Into the Darkness (86 page)

“Very well,” Rathar said, somewhat reassured. Swemmel saw conspiracies all around him. If he did not think the Algarvians suspected anything here, then the chance that they truly did not seemed pretty good to the marshal of Unkerlant. Of course, Swemmel had made mistakes before—about Rathar himself, for instance—but the marshal chose not to dwell on those.

Besides,
Rathar told himself,
then Swemmel was seeing danger where none existed. He wouldn’t miss danger where it truly lurked … would he?

Ibert said, “Submit to his Majesty a formal plan based on what you have discussed with me. I believe he will accept it.”

Rathar hoped the deputy foreign minister was right. King Swemmel, though, had an enormous attachment to Unkerlanter territory. Would he be willing to yield any, even temporarily, to gain more? The marshal had his doubts. He wished he were free of them, but he wasn’t. Still, he could only say, “He will have it before the week is out.” What he did with it … Whatever he did with it, the sooner he did it, the more time Rathar would have to try to set things to rights again.

Ibert departed, looking pleased with himself. He looked even more pleased as he strutted past Merovec. Rathar’s adjutant looked as if he wanted to see the deputy foreign minister shipped off to some distant village to keep a crystal going. As best he could, Rathar soothed Merovec’s ruffled feathers. That was part of his job, too.

“Come on,” Ealstan said to Sidroc. “New semester today. New masters. Maybe we’ll get some decent ones, for a change.”

“Fat chance,” his cousin answered, as usual dawdling over his breakfast porridge. “Only difference will be new hands breaking switches on our backs.”

“All right, then,” Ealstan said. “Maybe we’ll have a bunch of old men who can’t hit very hard.”

As he’d hoped it would, that made Sidroc smile, even if it didn’t make him eat any faster. After a swig of watered wine, Sidroc said, “Curse me if I know why we bother with school, anyhow. Your brother had a ton of it, and what’s he doing? Roadbuilding, that’s what. You could train a mountain ape to put cobblestones in place.”

Leofsig had already gone off to labor on the roads. “He would be helping my father, if it weren’t for the war,” Ealstan said. “Things can’t stay crazy forever.” Even as he said that, though, he wondered why not.

So did Sidroc. “Says who?” he replied, and Ealstan had no good answer. Sidroc got to his feet. “Well, come on. You’re so eager, let’s go.”

They both threw cloaks over their tunics. Snow didn’t fall in Gromheort more than about one winter in four, but mornings were chilly anyhow. So Ealstan thought, at any rate; maybe someone from the south of Unkerlant would have had a different opinion.

Ealstan was soon glad they had started out with time to spare, for they had to wait at a street corner while a regiment of Algarvian footsoldiers tramped by heading west. They weren’t men from Gromheort’s garrison; they kept looking around and exclaiming at the buildings—and at the good-looking women—they saw. Ealstan found he could understand quite a bit of their chatter. Master Agmund had a heavy hand with the switch, but he’d made his scholars learn.

At last, the redheads passed. Sidroc moved at a brisk clip after that. He didn’t like getting beaten. The trouble was, most of the time he didn’t like doing the things that kept him from getting beaten, either.

“We’re here in good time.” Ealstan knew he sounded surprised, but couldn’t help himself.

“Aye, we are,” his cousin answered, “and what does it get us? Not a cursed thing but the chance to queue up for the registrar.”

He was right. A long line of boys already snaked out of the office. Ealstan said, “We’d be even farther back if we were later.” Sidroc snorted. Ealstan’s cheeks heated. It had been a weak comeback, and he knew it.

Little by little, the line advanced. More boys took their places behind Ealstan and Sidroc. Ealstan liked that. It didn’t change how many boys were in front of him, but he wasn’t a tailender any more.

As he got nearer to the registrar’s office, he heard voices raised in anger. “What’s going on?” he asked the fellow in front of him.

“I don’t know,” the youth said. “They’re only letting in one at a time, and people aren’t coming out this way.” He shrugged. “We’ll find out pretty soon, I guess.”

“Something’s going on.” Sidroc spoke with authority. “This isn’t how they did things last semester, and that means they’re up to something. I wonder what.” His nose quivered, as if he were one of the dogs some rich nobles trained to hunt truffles and other extra-fancy mushrooms.

Ealstan wouldn’t have figured that out so quickly, but saw at once that his cousin was likely to be right. Sidroc had a gift for spotting the underhanded. Ealstan preferred not to wonder what else that said about him.

“It’s an outrage, I tell you,” the youth in the registrar’s office shouted. Ealstan leaned forward, trying to hear what kind of reply the scholar got. Whatever it was, it was too soft for him to make out. He slammed a fist into the side of his thigh in frustration.

Before long, the fellow in front of him in the queue went inside. Now Ealstan could hear whatever happened. But nothing happened. The scholar got his list of classes and didn’t say a word about it. “Next!” the registrar called.

Ealstan was in front of Sidroc, so he went in. The registrar looked up at him over a pair of half glasses. Having gone through this twice a year for a good many years, Ealstan knew what was expected of him. “Master, I am Ealstan son of Hestan,” he said. He didn’t think anyone at the school shared his name, but ritual required that he give his father’s name, too, and sticking to ritual was as important in registration as in sorcery. The registrar thought so, anyhow, and his was the only opinion that counted.

“Ealstan son of Hestan,” he repeated, as if he’d never heard the name before. But his fingers belied that; they sorted through piles of paper with amazing speed and sureness. The registrar plucked out the couple of sheets that had to do with Ealstan. Glancing at one, he said, “Your fees were paid in full at the beginning of the year.”

“Aye, Master,” Ealstan answered with quiet pride. In spite of everything, his father did better than most in Gromheort.

“Here are your courses, then.” The registrar thrust the other sheet of paper at Ealstan. Did he wince as he did so? For a moment, Ealstan thought he was imagining things. Then he remembered the shouts and arguments he’d heard. Maybe he wasn’t.

He looked at the list. The Algarvian language, history of Algarve, something called nature of Kaunianity … “What’s this?” he asked, pointing to it.

“New requirement,” the registrar said, which was less informative than Ealstan would have liked. By the set of the man’s chin, though, it was all he intended to say on the subject.

With a mental shrug, Ealstan glanced down the rest of the list: Forthwegian language and grammar, Forthwegian literature, and choral singing. “Where’s the rest of it?” he asked. “Where’s the stonelore? Where’s the ciphering?”

“Those courses arc no longer being offered,” the registrar said, and braced himself, as if for a blow.

“What?” Ealstan stared. “Why not? What’s the point of school, if not to learn things?” He sounded very much like his father, though he didn’t fully realize it.

By the look on the registrar’s face, he didn’t want to answer. But he did, and in a way that relieved him of all responsibility: “Those courses are no longer offered, by order of the occupying authorities.”

“They can’t do that!” Ealstan exclaimed.

“They can. They have,” the registrar said. “The headmaster has protested, but he can do no more than protest. And you, young sir, can do no more than go out that door yonder so I can deal with the next scholar in line.”

Ealstan could have done more. He could have pitched a fit, as several of his schoolmates had done before him. But he was too shocked. Numbly, he went out through the door at which the registrar had jerked his thumb. He stood in the hallway, staring down at the class list in his hand. He wondered what his father would say on seeing it. Something colorful and memorable, he had no doubt.

Sidroc came through the door less than a minute later. Smiles wreathed his face. “By the powers above, it’s going to be a pretty good semester,” he said. “Only hard course they’ve stuck me with is Algarvian.”

“Let’s see your list,” Ealstan said. His cousin handed him the paper. His eyes flicked down it. “It’s the same as mine, all right.”

“Isn’t it fine?” Sidroc looked about to dance for joy. “For once in my life, I won’t feel like my brains are trying to dribble out my ears when I do the work.”

“We
should
be taking the harder courses, though,” Ealstan said. “You know why we’re not, don’t you?” Sidroc shook his head. Ealstan muttered something his cousin fortunately did not hear. Aloud, he went on, “We’re not taking them because the redheads won’t let us take them, that’s why.”

“Huh?” Sidroc scratched his head. “Why should the Algarvians care whether we take stonelore or not?
I
care, on account of I know how hard it is, but what difference does it make to the Algarvians?”

“Have I told you lately you’re a blockhead?” Ealstan asked. Sidroc wasn’t, not in all ways, but he’d missed the boat here. Before he could get angry, Ealstan went on, “They want us to be stupid. They want us to be ignorant. They want us not to know things. You don’t see Forthwegian history on this list, do you? If we don’t know about the days of King Felgild, when Forthweg was the greatest kingdom in Derlavai, how can we want them to come back?”

“I don’t care. I don’t much care, either,” Sidroc said. “All I know is, I’m not going to be measuring triangles this semester, either, and I’m cursed glad of it.”

“But don’t you see?” Ealstan said, rather desperately. “If the Algarvians don’t let us learn anything, by the time our children grow up Forthwegians won’t be anything but peasants grubbing in the dirt.”

“I need to find a woman before I have children,” Sidroc said. “As a matter of fact, I’d like to find a woman whether I have children or not.” He glanced over at Ealstan. “And don’t tell me you wouldn’t. That blond wench in mushroom season—”

“Oh, shut up,” Ealstan said fiercely. He might not have sounded so fierce had he found Vanai unattractive. He had no idea what she thought of him, or even if she thought of him. All they’d talked about were mushrooms and the Algarvians’ multifarious iniquities.

Sidroc laughed at him, which made things worse. Then his cousin said, “If you’re going to cast books like Uncle Hestan, I can see why you might want more ciphering lessons, I suppose, but what do you care about stonelore any which way? It’s not like you’re going to be a mage.”

“My father always says the more you know, the more choices you have,” Ealstan answered. “I’d say the Algarvians think he’s right, wouldn’t you? Except with them, it’s the other way round—they don’t want us to have any choices, and so they don’t want us to know anything, either.”

“My father always says it’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” Sidroc said, which did indeed sound like Uncle Hengist. “As long as we can make connections, we’ll get on all right.”

That had more than a little truth in it. Ealstan’s father had used his connections to make sure no one looked too closely at where Leofsig had been before he came back to Gromheort. In the short run, and for relatively small things, connections were indeed splendid. For setting the course of one’s entire life? Ealstan didn’t think so.

He started to say as much, then shook his head instead. He couldn’t prove he was right. He wondered if he could even make a good case. Whether he did or not, Sidroc would laugh at him. He was sure of that.

Even though Ealstan kept his mouth shut, Sidroc started laughing anyhow, laughing and pointing at Ealstan. “What’s so cursed funny?” Ealstan demanded.

“I’ll tell you what’s so cursed funny,” his cousin replied. “If you can’t get the courses your father thinks you ought to have here at school, what’s he going to do? I’ll tell you what: he’ll make you study those things on your own. That’s what’s funny, by the powers above. Haw, haw, haw!”

“Oh, shut up,” Ealstan said again, suddenly and horribly certain Sidroc was right.

Nineteen

K
ING SHAZLI beamed at Hajjaj. “We shall have vengeance!” he exclaimed. “King Swemmel, may demons tear out his entrails and dance with them, will wail and gnash his teeth when he thinks of the day he sent his armies over the border into Zuwayza.”

“Even so, your Majesty,” Hajjaj replied, inclining his head to the young king. “But the Unkerlanters are suspicious of us; Swemmel, being a treacherous sort himself, sees treachery all around him. As I have reported to you, my conversations with the Algarvian minister have not gone unnoticed.”

By Shazli’s expression, he started to make some flip comment in response to that. He checked himself, though, at which Hajjaj nodded somber approval. Shazli
could
think, even if he remained too young to do it all the time. “Do you doubt the wisdom of our course, then?”

“I doubt the wisdom of all courses,” the foreign minister said. “I serve you best by doubting, and by admitting that I doubt.”