Wandering Star

by Steven Anderson

  “Will you be spending the night here?”

  “No, we change locations every night. But it’s not far.”

  “No guards?”

  “They just attract unwanted attention.”

  “I’ll walk with you. I want to make sure you’re safe.”

  “Safe? That’s something I don’t think about much anymore.”

  We reached the front door and Merrimac was there waiting for us. I could feel the hum of the Tarakana inside him from three meters away.

  “How did he get in here? The security shouldn’t let anything bigger than a grain of sand pass through.” She looked at me. “And where did you even get a dog, Ted? There were no dogs on Cleavus.”

  “There are some things I need to tell you.”

  “Hold that thought. I need to clock in at the next safe house soon or they’ll start looking for us.”

  She pushed the door open and a gust of wind tried to close it again, snow swirling in around us.

  “When did this start?” I asked.

  “That’s the Warrens. Always changing.”

  I looked down and Mac was rubbing up against Hannah’s legs, his nose nuzzling her hand. ‘Oh, Mac’, I thought, ‘Please don’t.’

  I looked into her eyes and they were wild and free. She smiled at me, a challenge, and then she was gone, running fast and for a moment all I could see was the snow and all I could hear was the sound of her laughter.

  I ran after them as fast as I could, catching a glimpse of her legs or of Mac loping along next to her until she stopped in a doorway that looked like all the rest we had passed.

  She smiled at me when I caught up, her hair full of snow. “Beat you.”

  “Not exactly fair when you knew where you were going and I didn’t.”

  She pressed her palm to a hidden panel and the door opened. “I never race fair.” We stepped into a small foyer with stairs leading up to the second floor and the door closed behind us. “I like your dog. He didn’t have any trouble keeping up. Where did you find him?”

  “Cleavus. He’s not a dog.”

  She thought a moment while she ran her fingers through her hair knocking snow everywhere. “Tarakana? You taught one of the Tarakana how to look like a dog?”

  “Taught? No. He reached into my mind and pulled out the memory of a dog I had when I was little.” We looked down at Mac who was sitting at our feet, his tongue out, still panting from our run through the snow. “You are looking at a representative of a space-faring civilization possessing technology far more advanced and sophisticated than our own. They live in massive colonies and communicate telepathically.” Mac licked my hand, looking pleased and I felt my heart pounding as every emotion was suddenly amplified.

  “That’s insane. He’s a dog.”

  “Pet him,” I told her. “Bury your fingers into his fur.”

  She looked at me with a mixture of confusion and concern and then, as her fingers reached into him, her face went blank and she said, “Oh.”

  I let it go on for a few minutes and then reached to pull her away. Before I could touch her she said, “He told me I should do this.” She grabbed my hand hard and pulled it down into Mac’s fur.

  I saw Hannah. The darkness and the wounds and the scars were all there for me to touch and understand. She did not try to hide and I could feel her moving through my mind, her touch gentle where she knew I was hurt.

  Mac pulled away from us and we sat on the stairs afterward talking together.

  Hannah took my hand. “He showed me every reason why I should let you go. I didn’t know how much Alice means to you, how you love her, how she looks through your eyes. I have no right to, to…” Her words stumbled and stopped.

  “And I saw every reason why I should stay. What you’re doing here, it’s magic. That’s what I told Father Ryczek but now I know how true it is. I’ve spent the past several months fixing bits of broken machines and cooking potatoes. You’re remaking a world.” I kissed her cheek. “It’s crushing you. Those men on your council are intelligent and committed but without you it will all fall apart in a month, maybe less. Let me help.”

  “It’s their world, not ours. They need to be able to carry it through, not me. We are so close.” She leaned back on the steps, looking at the ceiling. “To them I am Ysabeau Romee. I never make mistakes and I never have doubts. I am infallible and our victory is assured.”

  “You can’t live this way.”

  “No, but maybe I’m not supposed to. Maybe I’m supposed to die this way, like Buna.”

  I leaned back next to her and she tipped her head onto my shoulder.

  “You can’t,” I told her. “You have a paper to coauthor with me on Tarakana language.”

  Her smile was wistful. “That seems like so long ago. Was that even me? Ted, tell me again why you’re here.”

  “I came to make sure you’re all right.”

  “I’m not.”

  “And I came to rescue you.”

  “I need to be rescued.” She sighed. “I don’t want to be Ysabeau Romee and I don’t want to be infallible. I have doubts and I’d like to make mistakes. Just for one night, can the world not exist outside these walls? No Confederation, no men out there in the dark hunting me like an animal.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “No Alice.”

  “Just Hannah and Ted?”

  “No, not even them. Just two lovers sharing a warm bed, wrapped in each other’s arms while the storm rattles the windows and moans across their roof.”

  I picked her up and started carrying her up the stairs. “This would have been easier on Dulcinea,” I told her. “Eighty percent gravity, damn how I miss it.” She giggled. “And this staircase is kind of narrow. I’ll try not to bonk your head.” She giggled again.

  “Would you like to trade off half way up?”

  “Could we? That would be nice.” We reached the top and I looked down at her smiling at me. “Well, which way?”

  “Sorry, left, first door.”

  I set her down gently on the bed and tried to turn on the lights but they didn’t work.

  “We pulled all the wires out of the walls,” Hannah explained. “The CG was using them as a passive antenna. There should be a candle on the night stand.” I lit it and placed it on the floor a couple of meters away. Hannah looked at me questioningly.

  “I don’t want to hit it accidentally later,” I explained. She smiled.

  “And heat?” I asked.

  “No. There’s a fireplace but the heat signature would be too obvious. This building is supposed to be abandoned.”

  “How am I supposed to keep you warm?”

  “Come here and I’ll show you.” I sat down next to her.

  Mac walked in and crawled under the bed and Hannah looked at me. “That should scare the hell out of me but it doesn’t. I don’t know why.”

  “I understand. Do you think we brought him here voluntarily? It’s like there’s some kind of symbiotic relationship between us but every time I try to think about it my mind just gets all fuzzy.”

  Hannah moved the covers out from under her and started to get undressed. “I would prefer you to do this for me, slowly, piece by piece, but I don’t think it’s over ten degrees in here.” She removed her gun from the holster and placed it where she could reach it easily. I helped with her blouse.

  “I don’t recall this scar across your back.”

  “Did you know that some of the clans still use swords? Neither did I.”

  When I laid down next to her the feel of her skin against mine sent a shiver through me and I gasped.

  Hannah wrapped her arms and legs around me. “Yes,” she said. “Just like that. Don’t move for a few minutes. I need to remember this.”

  In a minute I felt her move under me and her teeth gentle on my neck. Nothing else mattered then bu
t to find what she needed, to touch where she needed to be touched and kiss where she needed to be kissed and to fulfill the desires of our bodies as urgently as possible.

  I was soon panting for breath, my head on her shoulder. She kissed my hand where it was cradling her cheek. “Smart move, putting the candle that far away.”

  I kissed her in the hollow between her breasts, long and slow, tasting her sweat and then looked at her watching me, her eyes catching the candle light.

  She touched my face, smiling. “You better not think we’re done.”

  In answer I kissed her bare shoulder and worked my way down slowly across her chest. I kissed down along her ribs and across her belly, pulling the covers over my head to keep her warm.

  “There can’t be much air under there,” I heard her warn me.

  I bit gently on the inside of her thigh. “There isn’t, but what there is tastes sweet.” I heard her start to laugh and made sure that it ended in a moan.

  An hours later, I was back resting my head between her breasts, feeling her heart pounding under me. We slept that way for a time.

  Sometime in the night Hannah rolled over on top of me. The candle had burned out by then but I could just make out the curves of her body by the light leaking in past the curtains. We made love for the third time that night, Hannah’s hands braced on my shoulders until she collapsed across my chest, her arms and legs shaking with exhaustion. I held her close to me and we listened to the storm beating against the house as it swept through the Warrens and then she slept in my arms until dawn.

  When I woke up Hannah was already dressed. She was sitting in the room’s one chair working on something on her display pad with Mac sleeping across her feet. Another dog was sleeping on the floor by the window, lighter in color.

  She glanced over at me. “Yeah, there’s more of him now. Whatever they are, they’re doing a good job of suppressing the fear I should be feeling.”

  “I’ve been expecting that he would start to multiply but I’m sort of glad I didn’t see it happen.”

  “There were two others here when I woke up but they disappeared when I opened the door to go down the hall to take a shower. I tried to save you some hot water, by the way.”

  “Thanks. I suppose I need to get cleaned up.”

  She smiled at me. “I know I certainly did. Go quickly and then we’ll talk.”

  I showered and dressed and came back to the room. I sat on the bed and Hannah pulled her chair over close to me.

  “Ted, you were right yesterday when you said we had unfinished business. There was a hole right here,” she tapped her chest, “from the way we were separated from each other. After last night I think it might start to heal.”

  “That sounds like goodbye.”

  “You know it has to be. I can feel what’s in your heart too. It’s strange but I think I know what you’re feeling.”

  “You do.” I pointed at Mac. “It’s a gift.”

  “Maybe that explains the intensity of what happened.”

  “Maybe. Partially. He only amplified what we were already feeling.”

  “I stole something from Alice last night. I had no right, but I needed it so badly that I took it anyway.”

  “We both needed it. I think I can help you now with the Confederation without needing,” I gestured toward the bed, “this again.” I looked away from her. “At least for a time.”

  “No. I need you to promise me something. When you get back to the Mission give our messages to Father Ryczek and then take Alice and get out of the Warrens as soon as possible. Get off-planet if you can.”

  “What’s happened?”

  “Hetman Bsilnik was killed last night. A kinetic energy weapon, probably dropped from orbit took out the entire block. At least thirty killed but we’re still sorting through the rubble.”

  “How did they know where he was?”

  “Maybe he lit a fire to keep warm.” Her voice was bitter. “That’s three of us in three weeks. Bsilnik and Buna were the ones I met on Cleavus, they were the ones with the original vision of remaking the Warrens into someplace just a little better for the people that live here. The one killed before that was the man who published our news and distributed it to all the clans in fifty different languages. He was a poet when I first met him. When he gave me the first draft of the Articles of Confederation he told me it was the most beautiful poem he had ever written.

  “It’s all coming apart, Ted. The CG doesn’t want to negotiate, they want the chaos back. They’ll kill us one by one and the Confederation will just be a cautionary tale for anyone that wants to challenge them.”

  “Hannah, I need to get back to the Mission. Father Ryczek may be able to get them to stop as a condition to begin talks. Come with me.”

  “Claim sanctuary in the church? No, that’s not what Ysabeau Romee would do. You can try to get them to stop, but they won’t. A couple more bombs and a handful of bullets and they’ll have won.”

  “Last night you told me I needed to rescue you.”

  “And you did. My heart is freer now than it’s been for a very long time. I know that yours is too.” She sighed. “Go down the stairs and turn right when you leave the building. Turn left at the end of the block and Cuza and another man will meet you and see you safely to the Mission.”

  She walked down the stairs with me and we kissed goodbye before I opened the door a crack to peek out. The snow was melting quickly and a few people were walking by on the muddy streets. Merrimac pushed past my legs, trotted across the street, and jumped up on a man that was standing in a doorway opposite ours. Mac grabbed the man by the throat with his mouth and threw him to the ground.

  It all happened without drama and so quickly that it took me a moment to realize what had occurred. I ran to where Mac was crushing the man’s trachea. His jacket had fallen open as he thrashed in the mud revealing a silenced handgun which I took. I kicked the assassin hard in the ribs and then pointed the gun at his head while Mac held him down for me.

  Cuza had reached us by then and pushed my arm down. “Easy now. Alive he can talk, dead, not so much.” Mac let go of the assassin’s throat and the man with Cuza dragged him away, disappearing quickly down a side alley.

  I was feeling a cold anger burning in me, anger at the CG for the killing they were doing, anger at the Warrens, anger at the assassin for trying to take Hannah’s life. I was angry at Cuza for not letting me kill the man lying unconscious with Mac’s teeth in his throat.

  Cuza and I walked back to where Hannah was still standing in the doorway and I was angry with her for putting herself in a situation where she would probably die. I released the magazine from the gun and ejected the round that was in the chamber. I picked it up out of the dirt and handed it to her.

  “This is the one that was supposed to have killed you.”

  She looked at it lying in her palm, feeling the weight of it. She slipped it into her pocket.

  “Would you have shot him if Cuza hadn’t stopped you?”

  “Yes.”

  Mac came back and sat at her feet looking up at her. There was blood on his muzzle and I could feel the cold anger in him too.

  “Tell Father Ryczek that I want to meet with him as soon as possible.”

  “Yes, Ysabeau. I will do that for you.”

  “Cuza, will you please make sure he arrives safely?”

  “Yes, ma’am, although he seems like he might be OK without me. We need to get you out of the Mission more often, Teddy. You ain’t half bad in a fight.”

  “Have him tell you about the Margo Islands sometime, Cuza.”

  “I’d rather not.” I handed the gun to Hannah. “I still have nightmares.”

  Hannah handed the gun back to me. “Keep it, Teddy.” Her eyes crinkled in a brief smile. “You may need to defend me again some time.”

  When Cuza and I
started to walk away Mac stayed with Hannah. I turned and looked at them standing in the doorway.

  “Keep her safe, Mac.” She closed the door and I heard the lock click shut.

  CHAPTER 16

  THE PLAN

  CUZA WALKED ALONG WITH ME in silence for several blocks before asking me, “You spend the night with her?”

  I thought about telling him that it was none of his damn business, but then decided that we had too many things in common for me to lie to him. We were both willing to kill for her or die for her. And we both loved her.

  “Yes, Cuza. I did.”

  He nodded. “I won’t tell nobody. Unless you plan to make a habit out of it, make her a second wife.”

  I laughed. “Can you see her being a ‘second’ anything?”

  He smiled, showing his teeth. “No, not her.” He looked at me closely. “When you gave her that bullet I realized I knew something about you. I was bent down petting the dog and telling him he was a good dog and it just slammed into my brain.”

  “What was it?”

  “Well, I seen the look in your eyes when you talked about her back at the Mission, and then, yesterday, there was that same look but in her eyes when she looked at you. Putting you together is bad news. All the good inside the two of you gets stronger but so does the bad, and both of you got plenty of bad. But with Alice,” he stopped and looked into my eyes, “with Alice the good gets stronger but most all the bad is canceled out. If you have to choose just one woman, Alice ain’t a bad choice.”

  He laughed and we started walking again. “That don’t make no damn sense now that I say it out loud.”

  “Oh, it does. You’re a wise man, Cuza, wiser than me.”

  I went to find Alice as soon as we reached the Mission, while Cuza went back the way we had come to, as he put it, ‘help a guy answer some questions’. Alice was sitting in a chair reading a story to a semicircle of children on the floor in front of her. I lifted her to her feet without a word and held her close to me while the children giggled.

  “Careful, Ted, or you’ll squish your baby right out of me.”