Phoenix in Flames

by Jaleta Clegg

  She would have been happy, she could have been, except Dace was still missing.

  Chapter 37

  I sat cross-legged on the ragged blanket. It didn't do much to soften the cold hard floor but the cushion smelled sour and rank. I shoved it out of my space. It disappeared while I slept. I shivered, rubbing my hands up my arms. My short white shift wasn't much good at keeping me warm. Shomies kept her mansion on the cold side.

  I found very quickly that if I tried to cross out of the square of plascrete to the carpet my collar would begin to tighten. Pain tingled down my arms and legs when I got too close to the carpet. I didn't know how it worked, but it was effective at keeping me in the space. I could access the bathroom behind the stairs, but nothing else. It held a sink and toilet and nothing more. It didn't even have a window.

  Neither did my space, but at least I could look across the wide room to the bank of windows across the front. The finish on the glass, old and cracked as it was, gave the reddish light outside a warmer tone. There wasn't much to watch. The courtyard was bare. I saw no animals of any kind, only stone walls and the empty courtyard.

  Blondie spent most of his time on the main floor. He ignored me. He drank a lot stared moodily into the fireplace or out the front windows. I suspected he was as much a prisoner as I was.

  Several days passed. I was fed ration bars. I dreamed of Jasyn's cookies. Shomies came every evening, the stairs creaking under her weight, to watch me eat. She stood over me, gloating, while I choked down the nasty bar. I wasn't going to give her the satisfaction of seeing me complain. I pretended I liked them.

  I drank water out of the bathroom sink. Nothing else was ever offered. I'd suffered worse but I knew Shomies hadn't even started on me yet. Waiting for her to make the first move was driving me crazy.

  Another day dawned. I stirred on the blanket. I hadn't slept well. I kept jerking awake, cold and hurting on the floor. I did my exercises, mostly to try to keep myself sane. If I just sat, I would give up. I wasn't going to let Shomies win.

  I watched and waited, but I hadn't seen anything that might help me. The collar was smooth, completely seamless under my fingers. My space was empty except for the sorry rag of a blanket. I couldn't reach anything outside of the uncarpeted space. I hoped Lowell would come, but I couldn't count on it being anytime soon. I had to find my own way out.

  Or I could lie down and die and let Shomies Pardui win.

  I did my exercises, stretching and working muscles in the small space.

  "Why do you bother?" Blondie spoke from the shadows around the fireplace. He sat in a chair beside the weird pile of white cubes. Sprawled was a better word. He looked as if he'd slept in the chair.

  "Why do you?" I replied.

  "She bought me when I was ten. I wasn't given a choice."

  "And I was?"

  He pushed himself out of the chair. His clothes were wrinkled. The spikes in his hair tilted to one side. He shuffled across the room and poured himself a drink. Ice clinked in his glass. He crossed the room to lean against the staircase, staring at me with bloodshot eyes.

  "What's your name?" I asked. He didn't look too unfriendly this morning.

  "Shomies never bothered to give me one. I usually answer to 'You'."

  I eased into another stretch. "What name did you give yourself?" I didn't really care, but it was something to do.

  He sipped his drink. "River. It's what my name means in the old tongue."

  It took me a minute to dig up the language of Dadilan. "Rivian?"

  "I'm surprised you remember."

  "I kept trying to forget." I stood, easing a kink out of my back. "Why do you stay with her?"

  He shrugged, the drink sloshing in his glass. "She owns me." He took a swallow. "I don't know anything else. She lets me do as I please, most of the time."

  "And are you happy here?"

  "What does that have to do with anything?"

  "If you aren't happy, you could leave."

  He laughed, a short bark that held too much pain to be pleasant. "You think I can just walk out? I'd be dead within five minutes. Shomies Pardui is not a forgiving person."

  "You're telling me." I shifted my balance, trying to find my center. "Do you have any idea what she wants with me?"

  "Your complete and utter humiliation, to start with. She hasn't said anything beyond that. Not yet."

  "She can try. She's out of her league. I've been humiliated by the best."

  He drank the last of his drink. It wasn't helping his looks or his balance. "She followed all of the stories about you. She has a whole room dedicated to you. She's got all of your pictures on the walls. Every one of them has a big, red X across the middle of your face."

  "Then she must have had a ball during my engagement."

  "What happened? Did he dump you?"

  "I dumped him. After his mother tried to kill me the fourth time."

  Rivian laughed again, the same harsh sound.

  "You know all about me. Tell me your story."

  He rattled his ice. "There isn't much to tell. Shomies bought me off the auction block. She paid a lot less for me, but then I'm not wanted by half the galaxy. After you got her arrested, I worked for the Duchess. She was deposed not long after Shomies left. I ran when I could. After the ships started coming, I found a way onto one. I worked for a pirate for a while, until I tracked Shomies down. It's a lot safer keeping house for her. Or so I thought."

  I shifted my stance, tucking one foot behind my knee and balancing on one foot. I kept my hands folded in front of me. "If you want safe, you shouldn't be working for her."

  "You know nothing about it, Dace." He drawled out my name. He watched me balance for a few minutes. "It's useless. Don't try escaping. It won't work."

  "She paid you to say that," I said, closing my eyes.

  "It's the truth." His voice faded as he walked away. "The sad, sad truth. You aren't walking out of here. Or even crawling."

  Ice clinked again. This time he took the glass to the far corner of the room. He pulled a chair around to face the window and sat where I couldn't see him.

  I relaxed out of the final stance. The sun rose, bathing everything in a ruddy glow. Streaks of reddish light tried to come through the front window. They didn't make it far. The glass was too scratched.

  I washed what I could in the bathroom. Rivian was gone when I came back out. I sat on my blanket and tried to figure out a way to get the collar off. Nothing new came to mind.

  Rivian ignored me for the next several days. I did my exercises several times a day, never when Shomies came down the stairs. I sat on my blanket and pretended to stare at the floor when she was present. It made her frustrated. I very carefully didn't react to anything she did or said. I'd gotten a lot better at the game.

  I wondered how long I could play it. Days? Weeks? Not months. Shomies would lose patience long before then. And so would I.

  People came to visit Shomies. They usually stayed out in the courtyard. She made her ponderous way out the wide doors to talk with them. Boxes and money changed hands. They flew away in their flitters. I sat in my cage, watching, trying to find a way out.

  I wondered if Rivian might be a key. He was unhappy. He didn't like working for Shomies. If I could get him to talk again, maybe I could convince him to help me. I didn't get a chance. He avoided me.

  Time crawled past. I was impatient for Shomies to start something, anything. The waiting was driving me crazy. It finally dawned on me that that was her plan. I played even more submissive after that. I barely moved when Shomies was present. I sat in the center of my prison and stared at my bare toes.

  I watched every move she made. She never showed me the controller for my collar after that first time, but I knew she kept it somewhere close. I figured out how far the field extended around my space but I couldn't find the generator for it. I would have tried shorting it out if I had found it.

  I knew something was up after the first week. Shomies came downstairs, her
massive bulk covered with billowing draperies. She ordered Rivian to prepare dinner for her and several guests.

  Another man came in through the front doors and helped Rivian set up a long table. Three girls joined him in the kitchen. They didn't talk while they cooked. Shomies came down the stairs to supervise. She stood and watched, smacking her lips over the food.

  I couldn't help drooling myself. It smelled wonderful. The thought of eating ration bars again turned my stomach.

  Shomies crossed the room, her feet soundless in the thick carpet. She loomed over me, watching me sit. I waited while she watched me. She finally humphed to herself. I heard a faint click.

  "Come join us at the table," she said to me. "You will sit on the floor next to me and beg for scraps. If you are good, I may reward you."

  "I'd rather stay here," I said.

  She kicked me. I sprawled onto my side. The force field came back on. I saw where she put the controller. It went into the front of her dress. There was no way I was going to be able to steal it there.

  "Maybe I'll make you dance later," she said.

  "I don't dance."

  "You will, if I want you to."

  I lay passively on the floor and waited to see what she was going to do next. She glared down at me for a long moment before turning and sweeping away across the carpet.

  Her guests arrived, two men and a woman I had never seen before. They gave me a few curious looks before ignoring me. I watched them eat and wondered if it would have been so bad to beg. It smelled delicious. My stomach growled. I ignored it.

  Rivian and the girls served the food. Shomies talked with her guests, the charming hostess. They were polite. I wondered why they were really there. I listened in to their conversation. It wasn't helpful. I had no idea who or what they were discussing.

  After a while, they moved to the fireplace area. The older man cleared the dishes and put the table away while they talked. Rivian got to wash the dishes and put the food away. The girls were called over and ordered to perform.

  They did a sinuous dance, twisting themselves into intricate knots. The music was odd, a thumping rhythm of drums with a plaintive tune woven through the drums as intricately as the girls were woven together. Shomies caught me watching. I ducked my head and pretended my feet were thoroughly fascinating.

  The evening dragged on. The guests finally rose. Shomies walked them out the front door. They stood by their flitter, talking with her for quite some time. The flitter finally lifted off. Shomies came back in.

  "Very good," she told the three girls. "Gynarr thinks he has a buyer for you. An entertainer who is looking for something unique. Go to bed now."

  The girls giggled their way up the stairs.

  "You may go," she told Rivian.

  He nodded, his spikes waving on his head. He wiped the counter one last time then sauntered out of the room. The stairs didn't creak under his weight. He walked lightly.

  That left me alone with Shomies. She stood in the middle of the room, watching me.

  "Does it bother you?" she asked. "That I sell people? They'll be well treated. I'm not usually in the market for slaves, although when something catches my eye I don't hesitate."

  "Does it matter if it bothers me?" I looked up, meeting her gaze for the first time since I'd recognized her.

  She smiled. "You wanted me to think you were beaten. It was all an act. You've been sitting there, plotting the whole time."

  "You won't win, Shomies. Cut your losses and let me go."

  "Not until I'm through with you. No one will want you then." She crossed to the kitchen and poured herself a goblet of something golden. "Do you enjoy ration bars?"

  I looked away from her, out the window even though I could only see darkness. I didn't bother to answer.

  "If I remember correctly, you really enjoyed your food on Dadilan. You look like you could use a few good meals. Maybe I should change my strategy." She brought her goblet across the carpet to stand near me. "What would you look like if you doubled or even tripled your weight? Who would look at you then?"

  I stared at the floor and ignored her. Or tried to. Would it make a difference if I were fat?

  "What happened to your Patrol boyfriend?" Shomies asked. "Would he want you if you were too fat to walk without help?"

  I'd never know the answer to that question. Not now.

  "He left you, didn't he? He found someone else. It shouldn't have been hard. I never understood what he saw in you."

  She was more than a little drunk. I waited for her to say something useful. She didn't. She stood over me, swaying while she sipped her drink. When the goblet was empty, she frowned at it.

  She stumbled away, leaving the goblet on the counter. She didn't say anything else. She climbed the stairs. They creaked loudly under her weight. After a minute, the lights dimmed and went out.

  I sat in the dark and sighed. How much of my personal life did she know about? How many barbs would she throw at me? If I ignored her long enough, maybe she'd move on to different tactics. Maybe she'd just settle for beating me up once a day. I could live with that.

  I curled up on my rag to sleep.

  Chapter 38

  Lowell sauntered into the afternoon light. The weather on Hawkmoor tended to lots of clouds but not too much rain. The temperature stayed fairly warm and pleasant without getting hot and muggy.

  It was interesting, he thought. It was almost a standoff between the port authority and the Phoenix's crew. They took turns standing guard outside the ship, one at the back, another near the hatch. The officials pretended not to notice but the number of armed guards patrolling the port was much higher than it should have been. He hadn't been able to get anyone to tell him exactly how it had happened, but knowing Jasyn and the Gypsy connection here, he could guess.

  He scratched his ear, thinking. It was an interesting situation. It was going to get even more interesting the longer they avoided the Gypsy Council. They wanted Jasyn, at least long enough so they could depose her as head. He wasn't certain of that, though. He was guessing blindly because no one would tell him anything. They either avoided his questions or had no answers to give, depending on who he talked to.

  Jasyn was determined to find Dace and the Gypsy Council would just have to wait until she was ready to return. The part that worried Lowell was knowing the Council wouldn't wait much longer. They were ready to force the issue if necessary. He'd found more information here than he'd had for the last months on Linas-Drias. Most of it was buried in the Phoenix's library. Clark had stolen a lot more than he realized. Lowell knew enough override codes to open most of the files.

  So far none of them had yielded the information they really wanted. None of them had information on a certain pirate by the name of Ren Matthias. None of them had records of illegal purchases at an arms bazaar run by more pirates. They were grounded here until they dug up something more useful.

  He stopped near the back of the ship. Ginni sat on the lip by the cargo bay doors. The rifle across her lap looked too big. She handled it more than competently, he knew. He'd seen her scores from the Academy. She was almost as good as Dace with a rifle. He deliberately made loud noises and gave her plenty of warning. He paused until she looked over at him.

  "Do you mind if I join you?" he asked.

  She shrugged and resettled the rifle in her lap. He walked into the shade of the ship and leaned one hip against the lip where she sat. A breeze ruffled his hair.

  "Peaceful out here," he said after a moment watching clouds.

  "That's why I'm here," she answered. "At least partly. How much longer are we going to sit here arguing?"

  "We don't know where to go," he said.

  "Ananda knows. Beat it out of her."

  "Clark's pushing her right now. You aren't the only one impatient to be going. Beryn says he'll have the thruster system back online by tomorrow. Jasyn's arguing with the parts supplier for the last bits even as we speak."

  She glanced sideways at him.
"I thought you knew everything."

  "I used to, until my people started disappearing." He shifted and the light caught on the green shipsuit he wore. He ran his finger down the sleeve. No more uniforms, at least not silver ones.

  "Why go after Dace?" Ginni asked. "She wasn't doing anything."

  "No, she was doing what she's best at. Getting into trouble without even trying."

  "Why sell her at an arms bazaar? It doesn't make sense." Ginni's dark eyes looked troubled.

  "That part makes perfect sense. Dace has a lot of enemies and I can't protect her anymore. Someone figured it out. If you'd gone straight back to Tebros, to the Federation, no one would have dared to lay a finger on her. Out here, where the syndicates rule, she was vulnerable."

  Ginni bristled. "You're saying it's our fault?"

  "No, it's probably mine. I promised her she'd be safe. You couldn't have known."

  "Jasyn thought she needed time."

  "Jasyn didn't want to face the Gypsy Council until she couldn't avoid them any longer. I believe they'll try to force the issue soon."

  Ginni looked at the port guards patrolling not too far away. "They can try."

  "And more people will get hurt," Lowell said. "That isn't the way to resolve it."

  "You're saying we should go to Tebros."

  It was Lowell's turn to shrug.

  "We'll be stuck there for months," Ginni argued. "They barely let us go last time."

  "Claim the same excuse," Lowell said. "One of your clan is in deep trouble. That preempts any claim the Council has over you."

  Ginni shook her head. "Jasyn says they've declared most of Shellfinder nonexistent. We weren't born Gypsies, so we aren't really Gypsies. Or clan. That was the latest argument they tried yesterday."

  "Blood debt doesn't matter anymore?"

  Ginni turned to look fully at him. "What does that mean?"

  "The Gypsies owe blood debt to Dace. As far as I could determine, she's saved over three hundred of them. At least. And that was only the ones she was directly responsible for returning to their clans."