Dreamlands (15 page)

“Then you should be there when they are questioned by my lady,” he said.

I nodded. I wasn’t going to tell him no; that thought never even crossed my mind. I also knew they weren’t going to recognize me. I had usually been dressed in sweats and T-shirts around them. I trailed behind Samojirou, as usual, when he walked into the main hall.

The place was impressive. It was about seven meters wide and seventeen meters long, maybe a bit bigger, since it was laid with
tatami
mats, the traditional floor covering used here. Tamazusa was kneeling at the other end, looking imposing and elegant, even in a simple black kimono. She looked like a statue, but I saw that she was happy to see Samojirou. He strode quickly to her and started talking, while I hurried behind him. I automatically bowed in greeting when I got close. She smiled.

“Samojirou-sama mentioned to me that you know these people,” Tamazusa said.

I nodded, my mouth dry, wondering for a second if I was doing the right thing. Then I remembered how scared I had been over the last few years and how good these two were to me, and I knew I was doing the right thing. I wasn’t betraying anyone here by giving Tamazusa information about Murphy and others in the Trust.

“I had been wondering if someone would try to come here,” she mused. “I would like you to attend me also,” she said. “Do not hesitate to tell me something that you think is important.” She hesitated for a second. “Sak… Keno, we were not any better than those who held you before. I simply gave you to Samojirou-sama, as if you were property.” 101

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I shook my head. I didn’t miss the fact that she stumbled over my name. I felt that I was Sakura more than Keno at times. Samojirou seemed to be the only one who remembered my given name.

“Tamazusa-sama, I owe them nothing. You have given me a life. You may think that it is nothing, but it is the world to me. I don’t want to see Mason and Wolf hurt, but that’s about it.”

FELICITAS IVEY

102

MASON

I WAS marched into the most fucking intimidating room I had ever been in, including the courtroom I had been sentenced in. It was big, it was covered in gold leaf on the walls and ceiling, and it was bare as all hell, no fucking furniture. The back wall was painted with some sort of mural of trees and flowers, and the place was lit with strange-looking lamps. More muscle boys and monsters were lined up on either side of the room, watching us like we were going to attack them or something.

At end of the room with the mural were Mr. Pissed Off, the chick, and another woman.

That woman was more scary and impressive than McGann ever was. She was dressed in a dark outfit, and she was also kneeling on what looked like a pile of mats, raised above everyone here, sitting as still as a statue and radiating an “I own every fucking thing I see” vibe to me. The chick was kneeling behind and to the left of her on the floor, and Mr. PO was standing behind both of them. Even I could figure out from the set up that this woman was the one in charge. I just wanted to know who the players were supposed to be. Why was she in charge and not a man? Not that I had anything against women in power, even McGann knew that, but in places like this, weren’t men in charge and women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen? Who was the chick?

Where the fuck were we, actually? Why hadn’t they killed us?

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Murphy and Wolf took the front, McGann and Romejinoff were in the middle, and I was tail-end Charlie. Most everyone in here looked at us like we were trash. Well, not the Reavers, because they had no eyes. I was pissed, but since Murphy was getting the same treatment, amused too.

“What are you doing here?” the woman demanded.

I was surprised she knew English. I was pretty sure no one else did. She didn’t have much of an accent, either. You could always cut Keno’s and Wolf’s with a knife. So us Americans were right, and English was spoken every place, even wherever this place was.

“We…” Murphy started before lying through his teeth, “we are simple explorers.”

She looked down her nose at him. She wasn’t buying that line. I wanted to tell her that as invasion force, we were a bust, so could she get us home? But I wasn’t too sure Murphy wasn’t telling the truth by the fact that we
were
just exploring the place even if we’d been loaded for bear. It was just that I knew the Trust, and I didn’t think they were interested in
only
exploring this place. Turning it into a wasteland or their own private fief was more their style. I had heard some rumors about what was going on with Global International and some of the

“hot spots” they were working, shit I knew the UN didn’t know about.

Stuff that the American public would shit bricks about if they knew or cared about it.

“I am Tamazusa. I know that you opened a gate in my
kuni
, and I know that you are not from here. What do you want?”

“Why are my people and I here?” Murphy demanded. “We did you no harm! We were just traveling to the nearest sign of habitation.”

“You are here because to wander around this place without protection will get you killed,” Tamazusa said coolly.

The chick hissed something rapidly, and the woman answered her. I didn’t know what either one of them were saying; it wasn’t English. I thought the man would be even more annoyed that he wasn’t in on this, but he just stared at us like a snake or a cat. I had the feeling FELICITAS IVEY

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that he was the muscle here, while the woman was the brains. I just had to figure out the chick. The woman in black was probably Mr. PO’s wife. Maybe this was a place that women ran things, like the Greek chicks, the Amazons had?

McGann swayed for a second, and I stepped forward to catch her.

“It’s her,” she hissed, and she straightened up.

It took me second to figure out what she was talking about―I guessed the woman here was the one who had been in Boylston Street.

But where the hell was Keno? I can see why she wasn’t telling anyone else, because the woman would want to know how we got that information. A ’path could be someone who was killed on sight here, and you didn’t want to tip the bad guys to your secret weapon. Our other secret was that Wolf spoke Japanese and was fairly fluent because of Keno.

“How do you know that we don’t have protection?” Wolf blurted out. Murphy shot him a dirty look for talking out of turn.

Tamazusa smiled, and I saw that she was beautiful. “I know that the things that are called guns do not work here. So you are defenseless.

There are many who would take advantage of this. I will not. You will be my guests and discuss your ‘exploration’ with me in the morning. It is late, and you must be tired.”

Murphy nodded. He knew there wasn’t a lot he could do or argue about talking longer with this woman. Tamazusa clapped her hands, and a couple of the posse strode forward and started motioning where we were supposed to go.

AS prison cells went, it wasn’t that bad, one big room with what looked like sleeping bags laid out for all of us, but no other furniture.

I’d be pissed, but I’d figured out that these people didn’t do furniture or a lot of decorations. There were a couple of murals on the wall, flowers and some other stuff. It was pretty, but I didn’t like the paper walls.

Snack trays were delivered by a couple cute, giggly girls, and it would 105

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have been nice, except for the fact that the posse and the monsters were patrolling the area so we wouldn’t wander off.

“Don’t eat the food,” Murphy snapped.

Wolf shrugged. “She won’t poison us yet. In fact, things could be a lot worse.”

“She’s the one who was in Boylston Street that night,” McGann said.

“She was the one who killed James?” Romejinoff quivered. She was trying to look cute and helpless. It might have worked if I didn’t know what a cunt she was.

“Someone that tough and mean is what’s needed to be in charge of this place,” I said. “She’s both. Fucking impressive.” I didn’t add that I thought she was hot, but from the way McGann was looking at me, she’d caught that thought. Or it just could be that she knew me; I did have a rep for thinking too much with my dick at times.

“You noticed that too,” Wolf said. “I didn’t catch what the other woman was telling her. The accent was too odd, and she was talking too low. It sounded like they were talking in Japanese, but it just didn’t sound right.”

“What was with the way she was dressed?” I asked. “The white face makes it look like she’s from a minstrel show.”

“She’s a whore,” Romejinoff sneered. “The makeup and what she was wearing, that’s the clothing of the pleasure class.” I bit my tongue so I wouldn’t comment that it took one to know one, and Wolf looked faintly embarrassed. I guess he didn’t like knowing that about a woman. “In Japanese society, most wives don’t mind that their husband has a mistress, but usually they don’t live with them,” he said.

“This is an isolated place,” Murphy said, “it’s kind of hard to keep your bit on the side in a house away from the wife.” FELICITAS IVEY

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“She also might encourage it to keep him out of her bed,” Romejinoff said nastily.

“And while Tamazusa might be in charge here, she may keep that man around because she needs one to deal with the others around here,” Wolf said. “But I noticed that she was the only one who told us her name.”

“Not like
we
were being too friendly,” I said.

“Interesting power structure here,” McGann said thoughtfully.

“This Tamazusa is definitely in charge; I just don’t know about the relationship between her and the other two. While she might be married to that man, I can’t tell. He could be her chief retainer or her husband or her brother. That other woman might be an advisor as well as the man’s mistress. She could be Tamazusa’s mistress. They could all be family, for all we know. We just don’t have enough information to know what is going on here.”

McGann started nibbling on what food was there, volunteering to be the guinea pig for us in case Tamazusa was going to poison us. I thought it would have been better if it were Romejinoff, since that bitch was useless to us and it might solve a couple of problems if she bought it.

“Not bad,” she said, after a couple of bites.

“If you can say that when you’re dying from those gooks poisoning you, then I’ll believe you,” Murphy snarled.

“That fucking attitude is what’s going to get us all killed,” I said.

I kept my tone even. Now was not the time to be dealing with this shit.

Throwing that word around wasn’t a good idea, even if no one else spoke English. For all I knew, all these guys spoke English, including the fucking Reavers. Murphy glared at me. I glared back. “She knows English. How many of her people know it? And where the fuck is Keno?”

“If she’s the one who was in Boylston Street, as Caitlynn said, then we should ask her about him,” Wolf said.

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“He might not be alive,” McGann said gently. “None of the people here are human, that much I know.”

“No shit,” Murphy sneered.

“So don’t be such an asshole, and we might get out of here,” I said. “And how the fuck are we supposed to go home? You know the mojo that can do it? Without carving up someone for it?”

“What do you mean?” Wolf asked.

“I
mean
a sacrifice is needed to get our asses out of here,” I snarled. “Like the one that got us here. Isn’t that right?” Dead silence followed that announcement, and I didn’t like the way Murphy was looking at me. Wolf and Romejinoff looked shocked, while McGann just looked tired. I guess by spilling the beans that way, I was gonna be the one carved into chitlins to get the rest of them home.

SAMOJIROU

I WAS proud of Keno during the interview with the outsiders. He had warned my lady about what exactly the weapons the outsiders carried did and what danger they were to us, showing her his loyalty to her, not that I doubted it. Keno also explained who these people were, since Tamazusa didn’t ask for their names and the outsiders didn’t have the courtesy to give them to her. These outsiders had no manners.

We waited until the outsiders were settled before walking back to our rooms. They were in the same wing as we were and far away from Tamazusa’s quarters.

“Samojirou-sama,” Keno said when we were back in our bedroom. Yukiko wasn’t there to help him, but I was very willing to do so. She was taking care of the outsiders, showing them that we had FELICITAS IVEY

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manners by the way we were treating them as guests instead of prisoners. “I… could we share a bed tonight?” I smiled. “I think that is a delightful idea.” I didn’t know why he wanted to, but I knew I would feel better if he were curled in my arms tonight. I didn’t trust the outsiders, even with the Reavers and the samurai patrolling my lady’s home.

“Let me help you get ready for sleep,” I said.

I carefully undid the layers of kimonos, placing them in a corner on their rack. The maids could take care of the mess in the morning. I teased the combs out of his hair. Keno removed his makeup, and I marveled at the transformation. Out of the kimono and makeup, Keno looked like the warrior that he could be. He was combing out his hair when he looked up with a small frown.