“Good,” she said fiercely, even though her stomach cramped with anxiety. She had made it this far; she wasn’t going to let anything else deter her.
“You do not understand. This is a slave ship. Commander Kadica is taking the females on this vessel to be sold at auction.”
Now it was her turn to sag as she stared at him in horror.
“You mean Judith? Charlie? They were sold as slaves?”
What had these aliens done to her family?
Forcing back her tears, she scowled at the male in front of her. “Why are you even trying to be nice to me? And why did you try and get me to leave? I would have thought you wanted more prisoners.”
“I don’t want any prisoners.” He hesitated, casting another look around the small room as if checking to make sure that no one had snuck up on them. He lowered his voice until she could barely hear him. “I am working to stop the slave trade.”
“Stop it?” In her excitement, she stepped forward and grabbed his arm. He flinched and ducked back but she was too excited to wonder about his actions. “Does that mean you could help me find my sister and get her free?”
“I am afraid it is not quite that simple. First of all, we would need to find out where she was sold.” He stopped, suddenly looking thoughtful. “Your sister, was she like you?”
Not at all, she started to reply and then realized he was probably asking about physical appearance rather than personality. “Yes, I guess so.”
They both had pale blonde hair, although Judith kept hers in a neat short bob whereas Mariah’s long hair was currently decorated with tiny braids and pink highlights. They were of a similar height and build as well and both of them had inherited their father’s blue eyes.
“There was a female with a male child taken on the previous journey to this planet. She was only transferred to our ship for a brief period before Commander Khaen made other arrangements.”
“Other arrangements? What other arrangements?”
He shook his head. “I do not know. I was a new crew member at the time and he neither liked nor trusted me. I suspect it was a private transaction.”
“Is there any way you can ask this Commander Khaen?”
Her heart sank as he shook his head again. “I am afraid not. Commander Khaen is dead.”
“What about his records?” she asked desperately. “Surely he must have kept some type of records.”
“Perhaps. He was not a… pleasant individual and he did not trust anyone. But we have been able to track some of his activities.”
“We?”
He ducked his head, looking suddenly embarrassed. “I have been working with a team on Trevelor to try and bring an end to the slave trade. It is the least I can do to make amends for some of the atrocities committed by my people.”
“Can I speak to them?” She started to reach for his arm again but stopped herself. “I’m sure I can make them understand how important it is for me to find my sister and my nephew.”
“You will have the opportunity.” He sighed and pulled out a small device, opening the screen. “Once they receive my signal, they should intercept us within a few days. The plan was to return all of the captives to your planet with no memory of what had occurred.”
“I can’t go back, not now. Not now that I’m finally making some progress towards finding her.”
“I will see what I can find out before then,” he promised.
“Oh, thank you so much—uh, I’m sorry. I don’t know your name.”
“My name is Kwaret.” He seemed cautiously pleased that she had asked.
“I’m Mariah.” She smiled, full of excitement to finally have some hope after this long terrible year. “And you’re like some undercover spy? Investigating the bad guys?”
Something that could almost have been a blush touched his white cheeks. “I suppose you could put it that way.”
“But why? Why are you doing this?”
“I met another human female on my last trip to this planet and she treated me with a respect that I have never had from my own people. She made me realize that I had to try and put an end to something that I had always known was wrong but had never had the courage to prevent.”
“That’s wonderful. She sounds like an amazing woman. Did she get to go home?” she asked eagerly.
“No. She is now mated to a—”
A harsh buzz interrupted him, and he immediately started backing towards the door. “That is the assembly call. I cannot miss it. Stay here and do not try to leave the room. I will return as soon as I am able.”
With surprising speed, he turned and disappeared. She heard the door panel close a moment later. A sudden torrent of relief and hope swept over her, her knees trembling now that she was alone. Once more she slid down the wall to her huddled position, buried her head in her knees, and burst into tears.
Chapter Three
Cestov Tok’Laren, Captain of the Confederated Planets Free Trader Wanderer, swore as he left his bridge. His small crew was usually quite competent despite their assorted backgrounds, but they had really fucked up this time. They were supposed to be transporting a cargo of rare pristidian seedlings—a perfect cargo, light, low maintenance, and extremely profitable. Somehow Maldost, his young assistant, had taken a slonga on board instead. The slonga was neither lightweight nor low maintenance and while it had the potential to be extremely valuable, it was illegal to transport outside of its home system. A system that was now two full days behind them. He headed for his cabin, tail whipping angrily, determined to try and find a place where they could sell the slonga—at a profit—before some nosy Confederated Planets Patrol ship approached them.
By the time he reached his cabin, some of his usual good humor had been restored. He had chosen this path. Unlike his brother, he had always been willing to play along the edges of the rules and this wasn’t the first time he’d made a risky trade. The thought of his brother caused the familiar pang. More than five years now and still he had found no trace of Bratan. Cestov had spent his time on Srashiman making inquiries instead of overseeing the trade. Now he was saddled with the slonga and still had no hint as to where he should look for his brother next.
“Damn you, Bratan. Why did you leave? You knew I didn’t mean it,” he muttered.
Pushing the painful memory aside, he sat down at his desk and brought up a map of the surrounding systems. Since the plague known as the Red Death had swept through the galaxy and devastated so many planets, a lot of the records in the ship’s computer were outdated, but there were two nearby systems where he might be able to make the trade. The first was larger, but it was also more likely to be regulated. The other had only a single habitable planet, Trevelor, but it should be beyond the usual boundaries of the Patrol. The Patrol’s numbers had also diminished as a result of the plague and they tended to concentrate on the central areas of the system, relying on volunteer craft farther out. He bent over the tablet, scrolling through the interweb message boards to review the latest information about Trevelor.
Halfway through his search, his heart rate increased. Several entries mentioned that Trevelor had become a haven for a variety of species because of the pleasant climate and the fact that they had been relatively untouched by the Red Death. One entry even mentioned a possible Cire colony.
Cestov was a Cire, one of the races most affected by the Red Death. The plague had been especially cruel to them. It had taken all of their women and their hope for the future. To the best of his knowledge, there were no longer any female Cires in existence. His tail flicked unhappily. He and his brother were the last generation that had been born before the plague and their father had taken them from Ciresia not long after their mother died. The older male had never been the same after her death, but he had lived long enough to make sure that both boys were prepared to take over the Wanderer and support themselves. Of course, their father had assumed that they would do it together. For the first ten years after his death, they had done just that, but five
years ago they had a bitter argument and when he woke the next morning, his brother was gone. If only he could go back in time and take back the things he had said.
He shook his head. There was no use dwelling on something he couldn’t change. All he could do was to keep searching for his brother and in this case, thankfully, it looked like his search and his business would coincide. They were headed for Trevelor.
“Captain!” Maldost burst into his cabin with an excited look on his face.
“Now what?”
“The slonga is giving birth!”
“What the hell do you mean it’s giving birth? First, you tell me that you traded for a slonga instead of the seedlings you were supposed to obtain and now you’re telling me that the creature is female?”
The anger in his voice finally penetrated the young crew member’s excitement, and he bowed his head, his ears flicking down in apology. Maldost was an Afbera, another race to lose many of their females to the plague, although not to the extent of the Cire. Perhaps that was why Maldost did not understand the appalling act he had propagated. The female was now separated from her mate and was about to have young without any assistance or anything familiar surrounding her.
“I didn’t know that she was female,” Maldost protested. “Just that the slonga was trapped in a too-small cage. And that it was worth a lot of credits,” he added hastily.
Cestov sighed and rubbed his head, a headache already forming beneath his lamella, the ridges on his scalp which marked his age and warrior status.
“Can you tell if she is in distress?” Not that either one of them had any experience with females—of any kind—in labor.
“Well, she is making a sort of grunting noise?”
“All right. Let’s go see what we can do to ease this birth. Did you summon Whovian?”
Maldost scowled, his fangs showing. “He said he was a medic, not a veterinarian. And he smelled like liquor again.”
Cestov’s tail twitched angrily as he and Maldost took off for the cargo bay at a run. He had known when he took the medic on board that Whovian had been running from some kind of trouble, but he hadn’t realized that the trouble had been of the male’s own making. The drunken idiot was leaving the ship at the next port. Twice now he had been softhearted enough to believe the male’s promises of improved behavior. The third time was enough.
He was still scowling at the male’s absence when they reached the slonga. A low grunting could be heard from the entrance to the cargo area and he looked down to see big dark eyes fastened on him, as if imploring him for assistance. Fuck. He had no experience and no equipment, but he could not resist that look of entreaty.
He pushed up his sleeves as he strode across the room.
“Start searching the interwebs to see if you can find any information,” he ordered Maldost.
“There, there,” he said soothingly as he stroked the slonga’s long pink fur, trying his best to sound calm and confident. The slonga mooed and wrapped her trunk around his arm. Still murmuring gently to her, he stroked the large mound of her stomach. How could they not have realized that she might be with young?
She grunted again, and he saw the very tip of a tiny trunk appear between her back set of legs. Prepared or not, she was giving birth and he was the only one here to help her.
Two hours later, Cestov sat back with a weary smile. Three tiny slonga calves snuggled against their mother as they nursed happily. But then he realized that the last one, the smallest one, had been pushed to one side and wasn’t moving.
“Maldost, did you find anything about an infant who isn’t moving?” he asked urgently.
Instinctively, he picked up the tiny creature and started rubbing the small sides. The mother mooed again, her trunk reaching for the infant.
“When they came out, she rubbed all of them with her trunk,” Maldost said anxiously. “Like you’re doing, but it looked much harder.”
He started stroking the calf again, more firmly this time, but there was still no response. Frantically searching for a solution, he finally remembered a technique his father had mentioned a long time ago when he was teaching them basic medical skills. He bent down over the infant and began gently compressing its ribs while he breathed into the tiny mouth. For an agonizing few minutes, nothing happened but then he finally felt a small movement, and a minute later the tiny trunk wrapped around his wrist. His tail circled the much smaller length protectively as he sighed with relief. Too many things had been lost to death over the past generation—people, planets, family—but he had managed to save one small life.
He helped the calf begin nursing, delighted when she latched on and began to drink, first slowly, then with surprising eagerness. When he looked up, Maldost was grinning at him and he couldn’t resist grinning back before he hardened his expression.
“You are very lucky that I managed to save her. If she had died, it would have been on your head.”
Maldost’s ears went down and he whined softly at the reprimand. Since Cestov knew that it was thoughtlessness rather than cruelty that had driven the younger male’s behavior, he relented slightly.
“And you will make up for it, by ensuring that this bedding is kept fresh and clean.” Even as he spoke, one of the infants wandered far enough away from his mother to let loose a gushing yellow flow. How could such a small creature produce so much shit? Maldost winced and nodded.
“I will take care of them,” he promised.
Cestov started to rise to his feet, only to be stopped by the slonga’s trunk wrapping around his arm. He looked at the big dark eyes watching him so intently. The slonga were known for their intelligence, but no one had ever suggested that they were sentient. The look of gratitude in the creature’s eyes contradicted that.
“You’ll be all right. You and your calves,” he said softly.
Before he could start to leave again, he felt a small weight against his knee. The youngest calf had finished feeding and curled up against him. His tail immediately covered it. The rest of the infants were tucked against the mother’s stomach but this one had come to him. With a sigh, he settled back down. It appeared that he would be spending the night down here.
Chapter Four
Mariah paced restlessly. The week had dragged on with agonizing boredom interrupted by a few moments of sheer terror. Even though there was a slight risk of others entering the small lab, Kwaret had decided that she was safer here than anywhere else on the ship. He had done everything he could to ensure her comfort in her small hiding place, but she’d still been lonely and bored. Too scared even to sing, she’d only emerged once the ship was deep in the night shift to work through some yoga poses and wash using the sink.
On her second day in hiding, two strange Vedeckians had entered the room. Fortunately, she had been obediently tucked away in her little hidey-hole, although she doubted that it would endure a full scrutiny. Kwaret had arranged a stack of containers at the end of the shelving unit but they were empty and easily pushed aside. She held her breath, frozen in place as she listened to their conversation.
“Hurry up. You know we’re not supposed to be in here,” the first speaker said urgently.
A sneering laugh made her skin crawl.
“Who’s going to say anything—that spineless worm? I don’t even know why Kadica took him on.”
“He serves a purpose. And he gets the smallest share.”
Bottles clinked and she moved a fraction closer, trying to catch a glimpse of what they were doing through a crack in the containers.
“Three females and two infants. A small reward for the risk.”
The speaker had his back to her, but she could see him combining the contents of several bottles.
The other male shrugged. “Not that much risk. And not that small a reward. Last year’s pickup was most profitable and this year we can keep all of them. We don’t have to give up anyone to Commander Khaen. A breeder and two infants, just because he found this planet? Ridiculous.”
Her pulse increased and she edged a little closer. Could they possibly be talking about Judith and Charlie?
“We don’t have to pay him because he disappeared.” The first male looked up and frowned. “How can you say no risk?”
“No risk on this primitive planet. No alarms, no one waiting. I say it’s been a successful test. I will suggest to the commander that we increase the frequency of our visits and expand our search area.”
“I would feel more comfortable if we knew why Commander Khaen disappeared after last year’s visit.”
“Probably ran into the Patrol.” The second male shrugged again. “No one’s come after us, have they? Stop worrying.”
The male at the counter turned and held up a vial of green fluid. He grinned, pointed teeth flashing. “This should help.”
“Are you sure? It looks toxic.”
“Only toxic enough to make me stop worrying. Let’s go.”
They had departed without even approaching her hiding place, but her heart hadn’t stopped pounding for a long time.
A few days later, her anxiety flared again when Kwaret didn’t make his usual visit. He tried to come twice a day, once in the morning and once in the evening, but when he missed the evening visit, she was not too concerned. She had heard the assembly alarm and assumed he had been required to attend. When he did not appear the next morning either, her concern started to grow.
What was she going to do without his assistance? She still had a reasonable quantity of the tasteless nutrition bars he had provided, and she could always get water from the sink. Her other bodily needs were resolved by the use of the waste incinerator. She should be able to survive if he didn’t return. She might even be able to find a way off the ship if they landed or were intercepted, although it would undoubtedly be an easier process if Kwaret was able to assist her. But practical concerns aside, she was also worried about the alien male. During their conversations, she had come to respect and even like him. He had a gentle deference that seemed at odds with the information he somewhat reluctantly shared about his people and a dry sense of humor that emerged as he grew more comfortable in her presence.
A Son for the Alien Warrior (Treasured by the Alien Book 2) Page 2
