Ariana took a blaster from the woman she’d identified as Tildy’s hand and gave it to Keirth. “In case we have to shoot our way out,” she said.
She was real. This was happening. He shook his head. “How did you get in here?”
“We charmed our way past the guards and shot one,” said Ariana.
“You’re amazing.” He was in awe of her. And he didn’t think she’d ever looked so beautiful.
“Great,” said Ariana, “but we have to get out of here now.” She was running towards the end of the hallway.
Keirth watched as Tildy ripped a big slit in the skirt of her dress. “It’s not easy to move in,” she told him, running after Ariana.
Still stunned, Keirth picked up his feet and followed them.
They emerged out of the hallway, where Keirth could see a man slumped behind a desk. She really had shot someone.
“The lifts!” Ariana pointed and headed that way.
But at moment the lift opened and two men in uniforms came out. The men took in the scene quickly, their gazes resting on the blasters in Keirth’s and Ariana’s hands. Their hands went for their own blasters.
Keirth switched his gun on and pulled the trigger. Shooting their way out, indeed.
* * *
Tramet hadn’t gotten up from the couch. He spoke in a numb voice. “She called herself Kara Transman. She was supporting herself as a prostitute. All those years, she was right under our noses, and I never knew.”
The prince still stood on the other side of the room. He was visibly shaking. “But why would she do that, Nigel? Why would Cecily run away? Why would she live like that?”
Tramet wished he understood. He wished she’d come to him before she disappeared. She was his only family left. She should have realized there was nothing so horrible that he couldn’t have forgiven it. He hesitated to say the rest of it to the prince. He worried that it would turn the man against Cecily completely, but he couldn’t lie. It was all connected, after all. “I think she was pregnant.”
The prince looked at him sharply. “But that hardly makes sense.” He folded his arms over his chest and looked at the floor. “I mean as a reason to run away. She was distraught over the loss of her family, and perhaps there were...indiscretions on both of our parts. Hers and mine. But even so, we were engaged, and I’m the prince. If she had been pregnant, we could have—” He broke off. “Unless it wasn’t mine.” He turned back to Tramet.
This made things even more confusing. Tramet stood up as well. “I don’t know, Gulien. I admit that I thought that the two of you had never...” He took a breath. It was awkward to speak of such things, especially concerning his sister. “I thought she feared your anger because she’d been unfaithful. But if you two had been...intimate, then it seems even stranger to me.”
“Perhaps not,” said the prince. “She was in mourning, and a hasty wedding would have been irregular. When the child was born too soon, the scandal would have been the talk of the sector.” He sighed. “I can only imagine what my mother might have said about it. She would have hated my involvement in something she would have thought was sordid. Cecily would have known that. After the loss of your family, she might have done something extreme.” He shook his head. Then another thought occurred to him. “Oh. Oh, Nigel, you’re saying that...that Transman, the man who’s supposed to hang tomorrow is...”
Tramet nodded. “If nothing else, Gulien, he’s the only living person with blood from my line. My entire family was killed. Cecily is gone. And I’ve never been able to have children.”
“He’s your heir,” said the prince.
“Even a bastard is something at this point,” said Tramet. “I’ve spent years thinking my title would die with me or that it would be auctioned off upon my death. If there’s a good chance that he’s not a murderer, then I want him alive.”
“Well, if there’s a good chance he’s my son, I want him alive,” said the prince. “We’ll go to the prison immediately. There are things that need to be sorted out.”
Tramet breathed a sigh of relief. The prince was going to help.
* * *
Keirth managed to get off a shot against the first man. The blaster was set to stun, and the man crumpled to the ground.
But his companion had his blaster out, and even though Ariana had fired at him, she’d missed him completely.
Keirth pushed Ariana and Tildy behind the desk, firing at the man again.
He hadn’t been aiming well. His shot drilled right past the man.
The man fired a shot, and his blaster wasn’t set to stun. The room lit up.
Keirth dove behind the desk as well. Resting his head against the wall, he said, “He’s shooting to kill.”
They could hear the man on his comm. “A prisoner’s escaped from cell block A. Looks like Transman.”
Ariana peered over the desk and aimed her blaster.
“Ariana!” Keirth yelled.
She shot anyway.
The man’s voice cut off.
Keirth stood up. The man was down all right. He motioned with his head for Ariana and Tildy to stand. “Get his blaster,” he told Ariana. He nodded at Tildy. “For you.”
Tildy was wide eyed. “This is absolutely thrilling.”
Keirth turned his attention to the screens on the wall. He touched a few buttons and a console folded out. Good. “Might be thrilling for you, but it’s dangerous as hell, too.” He began to type on the console. “I’m going to try to lock down those lifts so that no one else can get down that way. That man got off information about us to someone. They’re going to be coming for us.”
Ariana returned with the man’s blaster and handed it to Aunt Tildy. “Can you do it?”
Keirth was typing furiously, trying to remember any of the standard override codes he knew. He typed in one. “Denied,” flashed the screen. Another. No dice. A third. “Accepted,” said the screen. “Lifts locked.”
Keirth nodded at Ariana. “I’ve locked them.”
“Is there another way out?” she asked.
“Let me see if I can pull up a building schematic,” Keirth said, typing again. It took him a few seconds and a few override codes, but then he had it. He pulled it up on one of the big screens so that they could all look at it. “There’s some steps right here.” He pointed at the screen. “But with the lifts not functioning, they’ll come at us that way.”
“This is the lowest level of the building,” said Ariana. “We’re underground. We have to go up to get out.”
She was right. Keirth scanned the screen again. He couldn’t see any other exits. They’d designed this place well if they were trying to prevent an escape. “Guess I unlock the lifts then.”
“But won’t they come down them then?” Ariana asked.
Keirth was doing his best to think quickly. “They’re probably already heading down the steps. They’ll be waiting for us on the main level, because that’s the easiest way out. But what if we went all the way up to here?” He pointed.
“But why would we—?”
She was interrupted by the sounds of feet clambering down the steps. “Drop your weapons!” yelled a voice.
Keirth tapped the console, typing in a code to unlock the lift. “No time to explain, sweetheart. Get in the lift.”
“Repeat. Drop your weapons!” yelled the voice.
Ariana and Tildy sprinted across the room, just as the lift doors opened.
Keirth leapt over the desk and dove into the lift. He jammed his hands on the door close button just as scores of armed policemen ran into the room they’d just been in.
“Fourth floor,” he said. “Fourth floor!”
Tildy touched the screen. The lift moved.
“Keirth?” said Ariana. “What are we doing?”
“There’s a fire escape on those schematics on the fourth floor,” said Keirth. “It’s right across from the lift. We get out, run across the hall, and go down those steps.”
Ariana’s eyes lit up. She hu
gged him. “You’re brilliant.”
“Oh dear,” said Tildy. “The driver doesn’t know to meet us there, does he?”
“Well, call him on the comm!” said Ariana.
* * *
“You know,” said the prince, sitting in the back of his speeder with Tramet, “you really should have told me about this earlier.”
“I only found out about the boy myself a few months ago,” said Tramet. “I wanted to find him first before I said anything. And as I said before, I hardly thought Cecily’s indiscretions had been with you.”
The speeder rounded a corner. They were pulling alongside the side of the prison building. Tramet leaned forward to look out the window. Three people were climbing down a fire escape. And one of them was... “That’s Keirth. He’s there.”
The prince pushed him out of the way. “On the fire escape? He’s breaking out of jail?”
Tramet hit a button to roll down the window. “Keirth,” he called. “Keirth Transman.”
Keirth looked up in alarm. He pushed the two women with them into a waiting speeder, sighting the prince and Tramet with his blaster as he climbed in after them.
“Don’t shoot,” yelled Tramet. “We only want to talk.”
The speeder took off down the street.
The prince banged on the divider between them and the driver. “Follow that speeder!” he bellowed.
Chapter Twenty
“We’ve got a tail,” Keirth said, leaning up to talk to the driver. “Can you go any faster?”
“Maybe if I got up a little higher,” the driver responded. “I can climb up into the express lane.”
“Do it,” said Keirth.
“It’ll be hard to exit back to the spacedock,” said the driver.
“Hard,” said Keirth, “but not impossible.” He looked at Ariana. “I used to be a speeder driver, remember?”
“They said your name, Keirth,” said Ariana. “Who are they?”
Keirth shook his head. He had no idea.
* * *
“He’s switching into the express lane,” said the prince’s driver.
“Follow him then,” said the prince.
The speeder shook underneath them as the driver struggled to switch gears and take the speeder higher.
Tramet felt himself pitched back against the seat. He clutched the armrest to right himself.
The speeder took a hard left turn, throwing both Tramet and the prince against one side.
“He’s going too fast,” said the driver. “I can’t catch up.”
“You will catch up to him,” ordered the prince, peeling himself away from the speeder wall.
“I’m losing him,” said the driver.
“Go faster!” roared the prince.
The speeder surged forward, once again pushing Tramet and the prince back into their seats. Tramet tried to look out the window, but all he could see were speeders of various colors blurring together because they were going so fast.
“I don’t see him anywhere,” said the driver.
“What do you mean, you don’t see him?” said the prince.
“He was right in front of me and then he— Oh, no, wait, he’s switched out of express. He’d going to the spacedock.”
Of course. He’d be trying to get off world, wouldn’t he, if he’d just escaped from jail? But how would he have a ship? Tramet did his best to remember the two figures he’d seen with Keirth, getting into the speeder. They’d been women, and one of them must have been Miss Gilit, considering she’d just escaped from Winfield. But the other woman... Had he seen her before? Was she someone related to Miss Gilit? There was another daughter of the Duke of Wendo, wasn’t there? But she was much too young. That could only mean... Miss Vintro! The maiden aunt that lived with the family.
“Stop chasing the car,” said Tramet.
“What?” said the prince.
“I know where they’re going,” said Tramet. “Since you’re the prince, you should have no problem getting into her docking area. We’ll beat them to their ship!”
* * *
Ariana hugged Aunt Tildy quickly, as she and Keirth got out of the speeder. “Thank you so much for everything!”
“You’re welcome,” said Aunt Tildy. “This was fun. Anytime you want to do it again, let me know. I’d better get back home, though, before someone wonders where I am. I’m sure your parents know you’ve escaped from Winfield by now.”
“Thank you, Tildy,” said Keirth from behind Ariana.
“You kids have fun,” said Aunt Tildy. She pulled the door to the speeder shut.
Ariana forced herself to move slowly. “We can’t run, Keirth, or we’ll attract attention. Walk quickly but act like you’re supposed to be here. Act like nothing’s wrong.”
Keirth did his best to comply, but she could see worry in his expression. “What if someone recognizes me? My picture’s been all over the nets.”
“So has mine,” said Ariana. “But we’re going to look much more suspicious if we’re running.”
“You shouldn’t have done this,” Keirth said. “It’s too dangerous. If anything happened to you—”
“I wasn’t going to let you die,” she interrupted. “You saved my life before.”
He wrapped his arm around her. “Oh, sweetheart, I was going to kill that guy anyway. I think we’re way beyond even at this point.” He kissed her temple. “Which way is your aunt’s ship?”
Ariana pointed. They set off. As they walked, she did her best not to make eye contact with anyone, and she whispered to Keirth to do the same. They made it through the crowds on the docking bay without incident, and before long, they were at the door to the bay where Aunt Tildy’s ship was. Ariana swiped her aunt’s card, and the doors slid open diagonally. She was reminded of that day—it seemed so long ago—when she’d gone after Risciter back on Hallon. But this time, she was saving a man’s life who actually deserved it.
They stepped into the docking bay.
Ariana let out a little cry. People were standing in front of her aunt’s ship. They’d found them. After everything, it was over.
“Keirth Transman? Ariana Gilit?” called one of the people.
Keirth took out his blaster, leveling it. “You run,” he said. “I’ll take care of them.”
But then Ariana recognized one of the men. It was Prince Gulien. “Keirth, that’s the prince.”
And a voice rang out across the docking bay. “Wait. Keirth, I am your uncle!”
Chapter Twenty-one
The cup of tea in Ariana’s hand had gone cold. She, Keirth, the Duke of Tramet, and Prince Gulian were all sitting in one of the prince’s parlors, and there was a lavish spread of sweets and cakes set out, but not one of them had touched them. Ariana was stunned. She glanced at Keirth, who was sitting next to her, and the prince, who was sitting on an opposite couch. They were both leaning forward, their elbows resting on one knee, their chins propped up by a fist. The expressions on their faces were nearly identical.
It was true. It had to be true. Looking at the two of them together, she couldn’t deny it. She’d been flying around the galaxy with the son of the prince, and all the time, she’d thought of him as a lower class smuggler.
“I guess I don’t really know what this means,” Keirth said. “My mother couldn’t have been...” He gestured around at the elaborate couches and ornate wallpaper. “I don’t see why she’d run away from all this. You have no idea the way we lived. Why would she...?”
“We don’t really know either,” said Tramet.
“I barely remember what she was like right before she left,” said the prince. “Afterwards, after she was gone, I tried to think of any sign she might have given, anything she might have said, but I couldn’t think of any reason she would have left either.” He leaned back against the couch. “I only found she was pregnant this afternoon. If I’d known, maybe I would have looked harder.”
“We did look hard,” said Tramet. “We combed the sector for her. She di
dn’t want to be found, Gulien. And when I discovered she was pregnant, I had no idea the prince could possibly be responsible.”
“Did she ever give you any indication of who she was?” asked the prince. “Did she ever mention...anything?”
Keirth shook his head. “No. She didn’t like to talk about anything that had to do with the nobility. She hated it.” He sighed. “I guess, though, it makes certain things make sense. I was pretty young when we left the sector for the first time, maybe four or five, and before that, I’m not sure if she was, you know, working as a prostitute. I think that may have started after we got to Scranth. But when we left, I remember the sector was celebrating the prince’s—I mean your—marriage.” He gestured to the prince.
The prince covered his mouth with his hand. “Then it’s my fault. It’s my fault she died.”
“It’s Risciter’s fault.” Keirth’s voice was harsh.
“Indeed,” said Tramet. He was sitting next to the prince, and he turned to him. “Gulian, what’s done is done. Cecily was distraught over the loss of our family. She must have been sure she was ruined when she became pregnant. She ran because she was confused and frightened. She must not have seen any other way out.”
Ariana cleared her throat. “It’s the sector’s fault. The sector made her think she wasn’t worth anything if her virtue was in question. The sector drove her to it.”
No one said anything, but Keirth took Ariana’s hand.
“You told me your mother said that the sector was a pretty cover for something rotten, didn’t you?” Ariana said.
“She said something like that,” said Keirth.
“Well, it’s true,” said Ariana. “This place treats women like property, something to be traded, something that can get ruined or destroyed, not like people. It’s appalling. It’s why I wanted to leave.” Certainly, they couldn’t go anywhere now, not when Keirth had just found his father. But she didn’t know what would happen anymore. She’d never expected anything like this.
“Well, we will leave,” said Keirth. He stood up. “If we could evade gellococcus, escape from Trioth, get away from Risciter, break out of jail, we can do this.” He tugged her to her feet.
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