Without a Front

by Fletcher DeLancey

  At her desk, she read the ID and reached out to accept the call. “It’s Chief Counselor Aldirk. He must be calling for you.”

  “Wait!”

  She turned in surprise.

  “I don’t want to talk to him. He shouldn’t even know I’m here. Dammit, Micah’s having me followed even in the State Park.”

  Lanaril abandoned the vidcom and retook her seat. “Colonel Micah is having you followed? Why?”

  “Nothing I want to talk about. Lanaril…I just need a few ticks in a quiet place where no one is throwing more knives at me. Can you give me that?”

  “Of course I can.” Lanaril picked up her shannel cup and took a sip. “Do you want total quiet, or can I tell you about something that made me laugh this morning?”

  “People still laugh in the State Park?” Andira shook her head. “I hardly remember how.”

  “Then let me tell you a story, and we’ll see if it comes back to you.”

  CHAPTER 4

  The Lancer is lost

  Chief Counselor Sunsa Aldirk sighed as he terminated the call. “I’m sorry,” he told his guest. “She’s not there either. Lead Templar Satran says she hasn’t seen her since the Voloth asylum vote two ninedays ago.”

  “This is intolerable.” Colonel Micah’s stubby gray hair seemed to bristle even more than usual and his forehead ridges were red with annoyance. “It’s impossible for me to protect her when the information I am given is incorrect. This is the ninth time this moon. And it was six times last moon. It’s getting worse!” His chair gave an alarming groan as he abruptly stood.

  Aldirk held his breath; that chair was six generations old. Like most warriors, Colonel Micah did not understand the value of such things, and Aldirk was always on edge until the man left his office. He was like a beast of the field, a little too big for any room.

  Micah loomed over the desk, resting his knuckles on it. “For two moons your schedule has been remarkably inconsistent with the Lancer’s activities. How am I supposed to do my duty when you’re not doing yours?”

  “I assure you that my schedule concurs with Lancer Tal’s,” Aldirk said evenly. “It has never been my intention to mislead you.”

  “So you’re saying it’s her intention to mislead me?”

  “That’s not for either of us to say. But I would caution you to consider your words and your emotions a little more carefully.” He paused. “And perhaps consider the fact that she’s not wearing her wristcom.”

  Micah’s eyes narrowed. “I’m well aware she’s not wearing her wristcom. If I could speak with her directly, do you think I’d be here asking you to call her? I do not crave your company that badly. What I do want is information. What is going on? Your schedule is incorrect, Tal drops out of contact, and I’m reduced to posting my warriors around the base and the State Park like Fahla-damned enforcement officers, trying to catch her when she leaves. And still she manages to get through!”

  “Then perhaps your warriors should be better trained,” Aldirk said before he could stop himself.

  “My warriors are perfectly well trained. And if you would allocate another hundred or so to my detail, I’m certain I could catch the Lancer no matter where or when she crosses the border. But twenty warriors aren’t enough to guard the entire perimeter, nor should they be required to do so.” He pushed off the desk, his heavy ring making a scraping sound. “I am not a babysitter! And neither are my Guards.”

  Aldirk tried not to cringe at the scratch that he was sure had just been gouged into his desk, which was even older than the chair.

  “I give you precisely what I am given,” he said. “If that is insufficient for you to do your duty, then perhaps you should resign in favor of someone who can do the job.”

  “If anyone should resign, it’s you for your pitiful performance. You’re the gatekeeper to the Lancer, and you don’t even know where she is.”

  “Neither do you!” Aldirk regretted his loss of control almost before the words were out of his mouth, but it was too late.

  Micah smiled. “Ah, but I can find her,” he said smugly. “Even though that is not my job.”

  “Fine. If you find her, perhaps you might remind her that she has an appointment with Chief Kameha at mid-two.”

  “Certainly, Counselor. I’m always happy to do your job for you.” Colonel Micah walked out with a heavy step and banged the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 5

  Ambush

  Tal sensed the ambush just before she rounded the curve. Veering off the trail, she leaped over a log and slowed to a walk, controlling her breathing with some effort as she silently padded over the soft ground. For two moons she had slipped his grasp, but Micah had found her at last. He must have put a tracker on her personal transport.

  And now he was planning to teach her a lesson, it seemed. Well, they would see who ambushed whom. She had spent half her life under his tutelage, and he had taught her well, but sometimes he forgot that she was no longer his trainee.

  She scanned the woods for signs of the ambush. Micah’s greatest disadvantage was his weak front; she could pinpoint him by the emotions alone. For a moment she felt a twinge of guilt, knowing she was the reason for his anger, but it soon vanished under the sense of competition.

  A broad tree made an excellent shield as she stopped to examine a spot just ahead. Micah was there, though well concealed. She couldn’t see him, but she could feel his anticipation as he watched the trail, waiting for her to come through.

  Keeping a rigid front on her emotions, she slipped over to another tree, then crept to a third. She was one of the strongest empaths on the planet, and her gift had required her to learn an equally strong control. Micah would have no idea she was near until it was too late.

  She never saw the trip line. Focused on Micah’s emotions, she had forgotten that he sometimes set an ambush within an ambush.

  The immobilizer was a forceful reminder.

  Her body dropped like a stone, every muscle frozen. Immobilizers employed dampening fields to counteract the electrical signals of the nervous system, rendering a victim paralyzed but still conscious. Micah had used a live model, which allowed the heart and lungs to continue operating. Had he used a terminal model, she would be dying right now. As it was, she was helpless, unable even to blink or move her eyes. But far worse than her physical helplessness was the loss of her empathic senses. She was utterly cut off and more blind than if she had merely lost her eyesight.

  Footsteps crunched through the undergrowth; whoever was approaching was taking no care to hide his presence. She assumed it was Micah, but without her empathic senses it was impossible to tell. She waited, vacillating between fury and a growing alarm. If this was some sort of extremely ill-considered prank, Micah was about to get a reminder of what could happen when she unleashed her temper. But if it wasn’t…

  She couldn’t even consider it.

  After half an eternity, the footsteps drew near enough for a shadow to fall across her field of vision. Then Micah stood there, looking down at her. She stared back, trying to discern his intentions from his body language and expression, but he was giving her no hints—until he unclipped his disruptor and slowly raised it to aim directly at her heart.

  She watched in disbelief, her mind nearly as stunned as her body. Not Micah! Fahla, not him of all Alseans!

  But there he stood, one twitch of a finger away from blowing her chest open.

  She strained against the blanket thrown over her senses, desperate to understand whether this was real or not. Surely not; why would he use the live immobilizer if he wanted to kill her?

  Unless…maybe he wanted her to see her assassin before she died. To know just how blind she had been.

  Her mind raced over the possibilities as to who might have ordered her death. There were a disturbingly large number of them. Besides the usual pretenders jostling for pol
itical position, she had made enemies when she bypassed both the High Council and the main Council to break Fahla’s covenant. Four moons later, the voices calling her a war criminal had not gone away. Granting amnesty to the same Voloth soldiers who had killed so many Alseans hadn’t been a popular decision either. Aldirk assured her that the agitators were a small, powerless minority not worth her concern—but Aldirk cared only about political dangers, not physical ones.

  And the person in charge of her physical safety was the same one who was currently threatening it.

  Micah watched her, his expression giving nothing away, and Tal thought it rather incongruous that she should be so aware of the birdsong at a time like this. The forest was ringing with it as birds of several species voiced their existence, their territory, their suitability as mates. Life was in motion, all around them, and death was simply one more part of that cycle. She wished she could close her eyes and listen. A sense of calm flowed through her, and she felt ready for what came next. If she had to die, at least this was a pleasant place to do it.

  Micah lowered his arm, clipped the disruptor back to his belt, and took a small control pad from his pocket.

  The sudden release of her body was nearly as debilitating as the paralysis. She went limp as a sleeping newborn and blinked repeatedly, grimacing when her lids grated over dry eyes. Finally, she rolled over and pushed herself upright, getting used to movement again as she glared up at her Chief Guardian. Now that the threat had ended, so had her moment of clarity and peace, and Micah’s anger made it worse as it bombarded her still-shaken senses. She couldn’t get her blocks up and didn’t appreciate the feeling of being so out of control.

  “What the shek do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.

  “Showing you what an idiot you are!” Micah shoved the control pad back into his pocket, returning her glare in equal measure. “You think this is some kind of game, slipping your Guards, making me look like a fool? There’s a damned good reason you have Guards, and you of all people should know that. What if I’d been sent by someone else, someone with an eye on your title? You’re not invincible!”

  “Neither am I your trainee! You presume too much on our friendship, Colonel. I am your Lancer, and you’ve just committed a level-four state crime. Are you trying to destroy yourself? Because I’m more than tempted!”

  “Go ahead! Better I should be destroyed than you!”

  Startled, Tal straightened up from her aggressive stance. “What does that mean?”

  “It means you’re choosing a poor path! You don’t care about your safety, you don’t care about your friends, your mind isn’t on your duties. Something is weighing you down, and you’re letting it distract you to the point of danger. Your enemies wait for just this—they’ll strike if they think you’re vulnerable. Whether it’s in the Council or more physically, they will strike. I can’t help you in the Council, but I can out here—or I could if you’d let me do my job. You’re scaring me, and you won’t listen to me. This was the only means I had left to get your attention. And if you want to throw me in the Pit for showing you just how bad it’s gotten, then do it. But remember when you fall that at least one of your friends tried to speak the truth.”

  She stared at him, her own anger forgotten as she realized the extent of the feelings underlying his. Not even before the Battle of Alsea had Micah been this afraid for her.

  “I know I’ve been…distracted lately. But is it really that bad?”

  “It’s really that bad,” he snapped, pointing at her wrist. “Where is your wristcom? How could I warn you if I learned you were being targeted during one of these ill-advised solo runs? How could I tell you if Alsea were under attack from the Voloth?”

  The last question jolted her, and in the ensuing silence she realized that he had every right to question her. She had been too caught up in her selfish need to be alone, too satisfied with her skill at escaping the confines of her title, and she had not looked beyond it to the gravest potential consequences.

  Of the two of them, Micah had far more claim to anger.

  “All right,” she said, turning back toward the trail. “You wanted my attention, you have it. Let’s talk.”

  He took a moment to unwind the trip wire and collect the immobilizer before following her to a fallen log, where they sat together as they had on many a training mission.

  Tal crumbled a piece of decomposing wood in her hand and wondered how she had gotten so far from the simple pleasures that had once been easy for her to find. She was still happiest outside, where rocks and logs and sometimes just the ground served her better than the State Chair she occupied during Council sessions. She hated that chair. It was old and ornate and uncomfortable, built to project power. But here, on a log in the woods, she felt an ease which allowed her to say the last thing Micah expected.

  “I owe you an apology, my friend.”

  “You do? I thought you were ready to demote me to first-cycle Guard.”

  “I was. But I’m not that unwise. I may have made some bad decisions lately, but exiling my most trusted advisor would border on insanity.” She looked over in surprise at the reaction he couldn’t front. “Micah! You haven’t seriously thought that, have you?”

  “Not…seriously. But you have not been behaving like the Andira Tal I know. I’ve never known you to be so careless of your responsibilities, and you won’t tell me anything. You’ve been nothing but a stone wall; what was I supposed to think?”

  “I’m sorry I’ve made your job so difficult. I can only say that it’s been a difficult time for me as well.”

  “I already know that. What I don’t know is why. I thought it might have something to do with the departure of the Caphenon crew, but the timing isn’t right. This all started a moon after they left. Actually, it started when Ambassador Frank arrived, though I couldn’t see the connection. Then he left and it got even worse. I’ve been over every cause I can think of, and still I come up blank. The next thing I know, you’ve vanished again and nobody can find you. If there were any dark hairs left on my head, they’re all silver now.”

  She managed a faint smile. “You didn’t have any left, so don’t blame that on me.”

  “I don’t want to blame you at all. And I would leave you to the little privacy you have were it not for the risks you’ve been taking. As your Chief Guardian and your friend, I’m asking you: What is wrong?”

  There was no escaping it any longer. “Everything,” she said. “Just…everything.” Crumbling another bit of wood, she added, “I never imagined that beating the Voloth would be the easy part.”

  She had pulled out a new chunk when he gently took it from her fingers, crushed it, then opened his hand and let the remains fall to the ground. “War is easy,” he said. “At least, that kind of war, with a clear enemy and a clear objective. You either succeed and live, or you fail and die. There’s nothing in between.”

  “And now it’s all in between and nothing is clear. Micah…I miss it. I miss that time.” She looked up at him, waiting for the judgment, but he nodded.

  “You had the kind of clarity we’re rarely granted. You knew exactly what you had to do and be. There’s no shame in missing that.”

  Relieved at his understanding, she broke up another piece and watched the fragments fall. “For one moment our entire world was united. I hated the reason, but great Goddess above, we were phenomenal. We couldn’t be stopped. I felt like the tip of a spear with all the strength and courage of our entire race behind it, and it was glorious. And now—it’s all politics again. Except worse, because we’re dealing with things we never had to deal with before. Nothing I do is enough, and on top of all the other stupid little battles I’m fighting, they’re calling me a war criminal. I saved this whole damned planet and they call me a war criminal. And then I see a high empath hanging from a tree and I have to wonder if they’re right.”

  He put hi
s hand on hers, stopping her from picking off more wood. “You’re the Lancer. You’re the one who makes the final decisions. That means you’re the one people blame when they need someone to blame.” He ducked his head, catching her lowered gaze. “And you know that. This wouldn’t have bothered you before. Why is it bothering you now?”

  Tal looked away, her attention caught by a pair of birds engaged in winter courtship. Grateful for any distraction, she watched as the female sat nonchalantly on a branch, ignoring the male, who fluttered around her. He spread his wings and tail, singing in an energetic display of his attributes, but the female seemed uninterested. He was too early.

  “When the Gaians left, I lost something,” she began, her eyes on the birds. “Something that mattered. And I haven’t been able to move beyond it. I thought I could just keep doing what I’ve always done, and it worked for a while, but…it’s not working anymore. Everything is piling up on me, and I’m losing control of it. All I know is that the only time I feel right is when I can get away. I come here to run because it feels like sanctuary. I can’t find it anywhere else.”

  The female flew off the branch and the male deflated, folding his wings and tail. A moment later he launched himself in pursuit, and Tal wished him luck.

  “That item you lost,” Micah said slowly. “Was it by any chance your heart?”

  “Warriors at my level don’t give their hearts.” It had been drummed into her head from childhood by a dozen different teachers. “Not unless Fahla makes them tyree. I’m not, so my heart belongs to Alsea.”

  “Dokshin.”

  She stared at him, startled that he would use such a vulgarity in reference to their code.

  “Oh, don’t look at me that way,” he said. “Are you telling me you’ve never questioned that old line?”