He grinned, then said aloud, “No, she didn’t. But then, you’re doubly guilty, since you’ve made a career out of reading people’s minds without them knowing it.”
“I have not — ” she began, then stopped herself. Quarreling with this stranger in front of Brant couldn’t be a good idea.
Apparently not, since he smiled thinly and said, “Children, behave.” Then his eyes narrowed, and he appeared to study Trinity, his head cocked to one side. “Blake seems to have picked up on something just then. What were you feeling when you looked at that dead Zhore?”
Her first impulse was to lie, since she guessed that Brant would see any evidence of compassion as a weakness. But with Blake Chu standing there and watching her thoughts, lying was an impossibility. He’d know she was trying to hide something before the words even left her mouth.
“I felt sorry for him.”
She’d thought her response would annoy Gabriel, but instead he nodded, appearing pleased. “Excellent.”
Blake had the opposite reaction. Scowling, he slanted a look up at the handler. “I don’t see how being a weak, romantic fool could possibly be excellent.”
Weak and romantic she could handle. But fool? Trinity planted her hands on her hips and opened her mouth to speak, but Brant was too fast for her.
“You’ll have to forgive Blake for his candor. He doesn’t have much of a filter. Which makes him well-suited to some tasks, but not others.” A smile, one that didn’t fool Trinity a bit, and he continued, “Which is why we need you, Trinity. You see, one vital piece of information we’ve discovered is that the Zhore, while not precisely psychic, are a highly empathic race. Someone like Blake could never move amongst them undetected, because his talents lie in a different area. But you — you have powers that are similar to Blake’s, and yet you also are highly sensitive. This makes you a perfect candidate.”
“Candidate for what?” she asked, her tone guarded. Despite her question, it really wasn’t too difficult to look past all the compliments and get to the meat of what he wanted.
He wanted her to be a spy. But that had to be impossible. Even though the Zhore seemed to wear their hooded cloaks at all times, that still didn’t mean it would be safe for her, a human, to mingle with them. She’d be sure to be discovered, psychic powers or no.
Gabriel shot her a knowing look, one that told her he could tell she’d already guessed what he wanted. And Blake was smiling slightly and rocking back on his heels, as if in anticipation at watching and sensing her reaction to what was coming next.
Asshole. But at least he wasn’t actively intruding on her thoughts at the moment.
“Simple enough, Trinity. We want you to go among the Zhore and observe them. For exactly how long depends on how well you integrate into their society. Using the data we’ve gathered from the specimen in our possession, we’ll perform a series of bio-mods that will make you visually indistinguishable from any other Zhore.”
Bio-mods — well, anything beyond correcting vision problems and other congenital issues — were illegal, and had been banned ever since the Yangtze Outbreak in 2127, but Trinity had a feeling Gabriel Brant knew that and didn’t care. After all, it wasn’t as if the Consortium didn’t have a long history of overlooking its own laws whenever the situation called for it. Beyond that, though, her insides seemed to congeal into an icy mush at the thought of having her appearance, her very identity, erased so she could become some alien…thing.
Not a thing, she told herself quietly, not caring if Blake Chu was listening in. A person. But not human. Not you.
Her hands curled into fists at her sides, and she asked, “And if I refuse?”
“That’s always your prerogative. As it’s ours to send you to the MaxSec on Titan and find a nice deep hole for you. Not too deep, though. Not so deep that the guards there couldn’t have a little fun. I’m sure they’d enjoy that. It’s not every day they get sent a pretty young woman, after all. And it gets lonely out there beyond the rings of Saturn.”
She hadn’t been expecting anything other than that sort of response, but even so, the cold at her center seemed to intensify. Not much of a choice, was it? Be turned into something other than herself, or become a plaything for the prison’s guards. Part of her wanted to believe that wouldn’t happen, that even if she was sent to Titan, its personnel would be too professional for that sort of thing.
There was a joke.
Okay, then, she’d have to play Gabriel Brant’s game. How he ever expected her to pull off such an insane plan, she had no idea, but she supposed he’d delight in telling her, detail by excruciating detail.
And if the worst happened, and the Zhore discovered she was an impostor?
Seeing Gabriel’s self-satisfied smile and the expression of barely concealed glee on Blake Chu’s face as they both stared at her, Trinity had a feeling the aliens couldn’t do anything worse to her than her own government already had.
* * *
“You did not take your sabbatical,” Leizha said.
Zhandar hadn’t even heard her approach. It had felt good to stand here in this rooftop garden and smell the flowers and the fresh breeze all around him. In that moment, he’d wished he didn’t have to be swathed in these robes, that he could let them fall away so the wind and the sun could touch his skin. To do so, however, would be a scandal. No Zhore ever exposed himself so, except in the privacy of his own home, or on his own property, if the grounds were extensive enough that discovery was not an issue. Here in the heart of Torzhaan, his people lived close enough together that such a thing would be unthinkable.
Repressing a sigh, he turned back toward his assistant, who stood a respectful three paces away, a tablet clutched in her gloved hands. “No, I did not,” he replied. “I did not think it a good time to be away, not with so many renovations on the schedule.”
She didn’t nod, but he could feel the approval emanating from her all the same. Approval…and something more. He’d been sensing it for some time now, but had continued to hope that it would go away on its own, once Leizha understood that he was not emotionally ready to let another woman into his life.
Besides, she was not sayara. Quick and dedicated, with an almost uncanny ability to sense what each plant wanted and needed to thrive and grow, she would have been an exceptional mate, but his heart could not answer hers, because there was no echo of her soul within him. True, there had been isolated incidents when those of his people had come together even when that sacred bond did not exist between them, but those cases were few, and not widely accepted. The sayara connection was necessary for the continuation of their species, because the Zhore could not conceive without it.
And even its existence is no guarantee of success, he thought then, not bothering to keep the bitterness out of his thoughts. If Leizha sensed the emotion, perhaps she would realize that he would never be able to look upon her in the way she wanted.
She did not move, however. Voice soft, she said, “It is true. We seem to be busier than ever. This same time last year, I had thought I might take my leave, go on a retreat for a few months. But the work came in, and I did not feel it would be right to leave you after….” The words died away, as if she had just realized that speaking of Elzhair’s death almost a year to the day from when it had happened would not be good form at all.
The silence seemed to pulse between them. And as it stretched, Zhandar realized he must be the one to fill it. Glancing away from Leizha, at the terraced gardens on the next tower over from where they stood, he said, “It would have been difficult, training a new assistant while maintaining our current pace. And so I thank you for staying. As I am sure the residents of Torzhaan would thank you, if they but knew.”
Leizha inclined her head. Then her shoulders seemed to square under her heavy cloak, and she picked up the tablet and brushed a gloved finger across its surface to bring up a new screen. “The lazhir on Trezhar Row are blooming early. Would you like me to reroute tomorrow’s crew and have them go
there, rather than to the repiping project in the Maranzhar District?”
In that moment, he couldn’t help but feel grateful that she had retreated to formality, to the business at hand. But perception was not Leizha’s problem…only hoping for something that could never come to pass. Although he needed her assistance, he found himself wishing that she had gone on that retreat. Perhaps then she would have met someone who was sayara, and she would have been able to leave behind her entirely inappropriate affection for him.
Where it had even come from, he couldn’t be sure. They’d worked together for some time while Elzhair was still alive, and there had never been even a hint of impropriety then. But it was one thing to hunger for someone who did not share the soul bond, and quite another to covet another woman’s husband. Leizha was far too honorable for anything like that. No, it was probably more that she had hoped, now he was free….
But he would never be free. Elzhair would always be with him, a ghost of what might have been, of happiness lost forever. Grief would be his constant companion.
He could not imagine ever having another.
CHAPTER THREE
As Trinity had feared, her handler was all too happy to go over every detail of the operation with her. They’d been cooped up in this conference room for hours already, with no end in sight.
Well, at least he waited until after you had a good night’s sleep and a decent breakfast, she thought. That was something. The suite they’d provided had a very comfortable bed, and the food that had been left outside her door that morning was fresh, hot, and tasty. It was all designed to lull her into a false sense of security, she was sure. That was fine. It would take a lot more than a plate of real eggs, not reconstituted soy, and newly baked scones to make her lower her guard.
The same with the change of clothes and the grooming supplies they’d given her. She’d awoken to a care package of sorts waiting out on the coffee table in the sitting area of her suite. Inside it had been several new outfits, underwear, cosmetics, toiletries…everything she required to feel more or less human again. It would have all been fine and good…if she hadn’t known they planned to turn her into something that was very not-human.
“The lab-grown epidermis will be laid directly on top of yours,” Gabriel was saying. “It will fuse with your skin.”
Repressing a shiver, Trinity asked, “And when I’m done with this mission…what? Do I shed my Zhore epidermis like a snake sheds its skin?”
A cutting look from those icy charcoal eyes, and he replied, “No, it’s not that simple, I’m afraid. It will have to be surgically removed.”
Of course it will, she thought, holding in a sigh. But she only nodded and hoped that she looked unruffled by that particular revelation, then asked, “How much more will you have to change?”
“The Zhore male we were able examine had very human-looking eyes. Blue. Because your own eyes are in the same blue-green-gray color spectrum, we feel confident that we will not have to alter that part of your appearance.”
Well, that was something. Color grafts to change one’s eyes were commonplace these days, but Trinity had always felt squeamish at the thought of someone touching her eyes, even for such benign purposes. Luckily, she had perfect vision and so had never required any kind of surgery.
“Your hair is entirely the wrong color, but because it is long and straight, we’ll simply dye it rather than graft it with something more suitable.”
It took an actual effort of will for Trinity not to reach up and touch a strand of her hair, which now lay loose over her shoulders. She wouldn’t say she was exactly vain about it, but she was proud of its length, reaching nearly to her waist, and its warm golden-brown color was something she’d never felt any need to alter. But at least removing black dye from her heavy tresses would be far easier than getting rid of the lab-grown Zhore skin they planned to encase her in.
Assuming you survive long enough to even get back to “normal,” she thought, glad that Blake Chu wasn’t around to eavesdrop on her thoughts. Apparently there was some way to guard against that sort of mental intrusion, or Gabriel wouldn’t have been able to prevent her from looking into his mind. But Blake was the only other psychic Trinity had ever met, and so she’d never had any need to learn how to hide her thoughts from others.
“And false nails, I guess, so mine look like a Zhore’s,” she said, earning herself another irritated look from Gabriel. He really hated being interrupted.
However, he sounded neutral enough as he replied, “Yes. We’ve analyzed the fabric content of the garments he wore — there were close-fitting pieces under the robes — and feel confident that we can duplicate those without any problem.”
Maybe she’d feel better about all this once she had concealed herself in those robes. At least it wasn’t as if Gabriel and his superiors expected her to wander down the streets of Zhoraan with her face completely bare to its populace. If Zhoraan even had streets. Who knew what it was actually like?
Which brought her to her next question. Since Gabriel was already annoyed with her, she thought she might as well go for broke. “It seems as if you have the issue with my physical appearance pretty much figured out. But simply making me look like a Zhore isn’t going to make me fit in with Zhore society. What, are you just going to drop me in the middle of nowhere and hope for the best?”
That remark earned her another of his tight-lipped smiles. “Of course not, Trinity. We’ve been monitoring Zhoraan from a safe distance for many years. They are careful — extremely careful — and we’ve never been allowed on their planet’s surface the way we have on Eridani. Even so, they can’t keep everything hidden. We’ve picked up enough of their speech so that we were able to analyze it, reproduce it. You’ll be given sleep conditioning in their language, so that speaking it will be no different from speaking Galactic Standard.”
She wondered whether she would think in the Zhore tongue as well, but decided that was one question she wouldn’t bother to ask. Most likely, Gabriel Brant didn’t have an answer. She’d heard rumors of that sort of sleep training, but it wasn’t something that anyone outside the government was able to use. And she had a feeling she would be the first to receive training in the language of the Zhore.
“So I’ll look like one of them, talk like one of them,” Trinity said slowly. “But who am I to be? How will I fit in with their society?”
“I was hoping you would ask.” This whole time, Gabriel had been standing near the window, which looked down over an endless cityscape. Trinity didn’t recognize it, but then, she’d never really been outside the western territories, hadn’t ventured any farther east than Arizona. That could be Chicago down there, or New York, or the vast megalopolis that had overtaken the Fort Dallas area. One big city looked very much like another now, after the distinctive landmarks of the Normerican continent had fallen one by one to the developers, the improvers.
But now he moved away from the window and moved in her direction, going around her and stopping directly behind her chair. He stood so close that she thought she could almost feel the heat coming from his body, but that, she told herself, even as she sat still and tried not to react, had to be her imagination.
What wasn’t her imagination was his hands dropping to her shoulders, fingers squeezing ever so slightly. What exactly he was trying to prove, she didn’t know. Almost involuntarily, she reached out with her mind, attempting to read his thoughts, but once again it was like running full-force into a duracrete wall.
“I must feel a little tense,” she quipped, hoping she could deflect whatever game he was playing by treating it as if it were nothing.
“No,” he said, fingers digging even more deeply into her flesh, “you’re remarkably relaxed, all things considered.”
Trinity decided that her body must be doing things her brain didn’t know anything about, because everything in her wanted to shrink away from Gabriel’s touch. But she sat still and replied, “Well, I suppose it must be because of that amaz
ing massage you’re giving me.”
“Perfect,” he murmured. His hands stilled but remained resting on her shoulders. “So my touch doesn’t bother you?”
Define “bother,” she thought, but only said, “No. Should it?”
He paused for a second or two, then bent down, his breath hot against her neck. His lips grazed her skin. “What about this?”
Her flesh wanted to crawl right off her bones. Was this how it started? Maybe those prison guards on Titan wouldn’t be such a bad alternative after all. Willing herself not to react, she replied, “I don’t know, Gabriel. I suppose if you’re going to push it any further than this, you might want to get us a more comfortable room.”
A chuckle. Then his hands lifted from her shoulders and he stepped away. Trinity wouldn’t allow herself to sigh in relief, but she could almost sense her body relaxing. Not all the way — that probably wouldn’t happen until after she survived this whole ordeal…if she survived it — but enough that she didn’t feel as if she was about to throw up anymore.
“Now, that would be against regulations. But….” Gabriel paused for so long that Trinity wondered if he was going to push beyond a mere shoulder massage anyway, and what in the world would she do then? To her infinite relief, he lifted his shoulders and moved away from her, going back to the window. “Your reaction was very interesting. You didn’t flinch, or pull away. You endured my touch because you’d clearly decided it was something you just had to do, like it or not. Excellent.”
She didn’t think she liked where this was going. No, wait — she hadn’t liked where this was going pretty much from the very beginning. It was just that things seemed to have abruptly taken a right turn toward the outer circle of hell.
“To answer your question,” Gabriel went on, gaze fixed on the shimmering spires of glass and steel and composite just beyond the duraglass window, “you will be sent to a city called Torzhaan. It lies in Zhoraan’s temperate zone, and is the capital of the planet’s most populous district. There, you will be placed in a position with something that is roughly the equivalent of a city planning office, although in Zhore society, that means more focus on the arcosphere — ”
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