The Skypirate

by Justine Davis

  In a deep voice that sounded somewhat strained, the silver-haired man called the session to order, announcing as if it were news that this special meeting had been called to address the question of multiple transgressions of law on the part of a Triotian of blood.

  Then, sounding awkward, he addressed Dax.

  “Be you Dax, of the family of Silverbrake?”

  “I am.”

  The words were barely audible, and came in a voice as lifeless as his eyes. He never even raised his head. Califa felt that tightness in her chest increase.

  “It is the understanding of the council that you have waived the representation allowed you. Is that true?”

  “It is.”

  “You wish to defend yourself, then?”

  “No.”

  He still did not look up, and Califa felt that lump grow tighter, bigger.

  Glendar frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  Dax said nothing.

  “Dax,” the old man said, “these are serious charges.”

  In that moment, the reason for the man’s strain showed through, and the reason for that pause when he’d first seen him. He knew Dax, Califa thought. Knew him and liked him. Or had, once. And it was paining this dignified leader of the council to have to do this.

  Glendar tried again. “You know the procedure, Dax. You must have a defense, at the least an explanation. Theft, piracy, even murder—”

  “Don’t forget treason.”

  “Treason?” Glendar sounded startled.

  Dax stared at the floor. “What else would you call it?”

  Glendar glanced at the others; they looked as puzzled as he did. Except for Dare, Califa noticed. He looked merely thoughtful. Then, even as she watched, she saw a kind of understanding dawn in his eyes, as if something had just occurred to him.

  “There is no such charge against you,” Glendar said gently. “But the others are serious enough.”

  “Yes.”

  “Your defense, then.”

  “I have no defense,” Dax repeated.

  “Dax!” the man exclaimed. Dax never moved, his dark head stayed bent, his eyes fixed on some imaginary spot on the floor, as if he thought himself not good enough to even meet his accusers eye to eye.

  Califa nearly shouted at him, begging him to stop this. Can’t you see they don’t want to do this? she cried out silently. Even Dare had stiffened, staring at Dax tensely. Give them a chance, another option, she pled inwardly.

  Suddenly the woman next to Glendar stood up, the one, Califa remembered, who had also wavered when she’d seen Dax sitting there, so alone save for the guards beside him.

  “Dax,” she said gently, “we have not forgotten you. You were once of our best and brightest. We know there must be an explanation for the terrible things we have heard. Are they lies, exaggerations?”

  “No.”

  “But surely—”

  “The worst of what you have heard is true, and not the worst of what I have done.”

  The woman sank back into her chair, obviously shaken. Califa was shaking herself; he hadn’t just given up, he was begging them to convict him. She could hardly breathe for the painful tightness of her chest; he had finally found a way to punish himself enough.

  “Dax,” Glendar said urgently, “you must realize, in time of war, these charges could warrant even death, should his majesty so decree.”

  “I know.”

  “Then please, answer the charges.”

  For just an instant, Dax’s eyes closed. Then they snapped open again, still downcast. “Guilty,” he said.

  Murmurs of shock rippled through the room. Califa heard Rina cry out, and saw her run out of the room. At a quick whisper from Fleuren, her grandson, Renclan, followed the girl hastily. Numbed, Califa listened as Glendar abandoned his pretense at impartiality. He left the table and walked over to bend in front of the single chair.

  “Dax, please, you leave us no choice. No defense is as a conviction.”

  Dax remained stubbornly silent.

  Glendar straightened. He took in a deep breath, and turned to face Dare.

  “Your majesty? Do you wish to invoke the war authority for execution?”

  Even through her numbness, Califa saw Dare, already looking stunned, pale a little. Shaylah moved, just slightly, and Dare’s gaze flicked to her face. Then, letting out a long breath, he shook his head.

  Califa felt relief flood her. But it was short-lived when Glendar’s next words showed her the truth of what had happened; Dax had escaped death, but had been condemned back to the hell he’d been living in for the last six years.

  “It shall be banishment, then,” the old man said sadly, “as demanded by the laws of Trios, you shall be marked as an exile and forbidden ever to return.”

  Glendar nodded to the man Califa had almost forgotten, the man who stood to one side with that odd looking tool. He did something with it now, turning the handle. Almost immediately the tip, barely an inch across and shaped like an X, began to glow, first orange, then brightly, hotly red.

  It wasn’t until the man stepped toward Dax, and the two guards moved to hold his head, that she realized what was happening. She stared, in shocked disbelief. Surely he wasn’t going to let them do this, to literally brand him with that searingly hot metal?

  Then he moved, brushing away the hands of the guards, and Califa breathed again. And as quickly lost that breath on a gasp; Dax had merely rejected their hold on him. He bent his head to one side, then reached up and tugged the thick mane of his hair out of the way, baring his neck to the man with the red-hot brand. He wasn’t going to let them do it; he was going to help them.

  “Damn you!” Califa leapt to her feet, unable to bear it any longer. Dax seemed to wince, but he never looked at her. The man with the glowing tool paused. Glendar opened his mouth to speak, then closed it as she shouted again.

  “Damn you, Dax, look at me!”

  She strode across the room, oblivious of the sudden chorus of exclamations in the chamber. The guards moved to stop her, but at a wave from Dare, they let her pass. She came to a halt in front of the chair.

  “You’re not going to do this, do you hear me? You’re not going to just sit here and make them do this to you.”

  “Califa, don’t.”

  His voice was hoarse, strained, but it was at least a sign of some emotion and she welcomed it.

  “Don’t what? Speak for you when you refuse to speak for yourself?”

  “You can’t speak for me.”

  She whirled on Glendar. “Is that true? No one else can speak for him?”

  The silver-haired man looked miserable. “I’m afraid so, once he has declined that option.”

  Califa turned to look at Dare. He looked as torn as Shaylah had told her he was. But simply looking at him, thinking of something he had said earlier, gave her an idea. Desperately, she turned back to Glendar.

  “What of my time before you? Will you let me use it?”

  “Califa, no!” For the first time Dax looked up; she didn’t look at him.

  “Will you?” she demanded of Glendar.

  “If you use it now,” he cautioned, “you will shorten the time allowed for your own defense. Outworlders are only granted so much.”

  “I doesn’t matter. I have little enough to say.”

  Glendar hesitated, then glanced at Dare, who gave him a barely perceptible nod as Dax protested again.

  “Califa—”

  She whirled on Dax. “So now will you talk? Will you tell them why you refuse to defend yourself? Will you tell them the truth?”

  He lowered his eyes again. “I have,” he said flatly.

  “May your God preserve me from suicidal idiots,” she grated out. Then she spun around to fac
e the Council. “It is true I am an outworlder. And whatever else you have probably heard of me is true. But I have knowledge you need to hear, and despite the stubbornness of this . . . this Triotian of yours, you’re going to hear it.”

  “Stop it—”

  “Quiet,” Glendar ordered Dax, an odd light in his eyes now. “You refused to speak, now refrain from it.” Dax seemed to shut down before her eyes, as if he’d gone numb to everything around him.

  Glendar looked at Califa. “Go on. I would very much like to know why the son of one of the most honored families of Trios refuses to even try to defend himself.”

  “Because,” Califa said flatly, “he feels he deserves exactly what you are about to do to him. In fact, if he had his choice, I am sure he would prefer your king had invoked that order for execution.”

  Glendar blinked. “He would prefer death?”

  “He’s been trying for it ever since he committed that treason he spoke of.”

  “There is no charge of treason against him,” Glendar repeated, still clearly puzzled by the use of the word.

  “In your eyes, perhaps. But he has already tried and convicted himself, of the treason of not being here to die with the rest of his world.”

  The gasps that went around the room didn’t distract Califa from seeing the look that crossed Dare’s face; that of a man whose guess had been confirmed.

  “But that was no treason!” Glendar exclaimed. “It was not by design that he was gone at that time, we all knew that.”

  “That matters not to him. He is alive, and until a short time ago, he thought all of you—including your king—dead. For that reason alone he has risked himself time and again, hoping to join you all in that death.”

  She turned to face the council table. “He denied his identity as a Triotian, denied his family name because he felt he no longer had the right to either. Even the Triotian child he rescued three years ago, though he loves her, has been a living, daily torture, a reminder of how he had failed. All because he lived on after his world had been destroyed. All because he hadn’t been there to uselessly die along with the rest of his people.”

  Califa swallowed, knowing she was losing her emotional control but unable to fight it any longer. She had to make them understand.

  “When he learned that some of you still lived, and of your rebellion, he tried to atone by saving those he could, and bringing them home. Some of you look upon this as an effort to buy forgiveness, but I tell you that deep down, he expected none. He expected nothing other than what you are about to do. But I tell you as well, that no matter what he has done, no matter what laws of yours he has broken, I swear to you, there is nothing—nothing—you can do to him that is any worse than what he’s already done to himself. He has punished himself for six years, and in his mind, it is still not enough.”

  She was shaking now, visibly, and she couldn’t help it. Dare was staring, not at the silent Dax, but at her, and there was a look in his eyes she’d never seen there before. She steadied herself and forced out the last words she felt she must say.

  “If you must have vengeance this day, take it on me. I am the true representative of the Coalition here. I am the one you should hate, not Dax.” Her voice broke. “Not Dax.”

  She knew she dare not go on; she who had wept but twice in two decades would burst into frantic tears before them all if she did.

  “I would speak!”

  The high, clear voice came from the crowd. All heads turned, and Glendar spoke.

  “We recognize you, Fleuren, and your right to speak as an elder of the city of Triotia.”

  “I have reason to defend this man,” she said. “You all know he rescued me from imprisonment, and brought me to the home I thought to die without seeing again. But there is more to my plea. During my imprisonment, I heard much of the skypirate known only as Dax. I heard that honest people had nothing to fear from him. I heard that only those who perpetuated the Coalition evil needed watch out for him. I learned of his generosity to those downtrodden by the very forces that defeated us, and that much of what he gained by admittedly criminal acts was given back to such as those.”

  She glanced at Califa, who watched the old woman through eyes suddenly brimming; she had feared no one else but she cared what happened to Dax. Dax himself sat with his head lowered, and Califa saw tiny shudders rippling through him, as if each of Fleuren’s words was a blow. But he was feeling now, and that was something, Califa thought.

  “And I heard of his recklessness, his carelessness with his own life for the sake of others. And when he came for me, I found it to be true.”

  Fleuren looked around, as if she were singling out each person in the chamber.

  “It is true that Triotians rarely believe that the end justifies the method. But we have all agreed some of our cherished laws needs be suspended in time of war. I submit that Dax Silverbrake deserves no less.”

  Fleuren glanced toward the back of the room, as if expecting something. Then she turned back, and this time her attention was fixed on Dare.

  “And as the granddaughter of one of our greatest legends, I submit also, your highness, something you all seem to have forgotten. That only a Triotian of truest heart can fire the flashbow. Dax Silverbrake can.”

  The clamor that circled the room was instantaneous, as was the look of realization on Dare’s face. The noise nearly drowned out the disturbance at the back of the room as the two huge doors swung open.

  Glendar had to shout for order as a large group swarmed down the aisle to the front of the room, Rina in the lead. Califa’s heart leapt; it was the entire crew of the Evening Star. Roxton, Larcos, Nelcar, even the silent Qantar.

  The girl came to a halt as every guard in the room surrounded her small troop. She glanced at Califa, who smiled through her tears. The girl seemed to take heart from that, and glared up at the guard who towered over her.

  “They have told me I belong here,” she said, loud enough for all to hear. “That as the last one alive, I have all the rights of the Carbray family, and the rights of any Triotian. Is that not true?”

  Helplessly, Glendar looked at Dare.

  “Let them through,” Dare ordered. “I wish to hear all of this.”

  Rina darted past the guard and ran to Dax. She threw her arms around him. Only then did he look up, anguish vivid in his eyes as he looked at the girl he loved like his own blood. Roxton strolled up and stood beside Califa, grinning.

  “Damn you, Rox,” Dax said hoarsely, “you’re supposed to be a full day gone from here!”

  “Shut up, Dax. You gave the Evening Star to us, didn’t you? We’ll do as we like with her. And we all voted to stay and save your worthless hide.”

  Califa laughed; she couldn’t help it. She’d suspected something like this, when Roxton had so carefully worded his answer to Dax’s order to break out of orbit and leave. And Dax was hugging Rina back. He was alive, responding. Roxton threw her a snappy salute.

  Glendar scrambled to regain control. “Is there a point to this intrusion?”

  “Sure is, your honor, or whatever you are,” Roxton said.

  “Your honor will do,” Glendar said primly.

  “The point is, you should be introduced to someone.”

  “Introduced?”

  “To the man who has single-handedly done more to slow down the Coalition juggernaut than anyone. The man who has deprived them of more supplies, more ships, more men, more ammunition than they’ve been able to make up for. The man who made one ship as effective as a squadron against the full force of the Coalition. The man who took target after target, all of which had only one thing in common; taking them in some way hurt the Coalition. It took Califa here to figure it out for us, but every move that man made, every thing he did, while it made us rich, did only one thing for him—it was a blow against the Coal
ition. And maybe, just maybe, you should think about the possibility that the reason they didn’t just blow your entire world completely to pieces when you first started this little rebellion of yours, was because they needed your resources. Because that man I’m speaking of took so damned much away from them.”

  Califa saw Dax stiffen, saw his eyes widen. Since he’d believed Trios already destroyed, he had obviously never thought of this aspect, and she could have kissed Roxton for realizing it.

  Rina spoke then, never releasing her tight hold on Dax. Califa knew just how the girl felt; she wished she could grab him and hang on just as tightly.

  “I remember little of Trios,” she said. “What I do know, Dax has taught me. He taught me there was no other world like it, and when we thought it destroyed, he taught me that I should keep its memory alive, and honor it. He taught me there was no better place to have lived and grown up. But if this is what you see as justice, then he was wrong. And when you banish him, you banish me, for I go with him.”

  She released Dax then, and when the girl moved, Califa could have sworn she saw wetness glistening on his cheeks.

  “But there is one more thing you need know. Dax left something with me—”

  “Rina,” Dax said warningly.

  “No, Dax. I’ve never disobeyed a direct order from you, but even if you never forgive me, I must disobey this one.”

  The girl walked boldly up to Dare. She stopped, studying him with all the fierce concentration of youth. Dare looked disconcerted, and Califa was as proud of Rina in that moment as if she had been her own child.

  “You are the king, are you not?” she asked bluntly.

  Dare’s mouth quirked. “So they say.”

  “Dax told me that on Trios, even a child can speak to the king.”

  The quirk became a smile. “That is true.”

  “Then I wish to give you something. Dax left it with me. He ordered me to hold it until this was over, until you had decided. I didn’t understand when he said no matter what happened, I was to give this to you when it was done.” She gave Dare a look that was bitter far beyond her years. “I see now that he meant even if you killed him.”