by Elin Wyn
After a bit, Laz left the hallway, and we made our way into Skud’s office. Aryn argued that we were pushing it, but I wanted to see what was in those boxes on the shelves. We looked around, Aryn looking through his desk, while I looked in the boxes.
They were filled with random parts, paperwork, and tchotchkes from around the cosmos. I recognized some of the little things as being the same ones my grandmother had sitting on her window sills. I shook my head. Of all the things someone like Skud could have in his office, he had boxes of useless decorations.
“Find anything?” I asked Aryn.
She shook her head. “No. Nothing terribly important that I can tell. They’re connected to about a third of the station in terms of protection payments, but I can’t tell anything else from his writing.”
“Let’s get out of here before we’re caught, then,” I suggested. She nodded, put Skud’s desk back the way it was, and we left. We spent the rest of the day cleaning.
But when Skud came back, he requested our presence, immediately.
Aryn
By the time Kovor and I placed our filthy bristle-brushes on Skud’s desk, I ached from head to toe and felt a layer of grime even through the skin dye.
Which worried me.
While the skin dye was supposed to last through sweat and exertion, glancing down I noticed it had gotten a little thin in places.
The chemicals.
Shit.
I slid my hands behind my back and glanced at Kovor.
Poor guy might have been new to cleaning up other people’s filth, but he’d actually put the work in, scrubbing as hard as I had.
“Not bad.” Skud picked up my bristle-brush. Its initially white bristles were now black and clumped together. I doubted anything we cleaned looked much better than it did when we’d started, but I knew that wasn’t the point of this exercise.
Skud just wanted to see how far he could push us. Hopefully, he was satisfied.
“Is there anything else you need?” I made sure not to sound too eager.
“You kids have shown grit,” Skud nodded. “You did your jobs and didn’t squawk about it. Ordinarily, I’d have a few more hoops to put you through before I could sleep easy, but I have an opportunity that doesn’t come around too often.”
“What’s that?” I asked, letting my head fall to one side.
“We’ve got a delivery coming in and I’m a man short,” Skud replied. “Big delivery. Under the radar, but I’m sure I don’t have to explain that to you.”
“We’re familiar with the idea.” I let myself smirk just a little. Facial expressions were key. I couldn’t look too eager, too calm, too anxious, too uninterested. It was all a balancing act. If my eyes lit up with excitement, I’d look too greedy. If I looked nervous, I’d look useless.
I itched to look behind me and see which mask Kovor wore.
Since Skud hadn’t said anything to him, I figured Kovor had passed as well. I was getting a little curious about my playboy and his masks.
Shit. Not my playboy.
“Are you, now?” Skud leaned back in his chair, happily oblivious to my slip. “Who did you say you worked for before coming here?”
I deliberately hadn’t said anything about previous ‘employers’ and Skud knew that. His question was just another reminder of the dance we were doing.
“My brother and I freelanced for anyone who’d take us, that way we could get out in case an operation went belly up,” I explained.
“Smart thinking,” Skud nodded. “Why the urge to join a team now?”
“We’re on a confined station. There’s only so many places we could go before the permanent residents learned our faces.”
“Ah. You expect me to protect you?” Skud chuckled.
“Only if you think we’re worth it,” I shrugged.
“And what if I don’t?”
“It’ll be a disappointment for us and a loss on your part,” I replied evenly.
Skud’s shoulders shook as a laugh bubbled up from deep in his belly. “I like your confidence. Clearly, you’re the brains of your partnership. I want you on the shipment delivery with me,” Skud offered.
“My brother and I are a package deal.” I shoved my hands into my pockets and squared my shoulders.
“I can’t say I’m as sure your shadow is as useful.” Skud’s gaze flickered to Kovor.
“He’s my security,” I replied coolly. “He bites when I need him to. He’ll bite when I ask him to. He’ll bite who I want him to.” I was sure Kovor loved hearing that. No doubt I’d get an earful the next time we spoke in private.
“Fine. He’s in, too. We might need the muscle,” Skud relented. “We’re heading down to the port in an hour.”
“An hour?” I blurted. I knew Kovor and I had to see what they were up to, but I was worn down after a day of cleaning on my hands and knees. I wasn’t as sharp as I usually was.
What if this was some kind of trap?
“Problem?” Skud’s eyes hardened.
“Not at all,” I smiled easily. “It’s just that Koll and I reek after today. Hope you don’t mind the smell.”
Skud chuckled and made a dismissive gesture. Kovor and I silently left his office and headed back to our room.
“Security? Really?” Kovor said once we closed the door to our shared room. I started to laugh.
“I couldn’t think of anything better,” I half laughed at the idea of him as someone’s body-guard. Dark, mysterious, and dangerous, he wasn’t.
At least, I didn’t think so, but I was too tired to think straight.
“You didn’t try very hard,” Kovor replied but I could see the answering smile in his eyes.
“You’re right, I didn’t,” I admitted. “Cover the door while I freshen up. The skin dye’s starting to fade.” Kovor nodded and turned his back while I pulled my shirt over my head. I poured the smallest amount of skin dye needed and retouched the faint spots on my neck, chest, wrists, hands and face. It wasn’t just the chemicals that had faded the dye on my hands, the sweat through the day had done a number all over. I scowled at a bare patch on my side. The shirt would cover it, and I needed to conserve the dye for as long as possible.
Hell with it.
Throughout the process, I watched Kovor like a hawk.
He didn’t once peek.
A faint bloom of disappointment settled in my belly.
Really, Aryn?
I shook my hands, waiting for the dye to dry and my mind to come to its senses. When I couldn’t afford to wait any longer, I tugged my shirt back over my head and re-tied my hair into a neat Shein bun.
“Do my tattoos need touching up?” I asked Kovor. He turned to face me. He walked around the room until his face was inches from mine.
My heartbeat sped up and I held my breath. As he examined my face, my gaze was drawn to his mouth, those full lips.
I quickly looked away before he noticed.
“The markings look a tiny bit smudged, but only if someone is looking hard,” he assessed. “I can touch them up for you, if you like.”
“No,” I said too quickly. I took a step back from him. “I’ll keep my hood up. It’ll be dark. No one’s going to be looking at my face.”
“Except me,” Kovor grinned. Thankfully, the skin dye hid my blush.
“Why would you be watching my face?” I asked.
“It’s interesting to watch your expressions. I’ve made a game out of trying to figure out which expressions are genuine and which are calculated,” Kovor said.
“I wonder how many you’ve gotten right,” I raised my eyebrows, and wondered how many of his I’d gotten right. I wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.
“Probably none. You’re still a mystery,” Kovor replied. Before I could say anything back, he opened the door to the room and strolled out. I double checked the coverage on my hands and wrists before hurrying after him.
We hung at the back of the group as we followed Skud down to the port. Kovor and I kept
our heads low as we passed the Rogue Star. I wondered if anyone saw us.
Skud’s ship wasn’t as big or as nice as the Rogue Star. The lettering was in one of the alien scripts I hadn’t learned yet, so I couldn’t read the name painted on the side of the vessel, but I doubted it was the ship’s real name in any case.
Maybe Skud had his very own Maris to make false registration tags.
Or maybe he bribed the dockworkers to look the other way.
If it was me, I’d do both.
I wondered what Captain Dejar would think if he knew he shared a port with our enemy. They’d been a handful of ships down from us the whole time.
I felt a hand on my upper arm. Kovor looked at me with a carefully concealed look of concern. I relaxed my expression. I’d been glaring without realizing it. Kovor moved closer to me as we boarded Skud’s ship. We followed the group down a passageway and through an open room lined with windows, rather like the viewing deck back on the Rogue Star.
“Sit below deck. Make no sound, not even when we stop,” Skud instructed. I nodded. Kovor and I descended a rickety flight of steps to a small cargo hold. Though Skud had brought several Enclave members with him, he only made Kovor and me sit in the cargo hold. Once the door was shut, Kovor turned to me.
“Should we be worried?” he asked.
“Not yet,” I said, though I knew my voice lacked conviction. “He doesn’t trust us yet. He doesn’t want us to know where he goes to receive deliveries. He left the door unbolted. It’s another test.”
“Right.” Kovor nodded. He sat down on the floor with his back to the wall. After a few minutes, I sat down beside him. Through the floor, we felt the engine rumble to life. The ship tilted as it pulled away from the port.
Kovor and I sat in silence as the ship moved away from Qasar Station. After a while, the soothing vibrations of the engine started to lull me to sleep. I decided to rest my eyes for just a moment…
“Aryn!” Kovor’s quick whisper jolted me awake. My neck hurt. I realized my head was on his shoulder. I straightened up immediately, my entire body on alert.
“What?” I whispered back.
“We’ve stopped,” he replied.
“I’m going to go see what they’re doing,” I decided. Kovor grabbed my arm as I started to get up.
“No way! It’s too risky,” he insisted.
“Skud said shipments like these are few and far between. We might never get another chance to see who their supplier is,” I argued. I could tell Kovor didn’t want to let me go, but in the end, he released my arm.
“I should go,” he insisted.
“You’re too big to hide easily,” I patted his arm. “Good thing I was so sickly as a child, right?”
By his frown, I could tell he wasn’t nearly as amused as I’d hoped.
“Be careful,” he growled. “Shout for me if you need anything. Scream as loud as you can. I’ll come find you.”
“Okay.” I offered him a small smile before slowly opening the unlocked door to the cargo hold. I peeked into the hallway. Our door was unguarded. All hands must be above assisting with the delivery.
I slowly closed the cargo hold door. I remembered the path through the ship as Skud brought us down here and kept my footfalls silent on the metal floor as I moved.
My ears strained, ready to pick up even the faintest sounds of someone approaching. No one did.
There wasn’t a door at the top of the stairs. As I climbed up, I flattened my body down. I pulled my hood tighter over my head, ensuring that no bit of skin or red hair showed.
I peeked over the top of the stairs. I could see the ship we were meeting through the windows.
I’d seen this ship. Knew its strange curves and angles.
Never in real life, but over and over again in simulations with Maris and the crew.
It was the dark ship that attacked us weeks ago. That had killed three of the women from Persephone Station.
And on the deck of our ship, towering over Skud, was a black-robed figure marked with the oval Dominion sigil.
Kovor
Aryn had been gone for too long.
Something had happened to her, I knew it.
Then I convinced myself that she was fine. She was smart, resourceful, and a pain in my hurg, but she was more than capable of taking care of herself. Until she wasn’t. I headed towards the stairway, then stopped.
I had to trust her, but what if she was in trouble?
I had finally made up my mind to go find her when she descended the stairs and motioned me over to the far side of the cargo bay. “It’s like we thought, the shipment is more women.”
“Kout,” I cursed quietly.
“That’s not all.” She looked up at me, her eyes wide. “The ship that’s delivering them is that dark ship that attacked us…and it’s from the Dominion.”
“Are you sure? I mean, are you completely sure?” I asked. The idea that the Dominion truly was involved, and possibly even behind the abductions and auctions, didn’t sit well with me.
Even now, with the Rogue Star blacklisted, I had never known the Dominion to be anything other than a force for good.
The Dominion established laws and rules to maintain peace, maintain behavior, and to give everyone from the outer fringes a reason to improve. To be part of the Dominion, to be in their fold, protected by them, that was how peace had been maintained for so long. There hadn’t been a war with the Dominion, or its members, since long before my grandmother was born.
The Dominion had shut down tyrannies, dismantled criminal dictatorships, and helped to rebuild planets and civilizations decimated by illnesses, war, or corruption.
Pompous, hidebound bureaucrats that couldn’t understand that we were just protecting the Terran women, and hadn’t deliberately trespassed into non-sanctioned space?
Sure.
Kidnappers? Traffickers of women?
No.
Aryn put her hand on my arm. “Yes. The person that Skud was dealing with was in black robes like the Dominion…”
“That could be anyone in a black robe. It’s not like the Dominion owns that fashion statement,” I interrupted.
With a sad look in her eyes, she nodded. “I know, but the Dominion sigil was embroidered on the robes. They’re behind this.”
I shook my head and began pacing. This couldn’t possibly be right. Aryn had to be wrong. The Dominion wouldn’t stoop to these levels, to these kinds of tactics. What would their reasoning be? Why would they act in such an underhanded way?
“You’re wrong, Aryn. You saw the robes wrong,” I said.
“They were the same robes as the people that tried to chase us down at Outpost Nine,” she answered me. “I know it’s hard to believe, but I know what I saw. I dream about that damn sigil, those robes, and what almost happened to me and the others. It’s the Dominion.”
“It can’t be,” I snapped back. “They don’t do that sort of thing. Why would they?”
“I don’t know.”
I looked at her, searching for some answers. “Why would the Dominion act this way? Why would they act so suspiciously, so underhandedly? I mean, if the Dominion is really behind all of this, they wouldn’t be sending assassins and covert ships to hunt us down,” I argued. “They would just make our faces known all over the cosmos and do an open hunt for us. Why would they go about things the way they have been? Why would they be taking women from worlds that wanted to join the fold?”
I was struggling to maintain composure. It made no sense to me. The Dominion, during my entire life, had been a force of good. The only reason I was ‘against’ them as a smuggler was for the adventure and the money. Certain organizations paid better to make sure the Dominion didn’t know their actions, and the thrill of doing that was fun.
But this… something was very wrong.
Twisted somehow.
“Kovor?” I looked at Aryn, real concern on her face. “Are you okay?” she asked.
I shook my head at first, the
n changed it to a nod. “I’ll be fine. Just…processing.”
I didn’t get long to process as Skud brought our ‘cargo’ down into the bay. He did not look happy. “You two, keep an eye on these,” he barked at us as Laz pushed and prodded the women down the stairs.
They looked terrified. There were three of them, roughly Aryn’s size, but that was where any similarities ended. Each of them had silver skin that shined in the light and what looked to be like sheets of white hair that cascaded down their backs. Their giant eyes, easily three or four times larger than Aryn’s, took in everything.
As one stumbled on the last stair, Laz smacked her in the back of the head, barking at her to watch her step.
I let a small growl escape my lips, and Aryn flashed me a look. Luckily, Skud’s own growls drowned me out. “Easy, Laz. We lose money if they’re damaged.”
He turned away from Laz and the women and kept talking. I wasn’t sure if it was to himself or not, but his voice wasn’t able to get very low. “Not like there’s much money to get out of these three.”
His anger at the size of our ‘shipment’ was getting the better of him as his speech became more and more primitive. “This not good. We told to be prepared for important shipment, get this instead. It not right, it not what Skud expected.”
He looked over at Aryn and me. “You two, watch them. They not leave, they not get hurt, or Skud take pleasure in breaking both of you.”
We nodded emphatically. I didn’t think that either one of us wanted to try taking Skud on. Memories of Skud casually smacking me on the back returned and I didn’t want to feel how hard he hit when he was angry.
After a few more minutes of Skud pacing the cargo bay, he seemed to have calmed himself. When he turned to look at us again, he was no longer snarling, and his intelligent speech was back. “Make them look presentable,” he said, slightly stumbling over the last word and shoving a box at me. “Make sure they are clean, dressed, and look nice for when we get back to Qasar.”
I looked at the women. I couldn’t tell where they were from, or what race they were. The only thing I could tell was that they were terrified, they weren’t happy with us, and they particularly weren’t happy with me.