“Baskilor ilkalorda. I’d appreciate that.”
Emil gave her a puzzled look.
“Kalordin,” she told V’ritan and answered the question in the other man’s eyes. “He said he’d be grateful if we would, and I said we’d do that.”
He nodded and glanced at Jonathan Wattlebird. “In-system drives if you would Lieutenant Commander, with as much as speed as is safely possible.”
“Aye, sir.”
As they hastened toward the waiting Meligornian fleet, V’ritan spoke again. “Welcome home, Garghilum. Meligorn welcomes your Ebon Knight to the fleet.”
“Hartuitus baskilor, Ghargilum Afreghil.”
“Baskilor nye myerda,” he answered. “It is good to have you home, Valiant Soul—and to have another ship to add to our fleet.”
“Great,” she grumbled while she tried to work out what he meant by that. “If they shanghai my ship, they’ll pay my weapons costs.”
The journey to the Meligornian fleet seemed to take both forever and no time at all, and Stephanie waited impatiently as the captain maneuvered them into the position assigned him by the fleet. It was somewhat disconcerting to be placed to the King’s Warrior’s left with a battleship flying to their left.
“It could be my imagination,” the pilot murmured, “but these guys seemed geared up for war—and I mean they look like they’re ready to ship out at any moment. Scans show a full complement on each ship.”
“Keep us on station,” the captain instructed and stepped out from behind his console. He looked at Stephanie. “I have an in-board induction to attend.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“We are now part of the Meligornian fleet. There are apparently some things I need to know and I need to meet the other captains. With your permission?”
“Granted. I need to take the pinnace and meet V’ritan on the orbital. Do I have your permission?”
Emil gave her an ironic grimace. “You are a daughter of Meligorn and, from what I understand, one of its Valiant Souls. You are also the owner of this ship. You need no permission from me.”
“I should still let you know what to expect,” she told him. “I mean no disrespect.”
“I understand,” he told her. “Keep your comms lines clear.”
He paused on his way out of the command center. “Would you care to join me for dinner if our schedules permit it? We can swap notes.”
She gave him a relieved smile. “I’d be honored.”
Stephanie followed him out of the command center and they went in opposite directions. Lars walked with her and summoned the team over their comms as he walked. By the time they reached the docking bay where the ship’s pinnace was kept, the rest of the team was on board.
Bumblebee and Zeekat pricked their ears as she entered and both cast Vishlog a quick look. He kept his hands on their heads and they stayed where they were.
The Marine contingent was unexpected, though, and she narrowed her eyes.
“Captain’s orders, ma’am,” Captain Sartre explained. “You go nowhere without a little extra back-up.”
“And he thinks that’ll keep me out of trouble, does he?” she challenged and the Marine captain smiled.
“No, ma’am, but he wanted to know you were in good company.”
She pursed her lips and nodded. “Noted.”
Once she’d settled into a seat opposite Vishlog and the cats, Lars sealed the hatch.
“Take us out,” she instructed. “Has V’ritan sent the location?”
“Brilgus sent docking instructions,” Brendan informed her as he ensured the hangar was clear and cycled the atmosphere.
The pinnace lifted lightly, and he guided her out of the hangar bay.
The flight to the orbital was short and surprisingly smooth. There was a slight vibration when they entered the belt of magical energy that surrounded the planet, and Brenden switched to the auxiliary Meligornian drives they’d had installed.
Stephanie took a deep breath and reached out for the MU that permeated the air around her. V’ritan was right. It was like coming home. In the moment before she closed her eyes, she caught Vishlog and Lars smiling.
If she hadn’t known any better, she would have said they were pleased to see her drawing the magic to her. It didn’t matter. She was happy, and the energy welcomed her like an old friend. She drew it in and felt it fill the MU well that had run almost dry.
A light touch on her arm told her they’d reached the station, and she opened her eyes and released the magic with unexpected regret. It didn’t stop her from drawing it in, though. Her body did that automatically, and she was grateful.
They entered a passenger lounge that was surprisingly empty. To her surprise, V’ritan wasn’t there to greet her. Two Meligornians wearing the teal and gold of the royal household stood on either side of the airlock and both greeted her with the deep bow usually reserved for royalty.
Shocked, she returned it with care.
“If you would follow us, Ghargilum, the Ghargilum Afreghil is waiting.”
They led Stephanie out into the corridor where a contingent of Meligornian guards was waiting. The Marines formed up around her and the team, and the guard slid into place around them. Their journey through the station was swift, and she noted how empty the corridors seemed compared to what she remembered.
Where is everyone? The emptiness concerned her, but she did not ask. It was a question that could wait until she spoke to V’ritan. Remembering Wattlebird’s words, she decided the pilot was right. Something was definitely afoot.
That impression was confirmed when they were taken to a small conference room where The King’s Warrior waited. He was dressed in robes and not his armor, but he seemed to have aged and his eyes were grave when he regarded her.
“We are at war,” he said once she and the team were seated and their guards arrayed around the room. He nodded to his aides and they departed. “The Telorans are coming.”
Stephanie’s heart leapt and turned cold when she registered what he’d said. “Telorans?”
“It is what the Nihilism call themselves,” he told her.
Lars shifted restlessly beside her, and she met V’ritan’s gaze. “Why don’t you start at the beginning?” she suggested.
He nodded and drew a chair up at the end of the table. “A good suggestion,” he agreed and retrieved the remote resting on the end of the table. “Four weeks ago, one of our scout groups was patrolling the outer reaches of our territory when they came across this.”
He pressed the button and the screen at the end of the room came alive with the footage from the first scout ship. She gasped, the sound echoed by several others around the room.
“It got worse,” he told them and showed them how the battle had gone, from the Teloran greeting to the scout ship’s demise, and finally, the demise of the remainder of the small patrol group. “There were no survivors, but they managed to get several message torps away before they died.”
His words held a bitter twist and his voice caught. She was tempted to ask who he’d known, but she didn’t. The loss was still fresh, and he hadn’t finished his tale.
“From what we can tell, they were unable to follow the torps through their dimensional jumps and will come at us from across the systems.”
“How much time do we have?” Lars asked.
V’ritan looked at her. “Let’s say your timing is impeccable. We expect them any day now.”
“The Navy won’t reach you for weeks.”
“We know. We will not hold that against them. The intention was there.”
“Intention will not save your world,” she retorted and V’ritan gave her a sad smile.
“No, only we can do that. I am glad you are here.”
Stephanie thought of the delay caused by discovering the traitors and how she might not have arrived at all if they’d been left aboard. “So am I,” she agreed and earned a sharp look from him before she changed the subject.
“So, i
t’s only us. What do you think they’ll do?”
“Well, until our scout vessels destroyed that first ship, we had the element of surprise. I don’t think they really expected us to fight—or to be very effective if they did. Our scouts have shown them otherwise.”
“They’ve also shown them that MU does not mix well with nMU.”
V’ritan gave her a bitter grin. “On the contrary, they have shown them that it mixes very well. Unfortunately, they won’t make that mistake, again.”
“How many dropships do you think a ship that size can carry?” Lars asked with a glance at Sartre.
The Marine captain shrugged and shook his head. “I wouldn’t know,” he replied. “If it was Federation Navy, I’d say they could field over a thousand troops at any one time, and that depends on whether they had them in pods or bunked.”
They all looked at him, and he returned the stares. “If they pod their troops, they don’t need mess halls, galleys, latrines, and a hundred and one other things. Navy disagrees that it’s an effective technique, but the training’s shifting that way now that the technology’s improved.”
“Surely they’d be in no condition to fight if they’d been kept immobile for that long,” V’ritan suggested, but Stephanie shook her head.
“No, the universities keep their students in pods for most of their semesters, and they’ve reached a point where they don’t lose any physical conditioning. If the Ni—Telorans have that stage of tech, they’ll be fine.”
“Well, let’s hope they don’t,” Sartre mused. “That’s an awful big ship. I’d hate to guess our chances if they offloaded a boatload of Teloran Marines.”
The King’s Warrior frowned. “We’re missing something,” he said.
“Well, if this were the Federation Navy,” the Marine explained, “we’d start with bombardment and then we’d send the dropships down and take what was left.”
V’ritan’s frown deepened. “Somehow, they don’t strike me as the invading kind.” He glanced toward the screen. “Invasion infers settlement and taking control, and I honestly don’t think that’s what they have planned for our world. Besides,” he added. “Why would they stop if they plan to destroy Earth and settle on Dreth? No. I fear they plan to destroy us as completely as they can.”
What the Marine captain had suggested bothered Stephanie, and she frowned while she tried to determine why. On the surface, the idea of invasion was sound. Once the Telorans reached Meligornian soil, they could fight the Meligornians magic for magic.
Magic… She remembered drawing the nMU to her hand and the painful explosion that had followed when nMU and MU mixed.
“Oh…” she muttered, and all eyes turned toward her.
She looked up. Lars, V’ritan, and Sartre observed her in the same way the cats observed a mousehole. She refocused hastily.
“Invasion is unlikely,” she told them, her voice so sure that she now had their undivided attention. Her eyes had grown darker than before.
“Why?” the Meligornian asked.
“Because our world is death to the Telorans,” she told him. She held her regrown hand up. “They’d probably die if their energy mixed with MU—and our world is full of it. They can’t get near it.”
He finally understood. His shoulders slumped and he bowed his head. “So it’ll be bombardment, then.”
Stephanie nodded. “Yup. They’ll want you out of the fight and either planet-bound or, barring planet-bound, they will pummel you into history.”
She paused to consider what she’d seen. “After watching the battle footage from the scouts, I would guess they’ll think you’re too much of a pain in the ass to leave alive behind them.”
“We will stand between them and our world,” V’ritan said, his voice hard with determination. “No missile shall pass us.”
“They won’t use missiles,” Sartre argued, and they all looked toward him.
The Marine reddened. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a downer.” He looked at her. “Missiles can be diverted and they’re expensive. My guess is that if they have ships that big, they’re not pushed for space. They’ll throw rocks.”
V’ritan stared at him. “Rocks?”
“The size of asteroids if the girth on that first ship is anything to go by.”
The King’s Warrior paled. “I don’t know if we can…” His voice faltered. “I don’t…”
“What about nMU missiles?” Stephanie asked. “Wouldn’t they be more effective?”
Sartre shook his head. “They might try, but I assume they’d detonate on contact with the band of magic surrounding the planet. If that happens, they’ll use asteroids to pound this world to dust.”
He stared at them but they did not respond. Each one of them wracked their brains for ways to stop a cloud of asteroid-sized rocks, and he couldn’t blame them. That kind of bombardment was not a fate he’d wish on any world, let alone one as beautiful as Meligorn.
There was nothing he could say to make his prediction any more palatable.
“We don’t even have the ships we’d need to evacuate,” V’ritan murmured.
“How long did you say it would be before the Federation fleet arrives?” Lars asked as he tried to find alternatives.
“I thought they were weeks behind us,” she replied, “and they won’t send the entire fleet anyway.”
“Is there any way we can get them to change their minds on that?” he pushed but she shook her head.
“I don’t think so,” she said after she’d thought about it. “They’re sending a sizable force, but they won’t commit everything if they don’t think Meligorn is the prime target. The Federation theory is that the Telorans know Dreth has the same energy they do.”
She looked at V’ritan. “I’m sorry, but the Federation thinks Dreth is the primary target. They’re sending help, but it won’t be the entire fleet.”
“Even if they know that if we stop them here, we stop them for good?”
“They say they can’t be sure this is the only fleet the enemy has and they don’t want to risk having no ships they can send to Dreth if they are needed.”
He sighed. “That is understandable. I don’t like it, but I understand it. Meligorn would have done the same.”
“Earth is probably their next target,” Stephanie told him. “They’ll bomb Meligorn, beat Earth, and settle on Dreth. By that stage, Earth will be dead or defeated, with no hope of ever forming a future defense.”
V’ritan nodded and his face looked gray with worry and anticipated grief.
“What about evacuation?” she asked.
“What do you mean? I already told you we didn’t have enough ships.”
“The portals,” she reminded him. “Can’t your people get through the portals and take refuge on Earth?”
“Earth won’t agree to take us in time.”
She gave him an evil grin. “Who says we’d ask? And who says they’ll argue with their Witch?”
He raised his head sharply. “Even so, I—”
Alarms shrilled throughout the station, and one of V’ritan’s aides raced through the door. “A large ship transferred into the Non-Transition Zone.”
V’ritan glanced over at Stephanie. “Is that a friend of yours?”
Her lips twitched in an involuntary smile. “I don’t think so.”
He took the tablet offered by his aide and began to speak to the captain of the King’s Warrior. “Who is it?” he demanded.
“Two seconds, sir.”
“Make it one.”
“It’s Dreth, sir.”
His eyebrows rose and he glanced at Stephanie. The captain continued before he could speak.
“And they’re hailing us, sir. The Dreth are hailing.”
Chapter Fifty
V’ritan had The King’s Warrior put the call through to the conference room and looked as surprised as anyone else when Ambassador Jaleck appeared on the screen.
“Ambassador!” he exclaimed. “I hope you have a su
itable explanation for almost causing my heart to stop.”
Her lips quirked. “I am sorry, Ghargilum Afreghil, but I am no longer an ambassador for the Dreth nation.”
His smile faded. “Tell me you have come with good news.”
“That depends on your point of view, but I am no longer an ambassador. I am the First Admiral of the Dreth Navy.”
The Meligornian’s mouth dropped open for a moment before he recovered himself. Jaleck looked past him and saw Stephanie at the table. “Greetings, Ghargilum and Child of Dreth.”
Stephanie rose and gave the admiral a very Dreth salute, bringing her fist to her chest and bowing her head. She returned the gesture. “It is good to see you here,” she stated. “It saves us from having to fetch you.”
“I had business here,” she told her. “Are you the contingent Dreth promised?”
Jaleck snorted. “They sent those ships via Earth. Something about not trusting your Federation to fulfill its promises. We hoped to lead by example.”
“And?”
The admiral shrugged and gave them a sly smile. “I happened to be in the area and thought I’d drop by. You know how it is.”
V’ritan made a disbelieving sound. “How many jumps and transitions did you say?”
The smile turned into a bared-teeth grin. “Like I said, V’ritan, you know how it is. Sometimes, a warrior gets an itch between their shoulder blades and it draws them to battle like a moth to a flame. Mine brought me here.”
“And the jumps?” he insisted, refusing to be put off.
Her grin disappeared. “I counted three transitions and fourteen days of travel. I apologize for the alarm, but my back is burning. It is as though an enemy marksman has me in their sights.” She looked around. “Yet your system appears quiet. Tell me, what trouble is there for an old warrior to sink their teeth into?”
His reply was blunt. “The Telorans are coming.”
“Telorans? Ah, our enemies have a name!” The bared teeth were back, but it was hardly a grin. “Dreth would have been most annoyed if our Meligornian cousins failed to allow her people a share of the action.”
“Believe me,” V’ritan told her. “Meligorn had no intention to keep the action to herself. We would have been most dismayed should our Dreth brethren have failed to share our meal.” He gave her a wistful look. “Although we had hoped there would be more to break this meal with.”
Witch Of The Federation III (Federal Histories Book 3) Page 54