Chapter 4 #2
Vorik laughed softly and stepped closer, lifting a hand, as if he would take her in an embrace. Her body wanted that, even if her mind was wary of him, and she leaned toward him. But he looked over his shoulder toward the rest of the throne room and kept his place, dropping his arm.
The chief and chieftess and numerous of their entourage had disappeared, but many of the military men remained, the officers still negotiating, or whatever they were doing, at the table.
Dolok’s face was red. Things probably weren’t going his way.
Jhiton was impassive, impossible to read.
He didn’t glance over when Vorik looked back, but it didn’t matter.
Jhiton had already arranged for Vorik to speak with Syla.
To what end? To find out if Wreylith would come again to aid Syla if the stormers attacked? Or something more?
“We’ll cede no ground to you.” Dolok pushed his chair back, the legs screeching on the floor.
His words were, for the first time, loud enough for Syla to hear from across the room.
“No islands. And you’d better get your people off Harvest Island.
We’ve almost got that shielder repaired, and those people will be protected again soon. ”
If only that were true. Syla needed to speak with Tibby to get more details on those components she’d mentioned.
Whatever Jhiton's response was to the outburst, it was too quiet for Syla to hear, but he remained calm, seated with his fingers threaded and unperturbed that Dolok loomed from across the table.
“If you’ve no better offers than that to make,” Dolok said, “you can get in your ship and leave. The next time it appears in our harbor, we’ll fill it with cannonballs.”
“As long as you are aware that we’ll have a similar stance toward the ships that leave your harbor,” Jhiton said. “Any of your harbors. It would behoove you to negotiate.”
“It would behoove you not to be bullies.”
“I wonder if Wreylith will appear to guard your ships,” Vorik mused, gazing thoughtfully at Syla instead of watching the officers at the table.
Though the red dragon had returned the figurine that could be used to communicate with her, Syla had no delusions about Wreylith coming to her assistance again.
She wouldn’t randomly defend Garden Kingdom ships, regardless, nor would she want the Harvest Island shielder to be repaired.
Wreylith and the other wild dragons were enjoying hunting the apparently delicious elioks that lived there.
Since they were wild and elusive, Syla had never had the meat, so couldn’t speak to their taste.
Aware of Vorik watching her and waiting for a response, she said, “I believe she adores me now and can’t wait to drive enemies away from our ships.”
A laughable notion, but Syla would be smart to feed Vorik false information instead of truthfully answering all his questions. She should be the one getting information from him. That was how spying worked, wasn’t it?
“That seems unlikely, given her stance on humans in general,” Vorik mused. “I do wonder if she might drive enemies away from whatever ship you were on.”
“Are you and your people planning to target my ship if I go on a journey?”
“If it involves you taking a repaired shielder to the unprotected island, they might.”
“Because your goals are still to destroy all of the shielders and leave every island unprotected? Captain Lesva suggested that.” The woman who’d tortured her probably wasn’t a reliable source, but, given the circumstances, Syla had deemed her more likely to be telling the truth than Vorik.
“Plans are in flux.”
A vague answer that she could have guessed. She didn’t have experience interrogating people and didn’t know how to fish information from his depths. He was as wary with her as she with him—maybe more so.
Syla sighed and leaned on the windowsill, gazing out at the fountain. The sun had disappeared behind clouds as it sank toward the horizon, evening creeping over the island.
“I don’t suppose you’d like to spend this time with me talking about inane and unimportant things?” Syla asked.
Vorik smiled sadly, looking like he understood the reason for her request. Maybe he even regretted trying to finagle information from her.
“I would like that actually. Do you… How are you doing? I know this will sound hypocritical, given who I am and what my people are doing, but I regret that you’ve lost so much. I’ve lost family myself and understand how hard it is, but I can’t fathom what it would be like to lose everyone at once.”
His words and sympathetic tone brought her emotions to the surface, tears threatening as her throat tightened.
She shook her head, realizing she should have kept the talk political rather than personal.
This was more dangerous. She’d cried in front of Vorik before—and he’d held and comforted her—but she couldn’t do that here.
She dared not let Dolok see her being friendly toward him in any way, and she also didn’t want to break down in front of the general or anyone else in the room.
Blinking to keep the tears from falling, Syla stiffened her spine, tightened her grip on the sill. “It is difficult, yes.”
Vorik, perhaps realizing that he was making things more difficult rather than less, lifted an apologetic hand.
“Who have you lost?” she asked, not trusting her voice—her emotions—if he asked more questions. Better and safer to ask them of him.
“My mother when I was little, and my father when I was slightly less little. When I was about twenty, I lost a brother who was between Jhiton and me in age. He was also training to be a dragon rider, but neither of us had mounts of our own yet. We sought to prove ourselves in a sea hunt that would bring in a great deal of meat for the tribe’s winter stores.
We risked seeking the great tusked seals in the Strait of Tempest’s Torment.
The name isn’t melodramatic. It’s a deadly area when a storm comes up.
And, as we learned, cloud strikers also like to hunt the seals there.
That day, they hunted us. We defeated them, but they put us off our course, and when a storm came up, it hurled our craft against the rocks and destroyed it.
I lost my brother and almost my own life as well.
Jhiton came on his dragon and found me. We searched all over for our brother, but he must have drowned.
It’s been ten years, so if he’d survived, he would have found a way home by now. ”
“I’m sorry.” Syla had heard of the strait and the seals, but, other than a few brave explorers and hunters who went out more for sport than necessity, her people didn’t seek out such creatures, not when they could hunt and fish from their safe islands.
Since the shields did not deflect rain and wind, the islands weren’t immune to storms, but the weather was less dangerous than at sea.
“You needn’t be, but thank you.”
“Have you lost, uhm. Were you ever married?” Syla blinked when she realized he could be married now, and she wouldn’t know it. The stormers didn’t wear rings or outward symbols to indicate they were wed. “Or are you married?”
“I’m not, no. My brother wouldn’t ask me to seduce a woman on a mission if that would require me being unfaithful to a wife.
Our people aren’t always monogamous, but that’s something couples figure out, and he’s always been, or, ah, was a believer of that.
” Vorik waved, as if to dismiss a topic he hadn’t meant to bring up.
It occurred to Syla that getting information about General Jhiton and what motivated him might be more useful than asking Vorik about himself.
“Did he lose a wife?” she asked.
Vorik grimaced and glanced back. Not comfortable sharing anything about his brother without permission?
The officers had left the table, however, and Syla didn’t see Jhiton.
Actually, she didn’t see anyone in that area and looked around in surprise.
Sergeant Fel remained, watching her back as always, but the officers and all their military men had departed.
A couple of castle staff and a single soldier in a Royal Protector uniform stood near a door, keeping an eye on Vorik.
As if that would be a sufficient enough force to handle a dragon rider if he attacked her.
Did General Dolok hope that would happen and that he could be rid of the last Moonmark child?
And what were his men doing? Were all the stormers being escorted back to their ship?
The negotiations, such as they’d been, considered complete?
Syla looked at Fel, wondering if he thought it odd that they’d essentially been left alone. He widened his eyes toward Vorik.
What, did he want her to ask more prying questions—more militarily pertinent questions? She thought inquiring about what motivated the general in charge of the Sixteen Talons was pertinent.
“His wife lives.” Vorik’s tone was a little puzzled.
As attentive as he was, he must have noticed his people leaving, but maybe he hadn’t expected to find so few of hers remaining.
His gaze was curious when he looked thoughtfully back to her, but he continued to answer her question. “They are no longer together, however.”
“They divorced?”
“Perhaps not formally, as that’s not a common practice among our people.
For that matter, we don’t have marriages that are as elaborate and full of ceremony as yours.
A couple merely bonds in their own way and then informs the tribe.
But they… after their only living son passed, it was difficult for both of them.
His wife returned to the tribe into which she was born, and Jhiton threw himself into his duties. ”
“Like planning a war?”
Vorik spread his hand, as if to say that was information he couldn’t divulge. Of course not.
“What can we talk about that’s safe?” Syla whispered, not wanting him to go but wondering if he would stay if there was no chance of gaining intelligence.