Harry Turtledove - Rulers of the Darkness

Sometimes the mages would stay in the dining hall after supper, arguing about what they had done or what they wanted to do or simply chatting. Not tonight. They drifted apart and went upstairs to their chambers as if sick of one another's company. There were times when Pekka was sick of her comrades' company, most often of Ilmarinen's, then of Fernao's, and occasionally even of Siuntio's. Tonight wasn't one of those angry times. She just didn't want to talk to anyone.

Instead, she worked on two letters side by side. One was for her husband, the other for her son. Leino would be able to read his own, of course. Her sister Elimaki, who was taking care of Uto, would surely read aloud most of the one written to him, even though he was learning his letters.

The letter to Uto went well. Pekka had no trouble writing the things any mother should say to her son. Those were easy, and flowed from her pen as easily as they flowed from her heart. She loved him, she missed him, she hoped he was being a good little boy (with Uto, often a forlorn hope). The words, the thoughts, were simple and straightforward and true.

Writing to Leino was harder. She loved him and missed him, too, missed him with an ache that sometimes made her empty bed seem the loneliest place in the world. Those things were easy enough to say, even though she knew other eyes than his would also see them: functionaries serving the Seven Princes studied all outgoing correspondence to make sure no secrets were revealed.

But she wanted to tell her husband more. She couldn't even name the mages with whom she was working, for fear that knowledge would fall into the Algarvians' hands and give them clues they shouldn't have. She had to talk about personalities in indirect terms, a surprisingly difficult exercise. She had to talk about the work in which they were engaged in even more indirect terms. She hadn't been able to tell Leino all that much about it even when they'd been together. He hadn't asked, either. He'd known when silence was important, and respected the need for it.

We've had simply appalling weather lately, she wrote. If it were better, we could do more. That seemed safe enough. Most of Kuusamo had appalling weather through most of the winter. Hearing about it wouldn't tell an Algarvian spy where she was. And bad weather could interfere with any number of things, not all of them things in which a spy would be interested.

I hope to be able to see you before long. She'd been told she might be able to leave for a little while in the not too indefinite future. But even if she did manage to get away, could Leino escape his training as a proper military mage at the same time? She thought he should have stayed in a sorcerous laboratory, improving the weapons Kuusaman soldiers would take into battle. But the Seven Princes thought otherwise, and their will counted for more than hers.

Sighing, she stared down at the page. She wanted to tear it up and throw the pieces in the wastebasket. She had to be able to do better than the words she'd put down, the words that seemed so flat, so useless, even so stupid. What would Leino think when he saw them? That he'd married a halfwit?

He'll understand, she thought. I'm sure he's learning plenty of things he can't tell me, too. Most of her believed that. Just enough had doubts, though, to leave all of her upset and worried.

She jumped when someone knocked on the door. Springing away from her letters was something of a relief. Even arguing abstruse theoretical calculations with Ilmarinen seemed more appealing than trying to say things she couldn't say without having them cut out of her letter before Leino ever saw it.

But when she opened the door, she found Fernao standing there, not Ilmarinen. The Lagoan mage leaned on his stick and had his crutch stuck under his other arm. "I hope I am not disturbing you," he said in careful classical Kaunian.

"Not even a little bit," Pekka said in Kuusaman. She started to repeat that in the scholarly tongue, but Fernao's nod showed he'd followed her. "Come in," she went on, in Kaunian now. "Sit down. What can I do for you?"

"I thank you," he said, and made his slow way into her chamber. She took a couple of steps back, not only to get out of his way but to keep him from looming over her quite so much: Lagoans were almost uncouthly tall.

Maybe Fernao sensed what she felt, for he sank onto one of the stools in the room. Or maybe he's just glad to get off his feet, Pekka thought. Had she been injured as Fernao was, she knew she would have been. She turned the chair on which she'd been sitting to write away from the desk. "Shall I make you some tea?" she asked. She couldn't be much of a hostess here, but she could do that.

Fernao shook his head. "No, thank you," he said. "If you do not mind, I can talk with you without thinking I am once more a student bearding a professor in his den."

Pekka laughed. "I often have that feeling myself around Siuntio and Ilmarinen. I think even the Grandmaster of your kingdom's Guild of Mages would have it around them."

"Grandmaster Pinhiero is not the most potent mage ever to come out of our universities," Fernao said, "but he would speak his mind to anyone, even to King Swemmel of Unkerlant."

Lagoans had always had a reputation for speaking their minds, regardless of whether doing so was a good idea. Pekka asked, "Would that make Grandmaster Pinhiero a hero or a fool?"

"Without a doubt," Fernao answered. Pekka chewed on that for a little while before deciding it was another joke and laughing again. Fernao continued, "Every time I see how far you Kuusamans have come, it amazes me."

"Why is that?" Pekka knew her tone was tart, but couldn't help it. "Because you Lagoans do not think Kuusamo worth noticing at all most of the time?"

"That probably has something to do with it," he said, which caught her by surprise. "We did notice you when it came to declare war against Algarve- I will say that. We would have done it sooner had we not feared you might take Mezentio's side and assail us from behind."

"Ah." Pekka found herself nodding. "Aye, I knew people who wanted to do exactly that." She remembered a party at Elimaki's house. Some of the friends of Elimaki's husband, Olavin the banker, had been eager to take on Lagoas. Olavin was serving the Seven Princes these days. Pekka suspected most of those friends were doing the same thing.

"Did you?" Fernao said, and Pekka nodded again. He shrugged. "Well, I can hardly say I am surprised. It would have been… unfortunate had that happened, though." Even as Pekka wondered how he meant the word, he explained: "Unfortunate for Lagoas, unfortunate for the whole world."

"Aye, you are likely to be right." Pekka glanced over her shoulder at the letters to Leino and Uto, then back to Fernao. "May I ask you something?"

As if he were a great noble, he inclined his head to her. "Of course."

"How do you stand it here, cut off not just from your family but from your kingdom as well?"

Fernao said, "For one thing, I have not got much in the way of family: no wife, no children, and I am not what you would call close to either of my sisters. They never have understood what being a mage means. And, for another, the work we are doing here matters. It matters so much, or may matter so much, I would sooner be here than anywhere else."

That was a more thoughtful answer than Pekka had expected. She wondered how long Fernao had been waiting for someone to ask a question like hers. Quite a while, she guessed, which might also be a measure of his loneliness. "Why have you not got a wife?" she asked, and then, realizing she might have gone too far, she quickly added, "You need not answer that."

But the Lagoan didn't take offense. Instead, he started to laugh. "Not because I would rather have a pretty boy, if that is what you mean," he said. "I like women fine, thank you very much. But I have never found one I liked enough and respected enough to want to marry her." After a moment, he held up his hand. "I take it back. I have found a couple like that, but they were already other men's wives."