Black Halo

Twenty-One

‘She did it again.’

The voice came subtly this time, without cold fingers of rime. It came this time as soft as snow falling on his brow, accumulating and growing heavier.

‘She thinks you don’t see her.’

Growing impossible to ignore.

‘Thinks we don’t see her.’

Still, Lenk tried.

He focused on other distractions in the hut: the oppressive moisture of sweat sliding down his body, the stale breath of the still and humid air filtered through the roof of dried reeds, the sounds of buzzings, chirpings, the rustling of leaves.

And her.

He could feel her, too, just as easily as the sweat. He could feel her body trembling with each shallow breath, feel her eyes occasionally glancing to him, hear her voice bristling behind her teeth, ready to say something. He could feel the brief space of earth between them. When her hand twitched, he felt the dirt shift beneath his palm. When his fingers drummed, he knew she could feel the resonance in hers.

He felt her as he sat, felt her smile as easily as he felt his own creeping across his face.

‘She isn’t smiling.’

He furrowed his brow suddenly, resisting the urge to speak to the voice, to even acknowledge it. Try as he did, though, he couldn’t stop the thought from boiling up in his head.

She isn’t?

‘Look.’

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her for the first time since they had entered the hut. She was not smiling, not even looking at him. Her stare was tilted up to the roof, along with her ears, rigid and twitching with the same delicate, wary searching that he had seen before, once.

But she had been looking at him, then.

‘She listens.’

That makes sense. He was distantly aware of a voice in the room. Someone else is talking.

‘Not to them.’

Why wouldn’t she be listening to them?

‘You aren’t.’

Point.

‘Watch carefully. She searches for something that you can’t hear.’

But you can …

‘Only fragments of … wait, she is going to hear it again.’

As if she had heard the voice herself, she suddenly stiffened, her chin jerking. Her neck twisted, face looking out somewhere, through the stone walls and beneath the soil. He followed her stare, but whatever it was that she saw, he obviously could not.

‘She does not see it, either. She hears. It is loud.’

And at that cue, her ears trembled with a sudden violent tremor that coursed down her neck and into her shoulders. He saw her lips peel back in a teeth-clenching wince, as though she sought to hold on with her jaws to whatever it was she had found with her ears. He felt her shudder, through the soil, as she clung to it.

And he saw her release it, head bowing, ears drooping and folding over themselves, seeking to drive it away with as much intensity as she sought to hold on to it.

He listened intently and heard nothing but the frigid voice.

‘Didn’t like the noise. Pity.’

You … did you hear it?

‘Mmm … are we on speaking terms again?’

Did you or did you not?

‘Heard, not so much. Sensed, though …’

Sensed what?

‘Intent.’

What intent?

No reply.

Whose intent?

Silence.

‘Whose?’

It was only after the snow had flaked away, after the numbing silence in his head passed and was replaced with the distant ambience of the village outside, that Lenk realised he had just spoken aloud.

She turned to regard him with a start, eyes more suited to a frightened beast than a shict.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘What?’ he repeated, blankly.

‘You said something?’

‘We didn’t.’

‘We?’

‘Well, you didn’t, did you?’

‘Nothing.’ She shook her head a tad too vigorously to be considered not alarming.

‘Are you …?’ He furrowed his brow at her, frowning. ‘You looked a bit distracted just now.’

‘Not me, no,’ she said, her head trembling again with a tad more nervous enthusiasm. Just before it seemed as though her skull would come flying off, she stopped, her face sliding into an easy smile, eyes relaxing in their sockets. ‘What about you?’

‘What about me?’

‘Are you well?’

‘I’m …’

‘Calm.’

What?

‘When was the last time we felt like this? No concerns, no fears, no duties …’

‘You’re what?’ Kataria pressed.

He opened his mouth to reply, but became distracted by the sudden, fierce buzzing that violated his ears. A blue blur whizzed past his head, circling twice before he could even think to swat at it. And as he felt a sapphire-coloured dragonfly the size of a hand land on his face for the twenty-fifth time, he was far too resigned to do anything about it.

‘I’m a tad annoyed, actually,’ he replied as the insect made itself comfortable in his hair.

‘You could always swat it off, you know,’ she said.

‘I could and then its little, biting cousins would flense me alive,’ he growled, scratching at the red dots littering his arms and chest. ‘The big ones, at least, command enough fear that the little ones will flee at the sight of them.’

‘Perhaps it’s for the best that we’re leaving,’ Kataria said, ‘if you’ve been around long enough to figure out insect politics.’

‘It’s not like I’ve got a lot else to do,’ he growled. He cast a glance over her insultingly pale flesh, unpocked by even a hint of red. ‘How is it that they’re not biting you, anyway?’

‘Ah.’ Grinning, she held up an arm to a stray beam of sun seeping through the roof and displayed the waxy glisten of her skin. ‘I smeared myself in gohmn fat. Bugs don’t like the taste, I found.’

‘Is that what that smell is?’

‘I’m surprised you didn’t notice earlier.’

‘Well, I noticed the smell, certainly, I just thought it was all the gohmns you were eating.’

She grinned broadly. ‘Every part is used, you know.’

‘Yeah,’ he said, scratching an errant itch under his loincloth. ‘I know.’

He could feel her laugh, seeping into his body like some particularly merry disease. And like a disease, it infected him, caused him to flash a grin of his own at her, to take in the depth of her eyes. He could scarcely remember when they had looked so bright, so clear, unsullied by scrutinising concern.

‘It is nice, isn’t it?’

It is.

‘It could always be this way.’

It could?

‘Is that not why you wish to leave?’

It is, yes, but … well, you hardly seem the type to encourage that sort of thing. In the back of his mind, he became aware of an ache, slow and cold. In fact, you’re being awfully polite today. That’s … not normal, is it?

It should have occurred to him, he supposed, that it would take a special kind of logic to try and ask the voice in one’s head what constitutes normalcy, but his attentions were quickly snatched away by Kataria’s sudden exasperated sigh.

‘How long have we been sitting here, anyway?’ she asked.

Lenk gave his buttocks a thoughtful squeeze; there was approximately one more knuckle’s worth of soil clenched between them, as far as he could sense.

‘About half an hour,’ he replied. ‘You remember how we’re going to go about this?’

‘Not hard,’ she said. ‘Tell Togu we’re leaving, ask on the progress of our stuff, get it back, find a sea chart, ask for a boat, head to shipping lanes, quit adventuring and the possibility of dying horribly by steel in the guts and instead wait to die horribly by scurvy.’

‘Right, but remember, we aren’t leaving without pants.’

‘Are you still on about that?’ She grinned, adjusting the fur garment about her hips. ‘You don’t find the winds of Teji … invigorating?’

‘The winds of Teji, muggy and bug-laden as they may be, are tolerable,’ he grumbled. ‘It’s the subsequent knocking about that I can’t abide.’

‘The what?’

‘Yours don’t dangle. I don’t expect you to understand.’

‘Oh … oh!’ Her understanding dawned on her in an expression of disgust. ‘They knock?’

‘They knock.’

‘Well, then.’ She coughed, apparently looking for a change of subject in the damp soil beneath them. ‘Pants, then?’

‘And food.’

‘What about your sword?’

Not the first time she asked, not the first time he felt the leather in his hands and the weight in his arms at the thought of it. The image of it, aged steel, nicked from where he and his grandfather had both carved their professions through anything that would net them a single coin. His sword. His profession. His legacy.

‘Just a weapon,’ he whispered. ‘Plenty more to be had.’

He could feel her stare upon him, feel it become thick with studying intent for a moment before he felt it turn away, toward the opposite end of the hut. She leaned back on her palms and sighed.

‘Chances are it might be here,’ she said, sweeping an arm about the hut, ‘given all the other garbage he seems to collect.’

He followed her gesture with a frown; it was a bit unfair to call the possessions crowding the hut ‘garbage’, he thought, especially considering that most of it was stuffed away in various chests and drawers. He did wonder, not for the first time, how a monarch who presided over lizards with little more to their collective names beyond dried reeds and dirty hookahs managed to assemble such an eclectic collection of antiques.

The hut’s stone walls looked as though they might be buckling with the sheer weight of the various chests, dressers, wardrobes, braziers, model ships, crates, mannequins sporting everything from dresses to priestly robes, busts of long-dead monarchs and the occasional jar of … something.

And over all of them grew a thick net of ivy, flowers blooming upon flowers, leaves twitching as insects crawled over them. They seemed a world away from the dead forests beyond with no life.

‘All that grows on Teji,’ the lizardman Bagagame had said as he escorted them in, ‘grows for Togu.’

Of course, the reptile hadn’t bothered to say why, amongst the various pieces of furniture, there wasn’t a chair or stool to spare the honoured guests the uniquely displeasing sensation of having soil crawl up one’s rear end. Then again, he hadn’t bothered to say why the king never moved or spoke before he vanished behind the throne … and presumably stayed there.

‘We’ll ask him if we can sift through this’ — he paused — ‘collection.’

‘You were going to say “garbage”.’

‘You don’t know what I was going to say.’

‘Whatever,’ Kataria grunted. ‘It’s all moot since I’m pretty sure he’s not going to wake up in this lifetime.’

He glanced up towards the throne at the end of the hut, overpolished to a lumpy, greasy sheen. Squatting in its seat, as he had done for the past half hour, the past four conversations and the past two conversations that included discussions of itches in strange places, Togu sat, impassive, unmoving and possibly dead.

He was likely very impressive under the brown cloak, Lenk thought, if bottle-shaped and narrow-necked counted as kingly features in Owauku society. He blinked, considering; that seemed to fit the kind of persona that would be cultivated by a race of heavy-smoking, bug-eyed, bipedal reptiles who ate, raised and wore bugs.

But electing a corpse seemed a bit too eccentric even for them.

He was giving heavy consideration to the idea, though, considering King Togu didn’t even appear to be breathing, much less moving, at the moment.

Probably a concern.

‘Why worry about it?’

Why worry about the fact that we’ve been waiting half an hour to talk to a dead lizard?

‘Well, when you say it like that …’

A noise crept through his head. It began softly, then rang with crystalline clarity: cold, clear and mirthful. His eyes went wide.

Did you just … laugh?

‘Ah, honoured guests!’

The bass voice of Bagagame boomed with the ache that rose in Lenk’s neck whenever the Owauku made his presence known. He looked up to see the stout lizardman waddling in from the small hole in the stone wall that formed the hut’s back entrance. His yellow grin broad, he bowed deeply, doffing his hat.

‘May Bagagame present, on behalf of y’most pleased hosts of Teji …’ He stepped aside, pulling back the portal’s leather flap. ‘King Togu!’

Lenk turned a baffled stare from the hole to the figure seated upon the throne. Seeing no movement from the shrouded figure seated upon the throne, he glanced back to the portal and instantly had to choose between greeting, screaming or vomiting at the sight of the creature creeping out of the shadows.

It was difficult to decide, however; there was no clear way to regard the amalgamation of green flesh, fine silk and dirty feathers that came out and regarded the companions with its yellow stare, for, truly, Lenk really had no idea what the hell King Togu was.

Superficially, at least, it resembled an Owauku: stout, green, with a belly as round as his massive, gourdlike eyes. But this one sported a pair of long, fleshy whiskers that hung so far from his blunt snout as to dangle about his stubby feet.

Still, the silk robe he wore open, so that it formed a purple frame to the bright jewel he wore in his belly, suggested something that had been digging in a nobleman’s trash. The feathered headdress he wore about his prodigious skull and the nauseating blend of flowers, vines, feathers and leathers he wore as decoration … well, Lenk really had no explanation for that.

Quietly, the creature surveyed them, his eyes swivelling from Lenk to Kataria, then fixating one on Kataria while the other rolled with uncomfortable slowness to stare at Lenk. Eyes split apart, his face soon followed suit as a large, yellow-toothed smile neatly bisected the green visage into two equal segments of scaly flesh.

‘Cousins,’ King Togu spoke in a voice earth-deep and flower-sweet, ‘be welcome.’

‘Uh … thanks,’ Lenk replied. Possibly not the best greeting in the presence of reptilian royalty, he thought, but he found that the creature’s presence robbed him of coherent thought for anything more elegant. ‘I’m …’ He searched for a word and settled, reluctantly. ‘Glad? Glad that you’ve given us your time today.’

‘Glad? Glad?’ Both yellow eyes swivelled to regard Lenk incredulously. ‘Merely glad?’ He whirled upon Bagagame, face twisted into a frown. ‘Merely glad. Why not great? Why not fantastic? Why not in need of a drink, so viciously does the excitement inspired by Teji’s majesty seep out of their mouths?’

‘I don’t know!’ Bagagame offered, shrugging helplessly. ‘Maybe they came to complain? The sun don’t shine that brightly these days and maybe-’

‘The sun always shines on Teji!’ Togu drove his point home at the end of a stubby backhand against the shorter Owauku’s cheek. ‘You are the one that diminishes our great reputation! Look!’ He smacked his subject again, sending one eye spinning towards Lenk. ‘A giant bug is sitting on his head! Is this how we will be remembered?’

‘Oh, right,’ Lenk said, suddenly feeling the dragonfly as it, suddenly frightened by the noise, scurried down onto his face. He reached up to brush it away. ‘It’s really no-’

‘Sorry! Sorry! M’fix that right up now!’ Bagagame came bounding over, eyes fixated on the sapphire-coloured insect.

‘It’s not necessary!’ Lenk’s hand moved away from the bug and out in a futile attempt to stop the Owauku as his lips slowly parted. ‘No! No, don’t-’

His words were lost in the subsequent squishing sound and he blinked dumbly, unable to find any others. He didn’t feel this was at all inappropriate; it was, after all, quite difficult to form the proper thoughts to express one’s feelings at feeling the thick, sticky end of a lizardman’s three-foot-long tongue plastered to one’s cheek. Even as Bagagame drew it back, winged prize twitching as he yanked it into his grinning mouth, he was at a loss.

He remained in that dumbstruck silence for a moment, blinking through the veil of saliva dribbling down his eyelid as he slowly, calmly licked his lips.

‘Right,’ he said, ‘so, anyway, we’re leaving.’

‘Leaving.’ Togu levelled a scowl at Bagagame. ‘Leaving. Why leaving?’

‘I don’t-’

The king made a sweeping gesture back to the portal he had emerged from. ‘Go and get the coals.’

Bagagame offered a bob of his head, scurrying off to the shadows and leaving the larger Owauku to sigh and stalk toward his throne, keeping one large eye upon the companions. Lenk watched him with some befuddlement; he wasn’t quite sure how he expected the king to take the news, but he wasn’t anticipating such calmness.

Then again, he wasn’t sure he had ever actually anticipated having to explain anything to a feathered lizardman.

‘Naturally, I’m a bit curious,’ Togu said. ‘Have we not done all we could to establish our hospitality?’

The quality of the king’s speech should likely have provided some comfortable familiarity, Lenk thought. Contrasted against the other Owauku, it merely made him seem all the more peculiar.

‘Well, yes,’ Lenk replied, ‘but surely, you must have known we’d have to leave sometime.’

‘Of course.’

The king deftly leapt onto the armrest of his throne, nearly slipping from the wax before sliding up to perch on the velvet-lined back. His position, combined with his feathers, lent him an avian appearance that was only made more ominous as he reached down with a foot to slide the cloak off the stout figure seated in the throne. A truly massive waterpipe was revealed, seated smugly on the red velvet as Togu reached down to pluck up the hose and bring it to his scaly lips.

‘I suppose I was hoping that, against better judgement, you would linger for a while. It has been nice to have humans about in the village again.’

‘And your hospitality has been …’ Don’t say ‘horrifying’. ‘-lovely,’ Lenk said. ‘But we’ve got other places to be.’

‘And there is nothing I can say to convince you otherwise, I’m assuming, or you would not have come to me.’

A great yellow eye swivelled to the portal, regarding Bagagame sourly as the smaller Owauku came teetering out with a tiny censer full of smouldering coals. He quickly applied them to the waterpipe, the rich scent of flavoured tobacco filling the air almost instantly as the water burbled inside its vase. Togu drew in a breath that lasted for ages, his chest inflating to a size preposterous for a creature his size. When he did speak again, his words came out on a cloud of smoke that made him resemble some great, fire-breathing beast.

‘Which does make old Togu wonder why you have come.’

Bagagame cringed at even the brief, dismissive wave Togu offered him and quickly ran, bowing apologies to both of the companions as he scurried between them and out the door. Lenk watched him go only until he was exactly three and a half feet out of earshot then turned back to Togu.

‘Well, as you may have noticed, we aren’t in much shape to be getting anywhere,’ he explained. ‘We had been expecting a …’ Don’t say ‘hired peon.’ ‘-friend to come retrieve us, but we haven’t seen any sign of a black ship lately.’

‘Have you?’ Kataria chimed in.

Togu coughed slightly, apparently choking on a stray ash that had crept its way into his hose. He shook his head, thumping his chest gently.

‘Not as such, no,’ he said. He appeared to furrow his scaly ridges in thought, Lenk thought, but that might just be some other emotion too deep for eyes the size of grapefruits to convey. ‘No … no … the Gonwa would have spoken of such a boat.’

‘Ah, well, that seems-’

‘Lies.’

A cold ache crept through him, a frosty hand wringing his spine for a moment before releasing it. He shook his head, as he might shake snow from his hair.

‘Discouraging,’ Lenk finished, his voice degenerating into a mutter. ‘I suppose it might have been helpful if the Gonwa had actually told us first, though.’

‘They are … a complex people,’ Togu replied, scratching his chin. ‘They come from Komga, an island with too many trees, not enough sun and, as such, they lack our “sunny” disposition.’ He grinned at his own joke. ‘They must be more than a little irritated at having moved here, anyway, but Teji will grow on them.’

‘And why did they move here, exactly?’ Kataria asked, drawing a glance from Lenk.

That does seem important … Should … shouldn’t I have asked that?

‘Why would you?’

That’s usually my thing.

‘Worrying? Let someone else do it.’

Togu’s eyes rotated to regard her carefully. ‘Feel free to ask them.’

She accepted the retort with what would appear, to anyone else, as a cool silence. Lenk, however, could see the faint tremble of her upper lip, the minuscule twitch of her eyelid, and a tiny, distinct quiver of her ears.

‘Sees. Hears. Lies.’

‘What?’ he whispered inwardly.

‘Point being,’ Togu continued, ‘Teji warms all and all warm to Teji, in time.’ He settled back, taking another deep puff of his pipe. ‘I’m sure you could find your place in it, if you wished.’

‘Point being,’ Lenk retorted, ‘that we don’t. We appreciate the hospitality inasmuch as we can appreciate having loincloths slapped on us, but-’

‘We are mending your clothes. It takes time when we lack thread.’

‘That, too, is appreciated, which brings me to my next point,’ he continued. ‘We were wondering if we could ask a little more of you.’

Togu’s eyes shifted to him. ‘Ask away.’

‘A sea chart to find the nearest shipping lanes to the mainland, a boat to take us there, food to make it there and-’

‘Sword.’

‘And …’

‘Sword.’

‘Something …’

‘Need.’

‘Pants,’ Kataria interjected. ‘We want our pants back.’

‘Pants?’ Togu began to mutter, clouds of smoke roiling out of his nostrils. ‘Pants, pants, pants … It’s always pants with humans, isn’t it?’

‘What is it with lizardthings and calling me human? I’m not human!’ She took her ears in her hands, pulling them out for display. ‘Look at these things! They’re huge!’

‘Can you get us that sort of thing or not?’ Lenk asked with a sigh. ‘You can keep whatever it is you found from our wreckage in payment or we can work something out.’

‘What sort of something?’ Togu asked.

‘We can do … things.’

‘Such as?’

‘Kill stuff,’ Kataria said, sniffing, ‘mostly.’

‘We do other things,’ Lenk countered with a glare.

‘Like what?’ she asked, sneering.

‘Things, you know …’ He leaned back, twirling his hand in what he hoped was at least vaguely thoughtful. ‘Such as … well, Denaos, I know, can play the lute. You probably have something like that, right?’

‘Ah, yes, the tall one,’ Togu said, inclining his head approvingly. ‘My people are quite fond of him. Does he have anything to say about your decision to leave?’

‘Nothing worthwhile,’ Kataria replied. ‘The only thing missing by him, or the rest of them, not being here is a bunch of whining and probably some attempt at innuendo or something stupid like that.’ She frowned, shrugging. ‘So can we have the boat or not?’

Before Togu could even open his mouth, Lenk whirled upon her.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Negotiating.’

‘No, you’re just speaking loudly. You don’t understand negotiation.’ He tapped his chest. ‘That’s what I do.’

‘So … don’t this time,’ she replied, regarding him curiously. ‘Is that such a problem?’

‘It isn’t, you know.’

‘You be quiet,’ Lenk snarled.

‘Who be quiet?’ Togu asked.

‘Why even negotiate? Why leave? Everything you need is right here.’

‘Everything we need …’ Lenk whispered to himself.

The words seeped into him on the silence inside his head, sowing his mind with seeds of comfort. In his brain, they began to bloom, a calm logic spreading over him. Why was this important? he wondered. Why go back to the fighting and death on the mainland? What was the point of it all?

Everything he needed was here: sun, water, food, and though she may have been regarding him with a stare that twitched between confusion and worry, she was here, too. He smiled, not knowing why, not caring why.

‘No.’

It came back, a sudden frost that swept over his mind, killed the blooming calm. His skull throbbed with fear, anger, contempt, all swirling about his mind, all carrying the voice through.

‘Cannot leave now.’

‘Cannot leave now,’ he whispered.

‘What?’ Kataria asked.

‘Then,’ Togu muttered, hope rising in his voice, ‘you wish to stay?’

‘Need to stay … need to kill …’

‘Kill,’ he uttered quietly.

‘What was that?’ Togu asked.

‘Lenk …’ she whispered, leaning close.

‘Lies all around us. Surrounded by worthlessness. Need to kill. Need to stay.’

‘Need …’

‘Sword.’

‘Sword.’

‘Sword?’ Kataria asked.

‘Need sword.’

‘Need it,’ he whispered.

‘Need what?’ Togu asked.

‘Sword.’

‘Sword.’

‘Sword!’

‘Not again, Lenk …’

‘SWORD!’

‘WHERE IS IT?’

Togu recoiled, threatening to teeter off his throne as Lenk leapt to his feet and flung an icy stare at him. Lenk could feel his lids narrowing to slits, feel himself freezing despite the sun, but did not care. His head throbbed with need; his hands hungered for leather and steel.

‘Where is it?’ he demanded, not hearing the rasp of his voice. ‘Where is my sword? I need it … I …’ He took a step forward, leg trembling. ‘Need it.’

It was cold at that moment. He could feel his flesh prickle, hairs standing on end, feel the departure of buzzing insects, as though his skin was suddenly unhallowed ground. All of nature seemed to follow their example: the sun averted its warmth, the air was strangled into a crisp chill.

‘No.’

Even he would not have heard himself whimper if he didn’t know he had said the words; his voice was throttled, frozen in his throat. He did not dare to speak louder for fear of what might emerge instead.

He stared into Togu’s ever-widening eyes and knew that such a thing was wrong, not merely because such a feat seemed impossible for the creature’s already tremendous stare. Rather, he was familiar with such an expression, familiar with the fear embedded in a face rendered speechless by a voice not his own.

Familiarity turned to pain the instant he felt her eyes upon him. Clearness gone, softness gone, now hard, scrutinising, studying, watching, peering, probing.

‘Staring.’

‘Stop …’ he whispered so softly only he could hear it.

Or so he thought.

‘Mad.’ Togu may have whispered; the king’s voice was deep enough that such an effort was futile. His head trembled back and forth, as though refusing to acknowledge what he saw. ‘You’re … you …’

‘He’s fine.’

Her hand was warm on his shoulder; that should not be. But it was, and strong, effortlessly pushing him past. Not past, he recognised, but behind. She stepped in front of him; he could not see the hardness in her eyes, but in her body, it was undeniable. She was tense, her spine rigid under her skin, muscles glistening with sweat, feet planting themselves solidly on the ground, neck rigid and eyes staring forward.

‘Just stressed.’

‘But he-’

‘Stressed.’

Her canines flashed ivory white in the sunlight, her lip curling back to bare them menacingly. The meaning behind their sudden appearance, the inarguable fact that there would be no more discussion on the matter, was received by Togu and displayed in the slow and subtle tilt of his head.

‘These times are stressful, yes,’ the king muttered, nodding. ‘It is understandable that … people are on edge.’

‘It is,’ she said with an air of finality. ‘Now, then, about our request?’

‘A boat is no particular problem,’ Togu replied. ‘We had many before and the Gonwa only brought more. But-’

‘But what?’

‘I still dislike to waste one. What can you do with a boat? Sail out and hope for the best?’ He tilted his head to the side thoughtfully. ‘Not that we are not so very pleased that you managed to find your way, but … how was it you managed to arrive on Teji again?’

Her body rippled slightly with swallowed ire, Lenk noticed, and undoubtedly Togu did as well. She was not a creature of subtlety. She must have known this as well as he did.

So why did she step in? A resolve, fragile as glass, welled up meekly inside him. I should be the one to do this, the one to … And that resolve threatened to crack as he took a step forward.

‘Well, we wouldn’t be asking if our information was correct in the first place,’ she growled. ‘We were told this was a trading post, not a lizard den.’

Snideness, Lenk thought. Lovely. How long until the threats?

‘Trade implies something that is not me giving you a boat that you may or may not destroy with nothing more than goodwill and a kiss on the cheek, cousin,’ Togu said.

‘No one’s denying that you will get something in return,’ she replied, eyes narrowing, ‘and, in this case, what you are getting is whatever won’t be happening with regards to your cheek.’

That took a bit longer than I’d have thought.

‘Beyond the potential hazards of this trade, both before and after you hypothetically launch your boat,’ Togu said, ‘there is the matter of expenses.’

‘Expenses?’

‘Supplies? Food? Charts? These things we are in no certain supply of.’ He shrugged, taking a long puff of his pipe. ‘A difficult thing to ask.’

‘Ah, of course,’ Kataria said, folding her arms. ‘Forgive me, I should have asked the other king lizard with a house full of garbage.’

‘These,’ the king said, sweeping an arm about his collection, ‘are investments for when the humans return.’

‘So … this was a trading post.’

‘Was, yes,’ Togu said, nodding. ‘Not so long ago, in fact, which would account for your information.’ He eased back as far as he could without tipping over, groaning a smoky sigh. ‘They came from Toha, seeking trading routes. They had not expected to find partners, and we had not expected that we would enjoy their company. But, like all trade, this was driven by necessity.’

‘You seem to have everything you need,’ Kataria said, glancing over the crowding collection, ‘and more.’

‘I have many things, but nothing I need, no. The humans came with food, food we desperately needed. We found you in Teji’s jungles, yes? You saw.’

Lenk furrowed his brow at that. He had seen Teji’s jungles, and even through the fever that had swept over him, he could see things growing: greenery, leaves, wildlife. There looked to be no shortage of food. The moment he began to say this, however, Kataria spoke.

‘It’s a barren forest,’ she said, ‘lots of trees, but no fruit.’

‘No nothing,’ Togu replied. ‘Nothing but roots and tubers. Food for the moment, but not for the people.’ He shrugged. ‘Thus, when the humans came with fruits, meats, wines, grain to make the gohmns larger and more hardy … we traded. From there, we continued to trade. Our needs sated, we could take things we wanted: brandy, tobacco …’

And yet no one thought to trade for pants, Lenk thought sourly.

‘Don’t mistake me for a fool, my people for simpletons,’ Togu said. ‘I was not made leader because they didn’t know any better. I looked out for them, I learned the human language, the human ways.’ His face seemed to melt with the heat of his frown. ‘I learned they move on.

‘And, as I said, I am no fool. I knew you would have to leave, eventually, and I suppose my people did, too.’ He tried to offer a smile, but it was an expression with fragile legs, trembling under the weight that stood upon him. ‘But we wanted you to stay … if only so we could remember those times again.’

Lenk regarded the creature thoughtfully. He tried his hardest not to be suspicious, and indeed, Togu’s story gave him no ready cause to be distrusted. And yet …

Something in the creature’s eyes, perhaps: a little too intent to be reminiscent. Or maybe the long, slow pause that followed: a moment intended to reflect the severity of the memory, or a moment to gauge their reactions? He distrusted the lizard, but, for the life of him, he couldn’t really think why.

‘He’s a liar.’

Oh, right … that’s why.

Lenk wasn’t sure if the voice did have moods, but he suspected that none of them were of the kind to humour him. And so, he felt the cold creep over him with greater vigour, greater ferocity.

‘Surrounded by liars. Everywhere. He lies. They lie. You lie.’

Me, he tried to think through the freezing throb of his head, what do you-?

‘Listen. Listen to nothing else. Only to us. Only to ourselves. Realise.’

No, no more listening. This is supposed to be over. This is supposed to be-

‘THROUGH the lies! Do not be tricked! We cannot afford it! We need to stay! Need to fight! Need our sword! See through them! Do not listen! Do not trust!’

‘Not trust …’ he whispered, finding the words less reprehensible on his lips.

‘Something the matter, cousin?’ Togu asked.

‘What happened to them, King?’ The question sprang to Lenk’s lips easily, instinctually. ‘Where are they?’

‘What?’ Togu’s smile was crushed under his sudden frown. ‘Who?’

‘Lenk …’ Kataria placed a hand on his shoulder, but he could not feel it.

‘The humans,’ he said, ‘where are they now? Where did they go?’

‘They are’ — Togu’s lips trembled, searching for the words — ‘not here. They …’ He swallowed hard, a sudden fear in his eyes. ‘They are …’

‘Shi-i ah-ne-tange, Togu!’

The voice rang out through the hut like a thrown spear, its speaker following shortly through the front door. While it was impossible to slam a leather flap, the Gonwa that emerged, tall and limber with the ridges on his head flaring, certainly gave it his all.

Lenk could only guess at the thing’s gender, of course, and that came only from his booming voice as he shoved his way between the two companions, sparing a glare for both of them. With an arm long and lean like a javelin, he thrust a finger at Togu, using the other hand to pat at a satchel strung about his torso.

‘Ah-ne-ambe, Togu! Sakle-ah man-eh!’

Togu spared an indignant glare for the Gonwa, which quickly shifted to Bagagame as the littler lizardman came scurrying behind, gasping for air.

‘Bagagame!’ the king boomed. ‘Ah-dak-eh mah?’

Bagagame made a reply, his voice going far too rapidly to be discerned. In response, the Gonwa stepped up the tempo of his own voice, his ire flowing freely through his words. Togu tried to dominate them in speed and pitch both, roaring over them as they blended into a whirlwind of green limbs and bass rumbles.

‘Who’s the big one?’ Lenk asked, glancing sidelong at Kataria.

‘How am I supposed to know?’ she growled, fixing him with a very direct scowl. ‘What was that?’

‘What was what?’

‘That. What you just did.’

‘I asked him-’

‘You didn’t ask him anything.’

He strained to keep the shock beneath a stony visage hardened by denial. She couldn’t have heard, she can’t hear that, her ears aren’t that long … are they?

The argument between the lizardmen seemed to end in a thunderous roar as Togu shouted something and thrust a hand to the rear door. The Gonwa swung a scowl from him to the companions before nodding and stalking off to the back, Bagagame following with a nervous glance to Togu. The king himself hopped off of his throne and grunted at the two non-scaly creatures in the room.

‘Forgive the interruption,’ he said as he disappeared into the gloom. ‘This won’t take long.’

‘Huh,’ Lenk said. They were gone, but their voices carried into the hut, only slightly diminished by the walls between them. ‘What, exactly, do you suppose reptiles argue about?’

He turned to her and saw her lunging toward him, hands outstretched. Before he could even think to protest, question, or squeal and piss himself, she took him roughly by his head, pressing her fingers fiercely against his temples and pulling him close. Their foreheads met with a cracking sound, but they were bound by shock and narrow-eyed anger, neither making a move to resist.

‘Stop,’ she said swiftly.

‘What?’

‘Stop.’

‘I don’t-’

‘No, you do. You are. That’s the problem.’

‘I really don’t think-’

‘Then don’t. No more thinking; no more speaking. Don’t listen to anyone else. No one else.’

He felt his temples burn, warm blood weeping down in faint trickles. He saw a bead of sweat peel from her brow, slide over her snarling lip as she bared her teeth at him.

‘Only. Listen. To. Me.’

The warmth from her brow was feverish, intense, as though his skin might melt onto hers and come sloughing off when she pulled away. His whole body felt warm, hot, unbearable yet entrancing, all-consuming. It swept through him like a fire, sliding down his body on his sweat to send his arms aching, shoulders drooping, heart racing, stirring his body as it drifted lower and lower until it boiled his blood away, leaving him light-headed.

And, as such, he could only nod weakly.

‘It’s going to be over, soon.’

She sighed, the heavy breath sending her scent roiling over him, filling his nostrils, one more unbearable sensation heaped upon the other that threatened to send him crashing to the earth. Her grip relaxed slightly, her hands sliding down to rest upon his shoulders.

‘I’m going to take care of everything.’

She stepped away from him, turning her attentions back to the portal as the Gonwa came storming out first. Togu and Bagagame emerged from behind, looking alternately weary and shocked. The taller creature paused in front of the companions, whirling about to level his bulbous, yellow-eyed glower upon them.

‘Togu,’ he uttered softly, ‘Shi-ne-eh ade, netha.’

He raised his hands slowly, deliberately dusting his palms together.

‘Lah.’

And with that, he spun again, the companions having to step aside to avoid his whipping tail as he stalked out the front door. They turned to Togu, each baffled. The king merely sighed.

‘Hongwe,’ he said, gesturing at the vanished Gonwa. ‘Proud boy. His father was, too.’

‘And that was … what?’ Lenk asked.

‘A disagreement,’ Togu replied. He looked up with a weary smile. ‘So … you truly wish to leave, then?’

They both nodded stiffly.

‘Then you and Hongwe agree,’ he said, nodding sagely. ‘And so, I must respect the wishes of my guests and my people. Tomorrow, you depart. Tonight, we offer you a Kampo San-Bah.’

Lenk frowned at the word. It sounded ominous in his ears.

‘And that is?’

‘A party, of course!’ the king said, grinning.

‘Ah.’

Funny, he thought, that the word should get even more menacing with the definition.