Soulblade (24 page)

“There is only one seat,” Mara said coolly, making Ridge jump.

He hadn’t realized she had followed him into the barn.

“Yup, she’s one of the originals.” Mayford gave Mara a friendly smile, but she was too busy frowning at Ridge to notice. “Miss, you can stay here with us for a while, if you like. We can always use an extra hand in the orchards.”

Mara’s eyebrows flew upward. “Orchards?”

“Yes, miss. Rows of trees that grow fruit. You might have seen them before.”

Ridge snorted. The sarcastic streak must have been cultivated in pilots from the flier squadrons’ earliest days.

“I told her I’d take her back to the capital with me for a visit,” Ridge admitted. “I suppose I could fly home and bring a couple of pilots and fliers back. We’d need to return your craft, anyway, and I could pick you up then, Mara.”

“I will go with you,” she said.

“She’s small enough, maybe you could fly with her in your lap,” Mayford suggested.

“That sounds... distracting,” Ridge said.

Mayford looked Mara up and down, his expression just short of a leer. He winked at Ridge. “I’d think so, yes.”

Mara either didn’t notice or didn’t mind the leer. Her expression softened, and she linked her arm with Ridge’s. “Yes, I will fly to the capital in your lap with you. I can’t wait to meet the king.”

“Meet?”

That hadn’t been her original request. Ridge frowned, looking toward Mayford, as if he might offer support. But the lap idea had been his, and all he did was wink at Ridge again, give him a swat on the back, and say, “Enjoy the festivities, General.”

• • • • •

Tolemek stood still as the guards searched him, doing his best not to seethe as his vials, canisters, and jars were removed from his pockets and tossed onto a table without enough care. If something broke open and ate through the table, the wood floor, the platforms underneath their elevated building, and finally to the swampy water below, he would do nothing to help. The two men patting him down were less casual when they removed the grenades from their loops on his utility belt. Apparently, those looked enough like weapons to warrant care.

Kaika, who had already been searched and placed in a cell behind him, had left a pile of weapons, explosives, fuses, and detonators even higher than his pile. Quataldo had not been captured, and the guards hadn’t indicated that they had noticed him, so Tolemek held some hope of being rescued before the night was out, but he couldn’t help but feel they had bungled the mission to the point of being unsalvageable. How were they supposed to sneak in and kidnap the emperor now? Even if they escaped, the city would be on high alert. Already, he could hear people running past on the elevated boardwalks outside the police headquarters. Distant shouts sounded. He couldn’t understand the words.

After the guards finished removing his gear and weapons, they pushed Tolemek past the tree trunk that rose through the center of the room and into the same cell as Kaika. She barely acknowledged him. Her ear was tilted toward a small open window. It was too high on the wall for Tolemek to see anything more than leaves rustling in the treetop that held this building, but maybe she could understand the shouts outside. Not that Tolemek thought he needed a translation. He suspected everyone was yelling about intruders in the city and increasing the guards on patrol.

One guard remained once the search was done, and Kaika and Tolemek were secured behind bars. Tolemek could have eaten through those bars with one of the formulas on the table, but it lay more than ten feet away.

Tolemek leaned his back to the gate. “Any chance you can seduce that fellow?” he whispered.

One of Kaika’s eyebrows rose. “Is that what you think elite forces troops do?”

Tolemek thought of Colonel Quataldo and couldn’t imagine the man seducing his own wife. “I thought it was what
you
do.”

“Were you talking to Zirkander about me at some point?”

“No. Your reputation precedes you. From numerous fronts.”

“How flattering.” Kaika rolled up the sleeves of her jacket and buttoned them above her elbows. She, too, leaned against the bars, her back to the guard. “Before we worry about our company, let me fill you in on the conversation they didn’t bother hiding from me.”

“Yes?”

He watched her hands as their conversation continued. Either from her sleeve or from somewhere under it, she produced a small hook with a curved tip.

“They think we’re
Cofah
insurgents here to do something to upset the wedding.”

“Because of your fake accent?”

“And your face. I’m not too pale to pass for a Cofah, but you’re too tan to look like an Iskandian. Plus you have the big Cofah nose.” She extricated a second pin, this time with a straight tip, from the other sleeve. “I can’t believe they didn’t bother stripping us.”

“Big nose? My nose is perfectly normal for my face.”

“For a Cofah face. Move your butt over.” Kaika nudged Tolemek with a hip when he did not ease to the side of the gate quickly enough.

“You’re a very physical woman, aren’t you?” Tolemek asked, aware of the guard watching them. He assumed she wanted to pick the lock. Maybe if they kept talking, the guard wouldn’t pay much attention to her hands. He did not know if the man understood their language, but he would keep his voice low and assume he might.

“I am indeed,” Kaika said, shoving him to claim another inch of space. Elbow room so she could work, he guessed. Naturally, the lock hole faced the guard rather than the inside of the cell.

“Careful, I’ll tell Cas you were touching me in inappropriate places,” he said.

“Oh? Would she get jealous if I fondled your ass?”

“I’d be disappointed if she didn’t. Wouldn’t Angulus get jealous if I fondled yours?”

“Not if it was mission critical.”

“Mission-critical fondling. You live in an interesting world.”

Kaika grinned and draped her hands so they appeared to hang over the lock hole, doing nothing, just hanging. “Just the way I like it.”

“You Cofah talk too much,” the guard said, his words so accented, Tolemek struggled to understand them. Still, the man could probably catch the gist of the conversation. Tolemek was glad he had said Angulus’s name softly.

“This is how we engage in foreplay,” Kaika told the guard. “We’re going to have sex soon, if you want to join in.”

Tolemek gaped at her, more alarmed by her bluntness than that she would make the invitation. He assumed her thoughts were to clobber the guard if he was foolish enough to wander over.

Kaika shrugged at him. “I thought you wanted me to seduce him.”

“I wasn’t imagining myself being involved.”

“No? You just like to watch?”

“Be quiet,” the guard growled, tapping the side of his rifle. “Or say something useful.”

“Such as?” Tolemek immediately asked, sensing an opening.

The guard drummed his fingers on the rifle as he considered them, then walked to the door. He opened it, looked out, then closed it. He pointed the muzzle of his rifle at Tolemek’s pile of jars and vials.

“Tell me what these things are and if any of them are valuable.”

“They’re extremely valuable. I’m a chemist.”

“A what?” The guard’s forehead wrinkled. He must not have known the term.

“Scientist,” Tolemek said, resisting the urge to look down at Kaika’s hands, though he would occasionally notice her fingers moving slightly. “That little ceramic jar there contains a compound that can burn through iron and stone.”

“This little jar?” The guard pointed at the correct one with his rifle. “How much iron and stone?”

“Bring it here, and I’ll demonstrate on the bars.”

The guard snorted. He leaned his rifle against the table and bent low, studying the jar, his back mostly to the bars.

Tolemek glanced at Kaika’s hands, then met her eyes. “How long?” he mouthed.

“One minute,” she mouthed back.

“Be very careful if you remove the lid,” Tolemek advised. “It can burn through human skin even more easily than iron.”

“I must see a demonstration.”

“Who are you going to sell it to?” Tolemek asked. “That jar contains such a small amount that the earnings potential might not be great, but perhaps we could form a partnership. Were I free of these bars, I could gather the components to make more. I could sell it to you, and you could sell it to your contact for a mark up.”

The guard grunted. “Of course, I will let you go, so we can do that.” Despite his dismissal, his gaze remained fastened on the jar.

“As far as I know, we’re not being held for any crime,” Tolemek said.

“You blew up a bridge.”

“Only because it was covered with winged alligators.”

“You’re suspected of being here to interfere with Chief Razthar’s wedding.”

“Just because your superiors suspect something doesn’t mean it’s true. There’s absolutely no proof to indicate we have anything to do with that wedding. I’m a scientist, looking for new markets to sell my formulas in and also for new ingredients with which to experiment.”

Kaika tapped a finger on the gate and wriggled her eyebrows at Tolemek. He hadn’t heard the click of a lock, but trusted she knew what she was doing.

“I want to try this,” the guard said, gingerly reaching out and tapping the jar a couple of times before committing to touching it for longer.

Tolemek rolled his eyes. They hadn’t worried about touching any of his containers when they had been removing them from his pockets and flinging them on the table.

The guard decided to risk unscrewing the lid. He found the applicator brush fastened to the bottom and poked it into the cream. He looked at the dollop, then pressed it to an iron support post in the corner of the room. The dab started smoking.

“You spoke the truth,” the guard said, staring in wonder. His back was fully to them now.

Kaika eased the gate open and slipped across the room without making a sound. The guard must have spotted her shadow on the wall, because he whirled as she reached for him, but she was too quick. She unleashed a barrage of punches, kneed him, and spun him around, finally locking her arms around his throat. Seeing that she didn’t need his help, Tolemek strode for the table and returned his gear to his pockets. He grabbed his rifle from a rack it had been stuffed into with several local firearms. By the time he finished, the guard lay unconscious on the floor. Kaika found some rope, tied him and gagged him, and dragged him into the cell, where she locked him in.

Voices came from outside, so Tolemek did not know how long it would be before someone walked in and discovered the man, but if they could escape the building, they might disappear into the maze of walkways, rope bridges, and boardwalks that connected the different layers of the city.

While Kaika donned her gear, he stepped to the door and eased it open for a look. He closed it immediately.

“Six more guards outside,” he whispered. “They look like they’re waiting for someone. The man in charge of our interrogation, perhaps.”

Kaika snorted. “I don’t think blowing up a bridge is likely to bring a godly ordained inquisitor to our cell.”

Tolemek had no idea if that was an actual position in the city or if she was making it up, but he didn’t ask. He climbed onto the table to look out the window he had been studying earlier. It was too small for them to squeeze out, but it offered a view of the back side of the building. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a walkway or platform below it, so they couldn’t sneak out that way. Tolemek considered the tree trunk in the center of the room. Less than two inches remained open around its girth, but he would widen that with his compound.

“Down?” he asked.

“Can we do up?” Kaika looked toward the ceiling around the trunk. “I have a hunch.”

Someone shouted outside. Did one shout when an ordained inquisitor headed over? Though Tolemek thought down would be better, so that they could disappear into the lower levels of the city, it might take the guards longer to look up and spot their exit hole, especially if their prisoner remained unconscious and didn’t see which direction they went.

“You just want to see if I can climb,” he muttered, grasping the tree trunk. All of the limbs within the building had been cut, removing the easy handholds.

“Yes, and to gauge whether fondling your butt would be worth dealing with Lieutenant Ahn’s ire.”

Tolemek almost said he doubted it, but that might reflect poorly on his physique. He scrambled up the trunk as gracefully as he could, his jacket clanking with its contents. Kaika stood below, her rifle pointed toward the door. With his legs and one arm wrapped around the trunk near the ceiling, Tolemek had to apply his stone-eating concoction with great care. He tried to make his hole look artful, like a couple of boards had simply rotted away. They were thinner than expected, and the first of those boards broke away before he had finished dabbing the others. It dropped and smacked Kaika on the shoulder.

“Sorry,” he said.

She caught it before it hit the ground and made noise. “Your revenge for me making you climb?”

“Inadvertent, but yes. More are coming down. I don’t have a hand free to grab them.”

Kaika caught the three other board ends, looked around for someplace to hide them, and settled for the bottom drawer of a filing cabinet in the corner. While she climbed up after him, Tolemek eased his head through the hole he had made. Disappointment smothered him when he found a pair of boots and the tip of a rifle waiting for him. What was one of the guards doing up on the roof of the police building?

The man’s back was to him. Maybe he could scramble up and overpower him before the guard reacted.

Before he’d lifted even his shoulders out of the hole, the boots shifted, the rifle swinging toward him. He started to yank his head down, but realized that rifle was exactly like the ones he and Kaika carried. He looked up into Colonel Quataldo’s surprised eyes, his head nearly hidden by branches. He was squatting to avoid them.

“That will make my rescue easier,” he murmured.

Tolemek climbed out, keeping his grunts to a minimum since he could hear someone addressing the men on the platform below. He eased to the side, making room for Kaika to crawl out after him. Quataldo squatted down, peered through the hole briefly, then nodded at them.