Diamond was on top of Elata, and then big hands pulled him up.
Father had grabbed him.
“You’re all right,” said Diamond.
Father cursed. He looked tearful, touching himself, sure that he would find blood. Except he was fine, and Tar`ro was on the floor, alive, and so was Master Nissim. But the harpooner was in two big pieces, and part of his head was missing. Two other crewmen were dead, another man had one leg, while the young man who flew with Father was cut through the middle and noisily bleeding to death.
Fret called out to somebody.
“You saved us,” Seldom said weakly.
Diamond needed to walk. His legs wanted to walk.
Elata came up to him. She was hunting for words, but she saw Fret on his back with his pink insides sliding out, blood coming faster each time his heart pumped. Then she backed away again.
Karlan ran from somewhere. Stepping in front of Diamond, he carried a long crowbar in both hands. The giant seemed unsure who needed to be hit, but he was angry. He was wild and furious and ready for any good battle. Maybe he considered battering the corona’s little boy, but there wouldn’t be any satisfaction there. So he settled on striking Diamond on the shoulder, just enough to make him ache, saying, “Stay behind me. I’ll protect you, you little shit.”
A second whiffbird had appeared, hovering just beyond the shop door.
More papio shouted in at them, demanding that every gun was tossed to their wood-loving feet.
Master Nissim stood beside Karlan.
Tar`ro stepped in front of both of them, his pistol held high, as if ready to shoot the ceiling. Then to Karlan, he said, “If you think you can drop that ship with a piece of iron, do it. Go on.”
“I might,” Karlan said, almost laughing.
“Drop the bar or I’ll shoot you here,” Tar`ro said. “Otherwise, they’ll kill everybody and let one of us heal.”
“Yeah,” said the giant boy. “That’s what they should have done to begin with.”
Father was kneeling, holding Fret’s pale hand.
The crowbar hit the floor, and then with an underhand motion, Tar`ro tossed his gun toward the open air.
Bountiful had stopped climbing. Diamond felt it hovering, and after a few moments it began to drop, another pair of whiffbirds settling on top of its frame.
Fret said, “This.”
Father asked, “What?”
Diamond stepped around the blood. The man ate fruit today, chewed pieces showing inside the opened stomach. Fret looked sick but calm, weak but not quite uncomfortable. Life meant pain, but he was gone from life in too many ways, and Diamond studied his face and the open mouth, waiting for his father to tell him to not look, to back away.
Father did nothing of the kind.
The two of them kneeled, keeping their knees out of the gore, and then Diamond said, “I wonder if I could help. If I gave him my blood, or something.”
Father didn’t react.
The body beside them managed one good breath, and then death was everywhere inside a piece of something that wasn’t Fret.
“They tried that,” Father said.
“Tried what?” Diamond asked.
“Your blood.” Father’s face was pale, his eyes red and sorry. “The samples from your last physicals. Remember them?”
Teams of doctors had given Diamond a day full of tests, stealing away huge vials of blood.
“I agreed to those experiments,” Father confessed. “We thought . . . your mother and I decided . . . that if your blood could restore life or cure illnesses, it would just be another blessing for having you . . . ”
“Did it help?” the boy asked.
“Not even a little, no.”
Papio were everywhere else in the ship. They had come through the bridge’s hatch, and now they were filling the hallway, walking upright with guns cradled in their big arms, each one shouting orders. Diamond had never seen papio soldiers. As promised, they were huge men and women, each trained until the muscles bulged, but what Diamond didn’t expect were voices even bigger than those magnificent bodies.
“We are great,” they roared. “And you must be good.”
Father stood and offered Diamond his hand.
The boy took hold.
And then Father confessed something else.
“We were greedy with your blood,” he said, smiling shyly as his voice broke. “We wanted more, as if one marvel wasn’t enough.”
Every day began with rain and misty brilliance, and every day faded at its own pace, approaching that moment when the sun had to be strangled.
Watching the night build was a trustworthy pleasure.
Standing at the front of the Ruler’s bridge, King stared out through the pilot’s window. Lights came alive in the surrounding trees. Several quick vessels were passing under the fleet—fletches scouting the territory past the Hole, probably. Father was talking to his new generals. Those men were still wary of Father. But they were soldiers and natural fighters, and they didn’t let themselves stay quiet when they didn’t agree. They warned the civilian that merging their giant fleet with the Corona’s forces was a huge undertaking, cumbersome yet essential. And Father told them that he didn’t want any part of the military work, but since they were new to their posts, they had to appreciate the goals and what missteps were completely unacceptable.
King could twist his head farther than any human could. He could watch the world outside and enjoy whatever was happening behind him.
“We’re going to win tomorrow,” said Father.
Faces nodded out of reflex.
“And we are going to lose,” he said.
Nobody else understood. Chests came forward, and someone said, “We never lose our wars.”
“ ‘Our wars,’ ” Father repeated. “Is this ‘our war’?”
They sensed a trap, and the generals assumed it was the only trap. One of them took it upon himself to say, “Humans have been slaughtered. Even if the papio had no role in the first crime, they came out of their sanctuary to kill hundreds more of our brothers. We must, must push ahead in force, with full resolve. We have no choice but make them bleed, or more trees will die.”
Standing in one neat line, the military men were nodding in unison.
“I agree,” said Father.
His audience expected to hear as much.
“But what happens if we’re too successful?”
They didn’t understand.
“Vengeance is always sloppy,” Father said. “Our enemies won’t just stand on their hands, counting their dead until the tallies are just about even. They’ll claim their turn, counterattacking us, and we will lose expensive ships and soldiers who were your friends, and then it isn’t tomorrow. It’s the day after, war is declared. Then it’s twenty days later, and you’re standing on this bridge, trying to win a struggle with half your fleet and no ammunition, and I’m a political beast working out of sight, desperately trying to bring us back to a place where some ugly peace holds.”
The generals looked sour, ill-at-ease.
King glanced into the gloom outside. The scout fletches had vanished, but now the little local fleet was arriving, armed airships and commercial vehicles and several corona-hunters converging beneath the Hole. They were following a timetable agreed on a hundred recitations ago. The woman Archon remained stubbornly out of reach, but Father and his generals had come to this decision: they would marshal here for the night, and in the morning, after the rain, the combined fleet would fly en masse to the nearest portion of the reef.
“I am a politician,” Father continued. “I’ll never be a soldier, and don’t let me pretend to be. But this situation is political and it is very complex. You have no choice but believe me. Winning tomorrow is not a matter of bombs and death. Losing might be, but not winning.”
“What are you talking about?” one officer asked.
“I know something,” said Father. “Small events and patience have given me insights, and I won’t explain myself. Don’t ask. But we have a rare opportunity here. We can come home richer than when we left, and at least in their public eye, the papio will think that they have won a good small war of their own.”