“You should have taken Lazlo alive, worked his knowledge, recorded it. You would probably have been led to Acora. Take his knowledge, work it, record it. Terminate them both when you’re done with them—”
I shot a hard glance at Sully. “We didn’t go into this to be murderers. That’s what they are.”
“—and keep moving up the tree until you have Tage and Burke trapped on top, without support from below. The only thing they can do then is fall. And it’s a long way down.”
“It’s a terrific theory, Del. But sometimes events don’t play out exactly that way. And we weren’t in a position to kidnap and torture Lazlo to get information out of him.”
It’s not exactly torture, Chasidah. I’ve always left them smiling.
I shut my eyes, turning my face away from Del as his words soured in my stomach. And I felt a twinge of anguish from Sully. I was rejecting Del. Therefore I was rejecting him.
“Sully,” I said quietly, but his mouth was already a grim line.
“Sullivan,” Marsh said and his mouth too was a grim line. He stood in the doorway to the ready room, shoulders stiff, hands fisted at his waist as if he wanted to fight. Or run.
God, no. Not more jukors, more people dead. It was the only thing I could think of, but then Sully and Del were rising.
“Sit down, Ganton,” Sully ordered, stepping toward him. “We’re not going to hurt you. We need to talk about this.”
Marsh was shaking his head. He stared at Sully, something wild and fearful in his eyes, his mouth twisting as he spat out the word. “Mind-fucker.”
Oh, God. The news feed. No. Not now.
I heard Sully exhale a hard breath, felt fear and anger race through his mind. Then it stilled. He was silent, controlled.
“A mind-fucker who is trying to shut down the people who killed your father, yes.” Sully slowed in his steps, his voice firm, almost emotionless. “A mind-fucker who is willing to risk his life so no more innocents have to die. That’s exactly what I am. Now sit down.”
“You made us think it was Ren, and then you made us think Ren was harmless. And then you bring him on board.” Marsh jerked his chin at Del. “What are we, Sullivan, your stupid puppets?”
“It’s not like that.”
“What is it like? What in hell did you do to Gregor and Aubry? They never sold you out to the Farosians, did they? That’s a lie. You wanted them off the ship because they’d know what he was. Because they knew what you are!”
My chair squeaked as I pushed it around to the left. “Marsh, if you don’t want to listen to Sully, then listen to me. Gregor did sell us out to the Farosians and to Tage. I saw the archivers he used. I found those snoopers. If you want to see them, I’ll show you.”
“God, Chasidah.” Marsh was shaking his head again. “He’s got you brainwashed. The news explained that, that he’s controlling you. That he’ll kill you.”
“Sully’s not controlling me,” I said softly.
“He is. Even your brother said he is.”
Thad. I could imagine what Thad said, or how Tage used what Thad knew. “Thad lied,” I told Marsh. “Or they made him lie. Did the news article say anything about his working with Darius Tage?”
A very slight nod from Marsh.
“You know they’ve got him in lockup. They’re threatening him with treason. He’ll say whatever he needs to in order to save his life.” Including risk mine.
Do you need him? This from Del to Sully as I talked to Marsh. How critical is he to the operation of this ship? You or I could handle his duties.
Images flashed. Ugly ones.
“No!” I didn’t think. I acted. I lunged to my feet, swinging to my right to face Del. The Grizni snapped into my waiting hand. “This is my ship, Regarth. Power down or get off my bridge.”
Del regarded me through narrowed eyes as if he were amused. Or annoyed. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Marsh back up a step. He couldn’t know what Del said, but he knew something was very wrong.
Sully moved toward me, motioning Del away.
“I’ll handle this,” he said. “Chasidah.” He reached for me, palm up, his expression gentle but insistent. Ky’sara-mine. Not this way.
I shifted my stance slightly and held the knife between us. I imagine the look on my face was not unlike my expression just before I shot him two shipdays earlier.
Back off, Gabriel. He wants Marsh. He’s not getting him.
“Marsh,” Sully said, never taking his dark gaze off me, “I can explain everything. If you don’t like what you hear, you and Dorsie are free to go at the next port or dock. Year’s pay. Full docs. That’s a promise. But you need to sit down and listen. Please. Or I think my wife is going to stab me. And obviously, if I was controlling her, that wouldn’t be a pressing issue at this moment.”
Marsh moved again but toward me, slowly. I felt Del’s and Sully’s attention shift, felt the Kyi’s power almost roiling beneath Del’s skin. Sully’s pulsed and simmered. The energy was angry, demanding release.
“Captain Bergren,” Marsh said quietly. “Can you hand me your gun? Or will they stop you?”
“I would not recommend that action,” Del said evenly.
“Advice noted,” I snapped. I switched the dagger to my left hand—I’d trained with both and Sully knew it—and drew my Stinger out of the holster at my hip. For a moment my hand froze, my shoulder locking, unable to move.
Regarth! Sully growled out his name.
My arm moved again. “The man’s afraid,” I said to Sully, as if nothing had happened, as if Del hadn’t locked my body against my will. “For good reason. He wants a little security. He’s entitled to it. But on one condition. You listening, Marsh?”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Do not shoot Sullivan without asking me first.”
“Understood, Captain.”
“Thanks for including me under your veil of protection,” Del said dryly.
I slanted him a withering glance. “Sit.” It sounded as if I were talking to a dog. I wanted it to. The man could kill me, easily. I’d watched Sully force Gregor to almost slit his own throat. But this was my bridge, goddammit. My crew. I would not be cowed, and if His Royal Fucking Highness took offense at that, so be it. I have a long memory. I’d see him in hell.
Del shrugged, elegantly, and sat back down at nav.
I looked at Sully. “You too.”
“I’m on your side, Chaz.”
“Prove it.”
He sat.
Marsh, standing beside me, was breathing heavily. I flicked the pistol to stun and passed it to him.
“I’ll start,” I said as Marsh palmed the gun. “And I don’t blame you for not believing any of us. Hell, I’m not sure I can even comprehend everything that’s happened to me in the past few months. But what I’m going to tell you is the truth, what I know about Sully, how I found out.”
I told him how Sully wiped the memories of Kingswell and Paxton on the Meritorious so we could escape, how he’d breathed for Ren so he could live, how he impossibly transported us up the center core of Marker when Berri could have killed us. How he’d saved Philip’s life, knowing he could lose me as a result. How he’d nullify his abilities with copious amounts of honeylace because he hated what he was. And how Gregor and Aubry almost killed him when he couldn’t defend himself.
I told him how I’d feared Sully but loved him anyway. And yes, I was his ky’sara. But he was ky’sal to me. The risk was far greater to him. And Marsh could find documentation supporting that in any number of scholarly files on Kyi-Ragkirils.
Sully had been leaning forward, forearms on his knees, hands clasped, watching me through my entire recitation. Our mental link was silent but not shut down. His emotions surged and ebbed like a storm tide, from fear to hope and back again.
When I finished speaking, he cleared his throat. “Marsh, I’ve lied to you for years. For that I apologize. But for all those years, I was what I am now. You think I’ve controlled you. You wor
ry I might kill you. But we’ve had some differences before. Major ones. You’ve taken a few swings at me. On Ferrin’s, you even knocked me on my ass. Until I knocked you on yours.” He paused. “You’re still alive.”
“Yeah, but now I know what you are.”
“Evidently, so does most of civilized space, thanks to…let me guess. CCNN?”
Marsh nodded.
“If you don’t want to work for a known Ragkiril, I accept that. But I can’t change what I am. I can only try to use what I am to make a difference, just as I always have. To stop people like Tage from destroying the rim worlds, from killing Verno’s people and yours.”
“Does Verno know…?”
“You and Dorsie are the only ones who didn’t.”
“Gregor and Aubry, they found out the hard way.”
“They gave me no choice.”
“Like now?”
Del shifted in his chair, drawing one leg up, ankle resting on his knee, elbow on the chair’s armrest. The pose was languid. This was not a life-or-death matter. It was just another topic to get out of the way. “Consider this, Mr. Ganton. The man you are contemplating rejecting—and yes, he is quite human, not a Stolorth doing some fancy shape-shifting trick—is willing to risk his own life to avenge the death of your father. Can you show me another of your own kind, other than the enticing and spirited Captain Bergren here, who is willing to do that? For you, the baseborn son of an impoverished fruit picker?”
“You have such a way with words, Regarth,” I snapped.
A dark blue gaze that glittered with the mystery of exotic oceans turned to me. Then his lashes dropped seductively. “And you have a fire deep within that is positively enchanting.” He turned to Sully. “Let me again compliment you on your choice for a ky’sara.”
Marsh watched the exchange with interest. When it became apparent that Del was not going to kill me for my insolence, the stiffness in Marsh’s shoulders faded. A bit.
“When I accepted what Ren was,” he asked Sully, “why didn’t you tell me the truth?”
“Ren’s not a Ragkiril. He’s the lowest level empath, not even a full Ragkir. That’s different from being a mind-fucker.”
Marsh raked one hand over his face. “Sorry, Sullivan. The term just—”
“Flows so easily from the lips?” Del quipped.
I spun back to him, my last strand of patience fraying. “Off my bridge, Regarth. Now.”
“Del.” Sully straightened. “Your cabin has a nice tub. Go soak.”
Your head, I put in silently. And I wasn’t referring to the fact that Stolorths required water immersion every forty-eight hours.
“That is actually what I need to do,” Del said, rising. He winked at me then strode easily for the corridor with no further comment, aloud or internal. But I had no illusion that meant I had him under control.
Marsh relaxed visibly with Del’s departure. He glanced at my laser pistol in his hand, hefted it, then handed it back to me. “I have my own, will probably stayed armed for now. If you don’t mind, Captain.”
“I understand.”
He scrubbed at his face with his hands then with a new resolve apparent in the set of his shoulders, walked between me and Sully, heading to his chair at the engineering console. He spun it around but hesitated before sitting. “Requesting permission to resume my duties, Sullivan.”
Emotions played over Sully’s face, the link between us thawing, warming. He had to clear his throat again before he spoke. “Permission granted, Marsh. And thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me.”
“I figured if you wanted me dead, you would have done it on Ferrin’s.”
“You get really nasty when you’re stinking drunk.”
Marsh sat. “I still managed to clock you pretty good.”
“It only shuts down your brain. It doesn’t seem to slow your reflexes.”
“So it was a fair fight? No—” Marsh circled one hand in the air “—tricks?”
I eased myself back into the pilot’s chair and watched two old friends find their bearing again. Marsh wasn’t the only one who relaxed when Del left the bridge.
“Actually, because of what I am, I’m probably somewhat stronger than a guy my size should be. Someone else wouldn’t have been able to level me. But you did.”
“Until you kicked my feet out from under me.”
Sully shrugged. “You were staggering at that point. I just helped nature along.”
Marsh nodded. He was quiet for a moment, then: “Nature played a bad trick on you, didn’t she?”
“Most of my life I’ve hated what I am. But right now,” Sully said, pursing his lips thoughtfully for a moment, “I’m damned glad. Burke and Tage are afraid of me, or they wouldn’t be doing what they have been with Chaz’s brother, or trying to kill us at Narfial.” He hesitated, saw Marsh’s questioning expression as I did. “That’s something else we kept from you, yes. Tage had an ImpSec deuce come after us on Narfial. I couldn’t tell you then because you didn’t know what I was, what Del was. Because how we stopped them, got away, involved what we are. They probably have no idea we’ve hooked up with Del, or what that means. When they do, if they’re smart, they’ll start running and not look back.”
“Captain Regarth. Dorsie said he’s really a prince?”
Sully nodded.
“That brings us to our next problem,” Marsh said. “Now you’re going to have to go through this all over again with Dorsie.”
Sully groaned softly. “She’s going to poison me.”
“Take Ren with you,” I said. He had a calming presence. I wished he’d been on the bridge. I wonder if he knew how his prince would leave his victims smiling.
Sully departed the bridge, one problem if not solved, then at least on the way toward a solution. He had another ahead of him with Dorsie, and more after that—not the least of which was Del.
When I turned back, Marsh was looking at me. “I’m not really sure what to think yet,” he admitted. “I don’t like this. At all. But I’ve known you as long as he has, when you were Fleet, chasing us down. You’re still the same. You don’t take crap from him, from anyone. If I’m here, it’s because you are.”
I remember having a similar conversation with Ren when I first found out what Sully was. My faith in Sully was because of Ren’s trust in him.
“I’d like to read that research you mentioned,” Marsh continued after a moment, bringing me out of my thoughts.
“And I need to study that CCNN news feed.” I pulled up Gregor’s data and others Sully had on file. I sent the three most comprehensive to Marsh’s console with notations where he could find more.
Marsh glanced at his screen then back at me. “He really doesn’t control you. But he could.”
“Marsh, you could pull your laser pistol out of the locker in your cabin and shoot me anytime I walked down the corridor to the galley. But you don’t. All relationships work on an element of trust. You trust me to fly this ship, keep you safe. I trust you to keep the sublights operational and not shoot me in the back.”
“Can he hear what we’re thinking all the time?”
“He’s linked to me, so he knows if I’m upset or in trouble. And yes, he can talk to me, mentally, without being in the same room. But to listen to every thought you, Dorsie, Verno, Ren, and I have, constantly?” I shook my head. “The noise would be deafening, the content inane. It would wear him out.” I wasn’t sure of the last part but it sounded reasonable. And Del had made a similar comment.
“But you can tell when he’s doing that, right?”
“If he’s reading a mind deeply, yes, his eyes go very dark. And,” and I hesitated, not knowing how much to say, but he had the articles. He’d read about it anyway. “And when he uses the energies of the Kyi, you can see a silver haze around him.”
“I saw a vid clip of a Stolorth during the war doing that. It wasn’t real clear, but I know what you mean.” He raised his chin slightly. “So how does he get to be human
and be this Ragkiril too?”
“He doesn’t know. No one really knows. There’s a theory that in humans it’s a genetic mutation. Rare. Every four generations or more. But it’s theory.”
Marsh pursed his lips. “Some people say we don’t belong in this sector. This is Takan and Stolorth territory, not ours. Maybe that’s true and maybe the galaxy knows it. It’s pissed off, so it’s changing us into what’s supposed to live here. You know. Evolution affected by environment.”
I’d studied evolution and environment in the academy. But pissed-off galaxies were a new one for me.
“If the galaxy’s pissed off, then it should be changing Burke and Tage into netherats. Speaking of which,” and I tapped my finger on my screen, “I need to examine what Tage released to CCNN. And then I have to track down Sully again because Dock Five may not be the best idea at this time. We need to decide on a course change in the next twenty-five minutes.”
Marsh nodded. “You’re a good person, Chasidah.”
“So are you, Marsh. So are you.”
I read through the brief but damning CCNN article on the “dangerous and mentally unstable mutant human Ragkiril, Gabriel Sullivan,” three times, then moved on to the reports of the “accident” in Grover’s City. Jukors still at large. There was no report of a freighter colliding with Narfial Station so I assumed either damage had been minimal or a course correction had been entered when we were no longer able to be targeted.
No mention of two dead ImpSec agents either. But that didn’t surprise me.
Sully and Ren came onto the bridge when I was finished making notes on what I’d read. I felt him before I heard the bootsteps in the corridor. He was emotionally drained, but there was a definite sense of relief.
“Your aunt has quite an impressive vocabulary,” Sully said, ducking under the hatchway opening. “I didn’t know it was possible to do those kinds of things with my anatomy.”
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