How can this woman know these things about me, when I don’t know her at all? His head was spinning. Suddenly, he had a vision of himself, sitting next to his mother on a rickety couch, heard her sweet, soft voice, telling him a story about a warrior of ancient times, riding a big black quadruped, carrying a sword and a shield, and rescuing weaker people from their enemies. “How do you know what my mother wanted? Were you her friend?”
“I never met her. You confide in me, a bit, during a difficult experience we’ll have when you’re a grown man.” Leaning against the wall, Mara rubbed her forehead. “Nothing is simple.”
“Your words are strange, talking as if you come from the future.”
“In a way I have, I guess.” She straightened her spine and took a deep breath, as if she had a task to accomplish. “What if you were to see both Ladies? If you had a choice today?” Mara asked, resting one hand on top of his fist.
Khevan swallowed hard. “I vowed to avenge my mother’s death. I have to become a D’nvannae to carry out the execution. I’d choose Red.”
The room filled with a bright white light, so stark he had to close his eyes against it.
“Such determination and dedication,” said a new voice, lovely, yet with a sad inflection. “He refused then and refuses now to believe in other possibilities. He could have been one of my strongest, yet walked the other path from this moment forward. You cannot dissuade him, Mara.”
“I know his choice was made long ago,” the woman said, keeping her arm around him as if to protect him. “But I had to try.”
He wanted to see the White Lady, for he knew the newcomer must be the goddess. He’d never have another chance. Opening his eyes, struggling to make out the form in the brilliant halo of white light, he rose and took a step away from Mara, slipping from her loose embrace. There was a slender figure behind the majestic White Lady. Unable to believe what he was seeing, Khevan blinked hard against the light. “Mother?”
“Khevan Adaranovic, the Lady of D’nvannae will take your oath now,” said a sonorous male voice from the hallway. “Walk forward and pledge your life to her. The Red Lady waits.”
He hesitated.
Mara left the bench and moved to stand with the Lady in White and the ghost of his mother.
“If I choose your service, will my mother return to me?” he asked.
“She’s gone beyond this world, as you well know,” the benevolent goddess said. “I bring her spirit to you this one time, so no matter what befalls you, you may have her memory as comfort. She was a true adherent of my teachings and beliefs. That you reject me and go to my sister’s dark promises cannot be counted as a failing on her part.”
The light reached out, touching his forehead with a sensation as if a feather had been drawn across his skin. A cascade of images and sensory memories flooded his mind. Instinctively, he created a mental block like a stone barricade to protect them, the way his mother had taught him when he as a young boy, so he’d always have these precious moments as comfort. The glowing shadow he believed was his mother floated across the floor to him, touching what might have been her hand to his heart for the space of a single breath, and then was gone.
“Twice in the whorls of time you’ve refused my service, my gifts,” the Lady in White said. “Yet I wish you well, for all the potential to do good I see in your heart. I’ll not return to you again, Khevan, but I left one door open the slightest crack.” There was amusement in her voice as she said, “Things do come in threes, as you humans say. Yet this third possibility doesn’t lie in your hands, for I won’t be refused again. It will be the choice of another whether you’re worthy of the gift.” The Lady inclined her head to him and faded from view.
Only Mara was left.
“Khevan Adaranovic, the Red Lady waits.” The voice echoed in the chamber, a hint of impatience in the clipped syllables.
In three quick steps, Mara was at his side and gave him a hug. He returned the embrace, saying in a whisper, “I don’t know who you are, but thank you for trying to talk me out of my choice, for bringing the Lady of Light and my mother to me. I must go. If the herald calls a third time and I don’t answer, my chance is lost.”
“I don’t know how real any of this is,” Mara answered, smoothing his hair from his brow and framing his face with her hands for a moment before kissing him lightly on the forehead. “But I hope I helped.”
“You did. Someday I’ll repay you.” Hand over his heart, he made the pledge sincerely, even as he stepped away from her.
“You already have.”
Khevan spun on his heel, squared his shoulders, and paced into the corridor leading to the waiting Red Lady.
CHAPTER NINE
“The first challenge is a draw.”
Khevan shook his head, disoriented, as the Head Monk of the White Lady’s temple made his declaration. He gripped the railing in front of him tightly, to steady himself, and turned his head to search for Mara. Only Nick and Twilka stood in the designated square, their assigned monks behind the bench. He had a moment of panic such as he’d not experienced in years.
“Mara’s fine,” Quaid whispered quickly. “Her part in this is done and she’s been allowed to leave. The Lady of Light’s monk escorted her out while you were yet regaining consciousness.”
Shooting another quick glance at Nick, reassured by his friend’s calm demeanor, Khevan tried to focus on the Red Lady. If Mara had come to any harm, Nick would be tearing this place apart.
“He still chose my flames over my sister’s light,” said the Lady of the D’nvannae, raising her voice. “How is this counted as a draw?”
“In the process, he regained precious memories you’d extracted from him—of his mother and of the moment he met my lady, your sister.” The aged monk was adamant, leaning on his staff, not the least bit cowed by the towering flames blazing orange, red, and black around the Red Lady’s throne. “With the help of his friend, he overcame your power. Yet, undeniably, he did choose your service in the end, hence a draw.”
“He remains mine.” Her voice was greedy, possessive. “A D’nvannae subject to my will.”
The monk inclined his head. “For the moment. Two trials remain.”
“Prepare yourself—she’ll make the next challenge harder,” Quaid said.
Khevan opened his mouth to acknowledge the soft spoken warning and found himself alone, standing in the corridor of a spaceship. Pivoting slowly, hearing a recorded voice give warnings in the five official languages of the Sectors, he realized he was on the Nebula Dream. Piles of luggage, dropped items, here and there splashes of blood on the carpet or bulkhead testified to the terror and violence driving terrified passengers to seek escape from certain doom.
I need to find a lifeboat and get off this wreck myself.
A blinking green light at the curve of the corridor caught his eye. One lifeboat remaining, waiting for him. Of course the Lady would take care of him, make sure such a senior brother escaped the disaster. Smiling, he strode confidently to the portal, which was open, the short passageway that would take him to safety in the LB inviting. He raised his foot to step across the threshold and paused, gripping the edge of the portal with one hand.
This isn’t right. This isn’t what happened to me.
Confused, he shook his head, blinking. He heard voices faintly—a man shouting orders and a woman pleading for help to free people who were trapped. Nick? Mara? The names set off echoes in his mind, but when he checked in both directions, the main corridor was empty.
You have to go now. A voice in his head, the Lady’s voice, insistent, annoyed. Why do you hesitate?
The lights blinked off, emergency lamps coming on again only in spots, the rest of the corridor nothing but pools of inky darkness. The deck shuddered under his feet and he heard a muted explosion. Indeed, there was no time, the ship was clearly dying and he didn’t want to die with it. He had many years of service yet to give his Lady, with rewards to reap, and it was not part of her plan or
his for him to perish ingloriously here. Turning, he took one step into the passage and the portal began to slide shut behind him.
Call upon me, if ever you or Mara are in need of help. I will come.
His own voice rang in his ears, making an unbreakable promise to a man who was like a brother of flesh and blood to him, not merely a fellow devotee of the Red Lady.
Khevan shoved his body into the diminishing gap, stopping the portal from closing. He checked the corridor again, but it remained darkened, empty as far as he could tell. He took a deep breath, noting the air was going bad, the oxygen depleted.
I’ll come if you need me, my word as an officer, the other man, this brother, had sworn.
Nick had come to help him, and now Khevan was going to flee, breaking his own oath?
Without hesitation, Khevan forced himself past the pressure of the door and ran along the corridor toward the gravlift. Nick and Mara must have gone ahead without me. But he knew exactly where the couple would be and what peril they faced. Nick wouldn’t survive without his help and there was precious little time. He flung himself into the crew gravlift, which functioned smoothly, carrying him upward to the deck he sought, even as the ship shuddered. He stumbled going into the Level Two corridor, which was again empty, but part of his mind whispered the absence of others was correct. No one had been here, except those they came to rescue.
The air rushed past, buffeting him, throwing debris at him. Hull breach! But no, this was wrong, not how it happened, not when it happened. Clenching his jaw, Khevan let go of his memory. He had to deal with the situation at hand and not be distracted by uncertain flickers of memory. “Nick?” he called repeatedly, checking the cabins as he strode past them, which took too much time, but if this wasn’t the way he remembered the events, he couldn’t take a chance on missing his friend.
Another lifeboat portal beckoned him, the green light warm and inviting in the gloom and terror of the corridor ravaged by turbulent wind, accompanied by the sounds of a hull breaking apart. Khevan ignored it, pulling himself onward, fighting the pull of the escaping atmosphere, which tried to hurl him back the way he’d come. He could almost believe the swirling wind was trying to toss him into the LB passageway.
Ahead, a twisted mass of wreckage blocked his path, a maze of broken bulkheads and dangerously buckled structural members, with AI ganglions and power conduits wreathing the mess like pit vipers. Nick must be on the other side. Holding onto a support beam to stabilize himself, eyes narrowed against the flying debris, Khevan studied the obstacle, searching for the best way in. “Nick?”
A hoarse shout answered his call. “Here! Don’t risk yourself, pal; I’m trapped. Get out while there’s time.”
He would urge Khevan to save himself. Nick was a man of honor and self-sacrifice.
Khevan identified a potential path into the edge of the debris and edged forward. “Hold on; I’m coming. We’ll escape together.”
He was making progress, ducking and weaving and crawling on the deck at one point, when suddenly flames broke out directly ahead of him. Rising to his feet in a clear space, Khevan understood the fire was no natural phenomenon, but the unmistakable sign of the Lady’s presence, all oranges and reds laced with black. Her face formed inside the flames, eyes gleaming eerily scarlet.
“I order you to retreat, cease this useless effort. There is no contract with this man, you owe him nothing and you owe me everything.”
“I refuse to leave him. If the situation was reversed, Nick wouldn’t abandon me. His kind of warrior never leaves anyone behind. I can do no less.” He forged ahead, the flames retreating as he pushed his way through the next complicated tangle. A dangling wire shocked him, fat sparks flying in the wind. He realized his leather jacket had been burned through, revealing scorched and blackened skin beneath. Pushing away the pain, Khevan moved left, shifting a piece of wall and gaining a few yards. Tantalizing clear space lay ahead. “I’m nearly through,” he shouted, trying to encourage his friend, hoping the words could be heard over the gale force wind.
Moving like snakes, AI ganglions wrapped themselves around his legs, rendering him immobile. He fell heavily into the debris, nearly impaling himself on a protruding metal spike. Another gashed his forehead and blood dripped into his eyes. As the ganglions tried to cocoon him, he managed to draw his D’nvannae dagger and slash at them with his good arm. Crawling as best he could, wielding the knife, he made it to the edge of the obstruction and rolled free.
Nick lay half in, half out of a cabin door, tons of debris pinning his legs. Khevan knew the impossibility of freeing the soldier in time.
“Told you to retreat,” Nick said with an effort at a grin, although his face was taut with pain. “Your Lady changed things up on us like the bitch she is. Caught me here the moment the challenge began. I thought I heard the kids, worked my way inside, but the cabin was empty.”
“Doubtless a trick on her part.”
“Yeah, I figured. And then she collapsed the whole place around me as I was trying to escape, to go find you.” Nick coughed up blood as acrid smoke wafted across the deck. “Didn’t realize I was only here to act as bait to pull you off your objective.”
Despite the dire circumstances, Khevan laughed as yet another lifeboat portal materialized on his left, soft lights glowing in invitation. The Red Lady wasn’t being subtle at all. “There weren’t enough lifeboats on the Dream,” he shouted. “Stop throwing them at me—I won’t be tempted.”
He dragged himself to the cabin door, next to where Nick sprawled. Examining the debris pinning his friend, Khevan sought to shift the largest pieces. “If I can free you, we can get to one of the lifeboats the Lady keeps offering me.” He put all his strength into tugging at a shard of corridor wall, ignoring the searing pain from his burned arm.
Nick shouted a curse. “Fuck, that hurts. Khevan, stop. I can’t feel my legs anymore, but whatever you’re doing feels like I’m being cut in half.”
Khevan released the fragment of wood and metal and sank to his knees next to Nick as the entire ship shuddered around him.
“Guess we’re not gonna make it this time,” Nick said, fighting to get the words out, blood oozing from the corner of his mouth.
“Then we’ll die together.”
“Sorry I wasn’t more help.” Nick extended his right hand and they gripped each other’s forearms tightly, two comrades who’d fought a good battle side by side.
“Your presence clarified many things for me, made my decisions good ones. I couldn’t have asked for a better ally.”
The lights flickered and went out as the sound of rending metal and escaping atmosphere became a terrible cacophony. Khevan couldn’t hear himself think. He closed his eyes and held onto Nick as the one anchor he could trust in a mad world as the breath was sucked from his chest and he knew he was about to pass out.
“The Brother has won the second challenge. He followed his own path, refusing your orders and your enticements.” The elderly priest pointed his staff at the goddess. “Although you made it impossible for him to rescue his friend, he remained unswerving in his determination.”
Although the flames pulsed and roared around the throne, there was no argument from the Red Lady. She sat semi reclined, examining her elaborately decorated fingernails and not sparing so much as a glance for either the monk or Khevan.
Disoriented by the sudden end to the trip to the re-creation of the dying Nebula Dream, Khevan checked his arm, finding the jacket’s sleeve intact. Flexing his muscles and making a fist brought no sensation of pain. He shot a glance at the enclosure where his allies had been and found only Twilka, who raised her hand in a small wave. Grabbing the Renegade’s shoulder, he choked out his friend’s name in the form of a question. “Nick?”
“Since you won the challenge, he survived and is whole.” Quaid shook his head. “The Lady is determined to defeat you. The last round was perilously close. If Nick had died before you reached him, I’m not sure the victory would have
gone to you, despite your efforts to save him. Your friend would have perished here, in real life also. I hope you and your woman can come through the final round.”
“Any tips?”
“You’re in unprecedented territory, my friend.” Quaid swung around to stare at Twilka. “Do you believe she’s up to taking on whatever the Red Lady throws at her? Could she survive a scenario like the one Nick just endured?”
“I never wanted her to be in any danger at all,” he said, “But not because I doubted her heart or her strength. She’d do whatever is required.”
“She’s a Socialite, yes?”
“Among other things she’s done and experienced.” Annoyance at the implied criticism of Twilka made his voice curt. “There’s much more to her.”
“I was impressed with her determination to rescue you when I first met her, but whether that will be enough…”
Khevan turned to look at Twilka, who blew him an airy kiss, as if unconcerned by what lay ahead. He wasn’t deceived, noting the lines of strain bracketing her eyes and lips. She seemed ten years older today and he regretted bringing her to this state. “We’ll meet whatever is thrown at us together.”
Twilka cowered, back to the wall, surrounded by men in a ring three deep. The would-be assailants were literally faceless, as in her worst nightmares, only blank skin where eyes and other features should be. Hands curved into claws reached to grab at her and she slapped them away, cursing and kicking. She sidled to the right and her opponents moved in lockstep with her. Nearly tripping over an empty vodka bottle, which rolled away on the deck, she realized she was wearing the navy blue-and-gold silk dress she’d worn on the night the Nebula Dream wrecked. “I hate this fucking dress,” she screamed, shaking her fist at the ceiling. “I burned it. This isn’t real; you’re not real,” she yelled at the eerily silent male figures, so angry she was spitting. “It’s a fever dream from the Red Bitch. When Khevan gets here, you’ll all be sorry. I’d run now, if I were you.” Quickly, she ducked to grab another bottle from the deck, swinging it at a man who came too close, smashing it across his smooth face in a spray of broken glass and brandy. He reeled away, falling in a silent heap on the deck, bleeding heavily, and another took his place.
Star Survivor (The Sectors SF Romance Series Book 6) Page 11
