Alexis Carew: Books 1, 2, and 3

by J. A. Sutherland

  “I was showing Miss Mynatt the fine flechette pistol my uncle purchased for me and …” She shrugged. “… well, I fumbled it and it fell. Struck her foot and discharged.”

  Bowhay nodded. He looked at Dansby then back to Alexis. “And the knee then?”

  Alexis flushed. “Well, you see, when I went to pick it up I was quite distraught at what had happened to Miss Mynatt’s foot. I thought to engage the safety, but I must have …” She closed her eyes unable to believe she was forced to admit to such a thing. “I must have pulled the trigger instead.”

  Bowhay nodded. He looked at Dansby.

  “That’s the way of it, Mister Dansby, sir?”

  Dansby nodded. “Yes. See that the crew knows what happened, and that Anya will be back at her duties shortly.”

  “If you’d like, miss —” Bowhay glanced at Dansby. “— and with yer uncle’s permission, of course, there’s room in the hold if you’d like a bit of practice and training and such. I’m a fair shot and could, well, teach some safe handling and all.”

  Alexis clenched her teeth. “I —”

  “I think that’s an excellent idea, Bowhay,” Dansby said. Alexis glared at him, but he went on. “I knew she was a poor shot — rounds went all over the range when I bought that for her, and all over the corridor during that bit of business aboard the station — but I did think she knew how to handle the bloody things without shooting someone in the foot. Just glad it wasn’t worse.” He grinned. “Yes, why don’t you set up a bit of a range in the hold and see if you can at least get her to hit the target? Might take some time, mind you.”

  Alexis glared at him. She’d have to shoot as poorly as he’d described and accept Bowhay’s instruction just to keep their story plausible.

  “There’s a man at the hatch,” a spacer said, easing his way past Mynatt and into the compartment. “Says he’s a message from some fellow name of Coalson?”

  Twenty-Eight

  “Of course it’s a trap, Mister Dansby … uncle, whatever,” Alexis said. “I’m no fool.”

  Dansby grunted. He took a moment to ease Mynatt’s leg where it rested on a pillow. The three of them were in Dansby’s cabin where he’d ordered Mynatt brought once the flechettes were removed and her wounds dressed.

  Now she reclined on Dansby’s own bunk, her bandaged leg elevated, and, to Alexis’ surprise, Dansby was hovering around her like a mother hen, despite the fact that the injuries were, indeed, minor.

  Once the flechettes were out, it had been seen that Mynatt didn’t even have any broken bones. The tiny darts had simply punctured them cleanly. She’d be in pain for a day or two while things healed, but there was no serious damage.

  Not an hour past I had to draw on him so he’d not shoot her dead. I do not understand these two.

  “Best stick with ‘uncle’ even though it’s just the three of us and Anya knows the truth of it,” Dansby said.

  Alexis nodded.

  “As to whether you’re a fool, well, heeding this Coalson would be a fine sign of one. He’s simply goading you, trying to draw you in.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “A certainty.” Dansby adjusted Mynatt’s cup of grog on the bunkside table, as though to ensure it was within her easy reach. “It was an overturned buggy, you said. What more could he have to say about it?”

  Alexis thought of the short message Coalson’s man had brought. Simply a location and the words:

  Come alone and I’ll give you the truth of the day your father died.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Was there ever any suspicion around it?”

  Alexis shook her head. “Not that I ever heard. I was only … three years of age, I think, when it happened. They’d gone to Port Arthur for a time and their buggy was found on the road back. Too fast into a turn and it had gone off the road and down an embankment.” She shrugged. “Never a hint of anything more to it.”

  “There you have it, then. Nothing more to it and nothing for this Coalson to tell you. He’s simply thrown it out there to reel you in.”

  “But why choose something I’ve no questions about to begin with?”

  “She has a point,” Mynatt said. “Why choose something from so long ago? If he were going to lie about having information, why not use the war? Or piracy? Or something more current?” She reached for her cup, found it moved, and rolled her eyes at Dansby before drinking. “It makes no sense.”

  “It makes perfect sense.” Dansby rose and paced to the far side of the room. “She shows up, Coalson yells ‘buggy accident!’, then shoots her in the head. She dies knowing she was a fool and he has his revenge.” He crossed to the sideboard and poured himself a drink. “It’s exactly what I’d do.” He paused. “Well, I’d have killed you the first time you crossed me, but if you’d managed to maim me as you did him then I’d want you to die knowing you were an utter fool.”

  “Would you pour me one of those?” Alexis waited, thinking, while Dansby did so. Certainly it was a trap. Coalson wanted to kill her, no doubt. But was there some way to get his information without springing it? Or to turn the trap back on him?

  “Eades will not take kindly to your risking yourself on this, either.” Dansby handed her a glass and shook his finger at her. “We’ve his goals to accomplish here, don’t forget.”

  “Eades?” Mynatt asked.

  “Our sponsor in this endeavor. The source of your thousand pounds and not a man you’d like to cross.”

  “There is that,” Mynatt said. “Doesn’t do to leave a paying job for something personal.”

  Alexis drained half the glass, relishing the burn in her mouth and throat. Seeing Coalson again, the firefight, the confrontation with Mynatt, all of it had drained her. She felt numb and wanted to sleep, but Coalson’s message nagged at her. If she left without hearing what he had to say, would she ever have another chance? Was there something about her parents’ death that had been kept hidden from her, or that her grandfather didn’t even know?

  Dansby and Mynatt were right, though, that their task from Eades was more important. Did she even have the right to jeopardize it for personal satisfaction? And how to convince the two of them if she did? She’d need their help, to be sure.

  She drained the rest of the glass and held it out to Dansby. No, they should just sail away, forget about Coalson and resume their mission as though they’d never encountered him …

  No … no that won’t work at all, now will it?

  “We have to deal with Coalson,” she said. “There’s nothing else for it.” She saw that she had Dansby’s and Mynatt’s full attention. “We’re to just sail away and think he’ll leave it at that? No, he’ll dog our heels every step of the way and what then? Have him appear on some other station, a proper Hanoverese one, when we need to be secret and unnoticed?”

  “It’s your heels he’s after.”

  “And we’re all in the same footsteps for the duration, aren’t we? He hates me — if he’s access to a ship, and I think he must, then he’ll be after us.”

  “We can outsail him. Easily.”

  Alexis crossed her arms. “There’s money in it.”

  Dansby raised an eyebrow.

  “How much?” Mynatt asked. “And from where?”

  “Had the Navy not assumed Coalson was killed by Merlin’s broadside, there’d be a price on his head. Piracy, smuggling, murder, and his illicit trade in gallenium — how much do you think the bounty would be?”

  “Five hundred pounds at least,” Mynatt said, giving Dansby a speculative look.

  “More,” he said. “The gallenium with a war on?” He looked at Alexis. “The war was on when this occurred?”

  Alexis nodded. “We had yet to hear of it on Dalthus, but yes.”

  Dansby smiled. “Profiteering, possibly trading with the enemy — Hanover’s a large buyer on the black markets. A thousand just for that.” His smile fell and he sat on the edge of the bunk. “But he was assumed dead and there’s no bounty on offer, so how
do you get by that? And how am I to be seen to collect it? Who’d trust me thereafter? And how is it all to work? There’s no guarantee such a bounty’d be issued for him dead or alive, and if it’s issued for him only alive then we’d have to turn him over to the Navy. How are we to do that in the middle of —”

  Alexis raised her hand to stop him.

  Dansby frowned. “I don’t think —”

  Alexis cut him off again. “The Navy represents the Crown on distant stations, if there’s no civil authority,” Alexis said. “This station is quite distant, I think, and I’ve seen no magistrate for some time.” She shrugged. “I am, after all is said and done, a Naval officer.”

  “You plan to claim you represent the Crown in this?” Mynatt asked. “We take Coalson and then … what? Turn him over to you as the Crown’s representative? And you’ll do what with him? We can’t keep him aboard the entire trip.”

  “He receives the same treatment he would have, had Merlin plucked him from space in Dalthus,” Alexis said.

  Mynatt drew in a sharp breath. “You plan to hang him? Just like that?”

  “That’s a dangerous game, Carew,” Dansby said. “If your Navy decides you didn’t have that power. Usurping the Crown’s authority is a hanging offense itself.”

  “It provides at least some legal fiction,” Alexis said, “and gets us on our way to finish this mission without worrying about Coalson forever at our heels. Unless you’d like to rid us of him without attempting to collect a bounty?”

  “Not now that you’ve mentioned it, no,” Dansby said. “Five hundred pounds or more certainly wouldn’t go amiss.” He grinned. “And it’s you who’ll face the consequences if your superiors disagree, not us. Of course there’s a chance we won’t be paid, either.”

  “There’s a risk they’ll not pay,” Alexis admitted. “As for the other, rely on Eades for secrecy and I’ll rely on him to smooth things over — I can’t believe I said that, but I suspect he’ll not want this mission known, still, so it must be a small matter to keep the award to you secret and gloss over any imperfections in my authority.”

  Mynatt touched Dansby’s hand and they shared a look.

  “She’s right about having to deal with him, even if there’s a chance there’s no profit in it.”

  “I still find your motives suspect,” Dansby said to Alexis. “It’s personal for you more than anything.”

  “I have little memory of my parents, Mister Dansby, and those mostly from images and tales, I suspect. My earliest genuine recollection is sitting in my grandfather’s lap and seeing his tear-covered face as he tried to explain to me that my mother and father were never coming home.” She nodded. “If Coalson knows aught of that, then it is quite personal.”

  Dansby took their glasses and filled them, remaining silent until he’d returned to the bunk and passed them out.

  “All right then,” he said. “And what’s your plan to deal with him and remain alive yourself?”

  “That’s where my serpent comes in.” Alexis raised her glass to him in mock toast. “Surely you’re not prepared to admit that Daviel Coalson is cleverer than you?”

  Twenty-Nine

  Alexis’ back itched as she entered the pub. It was a different one from where she’d first seen Coalson, but no less seedy and disreputable. She felt vulnerable and exposed despite their plan.

  Seven plans, actually, for Dansby wasn’t one to make assumptions. They’d thought out every possible move of Coalson’s and had contingencies for all.

  Save the one where he shoots me in the head immediately. That we’ve no plan for.

  It was a risk, but she felt she knew Daviel Coalson well enough to be confident he’d wish to gloat for a time first.

  There were few patrons in the pub and she saw Coalson immediately. He sat at the rear of the compartment with his back to the bulkhead. There were, perhaps, a half dozen other patrons and she suspected they were all his men.

  One of them rose to block her path and gestured.

  “Arms up,” he said. “I’m ter search yer.”

  Alexis held her hands out to her sides and the man ran his hands over her, lingering in places that made her want to drive a knee into him. As his hands ran over her left arm, near the cuff where her ship’s jumpsuit was frayed, she fought the urge to tense. Most of the plans relied on what Dansby and his crew did, but one relied on what was concealed in that cuff. He moved on, though, and did find the hidden pocket at the small of her back, making her glad she’d left the flechette pistol behind. Finally he nodded and backed out of her way.

  She made her way to Coalson’s table and sat. He had a glass of wine before him, bottle on the table, and an empty glass near where she sat. Up close his injuries were worse than she’d thought. The right half of his face was deeply scarred and the prosthetic he wore seemed to start above the elbow.

  “I’m surprised you had the courage to come, Carew.”

  “Let’s get on with it, shall we?”

  Coalson pulled his tablet from a pocket and set it on the table. “Oh, do allow me my moment, yes? I plan to record this and send it to your grandfather along with the news of your death. It will be a last, fitting bit of my family’s revenge against him.”

  Alexis shook her head sadly. She could understand if Coalson wanted revenge against her — she’d been aboard Merlin when his schemes were discovered and she’d given the order to fire into his boat. She’d caused his gruesome injuries, and yet he was still, after all that, fixated on revenge against her grandfather.

  By all accounts his father, Rashae Coalson, had been mad. A paranoid well past the point of delusion. When the colonists to Dalthus were choosing lots, the properties they’d own based on their shares in the colony, Alexis’ grandfather had by chance chosen several that Rashae wanted. Instead of bad luck, Rashae Coalson had seen it as a plot — that her grandfather, Denholm, had some knowledge of what Rashae wanted and had chosen specifically to thwart him.

  Rashae had hated Denholm until the day he died, then passed that hatred, irrational though it was, on to his sons.

  Alexis scratched her left wrist, transferring the capsule in her cuff to her hand, then took the wine bottle from the table and poured herself a glass. She was relieved to find it was a new bottle and let the capsule fall into it. She raised her glass and drank.

  “No protestations, Carew? No going on about how your grandfather was innocent and misunderstood?”

  “I’ve given up trying, Mister Coalson. I cannot convince crazy.”

  Two men entered the pub. They were from Röslein, though Coalson wouldn’t know that. Dansby had brought along almost the entire crew, though not through the main hatch. They’d assumed Coalson would have men watching the ship to see that only Alexis left it, but Dansby had brushed the concern aside.

  “I’m a smuggler, dear niece,” he’d said. “Getting things on and off this ship without notice is a thing I’ve a bit of experience at.”

  Two of Coalson’s men approached the new arrivals and ushered them out, saying that the pub was closed, but they’d planned for that. The men had only to enter so that they could relay information about the layout to Dansby.

  “Station a man outside,” Coalson ordered. “I don’t wish to be interrupted.” He gestured at his face with the prosthetic and scowled. “This is your doing, you know. Firing into my boat.” He clenched the fingers of his prosthetic, grinding them together. “Can’t go to a decent clinic in New London space for fear of being identified — and proper Hanover systems are out, what with the war on.”

  “Any of Merlin’s officers would have fired into your boat. The outcome’s your doing and you have only yourself to blame.”

  “But I blame you.”

  “Of course you would — you’re as mad as your father.”

  “Mad? Mad to see the truth of your family’s vendetta against mine? How else to explain your presence here with the very man I’ve been waiting for?”

  “What —”

 
“Dansby, damn you!” Coalson slammed his prosthetic onto the table. One of his men glanced their way, but then went back to watching the door. “After I recovered, after I got fitted with this —” He held the prosthetic up for her to look at. It was a crude piece of work, all metal without even the semblance of artificial flesh. “The best that could be done in the primitive systems I could safely visit. I’ve been to every pirate haunt and smuggler’s den I could remember since … and everywhere it’s the same answer: If you want to go that deep into Hanover, deep enough for proper medical care, then it’s Avrel Dansby who can get you there and back again.”

  Coalson pointed at her.

  “Weeks I waited on Baikonur for one of his ships, so as to send a message to him and arrange passage. Then word that the man himself was meeting in that bloody pub.” He shook his head, snorting in disbelief. “And who do I see with him? A bloody Carew. And you claim I’m mad? That you’re not pursuing me? No, I’m no more mad than my father was.”

  Alexis remained silent. She could see how such a coincidence might appear, but as Dansby had said, if there was a system where she’d encounter a man like Coalson, it was Baikonur.

  “Rashae, my father, was a great man, Carew. You have no idea. He saw the promise of Dalthus and the gallenium ore in the belt there, arranged to bury the survey report, and founded the colony. In another generation the Coalsons would have been the wealthiest family in the Fringe if you’d not interfered. All my life I lived in his shadow, nothing good enough to please him. But this —” He tapped his tablet and smiled. “— when your grandfather gets this and knows the whole truth, along with the news that the last of his line is dead, then I’ll have surpassed Rashae. I’ll have made our revenge complete.”