Chapter 20

"Did she have papers?" asked the incredulous great lord Ramad Menadin. "If she claims to be an ambassador, she must have at least carried some papers!"

"My lord," began the short, bald man who was the mayor of Namitan.

"And since when does an ambassador come to steal an army! Where's the fucking diplomacy in that?"

"My lord," the mayor tried again.

"Ambassadors do not visit cities, they visit nations! When she comes to the city, you greet her, and you bring her to the capitol! To see me! You don't just off and give her an army!"

"My lord, she..."

"What? Is this a new trend, Takir? From now on, the mayors of all my cities will greet foreign ambassadors, and give each of them an army as an expression..."

"Lord Ramad," said the mayor with somewhat more force than he had intended. He took a step back to minimize the effect. "Her name was Petrova. She traveled with the princess of the Hai Lei, and two thousand young girls rescued from the slavers of Ninev. And yes, she did have papers."

"She... with my niece?" A nod from the mayor. "And you mean to tell me the stories of the slavers are true?" Another nod. "That you have proof?" Another.

"My lord, we had the slaves themselves as proof. Right here in this city."

"Here? How did they get here? Who did the rescuing?"

"It was the princess - your niece, my lord - and the ambassador who freed them and brought them here to seek shelter."

"I..." The great lord was flustered. He did not like being ill-informed. Neither did he particularly like the bald man standing before him wearing a face of smugness. Now, receiving new information from the man - information which he already should have known - doubled his dislike, and he struggled to keep a clear head. "My niece is no soldier. She just got home from the university and hardly has time to go freeing slaves from the Wastes of Ninev! And this ambassador! What was she doing there? You said you read her papers?"

"Well... I saw them, my lord." The smugness was gone.

"Saw them? Is there now a difference between seeing and reading? Is reading such a challenge for you now that it requires extra effort? I..."

"They were written in a language I do not know."

A beat.

"You don't know," said Ramad. The mayor nodded. "You don't. Did you send for someone who does?"

"My lord, there is no one who does. The language is alien."

"Alien?"

The mayor nodded again. Hearing the word on the lips of another made it seem fantastic indeed. He was not certain whether he could nod his confirmation if the question were asked again.

"Alien," repeated the great lord.

The mayor flicked his eyes away, did not give another nod.

"Look," said Ramad, more patiently. "Ambassadors come to us as the voices of other nations: they are not nations themselves; they are not sovereign. This woman claims to be an ambassador? Fine. We must see her papers."

"My..."

"Not just to see them," continued Ramad, silencing the mayor with a look. "But to see what nation she comes from. We need to see the seal of her great lord; we need to read her statement of purpose. Those things determine our dealings. If you can't read her papers..."

"My lord, we couldn't read the papers, but we do know where she came from."

"And where is that?"

"From beyond the stars, far across the night sky!"

"Oh, please..."

"From a planet called Earth, with..."

"Will you listen to yourself? You are mayor of one of the largest cities beneath these waves, and you're talking like a child!"

"But she..."

"Any idiot can claim to be an ambassador with phony papers. Any idiot can say they're an alien from outer space. That doesn't mean you have to believe her. Then let her address the whole god dammed city, then..."

"It wasn't only me, my lord."

"But as mayor, I expect more from..."

"What I mean is," the mayor paused to phrase his thoughts. "What I mean, is it was the princess who came to me. Your own niece, my lord. She's the one who asked entry into the city; she's the one who asked to address the city; she's the one who introduced Petrova as a royal ambassador. What was I supposed to do - turn her down?"

"No... no of course not. Jaide always was prone to flights of fancy, but I thought she might have outgrown that by now." Ramad sighed. "But the people! How many of them actually left?"

"It was about a thousand, my lord. Plus the girls she arrived with."

"She took girls to be part of an army?"

"That was her plan, my lord. She spent most of her time here training them to shoot arrows."

The great lord shook his head in disbelief. "This woman sounds more crazy with each new thing you tell me."

"She may be. But then, so were the three thousand that left the city with her."

"How she could have convinced so many, I just don't understand."

"My lord, if you had heard her speak..."

"Yes, yes. I heard about that. Still, words should not have been enough to make them break their oath. There were good, loyal men..."

"That's just the thing, my lord. It's the only reason I let them take the boats..."

"You let her use the boats?" roared Ramad. He sighed again, defeated.

"... she didn't ask them to break their oath. The men left of their own will, and they'll be returning as soon as they've finished."

A beat passed. Ramad said, "Now I know even less what to think."

"She did tell me one thing before she left. A message to give to you, my lord."

"Oh?"

"She said she'll wait for you at Iordantan, and will place herself at your mercy."

"Well," said Ramad after a long moment. "It appears I will be taking a trip North."

Then, there came a great commotion down the corridor: "Look out! Look out! Get out of the way!"

The sound of hundreds of running feet echoed off the polished coral floor, drowning the normal sounds of everyday city business. Waves of startled pedestrians shuffled to the sides, shaking their heads and chattering to one another, as a hurried mob rushed by. Curiosity at the spectacle only became inflamed when the identities of the running men and women became apparent: they were all of them members of the hundai, the elite search and rescue swimmers.

Revered and respected by all citizens of the Hai Menadin, the hundai had corps stationed in every city and village beneath the waves. They had always prided themselves on their speed, both in and out of water, and were well known for their long, grueling training sessions. Although very few emergencies occurred in and around the underwater cities, and thankfully so, the swimmers were always ready to rise to the occasion when it became necessary. In fact, the only time during the previous five years that the hundai could not be seen publicly honing their skills, was when they had graciously surrendered their training facility to the mysterious dark-haired woman and her army of slaves. So, when such a group of veterans is seen running breathlessly through crowded walkways, even forgetting in their haste to make the traditional warning cry - 'Hundai-Hamonidio! Away! Away!' - their is certainly cause for speculation. And the fact that news of the emergency would likely reach their ears within the hour, patience not being a virtue of large crowds, did not stop the onlookers from spawning an interim rumor mill.

A young messenger emerged from the running mass with a look of recognition on his face.

"Mayoro!" said the boy as he spotted the mayor. His face was flushed "My lord!" he added, his eyes flicking to the other man. "There's a breach in the gili over the plaza!"

"What?" said Ramad.

"My God," said a stunned mayor.

"How did it happen?"

"I don't know exactly," said the boy, as he and the two men broke into a run behind the hundai. "There was a shark that got away from some hunters, and one of their boats. I don't know which tore through the membrane, but all of them washed through the plaza, and there's still water pouring in!"

Gili-membrane is meant to be an unbreakable and untearable substance: in all of recorded history, on only one occasion had the membrane over a city been torn. That incident came shortly after the newly popular gili replaced whale's bladders as the water-barrier of choice, almost one hundred years in the past, and was the result of a poor understanding of the substance. Well-processed gili must be patched and replaced cyclically at least once every twelve weeks - the infamous tear occurred in a sheet of gili-membrane that had not been patched for almost a full year, significantly weakened by the slow decay of time. After that first tear, the possibility of a second should not have existed, so strict and regulated was the maintenance on all the Hai Menadin cities and villages. And yet, the public plaza at Namitan had sustained not just a tear, but a breach large enough to emit a hunting boat into the city itself.

Of course the hundai responded within an instant of notification. But with a tear so large, how many thousands of gallons of seawater had already poured through the peaceful streets? And a shark! How had a mere shark ripped through the membrane? If such a thing were possible, many a city would have floundered long ago.

As the lord Ramad followed the young men and women, he struggled to keep pace. He felt his age with each step. Now the same age as his father had been during the great war, he feared he did not posses the same strength. Already, still two hundred yards from the outer wall, the white sand floor was turned brown with water. The sound of sandals on wet sand was replaced by the sound of sandals splashing in standing water, and the water was rising. And then, the press of frightened people rushing in the opposite direction: school children enjoying an afternoon in the plaza, women weaving and dipping dyed fabrics, young men playing haja in the sand, the first round of squid hunters returned to dry their catch; all of them broken from their activities by a wall of rushing, thundering water.

Water ankle-deep.

Ramad saw the wreck of the hunting boat - he also saw the dark stain of blood along its broken bow. The boat had no membrane covering, meant to carry only the bodies of dead sharks across great expanses of open water. Shark hunters normally sought their prey many leagues from populated areas, and their boats were rarely seen by anyone except those who frequent the docks. This boat, however, had been drawn inside the city walls by a great rush of water, had ridden the water like a dart down a street that had been filled with people, and finally buried itself in the front wall of a small tool-and-dye shop. The great lord saw in the crowd of those who fled many people who were injured, with broken limbs and broken skin, most of them being helped by those still able to stand.

Calf-deep.

The great lord stopped for a moment when he saw a young woman lying, almost floating, on the flooded street. Her skull was smashed on the left and a dark wave of blood spread away from her on the current. Beside her was a young man who, even though he did not move, still held her lifeless hand; the man's eyes were closed and his face was pale, but his chest rose and fell with breath.

"You there!" called Ramad to two men about to pass, running away from the water. He stooped to lift the limp body of the young man; the young woman's hand rose, then fell back with a splash as its death-grip was broken.

"My lord?" said the men, recognizing the noble face. They stopped.

"Take this man with you. He's still alive."

"That his wife?" asked one, looking at the dead woman.

"I don't know," answered Ramad. "They were together."

"We'll take her too," said the second, bending to lift the young woman as his friend threw the young man's weight across his shoulders.

"Thank you. Both of you," said Ramad, his throat tightened by the gesture. And he ran on.

The street began to empty at last as all but the hundai sought higher ground. Ramad saw the carcass of a shark floating - at least the hunters had sense enough to kill the beast before fleeing from the rush of water. The plaza was at last in sight and the men and women of the hundai had not slowed their pace as they fought the stiff current.

Water knee-deep. And rushing.

A woman screamed; slower to clear the area than most, she had lost hold of her baby. Her child was no more than a year old, and swimming easily on the frothy white tide. She watched in horror, her face twisted. Though none born in the Hai Menadin feared the water and the child was in no danger of drowning, it was being swept away by the current at a frightening pace: two young men left the hundai mass and leapt into pursuit. Ramad lost sight of them as they disappeared around a corner.