Invictus

by Diana Palmer

  “Why did you come here?” he demanded, glaring down at her from his slitted eyes.

  “To see you,” she faltered.

  “Our people are at war,” he raged at her. “You could be put to death by your own government as a traitor if it became known that you even had contact with me. We risk enough by sending flashes back and forth to one another.”

  “There is a plot to kidnap you,” she began.

  “There is always a plot of some sort,” he interrupted.

  “No! This one is serious,” she insisted worriedly. “They dare not kill you because Chan Ho would be immediately suspected. But they can sell you into slavery. You will simply disappear without a trace!”

  He sobered.

  “There was no one I could tell who could have helped,” she said, answering the question she saw in his mind. “And I would only have endangered any other Cehn-Tahr whom I involved. I did attempt to flash the warning to you, but I was concerned it might be intercepted, because sometimes I am monitored. It made no difference... I was never able to get through to you. Apparently whoever monitors you has become familiar with the signatures of my flashes and denied you access to them. This was a last resort.” She looked down at his broad chest. “I could not bear to think of you in a mining colony....”

  “Lyceria,” he said in anguish. “This is impossible.”

  Her eyes looked up into his. They were a soft, opaque blue.

  “Stop it,” he muttered, and blocked her telepathic intrusion.

  She blinked, surprised. “How can you do that?”

  “I should not have to,” he returned. “It is a breach of ethics to touch a mind without permission.”

  “Someone taught you,” she guessed.

  “Even among the Rojok there are telepaths,” he said. “It has proven to be a valuable skill. Never in my career have I been more hunted. Chan Ho wishes to return to his late uncle’s policies,” he added grimly. “I will never permit it, as long as I am alive.” He stared into her eyes. “Who is behind this attempt, do you know?”

  “No,” she confessed miserably. “My spies say that it is someone you trust, but nothing more.”

  “You could have flashed me, through a scrambled port,” he said, his voice a little less accusing.

  She searched his dusky face silently, her expression one of bitterness and sorrow. “Of course I could have.” She averted her eyes. “It has been a long time since you rescued me from Ahkmau.”

  “Not so very long.”

  Soft dark blue anguish colored her great eyes. “A lifetime.” She stared at his broad chest. “You answer my flashes, but as though you dislike receiving them, and when you reply, it is with diplomatic formality.”

  “To protect you, you little fool,” he shot back angrily, “in case they were intercepted. You risk much.”

  “I could not let them make a prisoner of you,” she said miserably.

  His thin lips made a straight line. He was flattered. More than flattered. But he clamped down hard on his emotions. “You must leave here at once.”

  She laughed with faint self-contempt. “That is no longer possible. My forged papers have been stolen. I am without proof of citizenship, although most would recognize me as Cehn-Tahr. But that will not give me access to a ship. Nor do I have funds. Those, too, were stolen.”

  He looked at her as if she’d suddenly sprouted feathers. “They followed you here.”

  Her face lost every drop of color.

  “If there is a plot,” he said softly, dangerously, “it included your own capture. It was baited and sprung.” He drew her farther into the shop and looked around worriedly. “We must disguise you and hide you until I can think of some way to return you to your family.”

  She closed her eyes and shuddered. “I am sorry,” she whispered.

  “Sorry!”

  “You will die and I will be responsible, when I thought only to save you,” she moaned.

  His broad chest rose and fell heavily as he registered her misery. Even now, she thought first of his safety, not her own. It was humbling. His big, six-fingered hands smoothed down the soft skin of her arms, tugging her closer. “I was too harsh,” he confessed. “I have no fear of battle or death, but your welfare is another matter. I could not bear seeing you harmed.”

  “You could not?” Her great eyes opened into his, revealing secrets.

  He groaned inwardly at the expression on her face. “You are a child, chasing dreams and adventure. I am an old warrior, scarred and bloodied. I am not fit for such as you.”

  “Old?”

  He laughed bitterly. “In my own culture, yes. You see, the Rojok also used the DNA enhancements that have destroyed the original genome of your own people. We did not dare risk letting our enemies, the Cehn-Tahr, develop greater physical abilities than we had. I am the age of your Commander Dtimun, more or less.” His eyes narrowed and he smiled. “While I doubt that you have seen more than seventy summers.”

  She cleared her throat.

  One eye ridge lifted, for Rojoks had no eyebrows. “Less?”

  She averted her eyes.

  “Sixty?”

  She hesitated, and then nodded. His hands released her. It was worse than he had thought. She truly was a child in her own culture. Barely a woman.

  “So now you will not want to speak to me again. You think I am too young.” Her lips tightened. Tears threatened. “You do not...want me.”

  His eyes closed. A wave of anguish washed over him. Want her! He would die to have her, and he could not admit it, not now. He felt a tingling in his mind and his eyes opened. Hers were pale blue, intense and...stunned.

  He glared at her. “Unethical,” he bit off.

  She nodded. Then she walked right up against him and slid her arms around him, pressing close, holding on tight, with her soft cheek against the leather of his shirt. He hesitated, but only for an instant, before his arms closed around her fiercely. He recalled then his anguish when he found her at Ahkmau, racing across the galaxy to spare her the horrors of torture ordered by then-emperor Mangus Lo. He had been too late. She had been subjected to subsonics and her mind had been in full retreat. He had risked his career, his life, to bring Dtimun to her, to coax her back from certain death. It had been the happiest moment he could remember, when her soft, elegant eyes opened and looked at him.

  “I know what you feel,” she whispered at his chest. “You may try to hide it, but strong emotions are more difficult to conceal. And I am a telepath.”

  “You are never out of my thoughts,” he whispered back. “But what you seek is not possible. Your father is Emperor of the Cehn-Tahr. I may command the Rojok fleet, but I am a soldier, a commoner. I have no royal status.”

  “It will not matter. My father has more respect for courage than social status.”

  He laughed shortly. “Not when the future of his daughter is in question.”

  “We can agree to disagree. At the moment, your safety is my greatest concern,” she said.

  He drew back. “And yours is mine. You should not have come.”

  She smiled tenderly. “I know.”

  He touched her cheek lightly and then laid his forehead against hers, in the Cehn-Tahr greeting between family members. “When we leave the shop, you will go back to your hotel and remain there, safe, until I can find a way to deal with the loss of your documents. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” She sighed and pressed close. The world could end, now, and she would not notice.

  * * *

  MADELINE HAD ORDERED a tiny cup of the delicious imported Dacerian coffee and sipped it at the bar while she looked around at the traffic. Aliens on foot wandered from store to door. Some in one-person conveyances whizzed along the narrow streets at low speeds. Occasionally there was the sound of a fl
ute as a robber was pursued by Benaski Port security forces. It was a busy, colorful marketplace. Madeline loved it.

  When she finished her coffee, Sfilla was still arguing with the shopkeeper, her elegant hands waving in the air as she ridiculed the price he was charging for such a bit of mundane fabric. He, in turn, was arguing that his fabric was the finest sensor weave in the known galaxies and she was a peasant who knew nothing of quality merchandise.

  Chuckling, Madeline got up and moved into the crowd. She paused at a shop of beautiful handmade veils, and was looking through them, when she heard a familiar voice.

  Curious, she moved to the back of the shop. Now there were two voices, one male and thickly accented as he spoke Rojok, one feminine and soft, pleading. There was a long silence, and then the male walked out without looking anyplace except straight ahead.

  She moved quickly past the shopkeeper, who was inviting an Altairian woman to try on one of the veils, and followed behind the Rojok, who was wearing a hooded robe. She recognized his carriage and his big booted feet more than his voice. It was Chacon!

  He paused to speak to two Rojoks, dressed in the same black uniform as the one he wore under his robes. He pushed back the hood and his long, straight blond hair fell to the middle of his back. He ignored passersby as he gave what sounded like firm orders to them.

  Madeline came up beside him and tugged at his arm.

  He glared at her from slit eyes in a dusky face. “Go away,” he said icily.

  “I must speak with you,” she said, wary of eavesdroppers.

  “I have nothing to say to a female of the streets,” he added, and turned away from her.

  She kicked him in the leg.

  He whirled, furious.

  She opened her eyes wide. They were green. Even among Dacerian women with red hair, this eye color was unknown.

  Chacon’s eyes opened wide and he stared at her with dawning recognition.

  “You wish to be entertained?” she said in imitation of a Dacerian woman’s purring voice. “I make you good price.”

  “By all means,” Chacon said with now-twinkling eyes. “If I am not too crippled to accommodate you,” he added as he flexed the leg she’d kicked. He turned to his companions, who were grinning. “I will return soon.”

  They saluted him and moved away.

  Chacon waited until they were out of sight before he turned back to Ruszel. Now his eyes registered the lump under her robes and he blinked. “Ruszel?” he asked under his breath. He scowled. “What are you doing here, like that?” he indicated her obvious pregnancy.

  “Saving your butt, sir,” she said. “You must come with me. I’m not here alone,” she added meaningfully.

  He caught his breath. “This is insane!” he blurted out.

  “Oh, I do agree with that,” she replied, trying to smile. The pain suddenly doubled her over and she was sick on the street. “No...!” she groaned. “Not...now!”

  “Dtimun will kill me,” he said under his breath. But he swung Madeline up in his powerful arms, just the same, when her sickness abated and started down the street with her. “Where are we going?”

  “You’re driving, sir, figuratively speaking—I’m just a passenger,” she managed wanly. The nausea was almost unmanageable. “Sfilla is with me. She’s at...the fabric shop, there.”

  Sfilla had just made her purchase and spotted Madeline being carried by a Rojok. She came rushing forward belligerently, with an odd, smooth grace that sat strangely on a female servant. Suddenly a silvery little knife flashed low in her hand, catching the glint of the neon lights.

  “He’s a friend!” Madeline said quickly, before Sfilla could act. Amazing, that Sfilla would risk attacking him for her. “Show him...where we’re staying.”

  “A friend. He is a Rojok!”

  “Yes. Do as I say. Quickly...!” Her voice broke off and Sfilla suddenly realized that she was in great pain.

  Sfilla put the knife away, watching the Rojok warily. “We have a skimmer,” she said. “It is here.”

  She led the tall Rojok to the skimmer and watched him put Madeline gently down on the small backseat. He climbed in the driver’s seat, glaring when Sfilla tried to argue. Madeline groaned and Sfilla immediately gave in, telling Chacon the name of their hotel. He didn’t spare the engine getting Madeline there.

  Dtimun was studying a virtual computer readout when Chacon came in, with Madeline in his arms, flanked by a worried Sfilla.

  “Chacon!” Dtimun burst out.

  Sfilla’s eyes were almost comically wide as she realized belatedly who their companion was.

  “What happened to her?” Dtimun asked, too shocked to protest the Rojok touching his mate. He had just arrived back at the hotel, his search for the alien commander fruitless, only to have him walk in the door. It was ironic.

  “Growth spurt, I imagine,” he replied as he put her on the wide sofa. “We have officers who have mated with humans,” he explained belatedly, grinning. “She has herbs to take for this, surely?”

  Sfilla groaned. “I meant to obtain herbs from the market to replenish our stores! I did not have time!”

  “Go back,” Chacon said firmly. “Hurry.”

  “Yes!” She was gone with one last worried look at Madeline, who was groaning in pain.

  “Does she have anything for pain?” Chacon asked Dtimun.

  “In her wrist unit, but I do not know how to access it,” Dtimun said, kneeling beside Madeline to take her cold hand in his.

  “And you are too emotionally involved to remove the pain,” Chacon said solemnly. “I do not have the gift.”

  “But, I do,” came a soft, melodious voice from the doorway. “What a good thing I followed you,” she told Chacon.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  PRINCESS LYCERIA PUSHED back the hood of her own cloak and walked gracefully into the room. She smiled secretly at Chacon and moved to Dtimun’s side as he bent over Madeline.

  Her smile faded when she saw the pain that tautened the human face. She knelt at the sofa. Her soft hand went to Madeline’s cheek.

  “The pain is a shadow,” she said softly. “It moves behind your eyes. You cannot see it. You cannot feel it. The pain is a shadow. It passes in the darkness. It is gone.”

  Madeline gasped. It really was gone! She stared up at the beautiful Cehn-Tahr woman, fascinated. “Thank you. I will never get used to people being able to do that,” she said.

  Lyceria smiled. “It is a gift. Many have it,” she added quickly when she saw wheels turning in Madeline’s mind. “You know of us only through what textdiscs tell you, but there are many inconsistencies in such histories.”

  “I suppose so.” She glanced from Chacon to Lyceria and smiled. “What a lucky thing that I insisted on going into the city today, and that Sfilla insisted on going with me.” She glanced at Dtimun suspiciously. “Were you aware that she carries a knife?”

  Chacon chuckled. “Of course she does. She is one of his government’s finest assassins.”

  “Assassins?” Madeline burst out, sitting up in a jackknife motion.

  Dtimun gently pushed her back down. “She is not paid to assassinate you,” he told her. “Only to protect you.”

  “Which she almost assassinated me in doing,” Chacon murmured. He gave Madeline a speaking glance and bent to rub his shin. “After your mate crippled me,” he told Dtimun.

  “I did not,” Madeline returned haughtily. “I had to get your attention somehow, sir, and you were doing your best to push me off.”

  “There must have been a less painful method, Ruszel.”

  “Is it my fault that I don’t have social skills?” she asked the room at large. “What do I know about enticing a man, excuse me, a Rojok, for immoral purposes?”

  “What was that?” Dtimun asked,
staring at Chacon with cold, furious eyes.

  “I never touched her!” Chacon argued. “Except to bring her here. I do not think Sfilla could have carried her, and it was dangerous to leave her lying in the street!”

  “I would like to point out that if there’s any fault, it was mine,” Madeline said, exasperated, as she glared at Dtimun. “And would you mind explaining why you have a paid assassin pretending to be my servant woman?”

  Dtimun grimaced, a very human expression. “The pregnancy makes you vulnerable to attack,” he said through his teeth. “It would have been unwise to allow you out of my sight alone, especially here in this haven for thieves and murderers.”

  “He does have a point, Ruszel,” Chacon said. He frowned. “You were at the point of death only a short time ago. How is that you and he—” he indicated Dtimun “—are here together in such a disguise?”

  “A question I should also like answered,” Princess Lyceria said worriedly. “You must be aware of the risk you take!”

  “We have a...crewman,” Dtimun said, choosing his words, “who has traveled in time. He came back, among other reasons, to find a means of saving your life,” he told Chacon flatly. “He said that if you die, this timeline dies with you.”

  Chacon scoffed. “A seer,” he said gruffly. “They are flawed.”

  “They are not,” Princess Lyceria said firmly. “We have such a seer at Mahkmannah. It was she who saw Ruszel’s rise to prominence among us, who predicted her emergence as a catalyst to change our world.”

  Chacon stared at her with eyes that quickly changed from mockery to frank affection. “Perhaps there are some who have the gift,” he conceded. “But what danger could I possibly be in?” he added. “I have my bodyguard, including Lieumek who is the oldest and most trusted of my underlings. They never leave me. And Chan Ho,” he added, “would not dare send assassins after me. I am far more popular with our people than he is. It would be political suicide!”

  “That’s why he plans to have you kidnapped, sir,” Madeline said gently, “and sold into slavery. You would disappear. There would be no body, no certainty of death, but you would be removed and Chan Ho would build more ovens at Ahkmau.”