“Huh. Good point,” Cruz said with a shrug of his shoulders. “But that doesn’t mean they won’t stand outside. By the way, dude, I have got to ask you this.”
“What?” Herzer said with a crease of his brow.
“Do you take a pill or something? I mean, give me a break. One day you’re running around with a nymphomaniac wood elf…”
“She was not a nymphomaniac!” Herzer interjected.
“Whatever. She’s like three thousand years old and knows every position in the Kama Sutra!”
“Oh, thousand… maybe…” Herzer corrected. “And, okay, the Kama Sutra’s like primer!”
“God almighty, man,” Cruz laughed. “What? Is it a pill? Give me some.”
“I dunno,” Herzer said. “I was asking myself the same question. It’s like: ‘Hey, it’s the end of the world. We can get Herzer laid now!’ ”
Cruz laughed so hard he rolled over on the ground, waving his hand in the air for Herzer to stop.
“It’s not fair,” he said, waving a finger at Herzer. “You’re not the last man in the world! It’s not supposed to work that way!”
“I dunno. End of the world, all of a sudden women find me interesting. Don’t ask me, I just live here! If there was a pill I would have been taking it for the last five years. And, besides, hey, you, Shilan? Who are you to talk?”
“I’ve been working on Shilan for a week,” Cruz replied in exasperation. “Your wood elf takes off and the first time you come back to town it’s wham!”
“I dunno,” Herzer said with a shrug. “It’s just my searing good looks.”
“Oh, puh-leeeze,” Cruz replied. Cruz was just a shade under two meters tall with long, wavy blond hair, green eyes and a chiseled face. Everyone in the society was good looking but even within that group, Cruz was on the high end.
“Look, Cruz, don’t tell me that you have a lot of problems meeting girls,” Herzer said. “When I was growing up I had… uh… a genetic problem. It made me act really weird. I twitched, I couldn’t hold my hands steady, my head was always twitching. Nobody, and especially girls, wanted to get within ten meters of me in case it was catching. Even my damned parents ‘gave me my adult freedom’ at fourteen. By that time I hadn’t seen either one of them in more than three years; all I had raising me was nannies.”
“So what happened?” Cruz asked.
“Well, thank goodness just before the Fall it got fixed. By Dr. Daneh as a matter of fact.”
“Edmund Talbot’s wife?” Cruz asked.
“Uh… they’re not… I don’t think they’re married but… yeah.”
“So you know Edmund?”
“Except in passing, I’d never met Edmund until the other day in the bath. But I do know Dr. Daneh and I went to school with his daughter.”
“Cool.”
“Well, I mean that and a chit will get me a meal,” Herzer said with a note of exasperation.
“Yeah,” Cruz said, frowning. “But you know people. I don’t know nobody here.” For just a moment he looked haunted.
“Hey,” Herzer said, leaning forward and punching him in the shoulder. “You know me, you know everybody in Class A-5 and you know Morgen. Before you know it you’re going to know everybody in this town.”
“Now there is a goal to strive for,” Cruz smiled sadly. “But I had friends, you know? I never realized how scattered, but they were friends. Here… there’s nobody for me. Nobody at my back.”
“Yeah,” Herzer admitted. But in truth, since he’d never had anyone at his back, he couldn’t really empathize. “Speaking of which, have you seen Courtney and Mike?”
“Oh, yeah, Courtney drug Mike over to go dancing,” Cruz said.
“With what?” Herzer laughed. “Oxen?”
“Pretty damned close, man,” Cruz replied, smiling. “Actually, I think she just threatened to cut him off.” He looked over Herzer’s shoulder and chuckled. “Don’t look now, the womenfolk are coming back.”
“We gonna tell ’em we’re on to their secret?” Herzer asked, raising one eyebrow.
“Nah,” Cruz said. “Let ’em think they know something we don’t.”
There were still some greens left when Mike and Courtney, streaming sweat in the cool spring air, came walking back from the dancing. Introductions were made and then Mike thumped to the ground with a theatrical groan.
“That’s it, I’m done,” he said, waving his hands in the air and lying back on the ground. “This is a rest day!”
“Wimp,” Courtney said, her hands on her hips and obviously raring to go back to the dance floor. “How about you, Herzer?”
“Eh, nope, I have a prior engagement with Morgen here,” he replied, standing up and holding out his hand. “Care to dance, milady?” he asked, sticking one leg out as he bowed with a flourish.
“Why certainly, sirrah,” Morgen replied, snatching his hand and hoisting herself to her feet.
Herzer danced with Morgen for nearly an hour, jigs and reels and square dances, until he felt he was going to drop. Somewhere in there he had partnered off with Courtney and at one point even with Shilan but eventually came back to Morgen. After that dance the female minstrel held up her fiddle in apparent surrender.
“We’re taking a little break now,” she said to the crowd as she wiped sweat dramatically from her brow. “So should you!”
Herzer started to walk away then saw Edmund coming out of the edge of the crowd. He put his hand on Morgen’s arm to stop her and both of them saw Edmund walk over to the stage and wiggle his finger at the female fiddler. She raised an eyebrow in return. Edmund’s opinion of minstrels had become a standing joke in the town. So it was with an expression of obviously humorous trepidation that she stepped across the stage and leaned down to listen to what he had to say. Herzer wasn’t close enough to hear but he saw both her eyebrows raise in surprise and then she nodded, at which Edmund nodded in return. He walked to the edge of the stage and motioned to someone in the crowd. The short, dark man stepped out carrying a set of bagpipes. The minstrel had gotten the rest of the band together. As the man carrying the pipes mounted the stage she stepped to the front and raised her hands.
“Excuse me, folks, we’ve been requested to do one more number, but it’s nay a dance tune,” she said with a rueful chuckle. She shook the piper’s hand and waited for him to inflate the bellows, then nodded the beat.
Herzer’s skin went cold at the shivery sound of the pipes. He’d heard pipe music before and in general could take them or leave them. But this was unlike any tune he had ever heard. It reached down into him and grabbed something in his soul, something old and wild and terrible. His skin flushed cold and goosebumps came out on his arms as the rest of the band joined in. Then the female began to sing and with the first lyric he was gone.
Herzer could almost swear he heard the sound of sword on shield and the hoarse bellowing of battle in the distance. He stood there transfixed as the song ended and then looked at Morgen openmouthed. She returned it with an unreadable expression.