strongholdrising

by Lisanne Norman

  “That’s just as inexcusable,” he said, attempting to withdraw his hand from hers as his tail began to flick angrily. “He’s become a renegade, Carrie, turned his back on us all, stolen Toueesut’s ship and headed off to cause the Gods know what trouble!”

  “I can’t believe he has,” she said. “He’d no reason to do it. Kzizysus had operated on him, cured the damage the implant had done and given him back his Talent. Why would he want to risk it all again by going to the Prime world to find torturer priests who no longer exist?”

  “Then he’s headed for the M’zullian home world,” said Kaid, his tone dismissive. “In which case the Watchers will pick him up before he gets close. I won’t be on the estate when he gets back, Carrie. I meant it. Until he apologizes, I want nothing more to do with him.”

  “I don’t believe he’s looking for them,” she said. “It isn’t like him to leave like this.”

  “He’s changed completely since we came back,” he said, trying again to dislodge her hand. “At the end of the day, he has to take responsibility for what he says and does. We can’t all go around excusing him for the rest of his life. If we do, there’ll be no need for him to change. I’m sorry you can’t see it the same way.”

  “I’m not saying he shouldn’t be held responsible,” she said quietly, tightening her grip on him. “I’m saying there has to be a reason why he stole a ship and left, and the one you’ve given me just doesn’t fit the person I know. What does Noni say? He was staying with her up until a few days before the cubs were born.”

  “How should I know what she said? He’s gone over the edge, Carrie. Raiban has a warrant out for his arrest and Stronghold has issued instructions he’s to be apprehended and brought in. It’s probably the best thing that could happen to him. His treatment will be taken out of our hands once and for all. Maybe the Telepath Guild medics can straighten out his mind. We couldn’t.”

  “What?” Letting his hand go, she sat up suddenly— too suddenly— and cried out in pain.

  His anger instantly forgotten, he was all attention and she was hard pressed to stop him calling the nurse in from the other room.

  “I’m fine! You didn’t tell me he was being treated as a criminal, Tallinu! I assumed that since Toueesut wasn’t pressing charges, that would be the end of it! We’ve got to do something!”

  “What do you suggest?” he asked sarcastically. “Because of our Link and the cubs, I can’t go out looking for him, even if I wanted to. Besides, looking for the Couana would be like looking for a needle in the wilderness.”

  “Speak to Father Lijou! I thought Kusac meant more to you, especially after those nights together!”

  “Don’t you start doubting me,” he said, a touch of coldness creeping into his voice as he pulled back from her. “You know what I feel for him. He was the one who turned to me, Carrie, then accused me of…”

  “I know what he said,” she interrupted, clutching him anxiously, afraid she’d gone too far. “Can’t you see that’s proof he wasn’t in his right mind? Would he do that and then accuse you like he did if he wasn’t disturbed? Maybe there’s something else behind his actions. When did he leave Noni’s? Before or after he came out here? How did he persuade those who went with him to go? Why choose the Couana, and how did he manage to steal it from the middle of a busy spaceport?”

  “You’re looking for excuses for him,” he said. “I want to end this conversation now. I don’t want to argue with you over this. You know how I feel, what I think, let’s just leave it.”

  “He’s our Triad partner— your sword-brother! You can’t just assume he’s guilty and do nothing about it, even if he did hurt your feelings!”

  “This is more than hurt feelings, Carrie. My sword-brother, who swore my honor would be as dear to him as his own, accused me of dishonorable conduct! I could have Challenged him on the spot, and not to first blood either!” he said angrily.

  “You’re both Telepaths, Challenges are illegal for you,” she said frantically, grasping him by the hair at the sides of his neck as he began to get up.

  He snarled at the unexpected pain and attempted to free himself.

  She leaned closer, kissing his forehead, trying to hold back her tears. “I know it’s more than hurt feelings, I didn’t mean to trivialize it. All I’m asking is you think about it, Tallinu,” she said, resting her cheek against his. “I know how important your honor is to you, and to me, but Kusac didn’t repeat his allegations to anyone else, and within days he left Shola. I just don’t think this is as straightforward as it seems.”

  As he stopped trying to pull her hands away, gently she began to nibble the outer edge of his ear the way she knew he liked. “Please,” she said persuasively. “I need you both, Tallinu. I can’t stand the thought of him being jailed, or hurt as they try to capture him. And I know you feel the same.”

  Letting his hair go, she slipped her arms around him, working her way across his cheek. The tension was leaving his body and she could feel his anger dissipating as he began to respond to her.

  “Dzinae.” He sighed, turning his face to kiss her, the word both his nickname for her and an affirmation of her affinity to Vartra’s heavenly tormentors. “I’ll think about it,” he said between kisses. “I’ll take you home tomorrow.”

  “You’ll come too?” she asked, slipping further down the sofa so he could stretch out beside her.

  “Do you think I’m going to let you or our cubs out of my sight at this time?” he asked, nosing her chin up and kissing his way down her throat.

  CHAPTER 20

  Anchorage, Zhal-S’Asha, 22nd day (October)

  ANNUUR was in his quarters on the shuttle when the call from the Camarilla came in. “I come, I come,” he grumbled to Sokarr as he uncurled himself from his sleeping nest and staggered to the comm unit in the next room.

  “Phratry Leader,” the Cabbarran female said as he settled himself in front of the screen. “The sand-dwellers in sector four are mobilizing. Imperative you monitor situation from close hand.”

  “No sign of movement we detect, Leader Shvosi,” said Annuur calmly. “Area constantly patrolled by we Watchers. All is quiet.”

  “Are mobilizing,” insisted his colleague, her nose wrinkling in agitation. “Have seen it from imager in their sector. Must observe their destination. Fear we have they take offensive action against second world. Imager scanners indicate presence of chiro isotope particles.”

  “Means not control activator is present. Sand-dwellers consumed available resources destroying hunter worlds, no more have they.”

  “Potentialities indicate they found more. Now move against second world. Camarilla orders that you go, observe, and destroy activator if present.”

  “Presume Camarilla sends vessel to accompany us,” said Annuur sarcastically. “We only one scout ship, small, vulnerable. How get in center of their fleet and escape afterwards? Cannot affect outcome, can only attract sand-dwellers’s notice to ourselves, present Alliance as target. And draw attention to ourselves among other Watchers,” he added.

  “Enhanced shields and drives have you if used what Camarilla put on your Watcher, and sent you on Shola. Hides you. No need of our presence.”

  “What of children? Do this and they discover us. Tell Alliance. This not wise,” he said, shaking his head. It wasn’t the Camarilla’s way to take direct action like this. And how had the sand-dwellers’s acquisition of more resources escaped the Camarilla’s notice in the first place?

  “Must go. Naacha can make children attack, make them forget after. Shields hide you, other Watchers not see. If activator deployed, destruction of second world is inevitable.”

  He considered the situation dispassionately for a moment or two. “Destruction halves our problem, Leader Shvosi. Less of violent ones is to be wished for. Let them destroy each other, make our task easier. Camarilla say intervention should be always minimal. Better we do after attack second world.”

  There was a short silence. “Yo
u mistake your mission, Annuur,” said Shvosi carefully. “Hear me. Skepp Lords only say objective is destruction of ship if carrying activator.”

  A klaxon began to sound, relayed into their shuttle from the landing bay by the outpost’s communications system.

  “Maybe you right and sand-dwellers do move,” Annuur murmured. He didn’t like this mission at all but Shvosi was giving him room to maneuver. “Is what Sholans call Battle Muster— urgent call to go to ships ready for takeoff. Who speak for Camarilla in this?”

  “Azwokkuss spoke for all. Must persuade children to attack. You have made prescribed modifications to ship?” Shvosi asked anxiously.

  He should have known it was one of the TeLaxaudin. “Yes, yes. Done. Must go now, not be late at posts. Unwanted attention we draw to ourselves otherwise.”

  “Annuur! Move your furry ass and get your sept on board now! We got a M’zullian fleet on the move!” yelled Tirak over the ship to ship comm.

  “Must do, Annuur,” said Shvosi anxiously. “Must do.”

  “I do.” Annuur broke the connection and jumped hurriedly down from his couch, heading for the corridor as fast as his short legs could run. Rounding the corner, he almost collided with Lweeu.

  “I help with harness,” said Lweeu, rearing up on her hind legs and holding out Annuur’s belt and shoulder retainers.

  Thrusting his arms through the loops, he fidgeted impatiently while she quickly fastened the buckles then handed him his side arm.

  “We go,” he said tersely, dropping down to all fours when they finished. “Where Sokarr and Naacha?”

  “On Watcher 6, starting up systems,” Lweeu said as they began to run for the airlock.

  *

  “What kept you?” demanded Manesh, hitting the retractor as they clattered up the Watcher’s access ramp.

  “Might wait till we’re in before ramp closing,” complained Annuur as he leapt the last few feet onto the cargo deck.

  “No time,” she snapped. “The M’zullians’ fleet is gathering off their space platform. We’re being sent to observe.”

  Hooves skittered on the cold metal flooring as the Cabbarrans turned sharply to reach the elevator up to the mid-deck.

  “Annuur on board, Captain,” she called out, running after them.

  “Take off in thirty seconds,” came Tirak’s voice over the ship’s comm.

  The high-pitched whine of the engines increased as the elevator came to a stop, spilling out the two Cabbarrans and Manesh. One at a time, the Cabbarrans dropped out of sight down the grav shaft to their specially adapted avionics unit while Manesh clambered nimbly up the wall-mounted ladder into the bridge section.

  Like a Sholan bird of prey with wings held upward ready to swoop, Watcher 6 rose into the air and began to move forward. It gathered speed quickly, shooting out of the asteroid’s landing bay as Annuur and Lweeu joined Sokarr and Naacha on the formfitting work couches that spread out in a cross shape from the central navigation unit.

  “Routing avionics functions from bridge to your station, Phratry Leader,” said Sokarr, looking across at Annuur.

  “Accepted,” said Annuur, spatulate hands flying over the pressure sensitive keys to either side of him as he checked their heading on the small screens. “De-opaque avionics hull.”

  “Done,” said Sokarr.

  “Turn off lighting units.”

  The darkness of space surrounded him like black velvet, relieved only by the faint glow of their control panels and the pinpoints of light from the distant suns.

  “Initiating neural net,” said Lweeu.

  Annuur reached for the metal bands lying in the recessses on either side of him. Slipping one on each wrist, he glanced at Naacha. He didn’t know how the mystic managed to drop so suddenly into the requisite light trance. Already Naacha’s head and neck were lying stretched out in the support. Checking the others, he waited until they were ready before lowering his head to the padded rest and squirming around until he had an unhindered view of the darkness of space that surrounded them.

  He took a deep breath, tensing himself. “Activate neural net relay,” he said.

  The world around him changed abruptly as he found himself mentally linked through Naacha to the rest of his sept and the Watcher 6’s nav system. Concentrating on the grid of faint green lines that now bisected the darkness, he located the other five ships. The lines, guided by Naacha, moved, seeking out the shortest route before converging on the J’kirtikkain sector.

  “Jump engines on-line,” he heard Sheeowl say through the comm.

  “Chameleon shielding activated,” said Nayash.

  “Course plotted,” Annuur said. “Updating nav headings.”

  “New headings locked in and relayed to the other Watchers, Captain,” said Sayuk.

  “Initiate jump engines,” said Captain Tirak.

  J’kirtikkian world, Zhal-S’Asha, 26th day (October)

  They emerged in the J’kirtikkian solar system three days later. In the shadow of a small moon, they sat silently watching the main M’zullian fleet fighting off the defending J’kirtikkian ships while the remainder deployed itself over one hemisphere of the world below.

  At first, the disposition of the Valtegan ships seemed random, but not to Annuur and his sept. They’d seen it before in recordings of the destruction of the two hunter worlds. With surprising swiftness, the M’zullians took up their positions, creating a grid. In and out wove their fighters, dealing with any incoming fire from J’kirtikkian ships. Then suddenly, they pulled back high above the grid. From the main fleet, a fine mist began to fall.

  “What is that?” asked Sheeowl.

  “Nothing I can identify,” said Nayash. “Dammit! I could have done with Giyesh on the scanners right now!”

  “Belay that,” snapped Tirak.

  On their main screen, they watched in growing horror as the particulate cloud seemed to home in on the hulls of the remaining J’kirtikkian defenders, dissolving the very fabric of the ships, aware that they were witnessing the destruction of a world and its population.

  “They’re descending,” said Nayash eventually, breaking the silence. “Dropping down into the planet’s atmospheric envelope.”

  *

  “Why we not try to stop them?” Sokarr asked Annuur. “You say Camarilla orders us to do this.”

  “Needed confirmation they had activator. Now have. No chance to target lead ship earlier without risking us,” he replied. “We wait. Sand-dwellers will regroup to return home. Soon as lead ship is isolated, we go. Main drives accessed?”

  He wanted to do this alone, without involving Tirak and his crew, no matter what Shvosi said. This was the Camarilla’s problem. They, as its representatives, should solve it, not their U’Churian family. It was his private opinion that the TeLaxaudin were often offhanded in dealings with the child-species they’d created.

  Sokarr looked offended as his narrow ears flattened themselves briefly to his skull. “Of course,” he said stiffly.

  “Dangerous,” ventured Lweeu. “Not easy to do small jump.”

  “Concentrate on weapons, leave nav and piloting to Naccha and me,” Annuur said sternly.

  “What of Tirak? We family. Not right to…” she began.

  “Balance must be achieved. What sand-dwellers stole upsets it. Already two worlds dead, now this. Must do minimal intervention. Destroy lead ship and activator, then cannot use again.”

  “But other Watchers see us, Captain knows what we do…”

  “Not,” said Naacha unequivocally, touching his controls. “I fix Watchers after. Remodulating shields, none see.” He stopped to check his display again. “Fleet dispersing.”

  “Initiate lockout sequence,” ordered Annuur, checking his wrist bands. “Disconnect power from upper bridge section and start separation sequence.”

  The muffled bang as the explosive bolts detonated echoed throughout the ship. They experienced a slight dropping sensation as the two sections of the ship parted, then their o
wn power source kicked in.

  “Activate neural net.”

  *

  “Wait till I get my hands on Annuur,” snarled Tirak angrily as he paced the length of his bridge. “Have you found out how the hell he managed to separate us from the lower section of the ship?” he demanded of Sheeowl. “It shouldn’t be possible! How much longer until you get the drives back on-line?”

  Sheeowl glanced over her shoulder at him. “We don’t,” she said shortly. “He’s blocked me completely. I can’t bypass it, Captain.”

  “I’m getting a jump point forming in the M’zullian fleet,” said Sayuk.

  “Where?” demanded Tirak, spinning round to face the main view screen.

  “Above the main battleship, Captain. But I’m getting no readings from it…no ships. Nothing.”

  Space seemed to fold in on itself, then spiraled open in a swirl of blue and silver. As swiftly as it had formed, it was gone, but nothing they could sense emerged.

  “That’s like no jump I’ve ever seen,” murmured Sheeowl as they watched the battleship’s shield flare each time the same nothing began to strafe its way along its length.

  Fighters began to veer toward the battleship as its guns moved ponderously, beginning to track its phantom attacker. When the M’zullian fighters opened fire, Tirak spat out one word.

  “Annuur!”

  “We’re going to lose him!” said Sheeowl, her voice hushed with fear.

  As each hit drained more power from the huge battleship, the flares caused by Annuur’s weapons intensified, each one sending larger surges of energy through the battleship’s weakening defensive shield.

  “He’ll do it,” said Nayash, standing up. “He’s going too fast for them, and he’s too close to their hull— they’ll hit their own ship before they hit him!”

  Light blossomed suddenly, and a piece of debris spun out of the nothingness where Annuur’s ship was.

  “He’s hit,” moaned Sheeowl.

  “Silence!” ordered Tirak. “Can you pick up anything on the sensors?” he demanded.