Wartorn: Resurrection

They were nearly at the cargo dock, when Cat's fingers suddenly seized Aquint's shoulder.

'Wait,' the boy whispered urgently, a dire look on his young face. He bounded onto a barrel and vaulted toward a window sill far overhead, catching it and pulling himself up and into the shadows.

Aquint faded back to the far side of the street. Peering intently at the loose boards over the dock, he saw now, in the gathering dark, the flicker of candlelight within the warehouse. Something else must have tipped off the boy to some potential danger, though.

He waited, growing worried. Cat could move with great stealth, but even real cats blundered sometimes. In the distance, he heard criers announcing the curfew.

Finally, the boy emerged from the same high window into which he had disappeared. He flitted over to Aquint.

'What was it?' Aquint asked the lad.

Cat shrugged. 'Don't know. It just felt unsafe.'

Aquint ruffled his hair, relieved. 'Well, what did you find inside?'

The boy grinned. 'Tyber. And some friends.'

'Friends?'

'A motley little group. Plus, I'm pretty sure one of them is the fellow who murdered the Felk soldier. He fits the description, minus the beard.'

Aquint's eyes widened. 'Our minstrel? What's he doing mixed up with Tyber?' Whatever else, that minstrel was dangerous, and his actions had caused harm to the people of Callah.

Cat said, 'They've got some pathetic little weapons, and I heard them making plans.'

Aquint felt uneasy. 'What kind of plans?'

'To overthrow the Felk and retake Callah,' Cat said blandly.

Rebels, Aquint thought, dismayed. Actual rebels.

'I could go fetch a Felk patrol,' Cat offered. 'You would have to share the credit for the capture. But there's more than a dozen in there, and I don't think you want to take them by yourself.'

Capture the rebels, Aquint thought. Abraxis would be pleased. But.. . then what?

'Then what?' he said, voicing the question out loud to Cat.

Cat looked confused. 'What do you mean?'

'We turn them in, and then what happens to us? Abraxis reassigns us somewhere else. Are you in any hurry to leave Callah?'

The boy slowly shook his head. Callah, even under Felk rule, was still home to him and Cat. Neither of them wanted to be anywhere else, in the end.

'What do you want to do then?' said Cat.

Aquint's mind was working fast, cutting through the haze of the drinks he'd had.

'You said there's about a dozen of them, with not much in the way of weapons?'

'Old men and women, a couple kids, maybe one real sword among them,' Cat said.

Aquint chuckled quietly. 'Then, how much trouble can they cause?'

'How's that?'

'As long as there are rebels in Callah, we stay in Callah. As long as we make progress in tracking them down, Abraxis stays happy. Don't you see, lad? We can nab one of these pretend revolutionaries whenever we need to make ourselves look good. And the thing is, these people will think they actually are rebels. They'll probably confess to it.'

Cat was thinking it over. 'You're probably right. That's awfully sneaky, though, even for you.'

Aquint looked gravely at his young friend. 'Lad, I didn't ask to be snatched away from here by the Felk. I didn't even ask to be made an officer, let alone an Internal Security agent. I was happy with how things were before this godsdamned war.'

'So was I,' muttered Cat.

Aquint gazed across the street at the warehouse. 'I presume you got a decent look at everybody in there.'

'Naturally.'

'Then we know who our rebels are. And we know where they congregate.' Tyber must have picked the warehouse as a secret meeting place. Odd that the old black-marketeer had turned into a revolutionary, but war did strange things to people. Aquint knew.

He smiled. The game was entering a new phase here. These would-be rebels would help him sustain the fiction that an uprising was brewing in Callah.

'And the first one we hand over to the Felk,' Aquint said as he led Cat away, 'is going to be that minstrel.'

PRAULTH (5)

'WELL? WHAT'S YOUR answer?'

'I... need time.'

'There's none to spare.'

'If Praulth says she needs time,' Xink said pointedly, 'you will give it to her.' It was at once a show of assertiveness toward the Petgradite, and subservience directed toward her.

Praulth found, somewhat to her surprise, that she still cared for Xink deeply. They remained lovers. But love, she was learning, was a balance of power. Once, those scales had tipped completely in his favor and she had been absolutely helpless in her feelings toward him, lost in a kind of demented devotion that only the freshly deflowered could truly know.

That unequal balance had since transposed.

The messenger from Petgrad was much older than either her or Xink, and he seemed to radiate contempt for the University. His flesh was leathery, his limbs wiry. He looked built for fast travel. His name was Merse.

'You prefer to stay here?' Merse asked, ignoring Xink. 'Looking at word-scratchings and arguing about horseshit that happened a hundredwinter ago? Fine. I'll leave you to it.'

Praulth blinked, startled by the man's insolence. He was here at Premier Cultat's behest, he'd said, to fetch her to Petgrad, where her talents were desperately needed. With Honnis gone, the Far Speak link between the University at Febretree and Petgrad had been severed.

Xink bounded to his feet, but Merse was faster, coming fearlessly toe-to-toe with the younger, taller man. Merse's ready stance, the fists at his sides, and the combative glint in his eyes all demonstrated that he was more than willing to brawl. Xink, realizing this, wobbled back a step.

'You won't speak to her in that manner,' he said nonetheless, voice impressively steady.

Merse's wind-worn face showed a glimmer of teeth.

'Sit,' Praulth said, 'both of you.'

They were in her and Xink's quarters, in the Blue Annex. Praulth, these last few days, hadn't left these confines. Honnis was gone. Her work as a military strategist—she'd thought—was done. But she didn't know what she was supposed to do with herself now. Somehow it seemed impossible that she could simply resume her studies as a fourth-phase pupil. Too much had happened.

She couldn't go back, but how was she to go forward— as what?

Now, here was Merse, telling her she was still needed, still important. It was curious that his manners didn't suit the entreaty he was conveying from Cultat.

'I think your skills as a diplomat require some honing, Merse,' she said, trying out a droll tone. Sarcasm and other subtleties of speech were still new to her.

'Diplomat? Petgrad's got no diplomats.' He had returned to his chair, as had Xink.

Praulth lifted an eyebrow. 'Then how does your premier propose to assemble his alliance?'

'He's sent out his family,' said Merse.

She absorbed that. 'That seems risky.'