“I can’t take Ilkazam without ships,” Blaise said. “And I’ve got to take Ilkazam because I’VE GOT TO GET HIM!”
Spittle struck Durg’s cheek. He prudently didn’t wipe it away. There was also nothing to say to this outburst. The Morakh tried a change of subject. “Tandeh and Ss’ang wish to open negotiations -”
“No. Smash them.”
“Why, my lord? They were not responsible for this debacle. And willing allies are far more useful than defeated enemies.”
Blaise pivoted slowly and stared unblinking down at Durg. “They have ships.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Enough to conquer Ilkazam?”
“Probably not.”
Blaise turned back to a contemplation of hell. “I’ve got to have a navy. Find me one.”
Durg bowed and withdrew.
Illyana’s howls had dropped to desperate and hoarse whimpers. During the long day Jay and Hastet’s companions had slowly fallen away as they sought and obtained refuge with the various farm families along the road. It was an option that Jay and Hastet’s paranoia made impossible to consider. So when night drew in, they selected an abandoned barn and settled for the night.
There were the remains of several summers’ hay in the loft beneath the steeply peaked roof, and some of the rustlings Jay attributed not to their movements, but to the activities of the prior tenants. He just hoped they were the Takisian equivalents of mice. Not rats or spiders or something creepy.
Illyana had thrust a pudgy fist against her mouth and was sucking hopelessly. Hastet looked down at her. “Tomorrow we’ve got to get help. She’s got to eat.”
“Wouldn’t do us any harm either,” Jay said.
She pleated the folds of her heavy skirt for several moments, then looked up at him. Her gaze was intense. “I want to discuss something.”
“Okay,” Jay said cautiously.
“This morning… back on the road. I realized I reacted with greater emotion to the loss of Haupi than I did to those poor people. I don’t know why. And I don’t want you to hate me for it.”
“Oh, sweety you don’t have to worry about that. You were in shock, and, though it may sound callous, you didn’t know those people from the pope, and Haupi was your pet, your friend, and a link to everything you’ve given up since you’ve had the bad luck to get involved with me.”
“Oh, Jay,” she said, beginning to cry again. “She’ll never survive out on her own.”
“Hey, hey.” Jay folded her in his arms and rocked her gently. Her tears wet his shirt.
“I’m tired, Jay, and I’m hungry… and I’m scared.”
“Me too.”
They sat in silence for several more minutes. Through the high loft window, Jay could see the double moons of Takis rising over the hills. So alien… and yet, as he held this woman in his arms, Jay realized he wasn’t homesick or lonely anymore. And he realized he couldn’t endanger her anymore. He lifted her chin with a finger, forced her to face him. “Hasti, baby, I’m going to send you and Illyana back to Ilkazam.”
She shook her head violently, escaped strands of hair from her braid whipping across her face. “No, Raiyis Zabb will kill her.”
“Okay, I’ll send you back, and keep the kid with me.”
She lifted her hand, half dropped it back into her lap. Lifted it again and explored his lips with trembling fingertips. “No… I won’t leave you.”
He tasted the salt of her tears on her lips. Hastet cupped his face in her hands and slowly sank back onto the hay. As her clothes fell away, Jay finally understood the words of the old wedding ceremony: And with my body I thee worship.
Everything up till now had just been fucking.
Chapter Thirty Six
“Dry at least, brothers,” called a clear tenor voice. Jay jerked awake and placed a hand across Hastet’s mouth. “Beyond that I cannot speak for the accommodations.”
Hastet woke and nodded to indicate that she understood the danger in which they stood. Illyana had begun to wiggle, tiny arms and legs thrashing in the dry hay. Hastet gathered her up and placed her finger in the baby’s mouth, hoping the sucking reflex would sublimate the yelling reflex.
It was all wasted effort. The tenor voice sent his men fanning out through the barn. The first head popped over the edge of the loft, and Jay prepared to pop in return, but held off when he spotted the uniform – tan and green – Jeban, not Vayawand.
“A family of refugees, my lord,” the Tarhiji soldier called down.
“Let’s have a look at them,” the voice came floating up.
Jay and Hastet exchanged glances, shrugged, and moved to obey. The soldier, spotting the infant, went all Takisian gushy and quickly offered to help. Hastet let him. It was no easy matter to climb down a ladder encumbered with both skirt and a baby.
Once down, Jay found himself on the receiving end of an amused but wary scrutiny. “No proper courtesy to your lord and master?” the psi lord asked.
Like most Takisians he was a shrimp, with hair the color of amber and bright green eyes. He had a narrow, but very long, goatee, and that combined with his knowing smile made Jay think he needed only a pair of horns to play the perfect little devil.
“Sorry, we’re out-of-towners,” Jay answered, slapping hay from the seat of his trousers.
The noble was sucking on a raw egg, and even so unappetizing a reminder of food set Jay’s stomach to rumbling.
“You picked a poor time to come visiting,” said the psi lord.
“Yeah, tell us about it.”
Hastet was staring at the egg with the same famished longing that Jay sensed was in his own eyes. The Jeban nobleman pulled another from his pocket, bowed, and offered it to Hastet.
“Madam.”
“Thank you.” She shifted Illyana onto her hip and, cracking the egg with her thumbnail, began to suck. Jay noticed the Jeban noble frowning at Illyana’s hair color. With his brown hair and Hastet’s brown hair, it was evident even to a pea brain they weren’t the kid’s parents. It was also evident the kid wasn’t Tarhiji. Luckily the guy didn’t ask them about Illyana. Instead he asked, “Where are you out of?”
“Ilkazam,” Jay answered.
“You have a strange accent even for Ilkazam.”
“It’s the result of a severe speech impediment,” Jay replied.
The psi lord threw himself down on a pile of hay. “Well, consider yourself under the protection of what remains of House Jeban. For all I know, I might be Raiyis.”
“Congrats. Kind of a drastic way to get promoted, isn’t it?”
“Actually this whole war may be my fault.”
“Surely you wrong yourself, my lord,” Hastet said.
“No, no.” Nimble hands fluttered urgently in the air before his face. “I was in Rodaleh negotiating a marriage when Blaise invaded. Lost that bride, so next I tried Alaa. Meanwhile Blaise was asking his advisers, ‘Where is that piece of afterbirth Govan brant Shen sek Sova?’ Alaa, you say? Invade Alaa! So I come home. Maybe I’ll just marry in House. Damned if he doesn’t do it again.” There was laughter from Govan’s men, and he smiled in answer, but there was an air of forced gaiety.
Still, Jay had to admire them. There wasn’t much he admired about Takisians, but they did have an insouciance, an ability to laugh even in the face of disaster, that was rather appealing.
“I think, my lord, you might consider celibacy,” Hastet said. There was more laughter.
“So what do you do now?” Jay asked.
“Hide, hope, regroup, and wait.”
“Any advice on -”
Jay broke off as Govan jerked up a hand in warning. Jay experienced a sensation as if someone had spread cold jelly across the surface of his brain, and he realized Govan had shielded them against a mentatic probe.
“Did that do it?” the detective whispered.
“I don’t think so,” Govan replied. And with hand signals he issued quick orders. His men quickly assumed defensive positions. Hastet, Jay, Illyana, and Govan took cover behind the sagging wood of a stall. They heard a ship landing.