Dangerous

by Sharon Green

  "What makes you think there's a way to do that?" Tain asked mildly. "If you're judging by what I'm wearing, you have to remember there's such a thing as being in disguise."

  "Please don't," Gordi said, his tone and expression both weary. "I'm not blind, and I do try not to be a fool. Those women who … punished Flam… It was perfectly clear that they were both slaves at some time, but when Flam tried to give them orders they had no trouble refusing him. There's some way you can be freed of the slave drug and we'd like you to use that way - unless you've already decided not to."

  "No, I haven't made a decision like that," Tain answered, still speaking mildly. "But before we get to your request, I'd like each of you to tell me whether or not you're speaking the truth about your intentions. Are the plans you mentioned the only ones you have, or are there other plans you've decided to keep to yourselves?"

  "Our only intentions are to do as I said and to work toward getting rid of slavery as quickly as possible," Gordi responded at once without the least hesitation. "I don't blame you for being suspicious, not when I'd be the same in your place."

  "That's good to hear," Tain said once the other two men had supported Gordi with their own assurances. "There is a way to free you men and I'll use it in a minute, but first you need to be told something. If, once you're freed, any of you change your mind and do something to cause either capture or hurt for me or my friends, you will immediately revert to needing to take orders from everyone - and you'll never be able to be partially freed again. Do all of you understand what that means?"

  Jake saw the three men sigh before they nodded, happily showing nothing in the way of suspicious regret. Tain was trying to make sure he and the others would be as safe as possible, but there would be no true safety for any of them until they were off this world…

  Chapter Sixteen

  Jake noticed Tandro and Ennie entering the alcove while Tain spoke to Gordi and his friends, but the two just stopped near him and stood quietly. Somehow Tain had managed to put herself in charge of everyone and everything, and Jake still wasn't quite sure how she had done that. And, in the back of his mind, he also wasn't quite sure he liked the accomplishment…

  "There's one other thing I want to say before I free you," Tain told the men. "I don't want anyone knowing about this place, so once we're out of here you'll all forget about where you were kept and even what building you were brought to. Does everyone understand?"

  Jake saw the three men nod, and oddly enough he, Ennie, and Tandro also nodded. Then Tain was telling the three men not to take orders from anyone but her, and once she left even that exception would expire. If she came back even a single day later, they would no longer have to take her orders. Gordi and the other two men looked extremely relieved, and then it was time to start leaving.

  Jake joined Tandro in getting their gear together while Tain escorted Artro and Dimmis out first. Those two weren't going back to Gordi's house with the rest of them, so it made sense to let them leave first. If seven people left the warehouse at the same time someone might notice; as it was, keeping the five of them together might be pushing the bounds of luck.

  When Tain came back it turned out that it still wasn't time for the rest of them to leave.

  "We can't just leave Flam's body there," she said, looking down at the body in question. "We also can't take the body out with us, so we have to choose the final option."

  "Which is what?" Jake asked, his eagerness to be on his way playing havoc with his temper. "Wave a magic wand to make the body disappear?"

  "You're close," Tain said with barely a glance in his direction. "Before the women left I asked them about a place to dump serious garbage, and they gave me directions. If you three men will pick up the body, we can take care of its disposal before we go."

  There was no choice at all, so Jake took Flam's shoulders while Tandro took his legs, and once the two of them had the body off the floor Gordi helped by supporting his former opponent's middle. Tain took a lamp and then led the way into the tunnel, turning toward the darkness rather than the other way.

  They walked for what seemed like a very long time, long enough for Jake to feel the body he carried getting heavier and heavier. When they'd first started out he'd considered Gordi's "help" unnecessary, but by the time Tain stopped by a fold in the rock of the wall Gordi was sharing a lot more of the weight of their burden.

  "Now you have to be careful," Tain said, holding the lamp close to the fold. "There's supposed to be a deep pit just behind here, and we don't want anyone but Flam going into it."

  Tandro had been leading the way with Flam's feet, so Jake moved the other two men around until his part of the body was closest to the fold. A glance inside showed the pit Tain had mentioned, so Jake eased the body down at the lip of the opening and let it go. Then he joined Gordi near the middle of the body, and the two of them pushed. A moment later Flam's legs were disappearing into the dark hole, and that was that.

  Ennie had been trailing along behind them, obviously unwilling to just sit and wait until everyone else got back, so they made a parade of it retracing their steps. Ennie seemed a bit green around the gills to Jake even in the dim light of the lamp, and Tandro apparently saw the same. The native put his arm around Ennie as they walked, and the girl leaned into Tandro as though trying to share his warmth.

  When they finally made it back to the lit portions of the tunnel, Jake went directly to his saddlebags and Tandro did the same. If any other delays had come up Jake probably would have exploded, but Tain just replaced the lamp she'd been carrying and led the way to the stairs they'd come down. They were finally getting out of that place, the first step to being on their way to leaving this world entirely.

  Tain checked the area carefully before she let any of them leave the warehouse, but then they were out in the afternoon sunshine and heat. Jake wasn't the only one who took a deep breath of what seemed like freer air, and Gordi even smiled.

  "I'd better move to the head of this little procession now," the big man said, looking around at all of them. "My people will have been searching for me, and we don't want them to think I'm your prisoner." Then his smile disappeared. "I didn't want to ask this earlier, but now I have to. If my people didn't stop you from taking me to begin with, it can only be because they weren't able to. Did you … hurt any of them seriously?"

  "If you're asking if we killed them, the answer is no," Jake assured the man. "We only made them unconscious for a while, and by now they ought to be as good as new."

  "That's a very great relief," Gordi responded, his smile returning and widening. "Those people are my friends as well as my supporters, and if anything serious had happened to them…"

  "If anything serious had happened to them you wouldn't have been very happy with us," Jake finished when Gordi didn't. "We understand the point because we would have felt the same way, and that's why we were careful. We don't mind killing to protect ourselves, but killing someone just for the hell of it when making them unconscious will do as well isn't something we're willing to consider."

  "I'm really glad to hear that," Gordi said as he began to walk. "It makes me eager to hear what other ways your people are willing to help us besides supplying that antidote to the slave drug. While you and your friends are my guests, you and I will have to talk."

  "My pleasure," Jake agreed, surprised and delighted that things were working out so well. His department hadn't expected anything beyond getting the natives of this world to abolish slavery, and hadn't even been sure they could manage that much.

  Now Gordi was all but offering his support of whatever else Jake's people might have in mind to help his world, but the man wanted some details before he committed himself completely. That was as far from unreasonable as you could get, and suddenly Jake was also eager to have that talk. He did want to get back to base as quickly as possible, but the delay of an hour or two wasn't likely to be all that hard to take.

  They walked back toward Gordi's house with Gor
di and Jake leading the way, the two of them discussing what problems to expect when slavery was abolished. The slavers would hardly be the only ones who resisted the change, and Jake explained what Gordi's people would have to be on the lookout for. They had just passed the house closest to Gordi's and still hadn't run into any searchers, which probably meant Gordi's people were searching a different part of the town -

  The attack came so fast that Jake barely had time to understand what was going on, not to mention react. When he heard Ennie scream he whirled around and saw the slaver Himlin. Oddly enough Himlin was alone, but the slaver held a knife and clearly meant to use the weapon on Jake. In fact Himlin had obviously intended to knife Jake in the back, but somehow Tain had gotten in the way. The blade had sliced open Tain's arm, but she'd delayed Himlin long enough for Jake to take over.

  Which Jake did as soon as he thrust his saddlebags at Gordi. The big man took the saddlebags and moved back out of the way, and then Jake had nothing to distract him from the slaver. Himlin slashed at Jake, obviously intending to cut Jake open, but Jake had no trouble avoiding the slash.

  "You're a dead man," Himlin snarled as he slashed at Jake again. "Guardsmen have arrested all my people, and I was only just able to get away myself. I don't know how you managed to escape and report me, but you won't live long enough to enjoy the betrayal. Now obey me and stand still while I kill you as slowly and painfully as I can."

  "You're not going to kill me in any way at all," Jake growled in answer, rage having risen in him at sight of the slaver. "The last time we met you were protected by the presence of a large number of men as well as having put a drug in me. Now you're alone and the drug doesn't work, which means I'm going to show the world what a stinking coward you really are."

  Himlin paled just a little when he realized that he couldn't order Jake around any longer, but then he snarled and came at Jake again. After all, he had a knife and Jake's knife was in a saddlebag, so what was there to worry about? Jake could almost hear the man thinking like that, which made Jake smile as he answered the unspoken question. He waited for the next slash to go by before he moved in, then his left hand was wrapped around Himlin's right wrist and his right fist was being thrown into Himlin's face.

  By the time Himlin fell to the ground, Jake had already gotten the knife away from the slaver and had tossed the weapon out of reach. Then Jake reached down to Himlin's fancy vest, pulled the man upright again, and hit him a second time. The third time the slaver went down he was unconscious, and Jake's rage had been calmed just enough to let him think about other things. Tain had been hurt…

  Turning quickly showed Jake that Tandro had gotten some cloth out of his saddlebags and had bound up the wound on Tain's left arm. The woman looked a bit pale, and that disturbed Jake more than he'd thought it would. After all, the slaver had cut Tain just to get her out of the way so he could reach Jake himself…

  "Listen to me, all of you," Tain said suddenly before Jake could say a word. "You're to stay as Gordi's houseguests for a full two days at least, and none of you is to try to stop me now or even follow me. In case you were wondering, those were orders."

  And with that she turned and hurried away, leaving them able to do nothing but stand and stare after her until she was gone from sight.

  "Why did she do that?" Jake asked no one in particular as he tried to figure out the answer on his own. "She's hurt only because she was in Himlin's way, so why didn't she stay with us?"

  "That's not why she was hurt," Ennie said, and Jake turned to see the girl staring at him oddly. "She saw that man before any of the rest of us, and she deliberately got in his way before he could stab you in the back. If not for her, you would be dead now."

  Shock hit Jake worse than it ever had, even during the time he'd been Himlin's slave. Tain had let herself be hurt just to save his life? She must have seen Himlin only at the last second, otherwise she would have been able to interfere with the slaver in a different way. And if she let herself be hurt like that rather than see Jake hurt, he had to mean more to her than she'd been admitting…

  "My guess would be that the woman doesn't want to be near you now," Tandro said, faint disturbance to be heard behind the calm of his voice. "Either she thinks she can't trust you, or she doesn't trust herself."

  "Or both," Jake said, feeling more than a little weary as he remembered what Tain had said about being tired of waiting for him to consider her. He hadn't even really thanked her for getting him and Tandro out of Himlin's clutches, which was downright inexcusable. But she still felt something for him, and was afraid he would find that out if she stayed…

  "Gordi, you're the only one of us who'll be completely free once we get to your house," Jake said, turning to look at the big native. "Would you be willing to order some of your people to go after the woman? If she passes out from blood loss while she's alone, she could die."

  "I'll be glad to send my people out as soon as we take care of this garbage," Gordi said, nodding toward the still-unconscious slaver. "All you have to do is tell me where to send my men."

  Jake opened his mouth to answer, but the words he wanted refused to come. He had no idea where the hideout they'd just left was, something that made him curse with feeling.

  "That miserable female," Jake said bitterly once the cursing ran down. "She must have had something like this in mind even before we left wherever we were. If she happens to survive and we catch up with her, I'm going to beat her within an inch of her life!"

  "I think you're going to need that antidote first," Gordi suggested, speaking when Tandro and Ennie simply exchanged a glance and then stayed silent. "If you don't have the antidote, you probably won't get very far trying to punish her for being a fool."

  Jake would have loved to argue, but there was no sense in wasting his breath. Tain Halliday had waged a better campaign against Jake than he had against her, and now she'd left him behind. Not having to take any more orders from the woman should have made Jake feel really good, but the thought of Tain being wounded and all alone made his insides curl. All he could do was pray she survived long enough for him to kill her. If she didn't, Jake didn't know what he would do…

  * * *

  Tain walked into her department's headquarters on her own world, no longer feeling odd wearing real clothes. She'd gotten out of the town on Oliven by using the tunnel under the warehouse, first changing into the smock the women had left for her. She'd also been able to remove the red armbands, so there hadn't been anything to bring her to anyone's attention in the woods. The wound on her arm had given her trouble, of course, but that hadn't kept her from getting some food and water from the women's hideout and then finding a farm with a horse to steal.

  She really had been only a couple of days from her people's base, and having the food pack meant she hadn't even stopped to hunt. She did stop to give her stolen horse a rest every few hours, but once the horse seemed recovered she went on. When she reached the base she turned the horse loose to find its way back home, let her people doctor her arm and give her the antidote to the drug, and then she made them give her a ride to the nearest liner station. She was much too tired and aching to want to pilot herself, and seeing that she meant to take a liner was the only thing that kept the base personnel from insisting she stay until she was in better shape.

  And all that pushing helped to keep me from having to do any thinking, Tain admitted privately as she made her way to Coleson's office. I spent most of the liner ride sleeping, and now I have the strength to keep myself from thinking about anything I like. At least until I'm out of this place…

  "Ah, Agent Halliday," Coleson's secretary said with a smile when he looked up and saw Tain. "Right on time for your appointment. You can go right in."

  Tain nodded her thanks and continued on into Coleson's office. The room was larger than anyone really needed for a work space, not to mention that it was so poshly furnished it must have cost a fortune to decorate. But it wasn't just an office, after all, it was a p
olitical statement about Coleson's position and standing. Coleson was very much a politician, and that was only one of the reasons Tain didn't return the man's smile of welcome.

  "I'm glad to see you back, Tain," Coleson said warmly as she approached his ten-acre desk, then he gestured toward the line of chairs in front of the desk. "Have a seat and you can give me a synopsis of what your report will say."

  "Thanks anyway, but I'd rather stand," Tain said, watching the smile fade from the man's face. Coleson was handsome, well-built, and extremely charming, which was why people thought he made a great department head. "I've already sent copies of my report to everyone I could think of, but you'll probably be able to get it quashed anyway. Still, I'm hoping that someone uses the thing to beat you over the head for at least a little while."

  "What are you talking about?" Coleson demanded, most of the charm no longer apparent. "What could you have put into your report that you think will harm me?"

  "I described how you insisted that I take Ennie as a partner even though the girl wasn't properly trained," Tain obliged, showing a smile that had nothing of humor or good feeling behind it. "You did that because you expected Ennie to mess up in some way, and when she did you would be able to embarrass her uncle with her failure. It didn't bother you in the least that you risked my life and hers just so you could further your political ambitions."

  "Now, now, it was nothing so dire and dangerous as that," Coleson said, his smile back in place as he relaxed in his very expensive chair. "I already know that the girl did mess up, and the fault for her not being properly trained was her uncle's. He insisted that she start to work as an agent right away, and all I could do was go along with him. If the assignment had been on any other planet than Oliven I would have lodged a firm protest, but the worst that could have happened - what did, in fact, happen - was that you and she were enslaved. Considering the fact that you and she were retrieved by our own people almost at once means there was really no harm done at all."