“What division do you work in, Colonel?” she asked, making sure the smile was still on her face.
Haktari was evidently well-mannered enough not to let his surprise show for very long. He probably hadn’t expected much more than a greeting from the stationmaster’s shy daughter. “Security and defense, Your Ladyship. The station’s shields are undergoing a complete redesign, as I’m sure you know.”
Ari knew nothing about it. “That, ah, sounds like a lot of work. Big project.”
“It is. Lord Geiker has entrusted me with a first-rate team, however.” His smile was a little warmer now, his respect for Ari’s father obvious. “I obviously can’t go into any details, but we hope to have the work completed by the end of next cycle.”
Ari nodded. It would be nice if this sort of thing interested her as much as plants did, if this subject matter wasn’t already making her whole brain glaze over in boredom.
“There will be a ceremony when the work is done,” Haktari added. “I hope we’ll see you there.”
There would be no way around it. Maybe it was something Ari should make an effort to go to anyway. “You will,” she said resolutely. “I’ll be happy to tell my father you said hello.” A memory stirred of something she’d heard her father say to his troops countless times. “Thank you for your service to the Empire.”
Haktari straightened his shoulders, saluted again, and returned to his table, where two other men in uniform were glancing back and forth between him and Ari, curiosity evident on their faces.
From behind, Assistant murmured, “You handled that perfectly.”
Ari bit her lip to repress a smile. “I tried.”
“There will be more visitors. Just do that every time, and you’ll be fine.”
More visitors? That was the last thing Ari wanted. Thankfully, that was the moment the server arrived with Ari’s food and a glass of Blue Bubbly far taller than she’d anticipated. When she sipped from it, she realized it also contained more alcohol than she’d remembered. Wasn’t it supposed to be basically water, fruity syrup, and a touch of Mangerian rum?
“Better go slow,” she mumbled just loudly enough for Assistant to hear.
“If I had any money,” Assistant replied in the same way, “I’d give it all to watch you get drunk.”
Ari had never been drunk. “Is it fun?” she whispered.
“Under these circumstances, no.”
That was for sure. If Ari ever got tipsy, she wanted it to be with Assistant in the privacy of her quarters, not in front of her father’s troops in the Officers’ Mess. Nevertheless, she had to admit that a few sips of the Bubbly, taken slowly as she ate, helped her relax a little.
This proved to be an undeniable benefit, for Assistant was right as always. Colonel Haktari was not the only one to stop by and pay his respects. Ari wasn’t exactly besieged by visitors—and it was probably her time with Assistant that made her cynically think of them as suck-ups—but four people stopped by her table, apologized for interrupting her meal, and then kept on interrupting it while her food grew cold.
She followed Assistant’s instructions and just repeated what she’d said to Haktari. A polite greeting, an inquiry into their work, a word of thanks for their service. And Assistant had been right—it worked every time. By the end of the meal, Ari had learned about overhauled shields, the arrival of four top-of-the-line fighters next quarter, a series of upcoming drills, and an addition to the library that would make room for more children’s books, along with creating a new area for them to play.
“Well, that’s great,” Ari told Lieutenant Arnistad. By now, her cheeks were starting to ache and her smile felt fixed on her face. It probably wasn’t the best time to mention that her father didn’t like having children on the station at all. “Kids are…great. Thanks for your service!”
Arnistad saluted and returned to her table. Ari looked back down at her plate of cold food and sighed.
Time to make an executive decision. She’d done her image rehabilitation for nearly an hour, she was still hungry, and Assistant had to be both hungry and bored out of her mind. Ari signaled the server and gave him her credit chip.
“Was the food not to Her Ladyship’s liking?” the server asked, giving her plate a concerned look as he swiped the chip on his data reader.
“Oh, it was, it was,” Ari said quickly. “In fact, could you have two plates sent to my quarters? I…didn’t really get much of a chance to eat.”
His lip quirked. He’d understood what she meant, and he sympathized.
Ari couldn’t help smiling at him. How strange that such a small gesture of fellow-feeling should mean so much. Maybe she really should get out more.
“I’ll alert the kitchen staff, Your Ladyship.”
“Thank you.” A flight of fancy prompted Ari to add, “And two glasses of Blue Bubbly as well, please.”
~ ~ ~
On the way back to her quarters, she realized she might have drunk more water and Blue Bubbly than she’d thought, because she urgently needed to pee. Suddenly, the return walk seemed very long.
She spied a door to a restroom along the corridor and said to Assistant, “Um, I’m just going to duck in here for a second. Of course, if you need…”
Assistant nodded silently at the words “No Slaves” inscribed in small red letters beneath the restroom sign—something else pointless and demeaning.
Was it a useful protest not to use a restroom when nobody was paying attention? Ari’s bladder informed her that no, indeed it was not. “I’ll be right out,” she sighed.
She used the facilities and washed her hands. A quick glance in the mirror showed her that she looked a little flustered—pink-cheeked, and her hair could use a comb. Had dinner really worn her out that much?
Maybe the red dress was bringing out the color in her cheeks. It was pretty, but Ari had no idea why Assistant had made a big deal out of it. It didn’t look much different from what the other civilian women in the mess had been wearing. She patted down her hair and left the restroom.
Assistant wasn’t in the corridor. Ari blinked as she looked to the left and right. In fact, nobody was in the corridor.
There must be a slave restroom somewhere nearby. Trouble was, Ari had no idea where. Might as well wait here for Assistant to come back instead of wandering around. She sighed, leaned back against the wall, and waited.
And waited. And waited. Waited while she grew increasingly nervous, not of the passing people, but why it was taking Assistant so long. If she had indeed gone to the bathroom, then she must be sick. Or something else could have befallen her, but what? How much trouble could somebody get into during a three-minute wait in a corridor?
She rounded the corner and walked until she saw the nearest data terminal. Feeling shaky in a way that had nothing to do with the Blue Bubbly she’d drunk, she touched the “Search ID” button and entered in Assistant’s identification number. In some remote outposts where ancient traditions held true, slaves still got tattoos on their arms; here, they were given microchips just beneath their skin. It was something else Ari found barbaric, no matter what technology you used. People should have the right to come and go as they pleased.
But here she was, using the system to her advantage to find Assistant. She sighed. Principles were easy to compromise when you were worried—you could find all kinds of excuses as to why, this one time, it was okay to…
That was bizarre. What was Assistant doing outside a control room?
Nothing good. Ari’s instincts were already propelling her down the corridor in the direction of the room. It was one of the station’s data retrieval centers. Not Central Control where the classified stuff went in and out, but it was still barred to slaves.
As Ari left the mess hall area, the corridor grew less crowded, and when she rounded the corner and ducked into the side corridor leading to the control room, there was nobody there except for her and two other people: Assistant, and a guard who’d handcuffed her to a rail while sh
e struggled and snarled, and who was currently pulling out a shock rod.
The guard pressed the button with his thumb, and the rod glowed red. Assistant stopped struggling. Mute with horror, Ari saw her place her feet apart and brace herself, squaring her shoulders for something she had obviously endured before.
Ari’s tongue was frozen in her mouth, but her legs were working just fine, because—as if somebody else was controlling her body—she picked up her skirts and flew down the hallway toward Assistant and the guard. She wasn’t thinking. She couldn’t think, unless you counted the little voice in the back of her head that was shrieking, No, no, no! She only found her voice when she was nearly upon Assistant and the guard, just as he was raising the shock rod in one arm that didn’t look very strong, not really, not strong like Assistant, who held Ari so close every night—
She wanted to scream, but she only managed to gasp out, “Stop!” as she reached out to grab his forearm before he could swing.
It all happened very fast, then. The guard and Assistant both turned at the same time, and Assistant’s blue eyes widened even as the guard instinctively brought his arm down to fend off an attacker.
In fact, he brought it down so fast he whacked Ari with the shock rod on her left side with all the force that otherwise would have been brought to bear on a disobedient slave.
All Ari knew was pain. It drove out her breath so hard she couldn’t even scream. Her legs buckled and she fell while the left side of her body caught fire. An electric shock rattled all her bones and made lights flash behind her eyelids. For a second, she wondered if she had been stabbed instead of struck because the pain radiated so viciously from the rod’s point of contact.
Then it was over, leaving her gasping on the floor—sort of whimpering, really. The stabbing pain was gone, but every muscle in her body still ached, every nerve still moaned in protest.
“My God,” somebody gasped.
Ari opened her eyes to find that a fuzzy world awaited her, and a fuzzy guard was bending down, reaching toward her.
“Your Ladyship. Oh God. I’m—”
Ari’s tongue was thick, and somebody had sewn shut her throat. She still managed to croak, “D-d-don’t touch me.”
“My lady—I’m so sorry, but you require—”
Ari managed to turn her head, though that made everything ache again, to see Assistant still handcuffed to the rail. As Ari’s eyes finally began to focus, she saw that Assistant was paler than usual, her jaw slack, looking as dazed as if the guard had struck her, too. Which had been his plan all along. To strike Assistant with that rod, and probably with far more blows than he’d just doled out to Ari.
“Don’t touch me,” Ari repeated, cringing from the hands stretched out to her, the hands that had been ready to beat her only friend. “Release her. Right now.”
“Your Ladyship, I can’t… She said she was going to the restroom, but I’m sure I saw her venturing down this corridor, and slaves have no business—”
Well, Ari thought vaguely, that answered the question of what Assistant had been up to. She’d become lost on the way to the bathroom. “Release her.”
The guard continued, eyes wide with panic, as if he hadn’t heard her. “And then she was insolent, Your Ladyship. Looked me right in the eye, used language no lady’s slave should even know!” He no longer attempted to touch her, but crouched over her while he babbled his explanations.
Behind him, the shock was draining from Assistant’s face. Her lips were pulling back over her teeth like a snarling wolf’s, and red spots were appearing on her pale cheeks. Her eyes grew wild. She began yanking on her cuffs, slamming the metal links against the rail as if trying to break them with her strength alone. Even over the roar in her own ears, Ari could hear her panting with effort.
The guard turned around, saw Assistant’s expression, and actually raised his arm, as if to ward off a blow himself. He’d deserve it. Nobody deserved it, but he’d deserve it.
Ari shook her head with a groan. The pain had obviously scrambled her wits as well as her insides. The ache was beginning to shrink, to localize around her left ribs where the shock rod had made contact.
She had to think. She had to think fast, because this was very, very bad. The stationmaster’s daughter had just been assaulted by a guard, because the stationmaster’s daughter’s slave was accused of being in a restricted location. And, to top it all off, the slave was not, in fact, the stationmaster’s daughter’s. She belonged to Lord Geiker, and if word of this incident reached him, Assistant would be sent down to the mines in a trice, no matter how Ari pleaded with him, told him that the guard had lied and Assistant had just been on her way to the bathroom. Her father would send Assistant away and get Ari another slave as if one person could replace another, no trouble.
Ari licked her dry lips. Assistant was still making a racket, yanking and rattling her handcuffs against the metal rail. Someone would hear her soon. Once there were witnesses, there would be no fixing this.
“Assistant, calm down,” she said, giving Assistant a direct order for the first time she could remember. “You have…ow…you have to be quiet. And you…” She turned her gaze on the guard. “L-leave me the key to the cuffs. Then get out of here and do…whatever it is you do. I don’t know who you are. We’ll pretend this never happened.”
The guard just stared at her. Assistant, as if to prove miracles were possible, went still. The murderous look never left her eyes.
“This didn’t happen.” Ari wondered if her words were coming out all jumbled or something and that was why he had such a stupid look on his face. Why didn’t he move? “Nobody gets in trouble. Nobody says anything. You just…just…”
She couldn’t keep lying here on the floor. She sat up on her elbows, and when that didn’t make her collapse, she pushed a little harder, whimpering again as the pain elbowed her in the ribs. Then she sat all the way up. Another sound wanted to escape her mouth, something super undignified that the guard had no business hearing. A squeak, probably.
“You just be on your way. Leave the key,” Ari repeated. One glance at Assistant’s face made her add, “And don’t look back, okay? Just leave the key and go.”
“But—”
Officers had been saluting her all night. Her father was the stationmaster and one of the most respected men in the Empire. She was supposed to be suitably forceful, too, similarly able to think on her feet and play the part she’d been born into.
Ari set her jaw against the lingering pain and made her voice as hard as it had ever been. “Soldier, I might not be your commanding officer, but you know who I am. You want to do what I tell you. Right now.”
She rubbed a hand over her forehead and closed her eyes. Before she could open them again, she heard the thump of something hitting the floor next to her, and then the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps. When she looked up, she and Assistant were alone in the corridor.
They might not be for long. She had to hurry, especially since the guard might change his mind, turn himself in, and ruin everything. If only hurrying didn’t seem so difficult.
Ari could only do her best. She took the abandoned key and struggled to her knees.
“Slowly.” Assistant’s voice was soft, nearly breathless, as she watched Ari from where she was bound to the rail. “You might be dizzy.”
“I am definitely dizzy,” Ari groaned. That didn’t mean she got to laze around. She picked up her skirts so she wouldn’t trip and clambered to her feet. For a second, she had to steady herself against the nearest wall and nearly dropped the key.
Assistant never stopped watching her. The red spots had vanished from her cheeks. She looked almost back to normal, unless you counted the wild look in her eyes that had yet to fade.
“Right,” Ari muttered. She painstakingly made her way to the rail. She couldn’t believe how much one single blow from a shock rod had hurt. How many times had that guard meant to beat Assistant with it? How many times could you survive a feeling
like that? “Okay—let me see the cuffs.”
Before she saw the keyhole, though, she saw the blood. The metal of the cuffs had abraded Assistant’s skin during her struggle to get free, and now there were cuts and slices on her wrists, as well as reddened patches of flesh that would probably bruise.
“Are you all right?” Assistant asked tightly.
“Oh, peachy,” Ari snapped. She couldn’t help it—pain wasn’t conducive to a sunny disposition. “Just like you. Why did you do that?”
“I told him I was looking for the slave’s restroom.” Assistant kept her gaze focused on Ari’s fumbling efforts to fit the key into the keyhole. Her hand-eye coordination wasn’t the best right now. “I’m not very familiar with the station’s layout.”
If her eyeballs hadn’t hurt, too, Ari would have rolled them. “I didn’t mean that. I heard him say that. I meant why did you cut up your wrists so much? That didn’t do any good.”
“Why did I…?” Assistant trailed off and looked at her wrists.
Ari glanced over in time to see her eyes widen, as if she hadn’t even noticed her injuries until now.
“Oh.”
Finally, Ari got the key into the keyhole, turned it, and popped open the cuffs. “Now we’re both hurt. I didn’t want to see you get hurt—that was the whole point!” She took off the cuffs. “Or didn’t you notice?”
“What I noticed was you charging at someone who had a deadly weapon without even announcing yourself,” Assistant hissed. Anger burned in her eyes again. “You’re the stationmaster’s daughter, which you should have remembered before you got yourself knocked to the ground. He’d have stopped, and you wouldn’t be…”
She took Ari by the shoulders and looked her up and down. “He hit you.” Her nostrils flared. “He hit you.”
Ari pulled away, stumbled, and would have fallen if Assistant hadn’t caught her again. Her cheeks burned. How dare Assistant be angry at her now? “Yeah, and we don’t have time for this. We need to go before somebody shows up and sees us this way.”
The Lily and the Crown Page 14