The Remnant

by Paul B Spence

  "Then we understand one another," the marquess said.

  The house he provided for them was more than large enough for all of the survivors of the expedition. Not everyone had a private room, but the marines and graduate students had been used to sharing space. The officers and senior scientists received their own rooms. Tebrey took one on the second story where he could see out over the three-meter wall around the paved courtyard.

  The larder in the kitchen was well-stocked with durables, but they needed fresh meat, fruits, and vegetables. Tebrey had Mason and Bauval make him a list and then left in search of the market. It was better than staying in the house and listening to Anderson bitch.

  "I'm just saying that it doesn't make any sense," Anderson said testily. "What we need to do is explore this city. Why did you bring us here, only to tell us that we can't explore?"

  "Doctor, we've only been in the city a couple of days. If it wasn't for Tebrey and Jeroen talking to the marquess yesterday, we wouldn't have anything. The marquess has been generous in providing us a place to stay. Tebrey is the only one currently qualified to go out and get supplies for us. He is the only person with military training who understands the local language. I'll not go behind his back and authorize expeditions until he says it's okay for us to leave this house," Bauval said angrily. "The marines are standing guard at the gates, and they have orders to stop anyone from leaving. Is that understood?"

  Bauval had been trying to make Anderson understand that they couldn't just go out and wander at will for hours. He was close to reaching the end of his patience with the man.

  "I'm not trying to take anything away from the good commander," Anderson said. "I'm sure he has done all he can for us. I just feel that we have waited here long enough. We're the scientists, and we are cooped up in this house waiting while the military explores. It isn't right."

  "Anderson, be reasonable," Mason said. "Tebrey is learning what he can about the city and trying to make sure it's going to be safe for us. In order for him to secure the funds for our survival, he had to make some concessions. One of those concessions was that we would stay out of sight for a while."

  "I just think–"

  "No," Bauval said, cutting him off. "You don't think. That's the problem. You never think. You just go and do whatever it is that you want to do, whenever you want. Well, things have changed, Anderson. You may have noticed that most of the expedition you led has died. Why don't you think about that!" Bauval turned and stalked from the room.

  "Anderson," Mason said, "I know that you haven't felt well. I know that this must seem disappointing to you; it is to all of us. Believe me, you know I want to get out and explore, but we must not jeopardize our fragile rapport with the marquess. The political situation here is dangerous. There are forces at work in the city that will use any advantage they can against the marquess. We've been warned that they may try to take one of us hostage. They would want to know things, Anderson, and they wouldn't ask nicely. I'll talk to Tebrey when he gets back tonight. Maybe we can start small, with him to escort us. I, personally, would love to get out to the market and just observe."

  "I'm sorry, Amber. I know that I haven't done well as a leader. I just don't want to die with these questions unanswered. There is so much we don't know about the history of this planet."

  Mason eyed him critically. She wasn't trained in medicine, but he wasn't looking well. Anyone could tell that. He had lost a lot of weight over the last six months. But then, she thought, most of us have. Anderson had never truly recovered from his illness. He was still prone to long bouts of coughing and lacked that spark of vitality he had before being stranded on Cedeforthy. He had rallied for the expedition into the ruined city, but the strain had caused a relapse, and he had ridden in the wagon the rest of the way to the capitol.

  "You're not going to die. We'll take care of you. Why don't you sit with me, and we'll try to come up with a list of questions we'd like answered. Then we can prioritize them and assign teams to investigate each item. At least the marquess provided us with those books, and we have access to the imperial library."

  "Books we can't read," he said petulantly.

  "How about we concentrate on what we can do?"

  Even if Anderson thought she was just be humoring him, he still wanted to do something. "Okay," he said. "That sounds good. Where do we begin?"

  "Well, I'd like to learn more about the pale-skinned people," she replied. "I know you and Ramon want to learn more about the history of the planet; let's start there."

  Tebrey moved cautiously through the market.

  He had refrained from heading back the house because he was sure someone was following him. He could sense them, there in the back of his mind's eye, like an itch he couldn't scratch. He hoped they'd make a move against him. It had been a while since he'd had a good fight.

  There were things he wanted to ask of those who were following him.

  The market was a riotous blaze of colors and textures. The smells of fresh bread, rancid meat, exotic spices, and thousands of unwashed people were like a physical assault on his senses. The noise level was overwhelming, and the pressure of so many minds made him feel as if he was drowning in a sea of emotions. Still, there was something alluring about the seething press of the market.

  Normally, if someone was following him, he would have been able to pinpoint their exact location by sensing their mind. But he couldn't open himself up because of the danger posed by the psychic waves of the crowd. He had seen what effect that had on him at Vadodara. He didn't want to open himself to that kind of danger again. There was too much at stake for him to go offline for a few days to recover.

  A small figure darted out of the crowd toward him. It wasn't until Tebrey had caught the man's hand that he realized he'd been trying to steal Tebrey's small pouch of coins.

  "Oh, no, you don't." Tebrey twisted the thief's arm so that he cried out.

  The man unexpectedly kneed him in the groin and ran off through the crowd. Tebrey stumbled hard against a stall, recovered his balance and started after him. Part of him thought that he should just let the man go; it wasn't like he had actually been robbed. He didn't want anyone to think that he was easy prey, though.

  Scanning the crowd, he found his path barred by a small, wizened old woman.

  She stepped out of the stall and began screaming at him when he made eye contact. She was gesticulating furiously. Her accent was very thick.

  "I'm sorry, I don't understand you," he said, backing away.

  The woman continued to yell. Tebrey was afraid she might be calling the city guard. He didn't want to embarrass the marquess by getting into trouble, but he had no idea what her problem was. He was also unsure what to do about her. She didn't look like she was going to simply drop her grievance, whatever it was.

  The thief he had been after was nowhere to be seen.

  He sighed and concentrated on dealing with the woman. "I'm sorry," he said again slowly. "I don't know what you are saying."

  "She says that you scared her, and that you are a clumsy ox with the manners of a boar."

  Tebrey looked around and saw a small, pale woman with startling dark copper-red hair. She said something to the old woman in a dialect he hadn't heard before. There was something about her accent that reminded him of McGee.

  "Excuse me?"

  "She says you broke one of her vases," the mysterious woman said.

  Tebrey made a quick decision. "I'd be glad to pay for it. I didn't mean to break anything," he replied.

  "It would be best if you did pay for it," she said. "The old woman was about to send her nephew for the guard."

  "I don't think anyone wants that. How much was it worth?" Tebrey asked, fumbling with his belt pouch.

  She spoke to the old woman, who promptly replied. "She says it is worth a moon, if you can believe her. If you can afford a hound, I'd think that would mollify her. She sells most of those vases for just a few teeth each."

  "Here," he said,
handing over a coin.

  The young woman caught his arm. "That's a star," she said, shocked. "That's a fair bit of coin." Something in her tone suggested that he shouldn't have that much money.

  "It's fine," he replied. "Tell her I'm sorry to have bothered her."

  The old woman looked startled when the coin was passed to her. But she took it, making it disappear into her apron, and then ran back to her booth with an odd look for him. He couldn't tell what she was saying, by the shooing gesture was clear enough.

  "Thank you," Tebrey said. "My name is Hrothgar, by the way."

  The mysterious woman smiled shyly at him, making eye contact for the first time. "It suits you. My name is Ana," she said, blushing slightly. "New to the city, are you?"

  "That obvious, is it?"

  "Well, you do stand out a bit in a crowd," she replied, using her eyes to indicate his height.

  Tebrey was thirty to forty centimeters taller than most of the people in the market.

  "You saved me from certain doom," he said with a smile. "Can I at least buy you lunch? I seem to remember a small cafe at the edge of the market."

  She shook her head slowly. She wasn't sure how to take this large man with his strange accent, he sensed. He looked a lot like one of her people, but he was far too large, more like one of the barbarians, and she never seen one of them with red hair. "You are new to town, I see. I thank you for your kind offer, my lord, but I doubt we'd find good service there, even with your wealth. I'd be careful not to flash that around, were I you, or you'll find you attract worse than that cutpurse. I must be about my business. Good day."

  She turned to leave.

  "Thank you, Ana. Maybe we will meet again," he said. He watched her as she moved away in the crowd.

  She turned for a last glance and then hurried away.

  I'm an idiot, he thought savagely. I don't even know how I offended her. She was very pretty, though. Maybe... He let the thought trail off, shaking his head. He'd been more attracted to her than anyone since Jessica. He hadn't had that kind of response in years.

  Are you thinking about that again? Hunter complained.

  Hey, I'm only human.

  He could hear Hunter's amusement in his head. Words weren't needed.

  Mason is going to kill me for not securing her as a source of information about her people. We know so little about them.

  I'm sure you were thinking about her intellect, Hunter said.

  I'm thrifty, Tebrey answered back. I believe that everything can have more than one use.

  Uh huh, and what uses where you thinking of?

  Shut up, cat.

  Several pairs of eyes followed him as he picked up the items they needed back at the house and made his way clear of the market. It was a long walk back to the house, more than enough time for him to clear his thoughts of the lovely young woman from the market.

  Signals were passed and permission granted. Shadows detached themselves from the crowd and followed him. Tebrey walked on, oblivious to his peril.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  "Hello, Doctor. Made any progress?"

  Dr. Seshadri looked up from the old book in front of him and his piles of notations. He had been working for hours already, and had nothing but steady failure to show for it. Of course, they'd only had the books for a day, but he was impatient to learn more. There was an entire library waiting for them if only they could learn to read the language.

  "Hello, Jane. I'm sorry to say that I haven't made any progress at all. We really need someone to help translate these for us."

  The marquess had provided them with a stack of dusty tomes that were supposed to contain a history of human occupation on Cedeforthy. He had not provided someone to help them translate the texts. Reading and writing were not common abilities in the Lyonan Empire. He had suggested they hire a scribe, but they hadn't had a chance to locate one yet. Seshadri said as much.

  "Not much chance of that," she said. "I don't think they're going to let us out of this house."

  "I've been assured that it is a temporary thing," he replied. "There was talk of leaving the city after the summer storms and making another expedition to explore ruins, something else from that ancient map we found at the beta dig site."

  Jane shivered. "I'm not sure I'd like exploring another ruined city like the one we stopped at on the way here."

  "I can't say I would want to, either, to be honest. Nevertheless, we learned important things in that city. It also raised many more questions to which we need to find answers."

  Tebrey was now certain that he was being followed.

  The light was fading as the sun sank below the walls of the city. Street vendors were packing up, and people were moving toward their homes. He stopped to watch the gate to the Merchants' Quarter after he passed. No one suspicious came through, but he still felt watched.

  He wasn't sure what to do. He stood there indecisively for a few minutes, watching two gaunt and hungry cats worry something along a gutter. I'm just going to have to be more careful, he thought.

  If someone was following him, that suggested that they didn't know where he was going. He didn't want to lead them to the house where he was staying; the others of his party would be in danger. On the other hand, if he was late getting back to the house, someone might decide to come looking for him, which could be equally disastrous. He decided to circle around and see if he could find a pattern in the movements around him.

  Alert as he was, the attack still caught him off guard.

  "I'm fine," Tebrey said again. He pushed Lieutenant Christopher away from him.

  "You're bleeding badly from that head wound, sir. I need to apply pressure." She moved close again and pressed the folded cloth to the side of his head. He had a deep six-centimeter gash from which blood flowed freely. The side of his face, neck and shoulder were covered with gore.

  "Head wounds always look worse than they are," he said.

  You are okay, right? Hunter thought anxiously to him. He was up on the roof standing guard.

  I'm okay, Tebrey replied. It really is no worse than that crossbow wound you took. Just a scratch, really.

  "My god, man, what happened to you?"

  Tebrey turned his head slightly to look at Bauval, who had just run into the room.

  "I was attacked," Tebrey said succinctly.

  "I can see that," Bauval answered. "How? What exactly happened?"

  Tebrey sighed. "Three men attacked me as I was walking back from the market. I'm afraid that fresh bread I'd bought was trampled in the fight."

  "To hell with the bread," Bauval said angrily. "Are you okay? You look like crap."

  "Thanks, I'll be fine."

  "You're going to need stitches," Christopher interjected.

  "I've got a field kit in my bag upstairs."

  "I can get it, sir," McGee said. "I've naught else to do." He trotted out of the room. Tebrey could hear his steps on the stair.

  "The men who attacked you...," Bauval began.

  "Dead," said Tebrey. "I'm afraid that once they struck me in the head, from behind, I wasn't in the mood to play nice."

  "Is that going to cause a problem?"

  "There were no witnesses, and I didn't use any weapons," Tebrey replied grimly. "I don't see how they could trace it back to me."

  "I see. Do you have idea who the attackers might have been?"

  "Oh, yes. I can be very persuasive when asking questions."

  "And?" Bauval asked, somewhat disturbed.

  "I'd rather not say right now. I need to think about things first. Let my head clear up a bit."

  McGee came back into the room carrying the field medical kit. He handed it to the lieutenant. She sifted through it while McGee took over applying pressure.

  "There's no local anesthetic," she said to Tebrey quietly.

  "I'll be fine. Just clean it well and stitch it up."

  "It's going to hurt like hell."

  "I've got a neural block in place for the pain."
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  "If you say so, sir," she said. Christopher knew that he was lying about the pain block. Such things only worked to block major nerve junctions. He couldn't possibly block pain from a head injury like that. But she also knew that he didn't want to appear weak before the civilians. She cleaned the wound with a sterile wipe and began to sew it up.

  Bauval looked ill and excused himself.

  McGee got a bucket of water and cleaned up the blood that had dripped on the floor.

  Tebrey sat silently and brooded on the information he had learned, never making a sound as Christopher stitched. They needed more information if they were going to survive in Bellejor. He'd have to do something to get it.

  Tebrey needed a couple of days to regain his strength. He'd lost a lot of blood to the head wound. They still needed fresh food, though. And Mason had been ready to explode when he'd told her about meeting the woman in the market. She'd practically demanded that he go back out and find the girl. He didn't know what Mason expected him to do; she acted like she wanted him to grab Ana and carry her back to the house to talk.

  He took McGee and Christopher with him when he left for the market. They'd get fresh food, and try to find Ana if they could. With the lieutenant and the sergeant along, he was confident no one would try to ambush them.

  It was easier to make their way through the market crowds. The market wasn't as busy as it had been a few days before. McGee carried the food as they bought it. They found Ana buying bread after only a few minutes of searching.

  "Well," she said as he walked up. "You're like a bad tooth, aren't you? Always turning up." She smiled to let him know she was joking. He could sense that she was actually glad to see him. She had come to the market every day, hoping she would encounter him. She hated to admit that, even to herself. It made him feel good to feel it from her.

  It took him a moment to understand that she meant the coin when she said tooth. It wasn't a phrase he was familiar with. He smiled hesitantly. "I was hoping to find you here today."