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"Yes, he has them working, but he has kept up his part of the bargain. When they surrendered, there were to be no reprisals, no mistreatment, we were to live within his sight and build in return for our keep. It was all laid out in the First Understanding, and then when that was completed successfully, the Second Understanding became law. None would be sent off to the Kurian Zone, and any generations to come would choose whether to live in his domain or depart. His execution of the bargain is faultless."
"They can't wait to help his army, or the Iowa Guard. The Kurian Order, in effect."
"My people were defeated, my David. They accepted more generous terms than they would have received from other Gray One tribes or the Iowans."
"Well, did you at least get a count?"
"Some seven thousand and two hundred. There were losses in the fighting, and some managed to flee into the sand hills to the west rather than be taken. But those number in the hundreds, mostly those without family to think of."
"What would your Speakers like?"
"Like? I do not know that 'like' signifies. They will uphold their end of the bargain as long as this Baron does."
Anger surged up in Valentine. He'd travelled all these miles, killed, sent himself naked into the Gray Baron's camp, when he might as well have stayed in Kentucky, for all the good it would do. Stiff-necked-
No, that wasn't right. It was his fault for thinking he could steer history, the way he tried steering one of the Tennessee boats they'd stolen.
"What if the Baron doesn't keep his end?" Valentine asked.
"The peace and captivity would no longer be valid. They would be only too glad to go to the soft green hills of your Kentucky."
Valentine spent the rest of the day disgruntled and itchy.
With Ahn-Kha's help, he was fairly sure he could escape. Ahn-Kha still hadn't formally accepted a price for Valentine's sale, so he could demand his return at any time. Though the men on base were few in number, Valentine guessed fewer than a hundred were in camp at any one time, with a few dozen more strung out on the rail lines and back north in Iowa. The Golden Ones wouldn't rise and the Gray Ones couldn't. The Gray Baron was their chief's-chief, their warlord, and they liked it that way.
That night, Fat Daddy picked the wrong moment to humiliate Valentine.
Maybe because he'd seen Valentine eat an entire orange without saving half as an offering to the Lord of Dugout 3.
"Forget it, Pappy," Fat Daddy said from his usual prone position, rippled as a sea lion sunning itself. "Have Scar take the piss pot tonight."
"I don't mind, Big-," Pappy began.
"Give those knees a peaceful easy," Fat Daddy said. "Let the Groggie's pet handle it."
"I don't mind," Valentine said.
The worst part was he had to kneel down; Fat Daddy's joined bunks sagged so with the man's weight in it. Kneeling and leaning forward with the sawed-off water bottle made his bad leg hurt.
Beach Boy giggled as Fat Daddy filled the bottle. Disgusted, Valentine felt the plastic go warm in his hand.
"Give him a tap," Fat Daddy ordered.
Valentine pulled the bottle away.
"Don't you hear right, son? You're slower than a wooden Indian. I told you to tap it off. Now me sheet's all soiled."
"Ah-ah-ah," Beach Boy said, waggling his finger in Valentine's direction from behind the garden-slug form of his protector.
For a man who had taken the whole group's soap ration, his bedding was remarkably dirty. Valentine threw the contents of the warm jug into Fat Daddy's face.
For a full ten seconds Fat Daddy remained frozen, as though his brain couldn't quite absorb the splashed urine as well as the sheets and his shirtfront.
"You cunt!" Beach Boy spat.
"You'll regret that!" Fat Daddy bellowed, a rising tide of flesh coming for Valentine.
Valentine's only regret was that he didn't leave a few ounces for Beach Boy's concealer-coated face.
