The Dragon Circle

by Irene Radford

  “You are not responsible if he dies, Konner,” she called to him as he dove once more.

  “Yes, he is!” exclaimed Hanassa. He jumped up and down on the bank, brandishing his knife toward anyone who tried to enter the water. “Konner O’Hara alone determines if the petti-man lives or dies.”

  Dalleena went under once more. When she could hold her breath no longer, she gave up. Clinging to one of the rocks while gulping long draughts of air, her right palm began to tingle. Then she spotted him.

  “Konner!” She did not wait for him but swam a few strokes to her left, toward the opposite bank. She tugged on a limp white hand drifting above a tree snag.

  Konner splashed right behind her. He plunged deeper.

  Dalleena tried to clear branches and roots. The man beyond the visible arm remained stuck.

  “Help us,” she called to the IMPs. “We can still save him.”

  Hanassa drove his knife into the throat of the first man who tried climbing onto the ford of boulders.

  The remaining IMPs felled him with a concentrated blast of stunners.

  Not enough. Hanassa twitched and moaned, then rolled to his knees and crawled into the underbrush, still alive, still able to menace them all.

  CHAPTER 46

  KAT BIT HER LIP. Did she dare plunge the lander into the bay in pursuit of her brothers? She’d watched Loki and Konner closely when they executed this maneuver. She knew she could duplicate it. Was it worth the risk? Perhaps she should hover and monitor, waiting for them to emerge.

  On the other hand, the lander needed a bath to clean off the growing green gunk.

  “Go after them!” her Marine sergeant urged. “We can shoot them underwater.”

  “Efficiency?” Kat snapped at him.

  He ran numbers through the weapons array. “Saline content of the water will dissipate the focus by twenty-three point six percent.”

  “Intensity?”

  “I’m not a data tech,” the sergeant protested.

  Kat glanced at the data. “Fifteen point zero two percent drop.” Close enough.

  She aimed the craft into the water. She had to slow to a near stall to allow the transition of pressure to hit the hull gradually. Sensors distorted the moment she hit the water.

  The ten men with her were combat troops, not pilots or techs. They understood weapons. She had to fly (drive) the lander and interpret the data.

  “Look for this symbol in the data stream.” She pointed to the glyph that represented the cerama/ metal alloy common to any hull that could be exposed to the high radiation of space or intense heat of reentry. The same specs protected them from water seepage from increasing pressure.

  The sergeant gulped and nodded. “Starboard. Seven point three degrees.”

  “How far ahead?”

  “Sixty meters to firing range. Sixty-five. Seventy.”

  “Damn.”

  “Port. Twenty-five degrees.”

  “Can’t. There’s an outcropping between us.” Kat steered around it. By the time she cleared the pile of jagged rock, she’d lost contact with her quarry. Frantically, she searched the water ahead and her sensors for the tiniest glimpse of a man-made object.

  “Something big on the ocean floor,” the sergeant said excitedly.

  “Show me?”

  He pointed to the sensor screen. Sure enough a long and dense object glowed with the distinctive glyphs of cerama/metal.

  “That’s one of the landers the O’Haras stole.” Disappointed and frustrated, she steered for it. “Suit up, Sergeant. You and two others are going to fly that thing back to base.”

  “I’m no pilot.”

  “You are now. You know how to fire the engines, rock it a bit to get it off the bottom and aim for camp.”

  “How about if I take this one back to base and you maneuver that one off the bottom?”

  “Fine.” Alone, Kat would not have to report to anyone. Alone with a lander, she could take her revenge without the restrictions of GTE military protocol.

  “The controls are yours, Sergeant. I’ll retrieve the lost one.”

  Konner fought the white vortex. His mind swirled ever deeper into the whiteness. He clung to Dalleena’s last words to him. “You are not responsible.”

  His heart wanted to protest. Of course he was responsible. Pettigrew had chased Konner and become a victim of the chase.

  His logical engineer’s brain scoffed.

  A violent, mechanical roar tugged him back toward reality.

  He blinked rapidly. Outlines appeared before his eyes. Then color began to fill in the blank spaces.

  “Dalleena?” he called.

  A muffled grunt.

  “Dalleena, where are you?”

  “Here,” she croaked, less than a meter from him.

  “How do you fare?” He swam the single stroke from his side of the snag. Her face looked pale. Tight lines drew her mouth down and furrowed her brow. He stroked the lines with a delicate finger. They did not fade.

  “I tracked him and lost him,” she muttered.

  “You are not responsible.”

  “Neither are you,” she said. Then she shivered.

  “You’re chilling. We have to get out of the water.”

  “We have to retrieve the body.”

  “Leave it for the IMPs.”

  “Tracker’s code. I have to bring him back to his people for proper burial.”

  “Later.” He tried dragging her away from the snag. She resisted. The glare she shot him should have sizzled his hair. “Very well.”

  Without the press of time to save a living man making his movements clumsy and ineffectual, Konner freed Pettigrew’s trapped foot with only two more dives beneath the surface.

  The mechanical roar became a pulsing weapon. Konner looked shoreward. The IMPs crouched low, weapons drawn and aimed at Rover hovering above them.

  A red electronic charge skimmed the edge of Rover ’s nose.

  “Damn it, Loki, not now!” Konner grabbed two handfuls of moss and tore them free of one of the rocks. The moss that chinked gaps in cabin walls, lined baby diapers, and served as a fire starter. “Stuff this into your ears. Tight. Follow me. And hurry.”

  He pulled himself up onto the ford, pausing only to grab Dalleena’s wrist and haul her up. She choked off a scream.

  Still holding her hand, he ran as fast as he could for the opposite shore.

  “St. Bridget and all the angels, save me!” Kat stared at the sunken lander through the faceplate of her EVA suit. The long vehicle tilted on the edge of a trench. If it had touched down three meters farther, it would have plunged thousands of fathoms deeper, well beyond her reach, possibly beyond hull tolerances.

  “You say something, Lieutenant?” the sergeant asked over the comm unit.

  “Nothing worth repeating. Stay close, Sarge.”

  “Will do. Easier keeping this hunk of bolts in one place than swimming to the surface.”

  “Until the currents get you,” Kat subvocalized. No need scaring the man into doing something stupid.

  Kat half swam/half walked the twenty meters to the rear air lock of the lander. Her heavy magnetic boots dragged her down to the sandy bottom. The water felt as thick as soy pudding. Her suit kept beeping alarms, not liking the pressure she endured at this depth.

  She punched in the codes to work the air lock. The keypad responded sluggishly. She checked her air supply. At this rate she’d be breathing water by the time the chamber pressurized to equal that of the ocean bottom.

  “We’re sinking!”

  “Give her a little juice, Sergeant Brewster,” Kat ordered. She fought to keep her voice calm.

  A blast of water swirled around her. She braced herself against the air lock, desperate to keep her feet. A hasty glance over her shoulder showed the other lander swaying back and forth, creating its own current.

  Her lander rocked in response.

  A flood of curses spilled out of Kat’s mouth.

  Then the air lock
opened. The change in pressure rocked the lander again.

  Kat held her breath, praying it did not tip over into the trench.

  A few rocks back and forth, then it settled into the sand. Was it a fraction farther forward?

  “Don’t go anywhere just yet, Brewster. Gotta make sure I can get this baby off the bottom.” She stepped into the air lock and closed it behind her.

  Agonizing moments passed before the automatic system flushed out the water, replacing it with air. Her wrist monitor looked stuck in the hazard position. Finally, the numbers crept upward showing breathable atmosphere.

  “You still there, Brewster?”

  “Barely. I’m really uncomfortable at these controls, Lieutenant.”

  “Can you fly an air car? Take your girl out on a date back home?”

  “Yeah.” He sounded hesitant.

  “Real hot shot, I bet. Show off for the ladies.”

  “Yeah.” His voice brightened.

  “Same thing. This is just a bigger vessel, a little clumsier, a lot more powerful.”

  “You make it sound easy, Lieutenant.”

  “ ’Cause it is. Now stick around until I give you leave. I want this thing off the bottom before I see your tail in the viewscreen.”

  Kat opened her faceplate. The air tasted stale and salty. She hadn’t much time.

  Edging forward on the slightly tilted deck, she stayed near the outer bulkhead as much as possible, keeping the lander balanced. “So far so good,” she breathed as she neared the cockpit.

  Her third step toward the middle of the craft sent shivers through the hull. She grabbed the nearest handhold, riding out the rocking of the hull. When the lander finally settled, the deck tilted forward at least five additional degrees.

  She gulped and waited.

  “You okay, Kat? That thing looks mighty unstable.”

  “Yeah, Kent. Give me a few more moments. I think I can get to the copilot’s seat without any more disturbance. Firing up the engines could shift the balance.” Before she lost her courage, Kat slid into the nearest chair. She unlocked the legs and scooted along the rail that ran along the deck at the base of the circle of terminals.

  Halfway to the viewscreen she found systems control. A quick check showed the essentials working, navigation, weapons, environmentals, hull integrity, and fuel. When Konner had ditched the vehicle, he’d set it to go through automatic shutdown at some point after launch. The family mechanic couldn’t kill a machine any more than he could kill a king stone.

  Kat fully intended to take advantage of her brother’s weakness.

  She breathed a little easier as she ran through ignition. A comforting rumble answered her commands. Ever conscious of her precarious position, she edged her chair further along the rail. She came to command position and looked out the viewscreen. The trench yawned before her.

  A behemouth swam across her bow. It flipped its tail twice and shot upward. The crush of water pressed downward against the nose of her vessel. She tilted farther forward and slid . . .

  “Sonics, now,” Loki ordered Kim.

  His little brother reached for the red interface on his screen in the upper right-hand corner. Out of the way of any casual brush of his fingers.

  “No. Wait!” Loki stayed the command with a tight grip on Kim’s shoulder. “That’s Konner and Dalleena down there.”

  “IMPs taking aim at them.” Kim hesitated, his index finger one micro above the screen. “I’ve got to down the IMPs.”

  “If Konner and Dalleena fall off the ford, they’ll either drown or break their necks going over the cascade.

  “If the IMPs shoot them, they face the same choice.”

  “Two more femtos and they’ll be on firm ground.”

  “Damn, there’s Taneeo and his knife. He’s going to kill one of the IMPs.” Kim dropped his finger onto the blinking red interface.

  Muffled echoes of the piercing blast of sound penetrated the hull. Annoying. Almost painful.

  The figures below doubled over in pain, hands holding ears, grimaces of agony on their faces.

  Loki could not find Konner among them, or on the opposite bank.

  CHAPTER 47

  KONNER DOVE behind the upended roots of a huge fallen tree. The tangled roots, rocks, and mud, with infant ferns growing in the middle stood between him and Rover. Dalleena crawled behind him, burrowing deep into the leaf litter that collected between the root ball and the tree trunk.

  He mounded more of the plant debris around their heads as he lay on top of her, shielding her head with his body.

  Less than a heartbeat later his ears rang with the harsh pulses of a highly illegal sonic weapon. Every hair on his body felt as if it stood on end. His teeth ached. Tears streamed down his face.

  “I love you, Dalleena,” he whispered, fighting to stay conscious.

  “Loving you can be very dangerous, Stargod Konner O’Hara.”

  Kim counted each IMP as he fell victim to the sonic blast. Taneeo fell last, his wickedly curved knife still clutched in his hand.

  When the traitor’s body stopped twitching, Kim breathed a sigh of relief. But he left his hand upon the sonics trigger.

  The moment Taneeo succumbed, Loki signaled Kim to cease firing.

  The silence after the sonic blast seemed to echo around Kim’s head. Unnatural. Surreal. How much hearing had he lost? How much had the IMPs lost after the full exposure?

  “Where’s Konner?” Loki’s eyes were wide, nearly bulging out of their sockets.

  Kim searched with his eyes and every other sense he could muster. He saw fifteen IMPs and Taneeo all lying unconscious at the edge of the pool. Konner remained elusive.

  “I have to land this thing, quick. We have to find them.” Loki sounded as frantic as Kim felt.

  Loki moved Rover into the center of the clearing and dropped to the ground. Not the smoothest of landings. Kim hardly noticed. They ignored Cyndi, still gagged and bound, slumping against the tree where they’d left her hours ago. The sonics had silenced her, too.

  Together, Kim and Loki pelted down the narrow path toward the creek.

  “Konner!” Kim yelled across the water.

  Taneeo moaned and twitched. Loki pulled a set of force bracelets out of his pocket and slapped them on the little priest. “What’s this?” he held up the missing second beacon. Ungently, he yanked it away from Taneeo, snapping the leather thong that suspended it.

  The strained leather did not leave so much as a mark on the traitor. Loki felt along the man’s neck.

  “St. Bridget! Hide toughening, exoskeleton forming. He’s turning into a dragon. Just like Hanassa.”

  Kim examined the man’s neck and torso. His fingers met hard cartilage becoming as dense as bone.

  “We’ll have to make another trip back to the volcano and destroy that beacon, too,” Kim muttered.

  He pulled a length of vine away from the shrub it nearly choked. Viciously, he twisted it into convenient lengths, ignoring how it looped back upon his hands and arms, trying to snare him. Bloody welts appeared beneath its thorns. Devil’s vine the locals called it, with good reason.

  He used it to bind the wrists and ankles of all of the IMPs. The thorny weed gouged any skin it contacted, wrapping easily where Kim guided it. If one believed the locals, the plant was almost sentient. Kim had a hard time keeping it from tangling his own hands. The IMPs would not break free easily.

  “Konner!” Loki called again.

  “Here,” came a strangled voice.

  “Can you handle these guys?” Loki asked.

  Kim nodded grimly. “We can dump them a few kilometers from their camp after dark. Make them walk back.” He twisted a length of vine securely on the last of the IMPs. Then he yanked off their boots. All fifteen of them began to stir and moan.

  Loki leaped from slippery rock to jagged boulder across the ford without care for his own bare feet.

  He landed on the opposite muddy creek bank clumsily, sliding to his knees. Irythros had b
een digging here and left a mess. Desperate to find his brother, he regained his footing with only two backward slides toward the water. Behind him he heard the groans of recovering IMPs. Ahead of him, only silence.

  “Konner!” he yelled again.

  Was that a soft whimper ahead and to his right?

  “Konner, get your sorry ass out of whatever hole you crawled into.”

  “Do we have to?” The voice was weak. No, soft. Like an intimate whisper.

  “Where are you?” Loki began peering under bushes and around the massive root ball of a fallen forest giant.

  “Ow.” Konner’s protest was followed by a soft, feminine giggle. “Get off my foot, Loki.”

  Loki looked closer at the mound of leaf litter and plant debris filling the triangle between the root ball and the place where the tree trunk met the ground. He found a foot. Big and callused. Konner. Then a second foot, smaller and booted. Dalleena.

  “Do I need to leave you two alone? If so, then make it quick. We’ve got a clearing full of IMPs and our sister on the way in a lander.”

  “Coming,” Konner said. He sighed heavily. “Dalleena and I have the rest of our lives to be together.”

  “Well, I’m glad that’s settled.” Loki’s sigh sounded relieved, as if he’d been waiting a long time for Konner to find a life mate.

  “How did you manage?” Loki asked. He spoke louder than normal and mouthed his words carefully.

  Konner pulled the wads of moss out of his ears. Dalleena did the same. “I’ll have to analyze this more thoroughly. It does more than fill chinks in the cabins and insulate against the cold.”

  “It lines baby diapers, too. Quite absorbent,” Dalleena added with a glint of mischief in her eyes.

  Konner kissed her again, needing to linger. Other matters pressed upon his conscience.

  “I have to activate the confusion field before Kat arrives.” Konner crawled out from his hidey-hole, followed closely by Dalleena. He kissed her palm the moment she stood upright, then captured her hand in both of his. He did not want to break the contact, as if their skin had bonded as well as their hearts and minds.