by K Bledsoe
Raahi had to be the missing princess, she had to be. He had been so sure. But the logical voice inside of him argued convincingly.
Why does she have to be? Is it only because you want her to be?
True, he was extremely attracted to her. He had been from the moment he first saw her on the video feeds. It could be the betrothal bonds.
Or simply an attractive woman.
The scrambling tech.
Just because she has the tech doesn’t mean she is from the palace. The slave organization could implant similar tech, and the fact that the palace has a program to decode it is coincidence. The people who did the original implants are no longer alive, which is the reason the prince and Lavan don’t have it.
She knew Nirav’s name.
Are you sure or are you just looking for any reaction?
Jonah slammed his fist into his palm. He had been going back and forth with himself all day, and it was getting him nowhere. He had come straight home, hoping to escape the questions and doubts. But if he were truly honest, he had hoped Raahi would be here, knocking on his door like every day for the past couple of weeks. He missed her.
Enough self-pity, he told himself as he launched to his feet. He ordered more food to restock from all the dinners for two he had made recently. He organized his files, did his laundry, cleaned the apartment from front to back, and he still couldn’t settle. After glancing at the door for the tenth time, he finally admitted that she wasn’t going to come. Why would she? Especially after he had lied to her and accused her of being someone she wasn’t? His heart clenched as he realized he would most likely never see her again, and he truly didn’t know if the pain was because she wasn’t the princess or because he had lost Raahi. Maybe he could find her and apologize. He shook his head. He should have gotten his facts straight before he jumped to conclusions and drove away the only woman he ever had feelings for.
He continued with similar regretful thoughts until he glanced at the time and realized with a shock that he had to be back at work in only six hours. He sighed and readied himself for bed, though he was probably too wound up to sleep. As he poured himself a calming drink, he nearly dropped it as his terminal pinged. He leapt for it, ignoring the splash of liquid on his hand.
“Hello?”
“Sirrah Wilkerson. I apologize for the late hour.”
When he recognized the face, Jonah was extremely disappointed that it was not Raahi.
“Oh, um, I wasn’t expecting you, Baroness.” He was vaguely aware that he had never given her his personal code for contact, but he was too tired to really care.
“Don’t worry. This call is encrypted. I wanted to inform you of our progress.”
To his complete chagrin, he realized he had completely forgotten about the search.
“We have discovered that your new friend has the information we are looking for.”
Even with encryption, Delilah wasn’t taking the chance on revealing anything. He wasn’t quite clear headed enough to completely catch her hints.
“Friend?” Did she mean Raahi knew about the princess?
“Yes, the young lady.” The woman tilted her head at him as if considering her next words. “She is one of the two that were lost.”
Jonah felt a surge of renewed hope. “I had thought that as well, but she denied it.”
The Baroness’ eyes narrowed. “You confronted her?” Jonah couldn’t tell if she was angry or surprised.
“Yes.” He felt his face redden. “Are you sure?”
She briefly held up a photograph identical to the one that Raahi had showed him of her and her twin sister. “Here they are. We are preparing to physically affirm the information.”
“Do you…” Jonah swallowed and fought against rising emotions. “Do you know which one she is?”
“Not at this point, but I estimate we will in three, perhaps four days.”
Jonah’s thoughts tumbled over and about each other. He had never been so assaulted with mixed questions and emotions. How? Why?
The Baroness cleared her throat, bringing his attention back to the viewscreen.
“It would be helpful if you could keep an eye on her, maybe find out her story.”
Jonah shook his head. “I don’t know if that is possible. She hasn’t returned after our last conversation.” Again, his heart plummeted.
The Baroness gave an exasperated sigh, lips in a thin, disapproving line. “We will arrive as soon as we can to help find her.”
Jonah opened his mouth to apologize, but she had broken the connection with the usual static. He sat there staring at the blank screen, questions flitting through his tired mind. Nothing made sense.
He downed what was left of his drink and went to his room to attempt to sleep.
***
Lenore nodded to Allison who typed a few commands before nodding back, letting her know that the transmission records had been erased.
“Do we have to physically retrace the girls’ entire trip after their escape?” asked Diarmin. “Seems like a waste of time and resources. Can’t Allison hack into the databases like she usually does?”
Lenore tried not to show her concern about her husband suggesting their daughter do illegal activities, especially when he was usually the one to admonish her when she did. “We need to fill in the details, get verbal confirmation directly from people. Especially since Raahi denied her origins to Jonah. Also, since Raahi seems to be the only one who made it home, what happened to the other? When did their paths diverge? Let’s start near the end of the trail and hope we find what we are looking for there.”
“Melanalerrie?”
“I think so. Since they received new IDs, we can verify if both really did take a ship to Recavan,” answered Lenore.
“I figured as much.” Diarmin began to punch in codes on the command console.
Lenore turned back to the terminal that was working on decoding more information with the Chanis cypher.
“Course laid in. Should take a little over fourteen hours,” said Diarmin.
“It’s not direct, is it?” asked Lenore, a bit distracted with new information the cypher was displaying.
“Of course not,” he answered, a slight edge in his voice. “Have I ever forgotten to program in changes to throw others off our own trail?”
The tension in his voice was enough to grab Lenore’s attention.
“Sorry, force of habit.” She looked at her husband and noticed the deep frown lines. He noticed her scrutiny, stood and walked to the ladder.
“I’ll be in my workshop. Plenty to fix.” Without waiting for comment, he disappeared down the steps.
She was tempted to follow, but a ping from the computer meant another decoded section, so she was pulled back into processing data.
Chapter Fifty-three
Melanalerrie proved quite useless with the few people who possibly remembered twins. The picture helped, but all anyone could tell them was confirmation of what they had already uncovered through the IGnet. Yes, they were here. Yes, they were quite similar, beautiful, couldn’t tell them apart. No, they didn’t talk to anyone else that they know of. No, nobody else has asked about them. Yes, they got on the transport to Recavan.
“Well, at least we now know that nothing out of the ordinary happened here,” Lenore said. “They weren’t hurt or scared into leaving.”
“And I got some experience,” said Quinn as Lenore leaned back into the shuttle’s copilot chair with a sigh.
“Yes, you did fairly well with the questions. Next time try a little less emotion.”
“Okaaaaay.”
The way he strung out the response was an interesting reply. She considered all the encounters and decided what he was thinking about. “Except with that young baggage handler who looked to be in his twenties, like the twins in the photo. Those emotions were perfect, commenting on how cute the girls were, playing on his obvious attraction to them. Very well done and something I couldn’t do.” She gave him a mock punch on t
he shoulder.
“Thanks,” he said, but his lack of reaction made her realize that wasn’t what he was thinking.
Everyone is still recovering from the stressful events over the last few days. He’ll talk to me soon enough.
***
Two days later, they hit pay dirt on Recavan. Several remembered the girls, though neither was named Raahi. The most information they got was from a former employer where they worked for several months, a farm relatively close to the city with the largest spaceport. Lenore was solo on this trip.
“I told them I would rent them one of the cottages right outside the farm, but they insisted on the poorest section of the city. Needed to save money.” The owner of the farm was a large, friendly woman with sunburned cheeks and comfortable, rough clothes that showed she dug in as much as her workers.
“Money for what?” asked Lenore.
“They said they were traveling the galaxy, nomads enjoying adventure, but I could tell they were pining to go somewhere in particular. Shame what happened.”
“Oh?”
“The day after they booked passage, one of them got sick. I would have thought the one that worked in the fields would be more likely to catch the Lungus, not the one in the processing center.”
“Lungus?”
“Oh, sorry. That’s what we call the lung fungus that people catch. It’s very rare nowadays. Only one or two cases a year at the most. And most usually survive. Not this girl.” The farmer dabbed at her eyes.
“What happened?”
“The oddest thing. I happened to be there when she collapsed. I had just barely reached her side and had started to ask someone to find her sister when suddenly there she was. Her sister took her to the hospital, and I did check on them only to find out that she had died. Never saw the sister again.”
“Thank you. I appreciate your time.”
“Pass along my greetings if you find her. They were so very close, I’m afraid she might have…” She couldn’t finish her statement and dabbed her eyes again.
Lenore thanked her and returned to her rented vehicle. While driving back toward the city, she reported the conversation to Diarmin.
“So, what now?” he asked.
“I am heading for the hospital and then, well, I am going to need your help for something quite illegal. Well, more illegal than usual.”
***
“When you said illegal, I thought you were joking,” Diarmin said as they scaled the rather large wall with their usual stealth. Lenore was nothing but a shadow against the light-colored wall. The sliver of a moon did nothing to help their footing as they slowly made progress to their destination.
On the other side of the wall, Lenore pulled out her hand-held and her face was briefly visible when she opened the tiny map.
“This way,” she said. She thumbed off the hand-held and they were again in darkness.
Maneuvering between headstones and other grave markers, Diarmin tried to keep his tension under control but was failing miserably.
“Couldn’t we have done this in the daylight? Maybe even gone through proper channels?”
“Take too long,” said Lenore. “Besides, the grave might be under surveillance by the very people we don’t want to piss off.”
“You mean ‘piss off’ any more than we already have?”
Her head turned and though he couldn’t see her face in the dark, he could imagine the set lips and scolding eyes that meant “Really? Jokes now?” His attempt at humor was not helping him ignore the fact that his pulse had spiked at her comments.
He concentrated instead on not stumbling and soon they were at their destination. The large structure had one hundred spaces for coffins, five high and twenty long. The one they were looking for was right in the middle at eye-level, marked with the last name of the alias the girls had been using.
“What kind of backward planet buries instead of cremates anymore?” grumbled Diarmin as he pulled out anti-grav devices while Lenore worked at opening the crypt.
“Most agricultural planets do, some close connection with the dirt or something.” She grunted as she levered the thick door open. “Be grateful we didn’t have to dig.”
Diarmin helped pull the coffin out. “It still doesn’t feel right.”
“Don’t start the argument again. We need this for all the reasons I pointed out last night and my guess is that we will find even more reasons after we get this back to the ship. You’re just displaying the usual nerves at being in a graveyard. Lots of people have that.”
He didn’t bother with a response, but silently attached the anti-grav units and they began the trip back to the ship. Maybe Lenore is right, and my nerves are not my old emotions stirring, but unease at stealing a body.
He halted abruptly when an odd chirp came out of his pack.
“Was that what I think it was?” asked Lenore as she dropped into a defensive crouch. He reached into his pack to pull out another of his special devices.
“Yes. There is a dampening field that just activated.” He tapped his wrist comp. “All communication with the ship has been cut off.” His fingers brushed against the gun in his pack as he replaced the device, but he couldn’t bring himself to wrap fingers around it. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he stood there, frozen.
“Movement, to the right,” hissed Lenore. They ducked down on the other side of the coffin, trying to make out the shadow moving toward them. It stopped quite a distance away, and Diarmin could feel his wife tense. His heart rate increased, and his breath caught in his throat, making it impossible for the deep breathing required to settle his churning stomach.
“Hello out there. I mean you no harm, and I am not going to keep you from what you are doing.” The voice was masculine, and the shadow clearly showed that his hands were extended away from his body. “If you have a light,” the stranger continued, “You may shine it on me to confirm I am unarmed. Nobody is around to see.”
“Can we trust him?”
“He’s unarmed,” she said.
Diarmin was startled when she snapped on a light and removed her night-vision goggles. He had been so distracted with his own inner turmoil that he hadn’t noticed her don them. The small but bright light showed a thin man, rather tall, with short blond hair that stood on end as if he had seen his fair share of ghosts in this graveyard. Diarmin firmly told himself to get control of his emotions.
“What do you want?” she called back to the man who was blinking at the light in his face. Even though the man couldn’t see their faces, he wasn’t acting threating or afraid.
“Only to give you a message.”
“Well, what’s the message?”
“It is a recorded message that you are to deliver to the relative of that package you have obtained.”
Diarmin said nothing, letting Lenore take the lead. “How do you know the contents of our package?”
“There has been a constant watch on it for years because I promised the person who recorded this message that it would be delivered. Please, I would like to know. Is she…your package… going home?” The sincerity in the voice strangely did more to calm Diarmin than anything else.
“Boy, these girls did inspire confidences in others,” Lenore muttered. “Yes. She is going home. You may leave the message there, and we will make sure it is delivered to the correct person.”
“Thank you.” The man placed something on the headstone next to him and left in the direction he came. Lenore pulled out the scanner and the strange chirp came again from the pack, indicating the drop of the dampening field. Almost instantly, Diarmin’s wrist comp vibrated. He answered, hushing Allison’s frantic warning about a third person in the graveyard.
He signed off as Lenore came back with a portable reader, data stick inserted.
“It’s clear. Just what he said.”
“Great,” said Diarmin. “Another mystery. Let’s get back to the ship.”
***
“You’re sure?” Lenore asked Diarmin. She
had been on her way up the bridge when he intercepted her, straight from the cargo hold and his work on the last piece of evidence.
“Yes. My tests were extensive. The tattoos hold the key.”
“But Raahi must have removed her tattoos.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Diarmin. “There is subdermal activity with the tattoos. The ink is mostly design, basically hiding the real purpose of the tattoos. Brilliant, actually.”
“And Raahi didn’t remove her tattoos,” said Allison as they came onto the bridge.
“You have very good ears, my daughter,” said Diarmin.
“In fact, I do, but you were talking loud enough that it carried down the corridor and up here just fine.”
“About the tattoos?” asked Lenore.
“I said she still has them.” Allison brought up the file with the pictures that she and Jonah had gathered.
“How do you know?” Lenore pointed at the screen. “Look, that video shows bare hands and arms. Both.”
“Yes, but she is wearing gloves.” The grin on Allison’s face was very smug.
“Gloves? How can you tell?” asked Diarmin, leaning close to the screen.
“Well, you know I have been working on a program, in what little spare time I have had between kidnappings.”
Diarmin sputtered, but Lenore ignored the jibe, knowing Allison’s idea of a joke wasn’t the same as everyone else’s.
Allison went on. “It’s a program to find what I call ‘glove flaws.’ Watch.”
She opened a file and activated it. The picture of bare arms now showed two slight red marks near the wrist. “See those? Those are slight imperfections like a wrinkle or tear. Check this out.” She pulled up another one that had a blue line circling her arm right below the elbow. “That is an edge of a glove, above the line is skin, below is glove. These are very good but still gloves.”
Allison turned to her parents with a triumphant smile. “See, so she still has her tattoos.”
“This is a brilliant program, Alli,” said Diarmin.
“It’s what I’m paid to do. That is, if I got paid,” Allison sighed dramatically, but her smile widened even more.
