Tavi winced, but nodded. "How can we help you, Captain?"
"Tie down anything that isn't bolted to the floor," Demos said, "including yourselves. It's going to be a bad one."
Chapter Two
Valiar Marcus debated the proper way to inform the proud young Canim officer that there was, in fact, a considerable distinction between telling an Aleran that he had a poor sense of smell and informing him that he smelled bad.
The young Cane, Marcus knew, was anxious to make a good showing in his language lessons in front of no less personages than both Varg, the undisputed commander of the Canim fleet, and his son and second in command, Nasaug. If Marcus made the young officer look foolish, it would be an insult that the Cane would carry stubbornly to his grave-and given the enormous lifespan of the wolf-folk, it meant that Marcus' actions could cause repercussions, good or ill, for generations yet unborn.
"While your statement is doubtless accurate," Marcus replied, in careful, slow, clearly pronounced Aleran, "you may find that many of my countrymen will respond awkwardly to such remarks. Our own sense of smell is, as you note, a great deal less developed than your own, and as such the use of language that bears upon it will carry a different degree of significance than it might among your own folk."
Varg growled under his breath and muttered, "Few, Aleran or Cane, care to be informed that their odor is unwelcome."
Marcus turned his head to the grizzled old leader of the Canim and inclined his head, in the Alearn fashion. "As you say, sir."
He had only a split-second's warning as the embarrassed young officer let out a snarl and lunged at Marcus, his jaws snapping.
Marcus had recognized the signs of brittle pride, which, it seemed, were as common and easily noted among ambitious young Canim as it was among their Aleran counterparts. Marcus was nearing sixty years of age, and would never have been fast enough to have met the Cane, had he been relying upon his senses alone to warn him-but foresight had always proved to be a far more effective defense than speed alone. Marcus had been anticipating the flash of temper and instant violence.
The Cane was eight feet of coiled, steely muscle, fangs and hard bone, and weighed two or three of Marcus-but as its jaws darted forward, it was unable to twist away when Marcus seized its ear in one calloused fist and hauled to one side.
The Cane twisted and rolled with the motion, letting out a snarl that rose to a high-pitched yelp of agony as it instinctively moved toward the source of the pull against his sensitive ear, to reduce the pressure on it. Marcus took advantage of the motion, breaking the Cane's balance, building momentum, and dropped his entire weight as well as the young Cane's full onto his furry chin, slamming it to the deck with a skull-jarring crack of impact.
The young Cane lay there stunned for a moment, his eyes glazed, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, bleeding from a small cut.
Marcus rose and straightened his tunic. "An inferior sense of smell," Marcus said, as if absolutely nothing of significance had happened, "is distinct from being told that one smells unpleasant. It's possible that someone sensitive might think you intended an insult. I personally am only an old centurion, too old to be dangerous in a fight any more, and find nothing insulting in either statement. I am not at all angry, and could do nothing about it even if I was upset. But I would hate for someone less tolerant and more capable to do you harm when, clearly, you are only trying to be friendly. Do you understand me?"
The young officer stared at Marcus with glazed eyes. He blinked a few times. Then his ears twitched in a vague little motion of acknowledgment and assent.
"Good," Marcus said, in his rough but functional Canish, smiling with only the slightest baring of his teeth. "I am glad that you make adequate progress in your efforts to understand Alerans."
"A good lesson," Varg growled in agreement. "Dismissed."
The young Cane picked himself up, bared his throat respectfully to Varg and Nasaug, and then walked rather unsteadily from the ship's cabin.
Marcus turned to face Varg. The Cane was a giant of his race, nearly nine feet tall when standing, and the Trueblood had been built to fit him. The cabin, which was as cramped as any shipboard space, to the Cane, was cavernous to Marcus. The Cane, a great black-furred creature, his coat marred with the white streaks of many scars, crouched on his haunches, the at-rest posture of his kind, negligently holding a thick, heavy scroll in his paw-like hands, open to the middle, where he had been reading during the language lesson.
"Marcus," murmured Varg, his basso growl as threatening and familiar as it always was. "I expect you want an explanation for the attack."
"You have a young officer who would be promising if he wasn't an insufferably arrogant fool, convinced of the invincibility of your kind and, by extension, his own."
Varg's ears flicked back and forth in amusement. His eyes went to Nasaug-a Cane who was a shorter, brawnier version of his sire. Nasaug's mouth dropped open, white fangs bared and tongue lolling in the Canim version of a smile.
"Told you," Varg said, in Canish. "Huntmasters are huntmasters."
"Sir?" Marcus asked. He understood the separate meanings of the words, but not their combined context.
"Senior warriors," Nasaug clarified, to Marcus. "They are given command of groups of novices. Long ago, they would form hunting packs, and teach the young to hunt. The teacher was called the huntmaster."
"These days," Varg growled, "the word means one who trains groups of young soldiers, and prepares them for their place in the order of battle. Your legions have something like them as well."
"Centurions," Marcus said, nodding. "I see."
"The pup would not have killed you," Nasaug said.
Marcus faced the younger Cane squarely and calmly. "No, sir," he replied, his voice steady. "He would not have. And out of respect for the Princeps' desire for a peaceful journey, I did not kill him."
"Why would you have done so, huntmaster?" growled Varg, his voice quietly dangerous.
Marcus turned back to face him without flinching. "Because I would far rather leave a dead fool behind me than a live enemy who has gained a measure of wisdom. In the future, I would take it as a courtesy if I was not used as an object lesson beyond those which I have already been commanded to give."
Varg bared his fangs in another Canim smile. "It is good to see that we understand one another. My boat is prepared to take you back to your ship, if you are ready, Valiar Marcus."
"I am."
Varg bowed his head and neck, Aleran-style. "Then go your way, and find good hunting."
"And you, sir."
Marcus had just turned to the door when it opened, and a lean Cane, reddish-furred and small for his kind, entered the cabin. Without preamble he bared his throat slightly to Varg and said, "A severe storm approaches, my lord. We have half of an hour or less."
Varg took that in with a growl and dismissed the sailor with a jerk of his head. He glanced at Marcus. "No time to send you back and recover our boat," he said. "It looks as though you're staying for a time."