Page 18 of Romancing Rem'eb

“Lotide?” she asks, repeating my words and garbling them.

“Low tide,” I agree. “The beginning of the new day. The waters in the underground lake recede. They swell again at the end of the day. It is how we mark time down here.”

“Downeer?” she echoes, tilting her head.

“Below the mountain.”

She nods slowly, her expression thoughtful. If she is surprised that she is below the mountain instead of above land, she does not show it. Perhaps she suspected as much. Tia taps her chin in the “thankful” gesture.

“R’jaal,” she says again, and I am starting to hate that word very much.

Chapter

Eight

REM’EB

It takes me some time to find Kin’far the Exile and where he lurks in the deeper tunnels, where nothing grows and the walls are too narrow for the village to spread in that direction. I know vaguely where he hides, since I have run across him on patrol in the past. Naturally, when I am seeking him out, he is impossible to locate.

When I finally do find him, he is eating fresh fruit from above, the juices dribbling down his chin and staining his pelt bright red. He leers at me with amusement. “Have you come to look at the yellow-mane female? Is the brown-maned one not to your liking? Or are you greedy and want both?”

“You do not speak of her,” I growl at him, pointing a finger in his face. “You do not ever speak of her. You endanger all of us when you do.”

“No one comes into these tunnels but exiles,” he says in a singsong voice. “Exiles and wanderers.”

“Then you should quit coming out of them,” I snarl, rapidly losing my temper. “Show me where R’jaal the Stranger is. I know you have him and the other female.”

“The dying one? I do. I would not separate them. They like to touch when they’re together, and I like to watch that.” His eyes flare with sick amusement.

Disgusting.

I should know better than to expect decency from Kin’far the Exile. When he was a youth, he killed his patrol partner while out in the tunnels and hid the body. No one knew that he’d murdered someone until he’d returned alone and his story of the missing warrior continued to change every day. The male’s corpse was eventually found and Kin’far exiled, but he lurks in the tunnels and causes trouble wherever he can. My father should ignore him completely, and yet if he had, Tia would not be waiting for my return.

I think of her pressing her lips to my cheek again and my tail twitches. I want that lip-touch again more than anything.

“Show me the strangers,” I tell Kin’far, hating that I must use him to get what I want. “And be silent.”

He puts one hand over his mouth even as he giggles to himself, then turns and points to a branching tunnel. I follow after him, hating every step, and he continues to lead me down a twisting series of unused tunnels that have no value to our people. There are no water pools to drink from, no moss for harvesting, no mushrooms. It is no wonder he hides them out here. No one would think to look here unless they knew someone was hiding.

Sometimes I worry at what else Kin’far the Exile hides out in these tunnels that he doesn’t tell us about.

But then he turns down another narrowing tunnel and stops. “This place has not been used for some time,” he says. “Not since we warred with the strangers above. It seemed a shame not to utilize the rooms when so much work has gone into them.”

What is he jabbering about? I push past him…and then I see it.

A cell. A cell with metal bars to enclose it.

There are a few of them scattered in the tunnels, most of them far-flung and inconvenient. Only one is actually located inside our village, and the bars there have grown smooth from the hands that have rubbed and touched the metal repeatedly. The metal on these bars is rougher, not worn smooth, and enclose a small side-cavern with a latching metal door.

I don’t blame Kin’far for being impressed with all the metalwork. It is a skill our people are losing. Most of the metalworkers died during the great sickness, and there is not enough need for more metalworking for those of us that are left. Have I not heard Gar’duk the Forge complain bitterly about how no one needs his skills?

The enclosure is a small one, with a patch of moss crawling over the ceiling to provide enough lighting to see by. At the back of the enclosure, wrapped around each other, are the strangers. I see pale blue skin like the strangers have, paired against pasty white skin and a strangely yellow mane. The male has horns rather like ours, but his tail and body are lacking fur, and he only has two arms.

The female looks both a bit like Tia and nothing like her at all. This one is soft and rounded everywhere, with plump thighs and too-pale coloring. She wears one of our people’s wraps, made from stem fibers, and appears to be burrowing against the male for warmth. There is a low thrumming in the air, like a buzzing in the ears, and it takes me a few moments to realize that I am hearing them resonating.

“Only the male has a khui,” Kin’far says in a low voice, just behind me. “The female’s has died. Her eyes are dull and she grows weak.”

The sickness? I cover my mouth with the crook of one elbow and step back, glaring at Kin’far. “They have the sickness? And you did not tell my father?”

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