In Extremis

by M. C. A. Hogarth

  “I see,” Sediryl said. “Impressive.”

  “Isn’t it?” Kamaney said. “I don’t fear anything, you see.”

  “I can understand why.” Sediryl walked to her, train rustling. “Truly, you have thought of everything.”

  “Yes,” Kamaney said. “Exactly.”

  Sediryl. Here.

  Vasiht’h stared at the face of Jahir’s flame and wondered if he was imagining her… if anger had finally pushed him to the point of delirium. Or maybe he was confusing her with someone else? The Sediryl he’d met had been dressed like an Eldritch noble, not like a dominatrix out of a Harat-Shariin 3deo, and had carried herself with a focused, ferocious energy. This woman moved like an expensive courtesan, her expressions pouting or coquettish or enigmatic by turns. It wasn’t until she lowered herself on her unlikely heels to meet his eyes that he knew for certain.

  What was she doing here?

  How could she be here, knowing what pirates did to Eldritch?

  He’d had no idea how to react to her, could only stare as she maintained her side of the conversation with the Karaka’An who’d brought her by. But then he was being pulled from his cell and marched down the corridors, except this time they didn’t take him to be groomed or mutilated. They left the cargo bay entirely and walked through halls more appropriate to the interior of an Alliance starbase than to a pirate lair, and it took forever for them to bring him through a secure lock and to a new door.

  “In,” one guard said.

  “Don’t think of attacking your owner,” the second added. “She’s armed.”

  “And destruction of property will be punished,” the first finished.

  Then they left him there, and he’d thought himself alone but he wasn’t. Sitting calmly in the corner of the room on a pillow was a Faulfenzair. A striking one. Vasiht’h hadn’t known they came in white like that, pale as an Eldritch.

  Did his voice work? He tried it. “I… do you speak Universal?”

  “I do.” The Faulfenzair’s hands were resting on her? His? His knees, and their tips were an unsettling garnet red.

  Vasiht’h cleared his throat. “I’m sorry. I… I don’t know what to say.”

  A smile moved the corners of the alien’s lips. They had long muzzles, Faulfenza… Vasiht’h didn’t know if smiling was natural to them, or if they’d learned it to communicate with the Pelted. “You don’t know the protocol for initiating conversation with aliens with whom you have been enslaved and sold into the clutches of a new master? I am disappointed.”

  That didn’t register for several heartbeats. When it did… “You… you’re making a joke?”

  “Would it be better to keen despair?” The Faulfenzair’s lifted brow ridges felt admonitory. “Come, fellow sufferer. Sit. We are to be companions for a while, it seems.”

  “Who are you?” Vasiht’h blurted.

  “I am Qora Paunene Zela,” was the calm reply. “Of the Faulfenzair vessel Willseeker, and I am one of Faulza’s Eyes. What you would call a priest. And you?”

  “My name is Vasiht’h. I’m…” He struggled with the urge to laugh. “I’m a xenotherapist, and this isn’t my war.”

  “A fascinating introduction,” Qora said. “I’m intrigued. Go on.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You said it’s not your war. Whose war is it?”

  Vasiht’h’s feet flexed and the claws he should have had didn’t show at the tips of his paws, and his feet ached like missing bones. He winced and started pacing. “I can’t have this conversation now.”

  He’d expected to be asked why, but the Faulfenzair said nothing. Vasiht’h shot a glance at him and found the alien’s eyes closed. Just like that? Was Qora not curious? He’d expected to be hectored, not accommodated. But he was glad, glad because it left him to his racing thoughts. Why was she here? What did it mean? Had she come to rescue them? Had she been caught herself? Did she know anything about Jahir? Or the Slave Queen?

  Vasiht’h stumbled. His feet hurt more than he thought. His hands too. He clenched them into fists, tucking their ends out of sight. If he couldn’t see it, he wouldn’t fixate on it. Didn’t that work sometimes? They told their clients to concentrate on something outside themselves. But what?

  The door took forever to slide open, but it finally did. Sediryl, alone, stepped into the suite and waited for the door to close behind her. With a shuddering exhalation, she crossed the room in less time Vasiht’h thought safe or possible on those ridiculous heels and had her arms around him, tightly. “Oh, arii!” she exclaimed, eyes against his hair. “I came as quickly as I could.”

  “It’s you,” Vasiht’h breathed, daring to press his face into her shoulder. He’d never hugged her like this before and yet it seemed vital that he do so and natural that it comforted him. “It really is you. Sediryl, oh Goddess, what… what are you doing here? What am I doing here? Help me make sense of this, please!”

  “Sssh,” she said, squeezing him. “I won’t lie: we are in awful straits. But I came into this with my eyes open and I intend to leave in one piece, and with you with me, and as many as I can bring.” She leaned back and cupped his face in her hands. “My D-per has secured this suite against recordings. We can speak freely here as long as she says it.”

  Was he trembling? He was. His eyes fell from her face to her shoulders and seized there. “You… you’re wearing… that’s… that was a person…”

  Before he could vomit, a hand settled on his body, startling him because he could feel every finger and there were six of them, six warm fingers. As if someone had rested a heating pad on his back. Looking over his shoulder he found the Faulfenzair crouched at his flank, bright green eyes steady. “No,” Qora said. “This isn’t the time.”

  “What?” Vasiht’h managed, strangled. “This is exactly the time! What other time is there!”

  The Faulfenzair grinned. “Good point. There’s never a good time.” His face settled. “But this time in particular is a bad time.”

  “Because?” Vasiht’h said.

  “Because you are needed,” the Faulfenzair replied. “And you can’t be what you need to be if you are shattered in small and unavailable pieces.”

  Vasiht’h gaped at him. Then, torn between outrage and bafflement, “Are all Faulfenzair priests…”

  “Rude?” Qora smiled thinly. “No. You’re just lucky.” He tipped his nose toward Sediryl. “She’s wearing a fur because she must convince our keepers she’s one of them. What else?”

  “Yes,” Sediryl said, staring at him.

  Qora nodded, and the Alliance gesture was so strange Vasiht’h couldn’t stop staring at him. “Daize told me about you, Princess.”

  “Are you about to say that being here is your destiny?” Sediryl asked, so skeptically that Vasiht’h couldn’t help but relax. Better out of her mouth than his.

  “My destiny!” Qora laughed. “Your destiny! His destiny! What does that matter! I am a priest and one of His Eyes, not a fortune-teller. I observe, that’s all. And I observe that you needed me more than you needed Daize, and she knew it too.”

  “I wanted…”

  “To rescue her.” Qora wrinkled his long nose. “Admirable. But a distraction. You have a different purpose, don’t you?”

  It was Sediryl’s turn to stare at him, and Vasiht’h felt a ridiculous urge to comfort her.

  “Your friend said this wasn’t his war,” Qora continued. “But it’s yours. Yes?”

  “How did you know she was my friend?” Vasiht’h asked at the same time Sediryl said, “What do you know about the war?”

  Qora’s chuff sounded amused. He sat back. “Much better.”

  “How is this better?” Vasiht’h asked, irritated. And then sagged and pressed a hand to his forehead. “Because I no longer want to vomit and Sediryl’s not fixating on things she can’t change.”

  “You see? We are a perfect team.” Qora showed all his teeth, and this time Vasiht’h knew he was joking, could sense it on the air
in a way he abruptly realized he couldn’t sense Sediryl. She was still touching him, and yet… her emotions were closed to him. Why was that when every other Eldritch had been open as a sieve?

  “Jahir,” Vasiht’h said, because it was the thing he kept returning to. “They took him from me. They have him, Sediryl.”

  “I know.” She sighed and straightened. “I followed the ship that carried you both to the rendezvous, when they offloaded him. He’s heading for the palace on the throneworld.”

  “They think he’s Lisinthir.”

  “I… beg your pardon?”

  This detail felt important. Vasiht’h looked up at her, trying not to wring his hands because doing so called attention to how wrong their ends felt. “He’s wearing a Fleet domino, and it makes him look exactly like Lisinthir. Because the Chatcaava were looking for Lisinthir, and Jahir thought… that maybe if they thought they’d caught him…”

  “That they need no longer fear him?” Sediryl frowned. “Yes. I can see that. The Emperor’s missing. The Ambassador apparently mewed. They are cutting down their enemies. He wants to encourage their complacency, is that it?”

  Vasiht’h managed a nod.

  “But… how can he possibly sustain it?” Sediryl asked. “Even the best domino is a bad mask. And it runs out of power.”

  “Not this one,” Vasiht’h said, heavily. “It’ll eat through his fat stores and start on the rest of him to keep itself online.”

  “What fat stores?” Sediryl exclaimed. “Last I saw him he was hard as a rail!”

  “Exactly.”

  She was silent for several heartbeats, and in that moment, trembling, tense, like a sculpture swept up in red suede and white fur, she was magnificent and he thought… he thought they might survive. “Well,” she said. “It appears we have a deadline.”

  Vasiht’h hadn’t allowed himself to follow the ramifications to their inevitable end, but that statement forced him to imagine it, to see Jahir dead, alone, surrounded by their enemies… not even known, because the roquelaure would rob his death of that small dignity. He expected despair, but the rage roared back and he covered his face, shaking. When Sediryl touched his shoulder, he couldn’t understand how she didn’t jerk back—why he didn’t scorch her skin with the power of it.

  “We’ll rescue him,” Sediryl said. “Or Lisinthir will. All is not lost, arii. We’re in the middle of the story, and we’re the ones who will write the ending.” Her fingers tighten. “Believe me, Vasiht’h. I’m not planning to die here. I’m going to win.”

  “I believe you,” he whispered, willing to say anything to make the anger stop. He remembered Jahir’s promise on that alien vessel, in the cargo hold. We will not die apart, ariihir. Even that didn’t make the flames die back. You said we wouldn’t die apart, he said, reaching for the mindline and hearing only silence. You didn’t say we wouldn’t suffer. That I wouldn’t be trapped here, knowing you were suffering.

  He’d failed to conceal his emotions sufficiently, because Sediryl’s gaze on his was troubled. He forced himself to breathe in once, slowly, and out again. “All right,” he said. “We’re here. But we won’t be forever.”

  “No,” she said. Looking from him to the Faulfenzair. “Make yourselves as comfortable as you may. You can talk, if you want, or rest, whatever you need. I’m going to change. All right?”

  Vasiht’h nodded.

  “You too, alet?”

  “I will be fine,” Qora said.

  Sediryl hesitated. Her reply had a sardonic cast. “Right where you’re supposed to be?”

  “Not at all,” the Faulfenzair said amiably. “But I have plenty of time to figure out how to make use of where I am to the best of my ability.”

  Sediryl flinched. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply—”

  “I know,” Qora said. “Don’t waste time soothing me. I don’t require soothing. Our God is a god of fire, foreign woman, and fire burns even its friends.”

  Vasiht’h glanced at him again, startled, but the Faulfenzair wasn’t looking at him.

  “Go change,” Qora added. “We will be here.”

  After Sediryl left, Vasiht’h expected the priest to say something. Surely that comment had been meant for him. A priest of fire could sense the fury immolating Vasiht’h’s spirit from within, couldn’t he? He would have to. But Qora did not speak, resting with his back to the wall and those blood-tipped fingers on his knees. After a while, Vasiht’h resumed his pacing, until his feet hurt him too much and he sought the uncertain refuge of sleep.

  In the bathroom, Sediryl grasped the edge of the sink and tried not to hyperventilate. Her corset was too tight, or her ribs, or maybe it was some vital organ in her that was in crisis. She felt like she was suffocating—

  “Are you really going to change clothes?” Maia asked.

  The pedestrian question centered her. She stared at herself in the mirror, did not like the shocky quality of her gaze. “I am guessing becoming an alcoholic won’t make this easier.”

  Maia snorted. “You want to be drunk while trying to handle Kamaney?”

  “She is hard enough to handle sober.” Sediryl felt her shoulders squaring. She shrugged off the pelt and immediately felt better. “And yes, I’m changing. Find me something outrageous. Some lace, some leather. Mash it into something appropriate.”

  “I’m not a fashion designer…”

  “You are now.”

  “No pressure there,” Maia muttered

  Sediryl squelched a nervous laugh. “Not at all. Maia? The gun? Did you see? What happened with the gun?”

  “Yes,” Maia said, grim. “I saw.”

  “What was that?”

  “I’m not sure yet, but I’m not happy, arii. A shield like that… either it’s a personal thing she’s carrying on her, and then we’ll have to identify it and get it away from her before we can kill her… or it’s a base-wide subroutine, and someone was good enough to install it.”

  Sediryl’s hands twitched on the edge of the sink. “Would someone good enough to manage that be good enough to find you?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m afraid of, yes. It just got very important for me to find out who Kamaney is and whether she brought anyone with her.”

  “Maybe she did and this person is a Fleet plant?” Sediryl said, hopeful.

  Maia snorted. “Wouldn’t that be nice. Like finding Prince Charming and living happily ever after.”

  Sediryl finished spreading her laces and gulped in a deep breath, relieved. Leaving the busk fastened, she squirmed out of the corset. “I am planning on marrying Prince Charming and living happily ever after, Maia.”

  “Oh? Which one are you going for? Or is it both?”

  This reminder of happier conversations made her smile. “I’ll leave you in suspense. It’ll give you something to live for.”

  “Cruel, arii. Cruel and unusual punishment.”

  “It comes with the persona.” Frowning, Sediryl said, “What about your swain, come to think of it? The Chatcaavan?”

  “My… my what?”

  Sediryl grinned. “Uuvek, wasn’t it? Have you maintained communication with him?”

  “I had to drop the connection,” Maia said. “I left him a few notes, time-delayed, but once we started following the ship here, realtime communication became too risky. That’s another thing on my list, I promise. Figuring out how to get word out of here. But not until I know….”

  “About Kamaney’s possible computer specialist?” Sediryl nodded. “I am in complete accord with you there. Keep alive, Maia. I can’t do this without you.”

  Maia’s sigh shivered, as if the D-per was trembling on the exhale. More briskly, “So… the Queen of the Chatcaava. You agreed to rehabilitate her?”

  “As an excuse to talk with her, yes.”

  “Do you have an actual plan?”

  “Surprisingly,” Sediryl said. “I do.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  No guard came for Jahir the following morning. He was fed
three times a day, per the Surgeon’s instructions, and while the meals did not pacify the roquelaure they did reduce the incidence of its warnings to an interval Jahir could survive without wincing. Certainly the opportunity to lie still, minimizing his exertions, made a difference in its complaints. He spent the time dozing, wondering how long a Chatcaavan day was and watching the light in the adjacent bathing chamber as it aged, grew coppery, faded to a ruddy silver that made him wonder what the moon looked like, if there was one.

  No one came for him the following day, nor the next. He found his neglect perplexing after the Usurper had been so adamant about exposing him to the daily fleet movements... and he was torn between relief to be ignored and frustration that he could not be about the work that had brought him here. If he had felt that this respite was building his internal reserves against the need of the roquelaure, he could have borne it better… but the chimes never ceased, nor did his cravings. Had Lisinthir tested the device? Had it affected him this way? How had he managed it?

  Or was this some artifact of its being designed for Lisinthir, but inserted into someone else?

  When would it become more dangerous to leave it operational?

  He shuddered and pressed his face into the inside of his arm.

  Came a day at last when the guards did prepare him for the wall. The map was still up when they buckled him into his restraints, but most of the fleets remained where they’d been days ago. Had it not been updated, or were they waiting for something? But the Usurper did not come to elucidate, and the guards brought him the gag, and the earplugs, and at last the blindfold. An imminent meeting with Second, then, and he accepted what he could not change.

  The Surgeon’s strictures were observed exactly. He was hung for four hours at a time, with an hour’s break between each session. Three meals they offered, small enough to suit the appetite he’d had prior to the roquelaure, but nowhere near large enough to silence it or drive away the numbness at his extremities. Once Second had left, they did not reapply the gag, nor the earplugs. The blindfold remained, which galled him. He did not love the games of sensory deprivation, though Lisinthir had filed the edges off his revulsion. That day he learned only that the Usurper did not entertain many visitors, and did not prefer viseo or aural communication. He remained silent, and Jahir wondered if he thought of his newest prize at all. The temptation to find out directly rose again, but he tamped it down. A few more days to acclimate to the situation, and then he would try, tentatively, extending himself. For now he thought it wisest to conserve his energy.