The Last Aerie (33 page)

“— I know what the mentalist Turkur Tzonov thinks,” Nathan broke in. “He’s (
ambitious?
) and thinks a great many things, some of which are correct, some incorrect, and others which are simply wrong. He’s a (
schemer?
), a would-be warlord, hungry for power. He would examine me, (
subvert?
) me to his cause if possible, put me to use in his schemes. And if he can’t, then he’ll kill me! Through me, using my (
knowledge?
) of the world beyond the Gate, he would invade and (
conquer?
), not only the Wamphyri of Starside but also Sunside’s Szgany, its Travellers! But I
am
Szgany, and I can promise you this: making war with the Travellers would be a grave error of (
judgment?
). And as for going against the Wamphyri—what, knowing as little of them as you do?—that would be a sure sign of insanity!”

From the moment she heard his first spoken words, Siggi had scarcely been able to credit Nathan’s fluency in Russian, her own adopted language. And when he’d been uncertain of the words, there he’d filled in by thinking them! Finally she did believe and her mouth fell open. Then:

“Why have you chosen to remain silent?” she breathed. “I mean, you can speak our tongue! You understand … everything!” Her words were so naive as to sound stupid in her own ears.

He shrugged, but not negligently. “Our—tongues?—are not dissimilar. And anyway, you are a clever mentalist in your own right. Don’t you have a knack with tongues?”

She did, it was true, but not like this!

He read her answer in her mind, and explained. “That’s because you’ve come to rely too heavily on your mentalism—as a tool of your trade.” His voice was colder as he went on, “Why trouble yourself with learning a man’s tongue, mere words, when it’s so much easier to steal his thoughts? Isn’t that why you’ve come here now, to this terrible buried cell, to steal my thoughts for Turkur Tzonov?”

Siggi felt the colour rising to her face under Nathan’s steady scrutiny, and said, “We’ve all … underestimated you.” And immediately she wondered
: Why am
I tongue-tied? Why does every word I say to him sound so stupid? What? Am I actually the little sister I was going to pretend to be?
It would be a clever excuse for the warmth she was starting to feel, except Siggi knew that it wasn’t the warmth of a sister! And as that realization dawned, so she closed the shutters of her mind and let its mental vapours drift out, obscuring her thoughts. But no need, for Nathan had stopped reading them. As good as his word, he was no mind-spy and certainly no voyeur. Why should he be, when he could simply talk to her?

All of this taking a single second, before he told her: “No, you have
over
estimated me! Surely you must see—I
know
you can—that I’m not your enemy? What? Only one man, and unarmed? How could I be? I don’t mean you any harm, none of you. All I want right now is to get back to my own world, to what was my home before the Wamphyri returned.” Then his face and voice hardened. “But if or when Tzonov invades Sunside, then I shall be his enemy! As for my silence: it took time to watch, listen, learn. Time to study a new tongue, in (
combination?
) with the minds that think it.”

As he let go of her, backed off a short pace and sat down on his bed, Siggi found herself fascinated anew. Entirely fascinated. Nathan was like no man she’d ever known; of course he was, for he came from a universe which ran parallel to the one we know. But there was more than that to it, a lot more than the fascination of unknown horizons, just waiting to be opened in the depths of his mind. More even than the physical attraction of his young male body, his warmth, the way his eyes spoke soulfully of indefinable yearnings, a past shadowed under the arching wings of nightmare, and an equally uncertain future.

His shield of numbers was down. Siggi could go in but no longer wanted to, not uninvited, and not until he desired it. Whatever his terms, they would be more than acceptable to her. He didn’t need his telepathy to read it in her eyes.

“We’ll be … friends?” he said, offering her a first wan smile. “Despite Turkur Tzonov?”

“We
are
friends,” she answered, and sighed as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders. “And to hell with Turkur Tzonov! Except —” she frowned. “—He will expect something out of all this.”

Nathan nodded. “Of course. He’ll expect answers, and you shall supply them …” He was suddenly thoughtful, withdrawn, subdued. “But I won’t tell you—him—everything, not just yet. No, he won’t get all of it until … until he brings his machine here.”

Siggi felt her heart sinking like a stone. “His machine?” Her voice was a whisper. She knew about such a machine, banned now throughout the civilized world, but: Turkur hasn’t spoken to me about… about that!”

“Nor has he
said
anything to me,” Nathan answered. “But he has thought it…”

V

Out of Perchorsk

Siggi had asked him: “What will you tell me about yourself?”

And Nathan had answered, “Most of it, but I shall leave out anything which would help Tzonov. It could be argued that anything I tell you will be of some help to him, I know, but in fact there’s a great deal that might frighten him off! He would be a fool to ignore the menace of the Wamphyri.”

“You don’t know Turkur, despite what you’ve read in his mind,” she’d told him then. “And you haven’t seen—couldn’t possibly imagine—the power of the weapons he commands. How long will it take you to tell me … everything?”

Again Nathan’s expressive shrug. “How long is a lifetime? I can only tell it as it happened.”

“It would be shorter if I could see it, and it wouldn’t exhaust you.”

“In my mind?” He had understood her meaning. “I suppose so. But still it will take time: most of the night, maybe.”

She’d thought about it, then gone to the door and rapped on the hatch until it opened. “Give me your key,” she’d told the young soldier. “Then go to your bed. Your duty is over.”

“My orders are clear,” he’d answered. “I am to —”

“But I’ve just changed your orders! This is the way we planned it, Turkur Tzonov and I. So don’t interfere with the plans of your superiors. As you can see, the prisoner is completely harmless. Also, I’ve a gun hidden on my person.” (These things were lies, but she went on anyway): “In the morning, I shall return the key to Turkur personally. And that’s enough of explanations. Now give me the key and I’ll continue with my work, and you can go and get a good night’s sleep.”

“Madame, I —”

“Or perhaps you’d prefer to explain your disobedience to Tzonov himself, right now, tonight? Maybe you’d like to go and wake him up, so that he can validate what I say?” At which the soldier had handed over the key, saluted and excused himself.

Siggi’s actions had been almost automatic; she knew why she’d sent him away but would never have admitted it, consciously or otherwise, not even to herself. She was preparing the way, securing the ground, that was all; she didn’t want anyone outside the door, on the other side of that window. It wasn’t so much that she wanted Nathan, not yet, but if the night was going to be as long as he thought it was …

That had been a little less than three and a half hours ago, and now the two were asleep … in each other’s arms.

How it had happened, neither of them would ever be sure. But as night stretched out and Perchorsk’s energy requirements were reduced, so the room’s temperature had fallen by several degrees. Together with their physical inactivity, this hadn’t helped matters; soon they had felt the cold and eventually (in order to share their body heat, certainly) they’d sat together on Nathan’s bed. Finally it had seemed only natural that Siggi should recline in his arms, and then she’d drawn a blanket up to cover their fully clothed bodies. But when Nathan had reacted to her proximity, she’d known it at once, from which time on their thoughts had gradually turned away from his story to much more intimate things. And then Siggi had known for sure why she sent the guard away.

When her curious hand had discovered him hot and pounding, Nathan had closed his mind, warning her: “But if I love you, it will be Misha …” Of course, for only four or five Earth-days ago he’d been with his young Gypsy wife on Sunside.

“Not if you love me with your body, not your mind.” And she too had called up her mind-smog to obscure her thoughts.

“Even so, still you’ll know it. Just as you know it now.”

“But I won’t see her face in your mind.”
And what the eye can’t see, the mind won’t grieve.
“I’ll imagine it’s me you’re pleasuring. And in a purely physical sense it will be. But you have a need, Nathan, which you can relieve in me.”

“And your need?”

She had taken his hand, guided it to her hardened nipples. “My need is to satisfy the need in you. This could well be the only chance we’ll ever get. And it might be all I’m able to do for you, ever.”

“But you do have your own need?”

“I want you, yes.”

“Because I’m different? Or because you’ve been ordered to have me?” There had been a certain bitterness in his voice, but he’d stroked her breasts in spite of it. Siggi could hardly be expected to know that she wouldn’t be the first woman who had come—or been gift-wrapped and sent—to Nathan.

“Because you are different, probably,” she’d smiled sadly. “But ‘ordered’? To love you? On the contrary, I’ve been told not to!”

And she had sensed his understanding, and knew that he too was his own man. “I’m … forbidden?”

“Turkur likes to own things,” she had told him. “Including people. And if he can’t own something, still he’ll try to deny its … its
use
, to others. He would like to own both of us.”

“And this will help set you free?” Her fingertips had felt like small flames, burning where they brushed.

Again her wry smile. “Hardly that, for I’m in too deep. No, I can’t be free. But
inside
I’ll be like you: my own person.”

They’d been mainly free of their clothing by then, and when Siggi rolled onto him her breasts were soft, scented in his face. Her woman’s juices had prepared the way, and slipping into her was so easy it came almost as a surprise. But as she’d tightened herself to control him, slow him, take charge, then Nathan had seen how expert she was. And then, too, he’d known that she wasn’t and never could be Misha.

The first time had been quick, for all her control. But the second was slower, deeper, more knowing. It was as if he reached for her heart, while she in turn tried to swallow him whole. Then, when all too soon it was over and this man from a weird world fell asleep in Siggi’s arms and body, she could have cried. For at the last she’d glimpsed herself in his mind, and seen how she glowed there. Not the dark, sweating, sucking thing she’d come to expect—perhaps especially this time—but a haven, a harbour, almost a holy place.

She could have cried because … because he might be the one! Oh, it was too early to know, but he
might
be. Except he couldn’t be, not ever, because of Misha.

And so Nathan had slept in Siggi’s arms as at the house of an old friend. Then … she had wanted to give him something more than her body, because it might be her only chance to give him anything, ever. Taking her jade clasp, she’d placed it in a pocket of his jacket. And finally, lulled by the steady beat of his heart, in a little while she, too, had slept…

… And slept—

—Until Turkur Tzonov woke them up!

Finished with his work, Tzonov had caught up on a couple of hours’ lost sleep until something—some dream or other—had brought him awake. Siggi’s room was only a few doors from his own; out of curiosity (or perhaps for some other reason), he’d looked in … and the rest had seemed obvious. What? She was still working? Right through the night? Ah, but there’s work and there’s work! And now, coming here:

“Where’s the guard?” His voice was a snarl, his eyes huge and furious as he dragged her from the bed. His automatic pistol was trained on Nathan.

Confused by sleep, Siggi tried to think. What time was it? She glanced at her watch, which was all she was wearing! A little after 4:30
A.M.
In another hour or so Perchorsk would be waking up. But Tzonov was already awake, fully awake.

“I
asked
you —” He shook her.

“I
heard
you!” She shouted. “I… I sent him away.”

Tzonov growled low in his throat and nodded. “Yes, yes of
course
you did!”

“Out there in the corridor, he was a … a
distraction
. I couldn’t work.”

“Work?” Tzonov looked Siggi up and down, sneering at her nakedness. “You couldn’t …
work
? Ha!” He drew back his hand and slapped her, hard, a backhander that sent her sprawling.

Nathan was awake now, starting up from the bed. His face was white as chalk, hands reaching. Tzonov turned his gun on him and snarled through clenched teeth: “Come on, show me how you Travellers fight for your sluts. Give me a reason to blow your guts all over the room!”