Myoko's hair didn't move at all.
Pelinor disappeared in the direction Zunctweed and Impervia had gone. I ignored him. Instead I stared at Myoko. "You just lifted Pelinor, but your hair didn't-"
"Shush! Just shush." She glanced furtively at the others. The Caryatid, Gretchen, and Oberon were busy trying to see up to the deck; Annah stood apart from them, hidden in her cloak, almost invisible in the dark. I didn't know if fading into the background was just a reflex for her or if Annah was deliberately making herself inconspicuous.
Myoko looked at them all for a few moments, then turned back to me with a scowl. The scowl lasted a long ten seconds… then faded into a sigh. In the cold night air, the sigh billowed clouds of steam.
"What's on your mind, Phil?" Myoko asked.
"Your hair," I murmured. "You use your TK to lift it, don't you? You lift your hair whenever you lift anything else. To make a big show, so people will think you're safe; they don't have to worry about you pulling some sneaky TK trick because the hair always gives you away. But you do the hair deliberately. And you flipped Pelinor onto the deck without even wrinkling your brow. All that hard concentration you usually do is just another show."
Myoko said nothing. Her eyes were lost in darkness.
"You're hiding," I said. "Pretending to be a low-talent nothing, useless for anything but teaching in a mediocre school like Feliss. When really-"
She put her hand to my lips. "Yes. When really."
When really it was a clever ruse to protect herself from people who enslaved psychics. After all, if Myoko's powers were what she pretended, how could she be used to someone's devious benefit? She supposedly couldn't do her tricks quickly; she couldn't work without people noticing the levitating hair; and she demonstrated only modest lifting strength, about the same as a muscular man. So why would anyone kidnap her? There was nothing she could do psionically that couldn't be done more simply by a common laborer.
"So," I whispered, "bad guys leave you alone and you can have a real life."
"No. If I had a real life, I wouldn't lie in bed every night making a mental list: the few people I couldn't bring myself to kill if they ever learned the truth."
Silence. A chill went through me. Myoko turned away. "Relax, Phil-you're on the list."
She walked stiffly back toward the others… as if I'd somehow injured her deeply and she was pretending the wound didn't hurt.
Annah's hand slid softly into mine. "She's in love with you," Annah murmured. "Myoko. The way she looks at you when you aren't watching-in the faculty lounge, or when she 'accidentally' passes your classroom while you're teaching-Myoko's loved you for years." Annah shrugged. "I used to ask myself why she didn't tell you. Why she went out of her way to convince you she was 'just one of the guys.' What fear was holding her back?" Annah squeezed my hand. "It's certainly a night for revelations."
I couldn't answer. I'd gone speechless.
Sometime in the past few minutes, the Dinghy had fallen silent: no more fighting, no noise of any kind. Now, a thump, thump, thump came from the ship, accompanied by footsteps and grunting. The sound was moving upward: someone carrying something heavy up a flight of steps. By the time the thumping moved onto the deck, the Caryatid had sent her flame to the height of the railing. "Hello," she called, "who's there?"
Pelinor's head appeared over the rail. "Not to worry. We're all in one piece." He paused. "Some of us more than others."
"What does that mean?"
"Give me a minute."
Pelinor disappeared. Part of the railing opened like a gate and a gangplank slid down to the dock. Oberon scrambled up at once, his mass making the plank bend and creak… but the plank's reinforced wood was designed to hold rum barrels and other heavy cargo being rolled aboard, so Oberon made it to the deck without mishap. Myoko and the Caryatid hurried close behind; Gretchen followed at a more sedate pace, but she was clearly eager to see what was happening.
I was not quick to join the procession: my brain had slipped a gear, detached from the world. (Annah thought Myoko loved me. My good-time pal Myoko. Who had hidden her feelings because… because she was protecting her secret, and wouldn't allow herself to get close to me. How do these things happen? I could have sworn I was just Myoko's drinking buddy… and Gretchen's sexual fallback, Annah's excuse for melodrama. A stick man to them alclass="underline" a convenience. Now, all three women had somehow changed into involvements. How do these things happen?)
Annah nudged me toward the gangplank. My feet responded but my head didn't; she had to prod, drag, and coddle me before my wits rallied and I moved of my own volition. She gave me a wry look… then she released my hand and went up the gangplank unburdened.
On deck, the others stood in a circle around a white lump the size of a backpack. Myoko poked the thing lightly with her toe as Pelinor said, "So when I came through the door, Zunctweed caught one glimpse of my cutlass and he collapsed. Literally. Dropped to the floor and folded into this tight little bundle." Pelinor pointed at the lump. "You wouldn't think you could tuck a whole person into something that small."
"Oh, demons," Gretchen said with a dismissive gesture. "They all have a few silly tricks."
Oberon tapped the whitish bundle with his forefoot. "This is obviously a defense posture. The top's quite bony." He pressed down harder. "And strong. The whole skeleton must be hinged to form a protective dome over the vital organs." Oberon glanced at me. "Knowing you, baron, you must be consumed with scientific curiosity to dissect the body and see how the anatomy is constructed."
A groan came from the bony white bundle.
"No one's dissecting anyone," the Caryatid said in a Children-must-not-misbehave voice. "I don't know why you brought Zunctweed up here at all," she told Pelinor.
"Because Impervia didn't want him staying with her."
"Where is Impervia?" Myoko asked. "What's she doing?"
"Standing guard," Pelinor said.
"Over what?"
"Over what Zunctweed didn't want us to see." He waved toward a companionway that led below. "Take a look for yourselves. I'll watch the captain."
Gretchen didn't have to be told twice-she headed immediately toward the stairs. Oberon, the ever-faithful bodyguard, raced to go down ahead of her… only to find he couldn't fit through the companionway's narrow opening. He stood there squinching his whiskers in agitation until Gretchen rapped on his shelclass="underline" "Move, slave. You're in my way."
"Mistress Gretchen, you don't know what's down there. You don't know whether it's safe."
"Oh, it's safe," called Pelinor. "I think. Yes. I'd definitely say it's almost certainly safe."
This didn't reassure the big red lobster… but Gretchen wouldn't tolerate slaves telling her no. She banged again on Oberon's shell. "Move. Now. That's an order."
"Don't worry, dear," the Caryatid told Oberon. "We'll look after her."
Still reluctant, Oberon shuffled away from the opening. Gretchen went down without hesitation, though she did it in the landlubber way: facing the steps and holding the iron banisters, like climbing down a ladder. The rest of us followed close after. (Just for the record, the Caryatid descended à-la-landlubber too; Myoko slid down like an old salt, back to the steps, face out, feet barely touching the treads; I attempted to do the same, though without much grace; and Annah almost seemed to teleport-one second she was at the top of the companionway, then her cloak billowed and she was standing beside me. Making me feel ridiculous for having poised myself at the bottom, arms out and ready to catch her if she needed help getting down. I really had to stop underestimating that woman.)