“It’s possible,” Lorenzo said. “I’m sorry. Not all of my people go to church as often as they should.”
Taziri frowned. “You don’t need to talk to God to know that war is a bad thing.”
“No, I guess not,” he said. “But sometimes it helps.”
The tiny room drowned in the uncomfortable silence that followed. Taziri blinked back the tears that threatened to spill out. I’ve gone from “lost and presumed dead” to “hunted and soon-to-be dead” along with everyone else in Tingis. My poor Yuba and Menna. And Isoke, and her husband, and their two little boys. And all of the pilots, those young pilots I recruited and brought to Tingis. An entire city, thousands of innocent people. The vile taste of vomit washed lightly up against the back of her tongue.
“We have to get across,” she whispered. “We have to warn them.”
“You’ll be caught,” the small lady said.
Of all things, Taziri suddenly remembered the Halcyon ’s batteries and electrical leads in the bottom of her pack. When they catch me, they’ll have that, too. They’ll have the plane.
“Look,” the hidalgo said, then broke off to frown at his pitiful little shelf of books. A pained and confused look wrinkled his forehead. He looked sick. “Maybe you don’t have to go. Maybe we can hide you, at least for a little while. The navy doesn’t know who you are or what you look like, only that you’re Mazigh aviators. Right?”
“What are you suggesting?” his wife asked with an arched brow.
“They can come with us to Zaragoza,” he said to her. “It’s in the middle of nowhere, and the cathedral is enormous. The abbot is a friend of mine. We’ll all be safe there until this blows over.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Taziri said. “But I can’t just hide away somewhere. I have a duty to my passengers. And I need to report Magellan’s warship to my government as soon as possible. Lives are at stake, sir. My daughter’s among them.” Why does the world have to be so damn big? Even the best engine in the world will only take you so far before it dies, and leaves you to swim, or crawl, or die yourself. If I ever get home, I’m never leaving again.
A heavy boot thumped in the hall just behind her. “Hey, Ziri, can you see if this guy has any…oh. Right. Sorry.” Syfax leaned into the study, frowning at the little room. “Kinda dark in here. What are we talking about?”
Taziri brought the major up to speed in Mazigh, which was only slightly faster than her well-practiced Espani. Syfax nodded thoughtfully and she could see the tactical wheels grinding away behind his lidded eyes. He said, “Well, I’ll tell ya what I’d do, if this was a security situation, captain. I’d have you and the passengers trot on out of here with the Don while I go south by myself to Tingis. If I go alone, I’ll be there in no time. March all day and night. I can steal a boat and cross the Strait in the dark. They’ll never even know I was there.”
Taziri nodded. He’s right, of course. Major Zidane wasn’t good for much, but running across a country and fighting his way past enemy soldiers definitely fell within the fields of his expertise. But his plan also meant hiding herself away in some church in Espana for days, maybe for weeks. Although, if Syfax makes it through at least he can tell Yuba that I’m alive. And that might be my best option, as terrible as it is. “You’re right, major. You should go. But take Kenan with you.”
The big man grimaced. “Nah, I don’t need him.”
“Take him anyway. He’s good with languages and maps. And he has sharp eyes, so he can watch your back. If anyone asks, you can say he’s your son,” she said.
The major rolled his eyes. “Fine. But he’s not my son. He can be my nephew. My stupid grinning excuse for a nephew.”
“I can live with that,” Taziri said. And then, for a moment, she felt a small weight lifted from her shoulders. They had a plan. It was a bad plan, a flimsy plan, one based on hope and chance, and one that she would have no ability to help carry out. But it was a plan, and that was more than they had a few minutes ago.
Back in the dining room, she found the Italians and the young Eranian lady huddled in the corner while Kenan was quickly becoming fast friends with the young Espani fencers by exchanging bits of old songs and bawdy jokes filled with juvenile double entrendres. Taziri got the room’s attention with a sharp whistle and in her best Espani she told them the plan. The young fencers brightened a bit at the idea of going home for the winter, but the Italians, Shahera, and even Kenan looked slightly horrified when she said they were going north instead of south.
Taziri held up her hand to fend off their objections even as they opened their mouths. She said, “I think we’ve all realized over the last few days that this is not just some inconvenience or unfortunate detour. We’re in very real danger, all of us. And right now, instead of trying to get on with our lives we need to be focused on staying alive. Not just for a few days, but for as long as it takes for us all to get safely out of the country.”
“Are you completely incompetent?” Dante slammed his fist on the table. “All we have to do is walk to the nearest fishing village, throw some coins at the first slack-jawed idiot we see, and row away back to Mallorca, or even all the way to Marrakesh if needs be. They don’t know who we are. They don’t know what we look like. They’re probably not even looking for us at all. And you want to run and hide in some church cellar? Absolutely not. I’m leaving, with or without you fools. I’ll probably be better off on my own anyway.”
The young Italian stood up and snatched a crumbly black loaf from the table to stuff in his pocket. He turned to find Major Zidane in the doorway behind him, and Syfax reached out to gently shove the smaller man back into his seat at the table. “You’re not going anywhere, except with the captain. This Magellan character knows we were in a plane, so we’ve got to be Mazigh, and he knows we were coming from Italia, so he knows you’re Italian. So unless you think you can cover up that stupid accent of yours, I guarantee you’ll be in a cell by the end of the week. If this bastard is as paranoid and controlling as everyone says, he’ll be rounding up every poor fool from Valencia to Madrid just for looking or sounding funny.”
Dante slumped back in his seat, scowling. He took out his bread and began picking at it.
Taziri used the commotion to slip back out into the hall, but she had barely taken two steps before she felt a hand on her shoulder.
“Captain?” It was Kenan, but the earnest young lieutenant wasn’t grinning for once. “If it’s all the same to you, ma’am, I’d rather go north with you instead of south with the major.”
“It’s not the same to me, Kenan. The major is going to need your help if he runs into trouble. And knowing him, he will run into trouble. I’m counting on you to be the sensible one. Keep your eyes open. Give him options and ideas before he pulls out that knife of his.” Taziri raised an eyebrow. “I thought you’d be okay with this. It’ll be like old times.”
“That’s just it, captain,” he whispered. “I transferred to Section Four to get away from him. I didn’t like the old times, even if it was only a year or so. He treats me like a little kid. And the things he does to people, I mean, I know they were criminals, but still.” The lieutenant looked queasy. “He’s dangerous.”
“Well, I’m sorry you feel that way, lieutenant, but you’ve got your orders,” Taziri said. “If things go well, it will only be for a few days and you’ll be safe and sound back home before you know it.”
“And if it doesn’t go well, I’ll probably end up in front of an Espani firing squad.” He turned and sulked back into the dining room before she could say anything else. Her instinct was to call him back and give him a severe dressing down for his attitude and threaten him with some sort of disciplinary action, but she couldn’t think of any way to punish him beyond forcing him to accompany Syfax. And the truth is, he’s right. He very well might end up in front of a firing squad. On any other day, that thought might have troubled her more, but she had too much to worry about already.
Three passengers to sheph
erd. An experimental engine battery to protect. A family less than four hundred miles away that I can’t reach. And unknown days or weeks holed up in the basement of some freezing Espani church listening to Dante complain.
It took almost two hours for the hidalgo’s household to pack up and lock up, but eventually everyone was properly dressed for a long walk down a cold road, every back was aching under a pack laden with food and blankets, and every animal in the stable had been trotted out into the yard. Taziri wasn’t particularly shocked by the huge striding bird that the hidalgo’s wife had saddled and mounted. Its clicking talons and massive beak were worrisome, as were the blood red plumes around its eyes, but she could almost think of it as a giant ostrich, and that was a bit less frightening. Not that she had ever seen such a thing before, but there were more than a few strange and enormous beasts from the New World in Marrakesh. Tamed megatheras labored in the factories alongside the huge engines, while the smaller sivatheras drew the carriages of the wealthy, as well as those who wished to appear wealthy for a night. She had even heard of the racetracks where giant birds sprinted for the gamblers and the well-dressed ladies, who watched from a safe distance in their tents, through their binoculars.
But the cat. The cat was something else altogether. When the beast called Atoq padded silently out of his pen, Taziri had nearly screamed. In fact, she probably would have screamed if she had not been surrounded by perfectly calm young Espani who barely gave the monster a second look. She had nothing to compare it to except the great lions of the eastern plains, but standing in the snowy yard, only a stone’s throw from the creature, she was certain that Atoq was larger than any lion. His shoulders were thicker and broader than any great cat or dire wolf, his head and neck were muscled like an elephant’s leg, and the huge fangs spearing down from his mouth told her not only that he could slice her apart without even opening his maw, but also that he could open his jaws at least as wide as the fangs were long. And they were very long.
When Dona Qhora emerged from the house, Taziri almost mistook her for the Eranian girl. Unlike everyone else who was wearing black and brown and gray coats, gloves, and scarves, the hidalgo’s wife strode out into the snow in buff colored trousers that disappeared into her tall, shining black boots. Over her high-necked white blouse she wore a tight purple vest, and over that a long blue coat decorated in silver threadwork across the breasts with elaborate silver ropes draped from her shoulders. Qhora paused to adjust her white leather gloves, then took her white fur coat from one of the students and wrapped it over her tailored blue one. And lastly she set on her jet black hair a blue and silver hat that by rights should have been identical to the hidalgo’s wide-brimmed black hat, except that she had folded up the edges of the brim and fixed them to the top of the hat with large blue satin ribbons. The result was a tricorn headdress resembling a festival ship ready to set sail.
“I’ve never seen a hat quite like that,” Taziri said. No need to mention that the Italians wear them that way, too.
“It was my husband’s dress uniform, as was the coat.” Qhora gestured to the blue and silver affair under her furs. “When he put them aside, I had them tailored to my own use. Military service is nothing to be ashamed of. It should be recognized and celebrated. But since he is too modest to parade for the masses, then I’m happy to do it for him.”
Don Lorenzo gave some final instructions to his students and staff, rattling off directions to each person in rapid-fire Espani. The horses were all heading north, but there weren’t enough for everyone. Taziri had meant to insist that she not be given one, at least not yet, but the gallant young diestros insisted that the ladies ride, and she knew enough about Espani men to give them their moment of chivalry. After all, she was still exhausted from the long march up the road from the crash, and, she reasoned, she was no good to anyone if she collapsed.
So when they set out, the hidalgo led the way with his wife at his side and her huge cat trailing, and behind them rode Taziri, Shahera, Nicola, and the scowling Dante. The four senior students followed them on foot, talking and laughing quietly. She envied them.
They aren’t afraid of anything. Still young. Still immortal. No responsibilities or duties. Only possibilities, egos, and libidos.
Taziri gave Kenan one last, sharp salute. The sad-eyed boy returned it half-heartedly and trudged away after the hulking major and the other junior students heading south.
The rough road north to Zaragoza was a far cry from the machined highways of Marrakesh. This was a dirt and gravel track, pitted and muddy and icy, winding its slow way around hills and through villages and over ancient stone bridges across tiny frozen creeks. For the first half hour, Taziri sat miserably in the saddle trying to remember the last time she had sat on a horse. Maybe when she was nine or ten when she visited her uncle’s farm in the highlands. Trapped between the lumbering mass of the horse under her legs and the sweltering mass of wool, leather, and fur on her back, she was almost ready to offer the horse to one of the young men trailing behind on foot, but the gentle rocking of the saddle and sighing of the wind through the pines soon had her eyes drooping and her head nodding.
She awoke with a start and a terrible ache in her neck and shoulders. The sky had grown gray and dim and dark clouds were gathering in the north. A light dusting of frozen rain was falling all around them, tinkling on the road and the frozen snow drifts to either side of the uneven lane. Taziri straightened up and glanced over at Shahera. She looked much older and even a bit thinner now that she was out of her jester’s costume. The Eranian girl offered her an exhausted smile, and then looked away. Lorenzo and his wife were still plodding along just ahead, but the saber-toothed cat was nowhere to be seen. Behind her, Taziri saw Dante leaning low in the saddle to talk to the youths, but she couldn’t hear what they were saying. She turned to face forward again and was about to trot ahead and ask the hidalgo where they would be staying the night when she realized that they were a rider short.
“Nicola? Nicola!” She stared up and down the road for some sign of another figure, another horse.
Everyone looked at her, looked around, and came to a full stop as they realized they had lost one of their party. Don Lorenzo questioned his students, but none of them could say when the tall Italian woman had disappeared or how long she had been gone. Taziri felt her heart racing.
How could I let this happen? How could I fall asleep and just lose one of my people?
But looking around, she realized that everyone had been nodding off or staring miserably at their boots, and at any given moment their little group had been strung out over as much as fifty yards. The road had wound through heavy woodlands and tall stone houses, and plenty of other places where a rider might have left unseen at just the right moment.
Why would she leave the road? Taziri tried to list the possibilities, but the only one she could think of was the need to answer nature’s call, which she was currently trying to ignore herself. Unable to think of anything else to do, she turned her horse to backtrack up the road but the hidalgo was suddenly beside her and he reached over to rein back her mare.
“No. Qhora will go. We will wait and see what she finds.”
The little Incan woman nudged her towering bird into a sprint and they vanished up the road, Wayra’s talons digging deep gashes in the frozen gravel.
Taziri sat and waited. Dante complained, though everyone ignored him. Shahera said nothing. The four boys asked permission to spar in the road, but their master said no. After half an hour, they heard a faint squawk and whistle and soon heard the rider returning. Qhora let her mount strut into their midst and said, “Over two miles back, I found a fresh horse trail leaving the road in a thick stand of pine trees. She circled around to the road behind us and went back south. I couldn’t see her over the hills.”
“I’ll go back,” Taziri heard herself say. She didn’t want to go back. She didn’t give a damn about Nicola, or Dante, or even poor Shahera. She just wanted to fall asleep and wake up i
n her own bed with Yuba and Menna beside her. But I have to. I just have to. “I’ll find her.”
“No.” Don Lorenzo pulled down the high stiff collar of his coat to speak. “She chose to go back. God only knows why, but we must stay together and continue north. If your friend is smart, and lucky, then she’ll survive. I wish her well, but she’s gone now, and we need to be moving on. It will be dark soon, and we still have a few miles to go tonight.”
Taziri nodded, grateful to him that he had saved her from herself, and hating him for making her turn her back on her duty. Or am I just hating myself? Some captain I’m turning out to be.
Chapter 9. Shifrah
There was no one at the Diaz estate. No smoke rising from the chimney, no lights in the windows, no animals in the stables. But the snow in the yard wasn’t as deep as the snow outside the fence, and when she stared at the dimples in the fresh snow beyond the gate, Shifrah could see the telltale patterns of boots tramping along the lane to the left and the thinner trails of horse legs walking up the lane to the right.
“Another dead end,” she said. “What a waste of time.”
“No, this is the place.” Salvator shook the locked doors and pressed his eye up to the dark glass of the windows.
In Madrid there had been more than a few witnesses who said a procession of strange people in strange clothes had arrived in town, asking for Don Lorenzo. A man splitting firewood at the bottom of the lane had described as many as half a dozen of these travelers, which matched the furrier’s description.
And here is Don Lorenzo’s house. His dark and empty house.
“It looks like our Mazigh friends arrived around noon, and then left again just a few hours ago. Assuming this Don Lorenzo was at home when they arrived, it is possible the gentleman is with them now.” Salvator swung back up into the saddle and studied the darkening sky. A light snow was falling, but the evening promised to be mild by Espani standards.
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