Page 58 of Of Scale and Blood

The rider was on his side, partially propped up by the chunk of building rubble sitting against his stomach. He was in pretty bad shape, with finger-width chunks of flesh taken out of his exposed face and hands. The feather armor he wore had protected his torso and the front part of his legs from the bulk of the explosion, but the back of his legs had no such protection. Perhaps they figured there was little point, given that area was not exposed to normal attack when flying. When the tube had exploded, something large and obviously very sharp had sliced through his leg just above the back of his knee and had all but severed it. He’d been conscious enough at some point to put a torniquet around his upper thigh, but he’d very obviously lost a lot of blood before he’d managed to do that. The odds of him surviving weren’t great, even if we could get medical help here soon enough. It would be very inconvenient if he died before we’d had a chance to question him.

I handed Kele the kit. “Give him the bloomweed. We need him awake and aware.”

Bloomweed was a small herb bush that had wiry stems and small, hairy white flowers. It was used mainly to reduce fevers, but it had two rather odd side effects. One was the adrenaline kick it provided, and two, it was something of a truth serum. While it was usually used in the field for the former, there had been occasions when we’d needed to keep a captive consciousandtalking, and the bloomweed had certainly helped achieve both aims. Hopefully, it would work on this rider as well as it had the Mareritt.

“Might be wise to leash him first,” she said. “We have no idea what these bastards are capable of.”

“Good idea. There’s a length of rope in my smaller pack.”

Once she’d retrieved it, she bound his hands to his good foot to prevent any sudden attempt to lash out at either of us, then tied the rope to a nearby chunk of building. I moved his weapons beyond his reach with my foot—balancing a little precarious on my sore leg—then gave Kele the go ahead. She unstopped the small vial from the kit, forced several drops into his mouth, and then stepped back.

The good thing about bloomweed was its effects kicked in within a matter of minutes.

The rider growled deep in his throat, then muttered something that, while I couldn’t actually understand his words, very much sounded like a curse. Then his eyes snapped open, and he immediately began to struggle.

I pressed my blade against his exposed throat and said, “Stop.”

I wasn’t sure if he actually understood me, but the point of a sword against an exposed bit of flesh was a pretty universal language. He stilled, but his expression was murderous and his yellow—almost bird-like—eyes promised death. It was something I’d seen more than once in the eyes of Mareritten captives, but there was something about this man’s glare that sent a chill through my soul.

“You name and country of origin, soldier.”

He growled something unintelligible—at least to me—and sent a globule of spittle my way. I sidestepped it, then repeated the question.

He fought the order and bared his teeth, but eventually reeled off a short sharp sentence in which the only word I understood wasGrie-i-ton.

“Is Grie-i-ton the name of your country?”

He bared his teeth but eventually ground out, “Grie-i-ton.”

Amusement twitched Kele’s lips. “Either Grie-i-ton is his country’s version of ‘fuck off’ or it is indeed the name of his country.”

“There’s no such place marked on any of our maps.”

“Then maybe he’s simply not understanding the questions.”

“Oh, I think hecanunderstand us, even if only partially. He wouldn’t be fighting the urge to reply otherwise. We’re the problem here when it comes to communication, not him.”

“I take it he’s not using a language common to any of our trading partners?”

“No.” While I wasn’t fluent in all the different languages our trading partners used, I’d heard a good range of them over the years, thanks to the ambassadors and advisors who’d been sent our way to renew or renegotiate trade deals. But there was also a common language used by most of our trading partners, so I tried that. “Your name and place of birth, soldier.”

Kivlighanwas added toGrie-i-tonthis time.

“Well, that did elicit a different response. Not sure it helps us all that much more though.” Kele frowned. “There’s a rumor running around the barracks that the Mareritt are constructing larger versions of the tubes the riders use—is that true?”

“It seems the military grapevine remains a force to be reckoned with, but yes. Why?”

“Well, it means there must have been at least some trade contact between the two, and that, by default, suggests they found a way to communicate. So, it’s worth trying Mareritten.”

“The problem being I only know a few words. Besides, any interaction would have been between the commanding forces of each party, not the grunts.”

“Grunts or no, they’d pick up a word here or there. As you said, we have.”

“Yeah, but we’ve had more than a decade of interaction with them.”

“For all we know, Mareritten and this man’s people have been trading partners for decades.”

“True.” I hesitated, then added in Mareritten, “Why you here?”

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