Encrypted (7 page)

Chortles burst from the surrounding marines,
and flames torched her cheeks. Five straightened and released her
with a pat on the shoulder. She groaned and avoided his eyes. If
there had been awe there before, that was surely gone now. In
avoiding his gaze, she had a clear view of the marines pointing at
her and nudging each other. Even Bocrest’s rock-eating jaw flapped
with guffaws.

“
Walk?” Five suggested
gently.

“
Dear Akahe,
yes.”

She departed the scene at a vigorous pace,
and Five, with his long legs, easily matched her. His guards fell
in behind. At least they proved stolid and silent save for the
clatter of gear and synchronized thump of boots on the deck.

“
I must thank you for
this.” Five gestured at himself, encompassing the clean uniform and
haircut. “I got the story from Corporal Agarik. It was kind of you
to include me in the reward for your wager.”

“
You’re welcome,” she
muttered, knowing her thinking had not been purely altruistic.
“Though I’m surprised the captain let you out, lost bet or
not.”

“
He made me promise not to
make trouble during the exercise periods.”

“
Ah.” Interesting that
Five’s word was enough for the captain to trust him. She glanced at
the guards. To some extent anyway.

“
It was worth it.” He
stretched his arms overhead, then windmilled them, something the
confines of his cell would make impossible. “I almost feel like a
human being again.”

It had certainly improved his mood. She
thought of the silent, brooding man she had spoken to the first day
and could not help but feel pleased her request had lightened his
spirit. She gave him a smile and missed a step when he smiled back.
Oh, that was nice.

Stop it, Tikaya, she chastised herself.
Prisoner or not, he was one of them. That uniform fit him like he
had been born into it. Best get some answers from him while he was
in an affable mood.

“
Given the reception I’ve
gotten here, I’m surprised you aren’t...” She watched him sidelong.
“Does my wartime hobby not bother you?”

“
Actually...” He met her
sideways gaze. “It impresses me. A lot.”

“
Oh,” she breathed, then
looked away, not sure she wanted him to see her reaction. She had
wanted an ally; she had not expected an admirer. She was not sure
how to deal with that. Parkonis, though he had loved her
personally, had been a little jealous of her professionally. They
had worked in the same field, with her discoveries often eclipsing
his, and his praise had always sounded grudging.

They passed under men in the rigging,
adjusting sails to take advantage of the wind. Only a faint smudge
of black wafted from the smokestack today.

“
As far as we’ve heard,”
Five said, “cryptography isn’t taught on Kyatt, so I just assumed
what we called the cryptomancer was a team of mathematicians
learning as they went. But your specialty is linguistics,
right?”

The question sounded casual, but a trickle
of wariness returned to her thoughts. Just because he pretended to
be an admirer did not make him one. Maybe the Turgonians had simply
decided to substitute honey for vinegar, and had talked him into
delivering it.

“
Yes,” she said.
“Philology, really. I work with the anthropology and archaeology
departments in the Polytechnic.”

“
Interesting. How many
languages do you know?”

“
Sixteen modern, and I can
read a few dozen dead languages.”

“
Few
dozen
?” Five halted and gaped at
her. “You must be a genius.”

The proclamation startled her, and she
lurched to a stop beside him, conscious of the guards’ gazes on her
back. “No, no, trust me I’m not. It’s just something I’ve a knack
for.”

He lifted a single skeptical eyebrow.

Tikaya shook her head. “A world-exploring
uncle gave me a copy of the Tekdar Tablet when I was a child, and I
fell in love with solving language puzzles. My parents encouraged
it, so I had a head start when I started formally studying in
school. That’s all.”

Five was still standing, gazing at her, and
when she met his eyes, she found that admiration there again. It
was disarming. Maybe he meant it to be. What had the captain told
Five to convince her of?

“
Hm.” He resumed walking.
“My family gave me swords and toy soldiers when I was a boy.”
Bemusement laced his tone.

“
You would have preferred
something else?”

“
Oh, yes. I kept asking
for drawing pads and building materials. I wanted to design a
treehouse with a drawbridge to my room and a steam-powered potato
launcher for defense.”

“
Sounds like every boy’s
dream.” Despite her determination to remain chary with him, the
change of topic set her at ease. She could not reveal something she
shouldn’t if he was talking about himself.

“
Alas, this was not a
paternally approved childhood activity, so I had to find my own
building materials.” Five scratched his jaw. “I took it upon myself
to chop down some of the apple trees in my family’s orchard, trees
that my great grandfather had grafted from cuttings painstakingly
acquired when he was a marine sailing around the world. I, being
about eight at the time, was unaware of this bit of
history.”

“
Oh, dear,” she
murmured.

“
Yes. There was a lot of
yelling that summer.”

She chuckled.

“
What
is
engraved on your name plaque?”
Five asked as they started on their second lap of the
deck.

For a moment, the context of the question
eluded her, until she remembered her earlier comment. “You don’t
know my name?”

He spread his arms apologetically. “Nobody’s
told me much.”

The salty breeze gusted, and water sprayed
the deck ahead of them. A lieutenant bellowed at the men aloft.

“
Your name for mine,”
Tikaya offered with a smile. “I can’t keep calling you Five
forever.”

He glanced at the guards trailing them.
Maybe, as part of his punishment, he was forbidden from using his
old name.

He lowered his voice. “My friends and
family, back when I had them...” He grimaced. “They called me
Rias.”

“
Rias?”

Tikaya had a feeling that was a nickname or
a truncation. Regardless, it gave her no hints as to his identity.
Since she had decrypted all the communications her people had
intercepted, she knew most, if not all, of the Turgonian officers
with enough rank to command a vessel, and she could not think of
any name with those syllables.

“
My name is Tikaya,” she
said. “And, now that we’re on a first-name basis, maybe you can
tell me what you’re supposed to convince me of, Rias.”

Their route had taken them to the archery
lane. Rias paused by the rack of staves, and the guards tensed,
their fingers finding the triggers of their pistols.

“
No weapons,” the lead man
said.

“
Captain,” Rias called.
“May we shoot?”

In the center of the exercise area, Bocrest
knelt on a young officer’s back, with the man’s arm twisted in a
lock. The captain scowled over at them.

“
May you
shoot
? What is this, the
Officers’ Club? Perhaps I can get you some brandywine and lobster
too?”

“
Captain, are you inviting
me to dinner?” Rias rested his hand on his chest. “I’m
touched.”

Red flushed Bocrest’s face, and Tikaya
wondered at the wisdom of teasing the man. If the captain had a
sense of humor, she had not detected it. But he waved a disgusted
hand at the guards.

“
Let them
shoot.”

“
Sir?” The lead guard’s
mouth gaped open.

“
You heard me,” Bocrest
barked.

“
Yes, sir.”

Tikaya eyed Rias. “It seems your word means
something to the captain.”

“
He knows it’s all I have
left.”

Bleakness stripped away his humor, reminding
her that pain lurked beneath the facade he was showing her today.
He caught her watching and reaffixed his smile.

“
Tikaya,” he said slowly,
trying her name out, then nodding to himself as if he approved. “To
answer your question, despite his
threats
—” Rias scowled, “—the
captain has doubts about your intentions. He believes I should
convince you to help him wholeheartedly with his
mission.”

She selected the bow she had used the day
before. “Why, when he’s keeping you chained in the brig, does he
think you’d be inclined to speak on his behalf?”

“
He believes that my
indoctrinated loyalty to the empire will overrule whatever
revulsion I feel for him and those who took everything from
me.”

“
They must do a lot of
indoctrinating in Turgonian schools.”

Rias sighed. “Oh, they do.”

“
And
do
you think I should help? You
recognized something about those symbols when I showed you the
rubbing. What was it?”

He did not answer, though she did not think
him recalcitrant. His gaze grew far away, his face grim, as if some
painful memories had swallowed him and he had forgotten her.

Maybe archery would loosen his mind and
unlock his thoughts for sharing. She shot a few times, leaving
arrows quivering around the red dot in the target. A stiffer breeze
scraped across the deck today.

Rias stirred and selected his own
arrows.

“
Want to make a wager?”
Tikaya asked, thinking she might be able to get him to talk more
freely about the symbols if he owed her from a lost bet.

His grimness faded and he slanted her a
knowing gaze. “I suspect that would be unwise.”

“
Captain Bocrest did
it.”

“
Then I’m certain it’s
unwise.”

Tikaya grinned. “Maybe I just got a lucky
shot.”

“
I doubt it.”

“
Why?” All the marines had
been stunned when she hit the target.

He shrugged. “The Kyattese are bow
hunters.”

“
Well...” She smiled and
twirled an arrow in the air. “If you’re afraid...”

Rias splayed a hand across his chest. “When
you were learning our language, did you not also learn that we are
a fearless people? I simply don’t want to take advantage of you. I
studied ballistics in school, and I can’t imagine such a martial
course being taught at your Polytechnic.”

“
And did you also study
arrogance in school?” Tikaya nocked her arrow, aimed, and plunked
it into the bull’s-eye.

“
Of course.” He winked.
“I’m Turgonian.”

She snorted. Arrogance
probably
was
part
of their curriculum.

“
I even wrote a paper on
the ballistics of archery for merit points,” he said.

“
Less talking, more
shooting.”

Eyebrows arched, Rias nocked the first
arrow, but he paused as a pair of marines strolled past, one
munching the remains of an apple. The man lifted his arm to throw
the core overboard, but Rias stopped him.

“
I’ll take
that.”

The marine shrugged and tossed it to him.
Tikaya had an inkling of Rias’s intent and did not question him as
he readied the bow again. He nocked the arrow and held it against
the stave with one hand. With the other, he lobbed the apple core
so it arced toward the target. In one swift motion, he drew the bow
and fired. The arrow pierced the apple and hammered it to the
target right next to Tikaya’s bull’s-eye.

“
Hah.” Rias lowered the
bow. “After my cocky speech, I feared I’d embarrass
myself.”

“
I hope you got a good
grade for that paper,” Tikaya said, staring at the impaled
apple.

“
Me too.” He grinned at
her raised eyebrows. “It was twenty years ago. I don’t
remember.”

“
What was it
on?”

“
Oh, the usual. Explaining
the equations for general ballistic trajectory, horizontal launch,
launch velocity, and the like. The fun part was the modeling I did
on the different types of bows used throughout imperial history. I
analyzed them to show how the design and materials used would
define their accuracy, trajectories, distance capabilities, and...”
He must have noticed her gaping because he stopped, a sheepish
expression on his face. “I’m boring you, aren’t I?”

“
No!” Tikaya blurted. “I
just wasn’t expecting you to be so...” Dear ancestors, he sounded
just like her when she started talking about languages, and it
struck her as hilarious that he could not remember the grade but
recalled all the details of the topic. “Uhm, garrulous,” she
finished.

A blush colored his olive skin. “Sorry. I
haven’t talked to a woman in two years.” He nocked an arrow. “Shall
we shoot a few more?”

“
Sure, tell me more about
your paper.”

Rias’s fingers fumbled, and the arrow
clattered to the deck. “Really?”

“
Really.” She hid a smile,
tickled by his surprise. “The only ballistics experiments I ever
partook in involved a wager on who could use a spoon to launch a
macadamia nut across the lunch room and into Professor Lehanae’s
wig.”

“
Hm, I recall taking part
in a similar experiment. Must be a universal education
requirement.”