Before she could react or retreat, he reached her. He didn’t even stop, just slid his arm around her waist and swung her around, then pulled her with him as he headed back down the hall. His longs legs covered ground so fast she had to run to keep up with him.
He stopped in front of Dazza. “My wife and I are going riding.” Propelling Kamoj ahead of him, he stalked into the entrance foyer. He left her in the middle of the chamber while he went to where his cloak hung on the wall like a patch of evening sky.
Kamoj pushed her hand through her hair. What if she refused to go with him? Perhaps she was naïve, but she didn’t believe he would do anything more than leave her behind. The idea of his going alone bothered her more. Could he safely ride, as drunk as he seemed right now? Suppose he fell from his stag and broke a limb? Or worse? She didn’t know how it worked with his people, but among her own, a man thrown from a greenglass could die alone in the forest before anyone found him.
Vyrl smacked his palm on the wall, and a block of stone slid to the side, revealing a cubical cavity. He pulled out his silver mask. Crumpling it in his hand, he swung around and looked at someone behind her. “Bring Greypoint out front,” he said.
Turning, Kamoj saw Azander by the great double doors of the entrance. A bruise purpled the stagman’s chin where Vyrl had hit him last night. Azander pulled back the heavy bolts on the doors and leaned his weight into the left one until it swung open, letting blue-tinged sunlight pour into the foyer. Then he walked through the shimmer curtain, out into the autumn day.
Dazza spoke from the foyer’s inner archway. “Vyrl, at least let Kamoj ride her own stag. She’ll be safer that way.”
“Safe from what?” Vyrl swung his cloak over his shoulders, the blue cloth swirling through the air like a swath of midnight-blue sky. “Military witch-doctors who want to fill my blood with bugs to stop me from enjoying a drink, but who refuse to fix my body so I can goddamn breathe?”
“Don’t go riding,” Dazza said. “Wait until you’re sober.”
Bi-hooves clattered on the flagstones outside. Vyrl came over to Kamoj and took her arm. Pulling her with him, he strode through the shimmer curtain, out into the sunlit courtyard.
Dazza called from behind them. “Vyrl!”
When he turned to the colonel, Kamoj’s hope jumped. Would he change his mind and go back?
Dazza was standing in the palace entrance now, behind the shimmer curtain. “Your respirator,” she said.
He watched her, the mask still crumpled in his fist. Then he spun around and drew Kamoj over to where Azander held a stag ready. The animal was huge and muscled, with gigantic greenglass antlers that shaded from emerald at their base into silver tips. Despite the stag’s great height, Vyrl swung up onto its back with mesmerizing grace. Greypoint pranced sideways, shook his head, and stamped his four front legs. Then he stilled, becoming a statue as he looked down at Kamoj. His eyes, huge and green, with vertical pupil slits, stared at her with unsettling intelligence.
When Vyrl motioned, Azander put his hands on Kamoj’s waist and lifted. At the same time, Vyrl reached down and grabbed her. He hauled Kamoj up in front of him so she straddled the stag, her flared skirt foaming over her thighs and knees. It happened so fast it made her dizzy. Or maybe it was the air, so thin after the palace. Vyrl held her around the waist with one arm, his mask clutched in his fist, while Greypoint danced under them, agitated with Kamoj’s unfamiliar weight.
Suddenly the greenglass reared on his back legs, rising up, up, and up to his full height, his front four legs pawing the air, their scales splintering the light. Clangs filled the courtyard as he crashed his bi-hooves together. He threw back his head and bared his fangs, the opaline teeth glittering like daggers. And he screamed at the sky.
For one frozen instant Kamoj couldn’t move, terrified she would fly off the greenglass. From this height the fall could break her neck. Then she grabbed its antlers, their velvety green scales slippery in her hold.
“Damn it!” Dazza shouted. “Vyrl, don’t do this!”
The greenglass came down, jerking his head until Kamoj released his antlers. Vyrl’s labored breaths rasped behind her. Kamoj twisted around to see him staring at Dazza, his face flushed. As Greypoint danced beneath them, on the verge of rearing again, Vyrl yanked a narrow slab out from his cloak, a rectangle covered with lines and symbols. Extending his arm, he pointed the slab at Dazza. “You can forget about having your orbital monitors track me, Colonel. I’m setting up a jamming field—” He pressed a blue light on the slab. “—now.”
Dazza paled. “We want you here, Vyrl. What if something happens and we can’t locate you?”
“Is that all any of you think about?” he rasped. “What you want?” He thrust the slab back in his cloak and grabbed Kamoj’s shoulders. “Look at this. My wife. A farm girl like a virginal sex goddess out of an erotic holomovie, and all she asks is a simple life, a husband who doesn’t beat her, and the freedom to walk in the woods. Did it ever occur to all your generals, politicians, and strategists that maybe that’s all I want? That what I want might actually matter? Or are you all too busy plotting how to use your oh-so-valuable prince to give a flaming damn what I think?”
He jabbed the stag with his heels and Greypoint leapt forward, racing for the forest. Vyrl held the reins with both hands now, his arms around Kamoj. He was gasping, choking as if every breath hurt.
“Vyrl!” she shouted. “Put your mask on!” The wind carried away her voice. Desperate, she shouted in her mind. Vyrl! Your mask!
His arm moved and his breathing stopped. Dismayed, she twisted around-and stared into a face of silver scales. Jerking at the sight, she lost her balance. Vyrl caught her as she fell, but he misjudged his strength and almost shoved her off Greypoint in the other direction. She turned around and hung onto the stag’s neck while they raced through the iridescent trees.
The dirt path they followed sloped upward, trees towering on either side, branches meeting overhead. Despite the cloudless day, thunder rumbled above the forest. Kamoj stiffened, wondering what other “marvels” Vyrl’s outburst would call up.
“It’s just a shuttle engine,” he muttered against her ear. He slowed Greypoint to a walk and prodded him off the path, into the woods. The stag had calmed, his fire eased by the race. He trotted between the widely-spaced trees, his six legs moving with such smooth coordination that Kamoj barely felt the bumpiness of his bi-hooves hitting the ground. His muscular, long-legged grace reminded her of Vyrl.
They went deep into the mountains, always headed upward. Every now and then an “engine” grumbled overhead. Each time the sound came, Vyrl tensed, and each time it faded he relaxed again.
Eventually Kamoj said, “Where are we going?”
“Away. Until they find me.” He sounded tired. “Actually, they always know where I am. But usually they let me come back on my own.” He paused. “Except today I took the jammer. They’ll have more trouble this time.”
“Jammer?”
“What I pointed at Dazza,” he said. “It works best against electromagnetic sensors.”
“Lector’s senses?”
“It confuses the things they use to find me.” His voice slurred. “Neutrinos are harder to fool, though. They go through anything. But this jammer is a real beaut. It can create false shadows to throw off even neutrino sensors.”
“Oh.” Kamoj wondered if the rum made him babble, or if his words had some actual sense.
“What do you think is this Current you all worship?” Vyrl asked. “Electromagnetic radiation. Light. Those threads in your light panels are just optical fibers.”