Wolf was watching her carefully. “You’re not . . . angry?”
“Angry?” she said incredulously. “Wolf, you’re a genius!”
Seemingly relieved at her reaction, he grinned again, sending her heart tumbling as thoroughly as he had sent an enemy fighter. This was the Wolf she’d heard over the headset during the battle, the Wolf whose blood was high, the Wolf who was ready to fight, to die, as long as both were done freely. This was the Wolf she loved.
She smothered a gasp. Eos, had she truly thought that? Was that the explanation for her response to his touch, to his presence, to his very existence?
A memory knifed through her mind with startling clarity. A thought, barely sane in the midst of passion. Even then she had thought of it, not as merely mating, but as bonding, as the joyous union between two beings destined for each other, for all time. And she realized then that she had loved him for a long time.
His smile faded as he looked at her. He lifted one hand toward her, reaching out to gently brush her cheek with the backs of his fingers.
“I’m not much of a doctor, though. I’m afraid you’ll have a scar.”
Heat rippled through her at his touch. “I . . . It’s all right, I don’t mind.” Did he? she wondered breathlessly. Did it even matter to him at all? Did she? She needed to know, had to know, but shivered as she fought her reluctance to ask, afraid of the answer she might get.
“God, Shaylah,” he said softly, tightly, “I heard your voice, after the hit . . . you sounded so faint, so weak . . . then nothing. I thought you were dead.”
She tried to stop the question that rose to her lips. This feeling was new and strange, and made her feel fragile and utterly vulnerable. She’d never known anything could feel so good and so frightening at the same time. The question broke from her anyway.
“Would it . . . have mattered so much?”
“Of course it would.”
Shaylah swallowed tightly. “Why?”
He drew back a little, golden brows furrowing as he looked at her.
“Tell me why!” She realized too late, in the moment his face stiffened into that impassive mask, that her urgency had made it an order.
“Why, Captain? I should think that would be obvious,” he said formally. “I need you and your position as a Coalition officer.”
Pain much harsher than that from her body lanced through her. Was he just responding to her tone, or was that all she really meant to him? Desperately she tried again.
“You could have left,” she said in a low voice, struggling not to add a forlorn little “me” to that statement.
“And risk the skypirates myself? I heard they specialize in selling prisoners to the Halberds. Becoming a eunuch is not my idea of escape.”
Shaylah cringed inwardly, both at his words and his cool tone. “But there was the other shuttle. It’s fast and has range. You could have made it to a settlement.”
“And done what, Captain?” He lifted a hand, his fingers rubbing at the collar that branded him. “Wearing this, I’m just a runaway slave. In most places, that’s a signed death warrant.”
“So that’s . . . why you stayed?”
He seemed to hesitate, as if something in her low, quiet question had pierced that deliberate facade. Then, after another flick of his fingers over the golden band, he said flatly, “Why else?”
Shaylah gritted her teeth against the hurt that welled up inside her. Fool, she told herself. What did you expect him to say? That he stayed for your sake? That he gave up a chance at freedom because he couldn’t leave you to die? Did you expect him to say he loved you?
She smothered the tiny cry of anguish that rose to her lips. She felt much closer to dying than she had when that blast had come ripping into the Sunbird, but she would be damned before she’d let him know, let him guess what a fool she’d been.
“Why else, indeed?” she grated.
He was looking at her strangely, and she had the horrible idea that he could truly read her every witless thought.
“Shaylah . . .” he began slowly.
For the first time, she wished he had called her captain; her name sounded too good, too intimate in that rough, low voice. Before he could say any more, she burst out with the first thing she could think of.
“How did you blow up the shuttle?”
“What?” He seemed startled by the turn of her thoughts.
“How did you blow up the shuttle? I thought the weapons systems were out.”
“They are,” he said, diverted. “I put a nitron torpedo aboard before I launched it.”
Despite the wretchedness she was feeling, this answer caught Shaylah’s attention. “But that’s an impact round. It only detonates on contact.”
“I know.”
“Then how . . . ?”
“I put it in the pilot’s seat. When the shuttle was close enough”—he shrugged—”I rolled her over.”
“And it fell out of the seat,” she breathed.
He nodded. “Impact,” he said simply.
So very elementary, she thought. But perfectly effective. And utterly ingenious. Then, as another fact came to her, her brows lowered sharply.
“You can’t arm one of those by hand,” she said.
Wolf shifted uneasily. “I know.”
“They can only be armed in the gun itself.”
“That part was still working.”
“Are you saying,” Shaylah said carefully, “that you hand-carried an armed nitron torpedo from the weapons station to the shuttle bay, put it in a very precarious place, and stayed in the bay to launch the shuttle?”
“No, you are,” Wolf said, eyeing her warily.
The possibilities for disaster swamped her. On top of the vicious hurt she was feeling, it was too much. Her control snapped, and her emotions raged free.
“I don’t believe you! One misstep, and you could have blown us all to Hades! I’ve seen those shells go off when someone sneezes! And you carried the thing through the ship? And left it rolling around in an empty chair?”
“Shaylah—”
“It’s nothing less than a miracle that thing didn’t go off the instant the shuttle started to move! You could have killed yourself, me, the Sunbird—You’re crazy, do you know that? Eos, maybe the Halberds are right! At least a eunuch would be controllable!”
Wolf stiffened. “I’m quite controllable, Captain,” he said flatly. “And you have the means at your fingertips. Or had you forgotten?”
He reached up, took the controller unit from the shelf, and dropped it into her lap. Then, as she stared at the thing, he turned on his heel and left her.
Shaylah wanted to go after him, to tell him her anger was only at his own recklessness, endangering himself in his effort to save her and the Sunbird. Except that those hadn’t been his reasons; he had saved her only for his own sake, because he needed what protection her position could give him. And that hurt beyond bearing.
She sat for a long time, holding the control unit in a painfully tight grasp. She battled with feelings new and strange to her, trying to sort out her tangled emotions. Her mind seemed to leap from thing to thing, refusing to settle and work out any one. It seemed like hours before she arrived at the final, bottom line.
She loved him. He hated her. Whether it was she herself he hated or what she stood for, what she was, no longer mattered. What mattered was that it was immutable; he would never see her as anything other than a symbol of his degradation, a reminder of his slavery. There was nothing she could do to change that.
But there was, she thought, something she could do to make up for what the Coalition had done to him. It was, in fact, the only thing she could do. It was risky, and would end any hope of salvaging her career, but she had no choice.
The Coalition, not she personally, owe
d Wolf, but only she would ever pay the debt. And pay it she would, no matter the cost to herself. She could do nothing less. And if the price was high, she would count it part of the cost of loving him, for she discovered in the long hours of reflection that, even had she been able to, she never would have changed having met him. Or having loved him. And if it tore deeply into her vitals to have to say it in the past tense, well, that was part of the price as well.
The decision made, she made herself relax into sleep, knowing she would need to be back at full strength when she rose next. They had a long flight ahead of them.
SHAYLAH SET IN the course for Alpha 2 mechanically, the familiar task taking little concentration. She had checked out the ship and, other than the ravaged weapons station, found little damage. Using the mechanical repair arm, she had ripped away the ragged, damaged metal; the drag from the trailing edges was making the Sunbird tend to slip sideways under power. Then she had headed for the con, determined to carry out the decision she’d come to.
She had not seen Wolf. The door to Keleth’s cabin was closed, and she assumed he was there, since she had covered most of the rest of the ship.
The course set, Shaylah took over the controls and released the self-pilot. She half expected Wolf to appear when the Sunbird began to move, but the hatchway to the con room remained empty. Thinking he’d be no more than a slave wherever they went, perhaps it didn’t matter to him where they were going, she thought rather grimly.
It was a silent flight, the hours ticking off on the elapsed time clock one after the other as she flew seemingly alone through a darkness broken only by the glow of occasional planets or the bright fire of a distant star. She kept the controls on manual. She told herself it was because she needed to at least feel like she was doing something, not because she feared it might be her last flight if her plan didn’t work. Or even if it did.
When the planet of Alpha 2 came into view, Shaylah began to tense up despite herself. She was taking a great risk of discovery, but she was more determined than she had ever been in her life. When the standard identification request came crackling over the port frequency, she took a breath and answered in the steadiest voice she could manage.
After advising the port that the Sunbird would not be docking—she didn’t dare risk the questions the ship’s battle damage would raise—she informed them she would be descending to the surface via shuttle, then proceeding to the Legion Club.
She settled the Sunbird neatly into orbit, set the computers to hold her there, and at last stood up to leave the con. And came face-to-face with Wolf.
He was standing just inside the hatchway, his arms crossed over his chest, his face impassive as he looked at her. “Feel better back in your world, Captain?”
The last word was in that biting tone, and Shaylah’s chin came up. She might have been fool enough to fall in love with this man, but she wasn’t fool enough to let him see it when he so obviously wanted nothing to do with her.
“How I feel,” she said shortly, “is none of your concern.”
He lifted a brow at her tone, but nothing else in his expression changed. “Will I be coming with you, or will you be sending them for me?”
He said it so casually that it took her a moment to grasp his meaning, that he assumed she was here to turn him in. Fury spurted through her that he would think that after . . . everything.
“Damn you,” she snapped. “Just stay here. And you can consider that an order, if that’s what it takes.”
She swept past him and strode toward the shuttle bay. She tried to reason with herself, to rationalize that he had no reason to trust anyone, but her emotions were running too hot to be easily banked. All she could think was that she’d given more of herself to this man than she’d ever given to anyone, but never had he done the same; always, even in their most passionate moments, he had held something of himself back. They had shared the most intimate moments possible, yet he still didn’t trust her.
Well, she thought as she hastened down the corridor to the shuttle bay, she would show him. If he needed more proof, she would give it to him. And then, no matter how much it hurt, she would walk away and pick up what was left of her life. If there was anything of it left, after she was finished here.
She settled herself in the remaining shuttle, smothering a pang as she remembered what had happened to the other. It had been a stunt worthy of the most famous of Coalition warriors; for that alone, for saving both her and the Sunbird, whether it had been his intention or not, she owed him this.
For a moment she wondered if he would try something foolish, like taking the Sunbird and making a run for freedom. He wouldn’t, she thought. He had to know they would be after him in an instant, and when he didn’t turn back they would blow him to bits. Or would he, thinking a fiery death preferable to returning to enslavement? Eos, she thought, he just might. Especially if he thought her capable of turning him back over to the Coalition.
She had avoided an inspection of the Sunbird by putting her in a wide orbit safely outside the port’s immediate airspace, explaining that she would be here far too short a time to bring the bigger ship in to dock. But she had no choice once the shuttle was within their limits. The inspection was, fortunately for the sake of her nerves, quick; there was no place to hide anything or anyone on the small two-passenger craft.
The Legion Club on Alpha 2 was considerably less elegant than others in the system. Here everything was a bit uncivilized, a bit more savage. The crews who came here had two things on their minds: getting thoroughly intoxicated and relieving long bouts of celibacy.
Paradoxically, as if in an effort to balance the disorder, the Legion Club here had one of the most extensive archives in the system, an impressive collection of records, documents, and micro-books from all of the Coalition colonies. Shaylah had seen it once, back when she had been able to ignore the twinge she felt while looking at some of the artifacts from the worlds that had been forced into the Coalition by threat of annihilation.
It was the Archive Building she was headed for, knowing she would find her medical officer there. Lieutenant Sarleck had a long-standing acquaintance with the proprietor of the museum, and while the rest of the crew was doing what people on shore leave had done for centuries, he spent his leave with his old friend.
Shaylah had met the woman once, found her coolly gracious if not overly friendly, and she had wished them both well. It was not, she realized, a usual time of day to come calling, although it never really got quiet here. But she had no choice, and she wasn’t about to wait for a more convenient time.
When the archive caretaker opened her door, she was fully dressed and immaculately groomed despite the hour, and Shaylah couldn’t help remembering the jokes made by the rest of her crew about the kind of relationship Sarleck had with the caretaker. They spent, the crew speculated, all their time poring over those boring chronicles, never once noticing that he was male and she was female. Shaylah hoped they were right and that Sarleck had been too engrossed to have heard any stories of an escaped slave.
Shaylah hadn’t expected the woman to recognize her, but to her surprise, she did immediately.
“Captain Graymist, is it not?”
“Yes, Caretaker. I apologize for the intrusion—”
“That’s quite all right, Captain. I presume you are here to see Graon?”
“Yes, please. I wouldn’t disturb you, but it is rather urgent.”
“They’re not recalling you again, I hope?”
“No, but I do have to . . . borrow him for a while. A short while, I assure you.”
“Very well.”
The woman stepped aside and gestured Shaylah through the door. She led the way to a large, comfortable, well-lit room, where Graon Sarleck was indeed poring over some ancient-looking document spread out on a table. He looked up as she came in, his flat-featured face register
ing surprise. The caretaker discreetly left them alone.
“Captain,” he said. “I had heard you had taken off on another of your well-known solo jaunts.”
Shaylah had lain awake many long hours planning this, and her answer came easily. “That’s what you were supposed to hear.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Now I’m afraid I must impose on you for a small medical chore. You may return for the rest of your leave immediately afterward, of course.”
Sarleck eyed her up and down. “Except for those bruises you look healthy enough, if a bit tired, so I presume my talents are needed for someone else?”
“Yes. Someone most important to the Coalition.”
“I see. And where is this someone?”
“Aboard the Sunbird. She’s in orbit. I have the shuttle waiting.”
“Now?” He sounded surprised.
“I’m afraid so. It’s imperative that I . . . deliver him as soon as possible.”
Sarleck considered this in his methodical manner, then nodded. “Very well. What is required? Shall I need anything not already aboard in sick bay?”
This was it, Shaylah thought. Keeping her tone carefully casual, she said, “I don’t think so. It is a simple thing. The removal of a slave collar.”
Sarleck stared at her. “Captain, that requires formal Coalition proceedings. It hasn’t been done in years.”
Damn, she thought. He might be the best medical officer in the service, but he was so by the book . . .
“They are waiving it in this special case,” she explained, calmly enough, she thought. “No time. As I said, it seems this slave is very important to them.”
“You are certain this is what they wish?”
She saw the disbelief in his face. She had to divert it before it became suspicion. “I told them you should know why,” she said, working to put just the right amount of disgust with her superiors into her voice. “But no, they insisted you don’t need to know.”
Sarleck snorted. “Of course they did. Don’t they always?”
Shaylah looked around stealthily, as if making certain they were alone. “I think you have a right to know. After all, you’re the one they’re calling on in the middle of the night.”
Lord of the Storm Page 18
