“Come on,” he said.
“Where are we going?”
“To the train station.”
Oilcan always loved watching the train coming into the station. The big diesel train rumbled up to the buffers with a growl that could be felt the whole way into his bones. The brakes hissed and cars lurched to a stop. For a moment, he was back in Boston, holding his mother’s hand, waiting to go on some special adventure. Down to the harbor to watch the tall ships unfurl their bright sails. To Boston Commons to feed the mallards gliding beside the swan boats. Out to the windswept bay islands to fly kites. Anywhere his father wasn’t drinking himself into a murderous rage.
Sometimes, his mother talked about getting on the train and just keeping on going. She kept their immigration papers for Elfhome in the zippered compartment of her purse, just in case they would ever need to flee to another world to be safe. Their ancestor had come from Elfhome, once upon a time, and they could always run back. They were both fluent in Elvish; it had been handed down through the family for generations. They used it as their secret language as they tiptoed around his drunken father. She’d get work translating, and they’d live with the grandfather he’d never met.
But they always went back home. Despite all his father’s weaknesses, she loved him, and that love killed her. Only after she was dead did Oilcan take the train to Elfhome.
And it was Merry holding his hand tightly. “It makes the most marvelous sounds.” She was nearly vibrating in place with her excitement over all the sights and sounds of the city. Her hands twitched as if she wanted to translate it all to music on her olianuni.
Laedin-caste royal marines in scarlet uniforms spilled out of the passenger cars like schoolkids on a field trip. They pointed up through the glass ceiling at the buildings that towered over Pittsburgh. They pointed out onto the street, where a hoverbike was passing a slow-moving van. They pointed at him.
“It’s a human. Look, Blaze, your first human.”
The soldiers gathered around Oilcan, creating a tall wall of red, to study him closely. In amazed exclamations, innocent of any contempt, they made comments on his short hair, his rounded eyes and ears, his T-shirt and blue jeans, and his obvious lack of any weapons. Perhaps because of their schoolchildren-like exuberance, Merry showed no signs of being afraid of the laedin-caste warriors.
“I thought they would all have guns.” A female lifted her shoulder to indicate the rifle slung over it. The rifles were fairly standard issue, not the magic-insulated ones that the sekasha carried.
“Are you sure it’s not an oni?” asked a male that seemed barely out of his doubles. “They said that the oni are disguising themselves as humans.”
“He is not an oni!” Merry gave the young soldier a slight shove, which made all the soldiers laugh and push the soldier themselves.
“Oni are tall, Blaze,” one of the officers stated. “And they tend to smell of vinegar.”
“I didn’t realize humans were so small,” Blaze said.
“Forgiveness, I’m considered fairly short for a human male,” Oilcan said in High Elvish. He didn’t want the incoming troops to think all tall humans were oni. He raised a hand over his head to indicate several inches taller. “Most human males are taller. Some are as tall as you are.”
“I’m still growing,” Blaze snarled in Low Elvish.
The young elf male got smacked in the back of his head by his officer.
“You speak the high tongue very well, child.” The officer gave Oilcan a slight bow that begged forgiveness.
Oilcan ignored the mistake about his maturity. He knew from experience that his height misled elves, but his true age would only reinforce the impression. “Thank you. Were there any Stone Clan on the train?”
There was a rattle of a drum toward the back of the train.
“Fall in!” the officer shouted, and the troops dutifully shuffled into formation. “No, child, there were no Stone Clan with us.”
The drum rattled again, and they marched out, shouting excitedly and pointing at the new wonders of the human city.
Until the war broke out, the trains had been run by Americans, mostly by necessity since the freight cars would roll directly off Earth onto Elfhome and back during Shutdown. The tight schedules, the hundreds of freight cars that needed to be linked into one long train, and the necessity to match up rails to the exact inch meant humans well familiar with technology ran the system while elves worked in apprentice-like positions.
Oni had infiltrated most of the human organizations in Pittsburgh, and the train was no exception. In the name of security, the elves had taken over the rail lines.
The station didn’t have a ticket booth, since tickets weren’t required to ride the train. It did have a staff of three elves in Wind Clan blue who looked seriously overworked.
Oilcan bowed to the eldest looking of the three. “Forgiveness, but can you tell me if any of the Stone Clan arrived in the last few weeks?”
The elf male shot a look at Merry and pursed his lips as if he’d tasted something sour. “It is not my duty to pay attention to the comings and goings of the Stone Clan.”
Oilcan locked down on his anger. All this bigotry was starting to really make him mad. “Just yes or no, did any other Stone Clan get off the train?”
“I don’t have to answer you, human.”
A black-tattooed arm suddenly flashed past Oilcan’s head with the speed of a striking snake. Thorne Scratch caught the male elf by the collar and slammed him hard up against the wall. “Yes,” Thorne Scratch rasped in her rough, scratchy voice. “You do have to answer him.”
Merry squeaked and backpedaled from the female sekasha.
“Holy one!” The elf cried, eyes going wide with fear.
“Answer him,” Thorne snapped.
“Yes! Yes, some Stone Clan arrived. They got off the train and left the station.”
“How many? When?” Thorne said.
“I don’t know,” the elf said. “One every few days for the last three weeks. Six or seven total.”
“Which was it?” Thorne snapped. “Six or seven?”
“I’m not sure. Let me think. There were the two olianuni players. The taunrotiki came first and a taunlitiki came just yesterday.” He meant Rustle of Leaves and Merry. “There were three taunrotiki. One nivasa with his soup pots all clanging and two other — I don’t know what they were. There were two — no — three taunlitiki before the olianuni player yesterday. One was in court fashion; I think she was a seamstress. One had the hands of a potter — she was the first to arrive. I’m not sure what the smallest taunlitiki was.”
Oilcan felt sick. The Wind Clan male was using the gender words for children instead of adults.
“They were all children?” Thorne cried.
“They looked young,” the male said. “Either doubles or just hit their triple.”
“And you let them walk out into a war zone?” Thorne said.
“They were Stone Clan,” the male said it as if it explained and forgave everything.
“No!” Oilcan cried as Thorne pulled her sword. “Holy one! Please don’t! You will only make things worse. Please.”
“He as good as gave those children to the oni,” Thorne growled.
“Killing him will only turn the others against the Stone Clan more,” Oilcan said. “This is for Wolf Who Rules. As viceroy, the protection of all the elves in Westernlands is his duty, not just those of the Wind Clan. Let him punish his own.”