Tis slumped back. “No Baby. They would be too afraid she’d bolt. Ideal, I’d probably bolt with her.”
“You can’t give up, Doc.” He laid a tentative, comforting hand on her shoulder.
“I should have agreed to Jay’s scheme,” she said, and her expression was as bleak as the landscape.
The hours had passed in surprising comfort. Food was certainly not a problem, and Jay hadn’t even had to sleep on the floor. This glass cat house came equipped with everything. It was an easy guess what the secluded little rooms containing only beds were for, but Jay didn’t think his performance would be too hot. He’d be too aware of those transparent walls. Further snooping revealed game rooms with decks of cards and score pads at the ready. There were board games of indeterminate goals. Holographic video games. A nursery filled with cribs and toys for children.
A long ramp led deep into the polar ice, and to a great room carved entirely out of that same ice. There was a skating rink. And a track. Jay wondered what ran on it. Then he found the stalls, and he and some critter that looked like a cross between a giraffe, an impala, and a horse scared the bejesus out of each other. As he stumbled back, the detective wondered what kind of people would pack up food for seventy thousand, their kids, and their animals, and take an evening stroll to the pole? The closest analogy he could think of was the Super Bowl.
For the Takisians, though, the big event wasn’t sport, it was dance. The central focus of the great building was the ballroom. The floor was black, and twinkling in its depths were thousands of tiny lights. As he stared at them, Jay realized they seemed to form a stellar map. Spiraling out of the floor like coiling smoke were crystal pillars – clear, amethyst, blue, topaz – frozen jewels or flowers, Jay couldn’t decide which.
On a high podium rested the orchestra’s instruments. Jay walked up the stairs and softly touched the strings of a harp. The single note shivered in the air. Jay thrust his hands behind his back and, though he was not a fanciful man, felt as if he’d stumbled into a fairy tale. It was eerie. The instruments laid aside as if the orchestra had only paused for a break, the plates and cups arranged and waiting on the buffet, the food steaming softly, and there was not a soul in the place.
“Just one lost little soul,” Jay said aloud.
Suddenly the silence was broken by a loud boom. Jay knew that sound. Something large and very fast had hit the speed of sound. The party was about to begin. He flexed his right forefinger several times like a man checking the action of his pistol and went in search of a hiding place.
“Killed them all.” Gabru, Raiyis of House Ss’ang, sighed. He shook his harlequin head. Each contrasting strand of hair had been separated from the rest, lacquered, and swept up, until they resembled knife blades thrusting out from the skull.
“There are only a handful of women left from the entire House,” Ruek, Raiyis of House Alaa, said.
“A tragic loss,” offered Hazzal, ruler of House Jeban. “Rodaleh had a very powerful strain of psi healers. We’re going to see a lot more insanity with the loss of this gift.”
“All the insanity we could ever imagine has arrived and is dancing,” grunted Gabru. All the men turned to watch Blaise.
Zabb didn’t offer an opinion or a comment on the topic under discussion. Instead he just watched that tall black-clad figure and calculated. Sooner or later he would face this young man in combat, and he would glean what he could of Blaise’s psychology in the thirteen hours available to him.
The bounce/cast hadn’t fully captured the sheer size of the half-breed. Zabb was accounted a giant among the Takisians. He was dwarfed by Blaise. It made him uncomfortable. He had a sudden vision of Tisianne naked and tiny beneath the brute force of that massive body. Stomach acid climbed up his throat.
“Every Rodaleh Tarhiji soldier who participated in this outrage will have to be killed,” grunted Zujj, the military commander of House Alaa.
“I don’t think terror is our most effective weapon right now,” Zabb said softly. “We’ll only play into the Abomination’s hands.”
“We have to do something?” Quar’ande, military commander of Ss’ang, said.
Taj arrived with Yimkin, the Raiyis of House Tandeh.
“Agreed,” Zabb said. “So what say we repair to a more private venue and discuss what that something should be?”
Zabb dropped back and fell into step with Taj. Softly he asked, “Zaghloul?”
Taj shook his head. “Khuechen brant Chuea is eagerly spreading jam with what he perceives as the winning side.”
“Mongrel,” snapped the Raiyis.
At the door to the gaming room Taj checked and looked up at Zabb. “Is it wise to leave Tisianne alone?”
“She’ll do well enough. She has her groundling Paladin.”
You remember how I told you I was going to give you another one just as soon as this one is born?” Blaise rubbed her belly like a man with a Ho Tai good-luck figure. Tis searched the crowd desperately for Mark, or Taj, or, ancestors help her, even Zabb. They were not in evidence. Tisianne ran through a desperate litany of her sisters’ names. They failed to appear.
Someone rescue me!
Rescue yourself! another part of her snapped back.
But she couldn’t. She’d lost the knack for coherent speech.
Blaise leaned in, hands propped on the arms of the chair, pinning her in place. “Well, I’m going to. They’re all flocking to me. They saw what happened to Rodaleh. They don’t want to be next. I’m coming for you, Granddad, closer every day.”
Fear has a taste, sharp and sour on the tongue. It’s a driving pain deep in the gut. Steel fingers on the throat. The ballroom was lit only by the double moons, and the pattern of tiny lights in the floor. Cold, corpse light that deepened the hollows in Blaise’s face, giving him a gargoyle’s look. The sound of the revelers and the music of the orchestra faded to distant hummings. The only sound seemed to be her own harsh breaths.
“But you haven’t formally met Kelly.” Blaise straightened just before she screamed. He gestured, and out of the crowd he came.
All night Tisianne had avoided this, playing a little game with herself. Not looking for her body. Trying not to go mad from the wanting. Now it was coming, jerking forward with a marionette’s stiff gait. Mind controlled!… Just to show me he can do it.
Her body did not look well. Shadows beneath the lavender eyes. Skin a little too white, a little too pasty. A thin sheen of sweat on the upper lip. And a developing paunch. She wanted to beat the girl for so abusing her dwelling place. Then she correctly interpreted Kelly’s expression as he gazed at her body, now eight months pregnant.
Neither one of us has done such a good job as renters, thought Tis.
“Kelly Jenkins, meet my granddad.” The manic grin deepened. “Meet your baby. No, our baby. Don’t you love these family gatherings?”
she/lovesonly/you, doesn’tknow/me/at/all.
The communication of the slaves, conducted beneath the twitching nose of the overseer. Kelly and Tis stared at each other. Their telepathy blended, coalesced; linked as one mind, they explored the mind of their child. And all the bitterness melted away.
Illyana, meet your mother, sent Tisianne.
Total confusion from the baby.
Indulgent chuckles from the parents.
“Hey, bug out, man!” Mark’s sharp tones jerked Tis from her mind dance.
Tis recognized Zabb’s quick step approaching from behind her. Zabb’s gaze coolly raked Blaise from the top of his head to the soles of his feet and back again.