But energy was already swirling about the artifact, and she could feel it being sucked into the chamber from outside. It drew power through the shields as if they were no obstacle at all, and it powered that energy into Thor and everyone in NavCom. Just as it had drained those pirates of life, it was now doing the same thing to the bacteria outside.
Thor turned his face toward hers, and their eyes met, crimson light flashing between them. A hint of doubt and confusion furrowed his brow as she shared the images with him, tried to convey everything that had been conveyed to her.
He drew back, lifting his hands from the artifact, but it kept throbbing from its spot on the deck, draining energy from every living thing outside of the ship.
“How do we stop it?” Jelena asked, shaking from the raw power flowing into her. It combated the weakness she’d felt, how drained she’d been, but she knew it was killing those bacteria.
If Thor answered, she didn’t hear it. Instead, pain flowed into her, pain similar to what she’d experienced in the vision the bacteria had shared, the vision of their planet—their civilization—being destroyed. But this time, it was happening now.
She pulled her hand back, hugging it to her chest, and she tried to lock herself off from the artifact, tried to reject its energy, but some kind of backlash struck her, something akin to a rubber band snapping between her eyes. Pain and blackness smothered her, and she pitched backward, losing consciousness.
• • • • •
Jelena woke slowly, feeling hung over and groggy.
A faint beeping came from the control console above her. She lay on her back on the deck, the sound of someone’s breathing right beside her ear. Zhou. He was unconscious. Brody and Abelardus were tangled on the deck behind him, both halfway through the hatchway, neither moving. Everyone must have been knocked out.
Thor was on his side in the middle of NavCom, the artifact tipped over in front of him. It still glowed softly, but it had stopped pulsing like an engine on overload.
Thor’s eyes fluttered open, and he lifted his head. He stared at the artifact, then his eyes grew distant as he seemed to check something with his senses. His head clunked back down to the deck.
Jelena also reached out since she could no longer feel the presence of the bacteria. No images flowed into her mind. Nobody was trying to communicate with her.
She didn’t feel anything alive out there. She swallowed and tried again, searching carefully. After all, it had taken her a while to first sense the bacteria, to realize that something so small could represent life. And intelligence.
There was nothing out there, nothing to respond to her call. She looked bleakly at the artifact, and hatred for the thing surged within her. She wanted to kick it across the deck. Or out of the ship altogether.
But wasn’t some of this her fault? Numerous times, she’d defended herself against what had been attempts to communicate. What might have happened if she’d opened herself up earlier?
Sick at the thought, she pulled herself into the pilot’s seat.
She expected to be stiff and sore after all the pain she had experienced, after being knocked out and waking up on the deck. But she felt fine. Even good. As if she could move mountains. She glared at the artifact again, knowing all too well what had been lost so she could feel that way.
She touched the comm button. “Dr. Ogiwara? Are you awake?”
“I’m here.” Kiyoko sounded dazed, as if she’d been knocked out too. Maybe everyone on the ship had.
“When you have a chance, bring your medical kit to NavCom to check everyone out, please. We’ve had… an incident. Erick, are you out there?”
“I’m here. What happened?”
“I’ll explain later. For now, just turbocharge that generator to break these rocks and get us the hells out of here.” Jelena looked at the shield power holodisplay. They were at thirty-three percent now, and as she watched, it ticked up to thirty-four. The bacteria were no longer working against it.
“Gladly, Captain.”
Thor slowly rose to his feet. He turned, as if to leave, but paused and looked down at the artifact. He glanced at Abelardus and Brody, then sighed and picked it up. Without a word, he headed for the hatchway.
Jelena thought about asking him if he understood what had happened, if she’d successfully shared with him all the knowledge she’d been given. But if he hadn’t gotten the whole story, maybe that was for the best. What good could come of telling him? He’d chosen saving the ship over saving those bacteria, and it was hard to blame him for that choice.
I know, Thor said, looking back over his shoulder as he turned the corner. His expression was bleak, devastated. I know it all.
Jelena nodded as he disappeared, then turned to the controls. It was time to blaze through some boulders and get out of this place.
Chapter 20
The comm beeped as Jelena navigated the Snapper out of the Trajean Belt. It had been over an hour since they had left the asteroid, and she hadn’t seen pirate or Starseer ships yet, but she winced at the alert, certain someone was about to threaten her with utter destruction if she didn’t turn over the artifact.
But the face that popped up on the holodisplay was a familiar one—and a welcome one. Jelena almost laughed at the timing. It seemed like it had been weeks since she sent her message to Young-hee.
She hit the play button to listen to the recorded response.
“Jelena,” Young-hee said, her tone one of pure exasperation. She pushed her bangs away from her forehead. “I don’t even know where to start. Do not trust that Mark Brody. He’s a manipulative, dangerous liar at the least. Worse, we suspect him of being part of a chasadski plot to uncover powerful artifacts from the time of the Order Wars and before. Starseers were at the height of our powers, and they had some of the greatest toolmakers in history back then. Of course, he didn’t tell us about his goals when he asked to join our team last year. He showed us this impressive pedigree with advanced degrees from Perun Central, and he claimed to have grown up in one of the small Starseer enclaves on the planet. Since the empire hunkered down there and isolated itself from the rest of the system, we haven’t had much communication with the Perun communities, so nobody thought much of his claims. Why we didn’t put in the effort to check, I don’t know. We can blame ourselves for that. It’s hard being a mom and a student and a scholar, and—gah.” She pushed her bangs back again. She looked like she wanted to pull all of her hair out. “Just get him off your ship as soon as possible. And kick Abelardus in the ass and send him home. I’m sure Brody manipulated him into joining with his scheme in the hopes that he could provide a ship—though I bet Brody imagined him piloting it instead of him going to find you. I’m also sure Abelardus was an easy target for manipulation. If I find out he got wind of Brody’s goals early on and thought he could somehow come out on top… He’s obsessed with—oh, don’t get me started on his obsessions.” She rolled her eyes. “Just tell him to come home, that Meena misses tugging on his braids, and that it’s very much his turn to change diapers. For the rest of the year. And he better be here by the time our son is born. We don’t need any ancient artifacts. We need him. Stay safe, Jelena. Get that man off your ship as soon as possible. Brody, I mean. And Abelardus. Goodbye.”
“I’ll be happy to do so,” Jelena murmured as Young-hee’s face faded from the holodisplay. “With both of them.”
She contemplated the message, but it hadn’t told her anything she hadn’t already suspected. And it had come too late to do any good.
Jelena checked the sensors to make sure there weren’t any pirates lurking nearby and set the autopilot. The majority of the asteroids were behind the Snapper now, so she could step away for a few minutes.
She headed toward Thor’s cabin to check on him. He had seemed horrified at what he’d done, but he had also stalked off with that artifact.
What if he was back there now, cradling it in his arms and imagining that he could do the same thing to legions of
upstart Alliance soldiers who wanted to oppose him as he tried to recreate his father’s empire? She’d hesitated in proclaiming him a good man, and she wasn’t sure she had been wrong to do so, but she also didn’t think he was evil or could truly kill people indiscriminately to get what he wanted. She hoped she was right.
Not sure he would want to be disturbed, Jelena knocked lightly on Thor’s hatch. Normally, she would wait for him to come out of his cabin, but that Starseer ship could still be waiting out there, possibly with orders to destroy them. Nothing had changed from their point of view. The only good thing was that Jelena could potentially use the Starseer woman—if she was indeed who she said and not aligned with pirates—as a bargaining chip. She could also use the artifact. If she could wrest it from Thor.
If he was determined that they keep it and do their best to avoid the Starseer ship, Jelena didn’t know what she would do. Maybe it was already too late, but she hated the idea of being an enemy to the Starseer community for the rest of her life. What if they put some kind of bounty on her head? How was she supposed to haul freight if she had to look over her shoulder for the rest of her life?
She stared bleakly at the hatch. Thor hadn’t answered. Should she go in anyway?
She tried the handle. It wasn’t locked. She pushed open the hatch, expecting to hear a growl of, “Go away.” Or maybe he wasn’t even in there.
No, she could sense him inside. He sat cross-legged on the deck in the dark, the red glow of the artifact the only light source in the cabin. She half-expected to find him staring into its depths, mesmerized, but he had an elbow propped on his knee and his face in his hand.
“Thor?” she asked softly, though he had to know she was there.
He didn’t move, and she stayed in the hatchway until Masika came out of her cabin farther down the corridor. She leaned through Erick’s open hatchway and said something to him. Wanting privacy, whether Thor agreed to it or not, Jelena stepped fully inside and closed the hatch behind her. The swirls of the artifact created eerie red patterns on the walls.
“It was made to be a healing tool,” Thor said without lifting his head from his hand. His voice sounded odd. Ragged. “Ironic, isn’t it? It draws upon the energy of others in order to heal its wielder and those he chooses. It was supposed to help people, or at least Starseers. But it’s indiscriminate about where it gets the energy from. Clearly, it has no problem draining people, animals, and anything else living until they die. That gives it a lot of potential as a powerful weapon.”
No kidding.
“Do you think the Kirians on that ship took it along to heal the crew if they ran into trouble? Or did they know it was a weapon and intend all along to use it on the bacteria?”
“I don’t know. They didn’t do what I did—” He broke off, almost choking on those last words, then swallowed audibly. “They might have only considered it to be for healing. If you knew what you were doing, you could probably take only some of the life from a person and give it to another to heal a mortal wound without killing the first person. Like a blood transfusion. If you knew what you were doing.”
Thor dropped his hand and looked at Jelena for the first time. He had dark circles under his eyes and looked wrecked, like he’d been crying. If so, it would be the first time he had done it around her since they had been little kids. Even then, when his parents’ deaths had given him many reasons to cry, he rarely had.
“Jelena,” he whispered, his brow creasing in anguish, “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”
She came forward and sat cross-legged beside him, her knee touching his. “Are you still talking about the artifact?”
He snorted. “No, though I clearly bungled that too.” He swallowed again and looked away, not at the artifact but over it, at the bulkhead, or maybe at nothing. “I pretend I’m so confident, that I know exactly how I’m going to do what my father asked of me, but I don’t know. The more I’m out and away from Halite Moon and my tutors, the more I realize what an impossible task this is. Alejandro and the others, they all thought people would follow me just because I’m my father’s son, but the ones willing to do that are space-cases. The people I need—they doubt me. I don’t know how to prove I’m worthy to be the leader they want. I don’t even know if…” He dropped his head and gripped the back of his neck. “By the sun gods, Jelena, I destroyed the only survivors of an intelligent race. I’m just as bad as our ancestors, the ones who decided they’d do anything to claim this system for themselves. I wasn’t even trying to do anything but save us. To think I could annihilate a civilization by accident. And if I stay on the path I’m on and intentionally go out and start a war, how much more would I cause to be destroyed?”
Thor wouldn’t want to hear that Jelena was relieved to learn of his doubts, so she said nothing. She put an arm around his shoulders for support. She would certainly want support if she were in his shoes. As it was, she felt horrible for the part she’d played, for the fact that she hadn’t thought to try to communicate with the bacteria sooner. If she had, Thor might have learned what they were earlier and might not have attacked them with the artifact. Together, they might have found an escape from the asteroid that allowed everyone—everything—to survive.
Thor leaned into her, dropping his face onto her shoulder. For the first time ever, he let his barriers down and let his feelings out. She sensed his horror at what he’d done, his doubt in himself, his doubt in the future. The raw, honest emotions, not just the words.
It brought tears to her eyes, and she hugged him tighter, resting her face on the top of his head. His hair was soft against her cheek, a sharp contrast to the lean angularness of the rest of his body.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” he mumbled.
“On this ship? Well, I am the captain.”
“With me. Jelena, you’re right. I’m not a good man. I’m my father’s son, and my father… I think he was better than many leaders, but maybe you can’t be an emperor and be good. Maybe you can’t make the kind of ruthless life and death decisions that are needed to lead billions and be good.”
“Or maybe it’s just that when you’re an emperor, you can’t make a decision at all without there being ramifications for billions. It’s like a river where you can’t possibly see everyone downstream who will be affected if you drop something in at the source.”
“What do you think I should do?”
“You’re asking me?” Jelena gaped at the top of his head. “I’m just…” She stopped herself from saying just a kid. She might feel too young and inexperienced to be a good captain, but she didn’t truly think of herself as a child anymore. “I just run freight.”
“You’re the only one who thought to try to talk to the presence troubling us, to question why it was troubling us. You have a unique perspective. And I don’t know why, but you care about my fate, and the fate I make for others.”
Thor turned his face up to her neck and kissed her there. Jelena was so startled that she couldn’t answer him—she forgot the question altogether.
He rested his hand on her shoulder, rubbing her through her shirt with his thumb. She wasn’t sure it was supposed to mean anything—after all, he’d been clear about his lack of romantic intentions—but that didn’t keep her from tingling with awareness at his touch, at the warmth of his breath against her skin, at the heat of his body so close to hers.
His mental barriers were still down, and he let more of his emotions slip out to touch her, to envelop her. She sensed the warmth and appreciation he felt for her, that he was glad she’d come, that he was relieved she was still talking to him after the galactic mistake he’d made.
He lifted his head to look in her eyes, but there didn’t seem to be lustful thoughts lurking there. He was looking at her with that creased brow again. Waiting for an answer to his original question?
Jelena gathered her thoughts and groped for something helpful to say. Or at least coherent.
“Thor. You’re very focused and you
’re very determined… to get to this one star, to launch your colony ships and settle the planets orbiting it, right? And focus and determination aren’t bad traits, not at all, but I think you’re overlooking the fact that there’s a whole heap of stars in the sky. I know your father was partial to the one, but if you adjusted course and launched all your colony ships for one a little to the left of the original goal, one where the route doesn’t take you through as many asteroid fields, it wouldn’t mean you were a failure. You could still do great things. Maybe the new star would even turn out to have more habitable planets than the original. And those planets would be desirable distances from the sun and wouldn’t need to be terraformed. And lots of edible things would be growing there. And there’d be dogs.”
“Dogs?” Thor’s eyebrows twitched, and he held up his thumb and forefinger a few millimeters apart. “You were this close to helping me, Jelena.”
She shoved him. “Whatever. You know I’m totally wise for my age. And I talk to you. Who else talks to you?”
“I stay in my cabin with my hatch shut so people won’t talk to me.”
“It’s no wonder you have problems.”
He snorted softly, then looked contemplatively at the bulkhead. It was the same drab green that the rest of the ship had been before Masika started painting murals. He should invite her in to paint. Or maybe he would like Jelena to glitter it.
“So what’s the backup star?” Thor asked, for once not surfing in her thoughts, or not commenting on what he saw there if he was.
When she’d been making her analogy, she hadn’t truly expected him to contemplate an alternative. Now she wished she’d spent more time coming up with one. What could he do that wasn’t building an empire, but that wasn’t many magnitudes of order away from it? Something that would satisfy his dead father’s ghost as well as his sense of self-importance and grandeur.
“Grandeur, really.”
“You are reading my thoughts.”
“You’re not even trying to hide them. They’re practically leaking out of your ears.”
Stolen Legacy Page 23
