After the Downfall (12 page)

Where he fit himself was an interesting question. He was a captain of sorts, but only of sorts. Velona’s favor helped. Surviving against Orosei - who, like a lot of very senior noncoms, had more clout than most captains - helped more. Whatever he was, he wasn’t just someone who’d fallen off the turnip wagon. Nornat led another charge. After his line of lancers shredded some more bales of straw, he guided his dappled gray up to Hasso. Mail jingled on his shoulders. Sweat ran down his face from under his conical helm. The bar nasal on the helmet didn’t protect his face as well as the German would have liked. “What do you think, foreigner?” Nornat asked. By the pride in his voice, Hasso had better not think anything bad.

“Strong. Tough,” Hasso said. Nornat’s grin showed a couple of missing front teeth. A scar twisted his upper lip. No, a bar nasal didn’t cover everything.
We shredded Polish lancers,
went through Hasso’s mind.
You wouldn’t have lasted any longer.
But that didn’t matter here. Hasso cast his line: “Want to be more tougher?”

Nornat snapped like a trout. “How?”

“I show you,” Hasso said.

When Nornat saw that he meant it literally, he swung down from his mount. The animal lowered its head and started cropping grass. Nornat crouched by Hasso. The Lenello smelled of sweat and leather and iron and horse - all familiar military scents. Hasso made lines of pebbles and twigs. Then he made a column and aimed it at a line. “You charge, and - “ He stopped, waiting to see whether Nornat would get it.

And Nornat did. His eyes lit up. “We charge, and we smash right through, and we tear the guts out of whatever’s in our way!” He straightened up in a single smooth motion, which impressed the hell out of Hasso - that mailshirt wasn’t light. “Carsoli! Sanfrat! Come over here! You’ve got to take a look at this!”

he yelled.

Carsoli was a big man. Sanfrat was bigger, so big that only a brewery-wagon horse could haul him around. Hasso didn’t like feeling like a dink among the Lenelli, but he didn’t know what the devil he could do about it, either.

Nornat explained his idea at least as well as he could have himself - probably better, because Nornat was a working cavalry officer with a working cavalry officer’s appreciation of problems. “What do you think, boys?” he asked when he finished.

“I don’t know,” Carsoli said; by his tone, he didn’t like it but didn’t want to stick his neck out, either.

“Stinking Grenye won’t be looking for it - that’s for sure,” Sanfrat said. “Ought to win us a battle or two just from surprise.” He might be big - hell, he was enormous - but he wasn’t slow or stodgy.

“What did Marshal Lugo have to say? You were talking about it with him, weren’t you?” Nornat was quick on the uptake, too.

Hasso wished he could lie, but knew he’d get found out if he tried. “He does not like it. He says the old way to fight is good enough.”

Sanfrat snorted. “I’m surprised he ever lost his cherry. He would’ve said playing with himself was good enough.”

Nornat laughed. So did Hasso. He’d never known any soldiers who didn’t have pungent opinions about their superiors. Even the Ivans joked about their commissars after they got captured. Carsoli bared his teeth in a sort of a smile, but that was all. Hasso feared the marshal would hear about the gibe in nothing flat.

“How do we” - Hasso gestured - “get around the marshal?”

“Just talk to the king,” Nornat answered. “He’ll listen to you, or I think he will. I’ll talk to him, too, by the goddess. And you’re friends with Orosei, right?”

“Mm - maybe.” Hasso didn’t know if he would go that far. He and the master-at-arms had a strong mutual respect, the kind two tough men who knew each could maim the other tended to acquire. Whether that equaled friendship wasn’t so obvious.

“Well, try him,” the cavalry captain said. “He likes your throws. I was watching when the two of you tangled. I lost some money, because I thought he’d pound you into the ground. But he’s game for new things, so chances are he’d go for this column fighting. And I don’t care what his rank is - he has Bottero’s ear.”

Carsoli looked about ready to burst, like a man who needed to run for the jakes. Hasso caught Sanfrat’s eye, then flicked his gaze back to the dubious officer. Sanfrat got it without anything more than that. He didn’t even nod. He just smiled a little, crookedly.
Something
would keep Carsoli from blabbing to Lugo right away. Something immense and muscular and blond, most likely.

Hasso’s smile was as crooked as Sanfrat’s. He would have handled things the same way in the
Wehrmacht.
Yes, people were people, whether they carried Schmeissers or lances, rode horses or panzers.

Were the Grenye people, too? Hasso hadn’t worried about Jews in his own world; he didn’t worry much about the Grenye here. They were the enemy. What more did a soldier need to know about them?

Orosei lifted his mug of beer in salute to Hasso, who sat across the table from him in the buttery. Hasso had been using bits of stale bread and raisins to demonstrate his idea. “I like it,” Orosei told him. “You can stab right through the line that way. And once you do, the bastards on the other side won’t know what the demon to try next.”

“That is how I see it,” Hasso agreed. “Marshal Lugo does not think so, though.”

“Lugo doesn’t think, and that’s about the size of it.” The master-at-arms didn’t bother lowering his voice. If Lugo decided he was insulted, he would have to challenge. Here as in the
Reich,
the challenged party got to choose the weapons. Orosei was sudden death on two legs with any weapon or none. Lugo was brave enough and tough enough, but he wasn’t in the master-at-arms’ class. Orosei went on, “We can do this. It wouldn’t be hard. We really can - and we ought to.”

“We see things the same way, then,” Hasso said.

Orosei drained his mug and waved for a refill. A Grenye serving girl came over with a pitcher. “Thanks, sweetheart,” Orosei said, and swatted her on the backside. She squeaked, but she was smiling as she scurried away. Chuckling, Orosei went on, “Let’s both talk to his Majesty. Lugo’s a marshal, but he isn’t a god. The two of us can cancel him out.”

“I would love to,” Hasso said.

“You’re all right. By the goddess, you are,” the master-at-arms said. “I wasn’t sure Velona knew what she was doing till I got to know you, but she did. She usually does. You’ve got your head nailed down tight, bugger me if you don’t.” Hasso would have said Orosei had his head on straight, but it amounted to the same thing.

“I thank you,” the
Wehrmacht
officer answered. “You, too.”

“Well, I try,” Orosei said. “Some of the people in this castle don’t know enough to squat before they shit, if you know what I mean. But you aren’t like that. You’ve got your fancy weapon, but it doesn’t mean you don’t know how to fight.”

“I thank you,” Hasso said again. Praise from a soldier as capable as Orosei really meant something to him.

“I don’t waste time buttering people up,” Orosei said. “Life’s too short for that crap. So we’ll go to the king and see what he says, and then we’ll go from there.”

“What if he says no?” Hasso asked.

The master-at-arms shrugged. “Then it’s better luck next time, that’s all. What his Majesty says, goes. But the idea’s too good not to try it out. It isn’t like we’ve had much luck against Bucovin. Everybody knows how things keep going wrong there. Maybe this will make them go right instead. Here’s hoping.”

He raised his mug again.

In the hallway outside the buttery, a woman said, “No! No! No! No! No!” Her voice got higher and shriller every time she repeated it. Hasso didn’t wait to hear any more. He bounced to his feet and ran out to see what was going on. Orosei was right behind him.

Aderno was dragging a Grenye woman, a serving wench, along by the wrist. She didn’t want to come, but he was much bigger and much stronger. “By the goddess, wizard, can’t you find a willing woman?”

Orosei didn’t bother hiding his scorn.

“I don’t want her for that,” Aderno said.

“What, then?” Hasso demanded. Everything about the scene, from Aderno’s grip to the woman’s eyes, so wide with fear that you could see white all around the irises, looked like a prelude to rape.

“It was your idea,” Aderno answered. “I want to try that spell on her, the one that didn’t work on Scanno. If it doesn’t work on her, either, then Bucovin’s got claws in the palace. That’s something we need to know.”

Orosei relaxed. “Ah. All right. Makes sense.”

Hasso didn’t. “Can’t you use a different spell? A spell that doesn’t do what the one with Scanno would?”

“No.” The wizard shook his head. “I want everything to be the same except for the person I’m aiming at.”

A scientific sorcerer,
Hasso thought. “Can you cure the spell once you cast it?” he asked. He didn’t like the idea of slagging her face with boils and carbuncles and whatever else Aderno would conjure up.

“Maybe.” Aderno didn’t sound as if he cared, or as if he intended to try. “Any which way, I’ll learn something.”

“She do something to deserve something bad happen to her?” Hasso asked. The Grenye woman started shrieking and wailing again - now she knew something bad
would
happen.

“She walked by when I needed somebody. That’s all that matters,” Aderno replied.

“No. Let her go,” Hasso said.

“What? Are you out of your mind? I’d just have to go and catch another one.” The wizard might have been talking about rabbits.

“Let her go,” Hasso repeated. “Find a Grenye who does something bad. Find one who ... should have it happen.” He couldn’t come up with the word
deserve
in Lenello, but he got his meaning across.

“Listen, Hasso, take it easy. She’s only a Grenye,” Orosei said.

“In Bucovin, do they say, ‘He is only a Lenello’?” Hasso asked.

The master-at-arms bristled. So did Aderno. “They’d better not,” Orosei growled. “They’re only Grenye, sure, but they’re not that stupid.”

“Come on.” Aderno tugged at the woman. “We’ve already wasted too much time on this nonsense.”

Hasso realized he would have to hurt the wizard, maybe kill him, to make him stop. He hesitated before doing that. The way Orosei went along with Aderno made him hesitate more. They’d lived here all their lives. They knew how things were supposed to work. He hadn’t, and didn’t. With a disgusted noise, he turned away.

Aderno dragged the Grenye woman down the hall. As she went, she stretched out a hand to Hasso.

“You tried, lord. Thank you for trying. Nobody ever did before.” Then she was gone.

“Jesus!” Hasso kicked the wall as hard as he could. Pain shot up his leg. He hadn’t thought he could feel any worse, and didn’t like finding he was wrong.

“What are you throwing a fit for?” Honest puzzlement filled Orosei’s voice.

“Anybody’d think you were laying her or something. If you were, you should’ve said so. The wizard would’ve snagged somebody else. But if you were, you’d better light out for the tall timber starting yesterday, on account of the goddess won’t be very happy with you.”

“Not laying her,” Hasso said. The master-at-arms was right; Velona wouldn’t be happy with him if he were, and that was putting it mildly. “Just ... bad to take advantage of weak.”

“Why? What else are they there for?” No, Orosei didn’t get it. Would Hasso, had he come here flush with victory in 1940? He didn’t think so. Defeat was always so much more instructive than victory. Germany had learned a lot from World War I, France next to nothing. What would the
Reich
learn this time around?

Not to mess with the goddamn Russians, that’s what,
he thought.
Not messing with the USA looks
like a pretty good idea, too. And messing with both of them at once is really, really dumb.

“Things you do, sometimes they come back and - “ Hasso mimed biting. Orosei threw his hands in the air. “Oh, by the goddess! She’s only a Grenye. She’s not even a cute Grenye. I’m glad you’re not screwing her - I wouldn’t think much of your taste if you were. I mean, sure, pussy’s pussy, but you can do better than that. Demons! You have done better than that, way better.”

“You think Grenye don’t remember everything Lenelli do to them?” Hasso asked.

“Let ‘em remember. They can’t do anything about it. They’re - “

“Only Grenye,” Hasso finished for him. How many times had he heard that since finding himself here?

The Lenelli sure believed it. Did the Grenye? If they did, how come Bucovin stayed on its feet?

“That’s right. That’s all they’ll ever be.” Orosei thumped him on the back. “Come drink some more beer. You look like you could use it. You’re kind of green around the gills. You fit in so well here, sometimes I almost forget you’re a foreigner with funny notions. Every once in a while it comes out, though - no offense.”

A foreigner with funny notions.
Hasso found himself nodding. He was that, all right. Back in the
Reich,
he’d taken things for granted. Why not? They were what
he’d
grown up with. Here, unfairness struck him like a poke in the eye.

Or was it unfairness? What if the Grenye really were ... only Grenye? Then wasn’t it natural for the Lenelli to ride roughshod over them? Natural or not, it was what the Lenelli were doing. And, with his plan for a striking column of lancers, it was what he was helping them to do. He let Orosei steer him back to the buttery. A Grenye servant brought him more beer. The swarthy little curly-haired man stared at him out of eyes as big and wide and dark as a deer’s. How much of what went on out in the hallway had he heard? What kind of gossip would wildfire through the servants in Castle Drammen by this time tomorrow? How much trouble would Hasso land in because of it?

Off in the distance - but not nearly far enough off in the distance - a woman screamed, and went on screaming. Orosei pretended not to hear, the way someone who’d done a lot of interrogations might pretend not to hear a prisoner’s screams from the next room. Hasso tried pretending, too, but didn’t have much luck. Getting smashed let him forget about the noise - and, eventually, about everything else. When he woke up, he had no idea how he’d got to his own bed. Velona made a face at him. “Was she worth it?” the goddess on earth asked, a certain malicious glee in her voice. Things came back in a hurry in spite of Hasso’s headache. “I don’t touch her,” he said. “I don’t even know her name.”