Not that she seemed to have made much of an impression on the man. He surveyed me from black hair to bare toes, then the faintest quirk of his upper lip into a sneer of contempt.
I stopped. The girls stopped behind me.
A couple quick, graceful steps and Dhana took up position at my side, her breathing short, sharp, and annoyed.
“You,” the man drawled, “are Cherene Jennet Sherwood?”
“I go by that name,” I said, instantly boiling by the way he’d emphasized the ‘you’ — like he couldn’t believe his eyes. “Why, is it yours, too?”
He ignored the crack. (Later on I found out that indeed, he’d been on the receiving end of a generous helping of Dhana’s sarcasm.)
“We have a proposition to make,” the man said. His attitude made it clear he didn’t care what I decided.
Ordinarily that would have served as a warning. I mean, why come and offer something if you don’t really want to be accepted? If I’d looked beyond that, maybe things would have gone differently ... or not.
Anyway I didn’t.
“That’s nice,” I said in a sugary little-kid voice. Then, more normally, “Make it somewhere else. C’mon, girls.” I turned my back.
I’d taken about four steps when the creep gave a whistle that somehow managed to sound bored.
At once a whole gaggle of creeps — adults all, though some of them were youngish — efficiently ringed us, a couple from the trees and others from hiding places. I glanced at Dhana, who looked surprised. So, the creep had picked the time and place, huh? On our territory?
And without us knowing?
That was my first hint of real danger ahead. These weren’t uncertain Chwahir, their eyes magically enhanced to see in the Shadowland but clumsy out in the daylight, who didn’t know how to climb trees much less hide in one. These folk had all been well trained by someone.
I pulled my knife and whirled around — and because that slob with the feathered cap was smiling so smugly (he hadn’t bothered to move) I said loudly — with as much disgust as possible — ”I might have known.”
Meanwhile, his whistle-squad was slowly advancing, tightening the ring round us.
I took a couple running steps and leaped, catching hold of a tree branch. From the edge of my vision I saw a long arm reach to grab me, just an instant before I swung out of range. Tree-climbing we’re very good at; I swung, let go, flew, caught a branch just above where their leader still leaned.
Whoever was chasing me had misjudged my direction, and was further hampered by orders to grab-but-not-hurt, so I was able to swing my feet down and clop the leader creep on the side of the jaw, a hefty kick.
He hadn’t expected it — he hadn’t even looked up. He staggered, angry now. I laughed, even though my toes hurt, and reached for another branch. My plan was to drop out of grabbing range so I could get the girls into hand-holding reach and transfer us to safety — but I didn’t get that far.
The man drew his sword, and took a swing at me. I kicked wildly, struggling too fast to get out of his range, suddenly afraid I was about to be sliced into cutties.
The flat of the blade thwacked me squarely across my stomach.
“Foof!” I dropped onto the grass below, a hilt hit behind my ear, and that was that.
Two
I started waking up when someone dumped me onto a chair. A hard wooden chair.
My cheek leaned against a chair back, which hurt, and the back of my head and neck throbbed like a herd of horses had stomped me. Without opening my eyes or moving, I did a quick assessment of myself. No other hurts besides the back of my skull, good — bad, my knife, and belt, were gone.
I became aware of voices. Men’s voices. They were arguing. Or one was. The other was too soft and flat-toned to ascribe any kind of emotion to. They spoke in another language — but of course I understood it. Clair had performed the Universal Language spell on our medallions as soon as she’d mastered the magic.
“... any kind of finesse? If I’d wanted them half dead I would have said so.” That was the soft voice.
“Your Mearsiean brat gave me trouble.” I knew that drawl.
The soft voice uttered a soft laugh. “That fat lip serves you right. How’d she get past your guard?”
“Kick. From above.” The drawling voice was sharp with annoyance now.
More laughs, quick ones, hardly more than a breath. Whoever Soft Voice was, he didn’t have any more sympathy for Feather Cap than I had.
Then: “They’re stirring. Out.” Then the sound of footfalls, and a door closed.
I peeked open an eye, to find myself looking directly into a man’s face. He stared at me with as much curiosity as I stared at him — which surprised me so much I forgot to fake sleep, and opened both eyes to meet that interested gaze.
Light blue eyes, framed by black lashes, regarded me with no expression I could fathom. Something about the shape of those eyes was vaguely familiar. Not enough to recall anyone, but to draw attention to the odd shape. The underlid curved in such a way that the blue part didn’t touch, like most people’s. There was a rim of white underneath, which made his eye-expressions hard to read. His mouth was tight at the corners, also making it hard to read.
The rest of him was ordinary enough. Black curly hair worn short, medium height for a man, slight build, plain clothes: white shirt, dark trousers, no weapons.
He didn’t speak immediately, and neither did I. We just stared at each other like that for the space of a few breaths, while my head throbbed, and then the man moved away.
A soft snort at one side reminded me of the girls. Trying not to move my head, I eyeballed the room. We were in a kind of parlor. The room was absolutely plain, wood walls painted a bland light green, a single window, and wooden floors unvarnished. We’d all been dumped into chairs, awake or not; Diana and Dhana both looked groggy, and Irene rubbed her temples. No one had her knife belt, I noticed, but we didn’t seem to be in any kind of a dungeon — at least, I’d never seen one with planed wood flooring and green-washed walls. So what was this, some kind of interview room?
And who was that man watching us all like he knew us?
I said in Mearsiean, “Irene, you okay?”
“Yeah,” she said, still rubbing and wincing.
“Seshe?”
“Here. I think.”
“F’line?”
“Dead and gone.”
“Diana?”
“Alive.”
“Gwen?”
“37% of the pieces here.”
“Get cut?” I asked, turning to look. Waves of headache fogged my vision.
“Yup,” Gwen said, wincing as she held up her arm. “I fell and sliced myself with my own knife, just like a clod — ”
“Just like a Chwahir,” Faline butted in, joking as always.
“ — but I’m okay.”
“Dhana?”
“Here. I think. But don’t bet on it,” Dhana said crossly.
“Hey, CJ,” Sherry said, her big blue eyes rounder than ever.
Those and her cherubic face and bouncy curls make her seem like some grownup’s idea of the model kiddie, but despite her angelic demeanor she has an endless taste for practical jokes, the sillier the better. In fact, I don’t think she or Faline are capable of taking life “seriously” — which is why they are so much fun to have around.
Anyway, she said, “I’m gonna ask a stupid question. You know I have to ask it every time we get splorched into some kind of mess, just to get things started right. So we’ll win.”
“Go ahead,” I said, feeling a small urge to laugh, despite my headache and the weird situation. Only Sherry could figure that silliness would actually guarantee our safety. “I’ve got my sarcastic answer all ready.”
“Okay. Here goes.” Sherry groaned realistically, then moaned, “Where ARE we?”
“Right ... about ... here,” I snarled.
“Oh, what a relief to know!” Sherry snickered, and then added, “By the w
ay, who’s this pop-eyed floob watching us? Can’t be a Mearsiean.”
“Dunno. Hasta be with that batbrain with the green feather. Since we’re all here — wherever that is — and since I don’t think we’re under any dark magic wards, why don’t you all move close to me, and we’ll dust outa this dump. But I wish I could first blast that smirk-faced gaboon — ”
“Before you continue,” the man with the blue eyes said in slightly accented Mearsiean, “you should know that I can understand everything you say.”
Why did I think he didn’t understand us? Probably because most adults never would have let us get away with all that foolery. Also, my head hurt like crazy, and my thoughts were not exactly clear.
But now we all turned to look at the man, who stood by the door, watching. His attitude was patient and his expression interested.
“Nosy, ain’t he,” Irene snarled.
The rest of us were silent.
The man said, after a longish pause, “Did you understand the proposition we have for you?”
“Never heard it,” I said, not even trying to sound polite. If they’d asked before sticking me wherever this was, maybe I’d at least have tried for neutrality.
The man seemed slightly surprised, and I hoped that this meant Fatfaced Feathernose would be in trouble, if that had been the whole point of his polluting our forest. “Stay here. Rest a few moments,” the man said. “Let me remind you that I’ll still hear everything you say. If I didn’t know about you, I wouldn’t waste the time.” His tone was too flat for it to be an adult buttering up the stupid little kiddies. Too matter-of-fact. Like he really had somehow studied up on us — a thought that gave me the stomach-wheemies.
He added in exactly the same tone, “And you can’t dust out of this dump, either. It’s protected by a magician — one of the most knowledgeable in the world. Your access to your own spells has been blocked for the time being, and there are general protective wards over the compound. Keep these things in mind.” He went out the single door, leaving it wide open.
“Well, what does the healer do when the sickies are all croaking?” Dhana asked, chin in hand.
“Hope. Watch for recovering symptoms,” I said glumly, after trying a spell — only to find a kind of white space in my memory where all my magic knowledge usually resided. This wasn’t just a simple ward, it was messing with my mind, indeed a most sinister indication that the man’s pet sorcerer was just as strong as promised. Trying to force myself to remember the simplest spell just made my headache pang.
“C’ja toss?” Seshe asked, glancing at the ring on my hand.
I looked down, feeling intense longing. If I took off the ring and threw it against something, Clair would appear — but then would her magic be blocked as well? And would that leave the country open to — what?
“Nay,” I said, speaking in the same sort of half-code. “Don’t want to yank the superintendent and risk letting some insanitic into the Mad House.”
“So the sickies lie around ’n’ wait?” Dhana made a face.
“Until the healer knows what they have — and where they got it. Hafta experiment,” I said, grimacing. The only hope we had was that these unknown adults weren’t really listening to us, because no one who knew anything about us would be fooled for half a breath.
Sherry ran to the window and looked out. “This has got to be the most boring dump I’ve ever seen. Nothing out there but dirt and a wall.”
“Better than a Chwahir dungeon,” Diana muttered.
“Well, yeah, except you don’t need a dungeon to klunk people,” Irene snarled.
Seshe murmured, “No one’s made a threat yet. Let’s not help ’em by starting ourselves.”
One look at Gwen’s scared face and I nodded firmly. The boring green room was neutral. Things could go either way — which meant one could still hope that we’d be eating dinner in the Junky before long, commenting lengthily and with creative freedom about the stupidities of adults.
The dark-haired man returned just then.
“Come along, Cherene,” he said. No title — which was odd, since he certainly knew who I was. Not that I care, which I don’t, but I was looking for, oh, signs of normal adult behavior. Adults tend to really care about titles and stuff. But then so can kids.
Anyway, I hesitated, not knowing if it was better to stay or to leave the girls. Then I remembered that I had no access to my magic. If anything happened to them I couldn’t do much to save them.
I saw no threatening hardware in the man’s hands or even at his belt, so I slid off my chair, figuring at least I was likely to find out what was going on. And hopefully without too much more nastiness.
I flipped a wave to the girls, who watched with varying expressions as I followed the man into a short hall painted the same neutral green, and through another door to a plain room much like the first, this one furnished with a battered old desk and a few chairs, and a window on the side.
The man sat down behind the desk and I sat on the chair farthest away.
“I presume you’d like to know why you’re here before I begin with our goals. Am I right?”
“Didn’t say otherwise.” I crossed my arms firmly. His accent — so slight — sent warning zaps into my achy head.
“Good. We’ve observed you for a long time. There are a number of youths in the organization, though none who can work magic. This had presented some problems. We did look through Mearsies Heili just after your young queen — Clevarlineh, is that right?”
He waited for corroboration.
“Yes,” I said unwillingly — as if her formal name was any kind of secret. She didn’t use it much, which meant this crackaloon had really done some digging on us. Euw.
“After her accession, but I did not see you, nor was there any information about you. Since that time the case has been altogether different. Yet we cannot find out where you were born — and if you do not wish to tell me, it doesn’t matter. Backgrounds are not important here. The important thing is that you meet certain criteria, among which are: you know magic but are not a ruler, and you meet our standards for achievement. Therefore you — and your compatriots — are here to be recruited into the organization.”
“We want to go home, that’s what we want to do.”
The man got up and went to the single window, and while he looked out, he said, “I hoped to avoid pointing out the alternative choices, but perhaps it’s as well. Come here.”
I hesitated.
The man turned his head, looking slightly impatient. “Come here. I’m not going to hit you over the head. You need to see something before you choose.”
So I walked reluctantly over and joined him at the window.
“Look.” He lifted a hand, then clasped both his behind him.
I looked out the window. This office was at the front of the building; outside lay a dirt street. I could see in one direction a hard packed dirt courtyard of considerable size. A few other buildings were in sight, all single-story, plain, and in the farthest distance a high wall.
Straight across the street from the office I stood in was another blank-fronted structure, with two windows, both of which were barred. On either side of the door stood guards armed with swords and crossbows.
Crossbows. Not even Chwahir used those things, except when they were embarking on a big war.
“That’s a prison,” the man said. “Make no mistake about that. No mistake exists to those inside. We ask few to join us. Those who choose not to are sent there, and after a time, if they still refuse, the alternative is death. Those stupid enough to refuse to be part of my plans have to die, for as yet this is still a secret organization. None leave here who are not loyal.”
Now I was getting scared.
“I have no tolerance for stupidity,” the man went on to say. “Stupid people, or ugly people.”
And that was my first hint that the man standing next to me was not only up to something I’d hate, he was insane. Ugly people?
I was still trying to figure this out (like what was their goal, to establish a prettiness code for Sartorias-deles?) when he said, “There are three individuals inside the jail who have come to the end of their term of reflection. Your decision today will affect their lives; perhaps, if you join, they will during the course of another period of reflection see the wisdom of cooperation. One of them is of particular interest due to his skills. I really expected better of him, for a number of reasons, including the fact that I hate waste.”
“So who are these people?” I asked, thinking of the girls all together in the room next down the hall. He couldn’t mean one of them.
“One of them is a cousin to your queen. Puddlenose? Puddlenose. A strange sort of a name.”
“It’s not a name so much as an insult,” I muttered numbly. “Chwahir idea of a joke.”
“Yes, I thought he might be that boy. I’d begun to doubt. Now I understand that it wasn’t coincidental that they were all together. The second is his traveling companion, ah ...”
“Christoph?” I couldn’t help it. My voice squeaked.
“That’s it. The third, the one with superlative skills, is known only as Rel the Traveler.” The man looked down at me, his manner one of waiting.
I turned my gaze away from those unblinking blue eyes to the prison, my hands clammy. “Oh,” I said, my head buzzing weirdly.
Between the headache and the horror I’d just heard, my mind was limping like a centipede with one leg. At least, I couldn’t speak — and I scarcely heard it when the man said abruptly, “You can stay here and think it over,” as he led the way back down the hall not to the girls, but to a small windowless room with a door that locked behind me.
There I was left, to sit on an empty storage box in the dark.
o0o
The time passed slowly and miserably, and I’m not going to fritter away much space on my thoughts. After I’d pocalubed everyone (including and especially Rel, for making me get stuck with deciding for his life), I tried to figure a way around the mess. Escape, obviously, but how? If only I could talk to the girls!