by Kate Steele
Bond of the Maleri’ 5: Redemption
Kate Steele
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Copyright ©2006 Kate Steele
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Chapter One
Another flawless landing. It was a seamlessly smooth transition from space to dock and yet Jorrian Tavaris felt every nuance of vibration and movement the ship made. Pain lanced through his head, his vision momentarily blurring. Grimacing, eyes squeezing tightly shut, one hand went to his temple while the other stretched forth to search for the edge of the bed. Finding it, he flopped down with a groan and lay still, waiting for the pain to recede.
The attacks were coming with more and more regularity. In the darkness behind his closed lids, he let himself admit to a little of the fear he’d been successfully holding at bay. It wouldn’t be long now before the darkness claimed him for all time and, depending on popular beliefs, there would be eternal rest, a place paved with streets of gold or a fiery pit of never ending torment.
Jor snorted, a cynical if pained smile curving his lips. If it were up to his fellow gamblers, his reward would be the fiery pit. More than one had claimed he had the devil’s own luck, doling out curses along with the valuables they relinquished. At least he had the satisfaction of knowing it wasn’t only luck but skill that made him a winner. He never used his Maleri’ abilities while playing games of chance. One spectacular misuse of his empathic powers had lost him everything. No one could say he didn’t learn from his mistakes.
Suppressing the sharp stab of grief that the memory of Belthola and his lost position amongst the Maleri’ brotherhood brought, Jor massaged his temples. I’ll settle for the eternal rest. Peace, quiet, no hunger, no need, no pain. What’s not to love about that? Yet even as he thought it, deep inside a part of him rebelled. To sleep forever, to do and be nothing seemed an awful waste, not to mention boring as hell. Although I suppose if you’re asleep it’s a moot point. The universe could explode and you wouldn’t know a damn thing. He sighed. All this afterlife speculation was a melancholy and frustrating thing at best.
Experimentally opening his eyes, Jor blinked. He focused on the ceiling. The pain was receding. He’d been granted a few more hours, days or weeks. There was no way of knowing when his inner mind shield would give way, and no salvation was coming. Only the touch of his true mate could save him and Jor had never searched for him. He refused to burden anyone with his disgrace. He sat up, then stood. Satisfied when his legs remained steady, Jorrian took his already packed black leather duffle and left his cabin in search of the nearest drinking establishment.
Tired of metallic walls and recycled air, Jor bypassed the usual space dock bars and went in search of a little local color. A quick shuttle trip planet-side saw him debarking at the planet’s shuttle station on the outskirts of a medium-sized town with a rustic air. Buildings of different designs and heights housed a variety of shops and eating establishments. Quite a few people walked the sidewalks and ranged from browsers to serious, package-laden shoppers. On the street, a steady stream of personal and public transport units cruised.
Three blocks from the port he found what he was looking for. The bar was well appointed, not fancy but definitely not a dive. The clientele looked average, middle class. There was music playing loud enough to be heard but not raucous. The ratio of men to women was approximately three to one, most of the women obviously with a male partner. The servers seemed to be equally divided in number as to male and female, but all were young and good looking. The smell of food mingled with liquor. A small menu was posted behind the bar with simple offerings of sandwiches and finger-foods.
With a practiced eye, Jor quickly found a table with a card game in progress. The men who sat there were focused on their cards and the other players, not in the least interested in what went on in the room around them. This was exactly what he was looking for. Some obviously serious players.
Jor made his way to the bar, took a seat and ordered a shot of whiskey. In all his travels, whiskey was a form of liquor that seemed to be universal. No matter what it was called, every culture he’d come across had discovered a way to ferment whatever kind of grain their planet produced. Taking the small glass the bartender poured for him, he took an experimental sniff. The smell was potent but refined. This brew had an aged scent that caressed the palate as well as a clear and deep reddish-amber color that was visually pleasing.
He took a sip and savored the smooth and smoky bite while it slid down his throat. It settled in his stomach, its warmth easy and persuasive as it encouraged him to relax. Jor let a small curve lift his lips and finished his drink, taking the comfort it offered. He was about to rise from his seat when a tentative hand on his arm caught his attention.
He looked over to find a boy of perhaps fifteen or so giving him an inviting yet nervous smile. “Is there something I can do for you?” Jor asked politely.
The boy’s smile widened. “Maybe we can do for each other.”
Jor’s brow rose. The boy was propositioning him. Not that it hadn’t happened before, but this child was much too young to be offering himself in barrooms. “Go home to your mother, boy.”
A stricken look came over his face. “She’s sick.”
Before he could stop himself, Jor reached out with his senses. He’d met his share of flim flam artists but none could ever fool his empathic ability to sniff them out. What he felt from the boy was heartrending. Fear, sadness, shame, determination, they mixed and mingled with a dozen other raw emotions that beat at Jor’s shield.
Suppressing the urge to throw his arm up to ward himself from the boy’s roiling emotions, Jor reached into his jacket and drew out a small, leather case. Opening it, he took out a card and handed it to the boy. “Do you have a comm unit at home?” The boy shook his head. “Go to the shuttle station and use one of the public comms. Have you heard of the planet Belthola and the Maleri’?”
“Yes, sir,” the boy acknowledged with wide eyes.
“Put a call through to the number on that card. You won’t be charged for the call. This is going to put you into contact with Chastien Kaldor. He’s Maleri’ and head of the Taskin City Security Bureau on Belthola. Chase will vouch for me, then he’s going to put you in contact with some people who will help you and your mother. All right?”
The boy’s emotions soared. Hope warred with distrust. “Not that I don’t appreciate it but why… um why are you helping me and what do you want in return?”
“Let’s just call it my way of helping to balance the universe. And as for what I want in return? Make somethi
ng of yourself. Don’t waste this opportunity, boy.”
“Val, sir, Val Cammor.”
“Pleased to meet you, Val Cammor. Now get your young ass out of here.”
Val grinned and dashed out the door.
The bartender, who’d been busy up till then, noticed Val leaving. “I hope he didn’t bother you, sir. I’ve had to chase him out on more than one occasion. Sorry as I feel for him, I can’t have underage kids in here trying to sell their, um, assets to the customers.”
“Not a problem. I predict you won’t be seeing him again. At least not until he’s old enough to drink,” Jor mused, then shook his head at the puzzled look the bartender gave him.
He rose from his seat and sauntered over to the table of card players. Within minutes he’d caught their attention and, after making his wishes known, was invited to join the game. Jor seated himself and bought markers, unaware of the attention he’d garnered through his exchange with Val.
* * *
Stiff with indignation, Dane Jeffers started to rise from his seat but settled when he saw the stranger hand Val Cammor a card instead of money. He’d lectured Val about coming into places like the Benitenta, but apparently Val was too desperate to take heed. Even after the last incident that left him beaten in an alley with nothing to show for the services he’d performed for his customer but bumps and bruises. He was lucky he hadn’t been raped.
Dane’s gut twisted. He was treating Val’s mother but the supplies he had and the care she needed were far from meeting in the middle. Casithia was a backwater, agriculturally driven planet with very little to recommend it to high powered industry. The medical facilities planet-wide were inadequate and understaffed. Most doctors went where the money was and of those who practiced here, some had shady pasts and reputations.
Dane had trained at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Maryland, in the United States on the planet Earth. His credentials were impeccable, his skill welcomed and appreciated by those near and far but even that didn’t make needed medical supplies appear. The government was poor and the available resources were spread thin.
He kept his eyes on Val and the stranger. Especially the stranger. Dane had noticed the man the minute he’d coolly walked in the door. It would have been hard to overlook someone so distinctive. He was tall and well formed. His black coat fell in an elegant line from his broad shoulders. A crisp, white shirt was tucked into black pants that hugged slim hips and muscular thighs. When he’d sat himself down at the bar, Dane berated himself for letting his gaze wander to the man’s ass. It became a half- hearted rant when he found, to his amusement, that the stranger’s coat was long enough to hide his backside from view.
What really drew the eye was the man’s hair. It was blond, a blond so pale it was nearly white. It was also long. When he’d walked in, Dane could see that it was pulled back. When the man turned and seated himself at the bar a thick and solid rope of shimmering frost pale hair ran down his back and ended just short of being long enough for him to sit on. The man had cocked a booted foot on the rung of the barstool and ordered a drink.
Dane had gone back to his food, ready to dismiss the stranger, when Val had slipped in. He’d watched them, saw the emotions playing over Val’s face and his impudent, yet joyous grin as he’d fled the bar. Something the stranger said or did had made Val very happy. Dane was making it his business to find out what… although, for some reason, he had the feeling this man meant Val no harm. There wasn’t much he could do for Val and his mother. Keeping Val from being hurt further was one thing he could and would do. No matter what his instincts were telling him, he was determined to talk to Val and find out just what he and the stranger had discussed.
Sighing and shaking his head, Dane returned to his meal and the medical journal he’d been perusing. Peripherally he was aware of the stranger joining the card game. Dane kept his eyes on the journal, he’d had enough of watch dogging the man’s actions. Until the commotion brought him once more to Dane’s attention.
Dane looked up to find a growing crowd around the card players’ table. He could just make out a body lying on the floor. Rising from his seat, he pushed his way through the crowd. “Excuse me, I’m a doctor. Let me through please.”
The crowd parted. At the center of the ruckus was the stranger. He was lying on the floor, his pale hair turning red with the blood that was seeping from the back of his scalp. “Sariel, get me a towel or some napkins,” Dane ordered the server who stood on the other side of the table. As the girl ran to obey, Dane examined the man. His already pale complexion had gone pasty white. Dane took up his wrist to feel for a pulse. His own heart jumped at detecting nothing.
Wasting no time, Dane quickly opened the man’s shirt. He placed his head against the stranger’s chest but detected no heart sounds or movement of his chest. “He’s not breathing,” Dane said aloud.
There was a disconcerted rumble from the crowd but Dane paid them little heed. He tilted the man’s head back to check his airway, pinched his nose closed and leaned forward. Covering the man’s mouth with his own, he breathed out and into the man’s mouth twice. There was no response. Undaunted, he began chest compressions. Silently he counted thirty compressions then returned to again breathe twice into his mouth. Back and forth he worked, thirty chest compressions, two breaths.
The fifth time he placed his mouth over the stranger’s an odd feeling took hold of him. At first he thought he was getting dizzy. The feeling of lightheadedness increased and he tried to pull away and sit up only to find himself caught in an invisible web. Dane gasped. A silent scream his only recourse as the unthinkable happened.
Noooo!
Thoughts, images, touches, scents and sounds inundated his mind. The stranger’s life was paraded before him, indelibly ingrained into his conscious and subconscious until he knew this man as he’d known only one other before. Once more the mate gift of the Maleri’ was bestowed upon Dane, and he wailed his despair into the darkness of this unwelcome joining.
As suddenly as the power took him, he was released and Dane scrambled away, his being filled with horror at what had overtaken him. Jorrian -- Dane knew the stranger’s name now -- stirred and moaned. Pale lashes fluttered against his cheeks and frosty brows drew together in a frown as his eyes opened. Stormy green orbs pinned Dane in their sights, comprehension replacing confusion in their depths.
“You bastard,” Jor managed before his head lolled and hit the floor with a small yet solid thump.
There was a shocked silence until the serving girl waved a towel in front of Dane’s face. “Doc? Are you okay? You’re gonna take care of this guy, right?”
Dane blinked and sought for control of his agitated emotions. He took the towel from Sariel and forced himself back to Jorrian’s side. The wound in his scalp was still bleeding profusely. Letting his training brace him, Dane put all other considerations on hold and got to work.
“Can someone tell me what happened?” Dane questioned the crowd. “How did he end up on the floor?”
“I can answer that, Dr. Jeffers.”
Dane looked over in time to see one of the card players, Mont Bartel, squat down across from Jorrian. Dane nodded. “Mont.”
Mont acknowledged the greeting. “We hadn’t been playing very long, just a couple of hands when I noticed him frowning. Unusual behavior for a card player, especially one as polished as he seems to be. We’d just started the hand when he threw in his cards. He said there was something important he’d forgotten to take care of. He stood up, grabbed his head and keeled over.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it, Doc.”
“Thanks, Mont. Do you think you and couple of these other men could help me get him to the clinic?”
“Sure thing. You got your TU here?”
“Yeah, it’s parked out front.”
“Noan, give me a hand with this guy,” Mont said, directing his fellow card players. “Crayl, how about you follow us to the clinic, then Doc won’t hav
e to drive us back.”
The arrangements made, Dane secured a makeshift bandage to Jorrian’s head and followed the men out, watching as Jor was settled in Dane’s transport unit. The trip was quickly made -- his clinic was a few miles out of town, just beyond the shuttle station. Jorrian was brought into the clinic and settled on a narrow bed.
“Anything else we can do for you, Doc?” Mont asked.
Dane shook his head. “You’ve gone above and beyond. Thanks, Mont, Noan. And thank Crayl for me, would you?”
“You bet.”
The two men shuffled out and Dane went to his patient. He stared silently at him for a moment, then went to work.
Chapter Two
Jor woke with the headache from hell. A pounding reverberation had taken up residence in his skull and he frowned, both hands coming up to rub at his temples. It was then he discovered the bandage that encircled his head. Frowning, he puzzled at its presence until memory came rushing in to fill the gaps. Dr. Dane Jeffers. He sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed.
A picture filled his mind of dark curly hair, falling forward to frame a tanned and perfect visage. A chiseled jaw, straight nose, full lips and a pair of wide blue eyes the color of Beltholan skies that stared at him in horror.
Jor dropped his head forward and pinched the bridge of his nose. It was nothing more than what he’d come to expect if by some monumentally abysmal twist of fate he should find himself with a mate. Dane Jeffers’ horror was perfectly understandable. His own feelings were hardly less harsh. He was appalled. The man had once been mated to another Maleri’.
Jor tore the bandage from his head and flung it away.
“Hey! I put that there for a reason.”
Turning his head, Jor watched Dane enter the room. He turned his gaze away. “You wasted your time.”
“I’m a doctor. It’s my duty to waste my time fixing things that are broken. That includes your head.”
