Satan's Gambit (The Barrier War Book 3) (23 page)

“Oh, well then,”
Alessa said without losing her cheerful demeanor, “just have a seat, and I’ll
be right back out with some pies.”

“Pies?” Trames
said brightly. He had already finished off a third of the jar of honey.

“Kishiberry,
just like you said you like, Mr. Trames,” Alessa said. “It’s Vinnemanth, but
they’re not as ripe as I’d like. They just don’t seem to be growing as well
this year as they usually do. Heaven knows they taste horrible by themselves,
but they do make for excellent pie stuff.”

Trames smiled
contentedly, then suddenly broke into a little sing-song voice:

“Some things
swim

and some
things fly;

Some things
walk,

and some
things pie.

“Some things
cluck

and some
things sigh;

Some things
neigh,

and some
things pie.

“Now I don’t
cluck

and I can’t
fly;

But if I was
a kishiberry,

I’d just
pie.”

Alessa clapped
her hands. “That was lovely, Mr. Trames,” she said, then disappeared into the
kitchen.

All the
newcomers in the room stared at Trames in perplexity, no doubt unsure what to
make of him. Bronk, Bradley, and Anolla had already experienced Trames’s
eccentricities; he had treated them all with three or four songs over the past
two days. There was no telling what would trigger one of the little ditties,
which Trames appeared to make up on the spot about whatever happened to come
into his strange head. Kala had been taking care of the older man for the last
three months, and she hadn’t noticed any real pattern in their occurrence.

Brican caught
her eye again and nodded with his chin toward Trames.

“Is he a few
cats short of a litter?”
Brican asked.

Kala shrugged.
“Trames
is Trames. Sometimes he makes as much sense as a gay eunuch, while other times
he’s fairly lucid and almost acts normal.”

“I sure hope
this isn’t normal,”
Brican kythed.

“You’ll get
used to it,”
Kala added blithely.

Then Alessa returned
with an enormous tray laden with food, and they all sat down around the
expansive dining table and started in on the wonderfully aromatic pies.

- 3 -

Garnet kicked
Flasch under the table and threw him a warning glance.

“Relay from
Flasch,”
Brican kythed to Garnet with an amused tone,
“he wants to know
what that was for.”

“Tell him to
quit ogling my sister,”
Garnet replied.
“She’s not a dancer at Aunt
Delia’s.”

Flasch jumped
guiltily as he received Garnet’s reply, and he glared sullenly at the Red
paladin.

“So,” Garnet
said out loud, looking at Kala and Trames, “I’m to understand you two were
waiting for us to show up. May I ask both how and why?”

“You may ask,”
Trames said politely, then he put another spoon-full of pie in his mouth and
chewed happily while staring expectantly at Garnet.

Garnet snorted
softly in amusement.

“Alright then,”
he said. “How did you know we were coming, and why were you waiting for us?”

Kala answered
when Trames showed no sign of swallowing his food.

“It was Trames who
decided to come here,” she said, “but don’t ask me how he knew. He just up and
announced one day we would be leaving on a journey to someplace special, and we
were going to meet someone who would take us there.”

Trames finally
swallowed and then laughed boyishly. “A little birdie told me,” he said.

Garnet stared at
him. He turned to look at Kala with a raised eyebrow.

“I am Trames’s
ganashir,” Kala said. “In our village, those who can’t take care of themselves
are assigned a caretaker to see to their needs, keep them company, and protect
them from harm – even from themselves, if necessary. His last ganashir got
married, so I was assigned to look after him about three months ago.”

“Where is your
village?” Garnet asked.

“Deep in the
northern Cataran Mountains in the nation you call Sella,” Kala replied.

“We knew someone
who grew up there,” Danner said. “He grew up during the last Merishank War.”

“Things have
calmed down since then,” Kala assured him. “We tend to be very isolated, which
most of our people prefer. Our village is a very peaceful sort of place.”

“Peaceful, and
yet you carry a sword,” Flasch pointed out. “Not the sort of thing one sees on
many women. At least not anywhere I’ve been.”

“We practice the
art of taekiri,” Kala said coolly, “and have developed it to a very refined
state.”

Flasch gave a
rueful sort of smile. “You know, if we had our Orange friend Marc here, I’m
sure he’d know what taekiri is, but I’m afraid I’m at something of a loss.”

Across the table
from Flasch, Anolla suddenly stretched, throwing her arms wide and slightly
emphasizing her bosom. The effect on Flasch was immediate, and his eyes very
nearly popped out of his skull. Garnet gave him another sharp kick under the
table.

Sister
,
he mouthed slowly when Flasch looked at him.

Sorry
,
the Violet paladin mouthed back, then deliberately looked back toward Kala.

“Taekiri is a
style of fighting,” Garet was explaining to them all, “popular in the southeast
regions around Tal Horam and Talla. It’s also very popular amongst elves who don’t
prefer the halven. It’s typically two single-edged, curved blades: the shorter
blade, the wakizashi, which you noticed, Flasch, and a longer blade which is no
doubt safely somewhere other than on your person, right, miss Kala?”

Kala nodded.

“It is impolite
to carry the katana indoors,” Kala said.

“A woman
swordsman,” Flasch said, shaking his head. “That seems unnatural somehow.”

“I’ve been
trained with a sword, too, Flasch,” Anolla said in a too-sweet voice. “Bradley
taught me.”

“Somehow that’s
even worse,” Flasch muttered, and Garnet was sure almost nobody had heard his
friend’s comment. Garet, meanwhile, was looking at his middle son with a dark
glare that demanded a few explanations.

“Flasch doesn’t mean
to be insulting,” Danner said to Kala, whose eyes glittered dangerously. “It’s
just that in his world, which really only sometimes overlaps with where the
rest of us live, a woman might learn how to use a sword, but there’s really no
such thing as a swordswoman. Apparently that doesn’t seem to be the case where
you’re from.”

Kala flushed
slightly.

“Most women are
not trained in my village,” she admitted, “and those that are rarely become as
proficient as the men. I am something of an oddity, and I fear many of them are
pleased to see me gone with Trames.”

“You’re just a
kishiberry, Kala,” Trames said, “and kishiberries pie. That’s all they do. If
you try to fly, you’ll fall. If you try to walk, you’ll trip.”

They all stared
at Trames.

“When a
kishiberry tries to do more, it’s like trying to get richer milk by feeding
gold nuggets to a cow.”

Bronk frowned.
“What? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Exactly,”
Trames said and smiled triumphantly.

Flasch looked at
Garnet and smiled. “You know, I think I like this guy.”

“You would.”
Garnet cleared his throat deliberately. “I hate to bring things back to the
point…”

“But you’re
going to anyway,” Flasch said. Garnet glanced at Danner, who obligingly reached
over and smacked Flasch upside the head.

“You say Trames
wanted to come with us,” Garnet asked Kala, who nodded. Garnet shifted his
attention to the older man. “Why do you want to go with us, Trames? Do you even
know where we’re going?”

“To Heaven, of
course,” Trames said simply, “and I’ve never been there.”

“So why do you
want to go?”

“I just told
you,” Trames said. “Weren’t you listening?”

Garnet blinked
and actually had to think back on the last things the bizarre older man had
said. By the time he’d parsed out the answer, three other conversations had
started and the moment was passed. Somehow he couldn’t help but feel he’d been
verbally sparring with an insane person and had been soundly beaten.

Follow a road exactly to its end, and it will lead you
exactly nowhere.

- Trames,

“O Musings” (976 AM)

- 1 -

They stayed at
Garet’s farm for the rest of the afternoon until the sun began inching toward
the distant horizon. Finally, they’d delayed to a point where they knew they’d
have to ride back in the dark and would arrive after dinner was already over.

“It’ll be cold
trail rations for us tonight,” Flasch said cheerfully as he studiously avoided
looking at Garnet’s sister. It seemed no matter where he went in the small
house, she was somewhere just close enough to be in sight, and Flasch had to
force himself not to stare.

By Sin and San,
she was beautiful! She made all the other women Flasch had seen pale in
comparison, but there was something strange about her beauty. Flasch had seen
plenty of women who looked
prettier
, but not more
attractive
somehow. Even Deeta suddenly began to fade slightly from his thoughts. Only a
few days ago, Flasch had wondered again whether or not he was in love with the
voluptuous dancer, but somehow now he didn’t have to wonder. He knew he wasn’t.

Flasch also
wasn’t in love with Anolla, nor anything approaching it – he was sure of that.
Even if he thought that, he was smart enough and self-aware enough to know it
could only be based on her physical beauty, and that was lust, not love. He had
certainly felt
that
before! But there was something strange about the
way Anolla looked. She wore no obvious makeup and no adornments, and while it
was obvious she’d brushed herself up and had taken special care of her
appearance, there was nothing artful about her looks at all.

It stumped him
and left him unable to say more than about two words to her before his tongue
suddenly grafted itself to the roof of his mouth.

After they all
split up to prepare a few things for the return trip, Flasch hurriedly left the
house and took a stroll outside, hoping to avoid Anolla altogether. He went
around back and found a clear area on the ground where he could sit to think
and pray.

He mouthed a few
formula prayers he found comforting, then launched into a lengthy, one-sided
conversation as he quite often did when praying. Heartfelt prayers were very
personal for him, and he rarely did so when anyone else was around. Flasch felt
that when he was alone and in earnest, when he spoke to God it felt like there
really was someone listening to him. He gave thanks for what he considered the
many blessings in his life, he talked about his doubts and fears about the
upcoming campaign, and then he inevitably came to a discussion of his suddenly
twisted emotions.

The conversation
moved along at the speed of his thoughts, and while he often got side-tracked
on some tangent, he mangled his way through his thoughts and emotions, hoping
and asking for some sort of resolution. He left his thoughts open, as always
hoping for some definite response, and when he was finished, he sat in silence
for a long moment settling his thoughts. Flasch received no divine insight, he
heard no heavenly voice giving him advice, but somehow he felt better having
voiced his thoughts to a higher power. He went through another formula prayer,
then said his
Amen
[16]
and slowly began to straighten.

The sound of
voices from within the house stopped him. The window nearest him was halfway
open, and he heard a man and a woman talking in low tones. He’d been so absorbed
in his prayers, he hadn’t heard them until now. Curiosity overcame discretion
and privacy, and Flasch sat motionless and strained to overhear the voices.

“…just bring him
back safely,” the woman said, and Flasch recognized Alessa’s voice, which
immediately identified the man as Garet.

“I’ll look after
him,” Garet said, his voice a gentle rumble, “and I expect he’ll look after me,
too, Mama. Garnet is smarter, stronger, and better than I ever was. We did well
in that one, I think.”

“Too well,”
Alessa said. “It’s precisely because he’s so good that I’m worried. I don’t
want him getting it in his head that he’s
too
good and finding out
otherwise the hard way. San, I don’t want him anywhere near this awful war, but
I know I can’t stop him anymore than I could have stopped you. And I won’t try.
I just…”

“I know, Mama,”
Garet said gently, and Flasch heard a rustle of cloth and guessed the big man
was hugging his wife to him. “I know. I was so proud when Garnet decided to
follow me, but my heart lurches every time I even think about him being out
there. I can only trust in his good sense and his training to keep him safe.
He’s got a purpose, our son, and I think God’s got an eye out for him.”

“God doesn’t
love him like I do,” Alessa said fiercely. “He’s not his mother.”

Garet chuckled
softly.

“True enough,”
he said. “I’ll bring him back safely, Mama, I promise.”

Another rustle
of cloth.

“You come back
to me, too,” Alessa said, tears in her voice. “Come back to me, you great big,
lovable fool.”

Flasch heard the
sound of gentle weeping and decided it was time he moved on. He crept away
soundlessly, both awed and humbled by the display of emotion he’d overheard.
Suddenly, his own tangled issues and concerns paled in comparison to what he’d
witnessed, and he paused for a moment to wonder at his own reaction.