Love and Intrigue Under the Seven Moons of Kordea

by Helena Puumala

  “A couple of foolish Settlement girls were caught in Sarah’s net when she pulled us back to Kordea,” Jillian added. “We need to drop them back home before their parents lose hope of ever seeing them again.”

  *****

  “So how did the girls end up in Sarah’s net?” Coryn asked Jillian after they had finished the conversation with Marcues.

  “The rebellious little idiots were sleeping with a couple of the low level Neotsarians, as those Organization dorks call themselves. We actually used their relationship with their ‘boyfriends’ as an in into the Facility, so I figure we owe them a bit of kindness. I’ve got Nance cluing them in about male-female relationships, and Dr. Jonas has agreed to give them some basic sex-ed.”

  Jillian sighed.

  “I had Dr. Jonas do a body scan on us women who had travelled to Kordea in the unorthodox, Sarah-assisted manner, and came to the Port. One of the sexually adventurous girls was pregnant. Witch Anya took care of that, according to the Kordean manner, which, she said is less invasive than ours, after the girls reacted very badly to the notion that Mimi needed to have an abortion. She’s not much more than a kid herself, and Mary Jonas took a very strong, negative view of teens risking their health by bearing babies.

  “By the way, the Official Residence is well-tenanted, right now. Witch Anya, and that amarto-sensitive girl, Janelle, are staying there at the moment, and Suse and Mimi are sleeping there, too, although I’ve had Nance keep them busy elsewhere during the nights.”

  “That’ll have made Curt and Dili happy,” Coryn laughed. “And I’m sure they’ve kept my bedroom off-limits to everyone else. And one bedroom is all Sarah and I are going to be needing these days.

  “And thank you, Jill, for looking after the teens. I suspect that the kind of tough love that you’re capable of, is just what the two of them needed.”

  He gave his body a luxurious, happy stretch as he opened the inner office door again. Jillian watched the gesture, grinned at him, and for one, intense moment, missed Joe very much.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “So you are the male half of the little contingent of intrepid Confederation people who came to this world to deprive the authoritarian fools who call themselves Neotsarians, of the powerful weapon with which they had managed to arm themselves.”

  The man who was eyeing the group, and who had been introduced as the Spiritual Leader of the Community, Guru Johannes, sounded amused.

  Jaime, in his turn, stared at him in some bemusement. Guru Johannes, in spite of the ancient-Germanic name (Jaime had read enough history to be aware of that), was a very dark-skinned man, and his head was haloed in a pure white afro. The white hair was an age-related phenomenon, obviously, and not a product of some scalp-sculpting technique.

  The rest of the members of the Community whom The Mission men had met so far, had been a rainbow of human types common to the Confederation. There had even been a couple of people with the tell-tale colouring of Calligan blood, and that had rather surprised Jaime. Calligan crosses were more likely to inhabit the central planets and Space Stations of the galactic civilization; if they wanted to live more natural lives they simply went back to Calliga, much of which was a hot jungle, Jaime understood. Fiana Marsh who had grown up on Calliga, had had a few, not very complimentary things to say about that....

  “How do you know about it?” Joe, whose considerable bulk loomed behind Jaime, asked.

  “You’d be surprised by how much we, in this Community, know about what goes on elsewhere,” Guru Johannes replied, a small smile playing on his lips. “And about people such as yourselves, when they show up on our doorstep.”

  He was speaking of a figurative doorstep. The meeting was taking place in a public square; there was not door anywhere near.

  “Like I know that all of you have, at least for the time being, accepted the leadership of this tall, gangly, intelligent young man who fronts your group. Jaime was the name, right? A sensible move on the part of you others; he really is the most adventurous of all of you, although the rest of you are no slouches when it comes to that, either.

  “Though it was some of the women in your group, especially the little one who did the scuttling of the cute machine which three of your number had been tricked into creating, who were truly impressive. A pity that I didn’t get to meet the women before they were spirited off—the slight girl did it using a whole cache of those powerful Stones, didn’t she?”

  “Sarah is a remarkably talented Witch,” Jaime responded. “And strong-minded.”

  A sudden grin flashed across his countenance.

  “It would have been lovely to have seen her do her thing while standing face to face with those misogynistic Organization jokers,” he added. “I suspect that they would have had trouble figuring out what hit them.”

  “I think that they don’t know what hit them, even as it is,” opined Joe. “The idiots probably still think that Nance is Sarah.”

  Guru Johannes chuckled.

  “They can be a little slow, sometimes, those who call themselves the Neotsarians,” he said. “The reality must be as they understand it to be. Nothing else is conceivable. You Confederation people have at least some leeway in your thought-processes; you can absorb new ideas and methods, if rather slowly.”

  “Well, thanks for that lukewarm endorsement,” Joe muttered. Jaime shushed him.

  The Guru was grinning at them, not in the least bit offended.

  “I think that my people will make certain that you will remain safe until your colleagues can rescue you,” he then said. And turned his eyes on Jeb:

  “Why don’t you send a message via your implanted systems to the man responsible for your operation, that we in my Community would like the rescue team to include the women of the original team, as well as the interesting cat-animal which has chosen to involve itself with the Witch-women, especially the talented Sarah?”

  Jeb gawked. How the hell did the Guru know about his implants?

  “What do you think, Jaime?” he asked when he found his voice. “Should I?”

  “Why not?” countered Jaime. “There’s no harm in it. If one or more of them don’t want to come, they can always refuse.”

  He was sort of looking forward to seeing Dian again, anyway, and suspected that Joe and Texi would be glad to see their wives. Guru Johannes winked at him, and he had a sneaking suspicion that the Guru had somehow followed his train of thought, and found the paired men’s eagerness to reconnect with their significant others amusing and endearing at the same time.

  How would Sarah deal with the request? But, of course, Peter was her father, and Cameron her brother. She would come, if only to welcome these family members back into the Confederation universe.

  *****

  “The wording of the message from Jeb was, what?” Jillian asked.

  Coryn was seated behind his desk, looking thoughtful.

  Sarah, feeling at loose ends since she had no precise duties at the moment, had chosen to accompany Nance, and the two teens to the Infirmary classroom where a staff member with a lot of experience with rebellious teenagers was scheduled to give the Settlement girls a lesson in sex-ed.

  “I guess Nance and I can go for coffee during the lesson,” she had said to Coryn while giving him a quick hug before leaving. “Since, I’m pretty sure, neither of us needs further clinical information.”

  He had kissed the top of her head before she went, thinking that he was already anxious to get her into his bed, once the work-night was done. The two Settlement teens had been following their interaction with curious eyes, and he had tried to keep his enthusiasm for Sarah’s figure within the bounds of decency. Even at that he had heard one of them comment to laughing Nance as they went out the door:

  “I think that handsome guy is almost as randy as Rolf was. But in a much nicer way.”

  “And only when it comes to Sarah,” Nance had answered. “She’s the only woman he has eyes for these days.”

  That was n
ot literally true, of course. For one thing, the Liaison Office crawled with women.

  And now some guy calling himself a Guru was requesting that he send some of the women whom Sarah had transported across the galaxy back to the planet where the transport had begun. He had promised safety to the men of The Mission; they had ended up at his Community, following some rumours about a hidey-hole, safe from The Organization, existing on an island. That was about as much information as the message had contained, outside of naming the women—plus the Greencat—which this Guru was keen to meet. Marcues’ secretary had passed it on to Coryn via the usual convoluted channels, mentioning as she had done so, that Marcues was getting a bit annoyed at all these private messages flying back and forth. Coryn had gritted his teeth at that—there had not been that many, and they had not been flitting back and forth. Marcues was just annoyed because he was not comfortably in the amarto-angle loop. He had tossed the responsibility for the amarto-angle to Coryn some years ago, apparently hoping to keep an up-and-comer busy with something inconsequential, but work-intensive. Then it had turned into a big story, Coryn had handled it remarkably well, and now Marcues felt like he had been eclipsed.

  Sometimes, that’s how things just were.

  “Basically,” he said in response to Jillian’s question, “that this Spiritual Leader, Guru Johannes, wants us to include the female members of The Mission among the people who will go and fetch the men who are sheltering with his Community from The Organization. He wants to meet you feisty ladies! Oh, and he wants the Greencat included among the females.”

  “So that would mean Sarah, Dian, Nance, and me.”

  Jillian was counting on her fingers.

  “And the Greencat. And we’ll have to take Suse and Mimi back to the Settlement. That’s six people and a big cat. Witch Anya and Janelle can stay here in Trahea, assuming that someone takes on the responsibility of keeping them safe—but I think Nance looked into that already with the Port Security, the very day we arrived here. At least I asked her to do so, and she’s a dutiful worker.”

  “I can reinforce the need for their security with both the Port, and the City Security Forces,” Coryn said. “They’re on tenterhooks about safety anyway, what with the Hounds causing me to hit my head hard enough to more than see stars, in the middle of the Trade City. I believe Janelle’s mother is working and living at the Port now, anyway, married to a Terran employee. That should help, though I don’t know whether or not the girl wants to live with her mother and stepfather.

  “However,” he added in a determined voice. “If Sarah’s going, so am I. This time there’s no pressing need for me to stay behind.”

  “None other than the smooth running of the Kordean-Confederation Liaison Office,” Jillian replied tartly. “With both of us gone, who’s going to look after things here?”

  *****

  That problem solved itself in an unexpected fashion.

  When the Armed Forces ship, a small troop carrier rather than a battle cruiser, put down in Trahea Port, it had only the most basic crew aboard it, and Steph Clennan in the pilot’s seat. When the Port Officials called Coryn to tell him that on board, besides the pilot and a scanty crew were the pilot’s wife, one Fiana Marsh, and the Head of the Experimental Craft Division, Carovan, and his spouse, Janine, he had to control himself to keep from howling with laughter. It seemed like everyone had grown curious about Kordea, lately! He offered to host the guests at the Official Residence of the Liaison Officer, but the Port people told him that it was not necessary; there were suitable guest quarters in a building designed to house VIP travellers. That was something of a relief, since it was the middle of the Kordean sleep cycle, and the Official Residence was already reasonably well tenanted, what with all the women staying there. And Dili and Curt were not present of course, during the blistering day.

  “Seems that you and I don’t have to rush around, preparing accommodations for guests,” he told Sarah, when he returned from talking on the com which had announced the arrival. “They’re all staying at the fancy hotel at the Port.”

  “Hm, well, I can think of more pleasant things for us to do, rather than get rooms ready,” Sarah said, reaching to unknot the belt of the robe he had worn to talk on the communicator. “Or am I being an annoying pest, making demands on you?”

  Coryn laughed, and reached for her.

  “I think you’re being quite understandably eager for someone new to lovemaking. And I mean to enjoy every moment of it. The day may come when you’re going to tell me that I’m, ho, hum, boring.”

  “It’s not here yet, that’s for sure,” murmured Sarah against his chest.

  *****

  “Hey kid sister, what’s happened to you?” Steph Clennan asked Sarah the moment he lay eyes on her in the Liaison Office, that evening. “I’ve never seen you looking so happy!”

  Sarah started to giggle, and Steph turned his eyes on the Liaison Officer who was studying something on a flat table screen.

  “Oh, I get it,” the pilot said after a quick scrutiny of his friend, and turned to call to his wife who was just entering the premises in the company of Carovan’s wife, Janine.

  “Fiana, come and look at these two,” he shouted. “They’ve turned into lovebirds!”

  “About time,” replied Fiana, walking over to hug Sarah. “So did he finally say ‘the hell with rules and regulations’, and start to court you, dear girl?”

  “Well, maybe it wasn’t quite like that,” Sarah allowed.

  “But we’re together now,” Coryn added, looking up from the star map on the screen, “and I, for one, couldn’t be better pleased.”

  Sarah found that she barely heard his words. Gathered against the half-Calligan woman, she was suddenly extremely aware of Fiana’s physical form—something was happening in it. Sarah’s amarto, lying against the skin between her breasts blazed into life. Fiana was pregnant, she realized, and her foetus was communicating with the one mind open to it, defiantly objecting to having been transported through the omega-coordinates of space-flight. Fiana, apparently, was not aware of the pregnancy yet—otherwise she, without doubt, would have avoided space travel. After a certain, very early stage of pregnancy, unborn children had difficulty with omega-space.

  “Fiana!” Sarah cried. “You’re pregnant! And your baby is telling me that he’s furious with you for putting him through the travails of omega-jumping! He figures that you should have known better!”

  She had to help Fiana stumble to the nearest chair.

  “Good heavens!” the older woman cried. “But we’ve barely started trying—a month, six weeks at the most....”

  Her words trailed off helplessly, and she stared at her husband in mild shock.

  Then she drew a breath, obviously collecting her wits.

  “This means that I must be like my mother,” she said, making a face at Steph. “Conceiving babies at the drop of a hat! Damn, damn, damn! I really don’t want to be like her!”

  Steph came over, and gathered her into his arms.

  “Can’t say that I mind,” he said, kissing her. “I grew up a spacer brat, as you know, and am thrilled to bits to think that you’re making me a dad.

  “But,” he added, “this means that you can’t come with us on this foray. You’re going to have to humour this kid and stay put—did Sarah call it a he?”

  “It’s a boy,” Sarah said, grinning, “and I have a suspicion that he’s going to be a handful. Though anyone could have guessed that without any amarto-sensitivity—he has Fiana and Steph for parents, after all!”

  “Maybe something like what, Sarah, you, apparently, were as a youngster,” Coryn said. “According to Jane Mackenzie, that is.”

  He had come to stand beside Sarah, and he eyed his friends with a broad grin lighting up his face.

  “Since you’re going to be stuck on Kordea for a while Fiana, have I got a hell of a proposition for you,” he added. He took a deep breath. “How would you like to take on the role of the Kordean-Co
nfederation Liaison Officer while I’m off with Sarah and the rest, rescuing our Mission members stuck on the Facility planet?”

  Suse, sitting at a nearby table with Mimi, waiting for the time to arrive for Nance to take them for another sex-ed lesson, shook her head.

  “For good-looking people who think they’re so smart, and know so much, these folks sure use a lot of ugly words,” she muttered.

  *****

  Coryn’s suggestion energized Fiana, and while those who were leaving on this particular leg of The Mission made preparations, she spent every moment that she could corral either Coryn or Jillian, picking their brains. Coryn took her to the City Offices to introduce her to the officials there, and was not surprised when the said officials reacted by falling over one another’s feet, trying to impress her. The half-Calligan woman had that effect on people, he told Sarah with a laugh, during a private moment.

  “Almost everything I know about getting along with people I learned from her,” he said. “When I come back to resume the Liaison Officer’s job nobody’s going to want to give her up—just watch. I’ll be an anticlimax to everybody.”

  “Except me,” Sarah murmured.

  “Thank goodness for that—and note that I’m avoiding ugly words!”

  Coryn went to pick up Dian from Ferhil Stones personally, and took Fiana with him, to introduce her to Marlyss. Sarah wondered how the two strong-minded women would get along, but, then, the Eldest of the Twelve had grown much less stiff-necked in the time that Sarah had known her. She had come to accept that the Terrans were not all fools and blind materialists, and, in fact, had grown fond and respectful of Coryn; mostly likely she would extend at least some of that attitude to the woman who, as Coryn had said, had taught him “almost everything that he knew about getting along with people”.

  “And I’ll be curious to find out what Dian makes of Fiana. She’s a pretty good judge of people, too.”

  Carovan and Janine did not intend to join The Mission; they had come to Kordea out of curiosity, having heard all of Jaime’s amazed talk when he had first done his research on it. They were planning to stay a while, to help Fiana find her Liaison Officer modus operandi, and to marvel at the quirks of a rather unusual inhabited planet.