernao told her.

“One without encumbrances,” Pekka told him. When she saw he didn’t understand the word in Kuusaman, she translated it into classical Kaunian. He could have done without such thoughtfulness. She added, “And I’m not feeling any too wonderful right now, either.”

Fernao looked around. By some accident, nobody was staring at them as they stood just outside the refectory. That wouldn’t last long, though. It couldn’t, by the very nature of things. While he had the chance, Fernao kicked at the boards of the floor-after carefully positioning his stick so he didn’t fall on his face. “What’s the use?” he muttered. “What’s the cursed use?”

“You see?” Pekka set a hand on his arm. It was a sympathetic gesture, not an affectionate one-or not an affectionate one of the sort he craved. “It complicated your life, too, even without encumbrances.” Now she used the Kuusaman word without explanation.

“It wouldn’t have, if…” he said.

“If I’d decided to keep doing what we did once,” Pekka said, and he nodded. She shook her head. “The complications would just have taken longer to get here and been worse when they finally did. I’m sorry, Fernao; by the powers above, I’m very sorry. But I can’t imagine anything that would make me change my mind now.”

“All right,” he said. But it wasn’t all right, nor anywhere close. He limped off toward his room. Pekka didn’t come after him or try to call him back. He hadn’t really expected her to. He’d hoped-but expectation had the encumbrance of truth, while hope lived its own life, wild and free.

Once he got back to his chamber, he wondered why he’d come. All he had here was the chance to be alone with his misery. He sat down on the bed, then wished he hadn’t. Sitting there made him think of those frantic few minutes when he’d got everything he wanted… only to discover that, once he’d got it, he couldn’t keep it. That felt worse than not getting it, for now he could look back on what he’d had, know it was real, and know-or at least be certain enough for all practical purposes-it wouldn’t happen again.

Muttering something pungent under his breath, he got up and left his room. He did, at least, know where he was going: to the crystallomancers’ chamber, where the mages and their crystals kept the hostel in the Naantali district connected to the outside world throughout the year. As spring gave way to summer, getting here was easy enough, but that didn’t hold in fall or early spring or through the seemingly endless winter blizzards.

“I want a crystal for private communication with my Grandmaster,” he told the Kuusaman mage in charge of the chamber.

“Of course,” she said. It hadn’t always beenof course; he’d had to make a nuisance of himself to gain the privilege. Only by pointedly asking whether Lagoas was truly an equal ally to Kuusamo had he prevailed. The chief crystallomancer took him to a crystal in the corner. The couple of Kuusamans closest to that crystal moved away so they couldn’t listen to him. “Here you are,” the chief said. “Do remember that the Algarvians are always trying to spy on our emanations.”