“The Marquise de Wardes,” he said, with venom.
Dana laughed as she came, the vibrations hitting them both. Milord was only a minute behind her, groaning into her breasts so that she could not see his face.
Interesting. Dana caught a handful of his brown hair and tipped his head up, catching a flash of an unexpected colour in his pupils before they settled back to their usual grey. “What will you give me, if I kill her for you?”
She still held him in place with her thighs, though she knew he could push out of the hold if he wanted to. She had more muscle tone, though she had learned from their previous dalliance that he was strong for a man who spent most of his life at a desk.
“Anything,” said Milord, and kissed her almost politely on the mouth.
Dana was so damn tired of pretending to be someone that she was not. “The only thing that I want, you can’t give me,” she said in a hard voice.
He tilted his head back, curious. “What is it you want, Dana D’Artagnan?”
She shoved herself off him, backing away on bare feet. “I want Conrad Su, alive and well. And you know it.”
Milord’s eyes blazed silver. He looked her up and down with an expression of contempt that he had never allowed her to see before. “How much do you know?”
“Everything,” Dana snarled, and punched him because what the hell else was she going to do at this point? She was naked and her weapons were – much like her clothes – scattered half across the room.
It was a good hit – she had been aiming for the jaw, but over-compensated for the height difference and got him in the nose. He jerked back in pain, hands shielding his face.
Again, a flash of brightness, not only in his eyes. Lights reflected in tiny motes from his skin – no, the lights were part of his skin. Milord lit up like a constellation of stars against a scarlet sky. A terrible, overwhelming realisation rushed at Dana like a sonic engine to the face.
Milord lunged for her, and she was ready for him, her punches jabbing at his throat and solar plexus even as he slammed her to the ground. She clawed at his face, going for the sensitive parts of his mouth and eyes, and there, where her short nails dug into his lip, she saw it again.
“I know what you are,” she choked out as red and silver burst across his skin like she had thrown boiling water on him, like there was an explosion inside him trying to get out, like he wasn’t human.
He wasn’t human.
Sun-kissed, sun-kissed, sun-kissed.
It made too much sense. Milord was one of them, an alien spy. Dana had known she was sleeping with the enemy but this – this was worse than she had ever imagined.
“Do you think I won’t kill you to protect my secret?” Milord hissed down at her, his body pinning hers to the floor.
Dana stared at his bright red skin from hairline to fingertip. His eyes burned with hatred, and his skin glowed like fireworks.
“Well,” she said. “You can try.”
39
Milord, and his secrets
They grappled together, Milord’s body heavy over Dana’s, his hands pinning her shoulders to the floor of his fancy spaceship parlour.
Who even has a parlour in a spaceship? she thought, not for the first time. She should have known he was an enemy alien, from that.
Dana lay still, waiting for him to make the first move. Athos had taught her that. If she had learned anything from her fencing lessons, it was that patience paid off.
Do you think I won’t kill you to protect my secret?
Dana breathed, regaining her centre, and Milord took control of himself again. His skin paled to its usual pinkish white, and the bright constellation of stars faded away. His hair framed his face, metallic silver.
Secret agent hair. With Vaniel de Winter there had always been a promise of danger well-hidden under his affable, friendly surface. But he was pure Milord now, sharp as a knife.
Dana breathed, and waited for him to shift his weight.
“It would be in your interest,” he said in a low, threatening voice. “To come quietly, sweetness.”
He had never used pet names in bed, but was willing to pull them out when trying to kill her? Oh, that wasn’t creepy at all.
“And what?” Dana asked, borrowing the bored, ‘you can’t touch me’ tone that all three of her Musketeer friends employed before leaping into bar fights. “Surrender like a good prisoner? You don’t know me at all.”
“I’m starting to,” said Milord. He pushed up from her, his hands hard on her shoulders, as if his strength was enough to keep her down.
Yes, he was strong. But Dana was pissed off, and that counted for something. She dropped one hip, knocking his balance off by a fraction, and head-butted him in the face.
Milord’s fell back enough that Dana was able to slam an elbow into his neck and slide out from under him.
Clothes, she had to grab her clothes and her weapons and get the hell out of here, because running naked out of a spaceship dock was completely not on her list of things to do today. As she put space between them, she saw his feet, his bare feet, and a dizzying memory swept over her. Oh, fuck. How had she not put it together before now?
Milord lunged for her and Dana picked up the pace, rocketing across the room away from him.
A weight slammed into her bare back; he grappled her around the ribs. She dug a punch into his side and swung her shoulder into his entire arm, hard enough to break a bone though she did not hear a reassuring crack.
Did the Sun-kissed even have bones?
Milord could not get purchase on her hair, his nails sharp against her scalp, but Dana went down beneath his body, the air bursting from her lungs as she hit the floor. His arm wrapped around her throat, hard enough that stars sparked behind her eyes.
They were on top of her clothes, and that meant her weapons were right there. Dana slid her hand beneath her own stomach, hoping that the hard lump she could feel under her hip was the pilot’s slice and not a random candlestick or whatever rich people accessories Milord kept in his fancy parlour.
No, she realised as painful black circles spun in her vision, and her whole body battled to breathe. Not the pilot’s slice at all. Her fingers had closed around the handle of the pearl stunner.
Good enough.
She brought it up wildly, hoping not to catch the rebound as she sent a burst of bright white energy directly into her attacker’s face.
Milord collapsed on top of her, a dead weight on her shoulders and spine. Dana angled herself to shove him off her, not caring that his head hit the floor with a hollow sound.
It wasn’t like he was human.
She tugged on her underwear, not daring to take her eyes off the unconscious alien. He did not revert to his Sun-kissed form in unconsciousness –that would have been a giveaway every time he fell asleep. He had only lost control of his disguise when he was hurt.
His silver hair fell in soft tangles around the back of his neck. Dana knew that neck, but not from any of her own interactions with Milord. She examined his feet, to confirm the fleeting impression from the fight.
Milord’s hair, his bare feet, the back of his neck – she had seen him in a dream, long before the train on Valour.
Dana could not deny it any more. Milord Vaniel de Winter was not only a Sun-kissed spy like Athos’ pretty husband. He was the actual ghost who drove her friend to drink and occasional misery, the sleeping lover he kept locked inside his guilty conscience. The traitor who had married the Comte de la Fere.
Dana was still sticky from having sex with him.
“Shit,” she said aloud.
She had to get off this ship. She had to get less naked, and she had to get off the Matagot, and she had to get well clear of the ship so this traitorous Sun-kissed spy didn’t murder her to protect his secret.
There were lots of steps to go through before Dana had to start panicking about how to break it to Athos that she had fucked his dead husband.
Milord lay crumpled over Dan
a’s clothes. She shifted him with her foot, reaching down to grab the pilot’s slice. It felt better, to have her baton in one hand and the pearl stunner in the other, even if she was still only wearing a pair of black knickers.
She reached for her cargo pants next, but as she leaned over his body, Milord’s eyes snapped open.
Alien biology, Dana realised. The pearl stunner must not work on him for long. By the time that thought had sunk in, she was already running, crashing out of his bedroom and along the corridor.
This damned ship was so big, and she didn’t dare take the most direct route to the hatchway, not if he was coming after her. Once she was two twists of the corridor away from his room, she leapt up the walls and levered open an air duct panel, slipping up and into the narrow space in the ceiling. She pulled the panel closed behind her, as Athos had taught her to do, then slithered quietly along the crawl space.
She heard shouting, and at one point lay still and terrified as Milord thundered along the corridor, calling for the Red Hammers stationed outside the ship. She heard words like ‘treason’ and ‘assault’ and was glad she hadn’t tried to brazen it out at the main hatch.
No, she would be better off dropping out via one of the storage hatches underneath the ship, once the fuss had died down and they thought she was gone. But she would be even better off if she was wearing clothes.
After a couple of false starts, Dana got her bearings enough to slither into the air duct directly above Kitty’s office. There was no sign that Milord was nearby – and given how furious he was, she was sure she would hear about it.
Kitty, wearing a purple lace coverall with spiky silver earrings, sat at her desk, absorbed in some kind of social media site rating celebrity hairstyles. The Marquise de Wardes was top of the poll.
Dana whistled between her teeth, and when Kitty did not look up, rapped lightly on the inside of the grate.
Kitty frowned, and tipped her head up.
Dana loosened the panel and smiled hopefully down at Milord’s assistant. “Hey, babe.”
“I seriously don’t want to know,” Kitty said in a scandalised whisper. “I am so not helping you escape, he’s spitting spark plugs. I did not see you.”
“Um,” said Dana. “I’ve figured out an escape route, but I need -”
“WHAT?” Kitty demanded. “What can you possibly need from me?”
“Clothes.”
There was a long pause, during which Milord’s assistant rolled her eyes hard enough to make Dana wince with embarrassment. “Really?”
“I’ll take anything,” Dana begged.
Kitty smirked, and stood up, then walked to the cupboard on the other side of the office. “You’re lucky. I keep a spare outfit for nightclubbing emergencies.”
“Um,” said Dana, wondering if she wouldn’t after all be better off escaping through Paris in a pair of knickers and nothing else.
“Don’t worry,” said Kitty, opening the door to reveal a sparkly mini-dress covered in a print of happy baby dragons in astronaut costumes. “I have the matching shoes.”
The Buttercup was docked a few levels from the Matagot. Dana went there first, reclaimed her jewelled studs, and hid out in the old dart for an hour or two until her pulse had calmed down. She couldn’t get the printer to produce more than basic supplies – no replacement for the space dragon dress, no shoes, not even decent coffee. She would have to get Planchet to check it out before bringing the dart with her to war.
It was surreal to be thinking about war while wearing a sparkly space dragon frock.
The best option would be to call Planchet to bring a flight suit and a pair of boots from her place, but Dana didn’t think of that until she was halfway across Paris Satellite. To be safe, she used the most populated route, which meant a whole bunch of people got a good look at her in the sparkly dress, walking barefoot through the piazzas and boulevards of the city.
Talk about a walk of shame.
Aramis’ apartment was closer to the docks than any of the other Musketeer digs in the city, including Dana’s own lodgings. She told herself firmly that she was making this decision out of pure practicality – it had nothing to do with the fact that she was not ready to look Athos in the eye, or that she would literally rather die than have Madame Su catch sight of her in this get-up.
Aramis opened the door, and the expression on her face as she took in the sight of the sparkly space dragons was about what Dana had dreaded.
“So,” said Aramis. “There’s a story behind this?”
“I need to borrow your sonic shower and a change of clothes and please don’t ask,” Dana moaned as she pushed her way into the safe privacy of Aramis’ living room… which featured Porthos on the couch, and Athos printing coffee at the kitchen bar. Yep, Dana was completely and utterly not ready to look him in the eye. She made an embarrassed squeaking sound and scrambled for Aramis’ bedroom.
“Borrow whatever you like,” a bewildered Aramis called after her.
Dana found a spare black flight suit and threw it on the bed to change into after her shower, then stepped into the tiny cubicle and turned on the sonic spray. She couldn’t have her meltdown just yet, couldn’t even think about all the ramifications of what she had learned when Milord turned on her.
She wanted to throw up and die, possibly not in that order.
When she stepped out of the shower, wrapped in one of Aramis’ fluffy towels, she found Athos on the bed, leaning against the headboard. Waiting for her.
Dana swallowed.
Athos turned politely away, so she could get dressed without being observed. “I have been nominated,” he said. “Believe me, I’m no happier about this than you are.”
Dana dressed quickly in the soft, protective black folds of the flight suit. She felt like herself again, even if she had to roll up the sleeves and ankle cuffs because Aramis was so much taller. “I can’t talk to you about this, Athos.”
“Fine with me. I’ll get Porthos –”
“No,” Dana blurted out in horror. “I don’t want to talk to anyone. I’m not ready to think about it in my own brain, let alone inflict it on the rest of you.”
Athos glanced over his shoulder at her, and settled back against the headboard once he saw she was respectably dressed. “We’re worried about you, D’Artagnan. All this running around, playing at spy – you’re out of your depth.”
Dana burst into hysterical laughter, her hands pressed to her mouth. She could feel the sobs surging up inside her.
Athos stared at her in horror. “I’m getting Porthos.”
“No,” Dana said, hands still pressed to her mouth as she calmed herself down. “Give me a minute. It has to be you.” When she could breathe without breaking down, she climbed on to the bed, sitting beside him. She had to do this, or it would eat away at her until there was nothing left of their friendship.
She held her wrist out to Athos. When he did not react, she peeled the antique sapphire stud off her wrist and placed it on his, beside the vein. “It’s yours,” she insisted.
“I know,” he said, unflappable. “I recognised it. But that was in another life – it’s probably passed through a dozen pawn shops since then.”
“No, I need to you to take it. It’s yours.”
“I don’t understand what you’re saying.” He grazed the jewel with the soft pad of his thumb.
Dana tried to make the words come, but they got stuck in her throat. What if she was wrong? “Have you ever seen a picture of Milord de Winter?” she tried.
“I don’t think so. I don’t pay much attention to politics these days, especially Valour politics. I left that planet behind for a reason.”
Dana grabbed a tablet from Aramis’ side table and ran an image search. Milord had covered his tracks– there were hardly any pictures of him on Gossipnode, no official portraits attached to the Valour government website, or anything like that. But his ‘Vaniel de Winter’ identity brought up a few candid shots from social occasions at the Pala
ce, and the de Winter estate. There was a portrait of his wedding, deeply archived. He was younger, his soft brown hair worn long down one side of his neck in an aristocratic braid.
No images of him with his silver secret agent hair, but this would do. Dana pushed the tablet at Athos. “He’s a shape-changer,” she said flatly. “A Sun-kissed. And I think – I recognised him from the visions we shared back on the Parry-Riposte. I really want to be wrong.”
There was a long silence as Athos scrolled through the images.
“You’re not wrong, D’Artagnan,” he said finally. “There are – subtle differences about the face. But he looks a great deal like the man I married.”
Not husband, Dana noticed. The man I married.
“Maybe they all look like that,” she said in a small voice. “I mean, they’re shape-changers. They could use the same human design.” Was that worse? She should shut up.
“But this one had the sapphire,” said Athos, tilting his wrist to look at the stud.
“Yes,” admitted Dana.
“He’s alive.” He had something like wonder in his voice, as if this was not entirely terrible news.
“Alive and dangerous,” Dana reminded him.
“Yes, of course. Alive and dangerous.”
Dana turned away, not wanting to see Athos looking at pictures of his dead husband like it was a miracle. “He tried to kill me. He can’t afford to let me tell anyone who and what he is.”
Athos set the tablet aside on the bed. He pressed his hand firmly against the back of Dana’s neck for a moment, a reassuring touch. “D’Artagnan, I will not let that happen.”
There was a knock on the door, and Aramis opened it. “We’ve had our orders,” she sang out cheerfully. “Day after tomorrow, we ship out to motherfucking La Rochelle!”
Dana looked down at her wrist, where a message light was blinking on her comm stud. She passed her thumb over it, and read the contents. “All of us, it seems.”
Athos nodded, checking his own messages. “That’s good news. You only have two days to avoid the alien secret agent who is trying to kill you, and then we get to go into battle against his people.”
Musketeer Space Page 37