"I don't have time to slow down, mother," he said bluntly. "I have to be ready before that army gets here."
"There's still no excuse for slapdash work," she pressed.
"It won't be slapdash after me and Jenna go and practice what we learned. My teacher is actually a very good one. It's not her fault that we have so little time."
"Well, I guess not," Triana admitted finally. "Given who she is, anyway."
Tarrin gave his bond-mother a surprised look. "You know who she is?" he asked.
She gave him an impatient glare. "Tarrin, do you think I don't feel every single thing that goes on around here? Do you even use a crumb of the Druidic gift inside you? I can feel it every time she shows up, and I've been observing you and your sister learning magic." She snorted. "Sarraya, what did you teach him, anyway?"
"Don't blame me," the Faerie said quickly. "I taught him only what he needed to know, because I didn't want to take any risks."
"I'll have to take care of that," Triana said crisply, looking at him. "I'll not have any son of mine running around with so much talent and so little training."
Jesmind gave him a knowing look and then grinned. She warned him that Triana would be eager to train him in Druidic magic. It certainly didn't take his bond-mother very long to put it on the table.
"I'm afraid that you'll have to get in line, mother," he told her smoothly. "I'm kind of taken at the moment. When I'm done there, I'd be happy to learn about Druidic magic from you."
"There's plenty of time," she said with a negligent wave of her paw, though he could sense the near-truth behind the words. She wanted to start now, but she knew that he just didn't have the time. "We'll get to it when we have a chance."
"Fair enough," Tarrin told her. "Are you busy today, love?" he asked Jesmind. "I'd like to take you out into the city and meet someone."
"Who?"
"Tomas, Janine, and Janette," he replied. "The family that took me in after I ran away from the Tower."
"I'd like to meet them," Jesmind said with a smile. "Especially the little girl."
"I want to go!" Jasana said quickly, closing the book and scrambling out of her grandmother's lap. She grabbed Tarrin's tail and looked up into his eyes, her expression pleading and simpering. "Oh please, please, can I go?"
"Of course you can go," he told her, reaching down and picking her up. "Sarraya wants to go too. Don't you, Sarraya?"
"I think I can find the time for it," Sarraya grinned.
"Did you meet Kerri yet?" he asked curiously.
"The Wikuni? Oh, yes," Sarraya laughed. "She's exactly as you described her. Cunning, sneaky, underhanded, willful, and thoroughly dangerous. I liked her immediately."
"I figured you would," Tarrin chuckled. "Well, I'm a bit hungry. Let's go get something to eat, then we can go visiting."
"I've already met them, so I'll pass," Triana told him directly, standing up and picking up the book.
"When was that?"
"When I first started looking for you," she replied. "I came here first, to get an idea of you. You were there for a while, so I went to see them."
"How did you find them?" he asked in surprise.
"Tarrin, how often are you going to assume that I'm stupid?" she asked in a cross manner.
"It's not that, mother. It's that I never even told you about them, and Jesmind didn't know about them. Nobody did but a few people, and none of them would have said anything. How did you find out about them?"
She gave him a flat look. "Cub, I'm a Druid," she said, a bit scathingly. "I walked down every path, every street, every passageway that you did when you were here. Those tracks led me to them, and then I talked to them." She closed the book with a loud snap. "I think I'd better go before I get insulted by my cub's lack of faith," she told him.
"She's been away from Thean too long," Jesmind whispered to him with a knowing smile.
"Watch yourself, cub," Triana said in an ugly tone. "If I remember right, a certain daughter of mine was crossing her legs and complaining to me about every five minutes about how she accidentally got herself all hot and bothered before her mate left, and then found herself left out in the cold."
Jesmind looked away from her mother, the slightest of flushes appearing on her cheeks.
Tarrin was amazed. Jesmind was almost blushing! He never thought he'd live to see that! But then again, even among Were-cats, to hear one's own mother say something like that was a trifle embarassing.
"Now then, as my cub so elegantly pointed out, I'm going to go have dinner with Thean," Triana announced, setting the book on the tea table. "I'll leave this here for you, kitten," she told Jasana in a gentle voice, very much unlike the rough way she always addressed her children. "We'll finish it tomorrow, alright?"
"Alright, Gramma," Jasana said with a bright smile. She was handed off to Triana after she reached for her, then was kissed and snuggled in a way that showed the world just how loving and warm Triana really was. But that break in her stony outward demeanor lasted only as long as Jasana was in her paws. It returned when she handed the child back to Tarrin.
"I'll see you later, mother," Jesmind called.
"Behave, all of you," Triana called as she cut short any further farewells by marching out of the room.
"Well, let's go see if my parents want to go," Tarrin offered. "They're good friends with Tomas and Janine. I think they'd really like to go see them."
"That's a good idea. Your mother's been teaching me how to cook things that you like, so it'll give me a chance to ask her a few questions about that recipe for venison stew."
After collecting up his daughter, he foisted her off on Jesmind and they split up. Jesmind went down to the kitchens to get something to eat, and Tarrin went to the apartment his parents had claimed, which was on the same floor as his own. But to his surprise, the only one there was Jenna. She was sitting on a couch in a room that looked almost exactly like the common room of his own apartment, though this one only had one couch and a rather large tea table separating the couch from the elegantly carved mantle and fireplace. She had that book in her lap, which she promptly closed as Tarrin entered the room. "Hullo, Jenna. Where are mother and father?"
"I have no idea," she replied, a bit curtly. "I think they went into the city. Alot of mother's clan is here, she may be visiting with them."
"Is Grandfather here?"
"Of course he's here, silly!" she snorted. "Who do you think brought us to Suld?"
"Why haven't I seen him?"
"He's probably been drunk ever since you got here," she told him bluntly. "You know how grandfather is."
Tarrin chuckled. That was true. It wasn't that their grandfather was a drunkard, it was just that he was like just about any red-blooded Ungardt ship captain. Work hard on the sea, play hard on the land. That was the Ungardt custom. That was why the Ungardt got roaring drunk every afternoon and caused so much trouble down at the dock quarter.
"Mother may have went to go dry him out."
"Probably. If you don't mind, could you leave? I'm at an important part, and I don't want to lose my train of thought."
"Oh, alright. Sorry to bother you."
Tarrin went downstairs and rejoined his mate and daughter, ate a quick meal, and then they were off. He wouldn't even bother trying to find Sarraya, there was no way he would ever find her. As usual, if she wanted to go, she would probably find him. It had been a while since he'd been in Suld, and most of those times were when he was sneaking around. He couldn't remember more than once or twice walking down the streets of Suld in broad daylight in his natural form. But the place certainly looked and felt different. For one, there weren't just Sulasians anymore. There had always been a few Wikuni in Suld, for it was a port city, but now Suld looked like a bizarre menagerie. Sulasian citizens were very nearly outnumbered by the Wikuni and Ungardt, the Arakites and the Vendari, even a few Selani walking the streets. All of the visitors were armed, some armored, and walked in groups of their own. The Arakite Legions especially; they seemed to not move around unless in a group of at least twenty. They all gave Tarrin and Jesmind a very wide berth, no doubt having been warned about the Were-cats. As much as the people on the streets looked different from what he remembered, it was the feel of them that concerned him. All the visiting soldiers were tense, wary, and the civilians looked downright terrified, scurrying about as quickly as they could in order to get off the streets and away from the multitudes of foreign soldiers that had taken up residence in the city. It gave the city the sense of it being occupied, the same way that the villagers in Aldreth felt when the Dals were there. Tarrin realized that they couldn't help it, for he had a good inkling that few of the foreign soldiers could speak much Sulasian. The language barriers presented by the various armies were formidable; the average Arakite only spoke Arakite, and most common Wikuni sailors knew some Sulasian, but he wasn't sure what their soldiers would know. Selani only spoke Selani, and Vendari spoke Wikuni as well as their own sibilant language, but again he doubted that they knew much Sulasian. Tarrin had never gotten around to learning Wikuni. Denai hadn't known that language, and besides, she'd spent all their free time teaching him Sharadi, the accepted common language of the southern continent of Arathorn. Why a Selani would be fluent in a language she would probably never used still mystified him a little bit, but the Selani were like that sometimes. That inability to communicate certainly made things a little tense. And he wondered how it was going to affect the ability of the command staff to pass down orders. From what he'd heard from Keritanima, Darvon, the overall commander, was being advised by an Arakite Field Marshal, a Wikuni admiral, a Wikuni general, the colonel in command of the Sulasian garrison in Suld, the general of the Sulasian army appointed by the sitting regent, and probably the most meddlesome, the Keeper and Keritanima. And they'd be joined by a Selani, probably the clan's chief, who stood as general in times of war. Tarrin didn't doubt that the Arakite and the Wikuni spoke Sulasian, but the Selani may not speak Sulasian, needing an obe to act as his translator. The different languages were going to make sending orders tricky when the fighting started.