Corizen Rising

by Heidi J. Leavitt

  “I knew him back home,” she finally managed.

  “In Roma?” Zaq was watching her intently but his eyes were kind. It gave her the courage to keep going.

  “He was a librarian at the University,” she gulped. “He and I . . . we, uh . . .” She faltered, unable to finish her sentence. Zaq waited patiently, though his brow creased.

  Tiran took a deep breath and tried again. “We had a relationship. I kept it a secret from my parents—they wouldn’t have understood.” It was getting harder to breathe, but she forced herself to continue.

  “I didn’t know him as Erron Kruunde. He called himself Markus Stoer. I thought his name was Markus.” Her voice started to rise a bit hysterically.

  “It’s okay,” soothed Zaq.

  “We eloped the night my mother was killed,” Tiran admitted, her eyes filling with tears. Zaq’s eyes narrowed.

  “I didn’t find out until we got to Kruundin City,” she continued in a rush. “We were in the shuttleport—we were supposed to get married in Kruundin City. He left me in the café . . . and n-never came b-b-back,” she finished with a sob. Her self-control swept away and the tears overflowed and spilled down her cheeks.

  Zaq still stood there in front of her, staring at her with some kind of expression she couldn’t make out. He must be disgusted with her. The thought stabbed her with fresh pain.

  Then he stepped forward and put his arms around her. In relief she let herself go and sobbed into his chest. Her body shuddered violently and her eyes burned.

  Finally, she started to get control of herself and she stepped back, a little embarrassed. Her cheeks burned and she looked at the ground to avoid seeing Zaq’s reaction.

  Yet his voice when he spoke was sympathetic.

  “Tiran, listen. We have to stay a little while with Burke. No one else can deactivate my implant. If we don’t get that done soon, the Brotherhood will be able to track us down easily.”

  Tiran knew he was right, but how could she face Markus, or Erron, or whatever his name was?

  “Look, we’ll just stay long enough for Burke to fix my implant. Then we’ll leave. I promise.”

  Tiran searched his solemn eyes for a moment. Maybe with Zaq there she would be able to bear it. Resigned, she nodded her acceptance, and Zaq held out his hand. Taking his hand, she started back toward Burke’s house.

  Everything was going to be all right. It had to be.

  23. Lost

  The sun filtered through the high slotted window illuminating Andie’s barren gray holding cell, the soft light falling over her face. She moaned and restlessly turned over before her eyes slowly opened. Yawning, she stretched and sat up, staring around at the concrete walls. Nothing had changed since she had finally fallen into a fitful sleep last night. A single cot stood next to the wall. A small efficiency john and sink, which dispensed miniscule amounts of murky water, were crammed into the corner. A cracked yellow plastic cup teetered on the sink. Most prominently, a heavy metal door took up the wall directly across from the cot.

  She turned and climbed up on her cot, reaching as high as she could to grab onto the sill of her slit of a window. By pulling with all her strength and scrabbling with her feet up the wall, she could just reach high enough to get a brief glance outside. As far as she could tell there was nothing but barren earth outside her window. The angle just didn’t allow her to see very far. Yet the window did let in the sun, and as best as she could tell, she had been here for about two days.

  Dropping back down onto her cot, she heaved a loud sigh of boredom. She never had any visitors, except for a guard who brought her a meal twice a day. It wasn’t much—just plain barley soup and bread, but it tasted fine, and she always inhaled it quickly. Of course she had tried pumping her apathetic guard for any information but he never spoke a single word to her at all or even gave any sign that he heard her. It was horribly frustrating.

  She had seen nothing of Casey since that fateful night at Kruunde Manor. After the transport carrying him had left, the soldiers had questioned her roughly about her relationship to Casey. Since obviously Casey was in some kind of trouble and she was supposed to be dead, she had instinctively lied to them about who she was. They clearly didn’t believe her at first, but she held her ground, protesting over and over that she was just a casual acquaintance from Roma who had gone sightseeing with him. They had eventually given up and transported her to this holding cell. It had been late at night when they arrived and she had no idea what city she was in. Since then, they must have decided she wasn’t important enough to talk to because no one had questioned her again. In that case, she grumbled mentally, she didn’t understand why they didn’t just let her go. If they would just let her out of here she could do something to try and find out what had happened to her husband.

  The day passed slowly, and Andie spent most of it napping from sheer boredom. After dozing off and on through the afternoon, a sharp click sent her sitting straight up on the cot. The lock turned and the door opened. A guard she didn’t recognize peered around the door at her. He looked at her from head to toe and then ordered brusquely, “Come with me!”

  Andie didn’t see any reason not to comply. In fact she was grateful for the change, whatever it might be. Maybe she could finally get out of this place! The guard locked her arms behind her back and led her down the empty hallway. They made a few turns and came to a security door where the guard casually slid his gate key through. Andie frowned as they stepped into the late afternoon sun and climbed down a series of steps. Looking around she saw that they were in an alleyway of some kind. Her spine tingled. Surely they just didn’t release prisoners like this into an alleyway without any kind of processing?

  A small transport pulled up and the side door opened. The guard shoved her roughly in and slammed the door behind her. Puzzled, she looked around the inside of the tiny transport to see that she was facing a grim, grizzled Denicorizen with a laser pointed directly at her.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed involuntarily. Her new guard didn’t say anything. Trying to slow her breathing, she tried to get some idea of what could possibly be going on. Nothing about this made sense. Obviously this was no prisoner release. They could be transferring her, but the man with the laser was dressed just like any other normal Denicorizen factory worker. Unusual dress for a prison guard. He didn’t appear to be CPF either. Her head was swimming with confusion. Nothing seemed to fit.

  “Where are you taking me?” she finally asked in a desperate attempt to get some information.

  A terse order to “shut up” was all the response she got.

  The trip wasn’t long. They soon halted and the door was opened from the outside. Her laser pointing guard gestured at her to get out, so she took a deep breath and stepped out into the dark. It was night once again, wherever they were. Two more silent figures swiftly flanked her. She looked at them curiously, but it was so dark that she couldn’t see much, other than that they were both hooded and cloaked. Each took one of her arms, and they hurried her into the building.

  Inside it looked like she had stepped into a very dreary office. There were no windows, but several chairs lined the walls. In the center was a battered desk whose surface was almost painfully clear of any kind of clutter. A third figure appeared with a heavy chair with armrests and set it in front of the desk, and her hosts quickly seated her in the chair. It was hard and especially uncomfortable with her hands bound behind her back. Her fingers were starting to go numb. Twisting slightly back and forth she tried to get some circulation going, but at a harsh order from her captors she subsided. Obviously something had gone very wrong on Corizen. Maybe it had been a mistake to rush back so quickly. She couldn’t find Tiran if she was locked up like this, and she couldn’t help Casey either.

  A short, balding Denicorizen man slid into a chair behind the desk. He was directly opposite from her, and she couldn’t help but stare directly into hi
s eyes. They were curiously blank and emotionless. It frightened her as nothing else had. Even Oanni’s eyes had never looked quite like that.

  The man picked up a paper off his desk and began to read silently. Then he put it down and stared once again at Andie’s face. She flinched away from his gaze. “What is your name?” he asked, without any trace of anger or urgency.

  “Leslie Smith,” she answered directly. During her time in the cell she had decided on that name. It was a completely random Citizen-sounding name, and she had repeated it over and over to herself in an effort to make it seem natural.

  The man did not react; he merely picked up his paper again. “We have a report from an informer in Kruundin Village that states that you are Andrea Morten.”

  “But Andrea Morten is dead; everyone knows that,” she protested, hoping she sounded sincere. He ignored her response as if she hadn’t spoken at all.

  “What is your name?” he repeated calmly.

  “I told you, I’m Leslie Smith,” she firmly said again.

  “Hmm.” The man looked at his paper. “Andrea Morten, aka Sirra Bruche. Presumed dead, but never visually confirmed.”

  Andie waited patiently. If there was one thing to be grateful about on Corizen, it was that they didn’t believe in using IDs of any kind. It made all kinds of things inconvenient; however, in her case it helped things immensely. If she just kept repeating her story, they might give up. After all, they had no way to prove things either way.

  The little dispassionate man cleared his throat and then stated, “The Oman does not have time to waste on these issues.” He snapped his fingers at the others standing against the wall.

  Andie’s mouth dropped, aghast. The Brotherhood! She had fallen into the hands of the last people she had ever wanted to. She shook her head slightly. It didn’t make sense. The CPF had arrested her. Were the CPF and the Brotherhood working together now? She just couldn’t see how that was possible.

  Suddenly one of the cloaked men unlocked her wrists and she gasped in relief, rubbing her arms. They tingled with pins and needles after being behind her back for so long, but she didn’t have much time to chafe life back into them before her wrists were grabbed and they bound her arms to the chair. Before she could even struggle, one of them was brandishing a syringe. Andie sucked in her breath in horror. Once before she had been injected with the rare Arueban truth serum, and she had told everything she had been asked. If she got out of this without telling them her name it would be a miracle.

  The miracle never happened.

  Half an hour later, she sagged limply in her chair, the tears streaming from her eyes as she listened to her interrogator order a high priority message sent to the Oman. The former Red List target Sirra Bruche was still alive and in the hands of the Brotherhood.

  24. Allies

  Waking was not pleasant. Tiran rolled in her bed and pressed her face into her pillow, trying to recall what she had been dreaming. It was gone already, but she still felt a sense of loss, as if something wonderful had slipped through her fingers.

  After a minute, she gave up and opened her eyes. The sunlight was streaming through her window and lighting the small room. Bookshelves lined the walls; until two weeks ago it had been Burke’s home library. Now it was the room where Tiran slept on a makeshift bed made of blankets and some cushions borrowed from one of Burke’s neighbors. During the day she kept to the room as much as possible, leaving it only for the plain meals she shared with Zaq. It was the only way she could keep from running into Erron and his mocking smile, something she avoided at all costs.

  It had been two weeks now and they were still staying with Burke against her wishes. She wanted to say, against her better judgment, as well, but that wasn’t quite true. They had been safe here after all. And she grudgingly admitted, Erron had left her alone as much as she could have desired. Still, this place felt like a prison. If only she had somewhere else to go.

  Burke had deactivated Zaq’s transmitter shortly after Zaq had dragged her back to the house that first day. She had been so reluctant to return, whatever Zaq’s promises. The procedure hadn’t taken very long, but it had not been easy on Zaq. First Burke had tied Zaq onto his table. Tiran had watched fearfully, wondering if it was dangerous to Zaq to have this implant deactivated. Burke had then taken some kind of shiny, cylindrical probe, which he had pressed against the base of Zaq’s skull and held it there while Zaq had screamed and his body started to shudder violently as if he was having some kind of a seizure. Finally after five long minutes, Burke had removed his probe and Zaq had fallen still and quiet on the table. Tiran had knelt at his side and wiped the sweat from his face. Zaq had opened his eyes, exhausted by the pain, and then had spoken, his voice raspy. “The Oman of the Brotherhood can rot for all eternity!” he had exclaimed. Then he had smiled tiredly at her. “No effort and no pain. It worked.”

  Later, when Zaq had rested, Tiran had wanted to leave again. However, this time it was Burke who convinced them to stay.

  “I really think it would be safer for the two of you to stay with me,” he had counseled, his tone still genial with welcome. “If Othar is looking for you, I can promise you the last place he will look is with me.”

  “Thanks, Burke, but I really think it might be a bit awkward,” explained Zaq politely. Burke had pointedly looked at Tiran, his eyebrows raised.

  “Isn’t there somewhere else we can stay here in Davuune?” Tiran had asked hopefully. “The whole town should be safe enough, right?”

  “I’m sure it would be, but times are hard right now, and my neighbors might not be keen to take in strangers without extra supplies. I have those supplies, but I really would rather that everyone in town didn’t know it yet,” Burke admitted, his voice slightly less jovial. “What you really need, my dear young lady, is to get off planet,” he continued, his face bright again. “It’s a pity I don’t have my smuggling ship anymore. We could have taken care of this in a flash! Dropped you back on Zenith, eh?”

  “If only you could,” Tiran had responded unhappily. “At least I could go stay with my grandparents.” Zaq glanced sideways at her, an unfathomable look on his face. She wondered if he disapproved.

  Burke’s forehead creased. “Can’t think of a way to manage it without making things worse though,” he said finally. “Still, you never know what time will bring. I promise that you and Erron won’t ever have to stay in the same room!” He had laughed at that.

  So here she was, lying in bed and brooding about how she was going to make it through another day of avoiding Erron. Zaq spent most of the days working. He had learned that it was possible to get a menial, backbreaking job at the mine. There was very little going on there now. Most of the mine had been closed for many years but there was still some ore being wrung from the rocks. Burke found the idea of hard labor amusing, and Tiran had never seen Erron work very much even as a librarian, but Zaq had jumped at the chance. His wages were terribly low and his days were long, but he said that they would need all the money they could get when they left Burke’s. At night he shared Burke’s guest room with Erron, and Tiran secretly wondered what the two men thought of each other. She couldn’t imagine two more different personalities.

  Finally she dragged herself from bed and dressed slowly. It was going to be another long day for sure. On the way to the bathroom, she hurried past Erron’s open door and was surprised to hear Zaq’s voice. It must be Zaq’s rest day. She stopped involuntarily when she heard her name.

  “Tiran never had any idea who you were?” Zaq was asking.

  “No,” Erron answered languidly. “Why should she? We had never met before, and she is not naturally suspicious.”

  “But . . .” Zaq hesitated for a moment. “I don’t understand . . . if you wanted revenge so badly, why didn’t you just kill her? Or turn her over to the Brotherhood?” Tiran held her breath. Since learning Markus’ true identity she had won
dered the same thing.

  Erron laughed sourly. “Look, revenge was the steward’s goal. I helped him for the money. I was well paid, at least for the first half. In return, he told me I could keep Tiran. She was a nice enough little girl, so I did not object.” Tiran flinched. So that was what he really thought of her.

  “I still don’t understand. The Oman would never have given Oanni permission to let Tiran go. He wants the Bruche line exterminated.” Zaq’s voice faltered a bit. “You just can’t go against his orders.”

  “You did,” Erron refuted pointedly. “Oanni had a strong mind. I think it was his own way of defying the Oman.”

  “But why did you leave her alone in Kruundin City then?” Tiran could hear the edge in Zaq’s voice. It warmed her to know that he cared, even if Erron hadn’t.

  “I went to see a well-connected friend to see if he could pretend to marry us. At his place, he told me that on the news they were reporting that the girl had been kidnapped. I had no desire to have the CPF swooping after me so I decided it was not worth the risk and I did not go back. Within a few days, I heard that the Oman was hunting me also for not turning her over. So I came to Burke’s. We go back a long way.” Erron fell silent.

  “You didn’t care what happened to her,” Zaq stated quietly.

  “Like I said, I thought she was a nice kid. I just figured she would comm her daddy, he would come take her away, and there would be no harm done,” Erron explained blandly. The room was silent. Tiran returned to life and continued on to the bathroom. She didn’t want them to see her, and she was afraid one of them would come walking out of the room at any second.

  Later, she sat alone on the porch thinking about the things that Erron had told Zaq. It was hard to believe, but maybe Erron wasn’t as much of a monster as she thought. He had been lying to her all that time, but he could have turned her over to the Brotherhood and didn’t. That was something. Still, he must have known about the plans to kill her mother and done nothing.