by Alma Boykin
“Hmmmm, do you truly think it will?” At Kirlin’s angry glare Tarkeela explained, “Yes, this is still an excellent site for a port. But can we afford the cost of cleaning out the city and rebuilding it? Or should we flatten anything still standing and build on top of the old remains; the latter might be cheaper in cash.”
Kirlin started to say, “We can order it cleared,” and then caught himself. What if those who lost lineage and pack refused? And would even Kirlin himself be willing to live on top of the bones of over a hundred thousand dead Azdhagi? “I wonder what Cheerka thinks,” he heard himself saying instead.
“You’ve found him?” Tarkeela sounded eager. “None of my people have been able to contact him.”
“Don’t you read the news-feed?”
To Kirlin’s surprise, the older reptile made a negation. “No time the past few sixts. You try relocating an manufacturing plant to Pokara while getting ready for a tax assessment and testing the green-stem harvest.”
“The last my people knew, your story-catcher and his scrawny friend, excuse me,” and Kirlin pretended to correct himself, “his petite and lean associate, were helping sort out who needed what at the secondary assistance shelter, the one with the blue roof,” and the mottled reptile pointed with his tail. “Seems Cheerka had a talon in every kill and knows how to get anyone to talk about anything. I can see why you find him useful enough to keep on your payroll.”
Tarkeela smothered the urge to snarl, “He’s not useful, he’s just a good person,” but held his tongue. The people around them did not need to see two nobles fighting, not now, not here. “Thank you. I need to find out who and what needs transport.”
“Red roof is the food center, blue the secondary assistance, green primary assistance, brown is a temporary temple,” and the two reptiles noted how close it sat to the crematorium. “Orange is medical, and white is the junior den. Pink, well, you can guess.”
“The morgue,” which explained why it was the largest structure and the closest to the temple and pyres. “Thank you. Good hunting.”
“And you.”
Tarkeela found Cheerka and Rosilia during a lull in the constant waves of desperate or depressed Azdhagi. “No, how are you doing?” Tarkeela heard Cheerka’s rumble. A long pause followed and the noble could see Cheerka making a negation toward a small, blue-green True-dragon. “You do not sound fine, Rosi.” Another pause and Cheerka’s neck-spines slammed up into full threat/anger/fear display. “Don’t go back, Rosilia. No. Just leave the dead where they are. It’s not worth you or anyone else getting killed.” The True-dragon’s ears rotated and she pointed over Cheerka’s shoulder with a forefoot. “Who?” Cheerka pivoted, then bowed. As he did, the True-dragon waved to Tarkeela and disappeared between the benches and lines of waiting Azdhagi, sliding out of sight. Cheerka turned again, then growled, “Females.”
“Another universal, Cheerka?”
“Yes, my lord. Hydrogen, stupidity, and female stubbornness. How can I be of service?”
Tarkeela looked around for a semi-private place. “I need to ask your advice about a rather sensitive bit of prey.”
Cheerka led the noble out of the building and around the back, grabbing two flasks of water along the way. “Once the filtration system got set up, we could drink from the stream,” he explained. “The older juniors collect empty containers and take them back for sterilization and re-filling. Keeps them useful, saves material, and provides the families with an income.”
“Income?”
Cheerka enlightened the noble’s darkness. “The out-Clan are assigned to packs, my lord. Each individual gets basic food and shelter, medical help if needed, but for additional things the pack needs to have credits. Working on the sanitation crews, minding juniors in the camp den, assisting with food distribution, what have you, earns credits, my lord. It helps keep discipline and gives people something to do so they can’t get into trouble or think too much.”
It made complete sense to Tarkeela. The Azdhagi reverted to packs and lineages, so why not make use of it? “That tracks directly to my prey, Cheerka. I’ll be blunt: what about rebuilding Sea Gate. Would anyone live here?”
“Only the dangerously fearless or the insane, my lord. Follow me, please,” and he led Tarkeela through the edge of the encampment to a place where they could look into Sea Gate. “See all the rubble? Most of it has bodies inside, my lord. First, you’d have to clear the rubble of bodies, or they would have to be collected with everything else. Then you have to put the debris… where?”
“Hmm, not in the sea, I assume.” Cheerka gestured negatively and Tarkeela looked at the upland. “Make an enormous pile, an artificial hill, seal it to contain the hazardous materials, and grass over it as a living monument?”
“No one wants to live in the shadow of hundreds of thousands of dead, my lord. Not anymore. Maybe if this was the only disaster, my lord, but after all the junior deaths and New Southdown?” Cheerka gazed out over the remains of the port. “No. And if you built on top of the old city, can you guarantee that nothing will shift in the rainy season, if one of those massive sea storms and rain walls hits?”
Tarkeela heard what he needed to hear. “And no one really wants to stay, live outside the former city and work at a re-built port, do they?”
Cheerka snorted. “You might not believe in ghosts, my lord, but more and more Azdhagi do. Hell, I’m already nervous down on the streets at night and I know damn well that the dead are not going to bother me, my lord!”
Damn, Tarkeela hated to see such a good port location abandoned. But if no one would live or work near it, and with the plunging population… “Thank you, Cheerka. That’s what I wanted to know. Neither Tarkeela Clan nor TeerClaw Industries will try and rebuild here.”
“If you think this is bad, you should see Wave Wash and the others. Sea Touch is gone,” Cheerka told his patron. “And I mean gone, my lord. Nothing is there but sand and some trees from upstream.”
“Are you ready to go north, Cheerka?” Tarkeela inquired after several minutes of silence passed between them.
“Give me a sixt to finish what I started here, my lord, and yes. I’m tired of death, my lord.” He stared at the hideously quiet sea, devoid of ships and ship-fish both. “So damn tired.”
8. New Beginnings, Old Problems
“Do you want the Planetary Council to meet in person, Imperial Majesty?” Tsarli inquired of his younger sibling. He refrained from asking just what the King-Emperor thought he was accomplishing by digging a rather large hole in the ground in what was supposed to be the family’s private garden. Dirt flew for a moment longer before the larger reptile made a loud “whunf” sound and emerged from the depression, knocking loose dirt out of the way as he did.
“No, not now.” Seetoh picked up a small rod and began cleaning reddish soil out of his talons. “Mid-summer is the earliest to call everyone here. There is no need to interrupt planting and building, unless something else horrible has transpired in the last… when did I start working?”
Tsarli reached back and pulled a timepiece out of his sash. “Almost two hours by sun, my lord.” The medium green reptile backed neatly on three feet as he replaced the device onto the concealed belt.
“Thank you. Do you think it is too deep?” Seetoh inquired, gesturing toward the hole with his tail.
“Too deep for what?”
“For a shadow pool. It needs to be twice as long as it is now, I know, but is it too deep?”
Tsarli considered the matter. “Will there be black trunks on both sides?” At Seetoh’s affirmative gesture his older brother swept his forefoot in negation. “No, sir. It should be just right, especially if you don’t put in too many indigo leaf creepers below the black trunks.” They were supposed to accent, not carpet, the banks of a shadow pool and Tsarli wrinkled his muzzle at the memory of one of the more exuberant gardens he’d seen.
“Thinking of Shu’s humble, modest, and restrained plantings?” Seetoh inquired, neck-spines t
witching with concealed laughter.
“Trying not to, actually. No one in that lineage has any sense of subtlety,” the elder reptile sighed.
“Or of caring for their Clan-kin,” the King-Emperor snarled. “That foolish furbearer lost over half of his Clan followers in the crossing and then claims an area the size of the Great Central Plains for his efforts?” Talons cleaned, the black-green reptile stomped over to where his working robe lay, rose onto his hind legs, and pulled the elaborately patterned garment on, then tied it closed with a simple, pale pink sash. He slid a bone-handled knife into the sash and turned back to his sibling and advisor. “We are going to have to deal with him before the coming of winter. He’s as useful as a talkak in a medicinal garden.”
About as attractive, too, Tsarli thought. “Do you want the latest word from Sea Gate?” He followed the King-Emperor back into the family wing of the Palace-Capitol and watched as Seetoh settled himself onto a comfortable bench. As a servant brought flavored water and as array of seasonal meats, Tsarli made a mental note to ask the medics about research into new herbs. Some of the most reliable only grew in the northern lands if they were protected in winter by growing sheds. At that rate and scale of production, it might be years before enough could be harvested. Although, he had to admit, with the much smaller population there might be less domestic demand.
“No, I do not want the latest word from Sea Gate,” Seetoh interrupted Tsarli’s mental side-stalk. “When is Lord Nigelus coming?”
“He’s already here and was told to expect to meet you at the fourth hour.”
Seetoh glanced at the timekeeper beside his computer’s remote image projector before devouring half of the meats. “Good. Eat as much of these as you want, Longbone, and take some to your mate. The lesser throne room should be comfortable for Nigelus.”
“Very good, Imperial Majesty,” and Tsarli bowed low as his brother and the flask of water left the chamber. After a suitably respectful pause, Tsarli selected a meat bite and popped it into his mouth, chewing carefully and letting the flavor and texture of real animal protein linger on his tongue. Everyone had gone on short rations in case there was a crop failure of some sort and even in the Palace they only ate true meat once a sixt. Grain imports from the colony worlds helped, but the Imperial government kept word of those quiet in order to prevent demands for supplies before there was true dearth. That hunger forced everyone to work also went unmentioned, of course. Prince Ahtik believed in culling the pack and Tsarli concurred, although he would never ever speak such a thought aloud, not now.
One and a half hours later King-Emperor Seetoh, washed and robed appropriately for such an unprecedented meeting, watched from his throne as Nigelus of House Garrlow minced carefully into the lesser throne room, carefully because of his size and because he did not desire to ruin the newly tiled floor. The large, purple-green True-dragon stopped ten Azdhagi paces from the throne and bowed, then straightened up and looked around the wood-paneled room. «Nice wood. I hope you are not going to have it painted?»
Seetoh clenched his fangs at the informality. If he’d been an Azdhag Seetoh’s bodymen would have already beaten the reptile, but Nigelus was not Azdhag. The True-dragon led the most powerful of the Houses on Drakon IV and did not feel the need to obey the rules of protocol, something that grated Seetoh’s sense of order. The voice continued in the King-Emperor’s mind, «Be easy, Imperial Majesty. These are private sendings: I wasted my youth as a diplomat, as you may recall.»
“Indeed, Lord Nigelus. You have considered Our proposal?”
The True-dragon nodded, round ears twitching as his long golden whiskers floated lightly on either side of his narrow muzzle. «The House council has indeed, and we accept, conditionally.» Before Seetoh could ask, the larger, leaner reptile explained, «We will assist and serve as a part-time, volunteer defense force, Imperial Majesty. The Houses are not equipped or trained for more than that and it would be beyond foolish for us to try and do more. And we want you Azdhagi to keep those islands where you already have military bases or major infrastructure.»
Would he have enough bodies to keep the island bases staffed and supplied? Seetoh added the worry to the list even as he swept his strong-side forefoot in agreement. “So be it.”
Lord Nigelus studied his theoretical overlord for a moment. «On behalf of the House Council, I offer condolences to the Azdhag nation on the loss of the people of Sea Gate, and extend an offer of physical or spiritual assistance to the survivors or their kin.»
The black-green monarch dipped his head. “We thank you for your most generous offer, Lord Nigelus. Would that We could accept physical aid, but those of Sea Gate require spiritual assistance more than anything.” Seetoh had a thought and asked, “Were any Houses affected?”
«House Nagaki exists no longer.» Within the sent words came additional information — Nagaki had been the oldest House, one of the founding clans of True-dragons on Drakon IV. «Others lost members but the warning was enough for all but Nagaki.»
After more official words and assurances, and the transmission of a copy of the final agreement, Lord Nigelus departed to return to the Wildlands. Taking advantage of the chaos of the northern wars, the True-dragons had extended their holdings into the mountains, claiming land now unused by the Azdhagi. The subsequent King-Emperors had spoken of seizing that area, but the military realities and the lack of desire for the trade war that would inevitably follow dissuaded even the most eager. Still, as Seetoh felt the rumble of Nigelus’ transport lifting, he prayed once again, Forgive me, honored sire, for not trying to hold the highlands. The Azdhag ruler still felt a touch of guilt for never trying to reclaim the mining and hunting lands, but now it was too late.
Seetoh informed Tsarli of Nigelus’ offer and comments over a working supper that evening. Tsarli chewed carefully and helped himself to another sauce-dipped grainball. “Nagaki claimed Steamwreath Island, didn’t they?”
“Which is why they are no more.” The rolling tide that overwhelmed Sea Gate and raced as far as thirty kliqs inland had also devoured several islands in the Western Sea, or so the satellite images suggested.
“Does anyone have a casualty estimate more precise than ‘everyone living along the coast’?” Tsarli sighed before popping the grainball into his maw.
Seetoh’s chief of security slid a printout toward the older prince, who snagged it with a somewhat clean talon. “That’s… by the Lone God, that’s…” his voice trailed off as his neck-spines rose in horror.
“Four cities and towns, Your Highness, plus everyone within ten kliqs of White Beach. A bore went up the Losthills River and flooding, debris, and fire killed at least 25,000 that can be documented.” Captain Deek explained. “That’s why the total is over 1,000,000 gone to the God that can be confirmed,” he finished with a hiss. “We’ll never know how many more refugees vanished.”
Kirlin sighed and rolled stiff muscles as he commed his concubine. He missed Keeshti’s quiet presence more than he cared to admit, but Clan Kirlin needed her guidance and judgment even more. “Were there any problems with this group?” He asked her via voice-only comm. The video system now resided at Sunblast, sent ahead for Tarlek, Kharee, and the others to use.
“Only one, my lord and master,” her soft, warm voice replied. “A male attacked one of the out-Clan females because she has two healthy juniors. Your bodymen stopped him but not before he seriously injured the female. She will recover and the juniors are unharmed.” He heard her talons tapping on something. “I took the liberty of assigning her to one of the already-completed outlying farmsteads, my lord, where a mate-lost male has made a lease-claim. Kharee will escort her and four others to the farmstead, along with supplies.”
Kirlin slapped his tail on the floor, frustrated. “Good thinking, light of my heart. Anything else?”
She took a deep breath. “Yes, my lord. That second temporary pier, the one made using Shu Corp. material? It is not lasting and the shipmasters refuse to use it, ev
en for passenger-only loading.” Her tone remained appropriately respectful but her mate read through to the true trail.
“Thank you for informing me, Keeshti, and thank you for your work. It is greatly appreciated.” He heard the door opening behind him and cursed silently. Blast it, he so wanted to tell her how much he missed her and how proud he was of her! Instead he closed, “You have my blessings to continue as you have been doing. Kirlin out.”
A querulous male voice began, “Youngster, you should never assign that serious of a responsibility to a loose-born female! She has no training for such a task, no matter how good she is on the sleeping mat,” Kirlin’s sire’s sire’s brother complained.
Thank you, four-steps back sire, for having three male offspring so that Old Kirlin could not inherit the headship! Thank you whoever eliminated primogenitor from Azdhag law, Kirlin thought for the millionth time. He let the old reptile natter on for a minute while making notes about how best to distribute the refugees on the available land.
“Are you not listening to me?” Old Kirlin snarled at last.
“Yes, uncle, I am listening to you. I am not going to argue with you. And you know damn well that Keeshti’s dam came from Beesh lineage and that her sire was old Ro-diit’s concubine’s son,” Kirlin snarled in turn, turning muzzle-to-muzzle with the ancient lizard. “Are you packed?”
Old Kirlin, caught weak-footed, blinked pale green eyes and started, “Yes, of course. What—”
Kirlin interrupted him. “Good. You are going north with the next group, in order to provide some maturity and stability at Sunblast.” Kirlin did not like burdening Tarlek and Rotali, the estate manager, with his uncle but Rotali knew how to handle the obstreperous male. “Rotali reports that your quarters have been prepared and that a hot-pool now exists for soaking at any time you want or need to.”
