"Bats?" Ufalla asked, looking at Jestia in disbelief.
"Yes, Ufalla bats. Don't you see? That's the answer. Bats!" she said, trying to catch her breath.
"Jestia what in hell's name has gotten into you!?"
"I was having climax and then suddenly I was thinking about what Jazel said and . . . "
"You think while we're making love?!" Ufalla asked, a bit put out.
"Not on purpose, but thoughts float in, they float out." She kissed Ufalla on the lips then pushed her away and got out of bed. She turned to look at Ufalla and gave her a look that said why don't you understand anything and then once again as if it explained everything said, "Bats, Ufalla, bats. I can't make bats."
"All right."
"Come on we have to go tell Tarius."
Ufalla didn't want to get up and go wake the Great Leader up—or worse—in the middle of the night to tell her that Jestia couldn't make bats.
"Can't it wait 'til morning?"
"No."
"Why do I have to go?"
"Because I miss you when you aren't with me, now come on." She started for the door.
"Shouldn't we at least put on robes?"
* * *
She and Jena were just enjoying some alone time in the spring when Jestia and Ufalla walked up.
"Here first," Tarius said, as Jena tried to hide her nakedness by wrapping herself more firmly around her.
"Are you finished?" Jestia asked with a wry smile.
"Just," Tarius said, and Jena slapped her. "Seriously girls we'd just like to be alone."
"We aren't here to use the spring," Jestia said.
"No," Ufalla said pulling a face. "We're here so Jestia can tell you insane things concerning bats."
"That's right, Tarius, bats," Jestia said, as if anyone who heard it would understand and Tarius feared the spell had done the girl a bad turn after all.
"Bats?" Jena asked, taking the word right out of Tarius's mouth.
"Tarius, I can't make bats," Jestia said with wild hand gestures.
"I'm sorry?" Tarius said with a shrug, looking at Ufalla who just shrugged back.
"Oh don't you see? It's a summoning spell. They had to come from somewhere, and they were there so fast and there were so many it had to be close, and bats live in . . . "
"Caves," Tarius said with sudden realization, feeling suddenly cold even though she was submerged in the hot springs water. She looked at Jestia who was nodding her head excitedly. "The Amalites really have gone underground. They are living in caves."
"Why didn't you just say caves, Jestia?" Ufalla said, slapping Jestia on the shoulder hard enough to rock her whole body. Jestia shoved her back and Ufalla laughed at her. "Can we go back to bed now?" Jestia nodded took her hand and started following her, "And for the record Jestia, I'd rather you cried out an old lover's name than 'bats!' when we are making love."
"Oh, I seriously doubt that," Jestia said.
Tarius laughed at their antics and then her mind turned to what she had said.
Caves, I can't imagine trying to fight a battle underground. We could smoke them out but . . . How would we have any idea how many of them we would face, or where they might come from? They might just boil out of the ground under our feet.
"Don't worry about it now," Jena said, and Tarius smiled at her.
"When should I worry about it Jena?"
Jena gently kissed her lips and pulled her closer and whispered, "Not right now."
* * *
Tarius sat looking at the girl feeling like a total idiot. If the girl woke up and she told them she hadn't been aware of anything then Tarius was really going to feel stupid but the only way she could get her son to leave to do anything besides sit in the chair beside the girl's bed and watch her breathe was to promise to tell the girl a story.
She looked around to make sure that no one was close because perhaps the only thing that would be more embarrassing than telling a story to an unconscious person would be to have someone catch you doing it.
She told her a story about Jabone when he was a boy. Then her son wasn't back which she thought was a good thing but she didn't feel like telling another story.
"So, Kasiria, you're a Sword Master trained in the academy, a sergeant even. Tell me what do you think of a battle in a cave?. . Oh aye that's what I said a cave. That's why there are so many of them, yet no one knew they were growing, no patrols found a single sign of them . . . Oh good question, what about fire? They'd need fire to make weapons, to cook, for warmth because caves are cold. There would be smoke . . . Aye, you're right, if they made fires only at night you couldn't see smoke in the dark only flame and if their fires are in the cave you wouldn't see them . . . You're a clever girl . . . "
"Tarius," Jena said from the door, making Tarius jump. "What are you doing?"
"Talking to our daughter-in-law."
"Yet telling her a story makes you feel silly," Jena laughed.
"The girl has uncanny insight," Tarius said with a smile.
"Which means she can't disagree with you."
Tarius smiled, "Maybe she's just a good listener which is more than I can say for you, woman." Jena shook her head. Tarius looked back at Kasiria. "So where were we when we were so rudely interrupted? Well no she doesn't much care for you but she hasn't really given you a chance yet has she?" Jena laughed and walked away. "I thought she'd never leave. Anyway about those caves . . . "
* * *
Jabone had eaten and then gone to find Ufalla. She was sitting on the front stoop of the inn drinking a mug of tea.
"Where's Jestia?" he asked.
"Studying with Jazel at the moment," she said.
"Ufalla . . . Are you still mad at me?" he asked carefully.
"I had planned to be mad for quite a long time but Jestia forbade it. These days I only do what she wants me to do, because it's just easier that way." She looked at him and smiled and he relaxed.
"I really didn't know. She didn't say it was dangerous for her, Ufalla," Jabone said. "If I had known . . . "
"You would have made her do it anyway, and then I really would have been mad at you," Ufalla said and added soberly, "Jestia's fine so it would be stupid for me to be angry." Then she smiled. "At least I've been told that's what I think."
Jabone smiled.
"So Jabone, you and I, we found the great loves we wanted but they certainly aren't what we thought they'd be, not with Kasiria in the state she's in and Jestia . . . well being Jestia."
"My madra said you are getting married?"
"So I've been told, and what I'll wear and what I'll say. She's basically planned out the whole of my life except for a little block of time between the morning meal and midday three years seven months and two days from now. She's already named our kids. There are going to be three of them—two boys and a girl—and I'm going to carry them because she's too small and delicate to do it. Apparently they will be born through a spell because she can't stand the idea of anyone but her touching me. Oh, and I will take care of running the spa and taking care of her herb gardens and maybe train some of the locals to sword fight. On and on and on, she talks constantly."
"Would you change her?" Jabone asked with a smile, because even as Ufalla was complaining she had a smile on her face you couldn't have peeled off with a trowel.
"No not at all. It's not like I didn't have any idea what she was like when I fell in love with her. She certainly isn't boring," Ufalla said with a laugh. "This morning we went on a walk through the streets of Montero just because it was a lovely morning and of course Jestia wanted to. And we're just walking around holding hands, looking at the flowers and the gardens and the springs and she picks out this spa with a lovely flower garden and she says that's where we're going to live. Did you know that Jestia just has all sorts of coin? And . . . Well you see that little tile roof that you can just make out through the trees?" Jabone nodded. "That's our house. The people who run the spa now are going to continue to do so until we get back from the territories."
"You're going back there?" Jabone asked in disbelief.
"Yes, Jestia says we must go back with your madra."
"My madra has already made plans to go back?"
"Yes," Ufalla said, and it was obvious that she not only thought he knew already but that she didn't understand why he was so upset. He turned on his heel and went back into the inn with Ufalla screaming after him, "I'll just talk to you later then."
He went right back to his room and found his madra there telling Kasiria a story which he interrupted when he yelled, "You are going back to the Jethrikian held territories!"
"I must."
"No," Jabone said shaking his head. "You don't have to go. None of us have to go back there. Finally let that coward Persius stand on his own feet and fight his own battle. The Amalites are not here, they are not even in the Kartik-held territories. It was his job to make sure they were never allowed to rise up again and he has failed. Now those things eat his people, but there is no reason, none at all, for them to eat our people."
"Jabone, calm down, the girl . . . "
"Kasiria, Madra, her name is Kasiria, and you know as well as I do that we can't wake her." Jabone's voice now caught in his throat. "You saw them, you fought them, and as always there is no fear in you. But I am not you and I do fear them. I don't want you to go back there and drag my mother and my fadra and my friends with you into a battle with those things, because I don't want to go back there. I never want to go back there and if you all go then I must go, too, or be forever seen as the greatest coward that ever lived."
His madra stood up then and walked over to him. She reached up and took his head in her two hands and made him look at her. "You are wrong. There is much fear in me. That is why I have to go and fight them, because it was not in battle that my whole pack was slaughtered, my madra killed, but here at home when we thought we were safe. Then even after that a time did come when I felt safe again and then they killed my father in the Jethrik. I was not afraid. I felt no danger until it was too late and then . . . Well I killed many of them but some had gotten away because I never found my father's sword. They killed my father and they took his sword. And from that day on I have known fear. I am so afraid that I will not, I
can
not, sleep when a threat such as this one is over us all. Not because I'm brave or even because I love to fight, but because I'm afraid. If you don't want to go then you shouldn't go. I don't want you to go. I don't want your mother to go but I know that she won't be left behind because we have had that fight before. No man would dare to call you a coward, not if he had seen you as I did that day." She pulled his head down to her and kissed him on the forehead then she released him. "Put it out of your head for now and just be here for Kasiria. For now your battle lies in your heart and I know from experience that you can not think when your heart is broken."
He watched her walk away and went to sit beside Kasiria. He looked down at her and said, "My madra lies; she isn't afraid of anything, and if no man would dare to call me a coward it's only because they fear she would kill them if they did. You would go, Kasiria, if you wake up. I know you will go unless I force you to stay here. Maybe she's right and if you wake up and are fine and I can have even two minutes where I don't think you are going to die my courage will come back, but right now I don't want to be brave."
"Quit saying
if
she comes back and say
when
, ninny," Jestia said as she walked in the room. She walked over and administered the potion as she had been doing three times a day since that first day back on the ship.
"Jestia, you want to go back to the territories?"
She smiled at him as she put the now empty vial back in her pocket. "I think
want
might be going a bit too far.
Must
is a little closer to the truth. Could you quit frowning?" His effort to do so made her make a face and then laugh at him. "So I'm guessing the answer is no then."
"Jestia . . . do you think . . . is she getting better?"
"It's only been a day since she was cut. It's hard to say and I haven't seen the wound. Frankly I wouldn't get up if I was her. I mean she's bound to you and you're such a pouty, whiney, way-too-serious man. I mean you were always too serious but now, all this crying and carrying on like a big sissy, well it's just really unbecoming, Jabone. That's all I'm going to say."
"Oh I some how doubt that," Jabone said, and smiled in spite of himself.
"Oh so you are still in there somewhere. I was beginning to think that maybe we actually lost our friend in the territories and brought home some whining mama's boy by mistake."
"Jestia, have you seen my fadra today?"
"He is in the spring," she answered.
"Will you stay with Kasiria while I go talk to him?"
Jestia sighed. "Arvon will never be able to change Tarius's mind, Jabone, and no one needs to stay with Kasiria."
"Will you stay with her 'til I get back anyway, Jestia?"
"Yes, but do hurry back. She is boring company on her best days and these days even more so."
Jabone got up. As he walked out the door he heard Jestia start to sing to Kasiria and suddenly realized just why Ufalla was and always had been so in love with her.
Jestia just acts like she doesn't care but it's not what her actions indicate. She risked everything to try to save Kasiria. It's all just talk and when it's just Ufalla and her I doubt she talks such crap. She really is as extraordinary as Ufalla thinks she is.
Jabone walked to the spring where he found his fadra submerged up to his neck in the hot mineral water. Jabone walked up to the edge of the pool, took off his boots, pulled up his pants legs, and sat down next to where his fadra was in the pool, letting his legs dangle in the hot water.
"What?" Arvon asked with a smile, not opening his eyes.
"Fadra you must talk to my madra. She will pull us all back to the territories to fight the Amalites."
His fadra sighed. "I have little sway with Tarius you know that son. Besides, she has to go back. The Amalites must not be allowed to grow to power again. Their religion is nearly eradicated even among the Amalites left in the territories, but this could bring it all back. We can't risk that; they must be stopped now."