Quin and Justis found us there and sat down to share a small plate of fruit and cheese while we ate and talked.
"Can you tell us where you've been?" Justis asked.
"I can't," I shook my head. "I made a promise, I'm sorry."
"Don't worry about it. My Quin disappeared for five years. I was grateful to get her back."
"Five years your time," Quin pointed out before popping a grape in her mouth.
"Yes. Five years my time," Justis sighed. He'd suffered during that time, just as Pap had suffered during my absence.
"If there comes a time when I can tell you, I will," I said. "But for now, I have to keep the secret." I didn't want the Prophet to turn his gaze—and his wrath—upon Falchan for any reason. After two years of training with Sal, he'd sent me to help the current Warlord and his General on Falchan, while I continued to train with blades. Evidence of the help I'd provided was now tattooed across my back.
Salidar would be safe enough, but Falchan could be placed in danger if it was discovered I'd spent time there, learning a great many things so I could stand against the Prophet when the time came again.
Time would tell whether I'd learned enough to stand against him, because I knew as surely as I knew anything that he had plans to attack the Conclave and this time, it was on the Founder's home planet of Campiaa.
Teeg San Gerxon had security measures in place, but there was no reliable method of predicting what the Prophet could do when presented with such a challenge.
The Prophet would know in two days that the gauntlet had been thrown, as Salidar was fond of saying.
So far, no more had been seen of infected humanoids, but that could be a temporary ruse. I had no doubt that those soldiers—living and dead—merely waited to serve the Prophet's whims.
"How long can you stay?" Pap asked. He understood that Kooper still needed me; it wasn't necessary to tell him.
"I have three days before reporting in," I said. "I want to pay a visit to Queen Lissa's dungeons tomorrow, and then I need to do some shopping for clothes. What I have now isn't suitable."
After five years of training, all I had was Falchani-style leathers, and those were a dead giveaway to anyone as to where I'd been. I'd left the leathers with Salidar in his mountain cabin, choosing to wear the clothes I'd worn at the time of my disappearance.
Those clothes were now so tight across the shoulders I could barely fit into them, even after I'd made alterations with power.
So many things had changed while I was gone.
I'd changed while I was gone.
You have my blessings, Salidar's voice sounded in my mind. I always knew you'd choose the time to leave. Kick ass and take names, all right?
Thank you, I replied. For everything, including those cheesy Kung-Fu vids.
Just trying to make you into a well-rounded individual, he sent a mental smirk.
Right.
Send mindspeech anytime, he ended our conversation.
Right.
"Do you want company when you visit Lissa's dungeons?" Quin asked.
"I'll have to shield you if you go," I said, pushing my last piece of toast through the remains of brown gravy on my plate. "I'm going to visit Vrak."
"Why?" Pap didn't sound convinced that I should do anything of the sort.
"I have to know something about him," I shrugged.
"You learned how to shield?" Justis asked the question the others wanted to know.
"I sort of taught myself," I said. "I taught myself several things, actually."
"Isn't that unusual?" Justis asked.
"It is, but my ability isn't like a wizard's or warlock's, or so I've been told." I didn't add that Ilya Ironsmith told me so. I'd awakened the talent in myself, too, which, according to Ilya, wasn't possible with wizards or warlocks. Someone else had to do it for them, when they were young. He said the talent would remain out of their reach, otherwise.
My talent had been hovering in my mind all along, waiting for me to grasp it. And, as my father didn't have anything like it, I knew it had to come from my mother.
How I had it and she didn't, however, I had yet to figure out.
"We'll go with you to Queen Lissa's palace," Quin interrupted my thoughts. "We just won't go to the dungeon with you."
"I'd appreciate that," I said. "Pap, you want to go?"
"I need to speak with Lissa anyway about an event at the beach palace. I'll come," he agreed.
"You have a suite here to stay the night," Quin smiled at me. "It's still yours if you want it."
"That sounds great," I said. "I've had a long day."
Later, I pulled covers back on the bed inside a private suite not far from Pap's. Sitting on the edge of the soft, sheet-covered monstrosity, I leaned over to pull my boots off. They were Falchani-made, and I'd get rid of them the moment I bought other boots that could be found at a shop in either Alliance.
I undressed slowly as I considered events surrounding the last Joint Conclave, which had been postponed and relocated.
I also considered a piece of evidence that I'd asked Kooper for and hadn't gotten before I'd been sent to Falchan more than five years in the past.
Holding out a hand, I brought the coin to my fingers. The way I'd done it—with power—wouldn't set off any alarms in the ASD evidence warehouse.
Perhaps I'd put it back there the same way. For now, I wanted to examine it more thoroughly. I hoped it had the residue of the spell about it, because I wanted to study it.
I also wanted to search its history, and I had to hold it to do that.
Just not now. Now, I was more than weary and needed sleep. Setting the coin on the small, bedside table, I finished undressing and lay back on the bed. Time to meditate—just enough to fall asleep.
Kooper, I sent before beginning my meditation. I have the coin from Vogeffa II.
All right.
Good-night.
BlackWing X
Travis
"No, I've had several drinks already," Kooper held up a hand when I offered a glass of bourbon. He'd met me in the Captain's cubby not long after he'd ordered X, VII and XII to reverse course.
"What's going on with Bornelus?" I asked, offering a chair to Kooper before sitting down behind the desk.
"Well, I have it on good authority that any ships that show up will be flying into a trap."
"That's—interesting," I said after hesitating a few seconds. "Can you expand on that thought?"
"The source says the Prophet likely has designs on the ships and personnel that show up to investigate his hole-digging. I have a preliminary sample of the soil from the site and so far, there's no difference in it and any other samples we've taken."
"I'll ask who took that sample later," I said. "A trap sounds logical, now that you've said it. It would be in the Prophet's wheelhouse, I believe, after the attack he planned on Cord'ilus last year."
"I think that, too. Tell me, who do you think might have gone to take the soil sample?"
Kooper was hiding something, but his face was set and revealed nothing to me. "No idea," I admitted. "Someone with folding skills and power, I assume. Did Mom send somebody?" She'd be my first guess, if she weren't tending to two three-month-olds.
"Your mother had nothing to do with this."
"Wow." I flipped my braid over a shoulder and lifted the bottle of bourbon to pour a glass for myself. Who'd know anything about Bornelus—enough to sense that something had been disturbed and then have sufficient wisdom to take a soil sample for Kooper. "I don't have a clue," I shrugged.
"Randl," Kooper's voice was flat. "He's back—and—different."
I let that information soak into my mind for a moment. I'd just described who could take a soil sample. Randl couldn't fold space. Did he magically appear out of thin air and convince someone to give him a ride to Bornelus?
"I'm sorry," I pinched the bridge of my nose. "This isn't making sense."
"My entire evening has been filled with stuff that doesn't
make sense."
"Where is he now?" I thought to ask.
"Asleep at Avii Castle, according to Quin. I'm giving him three days before sending him here to BlackWing X. Be prepared. This isn't the Randl you knew before."
I toyed with my empty glass for a few moments before lifting my eyes to Kooper's. "When should I let the crew know?"
"Tomorrow is good enough. I have to get some uniforms together for him—for official business, you understand. You're going back undercover from here on out." Kooper rose from his seat, preparing to leave.
"Different how?" I asked the question foremost in my mind concerning Randl.
"I had a shield around me, Kell and Opal at New Fangled earlier. Randl breached it to include himself."
Kooper's admission made me draw in a breath. Who could do that? Shields created by the truly powerful couldn't be breached, to my knowledge. I couldn't breach one of Kooper's shields if I tried.
"No, I have no idea how he did it and trust me, I've been working on that since it happened," Kooper waved a hand. "Three days and he'll be here. I want full reports, Captain Tetsuya. If you can, find out where he trained and with whom. We may need that information."
"Yes, Director."
Kooper folded space while I pondered Randl's return—and the conundrum of what he'd become.
Queen's Palace, Le-Ath Veronis
Randl
We'd been invited to have breakfast with Queen Lissa, once she learned that we were coming. Wellend and Warlend transported us to her palace after I'd risen and dressed.
Pap couldn't stop smiling at me, and clapped me on the back when we landed in Lissa's private dining room. Several of her mates were there, including Winkler, Drake and Drew.
Winkler gave a low laugh and rose from his seat to engulf me in a hug.
"I hear you have some babies, now," I grinned when he pulled away.
"Sure do. Come take a look before you leave." He was as proud as any father could be of his twins, and wanted to show them off whenever possible.
"That sounds great," I said.
"I hear you want to visit Vrak," he said, his voice lowering.
"Yes. I want to do an experiment."
"Anything dangerous?"
"No, sir. Just a brief change of appearance, that's all."
"You want to see if he'll recognize you as the Prophet, don't you?" Winkler was a very smart werewolf.
"Yes. I'm the only one who's seen past the Prophet's hood, I think. I want to see if Vrak knows him by sight, or whether he has another way to identify the asshole."
"That's an interesting idea," Lissa said. As a vampire, she'd hear a whisper clearly. It didn't matter, I needed her permission anyway to visit Vrak in her dungeon.
"Come take a seat," she invited. "Sit next to Winkler so you won't have to talk over so many people," she added.
I took the indicated seat next to Winkler. "We heard you were back last night—from Kooper," Winkler said as plates of food were set in front of us. "I was hoping we'd get to see you before you took off into to the wild blue yonder."
The unusual phrase made me smile. What he referred to was occasionally wild, seldom blue and certainly yonder.
"I'm just glad he's alive," Lissa said. "It's good to see you, Randl."
"I feel the same way," Pap raised his cup of tea.
"Our boys will be happy, too," Drake said. "They've missed you and your sage advice."
"Some days I don't feel very sagacious," I said. Most of those days involved bruises and sore muscles from intense training with Sal. I wasn't going to admit that to anyone, however—except Travis and Trent. If they wanted to tell their mother and fathers, that was fine. The secret would be safe enough with them.
BlackWing X
Travis
"I asked you to this meeting to make an announcement," I said. We'd just finished breakfast, so Susan and Bekzi could join the rest of us at galley tables to hear the news.
"Does it involve the reason we're not going to Bornelus now?" David asked. The crew only had sketchy information on Kooper's reasons to reverse course. While David was an Amterean by naturalization, he had enough curiosity to be an Amterean Dwarf by birth.
"Yes, but that's not the most important thing," I said, waving off his question. James and Nathan, pilot and navigator, were here, too, and I didn't want to keep them away from the bridge for long.
Pulling in a breath, I blurted the news. "Randl's alive, and he's joining us aboard ship in two-and-a-half days."
For a crew of ten, they made enough noise to fill the entire galley. "Hold off on the speculation so I can tell you the rest," I raised my voice to be heard. Things quieted immediately.
"Thank you. Randl met with Kooper last night, who was just as surprised as the rest of us by his sudden appearance. He told Kooper that the Prophet removed dirt from the hole to pull us into a trap. Instead, Kooper's sending a few old ships to the area on auto-pilot, and setting them to detonate if anybody boards them."
"So, we fire the first volley instead of the Prophet," Jayna said quietly.
"That's the idea. Kooper says it will send a message to the Prophet—that we won't fall for all his tricks."
"That will just make him more devious next time," Sabrina pointed out. She'd learned a lot in a year; she'd made the decision to remain an ASD agent rather than become a liaison. She'd also immersed herself into her lessons after Randl's disappearance, and passed all her tests in near-record time. She was a full-fledged member of the crew, now, sexual frustration aside.
Kooper had readily agreed with Sabrina's decision to become a regular agent; I think she had some idea of avenging Randl's death. Nothing Trent or I could say would dissuade her so here we were; all of us waiting for her three-year stint to pass.
"Yes, but we'll have Randl back, and I hope that helps," Trent took over for me. "Conclave is coming, and Kooper wants all of us on alert. The Prophet has plans again, and nearly a year has passed for him to make them better. We have to be prepared for any attack."
He didn't say what we all knew, however. Without Randl's help last time, we'd probably be dead or enslaved by the Prophet. Not a pleasant thought, by any means.
"Where has Randl been?" James asked.
"I don't have that information. You can ask him yourself in a couple of days. That's all for now. Back to your duties, everyone." I dismissed the crew.
"Need tea?" Bekzi came forward as the others filed out of the galley.
"Yes. Please."
"I get," he nodded and walked away while I sat heavily at a galley table to consider everything I'd learned in the past day.
"Bro, stop worrying about it. We'll deal with things as they crop up," Trent sat opposite me.
"Yes, but what things? We already know the Prophet is as devious as they come—maybe more so."
"I'll feel better when Randl gets here," Trent blew out a breath. Bekzi arrived and set a mug of Falchani black in front of both of us.
"Be good to see Randl," Bekzi said. "He friend. Good help."
"You're right as usual, Bekz," Trent nodded to the lion snake shapeshifter. "I just hope we make it through the next round with the Prophet."
"That make two," Bekzi agreed. "We stand strong. As should."
Queen's Palace, Le-Ath Veronis
Randl
"Are you sure you don't want Winkler and me to come in with you—as mist?" Queen Lissa attempted to hide her worry.
"I'll send mental images," I said, hoping to put her off without upsetting her. "I think I'll be all right."
"Open the door," Lissa nodded to the dungeon guard, a vampire with a century of experience at handling unruly prisoners.
"No need," I said. "I can get myself inside."
"It's shielded," Lissa began as I bent reality and walked through it—and the cell wall—at the same time.
Lissa
Holy, fucking hell. It was all I could think as Randl did something I hadn't known was possible. Sure, I could mist through walls, but h
e'd been solid when he passed through the walls and my shields. Holy, fucking hell, I mentally repeated.
That's when Randl began transmitting images to Winkler and me as we stood outside the cell door. Winkler's hands dropped to my shoulders and he pulled me against him as we watched the scene unfold.
Randl
At first Vrak didn't know I was there. He sat against a wall, arms draped over bent knees, staring at the floor. My disguise was in place, hood and all, when he looked up. Vrak scrambled to his knees and almost prostrated himself before me.
"Please," he wept, "Tell me my children are alive."
"I didn't get much from him—he only babbled about his children, Varok and Perill. I figure they're in deep with the Prophet, and subject to his whims, just as Vrak is."
Kooper had joined me in Lissa's private study to hear what I'd learned from Vrak. Winkler, Drake, Drew and another mate, Rigo, were also there.
"Director, I need information on Vrak's past."
"You think this is another Phorde Gaster, don't you?" Kooper sat back in his chair, shaking his head.
"I'm concerned, yes," I told him. "Whatever the Prophet did to Phorde's replacement convinced him in every way that he was the real Phorde Gaster. Down to the fingerprints and DNA, if your testing procedures were correct."
"That's how we identified him," Kooper sounded grim.
"Do you think the Lyristolyi drug is involved, somehow?" Lissa asked. "That's the only way I know to make clones that are indistinguishable from the original."
"Do you know about the Lyristolyi drug?" Kooper turned to me.
"I'll do research," I said. "This sounds as if it may be the base the Prophet works from to produce these doppelgangers."
"This means he could have his sycophants planted everywhere," Lissa didn't sound pleased. "I thought that shit died out with Vardil Cayetes."
"I was hoping it was gone for good," Kooper agreed.
"We still don't have an idea how he's placing obsessions," Winkler growled. "He has a Sirenali stashed away somewhere, you can bet on that."
MindMage: BlackWing Pirates, Book 2 Page 2