"Fight for me, and I give you my promise: so far as it lies within my power, I will buy back every one of those beast-folk warriors, scattered now through the Starlight Empire, who were once your subordinates. And you have only to lead them in fighting and laboring for me three years; the three years once up, you and they are free! Well then, are you willing to fight for me? Or, to put it another way, are you willing to fight for your own freedom?"
At that time, that man stood outside the cage, and held out his hand to her, clad as she was in hides and cloth.
She, at that time, had no notion whatever of what that one hand meant.
Happily, the choice she made in those days was the right one.
As for that three-year pact, it had been thrown out of mind more years ago than she could say.
Looking upon the face before her, so much riper now than it had been six years past, she took suddenly a step forward, until there was, by the reckoning of it, but ten centimeters between herself and Zhao Chen.
Each could feel the breath of the other.
Charlotte set her hands upon her hips and lifted her head: "Three years, three years, what three years? I have no recollection of any such thing. What, then: I have followed you six years, and hard years they were. And now you would cast off the two of us, mother and child, would you!"
"Here now, here now, this is turning your face and disowning the reckoning. It was agreed before that it should be three years—" Zhao Chen was in the midst of his banter when suddenly he froze.
It seemed to him that he had just now heard some word that was not right.
"What did you say just now?" Zhao Chen seized Charlotte by both shoulders.
Charlotte's gaze shied away somewhat, but the corners of her mouth would not be kept from rising.
"What did I say? I said nothing at all."
So saying, Charlotte turned her body aside, meaning to slip away.
But the next second her body gave a shudder, and she came near to sinking limp upon the floor.
For her tail had been caught.
Zhao Chen hauled upon Charlotte's tail, and without the least ceremony threw her down outright into the captain's chair.
With one hand pressed upon the chair-back, he stared down at Charlotte, and would not be gainsaid: "Didn't you say just now, the two of you, mother and child!"
"Mother and child? I cannot make out what you are saying at all." Charlotte would still not own it.
Whereupon Zhao Chen brought out his trump stroke.
Both his hands began to search along Charlotte's waist.
Very soon Charlotte could bear it no longer.
"Hahahaha… Don't… don't tickle me… hahahaha…" Charlotte laughed aloud past all controlling.
"Will you tell me or not!" Zhao Chen kept at her, and waited her out.
"I… I will not!" Charlotte was laughing until the tears came.
But struggle as she might, she could not win free of Zhao Chen's palm.
At this moment Lilith came over, and spoke: "Charlotte, do tell him."
Lilith looked toward Zhao Chen: "Charlotte feared you would worry, and thought to tell you only after this campaign was ended."
Zhao Chen's hands stopped at this.
He looked at Charlotte lying in the captain's chair, her face flushed and her breath coming in great draughts, the uniform upon her somewhat disordered.
"Is it… is it true?" Zhao Chen swallowed; though he had guessed it, in his heart he dared not yet believe the thing.
Charlotte looked at Zhao Chen with a plaintive reproach: "Yes. We are to have a child."
Zhao Chen, the whole of him, seemed turned to stone.
He swallowed, and turned about to look at Lilith: "I… I am to have a child! I am to be a father!"
Lilith said with a smile: "To be exact, you are to be father to two children. Boy-and-girl twins.[1]"
This joyful news, coming so suddenly, went at one stroke to Zhao Chen's head.
Never once had he thought that he was in truth to be a father.
Fluster? Nervousness? Gladness? And past belief besides…
Every sort of feeling filled his mind at this moment.
In the six years and more gone by he had passed through scenes and straits beyond number, and never had he been in such confusion as now; his mind could not be brought to any calm at all.
"When… when did this happen?" Zhao Chen asked blankly.
"Half a month after you left, at a physical examination, it was found that Charlotte was already with child," said Lilith.
Zhao Chen suddenly caught up Charlotte, who had but just come to herself again, and spun round with her where he stood.
"I am to be a father! I am to be a father! I am to have children!" Zhao Chen shouted in his excitement.
Every soul upon the bridge could hear the Commander's voice at this moment.
As to the matter between the Commander and General Charlotte, everyone had in truth a fair notion of it.
Sometimes, indeed, the two of them might be seen at their rest going back into the same room, and not coming out again for several hours together.
"Stop turning, stop turning! My head is swimming!" Charlotte cried.
Only then did Zhao Chen come to himself: Charlotte was with child now, though it was but one month along.
He set Charlotte down upon the floor with the greatest care.
"What are you about?" Charlotte threw Zhao Chen a look of plaintive reproach.
And Zhao Chen at this moment only looked at Charlotte with a foolish, artless grin.
"Your body is in no danger? And you must deal with so many matters upon the battlefield besides." Something seemed to strike Zhao Chen, and he looked at Charlotte at once in his concern.
It was as though someone had trodden upon Charlotte's tail.
She said at once: "It was for this very reason, that you would fret over my body and not let me command the fighting, that I wished to keep it from you a while! We beast-folk are not made of water. One month gone with child is nothing worth speaking of. When my mother bore me, they say she could still pick a fight, and floored two old bull-folk matrons of the clan next door!"
Seeing that look upon Charlotte: that whoever dared bid her rest might come and have it out with her, one against one.
Zhao Chen knew Charlotte's temper well enough: with a war on, to leave her idle was much the same as taking her life.
"It is truly nothing?" Zhao Chen looked toward Lilith beside them.
Lilith nodded and said: "It is. The beast-folk constitution is strong to begin with. And the medical provision upon our starships may be called of the upper rank within the known universe. Charlotte stays besides upon the Dragon Emperor, and the Dragon Emperor does not appear upon the dangerous frontal battlefield. So Charlotte will stand in no very great danger. If you are anxious still, a few guards and physicians might be appointed to Charlotte, to keep her safe round the clock."
"I will not have people following me about!" Charlotte retorted at once.
Zhao Chen, for his part, pointed at Charlotte and said in earnest: "Either you agree to these conditions Lilith has put forward, or I arrange this moment for you to go back to the Owl Dragon Star System and convalesce. Choose for yourself!"
Seeing that air of Zhao Chen's that would brook no contradiction, Charlotte pouted, and in the end could only nod helplessly: "Very well then. Let it be so."
The terms were settled.
Zhao Chen returned at once to a look of tender fondness.
And began to inquire of Lilith upon matters of childbearing.
As, for instance, what a child born of himself, of the Human Race, and a White Tiger of the beast-folk would look like.
As, for instance, whether the White Tiger beast-folk too carried ten months.
The whole set of him, a doting new father entire!
It was as though the fighting upon the front had been thrown out of mind altogether.