Siren Song

“Who knows how long she’ll be,” Ryan explained. “You have a smart-looking ville here and Jak’s our best tracker—he’ll make sure they don’t get lost or lose us.”

Phyllida seemed reassured at that. “You call it a ville?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Ryan replied. “Like a village.”

The Melissas laughed, and one of the others spoke up—the honey-haired one who seemed to have attached herself to Doc. “We call it Home,” she said. “You may, too.”

“Thanks,” Ryan said uncertainly. Despite the friendly atmosphere, he was not quite sure whether he could trust these people. Ryan and his companions had seen a lot of bloodshed and a lot of duplicity over their travels.

* * *

MILDRED, RICKYAND Jak followed Nancy across the flower-lined path between the towers toward an entryway. The entrance was broad, with a rounded arch completing its design, and no door. “This place is beautiful,” Mildred said, gazing at the gleaming buildings.

“One should be able to take pride in one’s home,” Nancy said, escorting the three of them into the tower.

The floor was paved, and it echoed their footsteps as they walked inside. Mildred smiled as she saw the entry room. It was spotlessly clean and featured a high ceiling that had to have taken up three floors of this lobby area, at which point the walls gradually began to angle inward as if they were inside some kind of conical pyramid. The grand lobby featured Impressionist-type art on the walls, great murals of swirling colors and abstract shapes. The place was lit by some trick of the wall structure itself, allowing sunlight to penetrate at regular intervals despite there being no visible windows either outside or within. Instead, it seemed that the walls were thinner in places, or perhaps constructed of some specific material that allowed light to pass through it unobscured.

Mildred shook her head incredulously. Mongo.

Nancy led them into an unoccupied room featuring two beds, a sink and several chairs.

* * *

THERESTOFRyan’s group was accompanied through a freestanding arch into an open-air courtyard, beyond which stood the largest and centermost of the white towers.

“If you would be so kind as to wait here,” Phyllida said, “I’ll speak with the Regina regarding your arrival.”

That didn’t sound good, but Ryan accepted it, taking up a position on one of the crescent-shaped benches that lined the courtyard. His companions joined him, weary from their travels, while Phyllida and Adele disappeared inside the tower.

Ryan’s lone eye flicked up to watch the remaining sec women for a few moments. The woman with the honey-blond hair—Charm—was engaged in conversation with Doc. The old man had an eye for a pretty woman, and he could be a witty conversationalist. The other Melissa—Linda—paced across the courtyard before assuming a position beside the freestanding arch.

“You trust these people?” J.B. asked Ryan, keeping his voice low.

“Sec force,” Ryan replied with a shrug. “What’s to trust?”

A peal of laughter erupted from a nearby bench. Doc was showing Charm some kind of old-fashioned dance that involved using his stick as a cane, and they were in the middle of muddling into each other as he tried to demonstrate the steps.

“Doc seems at home already,” J.B. observed.

Ryan shook his head. “Doc doesn’t know what year it is half the time and he spends the other half wishing he didn’t know.”

J.B. continued to watch Doc as he showed the younger woman the dance. “Seeing him happy like that reminds me of how he was with Lori,” he said.

One of the dance moves seemed to involve turning one’s back on one’s partner and bumping rear ends. The woman called Charm blushed fiercely when Doc showed her, and, still laughing, she patted Doc’s hand.

“Yeah, a lot like Lori,” Ryan agreed.

Remembering what had happened to Lori Quint, Ryan wasn’t sure that this was such a good thing. She had died shortly after betraying Ryan’s group.

* * *

JAKWASPACINGthe room like a caged tiger. “Not like place,” he said to no one in particular. “Too clean.”

He halted by the open door, peering out into the lobby area that waited beyond where Nancy had retreated to get help. He could see people moving there, men, women and children, same as in the streets beyond. They were quiet and ordered and clean. It seemed a world away from the life he was used to.

Standing over the bed, Mildred bit her lip in thought. “I’m not going to pull punches, Ricky,” she said. “Internal bleeding would be bad. But we can check for that. This seems to be a sterile environment.”

Jak hissed in warning. Nancy was returning, accompanied by another woman, this one older, with short, nut-brown hair and wearing a simple jacket-and-pants ensemble of very light blue material. Unseen by the pair, Jak slipped back from the door, gliding across the room until he was standing in the far corner from which he could observe everything. A moment later Nancy and the other woman entered, solemn expressions on their faces.

“Mildred, Ricky, Jak...” Nancy began. “This is Petra, one of our medical experts. Petra, this is Mildred, whom I told you about.”

Mildred looked up from where she was checking Ricky’s wound, and she showed her hands in slight embarrassment. “Just washed them,” she explained to prevent any awkward moment of being expected to shake this new woman’s hand.

“That’s a nasty-looking wound your patient has suffered,” Petra said, stepping closer to the bed. “Nancy said you were all caught up in a bomb blast. None of the rest of you suffered any—”

“No,” Mildred said, “we’re all fine, barring a little dust in our hair.” She was glad that Nancy had informed the woman about the bomb, and that both had assumed that was where Ricky had sustained the wound. It saved her having to explain the fraught circumstances in which they had arrived.

Petra introduced herself to Ricky and began to examine his wound, first with her eyes and then by gently running her fingers over it, careful not to cause the patient too much distress. “There’s some grit in the wound,” she said.

“I had to patch him in a hurry,” Mildred admitted. “I cleaned the wound with ammonia—”

“Which stung like hell,” Ricky declared.

“—but there was a lot of dust floating around after the bomb burst,” Mildred finished.

“That’s understandable,” Petra concurred, placating. “I can assure you that this is a sanitary environment. We’ll clean out the wound properly with a sterile irrigant, then take a look at treating it with a salve.”

Mildred was surprised. “Do you think that will be enough? It’s pretty nasty.”

“We’ve been developing some remedies here,” Petra told her, “that we’ve found to be very successful. I think you—and your patient—will be pleasantly surprised.”

* * *

OUTSIDETHECENTRALtower, Krysty joined Ryan on one of the crescent-shaped benches. “I was devastated when I heard the bomb go off,” she whispered.

Ryan ran his fingers across her hand, working them along the webbing at the base of hers. “We found somewhere safe,” he said. “Those old redoubts are built to withstand a lot.”

“So are we,” Krysty said, and she raised an eyebrow and smiled.

Before they could say anything further, Phyllida and Adele appeared at the doorway to the grand tower.

“Ryan,” Phyllida began, “you and your friends have been granted an audience with the Regina. You may follow us to the meeting suite.”

Thanking her, Ryan stood, adjusting the longblaster he carried across his back. Krysty, J.B. and Doc also stood, and together the group was escorted into the towering building.

Chapter Six (#ulink_b873b0db-9492-53c2-9631-4c6c7bcc315b)

The Melissas took up positions to either side of the companions as they strode out of the morning sunshine and into the tower. A broad archway granted entry, with bent sides that worked outward to symmetrical points, and a horizontal apex in mirror to the ground. The entrance was wide enough to drive a couple wags through, shoulder to shoulder, and it served to dwarf any visitor.