“Makalang,” the leader said. “Clan leader Ceriniat wishes to speak with you. We have been told to report your whereabouts, but it would be easier if you accompanied us.”
I stood my ground.
“I am returning home. I am aware of her request, and I will respond to her shortly.”
We stared at each other for a few moments. Then she seemed to notice Mereceeree. Her eyes narrowed.
“May I ask who that is?”
“No one of your concern.”
I’d once fought five Long Claw mercenaries on my own and was nearly captured. But I didn’t want a fight now. I certainly did not want Eladra and Mereceeree placed at risk, or perhaps worse, have them kill one or more of the linyang.
“We are going. Have a good day.”
I walked around them with Eladra and Mereceeree following closely behind me. All of them watched me closely, but in the end they did nothing.
We circled quickly around the field toward my house. The crowd was still out front and scarcely diminished, so I went instead to the back gate.
I’d been wondering if any of the girls would wise up to the presence of the gate, and sure enough when we got to it, two of them waiting, sitting against the wall. They jumped up as we approached, and one spoke up.
“Makalang . . . please, I need to talk you. It’s very important.”
I realized with a start that it was the talalong girl with amethyst hair I’d seen at the university. With her was a dwenda with short silver hair.
“I’m sorry, this is a really bad time.”
“Please. I need to tell you something. It’s not about mating, I swear.”
I wavered, but we really had things to do.
“Look, I’ll come back out at some point. This just isn’t the time.”
I turned to the gate, and after rapping on it loudly several times, one of the linyang guards appeared.
“Tsulygoi!” she exclaimed. “You are back!”
I recognized her as Kaorin, one of my quasi-wives, who I had defeated escaping from aJia’jara. She pulled open the gate and let us in. The two girls outside watched forlornly as we went in.
“Who was the one who was killed today?” I asked the guard.
Her face was stern.
“It was Leria.”
I remembered her. She’d been one of the younger ones. Shit.
“I’m sorry.”
“She died well. We will avenge her.”
“Let me worry about that. There will be an accounting for what happened this morning.”
“Yes, my tsulygoi.”
I went straight up to the fourth floor, where I found Ayarala, Kisarat, and Merindra in the sitting room talking. They all jumped up with cries of surprise.
“Will! How –?” Ayarala yelled.
“I’ll explain later. Let’s just say a lot went on with the panikang.”
“Where is Narilora?” Merindra asked. “And who –?”
“I believe we healed Narilora, but she was not well enough to travel. They’re caring for her right now. And this –”
I turned to Mereceeree, who opened her cloak
“– is Mereceeree. I have taken her as wife. She will be part of our inner circle.”
The three of them all gasped.
“Hello, my awasa-lates,” she said.
Eladra stepped forward.
“Um, I’ve known her only two days, but I know she’ll fit in well with us. She’s smart and knows a lot. And we, um . . . ”
She grinned.
Kisarat raised an eyebrow.
“A lot did go on, I see.”
“Yeah.”
“I found it quite pleasurable,” Mereceeree said.
Ayarala laughed, putting her hand over her mouth, and Merindra laughed as well.
“Six clans, six wives in our circle,” I said. “This is how it should be.”
Kisarat walked up and took Mereceeree’s hands.
“You are the first panikang I have met in person. But if Will has claimed you, I am happy to welcome you, awasa-late.”
Ayarala and Merindra came up and welcomed her as well.
“All right. Fill me in here. What the hell happened?”
The three of them ran through it again. There wasn’t much more to tell, really. Ayarala had been out on the balcony, watching Lorelat, when it started. But Lorelat was too far away from the gate for the guards to reach her.
“Did you see where they took her?”
“Off into the city,” she said.
“I have to assume she was taken to Loreloo’s compound,” Kisarat said.
“If we’re lucky. They might just have shipped her completely out of town.” I stood. “Bring all the new cunelo to the front hallway. The new ones Loreloo just sent over, not any of the ones I’ve mated with.”
“There are five of them.”
“You said three of the pregnant ones left. How many does that leave?”
“Without Lorelat, only two. Birana and Malook.”
“What kind of mood are they in?”
“Heartbroken over Lorelat. They don’t want to leave, and after what happened, they’re terrified you’re going to kick them out.”
“I’m not. Not them at least. But bring the other five downstairs.”
Ayarala went off to get them. I went downstairs to talk to the guards, to gauge their mood. They were a bit shell-shocked but resolute. I talked to them briefly about Iraq and the friends I’d lost there. It seemed to firm them up. Then Ayarala arrived with the five cunelo. I’d yet to meet any of them. Their faces were a mix of fear and excitement.
“Look, I’m very sorry about this, but after what happened this morning, all of you need to leave. Tell Loreloo I will accept no more cunelo as wives until Lorelat is returned to me. None at all.”
I watched their faces sink in disappointment, but none of them argued with me. One by one, they went off to gather their things.
I went up to the fourth-floor balcony, asking Kisarat to come with me. I leaned out against the glass wall, looking out over the crowd. They seemed happy to have me back.
“I need your help,” I told her. “I need your intuition about this situation, and your knowledge of the city.”
“Lead me, Will.”
I recounted our experiences up in the mountains, and my discussions with Phareewee.
“You believe all this to be true?” she finally said.
“I do. I teleported us back here, Kisarat. I took that crystal, reached out, and boom, here we were.”
“Then I believe it as well. Before I knew you, I believed incredible things about the makalang with little evidence behind them, and they came true. So I can believe all this as well. What you say makes sense.”
“So I need to resolve this problem. There’s nothing after me. If I fail, Taitala dies.”
“That seems likely.”
“I don’t want it to die.”
“Neither do I.”
“There cannot be a war here. aJia’jara told me all of Silas’s children weren’t enough to make up for the casualties.”
I looked down. The five cunelo girls were sadly filing out of the gate. One of them looked up at me.
“The same concern would seem to apply here,” she said.
“None of which stops me from wanting to tear Loreloo limb from limb for taking Lorelat.”
“You heard what Merindra said? What she was calling to us?”
I gritted my teeth.
“Yes. I know she would never leave voluntarily. She told me only a few days ago that she wanted nothing more than to stay here and be a bunny-mom with me.”
“She said as much to me. Most of us feel exactly the same.”
I leaned against her, reaching for her stomach. The little snake-girl was in there, almost certainly the second child I’d made here.
“I don’t say this enough, but my life got a lot better when you came into it.”
Her tail caressed my leg softly.
“I kn
ow, Will. I know from the degree you depend on me, and confide in me like this. It is the same for me.”
“So what do we do here?”
“We must find a way to end this tension between the clans.”
“Right. But none of this makes any fucking sense. The cunelo? Why would they be the ones to stir up this shit? Eladra goes on like her people want to avoid conflict.”
“Things on Taitala are not always as they appear. You are proof of that.”
“The panikang are not the Black Sky. I know that now, and I’m increasingly convinced one of the other clans is behind it. I think it may be the linyang. Ceriniat seems determined to provoke everyone.”
Kisarat was silent for a few moments. Then she shook her head.
“I would agree with you, Will, except for one thing. The Tower of Starlight.”
“Why does that matter?”
“The clan leader of the linyang at the time was one of the driving forces behind its construction. The linyang have always been very proud of that fact. And Ceriniat is the only clan leader who has seemed to care about restoring it. To destroy it . . . no. She would never do that. It would be spitting . . . no, shitting on the legacy she inherited as leader of the clan.”
I groaned. “There goes my only theory.”
“And what about the buildings the Long Claw owned. Why destroy those?”
“You’re right.” I sighed. “If Ceriniat wanted to rebuild it, why didn’t it happen?”
“Varycibe argued against the expense. Reasonably, I would say. It would have been considerable, and the city’s resources are not what they were when the tower was raised. So with the two strongest clans in disagreement, nothing happened.”
“Okay. Forget the Black Sky. Why is Loreloo being such an insufferable bitch about all this?”
“Have you discussed this with Eladra?”
“Yes. She’s as baffled as I am.”
I leaned forward gripping the edge of the glass tightly in my fists.
“We have to get Lorelat back. That shouldn’t be my priority given everything else going on here, but it is. If I allow this to happen and do nothing, the other clan leaders will take note.”
“I agree.”
Neither of us said anything for about a minute. Then I leaned over and kissed her.
“It might not seem like we solved anything here, but this helped.”
She cuddled against me.
“I am glad, Will. And perhaps tonight . . . we will see what Eladra likes so much about Mereceeree.”
I laughed.
“Perhaps.”
Chapter 14
I went back downstairs and found Meridrian. I asked her to bring them all together into one of the common rooms on the first floor.
“Is there a problem, my tsulygoi?”
“More an issue I need to resolve.”
She nodded and went off to round them up. I went down to the room and waited as they filed in over the next few minutes. There were nineteen of them now, a mix of linyang and sorai. When they were all there, I stood up in front of them.
“You are all aware of what happened this morning. And unfortunately, it means things here have changed. Going forward, I need to be assured of your absolute, undivided loyalty. Those of you who feel you cannot give that to me are free to leave, with no hard feelings.”
I waited. None of them moved, though I could see some wavering, waiting to see what I said next.
“For some of you, I am confident in your loyalties, the eight who remain, and who lost a sister today.”
That group looked around at each other, then back at me, faces grave.
“For the rest of you, I need to be assured that I can count on the same loyalty. So, for all of you, I will make the same offer. If you chose to stay here, to commit to serving me and only me, I will promise to mate with each of you. I will have Eladra add you to the rotation with the other wives, and you will enjoy the same privileges. And if you conceive, you will be treated the same as the others who carry my children.”
I knew the reaction I was going to get with that, and it came. I was offering them something they had surely long since given up on, yet was a loss they had to deal with every single day as they worked and lived around my wives. I had considered this before. I knew from my years in the Marines that loyalty flowed both ways. More importantly, it was something you didn’t really get until you gave it. But until Narilora was healed, I also knew this was impossible.
Meridrian dropped to a knee.
“I serve only the makalang, who is my tsulygoi.”
The other seven dropped with her an instant later, repeating what she’d said in a cacophony together.
Then one of the sorai dropped to her knee, repeating what the leader had said. And the others slowly dropped as well, until all of them were kneeling before me.
Meridrian shouted her oath again.
“We serve only the makalang, who is our tsulygoi!”
The others shouted after her.
“We serve only the makalang, who is our tsulygoi!”
“Good,” I said. “I will return this loyalty. Now get back to your posts.”
◆◆◆
I was in the office just after lunch when one of the guards came in.
“My tsulygoi, the cunelo you sent away this morning have returned. And they are carrying a message for you.”
I resisted the urge to put my fist through the desk.
“Have Ayarala and Merindra meet me downstairs.”
When I got down to the front gate, the five bunny-girls were standing there. They cowered when I approached, no doubt seeing the furious look my face. One of the guards handed me a folded sheet of paper.
“They were carrying this.”
Of course I couldn’t read it. Then Ayarala and Merindra came up behind me. I handed the note to Ayarala. Her already pale face paled even further as she read.
“What does it say?”
“Not here.”
I followed her back into the house, into one of the rooms by the front door. She shut it behind us, then turned to me. She took a deep breath.
“It says, ‘Take these five back into your house, or the city will learn you have taken a panikang wife.’”
My jaw dropped. Then I exploded.
“God-fucking-dammit! How the hell does she know everything that goes on in this house?”
Merindra pursed her lips.
“Will . . . if this is a concern of yours . . . your wives are not the only cunelo in your home.”
In an instant, I went from furious at Loreloo to furious at myself. Fuck. Somehow, in all the concerns about wives and mating, I had completely forgotten that I had about a dozen cunelo maids and cooks working here. One or more of them had to be acting as Loreloo’s spy.
“Put those cunelo girls back in their rooms and keep them there. Then bring every cunelo maid in this house up to the sitting room.”
Merindra ran off. I went up to bedroom to find my focus crystal, then went down a floor to the big sitting room. The maids were already filing in, confused and concerned. Ayarala and Merindra came in with them. Eladra’s cousin Lalaria was among them, and I wasn’t concerned with her, but I needed to assess the rest of them.
I had been able to sense emotions and feelings in a crude sense up to now. The crystal gave things near-perfect clarity.
“Is this all of them?” I asked.
“Yes,” Ayarala said.
I concentrated for a moment with the crystal. Then it was clear.
There were actually two of them. I motioned for both to step forward. Shivering in fear, they did.
“Leave this house and never return. And tell your leader her schemes are no longer a mystery to me.”
They practically fell over themselves fleeing from the room. When they were gone, I addressed the rest of them.
“I don’t need perfect loyalty from you. But I have no room for betrayal. Continue your work as you have, and we have no quarrel. Understood?
”
They all nodded nervously, murmuring their assent, so I dismissed them.
I then went and checked on the five bunny-girls Loreloo had sent back. None could be called spies; they were all truly only interested in mating with me, and the whole episode had left them deeply confused and distressed. So I explained what was going on, and they swore up and down that they would never betray me, that they only wanted to bear my children. I told them to just sit tight for now.
◆◆◆
I let Mereceeree sleep as long as I could. But when it began to get dark, I woke her up.
“I’m sorry. I know you’ve got to be exhausted after everything over the last day. But I need you now.”
She sat up slowly, pulling the tangles out of her tawny hair in an intensely sexy way.
“I have rested sufficiently, my tsulygoi. Lead me.”
“You said there are other panikang in the city.”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Perhaps three dozen.”
“Do they follow you?”
“I am my mother’s envoy here.”
“Okay. I need you to find Lorelat. The cunelo have her, but I have no idea where.”
Mereceeree nodded, face hardening.
“This is the wife of yours they took? She means much to you?”
“Yes.”
“Then we will find her. Though I have not met her, she is my awasa-late, and I will protect her.”
“Just find her for now. We’ll figure out what to do once we know where she is. Don’t do anything to tip them off.”
She laughed.
“We own the night. No cunelo will ever see us.”
◆◆◆
After dinner, I returned to my bedroom to find three wives who had missed me terribly and were ready to show me just how much. I was pretty tired, so I let them take the lead while Eladra just watched. After all three had ridden me to exhaustion, I finished with Ayarala and cuddled with them for a while.
There was a quiet knock on the door. The guards knew not to disturb us unless it was important, so I pulled on my pants and went to see what was up.
I found one of the sorai waiting.
“Tsulygoi, I am very sorry, but there are two girls at the back gate who have been calling to us all afternoon and night. They insist that you promised to come talk to them. We would ignore them as we do the others, but Yarahan told us that she witnessed your conversation with them and was not sure if you meant to see them. They have been very insistent. It does not seem to be about mating.”
The Black Sky Page 13
