Chapter 26: Tessa
"Jak?"
Eyes still closed, he turned his head toward the sound of her voice. Tessa felt a shuddering wave of relief go through her. She’d been so sure he was dead, then so certain he was dying, yet still he lived. He groaned and clutched at the white sand beneath him. She’d taken off his clothes and spread them to dry. Only his boots and trousers and the cloth belt with his half of her bracelets sewn into it had survived. Her own boots and belt sat drying next to Jak’s.
Cross-legged, Tessa sat on the ground next to him, just watching him breathe. Her dress had ripped up the side, so that her bare left leg rested among the reeds. The once white fabric was gray where it wasn’t black with soot or stained grass green. She was a long, long way from her life as a Hired Companion. Although she still had her bracelets, she thought, as she patted the black bands next to her.
With a grimy finger, she traced what remained of the scar on Jak’s face as she marveled again at the change she saw in him. What had once been a twisted, purple snake of ruined skin, a scar that distorted his face into a permanent snarl, was now nothing more than a narrow white line. The change revealed a handsome face, she thought. Not beautiful in the Veloran sense, but then she wanted nothing to do with Velora or their customs. She saw even features, with a nose and chin that were a little too large, but seemed to fit Jak’s face just fine. He matched now, she thought. His face matched the spirit of the man within.
At the sound of rustling in the reeds, she glanced around, still afraid that some of either crew might have survived, might find them. The Serena had burned to the water line. She didn’t know what had happened to the cutter. She’d been knocked off the barge by Bolon’s casual swipe. Tessa couldn’t swim, and she’d been fortunate that the barge drew very little water and had been close to shore. The river had come only to mid-chest on her. As the barge went up, the blast had passed over her head. Debris and body parts had skimmed by just above her skull. One body bigger than the others had gone flying past her, and she’d seen Jak splash into the water. Then thick white smoke from the burning compost rolled over the water, making it impossible to see. Cursing, praying to sweet Lady Ur, to bloody Nish, to anyone who’d listen, she’d searched for him. All she’d known was that she needed to find Jak now. She’d reached out blindly and there he was. She’d managed to turn him over so that he was face up only to find that his chest was a scorched and bloody ruin. She’d thought he was dead. But then he took a breath, the air escaping through the hole in his chest with a terrifying burbling sound. Dragging his body through the river with her, she’d found her way to the shore by walking into ever shallower water.
She’d reached the bank and, frantic, had pulled Jak’s unresponsive body a good thirty paces away from the river. She’d heard stories of how adrenaline could give that kind of strength, but she’d never expected to experience it herself. Once they were far enough inland, once the vegetation had started to give way to sandy patches, she’d stopped. Now, they were well hidden among the tall reeds of the riverbank.
Listening, she heard the chirping and chattering of the tiny lizards that told her they were safe. The rustling in the reeds was just the wind. No one would find them here. They were sheltered for the moment.
She touched the bruise that swelled the curve of her left cheek, and smoothed her hair away from her face. Her hand wiped away a few tears, too; but they were tears of relief, she told herself, only relief. Beside her, Jak opened his mouth and tried to speak, but no sound came out. He licked his dry lips.
"Here, drink this."
She’d managed to salvage the bottom half of a small, plastic jug from the wreckage. The top was melted to dribbles of slag, but there was enough left to hold a cupful of water. She thought they were far enough from both Namdrik and Tekena for the water to be safe to drink. And it wasn’t as if the delivery boy was going to bring around her usual weekly ration of clean water. Raising Jak’s head on her arm, she held it to his mouth. He swallowed a mouthful and tried again to speak.
"What—" He struggled to sit up.
"Lie still. Don’t talk. I pulled you out of the river with a hole in your chest that I could put my fist through." She pushed him back down onto the warm sand. She had to force herself to be gentle. Although the hole was only a circle of pale skin now, she was furious with him for frightening her so badly. "So just be quiet. Rest. Get well."
Jak must have heard the tremor in her voice, because he did as he was told. He lay on his back with his green eyes dazed as he stared up through the reeds at the deep blue dome of the late afternoon sky. Around them, Tessa heard the small sounds of wind in the reeds and the soft lap of water from a little stream that ran nearby on its way to the Ur. Over all was the smell of the river.
"Tessa, how long?"
Again, he struggled to sit up.
"A day," she told him, "only a day. And I told you to keep still." Despite the snap in her voice, Tessa was gentle as she helped him to a more comfortable position. "You’re in no shape to move."
"Got to get away from here. Bolon . . . ."
"Bolon is dead." Her hand brushed his face as she pretended to wipe sand away from his mouth. Once again, her fingertip traced the scar that was almost gone. "He must have blasted you just before the ship went up in flames with him aboard."
"Blasted me?" His right hand went to his chest.
"You had a huge hole in your chest!"
She’d thought he was dead. She’d thought she would die herself, the pain and grief had been so sharp.
"It was chaos," Tessa said. "When that idiot Bolon blasted the captain and his son, he hit the compost with his beam. I was in the water when the cargo went up like a bomb, and the whole barge burned. I found you in the river and dragged you ashore. We’re not far from the remains of the barge, but there’s not much that’s useful left of it."
She gestured to the tall reeds that surrounded them. She didn’t know how she’d found the strength to drag Jak to shore, let alone pull him into hiding. But a desperate need had driven her and given her strength.
"What about Kamura and Toko?"
Tessa shrugged in dismissal. "Your two strays? Who knows? I haven’t seen any pieces; at least, not that I could identify. But it was messy. We’re alive through luck, nothing more."
She didn’t know what had happened to the Terran girl and the mobbie, and she didn’t care. Jak was alive, and so was she. As for the strange way he’d healed both a should-be-fatal wound and old scars, she didn’t care about that either. No, she did care, she cared a lot that whatever made him different had kept him alive.
"Are you hungry?" she asked.
"Yeah, I could eat."
She smiled. Never mind that the smile was shaky. Jak could always eat.
"There’s some lamnan. I cooked it this morning to hide the fire."
She’d used her blaster set on its narrowest beam to light a pile of the larger dried reeds and scraps of wood. It hadn’t been much of a fire, and the foliage had served to dissipate what little smoke it made.
"Where’d you get lamnan?" he asked, trying to sit up once more.
She shook her head and gave in, helping him to lean against a dense stand of reeds.
"When we got out of the water, I still had my blaster and my knife. Three of the barge’s lamnan had run away, but the remaining one had broken its back. Guess he fell in the panic or the others trampled him. Anyway, I put him out of his misery and carved off a few steaks. Best to eat now. It’s going bad fast."
She dug the meat out from under the sand and unwrapped it from its nest of grasses. Tessa watched as Jak wolfed down the half-raw lamnan. Cooking wasn’t one of her skills, not even if she’d had a real kitchen to work in. All of his scars had faded, she saw with wonder, not just the one on his face. They were nothing but pale, thin lines. He hadn’t noticed the change yet, but he wo
uld.
Finally, having eaten his fill, he licked his fingers and looked over at her from eyes that were the same green as the reeds around them.
"I remembered more," he said.
"Meaning?"
Heart pounding, she tried to keep her voice light. This was the moment that she’d feared from the day she’d brought him home with her.
"I remember what happened to me," he said slowly. "All of it this time." His mouth opened and closed, as if he couldn’t find the words he needed. At last, he said, "Something tried to eat me."
Tessa frowned. This was what he’d told her before, at the village. Someone had smashed him across the face, hard; she’d seen that for herself. But something had tried to eat him? That didn’t make sense.
"I’m not explaining this real well." He took a deep breath. "I was on the run, for something I didn’t do. A crime that I didn’t commit. I was a long way from home. I was here, in fact, on Shadriss. In a bar."
Tessa nodded and took Jak’s hand in hers. She’d found him outside the Doppler, a bar near the spaceport. Neither the best bar in town nor the worst, it was a place a stranger might frequent.
"I went outside with my client and his partner. I thought they were going to pay me, but they had something else in mind."
He paused and pushed his hair back from his face. He’s lost the band that usually kept it tied back, and the long red strands hung lank and dirty. He was naked and filthy. Why then did she take so much pleasure in the sight of him?
"Only, they weren’t really men," he told her. "I think their bodies were human, but something else was running them. Some kind of parasite, I guess. Anyway, it was one thing controlling both bodies, and it wanted to add me to the family.
"They put . . . they put whatever it was inside me, and it started eating my mind. That’s the best I can describe it." He shuddered. "My memories dissolved, until I forgot who I was and why I was fighting. I knew it was wrong, but I couldn’t remember why. All I had left was my name. Then, it broke through something. Something that neither of us knew was there. It felt like a group mind, a collective mind of all of humanity. It was too much for me, too much for the other. It tried to break away. I can remember my client yelling to his partner, ‘Kill it. Kill it now.’ And he meant kill me and kill what was in me. The last thing I remember is a piece of rebar coming down across my face." He smiled. "Then, there was you."
"I see." She looked at him, and then looked away. So, he’d remembered at last, remembered a life before her, a life without her. Would he go back to that now, if he had the chance?
"So, what’s wrong?"
She smiled, and smoothed the rough fabric of her dress over her knees. Only years of practice let her hide what she was feeling.
"Nothing’s wrong."
"No, you’re not happy. I can tell, Tessa. You’ve got that sparkly mask in place, the one you wear when you’re with your clients. Don’t treat me like that. Tell me what’s wrong."
She couldn’t deny it. She’d been such a fool. Such a complete and utter idiot. It had taken almost losing Jak to make her admit the truth to herself. Jak wasn’t just her pilot. He wasn’t just her protector. He was the man she loved.
"I can tell you’re not happy," he repeated, not accusingly, just thoughtfully, a statement of fact. Tessa said nothing. "Come on, Tessa, give. Tell me what’s bothering you."
She stared off into the gathering dusk.
"Nothing’s bothering me, so get off my back."
Jak waited. She had to say something before she blurted out exactly what she felt. She’d sworn long ago that she’d never be that vulnerable. And she wouldn’t, not even for Jak.
So, she asked, "And your home? Your family and clan? Do you remember them?"
"Yeah," he replied in a voice so low that it was almost lost in the chirping of the lizards. "I remember them. Not everything. But I remember murder, and I remember betrayal.
"My father ran a shipping business—built it himself from one ship to nearly fifty. My brother and I helped him run it. Only Felix liked the high life more than he liked working. He hid his debts for the gambling and the women from our father and me until his creditors got impatient." Jak’s voice turned angry. "So then Felix got the brilliant idea of murdering Dad and framing me for it so he could inherit the business."
"That’s what you were running from?"
"Yeah. I came home and found Felix with Dad’s body. The asshole had the nerve to tell me his grand plan. He meant to blast me and tell the cops he’d caught me in the act, but he missed. He always was too lazy to practice.
"Anyway, I ran. I knew Dad had a small aircar hidden on the grounds. His ‘getaway car’ he called it. Guess he wasn’t always the respectable business owner. I outran Felix, and was away and at the spaceport before the cops even reached the house. I got off planet, found work here and there as a pilot, and I’ve been on the run since. At least, I was until that thing tried to eat my soul."
He looked at Tessa, then glanced down at his chest were only a red mark remained where there should have been a death wound.
"You’ve noticed how quick I heal?"
"How could I miss it? You ought to be dead several times over."
"Those two left something inside me; I’ve been calling it the strangeness. I think the healing is part of the strangeness. And I’m stronger than I ought to be. Maybe that’s part of it, too. The two men who attacked me were both a lot stronger than any human ought to be."
"Something about you is different," Tessa agreed. "Have you looked at yourself, Jak? Look at your skin." She waited while he looked at the circle of new flesh on his chest, while he examined his arms and legs only to find old scars missing. "You healed even faster than usual this time, even healed old wounds. The scar on your face," she reached out to touch the narrow white line once more, "Jak, it’s almost gone."
"My face? My face is okay? No more monster mask?"
His voice was shaky. She hadn’t realized it meant so much to him. But why wouldn’t it? She, of all people, knew what it was like to be scorned for being ugly.
"Your face is fine. Quite handsome, really. Although, with your coloring, you’re obviously from off world."
She smiled as the pale skin that went with the red hair and green eyes reddened in what had to be a blush. But they needed to know more about this change.
"The men, who were they? Would you recognize them if you saw them again?"
"I haven’t seen my client since that night, but Bolon was one of the men—the partner. I just didn’t recognize him until we were on the barge. I think Bolon knows what I am, what they put inside me. On the Serena, before the blast, when we were fighting, he said something about a phage. What the hell is a phage?"
"A phage is a kind of bacteria. But I don’t see how that relates to what happened to you."
"Bolon knows. I have to find him, Tessa. I have to find out what he knows."
"Jak, Bolon is dead, remember?"
"No, he’s alive. I can feel him."
Tessa wasn’t convinced, but she didn’t press the point. "I’d rather believe Bolon is dead, but if you say he’s alive, and you want to find him, I’ll help you."
She would do anything that would keep her with Jak.
"Thanks." Jak yawned and shuddered. His face was still drawn with fatigue.
All this talking was tiring him out. She wished she could make him lie down and rest.
"It won’t be easy. Bolon is more dangerous than we thought. We’ll be taking risks we can’t even imagine."
"So? Is that something new? Are we safe now? Have we ever been safe?"
He smiled. "No, I guess not." He squeezed her hand and stretched out on the cloak again. "And we still have to get out of this mess first."
"Yes, and find a way off Shadriss so we can collect the payment from Kamura. We didn’t get her to Tekena
, but we did our best. The girl is probably dead now, but we still met the terms of the contract."
"She could be still alive," Jak said, yawning. His eyes drifted shut. "Toko was with her."
"And you think that mobbie cares what happens to her?"
"Yeah," he said, "I kinda do."
About to argue, Tessa saw that Jak had fallen asleep again. She sighed. Best to let him rest. She sat in silence as the setting sun reddened the reeds. They were marooned here, days from anywhere. They had the river Ur, with its schools of ravenous banderri, on one side and on the other, the Waste, with its moki and other deadly creatures.
Tessa thought about what he’d told her. So Jak could sense Bolon. Did that mean that Bolon could sense Jak, in turn? She felt so helpless, so blind with ignorance
She looked up at the heavens as full night settled in. The sky cut a black swathe above them. The stars seemed low, close to the ground, belying the immense distances she knew lay between them. Would she ever be free to rove from star to star? She glanced at Jak. She could barely see him in the glimmering starlight. If he did leave Shadriss, would she go with him?
Yes, he loved her now, but would that last once he was no longer a homeless wanderer? Love was such a treacherous emotion. She’d learned that on Velora. She’d loved her father, and she’d thought he’d loved her, even though she was such a disappointment to him. Looking back, she realized that he’d been a weak man, craven even by Veloran standards, and too afraid of what others thought of him to ever see her as a real person. And she’d been naive—by any standards. She’d gone on believing in him right up until the day he sold her.
Funny how so big a change in her life could happen without warning. But wasn’t that the way it always was; go along dumb and happy until the ground-car slams into you, until the flood washes you away, until the earth opens under your feet? It had been all of those things for her. She’d been so stupid. She still cringed remembering it.
Market day was always hard for her. The whispering was bad enough, but what hurt most was the way their eyes slid over her, deliberately not seeing her. Don’t look at the freak. Don’t stare at the too short girl with the strangely colored hair and eyes. A throwback, they said, bad genes from the very earliest settlers. Genes from before the time they’d come close to real beauty. Blue eyes instead of gray, black hair instead of dark blond, and not even two meters tall.
That day, they bought their usual supplies, and then her father had bought her a new dress. She’d been so happy. He never bought her presents! And this was a lovely dress, silky blue fabric with a swirl of skirt. Too long, of course; she’d have to hem it when they got home. Only there hadn’t been any going home. Never any going home again.
Their next stop had been in a part of the village she’d never visited before. She’d been shocked that her father would bring her to the prostitutes’ street. An alley, really, with small buildings painted with the gaudy colors that indicated their purpose. He’d stopped before one painted cherry red with a chartreuse door. With a curt, "Come," to her, he’d stepped inside.
In those days, she’d tried to be an obedient daughter, hoping to make up for her other deficiencies, so she’d followed her tall father’s back inside. She’d heard respectful male voices greeting him, and then he’d stepped aside so the men could see her.
"Here she is," her father had said. "My shame."
Cheeks burning, she’d looked back at the strangers. They were from off world, short dark men, even more ugly than she was. But unlike the villagers, they didn’t look away. No, they stared at her with appraising eyes, as if weighing up some bargain at the market. And that was exactly what she’d been.
"Payment as agreed," the man who seemed to be the leader had told her father.
"As agreed."
There was a moment of business while they entered a transaction onto the database. She’d stood there, clutching the bag that contained her new dress, still not understanding what was happening to her. Not even glancing her way, her father had gone to the door. When she moved to follow him, a man had taken her arm.
"No girl, you stay here."
And that was how she’d found out that her father had sold her. Too stunned even to protest, she’d done as she was told. She’d been numb, numb through her sale to a whorehouse on Shadriss, a broken doll going through the motions of her training, without feeling as she serviced her first clients. Then one day, anger burned through the numbness, a bright spark of rage warming the ice of her heart. She’d vowed then to be free someday, to trust no man, to let no man own her, to love no one.
And Jak had made her break her vow.
With a sigh, she lay down beside Jak, with her head on his shoulder. Her movement and the trickle of her tears on his skin woke him. He stirred and spoke with a voice so soft it blended with the murmur of the river.
"Tessa, don’t give up. We’ll make it through this."
"I suppose you’ll leave once you’ve finished this business," she said, her voice muffled as she pressed her face into the soft skin of his neck.
"Will you go with me?"
"Yes, of course. I thought we’d already agreed on that. This doesn’t change anything between us—unless you want it to. I know you don’t need me any more—"
"Need you!" He rose up on one elbow to look down at her from serious green eyes. "What does need have to do with it? Do I need my arms, my eyes, my head? Tessa, you’re part of me, and it would be like cutting my heart out to lose you. I love you."
He looked at her as if he expected her to laugh at him, but she didn’t laugh. Instead, she leaned reached up and kissed him. It was a long, gentle kiss.
"I thought you’d never say that," Tessa whispered when they separated. "I’ve felt the same about you for so long."
"Why didn’t you say so?"
"Because I was afraid you’d run away. Because I was afraid you wouldn’t want me."
She ran her hand through his long, red hair. Such a strange color for hair, as green was such a strange color for eyes, so totally against the Veloran standard. So much better than the Veloran standard. She’d never had so much trouble putting her thoughts into words.
"What if you woke one day to remember a clan and a family elsewhere, a wife who wanted you, a place to return to? Would you want then, to be tied to a freed slave? Would you want to be bound to a woman who was sold on the block and bought her freedom with her body?"
Jak reached to cradle her face in his hands.
"None of that matters. I remember my past now, and I promise you, there is no wife; there’s never been any other woman for me. I love you, Tessa. I love you for what you are, for who you are—strong, beautiful, clever, dangerous."
He kissed her with each word, on her throat, her eyes, and finally on her mouth. His kisses sent a thrill of pleasure through her that was different from anything she’d ever known. She felt his arms tighten around her. Tessa knew the art of making love; it was part of her trade. But there was no art here; only a blind, searing passion that overwhelmed her. This wasn’t some High Lord. This was Jak!
She felt his arousal, too. There was nothing between them but her torn shift. Twisting, she pulled it off. The feel of his strong, warm body against hers was so right!
"Jak," she heard herself say, as if the words were an unstoppable force welling up from inside her. "Jak, I love you."
Omniphage Invasion Page 26
