“We should have been more vigilant.”
The castle, at first far off in the distance, was now rearing up in front of them; every thud of Maltese’s paws brought it closer. She had been hanging on for dear life and wondering what a dark traveler was
(warmaker)
and if it was as bad
(warmaker)
as it sounded. Surely nothing could have been as bad as the Japanese, all those killer drones doing whatever their Emperor told them, why, it was indecent and…and un-American!
“I don’t know,” she shouted in his furry ear. “You spotted them right away. Before anybody. I couldn’t even see them. I still can’t see them.”
“They crept up on us like scum,” he continued, still sounding mightily mad.
“Scum?”
He put a picture in her head: a black sewer rat, its long, scabrous pink tail curled around it, its nose twitching, beady eyes gleaming.
“Oh, scum. Right. Maltese, you’re being too hard on yourself.” And you’re running faster than I’m comfortable with, but never mind. “The princess was telling me just last night that you guys don’t have wars here or anything. If you’re not used to it, you can’t watch for it.”
“We were easy,” he persisted. “We have made it easy for them.”
“We don’t even know what they want. They have this thing where I’m from, the Welcome Wagon? Maybe they’re bringing coupons and things. We don’t know.”
“No one knows what they want. They don’t speak; they grunt like animals.” His loathing was rolling through her head, making her shudder. “They are animals, they come down from the mountains to make fights, they fight until the last scum-loving one is defeated, then they scuttle away.”
“Okay, okay, I understand what you’re saying, calm down, you’re going to buck me off and trample me, and then how will I get home?” She tried to joke, to lighten his mood. “I see your plan now. It won’t work.”
“When we return, you must go with the princess and the Lady Gladys and the children, and you must stay with them until—”
“Wrong again, Maltese. Besides, do you really think that princess is going to cower in hiding with the babies?”
Silence, except for the thud-thud-thud of his paws hitting hard-packed sand.
“Right. And maybe I can help. I had a little bit of training before I ended up here. Maybe I can help you talk—”
“You do not go near them. You do not look at them, you do not touch them. You do not allow them to touch you. If one does touch you, I will eat his spine.”
“It’s good,” she commented, “that we’re establishing rules. For instance, being a newcomer here, I might not understand the whole ‘don’t touch or be devoured’ guideline. And I’ve said this before—you’re being too hard on yourself.”
Silence.
“We have this place where I’m from,” she continued doggedly. Her mouth was getting dry and she wanted a drink in the worst way. She blinked sun and sand out of her eyes and continued. “Pearl Harbor. It was the posting everybody wanted—the weather was kind of like here, breezy and warm but not too hot. And the ocean—that’s like a big body of water—”
“We have seas.”
“You understand, then. It was like paradise. You got to fight for your country and be stationed in Eden, what could be better? Anyway, my friend—my best friend from home—she was stationed there, and right before I signed up, I visited her at the base. It was like being in heaven. The palm trees and the—it was just really, really nice. And so I saw her, and she told me how great it all was, and it looked great, and I went away and signed up, and then the Japanese came and blew her up, and all her friends, too. And we never saw it coming.”
“I am sorry for your friend.”
“Yeah.” She sighed. Her eyes were still watering, but she didn’t think it was the sand. “Me, too. But my point is, I know what it’s like to be asleep at the switch. You spend a lot of time blaming yourself. You feel so stupid, as if you were the one who failed. When the ones who deserve all the blame are the bad guys.”
“So you especially want to go back,” he said, slowing down as the castle gates came into view. “To avenge your friend.”
“Well…yes.”
“I see.”
“It’s just that I would feel better—”
“I understand, truly. I did not, before. I will not stand in your way again. When this…business…is taken care of, we will try again. And this time I will mean it when I wish for you to go away.”
Stupid sand. She couldn’t stop her eyes from tearing up no matter how hard she rubbed.