by S. L. Viehl
There is only so much abuse Liana can take, Carada said. You were told to correct her, not brutalize her. At least, she hoped he had been. It was one of the things she couldn’t recall.
She can take more than that.
No, Fokrej. You go too far.
He tore the neural web from his fins. If you are worried about the physician’s examination, it leaves no trace, I promise you.
Carada wasn’t worried. She knew the device and, physically, the web did no harm. Mentally it turned even the most ruthless and disciplined mind into a quivering, acquiescent mass. She had enough.
But you promised. Fokrej sidled up against her, pricking her thick hide with his little, ineffectual barbs. I don’t want to wait anymore. I want her now.
She couldn’t remember the promise, but she understood his impatience. For some reason she felt as if she suffered from the same, as if long years of deprivation weighed on her. Yet she was so close to her objective, she could almost see the end as it might happen.
As it must happen.
Liana knew that she could destroy everything with a few words. Until it was done, Carada was taking no chances.
She rolled over onto her back, cradling the smaller male on the wide plain of her belly. I still have need of her. When I am through with her, you may do as you wish. Until then, I expect you to control yourself.
I want to hurt her again. Soon. Fokrej rubbed himself against her, trying to penetrate her. Unfortunately his erection had wilted, and his penis had retreated back into his genital sheath. I want you to watch me do it. I want you to smell her pain on my hide.
Carada recalled that she had allowed—even encouraged—Fokrej to think that observing his pathetic torture sessions also provided some sexual stimulation for her. She felt no desire for him, and suspected that it had been years since she had toward any member of the opposite gender. The physical release sex provided didn’t seem important anymore. The need to continually coddle her small sadist, however, was beginning to wear thin. The thought of teaching him what real pain was tempted her for a moment.
A chime from the panel dragged her from her own dark thoughts. What is it?
Ambassador Carada, the ship’s captain signaled. We have established orbit above the planet. There is a passenger shuttle requesting permission to dock, and they are using your private approval code.
Finally.
She pushed Fokrej off and flipped over to answer. Give them permission to dock, and have the pilot brought to my quarters at once.
“Mom?”
Dair walked through Teresa’s dwelling, turning on lights as she went. Onkar and Burn followed. All of the outer access panels had been secured and locked down, indicating her stepmother was in residence. Yet Teresa didn’t respond to the chime or their request to enter.
“This is a violation of privacy,” Burn said as he looked into one of the lavatories.
“I know.” Dair didn’t like using her override code, but her stepmother wouldn’t answer the door panel. “Mom?”
“Someone is in there.” Onkar pointed to the sitting room.
Dair heard a muffled, crackling sound coming from the room as they approached the open door panel. None of the lights in the room were on, either, but someone inside was standing on a lift platform and removing something from the wall panel. “That you, Mom?”
“Go away.” More crackling sounds, and some light, rattling thuds.
It was Teresa’s voice, but she sounded strange, and she had never sent Dair away from her in Dair’s entire life.
“I’ll go if you let me turn the lights on,” Dair said, peering in, “and you tell me you’re okay.”
“Lights.”
The emitters flared on, revealing Teresa at the wall. She had been ripping off the photoscans she had pinned there, balling them up and tossing them on the floor. The light traced wet tracks from her cheeks up to her eyelids, which were so swollen and red they had become thin slits.
“I’m okay,” Teresa said. “Now get out.”
Dair looked at Onkar and Burn, who looked as shocked and puzzled as she was. “Go on ahead without me. I need a few minutes alone with her.”
The two males left, and Dair closed the door panel before adjusting the lights to a softer, dimmer level. She bent to pick up one of the crumpled scans on the floor. It was an image of Teresa with her father; one of Teresa’s favorites. “Mom, what are you doing? Are you ill?”
“I’m terrific.” Teresa tore a large portrait of herself with members of the coastal pod in half and let the pieces flutter away. “I’m not your mother, though.”
“What are you talking about?” Dair moved forward, and then went still as Teresa flung out a hand and made the fin gesture for stay-away. “Of course you’re still my mother.”
“Sorry, but not anymore.” She climbed down from the lift and moved it over to another section of the wall panel. “Your father in his infinite wisdom and affection has terminated our relationship.”
“What? Why?”
“I decided to do something about the mogshrikes attacking the pods,” Teresa told her in a blithe, conversational way. “Your father objected. We argued. He gave me an ultimatum, and I made the only logical choice.” She bunched the ends of her fingers together and then thrust them apart and out. “Poof! End of relationship.”
“You argued over mogshrikes?” Dair couldn’t follow what she was trying to tell her.
“Try to keep up here, honey.” Her stepmother tore another photoscan down. “Your father and I argued over my plan to catch a mogshrike alive so that we can discover why it’s coming inland and attacking in warm waters.”
Dair felt a deep, wrenching sense of revulsion. “You can’t catch a live mogshrike.”
“I can now.” Teresa gave her a bright smile. “See, your father and I are no longer a couple. That means I’m no longer subject to follow ’Zangian customs. Not that I ever was before, you understand, but I tried to toe the line for his sake. Legally I’m not even obligated to ask the Elders for permission to catch a ’shrike. So in actuality, your father did me a big favor, tossing me out of his life. I can do whatever I want now.”
And it had made Teresa cry so much that now her eyes could barely stay open.
“You can’t catch a mogshrike in the outer currents. They’re too strong and fast out there.” Dair suddenly understood. “Mom, no. Not here. You can’t bring one here. We have twenty-nine pups in the pod this season. It would go after them first.”
“Just like your father.” Teresa shook her head. “For your information, I wouldn’t ever put the little ones, or the pod, in any danger. We’re going to lure it in north of your waters, in an uninhabited area.”
“Every coastal area is inhabited. Perhaps not every hour of every day, but we all make use of the waters along the entire coast.” Dair felt exasperated. “It doesn’t matter where you bring it in. ’Shrikes are too large and too dangerous to capture. Don’t be an idiot, Mom.”
“Thank you so much.” Teresa gave her an ugly look. “Would you like to bite me now? Your father almost did.”
Dair smothered a groan. “I’m sure my father was only angry over your plans, Teresa. He loves you very much. He doesn’t want the pod or you to get hurt.”
“I don’t know about that, Jadaira. When you love someone, you generally don’t break off a ten-year relationship and swim away without looking back.” Teresa looked blindly at the photoscan in her hands. “This is a nice one of him when we were out charting the currents around the southern bend. You weren’t even born yet, so you don’t remember.” Slowly she twisted it into a ball and stared down at it. “You know, I fell in love with your father on that trip.” With a sudden, violent motion she threw the crumpled scan across the room.
“That’s enough.” Dair went over and lifted Teresa from the platform, setting her down and resting her modified fins on her shoulders. “You can’t destroy ten years of happiness by tearing up a bunch of pictures.”
�
�No, but it makes me feel a hell of a lot better.” She looked around them as if seeing the mess she had made of her mementos for the first time, and then it was her face that crumpled. “I’m getting hysterical again, I guess. Only your father could reduce me to this.” She pressed her fists to her eyes. “Damn him.”
The fluttering sensation in Dair’s chest increased, and her grip changed as she held on to Teresa. “You’ll have to curse him later. Something is wrong with me.”
The last thing she heard was Teresa crying out as she fell forward and collapsed in her arms.
New attendants and guards had been summoned from Ylyd to replace those killed by the mercenaries, and Liana was allocated a middle-aged female named Graleba. The older Ylydii, a low-ranked but cheerful sort, had served as a companion to a grand matriarch and knew proper protocol. She also liked to gossip a great deal, which Liana encouraged whenever they were alone.
I have some trebelet today, my lady, Graleba said as she released Liana’s meal into the tank. Very lively and sweet, fresh from the homeworld.
Liana had little interest in eating, but fresh food meant that a supply ship had docked with them. Did anything else arrive?
Only a delegate’s aide from another ship, and those mono-colored brutes. Graleba snapped the edges of her veils at the trebelet, inciting them to dart over to Liana. You really should catch something, my lady. You look thin and sickly.
Liana caught one of the smaller iridescent teleosts in her petite veils and made a show of killing and eating it. If she displayed too much curiosity, Graleba might mention it to Fokrej, who was attending Carada but would use any excuse to serve as Liana’s valet again. Misdirection, that would serve. What manner of brutes?
Males, if you can believe it. So scarred up they were that you’d think they were clever food. They came on a separate transport from the planet. Graleba gestured toward K-2.
Did they bring the delegate’s aide with them?
No, he came on his own shuttle. Do you know their females allow them to carry weapons? She rolled her eyes. As if they’d know which end to point at an enemy.
They know. Liana wished she could use the ship’s database to learn exactly who had boarded, and why, but Carada had changed all the codes. One of the ’Zangian males saved us when the ship was captured.
That one was the leader of the group, Graleba told her. He had a funny name. Now, what was it? Born. Borg.
Byorn.
That’s it. Graleba finned gratitude. Miglan pointed him out to me and told me who he was. He also said the brute was not to be permitted to speak to you.
Naturally. Carada would not let her speak to any offworlder, especially not a League pilot and gunner who might tempt her to do something reckless.
Where are these males now?
They’ve stationed them all over the ship. They’re guarding all the members of the delegation. The older female nudged her with a gentle fin. Come now, my lady, you must feed or your mother will have me beaten.
Liana thought of the web and seized her. Did she say that to you? Fokrej, has he touched you? Threatened to hurt you?
He—oh, no, my lady. Graleba looked horrified. Forgive my ridiculous tongue—it was only an expression. Your lady mother would never do such a thing, much as I deserve it for upsetting you. Her eyes went soft and sad. You poor thing, you’ve likely been on spines and barbs since those criminals took the ship, and here I am making you more nervous. I’ll ask to have someone else assigned to look after you.
Someone else who wouldn’t gossip like Graleba.
Liana forced herself to relax and resume her authoritative role. You will do no such thing. I am very pleased with your service and attention to detail. I am only weary of being cooped up in here.
Your lady mother said it was safer for you and her to remain in seclusion until the summit begins, Graleba said. Her gaze went to the access hatch and then back to Liana’s drawn face. Of course, when I want to take a little swim, I don’t bother with the main corridors.
You don’t.
Not when I can swim in complete privacy and seclusion through the recycling conduits. Graleba pointed to the small hatch overhead that was the source of the tank’s water. Now that the ship’s atmosphere has been replaced twice, they’re very clean. No one uses them or monitors them. If I wanted to, I think I could swim through them around both wheels of the ship.
How common and revolting. Liana tried to look and sound bored, but she gave the attendant a furtive wink.
Graleba hummed a laugh. Yes, well, you royals are used to your space and your luxuries. And why shouldn’t you be? Now come, my lady, and eat something. In a few days these trebelet will be too old and stringy to eat without giving you indigestion.
Liana shut down her lighting after the attendant left her and waited in silence for a long time. She was depending on anyone monitoring her tank to assume from the silence that she was asleep and would not wake for several hours.
It was harder than she expected to move very slowly toward the access hatch and open it without making any noise. Her entire body wanted to shake. If I’m discovered, she will give me to Fokrej—or worse.
She also knew that the delegate’s aide who had arrived was likely not Skartesh, the people with whom Carada most wanted to form an alliance, because he came on a separate ship. The Skartesh had no ships, and were constrained to use ’Zangian transports. If Liana didn’t discover what of the plan had been altered, she might as well give herself to Fokrej for his sickening pleasures, for she would be unable to change or stop anything.
The recycling conduits were round pipes three times as wide as Liana’s body. Their mechanism removed solid waste and debris, and replenished fresh liquid atmosphere to all the Ylydii-occupied tanks within the vessel. Usually the sides of the conduits were perpetually scaled with sediment contaminants from the waste materials they channeled to the ship’s incinerators, but Liana saw Graleba’s claim was correct—the pipes were now very clean.
She slid through the narrow hatch, dropped into the rushing current within the conduit, and let it carry her away from the tank. It was strong, but not enough to sweep her into the fiery disposal equipment in the center of the ship.
Each tank had its own supply and return to the conduit, and it was a simple matter to stop and look through each hatch until she found Carada’s private tank. Staying there with the current rushing around her would be difficult, and Liana decided to wedge herself in the short space between the hatch and the conduit pipe, where the rush of the water was not as loud.
Almost immediately she could hear Carada speaking to someone. “—paying a personal visit.”
“Ambassador Urloy-ka was not amused,” a harsher, humanoid voice replied. “Considering what was said to him, he did not wish to send me as his representative.”
Liana shifted so she could see through the grid of the hatch. The ambassador was hovering in her water and speaking through an audio panel to a humanoid male standing in one of the air locks. He was dressed in Ninrana robes and had two heavily armed guards standing on either side of him.
Liana had never seen him before. Why did she summon him? There was no advantage to an alliance with the Ninrana. Her mother had told her a hundred times that their world had nothing to offer but some metals that, given the degraded environment, would be too much trouble for the Ylydii to mine.
“Urloy-ka is too sensitive,” Carada said. “Nevertheless, I will make do with you. I have a proposition for you that may benefit both our peoples.”
“Such matters are to be discussed at the Peace Summit, with Ambassador Urloy-ka,” the aide reminded her. “Only he can negotiate with you.”
“You have auditory canals. You may listen and relate what I offer to him.” The ambassador bared her teeth. “I would transmit this proposal, but it is a private one and not to be openly discussed with the other members of the summit. You will tell Urloy-ka this. And send your escort out, too.”
The Ninrana looked impati
ently at his guards, and then nodded once. The two other males left the air lock.
“What do you propose?” Urloy-ka’s aide demanded.
Carada moved to hover vertically in the water, casting her wide, long shadow over the Ninrana. “Ylyd will provide all the water and terraforming equipment Ninra needs. In return, you will disband your armies and your government, and henceforth live under Ylydii rule.”
The Ninrana made a strangled sound.
“For our investment, it is a fair return,” Carada added.
“Yes, you are only asking us to surrender our world, our leadership, and probably our freedom. I will relate this to Urloy-ka. I advise you pray he does not attack your vessel.” The aide turned to leave.
“So you think you are outraged, little male?” Carada’s hum of mirth rang out. “Tell me, do you Ninrana have something else to offer the Ylydii in return? Lifeless sand and endless heat have no value. Nor do the bones of all the poor people you have eaten.”
“They were sacrifices, delivered into our hands by the gods.” The aide gave her an angry look. “We offer minerals that can be mined. The Ninrana are willing to consider temporary mining operations to be carried out while we are rejuvenating our planet.”
“It will only take ten years to terraform Ninra, brainless one. Ten years of mining is not enough to repay the cost to do so.” Carada swam closer. “You would do well to remind your ambassador that in twenty revolutions your world will be a cold, dead, red rock. We are your only hope to keep it alive.”
“I will relay your offer.” The angry aide left.
“I can’t find anything wrong with her or the pup,” William told Teresa. “Both of them show steady vitals and their organs and blood scan clean.”
It had been a week since Dair had fainted in Teresa’s arms. She had rushed her stepdaughter to the FreeClinic, but by the time they had arrived in Trauma, Dair had regained consciousness and seemed perfectly normal. The pup developing in her womb also showed no signs of trouble. As they had every day since.
Teresa looked at Dair, who was swimming idly around the immersion tank. “You ran the cardiac scans again?”
