"Great."
Jasak's spine slumped just a bit, and he shook his head with a deep, heartfelt sigh.
"I'll go ahead and write. In the meantime, though, I don't think this is anything we need to discuss with Shaylar and Jathmar."
"Rahil, no!" Gadrial shook her head quickly, emphatically. "There's nothing anyone could do about it at this point, and there's absolutely no reason to worry them any more than they're already worried, Jasak!"
"That's exactly what I was thinking."
He pushed himself up out of the chair and took the hand which had rested on his shoulder in both of his. He held it for just a moment, smiling at her, and then drew himself up to his full towering height.
"And now that you've come and rousted me out of my hiding place up here, I've discovered that I'm actually hungry, after all. Would you care to come down to the dining compartment and share a cup of tea with me while I irritate the stewards into finding me something to eat?"
* * *
"Where did Gadrial go?" Shaylar asked.
"I think she went up to the observation dome looking for Jasak," Jathmar replied, looking up from the book in his lap. Then he straightened, and his eyebrows rose as he sensed her quiet consternation through their marriage bond. "Why?"
"I need—we need—to talk to her, Jath."
Shaylar's magnificent brown eyes were worried, and Jathmar laid the book aside and stood to take her in his arms.
"What is it?" he asked. She leaned back in his embrace, looking up at him, and he shrugged. "I've been able to tell that you were worrying about something for several days now, love. I just haven't been able to figure out what it was. I've been assuming you'd tell me about it in your own good time. So, is that time now?"
"I don't know if it's a 'good time' or not, but I'm afraid it is something we need to talk about," she said unhappily. "And, frankly, the fact that you haven't been able to figure out what's bothering me is part of the problem."
"What?" He couldn't quite keep an edge of hurt out of his tone, and she squeezed him quickly.
"That's not how I meant it!" she told him quickly. "What I meant was that we've always been so sensitive to one another because of our marriage bond that each of us has almost always been able to figure out what's bothering the other one, when something is. But this time, you haven't been, have you?"
"Well, I didn't want to push you . . ."
"Of course you didn't. But that's not my point, either."
"In that case, what is your point?" he asked with an unusual sense of frustration.
"It's about our bond, Jathmar," she said softly, her eyes anxious.
"What about it?" His expression was perplexed, and she sighed.
"You're not a Voice," she said. "Maybe that's why you haven't noticed."
"Noticed what?"
"It's weaker, Jath," she said very softly. "It's weaker."
"What?" He stared at her in consternation.
"It's weaker," she repeated. "Oh, it's not like it was when I had that head injury. It went away practically entirely then. This is different. It's . . . it's like we're losing some of our connections. When Voices Speak to one another, there are all sorts of side traces—emotional overtones, thoughts which aren't fully articulated but still transmitted, traces of memory. We're trained to filter those out when we're working to pass on messages, but they're always there. Well, marriage bonds are like that, especially when they are as strong as ours has always been."
"I've never really noticed it," he said slowly. "Not the way you're describing it right now, at least."
"Yes, you have," she disagreed. "But because you're not a Voice, you haven't realized they were all there, deepening and enriching the way our feelings flow back and forth. I am a Voice, though. I've always been aware of them. And now, for some reason, they're . . . weakening."
"What do you mean?" For the first time since the conversation had begun, he felt truly frightened by where she seemed to be going. "You mean we're losing our bond, somehow?"
"I don't know. I wish I did. All I know right now, though, is that we started losing those side trace elements a universe or two back. I don't have any idea why, and I don't have any idea how far it's likely to go. I've never heard of anything like it, so I don't have any way to hazard a guess about any of those questions."
"Then what do we do, love?" Jathmar hugged her tightly.
"I don't know," she repeated yet again. Then she looked up at him again.
"Have you tried using your Talent lately?"
"Not really," he replied slowly. "We haven't really stopped anywhere long enough for me to get a clear Look at things."
"Well, maybe the next time we stop, you should try," she suggested. "I'm the only Voice in this entire universe. I don't have anyone else to test my Talent with, but you don't need another Mapper."
"I don't think I like where you're going with this one, love," he said unhappily.
"I don't like where I might be going with it," she told him.
"Do you really think we should discuss it with Gadrial?" he asked her after a moment, trying to ignore the sick look in her eyes which he knew was mirrored in his own.
"I can't think of anyone else to discuss it with," Shaylar replied with a small, wan smile. "There's no one else with a Talent in the vicinity, that's for sure. She might have at least some suggestion about what could be causing it. Even if she can't come up with an answer, she might start us thinking in the direction of one."
"But then she'd also know about the problem."
Shaylar's eyes narrowed as she tasted the suddenly darker tinge of his emotions.
"Of course she would. Why?"
"Shaylar, I know Gadrial is our friend. And," he added a bit more reluctantly, "I know Jasak will do everything in his and his family's power to protect us. But unless these negotiations of theirs actually produce some sort of peaceful resolution, without anyone else getting killed, they're still going to be the enemy, love. Maybe not of us personally, but of Sharona. And both of them are honorable people who take their obligations seriously. If there is something happening to our marriage bond, to our Talents—possibly because we're spending so much time in proximity to someone who's Gifted, for all I know—do we really want to let the enemy know? Even if they would never do anything to hurt either of us, if it turns out to be something they could use against other people's Talents, you know that Jasak, for sure, and Gadrial almost equally for sure, would feel compelled to pass it along."
"But if we can't even ask Gadrial about it, then who can we ask?" Shaylar asked in a tiny voice.
"I don't know, love." Jathmar said softly. "I don't know."
'Chapter Nineteen
"So, how's your problem patient this week?" Regiment-Captain Namir Velvelig asked, turning from the office window through which he had been contemplating Fort Ghartoun's parade ground as Company-Captain Golvar Silkash completed the rest of the semi-weekly sick report.
"The esteemed Hadrign Thalmayr?" Fort Ghartoun's senior medical officer grimaced. Then he shrugged with a combination of helplessness, irritation, and smoldering frustration.
"The truth is, Sir," he continued, "that Tobis is more and more convinced the man's strongly Talented himself. Which, if you'll pardon my saying so, would be a dead waste of a Talent even if Thalmayr had the least clue of what a Talent was, in light of his total and invincible stupidity."
"Now, now, Silky," Velvelig admonished gently. "We've known one another a long time. There's no need for you to indulge in all these euphemisms to hide your true opinion of our guest."
Despite the sourness of his expression, Silkash made a sound that was halfway between a snort and chuckle. Any temptation towards amusement vanished quickly, however, and he shook his head.
"Honestly, Sir, Thalmayr is a disaster. I don't know what we're going to do with him. As nearly as Tobis—" Platoon-Captain Tobis Makree was the un-Talented Silkash's strongly Talented assistant surgeon "—and I can tell, he's convinced himself
our efforts to Heal him are actually some sort of insidious brainwashing or mental torture."
"You're saying he's a lunatic, as well as an idiot?"
"I wish I could dismiss it quite that easily, actually." Silkash shook his head again. "The thing is, the Talent he's got is sufficient, even without his having any idea in the world what it is, to throw up a mighty tough block. So he managed to tremendously limit what Tobis could do to control his pain. He even managed to limit the speed of the physical Healing we could encourage. And that same block made it all but impossible for Tobis to get through to those suicidal urges of his, and that—"
"Don't tell me," Velvelig interrupted. "Because he made it so hard to get through, Tobis had to adopt a brute force approach, and that only made things worse. Right?"
"Exactly right," Silkash agreed. "We didn't have a choice if we were going to keep him alive. We had to get through to him, so Tobis did . . . despite the fact that Thalmayr was fighting him every inch of the way. And despite the fact that Thalmayr's resistance really did turn the entire effort into something that could be readily mistaken by the uninformed for the 'mental torture' he thinks we were out to inflict in the first place!"
"Wonderful." Velvelig pursed his lips and looked back out the window.
Frankly, he could have gotten along just fine indefinitely without having Hadrign Thalmayr dumped on him. The regiment-captain wasn't much given to coddling weakness. That wasn't part of any Arpathian's cultural baggage, and in this case, Velvelig's contempt for Thalmayr's indescribably wretched performance as a military officer left him even less inclined to pity the Arcanan.
Which, unfortunately, did nothing to absolve him of his responsibility to see to it that the medical needs of any POW in his care were met.
Assuming the camel-fucking idiot will let us meet them! he thought sourly.
"Is there anything we can do about that situation?" he asked aloud.
"At this point?" Silkash shrugged. "Probably not. In fact, I've come to the conclusion that the best thing we can do, for the next few weeks, at least, is to pretty much leave him alone. Physically, he's close to fully recovered—or as close to it as a man who'll never walk again is going to get. The discomfort he's still experiencing can probably be treated by an herbalist almost as well as by a Healer at this point. We'll keep Tobis away from him for a while, see if he settles down if we stick to a purely physical nursing regimen."
"You really think that will help?"
"I don't know. Actually, I'm inclined to doubt it, as deeply as the idiot's dug himself in. I just don't see any other practical approach. If we can't find some way to get through to him soon, though, I'm going to recommend sending him on up-chain. Tobis is good, and with all due modesty, I'm a pretty fair surgeon myself, but let's not fool ourselves. There are hospitals closer to Sharona which are undoubtedly far better qualified to deal with something like this."
"I see."
Velvelig clasped his hands behind him and bounced gently up and down on the balls of his feet for a moment, then nodded to himself.
"Very well," he said, turning back from the window once more. "Write it up as a formal recommendation, and I'll approve it. To be honest, I'll be relieved to see his back!"
"I don't think you'll get an argument from anyone over in my shop," Silkash assured him.
"Good. In that case—"
"You wanted to see me, Sir?"
Velvelig broke off in midsentence as Senior-Armsman Folsar chan Tergis poked his head through the door behind the seated Silkash. The senior-armsman seemed blissfully unaware that interrupting his commanding officer was a military faux pas. Just as he seemed unaware that even the most rudimentary military courtesy would have required him to at least knock before opening the regiment-captain's office door unannounced.
Judging from his expression, Company-Captain Silkash obviously was aware of those minor points of military etiquette. Either that, or he'd just swallowed a spider, since he appeared to be experiencing some difficulty with his breathing.
Velvelig's own expression remained commendably grave—Arpathian septmen's faces tended to do that—despite the mental snort of amusement chan Tergis almost always managed to evoke. The senior-armsman might not have struck most people as particularly hilarious, but Velvelig had never been able to imagine anyone more unlike most people's concept of a professional military man. Which was fair enough; despite the "chan" in front of his surname, chan Tergis had never set out to pursue a military career.
The Ternathian was short (for a Ternathian, at any rate), sturdy, and undeniably plump. He had a round, guileless face, with blue eyes, both of which never quite seemed to focus on the same object at the same time. His straw-colored hair always looked at least a week overdue for a cutting, even if he'd only left the barber fifteen minutes before. And, unlike almost any other Voice Velvelig had ever known, chan Tergis had a distinct weakness for the bottle. Not only that, but on those occasions when he succumbed to that weakness, his normally pacific disposition tended to transform itself into a not particularly skilled but highly enthusiastic pugilism which rather reminded Velvelig of the old cliché about the bison in the glassworks.
It was those last two character traits which explained what he was doing in PAAF uniform and assigned to Fort Ghartoun. Inebriation had played a major role in getting his signature onto the enlistment form in the first place, and a series of less than felicitous encounters with various MPs in a wide selection of drinking establishments had led him to assignments like Fort Ghartoun, located about as far from Sharona as it was possible to get.
Yet despite his character flaws, which the gods knew were legion, he'd retained his noncom's rank for two reasons. First, when he was sober (which, to be fair, was most of the time), he was as hard-working, punctual, and reliable as anyone could ask. Second, despite the effect prolonged abuse of alcohol normally had on any Talent, chan Tergis' Voice remained incredibly strong and clear.
But no matter how strong his Talent, dozens of COs had despaired of ever transforming him into a neatly turned out exemplar of proper military appearance. Or behavior. It was simply impossible to get him to understand—or, at least, to observe—more than the bare minimum of the principles of proper military procedure and courtesy.
"Yes, Senior-Armsman, I did want to see you," Velvelig said, and chan Tergis nodded and cocked his head.
He can't really be that totally clueless, the regiment-captain told himself for far from the first time. No one could possibly be as smart as I know he is and not be able to figure it out eventually. Unless they choose not to, of course.
If he'd thought it would do one bit of good, he would cheerfully have hammered chan Tergis to encourage him to figure it out. Unfortunately, the senior-armsman's determination to remain the squarest peg in a round hole that anyone could possibly be was invincible. Besides, much as he sometimes irritated Velvelig, the Voice was rather charming in his own thankfully inimitable fashion.
"What was it you wanted to say to me, Sir?" chan Tergis inquired after a couple of seconds.
"If you'll give me a moment, I'll be right with you," Velvelig told him, and looked at Silkash. The company-captain's spider was doing its best to crawl back up through his nose, judging from his face's alarming color and the wheezing sounds he was making.
"If you'll excuse me, Company-Captain," Velvelig said with admirable gravity, in a voice which scarcely quivered at all, "I believe the Senior-Armsman requires a moment of my time."
"Of course, Sir," Silkash managed to get out. He stood. "With your permission, Sir?" he added in somewhat breathless tones, and Velvelig nodded.
"Dismissed, Company-Captain," he said, and Silkash departed. In fact, he actually managed to get through the office door and close it behind him before the laughter he'd valiantly suppressed broke free.
Velvelig shook his head slightly as he listened to the whoops coming from the hallway outside, then returned his attention to chan Tergis.
"So, here you are,
" he said. The senior-armsman simply nodded, and Velvelig gazed at him for a moment. Then the regiment-captain walked across to seat himself behind his desk, and the amusement he'd felt only moments ago had disappeared by the time he leaned back in his chair.
"I'm getting a little nervous," he told chan Tergis then.
"Nervous, Sir?" the Ternathian repeated.
"Yes. How long has it been now since your last Voice transmission from Company-Captain chan Tesh?"
"Seventy-six hours and—" chan Tergis pulled out his watch and opened it "—and forty-three minutes, Sir."
"I see." Velvelig cocked his head, lips ever so slightly pursed. Obviously, chan Tergis had been doing a little worrying of his own.
"Have you attempted to reach Petty-Captain Baulwan or Petty-Captain Traygan?" the regiment-captain asked.
"As a matter of fact," chan Tergis said slowly, snapping his watch closed once more and returning it to his pocket, "I have. Of course, I'd actually have to go through Lamir Ilthyr to relay to Erthek Vardan or Petty-Captain chan Lyrosk at Fort Brithik."
"And you haven't been able to raise them, either?" Velvelig's voice was just a shade sharper than it had been.
"No, Sir." Chan Tergis' blue eyes had sharpened into unusually clear focus, and he shook his head. "Of course, to be fair, it wouldn't be the first time we've had trouble getting Lamir to Hear one of us," he added. "He's not a lot older than Erthek, and he's considerably weaker than either Petty-Captain Baulwan or Petty-Captain Traygan—or Erthek, for that matter—and to be completely frank, we've got him covering too wide a gap." He shrugged. "You know how thin we're always stretched out here, Sir. When it was decided that we had to have our stronger voice assigned to Company-Captain Halifu, Petty-Captain Baulwan was sent on ahead from Fort Brithik, but we all knew there were going to be occasional glitches, especially once the decision was made to send chan Lyrosk to Brithik to work with Erthek Vardon. That left Lamir all alone to hold the relay between us and Brithik, and even though he's as disciplined and conscientious as anyone could ask, the fact that he's still young means his Talent still has a bit of growing to do. The truth is, the stretch he's responsible for covering is wide enough that even something as minor as an allergy attack could create a problem, which is the main reason we've been planning on recalling Erthek from Fort Brithik, now that chan Lyrosk is there, and assigning him to the same relay station as Lamir. Neither of them is all that strong, but together, they'd give us enough redundancy to feel comfortable about keeping the gap closed."