She fumbled mentally to work harder and faster, to get some idea of what was happening.
The Grihan in charge seemed to have known she could sing. He had obviously been gambling on swaying the other prisoners to come and help him. And that meant he knew a lot more about her than she did about him. And surely, that was impossible?
The sheer mix of aliens overturned the idea she'd built up of how things worked from observing the Tecran. Especially after all the muttering about the Grih she'd heard from her Tecran guards. She'd had the sense this world was very much delineated by racial groups.
Although, now she looked properly, she couldn't see a single Tecran amongst the prisoners. It occurred to her that if the Krik had dealt with every Tecran they'd come across the way Toloco had dealt with her guards, that would make a twisted kind of sense. They weren't here because they were all dead.
It looked like the enemies of her enemy were legion.
The Grihan leader didn't turn at the golden woman's words, but he did address those who'd joined them. “I am Captain Kalor of Grih Battle Center, assigned to the United Council Investigative Unit, and I thank you for your help.”
Imogen tried to work out what he was talking about, but whatever the United Council Investigative Unit was, it impressed most of the other prisoners.
The Grih who'd come across seemed relieved, and most of the others, who were obviously not as big fans of live rock opera as the Grih were, edged closer to Captain Kalor and his group, leaving the giant and his crew of three isolated.
“Battle Center and the United Council?” The giant spat the words in disgust. He shared a look with his team.
Imogen couldn't see their eyes, but she got the impression they became more cautious.
The Grihan member of the crew gave a nod. “Right uniform.”
“So what does the United Council want with her?” The giant tried to get a better look at Imogen, but the group around her shifted again to block her from view entirely.
“We protect all advanced sentients, music-makers or not. I'm more interested in what you wanted with her. You attacked very quickly.” The captain shifted with the moving crowds to keep his opponent in sight.
The giant said nothing, and they stared at one another until eventually he stepped back, taking his team into the shadows against the far wall again.
The small group were very much on their own now.
Whatever was going on, she'd suddenly gone from prisoner to protected advanced sentient and revered music-maker.
Nice work if you could get it.
The captain turned to face her.
“Fiona Russell?” he asked.
Imogen stared at him for a long, long time.
Ooookay. This really wasn't funny anymore.
Chapter 6
The Earth woman's face went pale, and after staring at Cam for longer than was polite, she stumbled back a step. “Fiona Russell?”
“You aren't she?” Olan asked, resting a hand on her shoulder to steady her.
She started as the Fitalian touched her, then shook her head. “No.”
“Who are you, then?” Cam tried to keep his tone even, but if this wasn't Fiona Russell, then a third Earth woman had been taken from her home.
He knew the Tecran had sworn Rose McKenzie's abduction had been a terrible breach by a scientist who had lost sight of the rules, a once-off aberration. The claim from Grihan captain Hal Vakeri that he'd found a second woman was explosive enough, but if Cam had found a third . . . He felt the prickle along his arms and the back of his neck as the significance of this woman's existence became clear.
The Tecran would have no excuses left.
He needed answers from her, but he found himself unwilling to upset her more; an aftereffect of her singing.
He wanted her happy and safe, as did every Grih in the room. He'd manipulated them all to achieve just that outcome. And he would have to put that aside and do his job.
She'd been furious at the way he'd ordered her to sing, and he'd been afraid she would refuse. He'd started planning how he and Pren could take the Vanad and his team right up until she had straightened and opened her mouth.
The two Fitali who'd joined their group had moved forward when things had turned violent, something he'd noted with relief, because with their aid, it would have been an even fight.
Fortunately, it hadn't been necessary. She had sung, and it had had the effect he'd hoped on the Grih in the hold.
There were audio and visual comms of Rose McKenzie singing on the Barrist, the Grihan explorer that had found her, and when he'd watched it, Cam thought it was the loveliest singing he'd ever heard, but it couldn't compare to being in the same room with an Earth music-maker singing a few meters from you.
Even one that looked like she'd like to strangle you with her bare hands.
His lips twitched at the thought.
His half-smile seemed to snap the woman out of her distress.
“My name is Imogen Peters.” Her gaze flicked to Diot, then Olan and Pren. Vraen held himself slightly apart from the rest of the team, as he'd done from the beginning, and she barely glanced at him. “Who are you?”
Cam gave a formal bow. “I am Captain Camlar Kalor, and this is my team.” He introduced each one by name, including Chep and Haru and the fast cruiser flight team, and she relaxed a little.
“Pleased to meet you,” she said, her tone unmistakably sincere.
“You reacted strangely when the captain mentioned Fiona Russell. Why is that?” Diot didn't waste any time.
“Fiona Russell disappeared from a town near where I live. I was driving toward it for a meeting when I was abducted.” She looked as if she was going to say something else, and stopped suddenly, her eyes widening. “Is Rose McKenzie here, too?”
Cam watched everyone's heads come up in surprise.
“Yes,” he said.
She flinched. “Where are they?”
Cam shook his head. “Rose is in another part of Grihan territory. I've never met her, but I've seen visual comms of her. I've never seen Fiona Russell, but she's the reason my team and I are here. We had information she was being held as a prisoner on a Garmman trading vessel.”
Vraen made a sound at that, and everyone looked at him.
He looked down.
Cam kept his gaze on his second-in-command. “Fiona was found by one of my colleagues and we were going to meet with them at Larga Ways, a way station that orbits the planet Balco.”
“Balco?” Her gaze jerked to his, eyes wide.
“That means something to you?” Cam had a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach as he watched Imogen Peter's lips twist into a parody of a smile.
“Until recently, that's where the Tecran were holding me.”
She'd obviously upset the apple cart.
Imogen leaned back against the cold metal wall of the hold, and faced Kalor. With his split lip and her black eye, they were like fighters sizing each other up across the ring.
And then, as the shouting escalated, he turned his laser focus from her, leaving her feeling suddenly bereft, and she crossed her arms over her chest, hugging herself as he tried to get some order from his team.
For a moment, it felt as if he'd seen her, right to her soul. Since she'd been taken, she'd been alternatively exotic, strange, and troublesome, but never Imogen Peters, person in her own right.
The sulky one, Vraen, who'd angled himself away from everyone while Kalor had questioned her, was punctuating every second word with a fist slammed onto his open palm, and Diot and Olan alternated between whispering into their wrists and offering their opinions into the mix.
Pren stood slightly back, watching everything with a considering gaze, and Chep and Haru looked even more dangerous and mysterious than they had before.
The only people who didn't seem to have an opinion were the group Kalor had introduced as the flight crew.
Imogen guessed they were too traumatized to care one way or the other.
“Enough.” Kalor's order was low, but it held an implacable edge, and everyone stopped talking.
“You going to investigate the Balcoans' complicity now, too?” Vraen said bitterly into the silence. “They were holding an Earth woman, as well.”
Kalor's jaw bunched a little. He looked like he was running out of patience with Mr. Surly.
“I don't think the Balcoans knew I was there.” Imogen didn't like what she'd seen of Vraen so far, and Kalor had physically saved her from harm. She was happy to interfere on his behalf a little. “It was a secret base, built underground.”
Everyone focused back on her, Olan more or less holding his wrist under her chin. She guessed the thin silver bracelet she saw was a recording unit.
She glared at him and he took a small step back.
She saw Chep and Haru, who seemed more and more like zen warrior monks, edging a little closer, for the first time forgetting to pretend they weren't interested.
She had initially had the sense they didn't speak Grihan, but now she wasn't so sure.
“Were there any Garmman there?” Vraen asked, a challenge in his tone.
“I don't know who the Garmman are.”
Everyone froze, and she had the sense she'd shown what an outsider she was again. Like when she'd asked Toloco to explain the gel wall.
“How could you?” Diot's voice was soft. “You speak such good Grihan, it's easy to forget you aren't one. There are five members of the United Council, the organization that rules this part of the galaxy. The Grih, like Captain Kalor and Lieutenant Pren. The Bukari, which is what I am. The Fitali, like Olan, Chep and Haru; the Garmman, like Vraen, and the Tecran.”
“What about the Krik? And him.” Imogen jerked her chin toward where the rock man was still lurking, watching them.
“There are other people, like the Krik and the Vanad, and the Balcoans, for that matter, who aren't populous enough, or powerful enough, to be part of the ruling body. They fall either outside the United Council's boundaries, but still have dealings with the member nations, or they fall within the territories of the Council's members. The Balcoans are in Grihan territory. The Vanad are in Garmman territory, whereas the Krik are just outside it, outside the Council's influence.”
“I only saw the Tecran while I was at the facility, but I was kept in a holding area on one of the lower floors. The team who recently took me off Balco weren't my original guards, but they were all Tecran, too.”
“How long were you on Balco?” Pren asked her first question.
“Forty-five days.” Imogen shrugged. “I don't know how long it took to get me there from Earth, that part was a blur in the beginning. And I've been on a small Tecran runner for the last two weeks.”
“You've just arrived?” Diot frowned.
Imogen nodded. “A few minutes before they put me in here.”
Diot and Kalor exchanged a quick, worried look.
“Where are the Tecran who were with you, then?” Kalor asked.
Imogen fought the way her mind went back to the memory of Fri, lying open-eyed and lifeless on the floor. Her throat closed up, and she stuttered, unable to get a single word out.
Kalor's gaze held her own, and she saw the moment he understood, his eyes widening.
“Dead?” he asked softly. “All of them?”
She gave a tight nod. Swallowed hard. “Every single one.”
Chapter 7
A ship full of dead Tecran.
Cam exchanged a quick look with Pren.
When the Grih had come across the first Class 5 in their territory, over two months ago, it had been littered with dead Tecran.
No matter how it was framed——and Battle Center was definitely trying to downplay it——when the thinking system Sazo had thrown off Tecran control, he had left a swathe of Tecran bodies behind him.
As the saying went, once you climbed onto the yurve's back, it was hard to get off without being trampled. The Tecran thought they'd harnessed the power of Fayir's thinking systems without having to deal with the dangers that came with them. The Tecran onboard Sazo had paid for that assumption with their lives.
The Tecran on this Class 5 had most likely gone the same way.
And it seemed that while the Krik were under instructions to round up all the vessels they came across without hurting the crew, they'd been given a green light to kill any Tecran they found.
Cam wondered if the Krik had any idea how close to the edge of danger they were skirting.
Koi knew, he decided.
The Krik leader's expression when he'd spoken to Cam on the UC cruiser had been one of both excitement and dread.
The Krik were gambling a lot on the hope of pulling themselves up onto the same rung of the ladder as the other UC members. If they knew exactly what they were dealing with, they might be more afraid of being shoved off and sent into free fall the moment their usefulness was over.
Pren cleared her throat, and Cam realized everyone was staring at him.
“Do you know where the Tecran were taking you?” Everyone in his team, as well as Chep and Haru, drew closer for Imogen's answer. Even Vraen deigned to be interested.
“I asked them often enough but I don't know if even they knew. It seemed to me they were waiting to be contacted. I don't think they thought we'd be on that runner two days, let alone two weeks.”
The way Imogen spoke Grihan was dangerously like a song. Cam found he had to actively concentrate to get her meaning, rather than simply listen to the rise and fall of her voice.
“Were you held at the facility on your own?” Olan's question provoked an instant reaction from Chep. He went very still. Cam moved his gaze casually over to Haru, and saw she was as focused as her partner.
“No.” There was something infinitely weary in Imogen's voice. “Not by a long way.”
“Who else was there?” Vraen lost his grudging tone for the first time.
“I don't know what they were. Animals from all over. The only one left from Earth when they put me on the runner was a bird, but there were animals and birds from other planets.” She paused. “Enough to give the Tecran a lot of entertainment.”
“Entertainment?” Cam frowned.
“I think they were done with them by the time they got to Balco. They needed the room in this place for new specimens, I suppose.” Imogen's wave encompassed the Class 5 hold.
Cam cleared his throat. “You've been in this hold before?”
“Well, if not this one, a place just like it. There were glass walls separating us all into cells though. Not like this.” She shrugged. “Then they delivered us to Balco and put us all underground.”
She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, it was like looking into blue flames. “I thought I'd end up having to fight something on Balco, but that never happened.”
“Fight something?” Pren shifted.
“Pit fighting.” Imogen grimaced. “That's how I worked out they were done with us all. They argued for ages over which animals would be the closest matches for each other. It couldn't be too one-sided. Less fun betting that way.”
“I'm trying to understand.” Olan's face wasn't built to frown, but his lips were turned down and he fluttered his hands. “They set animals to fight against each other for entertainment?”
Imogen nodded. “Pit fighting, as I said. It was all they talked about, beside the Grih.” She sent Cam a quick, almost amused look. “That's why I chose to learn Grihan.”
“And you thought you would get a turn?” Diot's hands were moving, too. Restless and agitated. “In this pit?”
Imogen twisted her lips into a wry smile. “I hoped not. They were uncomfortable with my talking to them in their own language. I hoped that would make them think twice about it, anyway. It's hard to put someone in a fight to the death when you've joked with her and told her about your family.”
“The fight was to the death?” Pren sounded shaken from her calm for the first time.
“Yes. As I
said, they were done with us. Or, with the animals that went into the ring, anyway.” Imogen dropped her arms to her sides, and Cam saw her form tight fists. “I never really knew what I was doing there. And I was afraid . . .”
She went silent, and Cam suppressed a shiver, her struggle for calm making him uncomfortable and restless.
“Afraid of what?” Vraen's tone was too sharp.
“There was an animal there, a terrifying animal. It was only brought down a few days before I left, but I thought . . .” She swallowed hard. “I thought they were going to put me in the ring with it.” She straightened and seemed to shake the fear off her. “But they didn't.”
Chep and Haru had gone beyond pretending they didn't understand Grihan, Cam noticed. Their focus on Imogen was complete.
“What did the animal look like?” Olan asked, and Cam saw Chep squeeze the old scientist's upper arm, as if in thanks.
“A blue and white furred primate with six limbs, sharp claws, and teeth, and a spooky intelligence.” Imogen had noticed the Fitalians' interest, and spoke directly to them. “The Tecran called it a grahudi.”
Even some of the Grih standing between them and the Vanad jerked their heads around at that.
The members of Cam's team, even Vraen, looked over at the Fitali. Chep and Haru were absolutely still, but Olan fiddled with the recorder at his wrist, and held it closer to them.
They looked at him in surprise, as if he'd suddenly switched sides and left them exposed.
“How would they have gotten into Fitali territory to steal a grahudi?” Diot spoke directly to Chep.
“We are talking about a Class 5,” Cam said, when neither Chep nor Haru answered. “If they've found new galaxies with advanced sentient life, they could probably steal a grahudi.”
“Did they put the grahudi in the pit while you were there?” Pren asked Imogen, her voice too loud in the silence.
She shook her head. “There was nothing to match it. It would have been over too quickly. That's why I thought they might use me. But either they had never planned to put me in the ring, or they didn't think I'd last long enough.”
Dark Minds (Class 5 Series Book 3) Page 4