The fintel gave another hoot and Fluffy scrambled up from the water onto the rock and jumped onto Dee, climbing up her arm to dig sharp claws into her shoulder and hiss at the invisible fintel.
“Ow.” Dee tried to pry the claws out of her skin, and saw pin pricks of blood all the way up her arm and a scratch on her shoulder. “This is the downside of being naked.”
Sebastian shot her a grin while the little talu focused in the direction of the hooting noise, fangs bared and growling softly. Dee's lips twitched because her fur was soaking wet and it made her look even tinier than she was.
“That was probably our signal to get going.” Sebastian lifted Dee up, muscles standing out in his arms, and set her down in the stream beside the rock, then stood himself.
She wondered if he thought things were settled.
She hadn't agreed to his plan, did not intend to walk off into the forest and leave him to deal with the mess.
Time was wasting, though. Especially if Lucia was being held by the Cores.
Dee climbed back onto the bank and started picking up her clothes, scattered in a trail from the path to the stream.
They were sweaty and dirty, but she didn't have much choice but to put them back on.
She lifted her shirt, and then choked out a scream as a large, flying insect, wings clacking, flew up into her face.
Fluffy leapt from her shoulder with a primal scream, and when she landed on the ground, she had the insect struggling feebly in her mouth. It was almost a third of the talu's size.
“Good girl.” Dee crouched beside her and gave the top of her head a scratch.
When she turned, she saw Sebastian watching her with amusement. He was back in his pants, but his chest was bare, and she spent a moment enjoying the view.
“It's harmless,” he said, tipping his head to where Fluffy was happily eating her kill.
Dee laughed. “It surprised me more than anything. Although it's given me a moment of sympathy for Leo's girlfriend, Sofie. We were traveling out of Tether Town, and she picked up a rock with a grass spider on it. I never heard anyone scream like that when she realized what was sitting on her hand.”
“Are they dangerous?”
“Most poisonous spider on Garmen.” Dee felt her world tip a little as she finished speaking, and she wondered how she could have forgotten what was attached to this memory. How she could have gone into this territory so easily.
“What is it?” Sebastian crouched beside her, and she realized she was still naked, holding her clothes in a tight grip in front of her.
She shook her head. “I'd forgotten for a moment what came next.”
“What did come next?” He took her clothes from her, shook out her top to make sure there was nothing else hiding in its folds, and then slid it over her head, dressing her like a child.
“Sofie picked up that rock because we were under attack. Being stalked by a traitor.” She stood and took her underwear and pants from him, bent to pull them on.
“You killed him?”
She pressed her lips together in a parody of a smile. “It was either him, or one of our group. And yes. I was the one to do it.”
She sat down beside her boots, and concentrated on pulling on her socks.
“I'm glad you got him before he got you.” Sebastian sat down beside her. “And I know for a fact that if it had been the other way around, he would not be spending even a moment worrying about the morality of what he did.”
She drew in a deep breath, tipped back her head to catch the last of the spectacular sunset, and then nodded.
“Sometimes it weighs on me, though.”
“I can see.” He ran a finger down her cheek. “When you want someone to carry that for you, just shout.”
She looked over at him, momentarily lost for words. “That's the nicest offer I've ever had, but it doesn't work like that.”
He sent her a crooked grin. “Maybe not. But I'm also available as a distraction.”
She leaned in to him, kissing him in a long, slow exploration. “Your application has been successful,” she whispered as she drew back.
Chapter 24
They sat together, shoulders and thighs brushing as they ate the energy bars Sebastian had pulled out of his emergency pack.
Even though he was angry with her, he still liked being close.
She thought that was just about the sweetest thing she'd ever had in a lover.
“You can be angry,” she said, then tried to gnaw on the corner of one of the bars, “but it won't change things.”
“I wish you'd reconsider.” He snapped a piece off his own bar. “If you get hurt or captured . . .”
“Then I'll face the consequences of my own decisions.” She wasn't particularly brave, but there was no way she could leave Sebastian to deal with the Cores and be swooped up to safety by the Bodivas military.
If they were even in a position to save her anyway.
After a long moment of silence, he sighed, and gave a tiny nod.
She ran a hand down his arm, and twined her fingers with his. “If we need a place to hide in the settlement that the resistance doesn't know about, I think Jamari and Paka would help us.”
“I thought you said Fluffy bit Paka. Isn't he dead?” Sebastian turned to her.
“She put him on his back, but he's really big, and Fluffy had already bitten Hanran and his guard by then, so she wasn't at a lethal level. He'll live. Jamari says Hanran Fattal probably sent Rina out to buy Fluffy because he needed the truth out of someone.”
Sebastian let go of her hand. “The truth?”
“Seems a talu's venom is a truth serum in tiny doses, a psychedelic drug in slightly larger doses, and a lethal poison after that.”
“Fluffy is a walking truth serum factory?” He stared at the talu with sudden interest.
Dee shrugged. “That's what Jamari's heard, and she's traveled a lot for Ruanne. She says the word is that a talu's venom is the most reliable truth serum to be found.”
“And Hanran Fattal was after it.” Sebastian nodded thoughtfully. “He sent his daughter out to get it. I know she was a drug user. She must have had some connections if it's also a drug.”
“And the way Peyt and his friend next door were acting suddenly makes a lot more sense.” Dee's jaw was getting tired, but she needed the calories, so she kept chewing.
Sebastian frowned at her. “Peyt and his friend?”
“When they caught me in his apartment.”
He came up off the ground, crouching in front of her. “What?”
“Didn't I tell you?” So much had happened, she couldn't remember.
“No.” Temper snapped in his voice.
She grinned. “No harm done. I stunned him with a laz and Fluffy and I got out of there.”
“So how do you extract the venom?” He was looking at Fluffy with a lot more warmth than he had before.
“Uh, uh.” She tucked Fluffy under her arm. “I'm not hurting her, and I'm not scaring her.”
“I've heard the med techs out in the deep forest collect snake venom in a cup to send to the labs to create antivenom.” Sebastian dug in his pack and came up with a long insulated bottle with a small lid. He took the lid off and handed it to her. “That looks about the right size.”
Dee took it reluctantly, holding it out in front of her. Fluffy squirmed out from under her arm into her lap and then lifted up toward the lid. Curious, Dee lowered it, and the talu grasped it with both front claws and bit down on the rim. Then she dropped down and chittered expectantly.
Dee peered into the lid, saw a small amount of clear, viscous liquid at the bottom.
“I think she wants a treat,” Sebastian said, voice dry.
“Yes.” Dee took the piece of energy bar he handed her, keeping a firm hold on the lid. “I have a feeling she's done this before.”
Sebastian pushed up into a crouch, watching Fluffy nibble on her reward. “The one thing I'd like to know, given the evidence is mounting up that
Hanran Fattal wanted Fluffy for her venom, is who does he want to get the truth out of?”
Sebastian hoped the person Fattal was holding was his friend, the former resistance leader, Vahn.
Dee could see it in his face before he'd packed everything up and started leading them back toward Dar Raca.
He set a punishing pace.
“If it is Vahn they're guarding down that passage, it's not your fault he's there.” She spoke as he waited for her, holding a branch to one side so she could climb over a fallen tree trunk.
Sebastian narrowed his eyes at her. “I should have known he wasn't dead. That they'd want to get him to tell them who our spies are.”
“Except someone's already giving them that information.”
She stopped beside him, and he let the branch go with a vicious snap.
“It isn't Vahn giving that information. He'd rather die.”
“I'm sure you're right.” She didn't touch him, or soften her voice, she simply stood in front of him until he looked at her. “They wouldn't need the truth serum if they'd already got him to talk. And Jamari says the people disappearing are those who reported information to resistance headquarters. It's most likely someone there who's passing on information.
“And you need to make some room for the possibility that it's Ruanne they're holding, not Vahn. Because I'm betting she'd be just as disinclined to talk to the Cores, and that she'd have a lot of knowledge in that wily, clever brain of hers that they'd like to know about her trade routes and her trading partners.”
He nodded. “Or it's someone else altogether. They've had Vahn more than two months, and they've had Ruanne just under six. I don't know that the Cores are able to look after prisoners for that long.”
His words sent a chill through her, because they were true. The Garmen Cores never bothered to keep prisoners longer than a few days, after which they threw them away, broken beyond all saving.
“I'll be happy if we just get Lucia back,” she said.
Sebastian nodded, and then pulled her close, kissing her forehead and then her lips. “We will.”
There was no one stationed at his house.
Sebastian had no plans on going in, but he was interested to see who might be waiting there.
After ten minutes, he withdrew, feeling his way in the shadowed dark of the forest until he reached the spot where he'd left Dee.
She wasn't there, and he knew a moment of panic before she stepped out from the other side of the tree.
“See anyone?” she asked.
“No.” He swung the pack she held out to him over his shoulder, and then pulled her close, holding her face in his hands and kissing her. He seemed unable to help himself.
“What's that for?” she asked as he drew back, and he liked that she sounded breathless.
“Do I need a reason?”
She laughed softly. “No. No, you don't.”
She slid her arm around his waist and kissed the side of his jaw, and then stepped back.
“How do you not have a lover already?” He hadn't meant to say it, but it had been something he'd been mulling almost since he'd met her. “Are the men on Garmen idiots?”
She gave an indelicate snort. “For a long time, at least the last eighteen months, but probably longer, I've worked in an environment of extreme suspicion. The Cores were out to get us, and we were out to get them, and I took no one, not a single person, at face value. Especially if they weren't part of my team.”
“And those on your team?”
“My colleagues were out of bounds as far as I was concerned. Before I was promoted, I didn't feel strongly enough about anyone to risk the problems that would come up if things went bad.” She shrugged. “And when it became my team to command, I obviously couldn't go there. I was their boss.”
“Lucky, lucky me.”
She looked over at him sharply, almost as if she suspected he was joking.
He stepped into her space, loosely looping his arms around her waist. “I don't know how long we have together. I don't know if you'll be leaving when this is over, or whether we'll even make it, but I want you to know when I say I feel lucky, I mean it.
“I don't remember a time when I wasn't fighting what seems to be a never-ending battle. I was close to going under when I met you, and you've reminded me that there are some good things to be found. That there are some truly beautiful things in this world, and while I'm sorry I involved you in this mess, I'll never be sorry I met you.”
She put her hands on his chest, and ran them upward, hooking them behind his neck. “You are--”
He froze, brought a finger to her lips, then lifted her in his arms and stepped silently up against the tree.
He set her down when they on the other side of the thick trunk, and then he edged back around, crouching low.
The sound he'd heard came again, the snap of twigs and crackle of leaves underfoot.
Dee crouched beside him.
“Anything?” someone asked softly.
“I thought I heard talking, but it might have been a bird.” As the second person spoke, a bird did call, although the cack, cack was muted.
Sebastian felt a cold chill as he recognized both voices.
“The comm unit is still out of range, so either Sebastian isn't coming or the comm set is broken. We're wasting our time.” Laschka kept her voice low.
“You think Sebastian would leave Lucia in Cores hands and do nothing? You think he's that far gone on this Garmen woman?”
Laschka shuffled. Sighed. “I don't know, Darren. But no matter what he thinks about it, he doesn't own her. You think he'll force Dee to give up her life for someone she barely knows?”
“If it's a choice between Lucia, who's been part of the team for years, and some woman he's just met--”
Sebastian heard them move away.
“As far as I know, the resistance doesn't own people, or force them to do things they don't want to do.” Laschka's voice was faint.
“Then best I resign from the resistance.” Darren's voice was cold as he followed her down the path.
He sensed Dee relax, then blow out a breath.
“He'd grab me and haul me off to the Tree in a heartbeat, wouldn't he?”
Sebastian felt the icy hand of rage caress his neck. “Looks like it.”
“And it puts you in a difficult position.” She had twisted, so her back was against the tree trunk, and she was sitting on the ground. She looked up at him, a thin beam of moonlight making her eyes gleam. “You'd be better off walking in to headquarters and telling them you gave me the choice and I decided to head deeper into the forest and see if the Bodivas would rescue me.”
He crouched beside her, considering it. “And what would you really be doing?”
“Finding a way into the Tree without being seen, and looking for Lucia, and whoever else they may have in there.”
“And what good would it do for me to be in headquarters? I won't be popular for letting you go.” By the sound of it, Darren might try to murder him for that alone.
She paused. Frowned. “I don't know. Try to renegotiate with the Cores by telling them I'm gone?”
“That sounds like a losing proposition.” He caught her hair between his fingers, and let it slide, cool and smooth, between them.
“Because they'll kill Lucia.”
He nodded. “Why not? If they don't have any chance of getting you, then killing her will damage me in the eyes of most of the resistance. They'd still be racking up a win, even if it's not the one they were after.”
“The trouble is, I don't think I am who they're after. Hanran Fattal wants Fluffy, although I'm sure he'd like to see me suffer because I'm guessing he didn't like being helpless and off his head in front of his loyal soldiers.”
“Why didn't he say so, then? Why not just say they want Fluffy? Theoretically, that'd be a much easier choice for us to make.” His lips twitched at the look on her face. “I said 'theoretically'.”
“You're rig
ht. So if they don't want to admit they want her, then it's because Hanran Fattal wants to hide the fact that he's procured a talu. He doesn't want others to know he has access to a truth serum. And I don't think the psychedelic properties are well regarded, either. Peyt wasn't at all eager to go to Hanran Fattal and admit to negotiating with me for the venom. He threatened to, but when I challenged him on it, he backed down.”
Sebastian slid her hair behind her ear, frowning. There was more to the incident in Peyt's apartment than she was telling, but he'd been the one to suggest she go there, so there was no one to feel angry with, no one to blame, but himself. “You could be right. He might want to use it on his fellow Cores execs. He might not have Vahn or Ruanne prisoner at all.”
The thought wasn't acceptable to him, and he shook it off.
“We can infiltrate the Tree together if you think it's a better idea.” She lifted her hands. “See if we can get Lucia out. But if we can't get to her, I can still meet him as promised, and when he realizes Fluffy isn't with me, we can negotiate.”
“But you don't want to negotiate,” Sebastian reminded her.
“No. But I'm prepared to talk a good game to get Lucia out alive.” She let her cheek rest in his palm.
The cack, cack of a night caller broke the moment, and they both rose to their feet.
“The night is wasting,” she said, quietly.
He could do nothing but nod in response.
Chapter 25
Dee knocked softly on Jamari's door, and felt a quick rush of relief when she opened it.
There was a dim light on inside, and it was absolutely dark in the settlement's back alleys, so she couldn't read the trader captain's expression, but after a moment Jamari stepped back, allowing them entry.
No one said anything until the door was closed.
“How's Paka?” Dee asked.
“Fine.” She looked over at the bed, and Dee just made out the outline of Paka's massive form under the covers.
“This your resistance leader?” Jamari asked, looking Sebastian up and down.
Dee nodded. “This is Sebastian.”
Breakeven Page 16
