Harry Turtledove - Jaws of Darkness

“I am Brusku,” the stranger said, which both did and did not sound like a Kaunian name-the ending was different from thes Forthwegian Kaunians used. Then he went on, “I am a soldier in the Phalanx of Valmiera.”

“Ahh.” Sidroc slowly nodded. Now things grew clearer. The Algarvians didn’t massacre blonds from Valmiera and Jelgava, maybe for fear of touching off revolts in the east. But they were getting some use from them, anyway. Sidroc nodded again in a more friendly way than he’d thought he would show to any Kaunian. “Welcome to Unkerlant. You can’t go home again either, can you?”

Brusku’s pale stare suddenly sharpened. “No,” he said after a moment. “So it is the same for you, is it? I did what I wanted to do. It is enough.”

Sidroc had done what he wanted to do, too. Was it enough? Whether it was or not, he was stuck with it. He said, “Come back to my camp with me.” He pointed north. “You can meet my pals.”

“All right.” Brusku splashed across the stream, which was no more than ankle deep. As Sidroc led the way, he thought about how strange it was to be fighting alongside a Kaunian. A few years before, though, he would have thought it strange to be fighting alongside Algarvians, too.

“Greetings,” Ceorl called when he walked up to the fire. The ruffian pointed behind him. “Who in blazes is that?”

“His name’s Brusku,” Sidroc answered-in Algarvian, so Brusku could follow. “He’s from the Phalanx of Valmiera-that’s the outfit Brigadier Polinesso said was going in on our left.”

He wondered if Ceorl would make a crack about Kaunians escaping from Algarvian camps. That wouldn’t do anybody any good. Maybe the Valmieran Kaunians didn’t know what happened to their blond brethren from Forthweg. Maybe they knew and tried not to think about it. By the way the ruffian’s lips pursed, he thought about it. But then, visibly, he thought better of it. He said, “Let’s kill some Unkerlanters,” and let it go at that.

“Aye,” Brusku said. “That is what we came for.”

Sergeant Werferth passed the Valmieran his flask. “Here. Try this.”

Brusku drank. He coughed a couple of times. “Unicorn piss and fire,” he said. “Is that what you Forthwegians drink?”

“We drink wine and plum brandy when we’re home,” Werferth answered. “Down here, we drink anything we can get our hands on. I think the Unkerlanters brewed this stuff out of turnips.”

Brusku looked at the flask as if he wanted to throw it away. Instead, he took another pull and handed it back to Werferth. Then he said, “I had better go, or my sergeant will come down on me.” He nodded to Sidroc and headed off in the direction from which he’d come.

Once he was gone, Ceorl spat into the fire. “Fighting side by side with Kaunians? I’ve thought of a lot of strange things, but never any like that.”

“I’ll tell you something, though,” Sidroc said: “I’d rather have them on my left hand than a pack of jumpy Yaninans.” He watched Ceorl weigh that. The ruffian didn’t take long to nod.

Werferth said, “A good thing you boys didn’t talk about what happens to Forthwegian Kaunians. I’m going to tell everybody to keep quiet about that.”

“What happens when the Phalanx of Valmiera-what in blazes is a phalanx, anyway?-finds out about it?” Sidroc asked. “Sooner or later, they will. They’re bound to.”

“Good question,” Werferth said. “We’ll probably see before too long, like you say. And when we do… You know what it’s like when an egg bursts almost close enough for the sorcerous energy to kill you?” He waited. Sidroc nodded. Everybody who’d been in battle for a while knew what that was like. Werferth went on, “When they find out, it’ll be like that, only more so.

Sidroc thought it over. How would he feel if the Algarvians started slaying Forthwegians to make their magic stronger? He could think of some Forthwegians he wouldn’t miss, starting with Ealstan and Hestan. Still… “Aye, you’re likely right.”

Istvan proved less unhappy as a captive on Obuda than he’d expected to. He lived in a barracks no worse than the one where he’d lived while a Gyongyosian soldier on that same island. He was a good deal more comfortable than he’d been in the forests of western Unkerlant or in the trenches on the island of Becsehely. The food his Kuusaman captors fed him and his comrades wasn’t especially good, but it wasn’t especially bad, either, and there was plenty of it. He had no work harder than chopping firewood under the watchful eyes of the Kuusaman guards. It could have been far worse.

When he said as much in line for breakfast one morning, Kun nodded and replied, “Aye, I thought they’d send us off to the mines or some such.

This-it’s as if they’ve made Obuda into a crate, and they’ll keep stowing captives here till it fills up.”

“Nothing to do but sit around and get fat,” Istvan agreed. “I’ve been a soldier for a long time. I don’t much mind being an old soldier for a while, if you know what I mean.”

“I’m with you,” Szonyi said from behind him. “Nobody’s trying to blaze me or drop an egg on my head. Anyone who thinks I’m sorry about that is plumb daft.”

“Well, the two of you get no arguments from me,” Kun said. Watery island sunshine glinted off the gold frames of his spectacles. “I’ve never been what you’d call eager to have people trying to kill me. I leave all that up to you fierce country lads.”

If he hadn’t fought bravely every time he had to, he would have condemned himself out of his own mouth there. Even as things were, Istvan spoke a little stiffly: “Weare a warrior race.”

Corporal Kun said nothing to that but, “Aye, Sergeant.” Istvan couldn’t possibly call him to account for two unexceptionable words. But then Kun looked around, the sun sparkling off his spectacles once more. His glance took in the captives’ camp, the palisade around it, the brisk, alert Kuusaman guards on the palisade, and the bedraggled Gyongyosians moving forward one at a time to be fed.

Ears burning, Istvan said, “Well, weare”

“Aye, Sergeant,” Kun repeated, which finished the job of demoralizing Istvan. The one-time mage’s apprentice made as if he didn’t even know what he’d done. He fights, Istvan thought. He just doesn’t fight fair. He didn’t say that out loud. It would have made Kun unbearably smug.

An Obudan-a medium-sized, dark-haired man with light reddish-brown skin-slapped oatmeal mush into Istvan’s mess tin. “Here you is,” he said in bad Gyongyosian. Gyongyos had held Obuda, been driven off by the Kuusamans, retaken the island, and then been driven off again. The locals had had their chances to learn the languages of both occupiers.

“Thanks.” Istvan turned away and started spooning up the mush. His own people flavored oatmeal with butter and salt. The Kuusamans put in sugar and spices and raisins instead. It wasn’t what he was used to, but it wasn’t too bad.

When he’d finished, he took his tin over to a basin of water to wash it. He was sloshing it around in the basin when another captive came up beside him. He blinked. “Hello, Major Borsos,” he said. “I didn’t know the stars-accursed slanteyes had got you, too.”

He’d fetched and carried for Borsos back in the days when Gyongyos still held Obuda. He’d seen the mage again in the vast forests of Unkerlant. Borsos had had trouble remembering him then, and plainly had trouble remembering him now. After a moment, he said, “Ah, hello, Sergeant. Aye, I’m among the unlucky, too. Gyongyos hasn’t had much luck lately.”

“Couldn’t you use your magecraft to do… something?” Istvan’s voice trailed away. Here on an island now far away from any that Gyongyos held, what could even a true mage do?