allies and enemies 02 - rogues (15 page)

“Hey, buddy. I
have
a name.”

“Rachel comes with us.”

He shook his head.

“If you had a plan to get out, that means you had a plan for transport too. You could have overpowered Liet but you didn’t. You let him bring you here. That means you still need something.” Tilley dipped her chin, eyes narrowed with suspicion. She folded her arms.
Where’d the frightened marsh hare go?

“There’s a ship,” Asher answered finally. “Ix keeps a personal yacht. Well-stocked for emergencies. Nice and lux. Room for us all.” He looked at each of them in turn. “I can get us there. Just need the access codes.”

“Would
he
know that?” Northway asked, striding over to Liet.

Asher scoffed. “Would you let him know anything important as that?”

The healer’s expression flattened. “Guess not.”

“Can you find someone who knows the codes?” Tilley grabbed the front of Asher’s jacket. He almost laughed.

“Yes. Why?” He studied her face. Was
she
still in there, the warrior that shot five Zenti in a matter of seconds?

“Take me to him.” Her mouth was a bitter bow, as if she’d made a harsh decision. “Time to watch the monster do her work.”

29

The roll of seething hatred was too much to bear. Neesa had thought that confronting Asher would have helped to quiet it. No satisfaction had come from that, as much as she had fantasized about that moment: She would imagine him desperate to amend his sins against her. He would beg and she would taunt. Then he would vow his allegiance to her anew.

Nothing like that occurred.

The man never did what she wanted him to. Why was this a surprise? Asher had promised to help her take control. Instead, he ran off with a ship of gullible Zenti. If only he hadn’t developed a conscience, Ix by all rights would be dead and they would be together.

Now he rotted in a cell, worried about some stupid little girl. He didn’t have the common decency to be afraid for himself. It was as if he
wanted
to be caught.

Her fury throbbed at her temples, barely contained. She flopped into the pallet of firesilk cushions and stared at the yellowing carved ivory of the ceilings, faces of cherubs and demons. This room had once seemed so lux to her, like a bedroom fit for a princess. The princess of reduced means forced to marry a beast to recompense the lost wealth of her brothers. Now it was a dungeon. Her gaze shifted over to Ix, where he stooped over dat reads behind the grand carved desk. Her own personal ogre. In Neesa’s version of the story, the princess killed her keeper instead of remaining married to it.

The ogre cleared his throat. He expected her attention. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Instead, she rolled against the pillows and pushed her body at an angle, aware of the distracting curves of her pose. She forced a vapid smile at him, expectant. The loyal concubine, hanging on his every word.

Ix seemed engrossed in something on the screen of the desk as he spoke. “It occurs to me, my love, the engineer may be of use. The men tell me that the assault vessel claimed from the insurrectionists is quite the prize. She would be useful in its study.”

Came up with that all by yourself, did you? Shall I applaud?

“Engineer?” She blinked, feigning forgetfulness.

“The female. Your talents may be of use with her if the healer deems her free of disease.”

I’d rather bed Ott and his disgusting brothers than touch that girl again.

“Ah. Poor sickly thing.” Neesa clicked her tongue and pretended to examine her nails. She could not resist adding, “She may not last the night.”

“Why? Have you been near the medical suite?” His dark eyes narrowed. “I was rather specific in my instructions, Neesa.”

Oh. You are such a neurotic fiend.

“No, dear heart. Just what I heard.” Again, she gave a simpleton smile.

“I see.” His voice flattened. Instead of just shutting up so she could think, he blathered on, approaching her bench. “How did you come by this information then?”

He’d changed clothes again. Probably had the last coat burned, worried that the girls’ “disease” had somehow clung to it.

“Gossip. An idle entertainment.” Neesa pushed up on an elbow, careful to sound dismissive. She leaned forward, realizing the view it provided down the deep cut of her bodice. Her eyes were wide and devoid of guile.

He seemed suitably distracted as he reached out to run a hand through her hair. The color of his thoughts were fading from a suspicious green and into a more soothing amber. Men were such weak things. Their tastes so predictable.

“You were saying you think the girl would be useful.” She turned her face into his palm, planted a light kiss. And tried not to think of a spike hound lapping at its master’s hand.

“Hmm?” he murmured. “Oh. Yes. Once a proper interrogation of Korbyn is conducted, it would be beneficial to question her as well. If his Guild has entered into a partnership with Origin, there are others that would pay handsomely for such information.”

Neesa shifted against the slick fabric. Ix took the wordless invitation to sit down. She sank against him, her head propped on his thigh.

“Why not simply kill him as you’ve promised? You know what they say of Guildsmen, impossible to break under interrogation. Would there actually be anything of use he could tell you? After all, he has been so long gone from his Guild.”

“You are eager to see him die.” His hand slipped down under the open collar of her blouse. She responded with a well-practiced sigh. But he did not seem pleased by this. The green remained in his energy. “Do you fear the things he might confess?”

“Of course not.” It was not hard to fake the insult in her voice. A sense of warning stirred in her. He was always jealous, always paranoid. Plots and intrigue surrounded him, imagined or real. How many times did she have to deny these claims? Asher’s return ruined everything.

She affected an air of tired patience. “Consider, my love. He defied you. You must send a proper message to anyone that would seek the same. This is how you deal with sedition and spies, not this hesitation.”

His thin lips compressed. “Good advice, sweetling. Duplicity should not be tolerated, regardless of where it is found.”

She looped her arms behind his neck, seeking to pull him down to kiss her. She needed to distract him further, if only to make that green go away.
Oh the things I do
.

It was not working. His back grew stiff. The hand that caressed her side now moved to her neck. The fingers rested around her throat. “Why did you go Korbyn’s cell?”

He’d been watching. The crawler cams on that level had been broken since before she was born, but somehow he knew.

Control him. Lead him away from this
.

“A lie. From those jealous of me.” She tried to sit up. His arm stiffened, pinning her.

“Why?” There was a sudden resurgence of green with the colors of anger, betrayal.

Neesa grabbed his wrist. His fingers squeezed against her throat.

“I asked you a question.” He clenched his teeth.

“Lucien!”

Ott thundered into the room, covered in frantic energies: fear, excitement. A creature she hated for his very loathsome loyalties, but now greeted with infinite gratitude. She scrambled to her feet, safely out of Ix’s reach.

“What.” Lucien’s anger still targeted her.

If Ott noticed this, he did not show it.

“There’s trouble, boss.”

Ix stood. “Explain.”

“Korbyn…he’s gone.”

“Incredible.” Ix’s glare fixed on Neesa. “How convenient.”

“The healer. The girl too. Found Liet in the med bay, half dead.”

“Find them, Mr. Ott.”

Ott shifted, wary, swallowing.

“Well. Why do you stand there?”

“Two ships on the way. Nothin’ I seen before. Too fast to be Guild.”

The warning klaxon groaned into life.

30

I’ve become Tristic’s beast after all.

Erelah felt the anger shift like wet sand beneath her. Tyron came with it: a murderous urge to rend and tear. That was how they made her. Quick to react with deadly intent to any perceived threat.

That is not me.

It was fuel just the same. It burned away the fear.

Erelah stood over the man as Asher held him down, forced to kneel like an offering to the monster. She did not recognize him from the audience chamber, not that she had seen many faces.

He seemed like any Eugenes man: dark hair and eyes. Perhaps in another life he could have been a farmer on some agri-colony, face perpetually burned by an alien sun, his thick forearms the product of heavy honest labor. Or a father with little ones.

Focus.

She hated this. Part of her loved it, craved it. The part that would still dwell in darkness, installed there by Tristic.

“Clear. Still clear.” Northway stood watch. Their escape from the medisuite had gotten them as far as this small maintenance area before the guards got too thick to avoid. The walls of the room seemed to press in on her.

Northway’s curious gaze fell on her. The questions pressed at her insides, but blessedly she kept them unvoiced. Erelah felt fear from her as well.

Asher studied her. From him she sensed nothing. Her attempt at a sight-jack on him had changed that. He was there and he wasn’t. He was still an Asher-shaped hole in the world that everything flowed around. She could only go by his wary stance: like he was watching a deadly insect, glad it was well out of range.

“Well,” he prodded, tense, holding his captive still. His hand clamped down over the man’s mouth. The man’s eyes widened, terrorized. Handsome Eugenes brown.

She knelt in front of him. Ignoring Asher, Northway.

Erelah leaned in like a lover ready to impart a secret. In a way, she was. “I’m sorry. There’s no other way. I can make it quick, but that part’s up to you.”

Her throat tightened.
Stop it!

The gloves had been Northway’s idea. They were a little big, broken in by some long-gone owner. I know what it’s like to be worn like that. Erelah slipped a glove off. Drew in a deep breath.

She placed her hand on the bare flesh at the junction of his neck and shoulder. The Sight, so long held in check, screamed from her skull, a wicked fire felt through every pore. It was enormous, stirring. It pressed against her insides, bloated with hunger.

The man stiffened, his scream muffled by Asher’s hand.

He resisted at first. A thick, sticky mired wall of fear. There was no vision of an agri-colony under a warm alien sun. Everything was blood, a great deal. Violent exchanges and simple pointless cruelties. Under that a steady loneliness.

She tried to compartmentalize it, to keep it from becoming part of her. Her focus shifted to searching out the well-lit, mundane areas for what she needed:
Codes. Ships. Hard metal and orderly lines.

When Erelah opened her eyes, she lay on the deck. Rachel peered down, face etched with worry. Asher stood over them both, head brushing the ceiling, a giant.

“She’s snapping out of it.” Northway’s voice was hushed with strange tension. There was a new intelligence there, as if suddenly realizing danger in a very unlikely place.

Asher’s voice seemed to flatten under regret. “You got it?”

Erelah swallowed, tasting blood. There was warm wet beneath her nose. “I got it.”

31

The ship was larger than Rachel had first assumed; her trips outside the lab were restricted. The corridors stopped looking familiar to her once they passed the largest intersection that led to the main room. Korbyn wasn’t exactly giving a guided tour either.

She glanced at Erelah. She seemed winded since the little sideshow trick she’d played on the guard. A fine layer of perspiration coated her pale features. It was very likely her fever had returned. Rachel resisted the urge to touch her.

A rhythmic squeal pierced the air. She jumped, reflexively grabbing Erelah’s shoulder.

“What the hell is that?”

“Proximity alarm. Someone not nice coming.” Korbyn shrugged.

Of course. Because that’s what people did out here: attacked each other for no good reason. Or maybe because it was Tuesday.

“Who’s attacking?”

“You want to stick around and find out? Go ahead. I’m not.”

The overhead lights in the corridor sputtered and came back on to half-brilliance. The girl stumbled.

Korbyn, as if he had anticipated the move, swooped a massive arm around her, righting her without breaking stride. “Come on. Faint later. Puke. Just do it all later.”

“You’d make a hell of a motivational speaker.” Rachel pulled the girl closer, taking on some of her weight.

“This is it.” Erelah seemed to ignore them both. She jabbed a finger as they approached another intersection. It was identical to the last three they’d sprinted past.

“You sure?” Rachel slowed. “These corridors all look the same to me.”

Korbyn rolled past her without a glance. Erelah fell in behind him. Taking the corner as well, Rachel nearly collided with Korbyn’s back. The space abruptly ended in what she’d come to recognize as an airlock. The customary illumination for the keylock mechanism was dark.

Not good.

She leaned against the alcove and planted her hands on her knees to catch her breath. Erelah did the same opposite her.

“Damn the Three!” Korbyn slammed a fist against the door. Rachel winced. That had to have hurt, but he didn’t show it if it did.

“He never came back. He promised her,” Erelah muttered. Tears streamed down her face to her chin; she was staring unfocused into the middle distance. “But it was just easier to stay away.”

“What’s she talking about?” Korbyn jerked a chin at Erelah as he concentrated on the nest of wires to the keypad.

Rachel crouched down in front of the girl. Her stare was distant, fixed on something no one could see but her. “Hey, what’s going on?”

The gaze stayed fixed. Rachel waved a hand before her face.