Such trust in the infallibility of Terran technology amused Marthe as she signaled Central one morning to intercept the surveillance of her quarters.
“His suspicion of me is growing,” she reported to her father and Jacquel.
“Has he not been so all along?”
“Yes, but something in particular happened about a month ago that’s made him even more suspicious; and no, I don’t know what it was. He barely leaves my side now, and last week my entire wardrobe was replaced with Terran-made clothing. About which all I can say is, if they are the latest Terran fashions, as Hamon claims, then Earth is sadly lacking in design skills.
I told Hamon what I thought of them, but he refused to return my own clothes and instead detailed a tech to change the styles to my liking. Even our food is untouched by Hathian hands. Terran standard rations only. He says he prefers them after so many years. It’s all a decided nuisance. I should be able to keep broadcasting at this time, but if I have to change, Central will let you know,” she added to Jacquel. “I’ll do my best not to, though, as I know you are as closely watched as I am.”
“Closely watched is an understatement,” said Jacquel, frustration lacing his codes. “Radcliff’s troops are as paranoid as their master. Their interference is seriously limiting what I can do. We need something to keep them better occupied, some sort of diversion.”
“Such as?” enquired the elder an Castre warily.
“It’s time for the emergence of a certain, highly intriguing Hathian rogue into Terran society. I’m sure I could set enough tongues wagging to divert the attention of our captors,” Jaca announced gleefully.
“I’m quite sure you could,” agreed Marthe dryly.
“The idea has merit,” Dr an Castre conceded. “You may go ahead.”
“What!” Marthe exploded. “Have two possible conspirators for the Terrans to wonder at? Why not just come right out and give them all the details of the resistance while you’re at it?”
“Are you two such clumsy actors then? The Terrans will think nothing of the kind, except Radcliff who suspects you anyway. I take it that we can trust Jaca to treat the Terrans to some of the less restrained facets of his otherwise quite admirable personality?”
“Thank you, I think,” laughed that worthy.
“You said yourself, Marthe, that none can play the Haut Liege better than Jacquel.” Marthe gritted her teeth at the chuckle from Jaca on hearing this. Did her father have to remember only her silliest comments? “May I leave the introduction in your capable hands?” added that venerable man, knowing the answer all the time.
“There is a reception next week for the outgoing comptroller. He will be invited,” she promised.
Marthe began her campaign the next day. She had become friendly with a few of the Terran woman, using her inclusion in their gatherings as a chance to gather valuable information, but this day it was she who let slip an interesting morsel, the merest hint of Jacquel’s name and exploits.
“How fascinating. Do tell us more.” Jocelyn Harp from Ballistics was bored with Hathe and, in particular, the men in the Terran forces stationed there. Her large, sultry green eyes gazed avidly at Marthe and her over-ripe mouth gaped ever so slightly.
“Well, I can’t say precisely. But from what I heard, via friends of friends…”
“Marthe! You cannot leave us in suspense. He sounds quite delicious,” protested Helen Ravensbot, a dark-haired and lively woman from Stores.
“Memorable, was one term I heard bandied about,” Marthe said, spinning out the word to its most intriguing fullness. “He’s certainly fun to be with, but I never had the chance to find out more than that. My brother and he were very close and, on occasion, even Jacquel remembers he has scruples—though I must have been only the only woman he ever singled out for such an honor,” she finished caustically.
“I have to meet this paragon,” exclaimed Mathilde Chong, slowly licking her lips and conveniently forgetting a hard working partner in senior administration.
“Not much chance of that, I’m afraid. Our families expected Jacquel and I to marry eventually, before your people arrived, that is. I was silly enough to let Hamon know and now he keeps Jacquel closely guarded, claiming he is a dangerous saboteur. He loathes Jacquel, I do know that, but if you ask me, it’s nothing more than simple jealousy.
“That’s infamous!”
“I agree, but what can I do. Hamon would completely misconstrue any attempt on my part to have Jacquel released. A pity. He could bring such cheer into our lives.”
“It is rather bleak at present,” sighed Jocelyn. “I can’t remember when I last had a man who was memorable.”
“Lucky you,” retorted Mathilde. “You haven’t got Hank snoring beside you every night.”
“You know, ladies,” said Helen, “we do need to add some life to our entertainments. I just happen to be in charge of next week’s reception, and not even Major Radcliff can ignore an official invitation from the Commander to our Hathian guest.”
They all laughed.
“Does Hamon need to be told?” queried Marthe, all innocent trepidation. “Surely the Commander has supreme authority over prisoners. As long as you ladies keep Jaca occupied, and well away from us for the night, I will manage Hamon.”
“With pleasure,” they chorused, laughing low and soft.
“Our invitations have arrived for the Comptroller’s reception,” announced Hamon at breakfast later that week.
“How nice of the establishment to notice my existence.”
“The Commander’s dinner still rankles?”
“Of course it does. Do you know what I did that evening?”
“Went to bed early with a reader?”
“Yes, if you must know.”
“I did,” he confirmed wryly. “A private dinner, my dear, is not a place for potential spies, whereas I doubt even your ingenuity could succeed in a crowded reception among the babble of nonsense that will be spouted. Plus your lady friends were quite insistent you should come. Jocelyn, in particular, was most persuasive.”
He grinned smugly at the memory and her eyes flew to his in surprise.
For a split second Hamon was rewarded with a hint of pain, then to his disappointment the barriers clashed down again.
“The lady and the tramp. What a surprising mixture of bedfellows you indulge in.”
“An excess of civility may pale, even on me,” he explained carelessly, as if unaware of the hurtful effect of his words. Under his lowered lids, he watched for her reactions. “What had you planned for today?”
Following his lead, she talked of the new fashion catalogue Helen Ravensbot had promised to share with her, a light frippery that should have bored him silly, but he was studying her too closely. He saw her shock, saw the stunned hurt she tried to hide.
“Are you sure you want to go? You look somewhat pale.”
“I haven’t been quite myself for the last few days,” she replied uneasily. “Your Terran rations may not agree with me.”
“I’ll see what I can do to make them more acceptable. But now, I must be off.” He rose to leave.
Lost in thought, she missed his backward glance. She hadn’t been herself, now she mentioned it, and the possible causes interested him greatly.
They spent that afternoon together, and he wreathed her in such tenderness that she almost dismissed his words of the morning—till late that night, when they came haunting back. Could he truly be tiring of her? Did it matter?
She pushed the question angrily aside and began thinking instead of a design for a gown for the reception. It didn’t suit her purpose to be abandoned just yet. Her mission was too crucial. If there were other matters at the heart of her anxiety, she refused to name them. Not out loud. Not yet. Not till she had to.
In one aspect at least, he wasn’t tiring. A secret smile tickled her lips as she reviewed her own, private journey since her capture.
Enemies they may be, the barriers separating them ever pre
sent, but she had thought that in this one thing there was truth between them. Granted his lovemaking was more experienced than her own, but he had taught her so much; and might not the instinctive well of sensuality she’d discovered within her have taught him also. Surely such loving as theirs had to be unique, could not be merely another night or woman to him? And now there was another worry growing in her.
She twisted yet again, hunching her shoulders down. So she was only one among all his women. Yet a principal one at least, she would have said. No others shared his waking as well as his resting moments.
Cold comfort, she scolded. Huffily she punched the headrest and threw herself down.
“If you’ve finished conquering your personal nemesis, do you think that both of us might get some rest?” came an amused voice from beside her.
“God, are you even spying on me at night.”
Hamon lifted his head suddenly at that and she felt his surprise. “Come here,” he said gently, turning her so that his eyes looked straight into the deep shadows hiding her face. “It’s personal, isn’t it? My urbane mistress doesn’t snap like a freighter’s second mate. “
She’d blown it. Escaping her control, her voice rolled inexorably on. “Jocelyn Hart. Are you really sleeping with her?” The pinprick of tears roughened her voice.
“What’s it to you if I am?” he teased gently, probingly.
“I’m pregnant, that’s what it is to me,” she retorted, bursting away from him as his shocked arms released her.
“What!”
“I’m going to have a baby, mine and yours. A baby whose father is already looking elsewhere for his pleasure.”
“I take it this news is less than welcome? You would have preferred another father for your child?”
She turned back then, to stare in consternation. “Oh, Jaca,” she murmured as the light slowly dawned. “What the hell, you aren’t interested anyway,” she spat, suddenly feeling savage and with no pride. “The truth is, I want this baby more than I can say. It’s mine and will know all the love I can give it—unlike its father.” She burst into a fit of sobbing, cradled unseeingly in the arms she wanted more than anything else.
“What do you mean, exactly?”
“I mean that you’re Terran and don’t trust me; that I’m Hathian and your people destroyed mine. I mean my brother died fighting against you and now my people are out there somewhere instead of here at home. I mean, I’m having the enemy’s baby and loving him,” the sobs tore at her now, “only to find he’s turned to another woman. I’ve sold my soul, to no end. ”
“I see,” was the slow reply.
“You see!”
“Yes, I see. I see at last the real Marthe I knew existed, not the lovely shell I’ve had these past weeks. I see you human and hurting and, I’m sorry love, but that makes me so happy. It tells me you love me as much as I love you. In this one place we will have truth between us. I have never shared any other woman’s bed since I found you that day in my rooms, and will never, as long as we are bound. I am so proud that it is you who will be my First Union partner and mother of my firstborn.”
The voice was so infused with love that she couldn’t ignore it. Silently and slowly, she turned, to be embraced in wordless joy as his body told hers the truth of his words.
Seemingly hours later, she lifted up her face from the warmth of his shoulder. “Hamon Radcliff, you fraud. That tough front of yours is only a cover.”
“In some things, yes,” he agreed, turning to nuzzle the dark waves of her hair, “but don’t tell anyone, especially my superiors. Speaking of which, I’d better arrange to have our liaison recorded tomorrow. Which will cause quite some surprise.”
“The ogre with two heads has finally caught you?”
“Something like that. Ferdo will be livid and will probably start plans for the dissolution feast, rather than the union one.” The puzzlement on her face was plain. “We celebrate both ends of a relationship,” he explained then smiled at her disbelief.
“Ending a marriage … that’s strange enough, but to celebrate it. Ugh!”
“We no longer have marriage on Earth, so you can ease your conscience. Now, go to sleep, my little, mother-to-be. You need all the rest you can get.”
“I’m only just over a month gone,” she protested.
“A month. You mean...”
“Yes, I fell pregnant our first time together. I had other things on my mind at the time,” she added in a piece of blatant diplomacy, “and forgot to turn on my contraceptive program. It wasn’t until the next day that I thought to check my cycle and it was too late then. But what’s done is done, as they say,” and she snuggled farther down the welcoming line of his body.
Soon, a smile sweetly curving her lips, sleep claimed her. He could hear her soft breathing, even and untroubled, as he lay very still beside her, gazing into the blackness. A rarely known peace was on him as thoughts chased through him. For once, they had absolutely nothing to do with duty.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Married,” gasped the outraged face, the little eyes dwindled to crackling specks among the ballooning facial creases. “Married … to a Terran!”
“I do believe that was what I said,” replied Sylvan an Castre. “My daughter has asked that I place her request for marriage before the appropriate body. I’m not sure if you quite fit that role, Trundain, but,” regarding the puffed up mass before him, “failing an alternative, I am left with the computer comptroller: you.”
“Don’t give me that fluff, Sylvan. This is much more than an ordinary marriage request and you know it. I’m calling a full Council meeting immediately. If your girl endangers the entire affair...”
A slight twinge of a cheek muscle was Sylvan’s only response to the insult. Everything else he kept under tight control. “I rather think it unlikely,” answered the statesman within the father. “If you will summon the Council, we can proceed to the chambers.” Sylvan waited as Trundain spoke into a nearby communicator then passed with him in strained silence down the corridors and through the security blocks to the Council chambers deep under the surface of the moon Mathe, the heart of the government in exile of Hathe. In short time, they were joined by the eighteen other councilors, all confusedly questioning one another in barely muted tones. They saw the two of them already there and immediately demanded to know what was so urgent.
“Excuse the hasty summons,” began Sylvan. “Trundain here has some concerns over my daughter’s pending nuptials and has seen fit to foist them on you.”
“Your daughter’s wedding?” was the surprised comment from the closest councilor. “Congratulations … but what has it to do with us?”
“Isn’t she on active duty?” came another puzzled voice.
“It would not be the first wedding via relay,” Sylvan reminded them.
“Yes, but you and Trundain can manage that between you. Why drag us down here?”
“Just who might the lucky man be?” threw in one, particularly astute member. Sylvan glanced at the speaker, a dignified lady of middle years, her clear brow above the intelligent brown eyes containing a hint of a frown. The lady, an old acquaintance, caught his quickly suppressed frustration and smiled slightly.
“So that is the crux,” he heard Gilda murmur softly, for his ears alone.
“The gentleman in question is Major Hamon Radcliff of the Terran forces.”
Abruptly, there was silence and, in the air, an undeniable wash of fear.
“Radcliff,” breathed a voice uneasily. “I’ve heard of him. A particularly dangerous customer, they say.” It was the head of the Terran information bureau speaking, his words deepening the dread he could see settling on the Council members. “Is he not her captor? Nor, I understand, has he been particularly considerate in his treatment of her? Why the change of heart?”
“The couple is to have a child. My daughter naturally wishes it to grow up with every security possible.” The flat chill in his voice should have silenced any ch
allengers, but not this time.
It was the astute Gilda again. “The people would honor the mother of such a child and ensure both are cared for always. There is no need for this kind of sacrifice.”
Sylvan didn’t miss the touch of irony in his old friend’s voice. Gilda had always been too perceptive by half. “Both parents are desirous that the child should be born into a family unit. Its own family unit.”
“You mean that the man’s feelings have softened towards his captive?” said Gilda, yet again cutting to the core of the business.
“So I understand.”
“And your daughter’s feelings?” the harsh voice of Aaron deln James asked, another rather too awake to the undercurrents.
“She is desirous of the connection.”
Trundain an Delsin glowered beside Sylvan, obviously deciding he had gone unnoticed quite long enough. “Desirous! The girl’s madly in love with a Terran, from what I can tell, and God alone knows what she’s whispered to him at night.”
Not even that could break Sylvan’s rigidly held self-control, though it came close. “She is open to full surveillance at all times and still retains a top level security clearance. Her immediate superior is fully confident that Marthe is alive to the cost of any indiscretion.”
“Are you telling us that a highly trained intelligence officer can be so easily gulled by a beautiful woman? Radcliff is known to have caused us a great deal of trouble in the past.”
“No, he is not telling you that,” said a cultured voice behind an Castre. Sylvan whirled in surprise.
“Gof! Gof deln Crantz. How good to see you.”
“Yes, I can see that,” said the little man, his beautiful voice clashing as always with his squat body and coarsely jovial face. “Ladies and gentlemen, you’re worried about the security risk presented by Agent asn Castre’s latest actions. Perfectly understandably, I assure you, and I share your worry, given that Major Radcliff is still suspicious of her background. But you must see that we can’t pull her out now. It would only serve to confirm the man’s suspicions and set off a planet-wide search for her—which we can ill afford at this crucial stage of our plans,” he reminded them all. “However, I will confirm that Agent asn Castre has formed an emotional attachment to this man and does have some sympathy for the Terran plight.”
Resistance: Hathe Book One Page 16