Kinsman's Oath

by Susan Krinard

  KINSMAN'S OATH

  By

  Susan Krinard

  * * *

  Contents

  Prologue

  PART I - Pegasus

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  PART II - Alliance

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  PART III - Shauri-ja

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Glossary

  * * *

  "A Vivid, talented writer with a sparkling imagination.:"

  —Anne Stuart

  In her popular novella in the New York Times best-selling Out of this World anthology, Susan Krinard created a futuristic world of humans, telepaths, and an alien race called the shaauri. Now, she returns to that future galaxy with a captivating tale about two telepaths who have nothing in common…except the love they share for one another.

  Ronan VelKalevi was a man torn between two worlds. Born into the human race, he was kidnapped at the age of six by shaauri. More than twenty years later, he has found himself on the run from the aliens who raised him—and being saved by a ship of humans…

  Captain Cynara D'Accorso, the commander of the Pegasus, has no reservations about rescuing the telepathic Kinsman from his damaged ship. But she isn't expecting the dangerous emotions this troubled man awakens in her—or that he isn't the innocent fugitive he claims to be.

  Now, as Ronan and Cynara's hearts fall prey to passion, they must discover the paths to which they each were born before their destinies destroy them both…

  "Susan Krinard has set the standard fro today's fantasy romance."

  —Affair de Coeur

  * * *

  Titles by Susan Krinard

  kinsman's oath

  to catch a wolf

  the forest lord

  secret of the wolf

  out of this world

  (anthology with J. D. Robb,

  Laurell K. Hamilton, and Maggie Shayne)

  * * *

  Kinsman's Oath

  Susan Krinard

  BERKLEY SENSATION, NEW YORK

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  KINSMAN'S OATH

  A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley Sensation edition / May 2004

  Copyright © 2004 by Susan Krinard.

  Cover illustration by Franco Accornero.

  Cover design by George Long.

  ISBN: 0-425-19655-0

  BERKLEY SENSATION™

  Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY SENSATION and the "B" design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  * * *

  This book is respectfully dedicated to the Science Fiction and Fantasy authors who have had the greatest impact on my life:

  Madeleine L'Engle—whose A Wrinkle in Time, read to my fifth grade class, introduced me to the wonders of the genre;

  Andre Norton—whose stories helped me live through the challenges of adolescence;

  Marion Zimmer Bradley—whose work introduced me to lifelong friend Brett Carter;

  C. J. Cherryh—my ideal world-builder, ultimately responsible for my wonderful marriage to fellow science fiction reader Serge Mailloux;

  Sharon Lee and Steve Miller—who not only write wonderful romantic "space opera," but who, along with friends and mentors eluki bes shahar and Jennara Wenk and the television series Beauty and the Beast, can take full credit for setting me on the writing path.

  Thank you all.

  * * *

  Prologue

  ^ »

  The boy was young—young enough to be barred from the areas of the Persephonean corvette he most wanted to see, and to be assigned one of the Archon's own special agents during the voyage into shaauri space. Too young for wandering the corridors, where he might interfere with the duties of busy crew; too young to visit engineering with its vast sparkling pillars filled with dancing light like rainbows in a bottle, or to join his parents on the bridge.

  All during the journey, he had spent most of his time in his small cabin or in the Aphrodite's mess hall, where he played games on the holosim or cards with Agent Teklys. She laughed when he almost beat her at Nova and told him he was too young to be so good.

  But he was not too young to know when something had gone terribly wrong.

  The first warning came when the Aphrodite shook as if a great fist had slammed into its hull. Agent Teklys jumped out of her seat, hand flying to the gun at her belt, and stared up as if she could see through the overhead to the source of the explosion.

  The boy followed her gaze. "What is it?" he asked. All of a sudden he was very excited and very scared. "Is someone attacking the ship?"

  Before she could answer, the first alarm shrieked over the intercom. Agent Teklys muttered something fierce under her breath. The boy felt her fear; he couldn't read thoughts, not yet, but he sometimes caught images, feelings. What he glimpsed in Teklys's mind made his stomach flip-flop like a spike-eel in a fishing net.

  Agent Teklys ran to the bulkhead and punched the intercom. All that answered her call was static and the wail of the klaxon. She dashed back to the boy and knelt before him, grasping both his arms.

  "Listen to me, young ser. I'm going out to see what's happening. I'll be right back, and I want you to stay here until I come for you. Is that understood?"

  He nodded, swallowing the thickness in his throat. He wanted very badly to go with her, but he'd only get in the way. That was what his older brother Ambros told him constantly.

  But Ambros was home on Persephone with Uncle Miklos, and he, the middle son, had been allowed to go with Mama and Papa on this most important of missions. He would not wish he'd been left at home as well.

  "Very good," Agent Teklys said. "Don't be afraid. I will protect you." With a final tap on his shoulder, she ran through the mess door and sealed it behind her.

  He waited. He was good at waiting, watching, and listening; Mama said he was very much like his father in that way. But he knew he was not nearly as brave as Papa, or as smart. The noises continued, explosions and bumps and thumps he could feel in the soles of his boots. He thought he smelled smoke. Stray emotions from the crew drifted around him like ghosts, adding to his fear.

  Mama? he cast out wildly. Papa? There was no answer. He was not strong enough to make them hear. He ran to the door and placed his hand flat on the control grid. It vibrated against his palm. He stepped back just in time as Agent Teklys charged through, hair loose in her face and her gun raised to fire. The door closed behind her.

  "We have very little time," she said in a clipped, tense voice. "The Aphrodite has been boarded. You must get to the escape pods immedia
tely."

  Boarded? He knew what that meant; someone else had come onto the ship, someone who hadn't been invited.

  "If ever the ship is boarded," Papa had told him, very seriously, on the day they left Concordat space, "I want you to go straight to the escape pods and do exactly what I've shown you. An automatic signal will go out to all of our nearby ships, and someone will come for you. Do you understand?"

  He didn't understand nearly enough. But he took Agent Teklys's sweaty hand and let her pull him toward the door.

  It slid open in a burst of bright light. Agent Teklys shoved him behind her, and then the tall figure in the doorway lifted his weapon and fired. She staggered and fell. The boy stood frozen where he was and looked up.

  He knew what he was seeing. Mama and Papa had carefully shown him the holovids, answered all his questions, and tried to prepare him to meet his father's friends among the shaauri. But his mind compared the holovids to the huge shape before him and refused to make the connection.

  Red fur. Red, black-striped fur covered the whole body, from long-nailed bare feet to the tips of pointed ears. He stood a head taller than even Papa, who was a big man. He wore short, loose trousers, many belts hung with tools and weapons across his chest, and metal decorations around his arms and throat. His face, wrinkled in anger or confusion, made the boy think of Uncle Miklos's cat on Persephone, but only a little. The shaauri were not cats.

  Shaauri. Shaaurin—that was what you called one of them. And this shaaurin had just shot Agent Teklys.

  "Boy?" the creature said. He grated out the word with effort, as if he couldn't quite make his mouth form the right shape. "What…" He flattened his ears and hissed out a stream of sounds the boy didn't understand.

  "Why are you here?" the boy demanded, clenching his fists. "You aren't my father's friend. You hurt Agent Teklys."

  The shaaurin's ears twitched back and forth, back and forth. He glanced down at Teklys.

  "Not… dead," he rasped. "Sleep."

  There was no reason to take the alien's word, even though Papa had told him that most shaauri didn't lie in the same way humans did. The boy dropped to his knees beside Teklys and put his ear against her chest. He could hear her heart beating, the air going in and out of her lungs.

  She was still alive. The shaaurin had only stunned her. The boy sat up and rubbed his eyes with his hands.

  "Why did you come here?" he asked, trying to keep his voice from shaking. "Where are my mother and father?"

  A rush of emotion pushed inside the boy's head. It wasn't anything like what he felt from the crew, or Mama, or Papa, or his uncles. But it was just like what he'd seen on the alien's face: anger, uncertainty, confusion.

  The shaaurin held out his hand with its bare-skinned palm and curved, claw-like nails. "Boy," he said, "come."

  Come. Come where? "Get to the escape pod." That was what he had to do, and that meant getting past the shaaurin with his big weapon and his claws.

  The boy stared at the small space between the shaaurin and the frame of the door. He had to move very, very fast. He met the reddish-gold eyes of the alien and lifted his hand. As the alien reached to take it, he darted sideways and dove through the gap.

  In all the boy's life he had never run as hard as he did then. He caught a glimpse of other crew members lying in the corridor, heard bangs and loud voices behind him. But though he ran with everything that was in him, it was not enough. The shaaurin caught him. Nails hooked in his jacket and hauled him up like a sack of rockroots. He dangled there, terrified, and swung his fist at the face centimeters from his own.

  The shaaurin shifted his grip, but not before the boy's fist connected with the alien's nose. The creature gave a grunt of surprise, just like a man. His long teeth bared in a grimace of rage.

  Then something strange happened. One moment the boy hung between the shaaurin's powerful hands, and the next he was on the deck, free, and the alien was just standing there as if he had been shot.

  But there was no one else in the corridor. And the boy's head pounded and rang like the great bells of Hestia at the Harvest Feast. The shaaurin was inside him, with a thousand thoughts and feelings the boy could hardly begin to understand. He stared out of someone else's eyes from a dizzying height—down at himself, sprawled motionless on the deck.

  You can do it, his father's voice seemed to urge.

  He pushed up on his arms and tried to stand. Everything was wrong with his body—the shape, the size, the way it felt when he moved. But he took one step, and then another, and the shaaurin didn't follow. Slowly the alien mind inside his began to fade away. His arms and legs belonged to him again, and he was able to run without stumbling.

  He did not look back. No one caught up with him or stopped him. He hid when he heard alien voices. He reached out for his parents with his mind, but they were gone—gone, as if a great wall had fallen between him and them.

  Tears blinded him, but still he ran, along corridors and companionways, until he reached the nearest pod berth. All the pods were still in place, their lights glowing a steady green.

  Papa had explained exactly what he had to do. He tapped out a sequence of numbers on the grid above the hatch. The hatch cycled open.

  The inside of the escape pod was very large for a child of six, and he felt very small indeed. But he had to get away, for Agent Teklys and for his parents. He could get help and come back for them.

  Pushing his way through the hatch, he settled into the webbing, strapped in, and studied the ranks of lights and controls overhead. It was easy to operate an escape pod; all he had to do was remember the sequence of operations. The pod did the rest.

  He followed instructions and watched the lights change color from green to standby yellow. The hatch locked. There were several loud clicks as the pod disengaged from its berth, and then the sensation of motion, tumbling, weightlessness. The boy gripped the webbing and shut his eyes very tight.

  I did what you told me, Agent Teklys. I got away. Mama, Papa, I'm coming back to get you.

  He knew they couldn't hear him. Someday he might be strong enough to push his thoughts across a big distance, but not yet. "Be patient," Mama had told him. "You have the gift. Ambros doesn't, and neither does little Damon. That's why we've brought you, so that you can learn."

  All he had learned was that there were bad shaauri, not like the ones who had adopted Papa. They had taken the ship. They were different from people, but not so different that he hadn't been able to feel one shaaurin's thoughts and know that it wanted to hate him for being human.

  Just as he ought to hate it for what it had done. But he was suddenly very tired, and couldn't seem to think of much at all. He let himself drift and imagined the distress signal going out to all the Concordat ships on the border. Pressure increased as the pod's small engine propelled it on a course for the nearest wormhole to human space. He knew that the stasis field was about to put him into a deep sleep until someone found him.

  He woke to the sound of something striking the hull of the pod. The display on the pod's small screen flashed a message: Retrieval imminent. Prepare for docking. The words were very big, but he knew they meant that someone had found him.

  The clock said that it hadn't been very long. The Aphrodite had been deep into shaauri space; he didn't think there would be many other Concordat ships so close. He waited tensely while the pod was drawn into the ship's docking bay and the lights turned green again. Gravity sucked him down into the webbing.

  He punched the hatch release. Strangely scented air rushed into the pod, but it was a minute before he recognized the smell.

  It was exactly the same as that of the shaaurin who had tried to capture him.

  Too late he tried to close the hatch. A sleek-furred hand reached in and caught at his harness, deftly undoing the clasps. There was no hope of struggle. He was grasped and carried and passed from one set of hands to another until he was set on his feet on an alien deck.

  * * *

  PART
I

  Pegasus

  * * *

  Chapter 1

  « ^ »

  The shaauri striker was closing in, and Ronan knew that it was a matter of minutes before it either overtook his darter or blew him out of space.

  He checked the flashing displays on his console, rows of shaauri numbers crowding the screen, and did a rapid calculation. Darter-class ships weren't meant to maintain this velocity for extended periods; they were like their namesakes, small, fierce predators efficient in a short pursuit but rapidly exhausted by a long chase.

  And he was the prey, not the hunter. He'd counted on the darter to get him to the nearest wormhole. But the shaauri had intercepted him halfway there. Three times they'd demanded his surrender, and three times he'd managed to nurse one more burst of speed from his beleaguered ship.

  No more. The engines had been pushed beyond their limits. His destination was still days away, the shaauri warship far closer.

  If they caught him, it would all have been for nothing: the years of pretending, the careful observation, the waiting for just the right moment. He would be a prisoner again, and he wouldn't get a second chance.

  Ronan rested his head against the seat and practiced the Eightfold Way until his heartbeat slowed to a normal rhythm. His senses cast off the dullness of fear. One by one he brought his physical functions under control until he was as devoid of emotion as the ship around him.