Harry Turtledove - Into the Darkness

“Shall I give you another lesson on why you would be well advised to learn manners?” the Algarvian asked, as politely as if he were offering another glass of brandy punch rather than another punch in the eye. The Yaninan did not lack spirit, but he didn’t altogether lack sense, either. Instead of starting up the fight again, he took himself elsewhere.

Sabrino bowed to the Algarvian victor, saying, “Well done, sir. Well done.”

“You do me too much honor.” His countryman returned the bow. “All these westerners—if you take a firm line with them, they are yours to command.”

“Aye.” Sabrino laughed. “That is the way of it, sure enough.”

Marshal Rathar strolled through King Swemmel Square, which was said to be the largest paved-over open space in the world. He had no idea whether that was true, or whether everything associated with King Swemmel had to be the biggest or the most of whatever it was simply because of its association with the king. He wondered whether anyone had actually measured all the great plazas of the world and compared them one to another. Then he wondered why he worried his head about such unimportant things. It wasn’t as if he had not important things about which to worry.

A wind howling up from the south blew little flurries of snow into his face. He pulled his cloak more tightly around him, and tugged the hood down low on his forehead. The cloak was the rock-gray of Unkerlanter army issue, but, unlike the long tunic beneath it, did not show his rank. Thus swaddled, he could have been anyone. He enjoyed his few minutes of anonymity. All too soon, he would have to return to the palace, return to his work, return to the knowledge that King Swemmel might order him dragged off to the headsman at any time.

Statues of past Unkerlanter kings, some in stone, some in bronze, marked the outer boundary of the square. One statue towered twice as tall as any of the others. Rathar did not need to glance at it to know it was made in King Swemmel’s image. Swemmel’s successor would no doubt knock it down. Maybe he would replace it with one to match the others in size. Maybe, having knocked it down, Swemmel’s successor would not replace it at all.

Under the shielding hood, Rathar shook his head. He might have been a man bedeviled by gnats, but no gnats could withstand Cottbus’s winter weather. No, he knew what he was: a man bedeviled by his own thoughts. Those were harder to shake off than gnats, and more dangerous, too.

He sighed. “I had better get back to it,” he muttered. If he buried himself in work, he would not—he hoped he would not—have much time to think about King Swemmel the man even as he carried out the orders of King Swemmel the sovereign.

He turned back toward the palace. As he did so, a couple of other men in nondescript rock-gray cloaks who had also been walking through King Swemmel Square turned in the same direction. Not enough other people were abroad in the square to let them disguise their movements, try as they would.

Rathar laughed. The wind tore apart the puff of vapor that burst from his mouth. He’d been a fool to imagine he could stay anonymous even for a few minutes.

Inside the palace, he took off the cloak at once, draping it over his arm. As if to make up for the savage weather outside, Unkerlanters commonly heated their dwellings and workplaces beyond the comfortable.

Major Merovec saluted him when he came into the office. “My lord Marshal, a gentleman from the foreign ministry has been waiting to see you,” his adjutant said. As usual, Merovec’s voice and face revealed little.

“And what does he want?” Rathar asked.

“Sir, he says he will discuss that only with you.” Merovec wasn’t shy about letting the marshal know what he thought of that: it infuriated him.

“Then I’d better see him, hadn’t I?” Rathar said mildly.

“I will get him, sir,” Merovec said. “I did not wish to leave him alone in your private office.” He’d probably found a broom closet for the foreign ministry official instead, if the gleam in his eye was any sign. That gleam still there, he hurried away.

When he returned, sure enough, he had an angry official with him. “Marshal, this man of yours has not granted me the deference due the deputy foreign minister of Unkerlant,” the fellow snapped.

“My lord Ibert, I am sure he only sought to keep secrets from spreading,” Rathar replied. “My aides can sometimes be more zealous on my behalf than I would be were I here in person.”

Ibert kept on glaring at Merovec, who might have been carved from stone. The deputy foreign minister muttered under his breath, but then said, “Very well, my lord Marshal, I will let it go—this time. Now that you are here in person, shall we closet ourselves together to keep secrets from spreading?” He kept an eye on Merovec: he wanted his own back.

And Rathar could not refuse him. “As you wish, my lord,” he said. “If you will do me the honor of accompanying me …” He led Ibert into his private office, closing the door behind them. The last he saw of the outside world was Merovec’s face. He knew he would have to make things right with his adjutant, but that could wait. He nodded to the deputy foreign minister. “And for what reason have we closeted ourselves together here?”

Ibert pointed to the map behind Rathar’s desk. “My lord Marshal, when we go to war against Algarve come spring, are we prepared to defend ourselves against a Zuwayzi attack from the north?”

Rathar turned to the map himself. Pins with colored heads showed concentrations of Unkerlanter soldiers and, somewhat less certainly, those of Algarve and Yanina. Almost all the gold-headed pins that represented Unkerlant’s war-ready forces were near the kingdom’s eastern border. The marshal clicked his tongue between his teeth. “Not so well as we might be, my lord,” he answered. “If we are to beat the redheads, I have no doubt we shall need every man we can scrape up.” He looked back to Ibert. “You are telling me we should prepare for such a misfortune, aren’t you?”

“I am,” Ibert said flatly. “Our spies and his Majesty’s minister in Bishah report there can be no doubt that Zuwayza and Algarve are conspiring against us.”

Sighing, Rathar tried to seem more surprised than he was. “That is too bad,” he said, and marveled at how large an understatement he could pack into four short words. Another of King Swemmel’s pigeons had come home to roost—and had shit on the windowsill as it flew in. Had Rathar been wearing King Shazli’s shoes (all Shazli was in the habit of wearing), he would have thought about avenging himself on Unkerlant, too.

“What do you propose to do about this?” Ibert demanded, sounding almost as petulant as his sovereign.

However petulant he sounded, it was the right question. Rathar said, “Since you assure me we do need to ready ourselves to meet this danger, I shall consult with my officers and develop a plan to do so. My immediate response”—he glanced at the map again—“is not to worry a great deal.”

“How not?” Ibert said. “The Zuwayzin were a thorn in our side during our last fight against them. Why should they prove any different now?”

Patiently, Rathar answered, “During the last war, they fought on the defensive. The going is usually harder when one attacks. And, even if the black men should win some early successes—if you will pardon my blunt-ness, my lord, so what?”

Ibert’s eyes almost bugged out of his head. “ ‘So what,’ my lord Marshal? Is that all you care for the soil of Unkerlant, that you would let the naked savages of the north seize it for their own?”

“Seizing it is one thing,” Rathar answered. “Keeping it is another. With the worst will in the world toward us, the Zuwayzin cannot go far beyond the borders they had before we forced them back a year ago. They have not the men, the behemoths, or the dragons to do more.”