The Occasional Diamond Thief

by J. A. McLachlan

  “Stop!”

  A hand light sweeps over us. I look up groggily, beyond the two men struggling together, toward the door.

  “I said, STOP!” The blast of a fired lead-arm shatters the air above us.

  The two guards fall apart.

  “Kia! Are you hurt?”

  “Uhh,” I croak, my voice still hoarse from having the wind knocked out of me. I recognize the voice—how is it possible?—but it is. I want to laugh with relief but it comes out part hiccup, part cough. “Y..yes,” I gasp, squinting into Jumal’s hand light.

  “The Select…?”

  “I…I am well.” Her voice sounds even worse than mine but I’m so relieved to hear it I do laugh this time, although it sounds more like a series of hiccups.

  “You,” Jumal’s light catches the High Priest’s man, “don’t move. And you,” the light moves over to the King’s guard. “Why are you here?”

  The man tries to speak but with what looks like a broken nose pouring blood, his words are indecipherable. I tell Jumal the King sent him with me to protect the Select, and that another guard radioed for reinforcements. Jumal gives him the lead-arm to hold on the High Priest’s guard and comes over to me.

  The gray rectangle of the open door has lightened into a bleak Malemese dawn, enough to let me see his face. He looks concerned, and yes, he can’t help it—he wrinkles his nose. I struggle to my feet with his help, and lean against him. I don’t care if the Malemese don’t touch, he’s saved my life and I’m hopelessly happy to see him, so I throw my arms around him. Who would have thought I’d be rescued by a handsome prince? And prince that he is, he hugs me back, even though he must be suffocating with the effort not to breathe. I hurt all over from the force of my fall, but I prolong that hug until his eyes are tearing up, partly because it feels so good to have his arms around me, and partly because it serves him right for making me hide under his mattress while he calmly led the guards into his bedroom. When I release him he coughs a couple times, trying not to. I smile and go to Agatha.

  “Ugh! It stinks in here,” I say, helping her up.

  She sighs and nods. “There’s no getting used to it. They might as well tear it down.”

  “Come outside and get some fresh air.” I slip my arm under her shoulder and behind her back, supporting her. Jumal is already pushing Broken-nose toward the door, ignoring his loud protests. The King’s guard—Broken-nose two, I guess—waits for us to preceed him, one hand holding his bleeding nose and the other holding the lead-arm.

  Agatha stops walking. “I am in quarantine.”

  I laugh and take another step, but she doesn’t move. She’s serious.

  “It’s morning.” I point to the increasing light in the doorway.

  “I have to wait for the priest to officially let me out.”

  I should have let him strangle her, I think. I open my mouth to tell her I’m not staying in here—

  “I am the King’s representative. I declare your quarantine over,” Jumal says from the doorway, in a way nicer tone of voice than I would have used.

  “Jumal,” Agatha says, in a chiding tone—

  “He is,” Broken-nose-two says. “He has the authority. Keep moving. Please.”

  Agatha looks at him, at the blood dripping steadily below the hand over his nose, and lets me help her to the door.

  I hear the voices just before we step outside. Even so, I’m not prepared for what I see. Dozens of people—I squint, my eyes accustomed to dark—maybe a hundred, crowding onto the island in a steady stream along the path. Naevah’s in front, with Liat on her hip and Prad Gaelig beside her. They brought them, they brought everyone! The innkeeper’s wife is on Naevah’s other side, proudly holding Tira, who clings to her neck and does not look happy at all to be here. The innkeeper walks beside his wife looking no more pleased about it than Tira. I recognize some of the people I saw at the inn—did the innkeeper’s wife bully her customers into coming and lock the door behind them to make sure they did? I wouldn’t put it past her.

  I see the women I visited with Agatha, and their husbands, and so many more they become a throng of silent brown faces, elders, young people, parents with children in arms, all coming to see Agatha triumph over her quarantine.

  And then, while I’m gaping at all the people, another amazing thing happens: the sun comes out. I look up, expecting to see a momentary break in the clouds, but a high wind is blowing them away, leaving a clear sky.

  The people catch sight of Agatha and a cheer goes up. “She’s alive! She’s alive and well!” those in front pass on to those behind, and the cheering grows. Agatha grasps my arm to steady herself. I pull her forward into the sunlight and hold her from falling as the crowd erupts in shouts of joy, increasing in volume as those too far to see her grasp the significance of the cheering and join in. Several babies including Tira start to wail, adding to the din.

  The crowd ripples and I catch sight of the High Priest surrounded by four of his guards pushing their way to the front. The look on the High Priest’s face as he stares from his bound guard to Jumal to Agatha turns every paranoid thought I had into intelligent reasoning. I tense for a moment until I see men with the King’s insignia pushing their way through the crowd: the reinforcements have arrived. And—my eyes widen—the King is with them! He notices the High Priest and gives him a measuring look as they both approach the fever hut.

  Agatha, shading her eyes from the sun and gazing on the cheering crowd with an expression of amazement, has not seen either of them. She holds up her hand. It takes a while for the noise to subside.

  “Thank you,” she says. Her voice, despite its hoarseness, carries over the crowd as only a Select’s voice can. “The fever hut is no longer a death sentence. CoVir is beaten! No one must ever be sent here again.”

  A shocked silence follows her words. I see those near the High Priest glance at him nervously as he glares at Agatha. Before he can speak the innkeeper’s wife, who isn’t close enough to see her priest and can’t resist the opportunity to star in an unfolding drama, raises Tira in the air like a torch and cries, “Praise God! And burn down the fever hut!”

  Naevah reaches quickly for her sobbing child as wild cheering breaks out again, punctuated with cries of “Burn it down!”, “The plague is over!”, Burn down the fever hut!”

  “NO!” The High Priest’s voice is almost unrecognizable in his rage. The King, however, has now reached him. He murmurs something into the High Priest’s ear that turns his face gray as the King’s men quietly surround them.

  “Burn it down,” I hear Prad Gaelig advise the King as the royal guards escort the High Priest and his men away.

  “So be it,” the King says, and the cry is taken up across the island.

  The flames are still crackling loudly, the hut a fetid torch in the center of the island, when Jumal finds us. I look at Agatha, leaning on my shoulder. Her eyes are closed, her face white with exhaustion. “I have to get her home where she can rest,” I tell him. “Can you help me with her?” He slips his arm under Agatha’s other arm and together we half carry her down to the path through the swamp.

  It’s a long way. I tell Jumal and Agatha about finding Hamza’s body, and that I was too afraid to talk about it—and that’s all the explanation I give for not telling Naevah and him about it, and for leaving their apartment. I can’t mention the diamond without betraying the Queen’s secret, and without that it just sounds like I didn’t trust him. Which is true, although I feel crummy about it now. Then I remember he lied to me about who he was, and I can’t say that without giving away his secret to Agatha, so I just mutter, “I guess neither of us gets an A+ in honesty.”

  Agatha says “Hmmm,” and I say, “You have your secrets too,” and we all walk on for a while in silence.

  “Thank you both for saving my life,” Agatha says when that has gone on long enough, and we’re back to our good points. I describe (sketchily) trying to convince the King to send two guards with me to find Hamza’
s body and protect the Select. Jumal says—a little unfairly, since we’ve moved on—that when he didn’t hear from me (emphasis there) he got worried and decided to come to the fever hut to find out if I’d gone there.

  And after that we’re back to silence, but we’ve reached the city by now. From time to time I glance at Jumal but I don’t know what to say next, and apparently he doesn’t either. Jaro would start up an easy conversation without a second’s thought but I can’t think of a thing to say that doesn’t sound idiotic. Like, it’s the first sunny day since I got here, and despite everything, I just want to stretch my arms up to the sunshine, but am I going to talk about the weather?

  Agatha doesn’t seem to notice. It’s taking all she has left just to keep walking, holding on to both of us. But I am more and more painfully aware, with every silent step, that Jumal and I have nothing to talk about.

  Why should we? He’s the heir to the throne and I’m a foreigner.

  He’ll never leave Malem, and I can’t possibly stay here.

  So, honestly, what is there to say? That’s what keeps me silent.

  We reach Prophet’s Lane, and then we’re at the door. Agatha hands me the key and I let us in and we lower her onto a chair and she thanks him for everything, and he leaves.

  The end.

  But then I jump up and run outside after him.

  “Why did you do it?” I blurt out “You risked your life for us.”

  “For you,” he says.

  “Why?”

  “You really don’t know, do you?”

  “Don’t know what?” I hate riddles.

  He shrugs. “People will always take risks for you, Kia.”

  He leaves me standing there, staring after him as he walks down the street and turns the corner and is gone.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  I wake up the next morning to thunder. I groan and roll over, but the thunder continues. It sounds pretty distant, just a low, steady rumble that goes on and on—

  I sit up and listen. …On and on…

  I jump out of bed and run to the front room, where Agatha sits calmly at the table drinking a mug of tea.

  “What’s happening?”

  “A ship is landing.”

  “A spaceship?” I say idiotically. “Landing here?”

  She smiles. “Apparently.”

  I race to my bedroom to dress.

  All I can think of as I try to hurry Agatha through Malem City to the spaceport is: what if it leaves before I get there? Which is ridiculous because it won’t have even cooled from landing yet, but even so, couldn’t Agatha walk a little faster?

  A lot of people are headed to the spaceport. We find out why when we overhear two men discussing the possible reasons a ship from Iterria would dare land here, and a third speculate on whether there’ll be trouble.

  What kind of trouble? I wonder. Then it registers: a ship from Iterria. Is it landing without permission? I shake my head. I don’t want to know. I don’t care about their stupid dispute or whether or not Malem joins the Alliance. All I care about is that I’m on board when that ship leaves. I glance at Agatha. She looks worried. I speed up. We’re almost there. I can see the edge of the field ahead, at the end of this street.

  What if the King and Queen order the ship off-planet before I can fight my way on board? Because that’s exactly what I intend to do. No matter what it takes I’m getting on that ship before it leaves. I’ll climb over anyone who gets in my way!

  I break into a run, sprinting to the end of the street—

  It’s there! Solid and real in the middle of the landing field. I can hardly believe my eyes. I want to run across the field toward it, but it’s just landed; waves of hot air still emanate out around it, and the hatch is closed.

  A small crowd has already gathered. Half-way down the field a ring of guards, their weapons held ready, surround the King and Queen as they face the ship. More guards patrol the perimeter, warning us back. Agatha catches up to me and we stand at the edge of the field, watching the ship as it cools down. I chew my lip with frustration, willing the hatch to open.

  At last it does. A hush falls over the crowd, every face tense, straining to see. When the hatch is fully open a figure steps into its arch. I recognize the blue and white of the O.U.B., but can make out little else through the crowd of Malemese around me. I wriggle my way forward, pulling Agatha with me.

  “You!” I hear the Queen cry. “How dare you come here again!”

  “Where are my people?” the figure in the hatch asks without so much as a glance at the Queen.

  I’m close enough to see her now, but I wouldn’t need to; I’d know that voice anywhere. A loud voice would carry across this tensely silent field, but hers ricochets over the crowd with the controlled force of a whiplash. The stillness of the Adept’s features is frightening, her voice a cool veneer over the frozen fire of her eyes. People around me step back, and I’m tempted to do the same except for Agatha’s ramrod straight back beside me.

  The Adept looks over the field full of people, ignoring the guards’ lead-arms as though they are toys. Her question hangs over us. She does not repeat it.

  Agatha starts forward. The guards allow her to pass. I take a deep breath and hurry after her. I’m not exactly crazy about this direction—the one thing I didn’t expect to have to climb over to board this ship is an angry Adept.

  She sees us coming. Her gaze lingers on Agatha, moves on to me—and I miss a step and nearly take Agatha down with me, because who would think a totally expressionless face could convey such relief?

  “There is one missing,” she says, her voice as commanding as ever, so I must have been mistaken. She looks back at the King and Queen and their guards.

  She talks like she owns us. It’s annoying, but right now, with an angry Adept facing down the Malemese, I’d rather be one of the owned than one of the accused. Especially when I remember being jailed, and being afraid my hand would be cut off, and having to get Tira out of the fever hut, and arriving just in time to prevent Agatha from being murdered. And finding Hamza’s body…

  “You’ve come too late for him, Adept,” I call to her. If this is her idea of a rescue, she’s bungled it. We’d be dead, too, if we’d had to wait for her.

  The Adept turns to me, standing with Agatha beside the King. I narrow my eyes, not retracting my words or my tone. She should have been here. She should have come with us, not sent us all unsuspecting into danger.

  “So. Another death on my soul.” Her voice is so low the meaning of the words follows a beat after her voice. “Tell me, child.”

  The field is silent. Even the wind has died down, as though it, too, is waiting to hear what I will say. I wish I’d kept my mouth shut, now that the pull of her intense focus is trained on me. I take a breath and open my mouth—

  “Enough,” the King says. His voice is firm, steadying. The Adept glances at him and I am released. I still want to tell her everything, but now I want to for my own reasons, and in my own way. I look at the King, cool and in control, and I admire him tremendously.

  “Yes,” the Adept says. “You are right, Your Highness. This is not the time or the place.”

  The King turns to his people. “Go home,” he says. He waits a few minutes as the crowd begins to disburse, then turns back to the Adept: “You may disembark.”

  The Adept inclines her head and steps out of the ship.

  For a grueling two hours Agatha and I stand in a private room in the palace, going over everything that has happened since we arrived. Well, not everything—I omit the parts that involve the Queen jailing me, and returning the Princess’s heart stone. The Queen is, after all, sitting between her husband and the Adept, listening to our testimony. Prad Gaelig is called in to verify his part in it all when we’re done, even though the Adept has already confirmed I’m telling the truth—mostly. She leaves that word out, but I’m pretty sure she knows it’s not the whole truth. She lets that go, for now.

  At last we’re
dismissed. We’ll have to appear at the High Priest’s public trial and execution—I flinch at the word—and repeat our testimony. The thought makes me sick, but when I look round at the faces in the room, there isn’t even the tiniest possibility I can get out of it. If I even suggested wanting to, they’d be shocked at my lack of ethics, wanting a man to be condemned without the opportunity to face his accusers.

  As soon as we reach Prophet’s Lane, I offer to make dinner and disappear into the kitchen, leaving Agatha with the Adept. I delay there as long as I can, but finally I have to either announce that dinner’s ready or explain why I stood in the kitchen while it cooked to ashes.

  I bring the platter of somewhat dried-out fish and vegetables and set it down on the table. “So I’ll let you enjoy—” the Adept cuts me off with a nod toward the third chair. I sit down with them.

  “Has the Queen’s loss been redeemed?” she asks. And so begins my second grilling.

  It’s rather quieter than the one at the palace. The Adept asks a question, waits till I look at her, and reads the answer in my face. An efficient use of words—or lack of them.

  “Good,” she says, with an air of finality, when she’s satisfied. “Then we have nothing more to worry about.”

  Nothing to worry about? I stab a piece of fish on my plate. What did she have to worry about? She wasn’t even here—

  I stop cold, the fish halfway to my mouth. A rush of understanding leaves me dizzy. “You were there…!”

  “I was,” the Adept agrees.

  “Tell me what happened.”