On Assignment to the Planet of the Exalted

by Helena Puumala

  “Oh, is he the property you’re talking about?” Kati rolled her eyes. “Well then, tell Lud and Joe to do their worst.”

  She turned her head to look at the male members of the Troupe.

  “Lank and Rakil, help them go through the cart, and make sure at the same time that they don’t damage anything, especially our instruments.”

  The Exalted nodded to Lud and Joe. They headed to the rear of the cart for easy entry. Lank and Rakil were already there, watching their every move.

  “You must think I’m thick-headed if you expect to find the missing boy with us,” Kati said to Mathis, shaking her head, but smiling. “You don’t really think I’d take a teenager who can’t sing or play an instrument, with us, on a tour that could last for months. He’d be just another mouth to feed, and, if I know anything about teenagers, a pain in the ass.”

  Mathis shrugged, looking a little doubtful.

  “Well, my father thought that you people might be smuggling him with you, since you hired the sister to go with you.” His eyes slid over Mathilde, apparently found her of no interest, and returned to Kati. “I’ll be heading to the Capital City for the Senate Session in a couple of months. If your Troupe is going to be there, be sure to look me up. I’ll be easy to find, since I’m the Warrion Representative for this Session—we all have to take our turns doing the job.”

  “Sure,” Kati agreed, with a pleasant smile. “Maybe I’ll be able to get a flyer ride on one of your vehicles then.”

  “What? Oh, yeah, of course.” The peacock grinned, looking pleased.

  “There’s nobody here,” Lud or Joe shouted from the back of the cart. “There’s nothing but their precious instruments, and luggage, and tenting stuff.”

  The goon sounded disappointed, and maybe a touch angry at having been asked to do something so pointless.

  “Maybe we could take the sister and beat the information about her brother out of her,” his companion snapped savagely. He glared at Mathilde while she visibly blanched.

  “You’d like that, Lud, wouldn’t you?” Mathis Warrion chortled. “You do enjoy beating up women, don’t you? It might be worth it, if we found out where she sent the boy.”

  His eyes were, not on Lud, or Mathilde for that matter, but on Kati who was desperately trying to come up with an idea to save the day. She had counted on the Exalted to be half-civilized, but here he was, encouraging brutality in his men!

  “You damn brutish half-wits!” Joaley cried out before Kati had a chance to recoup. “Do you really think that you’d find out anything through torture?”

  Her face was nearly as red as her hair as she glared at Mathis Warrion and his goons, each in turn.

  “Don’t you know anything about how things and people are disappeared?”

  “Huh?” The peacock looked from Kati to Joaley, and back again. Kati decided to let Joaley take this wherever she was taking it. Clearly she knew something that Kati didn’t.

  “If you take her, you’re taking her just to torture her,” Joaley said harshly. She had pinned Mathis Warrion with her eyes, and he had the decency to look somewhat uncomfortable. “Because she doesn’t know anything. I guarantee it.”

  She drew a breath in the silence that had descended on the road. Incongruously, Kati could hear birdsong coming from the scrubland ahead of them. As if all was right with the world.

  “Look,” said Joaley, her voice taking on an explanatory cast. “Say that you want to hide a box which contains contraband, weapons maybe, and you’re running a resistance cell. There’s going to be an inspection because your overlords have heard about your weapons shipment. You get in touch with another cell, and tell the contact that you’ll leave the box, marked with an identifying glyph—or colour, or whatever—at a certain place, at such and such time. Then, just before the agreed-upon time, you take the box to that place, and go home. Someone from the other cell comes and picks up the box. You don’t know who it is, but he gets in touch with a third cell and repeats the procedure. Maybe this is done another couple of times before someone stashes the box, or else gets it out of the jurisdiction altogether.

  “As you should be able to figure out, the first person to drop off the box can tell nothing, even if he or she is tortured, except for where he left the box and when. So if you’re going to torture him, or her, you’re doing it for the pleasure of being a brute, not to get information.”

  “And you, little red-head, know about this, how?” Mathis Warrion had regained his composure.

  “You have no idea what my life has been like,” Joaley retorted, “and I’m not going to talk about it. Not now. Maybe never.”

  She crossed her arms across her chest.

  “What she detailed, is common knowledge in certain circles,” subvocalized the Granda. “I could have told you about it.”

  The peacock smiled flirtatiously at Kati.

  “Fine then, boys, come on back to the flyer. We’ll let Kati and her crew get on their way to the next town.” He managed to look almost ingratiating. “I’ll be expecting to give you a flyer ride in the Capital City later on in the year, Kati of Terra. And for your Troupe to entertain my friends.”

  Kati winked at him.

  “The entertainment will cost you,” she said.

  *****

  They watched in silence as the flyer powered itself into flight and left, rushing towards the Port City in a burst of speed. Then they continued the interrupted trip, no-one commenting until they were past the arch and under the massive trees. Then:

  “Why didn’t you let that disgusting, arrogant turd lick your fingers while you were at it?” Joaley snarled at Kati. “Ye gods, that was a performance to make an honest woman puke!”

  Kati shrugged.

  “Actually, thank you for the ‘how to disappear a box’ diversion. It was excellent, and timely,” she said. “Mind you, if I’d thought that letting Mathis Warrion lick my fingers was necessary to keep Zass and Mathilde safe, I’d have done it. I trust that you noticed that he did not bother to take a look at the cart himself, but left the task to his goons.”

  “You think that it was better that he didn’t examine it himself?” Rakil asked, looking serious.

  “Of course. He has a node in his neck.” Kati looked around at all of her companions. Even Mathilde was listening intently. “If you were looking for something that you thought might be hidden, wouldn’t you get your node to do a little bit of comparing the height of this and that, and the length of one thing as compared to another, and then make a few calculations? I wanted to make sure that he wouldn’t do anything like that, and what better way to keep him from it than to have him concentrate his attention on something else, in this case, me? A touch of flattery, a bit of massage to an enlarged ego, and our boy was not interested in the cart any more.

  “If I’d insulted him instead of flattering him, he well might have insisted on going over the cart centimetre by centimetre.”

  “Admirable,” said Lank, laughing. “The use of feminine wiles to distract an opponent; a time-honoured tactic open only to women.”

  “Not all women,” Joaley muttered, but she sounded chagrined.

  “You use the weapons that you have available,” Kati said. “And I’ve always liked role-playing anyway, so this kind of thing is fun as far as I’m concerned. Plus, there was a saying on my world: ‘You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar’.”

  “But why the nonsense about wanting a flyer ride in the Capital City?” Rakil asked.

  “There’s a possibility that he might lead us to something or other that we should know about,” Kati answered. “It’s best to keep our options open.”

  “I get the impression that you figure that your personal feelings should not get in the way of doing what needs to be done,” Rakil said. “Do I have that right?”

  Kati pondered for a moment.

  “That’s probably accurate,” she replied. “I try to figure out what is most important, at any time. Like in this case it was
Zass and Mathilde’s safety. Then I work out what seems to be the best way to achieve that end, and let everything else go. Then I do what must be done, and I find more often than not, that I reach my goal, like I did there, with Mathis Warrion.”

  “And you ensured my brother’s safety in his hiding place,” added Mathilde.

  She looked genuinely gratified, and for the first time in days, almost relaxed. Kati wondered what the last days had been like for her, trying to lay false trails about sending Zass away, and keeping mum the fact that he had been hiding at Marita’s.

  Fortunately, Mathis Warrion had displayed no prurient interest in Mathilde; Kati had determined that while he had eyed the travellers. What salacious attention the peacock had paid had been directed at Kati herself; of course she had been flirting with him, if only mildly. By doing so she had invited his interest, and he had responded to the invitation, which was precisely the effect she had been after.

  “I can handle unwanted advances from a preening rooster, any day of the week, whereas Mathilde has been programmed to fear the Oligarchs,” she subvocalized to the Granda.

  “We, you and I, can handle him, is what you mean,” The Monk corrected her. “You would definitely need my help to do it, and I could be of more use if I had a decent weapon or two within reach.”

  “We have the stunner that Joaley smuggled onto the planet,” Kati responded, blandly refusing to take the hint. The Granda was always wanting killing weapons. And she never wanted to give them to him.

  *****

  Dark was falling when the Troupe reached the widening of the road which served as a campground. Kati was relieved that it was empty of other travellers; they could let Zass out from his hiding place, to eat and to sit by the campfire. Would he be able to sleep in the night, she wondered, after the day of hiding? Well, they were out of Warrion Territory now. Perhaps it would be safe to let him walk the next day. They could claim that he was only a simple-minded teenager; that was how Mathilde had been passing him off earlier. Maybe that identity would be sufficient until they reached Ithcar Province.

  The campsite was rudimentary, but it had the necessities. There was a hand-pump for water, and an outhouse across the road from the well. A circle of stones served as a fire pit, and some farmer had spent time recently chopping wood for travellers’ use; there was a large stack by the outhouse.

  Rakil and Lank let Zass out from his confinement and then set about erecting the two tents that they had. Mathilde took Zass with her to start the campfire; he seemed to be quite helpful, carrying wood to Mathilde’s instructions. He did not look stiff or sore as far as Kati could tell, and it was true that he had emerged from his hiding place unsoiled. Joaley dug up a pot and proceeded to use the stove in the cart to make tea. Which left Kati to dig up the provisions they had designated for the evening meal, mostly food already cooked by Sam or Leni, needing only to be heated, either on the stove or among the coals of the campfire.

  Since Joaley’s tea-making was occupying the stove, Kati placed the food in need of re-heating into a roasting pan and took it to the fire.

  “How’s the fire?” she asked of the brother-sister team. “Can we heat up supper, or do we have to wait until there are enough coals to bury the pan?”

  Mathilde looked at the pan.

  “It’s a cast-iron pan,” she said. “We should be able to surround it with burning wood, lay some sticks on the top, even. That ought to heat up the insides quickly; we’ll just have to be careful not to burn our supper.

  “Zass, can you help with that?”

  Zass, looking about as alert as Kati had seen him, took the roaster from her and put it into the pit, following his sister’s instructions. Kati watched for a moment, and then returned to the cart where Joaley had turned on the lights, and began to cut up vegetables for a salad.

  “How long before the tea’s ready?” she asked. “A cup of something hot—ah, that would go down well right now!”

  “Exactly the way I’m feeling,” Joaley said with a chuckle. “That’s why I grabbed the tea-making detail. The fastest way to get something is to take charge of it.”

  “That’s a philosophy to live by,” Kati agreed.

  *****

  Later in the evening as they were sitting around the campfire with full bellies, Lank brought out the little drum set that he had used to teach Rakil to drum. Since then Rakil had bought himself his own drums, from a small shop near Marita’s, one crammed with non-Vultairian objects. Lank turned to Zass with the drums.

  “I want to teach you to play these Zass,” he said, speaking emphatically, but his voice kind. “I think it’s best if you are a part of our Troupe.”

  He turned to look at Mathilde who had reached for her brother’s arm as soon as Lank had begun to speak. He added:

  “He’ll be safer if he seems to be just another entertainer. We won’t have to hide him away all the time, which would be pretty hard on him and the rest of us, too, once we get into the towns where we’ll be performing. I taught Rakil to drum; I can teach your brother, too, if he shows even a tiny bit of talent and the willingness to learn.”

  Mathilde nodded, but looked unhappy.

  “I understand what you’re saying,” she said. “But I don’t know if Zass can do it; usually his kind is limited to pretty simple tasks, since they’re sort of like sleepwalkers among us.”

  “I can do it,” Zass said suddenly, his eyes open and looking from Mathilde to Lank and back again.

  It was the first time Kati had heard him speak, and the first time that she had seen anything resembling animation in his face.

  “Mathilde, that makes sense,” she said encouragingly to the Vultairian girl. “What you had him doing with the roasting pan on the fire was actually pretty complicated and dangerous. If he could handle that, he can handle the drums.”

  Zass turned his eyes on her, and nodded. Then he reached for the drums.

  Kati, Mathilde, Joaley, and Rakil scrambled to the cart to fetch their instruments while Lank turned into an instructor. The lesson became a part of an impromptu jam session that had the group working out ways to incorporate the new member into their act. He would be kept mostly in the background, they decided, adding a beat to whatever music was being played. Lank was a patient teacher, Kati decided as she watched him working with the Klenser, and the boy was making a real effort to keep his concentration on the task at hand, and not fall into his usual state of inattention.

  “Someone really should provide those creatures with nodes,” subvocalized The Monk. “I’m quite sure that this boy could function adequately in society—while he’s not cleansing, of course—if he had the extra mind power that a node provides.”

  “Maybe, if we are successful in our task, that experiment will be run,” she subvocalized back.

  “I’d be very surprised if it already hasn’t been run, a long time ago,” the Granda responded. “And was found to be so successful that it was impossible for the Exalted to control the Klensers. That would explain a few things.”

  “But you weren’t there for the experiment?” Kati asked, feigning innocence.

  “No, I wasn’t—oh concentrate on your music, girl, and don’t tease an old monk!”

  *****

  They spent another night camping, this time sharing the campground with a family travelling in the opposite direction. There were the parents, two young children, and a grandmother in the family. They were fascinated to have come across off-worlders; the children, especially, could barely contain their curiosity. Mathilde spent a few minutes questioning them while the others readied their campsite and prepared the evening meal, and she returned with the information that they were farmers from the area outside of the Port City and had been to the next town for a family celebration—a wedding, apparently. She had explained that she and her companions were entertainers, and they would be travelling through the countryside, performing in the settlements along the way. When a family member had expressed disappointment at missing their s
how in the town that they had left, she had told them that they would be rehearsing their act that evening.

  “I told them that it was going to be a practice session, but that they’d get an idea of what it is that we do, if they came to watch and listen,” she explained. “They were very enthusiastic, especially the children. I think we’ll get a rapt audience.”

  They did.

  The audience may have been small, but it was attentive. The children had been allowed to stay up past their usual bedtime, and during the sing-along they almost made up for the scant numbers. Rakil’s juggling was an instant hit, certainly with the youngsters, but, the grandmother, too, followed anxiously with her eyes, the arcs of the balls. When he dropped a ball, the children howled loudly enough to frighten the forest nightlife. The little boy ran to fetch the dropped ball from where it had rolled by the campfire, keen to prevent it from touching the hot stones. Rakil thanked him courteously when he took the ball back; then proceeded to juggle again, finishing his act perfectly.

  Zass sat cross-legged in the back, adding a drumbeat to whatever music the others were playing. Kati found that she liked the sound of the drum in the background; it added a unifying element to the musical variations.

  “Lank’s a smart young man,” she subvocalized to the Granda.

  “He’s a genius of a sort,” The Monk replied. “A young man who is often underestimated, but should not be. He’s good to have along.”

  This was an astonishing statement, coming from the usually grumpy Granda. Kati wondered what the old reprobate had noticed that she hadn’t, but did not ask. She did intend, however, to keep her ears and eyes open.

  The last thing she heard that night, before falling asleep from sheer exhaustion, was a childish voice erratically singing the chorus to the “Mudball Song”.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The next evening they reached their first town. It was not a large place, but big enough to have a Town Square, with a few businesses, including an Inn and a Tavern, adjoining it. There was also a campground at the edge of town, but the Troupe had agreed to stay at the Inn, even if it meant denting their finances a trifle.