"We cursed well did," Sidroc said. "We might even be worse off, you know? Would you rather we were off in the west, and King Swemmel's Unkerlanters came stomping through Gromheort? If I had to chose between them and the Algarvians-"

"If I could make a choice, I'd choose to have all of them go far, far away." Ealstan sighed. "But magic doesn't work that way. I wish it did."

They got to the school just as the warning bell clanged, and then ran like madmen to their first class. In spite of his lethargy, Sidroc didn't want to have his back striped after all. "Why couldn't the Algarvians have dropped an egg here?" he muttered fretfully as he flung his bottom on to his stool.

But the master of classical Kaunian was not in the chamber to note - and to punish - his tardiness and Ealstan's. After a heartfelt sigh of relief, Ealstan turned to the scholar next to him and whispered, "Did Master Bede have to visit the jakes?"

"Don't think so," the other youth answered. "I haven't seen him at all this morning. Maybe the Algarvians have him grubbing stones."

"He'd be on the other end of the switch if they do," Ealstan said.

Seeing the Kaunian woman molested had bothered him. He could contemplate the master's being put to hard labor without batting an eye.

A man strode into the classroom. He was a Forthwegian, but he was not Master Bede, even if he did carry a switch in his left hand. "I am Master Agmund," he announced. "From this day forth, by order of the occupying authorities, all studies in classical Kaunian are suspended, the langauge being iudged useless both because of its antiquated, outmoded nature and because folk of Kaunian blood have wickedly attempted to destroy the Kingdom of Algarve."

He spoke as if reading from a script. Ealstan gaped. Master Bede and earlier masters of Kaunian had drilled into him - often painfully - that anyone in eastern Derlavai with the slightest claim to culture had to be fluent in the language, regardless of his own blood. Had they been lying?

Or did Algarve have its own purposes here?

Agmund answered that in a hurry, saying, "Instead, you shall be instructed in Algarvian, in which subject I am your new master. Attend me."

One of Ealstan's classmates, a youth named Odda, thrust his hand in the air. When Agmund recognized him, he said, "Master, can we not learn Algarvian from the soldiers in the city? Why, already I can say 'How much for your sister?'Just from having heard them say it so much."

A vast silence fell on the classroom. Ealstan stared, admiring Odda's defiant bravado. Master Agmund's stare was of a different sort. He advanced on Odda and gave him the fiercest thrashing Ealstan had ever seen. Agmund said, "My clever little friend, if you were half as funny as you think you are, you would be twice as funny as you really are."

When the beating was over, the lessons began. Agmund proved himself a capable enough master, and was plainly fluent in Algarvian. Ealstan repeated the words and phrases the master set him. He had no desire to learn Algarvian, but he had no desire to be whipped, either.

He and Sidroc took turns telling the story around the supper table that evening. "The boy did a brave thing," Sidroc's father said.

"He certainly did, Uncle Hengist," Ealstan agreed.

"Brave, aye," his father said. Hestan looked from Ealstan to Sidroc to Hengist. "Brave, but foolish. The lad suffered for it, as you and your cousin said, and his suffering is not over yet, either, unless I miss my guess.

And his fanuily's suffering will barely have begun."

Hengist grunted, as if Hestan had hit him in the belly. "You are likely to be right," he said. "Of course this new master is an Algarvian lapdog.

What he hears, the redheads win hear." He pointed to Sidroc. "We have suffered enough already. Whatever you think of this new language master, keep it locked in your head. Never let him suspect it, or we WA all pay."

"I don't mind him so much," Sidroc said with a shrug. "And Alga looks to be a lot easier than classical Kaunian ever was."

That wasn't what Hengist had meant. Ealstan understood as much, even if Sidroc didn't. Understanding such things went with being occupied, too. If Sidroc didn't figure them out pretty soon, he would be sorry, and so would everyone around him.

Ealstan's mother understood. "Take care, all of you," Elfryth said, and that was also good advice.

The next morning, Odda was not in the Algarvian class. He was not in any of his classes that day. He did not return to school the next day, either. Ealstan and Sidroc never saw him again. Ealstan understood the lesson. He hoped his cousin did, too.

King Shazli nibbled at a cake rich with raisins and pistachios. He licked his fingers clean, then glanced at Hajaj from lowered eyelids. "It would seem King Swemmel did not purpose attacking us after all," he said.

When his sovereign decided to talk business, Hajaj could with propriety do the same, even if his cake lay on the tray before him only half eaten. "Say rather, your Majesty, that King Swemmel did not yet purpose attacking us," he replied.

"You say this even after Unkerlant and Algarve have split Forthweg between them, as a man will tear a peeled tangerine in half that he might share it with his friend?"

"Your Majesty, I do," the foreign minister said. "If King Swemmel intended to leave Zuwayza alone, we would not see these continual proddings along the border. Nor would we see his envoy in Bishah lyingly denying that any fault attaches to Unkerlant. When Swemmel is ready, he will do what he will do."

Shazli started to reach for his teacup. At the last moment, his hand swerved and seized the goblet that held wine. After drinking, he said, "I confess I am not sorry that King Penda chose to flee south instead of coming here." Hajaj drank wine, too. Thinking of the King of Forthweg as an exile in Bishah was enough to make any Zuwayzi turn to wine, or perhaps to hashish. "We could not very well have turned him away, your Majesty, not if we cared to hold our heads up afterwards," he said, and then, before Shazli could speak, he went on, "We could not very well have kept him here, not if we cared to hold our heads on our shoulders."

"You speak nothing but the truth there." Shazli gulped the goblet dry.

"Well, now he is Yanina's worry. I tell you frankly, I am more glad than I can say that King Tsavellas has to explain to [..Mant..] how Penda came to go into exile in Patras. Better him than me. Better Yanina than Zuwayza, too."

"Indeed." Hajaj tried to make his long, thin, IMI ly face look wide and dour, as if he were an Unkerlanter. "First, King Swemmel will demand that Tsavellas turn King Penda over to him. When Tsavellas tells him no, he'll start massing troops on the border [..vioh..] Yanina. After that" - the Zuwayzi foreign minister shrugged - "he'll - probably invade."

"If I were Tsavellas, I'd put Penda on a ship of a dragon bound for Sibiu or Valmiera or Lagoas," Shazli said. "I might forgive him for harboring Penda just long enough to palm 11im off on someone else."

"Your Majesty, King Swemmel never forgives Aiyone for anything," Hajaj said. "He proved that after the Twinkings Vlar - and those were his own countrymen."

King Shazli grunted. "There, I judge, you speak nothing but the truth.

Everything he has done since seating himself [..ITIMPOly..] on the throne of Unkerlant goes toward confirming it." He [..i*T91M..] for his wine goblet again, so abruptly that a couple of his gold [..iisoll-ts..] clashed together.

Discovering the goblet was empty, he called for servant. A woman came in with a jar and refilled the goblet. "Ali, Rkank you, my dear," Shazli said. He watched her sway out of the [...-mmMinber..], then turned his attention back to Hajaj: Zuwayzin saw too much flesh to let it unduly stir them. "If, as you seem to think, we are next on Swemmel's list, what can we do to forestall him?"