Kei narrowed his eyes angrily at being teased in this way in front of his colleague. “Teki, let the general have peace and quiet. Keep the villagers—and more specially, this man—out of here while he sleeps.”
“Whatever you say,” Teki said mildly, clearly humouring him.
“Tiko, I want my things brought
here
and not to my house, regardless of what anyone else tells you I supposedly want.”
“If the clan head makes an order, I’ll follow his direction, not yours. But your pack will be left here for now.”
“Good. Don’t get used to the idea of me disappearing just yet.”
He stalked out to the front door, threw it open and instantly regretted it. He’d forgotten his friends would be waiting for his reappearance. “Kei! Keichichi!”
Banji and Misek. He barely had time to brace himself before two grinning men grabbed him.
“Hey, Banji-ki, only half of him came home!” Misek said, making a pretense of looking for the rest of him.”
His irritation momentarily forgotten, Kei gave himself over to the pure happiness his friends felt at his safe return. “I left my arse in Utuk and on the road here. You’re welcome to go back and find it,” he said, laughing at their antics. It was so good to see them both, again, safe and well. They both looked fit, and Misek’s scars were finally starting to fade a little. “Look, I have to go see Fedor—”
“Great!” Banji said. “We’ll come too.” Kei’s arms were grabbed on either side and he was towed up the street, allowed to acknowledge the calls of good wishes from his clan, but not being set free for a minute to stop and talk to anyone. Everyone looked little the worse for wear for the ordeal of being either in Darshek or in a village with enemy soldiers quartered on it.
Banji and Misek dragged him without any ceremony to Fedor’s house and through the door to no one’s apparent surprise. Kei’s aunt and adopted mother, Sira, hugged him warmly and kissed his cheek. “Welcome home, my son.”
“I’m so glad you’re all safe, mother,” he said, hugging her back.
Fedor and Myka were sitting on the comfortable chairs that were often used for clan elder meetings. Banji went immediately to Myka’s side and held her hand in a possessive way that caused Kei to raise a questioning eyebrow at him. “Well?”
Banji looked a little apprehensive as he said, “We’re pledged, Kei.”
If he’d been expected Kei to object for some reason, he’d be disappointed. Kei couldn’t have been more pleased for them. “Oh, well done, Banji!” He knelt at Myka’s feet. “You’re made me very happy, Mychichi.”
But she wasn’t at all happy with
him
. “We were waiting until you got back so Fedor could marry us. When we heard you were on your way, we made plans to have the ceremony as soon as you returned. Now we’ll have to wait for weeks more, not just to have you back, but to be wed. Why do you have to go to Darshek? Teki can look after that man.”
“I made a promise to myself, Myka. More than that...look, father, can you arrange a joining ceremony tomorrow? While I’m here?”
Myka protested immediately. “No, Kei! I wanted it to be a big celebration, not with soldiers and that damn Prijian general around.”
Kei looked helplessly at Banji, who shrugged. “I don’t mind for my own sake, but Myka has been waiting for you, because she said she wouldn’t wed until you were here to speak for her.”
“But I
am
here, Myka.”
She glared at him. “And then you’re running off again!” She flung herself at him. “Please don’t go!”
With her gripping him like this, he couldn’t escape her anger or her hurt. “Myka...let go...please, let go!”
He pushed her back, and gasped against the pain as he tried to regain some equilibrium. “Kei,” Misek said, coming up behind him. “Are you all right?”
“Just...some water, please?”
Misek dashed over to the stone jar of cool water in the kitchen and brought him back a mug. Kei used the delay as he drank to get himself back together. Misek urged him to sit on one of the other chairs while Myka stared at him in confused hurt, begging with her eyes for him to tell her why he’d rejected her, why he was doing this to her.
Fedor folded his arms and waited impassively as Kei collected himself, then he spoke. “Kei, I think you need to explain what’s going on, and what’s so urgent about Darshek.”
In a low voice, not wanting to meet any of their eyes, he told them about the hostage deaths and what it had done to him. “So I need to go to Darshek to see if they can help, Myka. Believe me, being apart from you has been an agony. But at the moment, so is being back unless I avoid almost all contact with people.”
“But where does this general fit in?” Banji asked.
“He...doesn’t, not really. He’s helped me a lot, but he’s not the solution.” Kei clasped his hands on his knee. “I suppose...we’ve been together for months now and I’d like to finish the journey we started together.”
“But you were his
slave
,” Myka said. “Kei, that’s sick!”
“Not a slave—at least, not his, anyway. Myka, it’s complex, all right? Sister mine, will you not consider having your joining ceremony before I go and a bigger celebration when I return?”
“Not while
he’s
in the village,” she said firmly. “I don’t care what he’s promised to do, I know what he’s
done
and so far as I’m concerned, I’ll never forgive him. And neither will anyone else.”
“You know, you’re wrong there,” Kei murmured. “Father, please don’t order Teki to go with the soldiers because I’ll have to disobey you and leave anyway.”
Fedor grunted. “All right, but I don’t like it. We still have nine people gone and I was hoping having our own healer back would help the pain a little. Not to mention the slight matter of Sira and Myka being out of their minds with worry about you—with good reason from the look of you. What else happened to you?”
Kei shook his head. “It’s really too painful to discuss. Myka, let me get the general seen to this evening, and I’ll spend all day with you tomorrow, I promise.”
“What? Not even dinner with us? Kei!”
Fedor held up his hand. “No, Myka, be fair. They’ve come all the way from Ai-Tuek in four days. Kei needs his rest. His arse must be harder than a brick.”
That made Banji snort and Misek smile. “It’s not so bad, father. You really ought to look at the cart Ruik in Ai-Darbin made—it’s a clever idea. You can feed Tiko and the soldiers, though. If you keep that interfering bastard out of my hair, you’ll be doing me a great favour.”
That took the conversation onto less contentious subjects, but as Kei spoke to the others Myka kept shooting him hurt little looks. He couldn’t leave things like that.
He stood, and said, “Mychichi, there are things I need from our house. Would you walk back with me? Fedor, if you want to have a clan meal or something of that sort, tomorrow I’ll be at your disposal. I just need to make sure the general is taken care of this evening.”
Fedor nodded. “We’ll have a meal here, you and a few of your friends, the soldiers too. They don’t need to guard your Prij—no one will lay a hand on him here.”
“I’ll tell Tiko but I don’t know if he’ll agree. He takes his job pretty seriously, for all he forgets the limits sometimes. You’ll be glad to know if you hadn’t adopted me, he probably would insist on doing so.”
Fedor coughed in amusement. “Hmmm, I’m not surprised, lad. It makes me glad Erte isn’t here to see you—she’d faint from shock at the sight of you.”
“Yes, Kei, you must let us put some pounds on you before you leave,” Sira said.
Kei groaned. “In a day, mother? All right, you can try. I’ve been dying for some gren nut cakes—Mis, do you think Meis would make me some?”
“She’ll make you more than some,” Misek promised with a grin. “You’ll need another cart to carry them away.”
“I don’t know. One of the soldiers has a stomach on him like a starving jombeker.”
“She’ll only see that as a challenge,” Banji said. “Go on, Myka,” he urged her, giving her a little nudge. “Your brother needs you.”
“Obviously not enough,” she said tartly, but stood up anyway. “Well, come on. I don’t have all night. If you don’t want me, then I’m sure I can find someone who does want my company.”
Kei braced himself to feel her pain and then put his arms around her. “Don’t,” he murmured, hugging her close. “Don’t, Mychichi. I love you, and I’ve missed you so much.”
He heard her crying, and let her weep on him even though her sadness sliced cruelly at his heart. “There, there, I’m only going away for a little while. It’s not like before. I’m not leaving under duress.”
“It was horrible with you gone,” she said, her face pressed into his shirt. “I was worried sick.”
“I know how you felt. Come on, come back to the house.”
Banji nodded at him as Kei led his sister away. His friend understood, even if Myka was blinded by her surprise and anger. He’d comfort her and help her accept. It wasn’t forever.
He kept his arm around her as they walked through the village. There were still people around, getting ready for the evening meal, and more good wishes were sent his way. “Everyone missed you,” she said.
“And I missed you, more than you can ever know,” he replied. “Why did Reji have to leave again? He’s only been back a short while.”
“Nearly three months. We left Darshek as soon as Ai-Kislik was rescued and by the time we got back, Ai-Albon was free. He didn’t know you were going to be here so soon, or leaving again. We needed tools and more supplies. He’s going to be surprised to see you in the city.”
“I’ll look forward to it.” Stepping through the doorway of his own home for the first time in nearly six months moved Kei to sudden tears, and as he stood in the middle of the main room, looking at the familiar books, his mother’s collection of odd animal artefacts, a few interesting rocks his father had no space for in his library, he wondered if he was making a mistake to leave again. “Oh, gods,” he whispered. “I’m really home.”
“Yes, you are, where you belong,” Myka said, leading him to a chair and making him sit. She crouched in front of him. “What did they do to you? It wasn’t just the hostages dying, was it?”
“It was just...all of it.” He shook his head. “I can’t talk about it. Unless you were there and a hostage too, you can’t imagine...it was awful...but also, there were some good things,” he added, thinking of Arman and Jena and Karus.
“How could there be anything good come from that?” she demanded. “The Prij are just animals. It makes me sick that one of them is here, it truly does. How can you stomach him, touching him—if I was his healer, I’d have let him die.”
“Myka! It’s entirely wrong to say you’ll pick and choose your patients. I’m ashamed to hear you say that—so would Ma be, if she was here.”
“I don’t care,” she said, her chin coming up defiantly. “He’s a murderer. I think they should all disappear off the face of the earth.”
“That’s exactly what the Prij think about us, and just what he did. He’s changed his mind as he’s got to know us. You should at least get to know them—or him.”
“Not interested. They took you and nine of my friends away, and killed our people. That’s all I care about.”
Kei looked at her sadly. “Then you have a lot to learn before you can truly call yourself a healer. I’m not going to argue this with you, but I say to you—General Arman is a man just like any other, with faults and goodness like any other. He’s a fine person and I consider him a friend.”
“Friend? Are you
insane
? Kei, he’s done something to you, keeping you prisoner, it’s warped you.”
She gripped his arms to make her point, but he winced and made her let go. “I won’t deny it’s changed me. I won’t deny I’m damaged. But I’m not insane.”
She got up and walked to the centre of the room so she could glare properly at him. “Are we going to spend our first night back together arguing?”
“No, I don’t want to. I need medical supplies, and some personal effects.”
“Medical? For him?”
He was so damn tired of this attitude. He stood so he could use his superior height to impose his authority. “Yes, for him,” he said severely. “If I ever hear you’ve refused help to a sick person on account of their race or your personal preference, I’ll disown you and I mean that entirely seriously. I’ll always love you—but I’ll turn my back on you if you shame me and our parents in this way.”
She stared up at him in shock. “Kei—”
“I mean it. I’m done with those of our profession who abjure the ethics we all believe in. I’m sick of prejudice and hate and violence. I just want peace...and I swear to you, that man lying in Reji’s house only wants it too. I don’t care what you think you know, or what you believe—Arman is throwing away all that’s important to him to right the wrongs he and his people have done, and if you can show to me how that makes him a lesser human being, then good luck to you. I still won’t listen to you.”
She was still staring at him. But then, slowly, she reached up her hand to touch his face—he discovered from her touch that his cheeks were wet. “I’m sorry, Keichichi,” she whispered. “One day...will you tell me what they did?”