“No.”
“No?” Alice’s eyebrows lifted a good two millimeters—more an expression of polite inquiry than surprise.
“I could promise not to reveal to anyone born in this realm what you tell me next, provided it is new information to me.”
“Ah.” She considered that. “A reasonable caveat, I suppose. Do so.”
Lily said it all again.
“Very well. You and Cynna Weaver want very much to retrieve the children who will arrive here soon. You have undoubtedly made plans towards that end. I wish to assist you.”
Lily said nothing for a very long time. Then she told Alice what she wanted.
TWENTY-TWO
WHAT did you tell her? Rule asked.
Night had fallen. A single mage light hovered up near the ceiling of the cell, courtesy of their jailers. A lot of people here had enough of a Gift to float a mage light or two. Lily and Cynna sat on one of the blankets, huddled up so close an observer could have been forgiven for thinking they were lovers. “I said I required proof of her intentions, and that returning my weapon and ammo would make fairly solid proof.”
Cynna snorted. “Like that’s gonna happen.”
Lily had whispered her words as well as sending them along her mindsense. The whisper was for Cynna. Lily had decided to risk a very soft whisper now that she knew it was Fang who, through his translating charm, understood English. Well, Ah Hai might, but she slept in another cell, and neither she nor Fang had super-duper lupi hearing, and this way she only had to say things once.
Did she agree? Rule asked.
“She nodded as if she did, but she didn’t actually say so. My weapon hasn’t shown up yet.”
And did she say why she wanted to help you rescue the children? Rule asked.
“I asked, of course. It was like I hadn’t spoken. She went back to talking about her undergraduate days until Ah Hai returned with her clothes.”
Do you believe her?
“I don’t know.” Lily wondered if any of her frustration traveled along the mindsense with her words.
“Don’t,” Cynna whispered. “She’s one hundred percent with them. With the spawn.”
“I don’t know what she is,” Lily whispered/sent. “She baffles me. She didn’t seem to expect me to confide in her . . . not that there’s much to tell.”
We need to talk about that. You said you had a way to remove the magic cage they put on Cynna and then break out of the cell. Go over that in more detail, please.
Lily had reached Rule for the second time that afternoon after she returned from her bath, but only briefly. Kongqi had sent for her to talk about—rather unnervingly—the ethics involving the use of mind magic. He wanted to know how the sentient dragons saw the subject. At least, that’s what he’d said. She suspected he wanted to know what the dragons could do with mind magic, and maybe whether she could do any of those things. He continued to be very interested in how her Gift worked, how she sensed magic.
So she’d tried again after supper—and succeeded. Rule was in Liangzhou now, a city he thought was about seventy miles from the capital. Seventy miles was a stretch for her mindsense. Literally a stretch. It felt like that Silly Putty she’d played with as a kid, stretched almost to the breaking point, but she could do it. The toltoi seemed to help her hold the connection; she kept rubbing it. They’d talked long enough to catch up on most of what had happened with each of them. Long enough for her mind to start tossing out thoughts and spinning up longings. Or maybe the longings came from her body. She wanted him here, where she could touch him. It had been so long since she’d touched him.
Stupid mind. Stupid body. Never satisfied.
She told her mind sternly to pay attention as she explained how she and Cynna planned to bust out of jail when the time came. Next he wanted to know about the soldiers or guards. A Fist was an individual soldier, right? How many were there? How were they structured?
Not very well, she told him, and went on to outline what she’d learned. A headache was setting up shop at the base of her skull.
The Fists had a warrior ethos—their motto was “Loyalty, courage, strength”—but they weren’t really soldiers. There were no wars to fight here. They dealt with crime, fires, dangerous beasts, dragons, and pretty much anything else that posed a threat. It was a high-prestige job—but as in any prestigious position, nepotism was a problem.
A bigger problem was unique to the Fists: too many Indians, not enough chiefs. What they really needed, in her opinion, were some sergeants. Li Po, the First Fist, was top dog. The Fist Seconds were the officers; everyone else was just a Fist. Fists were grouped into squads and wǔshí, or fifties. Squads had gēgē—the word literally meant “elder brother”—squad leaders who functioned like corporals, but there was no one for the squad leaders to report to except their Fist Second. The chain of command basically forced Fist Seconds to act as their own sergeants.
Two Fist Seconds were stationed here in the capital. Fist Second Fang was in charge of the guards used to police Heart’s Home—the government complex—including all prisoners of the spawn. His brother officer, Fist Second Chen, led the guards who policed the city itself. The other Fist Seconds handled the guard detachments assigned to the magistrates. There were six fifties in the capital, four of them beneath the city’s Fist Second and two beneath Fang.
“. . . I’ve caught some hints that First Fist Li Po doesn’t work all that hard at his administrative duties, passing many of them on to his Fist Second here,” she finished. “I think there’s some friction between him and Fang. Li Po ordered Fang to guard me personally, which is stupid. Fang doesn’t have a proper second to handle everything he ought to be doing.”
So there are two hundred guards assigned to the city, a hundred to the government complex. Do the two guard contingents back each other up in case of emergency?
“That would be up to the First Fist.” Her headache was getting worse—a sign of depletion. “Rule, I’m not sure how much longer I can hold the connection.”
I’d better brief you on my plan, then.
He had a plan. Thank God.
She interrupted three times as he outlined it—once to exclaim “She can do that?” and later to say in disbelief, “Reno is their mother?” And then, heart aching: “Rule.” Just that. Just his name.
For much too long he didn’t say anything. Then he picked up again with describing his plan. She let him finish. When he did, she said very softly, “We’re going to talk about it. Not now, maybe. But we will talk about it.”
Cynna gave her an odd look. She hadn’t translated that part, not fully. Lily swallowed and went on more normally, “Your distraction puts a lot of innocents at risk. I don’t like that.”
Do you have another suggestion?
She didn’t, but . . . “What does Grandmother say?”