Carnifex (69 page)

Marta leaned over to kiss the top of her lover's head, then reached out a hand to stroke hair and cheek. "You have too much imagination," she said. "We'll be fine. I won't let anything happen to you."

Jaquie backed off and looked intently into Marta's face. "I'm not worried about
me
, you idiot. I'm worried about
you.
"

The
hieros
was carved into the mountain, about a half mile from Rachman's family's home. The trail seemed well-worn, to Cano, as if the people of the village followed it regularly to the rectangularly carved opening in the mountainside. He mentioned this to Rachman.

"We come here often, yes," the Pashtun said. "To commune with God . . . to dedicate the young men to His service . . . sometimes just to be away from people to think."

By the time they reached the carved opening, the sun was down. Rachman took a match from one of the two guards standing by the entrance. With it, he lit a small, oil-burning lamp. It cast a flickering light over what looked to Cano to be brick-sized, carved stones, framing a tunnel perhaps thirty inches wide. With the flame from the lamp Rachman lit a torch lying nearby.

"We took these when we left Old Earth," Rachman explained, gesturing at the stones with the torch. "We had no money to pay for much extra baggage, not unless we were willing to sell off some of our patrimony, which we weren't. So say the legends, anyway. Each man and woman took one stone or one piece of something to rebuild this, here. Come, I'll show you."

The footing was even, if not quite smooth, and Cano, guided by Rachman's torch, felt his way along easily. Seventy-five yards or so into the mountainside the narrow tunnel opened up to . . . 

At first, Rachman's torchlight reflected dimly from what Cano judged to be over one hundred dull mirrors. As the Pashtun circled around the room, lighting more lamps as he went, the things Cano took to be mirrors began to appear as round shields, plates, medallions, necklaces and . . . 

"Holy shit."

"Very holy," Rachman agreed, "but not shit." He pointed with the torch toward a golden plate, perhaps fifteen inches across. "This is the image of our God."

"Where have I seen that face before?" Cano wondered aloud. "It was in an old book, at the Legion's library . . . an old book from Old Earth . . . Al . . . Alex . . . "

"Iskander," Rachman supplied. "The avatar of our God. God made flesh. It is to Him that we pray. He will come to us again, so say the prophecies." The was no waver of doubt in Rachman's voice. His god
would
come.

"Ohhh." He thought for a moment about the implications. Then it hit him. "You are not Moslems?"

"We pretend, sometimes," Rachman said. "And give little gifts to Mullah Hassim to make sure he doesn't raise a cry against us. But, no, not Moslems. Which is why—" He raised one eyebrow, waiting to see if Cano could make the connection.

He could. "I would not have to convert to be a suitable match for your sister?"

Rachman was smiling broadly. "Correct, Hektontar Cano."

"She's only fifteen, and she doesn't even know me," Cano objected.

"She is already a woman, ready to bear you fine, strong sons and daughters. And you have two weeks to get to know each other," Rachman answered.

"I am a soldier and I might be killed at any time."

"She is the sister, daughter, granddaughter, great-great-great-great to infinity granddaughter of soldiers. She would understand."

"I don't even know if she likes me."

"I told her and my father about you months ago. They
both
like you. You don't already have a wife, do you?"

"No," Cano shook his head. "No wife. No girlfriend. I never had time to even look for either since I joined the Legion."

"Well," Rachman said, "let's stop wasting time and get back to my father's home so you can get to know your future one."

In the flaring light of the torch and the lamps, all reflected by the gold and polished stone of the
hieros
, which Cano now understood to mean "shrine," or perhaps "temple," Cano said, "You are the strangest matchmaker I have ever heard of."

"No, no," Rachman disagreed. "You should see my aunt. She has a better moustache than I do . . . though I think my beard is more manly . . . a little."

Outside, the guards began to laugh so loudly that Cano was sure it was true about the moustache and beard on Rachman's aunt.

"Alena can read, you know," Rachman said, as they made their way back to the entrance. "Father insisted upon it. Me, personally, I think it was a mistake. She's too smart as it is—"

"Way too smart," agreed one of the guards, just as the two emerged from the tunnel.

"Not bad girl," said the other, "just make you feel stupid. Doesn't mean to," he shrugged.

"Good shot, too," said the first.

"Oh, yes, very good. Also good on horse. This important; means she can keep up with husband on campaign."

"Very important quality in wife," the first guard agreed. That guard put a hand on Cano's shoulder. "But better you than me, Hektontar. You see, she has the
sight
."

"The dowry for my sister will be immense," Rachman warned, changing the subject, and shooting a dirty look at the guards. "Immense! Not that anyone else is bidding, mind you," he admitted.

What the hell,
Cano thought,
I make more in a month than these people do in a year. Hell, in three or four years. And I never spend it. It might be nice to have a wife to spend it on. To see those beautiful eyes light up . . . 

Cano gulped, nervously. "Rachman, you have to talk me through this. How do I propose?"

It was a daunting enough proposition. Alone, untended, unsupported, Chu had to take his vessel into enemy waters and simply look for trouble or, failing that, wait for trouble to find him.

"Somehow, I don't think it'll be long," Chu said.

"What's that, Chu?" Centurion Rodriguez asked.

"Nothing . . . . oh, just that I don't think it will be too long before trouble finds us, even with the girls below and undercover."

"You can count on it," Rodriguez agreed, staring into the smoke that still covered the waters of the Straits. "Sucks to be us."

"Tonight, you figure?" Chu asked.

"Or tomorrow, or the next night. Wish we had the rest of the
classis
with us."

"Yeah," Chu sighed. "Wish in one hand . . . "

"Shit me a goddamned working elevator!" Fosa screamed at his chief engineer.

"It's not that simple, Captain," the engineer answered, sheepishly. "Yes, we
thought
it would be that simple but we were wrong."

Fosa turned around and stared out of the bridge's wide, and new, windows, looking at the menacing shadow of the
Tadeo Kurita
. It wasn't particularly easy to calm himself down, but he did. He turned around again and asked, "All right; what's the problem?"

"It's the way this class, any class, really, of warships was built, way back when, Skipper. They can use the same diagrams. They can subcontract to the same subcontractors. But they're always a little different. In this particular case, we've got to modify the goddamned hangar deck and the elevator portal because it's
three
fucking millimeters too small. Or the elevator is three millimeters too big; take your pick."

"How long?"

The engineer looked at the master of the shipfitters.

"'nother week, Skipper. Maybe five day if go well."

"Fuck."

"Why were the young men using a sheep before?" Cano asked, as Rachman fitted him with padding and a helmet in preparation for his upcoming game of
buzkashi.
Rachman and the other players, standing nearby holding their horses, were already suited up.

"Oh, that was just practice. For serious games we use calf . . . soaked in cold water to toughen it up . . . and filled with sand."

"And the purpose of this is?" Cano asked.

"Show toughness and courage in front of soon-to-be wife," said one of the other players in Cano's team. Cano thought he was one of the two guards he'd met at the
hieros
, the one who'd said, "Better you than me."

"You must pay close attention, David," Rachman added, "to the young men on both sides who show real fighting heart. They're playing to impress you, after all. Well . . . that and to get rid of my sister."

Cano looked across the dusty playing field past the opposing team to where Alena sat, framed by a simple goal. She wore a long blue dress and, for the ceremony, she was veiled. Between them, in a small pit, was the corpse of the calf.

"We only play by these rules when it's part of a wedding," Rachman explained. "Otherwise, we fight to take the calf around a pole and bring it back within a circle we draw around the pit. For wedding, though, you must present calf, whatever's left of it . . . and of you . . . to new wife as trophy."

"How long do I have?" Cano asked.

Rachman shrugged, "Maybe couple days."

A couple of days? DAYS?
"What if I lose?"

"Alena says you won't."

"And she has the sight, remember," added that same guard, pressing into Cano's hand a whip.

"What's this for?

"To hit people," Rachman explained, patiently. "Well, you're not the type to let someone hit you without hitting back, are you, brother-in-law to be?"

The morning sun was rising, the horse was limping, and had he been afoot Cano would have been staggering, when the two reached the rectangular goal beyond which sat his bride.

The rest of his team, and even the other team, and especially the crowd, all cheered themselves hoarse as Cano undraped from across his saddle the remains of the calf. The sand was long gone, an entire leg was missing, and the thing was more than half in shreds. He tossed the calf, what there was of it, through the goal and dismounted.

Rachman was there to catch him and keep him from falling over. He was also there to help him walk through the goals to claim his woman. This was as well since the various whips and fists and flailing hooves of rearing horses had fairly well shut Cano's eyes. He'd never have made it to the goal without Rachman to lead his horse.

You know
, Cano thought,
in a while, when it really starts to hurt, I'm going to regret this. But for now, before the serious pain begins, I've got to admit, that was
fun.

Alena's father walked onto the field, approached his daughter, and lifted her to her feet by her hand.

"Does anyone object that this proven man take this woman to wife?" the father shouted.

"NNNOOO!" roared the crowd.

The father led Alena to where Rachman and Cano stood. He took Cano's hand, eliciting a small yelp as the hand had been broken. Into it he placed Alena's smaller one. There was more ceremony, a feast, and a short trip to the
hieros
to come, but from that moment they were married.

It was a pity Cano couldn't see well enough to note the light in Alena's eyes.

She
had
the sight.

It might as well have been night for the little bit the crew of the boat could see. Somewhere overhead the sun shone; they could see it there, a dim circle of something that was a little bit lighter than the smoke and ash that filled the air. Below, sonar listened attentively but fruitlessly. When the smoke was this thick, all traffic in the Straits simply stopped and dropped anchor. Then all passive sonar could hear was the sound of waves slapping the shore and the hulls of the becalmed shipping. And those sounds came from
everywhere
.

To Jaquie, the waves slapping the hull were not relaxing, as they might have been in a different place on a different kind of world. They were just a reminder that she and her shipmates were
blind
, blinder, in fact, than any bat.

So, while Marta dozed below, Jaquie walked the deck with a 9mm Pound submachine gun.
Nothing
was going to hurt her lover, not if she could help it. Nothing was . . . 

What was that?

Liang Dao had had about enough. Did
he
care for the spread of Salafism? Not a chance; quite the opposite. Did
he
want to subordinate his people to some would-be sultan? No way. Did
he
want to get in, or take part in, a war with some people who had proven altogether too willing to take massive reprisals against anyone interfering with shipping?

Brother, my mother didn't give birth to any fools. I'm out of here.

So Liang Dao had done the only sensible thing when the other pirates had gotten together to attack the fleet patrolling the Nicobar Straits; he'd told his people to pack up and be ready to move at a moment's notice. They'd done it, too. They wanted no more to do with Salafism, or being on the blunt end of a reprisal, than Liang Dao did.

Not that Liang Dao or his people had any problem with piracy. They'd been pirates for millennia, and on two different planets.

But you've got to get
away
with it or it just doesn't pay. And those fucking round-eye bastard mercenaries
won't
let you get away with it. I shudder to think of what that fleet the Salafis
failed
to sink is going to do when it gets back.

Looking around his boat, a good-sized junk bearing nearly one hundred and fifty of Liang Dao's closest friend and relatives, he
did
shudder. He remembered seeing the
classis
—though he didn't know that was its name—pass by his coastal village months ago. The assembly had radiated menace. Had the Salafis succeeded in crushing it Liang Dao would have shed no tears. As was?

We've got to get the hell out of here. Unfortunately, we don't really have the funds to settle anyplace decent. Now if we could only pick off a small freighter or maybe some fat yacht . . . 

Hey, what's that?

Jaquie crouched down and jacked the bolt on her Pound SMG. Something had nudged the side of
Qamra
. Driftwood? Maybe. Wreckage from the
classis
? Possibly.