he growled to her.
Without Patricia there to translate, Jenkins had no idea of the threat Kasshas was trying to communicate. She reached into her cargo pocket and pulled out a small paper bag, opening it and holding it out to him.
“Candy?” she offered.
“Eh?!”
Alacea was lost again. Not geographically, of course, she knew where she was, but she had been certain that her new Tesho was bringing her to his den to rob her of her virtue and dignity, perhaps even as a way to entertain his men, but now she had no idea what was happening.
Several men and women dressed in the same mottled green and brown as Ben and Patricia were seated around a cheaply-made metal table. One man, wearing a uniform a slightly different shade than the others, spread out a parchment that took up a quarter of the table in front of her.
“This is the best of them, best we can tell, Sir,” Warren told Ben as he spread the map out and flattened it with his palms. “It also shows most of the wilderness outside the village.”
“Good,” Ben said from the other side of the table where he and Alacea stood. He turned to her and motioned for Patricia to get ready. “Alacea, now that we’re done with all that other stuff, will you please show us where your people are?”
The fox girl looked down at the map. It did show where her community was, but she was hesitant. Yes, her Tesho had passed his sentence on her, though it was not done in the way she had expected. And, yes, under their traditions that mean her people should now be shielded from cruel treatment, but…
What if they’re lying? she asked herself. What if all that was done just to get me to betray the location of my people? What if they are going there to harm them?
Her eyes fell on a point on the opposite side of the map from where her people were hiding. She could tell them that’s where they were. When they found nothing, she could say that they must have left, continued hiding somewhere else.
But then what? Where could her people go where the Dark Ones would not eventually find them? This Dark One, Gibson, seemed to at least be trying to understand her. Would the next one? Would another Dark One commander who found her people in the mountains make such efforts, or would he simply slaughter her people and leave them for the animals to eat?
She’d told Kasshas that she had to try, to give the old traditions a chance to work. Now that it seemed that they were, it would be dishonorable to change her mind.
Also, she was his Myorin. Could the first words she spoke to him as tod and vixen be a lie? Could she argue to the Gods that, given his conduct so far, it was right to deceive him after he had given her what she wanted, though in a very roundabout way?
Ben looked at Patricia. “She wants to know if you’re going to hurt them.”
Again, Ben tried to put himself in her shoes. If their positions were reversed, if an alien commander were asking him to give up the location of his Rangers, what would he do?
He’d spit in the guy’s face and tell him to look for them up his own ass.
No, he thought. That would be a bridge too far for him. Maybe it was military training or maybe his own history, but he thought he was incapable of showing that kind of trust to an enemy.
Is she, though? Is she an enemy?
He looked down into her green eyes and addressed her directly. “I promise no harm will come to them,” he said. “My mission is to protect them.”
Not technically a lie. Part of his mission was to maintain order in the community to prevent insurgent activity. Insurgent activity would almost certainly necessitate violence to put down, and violence inside a host community would almost certainly come with civilian casualties. History taught him there was no way around it.
“We want them to come home,” he continued. “To be safe. The war is over.”
Alacea searched Ben’s eyes for any hint of deceit. Finally, she took a breath and turned from him, speaking quietly as she faced the map again.
Warren circled the area with a pencil and examined the map. “It looks like a road or trail goes up to most of it,” he said. “We can have a couple of guys in an LTV go up as far as they can and see how far the vehicles can get.”
“How many people are there?” Ben asked her.
Patricia translated the question and Alacea answered without resistance.
More questions came after that as the assembled soldiers tried to get an idea of what kind of job was ahead of them.
Were any of them injured?
Not when she had left though a few were sick.
Did any of them have any weapons?
The Huntresses had hardlight rifles and some bows.
Who was in charge up there?
The Huntresses were in charge of defense, but a noble vixen was likely in charge of the day-to-day things.
How big was the cave? How many entrances were there? Were there booby-traps?
Alacea answered every question that came her way, her heart clenching with worry as she spoke. She knew the information she was giving them could be used to plan a massacre, but she could only pray that her Tesho would keep his word.
“You’re going to come with us, okay?” Ben told her. “We’re going to need you to keep them calm so they don’t get the wrong idea.”
The Mikorin listened to the disjointed translation, closed her eyes, and waved her tail up and down in assent.
Ben turned to the assembled Rangers and engineers. “Okay, scouts out and back today to give us an idea of road conditions, but it looks like we’re going to have to hump up and down that mountain. I don’t want to scare these people, so light footprint. One squad of Rangers for security, a medic, and Senior Chief, if you don’t mind, I’d like to take a few of your engineers. We don’t know what that cave is made of and there’s been a lot of rain. If parts of it are flooded or collapsed…”
“No problem, Sir. I’ll get you guys who can keep up.”
“Thanks.”
“Heavy weapons, Sir?” one of the NCOs asked from the left side of the table.
“This is a rescue mission,” Ben told him. “Let’s try not to scare the pants off everyone. If we need a crew-served weapon for this, we’ve already lost.”
“Sir, we don’t have enough trucks to move five hundred people in one go,” another NCO pointed out. “It’s going to take a couple of trips.”
Ben nodded. “We’ll make do. Some folks will have to wait. Maybe we’ll just… I don’t know… build a fire and sing some songs.”
A few chuckles came from the group.
“There’s risk here,” Ben told them seriously. “Some of them have weapons, and this is their turf. You’ve seen what they’re like during an away game. This is their home, and they’ve got all the advantages. But if we don’t go up there and try to bring them down peacefully, they’re still going to have those weapons a day, a week, a month from now. The only difference is they’ll be hungrier and more desperate. So, let’s bring them home so we can all be friends and we won’t have to worry about what the Koreans and Slovenians have been getting. Showtime tomorrow is zero-three. Departure at zero-four. Don’t be late.”
Sensing an end to the meeting, the soldiers around the table stood up.
“Rangers lead the way,” Ben said.
“All the way!” the Rangers returned as one.
Alacea had listened intently to Ben’s words, una
ble to understand them, but attempting to divine their meaning from his tone and the reactions of the others around the table. When they rose and chanted the simple phrase together, she got the feeling that something had been decided and took a step back to better see what would happen next.
The Dark Ones milled about, collecting papers and notes, some of them leaving immediately, but some of them lingering behind to speak to her Tesho. She stayed at his right elbow, ready to answer to him if needed. Some of them gave her questioning or even dark looks as they left. Tesho paid them no heed.
Patricia had not bothered to try to translate the briefing to her, but it was pretty obvious what course of action had been set. She looked up as Ben turned to her and motioned for Patricia to step closer to them.
“Alacea,” he began.
“We’re going to leave early tomorrow to bring your people home,” he told her. “So go home, get some rest, gather anything you think you’ll need. We’re going to be walking a lot.”
She listened as Patricia clumsily translated, and her ears flattened in confusion.
“It’s going to be a long few days,” Ben told her. “So, rest, relax… do… Va’Shen things,” he said. “Come back here at three tomorrow morning.” He broke off and addressed Patricia directly. “Can you translate our time to theirs?” At her nod, he continued. “We’re going to leave very early, and there’s a lot to do before then.”
Her tail thumped against the floor as Patricia translated, and she bowed in acquiescence. He was letting her go free, and at that point it didn’t matter if it was because he wanted her to rest or was simply too busy to rape her at the moment, she grasped at that freedom.
she said obediently, jumping for joy on the inside.
He led her to the door and opened it. Waiting not far from the steps, Kasshas looked up and his tail thumped against the ground.
Ben blinked at the response and turned to Patricia. “What does he think went on in there?”
Alacea bowed her head to him in a muted greeting. she said to him.
The chieftain grunted, not sure he believed her.
She looked up at him.
Kasshas bit his lip angrily but said nothing. He knew any argument he made would be met with resistance. Alacea believed too wholeheartedly in the Great Ones’ traditions to set them aside, even under these circumstances.
Her ears twitched an affirmative.
“What does he think went on in there?” Ben asked Patricia as Kasshas and Alacea spoke.
For what felt like the millionth time that day, Patricia shrugged at the question. “Perhaps he’s had a bad experience with other humans,” she said. “Wouldn’t a lot of our guys think the worst of them?”
Ben couldn’t tell if that was a veiled criticism of him but said nothing in response. Patricia quickly changed the subject.
“Sir, shouldn’t we let headquarters know about all this before we go up there after the Va’Shen?”
“Comms are still out,” Ben said with a shrug. “There’s a convoy coming through tomorrow that could take a message with them, but it would take days before we would get an answer, and that answer would probably be to stand by until they ask someone for permission from Earth.”
“What if it’s a trap?” she asked quietly, a hint of fear in her voice for the first time.
He took a breath. The idea that he might be leading his people into an ambush weighed heavily on him. He’d been through ambushes and, having survived them, would spend the rest of his life thankful that he was still whole afterward.
“Maybe it is,” he told her. “But look at it from a combatant perspective.”
“Okay,” she said hesitantly.
He began. “You have enemy forces numbering in the hundreds hidden away in unknown terrain on their home soil. The enemy is armed with heavy, armor-piercing weapons, and the terrain they occupy is in hills and mountains that overlook your encampment. What are the options?”
“I guess… you could ask for back-up,” she ventured.
“Back-up is days away,” he said with a head-shake. “And by that point they could be somewhere else.” He looked down at her. “What would be the last thing the enemy in this case would expect?”
Patricia sighed in resignation. “Attack?” she asked.
“Attack,” he confirmed with a nod. “Ninety percent of winning in combat is seizing the initiative while denying it to the enemy. We don’t move soon, we give that initiative to them. If they are setting us up for an ambush, that ambush isn’t going to get weaker with time. It’s only going to get better. One way or another, we need to go now.”
“I guess so,” she sighed.
The conversation broke up as Alacea turned back to them and bowed.
“She says ‘bye.’” Patricia told him.
“We’ll see you tomorrow,” he told her, bowing in return.
The fox girl gave him one last look before turning and following Kasshas down the main thoroughfare toward the camp gate.
“She’s a strange girl,” Ben noted.
“I think she likes you,” Patricia returned jokingly.
“I think she wants to kill me,” he told her quietly.
Kasshas eyed Alacea warily as the two walked down the road together toward the village proper, passing empty homes as they trudged wearily with an air of defeat. The old Va’Shen man had a fair idea of what Alacea was going through at the moment. The girl had been certain of her course as most young people were. Now that course had been violently changed, and she was uncertain of what would become of her. She had marched into the jaws of death only to find that death had been determined to be too good for her. What remained would likely be worse.
he told her. She looked up at him in confusion.
Alacea’s tail twitched from side to side, and her ears flicked back at the statement. she said.
He sighed, his tail sweeping the street behind him in thought.
she whispered.
The two reached the gates of the temple, and Alacea started up the walk toward the steps. she said, unwilling to turn and face him.
Behind her, Kasshas’s ears twitched.
Alacea continued to the steps that led up into the cold and abandoned temple. Everything was as clean and as pristine as they had left it. She really wanted a warm bath, but it would take time to heat the water, and she simply was not up to it at the moment.
She walked the polished wood-floored hallways, looking into the various rooms and studios of the ground floor where the Mikorin spent their days perfecting their arts. Pausing at the door to a large room, she slid the paper door open and looked inside the dance studio where she had spent so much time in her youth. She could still remember every move for every dance covering almost four thousand years of Va’Shen history. The time she had spent as the Mikorin Alva’Rem had been the happiest in her life, happy enough that she had hesitated before accepting the honor of becoming Mikorin Na’Sha.
If it all went poorly tomorrow, if her Tesho was deceiving her, if he truly meant to betray her trust and wipe out her people rather than save them, all of those dances and the songs that went with them, and the stories they told would all be lost forever.
The Vixen War Bride Page 10