Stargate SG-1: Trial by Fire: SG1-1 (20 page)

He scowled at his wife for a second, their difference in heights
making it look unintentionally comical. As he stalked away, he
caught Teal'c's eye, forced a discomfited smile, and vanished inside
the house. Ayzebel's shoulders stiffened and her gaze dropped.
She must have discovered something lying on the stone tiles,
for she stooped suddenly and picked up the out-of-place object.
Removing this small token of disorder seemed like a crutch for her
to regain her composure. It was a red string, wool or silk, and she
absentmindedly began winding it around her fingers, unraveling
the loops, and winding them again.

"Excuse me, Major Carter," Teal'c said and leisurely crossed the
patio, hands clasped behind his back.

Fingers still winding and unthreading, Ayzebel did not perceive
his approach until the shadow he cast flitted across her face.

"Lord Spirit," she greeted him, eyes deadened by grief or
purposely withholding any thought or feeling.

"Lady Ayzebel. We shall be departing soon, and I wish to thank
you for your kindness."

Teal'c bowed, smiled. Contrary to what O'Neill liked to assert,
he could smile if circumstances required it, though now it was to no avail. A soft purr caught his attention, dark and strangely soothing.
Suspended from the vault above and behind Ayzebel hung a wicker
cage. Inside huddled a brace of pigeons, gray and blue and cooing
contently.

She followed his gaze. "My husband demands I release them.
What is your opinion, Lord Spirit?"

"Does not every creature deserve freedom?"

"Freedom has to be earned." The thread she had been handling
tore, and two pieces of red silk fluttered in her hands.

Her answer took the Jaffa by surprise. He was more intimately
familiar with the subject than she could ever appreciate, yet
he agreed with her assessment. His father's fate had taught him
long ago that the patient wait for freedom only resulted in more
servitude and, more often than not, dishonorable death. No matter
how deserving one might be, freedom had to be earned. But why
would this woman, who spent her days cloistered in a secluded
courtyard, know or even care about such things?

"What would the Lady Ayzebel's birds have to do to earn their
freedom?" he asked cautiously.

If she had heard his question at all, she chose to ignore it.

"Tell the Synod you have changed your mind!" Wild eyes swam
out of focus, as though she had entered a trance; a soothsayer half
maddened by her vision. "Do not lead them there! You shall cause
sorrow and bloodshed beyond your darkest imaginings!"

"We shall free our friends and your son."

"To what end? Free my son and he shall die before the moons
have waned. Your friends shall die before him."

"Should it come to that, I shall avenge them."

"Your vengeance, Lord Spirit, can it raise the dead? Or shall you
beseech Meleq for his aid in that?"

She toppled into a burst of manic laughter that ceased as abruptly
as her tirade. Her eyes lost their mad sheen and seemed to catch
some motion in the arcade beyond Teal'c. Obeying an indefinable
impulse she cast the two threads of silk to the breeze and smiled
blandly as they swirled across the patio.

"You asked about my birds, Lord Spirit? I would have them earn
their freedom by flying and speaking for me. But now..."

Her words trailed off once more, and the Jaffa knew why. He
had identified the rhythm of the footfalls. Hamilqart was returning.
The steps slowed, grew hesitant, and finally came to a halt beside
Teal'c. After him a servant arrived, carrying a wooden trunk.
Presumably it contained the equipment his master intended to take
on the journey.

"Wife," Hamilgart said brusquely. "When will you do my
bidding?"

"Vow. Right now. As you will not do mine, I shall do yours."
Her voice quivered with desperation. "Look, my husband! Look!"

A slender hand reached up, undid a clasp, and flung open
the hatch of the cage. The pigeons inside tarried for a moment,
as though baffled by this unmerited chance, then they waddled
towards the opening, clawed feet clicking softly on the bottom of
the cage. One after the other they took to the air, flapped and circled
above the pond, before soaring into a pale blue square of sky and
disappearing beyond the roof.

"Remember, my husband. You wished that I do this." With that
Ayzebel turned and glided through the downy shade beneath the
arches and into the darkness of the house.

Hamilqart smiled again. There were too many smiles and too
little frankness. "My wife can be somewhat anxious at times. You
must forgive her, Lord Spirit. She means no discourtesy. She simply
does not want me to leave."

This much at least was true, and thus far Major Carter's
assessment was correct. But it was merely part of the truth. The
Lady Ayzebel did not desire any of them to leave. And she appeared
to attach inordinate importance to birds.

Her husband studied the shadows that had begun to lengthen
and slither towards the rim of the pool. "We must make haste, Lord
Spirit. The ships' masters wish to weigh anchor with the afternoon
tide. Are you all packed and ready?"

The enquiry was pertinent and it provided an excuse. "I shall
find out," offered Teal'c and strode back to where Major Carter
was waiting.

She had finished her computations, stowed the laptop in her
pack, and now observed his approach with undisguised curiosity. Daniel Jackson had joined her, his backpack already shouldered.
As far as Teal'c could tell they were set to leave. He himself would
only take his staff weapon, which rested against a pillar nearby.

"That looked interesting," remarked Major Carter as soon as the
Jaffa was within earshot.

"Indeed." The young archaeologist grinned. "You weren't trying
to flirt, Teal'c, were you?"

"I do not believe she would have been amenable," replied Teal'c.
"Daniel Jackson, are you aware of any particular significance this
culture attributes to pigeons?"

"Pigeons?" echoed Daniel Jackson and Major Carter in unison.

"Pigeons. Domesticated cooing birds."

"The things Ayzebel let fly just now?"

"The same. Hamilgart insisted she release them."

"Uhm..." Daniel Jackson's forehead wrinkled. "They're
considered symbols of peace, but that's largely old-testamentary
and doesn't necessarily apply to these guys. Quite a few cultures use
them as sacrificial animals, so there's some religious connection.
Some also study the flight pattern of birds for divination. As for the
Tyreans' specific position on pigeons... beats me, Teal'c. Hamilgart
didn't mention anything. Why?"

"Lady Ayzebel seemed to be vehemently opposed to freeing the
birds, but I do not think that it was due to an emotional -"

"Whoa!" said Daniel Jackson.

"Daniel? What -" Major Carter cut herself off, eyes wide.
"Homing pigeons?"

"Remember what I told you about Hamilgart suspecting that
somebody here was keeping the Phrygians in the loop?"

"What is a homing pigeon?"

"They're called that because they will come back to their coop
over great distances," explained Major Carter. "You can use them
for transmitting information. Take one with you, and if you need to
send a message to the guys back home, you write it on a scrap of
paper, tie it to the pigeon's leg, and let the bird fly."

"This would appear to be a most untrustworthy form of
communication."

"Actually it's pretty reliable, Teal'c. Homing pigeons rarely get lost, and birds look innocuous enough just about anywhere, don't
they?"

"I see." Teal'c recalled the stray piece of red silk. Equally
innocuous on its own. "Do you suggest that Ayzebel notified the
Phrygians of the ceremony that was to have taken place two days
ago?"

"She grew up in the village by the harbor the Phrygians used,"
Daniel Jackson pointed out. "What's that tell you?"

"That she was raised out of town," Major Carter answered drily.
"Why give the Phrygians information that would enable them to
kidnap her own son?"

"Perhaps she considered it to be the lesser of two evils."

"The lesser of -... Teal'c, you saw that ship!"

"I did not mean to imply that I concur with the Lady Ayzebel,
Major Carter," the Jaffa replied. "However..."

"However?"

"Once it became evident that she would lose her means of
communicating with the Phrygians - if that is indeed what she does
- she cautioned me against leading the Tyreans to their hideout."

"She did what?"

"She

"Uhm... Guys?" murmured Daniel Jackson through a too-bright
smile that was directed past them. "I guess we'd better postpone
this."

Hamilgart had come bustling across the yard. The attempt to
marry his impatience with a need for courtesy was beginning to
fail.

"Please, my friends, can we go? We have to make haste!"

"We are prepared to depart."

It occurred to Teal'c that this, too, fell short of total frankness.

ack was losing himself in nostalgic memories of Marve Miller,
an upperclassman with a pathological streak and a deep-seated
hatred of Yankees and lippy junior cadets. Unlucky coincidence.
After having been taped into their blankets and tenderized, all
smart-mouths had been cordially invited to tuck into a bowl of
live worms. Cadet O'Neill had distinguished himself by meriting
second and third helpings. It'd given him one hell of a head start in
survival training.

Right now he'd eat that bowl of worms and be grateful for it.

They'd left the assembly hall, and Tertius and his merry men
had led him to an olive grove in the foothills, roughly three klicks
outside the garrison. On the way there, about fifteen other guys
had joined them, one by one, quietly deserting their workshops
and abandoning their fields. A crew of soldiers had slipped out of
the guardhouse by the perimeter wall. No women. It was strictly a
boys' day out.

Their taciturn little column had stopped in a clearing. Gnarled,
silver-leaved olive trees all round, silence, sunshine, bleached
grass, and crickets. A clear stream ran through the glade, frothing
over black rock. By the stream, a statue of some sort. It was an eggshaped stone ring, with zodiac signs and, inside the ring, a guy who
carried a torch and sword and shared his taste in headwear with
Lord Zipacna. Obviously he was important in some way, because
this had been where the fun had started.

After solemnly bowing to Egg-Boy they'd blindfolded him and
announced that he was to be reborn into a new life, which they took
as an excuse to strip him down to his boxers. God only knew what
they'd made of the Simpsons theme. Then they'd guided him on
and grass and dust had given way to sharp-edged shingle. Easy to
tell when you're barefoot: one's comfortable, the other isn't. You
could hear it, too. Snap, crackle, and pop under your feet. A whole
new set of calluses later they'd gone underground. Dank, cold air,
and he'd felt goosebumps erupt on his skin. Sounds took on a limp quality and multiplied into wet, whispering echoes. There'd been a
sense of confinement and his two guides had fallen behind, so the
tunnel must have been narrow. Until that odd feeling of pressure
had suddenly been replaced by an impression almost of falling.
And there'd been a new noise.

His notion of being in some vast cavern had been verified
seconds later when a pair of hands had undone the blindfold. He'd
been standing at the edge of a fast-flowing underground river, and
Tertius and his followers had been lined up in a semicircle around
him, effectively cutting him off from the outside world. Each had
held a torch and a sword, like Egg-Boy in the glade, and when
they'd found time to change was anybody's guess. Floppy hats for
all, and elaborately embroidered white tunics instead of the brown
everyday ones. In the torchlight he'd seen the delicate pink and
blue lacework of stalactites and stalagmites and a profusion of
black tunnel mouths. Even if he'd wanted to break past the men
and run, he'd have had no clue which way was out.