Love and Intrigue Under the Seven Moons of Kordea

by Helena Puumala

  “But, Coryn, what, precisely, did you have in mind?”

  “If you and Dian agree to be identified as Kordean Witches, I thought that we might offer to parley with the enemy, saying that one of you was willing to become a hostage in order to ensure the rest of us safe passage within the system,” Coryn said.

  He was thinking on his feet, trying to devise a plausible scenario.

  “Just one of us?” Dian asked.

  “Yeah,” Coryn replied. “We’d tell them that we want to keep the other Witch as insurance so that they won’t go back on their word, and blow us up the moment that they have the prize. They should be plenty familiar with that sort of strategizing.”

  “But maybe they’d be satisfied with just one Witch,” objected Chen, “and blow us up anyway.”

  Coryn gave him a dirty look.

  “I have no intention of giving them anyone,” he snapped. “We’ll be playing for time; keeping those jokers from shooting at us. Then, maybe, once we’re close enough to do a little damage ourselves, we can cause a bit of mayhem, while they’ll avoid making any killing shots on us, in order to keep the Witches who are almost within their grasp, alive.”

  “They could decide to disable us, though,” Steph pointed out.

  “Yeah, well, if you can get in contact with our supposed escort, maybe you can relay word about such a possibility,” Coryn answered. “They’re the ones equipped to fight these guys, not us. We’ll need them to come to the rescue.”

  He let go of Sarah, giving her a final pat on an arm.

  “In the meantime, Sarah, and Dian, will you be good enough to do some professional brainstorming?” he added. “Figure out if there isn’t some way you can use your talents to give us an extra edge. If we can avoid casualties…, that would definitely be excellent.”

  “Of course we’ll do that,” Sarah replied, smiling up at him.

  She looked livelier than she had since the beginning of the voyage.

  “And we’ll come up with a trick or two, never fear,” added Dian. “Marlyss would expect it of us.”

  “We’ll be meditating in the padded corner of the exercise room, should you need us before, say, a half-hour has passed,” said Sarah. “Want us, on our way, to tell Nance, Suse and Mimi to bring you all some coffee?”

  “Good idea,” said Jillian. “Crackers and cookies, too, please.”

  Sarah and Dian left.

  “Marlyss?” asked Chen. “Who’s Marlyss, and what’s she—presuming that the name belongs to a woman—got to do with anything?”

  “You could say that Marlyss is Sarah and Dian’s boss,” Coryn replied.

  “I thought that you were the man in charge,” Chen protested.

  “On this mission, yes.” Coryn shrugged. “But Sarah and Dian are just on loan to us. Normally they belong at Ferhil Stones, the Stronghold of the largest, and the most powerful Circle of Kordean Witches. Marlyss is The Eldest of that Circle, the Circle of the Twelve.”

  “Oh,” piped up Quill. “She’s the Head Crone of the Coven, then?”

  “You two have no manners!” Steph snapped, and Coryn was glad that he had been the one to jump on the comment.

  Jillian was hyperventilating, and he, himself, was not quite sure whether he ought to weep or laugh at the Navigator’s ignorance.

  “It’s a pity Fiana couldn’t come with us,” Steph added. “She would have put you guys in your place, and then she would have given you a lesson in the use of tact!”

  “What did I say?” Quill was mumbling under his breath, and Coryn rolled his eyes. Steph did have reason to be an arrogant cuss, considering that he had been spending his working hours with one or both of these Military dolts.

  “Never mind that now,” he, nevertheless, said, drawing another deep breath.

  The trouble was that these two were the ones whose fingers were going to be on the controls of the laser cannons, F-class though they might only be. Would they take orders from a civilian when things got tricky, even if he was ‘the man in charge’?

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  There was a third member in the permanent crew of the Troop Carrier which, apparently, normally was used for transporting specialized troops, or high level brass. She was called The Housekeeper, and Jillian’s mouth had thinned into a straight line the moment she had met her, and taken in the significance of the gender divide in the work force.

  “In which frigging century do the Armed Forces think that they exist?” she had asked Coryn, on being introduced to Mae Lin.

  Not that Mae Lin cooked, and at least her present guests mostly cleaned up their own messes. The food on board was frozen, freeze-dried, or dehydrated, in serving-size packets. The dishes and the cutlery were thrown into washers after use. Still, Lin retrieved the clean dishes and put them away, compacted the garbage, and took care of the linens in the cabins and the washrooms. What else was on her duty list Coryn was rather hazy on, but he had the feeling that Jillian may have well taken it upon herself to question the cheerful young woman about it. He had warned Jill to not interfere—the Military was what it was—and had pointed out that what Lou Chen and Quill were doing was also routine, and probably, most of the time, even more boring than Lin’s work.

  Lin had taken it upon herself to supervise the coffee service which Nance and the Settlement girls brought to the Bridge. Coryn deduced—probably correctly—that the task gave all the young women an opportunity to spend time in the heart of the ship, a place which they were hesitant to broach without an invitation, even though no rules had been laid down about who was allowed where. Suse and Mimi controlled the hover-cart which held all the necessities, whooping with delight to see it smoothly glide through doors, and over obstacles.

  “You’d think that something would fall off sometimes,” Suse said enthusiastically when the foursome had arrived on the Bridge, and Mae Lin was directing the girls to settle the cart by a group of empty seats, obviously there to accommodate visiting Brass when the Troop Carrier had such on board.

  “These carts are very sturdy,” The Housekeeper explained, sounding like a teacher. “And the coffee and tea urns have lids, you’ll note; so do the creamer and the sugar dish.”

  “And the cookie and the cracker containers, and the mugs are stored inside the drawers,” Nance added. “It’s a clever contraption, all right.”

  “Useful,” agreed Lin.

  She directed the teens to start filling cups to order, and to pass around the nibbles.

  “Agent Leigh, do you want me to take refreshments to the women who went into the exercise room?” she then asked.

  “My name’s Coryn,” Coryn corrected, for what seemed like the hundredth time. Mae Lin seemed to have trouble grasping the informality with which the civilian passengers treated their boss. “No, better not disturb them unless it’s absolutely necessary. They’re working, even if it looks like all they’re doing is meditating.”

  “If they’re working to strengthen our ship to face an attack, it’s definitely better to leave them be,” said Nance. “I’ve been told that that sort of a thing is hard for a whole Circle to do, never mind just two Witches, no matter how talented.”

  “Is that what they’re up to?” asked Chen. “I don’t think that they ought to be fooling around with our shields. I doubt that they know anything about them.”

  “Ahem,” said Steph. “Didn’t we point out a short while ago that kid sister is a very competent space ship mechanic? And Dian—well, Coryn, maybe you better explain Dian, although, granted, Jaime is a friend of mine.”

  Coryn threw an amused look at the pilot. He had definitely taken on the role of the defender of the two Witches. Jillian, he noted, was also eyeing Steph approvingly. It seemed that being Fiana Marsh’s significant other had turned the space rat of a pilot into an appreciator of the fair sex. Not surprising that; Fiana, besides being an intelligent beauty who was capable of enhancing the reputation of any man she chose to associate with, was also a feminist to rival Jillian.

/>   “Dian, the most talented Circle Witch of the Twelve, if also the youngest of them, has chosen to work, and otherwise associate, with a Terran fellow who possesses a brilliant, scientific mind,” Coryn began. “Those two amazing brains apparently mesh together so well that it has been possible for Dian to take Jaime along on her amarto-enhanced ESP jaunts.”

  “What do you mean by ESP jaunts?” asked Quill. “Clearly you’re not talking about strolls along Space Station walkways, or city streets.”

  “Psychic travel,” Jillian threw in impatiently. “I was one of the people in our office when they went off the first time, to help save the Kordean moon Lina from the Neotsarians’ interference. Physically they sat cross-legged on the floor of the office the whole time, but their minds were definitely far away—we didn’t know how far until Jaime came back. He came back first, while Dian stayed behind to help free the moon with the rest of the Kordean Circle Witches, after she, Jaime and Sarah had figured out how it could be done.”

  “Jaime trained with me at the Mallora Pilot Training Facility before going off to earn a handful of University degrees in Physics,” pointed out Steph. “He probably knows more about how our space ships do what they do than any other human alive.”

  “And now Dian knows at least some of what he knows, because she is familiar with the contents of his mind, and she’s brainy enough to understand stuff that leaves me gasping for breath,” Coryn added. “What she and Sarah will add to our defensive arsenal will certainly help us, although I doubt that they’ll try to turn our F-class cannons into anything more powerful. The Witches of Kordea are basically pacifist; they will not kill fellow beings unless they absolutely have no choice.”

  “Though the Neotsarians are definitely pushing them,” said Jillian darkly. “That Lina-caper is what got them to cooperate with us.”

  “Those Organization guys are a little too power-hungry for their own good,” said Coryn. “I’m hoping that we can use that trait to buy us time enough for our escort to come and make them scatter.”

  *****

  “Confederation Troop Carrier, what is your business in this system?” the voice from the leading Organization vessel asked.

  It had come close enough that its A-class laser cannons were a definite threat to the small Troop Carrier. It’s commander had apparently decided not to project an image of himself along with the words.

  “Give them sound and a picture, Steph,” Coryn said. “Let’s see if they’ll accept the notion that the passengers of this vessel are all mere civilians. Zero the image on Jillian and me.”

  “We’re on a humanitarian mission,” Coryn said blandly to the faceless Neotsarian in the other ship. “We have two objectives. One: to rescue a group of stranded religious types who rather foolishly got themselves mixed up in some altercation on the world Altec III. Two: to return home two young girls belonging to the largest Settlement on Altec III, who also inadvertently became involved in the altercation.”

  Steph turned off the microphones.

  “You’ve got a bloody lot of nerve,” he said severely. “Someone on that ship may well recognize your face, Agent Coryn Leigh.”

  Coryn shrugged.

  “This is a game of nerves,” he countered. “I’m expecting someone to remember my face.”

  “It is a rather memorable face,” threw in Jillian before Coryn had a chance to tell Steph to reinstate the sound. Coryn grinned at her.

  “So’s yours,” he said just before Steph turned the mikes on again.

  The screen facing Steph abruptly blossomed to display the image of a high level, uniformed official.

  “Civilians on a humanitarian mission?” he said, grinning sardonically. “I think not. You’re a known Agency Operative, Coryn Leigh, and I bet that you had your fingers in the mayhem that took place in our installation on Altec III, a short while ago. The woman with you led the little sortie into our Lab, and disappeared from there in some fashion which we have not yet determined.”

  “How foolish of you people to have built your installation in neutral territory,” Coryn said. “Why, in the name of powers that be, did your Elites sanction that?”

  “It is not my role to question the decisions that do not concern me,” the Neotsarian Officer answered coldly. “But it is my business to protect what I’m required to protect. And, Agent Leigh, I calculate that your ship, and the people on it, may well be a danger to what I protect, even puny as your guns are. I will not allow your vessel to land on the inhabited planet in question.”

  “Really? Are you saying that you’re willing to blow us to smithereens to protect an installation which has already been destroyed?”

  The Officer glared.

  “Why not?” he responded. “The Elite who was in charge of the place is screaming for heads to roll.”

  Coryn glanced at the screen in front of the Navigator, Quill. It was still displaying the relative positions of the ships in the system—at least the ones that were no longer hidden. The red hue surrounding the enemy ships, which indicated the reach of the A-class laser cannons, now extended considerably past the Troop Carrier’s position.

  “Plus, my superiors would love it if I got rid of the annoying pest that you have proved yourself to be,” the Officer added. “Some of them suspect that if it was not for your interference, we would already be the masters of the planet, Kordea, and in control of the women who rule it.”

  “You underestimate those women,” Coryn said. “Speaking of which, if you blow up this ship you will be killing two very talented Kordean Witches who are accompanying us on this humanitarian mission.”

  He was gratified to see the Neotsarian goggle.

  “You’re trying to put one over on me, right?” he finally said. “You’re trying to fool me into saving your worthless lives!”

  “I can send for the Witches to come to the Bridge and show themselves to you,” Coryn said, smiling.

  He could have, of course, used the vessel’s interior surveillance system to relay an image of Sarah and Dian meditating in the exercise room, but he had no intention of being that efficient. He was playing for time. Sending someone to fetch the women to the Bridge would give the rescuers more time to reach a position of strength.

  “Well, then, you better get at it!” snapped the Neotsarian.

  “Nance and Mae Lin, could you kindly go and tell Sarah and Dian that their presence is required on the Bridge,” Coryn said evenly.

  He did not ask Steph to block the sound, judging that at this point it was wiser to seem as open as possible. Suse and Mimi watched the two older women nod, and go, and busied themselves refilling coffee and tea mugs for the people remaining on the Bridge. Suse pulled out a couple of more mugs from the cart’s drawer, but left them empty.

  Lou Chen and Quill looked as if they were almost afraid to breathe. Steph eyed Coryn shrewdly, and Jillian carefully sipped at her coffee. Coryn lounged behind the pilots and the navigator with an exaggerated display of nonchalance, and graciously accepted a coffee refill from Mimi who proffered it to him. Wryly he thought of how, once again, the skills that he had developed in the sex trade on Space Station RES were coming in useful. There had been times on that job, too, when you just did not allow your vulnerabilities to show themselves. Which, of course, was the essence of bluffing.

  Steph began to pretend to fiddle with the controls that determined the image which was going over to the other ship. He was peering at the miniature monitor connected to those controls, but Coryn, carefully, refrained from checking what he was doing. He trusted Steph to be canny, and the trust was necessary under the circumstances. His people understood what was at stake, and would do what needed to be done. The two Armed Forces men he was less sure of, but he expected to be able to control them. They were used to taking orders, and he was “the man in charge”. As long as he remained on the Bridge, and insisted on being obeyed, they ought to follow his lead, even if they found the idea of working with women irksome.

  The time it took fo
r Dian and Sarah to arrive amounted to only minutes, but they were minutes which seemed to extend almost to eternity. There was no communication between the ships during that eon, and no-one on the Bridge of the Troop Carrier spoke. Suse and Mimi sat down on the chairs nearest to the hover-cart, and Jillian joined them in the next seat, perhaps to reassure them, or to ease her own nervousness. Steph kept his attention on the controls which he was monitoring, and Lou Chen and Quill were attempting to look busy while not doing anything at all. Coryn paced lazily behind their chairs, as if nothing was amiss in the universe.

  Then Sarah and Dian burst on to the scene, followed by Nance and Mae Lin.

  “What’s happening?” Sarah asked as she hurried to Coryn’s side. “Is something wrong?”

  She did not look in the least bit troubled. In fact, both Dian and she had half-grins playing on their lips; Coryn was certain that they had come up with something useful to throw into the fray.

  “Looks like it,” Coryn answered Sarah’s question, feigning relaxation.

  He glanced at the screen where the image of the Neotsarian Officer stood in a stiff pose. She, aware of the tension Coryn was concealing, gave his hand a quick, comforting squeeze.

  “The Organization Military man wanted us to show proof that we have, in fact, two Kordean Witches aboard this vessel,” he added.

  “That would be me and Dian, of course,” Sarah said, and her grin broadened. “Unless, of course, those guys are still insisting that I’m not the Witch, but that Nance is.”

  “Oh no you don’t, Sarah Mackenzie,” Nance cried. “You well know that I can’t magic a single thing!”

  “You do turn a lot of male heads, though!” Sarah said, giggling.

  “Which is magic of sorts,” commented Coryn. “Though, I doubt that it’s the kind that the Neotsarians are the most interested in.”

  He turned to look at the image of The Organization Officer, and placed an arm around Sarah, and one around Dian who had come to stand on his other side:

  “Meet Witches Sarah and Dian,” he said formally. “Two very capable young women. Dian,” he lifted her arm up, “—is the youngest, and the most talented member of the Circle of the Twelve, the largest of the Witch Circles of Kordea. Sarah, on my other side, was believed to be a Terran, until the truth about her background was discovered. She is, perhaps, even more talented than Dian, although not officially a member of any Circle. I am very proud to have them as members of my crew.”