"Ha! I'm not afraid of her," Flegrei declared.
"Well, if that doesn't prove you're a blockhead, I don't know what would," Aderno said. By the way the rest of the wizards stepped back from Flegrei, they agreed with Aderno. That was one more sign of the power of the woman Hasso had taken up with — or rather, the woman who'd taken up with him.
As for his own power… Security minister wasn't bad. De facto General Staff officer wasn't bad, either. And showing up a bunch of haughty wizards, and making money while he did it, was a hell of a lot better than not bad.
Coming back to Castle Svarag wasn't quite like coming home for Hasso. He wondered if he would ever feel at home anywhere here. He doubted it. Giving up the sense of home was the emigre's curse. But he'd spent some time at Mertois' castle, and he'd got to know a good many of the castellan's soldiers. He felt less not at home here than he did most other places in this world. The convoluted thought made one corner of his mouth quirk up in ironic amusement.
"Good to see you, little man. Good to see you," Sholseth boomed. The clout on the back he gave Hasso almost knocked him over. "I hear you and Orosei couldn't take each other out."
"After a while, we stop trying," Hasso answered. "We decide, why bother? One of us could get hurt bad."
Sholseth nodded. "Makes sense. I tell you, I felt better when I heard Orosei didn't beat you. He's as good as we've got. I know I can't take him, even though I'm bigger. So if you're as good as he is, no wonder you knocked me for a loop."
"Maybe I'm just lucky," Hasso said.
"Nah." Sholseth shook his head. "You're good. When you threw me over your shoulder, I thought, What the demon am I getting into? Then I went wham, and I pretty much stopped thinking after that." He thumped Hasso again, still good-naturedly. He seemed to take a perverse pride in being the first Lenello to discover what a formidable fellow this foreigner could be.
Hasso was glad enough to drink and talk with his old acquaintances. But he also found he had serious business at Castle Svarag. Mertois was keeping close to a dozen Grenye who'd got caught slipping east toward Bucovin in his dungeon. Hasso had them brought out one at a time. "If you lie to me, you be sorry," he told the first one, a stocky man named Magar. He nodded to Aderno. "And the wizard, he knows if you lie."
"I didn't do anything," Magar said stolidly.
"No one ever does anything," Hasso answered with a weary sigh. "Everyone is always so innocent, it makes you cry. Why you run off to Bucovin?"
"I wasn't going to Bucovin," Magar said. "I had a fight with my woman. I was going away when these Lenelli on horseback grabbed me and hauled me back here."
"Well?" Hasso asked Aderno.
The wizard used the little truth spell Hasso had seen before. Then he frowned. "I'm not sure. It doesn't say yes or no." His head came up and his nostrils twitched; he might have been a hunting hound taking a scent. "This reminds me of how that goddess-cursed Scanno masked his taste for Grenye-loving."
"Does it?" Hasso eyed Magar. "Where do we go now?"
"Where else? The torturers. They'll pull the truth out of him," Aderno answered.
Magar let out a horrified yowl. "I didn't do anything!" he wailed when he found words. "Don't hurt me! I didn't do anything!"
Aderno waited to see what Hasso did next. If Hasso didn't go along, the wizard would suspect him of liking the Grenye too well. But that wasn't what decided him. Bucovin was the enemy. If Magar worked for the Grenye there, he would know useful things, things King Bottero needed to find out. "Yes, we give him to them," Hasso said. Magar howled again. Ignoring him, Hasso went on, "They need to go after truth, not to hurt for the fun of hurting. They know the difference?"
"They know," Aderno assured him. He couldn't help adding, "I wasn't sure you did."
"Oh, yes," Hasso said. Like any army, the Wehrmacht squeezed enemy prisoners when it had to. So did the Waffen-SS, often more enthusiastically. "Sometimes prisoners say anything just to stop hurting," he warned. "Have to be careful, keep him away from others, weigh what he says, what they say." He used his hands as a set of scales coming into balance.
"Yes." Aderno nodded. "You do know something about this business. I wondered how soft you were."
"Because sometimes I think you are a jackass, that makes me soft?" Hasso asked. Aderno blinked. Hasso went on, "I know sometimes you think I am a jackass, too. I do not think that makes you soft." He jerked a thumb at Magar. "Have them work on him where the ones we question can hear him yell. When they hear that, they want to tell us everything we need to know, yes?"
Magar quailed from the wizard's smile. Hasso didn't blame him; he would have quailed, too, were those teeth and that twist of lip aimed his way. "A good thought, outlander. Yes, a very good thought."
Sure enough, the Grenye's shrieks pierced the interrogation chamber like so many spearthrusts. The other little dark men quivered whenever a new one rang out. Hasso let a couple of them go free after Aderno's magic showed they really were hunting or fishing when the Lenelli scooped them up. "If you are not King Bottero's enemy, I am not your enemy," he told them. "But if you are the king's enemy, my job is to make you sorry. I do — I will do — my job."
The ones he turned loose blubbered their thanks. Some of the ones he didn't turn loose went on claiming they had nothing to do with anything. Aderno's spell didn't always prove they were lying. It didn't exonerate them, either. It did… nothing. The ambiguity, the blankness, were plenty to make Hasso and Aderno suspicious. Those Grenye went to the torturer, too.
One peasant sang like a goldfinch. His name was Lupul, and he admitted everything as soon as he heard another Grenye yell in torment. Hasso could almost watch his ballocks crawl up into his belly. "Yes, I wanted to tell Bucovin what you were doing," he gabbled. "Why not? My people rule Bucovin. You blond robbers don't."
"We will," Aderno said. He turned to Hasso. "Now what do we do with him?"
"He should have a quick end, anyway," Hasso said. "Give him to the headsman." Lupul wailed. Hasso felt like wailing himself, though he didn't show it. If the Grenye were still clan against clan, tribe against tribe, beating them in detail would be easier. If they saw the struggle as all of them against the Lenelli… well, it sure didn't help.
VII
King Bottero didn't invade Bucovin along the causeway road through the swamp. He sent soldiers along it, but only to hold it against any counterthrusts from the Grenye to the east.
"Once we drive the savages back, we can send supplies and reinforcements up the causeway," he said.
Hasso nodded along with Bottero's marshals. The men of Bucovin could have blocked an advance along the causeway for a long time with only a handful of men. Hasso was relieved that the Lenelli could see as much for themselves. He didn't like having to point out their stupidities and blindnesses to them. Some of it was necessary — hell, a lot of it was necessary — but he recognized the difference between gadfly and pain in the ass.
He felt Orosei's ironic eye on him. The master-at-arms was no marshal, but Bottero would have had a mutiny on his hands if he tried to keep him in the dark. Did Orosei know what Hasso was thinking? It looked that way to the Wehrmacht officer.
Some of the lighter boats could go out into the marsh, at least partway. The rest unloaded their supplies, which went into more wagons. That made the army slower and more unwieldy than it had been, but Hasso didn't know what anybody could do about it. You needed things to fight, and you needed to haul them to where you fought.
His horse's hooves drummed on the planks of a bridge that took him over the Drammion to the south bank. Grenye farmers looked up from their fields to stare at the Lenelli riding by. In their dull homespun, the peasants seemed hardly more than domestic animals themselves. Looks could deceive, though — and probably did.