House of Reeds

Both Eagle Knights stared at him expectantly, but the young man shook his head, bemused. 'Huh. Nothing.' He rapped his head with his knuckles. 'Empty as a gourd! I've forgotten who it was. Don't mind me.'

'We don't,' Colmuir said in an offhand way. He gave Dawd a tight little smile. 'Now, laddie, you haven't lived until you've jumped a train, as my da would say. And he jumped one or two in his time. Now, which way t' the station?'

Dawd made a sour face, hitched up the assault rifle on his shoulder, consulted his comp and pointed up a tunnel spilling a slow, turgid sludge into the main sewer. 'That way.'

A gloved hand reached up, grasped hold of a marble lip around the urinal and Dawd heaved himself up and onto the floor of an empty restroom. The chuffing sound of a steam engine mixed with the hooting and warbling of Jehanan adults echoed in through high windows. The sergeant glanced around, making sure the large, stone-floored room was empty, and knelt to take the prince by the arms and hoist the boy up. Colmuir scrambled up through the wide-mouthed opening – Jehanan bathrooms were well appointed with ornamental stone, delicate carvings and elegant fixtures but consisted solely of a deep pit to raise tail over – and took a moment to let himself breathe cleaner air. The sharp smell of hot metal, coal dust and hundreds of natives rushing about trying to get aboard the afternoon express train filled his nostrils and he beamed a smile of relief at Tezozуmoc, who was batting at legs dripping yellow-green ooze.

'Ah! Much better.' The master sergeant considered their appearance and his smile faded. 'Now, we must make ourselves presentable enough to cross the tracks and get aboard a luggage car – Dawd you think these faucets will work?'

The sergeant was at the doorway, peering out into the waiting hall with a perplexed expression on his face.

'Sergeant Dawd? Can you hear me?'

The younger Skawtsman shook his head, breaking out of something like a daydream and nodded. 'Yes, Master Sergeant. I'll have a look at the faucets – but you should scope this…'

Grumbling to himself and waving the prince to stand beside the marble sink lining the wall – and out of the line of fire from the entrance – Colmuir edged up to the door and looked out. At first, all he saw was a melee of Jehanan – young and old alike, all dressed in harnesses hung with flowers, long narrow sun-hats and gaudy drapes and accompanied by a great deal of luggage in woven bags and heavy-looking steamer-style trunks – surging past. And then, much as the clouds might peel back from the mountaintops looming over the city, a troupe of monks in very tall, saffron-colored hats stamped past and he saw, waiting patiently beside the number four track schedule board, Mrs. Petrel and her two young ladies with no more luggage than their handbags, traditional Imperial festival clothes over flesh toned skinsuits and Army-issue umbrellas for parasols.

The Resident's wife seemed entirely composed and perfectly at ease. None of the Jehanan rushing about, hooting and trilling and warbling in their alien tongue, seemed to pay her the least attention.

Colmuir pursed his lips and wished he had a fresh pack of tabacs to hand. He looked back to the prince, saw Dawd had affixed a length of hose from his duty bag to the nearest faucet and was sluicing the sewer ooze from the boy's legs, made up his mind to escape the train station somehow and looked back in time to have his heart lurch into his throat.

The auburn-haired of the two girls accompanying Mrs. Petrel was hurrying through the crowd, directly towards the bathroom, with a very determined expression on her face.

'Ah that's torn it,' Colmuir cursed, stepping back out of sight. 'Dawd, get that hose on me swift-like, we've company coming t' dinner.'

The master sergeant had managed to clean off his gear, though his uniform legs and underlying combatskin were still dripping wet when the girl strode into the bathroom and took the sight of the three of them in with a frown.

'Do you have any other clothes,' she said, in a brisk tone very reminiscent of her mistress. 'Capes or something to drape about all your…guns and tools and things?'

'We do,' Tezozуmoc said, while both Eagle Knights were goggling at the audacity of a rather prim-looking Nisei girl barging into the gentleman's restroom. The prince tapped Dawd on the shoulder. 'Sergeant, do you have a rain-cape in the back pocket of your gunrig?'

Dawd blinked, nodded and turned to let Tezozуmoc unseal the pouch and drag out a rain poncho. 'They're autocamo -' the sergeant started to say, but the prince had already turned the poncho inside out and found the little control panel woven into the waterproof fabric.

'Very useful,' Tezozуmoc said cheerfully, using his thumbs to switch through the settings, 'if you'd like to just sit quietly outside of headquarters and, ah, have a smoke or something…' He winked at the girl, which made her stiffen slightly. 'Big enough for two, most times.'

The rain cloak settled into a dull pattern of interlocking brown and yellow-green triangles. The prince swung the garment around Dawd's shoulders, drew the hood mostly over his face and snapped the bottom straight. The sergeant stared down at himself and realized the young man had chosen a pattern close to the coloring of Jehanan scales.

'You too, Master Sergeant.' Tezozуmoc nodded to Colmuir and then looked at himself. The Fleet skinsuit he'd donned in the house was dull black, like most Imperial garments, and had its own autocamo capability, but being skin-tight, made him look far too human in outline.

'Miss.' He looked at the Nisei girl. 'Does your mistress have any local money?'

The Parus Express shuddered into motion, the linkages between the cars drawing tight one by one, clouds of steam and coal-smoke billowing up against a glassed-in ceiling. In the next to last car, Colmuir squeezed into a reserved compartment and immediately drew the window curtains closed. The clashing of wheels on the tracks drowned out all other sound until the door slammed shut behind Dawd.

Then something like silence – save for the swinging rattle of the train car itself, and the assorted sighs of relief from the six humans in the compartment – settled around him.

'Now,' the master sergeant said, sitting down beside the prince, 'that was some quick thinking, mi'lady.'

Greta Petrel smiled at the Eagle Knight and carefully removed her hat from the high, coiffed, hairpinned and gelled pompadour she had elected to sport for the festival. 'Nonsense, master Colmuir, I always reserve an entire compartment for myself and my young ladies. Otherwise,' she glanced in amusement at the Nisei girl and her Anglish companion, 'we would be forced to endure the company of reprobates, villains and men with sacks of smelly ham sandwiches.'

'Or those who smoke,' the Nisei girl said, glaring pointedly at the master sergeant, who had just fished the last tabac from the crushed box in his vest pocket. 'There is no smoking.'

'Mei,' Mrs. Petrel said, leaning a little towards the master sergeant and smiling faintly, 'has asthma.'

'Your pardon, miss,' Colmuir replied, licking his lips and returning the tabac to its box. 'Wouldn't want t' be a bother, now would I?'

'Not at all,' Mrs. Petrel said. 'You are very, very welcome company. I was afraid the Lord Prince had fallen into the hands of the kujen and his fellow conspirators.'

'A conspiracy?' Sergeant Dawd glanced at the prince, who was sitting between him and Colmuir, now dressed in flowing native robes and a wickerwork sun hat which hid his entire face behind a long visor designed to protect the snout of a Jehanan matron from the fierce sun. 'Just in Gandaris, or…'

'I expect the whole of the Five Rivers has risen up.' Mrs. Petrel said, turning sideways so Mei could undo her hair. 'There have been rumors for months of a secret cabal among the native princes – a society called the moktar – which is devoted to expunging the taint of Imperial thought, goods and presence from Jagan.' She sighed with relief as the last of the pins came out. The white streaks sweeping back from her temples emerged as she shook out her hair.

'We have never been terribly welcome here,' she said, turning back to Colmuir. 'They will do their best to drive us off-world. I'm sure kujen Nahwar hoped to snare the lot of us – the Lord Prince included – once we'd arrived for the festival of the Nem.'

Tezozуmoc laughed softly, face still hidden under the long hat. His hands were clasped tight on his knees and he'd said nothing from the time they rushed him out of the bathroom, across the platform and onto the train just as it prepared to pull out of the station.

'Wanted again,' he said, most of the bitterness leached from his voice by an aftertone of adrenaline. 'I should let them take me – I'd have some use then, as a bargaining chip between princes and the Empire.'