I understand, Damien assured him. And he did, more than the Regent could possibly know.
I understand exactly.
The inspection was precise, efficient, and ruthless. It was also—viewed from the Regent’s perspective—absolutely necessary. Who could say what evil thing might not crouch hidden in a dark corner, might not nestle behind sleeping livestock, might not take up its shelter in a crate of canned goods bound for distant markets? Their enemy feared the sunlight, and therefore any place that might serve as a shelter against the light must be uncovered, opened up, searched.
They gathered the passengers together on the open deck, so that the Regent might see them. “Is this all?” he demanded. Damien was halfway through a head count when Tyria Lester informed them that her brother Mels was laid out with a hangover, and had not managed to get out of bed that morning. “Get him,” the Regent commanded, and Damien could almost hear the unspoken command that went with it: Let me see him in the sunlight. The man studied each of them in turn while the captain explained to all his rank, his power, his purpose. Damien could see the fear in their eyes, and he sympathized; since they didn’t know what the Regent was looking for, how could they be certain that he wouldn’t discover it in them? But his eyes passed over them quickly, one after another, and he nodded a curt approval to indicate that the lot of them had passed muster,
Then he turned to Hesseth.
She was dressed in her traveling garb, which is to say in layers that covered her from head to foot and then some, Only her face was visible—her altered face—and that was blistered from exposure to the sunlight, with angry red patches that ran across her cheekbones and down the ridge of her nose. It hadn’t occurred to any of them at the time that her tender rakhene skin, normally protected by a layer of fur, would have no mechanism for tanning. He wondered what the Regent would make of such a burn. Was that one sign enough to condemn her in his eyes? He tensed wondering if this was the moment when all their work would come to naught. Wondering what he could do to save her, if it was.
And then the Regent stepped back from her and bowed. Bowed! Deeply and reverently, as one might to an equal. She managed to maintain her poise somehow, but her frightened eyes met Damien’s and begged him, why! To which he could only shake his head in mute response: I don’t know.
The cabins were searched then, quickly and efficiently. The protests of the passengers and crew went unheeded. A phalanx of guards protected Toshida while he went through each room, while a handful more took up watch on the deck, to make sure that no people or weapons were shuffled from cabin to cabin ahead of him. He was as polite as he could be under the circumstances, but he was thorough. No living creature could have hidden from his scrutiny.
Then belowdeck, to the vast storage space within the hull. Every corner was searched. Every crate whose size or weight seemed consequential was pried open, to the accompanying protests of its owner. Gold ingots flashed in the lamplight, bricks of spices, flasks of perfume, books and gems and herbs and furs and bolts of silk, fine wool, silver bullion. It was the first time Damien had actually seen what his co-travelers were bringing with them, and he was stunned by its diversity and its value. No wonder they were terrified; Toshida could take it all from them if he liked, and claim some foreign law as justification. What could they do to stop him? How could they fight back? Whom would they turn to for justice?
But he had no interest in their baubles, nor in their complaints. Silently he continued through the ship, sparing a sharp glance for the space that Gerald Tarrant hid so recently occupied. For a moment he paused, and Damien wondered if it was some structural anomaly that had caught his eye, or a whisper of power that had somehow seeped into the ancient wood, defying their ritual cleansing. He was suddenly very glad that Tarrant was gone, and even more glad that they’d brought down the ship’s great mirrors and flooded this space with sunlight. If he had still been here, or his cabin still remained . . . he shuddered to think of the consequences. Thank God for the Hunter’s foresight.
Last on the list was livestock. They went to the forward end of the hold where the horses were kept, and for a moment the Regent just stared at them; it was clear that to him they were totally alien creatures. Finally he motioned for one of his guards to inspect their space, and it said much for the man that despite his obvious misgivings he did so without hesitation. He needn’t have worried. The horses’ owners had fed them an herbal mixture designed to keep the animals docile while on the long journey, and to prevent the mares from coming into heat. Even the stallions were tractable.
“How very beautiful,” the Regent murmured. He turned to Damien. “Pack animals?”
“Mostly ” he lied. “But they’ll carry a man.” For some reason he found that he wanted to keep the horses’ true strength a secret. It was a minor advantage, but at least it was something.
“We brought breeding stock,” Mels Lester informed him. Five of the horses were his. “Just in case.”
“Then I congratulate you on your foresight. Nyquist’s expedition attempted to bring what they called ‘unhorses’ with them, but more than half died enroute. Including all the males. A terrible loss.” He held out his hand to the nearest mare, who sniffed at it with passing interest. Damien could see the effect of the drug in her eyes, in her coat, in her mane, but to one who didn’t know the species’ natural state she must still have seemed a magnificent animal. “These may prove to be worth more than all the rest of what you have on board,” Toshida told them. His guard had made the rounds of the enclosure, and nodded tightly toward the Regent. Nothing there, the gesture said. Proceed as you see fit.
The Regent turned to face them. In the shadowy closeness of the hold his gaze was piercing, the whites of his eyes glittering like polished gemstones against the darkness of his skin as he studied first one man, then another.
This is a man who could condemn us to death without a moment’s hesitation, Damien thought. And he would, if he thought we posed any threat to his domain. God grant that he would prove an ally once, this trial was over. God grant, above all else, that he not become an enemy.
“I see nothing on board this ship that would be a threat to my people,” the Regent said at last. A communal sigh of relief seemed to resonate from the westerners, and Damien could feel his own muscles unknotting. “And I also see nothing to indicate that you aren’t exactly what you claim. In which case . . .”
He smiled. It was an expression of genuine warmth, as different from his previous mien as night was from day. And yet it was equally natural to him, the flip side of a nature that must judge men as often as it must reward. “Welcome to the promised land,” he said.
5
Black shapes scurrying across white sand, darting from boulder to boulder and dune to dune with predatory caution: the rhythm of invasion. Seen from up above, the creatures looked like rats or insects—anything but men. Vermin, the Protector thought, as he watched them swarm across his precious beach. That’s what they are: vermin. The mere sight of them made him sick inside.