March to the Stars

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Denat picked up the poorly baked clay cup and hunched his shoulders. A fine rain had started, and the denizens of the port bazaar had mostly sought the shelter of awnings. Personally, Denat was rather enjoying the gentle drizzle, and sitting out in the middle of it should make him look even more like an ignorant barbarian, too stupid to come in out of the rain. Certainly not the sort of eavesdropper a civilized city dweller would concern himself over—after all, the ignorant lout wouldn't be able to understand a civilized dialect, anyway!

But Denat understood enough to get along, and even from his place in the open, he could hear various conversations under the awnings. He grimaced as he sipped the thin, sour wine—just the sort of stuff any city barkeep would offer a dumb barbarian—and subconsciously sorted the discussions around him.

Denat's natural flair for espionage, like his gift for languages, had never been noticeable among the People as the nephew of the village shaman. His skill and expertise as a hunter, one who actually preferred to hunt the far more dangerous night than during the day, had been well-known. And even before the arrival of the Marines, he'd had an affinity for picking up information in Q'Nkok, which was one of the reasons Cord had asked him to accompany the humans as they made their way to that first city. But no one had ever seriously considered him for the role of a spy.

It had originally been assumed that he and the other village warriors would return after Cord and his asi's companions had passed through Q'Nkok to begin their monumental, probably suicidal, trek halfway around the planet. Instead, he and a few others had stuck around, as much to play cards with Poertena as anything else, and the journey which had so noticeably changed the prince, had changed Denat almost as greatly.

He'd discovered his natural ability for languages, and a flair for the dramatic that permitted him to either blend into societies or to put on an excellent "dumb barbarian" routine. And he'd also discovered how much he enjoyed putting those talents to work.

It was in the dumb barb role that he had been wandering the city for the last few days, and the impressions he was picking up made him uneasy. He still had only a rudimentary grasp of Krath, and an even more rudimentary one of the society which spoke it, but nothing he had learned so far seemed to add up.

This city was filled with temples. In fact, it seemed that there was one on every third street corner, and they were all more or less identical, barring size. They had a square front that connected to a conical back. The cone was clearly meant to represent a volcano, and on the one holy day which had been observed since their arrival, smoke had issued from all the temples. And the smoke had been filled with the bitter-sweet scent of burning meat, which had to have been immensely expensive. Denat knew how much forage for the civan was costing Poertena, so he also knew that the cost of feeding meat animals had to be extremely high. So if the worshipers were prepared to tithe sufficient donations for the priesthood to fatten up sufficient sacrificial animals to scent that much smoke, then they must be really devout.

The quantity of smoke was explained readily enough. It had come from the endless loads of coal and wood that had been brought in through the previous few days by the many slaves of the Temple. What didn't add up was that there were no holding pens around the temples. The Diasprans hadn't practiced animal sacrifice, but other religions on Denat's home continent had, and behind all of those temples had been pens for the sacrificial animals. But there hadn't been so much as a single turom penned up around these temples.

In addition, as Sergeant Major Kosutic had pointed out, nobody argued religion. This city was clearly a theocracy, even more totally under the control of the local priesthood than Diaspra had been. But whereas, in Diaspra, everyone discussed the nature of Water, here no one discussed the nature of their god at all. It wasn't even clear what the god was, although Denat had been told it was a god of Fire.

The conversations around him were of no use. They were all complaining about the lack of trade, which was a pretty constant theme. Something had dried it up, and fairly recently, apparently. The immediate consequences were readily apparent, particularly in the dock areas, where many of the wharves were unused. Exactly what had happened to it was unclear, to say the least, though. The almost total lack of a long-range merchant fleet seemed to have had something to do with it, but the reason for the shipping shortage itself was, again, unclear.

Kirsti was turning out to be a mystery wrapped in a conundrum. And that was making him irritated.

Cord pushed his way through the bustling streets with his lower arms set in an expression of disapproval.

"A fine city, indeed," he growled, "but this covering of the body is barbarous." He pulled at the kiltlike affair, then snarled as one of the locals ran into him. "And the manners are atrocious."

"Krath, what to say?" Pedi looked around nervously. She was trying to simulate a Shadem accent while speaking in Imperial. Since she was far from eloquent in Shadem and even further from fluent in Imperial, it was tough. But the alternative was to let her Shin accent be noticeable, and she was trying very hard to avoid that. She also knew that there were habits to maintaining and managing a sumei which she simply didn't have. Hopefully, the fact that so few of the Krath's Shadem allies made it as far as Kirsti would mean that no one was familiar enough with the proper way to wear a sumei to recognize her own lapses. She told herself that as long as she didn't have to remove the robes, she should be fine.

In fact, she told herself that at least once every four or five of the humans' "minutes."

So far, this combined shopping trip and intelligence mission had gone well enough to indicate that she was probably right. On the other hand, one item she intended to purchase before returning to the quarters the city council had assigned to them might be looked at askance. She wasn't sure if Shadem females knew its use or not. Some Krath did, but it was not looked upon with wide favor. So be it. She wasn't going another day without some wasen.

Cord paused at the mouth of an alley and consulted a map Poertena had drawn. The sawed-off Marine had already "scoped out" much of the shopping in the western city, and his chart indicated that this would be one of the better places to look for the items Pedi had listed. Now that they were here, though, the opening was a dark cavern, a set of steps downward into a brick-lined tunnel which Cord found particularly unappealing.

"Go," Pedi whispered. "People look."

"I hate cities," Cord muttered, and stepped into the darkness.

From the bottom of the short set of steps, it was apparent that the tunnel was lit, after a fashion, by high skylights which threw occasional, bright circles on its floor at irregular intervals down its length. It continued with a faint, mildly organic curve to the right, then turned sharply left about fifty meters in. There were doorways to either side, many of them low, and in front of each doorway were groups of Mardukans, most of them sitting on cloth covers. In several of the doorways, one or more of the locals were working on some item—here a metalworker was hammering designs on a pot, there a knife-maker was riveting grips to a tang, and about halfway down the aisle a jeweler under one of the skylights was meticulously setting a teardrop of Fire into a horn bangle.

The atmosphere was thick with a mixture of smoke from coal fires, drifting like wisps of fog through the light from the skylights, and the heady scent of spices. Several of the doorways sheltered Krath, some of them female, cooking over small grills. Most of the food being prepared was seafood, ranging from boiling seaweed to grilled coll fish, along with small pots of the ubiquitous barleyrice.

Cord strode forward, ignoring the looks his outlandish dress and peace-bonded spear drew, until he reached an alcove on the left, decorated with a variety of dried items and bottles of mysterious liquids.

The Krath who ran the apothecary's shop was short, even by local standards. He peered up at the towering shaman suspiciously and babbled a quick, liquid sentence in the local trade patois.

Cord caught only a bit of the meaning, but the question was fairly clear. He settled into a squat as Pedi obediently settled in behind him.

"I need to buy," he said. "Need stuff for me. Stuff for wife. Need wasen."

The merchant made a gesture and grunted another fast sentence. Hand signs were closer to universal on Marduk, where so much was expressed by body language and gesture, than on many other planets. So while Cord had never seen this particular one, he'd seen one very much like it in K'Vaern's Cove.

His motioning true-hand stopped Pedi even as he felt her start to move forward. He waited for a breath or two to be certain she stayed stopped, then leaned forward until his ancient, dry face was centimeters from the merchant's.

"Don't think leather on spear save your life. Keep comments to self, or eat horn through asshole."

The shaman was beginning to distinctly regret this trip. He wasn't sure what wasen was, but he'd already decided it wasn't worth the trouble.

Pedi was beginning to wonder if it had been worthwhile herself. It might have made more sense just to forget about the wasen. It wasn't as if she were really going to need it anytime soon, after all. Or, failing that, it might have made more sense to come by herself, or in the company of one of the female Marines. Despreaux perhaps. But it was not permitted for a benan to leave her master, even for a moment.

Not when there was the possibility of danger... which happened to be the case anywhere in this Ashes-damned city.

She wondered suddenly if Cord lived under those strictures, as well. And, if he did, how he reconciled being away from Prince Roger. Or had her own insistence finally driven him to bend his honor? And, if it had, to what extent was her own honor tarnished by the action into which she had manipulated him?

Wasen was beginning to look less and less like a good idea.

She leaned forward and, keeping her hands draped in the sumei, gestured at one of the dried items. It was a type of sea creature that clung to rocks in the surf zone. Fairly rare on the continent, wasen was one of the major trade goods of the Lemmar Alliance, and one of the reasons for the recent successful effort to take Strem away from the Lemmar. Besides the use for which she intended it, it was employed in various industries, including textiles.

In a place like this, however, it would be bought only for less acceptable uses. Less acceptable, at least, to the Krath.

Cord looked at the dried bit of what looked like meat and pointed in turn.

"How much?"

He had learned as a boy traveling to far Voitan that along with "Where water?" and "Where food?" that was one of the three most important phrases any venturer could learn in the local dialect.

The merchant held up fingers indicating a number that certainly sounded outlandish to the shaman. But that was what bargaining was all about, and he automatically quoted a return price one-third the suggested one.

The merchant screamed like a stuck atul and grabbed his horns. The offer must have been just about right.

As Cord, with obvious reluctance, pulled out a pouch and started measuring silver against the merchant's weights, Pedi leaned forward and picked up the hand-sized mass of wasen. She noticed immediately that it was unusually hard, and after she brought it under her robes and broke it, she wanted to scream in anger. Instead, she leaned forward and pulled urgently at Cord's arm.

"Not good," she hissed in the little People she knew. "Bad quality. Old. Not good."

Cord turned around and fixed her with a glare.

"You use?" he asked.

"Too much," she insisted furiously. "Bad quality. Too old."

Cord turned back to the merchant.

"She say stuff too old," he snarled. "No can use."

"First quality wasen," the apothecary spat back. The rest of the sentence was too fast for the shaman to catch, but one word sounded particularly bad.

The apothecary didn't speak too rapidly for Pedi, though. She managed not to break into Shin, but after a moment's spluttering, she launched over the seated Cord and grabbed the merchant by the horns.

"Kick your ass, modderpocker!" she screamed, using the only Imperial curses she knew—so far. "Kick your ass!"

"Barbarian whore!" the merchant shouted back. "Let go of me, you bitch!"

Cord grabbed one of his erstwhile bodyguard's arms and disengaged it from the merchant, then pushed the Krath to the ground.

"Here's your silver," he said with a growl. "I'll keep the copper as a charge for calling my wife a whore."

"Barbarian sathrek," the merchant snarled.

Cord looked around at the other merchants. Some of them had started to come to the apothecary's aid, and he pulled the still cursing Pedi down the way until they were out of sight of the scene of the confrontation.

"Listen to me," he grated in a mixture of Imperial and People. "Do you want to kill us all? You want to kill your asi?" He could tell from the drape of her sumei that she had crossed all four arms under the muffling folds.

"Bad quality," she hissed. "Too much. And..." She stopped and stamped a foot. "Modderpocker," she muttered.

"What did he say?" Cord asked. "That was what really set you off, wasn't it?"

"He say... he say..." She stopped. "Don't know Imperial. Don't know People. Don't want say, anyway. Bad."

"What was it?" Cord asked. "I've been called some pretty bad things and survived."

"Was... was having season with slimer. With baby."

Cord thought about what she meant for a second, then fingered the peacebonds on his spear while he did a dinshon exercise to control anger.

"The Imperial term is pedophile," he said after a moment, once he was certain of his own composure. "And 'modderpocker' means having season with your own birther. If you should happen to be interested."

Pedi thought about that for a moment, then grunted a faint laugh.

"Wish pocking merchant speak Imperial," she said much more cheerfully, and Cord shook his head and sighed.

"Pedi Karuse, you are a lot of trouble."

Poertena flipped over the hole card and scooped in the pot.

"That was a a lot of trouble for a measly few coppers," Denat growled, as he scooped up the cards to begin shuffling.

"Wha'ever it take," the Pinopan replied, leaning back with a shrug. "You not out looking por trouble?"

"You don't have to look with this lot," the barbarian said. "Most obnoxious group I've ever dealt with."

"You sure it's just one way?" Julian asked carefully. He usually sat out Poertena's card games—the Pinopan was deadly with a deck—but the waiting was getting on his nerves. And, apparently, on Denat's. "You've been pretty... touchy lately."

"What do you mean?" Denat shot back sharply. "I'm fine."

"Okay, you fine," Poertena agreed. "But you have to admit, you been pretty short temper lately."

"I am not short tempered," he insisted hotly. "What in nine hells are you talking about? When have I been short tempered?"

"Ummm... now?" the Pinopan replied easily. "And you nearly kill t'at Diaspran yesterday."

"He shouldn't have snuck up behind me! It's not my fault people go creeping around all the time!" Denat threw the cards down on their crate-card table and jerked to his feet. "I don't have to put up with this. You can just find somebody else to insult!"

"So," Julian asked as the Mardukan stalked away. "Did we start that, or were we right?"

"I t'ink you right," Poertena replied uneasily. "He didn' even insult me when he lef'. I t'ink we gots a problem."

"Should we talk to Cord about it?"

"Maybe." The Pinopan rubbed his head. "Cord pretty wrap up wit' his girlfrien', though. Maybe I ask Denat later. He might cool down, decide to talk. It could work."

"Better not let Cord hear you call her his 'girlfriend,' or Denat will be the least of your worries."

They had managed to secure better clothing at a small textile shop without even a single additional disaster. And at an herbalist, they had found some mysterious emollients. Not far from the herbalist's, Pedi had surreptitiously directed Cord's attention to two small swords, which he'd also purchased. These transactions had been relatively simple, although the locals were notably hostile towards both of them.

With those minimal supplies collected, Cord had unilaterally headed back to their assigned quarters, forcing Pedi to follow. The Shin clearly would have liked to have spent more time in the massive, dusky market, but the shaman was sure that something else would set her off if he allowed her to. She was the most difficult female it had ever been his misfortune to encounter. Smart, yes, but very headstrong, and unable or unwilling to rein in her temper. She'd shown some capacity to back up that temper, on the Lemmar ship, and the swords—which she had indicated she had some knowledge of—were to test whether or not she was all talk.

Back at their quarters, she snatched the packages—including the dual swords and the mysterious wasen—and disappeared into her private room. They had been scheduled to test their martial skills against one another after their shopping trip, but Cord found himself cooling his heels for some time while the sun glow moved across the clouds. In fact, the bright, pewter-gray light had swept low in the west before Pedi reemerged.

Her appearance had... changed.

The rough, dark rims at the bases of her horns were gone, and the overall color of the horns had faded slightly, to an even yellower honey with just a touch of rust. The mystery of the emollients' purpose was also revealed, for her skin had developed an even finer coating of slime. The clothing turned out to be a set of baggy pants and a vest that draped to her midsection, connecting at the base, but leaving all four arms free. The overall color was a light scarlet, with yellow embroidery along the edges of the vest and at the cuffs and waistline of the pantaloons.

"Do you like it?" Pedi stepped through the door and twirled lightly on one foot.

Cord looked at her for a moment and thought about saying what he thought. But only for a moment. Instead, he controlled his initial reaction and cleared his throat.

"You are my asi, my benan, not my bond-mate. Your appearance matters only in that it does not bring disfavor upon me or my clan. Your skill with those puny swords matters far more."

Pedi stopped in mid-pirouette with her back turned to him. A moment passed, then she leaned through the door and picked up her "puny swords." She turned back to Cord and took a guard position.

"Are you ready?" she asked with a certain, dangerous levelness of tone.

"Would you care to warm up or stretch first?" Cord asked, still leaning on his spear.

"You don't get a chance before a battle," Pedi replied, and, without another word, charged him with one's sword held in a port guard, and the other stretched out before.

Cord had been expecting it, but he'd forgotten how fast she was, so his first reaction was to put the spearhead in position to spit her. It would have been a formidable obstacle, even with its leather binding. But after a bare hesitation, he checked that and brought the base of the spear around in a tripping blow, instead.

Her reaction made him wonder if she'd been actively courting the spitting maneuver. As the spear shaft swung around, she leapt lightly into the air, brought the left sword down to barely make contact with the spear. The right-hand sword licked around to meet it, and then she twisted through a midair course correction that left her with both sword hafts locked onto the spear.

A wrist twisted, a foot kicked lightly, and the spear was very nearly wrenched out of his hands. But the shaman had experienced a similar technique, albeit years before, and twisted his body through the disengage. He felt every lengthy year of his age as creaky muscles responded unwillingly to the move, but it seemed that Pedi had never dealt with the disengage before.

The spear shaft snaked through three dimensions, one of which pressed painfully on her wrists and nearly forced her to drop one of the swords. At the end of the maneuver, she was left leaning sideways and badly off balance, while Cord flipped his spear around and went back to peacefully resting on it.

Looking as if he had never moved at all.

"That was interesting," he said brightly, trying very hard not to let his earlier momentary lack of composure show. "Why don't we try the next one a little slower, so we can see where we went wrong?"

Pedi rubbed her wrist and looked at the shaman very thoughtfully.

"I'm not sure who needs the benan more," she said after a moment, with a gesture of rueful astonishment.

"I have been studying weapons since long before you were born," Cord pointed out serenely. "When I was your age, before the fall of Voitan, I was sent to the finest schools in the land, and I have studied and sought new ways ever since. The way of the sword—or the spear—is one of constant study. It is rich every day in new insights. Learn that, and you will be dangerous. Forget it, and we'll both be dead."

"Aargh!" Pedi groaned. "It wasn't pleasant to be caught by the Fire Priests. It wasn't pleasant to be shipped off to Strem as a Servant. It wasn't even pleasant to be captured by the Lemmar on my way there. But at least, at my darkest moment, I was able to console myself with the thought that I was finally rid of armsmasters!"

Cord wheeled around and stared out the window towards the mountains. It was a rather silly and dramatic pose, and he knew it, but he didn't want her to see his amusement. Or the fact that... parts of him had just surged.

Not the Season, he thought. Please, not that. That would be... bad.

"Whatever your life and destiny before," he said finally, solemnly, careful to keep any humor—or anything else—out of his voice, "your life and destiny now are to become an armsmaster."

So, as Julian would say, put that in your pipe and smoke it.

"I know that," Pedi said, with a gesture of resignation. "But that doesn't mean I have to like it."

"Perhaps you don't, but..." Cord began, only to pause, looking more intently out of the window.

"But what?" she asked.

"But I have a question for you."

"Yes?" She looked down at her outfit. "Is something wrong?"

"I'd rather hoped you could tell me that," Cord said, gesturing out the window. "You are from here, after all. So tell me, do the mountains often smoke?"

It was nearly noon, yet the only light in the room came from oil lamps as the human and Mardukan staff and senior commanders trickled into the room. Pahner looked towards the window, listening to the slow, atonal chanting that echoed through the darkened streets, and shook his head.

"I have the funny feeling that this is not a good thing," he muttered.

"They must have these eruptions on a fairly regular basis," O'Casey pointed out as she flopped onto one of the pillows. She pulled a strand of hair away from her face and grimaced at the gritty ash that covered it. "At least we know now why they wear clothing here. Getting this stuff out of a Mardukan's mucous must be an almost impossible task."

Roger pulled up his own cushion without even glancing behind him as the various entities who had taken to following him jockeyed for position. It usually ended up with Cord to one side, Pedi stretched in the same general direction, and Dogzard curled up on top of Pedi. But for the fact that every one of them was, in his or her own way, heavily armed, it would have been humorous.

"I wish we had a better handle on their religion," he said seriously, listening to the same chant. "I can't figure out if this is a celebration or a funeral."

"The Krath Fire Priests consider this a dark omen of their gods," Pedi said. "Many Servants will be ingathered."

"More slave raids, then," Pahner said.

"Yes. And a great gathering." The Shin made a gesture of absolute disgust. "The Fire-loving bastards."

"T'e merchants have clam up," Poertena said. "Even t'e stuff we already contract for not getting delivered."

"How are we fixed?" Kosutic asked. "Can we hang on until things clear up, or do we need to talk to the Powers That Be?"

"We got ten days or so supply," the Pinopan said without consulting any of his data devices. "And more on t'e ship. But if we have to cut out, we gots problem."

"We may be able to avoid that," O'Casey said. "I think that something's broken free in the council. Maybe it has something to do with the eruption—I don't know." She shrugged. "Whatever it is, we've received a message from the High Priest indicating that he's willing to meet with Roger under the conditions we prescribed. That is, that Roger will not have to recognize the High Priest's sovereignty."

"I thought the council was more or less in control," Pahner said. "If that's true, what's the point of meeting with the High priest?"

"The council is in day-to-day control," O'Casey admitted. "But if the High Priest pronounces that we're free to travel, the council will have to accede to that."

"When is this thing?" Fain asked. "And who's going to accompany Roger?"

"Me, for one, obviously," O'Casey said with a faint smile. "After that, the guest list will be up to Captain Pahner. Who, I trust, will pack it with suitably lethal individuals."

"Kosutic in charge," Pahner said. "Despreaux and a fire team from her squad. Turn in your smoke poles and draw bead rifles. We've got enough ammo left for almost a full unit of fire for your team, and some of these people may recognize Imperial weapons when they see them. If they do, I want them to know we cared enough to send the very best. Fain, one squad from your infantry and one squad of cavalry. You, Rastar, and Honal stay back, though."

"I'll send Chim Pri," Rastar said. "It will get him off the boats."

"Where is this going to take place, Eleanora?" Kosutic asked.

"At the High Temple. That's the one all the way up at the crest of the ridge."

"I wish we knew whether or not this is a good sign," Roger said.

"I think it's a good one," O'Casey told him. "If there hadn't been some movement on their front, it wouldn't make sense to arrange a meeting with the High Priest."

"We'll see," Pahner said. "It could also be because they have such bad news to give us that the High Priest is the only appropriate spokesman to break it to us, you know. Rastar, how are the civan?"

"They don't like the ash," the Prince of Therdan said. "Neither do I, for that matter, and their hides are a lot more resistant to it than my slime is! Other than that, they're fine. They've recovered from their sea voyage, at least, and we're getting them back into training."

"Okay." Pahner nodded. "I don't know how this meeting is going to work out, but we're getting to the end of the time we can afford to spend here. I want everyone to quietly and not too obviously get ready to move out on a moment's notice. We'll have an inspection and get everything packaged for that. Eleanora, when is this meeting?"

"Tomorrow, just after the dawn service."

"Right. We'll schedule the inspection for the same time."

"Does all this martial ardor indicate that you think I'm going to have problems at the meeting?" Roger asked, unconsciously tapping the butt of one of his pistols.

"I hope not," Pahner said. "I'll go further—if I thought you were going to, I wouldn't let you go. Period. We haven't gotten this far taking things for granted, but I don't expect this to be the sort of problem you'll need a pistol for. Nobody's going to call a visiting Imperial nobleman and his bodyguards together with the High Priest of the entire satrap for a shooting match, at any rate."

"Nah," O'Casey agreed with a smile. "Heads of state are too valuable to use for targets or get caught in cross fires. That's what lower-level functionaries are for.