The Stars Like Ice (The Star Sojourner Series Book 8)

by Jean Kilczer

  We will see, after we bring you to the human hut."

  Sophia reached out and stroked his head. “Thank you, Granbor, for all that you've done.”

  “The welcome is ours, but we expect you and your team members to help fight the savage Cultists who kill my people.”

  Sophia looked at me.

  “We'll do whatever we can, Granbor, but we can't speak for our other friends.”

  “That is just. Now ride on my back, Terran Jules. I have seen the damage to your ribs with my echo sight.” He dived under me and came up gently, until I was braced, with my legs around his sides, just in front of his pectoral fins. Sophia clung to a smaller member, perhaps Brugrish. It was difficult to tell them apart, except for size.

  They took us past glaciers light by moonlight that seemed to hang in the black night of sky and sea.

  After about fifteen Earth minutes, they turned to the shore until their bellies touched sand.

  I slid off Granbor's back and steadied myself against him. The truck still sat on my ribs. Sophia came around and pulled off my fins.

  “See you the structure?” Granbor asked Sophia.

  “No,” Sophia replied.

  "That is good. It is just beyond the dunes, hidden in a well between them.

  “Thank you, Granbor,” Sophia said, “thank you all, my friends.”

  “The welcome will come when you help us rid our north seas of the savages.”

  Granbor turned, lifting himself in the shallows, and swam out to deeper water. His family followed. We watched their tail fins lift and plunge into the depths.

  Suddenly, I felt weary, having to hold up my own weight and feeling the pain as I tightened muscles to walk.

  Sophia braced me as we made our way between the soft sand dunes.

  “There it is,” she said.

  Rimmed by moonlight, Doctor Wallace's and Gabby's small prefab hut was a welcome sight. It seemed strange to know that they'd been here.

  The door was locked. I leaned against the hut while Sophia burned open the lock with her stingler. The interior was dark, with that cold feeling of abandoned buildings.

  Sophia helped me to sit on a cot, and put two pillows behind my back. I let her lift my legs without helping. Unlike the Wallace hut on Equus, here there were no instruments or growing alien plants. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the pillows.

  I started to fall asleep while Sophia searched for ingredients to the small, portable sous chef.

  Behind my eyes I saw Zach, a Mafia killer, smack Gabby across the face as he once did. “Don't hurt her,” I yelled, and jumped. I cried out as pain tore through my ribs.

  Sophia knelt beside me. “What is it? Was it a tel send?”

  “A dream,” I said hoarsely. “A memory of something that happened in a hut like this one on planet Equus.”

  “Sorry, Babe.” She took my hand. “I couldn't find ingredients for food, but there are packets for earthbrew. Suppose I make some?”

  “Sounds good.” I closed my eyes again and slept.

  “Jules.”

  I opened my eyes. She handed me the hot brew, sat on the cot, and watched me while I drank it. “I love to look at you.”

  “Yeah, but will you say that when I'm old and gray?”

  “I'll trade you in for a young one.” She ran a finger across my lips. “But he'll need the bluest eyes to replace you.”

  I smiled. “With your looks, you can have any tag that's out there. Help me move to my good side, Soph, and take the pressure off my ribs.”

  She rolled me carefully to my side. The only part of me that didn't hurt to move, began moving. “My Kalira,” I said and stroked her hip.

  “A former girlfriend? I'll bet you've had a few.”

  “No. The Slattie sea goddess who eats people and spits their bones onto the beach.”

  She leaned down and nibbled on my ear. “I could start from here.”

  “My whole body wants you, Soph,” I whispered, “except my ribs.”

  "She laughed.

  “What's so funny?”

  “Oh, in the Christian faith, Eve was made from Adam's rib. Maybe I was made from one of yours.”

  I smiled. “I hope it wasn't a broken one.”

  She brushed back my hair and kissed my forehead. “My skinny blondie. You smile and I'm yours.”

  I sighed. “Then I'd better not smile. And who's skinny?” I kissed the tip of her nose. “I look into your devil eyes, and I'm lost.”

  She pulled back. “Devil eyes?”

  “Hot, dangerous, and horny.”

  “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

  “Just an evaluation.”

  “How do I evaluate what's pressing against my hip?”

  “Call it wishful thinking.”

  “Suppose I can grant that wish?” She kissed my lips lightly. “Your wish is my command, oh, lord.”

  “You know a way to grant it without killing your lord?”

  “Where there's a will, sire.” She stood up and shrugged out of her dive suit. She wore thin white thermos under it.

  “Is that supposed to be sexy?” I asked.

  She pulled the top over her head. Her bare breasts caught the soft light and enticing shadows of the fake fireplace that was really a heater. She wiggled out of the pants and stood naked before me.

  “That's a little better.” I stroked her thigh. “This dive suit is getting tight.”

  “That's because you're a growing boy.”

  I reached to unzip the top of my suit, then let my hand drop as pain flashed through my chest.

  “Here, let me.” She gently laid me back against the pillows, pulled off my dive pants and straddled my hips. “I have a solution to your growing problem.” She leaned forward, her nipples brushing my chest. I lifted my head and we kissed. “We could sheath that problem,” she said.

  “I love when you talk in dirty metaphors,” I told her.

  “I love when you rise to the occasion.” She wrapped her hand around my shaft.

  “I was thinking of a different sheath,” I said.

  She smiled and pushed herself down on me.

  I wanted to pull her onto my chest, to embrace her. I lifted my arms, then moaned and let them drop as pain sliced my ribs.

  “I'm sorry, Babe. Suppose you let me do the work?”

  “I'm all yours, woman.”

  It was a slow and easy lovemaking as she rocked her hips against me. Even our orgasms were handled with care.

  I took in shallow breaths. “Do you think that when we're ninety, this is how we'll always make love?”

  “The way we're going, I doubt we'll see ninety.” She sat on the floor beside me and rested her head on my shoulder. “I don't look past the current assignment,” she said, “never mind future suicidal missions.”

  “You want to retire after this one?”

  “Sure. I can stay home and squeeze out babies while you find a nice desk job. Maybe if we're lucky, we can even live in a subdivision where they'll tell us how high our grass can grow and what color we can paint our white picket fence with the roses.”

  “Sounds lovely.”

  “Ya think, dear?”

  “Sure, when we're ninety.”

  I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.

  * * *

  The gray dawn touched the windows when I awoke. Sophia was standing by one, a stingler in her lowered hand.

  “Expecting company?” I asked.

  “You're awake. Joe contacted us while you slept.”

  “Oh? What'd he say?”

  “You want a cup of earthbrew?”

  “OK.”

  She poured a cup and slid it onto the sous chef's warming plate. “They're waiting offshore for daylight. Then they were going to come into shallow water with the boats and pick us up.” She stared out a window.

  “You don't seem too happy about it.” I tried to sit up, but pain flashed through my chest.

  She sat on a chair beside my cot. “He th
inks the Cultists may have left a small force behind to capture us.”

  I rubbed my eyes.

  “He thinks they want to take us alive, Jules.”

  “I know they do. The Slattie general said we'd be a prize capture for Lord Aburra.”

  “Why us?”

  “Soph.” I took her hand. "The only Terrans Aburra tolerates are merchant starships that trade weapons for Druid furs and bone carvings. He sees the rest of us as competition.

  The chef buzzed. She got up and brought me the cup. “That's why he killed the two brothers, isn't it?”

  I nodded and sipped the hot brew.

  She was silent as she stared at a window again. “I've…I've heard that he does horrible things to Terran prisoners.”

  “Let's just say that the brother who was killed in the boat was the luckier of the two.”

  She clenched her jaw. “I won't be taken alive.”

  “No. I won't let you. If it comes to that, Soph, we should make a pact that neither of us will be taken alive.” I felt her hand tremble. “Joe is capable and experienced,” I said. “If anybody can rescue us–”

  “It's not that simple.” She pulled her hand away and rubbed her arm.

  “Soph, what aren't you telling me?”

  “They had to cut loose the skiffs when the Cultists tried to burn our boats' pontoons. They were a drag as the boats made a dash for the open sea.”

  “Damn them. OK, the boats can't be beached. We'll swim out to them. Joe and the team can keep a small force of Cultists underwater by firing at them.” I put the cup on the table by my cot. "Help me up, Soph. We have to get our gear and get down to the beach to wait for them.

  The hut's solar panels had been disconnected and we were wearing our dive suits with the heating filaments turned on.

  “Jules…” She stared at a window.

  “What now, Soph?”

  “Joe said the Cultists can locate us through our comlinks even if they're shut off.”

  I sighed. “My God, that's right!”

  “So I went down to the water while you were asleep and threw them both in, under an ice floe.”

  “OK. We can see Joe's two boats when they approach.”

  Her lips quivered.

  “What, Soph? What else aren't you telling me, dammit?”

  She jumped. “I screwed up.”

  “OK,” I said gently, “I didn't mean to yell. I'm listening.”

  “When I went overboard and followed the three Slatties to the grotto, I tried to remember everything I had to bring for you, but–”

  I felt a twinge of fear tighten my throat. “What did you forget?”

  “The water is so cold…”

  “And?”

  She stared at me. “I forgot the backup batteries for the suits' heating filaments. The water is so cold, Jules, the batteries switched to high heat, and now…”

  Oh my God, I thought. “They're depleted?”

  She nodded. “Close to it. They won't last long enough for a swim in these frigid waters.”

  “OK. OK, Chancey's a strong swimmer. He can bring us backup batteries in his survival suit.”

  She lowered her head. “If he knew.”

  “You didn't tell them before you dumped the comlinks?”

  “I, I didn't know our batteries were low.”

  I leaned back against the wall on the narrow cot. “You're right.”

  She looked up.

  “It's not that simple. Did you see any Druids in the area? They could give us a ride out.”

  She shook her head. “Gone. I think it's too dangerous for them to show themselves in daylight while there might be Cultists in the water.”

  “Huff. Did Joe see him after the battle?”

  “I asked Joe. He said they all look alike in the water.”

  “Help me up. We have to get out of here before the Cultists locate this hut through the comlinks. They might already know about it.”

  Once on my feet, I began to strip off the dive suit. “I'll wear my clothes and the jacket. You wear your suit and take the extra battery.”

  She helped me out of the suit and into my clothes. We stuffed the extra gear in her bag. She fitted my dive-suit battery under a strap on the bag for solar backup charging.

  “Sling it over my shoulder, Soph.”

  “No, I'll carry it.” She slung it over her shoulders like a backpack. She looked so scared and vulnerable.

  I took her shoulders. “With any luck, we'll find a safe shelter. But…”

  She looked up with tear-streaked eyes.

  “Remember our pact, OK?”

  She nodded.

  We checked our stinglers. Both showed Full Charge. I think she hated to leave this warm haven as much as I did.

  We shut off the small heater, the lights, and went out into a cold, gray morning. Frigid air assaulted my nostrils and skin. Waves lifted chunks of inshore ice to grind against each other. Crystals danced in the frozen air.

  On the ocean's horizon, I made out our two boats. How long would they wait before giving up? I formed a tel coil behind my eyes, a gentle energy designed to touch minds without influencing them, and scanned.

  I picked up Joe's thoughts. Fear. Concern. Anxiety. They melded together.

  “I'm sorry, Joe,” I whispered, but Joe is not a sensitive and cannot receive.

  Huff? I thought. Are you out there, Huff?

  This is Huff, a thought came through. But the hard edge, the rage and animosity that seethed through it, told me it was not my gentle friend.

  Good to hear from you! I sent. Where are you, Huff?

  Close. Where are you?

  “Jules,” Sophia said.

  I raised a hand and shook my head. We're heading west, Huff, toward the cove. We'll meet you and the team there, as we planned.

  I will meet you and the Terran woman there, and your…our two boats.

  That's great, Huff. We'll see you there!

  I raised my mental shields and sent the bee that is the manifestation of my essence down to the protection of the flower, as my Kubraen mentor Star Speaker had taught me to do. It ended the link and my thoughts would no longer project.

  “You son of a bitch!” I said. “So one of you is a tel.”

  Sophia remained quiet.

  I could have tried for a death-lock, burning his brain stem with a powerful hot link, but the distance was too great, and I wanted the bastard to tell his comrades the lie I'd sent.

  This way, Soph." I pointed east. As we began to walk, I told her about the send. The wind was at our backs, but the rising sun did little to lessen the cold as we trudged through drifts of snow behind the dunes.

  “Look at it this way,” I said as the wind picked up and swirled snow around us, “at least it's wiping out our tracks.”

  She took my gloved hand. “I'd smile, but I don't want snow in my teeth.”

  “Don't make me laugh, woman!”

  I held my side as we walked.

  “How do you feel?”

  “Well, the truck shrank to a compact, so who's complaining?”

  “I'd laugh,” she said, “but, you know…”

  “Yeah, snow in your mouth.” I pointed to a hillock to our left. “Suppose we climb that for a better view?”

  “A better view of what?”

  "Let's climb it and view, unless you have something better to do.

  “Let's go view.”

  We were both trying to keep it light, but if we didn't find shelter before nightfall, when the temp would plummet to below zero by Fahrenheit reckoning, we'd be in deep dog do do and deeper snow. I didn't tell Sophia, but trudging through snow-covered sand was increasing the pain in my ribs again, and taking its toll of my endurance. I was tiring fast as we reached the top of the hillock.

  I scanned the surrounding land and sea with my graphoculars, but snow flurries drew a white curtain around us.

  “Do you see anything?” Sophia asked.

  I shook my head. Just lots of snow. Wait a
minute. Something just moved to the west."

  She drew her stingler. “Can you make it out?”

  “Not visually. Wait.” I closed my eyes and pulled the hood over my lowered head. I dropped my mental shields for the most sensitive probe possible.

  A sentient mind. Alien. Focused. And pissed as hell. If this entity had a weapon, we could be in trouble.

  “What is it, Jules?”

  “Something with a grudge.” I lifted the graphs again. A bulky white body moved through swirling snow. “Either the Cultist who was impersonating Huff, or the Abominable Snowman. C'mon!”

  I lost my footing and slid down the slope. Pain shot through my side. I gritted my teeth so I wouldn't cry out.

  Sophia helped me to my feet. I saw the concern in her eyes, but she remained silent as we walked east.

  The tel-link became intense, a pressure that forced itself against my thoughts and tried to scramble them. I could've raised shields, but I wanted to track this entity's progress toward us. I wondered, with a sudden start, if he were capable of a death blow to the brain stem.

  Yes! his send came through. If you attempt to defy me.

  What do you want?

  You, and your companion.

  You're the Cultist who impersonated Huff, aren't you?

  And you're the Terran mud crawler who lied to me!

  Sorry about that. I didn't think I owed you.

  Oh, but you do, Terran. Leave your weapons in the snow and walk toward me.

  I was about to ask you to do the same thing.

  Do it, or I will burn the female's brain where she stands.

  I touched Sophia's cold cheek. He was a powerful tel. I didn't think he was bluffing.

  “What is it, Jules? Are you in contact with the…whatever?”

  I nodded. Suppose we keep this between you and me, Cultist?

  Suppose you follow my order or I drop her in the snow.

  I closed my eyes and began to form a hot, tight tel coil behind my forehead. I'd make this a dual between me and the Slattie. This much I knew. Sophia and I would not be taken alive.

  I spun the coil; tighter and hotter, throwing my life force into its searing core. The power of my tel coil beat at my temples, ready to burst through. A laser of electric energy that only needed guidance to seek out its prey; to slice that primal connection between brain and body.

  Blocked! Mentally blinded.

  “Jules!” I heard Sophia call, but that was from a different plane of existence.