Trident's Forge, page 18
The humans, by and large, seemed to handle the morning chill with less hassle than Kexx’s people. Several of them were already wide awake and busy preparing their large morning meal. That was something else about the humans: they ate a lot. Kexx had watched tiny Mei put down enough food in one sitting to keep zer own belly full for the entire day. And they did it three or four times every day. How they managed not to puff out like a startled hala fish, ze had no idea.
One of them looked up from chopping tubers and nodded a greeting as Kexx passed. Ze’d spent enough time in the shelter to be a common sight.
“Benson?” Kexx asked the young human. Some of them had started to learn G’tel, especially the children. But none of them had yet risen to Mei’s proficiency, so it was best to keep things simple. The youth got up and took Kexx’s hand without hesitation and tugged zer toward the back of the shelter.
Lying in a hammock sagging near the floor and dangling an arm, Benson snored in blissful oblivion. Zer comfort ended when the young human yanked off zer blanket and poked Benson in the back. Benson jerked awake like a startled dux’ah, tumbled out of the hammock and landed hard on the ground in a pile. The younger human found this immensely entertaining and laughed freely.
Clutching zer head with one hand, Benson grabbed the youth’s ankle and growled.
“Coffee. Now,” ze said.
The youth shook zer head. “No coffee.”
Benson moaned. “Tea, then.”
Still giggling, the smaller human headed back for the food prep area. Kexx looked down and offered Benson a hand up.
“I’m fine down here just now, thanks.”
“Benson. We must begin our work.”
Benson sat up slowly, then crossed zer legs and cradled zer head in zer hands. “After my tea.”
“Are you ill?”
“I’m hung over is what I am.”
Kexx grimaced. “Hung over what?”
“Don’t you people get hangovers?” Kexx shrugged uncomprehendingly. “How lucky for you. Yes, I’m ill.”
“Our work cannot wait.”
“It will wait until I’ve drank my tea,” Benson said irritably. “Then I’m all yours.” The youth returned with a steaming hot cup of water with dried leaves floating in it. Benson held out his hand without looking up and gripped the offered cup. Ze held the cup under zer… nose, Mei had called it, and inhaled. “Ah, oolong. That’ll do the trick.” Ze swirled the cup around as the water within slowly stained black, then took a long drink.
Kexx waited patiently for zer new companion to finish zer tea. Benson threw zer head back and drained what was left from the cup, then spat the dregs back into the cup.
“Mmm, good stuff.” Benson picked a leaf off of zer tongue and flicked it away. “Wish they had filters, though. Care for a cup?”
“No, it hurts my stomach,” Kexx said. “Benson, I think we should speak my language while we work.”
“Agreed,” Benson answered in G’tel after a slight pause. “Where to first, Kemosabe?”
Kexx stumbled over the last word. “I don’t know what that means.”
“Sorry. It’s from… actually, I have no idea where it’s from. It just means friend from another land, I think.”
Benson rose on shaky legs. Kexx held down a hand to steady zer. Benson took it. “Your hand’s freezing,” ze said. “You should warm up by the fire.”
“I’m fine. I think we should start in the forest where I first ran into the intruders.”
Benson shook zer head. “That can wait. The prisoners have been cooling their, whatever the back of your feet are called, for long enough now. We can start sweating them for info.”
“What prisoners?”
Benson looked at zer confused. “The dozen invaders we captured yesterday, remember? Blacked-out skin, disagreeable attitude?”
“The intruders are all dead, Benson.”
Benson stared at zer for a long, uncomfortable moment.
“You killed them,” ze said finally with a bite in zer voice not even Kexx could miss. It wasn’t a question. It was an accusation.
“They were allowed to kill themselves, Benson, as is their right as defeated warriors.”
Benson threw up zer arms in frustration. “Great!” ze shouted in human. “I’m working with a samurai squid.” Ze took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. That was rude,” ze said, switching back to G’tel.
Kexx didn’t know what “samurai squid” meant, but assumed it wasn’t intended to be complimentary. “I’m surprised, Benson. You had no reservations about killing yesterday.”
“That was combat. Our lives were in danger.”
“Our lives are still in danger, Ki-mo-sa-bee.” Kexx sounded out the new word to try it on for size. “The gathering happened in our village. The other villages will stain the ground for the deaths of their emissaries. Either with the blood of those responsible…”
“Or the blood of your village,” Benson finished for zer quietly.
Kexx nodded.
“We could have found out a lot quicker if there was someone left to ask,” Benson protested. “Can we at least have a look at the bodies?”
“They are probably being prepared by the elders by now.”
“Prepared for what?”
“Their pyres, of course,” Kexx said as if explaining it to a child. Which, ze supposed, ze was. Benson had only been here for a halfhand of days. The fact ze could speak the language so effectively made it difficult to remember that ze was still a newcomer.
“Where? Show me where.”
“What do you expect to find?”
“No way to know until we get there. Hurry.”
Kexx shrugged. “Follow me.”
With Benson trailing, Kexx reached the small building near the edge of the village where the bodies of the returning were prepared to meet Xis once more. Business for the two elders inside was rather more robust than usual. Outside, two lines of the returning had been carefully laid out on the ground. One line had already gone through the rites, while the others waited patiently for their turn on the table. Very patiently.
The lines had no regard for who was who. Kexx recognized two of zer friends lying next to two of the invaders who’d killed them, their skin still cloaked in black. Death had united them all. Benson knelt down to inspect one of the returning that awaited preparation. “I recognize this one.” Ze pointed to the significant hole running through the body’s left eye. “I think it’s the one I killed outside the temple.”
“With a fishing trident.”
“How did you know that?”
“Words spread.”
“Yeah, well, it was the only thing I could find. Can we get some light out here?”
Kexx grabbed the body’s feet and nodded at the door. “Let’s take zer inside.”
They ambled with the awkward load through the doorway and into the small preparation room.
“Truth-digger,” Chak looked up from zer work, surprised and annoyed by the interruption. “You can’t be here now.”
“You know I can, Chak. We have to inspect this body before you perform the rites.”
“We?” Chak looked past Kexx and saw Benson standing at the other end of the body, holding its arms, and promptly turned bright blue with incandescent rage. Chak pointed an accusing finger at the human. “What is that defiler doing here?”
“Defiler?” Benson asked. “That’s a little strong, don’t you think?”
Chak’s finger hadn’t budged. “You shattered the Emissary’s Sanctuary!”
“’Sanctuary?’” Kexx asked mockingly. “You mean that shoddy dome we built four days ago?”
“And saved your life in the process, if I remember right,” Benson shot back at Chak. Kexx would have preferred to handle it zerself. Benson had proven to be… less than diplomatic since zer arrival in the village.
“And as if that wasn’t bad enough, ze threatened an elder in Xis’s womb during a birthing ceremony. Namely me!”
That one carried a little more weight.
“Yeah, you’ve got me there,” Benson said more quietly. “It was a misunderstanding. I’m sorry. Won’t happen again.”
“Ze has no right to be in here. I demand ze leaves immediately.”
“Humans were killed in the attack too, Chak. They are back in their village being prepared for their own returns even now.”
“As if Xis would have them!”
Kexx was known throughout the village for zer calm temper and respectful nature, but Chak was testing even zer patience. Zer skin grew darker, its patterns hardening into jagged edges.
“That was ugly, elder, and does not become someone of your position. The humans fought with us. You are alive to prepare our dead because of them, and they have just as much cause to dig for the truth as we do. You will not deny them the opportunity.”
“I can and will. You know the rites, Kexx. I have to finish preparing the returning before sunrise. The sky already glows with morning.”
“Then we will be quick, and we will help you finish.”
Chak pointed at Kexx. “You will help me finish.” The finger then stabbed back at Benson. “Ze will wait outside.”
Kexx bowed and let a soft glow return to zer skin in a conciliatory gesture. “As you wish, elder.”
Without another word, Chak set down zer anointing cloth and stormed out of the room with a huff.
“Quickly,” Kexx said. “Get zer up on the table.”
Benson obliged, then tipped zer head toward the door. “Kind of a hard ass, that one.”
“Ass” was new to Kexx’s vocabulary, but the meaning seemed obvious enough in context. “In fairness, you have been somewhat disruptive since your arrival, Benson.”
“I get that a lot.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Kexx motioned at the body lying on the table in the torch light. “We’re here now. What are we doing?”
Benson walked around the body once, stopping here and there to inspect the fingers, a wound, the returning’s black coating. Abruptly, ze stopped and stood straight up.
“Well, I have no idea what I’m looking at. I need you to tell me what you see, Kexx.”
“A body?”
“Go deeper. Explain everything you see. Walk me through this like I’m a child.”
Kexx laughed. “I think I can do that.”
“Yes, yes. Laugh it up. But we’re on the clock.”
“Clock?”
Benson grimaced. “Time. We’re low on time.”
Kexx nodded. Time, humans were obsessed with it, always checking it, labeling it, and cutting it up as if they could take a knife to something they couldn’t even hold in their hands. Kexx had trouble with the whole concept. Cuut already defined the year, Varr’s passings broke up the year, and Xis’s spin punctuated the days. What further divisions were necessary?
Still, Cuut really would rise soon, so ze took to the task, looking over every detail of the corpse and explaining what ze saw to zer new apprentice. “Height and size are on the large side, but normal for a warrior from any of the villages or nomads.”
“Nomads?”
Kexx nodded. “There are tribes in the west and south that never settled in villages. They wander the plains, hunting wild herds.”
“Are they violent?”
Kexx flickered. “Usually not, but in times of drought they have been known to raid our fields and steal from our herds.”
“But nothing of the size of yesterday?”
“It’s not just the size, it’s the coordination and goals. They steal food to survive, they don’t come into our villages to make war. Besides, I actually spoke to their commander in the forest. Ze spoke much too well to be a nomad.”
“You actually spoke to him?”
“Zer,” Kexx corrected. It was a strange affectation. Mei had shared it in the beginning and took many days to break zerself of the habit.
“Sorry, zer,” Benson said. “Could you tell where they were from?”
“No, I didn’t recognize the accent.”
Ze returned to the body and rubbed off some of the black coating the invader had used to cover zer skinglow, tasting it on zer fingers. It was smoky and bitter.
“Charcoal pigment, mixed with plant sap as a binder.”
“Do you recognize the plant?” Benson asked.
Kexx rubbed the pigment on zer tongue to try and refine the flavor, but shook zer head and spat it out. “No, I don’t. Very bitter, I doubt it’s edible.” Kexx moved down the rest of the body. There was very little to see. The invader wore no necklaces or bracelets that could give away any clues to zer village of origin, probably by design. Ze reached the end of the table and inspected the returning’s feet.
“Ah, that settles it.”
Benson perked up. “Settles what?”
Kexx picked up the foot and bent the leg forward so Benson could get a good look at the bottom of the returning’s toes. Oddly, the human covered zer mouth and shut zer eyes. Ze almost looked sick.
“What’s wrong?”
“Sorry,” Benson said. “It’s just when a human leg bends like that, something went very badly.”
“What, like this?” Kexx rotated the knee joint around its full range until Benson turned away.
“Hilarious. Do you mind?”
“Sorry.” Kexx gripped the lower leg and squeezed hard, pulling on the tendons and splaying open the foot’s four toes. “If you look closely, you can see a pattern of wear and calluses on the skin.”
“I’ll take your word for it. What does it mean?”
“That our intruder here spent a lot of time walking on bare rock.” Kexx lifted zer own foot to illustrate the similar pattern. “It’s common among those who spend time on the road system or walking around on mudstone floors.”
“And the nomads don’t use your roads as trails?”
Kexx shook zer head. “No, they think the roads are unnatural, cursed.”
Benson stroked zer chin. “So villagers, then. That narrows it down to, what, two dozen different places?”
“Minus one. We can be sure they weren’t from our village, after all.”
“Not a huge help, in the end. Is there anything else you can tell me about the body?”
Kexx stood back and tried to take in the entire scene, searching out anything ze might have missed from being too close, but failed.
“No. They went to some effort to frustrate any truth-diggers.”
Benson leaned against the wall and crossed zer arms. “We should line everyone from the other villages up and ask them if they recognize any of the invaders’ bodies.”
“It’s already been done,” Kexx said. “Without result.”
“You think someone is lying?”
“I try not to dwell on what I can’t know,” Kexx said with a forced serenity.
The human seemed sympathetic. “So, where do we go next?”
Kexx took zer own spot leaning against the wall and considered their options. “I think once the light comes up, we go to the spot in the forest where I found them. From there, we can pick up their trail and see how far we can follow it.”
Benson crossed his arms and smiled. “Outstanding. Do we have time for breakfast?”
Eighteen
The trail ended less than a kilometer outside the village’s halo trees. Or, more precisely, scattered like leaves thrown into a strong wind, branching off in a hundred seemingly random directions. Benson stood back and watched quietly as his Atlantian partner tried in vain to follow each new trail, tasting the air and ground with his outstretched fingers. But with each dead end and double-back, it became apparent even to Benson’s untrained eye that Kexx’s body language grew frustrated.
“I don’t understand,” Kexx said. “If this was their escape route, it would make sense. But these are the tracks they used to come in. It’s like broken pottery shards all jumped up off the floor and made a pot.”
“That’s an impressive level of coordination,” Benson said. “For all of them to arrive from different places at the same spot at the same time, that’s no easy feat. Have you seen anything like this before?”
Kexx sat down heavily among the rows of yulka stalks before answering. “Among hunting parties converging on prey, but not on this scale.”
Benson sat next to him and crossed his legs. “What about the warriors who hid among our guests and attacked us from inside the village? Someone must have noticed them sneak in.”
“I already thought of that. They were there the whole time. They came in with the rest of the envoys. No one recognized them, but everyone just assumed they were from one of the other villages.”
Benson laughed an angry little laugh. It was exactly what he’d warned Valmassoi about. Too many bodies and no way to run backgrounds on anybody. It wasn’t like the Atlantians had an extensive ID database to work with. It was a nightmare scenario from a security and crowd control standpoint, yet they’d walked straight into it, whistling in the wind without a care in the world.
He’d opposed the presence of Atwood’s people initially because he believed an armed escort, especially one with firepower beyond even the understanding of their hosts, sent entirely the wrong message for what was supposed to be a diplomatic expedition. But now he had to admit the truth; not only had Atwood’s detachment been the only thing that prevented the entire village from being sacked, but not even their crushing technological superiority had been enough to prevent a complete massacre.
They’d all been overconfident. The image of Atwood’s ravaged throat would remain a potent reminder for him personally. She’d been tough, a competitor. She was smart and aggressive and knew how to use her small size to its greatest advantage. If Madison Atwood could be brought down, anyone could.
Benson absently stroked the top of his rifle, knowing full well that it held the power to take dozens of lives with the ammunition he had, but that it was a price the enemy they faced was only too eager to pay. If even a handful of warriors remained standing when his gun ran dry, nothing would save him.
