The skyfort crew led Jupiter down the wide central companionway underneath an open grating beneath the main deck. Glass, or another transparent material, formed the ceiling of the corridor with the grating above. Squares of light pixelated down from the afternoon sun to fill the space. No sound came from above though the barrier, he heard only the tramping of the group’s feet on the timber deck of the corridor.
He walked fast to keep up with Tharumiyo and the Air Lord. Tiredness tugged at his limbs, as if they were weighed down and urged to walk through thick honey. Pushes came from behind if he slowed or dragged his feet.
Jupiter remain unbound. Perhaps his captors believed him little threat. They were right — how could he escape? The skyfort sailed high in the air above land or sea, with no friends to aid him. How much could a teenaged human do to a ship full of fighting manisaurs?
Jupiter did not know the truth of that. Could he escape? Could he stand up to any manisaur in a fight?
He steeled himself then, and vowed the Imperials should under-estimate him. The rebels had under-estimated Tharumiyo. He no longer thought of the Traitor as ‘old-bird’ — something more brewed here.
They paused amidships and Tharumiyo passed a zharaqsa gem to the Air Lord. After a short inspection the Air Lord handed it off to a lackey who stepped away and down a stair, to the flight engine Jupiter guessed. But where had Tharumiyo got the gem? He and Gan had taken all from the flight works.
‘Maggs. That’s how she knew about the Traitor.’ Jupiter muttered this under his breath, but not quiet enough.
‘What say you?’ Tharumiyo said without the hesitation and sense of slow wisdom he had used at all other times? The Traitor appeared more active and sprightly than before.
‘This nuvra, why would you think you can understand it?’ The Air Lord’s voice had become guttural and Jupiter heard in his Thaluk a slight inflection different from the other manisaurs.
‘Oh, this one can understand. And be understood well enough.’ Tharumiyo harrumphed as if reluctant to admit Jupiter had any such ability. ‘So beware your Eoth words.’
‘Then this is no nuvra.’ The Air Lord’s intoned with a finality. Someone used to being listened to, believed, and obeyed.
‘Perhaps. But there are other things…’
‘Why do you have an interest in it?’
‘Let us speak on this more. But not here.’
They continued their walk along the length of the skyfort. A musty animal smell filled the air but he saw no animals, only the manisaurs pacing the huge central gallery. Now Jupiter had a greater understanding of the the scale of the vessel as they moved past large partitioned spaces. What were they for? Perhaps empty cargo holds?
They came to a wide set of double doors. The manisaurs guards at the elegant carved wooden entry had the same lean build as the Air Lord.
And Jupiter considered Tharumiyo. Now that the ‘old bird’ stood taller, less hunched over, he appeared less elderly. What more had he lied about? Previously hidden under baggy clothing, he had a shape to his body frame not typical of quevantaqi. The full covering of clothing had seemed strange in the heat of Zenska, perhaps not so unusual when flying high in a skyship. Except here, when it might have been useful, it had been removed. Now, as if a disguise had fallen away, Tharumiyo had been revealed.
The group entered a wide cabin with stern windows with a breath-taking view over the blue-blue sky. A dark green forest lay below over undulating hills. The trees were perfect conical shapes, as if a child happy to have discovered how to draw a tree, had not stopped and covered the view with them. The forest stretched forever, until at the horizon, where clouds mounted high, the sea began. Jupiter stepped forward and studied the view to left and right. The expanse of windows showed more forest to port, but to starboard a volcano reared tall in the sky. Higher than their flight, and snow capped.
‘Pariqhamtu,’ Jupiter said as he remembered the manisaur female he had known for such a brief time. ‘Snow capped highlands.’
‘You see. It has some affinity.’ Tharumiyo settled himself on a pile of cushions and extended his legs.
‘Curious.’ The Air Lord said as he studied Jupiter intently.
Jupiter placed his back to the window and returned their gaze with one of sullen indifference. But his mind raced. Air Lord - Havanatha in Thaluk. Did that mean this manisaur was head of the Navy? His heart thumped. He did not want such attention on him. He pretended boredom in the hope they would pay him less attention. He regretted his reference to snowy mountain tops, but it all came unbidden. Just as Havanatha had.
Tharumiyo now sat relaxed unlike any manisaur in his experience. Cushions. Usually they squatted like laying an egg, or rested upon benches. Never lounging like lizards on a rock. He realized he paid too much obvious attention to them, and returned to the view out the window. The motionless sky contrasted with the skyfort’s slow movement over the forest below.
Except he really searched for his captors in their reflection against the dark forest. The light from the sky made it too bright. So he turned, then slumped against the wall under the window, his arms wrapped across his knees. He now hung his head upon them as if fatigued beyond care.
The rebel prisoners below decks — what would happen to them? How could he escape? Why had they brought him here now and not left him with the other prisoners?
From under his brow, he glanced up now and again, just to see what they did. But mostly he tried to make it appear he just rested. But he listened.
Instead of the usual burbling sounds of manisaur language, his two captors spoke in a series of guttural and harsh croaks. It lacked the pops and squeaks that made manisaurs seem like happy parrots, and more in keeping with the cries of eagles, or gulls, underlaid with a deeper resonance.
What language did they speak? Who were these two strange aliens that they could be so different from every other he had met?
Jupiter did not understand how tulanvarqa, the connexion, worked. Before it had seemed like manisaur words matched up with those of the human language Thaluk. Maybe under the influence of tulanvarqa the two had evolved together to use the same grammar and vocabulary — except different sounds for each species. It had even been a little weird when Gan made an attempt to sound out his name — Joopah. Others spoke the manisaur version of Jupiter - Upariqami.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
A first it had seemed he heard one of the languages but understood his own — almost like he watched a film or TV show but read a translation in the subtitles. When that happened before he could almost kid himself he could understood the words. Brains were wired to find language in the sounds. Tulanvarqa sort of worked like that on Eoth.
Except here the subtitles had been turned off. He heard noises from Tharumiyo and the Havanatha but the subtext of meaning disappeared in the confusion of new sounds.
It was like the time he had first met the enslaved manisaur on the beach — he had huddled on the edge of a tropical forest in fear. And, as the alien had twisted the feather wrap talisman, its burbling sounds had been just noise to him. Like this.
Now he experienced the same confusion — but different. The individual croaking squawks were clear and distinct. He had that knack at least. But the sense of meaning remained shadowed… Perhaps what he sensed were hints of emotion, not meaning. Like the sound of words played backwards — if he puzzled at it something could be guessed at. With no reference to context he guessed with more imagination than understanding. Language but… different again for all he had heard before.
When he had first arrived he began to understand some of the meaning. Sure, there had been unsure ideas and concepts that he just glossed over. Like when his mathematics teacher rushed through a topic and talked of strange things that needed more context. But after a time even those concepts had resolved in his mind. Sometimes Thaluk words and ideas described the way things worked on Eoth. Culture he needed to know before understanding blossomed. Other times the meanings changed and expanded to describe deeper concepts. Like how a phone used to be a big clunky thing with buttons, or even dials, on the face that you couldn’t walk out of the house with with. But now a phone meant something very different.
Now when listening to these two — the complex interweaving of sound to understanding via tulanvarqa had faded. Almost as if they did not talk in… manisaur. Or whatever the name for their language was. He glanced up under his brows but still hid his attention from them. Unlike other manisaurs he had met, their bodies were leaner and taller. Their auras less expressive. Hidden.
It struck him then how Tharumiyo had always seemed to talk in double meanings. He really had. The aura he presented always subtly different to what he said. He was not sure if Manisaurs could lie, but their auras always seemed to show a truth.
Except Tharumiyo — they could lie with their aura. Or manipulate it in ways that other manisaurs couldn’t or didn’t. How had other manisaurs not noticed? Did the tulanvarqa sense work differently with him and Maggie?
‘Traitor,’ Maggie had signaled. Tharumiyo had taken a zharaqsa gem and come to the Air Lord, something only possible because Tharumiyo lied better than other manisaurs believed possible?
While these thoughts ran through his mind he listened to what the two were saying…
‘Curiousity…’
‘You mock me…’
Jupiter held his breath. He could understand some.
‘It will be your downfall.’
‘Such primitives deserve to be replaced…’
Yet the language remained the harsh raptor-eagle sounds of nightmare. They did not speak regular manisaur.
‘This skyfort is slow and cumbersome…’ The Air Lord’s vocalizations boomed deeper with more rasp to them. It chilled Jupiter even when he spoke of innocent things.
‘Yet useful enough.’ Tharumiyo’s voice inflected more like a typical manisaur.
’Perhaps. Given the opposition. Yet the rebels escaped.’
This Air Lord’s speech was something else — one scary voice. Like fingernails scraped down a blackboard. Or feedback when a teacher stood in front of a PA speaker at school assembly. Jupiter wanted to cringe and hide. He pressed his back against the wooden hull. Cold seeped through and chilled him.
‘It is of little consequence.’ Tharumiyo said. ‘They believe me captured. And in their loyalty they will attempt a rescue, prompted by an ally onboard.’
Jupiter focussed on the words. The meaning now. And tried to stop his instinctive fear. He did not wonder how he could understand all of a sudden. That would come later.
‘And you did not even potion imprint them?’ A sense of disapproval growled within Air Lord’s words.
‘No. Indeed it is my charm alone that has given me their loyalty.’
‘You take a risk.’ The Air Lord paused. ‘It is a shame our plan requires us to potion-turn our prisoners.’
‘I know your pain. But you must resist.’ Tharumiyo’s voice came urgent and insistent.
‘I am a traditionalist.’ The Air Lord said. ‘And it is affecting me. I wither and shrink it seems.’
‘We have been here an age. We age in turn.’
‘It is past time for us to take over, and bring our cattle to this land.’ The Air Lord’s voice took on a less harsh note. Jupiter got the sense another language lay under those words. Still not the manisaur he had experienced. The tone of the sounds had changed. But the meaning had cleared for him now.
‘In time.’ Tharumiyo said. ‘In time we will have ample cattle here. But bringing them in passage now might also alert rivals.’
‘I like a challenge though.’ The Air Lord’s voice turned angrier. ‘Cattle that fight, raise the blood. The domesticated and pampered generations of Arth… I fear it will diminish we breeder-warriors too.’
‘I am with you of course. New frontiers are needed. But with cattle here, we will mate and create a new generation. One that will return to the wild so we may hunt again. We breeder-warriors will be fitter. This land will return us to greatness, while those remaining in the Arth homeland domesticate themselves into weakness.’
‘And so we plan. And wait.’ The Air Lord paused a while. But into the silence his voice turned chilly.
’There is this other place too. Earth. This nuvra is proof of that.’
‘Consider it though. Hardly any sport there.’
Jupiter felt their gaze upon him and froze, held his breath. He did not want them to pay any attention to him.
‘If only it knew.’
‘It is well it can not understand us. It would piss its mammal’s pants.’
‘Disgusting.’ Tharumiyo said.
‘A hunt would be a good diversion.’ The Air Lord made a screeching cackle that Jupiter feared might be laughter. It chilled him to his bones.
‘We will have to kill it though.’ Tharumiyo said.
‘Indeed.’
‘But I wished for you to see this. A mammal of Earth. Nuvra I am assured, even as it has some affinity with the language of this place.’ Tharumiyo’s voice grew questioning, and Jupiter realized the words had slipped back to the manisaur pops and burbles he knew and found more comforting somehow.
‘Perhaps that is not the right of it.’ The Air Lord’s voice fell harsh again. Dismissive. ‘There is no way to tell. No true test.’
‘But it flies.’ Tharumiyo said and a sense of respect lay in those words Jupiter found surprising.
‘Indeed. A curious craft. But of little utility.’ The Air Lord’s voice revealed boredom, or at least a wish to change the subject. Jupiter grinned. The Air Lord’s disinterest in what he did not understand betrayed a weakness — that they did not suspect he understood them now emphasized it all too well.
‘As a fast packet, a messenger? And it fought in a handy manner with its ropes during the recent action.’
‘If there is no potion to turn it… perhaps words will? Use your charm upon it. Find out what it knows. Promise it… whatever.’
Tharumiyo rose, turned to Jupiter, and paced forward. Their claws scraped against the wooden deck.
‘So young human,’ Tharumiyo said in the manisaur parroty language again. ‘How is it you fly? What is this craft you sail so fast and so well in? Stand, approach, and tell me. I wish to know.’
Jupiter stared at him from his seat against the chill bulkhead. The strangeness of these manisaurs made them more alien than ever.
‘Time is wasting. Find out the information then we kill it and be done.’ The Air Lord raptor-cry chilled him more than cold alone.
Jupiter stood and locked eyes on Tharumiyo. He knew then that if he was to survive he could not let them know how much he understood. But what he had heard chilled him.
He could not think of a way out.