Callan excused himself when Rose appeared, and Rohn faced her. “I trust you found everything to your satisfaction.”
His deep rumbling voice vibrated her very bones. She’d never heard anything like it among any of the men she knew. That deep rumbling male voice had died out long ago. Only a few expert singers could still produce those bass notes. Her heart skipped a beat. “Very satisfactory. Thank you very much for your hospitality.”
He shifted his eyes to stare off somewhere over her shoulder. Did he intend to stand there silent, as though she wasn’t there? She couldn’t let that happen. “I’m supposed to meet my friends here. We want to go back up to the surface to fetch our equipment.”
“I can take you up there now, if you wish.”
Rose brightened up. “Thank you, Rohn. That’s very kind of you.”
“We want to extend every courtesy to you and your colleagues.”
She fell in at his side on the way back up the long passage. Already she sensed the ice melting between them. “Do you mind if I ask you a question, Rohn?”
“What is it?”
“These medallions you men wear. Do they have any special meaning?”
“They represent the person’s identity. They announce to everyone around you who you are, which Clan you belong to, and anything else anybody cares to know.”
She studied his medallion, but she couldn’t get very close to it without blocking his path. “Interesting, but doesn’t your family already know who you are and which Clan you belong to?”
“The medallion identifies us when we gather with other Clans.”
“How often does that happen? I thought the Clans kept to themselves in their family Keeps.”
“We gather once or twice a year with the Clans nearest us. That’s how we choose mates from Clans other than our own.”
“That’s fascinating. Who decides where the new couple will live? Do they automatically go to the woman’s family, the way Callan did?”
“They always go to the man’s family. The new wife joins her husband’s Clan. Callan came here because Clan Harkniss had so few people we were in danger of dying out altogether.”
“Really? Why so few?”
“In most cases, the patriarch’s sons inherit the Keep. They bring their wives to live there and raise their children, so a Clan gets stronger and stronger with every passing generation. Clan Harkniss is one of the smallest Clans on the planet. Most other Clans have several hundred members living within a single Keep.”
“So, what happened? Why do you have only the one family?”
“My father’s two brothers were killed in a war with another Clan, so only he was left to inherit the Keep. The previous generations had a majority of daughters who moved away and left Harkniss Keep almost empty. That is the reason Clan Assan chose to make an exception and send Callan to live here with Haya.”
“I see. That’s very interesting. My friends and I are anxious to learn everything about your way of life.”
“It’s really not that interesting. We’re people like any other. I’m sure we have all the same foibles and eccentricities everyone has among the Allies.”
“Everyone has their own eccentricities, but that’s what makes them unique and fascinating. Take Tanner, for example. He’s spent his career studying alien races. I’m sure he will find your people no less interesting than the others.”
Rohn puffed out his barrel chest. “I don’t think I wish to discuss our way of life with your friend Tanner.”
“Why not? He’s a professional archaeologist.”
Rohn pursed his lips. “I don’t understand the men of your world. I understand the women much better.”
“Is that because the women are dominant?”
“If the women are dominant, that must mean the men are subservient.”
“They aren’t exactly subservient. Men among the Allies enjoy the same rights and self-determination as the women. Everyone does. Our laws guarantee them that.”
“Then what do you mean when you say the women are dominant?”
“We aren’t exactly dominant. I suppose I made a mistake when I said that, but women usually occupy the command positions in the military and political life. Women hold the top jobs, and we make most of the decisions in family life, too. That’s just the way it worked out, but the men wouldn’t argue with it. If a man wants to become a general or a leader or a doctor, there’s nothing to stop him but his own determination.”
“Do they lack the will to take those positions?”
“Most don’t bother. They would rather study or work in menial jobs like laboring or building. Those jobs seem to suit their temperaments better.”
He looked her square in the eye. “It seems to me you didn’t make any mistake when you said women are dominant. What happens when a woman gets pregnant and wants to raise her children?”
“Then she gets pregnant and raises her children.”
“Is the father expected to support her and the children by working as a laborer?”
“Of course not. That would be inhuman. We have social structures in place so mothers don’t have to worry about support while their children are young. The society pays for their support, and the women return to work when the children get old enough to spend time away from her.”
“That sounds very interesting.”
“It must be very different here.”
“Of course, it is. Women do not leave their family Keeps, and they have their whole family to help them raise their children.”
“They’re very lucky.”
“Luck has nothing to do with it. Clan is everything on Kratak. I am as much responsible for raising Haya’s daughter Asya as Haya and Callan are. Asya has a home here for the rest of her life. I hunt food for her as much for my parents and any woman I marry and children I have with her. Asya receives food, clothing, shelter and anything else she needs. Then when she grows up and marries into another Clan, they will take care of her as one of their own, which she will then indeed be.”
“That really is fascinating. It sounds like a very civilized way of handling things.”
“We have to handle things that way. If a man dies in a war, he has to know his wife and children will be taken care of by the rest of the Clan.”
“How do the wars start? Don’t all the Clans have their own territories?”
Instead of answering, Rohn pointed in front of him. “Look there. Here we are.”
They came to the top of the passage where daylight flooded the Keep’s entrance. The sweeping expanse of mountains spread out to the farthest horizon. The sun slanted through the purple clouds and played across the treetops down in the forested valleys below. Rose caught her breath at the view.
At that moment, the dragon cut across Rose’s line of sight. It banked right in front of the Keep and swept up to the same mountaintop where she first noticed it. It folded its leathery wings against its body and crouched to perch among the rocks.
“What is that dragon doing there? Is that the only one on the planet? The Command never said anything about dragons on this planet.”
Rohn didn’t appear to hear her. “There’s your gear. I’ll help you carry it inside so your friends don’t have to come up to get it.”
He strode down the hill to the spot where the rocket shuttle had dropped off Rose and her team. Their duffel bags and backpacks all lay in a heap on the ground. Rohn picked up two duffel bags in each hand and slung them over his shoulders.
Rose trotted after him with no further thought for the dragon. She heaved her backpack onto her back and grabbed a duffel bag in each hand. She struggled under the weight up the hill after Rohn when the dragon let out a deafening roar from the peak behind them.
Rohn whipped around and frowned at it. Rose followed his gaze. The dragon stared right at them. It opened its mouth and let out a spurt of flame. Rose jumped three feet into the air. She would have run away if the bags hadn’t weig
hed her down.
Rohn narrowed his eyes at the dragon, but it only chuckled under its breath. Rose could barely hear the low sound, but the vibrations hit her in the chest. Rohn gave the creature one last scowl and walked away.
Chapter 3
Rose stopped more than once to catch her breath, but she pushed herself to get back inside the Keep. Every time she paused to look back, she beheld the dragon regarding her with its gleaming silver eyes. Its skin glowed copper red, and the light rippled over its scales. It ruffled its wings at her and opened its mouth, but she never waited long enough to see if it spat fire at her again.
She collapsed inside the entrance and let her bags fall to the ground. “Thank goodness! That thing is a menace.”
Rohn studied her. He hadn’t even broken a sweat carrying twice as many bags up that hill. His arm muscles flexed under the weight, but he stood just as tall and straight as ever.
“Does that thing ever attack people?”
He put his head to one side. “We better get down to the hall. We’ll be eating the midday meal soon.”
He walked away without another word. By the time Rose got her bags hauled down the passage to the hall, the members of the Harkniss family all sat around a long table at one end of the room. Rohn sat next to his father with the duffel bags tossed into a corner.
With his bare hand, he pulled some body part off a roast animal in the middle of the table and tore a piece off with his teeth. The other Clan members ate the same way. No one paid any attention to the team, who stood in a cluster across the room.
Rose walked over and took a place in the group between Reyna and Tanner. She swept the group with her eyes. “Where’s Moira?”
“I haven’t seen her,” Reyna replied. “I’m sure she’ll turn up in a few minutes. She probably went off to explore this place.”
“I brought your gear down from the landing site. We can all start taking notes.”
“I already have,” Tanner replied. “This place is incredible. It’s like something out of the distant past. I wish I had a camera.”
Rose kept her voice low. “Don’t let them hear you say that. They already suspect us of trying to destroy their way of life.”
“Can you blame them?” Reyna asked. “We represent everything they want to avoid.”
Rose turned to Whitney. “What do you make of their skin color patterns?”
“I never saw anything like it before. It must be some kind of tattooing.”
“How could it be? It changes with every passing minute. It never stays the same, and it even seems to match the person’s thoughts and feelings. Did you see how Rowan’s face changed when he challenged us out there? I never saw any tattooing that could do that.”
“There’s a lot about this place and these people we don’t understand. That’s what we’re here for.”
“Have any of you had a chance to talk to them?”
Everyone shook their heads. Tanner dropped his voice to a murmur. “They won’t even talk to Whitney and me. Rohn didn’t say two words to us on the way to our quarters. He answered every question with a wordless grunt.”
Rose bit back a smile. “They don’t understand how men could live in a female-dominated society.”
“Did you explain to them that the Allies aren’t female dominated?”
Rose shrugged. “To them, it is. That’s all they understand, and that’s all they want to understand. Maybe we should just work within their expectations.”
“That’s easy for you to say. They’ll talk to you. How am I supposed to conduct an archaeological survey of this planet when none of the inhabitants will talk to me? They must have maps of the area and information about how these Keeps were built. How can I access any of that?”
“One of us could run interference for you. We can ask, and they’ll probably give it to us. They seem much more agreeable to women.”
“Dominant women, you mean.”
Rose turned to Ben. “How are you, munchkin? How did you find your room?”
“My room was fine. It was very nice, much nicer than I thought it would be when I saw the outside of this place. I thought it would be a bare prison, but it was really very pleasant.”
“You don’t mind entertaining yourself while we work on our boring scientific stuff, do you? It’s going to be a long year for you, with no one to talk to.”
“I have someone to talk to.”
Rose’s head shot up. “Who?”
“Asya.”
She stared at him. “Asya?”
“Asya Assan. She’s Haya and Callan’s daughter.”
Rose looked around the hall. She didn’t see any sign of anybody but the people they already met. “Where is she?”
“I have no idea. I haven’t seen her since I met her in the passage outside my room.”
“You met her outside your room, and she talked to you? Tanner just said no one would talk to you.”
“Maybe no one talked to him, but after Rohn took us to our rooms and I had a good look around, I came out and found her in the passage. We started talking, and she invited me to go for a walk with her after the meal.”
“So why isn’t she joining the meal? Do they keep her locked up or something, so she won’t talk to foreign men?”
“If they are, it’s not doing much good. She talked to me, and she didn’t seem to have any strange ideas about me being dominated by women, even if my mother is the Commanding Officer.”
At that moment, a lovely, willowy girl with long golden yellow hair strode into the hall. She cast a calculated look over the guests before she sat down next to Haya. Rose opened her mouth to say something. Then thought better of it and closed her mouth.
“What are we all doing over here in a corner? Why don’t we sit down and have something to eat?”
“We haven’t been invited.”
“Maybe they don’t invite. Maybe meals are every man for himself.”
Tanner chuckled. “It seems like everything around here is like that.”
“Well, I’m hungry. I’m going to sit down and eat. If I make a tactical blunder, I’ll pay for it.”
Rose walked over to the long table. There was only one seat available, next to Fay Harkniss, the matriarch. Rose slid into the seat. No one said anything. No one even looked at her.
She waited another long moment before she dared to put out her hand for a piece of the meat. Still no one took any notice of her. She might as well not even be here. She tore off a chunk and started chewing. So far, so good.
For some odd reason of their own, the family didn’t pass conversation among themselves during the meal. They all ate in silence. From her place at the end of the table, Rose couldn’t see them even looking at each other or acknowledging each other’s existence. Everyone sat in a cocoon of their own thoughts.
At the sight of her success, the others came over and sat down, too. The Clan shifted around to make room for them, and pretty soon, they scattered around the table and got something to eat.
Rose waited, but no one opened the table to discussion. Did these people plan to let a whole year pass without talking to their visitors about their studies? No one else would broach the subject, so it was up to her to initiate it. She turned to Fay. “I didn’t realize there were dragons living on this planet.”
Fay didn’t answer. She showed no sign of having heard.
Rose stared at her and waited. Then she tried again. “I was surprised when our shuttle dropped us off and I saw that dragon on the mountain. Is it dangerous?”
Still Fay looked straight in front of her. She chewed her meat with slow, methodical movements of her jaw.
Rose swallowed the food in her mouth. What was going on here? Would these people ignore all their questions? Her mind whirled through the possibilities. Maybe Fay had some personal reason not to talk about the dragon. Maybe she would be more inclined to talk about something else. “Where’s your oldest son? Is he coming back som
etime soon?”
Rohn answered from across the table. “My father told you he isn’t here right now.”
“I heard that. I asked if he was coming back sometime soon. We’ll need to interview him, along with the rest of you, for our reports.” She forced a laugh. “We couldn’t write a report and leave one of you out of it.”
“What do you put in your reports?”
“Well, I’m a doctor, so I’ll want to examine a few of you. I’ll report anything unusual about your physiology. That reminds me. If you don’t mind, Fay, I’d like to interview you about childbearing among your people—how you do it, what specific practices you have to care for the mother and baby, that sort of thing.”
Fay replied for the first time, but she still didn’t look at Rose. “Haya has given birth, too. You could interview her.”
Rose struggled to keep her composure, but her hackles started to rise. “Do you have some objection to talking to me, about that or anything else?”
“I have no objection.”
“Then, if you don’t mind, I’d like to interview you.”
“Very well. Ask me anything you like.”
Rose looked around the table. Rohn stared at her from directly across the table. Besides him and her own teammates, no one looked up from their meal. “Do you mean...right now?”
“Why not?”
“It’s not exactly dinner table conversation.”
Fay shifted her languid eyes to Rose’s face. “Why not? You want to interview me. Go ahead.”
Rose fidgeted in her seat. “I thought we’d do it later, in private.”
A hint of a smile crept over Fay’s face. “I don’t see why. These men all know what it’s like. They’ve all been born.”
No one laughed. Only Rohn smiled. Rose blushed. Rohn spoke up. “Perhaps you’d like to examine me.”
Rose’s eyes flew open. “Really?”
“You want people to examine. Why not me?”
Rose blushed again. Why? Something in his eyes unsettled her, something sharp and predatory. Her eyes skipped around the table. She wasn’t getting any other volunteers. At this rate, he might be the only Kratak she got to examine. “Okay. I could examine you.”
Rohn (Dragons of Kratak Book 1) Page 2
