The Devil's Concubine (The Devil of Ponong series #1) (22 page)

None
of the
soldiers or sailors spoke as they rowed toward the cay. The skiffs
rode the crests of waves and dropped down into the troughs in the choppy water.
The sun wouldn’t set for several hours, but the edge of a tropical storm
darkened the southern sky. Even over the sea, the air was sticky and thick with
humidity.

QuiTai bailed water
from the bottom of the boat until she realized it was useless. Without
something to keep her occupied though, all she could do was watch their
progress toward land and fret about what they might find there. Kyam didn’t ask
what she foresaw; they were surrounded by Thampurian soldiers now, and every
word, every gesture, might have ramifications later on. For now, it was best to
keep their public conversations hostile.

While Cay Rhi’s lagoon
was a safer harbor, Voorus decided it would be better to row to a smaller beach
further from the tide pool plantation so that the Ravidians wouldn’t see them
coming. But the narrow, rocky beach was perilous landing. Kyam jumped out of
the skiff in the surf with the sailors, and shook his head when QuiTai slipped
overboard and grabbed hold of one of the guide ropes. She saw him stifle a
chuckle. If he could still laugh, he hadn’t put together the pieces of the
puzzle as she had. Or maybe he knew exactly what the soldiers planned to do.

No matter. Their
business was concluded. They owed each other nothing now. It wasn’t betrayal if
he sided with the Thampurians, any more than if she chose her people over him.

When it became clear
that the skiffs couldn’t be dragged over the rocks to the narrow band of soft
white sand, the soldiers reluctantly waded to shore.

The cay, like many
of the small archipelago islands, was little more than a giant dune pushed out
of the sea by the relentless waves. Even the monolith stones along its southern
shore were worn to stumps that barely rose above the water. The cay was covered
with coconut palms and stands of tall grass. Further from the beach, the jungle
clung to the sandy soil with tenacious roots.

Voorus tossed an
equipment pack at QuiTai. She staggered backward as the heavy pack hit her
chest. He snapped his fingers at her and strode toward the jungle. Before she
could drop the pack, Kyam took it from her, briefly touching her arm, pleading
with his eyes for her to hold her tongue.

The sailors quickly
pushed the skiffs off the rocks and rowed back to the junk. That made the
little plan forming in QuiTai’s mind a bit harder to carry out, but she was
sure that she’d find a way around it. She had to.

The soldiers under
Voorus’ command quickly secured the beach and gathered by the trunk of a slim
coconut palm that bowed toward the water. Rivulets of sweat already poured down
the major’s temples, even though he hadn’t manned an oar on the skiff. He
opened the equipment pack Kyam held and pulled out a machete. “Make sure that
she only uses it on plants,” he warned Kyam.

Clouds of mosquitoes
and night spirit moths rose as QuiTai and the soldiers hacked two parallel
paths through the jungle. Kyam took the lead on the line of men to QuiTai’s
left. Even though the canopy overhead shielded them from the sun, the hot,
humid air scorched their lungs. Ten minutes later, soaked in sweat, they
yielded the lead to the men behind them and fell to the back of the line.

QuiTai joined Kyam as
he paused to consult his compass. She was glad he had it; she knew her way
around Ponong, but she had only a vague idea of where they were headed on the
cay. The entire island wasn’t more than half a mile wide and maybe two miles
long, so it was impossible to get too lost, but she was in no mood to waste
time.

“Let the soldiers do
most of the work. Don’t exhaust yourself. You need to stay alert,” Kyam said in
a quiet voice as he kept his focus on the compass.

Using her forearm,
she wiped sweat from her forehead.

“And don’t give me
that look. You saw what the Ravidians did to the harbor master’s neck. Not to
mention that Petrof could be lurking anywhere.”

QuiTai unhinged her
fangs and ran her tongue down one with such relish that Kyam shuddered. Then he
clamped his sweaty hand over her mouth. “That’s not a good idea.”

Her hand went on her
hip as she gave him a look that she was sure he couldn’t misinterpret. Then she
turned and followed the line of soldiers who had moved ahead without them.

The lead soldier on
Kyam’s column stopped abruptly, motioned for silence, and ducked. QuiTai and
Kyam carefully picked their own path through the undergrowth without using
their machetes. They squatted shoulder to shoulder and pushed the glossy, dark
green leaf that blocked their view.

Gentle waves lapped
a crescent of white sand beach around the lagoon; several small outrigger
fishing boats bobbed in the pale blue-green water beyond. Jungle fowl clucked as
if muttering to themselves as they scratched at the ground around quiet huts. But
no people. No children laughing. No grandmothers on the rickety, modest
verandas of the palm leaf covered huts. No men singing as they hung their
fishing nets to dry.

The bad feeling in
the pit of QuiTai’s stomach wrenched into pangs of fear. There: a bowl
overturned yards from the water. There: a splatter of blood on the wall of a
hut.

She tried to guess
how many people lived in the village and how many could fit in the fishing
boats. It would be tight, but if the series of events she expected came to
pass, any Ponongese left behind would never leave the island alive.

QuiTai unscrewed the
top from the vial of black lotus and spread a few drops of the murky mixture of
her venom and the tar around her wrists.

~ ~ ~

The eerie stillness in the village seemed to affect the
Thampurian soldiers too. They crouched and made their way through the
underbrush without a word, skirting the village as if it were ground too sacred
to touch.

As the soldiers
paused to get their bearings, she stayed within sight, but at a distance. “Where’s
our guide?” Voorus asked. His dark eyes sought QuiTai. “Bring her to me.”

A soldier gripped
her sleeved forearm. She wanted him to touch her skin, so she pulled away. In
the brief struggle, his fingers clamped around her wrist. Only then did she
allow him to drag her toward the major.

“We wouldn’t want
you to get lost,” Voorus said.

“I have no idea where we’re going, so you
could say that I already am.”

“We’re going to the plantation. That’s where
you promised the Ravidians would be.”

“I said that’s where I thought they might be,
Major, but I made no promises. However, if you want to get from this village to
the plantation, I suggest you take the established path rather than spend your
energy cutting a new one.”

“What path?”

“If the villagers work on the plantation,
they probably walk there. If they walk there every day, there’s probably a
path. It shouldn’t be too hard to find. Look for the place where the plants
aren’t growing.”

Several feet away, Kyam covered his face and
slowly shook his head.

“Men, look for a path,” Voorus said.

The soldier who’d gripped QuiTai’s wrist
staggered a few steps and then stared at his hand. He giggled. QuiTai fought
the urge to giggle with him as she felt the black lotus seep into his blood.
Even from here, she could see that his pupils were contracted.

“Soldier!” Voorus’ face flushed with heat and
anger.

The man tried to come to attention, but
collapsed in another fit of laughter. “My hands are floating.”

Kyam shot QuiTai a piercing look and rushed
to the soldier to unbutton the soldier’s jacket and try to persuade him to sip
water from a canteen. “He’s overcome from the heat. Someone should take him
back to the
Golden Barracuda.
”

Interesting. Kyam suspected that she had
something to do with the soldier’s condition, but wasn’t telling anyone.

“Leave him here. We’ll deal with him later.” Voorus
ran his finger under his collar. Rings of sweat darkened his uniform under his
arms. “Have you found the path yet?” he called out.

“Over here, sir,” a soldier said.

“Come on.” Voorus stomped off.

Kyam shook a warning finger at her. QuiTai
barely suppressed a wicked grin and followed the major.

~ ~ ~

A flock of small gold, green, and red parrots rose from the
upper limbs of a mango tree beside the path. The soldiers flinched as the loud
voices of the parrots racketed through the jungle. When Voorus was convinced it
was safe, he motioned his men to follow.

They were almost at
the plantation wall before they saw it. The original compound hadn’t been
built as a fortress, but it was one now. Blue tiles that had once capped the
wall lay in shards on the ground. Damp plaster, still smelling of wet clay,
covered the top four feet of the wall. Strands of a slick gel draped over wires
strung tight above the new bricks.

A single guard tower
rose from the center of the compound. The Ravidian standing in it held
something long and metal in his hands as he leaned against the railing and looked
toward the sea.

The soldiers darted
back into the jungle before the Ravidian could turn and see them, but QuiTai
rushed to the wall and pressed her back to it. There was no way the guard could
see her from that angle if she couldn’t see him. As Voorus hissed for her to
join them, she tucked her machete into the waistband of her sarong and moved
along the wall toward the back of the compound, where the path widened into a
large patch of cleared dirt in front of a walled-up gate.

She startled when
she saw a body at the far edge of the clearing. Every detail came to her in
quick flashes. The plants and dirt around him seemed to be covered with the
same gel that hung from the wires; even his clothes looked wet. Flies buzzed
around his bloated body but didn’t land.

So this is how they use the sea
wasps as a weapon.

She wasn’t surprised. It was how she
envisioned using them if LiHoun was successful.

How did they throw so many?

“Get over here now!” Voorus sounded
remarkably like Kyam when he was about to start shouting, although she doubted
he would raise his voice over his terse whisper.

I’ll give you your
native
,
Voorus, and I’ll play my role to the back of the house.

QuiTai lurched toward the corpse with one
hand before her face and the other stretched out. Her halting walk,
perfected on stage, gave her a chance to pick a path through the nearly clear remains
of shredded sea wasps. Sobbing, she dropped to her knees in a spot clear of the
stingers. After choosing the safest place to touch him, she turned him over.

She gasped. “PhaNyan!” It really was him. The
fool had gotten himself killed. His rascal’s smile was a frozen grimace
now.

Two soldiers rushed her. Kyam tried to
hold the second one back, but he wrested free. In the scuffle to drag her back
to cover, both brushed against plants coated with sea wasps. The stung soldiers
muffled their cries of agony as they staggered back into hiding, but they
didn’t let go of her until they were well into the trees. Their friends doused
their faces and hands with vinegar.

Damn Kyam for telling them how to combat the
sea wasps’ stings! She’d warned him not to tell them anything, and now they’d
taken over the mission that could have saved his name and brought him out of
disgrace.

Serves you right.

From the way Kyam seemed to hold his breath
as his eyes fixed on a point far above the compound wall, she assumed that the
Ravidian guard had turned in their direction. The soldiers, Kyam, and she held
their collective breath. On an invisible signal, perhaps, the Ravidian in the
guard tower turned away, and the men relaxed.

It was too bad she’d only been able to take
out the two soldiers. That still left seventeen to neutralize, and then there
was Kyam to consider.

Voorus’ fingers dug into her arm as he yanked
her deeper into the trees. “You know that Ponongese?”

QuiTai nodded. She continued to cry, although
not as loudly as before.

Voorus beckoned Kyam over. “If she’s never
been on this cay before, how does she know him?” He pointed to the clearing.
“Or is that one of the Devil’s men?”

“I’ve seen her speaking with him before in
Levapur, so he could be one of the Devil’s men, but I swear that she hasn’t
left my side since we spoke at the Red Happiness.” Kyam’s mouth snapped shut as
his eyes narrowed.

Voorus shook her so hard that her head swam. “How
did you get a message to your operatives? Tell me. I swear I’ll strip you and
roll you in those sea wasp stingers if you don’t tell me now.”

“I sent him to keep an eye on the Ravidians,
back before we knew what they were doing. He must have followed them here.” She
wiped tears from her eyes. “I haven’t spoken to him since before Jezereet was
murdered.”

Voorus gripped her hand and forced it open.
He pointed to her scar. “One wonders where you got that, since you claim you’ve
never been on this island before.”