Unwilling to stay and watch the barbarous repair of the colonel’s abdomen and too ill to eat, Raine scooted across the circular chamber and veered down the connecting tentacle to check on Dalf. As always, her ears popped as she descended the steep incline. Normally, she worried about landing after a space mission and then descending to about thirty feet below sea level, but today was not an ordinary day.
When she arrived at the hatch to Dalf’s chamber, she held her breath and unlatched the lock. How silly could she be? First expecting a battalion of Guerreterran warriors to show up on her dock, now trying to be so quiet that she didn’t disturb her deaf stepson. She pushed the hatch inward, careful not to get her feet wet as the door brushed against the water, which filled the lower half of his chamber.
Dalf curled on top of his golden air mattress, his sightless eyes staring blindly across the chamber and his favorite stuffed squid cradled in his scared arms. He looked so peaceful. Raine’s eyes misted. Too bad his waking moments were such a nightmare.
She gazed at the boy until calm seeped into her core and she felt assured that whatever happened, it would be for the best. Then, she locked the door for Dalf’s safety and trudged back up the corridor.
She entered her eating room as Preston applied medicated adhesive to a wound and pressed it in place. The colonel’s chest looked as if her brother had pieced together a grotesque crazy quilt of flesh, but it also looked much cleaner and no blood spurted. The table still looked like it belonged in a butcher’s shop and several containers contained samples of blood, hair and skin. Hair samples? Oh, yeah, her brother had found a way for this to benefit himself. She quickly looked away from the plastoid bottles. "Are you glad I asked for your help, yet?"
He looked up at her and grunted. "Hold this." Without considering the consequences, she stepped forward and grabbed the handle of the translucent pressure-instrument. When Preston loosened his hold, the warrior's skin began to shift. "Don't let it move or it won't adhere correctly."
She tightened her grip, but couldn't bring herself to look at the way the undamaged skin stretched across the lean abdomen and she refused to imagine how the warrior’s stomach had looked before the disaster with the android. She glanced at the warrior's pale, pain-ridden face, then quickly looked away. “How long do I have to keep up the pressure?”
“Tally to fifty.” While she began a silent count, Preston massaged his hands. If the pressure of holding one small part of a seam took this much pressure, she understood why his hands bothered him.
The warrior made a soft sound. She looked down, but he hadn’t regained consciousness. Though fashionably long, his jet-black hair color hadn’t been in style any time in Raine’s lifetime, yet it seemed right for the colonel. The natural cut looked right for him, too. The four small braids with their tiny feathers and beads were an interesting feature. Did each feather represent a world he'd annihilated? Was that why each feather was a different color or were they some sort of award for murderous skill? And were the beads significant? Raine swallowed and looked away from the handsome warrior.
Preston made a production of sealing the tissue samples into his medkit.
Raine reached fifty and handed Preston the pressure-instrument. He tossed it into his medkit, as if the device was common as a fishhook. After making sure the bandages were in their proper place, he refastened the warrior's uniform, to help hold the repairs in place. Finally, he took off the tablecloth, wadded it up to control the mess, and then tossed it against the wall.
She cleared her throat. "Now you know how strong you'll need to make your tox." He gave her a sharp look, as if questioning her sanity. Apparently, after spending half the night trying to repair the warrior's injuries, he must have thought she wanted to save the brutal savages. Raine forced the corners of her mouth upward. "No matter what, it always comes back to making sure we can kill them effectively, doesn't it?"
He glowered at her, as if uncertain if she was being satirical or serious. "That is my job." Preston scowled at the warrior. "Amnesia is common in coma-cases."
"Then he'd believe me if I told him he was my personal slave." She studied the warrior's well-defined cheekbones and fought the urge to touch his face.
Preston's hand clamped on her shoulder, and the expression in his eyes looked like he was ready to launch into a diatribe. Then, he let go of her and stretched his back. "I'm going outside."
"Aren't you tired?"
He shrugged.
She followed him outside and gratefully inhaled the night air. "So, what are you working on now, airborne plagues?"
He ignored her and headed purposefully toward Nambaba’s mooring line. With practiced ease, he punched in the code for the ship to surface.
It was too soon, but she didn’t argue with him. “What do you need? To check the tox spill?
Preston paused, then stopped. She nearly ran into him. He turned to her and patted her shoulder. She jerked away from him. He held her hands between his and began talking in a low hypnotic tone. "Relax. The spill won't hurt you." Surly he didn't expect her to believe that. He sighed. "It’s toxic, but not a poison, it's a variation of a fuel derivative." He squeezed her fingers. Though he looked and sounded sincere, she didn’t believe him.
Everything about them was opposite, even their fingers. Hers were short and work-hardened; his were long and patrician, just like the rest of him. No matter what she did, she'd never be tall, lissome or respected for her intellect. Those attributes had been reserved for her brother. All she could hope for was what she had: sturdy shoulders and the will to support her adopted family.
Realizing that Preston was speaking, Raine shook away her thoughts and listened.
"Actually, it was a variation of the eepyllihg additive. Ironic, don't you think? We'll allow our enemies the privilege of paying for the very thing that will destroy them." Preston chortled.
If they lost the Guerreterre market for fuel, she would probably lose her job and become useless. Then, The Zar would probably decide to reclaim the elements of all dragon shepherds. She shivered.
Preston's palm clamped against her forehead. "Spirit! You're running a fever."
Raine pushed Preston's hand away. "No I'm not." Her tongue felt furry. "You're just trying to distract me." She wrenched her hands free and stumbled over the slowly rolling deck to the vine-covered railing. Her rubbery knees barely made it. Raine curled her fingers around the smooth railing and breathed in moist air.
She drank in several gulps of oxygen before her heart rate stabilized. Straightening her spine and squaring her shoulders, Raine turned back to Preston. "Did you treat the Guerreterran so you could use him to carry a plague back to his world?" Though his back stiffened and he seemed to be watching her out of the corner of his eye, he didn’t look back at her. Score one for intuition. She silently stared at him, willing him to confirm her suspicions in another way.
Finally, he turned to her. "You saw an enemy ship, shot it down, investigated the crash-site, found a survivor, dragged him to your ship, then hauled him across half the galaxy and now you want me to save him. Is that about it?" Raine gave a slight shrug, deciding that his change of subject and confrontation was all the proof she needed. Preston tossed his thick emerald mane. "While I can't figure out the how's and why's that would inspire you to fire on such a foe, I am impressed with your daring." He shook his head. "To think that you actually shot down a Shadow Warrior."
Raine still hadn't figured that one out how she'd accomplished that.
"What I don't understand is why you haven't given him to the God Head.”
Raine blinked. She’d never thought of offering the warrior to The Zar.
“A gift like this would surely elevate you to nobility status and you could move from this leaky string of rubbish to the Pinnacle." Preston gestured toward the entrance of her home. A look of revulsion flitted across his face.
Yes, it would elevate her status, but it would also bring unwanted attention to her and her life. If they disc
overed that Dalf still lived, they would murder him. Of course, they would use positive words like reclaim elements, but no matter what they called it, she called it murder.
Raine focused her attention on the tentacle, which was secured to her front deck. "My home is not a leaky string of rubbish."
"The reclamation unit never scraps anything unless it's worthless. I know those old tanks leak, especially the one you keep Dalf in."
“It is meant to. He is a creature of the sea.” She changed the topic. "I could never live at The Pinnacle." To do so would sign Dalf's euthanasia warrant.
"Since when do you love Shadow Warriors?"
"I don't even like them."
"Really?" One of Preston's shapely green eyebrows arched. "You incapacitate one, capture him and bring him home, then demand that I heal him and every time you look at him, your face softens.” He chuckled, but his eyes glittered with malice. “Yet you claim you don't like them." He gave her a leering grin. "Your warrior does have a nice physique." He flexed his reed-thin biceps. "I'd forgotten how muscle-bound Gornt was."
He made it sound like preferring Gornt’s healthy, sturdy frame to his fashionably emaciated one was physical. Raine felt tears spring to her eyes and nearly choked on the hostile words clogging her throat. Whirling away, she leaped onto Nambaba's trailing tentacle. Her boot slipped on the wet, rolling surface. She compensated for the rhythm of the waves and hurried to her ship. While her home might not meet her brother's exalted standards, she and Gornt had collected the five canisters themselves, made them habitable, and then connected them to the spare tentacle with the help of his best friend. While it might not look fancy and certainly didn't have all the creature comforts that The Pinnacle boasted, it was the home she and Gornt had built with their own sweat, blood and vision. It was the one place where they had been free. Her bother would never understand the wonderful feeling freedom gave her, because he'd never known anything but phony pride and arrogance. She wouldn't have known freedom, either, if it hadn't been for Gornt.
How she missed her dear friend.
Halfway between her home and the ship's core, she slipped on the slick surface, again. Raine stopped, closed her eyes and focused her energy on adapting her inner rhythms to the undulations of her home sea. Within a few moments, the peaceful cadence calmed her. Opening her eyes, she looked at the other tentacles radiating out from Nambaba forming a silvery starburst on the dark water. The magenta rays from Vilecom made her ship appear beautiful, instead of somewhat shabby.
A sinewy hand closed on her shoulder. "He's not alone, is he?" Preston leaned down and whispered into her ear. "You're being forced, aren't you? Where are the rest hiding?" Every syllable burst against her flesh with a puff of hot, stale breath.
She'd tried to find out the answer to that question the whole journey back. All she was certain of were occasional odd energy readings and bits of transmissions. She had no proof that she'd been followed. No proof that, if she didn't get the warrior's help, reprisals would be made. But she felt as if she was being watched and didn't need any proof. "The man and 'droid are it," Raine snapped. She shook off Preston's grip and faced him. "Who do you plan to kill with those germs you're brewing?” Abruptly, he jerked away from her and stalked toward Nambaba. “Slaves? Nobility? Vole d'Laires?" He stopped, back stiff, then slowly turned to stare at her. His look indicated that he thought she'd gone lunar. She swallowed. "Or do you plan to kill Shadow Warriors? If so, it seems to me that I handed you a once in a lifetime opportunity to study their DNA.” Her gaze narrowed on his eyes before she asked, “Prior to treating him, did you realize they had red blood, like ours? That whatever would kill them, might also kill us?”
His pupils widened.
No, he had not thought of that, but hopefully, he would, now.
A silence grew between them, and his eyes kept glancing toward Nambaba. “What do you want in my ship, if it’s not to clean up that tox spill?" Raine looked up at Vilecom, before her own indigo orbs revealed how revolting she found her sibling's work. No one, not even a Guerreterran should have to be subjected to the experiments The Zar demanded of his scientists.
His eyes began to glitter. “I want the droid.”
Chapter 9
“I don’t recall offering it to you,” Raine could barely speak through her gritted teeth, “but if I had, how would you explain it at The Pinnacle?”
“Why would I have to explain it?”
Was he so accustomed to living with hundreds that he felt invisible? So audacious that he truly believed he could make the rules? Or just greedy? “Don’t you think someone would ask where you got it?” She pressed her point. “I can bring something into my home without a hundred eyes watching. You can’t.”
Water sloshing was the only sound during several moments of tense silence.
“I’d like to study its design.” Preston glanced back over his shoulder toward Nambaba.
“You can do that here, but not now.” A yawn threatened. “Now, you need to help me move the warrior and then, I need to sleep. So do you.” She turned back to her home. “You can either stay here or go back to your posh silk sheets.” Slight undulations beneath her feet indicated that Preston was following her. Raine vaulted back onto the mooring deck. The fancy porpoise-boat tied up to her makeshift dock made her simple home look as shabby as the refuse she and Gornt had used to make it. Tears stung her eyes as she checked the tether line's tension.
Preston landed on the deck. She steeled herself for an argument, but to her surprise, he gently touched her. She gestured toward the sleek golden porpoise-boat. "I don’t know what you told The Zar, but it had to be a whopper if he let you take one of his beloved transports instead of the skimmer you usually use."
He chuckled and his fingers began caressing her knuckles. A glance at his lean face told her that Preston’s thoughts were focused on something else. Looking in the same direction, she only saw peaceful dark water. Preston exhaled. "Since Gornt's death, you don't even like sunrises and their promise of a new day." He looked at her home. She squinted at the horizon, trying to determine how long it would be until dawn. "The warrior is handsome," he said softly. "Did you want me to save him for you so he could replace Gornt or save him so I can perfect the death of his race?"
"No one could replace Gornt."
"That's good, because it would never work." His expression took on a wry look. "Not that I ever figured out how anything worked with Gornt."
"He was my friend and we cared for each other."
"So? There's a lot more to a union than friendship. Bakufus are egg layers; you're a mammal. That relationship should never have happened." She glared at him. Preston got the message and shut up.
"You shouldn't underrate friendship." Again, she squinted in the horizon. Her brother would never understand, because he was too self-centered to be a friend to anyone. "I think it's interesting that you find beauty in that savage. Especially since you've devoted the last few years to brewing up concoctions to wipe out him and all his kind."
"And one of these days I'll succeed." His chuckle sounded ominous in the dark. "Especially now that I have a live specimen to exper-"
"I told you, he's mine."
"What do you need him for?"
Insurance that no retaliatory measures were made. "None of your business."
"You expect me to waste time saving his life and not get a lab toy."
Raine's teeth ground together. "You got plenty of samples for your efforts. More than you could ever have hoped for." Inspiration struck. "Besides, he's going to be my slave." Raine almost spoiled her ridiculous declaration by laughing at his stupefied expression.
"You're not nobility," he sputtered. "You can't own slaves. Spirit! Near-nobility is a meaningless title, you know that as well as I do." He gesticulated helplessly.
Raine glared up at her brother, who lived in the shadow of The Zar’s smile and had such a posh life that he couldn't understand her own struggle to survive. "You're only near-nobility
, too, Doctor High-and-Mighty. You always forget that, because you live at The Pinnacle, but you and I are equal." He shook his head. She nodded. "I work directly for the Vole d'Laires, too." She made a sweeping gesture, which encompassed the entire world and included the setting arc of Vilecom. "In some way, everyone works for him. You just get more luxurious perks."
He shook his head and opened his mouth to argue.
She held up a hand for silence. "The only real difference is that you don't have a transponder code for an address."
Preston pointed toward the porpoise-boat.
Raine gestured toward Nambaba, which rode the pre-dawn tides on a halo of tentacles and impressive compared to the small, sleek porpoise-boat. Once the sun rose, Nambaba would begin to look more serviceable than elegant, but for now, she was in the ideal lighting for Raine to make her point.
Her brother's mouth flattened.
"In fact, in some ways,” she added, “I have more freedom than you do." He opened his mouth to argue. She cut him off with a threatening look. "I cook and eat what I wish. You are subject to the chef's whims. So what if I don't drive a porpoise-boat? Every day at work, the view I have is awesome. You are stuck in a windowless hole. And when I'm off work, I can swim or paddle my reed boat."
"I like my life." His tone sounded stiff as his posture.
"Of course you do. You have a good life and you have lots of things I could never imagine. But they are just things and things are not really that important.” She paused, then made her point, “I have family and love.” Preston rolled his eyes skyward. She felt a muscle twitch, but held her temper. “Most of us have three options: swim, ride the ferry-gliders or, if we're not too busy working for The Zar, we can weave boats." But who had time for anything except working and trying to keep the house together?
Thunder Moon: Book 2 of the Chatterre Trilogy (Chatterre Triology) Page 10