by John Daulton
Orli said something that he couldn’t understand, and she was fanning herself, obviously surprised at the temperature Taot had created with his fiery tirade. It was also obvious from her tone that she was baffled by his sudden shift in attitude. And, once again, he’d forgotten about the ten-step radius of Common Tongues.
He came back down the stairs, shielding his eyes with a hand so as not to gape at the woman in his boudoir like some predatory lout, and ran down to the first floor of his tower to get some parchment, a quill pen and some ink. He came back up, displaying the objects to Orli while maintaining the properly discreet aversion of his eyes, and then went up to the battlements hoping that she understood. Apparently she recognized the purpose of the objects, for he happened to glimpse her nodding as he shuffled past. She had a grin on her face that suggested that she was mildly amused. He marveled at how forgiving the woman was as he skittered up the stairs.
He set the items down upon the battlement floor, roughly centered, but close enough for the spell area’s outer edge to overlap with Taot’s resting place. The dragon eyed him expectantly and licked its teeth.
“Oh,” Altin said. “One second. I’ll be right back.”
He ran back down to his rooms where Orli, clearly waiting for permission to approach the area wherein the dragon lay, had gone to his bookshelf and was leafing through a book. Her alabaster skin was beginning to shine as the heat hanging in the air brought a sheen of perspiration to her flesh, luminously wet, reflective and smooth like fine marble under the lights in Mercy’s temple or that of some other feminine divinity. He wanted to smile at her, but did not want her to misinterpret his gaze for lust, particularly given that he found himself with more than a seed of it stirring in his loins. Her uniform was unparalleled in inspiring such ungallant thoughts, more so than anything he’d ever seen.
The whole of discomfiture was made worse by the fact that he had to approach her to get to the crate of food, which was not too far from where she stood.
“Excuse me,” he said, face turned away from her and still blushing red, “I need to get Taot something to eat.”
Apparently she sensed his predicament and stepped to the other side of the bed. She was still smiling, almost a smirk now, as if she had figured out exactly what was on his mind and yet found it amusing just the same. That didn’t help at all.
He hadn’t checked the crate before he’d brought his tower back out into the stars, and there wasn’t much left inside. There was, however, still an entire ham and three turkey legs, plus a wedge of cheese and some bread. He wasn’t sure the dragon would be interested in the latter two, but the rest would suit him fine. The meager portions wouldn’t fill the dragon up, but they would keep hunger at bay until Altin could send the great beast home.
With an unintentional glimpse at Orli, now pretending to leaf through the book as she watched him with an unashamed stare, he loaded all the food into his arms and trundled up the stairs. He dumped his haul near Taot’s head and watched with satisfaction as the dragon began to eat. The ham was gone in the matter of a blink. Altin sent the dragon a promise that he’d teleport him home in just a moment, but that he was going to bring someone up. He asked that the dragon behave when Orli arrived, but, as usual with dragons, no promises were made. Taot sniffed the air near the stairs and sent back to Altin’s mind the sense that he didn’t need to eat her just yet. That was as close as Altin was going to get.
Altin ran back down the stairs, growing breathless with all his labor and the stress, motioned for Orli to wait and went down to the bottom floor in search of some scissors with which to cut their hair. Of course he didn’t have a pair. However, he still had his service dagger hanging on the belt suspended from a peg on the back of the door. So he pulled that from its scabbard and headed back upstairs, wiping the dust from its pommel as he went.
Orli greeted him with a smile as he reentered his bed chamber and, for whatever reason, this time he did not avert his eyes. She certainly didn’t make him as uncomfortable in this circumstance as other women might have done. He would have to thank her for that. Most women would have been outraged. However, as he approached, she saw the dagger in his hand. He realized, as her hand moved down to her red-light weapon, that she was not quite so comfortable as he had assumed.
“Oh,” he said, stopping and stepping back. “It’s for the hair.” He reached for another lock of his hair, and sliced it neatly with the knife. “See.” He held his newly pruned spell component out for her to see. “For the spell.”
She immediately recognized his intent and her posture became more relaxed. Still, the moment had taken something from the energy that been heating up the air quite aside from anything Taot had done before.
Altin flipped the dagger around in his hand, holding it by the blade, and offered it pommel first to her so that she could cut her hair herself. She smiled, clearly relieved, and took it. He made a quick gesture to his own ear, reminding her to take it from the area specified by the spell. She was rather clumsy with the knife and took a somewhat longish cut, twice the size required by the spell. He wondered if maybe he should have offered to do it after all. Gods, what was it about her that made him so out of sorts?
She returned the dagger to him with the sample of her own hair, which he took, smiling, and then beckoned her to follow him up to the battlements. Once there, he placed the dagger on the table, discreetly halving the sample Orli had cut and slipping the extra portion behind the lamp so that she would not know that she’d made a mistake. Then he went about placing the samples on the parchment and setting up the rest of the ten-pace radius spell that would allow them to communicate. The spell was cast a moment later, and, still out of breath, he could finally apologize for teleporting her into his bed chamber as if he thought her some common tart.
“What?” she stammered as soon as he’d prattled out his long, dissembling explanation of chivalry and proper etiquette. “Is that what that was all about?” She giggled, almost childlike, and blushed a little pink into her cheeks. “I admit, I thought it might be something like that, but chivalry has been dead so long on Earth I really figured it had to be something else.” She looked him square in the eye, and a smile came upon her perfect lips. “You really are sweet, Altin. I’ve never met a man like you.”
His cheeks caught fire as if Taot had just breathed directly in his face. He used the dragon as his excuse to divert her attention from his blush. “Thank you,” he managed after a moment. “You’re very kind to say it.” He stepped to the dragon and patted it on the head. “This is Taot, my dragon.” He paused. “Well, he’s not really mine. He’s entirely his own, but we have something of a partnership.”
Orli regarded the dragon who was just finishing off the last of the turkey legs, the bones popping and crunching as they were crushed between its powerful jaws. She clapped her hands and laughed aloud. “He’s magnificent! And so huge. Whatever made you want to cram an animal this big up here in such a tiny space?” Before Altin could answer she added, “Can I pet him?”
A bit surprised that she was not more cautious, and a bit impressed, he queried Taot to see if he was going to stand for a stranger’s touch; the dragon was never amenable to such things, but it was always worth a try. The sensation the dragon returned to Altin’s mind was entirely unspeakable, inappropriate beyond all measure, and he could not believe that Taot would assume such base and lustful things about Altin’s purely chivalrous motives regarding the woman standing here. Taot was an unremitted and lascivious beast, and clearly expected little more from Altin than he expected from himself. And in addition to assuming Altin had such carnal plans, the dragon apparently approved of Altin’s “choice of mates” as well—including an appalling appreciation for her scent. Altin’s blush could not have gotten any deeper red, though there was a lurking voice inside him that wished he dared be so bold.
“Good gods,” was all he managed to get out.
“Does that mean I can’t pet him?” Orli asked, sounding a
bit disappointed as she took a step away from the dragon lying on the floor.
“No,” Altin said as the pricks of heat slowly faded from his face. “Quite the opposite. He seems to…,” he paused, appropriate words not at hand. “It’s fine. Go ahead.”
Orli moved cautiously to the dragon and reached a hand slowly out towards his snout. As no fire erupted to consume her, she pressed her fingers against the very tip of his nose where it was pointed, almost like a beak. The skin there was scaly, hard like industrial plastic and just as smooth. The dragon made no move to bite her, and so her confidence grew.
“There’s some softer skin just behind his ears. He likes when you rub him there, if your hands are strong enough. Don’t be afraid to dig right in, or he won’t even know you’re there.”
She followed Altin’s instructions and found the spot that he was speaking of. Rubbing the thick skin was rather like trying to knead body armor, but, using both hands, she managed to pull it off. Taot let out a low rumble that rattled the stone beneath her feet. She echoed it with a less stentorian version of her own.
“Oh, Altin, he’s amazing,” she said after petting the dragon for a while. “So beautiful and strong.” She cooed at the dragon and spoke to it as if it were a puppy or soft kitten in her lap.
Altin grinned and watched her with warmth filling his chest like hot water being poured into a bath. She was so innocent, standing there like that, sweet and pure, yet clearly not like any other woman he had seen. She was strong and confident, even assertive, but not like Lena or any of the other girls he knew, and not crude like the women who fought for the Queen with knives and swords; she was not a hardened warrior despite the red-light strapped to her thigh. Orli’s was a different kind of strength, an alien one, entirely unique. And she was exquisite to be near.
That was when the button she had given him began to squawk from inside the pocket he had dropped it in. He could not make out the words, as whoever spoke had not been included in the translation spell he’d cast a few moments ago. But whoever it was, they were clearly quite upset.
“Oh shit,” she said as the button sounded off. She spun and stared out at her ship. “They can see me standing here.”
“Who?” said Altin. “Is that the captain yelling there?”
“Who else?” she replied. “You’d better take me back.”
Judging from the captain’s tone, Altin could tell that it was true. “All right,” he said, his heart breaking at the thought. He handed her the device, but she did not take it. She closed his hand around it with both of hers; he could feel the wetness in her palms as they wrapped around his fist. “Enchant it, like you said.” She went to the table then and took the dagger from where he’d placed it coming up. She deftly sliced another sample of her hair from behind her ear and turned to him with a grin. “If we keep this up, we’ll both be bald.” She laughed and handed him the lock of white-gold hair. “Can you send me back alone? I think you might be safer here.” She glanced down at the silver button in his palm and gave a semi-shrug. Altin knew exactly what she meant.
“Yes,” he said, his hand going absently to the dark patch upon his chest and the wound that lay beneath. “Perhaps you’re right about that.”
The silver button nearly exploded with the violence of the captain’s next command.
“I need to go, Altin.”
He’d never wanted to kiss anyone so much in his entire life, but he tore his eyes away from her and went to the scrying basin, calling up the hospital room where they’d first met. It was empty. With agony in his heart, he turned, smiled, and sent her back.
Chapter 40
“What in the hell did you think you were doing, Pewter? You just leave the ship with the first swinging dick you meet? Are you out of your fucking mind?” Captain Asad was fuming, his brown eyes wide and his voice booming from deep inside his chest like explosions from some unseen engine catastrophe. “I should have you shot for unspeakable stupidity, not to mention aiding and abetting the enemy, dereliction of duty, unapproved leave and treason. My God, Ensign, what the hell is wrong with you?”
Orli leaned defiantly into the wind of the captain’s tirade, too rapturous from her moments in Altin’s tower to let the words get beneath her skin. Being there with Altin and his dragon was the most fun she’d had in her entire adult life. Altin was alive, a real man from a real place, not some sterile military robot like everyone in the entire goddamn fleet. Let the captain shoot her. She didn’t care. She finally felt alive. For the first time in memory, she lived, as if something had come awake inside. And besides, she’d just scratched a dragon behind the ears. How dangerous could the captain possibly be?
Her silence only made matters worse. “Speak up, Ensign, what the hell were you doing down there? Tell me your infatuation has not endangered the entire fleet. Did you even have yourself decontaminated before coming back aboard?” He didn’t wait for her reply. “Of course you didn’t. You’re too busy thinking with your cunt to have one thought for the safety of this already decimated crew. Goddamn it, Pewter.”
The veins in his forehead were enormous, thick wires trying to swell through his heated flesh. He’d always been a surly man, but she had never in ten long years ever seen him get like this. She actually believed she was in real danger of being shot.
“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice trembling now. There were a million emotions coursing through her veins, fear was only one. “It seemed harmless.”
“You can’t be fucking serious.” Flecks of spittle flew from his mouth, luminous particles of irritation launched at her, given light by the glow from the console by which he stood. “Harmless? Boarding an alien vessel without permission. And alone, no less. That doesn’t seem stupid beyond the pale?” His eyes bulged with incredulity, the whites tinted blue by the same light that illuminated his apoplectic spit.
“Well,” she stammered, “not once you get to know him. If you just took the time to talk to him like we did…,” she gestured to where Roberto normally sat, but their shift had still not come back around. There was only Lieutenant Mitur sitting there, and he didn’t appear to have any intention of helping her.
“Some of us have duties to the rest of the crew. Some of us think about other people besides ourselves. You have a duty to the goddamn crew, Pewter. To the rest of us. To the fleet.”
Orli began to recede into herself; clearly nothing she could say would abate the captain’s wrath. And so she stood silently in the storm of his assault, her unfocused gaze absently aware of the panel lights flickering behind him until at last his anger had played itself mostly out. He stood there glaring at her for a moment in silence, a looming presence in the dimness of the bridge. He seemed to swell almost, as if frustration and rage inflated him from within, but at last he relented and his presence normalized. After a very measured breath, he spoke again.
“You’re lucky I have no other choice,” he said. “Otherwise I’d be sticking you in the brig. And the first second I have an actual crew again, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. You have my word on that. You’re living on borrowed time, Ensign, trust that. You better hope the rest of the fleet never decides it’s safe to board my ship again, because on that day you’re through. Now get out of my sight. If I see you in that tower again, I’ll fire the lasers myself. Do you hear?”
“Yes, sir,” she said. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t think it was going to be that big a deal.”
“Get out.” He looked as if he wanted to spit on her for real, so she turned and immediately went away.
Back in her room she cried into her pillow for nearly an hour and a half. This place was so horrible. God, she just wanted to go away. She wished they’d left her back on Andalia, even if there were Hostile spores hiding in the dirt. Who cared? At least there’d be no one there to make her feel like shit every time she made a move. Goddamn it. This ship was such a fucking nightmare. She hated it. She hated the fleet. She hated them all. Every last one of them in their goddamn match
ing clothes and matching words and matching every-fucking-thing. Goddamn it. She wished Altin would come and just take her far from here. He said his world was only a few moments away. Maybe that was true. Maybe he could teleport home as easily as he could teleport from his tower to the ship. Maybe it really was that easy.
Or maybe it was just a dream. Maybe the captain and Roberto were right. Maybe it was some horrible Hostile ruse. Maybe they really could control everyone else’s mind. It did seem awfully hard to believe. The magic. The dragon. A man that was more than simple lust. That really was impossible if she thought about it very long.
She raised a trembling, tear-dampened hand to her ear, to where so much of her hair had recently been clipped. The ends were blunted in three distinct places, cut with no concern for aesthetics or for style. If this was all a dream, then the Hostiles didn’t miss a trick.
But it couldn’t be a trick. How could it possibly be? The way he blushed, the rustle of his robes. My God, the tables were all burnt. So was the carpet on his floor. She had smelled the smoke. And the clutter. The half-eaten bread. The sound of bones crunching in the dragon’s mouth. And it had been so terribly hot in there. How could the Hostiles create a hallucination so completely real, so filled with the most random things? And why? Why would they feel the need for so much insignificant detail? It didn’t make any sense.
Or at least it didn’t make any more sense than did a magic man floating in a tower with a dragon out in space. She sighed and sniffled all at once, the combination giving her the hiccups in its wake. She sighed again and curled up into a ball. Maybe she could go to sleep. A few hours to at least dream that he was real. She had just enough time for that before her shift came back around and she had to return to her post up on the bridge. Where the captain was. She shuddered and rocked herself to sleep, visions of green-eyed sorcerers and rumbling dragons whirling in her mind.
