The soldier in charge of her guard detail approached Larissa. “Quite a display, female. I won many credits on you.”
Woozy and nauseous, she wondered if she could manage to walk back to the hold. “I’m so happy for you.” Do aliens get human sarcasm? She tottered across the floor toward the door, as a flock of juveniles swarmed into the chamber, presumably to dispose of her recent opponent.
The guard swept her up over his shoulder and lumbered forward. “I don’t have all day for this errand.”
She lapsed in and out of consciousness as they proceeded through the ship. She heard a number of compliments in Shemdylann as she was carried past crew members. Never thought I’d have a Shemdylann fan club. Laughing—even chuckling—hurt too much but at least her soldier’s sense of humor was intact. Next thing she knew, she was inside the slave compartment, being carried to the cage. Dimly, she heard Samell’s voice but was too disoriented to make out the words.
Pete and Donnie D took her from the guard’s careless hold and laid her gently on a mattress as the cage door slammed.
“You put on an astounding exhibition of ad hoc fighting skills,” the captain said. “No one’s ever killed a Shemdylann bare handed.”
“Was a mutant,” she murmured.
“I don’t care, it was incredible.”
“If he wasn’t dead, I’d say I got the worst of it,” she said between gritted teeth.
“Donnie’s a medic, we’ll get him to look you over.” Pete moved aside.
“I insist you let me see her.” Samell’s raised voice carried, and she tried to peer around the hulking sergeant as he gently probed her abdomen.
The Tulavarran was pressed against the cage door, staring at her, his emerald eyes blazing with golden fire. “I can’t believe you’re alive. I prayed to Thuun.”
“Yeah, me too,” she said. “To anyone who was listening.”
“It’s not good, sir,” Donnie was reporting to Pete. “Broken ribs, concussion, she got hit with the poison stinger at least twice, broken arm, maybe internal bleeding. And I’ve got nothing here to help with any of it. We’ll have to ask those alien bastards for medical care for her.”
“The injects I got in the service are fighting the poison,” she said, not sure if anyone was listening to her.
“I have to get to her.” Samell was arguing vehemently. His own people? Pete?
“Sir, I’ve no desire to stop you.” Pete’s voice. “But you might have noticed the cage is locked.”
Samell swore a long string of curses. Larissa moved her head slightly to see him more clearly as he placed his hands on the locking mechanism.
Bartell tried to pull him away. “Our powers don’t work on these devices—you know that. Maybe the humans can move her closer to the bars, and you can reach through.”
Samell shook him off. “Let me concentrate.” He launched into a song reminiscent of the bird song on Cherram Six. His hands emitted a golden glow, gone so fast she wasn’t sure she hadn’t been hallucinating, then there was a loud popping sound, a spray of sparks, and the door slid open.
Samell rushed to her side, falling to his knees beside the thin mattress. Gently, he brushed her hair out of her face and leaned over to kiss her lips. “I thought I was going to watch your death and was totally helpless to help in any way. But now I can take action.”
She caught his hand with her good one. “Don’t waste your energy on me. I’m tough, I’ll heal.”
“You don’t know me at all if you think I’ll sit by and watch you suffer just to conserve my power for unknown future problems. Nothing is as important to me as your life.” Without taking his focus away from her, he said, “I require as much privacy as I can have in this cursed place. Bring me a blanket, a basin and towel, and fresh clothing for her. Immediately.”
Larissa’s recollection of the next hour or so was hazy. She vaguely remembered several Tulavarran women entering the now-open cell and creating a makeshift privacy screen around Samell and her with towels, cloaks, skirts, whatever they could find. Samell took her into his arms and sang, a beautiful melody filling her head and drowning out the ringing and the pain. She nestled against his warmth, breathing deeply of his scent, calmed and comforted. “I’m sorry you had to see me fight.”
He stopped singing to gaze into her eyes. “You were magnificent. However, in my despair and worry, I absorbed each blow you suffered as if the beast struck my own body. Hush now, and let me heal us both.”
As he sang again, she closed her eyes and found herself standing on the dream beach.
Samell was there, watching her carefully.
“You can’t remember I don’t do dresses, can you?” Laughing because she wasn’t in pain any longer, she twirled and let the skirt flare and fly in the sunlight.
“I can’t spare the concentration to provide other clothes right now,” he said. “I’m busy healing your injuries. There was internal bleeding – you would have bled to death by evening.”
“Better than being Kinterow’s unwilling bedmate.” She faced the lavender waves, enjoying the gentle caress of the breeze in her hair.
“He’s on the ship?”
“He came to buy me from the Shemdylann,” she said, surprised at how serene she felt. It was hard to care too much about anything. “I volunteered to be a gladiator instead.”
Samell gave her a gentle hug. “You’re not making much sense, my warrior. Stay here in the dream while I’m healing you—you won’t be bothered by the pain.”
“We have to talk.” Larissa knew there was something, or maybe several things she needed to tell him, but right now her thoughts were hazy and scattered.
“Later, I promise. Enjoy the waves and the birds, and I’ll see you later.”
“Don’t leave me.” She caught at his hand.
“Never.” Samell stared into her eyes, the golden glints in his whirling and sparking. “I’m yours until death and beyond. But I must concentrate fully, and you must rest.”
“All right, if you insist.” She pivoted and strolled down the beach.
Larissa came awake with a start, opening her eyes to find herself staring at the grim, gray walls of the Shemdylann slave hold. She took a deep breath cautiously and moved to sit up.
“Go slowly, my warrior.” Samell was there to provide a strong arm at her back as she wavered.
“How are you?” She leaned into his strength, breathing in his scent and letting herself luxuriate in the closeness. “Don’t tell me you used all your reserves on me.”
“If I had it would have been worth it.”
“Not to them.” Not to me. She hooked her thumb at the crowd of Tulavarrans going about their business in the hold beyond their small space. “Your people need you. They don’t need me. Where exactly are we, by the way? The last thing I remember is the cage.” She stared at him. “You blasted the door open?”
A pleased expression on his face, Samell nodded. “I don’t think I can exhaust the power Moratiu gave me. It replenishes itself faster the more I use it.” He raised a hand. “Yes, my ever cautious warrior, I promise not to be profligate and reckless. But healing you was my most essential task. As to where we are, after the healing, I had you moved here, to the private corner Bartell insisted on establishing for me. I certainly wasn’t going to leave you in the cage.”
“We need to talk. I overheard a few alarming things while I was with the Shemdylann captain and his officers. Apparently the Mawreg themselves ordered the removal of all Tulavarrans from Sectors space.”
“But why? Why after all the effort the overlords apparently made to have my people kidnapped and enslaved there?”
“I have a feeling it might have to do with the Combine arrests, but I’m not sure. The critical thing is the Mawreg ordered you all to be killed, once you were in one place on this ship and had been accounted for.”
Samell rocked back, frowning.
She kept talking. “I don’t know the reason behind the decree but the only thing keeping all of
us alive is the captain’s greed. He carried out the new raid on your planet right before the new orders from the Mawreg changed the operating rules. He’s pissed at not being allowed to profit. He’s debating between carrying out the Mawreg execution order and secretly taking all of you into the Hinterlands to sell you as slaves there.”
“So our survival rests on a thin edge indeed.” Samell glanced in the direction of the door. “I believe I could open the outer portal the same way I did the cage door.”
“But once we were in the ship’s corridors, we’d be easy to trap and subdue. Or kill. Captain Prrx’mart might decide we were too much trouble to keep alive then.”
“I refuse to allow my people to sit here and tamely wait for death or a life of hopeless slavery,” he said. “But our powers don’t work on Shemdylann and even you, invincible warrior that you are, came close to paying with your life to accomplish the death of a single mutant.”
“Yeah, he wasn’t even a full soldier. But I had an idea. Remember when we were on Cherram Six, doing the favor for Moratiu and you got the snake things to leave?”
“A simple repellent song. Why do you ask?”
“What if we’d disturbed a hornets’ nest—if we’d found bugs instead of snakes? Do you have a song for the occasion?”
“Of course.” He furrowed his brow in a puzzled frown. “At a certain point in the crop cycle, farmers call upon the temple for priests and priestesses to come sing the lacile bugs from the grain fields.”
“You don’t use the death song on them?”
“No, of course not. The death song is for enemies, not infestations of pests—” Staring at her wide-eyed, he stopped in mid-sentence.
Larissa pointed her index finger at him and clicked her tongue. “Got it in one. The Shemdylann are sentient enemies of the worst sort, so of course your people defaulted to the strongest weapon you had against other beings of high intelligence. But the aliens are also a lot like insects. The thing I killed was a more primitive insectoid form, which gave me the kernel of an idea. Then I watched a group of juveniles swarming like a bunch of sand weevils back home, and I knew—this has to be the answer. What if you and all the others here with power sang the bug repellent song? Could you create an urge in the Shemdylann, in the big bad bugs, to be elsewhere?”
He nodded slowly. “In theory. No one has ever tried this, to my knowledge, but the logic seems sound. Just because the Shemdylann are of a higher order of intelligence doesn’t negate their biology.”
“Exactly. There’s no way to test the idea first. You’d have to make them desperate to be away from this ship, so lost in mindless terror they open the air locks and flee into space. And forget to space us in their panic. Can you create overwhelming terror?”
“And then what? We’d be floating in space on this ship, in enemy territory, I believe you said.”
“Pete McQueen has had training on flying a Shemdylann ship. Now granted it was a long time ago, but he can probably at least get us moving in the right direction and maintain life support. I have an idea about calling for help. So you and your people sing the enemy into abandoning ship, then we take over the empty bridge.”
“Can the Shemdylann survive in space?”
She shook her head. “No idea. I doubt it. But even if they can, they won’t be able to get back aboard. What do you say? Are we a go?” She held out her hand.
Firmly he shook it before gathering her in for a hug and an exuberant kiss. “You give me hope, my warrior.”
“We’d better launch Operation Bug Repellent as soon as we can. There’s no telling when the captain might decide he can’t risk the Mawreg getting mad at him. He could hit the kill switch any time now.”
Samell left her and walked to the edge of the informal tent constructed for his ‘private’ quarters. He gave rapid orders to whoever was waiting outside. “Summon Bartell and the other leaders. I’ll need Captain McQueen and his sergeant as well.”
“Thanks for the tender loving care,” Larissa said when he walked back and enveloped her in a hug. “I appreciate the sponge bath, not that I remember any of it, and the new clothes.”
“Not a dress,” he pointed out with raised eyebrows and a smile. “See, I do listen. Although my priestesses were scandalized. Women on Tulavarra don’t ordinarily wear pants.”
“My sympathy to them then.” She grinned.
He stroked her hair. “You’ve convinced me over the time we’ve been together. As long as I’m in charge of my people, each citizen can wear whatever he or she likes, and I’ll give them my full support on their choice. There are much more important matters at stake here than obsolete dress codes.”
“In appreciation of your newly enlightened attitude, I might surprise you and wear a damn dress someday. In real life, not in the dream.”
“Actually,” he said with a wicked gleam in his eyes, “I prefer you with no clothing at all—”
She gave him a gentle shove. “No time for indulging ourselves, not with everyone coming to help plan the uprising. Hold the thought for later.”
The war council was short. Samell had Larissa explain her idea and made it clear he wouldn’t tolerate any dissent or doubt. Certainly no one else raised any suggestions. “We have no other chance, no other option,” he said when she finished.
“And we need to do this now.” Larissa glanced around the circle. “Samell blows the door. Peter, the guys, and I go out first, then your singers. You people put the repellent tune on repeat until every last bug has been cleared from the ship.”
Bartell cleared his throat. “And if it doesn’t work? Then what?”
“Then we fight, make a last stand, because believe me, it’s better to die a clean death in combat than to be slaughtered in this cell by the Shemdylann or sold as slaves in the Hinterland. Or blown out an airlock.” Larissa was uncompromising.
“It’s a blessing the enemy only wanted able bodied adults, didn’t snatch children, or the elderly,” said Kliderr. “They’d stand no chance in this situation.”
Samell stood. “Gather those who possess the power to any degree at the portal now. Tell them to be prepared to commence the first verse of the primary crop protection song on my cue. Do a fast refresher for anyone from the cities who may not have sung it often or not know it at all. May Thuun be with us today, as he was on the evening he first sent my Warrior to meet me. ”
“I hate to be the one to raise a potential problem,” Pete said, “But do the Shemdylann have to hear the song to be stampeded?” He went on as the group’s attention focused on him. “This is a big ship, not the largest the Shemdylann have by any means, but if the enemy soldiers and juveniles have to actually hear the choir sing, we’re going to be required to traipse through well defended areas. And the bastards at the further end of the vessel will have time to take precautions and fight back. Now we can gather weapons on the way, but I’m thinking we’d better be prepared to take heavy casualties.”
“When the song is sung ordinarily,” Samell said, “the celebrants stand in the center of the field, but the acreage is immense, so I doubt every insect actually hears the sounds. For that matter, when the death song is sung, the effect can spread far beyond the immediate vicinity, if enough powerful, trained priests and priestesses are involved. I believe we can affect the entire ship from here.”
“We need to remember to cast the power wide,” Bartell said, obviously making a mental note. “Another instruction for the singers.”
“And be prepared to fight,” Larissa added. “We need to come up with whatever weapons we can for the first assault. I saw pipes we could probably make into spears, a few jagged edge pieces we can pry loose and use for crude knives. Can you navigate to the bridge from here?” she asked Pete.
“Pretty sure. The layout is standard, and I’ve done various operations, shall we say, on other Shemdylann craft.” He tapped his skull. “Got the layout here. Never flew one, though, but I’m eager to try.”
Samell and his assistants ga
thered all the singers of power in a large group beside the door and, after a blessing by Samell, Bartell led them in the beginning bars, where power would be called and gathered, to be deployed against the pests. Samell prepared to disrupt the door circuits with his newly enhanced power, while Larissa, Pete and the other humans stood ready to burst through and distract any guards long enough for the song to ramp up.
Larissa eyed the makeshift spear in her hand, throwing it up in the air and catching it one handed. “Wish I’d had this in my last battle. A real advance in tech from blunt jousting sticks. Of course a blaster would be better.”
“If this unusual plan works, there should be plenty of abandoned weapons for us to choose from,” Pete said, hefting his own crude knife.
Samell nodded. “I’m ready to open the door.”
A moment later there was a fat spark of an explosion and the door slid aside. Larissa rushed out right behind Pete, the other men on her heels, and was relieved to find only a pair of confused juveniles standing guard, who were quickly dispatched. Even with the crude weapons available, she and her allies were more than a match for the immature form of the Shemdylann life cycle. The choir filed into the corridor, voices rising in a beautiful harmony, compelling in its intricacy.
But will it work against big alien bugs? She eyed her newly acquired small Shemdylann energy weapon and pondered how helpful it would be against a mature alien. Not very. The soldiers don’t trust their juveniles.
Donnie D tapped Larissa on the sleeve and leaned in so his mouth was close to her ear, so she could hear him over the song. “I think I can jury rig the ship’s coms over there to carry this concert.”
“Really?”
“Piece of cake. Sabotage and hacking of alien tech are talents of mine.” The big soldier grinned cockily.
“Go for it.” Larissa figured no matter how well the song worked it had to be better if the aliens could actually hear it.
The Fated Stars Page 13