Gateways 07_ What Lay Beyond - Diane Carey [45]
Within half an hour, Inna and Torrna had extricated themselves from the admiring crowd. Kira noted that they had been chatting amiably as they approached the gangplank before they were set upon by the admirers. Quite a switch, she thought, from all the sniping they’ve been doing. The admiral went off to consult with the captains of the other fleet ships in dock, and Torrna walked with Kira back toward their office in the rear of the marina.
“So what happened?” Kira asked.
“We found the pirates and took care of them in fairly short order. They didn’t have anything to match Murent’s cannon.”
Smiling, Kira said, ” ‘Murent’? That’s new.”
“I beg your pardon,” Torrna said, a little indignantly.
As they approached the office, nodding to the sergeant at the desk, Kira said, “It wasn’t that long ago that the only way you referred to her was as “the admiral’ or “that damned woman.’ “
To Kira’s surprise, Torrna actually blushed, his skin turning the color of his hair and beard. “I suppose so. But she showed me something on this trip that I didn’t expect. She was efficient yet merciful with the pirates, she was very effective in questioning the pirate leader without being unnecessarily brutal, and she agreed to fly the Perikian flag.”
“I was going to ask you about that.”
They entered Torrna’s tiny office. The general sat behind his rickety wooden desk, which was cluttered with assorted pieces of paper that required his attention. Torrna ignored them and instead poured himself a drink from the small bar that sat under the window looking out onto the mainland. Torrna had specifically requested a north-facing office so he could look out on, in his words, “the republic that I fought for, not the ocean that is controlled by someone else.”
He offered Kira a drink, which she declined. They liked their drinks a little less smooth in the old days, she had thought after the first drink she had shared with Torrna, and she made it a point to avoid the stuff when possible.
“It took surprisingly little argument,” he said as he sat down. “I pointed out that her fleet was there at the invitation of the Perikian government and was there to protect Perikian interests, so it made sense that they should fly our colors. Not that she gave in completely, of course…”
“Let me guess, you wanted the Perikian flag on top?”
Kira had spoken with a modicum of facetiousness, but Torrna leaned forward and said gravely, “These are our waters, Ashla. We must never forget that.”
“I haven’t,” she said with equal seriousness.
She also noted that she’d said “the Perikian flag,” not “our flag.” Perhaps a minor point, but, even though she had fought for the republic’s independence, even though she now worked for Torrna, she still couldn’t bring herself to think of this as home. She knew this was the right place for her to be, but in the back of her mind was the constant feeling that this was not her new home, that she was only visiting. It made no sense to Kira on the face of it, and she wasn’t sure what to think of these feelings.
Deciding not to dwell on it, she leaned back in her chair. “So what did the pirate leader say when Inna questioned her so efficiently?”
Taking a sip of his drink, Torrna said, “Actually, the most interesting intelligence we received wasn’t from the pirates, but from their slaves. The most recent conscriptions they picked up were refugees from a disaster in the fire caves.”
Kira blinked. “What?”
“Apparently the entrance to the fire caves collapsed and completely destroyed Yvrig.” Yvrig was a city on another peninsula west of Perikia but on the same continent; it, too, had a thriving port.
Torrna snorted as he continued. “Some of the slaves claimed there was some kind of blue fire when the caves collapsed, but I don’t put much stock in that.”
Kosst Amojan imprisoned… the Pah-wraiths banished to the fire caves… Shabren’s Fifth Prophecy… the Emissary going to