Surely there could be nothing wrong with approaching him and thanking him for his assistance. But I stayed where I was, silent and unmoving, until Tom returned to my side.
He had been on one of the ropes himself, and was soaked with sweat. Breathing heavily, he said, “We have to find a better way.”
“Yes,” I said, watching the nomads leave, Suhail in their midst. “We do.”
SIX
The death of Prima and the acquisition of Saeva (whom I named for her ferocity) were only two of the changes we experienced around that time. Not three days after that incident, my honeyseekers arrived on a ship from Scirland.
I had named them Amamis and Hicara, after the brother and sister who founded Spurena in myth. They were as hardy as their namesakes, surviving not one but two ocean voyages—albeit in far more luxurious conditions. I had been concerned that the rigors of travel would put them sufficiently off their feed that they would require special care upon arrival, but they fell with gusto upon the dishes of honey I laid out for them, dipping their brushy little tongues into the sweet liquid. When drab Hicara shouldered her brighter mate out of the way, he tried to spit at her—their defense mechanism, and arguably a form of extraordinary breath—but it did little good. The noxiousness of their spray comes from toxins in the eucalyptus itself, and my little dragons had been subsisting on clover honey during their journey.
They would have better soon enough. Despite the tensions between us, the sheikh had given permission for me to use the trees in his garden for the sake of our research. I had yet to determine, though, how that would be done. He would hardly wish me on his doorstep every day; and I had been very clear about not asking for that, lest he ascribe impure motivations to my presence. But that meant someone in his household would need to care for the honeyseekers in my stead.
Of course I hoped this might be Suhail. I had little expectation he would take it up, though, and was correct in that—but I could never have predicted who wound up shouldering the task.
I arrived at the House of Dragons one morning and learned from Lieutenant Marton that a woman from the sheikh’s household was waiting in my office. “A woman?” I asked. “Are you sure?”
“Very sure,” he said, as if my question were not entirely foolish. “Hajjah Mahira, her name is.”
The woman sitting in my office was garbed like an Amaneen prayer-leader’s wife. She wore the long cloak, and had veiled her face even though I was hardly a man to whom she need demonstrate respect. When I entered, she rose to her feet and said in Akhian, “Peace be upon you, Umm Yaqub.”
“And upon you, peace,” I said by reflex. “Umm Yaqub” was my appellation there: parents are commonly known as the mothers and fathers of their children, and “Yaqub” is the Akhian form of “Jacob.” “You—were sent here by the sheikh?” He was not a prayer-leader, so far as I knew; but if one of his wives was extremely pious, she might dress in such fashion. And she, too, had completed the pilgrimage.
The woman gestured at the door and windows. “Will it bother you to close these?”
It would make the room stuffy, but I could endure that. I shut the door behind me and then crossed the room to tend to the shutters. Our privacy thus assured, I turned to find she had lowered her veil.
The line of her nose, the fine edge to her lips: these and other details were immediately familiar. The sheikh did not have such features, and I wondered whom Suhail and his sister took after, their mother or their father.
“I am Mahira bint Ramiz,” she said, confirming my guess. “I live with my brother Husam, and when I heard of your research, I offered to assist. If this is agreeable for you, then you may show me what care these creatures require.”
My time in Akhia had already done a great deal to improve my command of the language, but much of the improvement had been in the field of giving instructions to and receiving reports from our labourers, which left me less than wholly prepared for courteous conversation. I gestured for her to take a chair, wishing we had some kind of reception room in the compound, furnished in a more comfortable manner. It would be a useful thing overall, given the length of time this enterprise was likely to persist, and I made a mental note to inquire about the possibility. I did not even have coffee and dates on hand to offer her.
All I had were questions. “Are you a natural historian?”
It would have been a stroke of pure luck—and not entirely outside the realm of possibility, given Suhail’s own scholarly tendencies. She shook her head, though, disappointing me. “No, I am studying to be a prayer-leader. For women,” she added, when I showed my surprise.
That explained her mode of dress. I bit down on the urge to say I did not expect any sister of Suhail’s to be so religious: like me, he followed his faith, but not with any particular zeal. Indeed, sitting with Hajjah Mahira made me feel like I was having tea with my cousin Joseph, who was a magister in Kenway. He never chided me for my lack of piety, but his mere presence always sufficed to make me feel vaguely guilty.
“I hope this is not a burden for you, or in any way detracts from your studies,” I said.
“Not at all,” she assured me. “I asked Husam to allow me to help. I often study in the garden, so it will be easy for me to do whatever is necessary out there.”
The gears of my mind were clicking along, some of them weighing issues related to the honeyseekers, others performing calculations that had nothing to do with professional matters at all. If Mahira had responsibility for the honeyseekers, then I could deal with her instead of the sheikh. Indeed, I would have to deal with her, as it would be inappropriate for Tom to do so in my stead; and doubly so when she was so pious. The same rules of propriety that said I should not be conducting business with strange men might for once operate in my favour. And that, in turn, might open up certain possibilities.
Such considerations, though, had to wait. “They don’t require a great deal,” I said. “Honeyseekers are a good deal more cooperative in that regard than desert drakes! If you can arrange netting around the eucalyptus trees, to prevent them from flying away, that should be all the confinement they need—and really, even that may not be necessary. But I would rather not have to send all the way to Lutjarro for replacements.”
When she smiled, her resemblance to Suhail grew even stronger. “Indeed. Will the eucalyptus trees provide all they need?”
“That and insects ought to be sufficient, but I will tell you what signs of ill health to look for. If they seem underfed, then you can notify me and I will investigate.” I rummaged in a drawer and came up with the notebook in which I had begun to sketch out my plans. “The most important thing is the eggs. You will need to look for them every day; there will not be one every day, but I would like them collected at precise intervals after their laying, which means we will need to know when that occurs.”
She cocked her head to one side, curious. “What do you intend to do with them? I understand this is for your research, but I cannot see how it relates to desert drakes.”
“If all goes as I hope, it will teach us something useful about which environmental variations can be tolerated, and which ones cannot; also when such variations can be introduced without causing undue difficulty.” I had an extensive outline of test cases in my notebook, the fruit of my association with other scientific members of the Flying University. Mine was not a field that often suited itself to laboratory-style experimentation, but in this instance a rigorous comparative approach was possible. Depending on how long I was permitted to continue the experiment, I might be able to test every significant variable in a wide range of degrees and combinations.