Shielded from the priestess, Baufent offered Caliph an elevated eyebrow.
“Taelin? Can you excuse the doctor and me for just a couple of minutes? I want to talk to her about my injuries.”
“Sena healed you.” Taelin beamed. She giggled softly and sauntered toward the door. “But that’s fine. I know you want to talk about me.” She blew him a kiss and then the curious octagonal portal slid shut.
As soon as she was out, Baufent exhaled. “She’s lost her blessed mind. Completely. She practically worships your…” An awkward moment. Baufent’s face was deeply lined. “Anyway, I have to admit, I’m starting to wonder whether I should join her church.”
The humor was so dry that neither one of them smiled. Caliph was looking at his hand. The stitches were gone. There were no scars or traces of injury.
“Look, I’m sorry you’re here. I know you didn’t want to come—”
“Of course I didn’t want to come!” Baufent yelled at him. “Do you realize where I am? I’m fourteen hundred miles south of where I should be. Fourteen hundred!”
“I know. We’ll get you on a ship headed for Stonehold—”
“There aren’t any ships.” Baufent’s voice was a chisel. She chipped her words directly from his optimism. “Did you not look at the streets? When Ku’h said only some of them were left, he meant it. There isn’t anyone in Bablemum. There are no flights out of here!” Her cheeks sagged but her eyes looked bright and young and pleading.
Caliph couldn’t reassure her so he changed tack. “What did Sena do while she was here?”
“You think that’s going to help us figure—”
“I want to know!” he barked. “What happened while I was asleep?”
“I already told you.”
“Tell me again.”
Baufent glowered. “They had me in a cell. The Iycestokians I mean. Lady Rae let me out and told me you needed a doctor. We were on our way to the cockpit to tend to you when Sena walked onto the deck. She’s the one who fiddled with the controls.”
“How did she get on board?”
“The same way we all saw her leave the ship in Sandren. She just walked clean out of the sky!”
“And she left the same way?” It sounded stupid but he wondered if Baufent might have seen her go into the city.
“I didn’t see her leave. All I know is that she took the Iycestokians with.”
Caliph noticed for the first time how quiet the ship was. He remembered the silver arms flailing, the hands pawing at him. “So there’s just the three of us now?”
“As far as I can tell.”
“And you never spoke to Sena?”
“No.”
Caliph found it hard to believe, but the fear on Baufent’s face as she remembered the event was clear.
“Sena talked to Taelin. I stayed away. They moved you into the room over there.” She waved her hand toward the place he had woken up. “Then the ship started moving. I came back to find out what was going on and Taelin said we were headed for Bablemum.
“I assumed she was delusional but she wouldn’t let me give her anything to calm her down.
“Anyway, that’s pretty much it. Shortly after that I realized Sena was gone and so were the Iycestokians.”
“Did you check the cockpit?”
“I looked in. I’m not a pilot. I didn’t dare to touch anything.”
“And you said we arrived here last night?”
“That’s right. We drifted in low, through the trees. Ku’h showed up right away. Said he’d seen us coming from a lookout in one of the towers. He basically showed up and said hi, then left and didn’t come back until this evening. That’s when I came and got you.”
“Did he say he wanted anything?”
“He’s offering us dinner,” said Baufent. “Which I’d like to take him up on. We’re down to a few canned goods in the kitchen.”
Caliph was hungry too but he remained thoughtful.
“So,” said Baufent. “Are we going? To dinner?”
“Indeed,” Caliph mumbled.
After half a minute of silence Baufent asked, “What are you going to do?”
Caliph looked at her. She was powerful and fierce, defiant of her own lack of options.
“I’m going after Sena.” When Baufent didn’t reply he offered a few qualifiers. “It’s all I have left. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Sigmund’s dead. Alani. So many people.”
“Well can you at least get me fed before discarding me for your silly quest?”
“I’m not discarding you. What else do you want me to do? What makes sense? I couldn’t have planned for this. How the fuck could I have planned for this?” He saw the truth of it register in her face. He saw her regret her words. “You can come with me,” said Caliph. “Or you can do whatever you think is best. I’m not your king anymore. I’m not a pilot either. I can’t fly us back home.
“I just need to understand what happened. How everything turned upside down. Even if it kills me.”
“Again?” Baufent asked.
“What?”
“Even if it kills you again?”
He studied her face for cynicism but she was unreadable. “You really believe that?” he asked. “That my organs are in jars back in Stonehold?”
Baufent pawed the side of her face, a combination perhaps of pensiveness and nervous tic. “The organs you were born with? Yes,” she said. “Yes I do.”
CHAPTER
46
Sena stood at one of Ulung’s many inroads, waiting for the Veydens. The flawless did not guard the borders to their empire. Those who stumbled in were presumed swallowed by the sewers.
You ate here last summer, said Nathaniel.
This particular gateway to Ulung was located in a cistern beneath one of Bablemum’s restaurants, not far from where the airship had moored.
“Yes,” she said. Despite her eternal lack of hunger it was true.
You made your pact with the flawless here?
“Yes.”
I don’t doubt they greedily accepted your terms. But you don’t need to be here. You don’t need to fulfill your promise to them. I’ve been infinitely patient, he said.
“Patient, is it? Not desperate?”
I’m far from desperate.
“So it seems. You just returned from the ocean … I’ve been wondering—”
Why isn’t the High King dead? Why are you delaying the ink?
“When I need ink I’ll have it, Nathan.” He hated when she called him that. “But I’ve been wanting to ask you something—”
Don’t try to turn this around.
“Why did you send me to Soth—?”
For my daughter. And the pimplot—
“That’s a lie. You never loved your daughter. You saved yourself in that garden twenty thousand years ago—”
You know nothing.
“I think we could have found a substitute for the pimplota seed, don’t you?”
I don’t know. You’re the one going to the jungles. You’re the one who wants to do everything with exactness—
“The platinum wires. The rubies? You actually tried to use stones. You’ve made mistakes. But I don’t think you could have really believed—”
So you think my journals are a fabrication …
“Yes. An impressive fabrication.”
You know the number is two, don’t you? I knew it when you came back from the Chamber. Who are you planning to take instead of me? After the ink is made, who will you take? Who?
“I’m taking you.”
Lie! Who?
“It’s you Nathan. Who else can I take? If I don’t want you to sabotage the glyphs? I have to choose you, don’t I? Isn’t that what you’d do?”