Judit put her own hand over the surface. “Query. How many prophecies containing references to House Meridian, the chosen one, and House Munn?”
There were only several hundred, so they resigned themselves to sitting and listening to the prophecies or reading them. Most were beyond comprehension, people babbling as they stared into the void, trying to speak about what they saw. Judit had never been near a black hole, couldn’t say what the hierophants were seeing and how it was presented. The hierophants had been listening to transmissions made far in the future or watching vid feeds or sometimes staring at stars whose light was hurtling at them before disappearing over the event horizon. Judit grew tired of listening to the shouting and babbling and read instead.
“Anything?” she asked after an hour or so.
“Nope. Maybe we should go find Annika.”
She peered across the console at him, hearing the edge in his voice. “Look, Noal…”
He gave her a languid look. “Are you going to tell me to get over it? Which part? The one where instead of being destined to unite two houses, I’m destined for dick-all? Or are you asking me to get over how I feel about not getting married to the person I’ve been training to be married to for years? Or maybe it’s the murder thing? You want me to let that go so you don’t have to think about it.”
She sat back, feeling slightly sick. “Do you love her?”
“How come you’re only asking that now?”
She looked down. “I couldn’t bear to hear it before.”
“So, now that you feel sorry for me, you can bear it? Now that you’re certain she doesn’t want me but has always wanted you?”
“By the darkness, Noal! I want us to be okay. You and me.”
He stared. He was always so much better at arguing than her. He knew how to cut deep, but the pain in her eyes must have gotten to him. He dropped his gaze. “I did love her, but not like you do. I didn’t want to fall in bed with her every time I saw her.”
She tried to think of the right thing to say, something that wouldn’t bring his bitterness out again, something that wouldn’t make him bring up Annika’s darker side. “Be angry with our grandmother, Noal. Be angry at the people who thought you were only good as a decoy. I know you’re smart and cunning. Your compassion is your strength. Show them.”
He held her gaze for a second before dropping it. “I don’t know.”
She pounded a fist on the surface, and he jerked in his seat, eyes wide. “Show. Them. You will not let them turn you into nothing.”
He smiled, and it had more than a bit of the old Noal. “Are you going to marry her?”
She blinked, and a myriad of emotions rushed through her. On the one hand, she’d love to finish what she and Annika started on the Damat, but on the other? She’d secretly pictured herself marrying Annika dozens of times, but to say it aloud? And she wasn’t certain Annika would want to go through with such a deed now that she wasn’t being forced.
“I wouldn’t be sad if you did,” he said. “Well, not forever. I’d dance at your wedding.”
That felt like a punch to the gut. She didn’t know if she could have said the same, but one look at his face said he wasn’t trying to wound. She clasped his hand. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. I’ll be drunk. My dance will be so bad, it’ll embarrass both of us.”
She smiled, touched. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The door slid open, and Annika walked through. “I looked for you two in your room, but I see you’re being productive.” She flashed a smile, and Judit considered marriage yet again. Even Noal returned her look with an ounce of his old affection.
“We haven’t found anything solid,” he said. “Plenty of vague references that might be talking about what’s happening right now, but other than that…”
“And your spy?” Judit asked. “Was Feric here?”
“It took a little doing to convince my contact not to report me, but once he agreed, he confirmed that Feric was here.” She shook her head and crossed her arms as if the idea disturbed her, even though it was what they were hoping to hear. “Feric said he was here to check on a Nocturna initiate, and that initiate left with him.”
“Another spy?” Judit asked.
“I don’t know. My contact said we’d have to get access to the command center to get a look at her.”
Noal shook his head. “But whatever information Feric was after, this initiate probably had it, and now she’s gone, too.”
Judit sat back and closed her eyes. “And your contact had no idea what the information might be?”
Annika shook her head.
Judit’s jaw tingled, and Beatrice’s voice sounded in her ear. “Jude, someone on the Eye sent a coded transmission to the nearest gate.”
Judit pointed toward her ear so the other two would know she wasn’t about to talk to herself. “Any idea who it’s for?”
“If I had to guess, with the three of you there, it’s either Meridian or Nocturna.”
“Someone sent a transmission,” Judit said to Annika and Noal.
Noal sat up straighter and looked to Annika. “Sounds as if your contact wasn’t convinced not to turn you in.”
She started for the door, a deep frown in place, but Judit rose to stop her. “We don’t have time. We need to get to the command center and see if we can get eyes on Feric’s initiate. Maybe you’ll recognize her. Bea?”
“Still here, Jude.”
“See if Roberts can send some transmissions to make it look as if the Damat already left the system. Buy us as much time as you can.”
“Will do, Jude.”
They hurried from the room and turned right, heading for the lift that would take them to the Eye’s highest level, where the tour guide told them the command center was. “I hope the head hierophant wasn’t joking when he said we’d be welcome anywhere on the station.”
They headed up, but when the doors opened on a long, unmarked hallway, Judit headed for the first person she saw and spun him around by the shoulder. The hand computer he’d been reading went flying.
“Take us to the command center,” she said. His mouth opened and shut. Judit stepped close to him, face angled down, expression grim. “Now.”
He babbled then hurried back the way they’d come, past the lift and down a hall to a large set of double doors. Instead of keying them open, he rang a chime, and Judit cursed the fact that she hadn’t bullied someone with access.
The head hierophant opened the door. Judit stepped forward and forced him to take a step inside, blocking the door.
“You’ve been harboring Meridian enemies,” she said.
His eyes widened. “We have hierophants from many different—”
“A person who committed crimes against House Meridian fled here, met up with one of your initiates, and escaped.”
He paled, and Judit knew she’d hit the mark. Feric’s visit and disappearance with one of his initiates had disturbed him. Those who wanted to join the temple took a few days to make their final decision when they arrived at the Eye, but once that decision was made, they didn’t leave again until they were full hierophants.
“We…didn’t know what he wanted,” the head hierophant said. “That man came here under false pretenses.”
“Show us the feeds.”
He marched toward a display and called up an image of Feric entering the Eye through one of the umbilicals. “The dock is the only place we have cameras.”
“Do you have him leaving?”
He chose another file and opened it, showing Feric leaving with a dark-haired, fair-skinned woman. Judit couldn’t immediately place her house. She could have been Nightingale, a house with strong connections to Nocturna.
Annika stepped past, eyes glued on the holo image. Her mouth parted, and she breathed heavily as if she was a heartbeat away from losing control.
“You know her?” Judit asked softly.
A terse nod, then Annika strode from the roo
m. Judit stayed with her, not acknowledging the babbling head hierophant who trailed behind them.
“Who is it?” Noal asked as he hurried to keep up.
“My mother,” Annika said.
Noal and Judit exchanged a look, and Judit had a thousand questions, but she didn’t ask them yet.
“I’m going to tell Spartan we’re leaving,” Noal said.
Judit nodded. “Quickly.”
He peeled off, but they didn’t stop as they marched toward the lowest level. As they reached the hallway closest to the umbilical airlocks, Judit turned to the head hierophant.
“That’ll be all.” He seemed as if he might speak again, but Judit held up a hand. “We don’t hold you responsible. We’re leaving to look into it now. If you see any of our ships, tell them to meet us in the Panther Nebula.”
Which was the opposite direction of where she planned to go. But he nodded and hurried away, and all that was left was to wait.
“You can go ahead,” she said to Annika. “I’ll wait for Noal.”
Annika paced up and down the hall, shaking her head, not speaking.
Judit thought of a thousand things to say but didn’t know which would help. Like all of them, Annika hadn’t been raised by her parents. The few times they’d spoken of family, Annika had only mentioned her father. Judit had assumed her mother was dead, but when she and Noal had done a little prying, they’d found that Annika’s mother had been exiled from House Nocturna. Rumors varied about why.
It had happened when Annika was twelve, so she’d known her mother a little, unless Nocturna had always kept them separate. Neither Judit nor Noal had wanted to ask. Now, from the pinched, angry look on Annika’s face, Judit wondered if the falling-out between her mother and Nocturna had involved Annika herself.
Chapter Nine
Annika couldn’t believe what she’d seen on that holo. She felt as if it was still hovering in front of her. Her mother, Variel Nightingale-Nocturna, a woman she’d thought never to see again, large as life, escaping the Eye with Feric the betrayer.
She thought of the last time they’d seen each other, shortly after her mother had guided the surgery that resulted in the bone stiletto. It had seemed the perfect gift, a weapon not even Ama knew about, though she had no doubt Ama would have approved. Her mother had taken her aside one day, pulling her out of training, and she’d wondered if there would be another gift. But her mother had led her out of the training facility on Nocturna Prime and told her it was a day out.
Probably another test, but Annika was always happy to spend time with her mother, even if her mother’s lessons skewed slightly from Ama’s. Her mother was happy Annika had so many skills, but where Ama displayed a willingness to sacrifice others, Annika’s mother always encouraged caution. Annika hadn’t see the point of thinking before killing someone. Such hesitation might get her killed. That had changed when she’d met Judit and Noal, but by that time, her mother had been gone for three years.
Outside the facility, her mother had made her wait on a street corner, claiming she’d forgotten something, but when she’d ducked back into the building, she hadn’t come out again. Her last smile had been tense and hurried, so different from her normal, easygoing look, another thing Ama didn’t share.
It was Ama who finally came to collect Annika, saying Annika’s mother had betrayed Nocturna and been exiled. It was only later that Annika had found out the sentence had been passed down after her mother had already escaped. Ama said her mother had gotten her out of class as a distraction, that she’d taken Annika outside so everyone would be looking for the Nocturna heir rather than her mother.
For a time, Annika hadn’t believed her. In her secret heart, she’d known her mother had been going to take her into exile. And one day, her mother would come back for her. But that hadn’t happened, and then it was easier to believe Ama.
Now, though, with that holo image looming in her mind, tiny thoughts long dead began to resurface. Her mother might have had a plan to get her with Feric. Her kidnapping might have been her liberation. The person who’d wanted to meet her on that kidnapper’s ship could have been her mother.
Or maybe her mother was just trying to cripple the house who’d betrayed her.
Noal jogged down the hallway, Spartan in tow. Annika raised an eyebrow, happy to have a target for her anger that wasn’t in her own mind. “Come to say good-bye to your abductors?”
She meant it as sarcasm, but Spartan shook his head. “Even though I was on my way to getting a good poker game going, I’m not sticking around waiting for your houses to interrogate me. I like my fingernails where they are, thanks.”
“Meridian wouldn’t…” Noal started to say. He glanced at Annika and cleared his throat. “He wants to come with us.”
“Better the darkness you know,” Spartan said.
Annika rolled her eyes, but Judit shrugged. “Fine.” She gestured for Noal and Spartan to step into the umbilical. “Someone’s waiting to catch you on the other end. Annika, you’re next.”
Even though Annika was probably more capable in a fight, Judit still volunteered to go last. Was that Meridian thinking or simply her nature? Whatever it was, Annika couldn’t think too hard on it at the moment, not with thoughts of her mother swirling in her brain.
As soon as everyone was aboard the Damat, Judit marched for the bridge, ordering Beatrice to take them out of the system and toward the nearest transmission gate.
“Destination?” Beatrice asked.
Judit hesitated, looking around the bridge. “We need to sort through the info we have, plan our next move. Take us to Xeni.”
Annika couldn’t help a shocked laugh. “So, one of the favorite vacation spots of the Blood is also your secret planning location?” She’d never been there, but she’d heard tales of pristine beaches and perfect weather, of glorious violet sunsets and light reflecting off the planet’s rings.
Judit cleared her throat. “It’s mostly untouched. We won’t be spotted over some city, and people only go there for pleasure. Would you expect it?”
“No,” Annika said. “It’s brilliant.”
And unexpected. Thoughts of her mother, of all her problems flew away as she stared at Judit and pictured the beaches of Xeni. There were many ways they could lose themselves there, many things to do that didn’t require thinking or planning. Even though Judit wanted to plan, Annika was certain she could prove a distraction, at least for a little while.
Her first look at Xeni through Judit’s screen did not disappoint. In the light of its twin suns, Xeni looked purple, a hue cast over most of the planets in its system because of the bright white sun and the blue dwarf star circling close to it. The ore in the rocks of Xeni’s rings shone like molten gold, and each time one rock smacked gently into its neighbors, it created a shower of golden dust that sparkled like fireworks.
An automated system prompted them for the codes needed to breach the planet’s atmosphere, and Judit used a standard Meridian code. There were many coded planets in the galaxy, and Annika had no doubt someone was combing through each and every one, trying to find Annika and Noal, but it would take them a while, and Judit was right. Xeni might be one of the last places anyone would check.
They breached the atmosphere, and Annika watched the ocean go by with the occasional land mass rising out of the water, none of them large enough to be called a continent. It was a series of islands, though some were grand indeed. Each island was encircled by a bright white beach, and the plants inward were a mix of dark green and even darker purple. Blue-green and lavender near the shore, the water surrounding each island deepened to indigo farther out, punctuated by white wave caps.
The automated system guided the Damat to a large, empty island. Beatrice steered for a patch of cleared jungle near a deserted beach. Xeni had many such landing pads, reserved for high-ranking members of the Blood, but they were all shrouded by signal-masking satellites. The Blood didn’t like to be spied on while sunbathing, and even though
Xeni’s satellites could be hacked like any others, Xeni would give them somewhere to go to ground.
The Damat landed with barely a thud, and everyone seemed to relax.
“Bea,” Judit said. “Make a schedule for shore leave. Someone should always be monitoring scanners.”
“Got it, Jude.”
With a soft smile at Annika, Judit inclined her head toward the exit, and they made their way down before anyone else, exiting the Damat from the long gangplank that extended between its landing struts.
It was a quick walk out of the trees to the beach, and Annika pulled off her shoes and buried her feet in the soft white sand. The breeze lifted her hair, and the air smelled of salt mixed with a floral scent. The trees towered overhead, great trunks groaning in the breeze while their dark purple leaves flapped against each other in a waxy, clapping sound.
Along the beach stood little cabanas, wood and gauze with reclining chairs inside, but Annika knew they would be state-of-the-art with light refracting enclosures that could obscure the occupants and provide climate control. They were probably well stocked with provisions. She’d heard that people who visited Xeni preferred to see no one else on their trip, and the house who owned it had gotten wealthy providing just such an experience.
Voices came from the ship as others disembarked. Annika wandered down the beach away from them, watching the ocean, listening to the surf, scanning the horizon, something she didn’t often get to see. The sky was a delicate pink, the scarce clouds white, and the air utterly peaceful.
When Judit touched her shoulder, she jumped a little, laughing at the sensation.
“Sorry,” Judit said. “You’ve been quiet since…”
“Just thinking. I’ve never been here before.” She started to walk, and Judit stayed beside her. After a long moment, Annika paused. “Will everyone be all right without you?”
“They’ll wander around or get some rest, and if they need me, they know how to get in touch with me.” Her eyes held a thousand questions, but Annika didn’t want to answer any of them, not yet.
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