“It just looks like sorcery.” Jax considered Lector, then the others. “Do any of you read?”
Hai! Kamoj wanted to shake him. How could he talk about reading now? Was Vyrl alive or dead?
“I can read and write my name,” Lector said. “My wife’s name too, and those of our children. I know a few other words.”
The other stagman spread his hands. “I cannee read at all.”
“I be knowing my name,” Tera said.
Jax looked disappointed, but unsurprised. Kamoj wondered what it was like for a man with his intellect to live in a place where almost none of the population could even read, let alone offer him an educated discussion.
“A codex in my library describes weapons similar to Lionstar’s,” Jax said. “They rely on something called ‘particle physics.’ The source of the orange light is a sub-electronic particle called an abiton, the antiparticle of a biton. It has a rest energy of 1.9 eV and a charge of 5.95 raised to the negative 25th power. Whatever that means. And this charge is called Coulomb. It’s the same as the name in the Amperman line, I’m sure of it. The gun uses a magnet of 0.0001 Tesla and its accelerator needs a radius of five centimeters.” He held up his hand, his thumb and forefinger a short distance apart. “This is a centimeter.”
The others remained silent, watching him as if his words were an incantation.
“If his people have these weapons,” Jax said, “they may well have other devices described in the old codices.”
“It be a bad omen,” Lector said.
“Is it? Or the promise of the future?” Jax rubbed his chin. “Then there is Lionstar’s language. He speaks pure classical Iotic.”
“You mean Iotaca?” Lector asked.
Who cares what they speak? Kamoj thought. Tell us what happened.
“That’s right,” Jax said. “The temple language.”
“But no one understands it any more,” Lector said.
Jax shrugged. “That’s only because the ancient glyphs are different from the ones we use now. And the temple priestess has a different accent than Lionstar. I have trouble understanding the priestess, but Lionstar is easy.”
“I cannee understand him at all,” Lector said.
“Your dialect is more removed from Iotic,” Jax answered. “Classical Iotic was the language of the highborn here, in the days before the Current died. Lionstar probably inherited it the same way I did, as a nobleman descended from an ancient line.” He paused. “But I don’t think it’s the native tongue of his people. Petrin told me that on the Ascendant, the crew spoke a language he didn’t—understand.”
Petrin? It took Kamoj a moment to figure out he meant the Ironbridge stagman Vyrl had stabbed, the man the metal bird had taken to the Ascendant.
“Yet they all speak Iotaca to Lionstar,” Lector said.
“They are his lieges,” Jax pointed out.
“He does seem to have authority,” Lector acknowledged.
Kamoj began to relax. If Vyrl had died, surely Jax would have said something by now.
“It’s more than his authority,” Jax said. “He’s valuable to them, beyond being their prince. His people would kill every one of us to protect him, if it became necessary. And how do they move so fast? What do they have inside their bodies that lets them do that?”
“It be a bad affair,” Lector said. “Like that old sorceress who rides with him.”
“They don’t use sorcery,” Jax said. “Just knowledge we’ve forgotten.” Longing showed on his face. “What must their armies be like? It stretches the mind to imagine it.”
“I cannee imagine it, sir.”
Jax exhaled. “We had better try. We have to know what we’re fighting.” He glanced at Kamoj. Although she averted her gaze, it wasn’t before she saw his pain, the vulnerability toward her that he hid almost as soon as it escaped his defenses.
“None of Lionstar’s party were close enough to decipher my wife’s outburst,” Jax said. When she looked up, he was talking to Lector again. “But it has spurred the Ascendant’s people to investigate. They are bringing an ‘Arbiter’ tomorrow to resume the Inquiry. If we don’t cooperate, they threaten to use force.”
“If they be so powerful, why do they hesitate with this ‘force’?” Lector asked.
“They don’t want to exacerbate the situation,” Jax answered. “Apparently I’m one of the leaders they expect to deal with when they institute ‘formal assimilation procedures’ here.”
“I donnee understand that,” Lector said.
Dryly Jax said, “Nor do I.” He fell silent and the stagmen waited. Finally Jax said, “Well, Lector, what do you think?”
“Sir?”
“Give me your opinion on the situation.”
“You must never give in to Lionstar. It would weaken your authority.”
“My thought also.” Jax blew out a gust of air. “But by the Current, man, how do I maintain authority here?”
“I donnee know, sir. But you must.”
Disappointment flickered across Jax’s face, but he seemed unsurprised. Although he glanced at the others, he didn’t seek their counsel. It didn’t surprise Kamoj. What could they say? He was so far beyond them in intellect and education that his asking for their advice was like Vyrl asking her how to sail a sky boat.
Finally he said, “My wife and I will remain here tonight, in case Lionstar violates the truce his people set up and tries to find her. I will need the three of you on watch outside.”
“It be our honor,” Lector said.
Jax nodded, then dismissed them. After the soldiers left, the governor continued to sit on the boulder, staring at the ground. Finally he looked at Kamoj. “Come here.”
She walked over to him. Even wrapped in Argalian wool she was still shivering.
“Why are you wearing Lector’s cloak?” he asked.
“I was cold. He gave it to me.”
“Delicate Kamoj.” Bitterness edged his voice. “Pretty delicate rose. I truly am a fool, because I still want you.”
“Jax—”
“No.” He shook his head, denying whatever remained unspoken on her lips. “Tomorrow you will be asked to sign the merger and annulment contracts before witnesses, with an X since you can’t write your name.” He regarded her with a steady gaze. “You will do this, Kamoj. I will tolerate no more betrayals.”
She swallowed, afraid to voice her question yet needing the answer anyway. “And if I refuse?”
Softly he said, “Then I will kill you, Kamoj. I will see you dead before I let these conquerors take what belongs to me.”
XII. Consent. Multi-Channel Scattering
A voice pulled Kamoj awake. For the past few hours, she and Jax had been sitting against a wall of the burrow, dozing. She couldn’t truly sleep, though. Hunger and thirst gnawed at her. Just the act of breathing had become a torment, a battle against the constriction of her clothes. The cold felt as if it had permeated to her bones.
Jax also slept fitfully. He had neither cloak nor jacket, and he still hadn’t bothered to lace his shirt. Frost lined the hairs on his chest. His quirt, sword, and leather sword-belt lay at his feet.
“Governor Ironbridge,” the voice repeated. A stagman stood within the shadows by the burrow entrance.
Jax stirred, then sat forward, rubbing his eyes. “Lector? Come here, man. What is it?”
Lector came over and knelt by him. “You had the right of it, sir. Lionstar attacked the camp. There was fighting.”
“I don’t suppose Lionstar is dead by any chance?” Jax asked.
“No, sir. No one died.”
Jax rubbed his neck and shoulders. “What is the situation?”