Martin knew the story very well, how Roxanne had been doing research on a strategically placed outpost world when the war started. Battles, both space and planet-based, had raged all around the system for weeks. Eamon Merkrates’s Tigris had been in the thick of the fighting. The ship had taken heavy casualties, including most of the medical personnel being killed. Merkrates grabbed the chance to get his hands on a koltiri Physician, and dragged an empath into the thick of battle. The battles had lasted for nearly three brutal years, with the Tigris gaining the reputation as the most ruthless band of Trin hunters in the Systems. Empaths reflect their surroundings, and koltiri were never what they seemed. Martin supposed Eamon Merkrates loved Roxanne in his own status-hungry way, but he’d made it hard for her to take any steps back into the wider, fuller life an empath needed to stay balanced.
“I’m sorry that your first trip off the Tigris hasn’t exactly been a vacation,” Martin told his sister-in-law. He squeezed her shoulder. “And it’s only going to get worse before—if—it gets better.”
She gave him a direct, very lucid look. “Now you’re going to tell me why you kidnapped me, right?”
He nodded. “Reine isn’t up to the job. Besides, she doesn’t have your reputation. The Tigris years are useful for that, at least. Bucons respect peoples’ reps. We’re going to need all the influence we can get if Glover is going to convince the Bucons to let you heal the emperor of Rust addiction.” Other than to stiffen against him, she didn’t react. No, her dark eyes went flat and expressionless. Not a good sign. “Roxy,” Martin hurried on. “The Bucon Empire is larger than they’ve let on to the Systems, more influential among non-aligned powers than our intelligence thought. They know more about the Pirate League and have leads to the remnants of the Trin forces. The United Systems needs the Bucons, and our treaty with them has always been tenuous. Thanks to Sagouran Fever, the Bucons are waging an undeclared civil war. Half the people in the empire are Rust addicts, and the other half is dealing Rust to them. It’s chaos inside their borders. Something has to be done about it. Glover figures that straightening cut Emperor Monolem is a big step in the right direction.”
“I see,” she said. Then added, “Let him die.”
Martin’s head reeled with shock. Koltiri weren’t allowed to say things like that. Even war-veteran koltiri who’d spent too much time on the front lines. “Honey?”
“Sagouran Fever is an artificial virus, a laboratory construct. Rust is an antigen formed from the same matrix. Dee is dead because she knew this, not just because she got her hands on Rust. Can you think of anyone besides the fucking Bucons who could come up with a disease and sell its cure for profit?”
Of course he could, but Martin filed this news away, and kept calmly looking at Roxy. It wasn’t as if he didn’t have his suspicions about the plague and the way it was being spread. “We have to concentrate on what we can do,” he told Roxy. “We have to save the man who can do something about the whole Bucon Empire.”
“We?”
“You.”
“No.”
“Roxy.”
“Never mind,” she said, and suddenly drew him near. “I’m about to be too messed up to argue for a while. You’ve got the damn Sag Fever again. I can do something about this.” Her fingers slid up his cheeks, fingertips sharp as shards of bone pressed against his temples.
“No—!”
Martin was no stranger to telempathic contact, but he was unprepared for the invasion force that was Roxy’s being entering his. This time he was hit with a wall of flame that rolled over him and pushed him down under dark, drowning water.
———
“Wake the fuck up.”
Glover shook him, and Martin opened his eyes. Roxy was unconscious again, her arms twined around him. He rolled away from that comfort and rose to his feet in front of the Bucon ambassador. Glover was pale, unshaven, and scared, vaunted Bucon cool utterly abandoned. “What?”
“We have to get her to the docking bay. Now.”
Martin didn’t argue with a man who sounded as desperate as Glover. “What’s up?” he asked as he scooped Roxy up off the bed. “Girl, you are heavy.”
She roused as he rushed toward the door behind Glover. “Then put me down.”
“Can you run?”
“Do I have to?”
“We’re about to be boarded,” Glover said.
Out in the corridor, Martin put Roxy down and grabbed Glover by the shoulders. “This yacht of yours is cloaked.”
“And the sensors on board the ship out there have seen through it.”
“That’s not good.” He’d heard rumors about improvements in pirate technology. Too bad they turned out to be true.
Glover gestured toward the hull and space beyond. “You want to take it up with our visitors when they get on board?”
Martin looked at Roxy, who leaned heavily against the nearest bulkhead, her big eyes once again full of confusion. “No. I want her safely off this ship.” He held down his fury at the Bucon, and at himself for believing false assurances from a desperate junkie that his diplomatic status and fast private yacht would safely get them to the Bucon homeworld. Idiot. He was an idiot. “Let’s get to the docking bay.” Chances were the cutter stored there wouldn’t suffice to get them away from the raiders, but it was still the only chance they had. He grabbed her hand. “Run.”
“Where’s the crew?” Roxy asked as they hurried down a long corridor. “Place feels empty.”
“Glover has everything on automatic. Even the weapons system.”
As was evident a moment later, when the vessel was rocked by fire from the attacking ship.
“Sounds like they just took out my guns,” Glover commented, almost nonchalantly.
“Boarding clamps,” Roxy said when the ship shook again.
They reached the docking bay before the intruders were through the outer airlock and raced for the shielded docking pad where the cutter rested. Martin gave them zero chance of escape, but he wasn’t about to let the hopelessness of the situation stop them from trying.
Roxy, however, was more pragmatic. She halted just outside the pad’s environmental shield and shook off Martin’s grasp to point toward the bay’s outer entrance. “They’re at the door, you know. Exit’s blocked. There’s nowhere for us to go. Gotta gun I can borrow?”
Glover gestured toward the small United Systems ship. “Don’t tell me you haven’t got a Shireny cloak on that thing. We get inside, cloak, and nobody knows we’re here. Nobody can detect energy signatures through one of those.”
“That’s a cutter from the Tigris!” Roxy shouted. “We don’t get issued fancy stuff like that.”
“So? You’re one of the Shirah sisters!” the Bucon shouted back. “Adapt it.”
“But I’m not the right one.” She looked to Martin. Warning lights lit up around the airlock door, and an alarm klaxon very nearly drowned out Roxy’s frustrated, “I’m a doctor, not a—Listen, I’m not my sister.”
He grabbed her shoulders. “I know that.” He went very still, thoughts racing, remembering. The invaders would be through in seconds. “You’re not your sister, but I—Maybe I could… “
Then it was too late. Martin barely had time to shove Roxy and Glover through the docking pad shield as the outer doors to the bay cycled open. Artificial atmosphere rushed out into space, while invaders safe within environmental belts poured in. The dangerous chaos of the transition was momentary, but it would have been fatal had they not reached the protection of the pad. It was only a few steps to the cutter. Martin didn’t waste a moment in shepherding the other two onboard the little ship as the boarding party spread out across the bay. They weren’t safe once they were inside the cutter, they just weren’t dead for the moment. Martin immediately went to the pilot’s station to start the ship’s engine. He tossed Roxy his gun. “Try to stay awake long enough to use this.”
“Can’t you make them think we’re not here?” Glover asked.
She
laughed, while adjusting the energy setting on the weapon. “Been trying. I’m weak, and the raid leader is mindblind.”
“Damn.”
“And they’ll be here in about three seconds.” She and Glover took up positions on either side of the cockpit entrance, covering Martin as he worked over the helm.
The cutter’s engine began to cycle through the startup sequence, but the invaders threw up a dampening field, making the effort to use the little ship fruitless. “No engine, no shields, no nothing,” Martin announced.
“No time,” Roxy added as a pair of raiders appeared in the doorway. She fired. The shield of the man she targeted glowed cherry red over his chest.
Martin saw she’d overrode the safety on his gun. The energy beam from the shot was focused tight enough to cut into the environmental shield, but not forceful enough to cut completely through on its own. The power would drain quickly from the hand weapon at that setting, but it was the only chance they had. Glover quickly switched targets and added his fire to hers.
That was the last thing Martin saw, as the second raider fired on him before he had an opportunity to do anything else.
———
Martin was more than a little surprised when he woke up. Not surprised by the headache, though. He’d been stunned before. He opened his eyes and sat up slowly. Roxy was lying in a heap beside him on the main deck of the docking bay. A dozen men and women and a couple of unrecognizable humanoids were ranged in a loose circle around them, holding various kinds of energy and projectile weapons. Martin didn’t draw attention to Roxy by reaching over to check on her. He climbed slowly and cautiously to his feet, hands visible at all times. Guns came up, but no one tried to stop him. He spotted Glover once he was standing. The Bucon ambassador was on his knees in front of a man Martin recognized from security holos. Rike Bruis. Martin remembered the slaver’s stats even better than he did the heavy-jawed face. Which was why he didn’t move and barely breathed as a pair of cold black eyes gave him a thoroughly professional going over. He didn’t expect to be shot, and wasn’t surprised by the calculated smile.
“Tag the pretty boy,” Bruis told the man nearest him.
Martin didn’t have time to dispute the pretty boy reference before a restrainer field blocked off movement. He couldn’t struggle or speak, or even blink.
Bruis took a moment to step around Glover. He grabbed Roxy by the hair and pulled her head and shoulders up off the deck. “Could use some fattening up,” he judged. He shook her by the hair and she opened her eyes for a moment. “Purple.”
“Stop that,” she advised as he continued to hold her by the hair. “It hurts.”
The slavers laughed. Bruis tossed her aside. “Keep it,” he ordered. “It’s funny.” She didn’t seem to notice the restrainer field when it was turned on her. Bruis returned to Glover. “You made this too easy, Ambassador,” he told him.
Glover looked up in disgust. “Done in by a slaver,” he complained.
“Bad luck,” Bruis sympathized. He holstered the heavy-duty weapon he carried. “No hard feelings, but Halfor made it clear that your head’s the only thing with a price on it.” A knife appeared in his hand from somewhere. Martin didn’t see him draw it. The Bucon Ambassador to the United System had his throat slit a second later.
Blood spurted and, as Glover’s corpse sank to the deck, Bruis casually cleaned the knife. He then signaled with an equally casual gesture for his crew and their prisoners to head back to the boarding tube.
Chapter Thirteen
“How long?” Pyr asked the holocubes on the shelf by his bed. “How many days? Weeks? Years?”
There were three holos, one of a man and woman dressed in matching gold tunics with each other’s house badges glittering on their left shoulders. The man’s hair was dark red, the woman’s black. Their arms were clasped tightly around each other’s waists, and they looked happy. The center holo was of a laughing adolescent girl, black hair framing her face. The third was the head of a red-haired young man, expression a combination of vulnerability and challenge.
The small holocubes took up very little space on the wide shelf. There was plenty of room beside them for a stack of datacubes, wafers, and cassettes kept in no particular order. The private space Pyr occupied was never in any particular order. He let Kristi in once every couple of weeks to straighten up, but the paraphernalia of his existence really held no meaning for him. His mind was a neatly compartmentalized place; he didn’t see any reason why anything else he owned should be. Only now, all those compartments were opening up and spilling out into jumbled heaps.
He sat on the side of the bed and shivered despite the room’s stifling temperature, and stared into the tiny reproductions of loved and lost faces. Pyr Dhakynn Kaddani was keenly aware that everything of importance was lost. That he’d have to fight madness as well as the pain hadn’t occurred to him when the priestess killed him with her poisoned bite. “I even thought I’d have more time,” he told the holos… if they were holos… he kept thinking Siiyel and Duharre and Axylel and the other self holding Siiyel so confidently were standing over him. It was the other self who looked contemptuous and accusing.
“What is there to count on on the border?” the other self demanded of him. “You chose the road, Dhakynn.” It was his secret name, his private name. It had belonged to Siiyel. A part of it belonged to Linch. He didn’t even like saying it to himself.
Siiyel’s bright smile remained forever fixed, but her words were the puzzled hurt he remembered too well. “You have no honor, Dhakynn. I don’t understand why you do it.”
“I can’t live like this,” Duharre told him. “I want a quiet place. And a husband and children of my own.”
“Why, Dhakynn?” Siiyel questioned.
“Because others fear me,” he told her again, and again. “There is no place for me - but honor requires I do what I can to protect my own.”
“You enjoy it.”
“No.”
“Yes,” Axylel said. “I understand. Take me with you.”
“I’ve been offered my own ship,” Siiyel said, regretful and overjoyed. “I have to go, Dha-lrm.”
“She’s dead,” Linch’s voice intruded. “Dead for months. You’re lucky to be sane. Don’t pretend your mind hasn’t healed. Come with me, Dha-lrm. Follow the old custom for once, brother. Finish the healing.”
“With you?”
“Is there anyone else?”
Pyr shuddered, hoping his shielding was barricade enough to keep Linch out. Linch couldn’t know. Not yet. “Not yet!” he screamed at the top of his lungs, then threw himself down on the bed.
And landed at his teacher’s feet.
Laeenin took a seat beside him, careful not to touch him. Everyone was careful not to touch him—students, teachers, friends. Everyone always looked elsewhere nervously when he was near. “You’re too strong,” Laeenin explained. “Telepathy like yours has never happened before.”
“I’m a freak.”
“You will always be an outsider.”
“Outcast?”
A slight shake of the head from the desert-dwelling monk. “Train yourself and we will find a way for you.”
Outcast—no matter what anyone else called it. No matter what he called it most of the time.
Took years to find and train a core of telepaths with even vaguely similar talent. Turned them into the toughest weapon in anybody’s empire. But there were so few of them. Enemies all around.
Hope they survive me.
They better. Too much to do.
He was on fire, and thought he was laughing. He knew he was alone in his quarters. “I’m on my bed. Feels like a sea of lava. Can’t even stand, have to be sick in my own bed, like a child. I won’t have them find me like this. Die on my feet somehow.”
As if the position a man died in made any difference.
Axylel would think so. Axylel’s a boy—full of brittle pride. Is he learning any lessons out there on his own?
; Pyr opened his eyes. It was a long time before he actually saw anything but dancing, blurred shapes and blood-colored lights. Forcing his eyelids to stay up was the only victory he could manage for a while. Brittle pride.
Eventually sight returned. The room settled down—empty, no beloved demons bent over him now. They had faded back into memories. He blinked the sweat out of his eyes, became aware of the stench of vomit and urine, the reek of the sweat soaking his clothes and plastering the hair to his scalp.
Disgust drove him out of the bed. Pain drove him to his knees. Using his right hand, he was barely able to catch himself from pitching onto his face. His left arm dangled uselessly at his side, the only part of him free of the consuming fire. Numb, dead. Like the rest of him would be soon.
“Time,” he snarled. “I want more time!”
Not with the fever and the Rust already eating away at you, fool.
Pyr started to crawl toward the head. Halfway there, he changed his mind and used the back of a chair to pull himself to his feet. “I might not care how I die,” he said between pants once he’d accomplished his goal. “But Pilsane would never forgive me for a lack of proper attitude. I’ll walk.” He took a deep breath, held it, and forced himself to wobble slowly forward, gaining balance with sheer stubbornness. He was almost steady by the time he reached the head.
It took hours, but he managed to get himself cleaned up, remembering to don a deep-pocketed jacket when he changed clothes. If he could keep his hands rammed into those pockets whenever possible, it might keep the crew from noticing he was crippled. He put on his wide-brimmed hat and hoped it would disguise his drawn appearance somewhat.
“Style,” he said to the image in the mirror next to the large closet, “is everything.” The sick face gazing back at him told him he was crazy. He turned from it, and kicked a pile of discarded clothing out of his way. For a moment, he stared down as shirts of bright silk and heavier black material scattered themselves into a different pattern on the carpeted deck. “What am I doing here?” It was like living in a kaleidoscope.
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