by E M Gale
“Don’t know that anyone did.” He was being rather helpful.
“Why are you telling me all this?”
“’Cos you’re Kotargralok.”
‘Great.’
I looked at the marines.
‘Nah, now’s not the time to ask what the hell that means.’
I sighed and leaned back in the chair to stare out the orc. He fidgeted.
“What’s going to happen to you? Will your captain pay your ransom?”
“Probably,” he said miserably.
“What will happen to you when you get back on your ship?”
He shrugged.
‘Poor guy.’
I frowned.
‘Someone was targeting me. Surely he wouldn’t be?’
“Are you or your captain working for Kuj Kuz-aj?” I asked. The orc shrugged then shook his head. I didn’t think he was lying.
“Them Kreegs stick to themselves, they don’t tend to hire non-Kreegles.”
‘Fair point. Why would Kujjie attack me anyway? I’m carrying a stupid letter for him. I have the damn thing in my pocket at this very moment.’
“OK, thank you. Next one,” I said with a sigh. I spoke to all the orcs from the second attack one by one. They all said essentially the same thing. I spoke to a few humans from the first attack as well. That was fun. They were terrified of me, but even terrified, they couldn’t tell me more than they knew and they didn’t know much. Finally I got one of the assassins.
“Hello,” I said to the assassin as the marines dumped him in the chair. He sneered at me and tested the strength of Wright and Bron by struggling against their grip. Not getting anywhere with that, he went limp and slumped in the chair, tilting his head to rest on the chair’s back and stretching his feet out. He glared at me belligerently over his pointed chin.
“Why did you attack me?” I asked.
No answer. I wasn’t really expecting one.
“Why were you dumb enough to allow someone to teleport you onto a nearby ship through a forcefield?”
The pirate grinned, but said nothing.
“Were you after me specifically?”
He started to pick at his teeth with a short fingernail.
“Who are you working for?”
Nothing. Now he wasn’t even looking at me.
I sighed. “Are you working for Kuj Kuz-aj?”
‘Nope, his heart rate is still normal.’
“Did you know I am a vampire?”
His heart rate jumped at that and he looked back at me in fear. He didn’t bite though.
‘Well, what does that mean: yes or no? He must have figured out by now, if he didn’t already know. I would say he didn’t. Why else would they have been armed with swords and not wooden stakes?’
“Why were you armed with two swords?” I asked.
He held his hand halfway to his mouth, the scum between his teeth momentarily forgotten. He looked slightly confused at the question, but he was at least looking at me now.
“And why no scabbards? It’s a pain to have to carry the swords around, you know.”
The pirate frowned.
I grinned. “I kicked your butt, you know, and you had two swords and a plethora of knives and I didn’t even have a weapon.” I smiled.
The pirate glared, but didn’t say anything.
“And your swordwork was pretty crap.” I started counting my criticisms off on my fingers. “You were wide open. Bad footwork, sloppy defence.”
‘Ooo, I’m riling him. I can smell anger now, rather than just fear. At least I think that’s what I can smell. I’ve started to disentangle my vampiric senses and match what I can smell with what it means.’
“A man ought to take pride in his work, do it properly. I’ve seen fifteen-year-old boys fight better than that.”
“Damn you, you evil vampire suka!” he yelled.
‘Ah, riled. That was easy.’
“Ah, so you can talk then. Tell me, who are you working for?”
“I ain’t telling you nuffink!”
“Yep, that’s right,” I said, confusing him. “What sort of an idiot would go up against a vampire without a single wooden weapon?”
“They didn’t tell me ’bout no draculina bitch.”
‘Ah.’
“That’s a real shame,” I said. “I bet you feel really pissed at… who was giving the orders?”
“I said I ain’t telling you nuffink.”
“How were you supposed to get back to your ship?”
He narrowed his eyes at me.
“Or was it a suicide mission?”
He frowned. He wasn’t particularly attractive, but he looked very dumb when confused.
“Well, it looks like a suicide mission to me. Teleported in like that, you could have ended up in a floor, you had no way to get back and were sent up against a foe with the wrong weapons…” I shook my head. “You must not want to live.”
The pirate’s heart rate rose.
“And if you don’t want to live, then I guess that there’s nothing wrong with me helping you with that.” I smiled the evillest grin I could manage. If the idea didn’t disgust me, I would have made my teeth grow to completely freak him out.
“You stay away from me! You stay away!” He put his forefingers up at me in the shape of a cross.
‘I am not evil!’
I glared at him. He waved his crossed fingers at me, seeming to think that it was doing something.
“Talk to me, and I’ll ransom you at Tortuga,” I hissed. “Tell me who sent you.”
“Bloody Cap’n Cerberus.”
‘What a stupid name. I’ve three-headed sea-dogs after me, have I?’
“That his real name?”
“That’s the only name I know.” The pirate waved his crossed fingers at me again.
‘Bloody bastard! I’m not evil!’
“Cut it out. The most that is going to do is annoy me,” I said.
He frowned but dropped his hands and eyed me warily. I crossed my arms.
“What were your orders?”
“Capture the suka. They didn’t say nothing ’bout no padla draculinas.”
I was confused.
‘Is ’suka’ not slang for vampire? I thought he was saying ‘sucker’.’
“What does suka mean?” I asked.
“Bitch. Ho. Cunt. Whore.” He grinned at me.
‘Oh. That would be me, then. So the orcs knew they were after a vampire, the assassins knew they were after a woman. Great, there are at least two groups after me. At least they haven’t shared intel.’
“Don’t you call her a whore!” said Grom, glaring at the assassin, who twisted away from him. Wright had to apply extra pressure to keep the captive in the chair. I shook my head at Gromley.
“I appreciate it, but I’m trying to get the gutless bastard to spill. It’s unfortunate that what he spills is so disgusting,” I said to Grom in orcish.
“Sorry,” he said in English.
The assassin leered at Grom. I didn’t think he could speak orcish, so I guessed that he thought that Grom had been told off.
I turned to the assassin. “Why did they want you to capture me?”
“Hundan didn’t tell me,” he said, then he muttered something in a language I didn’t know. It was either a prayer or a long list of swear words. He kept his eyes on me, though, which made the whole thing rather odd.
“How were you supposed to get back?” I asked. He stopped praying/swearing.
“Once you were captured, we were to hold a knife to your maggoty throat and get your crew to turn the ship over to us.”
I frowned at him.
‘Ah, they don’t know that this isn’t my ship. Interesting.’
“What if the crew wouldn’t do that?” I couldn’t see the captain agreeing to it.
“Heh, you’d make them do that. A bitch will do anything to save her own fur.” He leered at me.
I shrugged.
‘Sounds like a dumb plan to
me.’
“What then?” I asked.
“Well, we hand you over for the babki.”
‘Babki? Bambi? Babkins?’
“The what now?” I asked, confused.
“The dough, the moolah, the pelf. Your padla brain been so chewed by worms youse don’t know English?”
‘Stop bloody mentioning decay! I am not undead!’
“How much they paying for that?” I asked levelly.
The pirate gave me a funny look.
I smiled at him. “I want to know how much I’m worth.”
“Huh, whores always do.”
I glared at him. He whimpered slightly as Grom tightened his grip on the guy’s shoulder.
“Twenty thousand pelfre each,” he squeaked, and then chuckled when Grom stopped squeezing.
I blew air out of my mouth noisily. “That’s it? I’m insulted. That’s a hell of a lot of work for a hell of a lot of nothing.”
‘Forty thousand pelfre? I’m getting fifty thousand for just carrying a letter.’
“Maybe you are suicidal after all,” I added, just to freak him out again. It was better than him leering at me and calling me a whore.
“Stay away!” said the assassin, sitting up and trying to move his chair back. Wright and Grom restrained him. I didn’t like this. At all.
“Ah, motherfucking Mary, keep me safe from bloody evil draculinas,” he muttered. “Ummm, give us this day our daily…babki…amen.” He crossed himself three times.
“Take him back,” I said to the marines. “And don’t bother bringing the other one up, I can’t see anyone with even a quarter of a brain being part of such a half-arsed scheme.”
They nodded. I put my elbow on the desk and put my chin on my hand. Once the pirate had been led out, the major sat down opposite me.
“Any ideas?” he asked.
“Well… there’s two groups of people after me. One group knew I was a vampire but didn’t tell the orcs which one. The other group knew I was a woman but not a vampire. Who the hell have I pissed off?”
“Why did you ask them about Kuj Kuz-aj?” he asked suspiciously.
“Well, he is the famous piratey scourge of the galaxy who hangs ’round this area, isn’t he?”
He nodded. “Have you had any dealings with him?”
“No,” I said distractedly, looking off into the middle distance. “Hemmingway…”
“Yes?”
“Do people still… do that?” I gestured vaguely. “That cross thing?”
“You didn’t like that, did you?”
I looked at him. “No! I’m not evil! You don’t think I’m evil, do you?”
“No, I don’t. But that guy had probably never met a vampire before, and you were trying to scare him.”
“Well… yeah. I got the intel out of him, didn’t I? He wouldn’t even talk to you.”
The major nodded. I sighed.
‘Yuk.’
“Do you think they’ll attack again?” I asked the major.
“Not a clue. We arrive at Tortuga tomorrow morning.”
“Eeek! Then there’ll be even more pirates, and they’ll have had ample opportunity to share intel on me in the brig.”
“You’ll be safe at Tortuga. Pirates don’t attack each other there.”
‘Really?’
“What, even the ill-informed teleporting kind?” I asked sceptically.
“You’ll be fine once we’re there,” he repeated. The major sounded like it was an utter certainty.
‘I’ll believe it when I see it.’
“Huh… what about until then? I want to sleep tonight, you know,” I griped. “I’m bloody tired.”
“Did you bring anywhere safe to sleep?”
I looked at him sidelong.
“Like a well-sealed or armoured coffin?”
‘Meh.’
For the first time since I had become a vampire I considered whether it had been a good idea.
‘People calling me evil, throwing up crosses at me, suggesting I sleep in a coffin. Yuk.’
“I sleep in a bed, Hemmingway, as you well know,” I said acidly.
“Sorry.”
I sighed. “The captain’s not gonna chuck me off at Tortuga, is he?”
The major looked horrified. “No, of course not.”
“Why ‘of course not’?”
“What? You think we’ll just dump you when you’ve got people coming after you?”
‘Yup. Standard operating procedure for smugglers, isn’t it? Maybe undercover UESF troops are nicer to random mercs who sign on. But still, the military have no reason to not dump me.’
“You mean you wouldn’t?”
“No!” He looked very offended. I didn’t mean to offend him but…
“Really?”
“No, Clarke! Of course not!” The major had gone red in the face.
‘Oops. I didn’t mean to insult his honour.’
“And would the captain agree with you on this?”
“Yes!”
“Really?”
The major frowned. “Yes. Well, probably.”
‘Huh. ‘Probably’. Great.’
“Well, thank God for that,” I said with feeling.
‘Probably will have to do. It’s better than ‘not at all’.’
“I really don’t want to be dumped and auctioned off at Tortuga.”
“We wouldn’t do that, Clarke,” said the major.
I nodded, believing him at least. As for the captain, well, perhaps the major could persuade him.
“Does everyone else know about this–people being after me, I mean?” I asked.
“No, we’re keeping it quiet. Just the mercenaries know.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t realised I’d been holding. “Do you think they’ll beam into the bar again?”
“It was probably pot luck where they teleported. The techies said that they didn’t find a beacon.”
“So, you don’t think that they knew where I was?”
‘The pirates do seem to be good at finding me. Still, I would look for me in the bar.’
“How is that possible? They wouldn’t have known where you were… Well, there have always been rumours that the orcs have some sort of vampire detector…” He looked at me here, and I shrugged. “I suspect that they guessed the layout of the ship, it’s a pretty standard one, and tried to aim for the bar because it’s a nice big room, so there was less chance of ending up in a wall. Or maybe they were aiming for the bridge. They seemed to think it was your ship.”
“Yeah, I noticed that. The captain’s not going to be happy to hear that. So please tell him that just ’cos some weird would-be abductors think it’s my ship doesn’t mean I think it is.”
The major chuckled.
“Actually don’t tell him, he’s über-paranoid and I don’t want him to freak out and chuck me in the brig with the words ‘forty thousand pelfre’ stamped across my forehead.”
The major chuckled again. Then he sighed and gestured at the swords I had brought to his office.
“I suggest that you go and guard the bar with the other mercs,” said the major.
I nodded. “Yeah, OK.” I sighed. I stood up to leave. “By the way”–the major looked up at me–“thanks.”
“What for?”
“Promising to not chuck me off at Tortuga.”
He shook his head.
I picked up the assassins’ swords and walked up to my quarters. I liberated my two scabbards from my hidden weapons locker, sheathed the newly-acquired swords, made myself an orcian coffee and took the whole lot down to the bar. My friends were still there. As was my almost full glass of wine. I looked mournfully at it as I placed my coffee on the table. Then I told my friends I’d be back in a moment and had a quick word with all the marines in the bar.
They were scattered around in small groups with soft drinks in front of them, warily watching what was going on. Their weapons were mostly concealed–I guessed they didn’t want to scare the rest o
f the crew, who were obliviously drinking to the captain’s profit–but I could still see that they were armed.
I sat down with my friends again and started adjusting my new swords in the scabbards.
“You were gone a long time,” said Anna. She looked concerned now, rather than annoyed with me, which was better, I thought. “Did you get bawled out?”
‘Eh? What?’
“No…” I strapped one of the swords across my back and adjusted the straps on the other one so that it could be worn on the waist, which was where I attached it. Cleckley was looking at me sympathetically.
‘I wonder if he’s figured out that the assassin pirates were after me. I think he has.’
“You seem down,” said Rob.
‘Ha, ha. It was a bad day before I knew that someone wants to capture me for some reason, and on top of everything else, I just want to go to sleep. But I can’t, just in case, hence the coffee.’
“I think I’m experiencing the worst day of my life so far,” I said.
‘That just about sums it up, really.’
Rob looked shocked.
“But, hey, it’s fun. At least I know I’m alive!” I said brightly to him with a grin.
‘There’s always a bright side to everything.’
“Riiight, OK.” He sounded a little disturbed.
‘Why is my optimism disturbing?’
“Anyway, forget that, what were you guys talking about before I got back?” I asked.
“Tortuga!” said Rob, grinning again.
“For an hour and a half?”
“Yeah, it sounds really cool.”
‘Ah, that reminds me.’
“Cleckley, is it true that pirates can’t attack each other on Tortuga?”
“Yes. It’s neutral ground for everyone–pirates, smugglers, anyone else.”
“Ah… a neutral port…” I mused on this whilst I gnawed on my knuckle.
“Yes.”
“That’s hidden and secret…”
‘I looked it up on my notepad. Tortuga is a rumour… just like the vampire home planet. Hey, it isn’t the vampire home planet, is it? Nah, surely not.’
“Well… yes,” he said, slightly bemused. Rob was scowling at Cleckley.
“Who owns this planet?” I asked.
“It’s not a planet, it’s an armoured asteroid,” said Cleckley.
“Eh?”
Rob leaned forwards eagerly and started to wave his hands around. “It’s a huge spaceship–”
