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"Cornelu?" Fernao exclaimed- the name got his notice. "Oh, that poor bugger!"

"You knew him?" Now Ilmarinen sounded surprised.

"Not well, but aye, I knew him," Fernao answered. "He was the leviathan-rider who pulled King Penda of Forthweg and me out of Mizpah, down in the land of the Ice People, when it was on the point of falling to the Yaninans."

"Ah." Ilmarinen nodded. "I suspect that, if we knew more of these webs of casual acquaintance, we could do more with the law of contagion than we've managed up till now. If I had to guess, I'd say that would be for the generation of mages after you."

"It could be." Fernao eyed Ilmarinen with admiration no less genuine for being reluctant. No one could ever say Ilmarinen thought small. In a couple of sentences, he'd proposed a program of research that might well keep a whole generation of mages busy.

Before Fernao could say anything else, Pekka strode into the refectory and spoke in ringing tones: "My fellow mages, we are leaving for the blockhouse in a quarter of an hour. You will be ready." The Kuusaman verb had a form that expressed absolute certainty; Pekka used it then.

And Fernao was ready in a quarter of an hour- done with his breakfast and decked in furs a man of the Ice People wouldn't have disdained. As he dressed, he wondered whether Ilmarinen, who'd lingered in the dining hall, could possibly get to the front door of the hostel within the appointed time. But he found Ilmarinen there before him. The master mage gave a superior smirk, as if to say he knew he'd put one over on Fernao.

Everyone was there: all the theoretical sorcerers who would conduct the next experiment that sprang from the unity at the heart of the Two Laws, the secondary sorcerers who would project their spell to the animals, the sorcerers who would keep the animals from freezing till the spell went forth, and the contingent of mages who would do their best to protect the theoretical sorcerers against any onslaught from Algarve.

Pekka didn't look pleased to find everyone ready on time. She looked as if that were nothing less than her due. Maybe that was what leading meant. "And off we go," she said. "The weather is very fine today."

She came from Kajaani, of course, on the southern coast of Kuusamo. That meant her standards differed from Fernao's. As far as he was concerned, it was bloody cold outside. But several of the other Kuusamans nodded, so he supposed he was the odd man out here.

Odd man out or not, he was glad to snuggle under more furs in a sleigh. He was also glad to snuggle under them beside Pekka. Snuggle down beside her was all he did. Without a word, without a gesture, she'd made it plain that anything else would cost them the friendship they'd built up since he came to Kuusamo. He didn't think that was because she wasn't interested in him. On the contrary- he thought she was, and sternly wouldn't let herself be.