“You’re not.” Romi finished what he was doing and did his trousers up—it was too cold to have a conversation outside, didn’t the man know that?
“And why not? I’m perfectly able and willing to do my part.”
“Right. And which shift is Soza going to do?”
Karik seemed nonplussed at the question? “Soza? I don’t.... He’s not really....”
“Exactly. I know you are quite capable of keeping watch, and I appreciate your willingness. But if I can’t ask Soza, I can’t ask you, nor can I let you volunteer if he won’t.”
“Why? What difference does it make?”
Romi sighed and leaned an arm against the tree. “I know it’s not what you want to hear, but Soza’s unwillingness to help out is causing resentment. To a certain extent, that’s not a problem. But things like the watch—well, it would make a difference if we had your assistance, there’s no question. So the resentment would get much worse if he was seen to be getting out of something that we all want to get out of. The only way I can stop it becoming a problem is to pretend that the security of the camp is military business, and therefore the civilians aren’t involved.”
“But it’s not.”
“No, it’s not, but do you really want Soza to be even more disliked than he is now?”
Karik bit his lip. “I see. I...appreciate the diplomacy.”
“I’m not doing it for you. Leave the management to me, and you see to your own duties. All I want is for us to go home safe and sound and with the mission objectives achieved.”
“That’s what we all want, captain.”
“Good. Now I’m going in because it’s pissing freezing. Don’t hang around out here, the cold can kill you.”
And that, Romi hoped, might set a few hisks running. He had no great faith that Karik could improve his lover’s behaviour—but he had great faith in Karik’s pride. He would be curious what would result from that little conversation.
~~~~~~~~
Karik wanted to be angry with lieutenant arse over what he’d said, but Romi had only done exactly what Arman or Tiko or any responsible person would have done. He couldn’t fault the logic, or even the manner in which the message had been delivered. The only thing he could fault was that he had nothing he could hook his anger onto except Soza’s own behaviour.
Everyone was settling down to sleep as he came back in. Jou and Sibu slipped out to relieve themselves, but the rest of the soldiers were already wrapped in blankets and huddled on the thick furs. Soza was tucked in too—he’d had a rotten day with the cold and the length of the ride, and he was tired. It wasn’t the time or place to bring up his lack of participation, though Karik wondered why Soza, normally so assiduous about not causing offence, was being so careless of his teammate’s feelings. He missed the innocent enjoyment he’d once had in Soza’s company, and didn’t welcome the new awareness of his friend’s faults. He felt he was losing something he valued, and he put the blame for that fairly and squarely on lieutenant arse’s broad shoulders.
He slept well enough because he was tired, though he woke several times, disturbed by the soft sounds of his companions. He was astonished how warm he was—almost too warm—and marvelled again at the efficiency of the tent. The trouble of carrying such a bulky item and of having to erect it had proved to be well worth it.
The next few days were more enjoyable than he’d expected, since he’d not thought there would be much to see in the cultivated regions. He owed that enjoyment to Wepizi, who, to Karik’s surprise, spent a good bit of each day riding alongside him, quietly pointing out the subtle features of the landscape, the signs of the small animals emerging from their winter sleep as the thaw began, and the plants shyly springing into life. The lep was a modest man, deprecating his own talents, but Karik was astonished how much he knew about the natural history of his land, and how keen his observations were. Broadly intelligent, tolerant, pacific and ever enquiring, he was quite unlike any soldier Karik had ever met, except for Arman. And Arman wasn’t typical of anyone.
Wepizi didn’t carry all the conversation. He was intensely curious about Karik’s background, asking him frankly but without the least prurience about his Prijian ancestry, and how he had come to be raised as a Darshianese. Karik was happy to tell him, and to talk about his family in a general way, but though he liked Wepizi a good deal, he was conscious of how close he was to Romi. Karik had no intention of giving lieutenant arse more information he could twist in his own special way, so he skirted around the topic of Jes and her conception, and the precise details of his own. It was, he decided, no one else’s business, and Wepizi was far too polite to press him.
Feeling guilty about abandoning Soza, he tried to spend a little time each day riding beside him, but it wasn’t enough apparently. “We should be preparing our notes,” Soza said with a sniff as Karik dropped back down the line to talk to him, after spending an hour’s enjoyable conversation with Wepizi about the nesting habits of waterfowl. “You forget your position on this mission.”
“Our role is to collect information, and Lep Wepizi is very knowledgeable.”
“He’s only a soldier, and an untrained one at that. Next thing you’ll be telling me I needn’t have bothered coming and that we could have left it all to the military.”
Karik repressed a sigh. “Of course not. But even an untrained person can bring us valuable observations.”
“Then why don’t you wait until there’s something worth observing? I fail to see how Wepizi can be telling you anything you want to know about farmland.”
Karik smiled, made some anodyne comment, and then found an excuse a few minutes later to move up the line again, so he didn’t quarrel with his friend. Soza was finding it hard, and being ignored by the only person he felt understood his interests wasn’t helping. At the same time, Soza’s isolation was self-inflicted, and since he’d dismissed Karik’s tentative attempts to get him to play a bigger part in the team tasks as being beneath his interest, Karik couldn’t help hoping that the experience of being ignored might inspire Soza to work it out on his own. He was beginning to resent his unwanted role as Soza-wrangler.
Soza wasn’t the only one who begrudged Wepizi’s friendliness. More than once, Karik had looked up to see Romi giving him a long, hard look, and Karik couldn’t really see it as anything but jealousy. He thought Wepizi had noticed it too, but had ignored it—in his own gentle way, Wepizi was a dreadful prankster, and probably thought it amusing to pull his friend’s tail. Romi never said anything. Not that he had better dare.
But Karik wasn’t just there as entertainment. The long, low Gunozidei range was coming closer, and the flat, apparently empty land of the marshes could now be seen at the edge of the obviously cultivated farms. The thaw was, just as Wepizi had promised, upon them with astonishing speed, and crisp snow was quickly turning slushy. Under the melting snow, early bulbs were shooting, and the trees were budding almost as Karik watched. There was still little of botanical interest, though he kept a close eye out for anything new or unusual. What was more interesting was the game the soldiers were bringing in. Though Soza knew more about the distribution patterns of animals, he wasn’t much of an anatomist—that was Karik’s speciality, thanks to Kei’s diligent training, and though they couldn’t tarry to let him really examine the carcasses, he was able to make quick sketches of the doigs and dowkiqu and weti as they were butchered, and to preserve a few feathers from the birds shot down from the air. Romi, he had to admit, was a fine shot, and always brought his birds down cleanly, almost if he was killing them for a reference collection rather than for their supper.
Ever curious, Wepizi wanted to know everything about the process, and loved to watch Karik sketching. “Such skill,” Wepizi said admiringly, as Karik drew a dead liti bird, brought down earlier by Romi’s bow and which would be part of their supper the following evening. “But these are common—why do you need to record them?”
“Well, for one thing, they’re not common in Darshian. For a
nother, we can use the sketches to produce identification guides if people come back to Andon. Litis can easily be confused with riqizits, and several other species. I’m trying to make a note of what distinguishes them from other birds.”
“Their song,” Netu said as he joined them. Others of the team, as they always did in the evenings, had come to sit close by, listening to Karik and Wepizi talk. “That’s how you can tell them from riqizits.”
“Very true, Netu, well observed,” Karik said. “But if I was a female liti and I had to wait until I heard the male sing before I knew the bird on my back was the right species, I’d be a little nervous.” Sibu gave him a grin for that comment. “Fortunately for them, they don’t. See this?” He pointed to a thin white bar above the beak. “Riqizits are yellow there, and their bib is reddish, not blackish.”
“So they’re just different versions of the same bird?” Tiro asked.
“Some might say that. I don’t think so—have any of you seen the two types together, or nesting together? Wepizi?”
“Never, my friend. We consider them different.”
“And that’s significant,” Karik said. “This is what’s so important about talking to the locals—we can only see the animals and plants for a brief window in time. They have generations of knowledge to draw on. It helps when they have a good eye too,” he added, with a little bow to Wepizi, who smiled at the compliment.
As he continued his little lecture, he noticed Soza was, as usual, steadfastly ignoring the activity. More than once he’d openly wondered why Karik bothered to teach people who weren’t actively interested in natural history, and more than once, Karik had wondered why Soza was such a damn snob. His own opinion of the soldiers was undergoing something of a change. He saw now they were as capable as he was of understanding the subtleties of the natural world and the interactions of organisms if only someone could be bothered to explain it. It would not be their primary concern, any more than how to use a sword would be his—but there was no essential difference between his abilities and theirs. Besides, Kei and Karik’s own parents had impressed on him that learning and teaching were always good things. If Karik scattered seeds and some fell on barren ground, that didn’t mean some might not bear fruit. Soza’s approach meant you were guaranteed never to be pleasantly surprised, and Karik preferred his own way to Soza’s.
The other person who remained aloof was Romi, though Karik got the impression it was not so much out of snobbery as wariness. The lieutenant always watched them closely, though from a distance and never participating himself. Was he just trying to make sure Karik didn’t slip up? Or was he hoping to learn without making it obvious that someone he despised could teach him something?
Karik couldn’t tell, and really didn’t care. He continued to teach, Romi continued to watch and if Romi’s own barren ground suddenly bore fruit, then Karik was prepared to be gracious about it. If not, then he wouldn’t be disappointed.
Staying Power: 15
“There, my friend,” Wepizi whispered.
“Seen them,” Romi muttered back, taking careful aim with his crossbow. Wepizi’s arrow flew to its homing just as his own arrow struck the other waterfowl in a small puff of snow and feathers. “Well done—that’s supper.”
“Perhaps—they’ll be poor eating at this time of year. We could do with a couple more.”
“If we can take some more, well and good but I’m not turning these down.” They walked carefully across the frozen ground, testing to see if they were truly on dirt or over water which, with the thaw, could be unreliable.
Wepizi picked the dead birds up, hefted them for weight and pulled the bolts from their carcasses. “Not bad at all. Good shot, Romi—our beautiful man will be pleased at the clean kill.”
“As if I care,” Romi scoffed, though the idea of Karik being impressed despite himself wasn’t displeasing. As Wepizi tied the legs of the birds together, and then attached them to his belt, Romi had a question that had been burning for a day or two now. “Wepizi, you’re not...getting a bit too fond of Karik, are you? He’s got a lover, you know that.”
His friend was unperturbed by his words. “I know that, my friend. Karik is just good company. A charming young man, I find him. Genuine. I like him a good deal. But no more than that. My heart has no room for another.”
“Good,” Romi said with relief. The last thing Wepizi needed was a failed romance, and that would be the outcome of his pursuing someone as arrogant as Karik.
“But I think you are wrong about one thing, Romi. Lovers they may be, but they are not in love.”
“Oh?” Romi was scanning the landscape for more prey for his bow, but he was listening intently to Wepizi’s words. “Soza’s jealous enough if you spend any time talking to Karik.”
“Yes, so he is, and quite possessive. Karik is, as you said, very solicitous of him, but yet...I do not sense any strong feeling, at least from him.”
Romi grinned. “Become a soul-toucher, have you?” Wepizi shook his head at Romi’s cheekiness. “I grant you that it’s not exactly a deathless romance, not on the face of it, but people are different in how they conduct such things.”
“Perhaps,” Wepizi said peaceably. “And I don’t know either of them well, though I say to you frankly, that Soza is a poor mate for Karik.”
“He’s a poor mate for a jombeker if you ask me. When I get back to Darshek, I’ll be telling Karik’s honoured uncles just what I think of them foisting that bastard on us.”
Wepizi grinned. “I imagine you will be your usual diplomatic self, my friend, and they tell me Lord Arman is tough enough to bear it.”
“Don’t much care—if he isn’t, he can lead an expedition with pissing Soza—” He halted suddenly. “Wepizi...?”
“I see him.” Wepizi straightened and waved. “Welcome, my friend. I bring greetings from his majesty and his council.”
At first their silent, fur-clad observer seemed to be ignoring them, but then he walked over, and gave a sketchy bow. “I am Fezerir.” He had his hand on his belt knife, and held a rather fierce-looking axe in clear warning. If he’d been hunting, he’d had no obvious luck.
Wepizi bowed and gave his own name and rank. “This is Romi, of Darshian. We are leading a group investigating the natural history of Andon, and mapping these territories.”
“Seen them. Not travelling covert, are you?”
“No, my friend, we have nothing to hide,” Wepizi said with a grin. “We have people who would like to speak with your healers, your wise men and women. We have gifts for your tribe, if you are willing to accept them.”
Fezerir gave Wepizi a long, assessing look. “Three may come with you. No more. The rest must stay where they are.”
“Romi?”
“That’s fine, thank you. Will you come with us back to the camp?”
Fezerir nodded. Romi saw him eyeing the waterfowl on Wepizi’s belt. “You’re welcome to the game,” he said politely. “They’re yours, not ours.”
“Keep them. We have better,” he said with a sniff. “Waste of an arrow, such as these.”
“No doubt. We are inexperienced in your ways and would like to learn what you are willing to teach us.”
“Yes, I’m sure you’d like that,” Fezerir said dryly. Not any pushover, this man.
The rest of the team were camped about a mile away. Karik and Pali had both requested a day’s break to survey the marshlands, and Romi had been glad of the chance to do some stocking up since it hardly needed all of them to do the scientific work. After two weeks on the road, there was any amount of repairing and maintenance to do on weapons, saddles and even on the tent, and as Romi and the other two approached, he could see people working on it and their crossbows.
Karik was sitting by the fire, talking to Soza, and spotted them first. Romi was pleased to see him give a courteous bow to their visitor, and that gave the cue to the rest of the team, including Soza. “Everyone, this is Fezerir. We’ve explained what we’re doing and he’s
agreed to have three of us along with Wepizi to visit their camp. Karik, you and Netu get your gear and come with me.”
“Wait a minute, lieutenant!” Soza came over to him—for the sake of the watching Fezerir, Romi kept a pleasant smile on his face. “As senior researcher, I should—”
“Stay here and supervise the plant collecting,” Karik quickly interrupted. “Soza, I’ll just be talking to the healers about medical things.”
Soza turned and gave his lover a hostile look, but Karik kept smiling in a friendly way until Soza gave up and turned to Romi with a scowl. “Very well, but we’ll speak of this later, lieutenant.”
“Captain,” Romi couldn’t help but correcting. “And I’m sure we will, but right now, I don’t want to waste any more of Fezerir’s time. Kepi, tell Jou and Taz to keep the camp together here, and go no further east until we return. We’ll be back by....” He turned to Fezerir. “Do you wish us to stay overnight?”
“We’ll see,” was the cryptic answer.
Perhaps as good as he could expect from the man. “If we’re not back by noon tomorrow, then be concerned. Otherwise, not,” Romi told his friend. “ Fezerir, your camp is how far, and in which direction?”
“Three miles, that way,” he said grudgingly, waving his hand northeast.
“Thank you. Sibu, Kepi, could you bring the hides? Friend, will you allow us to ride our beasts? May we offer you an animal to use?”
Though he appeared disdainful, Romi could tell Fezerir was wild with curiosity to try riding an urs beast. It was equally obvious he had never done anything like it before, though he gathered up the reins with great confidence. “Does this thing speak Andonese?”
“They’re multi-lingual, as are my friends,” Wepizi said, his eyes twinkling with amusement. “Does the saddle suit you?”
“It’s like riding a bed,” he said dismissively, which made Romi smile to himself.
Karik and Netu had mounted up and waited respectfully for them to continue. Romi was curious at the way Karik had stepped in so quickly to stop Soza’s rant, and wondered for whose benefit it had principally been. He was grateful, but cynical about the reasons.
Staying Power (Darshian Tales #3) Page 19