Trade Circle: A Space Opera Adventure Series (The New Dawn Book 3)

by Valerie J Mikles

“Since when do the Drava train their young warriors in the art of depravity,” Sky asked as soon as Kavari left.

  “You make it easy for them,” Caira said, circling the mat imposingly. “Do you know who I am?”

  “I don’t remember you, if that’s what you mean,” Sky said.

  “I remember you,” Caira said, squatting and leaning over Sky so that her long, black hair curtained the light.

  “I’ve got one of those faces, I guess,” Sky said, turning her head when she recognized the huntress. “Sidney said you were his wife.”

  “How can I be? Every time I get close to catching him, you show up,” she said. “You come and go from our village, just often enough to keep him from seeing anyone else. By the time you disappeared, he was hooked. No one else stood a chance.”

  Sky’s heart sank. A scorned lover was a bigger threat than a dozen depraved men. Spirit stirred eagerly and Sky felt her strength waning.

  “Let me go. I’ll never return,” Sky promised.

  “I need more assurance than that,” Caira said, pulling the pillow out from under Sky’s head.

  “No! No!” Sky rasped. She tried to kick and scream, but her feet were tied, and Caira pressed the pillow over her face, smothering her. Spirit’s talons pierced her lungs, then her neck, its essence clawing its way out of her body.

  The Drava were kind and noble. Laos had always believed that; she’d never had cause to doubt before today. Seeing what her people were doing to Adita reminded her too much of what the Nayak had done to her. She remembered being tied up, wondering why everyone watched and no one helped her. This time, she was the coward, standing outside the tent, letting the atrocities happen right in her own village.

  Wrapped in a cloak, concealing a crossbow, Laos snuck back to Adita’s tent. She couldn’t use lethal force on her own people, but maybe if she sat next to Adita and threatened anyone who came close, her people would come to their senses. Or they would drive her from the tent and exile her from the tribe.

  Coming behind the tent, Laos pressed her ear to the canvas and listened. It was quiet inside. Lifting the base of the wall, Laos crawled under, slithering into the tent. Adita’s mat was right in front of her. The Seer’s body bowed, her face held to the mattress by a pillow . . . and her own mother!

  “Mom!” Laos cried, launching over Adita and pulling her mother back. “Are you crazy. You can’t kill a Seer like that!”

  “The Spirit is trapped by the darkness. It will die with her!” Caira replied, picking up the pillow. Tears streamed down her cheeks and she looked guiltily at the blue-faced woman lying on the mattress.

  “No, Mom! We don’t know that. For all you know, this is how Adita got the spirit from the last vessel. You don’t want to be tied to a bed like that waiting to be broken,” Laos said, touching the Seer’s cold cheeks. She hoped she wasn’t too late.

  “Why not? If I had a spirit, maybe then your father would look at me,” Caira cried. She threw the pillow aside and kicked the mat.

  Laos covered her mouth, fear surging through her. Very little was known about the transference of spirits, but to be with a Seer at death was considered an open invitation to becoming its next vessel.

  “Seer? Adita?” Laos whispered, slapping Adita’s cheeks.

  Adita’s body convulsed again, and her watery, blue eyes shot open. “Let me go,” she panted. Her teeth were coated in blood.

  “Laos, she will destroy our family. She already has!” Caira said, jostling her back by the elbows. She felt the crossbow under Laos’ cloak and snatched it away.

  “Do you still have the Seer spirit?” Laos asked. There were so many conflicting superstitions, and they’d hurt more people than Laos could count.

  “Let me go, or you will all die,” Adita moaned, coughing up blood.

  “I believe you,” Laos said, reaching for the bonds.

  “Volk! Move, Laos!” Caira shouted, raising the crossbow.

  The tent flap flew open and Marius Kassa burst inside.

  “What are you doing in here?” he shouted, like he didn’t even recognize them. Laos twisted out of her mother’s arm and made a grab for the crossbow, but Caira kept a tight grip on the weapon.

  “Is it only the men that are allowed to break her?” Laos asked haughtily, sneaking closer to Adita so she could loosen the bonds. She never got close.

  “Did your father send you? Get out,” Marius ordered, grabbing her cloak by the nape. Laos gave her best petulant eye roll and let herself be tossed out. Caira was shoved out a moment later and Marius sealed the tent behind them.

  Caira stood outside the tent, stunned, her hand going slack, then her body. Laos grabbed the crossbow, wanting to charge back into the tent and defend Adita. It had been difficult enough to imagine pointing the weapon at her friends. She couldn’t threaten her grandfather.

  Caira fell to her knees, then she laid on the ground, mourning.

  “Mom?” Laos said.

  “If they tame her, she’ll never leave. He’ll never give her up,” she said distantly.

  Laos had to get Adita back to her own people, which meant she had to go to the airship and bring back help.

  31

  Amanda couldn’t listen to the men fighting any longer. Tray and Danny could be so passive/aggressive, mixing insults with olive branches. Hawk smelled of fermented apples and kept pounding the walls between coughing fits and fainting spells. Danny was not light in blaming Tray for Hawk’s condition. Hawk should have eaten the chili. He would have felt better. His stomach kept growling.

  Amanda lay on a broken table in the citadel room. The opening in the Terranan tunnel had been painted to look like a cityscape of ancient Aquia. The Terranan tunnels predated the Aquian domes by almost a century, and the artistic homages on the tunnel walls were one of the most complete historic records on hand. The citadel cityscape was convincing. In the right light, it was complete enough to believe one was lost in a foreign city.

  The smell of fresh bread wafted through the citadel room, drawing Amanda out of hiding. The Elysians had strange ways of conjuring food—ways they did not share with the surface dwellers. Whether they had preserved the technology from antiquity or developed it themselves, it did not matter. They had food, and she needed it.

  Rolling off the table, Amanda collapsed on the dusty floor of the lunar tunnel, kicking up swirls of black dust. Her hip was dislocated, and she couldn’t snap it back into joint. She needed help. Finding a scrap of metal, Amanda reached out and scraped her hand, drawing blood. Galen would come for her when he smelled her blood.

  The landscape here was foreign to Amanda. It had all the chill of the lunar tunnel, but it was damp and muddy. Bugs buzzed and birds chirped. The breeze rustled the leaves in the trees. The air was thick and humid, the gravity taxing on her joints. Looking up, the sky went on for miles, the moonlight peeking through clouds.

  Feeling her ankles get wet, Amanda stumbled toward the trees, hoping the interlacing roots would afford her solid ground. With her broken arm braced to her chest, it was difficult to maintain balance. The stress of gravity made her leg muscles burn. Pulling a knife from her boot, she made a shallow cut on the side of her hand and smeared the blood on the tree trunk. Galen would come—

  Suddenly, a figure flew from the darkness, tackling Amanda to the ground. The black-cloaked stranger pinned Amanda’s wrist and hissed. Recognizing the words as Lanvarian, Amanda snapped out of her flashback. She was not in the Terranan tunnel; she was on Aquia, and Terrana’s light illuminated the night.

  “What did you say?” Amanda asked, mentally shifting her brain to the other language. Her familiarity with Lanvarian came more from books than practice. The pressure on her bruised ribs made her head ache.

  “You will draw every flesh-eating scavenger within a hundred miles,” the woman said, covering the cut on Amanda’s hand. Her accent was intriguing, and her words were clear and understandable.

  “I seek only one,” Amanda said, trying to get free of the str
anger’s pin hold. Her broken arm worked against her.

  “I need your help to save Adita,” another woman said, standing behind the first. She wore an Occ, like Amanda.

  “Who?” Amanda tried to roll, but the first woman pushed her back again. A small rock jutted from the ground, pressing against the small of Amanda’s back. Amanda saw more shadows behind the two women, but she couldn’t be sure if they were real people.

  “Sky the Bandit,” the second woman said. With a flick of her wrist, she motioned the first to let Amanda go.

  “Sky?” Amanda asked. “Keep her!”

  “My people are torturing her,” the woman said.

  “Let her die!” Amanda snapped, falling into the water when she tried to run. The water splashed around her face, and she was drowning.

  Sky’s eyes fell open, unseeing. Blood trickled past her lips, dripping onto the bed sheets because any effort she made to clear her throat would compound the pain she felt. It was hard to breathe, but Spirit kept lifting her chest, forcing air into her lungs. What was it waiting for? Why didn’t it kill her? She tried to stop breathing, hoping death would come. Marius had stripped her and left her without a blanket, but he didn’t notice the loosened bonds. It didn’t matter. Her numbed fingers could not take advantage. The evening was cool, though not cold enough to induce hypothermia.

  Ghostly images danced across her vision as the dreams of the arena merged with reality. Danny cradled her face, dabbing blood from her lips with a scratchy, wool scarf. Tray fell on top of her, landing hard on her stab wound, making her body convulse. The knife in her chest pierced Tray and he bled into her. Danny stuffed the bloodied scarf into Sky’s mouth, gagging her. Then his ghost and Tray’s disappeared. Hawk came next—her real Hawk, not Spirit’s portrayal of him. Ever the angel of mercy in her visions, Hawk removed the gag and sat near her face, massaging her bone-chilled limbs restoring circulation. He wanted her to escape.

  The light in the room came to focus, but the tent’s ceiling was nothing much to see. Still, the fuzzy edges of the support beams and fabric seams helped Sky breathe. She lay on her back, hands and feet bound. She’d been immobile long enough for her arms to go numb, but Hawk’s ethereal presence massaged warmth back into her fingers.

  Every breath sent fire through her torso, goading Spirit, though Spirit’s gnashing teeth could not seep past Hawk’s barrier. Healing was slow. With the medical kit in her satchel, she’d have been mended and on the run by now, but with only Spirit affecting the repairs, she feared she might yet bleed out. Kavari was a good doctor, but her tools for healing were as primitive as the knife that made this wound.

  Sky’s aching fingers worked clumsily at her bonds. Her left hand came free first and she brought the arm to her side. Moving gingerly, she tried to work circulation back into the limb without agitating her torso. All she had to do was get free.

  Tray massaged his temples and raked his fingers through his hair, tired of fighting. He wished his brother would rest and stop trying to take charge. Hawk was coughing so hard that his face was purple and there were tears streaming down his cheeks, but whenever Tray tried to help, Hawk just fought him off. When Danny made the same suggestion to Hawk about easy breathing, Hawk listened. Danny should not have had to get out of bed. Things had gotten so bad that Amanda had run out of the infirmary. Tray was ready to do the same.

  Most times when Danny yelled, Tray could justify himself. This time, Tray knew he’d screwed up. He’d left Amanda vulnerable and gotten her arm broken. He’d let himself get chased out of a village that was holding Sky captive. He’d gone unarmed, unprepared, and empty-handed, and he’d let Sky come along even after seeing how tense she was in the company of the visitors. He should have seen in her eyes—the way she was begging him for an order to be left behind.

  Saskia stepped on Tray’s toe and collapsed against his chest. Instinctively, Tray caught her under the shoulders and helped her to stand. She was woozier than Danny, and she laid her head on his shoulder, panting for breath.

  “You should lie down,” Tray said. He’d been repeating the suggestion almost continuously for the last half hour to no avail.

  “Gray,” Saskia panted, not lifting her head. It amazed Tray how tiny Saskia seemed now that she’d been weakened by illness. Because she was stronger than him, she’d always seemed bigger, but she had a slight figure and small hands.

  “Gray,” Saskia whispered again, leaning into him to signify that she was ready to walk. It wouldn’t have been difficult to carry her, but he imagined she’d kill him for the indignity.

  In the cargo bay, Danny sat at the base of the stairs muttering Amanda’s name, thinking he was yelling, while Hawk dashed across the catwalks, checking for her. Saskia pushed off Tray, using the wall for support, making her way to the nearest weapon’s locker.

  “Remember we talked about lifting your own head first,” Tray said pointedly, frowning when Saskia pulled out a pulse rifle. Saskia gave him a look, and tottered around the bay. When her hand fell on the back door, the hatch swung open easily, and Tray racked his brain trying to remember if he’d sealed it earlier when he’d gone after Hawk. He must have or the place would have been swarming with bugs. Saskia fell to her knees and the pulse rifle went off.

  “Careful!” Tray shouted, dropping to the floor in case the rifle went off again.

  “Amanda?” Saskia said, pointing outside, using the handrails to pull herself up again.

  “What is she doing out there?” Danny asked, crawling across the bay to see.

  “Sit! Both of you sit!” Tray ordered, turning on the exterior lights, peering out the back hatch.

  “Is it Sky? Did she escape?” Hawk asked, charging down the stairs.

  There was a loud blast of pistol fire, and a projectile whizzed into the bay, barely missing Hawk before embedding itself in the bulkhead. Tray swore.

  “I think it’s that welcoming party I didn’t invite,” Tray muttered, dropping to the floor. He heard arguing outside, and recognized a girl’s voice.

  “Laos?” he called.

  “Tray!”

  “Laos, don’t shoot!” he said, peeking outside. He counted five in her raiding party, and a garnet pistol gleamed in the moonlight. Tray hated projectile weapons, and he didn’t have the skill to treat the kinds of wounds those weapons made. “We didn’t mean to fire. It was an accident.”

  No one answered. Tray held his Virp out, grabbing a quick image of the scene, then crouched behind a bulkhead to review the situation. The image showed Amanda sitting on the ground at the center of the group, but it looked like Laos’ friends were helping her.

  “Laos?” Tray called, holding his hands up and stepping into the pool of water growing just outside the door.

  Laos took a step forward, pushing back the hood of a black cloak so that he could see her face. The man with the pistol wore the gems of the Nayak, and Tray realized that the group represented many different tribes.

  “What are you doing here? Are you okay? Is Amanda okay?” Tray asked, wading through the ankle-deep water, wincing as the mud sucked at his shoes. Laos and the others were on dry land, and they parted so that Tray could see Amanda. An older woman was tending a deep gash on Amanda’s hand while Amanda murmured in Terranan.

  “Hey, sweetheart. You made friends?” Tray said, rubbing Amanda’s cheek to get her attention.

  “In the tunnel.” Amanda opened her eyes, looking guilty, like she often did after her dissociative episodes. “Did Galen come?”

  She was soaked to the skin. “I came. Let’s go inside where it’s warm.”

  Amanda twitched and shivered, then inched closer, favoring her broken arm.

  “Laos, did you come to talk?” Tray asked, nodding toward the ship to show her she was invited. She looked toward her friends and they exchanged nods and scowls. Then a little boy stepped forward and took her hand. He was at least a foot shorter than any of the others, and he walked with a limp. When they reached the edge of the water, Laos pu
t him on her back and carried him.

  Danny’s heart sank when Tray picked up Amanda and carried her back to the ship. She was so frail. She needed him and he was not strong enough to stand. Breathing raggedly, Danny coughed into his elbow, and scooted away from the door. Two strangers followed Tray, and Danny knew he should have a weapon handy. Their primary weapons store was across the bay.

  “Saskia,” he wheezed, coughing again. He still felt that fire in his lungs, like when the illness first hit. Saskia’s eyes were closed, her head tipped back. She drooped sideways and lowered herself slowly to the ground, pillowing her head on her arm.

  “Tray can handle it,” she said, closing her eyes again.

  Danny slouched, wanting to believe her. Closing his eyes, he focused on settling his breathing. The cargo bay had never felt so dusty. Tray had always been fickle about hosing it down when they were in port. They had taken the ‘sled in and out, tracking mud, and Danny had given Tray so much grief for being prissy. Now he wished he’d heeded his brother’s warnings.

  “I’m not carrying you upstairs,” Tray said. He was talking to Amanda.

  “I don’t want to be here when you’re fighting,” she moaned.

  “You walked outside; you can walk yourself upstairs,” Tray said sternly, setting her down next to Danny. “We’re not going to fight anymore, are we Danny?”

  “Sleep,” Danny murmured, scooting close enough to wrap his arm around Amanda’s waist. Amanda squirmed, but laced her fingers through his. Her hand was bleeding. Again.

  “Did you fall on your arm?” Tray asked.

  “It hurts,” Amanda said, adjusting her sling. The sling was dripping with the chilly water.

  Curling around her, Danny laid his head in Amanda’s lap. She bit her lip, then moved to lean against the wall, pulling him next to her. They were a mess—all of them. He pulled her bleeding hand around, dabbing it with the cuff of his sleeve. The cut was clotted, but it still needed to be cleaned.