Double Solitaire

Chapter Thirty Six

"Dry at least, brothers," called a clear tenor voice. Jay jerked awake and placed a hand across Hastet's mouth. "Beyond that I cannot speak for the accommodations."

Hastet woke and nodded to indicate that she understood the danger in which they stood. Illyana had begun to wiggle, tiny arms and legs thrashing in the dry hay. Hastet gathered her up and placed her finger in the baby's mouth, hoping the sucking reflex would sublimate the yelling reflex.

It was all wasted effort. The tenor voice sent his men fanning out through the barn. The first head popped over the edge of the loft, and Jay prepared to pop in return, but held off when he spotted the uniform -- tan and green - Jeban, not Vayawand.

"A family of refugees, my lord," the Tarhiji soldier called down.

"Let's have a look at them," the voice came floating up.

Jay and Hastet exchanged glances, shrugged, and moved to obey. The soldier, spotting the infant, went all Takisian gushy and quickly offered to help. Hastet let him. It was no easy matter to climb down a ladder encumbered with both skirt and a baby.

Once down, Jay found himself on the receiving end of an amused but wary scrutiny. "No proper courtesy to your lord and master?" the psi lord asked.

Like most Takisians he was a shrimp, with hair the color of amber and bright green eyes. He had a narrow, but very long, goatee, and that combined with his knowing smile made Jay think he needed only a pair of horns to play the perfect little devil.

"Sorry, we're out-of-towners," Jay answered, slapping hay from the seat of his trousers.

The noble was sucking on a raw egg, and even so unappetizing a reminder of food set Jay's stomach to rumbling.

"You picked a poor time to come visiting," said the psi lord.

"Yeah, tell us about it."

Hastet was staring at the egg with the same famished longing that Jay sensed was in his own eyes. The Jeban nobleman pulled another from his pocket, bowed, and offered it to Hastet.

"Madam."

"Thank you." She shifted Illyana onto her hip and, cracking the egg with her thumbnail, began to suck. Jay noticed the Jeban noble frowning at Illyana's hair color. With his brown hair and Hastet's brown hair, it was evident even to a pea brain they weren't the kid's parents. It was also evident the kid wasn't Tarhiji. Luckily the guy didn't ask them about Illyana. Instead he asked, "Where are you out of?"

"Ilkazam," Jay answered.

"You have a strange accent even for Ilkazam."

"It's the result of a severe speech impediment," Jay replied.

The psi lord threw himself down on a pile of hay. "Well, consider yourself under the protection of what remains of House Jeban. For all I know, I might be Raiyis."

"Congrats. Kind of a drastic way to get promoted, isn't it?"

"Actually this whole war may be my fault."

"Surely you wrong yourself, my lord," Hastet said.

"No, no." Nimble hands fluttered urgently in the air before his face. "I was in Rodaleh negotiating a marriage when Blaise invaded. Lost that bride, so next I tried Alaa. Meanwhile Blaise was asking his advisers, 'Where is that piece of afterbirth Govan brant Shen sek Sova?' Alaa, you say? Invade Alaa! So I come home. Maybe I'll just marry in House. Damned if he doesn't do it again." There was laughter from Govan's men, and he smiled in answer, but there was an air of forced gaiety.

Still, Jay had to admire them. There wasn't much he admired about Takisians, but they did have an insouciance, an ability to laugh even in the face of disaster, that was rather appealing.

"I think, my lord, you might consider celibacy," Hastet said. There was more laughter.

"So what do you do now?" Jay asked.

"Hide, hope, regroup, and wait."

"Any advice on --"

Jay broke off as Govan jerked up a hand in warning. Jay experienced a sensation as if someone had spread cold jelly across the surface of his brain, and he realized Govan had shielded them against a mentatic probe.

"Did that do it?" the detective whispered.

"I don't think so," Govan replied. And with hand signals he issued quick orders. His men quickly assumed defensive positions. Hastet, Jay, Illyana, and Govan took cover behind the sagging wood of a stall. They heard a ship landing.

Govan chewed nervously on his lower lip. Shook his head. "No good, too many to fight." He stood. "Let us see if they will be content with my surrender."

Jay grabbed the nobleman's wrist. "I don't get it. You're surrendering to save a bunch of Tarhiji?"

Govan looked down his nose. "They are my men. Selected by me. Trained by me. They have fought with me."

He walked through the wide front doors. Jay heard furtive movement behind him. The Vayawand troops were wisely encircling the building. They heard Govan's voice raised in greeting. Another few murmured words of conversation. The sharp report of a laser rifle being fired, and Govan's body was knocked back through the door.

There was a moment of shocked silence from the Jeban soldiers. Then a man a few feet to Jay's left spun and fired through the wall. There was a scream from outside, and then a barrage of laser and projectile fire ripped through the barn. Jeban soldiers twitched like men with Saint Vitus' dance, and Jay threw himself across Hastet and Illyana, trying to push them beneath the level of the dirt floor.

Five Vayawand soldiers came hurtling through the door. Two of them went down to weapons fire from the defenders. Jay popped the other three. Then ten or twelve ran in, and it got very confused. It was tough to get a clear shot so Jay was just popping Jeban and Vayawand randomly. A Jeban soldier collapsed nearby, his face a charred mess. With only the stretch of a hand Jay could seize his rifle. With it set for automatic fire, he could do more damage a lot faster than his finger.

Stubbornly he shook his head and looked away from that evil seduction. Seven, eight more soldiers vanished. The gunfire was becoming sporadic as the sheer weight of numbers bore down the Jeban defenders. Jay lined up on another soldier -- and then froze as the cold weight of a gun muzzle caressed the nape of his neck.

Rolling over on his back, Jay put his hands over his head.

"We're going to throw a party?" Disbelief drove Tisianne's voice into a squeak.

A trifle defensively Zabb said, "We have won a victory." He spun around in front of her and continued to skate backward, hands clasped lightly behind him. "It is traditional to celebrate."

"I don't know if I'd categorize a raid against ship homes when Blaise and his armies were occupied elsewhere a victory."

"You always have been hard to impress. It kept Blaise off our necks for another few weeks, my dear, maybe a few months. In our current precarious position I call that a victory."

The Tarhiji orchestra was tootling energetically from the glass bandstand. It was a celebration day, and all nonpregnant women had been released from Rarrana. Fathers, mothers, children, and lovers dived and swooped about the ice like gaudily plumed birds. Personal sleighs crisscrossed the ice like gliding flowers, each propelled by an attentive gentleman. A light snow was falling, which occasionally obscured the whirling figures, adding to the dreamlike quality of the scene.

Tis had lost her taste for the sport, and she skated off the ice to where Mark, aided (or hindered) by a giggling clot of children, was building a snowman. Reaching the bank, she spun, sat down in the snow, and started pulling off her skates. Her ever-watchful maid, Gena, came running with her furlined boots.

Mark abandoned the children and joined her and Zabb at the ice's edge. "What's up, Doc?" he asked.

Tis winced. Fortunately no Takisian was struck by the absurdity. "My cousin has a mind to celebrate. There's to be a ball, dancing and music, food and fripperies --"

Mark turned serious eyes on Zabb. "Seems kind of wrong to be dancing when so many people are dying."

"I wish to celebrate that we're not in the latter category," Zabb said. "It will reassure our people. It will thumb our collective nose at Blaise, and..."

"And," Tis prompted suspiciously. She accepted her boots from Gena and pulled them on.

"I have a reason for us being impressive right now."

"The Network," Mark supplied.

"Very astute, groundling. The Master Trader's demands are becoming more pointed and less diplomatic with each passing day. I'm going to invite him to join us.

"You are out of your mind," Tis said. "I suspected it before, but now I am convinced of it. It took a war to throw them off eight thousand years ago. Now you're inviting them back?"

"One. To a dance."

"It violates one of our most deeply held traditions."

"Sort of like Festival peace?" Zabb inquired, and Tis felt the blood rush into her cheeks. "Tis, we've broken so many traditions, laws, and rules, what's one more?"

They had taken Hastet for questioning and had left Illyana with Jay, apparently on the theory that a woman would be upset to be separated from her newborn infant and thus would talk more freely and willingly. Jay didn't know why they bothered. They were telepaths, all they had to do was open their heads with a can opener, and the little charade was over. So maybe they left the baby behind just because they were assholes, and they liked to torment people. Jay reassured himself that rape was not a practice on this strange world -- he just hoped Blaise hadn't taught them that Earth concept along with large-scale killing.

After all that struggle and effort, they were back in Ban. Illyana was screaming her hunger, and Jay could tell the noise was starting to get to his guard as well as himself. At times the ground sloth was so cute, it hurt. Other times... it was said that your baby's shit don't stink -- unfortunately this one wasn't Jay's.

Jay glanced about and wondered what the man had been like who decorated this vividly painted room. His legacy was a bloodstain on the floor now.

The door opened, and a clear young voice called out. "Jay Ackroyd, what a wonderful surprise. I should have realized when Grand-pere vanished at Festival that you were responsible."

Blaise walked in. Durg trailed him, silent and morose as ever, festooned with weapons like an apocalyptic Christmas tree. The breath jammed in Jay's chest, and he emitted a sound that was half squeak, half moan. For one wild moment he considered thrusting Illyana beneath his chair. Instead he pinned a tattered grin to his face and stood.

Blaise was dressed in his trademark black, but the skintight jumpsuit had been augmented with a high-collared jacket. The heels of his high black boots had been encrusted with diamonds, and more of the jewels formed military-style bands on the sleeves and breast of his jacket. More diamonds had been plaited into the long braid that fell between his shoulders, and the diamonds and jet set into his face flashed and flickered and held the eye like the gaze of a snake. He also carried himself with an assurance far beyond his sixteen years.

Jay braced for the attack. Instead he was pulled into a crushing and exuberant embrace. "Jay, my dear, dear old friend. How are you?"

Hearing English almost made Jay forget his fear and the danger in which he stood. "Can't complain."

"What are you doing in Ban?"

His mind was racing furiously, and Jay reminded himself of the old adage. Lie with enough of the truth to sell it. And since Blaise wasn't a telepath, Jay just might pull it off -- assuming no real telepath was brought in to verify his story.

Jay continued. "I got involved with this lady, and she's had some problems with the Ilkazam. They tried to tell me I had to stop seeing her, and..." He shrugged.

But Blaise wasn't interested in Hastet. "Remember that awesome night in Atlanta?"

Blaise settled into a chair with the air of a man prepared to stay and reminisce. Since that counted as probably the worst night of Jay's life, his response was perhaps a little sharper than it should have been.

"No, no, Jay," Blaise demurred. "I learned a lot that night. Grandfather, when he kept trying to psychoanalyze me, said the course of my life had been set that night. I think he was right. And I'm very, very grateful to you." He smiled winningly. "Look at this. From frightened teenager to planetary potentate. Not bad, huh?"

The transitions from flowery Takisian to exuberant adolescent had Jay grabbing for the safety bar on this mental roller-coaster ride. Blaise stood and circled Jay. His eyes were on the baby. Jay swallowed panic. Blaise plucked Illyana from Jay's arms. Her wails increased in intensity.

"What a pretty, pretty little girl." Blaise glanced inquiringly at Jay.

"She's Hastet's. Her husband knocked her up, and then got killed in a raid. That's why she's so down on the Ilkazam too," Jay babbled, and felt like an idiot.

"Really?" Jay nodded. "I don't think so." Blaise laid the screaming child over his shoulder. "We read your Hastet, so I know this is my daughter."

Jay began bringing up his finger. Then Blaise was in his head, and his hand froze at waist level.

"Read him," Blaise ordered the captain, and Jay felt as if a rake had been taken to his cortex. Two mentats cavorting in his brain didn't seem to leave enough room for Jay. His head exploded in pain. Eventually it ended, leaving only the bitter taste of defeat and betrayal. Jay apologized to the baby, and to the distant Tachyon.

"Jay, I'm very appreciative that you brought me my daughter, and you and your girlfriend must consider yourselves my honored guests. But I'm afraid you might take it into your head to send my child away, so while it pains me to inconvenience you in any way" -- a little smile, a slight shrug, and a regretful sigh -- "I'm afraid I must."

Blaise outlined his plan to the captain. It served no purpose other than to set Jay struggling so hard that he broke into a visible sweat. Jay had a feeling that was the effect Blaise had been seeking. The pleasure of feeling a captive mind battering to no avail. Blaise tweaked, and Jay walked obediently over to the desk and spread his hands, palm down, on the stone surface. Blaise held out a hand, and Durg laid a very long, very wicked, very sharp knife in it.

Maybe Blaise really did like Jay -- he didn't saw. A hard chop, and the right index finger went hopping across the desk as if propelled by the font of blood. Jay screamed. The knife fell a second time.