Decrypted

by Lindsay Buroker

“Your... new design? You have one already? Didn’t you just learn that you had to change it this morning?”

  “Yes, I had time to revamp it on the ride out here. So long as the bumps I received to my head while sitting in your family’s conveyance didn’t cause damage that will render my calculating skills untrustworthy.”

  Tikaya snorted. “I knew you thought the runabout was awful.”

  “Just... incomplete.” Rias touched her sash. “Have I answered your questions adequately? Are you going to slap my hand if I slip it under your dress to see what you’re hiding?”

  “Have I ever?” Tikaya checked the window. The youngsters, perhaps bored by the dearth of physical activity, had disappeared, and only the policewoman remained. Unfortunately, she seemed to take her job seriously, and she watched them like dedicated surfers surveying the ocean for a promising wave. “We better put on a show for her,” Tikaya whispered. “Can you slip it out and take it to your hostel room?”

  Rias eyeballed his sleeveless shirt and clam diggers. “I suppose I can employ a similar method to yours, so long as nobody’s looking too closely at my groin area.”

  “Don’t walk past my mother on the way out.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. It’s a journal that was written over three hundred years ago by one of your countrymen. He’d retired from the military and was sailing on an exploration vessel. They were seeking gold, ancient treasures, and signs of some sort of lost colony. The latter intrigued me, because, for all that I’ve studied history, I hadn’t heard of any such thing. Do you know of it?”

  “It’s a fable,” Rias said, “one of many my mother read to me as a child. According to our history, there were eight waves of ships that left Nuria, all intending to colonize different parts of what’s now the Turgonian West Coast. After a generation or two of conquering, assimilating, and carving out places for themselves, they eventually found each other again and formed a central government. The history books claim that all of the original colony waves were accounted for, but the fable says that there were actually nine waves and that one never made it. The story tells of a great storm that forced the small fleet off course and eventually sank the ships. Every now and then, someone goes looking for evidence of the lost colonists, because the fable also tells of priceless antiques that had been taken from the old world.” Rias shrugged. “I suspect it’s simply a tale kept alive by wistful treasure hunters.”

  “Many cultures have such stories,” Tikaya said, “some based on a grain of truth but some totally fantastical. I don’t know about a lost colony, but according to this journal, this exploration vessel was here in 397—that’s 342 by your calendar. It’d be an impressive coincidence if their quest didn’t have anything to do with the altered map and the missing government journal from that year.”

  “Did this countryman of mine find anything?” Rias asked. “How did the journal end up in... Where did you say you found it?”

  “Our attic. I’m—”

  A door banged, and Tikaya flinched.

  “It’s getting late,” Father said. “Finish up, send your... suitor home, and come to bed.”

  Suitor. That was an improvement. Maybe Mother had won the argument. The door thudded shut again. At least he was giving her a couple more minutes. “Ever notice how you’re always a child in the eyes of your parents? So long as you’re staying under their roof....”

  “I have experienced similar scenarios during my homecomings, yes.” Rias turned his shoulder and leaned in to stroke her face with one hand while resting the other on her thigh near the book. “It doesn’t matter how many military medals and accolades you receive; your mother still expects you to clear the table and take out the trash.”

  Tikaya might have chuckled, but her body had instantly grown aware of the warmth of his hand through her dress. “Er, yes, as I was saying, I didn’t get to read all of it before dinner, but the book will be safer with you.”

  “Safer?” Rias’s roaming fingers paused. “What do you mean?”

  Tikaya, aware that Father might be back out at any moment, gave him a quick synopsis of the afternoon’s events.

  “You suspect your cousin?”

  “He’s been around—and around me—far more than usual.”

  “And here I thought he simply found me intriguing.”

  “I’m sure that’s true too.” Tikaya tapped the back of Rias’s hand, reminding him that his fingers were supposed to be delving under her dress. She supposed she could get the book out herself without her observer noticing, but thought Rias might perform the move more adroitly. Akahe knew it was within her range of talents to fall off the bench while trying to extricate the tome.

  Fortunately Rias obliged, his warm fingers slipping beneath the hem to find bare skin. He lowered his lips to hers for a kiss as well, perhaps figuring the policewoman would be more likely to watch that than his hand. Tikaya certainly didn’t mind. Too soon, he pulled back.

  “Wait, did you say this journal was written in three-forty-two?” Rias whispered. “It’ll be in Middle Turgonian then.”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “Only if you want me to be able to read it.”

  “It’s not that different from the modern tongue. I’m sure you’ll be able to work it out. If you’re as smart as I believe you are.” Tikaya took his face in both hands, smiled, and leaned into him to resume the kiss.

  “There better be maps and pictures,” he muttered around her ardor.

  Before she could decide whether she wanted to respond, his roaming fingers inched higher, finding the book, but also delivering a few teasing strokes that made her breath hitch and her body flush. “Rias,” she whispered against his mouth. “You can’t do such things if you’re leaving.”

  The door slammed open again, and Tikaya jerked away from Rias like a guilty teenager.

  “Enough, Tikaya,” came her father’s voice.

  She wanted to tell him to go away, that, by all the blighted banyan sprits in the forest, she was thirty years old. Besides, he’d never objected to her spending late evenings in the courtyard with Parkonis. Of course, she’d had her own room in the city then, and necking sessions at the homestead had been rare. It didn’t matter anyway. The book was gone. When she glanced at Rias’s lap, he gave her a nod. Mission accomplished.

  “Coming, Father.” Tikaya stood and smoothed her dress.

  Her father had gone back inside, but the policewoman stood on the lanai. A second woman in uniform had joined her. The night shift?

  Rias stood up and captured her hand. “Ms. Komitopis, would you be available for a date in three days hence?”

  “A date? I’m confined to the house and under watch.”

  Sure, he might be free now, but Tikaya had still assaulted a professor.

  “Perhaps you can figure out a way to sneak away,” Rias said softly.

  “I’ll... see what I can think of.” Tikaya remembered that Liusus had said her colleagues were missing her, or rather missing her expertise when it came to the alien artifacts. She could try sending Dean Teailat a note. He had some sway in the city; maybe he could speed the judicial process along. “What did you have in mind for this date?”

  “I thought we might take a stroll up the coast, and you could show me the sights. I’ve heard you can stand on the rocks and watch live lava plop out of tubes, then sizzle as it falls into sea.”

  Ah, he wanted to explore the shoreline near the basin that had disappeared from the maps. “It’s not as exciting as you’d think,” Tikaya said, hoping he understood that to mean that she’d been to the area and seen nothing suspicious or intriguing. Surfers hit the breaks up there every day and kids tramped all over the caves in the nearby cliffs. After more than three hundred years, any evidence of historically significant happenings would be long gone.

  “You only say that because you grew up here. I’m sure I’ll find it fascinating.” Rias smiled, kissed her in parting, and strolled out of the courtyard, choosing, with
his book burden, to walk around the house rather than through it.

  “Fascinating?” Tikaya murmured. Dear Akahe, what did he have in mind?

  CHAPTER 11

  Tikaya took a deep breath and climbed the steps to Iweue’s lanai. It’d been two days since Rias’s evening visit. That morning, a new policewoman had come by, relieving the old one of duty, and handed Tikaya a message. Apparently, her plea to Dean Teailat had worked. She had a month of community work to look forward to, along with eight weeks of counseling sessions in which she’d learn to control her “inappropriate rage,” but at least she could walk around without an escort. Of course, she was supposed to be back working at the Polytechnic, not visiting Parkonis’s mother.

  Tikaya pulled the doorbell ringer, a braided seashell chain with a pewter book dangling on the end. She’d loved that ringer once—as it showed how much Iweue adored reading—but now it reminded her how much she’d liked having Iweue for a future mother-in-law, and she’d seemed to like Tikaya too. If the woman had been a condescending nag, it would have been much easier to walk away from the family. Showing up today and asking for something on Rias’s behalf would likely wound Iweue. Tikaya could only hope she’d be in a cheery mood thanks to Parkonis’s recent return from the dead.

  A thump sounded within the thatch-roof bungalow, followed by a call of, “Coming.”

  Tikaya reminded herself that she was on a necessary errand and that it wouldn’t do to feel chagrin at the fact that Iweue was home. When the door opened, she forced a bright smile, though she doubted it disguised the wariness that hunched her shoulders.

  “Good afternoon,” she said.

  Iweue, a graying woman with her hair swept into a bun, leaned forward to squint through the screen door, almost dropping the book clutched to her chest. She patted about, checking the pockets of a loose blouse and an apron before finding her spectacles in their usual perch above her brow. “Tikaya?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The formal title slipped out before she caught herself. Parkonis’s mother had always insisted on being called by her first name, even by her students at the College, preferring that to ma’am, and certainly not Mrs. Osu, thank you very much, for that surname had come by way of a deadbeat husband who’d wandered off to one of the small islands to lounge about the beaches and avoid work and responsibility, a story Iweue had explained often. Even so, Tikaya wasn’t certain the woman would appreciate first name usage from her any more.

  “Iweue, please.” With her spectacles now affixed, she looked Tikaya up and down. “It’s wonderful to see that you’ve returned home safely. And that you’re well. There are rumors all over the island, and I’ve heard... so many things, really, from Parkonis. I’m not certain what to believe about, er, is there no hope for you two, Tikaya? Underneath it all, I think he misses you and would come back if... your new... relationship doesn’t end up lasting.”

  Tikaya didn’t know what to say. She had expected disappointment and maybe condemnation from Parkonis’s mother, not for her to ask if she’d take her son back. The mature thing to do would have been to discuss the situation; instead Tikaya avoided it completely by asking, “Rumors?”

  Iweue pursed her lips thoughtfully—probably seeing through Tikaya’s reluctance to discuss the matter—and said, “Yes, rumors. Here, sit down.” She waved to a pair of rattan chairs and a small table at the corner of the lanai.

  Before their rumps had more than touched down, Iweue launched into details. “Parkonis says that his team was there on a sanctioned—” her eyebrow twitched at the word, “—relic hunt with several others from the archaeological community when Admiral Starcrest showed up with a company of marines and started slaying people left and right. This being the group who had kidnapped you from your parents’ plantation, Parkonis felt quite justified and heroic in kidnapping you back from their vile midst. But you were uncooperative in helping our own people thwart the Turgonians. For the safety of all of her allies, his colleague Gali was forced to use her telepathy training to enter your mind—” Iweue’s eyebrow twitched again, this time at the word forced, “—and found out Starcrest had duped you into working for him. Parkonis claims that Starcrest is here now, under the guise of courting you, to delve into Kyattese secrets and seek a weakness that imperial forces, led by himself, can swoop in and exploit.”

  “That’s... similar to the version of events I keep hearing,” Tikaya said. “I suppose I should have guessed that the government didn’t make up such an elaborate tale of its own accord. Bureaucrats aren’t known for their creativity.”

  “Yes, Parkonis reported to them immediately upon his return.” Iweue folded her hands in her lap and waited. For Tikaya to offer her own version of events? It was promising that Iweue didn’t seem to have formed an opinion yet.

  Though Tikaya was starting to grow weary of telling the story—maybe she could put together a pamphlet to hand out to folks—she launched into it again, adding in a few more details of the ancient civilization and puzzle-solving because Iweue had often shown interest in her work when she and Parkonis had come for dinner.

  “Hm,” Iweue said after the story’s conclusion.

  Tikaya wondered if that meant she’d lost belief in the tale somewhere along the way and had continued listening only out of politeness.

  After a moment, Iweue asked, “Did he mention his wife to you?”

  “Huh?” Tikaya blurted. Of course Rias had mentioned his former wife, but nobody had asked about the woman yet—how did Iweue even know?—so the topic surprised her. “I mean, he did, yes. Early on. He said the marriage had been dissolved as a result of him losing his name, warrior-caste status, and ancestral lands.” Realizing that implied he hadn’t necessarily wanted the marriage to end, Tikaya rushed to add, “He said he didn’t regret that. I gather it was something of a relief because she wasn’t faithful. It’d been a relationship arranged in his youth, and they’d turned out not to have anything in common.”

  “She wasn’t faithful?” Iweue leaned forward so quickly, her spectacles slipped down her nose. She stared at Tikaya over the rims.

  Not certain what response Iweue wanted or expected, Tikaya only said, “Yes...”

  Iweue sank back in the chair and adjusted her spectacles. “That’s hard to imagine. He’s a great hero over there. I’d think being his wife would have been very prestigious, second only to wedding the emperor himself.”

  “Uhm.” The last thing Tikaya wanted was some scenario in which Rias’s wife regretted her past indiscretions and showed up on the docks to ask for him to return. How had they ended up on the subject? She’d come to discuss components for powering engines, not Rias’s past loves. “I suppose some warrior-caste women, being born into a privileged aristocracy, may not appreciate the gifts Akahe—er, their ancestors—bestow on them.” Tikaya tilted her head. “I didn’t know you were an expert on Turgonian marriage practices.”

  “Not an expert, no, but I’ve read...” Iweue flipped a hand, as if to dismiss the notion, but a thoughtful expression drifted onto her face. “Actually, why don’t I show you?”

  Before Tikaya could agree or disagree, Iweue slipped out of her chair and into the house, leaving the screen door banging in the breeze in her haste to reach... what? Curiosity propelled Tikaya after her host.

  Little had changed in the small home, though Tikaya barely had time to notice the woven grass rugs, the beach-themed wall decor, or the bamboo and rattan furniture—all littered with books—before Iweue zipped through the living area and up a ladder to the loft. Bookcases, their shelves bent under the weight of so many tomes, filled the low walls and formed aisles through the space. In some spots, lesser encyclopedias and compendiums were simply stacked on the floor. Tikaya followed her guide through the maze to the back of the loft where a lamp and a plush chair waited. Iweue put her hand on a case built into the back wall. Numerous history and Science tomes with bland black and brown leather bindings filled it.

  “As you may have noticed,” Iweue said, �
��I’ve been collecting over the decades. I keep saying I’ll donate some of my books to the library, but it’s difficult to part with one’s treasures.”

  “I’ve always found that to be true,” Tikaya said politely, not sure what else to say. Though she had a fondness for all sorts of books herself, she wondered at the point of this diversion.

  “I so crave good adventure yarns that I read novels from a number of different cultures. I must admit, I find our own authors tend toward the academic; some are very imaginative, but you wonder if they’ve ever actually had any adventures themselves. And they can be quite verbose. I don’t care how much symbolism one can find in a dead fish washed up on the beach—there’s just no reason to spend paragraphs describing it.”

  By this point, Tikaya had no idea where Iweue was going with the conversation, so she merely nodded.

  “I’ve found that Turgonian novelists, though terse and not known to pen books of great literary merit, at least when judged by other nations, have a knack for telling stories in a succinct way that moves the story along and makes you want to turn the page.”

  Tikaya gave another encouraging nod. Iweue’s rambling seemed to be coming to a head.

  “Of course, it grew terribly hard to acquire such novels during and after the war—and it’s considered quite unseemly to own them today. I was encouraged by colleagues to burn my copies, if you can imagine. Ghastly notion, that. I did make their placement in my library more... discreet.”

  With that, Iweue pulled out a particularly drab looking tome entitled On Manipulating Alchemical States. A soft click sounded, and the bookcase swung outward. Surprised, Tikaya stepped back to evade its bulk. Iweue pushed it all the way around, revealing a second case full of books on the backside. These were more slender texts, some with quite vivid colors. Tikaya didn’t think she’d ever seen a book with such a luscious pink binding.

  “The Rapier and the Rose, by Lady Dourcrest?” she read.

  Iweue cleared her throat. “Pay no attention to those books. They’re terribly salacious. Not at all worth your time to read, but the merchant captain who smuggles, er, brings the latest Turgonian publications to me when he passes through always includes that author’s latest titles. The way he smirks and admires my physique when he hands them over... I dare say he’s trying to put suggestions into my head.” Iweue sniffed.