Storms Over Open Fields (Life of Riley Book 2)

by G. Howell

  “Well, we certainly wish you every success,” Lady H’risnth injected into an awkward silence. “I have great confidence in the ability of the Guild and in Mikah’s abilities. He has well demonstrated his abilities to provide singularly unique services. To lose that would be a great shame. Now, I’m afraid I must beg you to excuse me. There is a great deal to do.”

  That was our dismissal. To either side the Rris flowed to their feet with an elegant economy of movement. I unfolded myself a great deal more slowly, grimacing. Chaeitch offered a hand, but I managed to get myself to my feet in an awkward three-step plan.

  “You’re all right?” her ladyship asked as she watched. “You look like you’re in discomfort.” She actually sounded concerned.

  “A,” I shrugged, a little embarrassed. “A bit sore. The last week has been... difficult.”

  “A,” she said. Her tufted tail flicked, lashing once. “A, quite. Ah Ties, a moment, if you will?”

  The Mediator nudged me to get me moving and stayed close behind me as we left the other two. I could hear a couple of words, including my name being mentioned as we walked across the room. At the door I glanced back to see the Queen flick a small gesture my way. Chaeitch half-turned to look at me, then turn back to her. I couldn’t hear the reply, but she seemed pleased. Then the door closed between us and I wasn’t able to watch the rest of the exchange. We waited out in the corridor, the Mediator watching me while I amused myself inspecting a cracked old landscape painting. It wasn’t particularly good.

  It was a couple of minutes before Chaeitch joined us. He closed the white lacquered door behind him and gave me a peculiar look.

  “What was that about?” I asked.

  “Ah, you,” he admitted.

  “Important?” the Mediator inquired.

  “No,” Chaeitch said, brushing back his cheek tufts with one hand in an effort to appear nonchalant. It didn’t work. “No, not important. Just... she had some questions.”

  “About what?” Jenes’ahn asked. I was curious myself.

  He glanced at me. “Oh, nothing of consequence.”

  As it turned out, it wasn’t a lie. Not exactly.

  ------v------

  By evening the edge was gone from the heat of the day. The breeze meandering in from the lake was cooler, stirring treetops and setting weathervanes to squeaking. It stroked across the rolling hills around the palace, setting the endless fields of grasses to swaying, ripples propagating and swirling across the sienna folds. From low in the west gentler sunlight slanted in. Rooftops and high walls were painted in touches of reds and golds. Lazy saffron light slanted in through the hall windows, throwing our shadows across the floor and opposite wall as we passed by.

  Just ahead of me Chaeitch stalked along, following the Rris servant. Not three meters behind me, I knew Jenes’ahn was padding along on silent feet. My own little personal shadow.

  The servant had turned up at my quarters while Chaeitch had been going through some of the preliminaries for the next day’s work. He’d closed the folder with a final air and proclaimed that was all for the time. And then he’d told me to come along. Truth be told, I wasn’t in the mood or mindset for dealing with Rris schedules, so the interruption was welcome, but he never said exactly where he was taking me. He was being deliberately vague about the whole thing.

  I found I was getting really paranoid when it came to the unexpected.

  “Here, sir,” the servant said as she stopped us at a door at the end of the hall. We were somewhere in the west wing. This was usually an area used by the local royalty, not guest quarters. “You are expected,” she said as she held the door open.

  I followed Chaeitch in past the servant. The room beyond was light and airy. Walls were pale cream and gleaming white marble and climbed to a high lantern circumvented by a row of latticed windows admitting soft evening light. Underfoot the floor was a mosaic of small tiles: black and white chips forming pixilated curlicues of plants. Opposite us was an archway covered by a white curtain while off to either side were a pair of smaller doors in the unobtrusive fashion intended for use by servants. There was no furniture. The place had the feeling of an antechamber but the air was warm, humid. It smelled of salt and smoke and water.

  “What is this?” I asked.

  “Patience,” he told me. If I was reading his expression correctly, he was... amused?

  “Patience,” I sighed. “Please. This is supposed to be a surprise?”

  Now his ears flicked back a little. “You’re... concerned?”

  “Chaeitch, a couple of years back I got the biggest surprise of my life and since then there’ve been more than I can count and - on the whole – a lot of them haven’t been entirely enjoyable. So, I’m really not so fond of surprises anymore.”

  Whatever he was about to say in return was interrupted when one of the side doors opened and a squad of Rris entered. Servants, by their dress of simple tan kilts. Five of them. They approached, lined up before us and ducked their heads. One stepped forward. “Welcome, Sirs. Ma’am,” that one said. “We will be attending, if it pleases you. Ah, we were told there would be two?”

  “Huhn, her,” Chaeitch glanced back at Jenes’ahn. “She’s just escorting.”

  “Very good,” the servant acknowledged without a flicker. “Then can we take your clothes, sirs?”

  “What?” I flinched, alarmed. “What? What is this? Chaeitch, is this physicians again?”

  He looked confused and then alarmed. “No. Sah! No, it’s just baths. Rot, Mikah, you know about them? Surely?”

  “Baths?” I bit my lip and looked at the servants, who were in turn were looking uncertain. “I know baths, but what do they want?” I gestured toward the servants.

  He gave an exasperated snort. “They’re attendants. Rot it all. Mikah, you think my fur looks after itself? We all need some assistance sometimes. It’s not a bad thing. It’s quite normal. There are public baths like this all over, but her Ladyship was kind enough to offer you her personal one. It’s supposed to be relaxing. It’s supposed to be pleasant. And it’s supposed to be an act of generosity.”

  “Oh.” I hesitated and he looked as if he were about to laugh at me, but I had to ask: “It’s not involving sex is it?”

  I think if he could have rolled his eyes he would have. “No. Not at all. That is a problem?”

  “No,” I almost laughed, quite relieved. “Far from it.”

  He snorted again and stripped off. Two of the attendants came forward to assist him, one helping him disrobe and the other taking the removed breeches and belt and neatly folding them over one arm, leaving him standing in his fur, about as naked as someone with a built-in fur coat can be. I hesitated before following his lead and the other two attendants came forward. There wasn’t a flicker of disrespectful curiosity from any of them as they took my moccasins and jeans, one of them providing some cursory assistance and handing the clothes off to the other. But when my shirt came off and one of them got a glimpse of my back I heard a quick hiss of breath. He recovered with professional speed, looking away and quietly passing the cloth over to the other to neatly fold and drape across his arm.

  Jenes’ahn wasn’t so burdened by status. When I turned I found she was staring with interest, openly and unabashedly. “What?” I asked, more than a little defensively.

  She deliberately looked me over, up and down, and then down again. She tapped a finger against her furry chin in a surprisingly human-looking show of thoughtfulness. “You’ve only got two nipples,” she finally pronounced. “And you’ve got very strange feet.”

  I shook my head and didn’t press that any further. It could have been worse. Chaeitch flicked his ears. “Are you going to join us, constable?” he asked.

  “Huhn,” the Mediator cocked her head, still staring at me. “I’m on duty. So, no.”
>
  “As you will,” he waved an unconcerned shrug and smoothed down the fur on his stomach.

  When they had our clothes, the two attendants bowed politely and retreated toward the door they’d entered by. Over by the archway the third attendant also bowed and moved to hold the curtain aside, “Sirs, please, if you would be so kind to come this way.”

  Chaeitch inclined his head and did as invited, stalking past the attendant while scratching at a furry hip. I followed his twitching tail and was aware of Jenes’ahn’s eyes on me as she fell in behind me, following the rest of us through the archway into a high space of tiles and water.

  This was a private bath?! Whoever had built that room really took their bathing seriously.

  The space beyond the curtains was the size of a small ballroom. Broad and high, sounding of water, smelling of water. The vaulted ceiling arched overhead, painted powder blue with stylized clouds swirling around to a circular central skylight of clear glass, the frame of which was wrought into a fanciful sun-shape. Below the roof line, the upper three-quarters of the walls were trees – black, wrought-iron trees. Wrought metal splayed and spread out and interlaced in patterns that suggested trees and branches. The elaborate spaces in between were filled with glass leaves: Thousands of small pieces of which no two may have been the same, and that pattern was running all the way around the room, back to the far wall. That entire wall was a lattice of glass and ironwork, a forest of stone columns, black metal branches arching between them and glass foliage filling the interstices between those. In the late sun, the entire western span of those windows was burning autumn colors: gleaming red and golds.

  Any walls that weren’t picture windows were tiled in glossy white – patterns of irregularly shaped tiles all shaped and locked together in something like herringbone. Set at about head height were gas lamps with polished copper reflectors wrought into flame shapes, and beneath those were planters filled with ferns growing lush and green in air that was humid and tropically warm.

  That would have been thanks to the bath. There was only one, and it was big. In fact, most of the room was occupied by the bath. Set among green and blue and white tiles, it was almost half the size of an Olympic-sized swimming pool. Warmth rose from the water, along with wisps of steam. The motionless surface glistened with an oil-like sheen and reflected the smoldering windows high above like a liquid mirror. Over on the far side a terrace extended the other half of the room, out to the wall of glass trees. Arranged in front of the window stood a pair of stone tables: a couple of dark slabs like fallen ancient monoliths only lacking the worshipping druids. The entire room was blood warm, like the light spilling in through the windows.

  “Be welcome,” the attendant bowed to us and waved a hand in a gesture that encompassed the room, “You have the facilities to yourselves. The water is hot. There are oils and scents. The grooms are waiting with brushes and combs and [something] and anything you may require. If there is anything you wish or desire, don’t hesitate to ask.”

  “Gratitude,” Chaeitch said.

  “Thank you,” I said in passing and the Rris servant twitched.

  Jenes’ahn just strolled past and took position beside the door.

  Chaeitch climbed the three steps up to the edge of the bath and dipped a broad, furry toe in with an almost comical delicacy. “Ah, hot” he winced, grimaced, then slowly stepped down into the pool. With a final escaping-steam sigh he sank in to his shoulders: a feline head protruding above the faint curls of steam. I dithered a second, regarding the water. It had a distinctive sheen on the surface, like a pale oil slick: The gouges on my leg had scabbed over, but I wasn’t sure about that bath. They didn’t have disinfectants and I didn’t know how well that thing was cleaned or what sort of nasties might be lurking in there?

  “It’s all right.” Chaeitch was watching me, looking a little concerned.

  Hell with it. If I hadn’t caught some exotic leg-rot after that swim in the harbor, then I figured I’d be okay. Besides, could I catch communicable Rris diseases? I wasn’t sure I could. At least, not as easily. I’d had a lot of scrapes and gouges but hadn’t caught any sort of serious infections. Just lucky? That was a fickle safety net.

  It was hot, Chaeitch wasn’t kidding about that. I also hissed as I stepped in and carefully descended one step at a time. I needn’t have worried about some slimy cesspool: it was clean, and hot enough to make me wince as I got halfway down. The stone floor of the felt like scrubbed granite and was hotter than the water, almost painful to stand on. Chaeitch had parked himself on an underwater bench at the edge of the pool where he’d watched my gingerly progress with slitted eyes and amusement. I settled myself just along from him. The stone the bench was made from was also almost too hot, but once my hide became acclimatized, it was a good hot. I sank down to my shoulders, closed my eyes and heard only water. I sighed. The heat seemed to get into muscles I didn’t know I had. I relaxed.

  And for a while there was nothing but the faint sound of water. And a faint smell of cinnamon.

  After a time I heard a murmuring in Rris from beside me. Shortly after that a rustling, a smell of smoke. I cracked an eye.

  Chaeitch was leaning back against the side of the pool, a pipe hanging from his mouth. At the side of the bath an attendant stood, waiting with a leather pouch clutched in hand while Chaeitch gave a couple of evaluatory inhalations from the pipe and then waved a dismissal. The servant bowed and retreated and Chaeitch took another puff and exhaled fragrant smoke. He saw me looking and flashed tooth-filled parody of one of my smiles. “Huhn, a good crop,” he sighed a mouthful of smoke and held the pipe out toward me, water streaming from the sodden fur of his arm. “Try some”

  I accepted. The stem was short made from some kind of dark wood and engraved with interlaced motifs reminiscent of Celtic artwork. The bowl was carved from stone, wide and shallow and the leaves smoldering in there weren’t tobacco. I took a puff, then another, deeper one and held it while I passed the pipe back. It had a bit more flavor to it than the stuff I’d had back in Westwater, but wasn’t strong. I exhaled a cloud. “I shouldn’t do that,” I said.

  “It’s got that much of an effect on you?”

  “I shouldn’t overdo it,” I said. “This place is strange enough without being drunk on drugs.”

  Chaeitch chittered and leaned back, blowing smoke. The pipe exchanged hands again.

  After passing it back I flicked a finger at the water, then scooped a handful and let it trickle out. “What is this?”

  “Uhn?”

  “This... stuff on the water? It smells... like spices?”

  “Uhn, oils,” he grunted lazily, surrounded by a sweet-smelling mist. “They’re good for the fur. Keeps it glossy. The smell is just scenting.”

  “Oh,” I said. It was at least a relief to know the slick was deliberate and not something distasteful in the water.

  “Mikah,” he rumbled after a few seconds.

  “A?”

  “I’ve been meaning to ask: what happened to my ship?”

  “Your ship now?” I sighed. “Possessive, aren’t you.”

  He snorted smoke. “There was considerable time and effort invested in the Ironheart. I was just wondering what caused it to be reduced to kindling.”

  I hummed thoughtfully. “I suppose it could have been something to do with the safety valve.”

  “Huhn, both of them?”

  “Stranger things have happened,” I shrugged, sending wavelets lapping.

  “A. Yes,” he rumbled, and then added as almost an idle afterthought, “Fortunate we didn’t leave without you.”

  “A,” I replied. “Yes, it was.”

  “Huhn.” Thoughtfully.

  “Chaeitch?”

  “A?”

  “You passed that message on to the Guild, a?” I asked, meaning the
warning I’d sent him about not leaving.

  He hesitated as he thought that through, puffed again. “There wasn’t much choice. Sorry.”

  “Understood,” I said. “Sorry about your toy.”

  He’d told the Mediators about that? If he had, then why hadn’t they done something about it. Something was odd there.

  He puffed at the pipe and then said. “Still, I can think of some improvements for the next one.”

  I grinned into the warm air and leaned back against the hot tiles and watched the light fading behind the windows overhead. Glass leaves gradually dimmed to twilight, the light beyond them fading past red into darkness. Silent stewards moved about the peripheries of the spa, touching tapers to the oil lamps along the wall. Copper gleamed: brass flames catching in the gloom. The pipe changed hands a few more times and I felt actually relaxed, for the first time in... a long while. In the warm, wet twilight I laid my head back on the edge of the bath, closed my eyes and did nothing but listen to water and the sound of my own heartbeat.

  Eventually someone nudged me.

  “Hmmm, thanks, but I think I’ve had enough,” I mumbled through the mild buzz.

  “So do I,” Chaeitch retorted. “Wake up, a?”

  Movements in the corner of my eye. There were several attendants there. Five of them, standing by the bath, one carrying a small stack of towels.

  Chaeitch noticed my stare. “They’re groomers,” he said by way of explanation. “And before you ask, they’re here to groom you.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Thank you for clearing that up.”

  “You need some tutoring in the simpler things in life,” he sighed. “Come along.” Water streamed from his hide as he stepped up out of the bath, cascading down to splash around his feet in a dramatic waterfall and I bit back a snigger: From his neck down he was soaked though. In the dimness his fur glistened like wet black rock. And with it clinging to his body like that he was a skinny, drenched dark figure with an outsized fluffy head. His tail was weighed down with the weight of the water.