Price of Ransom (30 page)

Lily glanced at her audience: Blue and Paisley, Jenny and Yehoshua and Bach, two technicians. At her gaze, as if with one thought, they all retreated to give her privacy. Bach stayed. “Put her through. Dr. Farhad? This is Captain Ransome.”

“I am deeply disappointed, Captain.” Even through the com-link, Lily could hear the uncharacteristic edge on Dr. Farhad’s otherwise calm voice. “You assured me—” She broke off, evidently too overcome by emotion for a moment to continue. “I scarcely expected an action of this kind. And with a patient so manifestly fragile. I thought you had a real concern for him.”

“An action of
what
kind, doctor?”

“It has not been my experience,” continued Dr. Farhad, as if Lily’s relay had not reached her, “that kidnapping is any kind of solution toward finding a cure with a deeply disturbed patient. It is most likely to exacerbate the disturbance, not soothe it, which, I assure you—too late now, unfortunately—is my
only
goal in this matter, whatever Central Intelligence may have done to him in the past. I thought I made it clear to you that I disapproved of their previous incarceration of him and meant to make a report to that effect.” She paused for breath.

For an instant, the only thought Lily could muster was that she was relieved that she was not having to face Dr. Farhad’s disappointment in person. “Dr. Farhad. If you’ll let me speak a moment.” Lily took in Dr. Farhad’s silence on the comnet as assent. “
What
kidnapping?”

The silence extended. “I trust,” said the doctor finally, but more slowly, and with a touch of uncertainty, “that this is not some ploy on your part to attempt to lead me off the scent. I understand that he is your mate, and that bond runs very deep, and the obligations—as you put it when you left—are both strict and all-consuming. But that does not excuse—” She was getting her breath back.

“Doctor. One moment please.” Lily glanced up to see Yehoshua signaling to her. She waved him over.

As he approached, she could see the frown furrowing his temple. “Captain.” He looked puzzled. “Finch says there’s another urgent incoming. From our old friend. The bounty hunter. Windsor. He says he wants to speak with you about Hawk.”

The report left her speechless. Doctor Farhad chose this silence to start again. “Let me repeat, Captain, that does not excuse your strong-arm kidnapping of your mate from my care. I shudder to contemplate the damage this may have done him. I can only thank you”—here her voice grew plainly sarcastic—“for minimizing the damage done the suite and our equipment and for so gracefully handling whatever gas you used to render myself and my assistant unconscious. At least you have some scruples. The door will have to be completely replaced. And Kyosti—I haven’t reported this yet, Captain. Please, if you will only let me come over to your ship and continue seeing to his care.” She hesitated.

Lily felt numb, like all her nerves had blunted to nothing. “Yes,” she said tonelessly. “You’d better come over to my ship. I’ll send someone for you.”

“I prefer to arrange my own transportation. Thank you. I’m sure, under the circumstances, that you understand.”

“Certainly,” Lily agreed absently. “Ransome out.” She turned to Yehoshua. He took a step back, as if something in her expression or demeanor startled him. “That bastard.”

The com startled to life again. “Captain?” We’ve got
another
incoming.”

“Is it about Hawk?”

“No, but—”

“Then it can wait. I’m coming up and I want no interruptions. Understood?”

“Yes, but it’s from that pirate La Belle—”

“
And
a full-alert code two. Ransome out.” She turned and left. Behind her, Bach sang:

Nun mögt ihr stolzen Feinde schrecken:

Was könnt ihr mir für Furcht erwecken?

Mein Schatz, mein Hort ist hier bei mir.

Ihr mögt euch noch so grimmig stellen,

Droht nur, mich ganz und gar zu fällen,

Doch seht! mein Heiland wohnet hier.

“Now may you proud foes be affrighted,

What fear could you awake in me?

My precious, my treasure is beside me here!

You may appear as grim as may be,

threaten to lay me low completely,

but lo! my Saviour dwells here.”

“T
HIS IS RANSOME.”

Static snapped over comm.

“Captain. This is Windsor.” Background noise muffled his voice. “I have Hawk. I’ll trade him for you. Land a shuttle on Discord by twenty-one hundred hours at these coordinates.” A pause, and then he spoke the numbers slowly, as if he were reading from a list. “Disembark alone. A one-for-one trade, Ransome. Don’t try anything.”

“Listen, Windsor. Hawk is seriously ill. You’re jeopardizing—”

“Captain, the link has been cut from their end. I got a quick trace, but it won’t be very accurate.”

“Thank you, Finch.” Even meaning the words, she could not keep the hard edge of anger out of her voice. She had not sat down in the captain’s chair, but stood, two fingers still pressing down the “comm” button. Realizing, finally, the futility of this action, she lifted her hand. “What’s Discord?”

The Mule answered. “The planet which shares the same orbital path as Concord. According to what files I’ve accessed, it is designated wilderness and recreation zone.”

“The whole planet?”

“Evidently.”

“Finch, do you have a trace on that link yet?”

“Yes. This is approximate, but it reads to the same coordinates as we were given.”

“Thereby giving him plenty of time to move by the time we can get there. Yehoshua.” He had followed her up from Engineering and now he waited. “Prepare a shuttle. I’ll need you and Pinto, and Jenny. Choose another six for backup. No je’jiri. Armed. Trey on the bridge. Finch, stay on comm as much as you can. Take a break when you need to, but we need your expertise.”

“Yes, Captain.” The substance of her praise, even in the clipped tone with which she delivered it, seemed to satisfy him.

“Mule. When Dr. Farhad arrives, I’d like you to act as liaison. I trust to your judgment to explain the situation to her.”

“As you wish, Captain,” the Mule hissed. Its crest lifted slightly, but subsided again. Pinto unstrapped himself from his chair.

“But Captain, what if it’s a bluff?” Yehoshua began. “I’m not sure the wisest course is to—” Lily turned her gaze on him, scarcely aware of him except as an object which she had to move in order to reach her goal. He faltered, shook his head. “I’ll meet you at the shuttle.” He inclined his head, acknowledging her unspoken order, and left the bridge.

“Now.” Having dismissed this obstacle, she shifted her attention to Trey. “You’ll be in charge of the bridge. Dr. Farhad is to be allowed on board. No one else. Not even if we’re delayed and an inquiry comes from Concord or Intelligence. I leave you the unenviable task of explaining this to Deucalion—to min Belsonn.”

The Mule hissed its fluid laugh, and even Finch smiled, but Trey merely assented without any visible emotion. Lily whistled to Bach and left the bridge with the robot drifting at her back. She stopped in her suite.

Bach. Access all information on the planet Discord. What you can get in, say, twenty minutes. Then meet me at the shuttle bay.

Affirmative, patroness. If I may suggest?

A two-note assent.

Thou mayest well be served to take two shuttles, that which delivers thee to the appointed rendezvous, and a second that can serve as a second voice to thy plans, one unexpected by thine opponent.

“Surely he’ll expect something like that.” The thought of Windsor made her cold with fury. She felt as if all her emotions had frozen, leaving her only a narrow beam of cognition from which to draw her choice of actions. “But I think you’re right.”

Bach accepted this encomium with a muted trill, understanding, perhaps, the intensity of Lily’s passion. He plugged in to the wall terminal while she changed and fitted a pistol and rifle onto a light harness.

Her stride, taking her through the ship down to iron deck, was deliberate and swift. Passing crew members, she had enough perception to know that they did not speak to her because of the entire expression of her face and body.

But even her expression was not enough to deter some. Of course, Deucalion was waiting at the shuttle. Jenny had blocked the hatchway ramp with her own person. She was fitted out in full mercenary rig, looking dangerous and not a little fierce.

“Guns?” Deucalion demanded as soon as he caught sight of Lily. “You can’t simply use—”

Lily ignored him. “Jenny, tell Yehoshua I want the second shuttle as well. Put your people on it. You’re our backup.”

“Backup!” Deucalion went on as Jenny, responding with a salute, disappeared down the hatchway. “Lily. May I remind you that you have a hearing tomorrow. You gave me your word that you would attend.”

Now she turned on him, and in the face of her anger, even he stopped speaking. “So I will. But perhaps under slightly different circumstances.”

“I thought you were adamant that you would not let the bounty hunter bring you in. I think your case in that matter was legitimate. You don’t want to appear as a criminal—”

“The circumstances have changed. He just put a price on my bounty that I can’t refuse. He says he has Hawk. I’m turning myself in to him, in exchange.”

“You’re not making sense. How can he have Hawk?”

“He broke him out of Concord prison.”

“Impossible.”

“It may be. That’s why we’re going armed, and I’m taking a backup force with me. If it’s a bluff, he’ll pay for it.” She waited, expecting his reply and ready to deflect it off the shield she had constructed around herself, to protect herself from any stimulus that might tug at the edge of her focus. Then she realized that Deucalion was speechless. He merely gazed at her. The absurdity of his being unable to find words made her smile, a little.

Finally, as her silence wound away into the throbbing hum of the shuttle’s engines at lowest power, he spoke. “You’ve been around je’jiri too long. I think you’ve absorbed a trace element of them into your blood. I wouldn’t want you on
my
trail, unless you were coming to help me.”

The comment left
her
speechless.

“Have you always been this way?”

The truth of the statement hung like a physical presence in front of her. Her pursuit of the martial arts Heredes had taught her; her pursuit of Heredes himself, that had led, ultimately, to his death. Paisley on Harsh. Each expedition led for Jehane, even at the end, as she tried to save Robbie—Pero—from death. And the choice to leave the Reft and find League space.

“Yes,” she said slowly, considering it. “I suppose I have.”

Deucalion smiled slightly, shaking his head with a weak chuckle. “So Father finally did get a child who took after him. Once he took up on something, he wouldn’t let it go until he had finished. I’ll go with you.”

“You don’t need to.”

“Certainly I do, sister. You need a Concord representative to protect your interests and to make sure that this bounty hunter turns over his hostage. He’ll be prosecuted for that, you know—I can’t imagine why he did it, unless he hopes that no one will
believe
that Concord prison’s security could be breached. And anyway, the only way you can stop me from going is to use force.”

“I don’t have time.” But she had to grin at the sound of her own annoyance. “You’re a damn sight stubborner than I am, Deucalion.”

“
That’s
a trait I got from my mother.” He walked down onto the hatchway.

“Aren’t you going to take anything? Or change your clothes, even?”

“Oh, no, dear sister. I’m not taking the chance that you’ll just leave me.”

She laughed and let him precede her onto the shuttle.

By the time Bach arrived, the second shuttle was staffed and ready to go. With Pinto at the controls and Lily at comm, it left only Yehoshua and Deucalion and Bach to the rest of the shuttle. Lily regarded Pinto with misgivings, unsure of how Kyosti might react to him and yet wondering if Pinto and Yehoshua would seem familiar enough to Kyosti to garner any recognition at all.

“Once I’m gone, if he panics, you might have to restrain him until you can get him to secure rooms on the
Hope
,” she said, and no one had to ask her who she was talking about.

The detach from the
Hope
went smoothly. The second shuttle followed them, and then curved off on a new course to come in toward the rendezvous point from an opposite, and presumably less conspicuous, direction. Lily’s sporadic and perfunctory replies on comm left the cabin swathed in uncomfortable silence.

“Why Discord?” Yehoshua asked finally, wanting any distraction. “It seems a strange name for a planet next to a construct like Concord.”

Deucalion smiled. “Heraclitus, I think. Opposites attract. Originally, when this system was chosen as Concord’s home, they meant to build it on the planet. It’s a class-A habitat. But they realized that disrupting its ecology to that extent would be a negation of all that Concord stands for. There was a lot of argument over it. Hence, Discord. Eventually it became a designated wilderness and park. The only permanent habitations are for the park rangers and the zoned resorts.”

“So people can visit it?” Yehoshua shook his head. “There were never enough class-A planets in Reft space not to use them all for agriculture.”

“No, Discord has been left as it is, but it serves a good recreational purpose as well. In the zoned areas people can holiday, do sports, hike, swim, observe; some even war game.”

“They do
what
?”

Deucalion shrugged. “It’s a kind of sport. It’s very safe. I’ve never done it myself, having had enough of the real thing in my youth.”

“People play at”—Yehoshua coughed, deliberately obscuring his amazement—“Never mind. Are we landing in a—ah—zoned area or a—what did you call it?—wilderness area?”

“As far as I can tell, a wilderness area. It makes sense, although it’s against the law. One is supposed to have a permit. But if this bounty hunter actually broke into Concord prison, I doubt if he’s concerned with as minor a breach of law as
that
.”