Chapter Eleven
The crew of Crusade were rather pale and irritable the next day; not really a credit to Asturia. Baile in particular was sick as a dog and tended to respond with 'Why can't you for God's sake leave me alone?' to any question.
Serena stood on the bridge, wishing the sun wasn't so bright and trying to drink a cup of strong black coffee, which she detested, but which Gadeth claimed would make her feel better. She did not feel sick or headachey so much as heavily tired, with a sort of itchy tenderness inside her skull which suggested a headache was a definite option if she wasn't careful. Her mouth felt manky. Someone tapped her on the shoulder and she shuddered involuntarily before turning around; she was definitely not in a mood to be touched. Brother Ailo was behind her, smiling mildly and holding another steaming cup.
'You're actually introducing more toxins to your system,' he said. 'Try this, and also drink plenty of water for the rest of the day.'
Serena took his cup and looked into it dubiously.
'It's an infusion of herbs,' Ailo said. 'It should clear your head and stimulate your metabolism.'
'Martial arts, diplomacy and medicine too, hmm?' She took a sip of the infusion. It tasted like hot grass, but not in a bad way.
'Only in an amateur way,' Ailo said. 'One of those things everyone learns. As a matter of fact, it's considered a branch of diplomacy. We also use botanically-derived poisons on arrowheads. Sometimes poison and beneficial properties can be extracted from the same plant.'
Serena looked at him over the rim of the cup as she took another drink. It was hard to imagine him in a battle; he seemed like such a gentle person. Still, the same was true of many soldiers. It was something you turned on and off. Looking at Van in the last couple of days, mooching around looking worried and sulky, it was hard to connect him in her mind with the demonic enemy Dilandau had seen. But he really could fight like that. She hoped she would be able to do the same when it came to it. Her mind kept going back to how she had challenged Dilandau, how he had refused to really fight with her. If he hadn't killed himself, could she have done it? She was inclined to think not, and felt ashamed of herself; not that killing people was good, these days she could see Hamlet's point about that, but sometimes you didn't have the option of agonising about it. There could be enemies in Zaibach; she could have to defend her own life and lead the others in battle.
Brother Ailo suddenly put his hand on her shoulder, startling her. 'There is no harm in questioning yourself,' he said, 'but too much doubt will sabotage everything you try to do. I think you will find you cannot always be the gentle person you would like to think you are. Don't assume that none of the violence is your own.'
Serena stared at him, eyes wide. He's reading my mind.
'Well, not so much reading as watching,' Brother Ailo said, with a modest smile. 'Nothing too invasive. And, you know, I don't think you want to tell anyone about this. Nothing bad happened. You'll feel better soon.' He patted her shoulder kindly and left. Serena watched him go, wanting to say 'Didn't anyone else see that? Didn't you see what he did?' The words wouldn't come out. She told herself, very sensibly, that she should just drink up the grassy stuff and get on with the day.
Van was getting annoyed with Meruru. He hadn't known about it until they had to share a room, but in the last few months she had developed some quirks that were going to make her hard to live with. Foremost among these was a panicky fear that he would look at her when she was getting dressed in the morning. She ordered him to sit on his bunk facing the wall and cover his eyes until she announced she was ready, or else leave the room entirely.
'But I'm not dressed,' he complained. This hadn't been an issue last night because she had gone to bed earlier than he had, and was already asleep when he came in. 'I don't want to stand out in the corridor in my skivvies waiting for you to be finished. I'd look like an idiot and I'd be cold.'
'Well, sit with your eyes shut. I'll do the same for you.' She was still in her nightie, clasping her dress to her front like an extra protective layer.
'I don't care if you do or not. I don't have anything you haven't seen already. We've had baths together, for goodness' sake.'
'When we were tiny.'
'When did you become so modest, anyway? It used to be that anyone could see your furry little butt whenever you bent over, and you didn't care at all.'
The 'furry little butt' seemed to sting her. 'It's not being modest, it's trying to be mature.'
'I think it would be more mature to just let me get dressed at the same time and not worry about it so much. When you make so much fuss about it it makes me wonder if you've grown an extra tail or something.'
'You shouldn't be looking at me!' she snapped, hoisting the dress higher over her chest. It was still, after all, more of a chest than a bosom.
'I don't want to look at you, I want to be able to get dressed in the morning and if I happen to glimpse you it won't matter!'
Meruru glared at him. 'I'm going to sit on my bunk with my eyes shut, while you get dressed,' she said. 'Tell me when you're finished. Then you can go, and I can get dressed, and I'll have some privacy and everyone will be happy.' She sprang up onto the top bunk and put her nose against the wall.
'I know what it is,' Van said. 'You don't care about people seeing your body, but you don't want me to see your underwear.'
'Shut up!'
'That must be some amazing underwear.'
'Shut up!'
'Did you have to cut sort of buttonholes for your tail in the knickers, or could you get them ready-made like that?' He tweaked the end of her tail, which was hanging over the edge of the bunk. She twitched it away crossly. 'C'mon, Meruru, I'm just teasing you.'
'You think I'm just a silly little girl,' she said petulantly.
'Sometimes you are one,' he said. 'I thought you wanted to go back to how we always were. Don't you?'
'You don't usually tease me like that.'
'Maybe not that much. But you don't usually make as much of a fuss.'
'I don't know how I want to be,' Meruru said mournfully. 'It's easier being a little girl, and I have more fun. But soon I'll be too old for it and I was trying to get ready.'
Van stepped up on the edge of his bunk and hooked his elbows over the side of Meruru's, so he could talk to her better. She was still sitting with her back to him.
'Growing up does happen by itself, you know,' he told her. 'You don't have to try to induce it.'
'Would you like me better if I was more grown up?'
'I couldn't like you any better than I do. You're my best girl, remember?'
She gave him a half-smile over her shoulder. 'Go on and get dressed. After all, you're the one with a lot to do today.'
They entered Zaibach's airspace at three in the afternoon. Everyone had been getting increasingly tense as the day progressed, lest they should be challenged or outright attacked - previous expeditions had had problems that way - but there were no border patrols, not even any of the air pirates rumoured to be in the area. It began to look as though they would even reach the capital earlier than expected. The representatives met on the bridge of Crusade, or at least five of them did. Brother Arctu was on board Lion Rampant, engaged in a ritual of intensive prayer with a small group of helpers.
'What's the plan when we get there?' Van asked. 'Where are we going to land?' This had been left up to Serena, as the one with the most familiarity with the local geography.
'The Capitol,' Serena said. 'It's at the dead centre of the city. All the broadcasts used to be made from there and it's where most of the major laboratories were too - Lord Dornkirk's base of operations. People looked up and saw it a dozen times a day. Landing there will give us the most psychological impact. It's also where we're most likely to find useful materials and functioning machinery - I think people would be less likely to loot a place that was held in so much reverence. You've been there already - it's where you were held prisoner. It's a citadel as well as a centre of research and administration.'
'And what will we do there?' asked Brother Ailo.
'I thought we'd see about that when we get there,' Serena said. 'Is that foolish? We need to be adaptable. We should talk to whoever's there, if anyone - be friendly, but be prepared to defend ourselves and leave quickly if necessary. And if we can, we should establish a field HQ there. Move in. It's a very defensible position if our presence there annoys people. And, again, we'll be sending a strong message symbolically.'
'It sounds about right to me,' said Ailo. 'Will the first landing party be we representatives?'
'Naturally.'
'Not Meruru,' said Van. 'I don't want her to leave the ship until we're sure it's safe below.'
'I'd be all right if I was with you,' Meruru said.
'I just don't want to have to worry about you,' he said.
'Brother Arctu will probably not join us either,' Ailo said. 'I think four will be sufficient, in any case. We don't want to look like an invading army.'
It was getting dark as they approached the capital, though it was still only afternoon. Lights were on in some parts of the city, but others were very shadowy.
'The monorail isn't running,' Serena said, looking out the tall bridge windows. 'I wonder if the subways still work?'
'What are they?' Meruru asked, curious as always.
'It's hard to explain to someone who doesn't know what a train is either,' Serena said. 'They're transport systems. Public transport, run by the government. Most people don't have vehicles of their own, unless they need one for their work.'
'They must have really bright lamps,' Meruru said. 'Look at the windows. They're like stars, and they don't flicker.'
'Electric lighting,' Serena said. 'It's the same energy that makes lightning, but we can use it to power all sorts of things as well as lamps. There must still be generators running, even if the big wind farm is offline.'
'You can farm wind?'
'Sort of,' Serena said. 'There's technology in Zaibach that no-one's dreamed of in the rest of the world. Just a couple of centuries of totally concentrated effort, research and development, took it from a society a lot like Fanelia to an advanced, industrialised nation. And look where it got them.' She blinked sharply, almost as if trying to keep back tears. 'I'm hungry. Anyone else hungry?' Everyone said no. 'I'm going to see if I can find an apple or something.' She left the bridge.
'What's up with her?' Van asked.
'She gets a bit thingy about this sometimes,' Gadeth said. 'She just likes to be by herself when she thinks about things that upset her. She's fine afterwards. It'll help her pull herself together before we go down there. When we were staying by the sea, after the trial, she started thinking about her mother a lot. She just hadn't had a chance to do that before - think about how she died while she was away. For a few days, she'd go off by herself in the mornings, off round the rocks. So I'd spend the morning fishing, and she'd come back at lunchtime, we'd cook whatever I'd caught - she was a bit subdued, but not really depressed. She was just dealing with it her own way. After that she cheered up, and the rest of it was wine and roses. She still goes quiet sometimes and I think that's what she's thinking about. If she wanted to talk about it she would. So I just wait for her.' He had been looking down at the city while he spoke, and now he glanced at Van as though remembering he was there. 'That's probably more information than you wanted, of course.'
'Just so long as she pulls herself together,' Van said, 'it doesn't matter to me.'
'That's what she's doing,' Gadeth said. They watched as the blocky buildings of the capital slid by under Crusade's belly. They were proceeding slightly ahead of the larger ship while Lion Rampant brought up the rear.
We're going into the dark, Van thought.
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