“She said nanobots,” Vyrl said. “She’s speaking Iotic.”
Kamoj stared at him. He understood Iotaca? Then again, he had read the contract scroll at their wedding, which was written in pure Iotaca. Maybe he could clear up the mystery of what the blasted thing said.
Dazza, however, also looked puzzled. “Why do you say it that way, as if she used a different language for ‘nanobot’? Everything we’ve said is in Iotic.”
Vyrl shook his head. “You and I may be speaking Iotic, but the people here don’t. Or not pure Iotic. Their ‘Bridge’ language is a dialect.”
It would never have occurred to Kamoj to describe Bridge as a dialect of Iotaca. The differences seemed too extreme to call them two forms of the same language. But then, to the people of the Northern Lands any change was extreme.
“Nanobot is a word from the temple language,” Kamoj said.
“I haven’t heard enough of your temple language to be sure,” Vyrl said, “but I think it’s what we call classical Iotic. That contract I read at the ceremony was written in it. What Dazza and I are speaking now is modern Iotic.”
Dazza regarded him with curiosity. “You speak the classics?”
“I learned them when I was a boy,” he said.
The doctor looked impressed. “You must have had a good education.”
He shrugged. “There were no schools where we lived, so my parents brought in tutors from offworld.”
Kamoj wondered what he meant by offworld. Whatever it was, she too found the result impressive. “I can pronounce words and phrases in Iotaca,” she said, “but I don’t understand it all. Like nanobot. I know the word but not the meaning.”
“Do you know what ‘molecule’ means?” Dazza asked. When Kamoj shook her head, Dazza said, “It’s like a tiny machine. A nanobot is designed for a specific duty. Different types have different duties. The ones we carry in our bodies, that help make us healthy, we call nanomeds. Each one has a picochip attached to it, a quantum computer.” She paused. “Think of it as a brain. The picochip tells the nanobot what to do and how to make more of itself. If you put a lot of them together, their chips combine into a what we call a picoweb. A bigger brain.”
Kamoj blinked. “You put all that in my foot?”
A smile gentled Dazza’s face. “I did indeed. Three types of nanomed, in fact. Two help ferry nutrients and structural materials to the wound and maintain your physiological balance while you heal. The third catalyzes molecular repair processes.”
“Catalyze?” Kamoj asked.
“Helps them go faster.”
“Is she going to be all right?” Vyrl asked.
“She’ll be fine by tomorrow.” Dazza snapped her quill into her box. Concentrating on her displays, the doctor said, “She should stay off that foot for the rest of the night, however.”
Vyrl started to speak, then just smiled. Kamoj flushed. Walking clearly wasn’t what he had in mind for the rest of the night.
Dazza closed the lid of her book-box and looked up at Vyrl. “Did you talk to Azander after you arrived?”
“Not really,” Vyrl answered. “Why?”
“He said you were followed by Ironbridge stagmen.”
“Ironbridge? Why?”
“Azander seemed to think you would know.”
“I’ve no idea,” Vyrl said.
His response disquieted Kamoj. Ironbridge was nothing to ignore. What was Jax up to?
Watching her, Vyrl sat on the bed. “What is it, water sprite? What troubles you about Ironbridge?”
Dazza drew in a sharp breath. Startled, Kamoj glanced at her. The colonel had the look of a healer whose patient had just showed signs of a recovery the healer had feared would never happen. It made no sense to Kamoj. Vyrl wasn’t sick, at least that she could see. Except for the rum. But he wasn’t drunk now, and all he had done was ask her about Ironbridge.
He hadn’t noticed Dazza’s reaction. Intent on Kamoj, he said, “Talk to me.”
“It is forbidden,” Kamoj answered.
“To talk to me?”
“For me to talk of Ironbridge.”
“Why?”
“Because you and I have a dowered merger.”
“Why does that make a difference?”
She wasn’t actually sure why tradition forbade discussing other bid candidates with the winner of a hostile merger. Rules changed in situations like this, when the balance of power tipped so far in favor of one party. “Hostile” was probably the operative word; if she spoke about Ironbridge she could aggravate Vyrl and so bring harm to herself, Argali, and Ironbridge.
“It is forbidden,” she repeated.
Vyrl glanced at Dazza with an expression that clearly said: Can you do something with this?
Dazza considered her. “If Prince Havyrl gives you permission to speak about Ironbridge, can you do it?”
Vyrl made an exasperated noise. “She doesn’t need my permission to talk.”
Kamoj looked from Vyrl to Dazza, at a loss to understand the strange hierarchy of authority here.
Dazza tried again. “Can you talk to me about it?”
“No,” Kamoj said.
“Who can we ask?”
Who indeed? Maxard, perhaps. He hadn’t married Vyrl. He was less likely to incur Lionstar wrath by talking about Kamoj’s relationship with another man.
“My uncle,” Kamoj said.
“We can send someone to Argali tomorrow.” Vyrl grimaced. “Which’ll be forever with how long the nights here last.”
Kamoj wondered what he meant. Nights weren’t long in autumn, not compared to winter, when snow covered the world and blizzards roared down from the North Sky Islands.
Dazza was watching her. “This is about your customs, isn’t it? All of you here, you’re afraid of showing disrespect. That’s important. Respect. To custom, to authority, and to the land.”
Relief settled over Kamoj. Dazza understood. “Yes.”
Vyrl blinked at the doctor. “Where did you get all that?”
With a scowl, Dazza said, “From talking to your ever-so-patient butler the last time you went riding during one of your binges. I wanted to know why no one stopped you.”
“Don’t start with me, Dazza.”
“Why? Because you happen to be more sober now than you’ve been in weeks? You’re going to kill yourself.”
Vyrl ignored the comment. “What did my butler tell you?”
Dazza tilted her head at Kamoj. “They all feel that way. I think they’re genetically engineered to obey authority. I’ve never known such a docile, cooperative people.”
“They have armies.” Vyrl paused. “If you can call thirty farmers who practice ritualized swordplay every now and then an army.”
Kamoj wondered why he found that strange. An incorporated man’s stagmen rode in his honor guard when needed and otherwise worked to support their families. Ironbridge had the only army that trained all year round. Only Jax could afford to pay a good wage in every season.
Given what she had seen in the past two days, though, it wouldn’t surprise her if Vyrl had his men training all year too, while he supported them at a rate ten times greater than anyone else without even realizing it. Most of his staff and stagmen obviously came from Argali. She and Maxard employed the best in the village, so Vyrl must be drawing from the outlying hamlets, which were even more impoverished. By hiring locals instead of his own people, he had been supporting her province even prior to their merger.
“Their ‘wars’ are more like arguments,” Dazza was saying. “In the rare instances when they do fight, it’s a ritualistic ceremony. Ironbridge is the only province with real calvary or troops, and they’re more of a police force. I doubt you could convince these people to defy authority even if you paid them to do it.”