CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: A Most Honorable Man

"Do you know what it feels like to drown?" Ling Kray asked, in a low voice, when he was alone with Arwen in the cavern.

"No, I don't." Arwen shuddered, even though the small cook fire provided quite a bit of warmth as well as light. They had all eaten a few of the tasty blind fish that swam in the underground river, and then Captain Tamara had gently lifted the sleeping Prince Kassim and carried him off to rest. And now the beautiful daughter of Elrond found herself alone with a dangerous pirate who had come back from the dead!

"When you feel life slipping away," Ling Kray said quietly, "there's a sort of sadness. You see all of the harm you've done, and realize that you really never meant to be that sort of person. Only it's a little too late to make any changes."

"Well, it's not too late for you," Arwen said briskly. She didn't like to think that Ling Kray might have a conscience after all. The bronzed warrior was still just a lawless pirate! Arwen pushed aside the heated memories that made her squirm. "The frog-creatures saved you from that unspeakable beast of a thousand fathoms – I guessed that already. But how did you make your way here, to Zin Zaraboob? And why?"

Ling Kray gave her a crooked smile. "Technically, daughter of Elrond, you are still my slave. Somehow I couldn't bear the thought of anyone damaging my property, and so I set out alone across the desert to find you."

"How heroic," Arwen muttered, in a bitter and snarky tone. The idea of Ling Kray claiming her after all this time was enough to make her blood boil. He couldn't just carry her off on his pirate ship again. Didn't he realize she was a lady?

"I suppose you forced Captain Tamara to show you the way to Zin Zaraboob," she accused, sitting up straight and pushing aside her thick jet-black hair. The damp air of the underground cavern made everything feel sticky and heavy.

"Not exactly," the pirate replied. "You see, when I hit the desert and came to the first oasis, I found the black captain lying wounded and unconscious in the sand. It seems she'd had an argument with one of the other elite female warriors."

"It must have been that cruel blonde, Captain Gwenna." Arwen remembered Gwenna only too well. She was getting interested in the story in spite of herself. "So then, you found Tamara, and you made your way here across the desert?"

Ling Kray shook his head. "No, the captain was too badly hurt to travel, so I picked her up on my shoulders and carried her back to the swamps. I thought the Frog Children might be able to heal her, the same way they revived me after I nearly drowned in the grip of that giant underwater creature."

"And did they?" It was a foolish question, but by this time Arwen was engrossed in the story and hanging on every word. How brave Tamara was, fighting the evil Gwenna – and how unexpected of Ling Kray to carry a stranger all that way on his shoulders! "The Frog Children must truly love you," she blurted out. "I mean, they gave us a feast, and they helped Tamara, so they must see you as . . . well, a most honorable man." For some reason she began to blush.

The pirate nodded. "They are strange creatures," he said, stirring the twigs in the fire with the toe of his boot. "No other tribe has ever accepted me as they have. Humans call me a pirate, a raider . . . and a despoiler of unwilling women." He flicked a grin at her. "You know the truth of that charge."

"A moment ago you mentioned having a desire to change," Arwen reminded him crisply. "But what about the Frog Children? Did they heal Captain Tamara out of love for you? I know there's been bad feeling between the swamp creatures and the warriors of Queen Zuleika in the past."

"Ah, this is where the story gets interesting." Ling Kray leaned towards her. The firelight picked out the stark beauty of his lean visage, emphasizing the sharp lines of his cheekbones and the mysterious gleam in his slanting dark eyes. "You may not know this, gentle elf-lady, but there is a vast underground river beneath the desert. It connects the swamps to the city of Zin Zaraboob. Now, when the Frog Children healed Captain Tamara, they offered to guide us along the dark river, so we could approach the city unseen and without having to trek across the desert. But in return they wanted my pledge to help with the rituals of breeding."

Arwen was almost afraid to ask. "Well, exactly what kind of help would the Frog Children need with breeding?"

Ling Kray surprised her again. He didn't come back with a lewd, teasing remark. It was evident that he took his bond with the frog people quite seriously. "For quite some time, the southern swamps have been slowly drying up. It's nothing you and I would notice, but the miri-squaramiri, the Frog Children, they sense it. And they need a place to breed. And so I gave my promise to help them reclaim these ancient caverns, here beneath the city of Zin Zaraboob."

"Well, I doubt Queen Zuleika will ever approve of that," Arwen frowned. "That's why you helped me rescue Prince Kassim, isn't it? You don't care at all about Zin Zaraboob – you want to put him on the throne to make things better for your web-footed green friends!"

"I think having Kassim on the throne will make things better for everyone," Ling Kray replied. "Surely the Lady Galadriel felt the same way. Why else did she send you on a diplomatic mission to these parts in the first place?"

The pirate had a point. "Well, I don't see how anyone can stop you if swarms of frog-creatures come pouring out into the streets of the city," Arwen said wryly. "But I do think the human inhabitants have a right to be told! Are you going to keep me chained up in the dark until the eggs all hatch? There must be thousands of them lying here in the caverns!"

"That is true," Ling Kray told her. "Only they won't hatch for another two weeks at least. And now that the young prince has gone missing, there's always the danger that Queen Zuleika will order her evil minions down into the caverns, to seek us out and destroy us."

Arwen shuddered. "If Zuleika knew what was brewing down here, she'd destroy all of us this instant – starting with me!"

"She must never know," Ling Kray said firmly. "And that is why you must return to the surface at once, before another minute passes."

"Are you mad?" Arwen scrambled to her feet in panic. Yet it was ridiculous to run – where could she go except deeper and deeper into dank caverns filled with slimy creatures? Her stumbling steps tapered off, and she sagged against a rocky ledge in total despair, hiding her face in her hands.

Ling Kray's low voice buzzed in her ear, the sound as soothing and reassuring as the strong arm around her waist. "Brave Lady Arwen, only you can buy us the time we need. You must keep the evil queen from getting suspicious."

"But how can I explain what I was doing down here all afternoon?" Arwen lifted her tear-stained face and looked at the pirate directly. Did he really think she could pull this off?

"The guards never actually saw you, did they? And you said you came down through a trap door. No one even knows you left your room. All you need to do is go back up the way you came, and act as though you spent the whole afternoon relaxing in your chambers. They'll believe that, won't they?"

"They might," Arwen said doubtfully, rubbing her eyes. "But the evil queen will certainly know if her prisoner is missing!"

"But don't you see? That's a good thing." Ling Kray produced a colorful scrap of cloth and began drying her tears. His touch was amazingly gentle, yet it sent shivers of awareness right down to her toes. "The lower levels are feared by the city dwellers above. They will most likely think that some horrible monster from the deep killed the guards, and the prince, and then vanished into the underground river. I'll get the frog children to help me pry open the bars, and slime up the empty cell a little, too, after you've gone upstairs."

"M-maybe Queen Zuleika will believe Kassim was taken," Arwen sniffled. "Maybe she wanted that to happen all along." The beautiful elf-maiden suddenly realized that she trusted Ling Kray. His plan was madness, but he was counting on her to make it work. Arwen was astonished at how much that meant to her.

And of course, she was also astonished when Ling Kray kissed her. Danger and doubt were extinguished instantly. Heat and pleasure spiraled through her in ever-widening waves of sensation. There was nothing quite like being kissed by a dangerous pirate, Arwen thought. All she wanted was more. The worrying could wait till later.