After the Downfall

Hasso inclined his head. “I thank you,” he said in Bucovinan, thinking, I’d rather go to bed with you. Not for the first time, he wondered how smart – no, how dumb – he was. His goddess-filled lover had just tried to do him in twice, so now he wanted to sleep with a priestess instead. Maybe he ought to have his head examined to see if it held any working parts.

Drepteaza nodded absently. “I do this more for us than for you,” she said. “Whatever you know, the Lenelli don’t want you showing it to us. That seems plain enough, doesn’t it?”

“I suppose so.” Hasso figured that was part of it, too. But he would have bet marks against mud pies that Velona’s rage weighed more in the scales.

“But, of course, you don’t want to show it to us, either, whatever it is,” Drepteaza said. “You have sworn an oath to the people who want to kill you, and it counts for more than anything else.”

That was irony honed to a point sharp enough to slip between the ribs, pierce the heart, and leave behind hardly a drop of blood. Hasso’s ears heated. “I try to be loyal,” he said.

“Loyalty is a wonderful thing. It is also a road people travel in both directions – or it should be,” Drepteaza said. “If you are loyal and your lord is not…”

What had Bottero promised when Hasso swore homage to him? He’d vowed he would do nothing that made him not deserve it. Had he kept his half of the oath? When you got right down to it, no.

He’s forsworn, all right. I can do whatever I want, and do it with a clear conscience.

The thought made Hasso no happier. He didn’t want to take service with the Grenye, to pledge allegiance to Lord Zgomot of Bucovin. It reminded him too much of Wehrmacht men joining the Red Army and going to war against their old comrades. Some few had done it, he knew. And great swarms of Russians fought for the swastika and against the hammer and sickle.

Yes, they did. And Hasso knew what he thought of them. “You can use a turncoat,” he said miserably. “You can use him, but you can never like him or trust him or respect him.”

“You do have honor.” Drepteaza sounded surprised when she said it. Somehow, that seemed the most unkindest cut of all. After a moment, she went on, “Tell me this, Hasso Pemsel: do the Lenelli like you or trust you or respect you?”

“They … did.” Hasso made himself pause and use the past tense. The present wasn’t true, however much he wished it were.

“They did, yes, when you were useful to them. Then they threw you away like a bone with the meat gnawed off it,” Drepteaza said. “So why hold back now? Don’t you want your revenge? Don’t you deserve it?”

Hasso didn’t answer right away. He had to look inside himself to find where the truth lay. When he did, it only made him even more uneasy, and here he hadn’t thought he could be. Joining Bucovin, joining the Grenye, wasn’t like going over to the Slavic Untermenschen. No, it was worse than that. Every time he looked at them, he thought of Jews, a whole great country full of grasping, swarthy Jews.

And he slept with Leneshul. And he wanted to sleep with Drepteaza. But that was his sport. Helping this folk against the Aryan-seeming warriors from across the sea…

“I don’t know,” he whispered. “I just don’t know.”

“Well, you had better make up your mind, Hasso Pemsel.” Drepteaza didn’t know what was bothering him. He didn’t think he could explain it, either, not so it made sense to her. “You’d better make up your mind,” she repeated. “And you’d better hurry up about it, too. You don’t have much time left.” And away she went, taking with her the captor’s privilege of the last word.

Somebody pounded on Hasso’s door, much too early in the morning. Next to the Wehrmacht officer, Leneshul groaned. “Who’s that?” she muttered. “Why doesn’t he go away?”

“Shall I find out?” Hasso asked. Leneshul only shrugged and pulled the blankets over her head, not that that did any good against the racket. Whoever was out there was bound and determined to come in.

Yawning and cursing in German, Hasso pulled on his trousers and walked to the door. He threw it open, then stopped in surprise. That wasn’t a dark little Bucovinan out there, but a blond taller than himself. And, he realized a heartbeat later, someone he knew, too.

“Sca

“I could ask you the same question, buddy,” the Lenello from Drammen answered. “They wanted me to come here and talk some sense into your pointed head, that’s why I’m here. Nechemat’s cursed glad to get away from all the Lenelli, too.”

Nechemat, Hasso gathered, was Sca

“On the outside, sure.” Sca

“They tell you everything?” Hasso asked. “Back in Drammen, they tell you everything?”

“All kinds of crap goes on under Bottero’s big, pointy beak,” said Sca

“I suppose so.” Hasso hadn’t had time to do a really good job of training the Lenelli in security and counterespionage. If the likes of Sca

Sca

He said that even as the same thought formed in Hasso’s mind. If Sca

“But anyway, Bottero’s not happy right now. I don’t need to eat his duck and drink his sugarwine to know that,” Sca

“No, it didn’t,” Hasso agreed. “So why do you throw in with the Grenye and not your own folk?”

“I like ‘em better,” Sca

Sca

But that question had another answer, one it wouldn’t have had in Hasso’s old world. Sca