The Sons of Heaven by Kage Baker Page A

work, too?” demanded Tiara.
    “It ought to—but it’s not just a question of eating, you see?” The dreamy vagueness had gone from the slave’s voice; he sounded more sharp and alert than she could ever recall. “There are specific chemical compounds I need. My body must convert them into fuel. Potassium, magnesium, and iron. Selenium. Calcium.”
    “They sound delicious, my heart’s darling,” said Tiara, but uncertainly, because she had never heard of such things.
    “Ah, but where to find them?” The slave frowned, thinking very hard. “Can’t exactly jog down to the corner shop for orange juice and bananas, can we? No indeed. And liver’s not easy to come by either, unless you were able to steal one from some unsuspecting cow.” He turned his blind face in her direction. “Sweetheart, my adored one, what does he farm, that mortal you visit? Cattle alone? Or would he have rows of green stuff?”
    “Nasty green stuff,” she told him, frowning and shaking her head. “I tasted it. Berries are nicer, and plums.”
    “To be sure they’re sweeter, dearest, but will you bring a leaf or two of the nasty for your poor old slave to try? Raw kale would suit very nicely, I think.” The slave hugged himself, shivering with happiness. “Roots of any kind, if you can find them. Oh, Princess, think of being free. Think of walking in the sunlight. I’ll take you to the gardens, the museums, the theaters, the shops! What a time we’ll have …”
    Tiara could barely wait. She ventured far afield, farther than she’d ever gone, and did what Quean Barbie would have indignantly refused to do: dug roots with her own slender hands for an old slave, and filled her arms with nasty cabbagey stuff. It made her very cold and cross, to labor across the muddy night fields, and she was tired when she came back to the bone room; but her heart beat all strangely when she saw the slave sitting up, listening for her, his lined face anxious.
    He ate so gladly of the kale, and coaxed her to try it, though she still spat it out and shuddered. Ah, but potatoes and carrots! Tiara couldn’t believe how delicious they were. She went back to the farmer’s field the next night and dug all she could carry away with her. The next night she did the same.
    The next night, as she was working her way through the heather to the edge of the terraced field, a figure rose suddenly, looming against the starlight, and a gnarled hand caught her by the wrist. She screamed, so high and shrill no human ear could have heard her, and bit frantically at the hand.
    “Hello hello,” hissed her captor. “I’d keep my voice down if I were you, stranger in the night, sweetmeat. Sweeney sits in the dark with a sling well loaded, ready to bash out the little pretty brains of you, if you make free with his truck patch again.”
    “Uncle Ratlin?” she said in surprise, and somewhat muffled around his withered knob-knuckles. She lifted her face to stare at him, and he at her, in mutual astonishment.
    Uncle Ratlin was terribly big for kin, nearly as tall as her slave might be if he could stand. And whiskery! The stupids’ gray skins were smooth and hairless, but Uncle Ratlin had a straggling beard and wispy elflocks trailing from under his hat. He was wearing big people clothes. But of course, he had to; for Tiara recollected now that he went out among the big people, did Uncle Ratlin, fooling them into thinking he was one too, so that he could further his grand scheme to ruin them all.
    He peered at her now, his wide green eyes puzzled. “How should you know me?” he wondered, pursing his thin mouth. He thrust his face close and sniffled at her. “Was it you Sweeney was grousing about down at the Rising Moon,
you
stripping his fields? Pretty ripe girl, what hill are you from? There’s no kin in this county but mine.”
    She drew back haughtily. “Unhand me, sir,” she ordered. “I am the Princess Tiara Parakeet.”
    He bared his tiny sharp teeth in a