Daniel pulled his second knife from its scabbard on his shin and scanned the water around him continuously as the rope pulled him backwards to the boat. He saw the reedrats coming, darting out to him from a marshy area along the shore. He readied his knives and waited. Suddenly a zat fired into the waters around him. It gave the hunters pause long enough for him to be hauled into the boat.
He was shivering violently when Teal'c and a dripping wet Sam pulled him over the railing. Reaction had begun to set in. The riverlions dealt some sort of poison in their claws. "Help me," Daniel said to Teal'c and used his friend to prop him up as he went below. He fumbled through the smallest of the chests where he kept the medicinal herbs and other medical supplies. With Teal'c holding him up, he stuffed some powdered herb in his mouth and handed a jar of salve to Sam who hovered next to them. "I'm about to pass out," he said, his speech already slurred. "Please clean the wounds and put this on them. If you can get any tea with that powder in it down me, it'll probably help. I'll be out of my head for a few hours, but just keep me from hurting myself and I'll probably be okay by morning." He sagged against Teal'c, the edges going black around his vision. "Tell Cam, drop anchor. I don't think he's up to sailing the boat in this weather and these waters."
The next he knew he was in the hammock. Sam had pushed a chest against the wall and was sitting on it, drowsing, propped against the planks. Cam slumped against the wall next to the porthole looking out. Daniel stirred weakly. His head was swimming and the taste in his mouth was indescribable. "How long?" he rasped.
Cam turned quickly from the porthole and took the two steps to his side. Sam jerked to alertness and shot up off the chest. "You're awake!" she said, relief plain in her voice.
"How long?" Daniel asked again.
"You were attacked yesterday afternoon. It's a little after dawn now," Cam answered.
Sam was checking his pulse, feeling his forehead, acting like Nurse Chapel. He brushed her away. "I'm just fine. We need to get underway. It's going to be hard to honor the terms of my contract."
"To…hell….with … that!" Sam said. "That thing could have killed you. No message is that important."
"They take contracts very seriously here. If I don't honor it, I am going to have some major work to do to reestablish myself."
"You won't need to…" Sam said hotly.
Cam cut her off. "We'll do the best we can to get there. I'm sorry about causing problems not trimming the sails. I was having too damn much fun, I guess. Didn't see the danger. Teal'c's up top watching out for things now so we don't get surprised by anything."
"Don't apologize. We get into a round of apologies and Sam and I will have you so beat with the things for which we need forgiveness -- you don't want to go there," Daniel said. He was struggling to sit up.
Sam made a small sound and left the cabin. "A little harsh, Daniel? What has she got to be forgiven for other than being a little over intense at times?"
"You really have no idea, do you? I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't fall over board on purpose to get attention." Daniel's hand went to his hair. It was smooth and combed. Someone had worked on him while he slept. "She do this?"
"You got to be a regular Ken doll," Cam said. "She cleaned you up, got you out of your wet things and into something else, with a little help from Teal'c. Then she worked on your hair, sniffling suspiciously the whole time."
"Did I say anything while I was delirious?" Daniel asked. There were so many things he could have said that would have given Sam encouragement he didn't want her to have. He still loved her despite not wanting to and he could well have said so.
"There was a lot of incoherent mumbling, I suspect in a lot of languages we don't know, including the main local dialect. The one thing I could understand was the name Carlos. You called out to him repeatedly, clearly in anguish. This guy was really important to you, I guess."
"I loved him," Daniel said shortly. He swung his feet over the side of the hammock and looked up to see Sam who had returned with a mug of something. She looked strangely upset.
"I thought some more of this tea might help you," she said and held out the mug.
"Thanks. Actually it will." He accepted the mug and drained it with a single swig.
He brushed past her to go up to the deck and watched while they hoisted anchor and set sail. He was willing to let Cam play sailor as long as he watched but there would be no more naps while they were under sail. It was late in the day before they reached little Karkach, slumbering in the summer heat. He might still be able to honor his contract since for their return, they would sailing downstream and the wind had shifted to be at his back. Business needed to be conducted swiftly so they could leave before dark.
He put the message packet in a satchel over a shoulder and took the bandages off his arm and hand. "What are you doing?" Sam immediately protested.
"If I'm walking around with riverlion wounds but no problems, my rep gets even scarier, but the bandage would look like weakness. My carefully cultivated image is what ensures the safety of my possessions when I'm not on my boat. Operating solo in this world is dangerous and I have to work at it. I ought to take on another partner, but I had to be at a place where I could put someone else in Carlos' place."
"Would it be weakness if we came with and watched your back?" Cam asked.
"No, but it would be good if at least one of you stayed with the boat. Normally I hire someone to watch my stuff."
"I'll do it," Teal'c offered.
"Thanks. Keep an eye out for Valentino. It wouldn't be like him to come after us in daylight, but he really hates me. He had ample time to get here before us. We shouldn't be more than a half an hour," Daniel said. He was already on the dock and moving toward the town's single tavern whose swaying sign identified it as 'The Riverlion.'"
Daniel looked at his companions as they walked. Cam wasn't particularly noticeable. Daniel was known and Cam looked like his brother. That would work. Sam was something of a problem. She was dressed as a man in loose cotton drawstring pants and close fitting cotton shirt instead of the long sleeveless shift worn by local women in the warm weather. It marked her as an adventuress, probably willing to do anything for a price. The men who had attacked her on the wharf hadn't been that far out of line by local custom. "Sam, we go in there with you dressed like you are, there's going to be problems. Surely you've noticed that there aren't many women who dress like that."
"I've seen some," she said defensively.
"Most, if not all, of whom were the local equivalent of prostitutes or at least not socially acceptable. Haven't you noticed the reactions you've been getting?"
Sam looked extremely uncomfortable. "So what do you suggest?"
"You and Cam need to act like you're together. Let them think that he's hired you for the night or made some other arrangement with you."
"Daniel," Cam said, "that would feel too weird. She's an officer under my command on this mission. I think she needs to act like your personal light skirt."
"Excuse me," Sam said. She looked rather affronted.
"Don't be that way, Carter. You know what I mean," Cam said. He was starting to look a little too amused by the entire situation to Daniel's way of thinking.
The upshot was that as they pushed into the tavern's gloom, Daniel had his arm around Sam. After initially appearing to be annoyed, she had decided to get into it more than Daniel thought necessary. As he stood waiting for the tavern keeper to look up from the glasses he was stacking, she pressed against his side and toyed with the drawstring of his pants.
The man continued to ignore him. At last Daniel said, his voice loud but polite, "I seek one known as Petras the Fat. "Can you direct me to him?"
"What would your purpose be? He's a decent man with a wife and little one and not the sort to go carousing." The tavern keeper, a tan, lanky man with a dyspeptic expression, looked with disapproval at Sam. He had, indeed, noticed them.
Daniel patted the satchel. "I bear a message from Jaqauin, the blacksmith at Inova."
"Who might you be?" came the next question. This fellow was born in the wrong place. The NID had a spot that he was supposed to be filling, Daniel thought grumpily.
"I am the boatman, Lodi of Enphata," Daniel answered patiently.
"The one they call Strider? I know of you, honorably won scar and all." He favored Sam with another withering glare. "A word of advice, Master Strider, don't mix business with pleasure. You'll end up with a disease or worse." He pointed across the room. "Petras is over there by the hearth." Daniel followed the tavern keep's finger and saw a rail thin man relaxed over a mug of ale next to the cold fireplace. It was entirely too hot for a fire.
They started across the room and were accosted by two inebriated men, one of whom crashed into Sam. "Hey, sweet stuff, I'll pay you double whatever he's offering," one said with a leer at Sam.
"She's much too taken with me to even consider it," Daniel said. He kissed Sam thoroughly and possessively. She staggered a little, blinking, when he finished.
"Hey, Strider," the tavern keep called. "When you finish with Petras, check with me. I think I just found a piece of work for you." He gestured at a newcomer who was standing close by.
Daniel nodded. When he turned back to the two men, one stammered, "You're the Strider, Lodi of Enphata?" He looked a little green.
His much drunker friend said, querulously, "Don't care what his name is. We can show her a better time."
The first man said, slowly and enunciating very carefully, "Pay attention, Bono, this is STRIDER like in the boatman who did the deed for the Margave in Hacinetta."
There was a sudden attempt to sober up. "We're so sorry. No disrespect intended." They were both backing away. "Really, sorry, very sorry." They turned and hurried out the door.
Mitchell and Sam, though unable to understand any words except for Daniel's names, had certainly understood the big idea. Daniel was getting a little of that zoo animal perusal again. He grabbed Sam's hand impatiently and towed her after him to the nearest empty table by the hearth. "The two of you have a seat. I'll be right back."
He went quickly to Petras who smiled warmly when Daniel told him his errand and handed over the message packet. "I can only read the odd word out of four," he explained and handed it back.
"Of course," Daniel said. Reading messages and writing responses where required was part of the service he provided. He extricated the message, leaned forward, and read it in a low voice into Petras' ear. Petras became very quiet. The message was serious. Daniel had known when he accepted it that he might himself be in trouble if the Margave's representatives found him carrying it. Although it wasn't treason, it was perilously close which would be good enough for the Margave. The boatman were bound to a code of conduct for this duty and sworn to keep what they carried in confidence, but many would not have accepted this message because of the unwelcome strain on their sense of honor. Daniel had offered to commit it to memory, but the sender wanted Petras to have it so that he could share it with others faithfully after Daniel left. There would be some who could read. The sender was willing to pay the extra charge Daniel demanded for a written message of this type, but allowed Daniel to simply commit the return message to memory. As Daniel finished, Petras looked anxious and twisted his hands. His eyes darted around the large room, half full of men and a few women at the trestle tables.
"My friend, there may be eyes on you," Daniel warned. "It would be well to act more as if this was a happy message. There if another in the packet, shorter than this one. If you are asked, show the shorter one. It says that your friend wishes you well and would like to invite you to visit him for the midsummer celebration next week. You should give me an answer to both messages."
Petras adopted, to Daniel, a rather unconvincing expression of conviviality. He chattered to Daniel a lot of nonsense about the midsummer celebration that made very little sense, but included acceptance of the invitation for himself and his little family. At last, Daniel stood up and bowed. As he leaned over in farewell, Petras gave him the short answer to the real message.
Daniel returned to his friends. "Let me check with the tavern keep as to the other work. I will undoubtedly turn it down if it doesn't fit with going straight back to Ivona with Petras' response."
He made his way to the tavern keep who seemed glad he had shed Sam. He gestured to a compact man, well but simply dressed, who leaned against his counter. "This gentleman is a traveler like yourself. When I told him you'd come up from Inova and were likely going straight back there, he asked me to make him known to you."
The stranger smiled and bowed. "I am Clovis, an agent of the Margave. I've had a problem with my transport and would like to gain passage with you back to Inova."
Daniel tried to look regretful. "It pains me to have to refuse for it would be an easy fee to earn and it meets well for a man to make a record of willing service to the Margave. You perhaps know that I have done so in the past?"
Clovis bowed slightly in acknowledgement. "You cannot, it seems, provide such service at this time?"
"I have one too many people on my boat already," Daniel said. "Another man in addition to the two you see with me. They hired exclusive use of the boat for simple business here in Karkach and must return immediately to Inova. I have already taken their money and," he laughed lazily, "other payment from the woman that I doubt you could match." He was very glad Sam couldn't have possibly overheard or understood if she had.
Clovis laughed. "Indeed. Respect for contracts is the basis for our law. I would not interfere with your fulfillment of your agreement."
Daniel signaled to Sam and Mitchell to join him and willed himself to stroll unconcerned from The Riverlion. The entire time he felt a crawling sensation in between his shoulder blades. It was a bit much of a coincidence for the Margave's man to beg passage when he had just carried a message that was not in the Margave's best interests.
Once they were out on an empty street, Cam asked, "When did you start channeling Aragorn?"
"Oh, the Strider thing?" Daniel blushed slightly, feeling a little as he had been caught playing pretend. "There's a real tradition of storytelling here so I sort of stole the Lord of the Rings and told it to Carlos. Carlos was much taken with the idea that I was like Aragorn during the years that he was known as Strider. He started calling me that, Jem and Tomas picked it up from him, and it just caught on."
"Something I've been wondering about Jem and Tomas," Cam said. "They were talking to you in trade, not the local language. Isn't that unusual?"
"They were originally from up the Little Drake and things are … less accepting there so they relocated to the Drake. Jem is fluent in the local dialect but Tomas has no gift for languages," Daniel explained.
There was no more conversation as they walked the rest of the way back to the boat and clambered aboard. Teal'c reported that he had seen no one. Daniel was glad Teal'c had not had to handle anything ugly on Daniel's behalf. He could feel the bounds of obligation tightening again to his old friends and knew with a sinking inevitability that he would agree to go back with them. The longer he put off telling them though, the longer he could be Lodi, free and divorced from Daniel Jackson who had ultimately failed to give him a happy life.
They pulled up the anchor and glided back out onto the river. Both moons would be out tonight and Daniel planned to sail until just before the Little Drake emptied into the Drake. They'd stand at anchor there until light. He stood at the helm and gloried in the wind, the soft sound of the waves, the beautiful sunset, and his own small world on this boat that tied him to Carlos, his late foster father, the only human who had unconditionally loved and accepted him since he'd lost Sha're.
He was pulled from his reverie by Sam's voice, asking softly, "I'm sorry Daniel but I have to ask you something. It's eating me up."
Daniel looked at her reluctantly. He had become so much of this world that her choice of man's clothes was erotic to him and he didn't want to think about her that way. "You can always ask."
"Did I hurt you so badly that I soured you on women and you fell in love with a man?"
Daniel wasn't processing this question. "Did … I … hurt … you … so … badly … that … I … WHAT?" He looked at her in disgust. "Carlos was my father in every way that mattered. MY FATHER. Not all relationships have to do with sex."
"Daniel, I didn't know. It never occurred to me it would be a father and son sort of thing. Jem and Tomas…"
Daniel secured the helm and turned to Sam. He took her face in his hands and gave her the most expert kiss he could come up with. He meant to make a point but he was quickly as much a captive of his demonstration as she was. She cooperated completely and grabbed his shirt with one hand and circled his waist with the other. It was an almost endless kiss, the kind of kiss that creates a world onto itself. Daniel was badly shaken when it ended and he released her.
He put his walls back in place as quickly as possible and asked coldly, "Did that answer your question about my sexual orientation?"
She looked at him mutely, her mouth swollen, and tears shining in her eyes. "I… I…" She gave up in the face of the remote expression on his face. She walked swiftly away and he heard her going down to the cabin. His riverlion wounds throbbed but it was the very least of the pain he felt.