“That’s okay. I’ll get used to it,” she said happily. “I love my room! It’s much bigger than the one at the temple, and the bed is great. There are clothes in there and everything!” She made a face. “And there’s a VidPad that has the name of a school etched into it.”
“Ah. Your schoolbooks have arrived. You have a bit of catching up to do, so you might want to start reading tonight. You’ll start attending classes tomorrow,” Bronse said.
Devan shuddered delicately. “I’m not looking forward to this. I was always schooled with the village children. I grew up with them. I don’t know anything about how to make new friends.”
“You’ll learn,” Bronse assured her. “Don’t worry about it. You’re a bright and funny girl. People are going to love that about you. You’ll have new friends in no time.”
“Just because you say it doesn’t always make it true,” the young girl said gravely, the pearl of wisdom telling him that her trust for him had grown, but she wasn’t yet willing to believe his word as law. Bronse didn’t mind. It just made her more clever than before in his eyes.
“We’ll just have to wait and see then, won’t we?”
She shrugged. “Sure.” Then she hopped back off to her bedroom. Just before she stepped through the door, she said, “Oh, I’m going to try a bunch of clothes on in here. Then do some reading. I don’t expect I’ll come out for a good long while.”
Then she disappeared through the door. Bronse and Rave looked at each other.
“Did she just give us permission to have sex?” he asked.
“Yes.” Ravenna giggled. “She thinks she’s being clever.”
Bronse narrowed darkening eyes on Ravenna. “I think she’s brilliant.”
Rave stepped back when he stepped forward. “It’s the middle of the day cycle!”
“So?” His look was positively predatory. He reached out to snag her wrist in his hand and continued to advance for every step she retreated.
“But Devan—”
“You heard her. She’ll be busy.” He grinned, teeth gleaming between his lips.
“What if one of the others comes to the door?” she persisted.
“If any of them are less savvy than a fourteen-year-old girl, they deserve to be ignored.” He leapt forward and grabbed her, making her squeal as he scooped her up over his shoulder and began to march for the hallway.
“Bronse! Put me down!” She laughed, squirming under the hand that patted her upturned bottom.
“Just as soon as I get my bed underneath you.”
It was three nights after that when Ravenna woke to a noise in the outer room. Devan had taken to getting up for nighttime snacks, so she didn’t think anything of it as she slid out from under Bronse’s arm and slipped on a robe. She left their bedroom and walked through the darkness to the living area. She thought it odd that no lights were on—until she reached for the panel that would turn them on and felt someone grab her wrist.
She was spun around so hard that her arm was shoved up her back as she was pushed into a wall. Every tendon protested as they resisted the impossible position. She opened her mouth to yell for Bronse, but the muzzle of a laser pistol shoved up under the point of her chin made the scream die in her throat.
“One sound,” she heard a man whisper between the tight clench of teeth, “and I’ll kill everyone I find in this house.”
Afraid for Devan and Bronse, she nodded her acquiescence.
“Good girl,” he said softly. “Now tell me where I can find Chapel and I’ll leave you be.”
Ravenna knew instantly that it was a lie. Whether she was reading him or not, she didn’t know, but every instinct screamed a warning that she could not and should not believe a single word that came out of his mouth. Who was this person? Was there random crime on a space station like this?
No. Not random at all. He was looking specifically for Bronse.
That was when she knew he was an assassin and this was yet another attempt to kill the man who had defied death again and again despite the powerful hands trying to wield it. This was JuJuren’s work.
Ravenna panicked. Not because she was afraid for herself or Bronse, but because she was afraid for the freedom of the Chosen Ones. If something like this got back to the higher-ups, they might jerk them all back into lockdown.
The idea made her angry. It made her bold.
“He isn’t here. He’s on a mission,” she said, knowing it was the most plausible excuse.
“You’re a liar. I saw him come home with you earlier.” The pistol became so insistent under her chin that she had to stretch her neck to accommodate it. “If I have to start searching rooms, I can’t take you with me. That means you’re dead. Tell me where he is right now.”
“Behind you.”
The snap and whip of the garrote bracelet Bronse always wore was as fast as lightning. Ravenna bolted to the right as Bronse looped the wire around the assassin’s neck and yanked him back off balance. Taken so off guard, the would-be killer squeezed the trigger. The shot was so close that it singed Ravenna’s hair. But within an instant the man dropped the weapon and grasped for the wire that was embedded in his throat and cutting off his air supply.
Still afraid, still needing to feel safe, Ravenna reached out her hand and called the weapon to her. It came up from the floor and flew straight into her palm. She was hoping that the darkness would hide the trick as she turned to point the pistol at the chest of the intruder.
Even in the dimness, she could see the light periwinkle eyes of her lover, as well as the shock and accusation that now emanated from them.
So much for hiding tricks, she thought.
Bronse turned all of his attention on the man he was struggling with. He was big, rather like Ender, and had a decent muscle mass. Strong. But without oxygen he was nothing. Less than nothing. And the intruder knew it. He stopped struggling to win and focused solely on making the effort to breathe against the incredible power of Bronse’s grip.
“Who sent you?” Bronse demanded. He was not about to just turn him over to the justice branch and let them handle this incessant breach in security and the threats to his personal safety.
“You know who!” The man gagged. Bronse eased up only enough to give him air for his next sentence.
“I want to know why that miserable fuck is out to get me! What the hell did I do?”
“I don’t know!” the assailant squeaked. “But he knows you have a woman and child now!”
The implication was clear. JuJuren would stop at nothing to get to Bronse. Even going through Ravenna and Devan to get to him.
Bronse and Rave’s gazes clashed. They both knew instantly what that would mean. Rave and Devan and the other Chosen Ones were too hot a commodity to allow any kind of danger near them.
The IM would pull Bronse off their detail if they found out about this.
Unable to stomach the idea, his rage and frustration taking over, Bronse strangled the bastard to within an inch of his life. It was only because Ravenna jumped in to stop him that the intruder was left to drop to the floor in an unconscious heap instead of a dead one.
Bronse whipped the garrote free of the assassin’s neck, and it retracted back into the whole bracelet again with a deadly snap. Breathing hard from exertion and the bushel of pure fear that had been dumped into his system when he had come out of the bedroom to find Rave with a gun to her face, Bronse leaned back against a near wall and let Ravenna come up to him with concern.
“It’s over,” he said, his voice dead and cold. “They’ll separate us and I won’t be allowed within a mile of you as long as JuJuren’s at large.”
“Then we have to see to it that he isn’t at large,” Rave shot back, the equally wintry nature of her voice telling him just how serious she was.
Anger snapped through him instantly. “What do you suggest? I take you with me and we go hunt him down? Spec Ops would just love that! I’d be court-martialed so fast—” He broke off and glared at her. “You�
��ve been lying to me.”
“It wasn’t a lie,” she insisted. “I told you I could take care of myself if I wanted to!”
“What was that?” he wanted to know. “Some kind of telekinesis? You can move shit with your mind, Ravenna!”
“Shh!” she hushed him worriedly, looking toward the front door and knowing that Justice was awake and alert across the hall. “Yes, I can move things with my mind. A great many things. I can do things you probably can’t even imagine—that’s how strong it is! But I won’t give that kind of weapon to just anyone, now will I? I can’t show it to anyone! I didn’t even want to show it to you! I didn’t want to put you in the position of having to decide between keeping a secret I have and reporting honestly to your superiors. Once I know I can trust the people around me, then maybe I’ll tell them about it. I’m hoping I can trust you not to say anything.”
“Fuck!” he swore violently, running agitated hands through his hair. “It doesn’t matter. As soon as he talks to anyone else, they’re going to yank me out of here.”
“I won’t let them. I won’t let that happen!” She reached out and smacked her hand against the panel, lighting the room. “Stay here with him. I’ll be right back.”
“Where are you going?” he demanded.
“Just let me handle this!”
Rave marched out of their quarters and headed straight for Ender and Fallon’s room. The last thing she wanted was to wake up her testy brother and bring him in on this, but she doubted that she was going to get that lucky. She waited impatiently for Ender to answer the door call, and wasn’t surprised when Justice came out of her quarters as well.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
“Not here,” Rave silenced her as the door finally opened to reveal a tousled Ender with a pistol in his hand. “I need Fallon. Right now.”
Ender didn’t bother to question her. He hurried back to where the boys’ rooms were and came back with Fallon. As expected, Kith was also awake, his empathic senses too keen to miss the emotional uproar going on right outside his door. Rave turned to Justice. “You might as well get Lasher and the others and have them come to our quarters. We have trouble and I have the solution.”
She grabbed up Fallon’s hand and marched him back across the hall.
Minutes later, everyone was awake and staring down at the assassin who had come for Bronse. He was still out cold as he lay there on the floor, but that would change.
“Fallon, wake him up.” She reached out a hand, spreading a palm wide, using her power to hold the turncoat down to the floor. They all knew they were looking at an IM soldier. Possibly even ETF by the look of him and if the stealth he had used to get past Justice was anything to go by. He probably hadn’t even really made a noise in the outer room. Rave had probably been awakened by her own abilities, the warning coming to her in the most likely way to prompt her to get up and act.
Fallon reached deep into the darkness of the man’s unconscious brain, rerouting disturbed and protective wiring until he was forcing him awake. The intruder gasped hard for breath through his swollen throat, trying to grab at it but finding his arms pinned to the floor along with every other part of him.
“I am going to ask you some very simple questions,” Ravenna announced to him, “and you are going to answer whether you want to or not. If you resist, it will hurt you. I really, really hope you resist,” she said darkly.
She didn’t acknowledge Ender’s grin across the way from her. He might think this was something to be laughed off, but she didn’t. She’d be damned if she’d see her Chosen Ones lose what they had worked so hard for these past few weeks. And there was no way she would let them take Bronse away from her, either. This JuJuren had come after him for the last time. Now he would pay the price for what he’d been doing. This, she thought, was about to be the very first mission that the Chosen Ones would engage in.
“What’s your name?” she asked first.
“Drumm Easley,” Fallon answered for him as soon as the thought ripped through the man’s mind.
“Drumm, did former Admiral JuJuren hire you?” Rave asked him.
“Yes,” Fallon replied, “they planned it a week ago.”
“What the hell is this?” Easley demanded in a panic as Fallon spoke the answers he was trying to hide.
“Where is JuJuren now?” Rave asked coldly.
“Tari.” Fallon lifted two fingers to his temple, a telling sign that the headache he got when he read resistant minds was quickly starting. “Not the stations, but on the planet itself.”
“The old hometown,” Justice said to Ender dryly. “Good thing Ender and I know our way around.” She gave the arms master a wolfish grin.
“Where on Tari?”
“I’m not telling!” Easley squawked, his frantic eyes jolting up to Fallon’s. “He’ll kill me!”
“Not if we kill him first,” Bronse said.
Ravenna looked up to meet his eyes, seeing the determination that had settled there. She knew in that very instant that they were on exactly the same page.
They were all going to go and stop JuJuren once and for all.
“He’s at a place called Prime and Lights. Or that’s where they met up anyway. Several times, in fact,” Fallon informed them.
“Prime and Lights is the name of a bar in one of the higher-end hotels on the upper territory coastline,” Ender said. “Hot damn, I’ll bet he’s staying at the hotel.”
“He doesn’t know a room number,” Fallon said wearily.
“We don’t need one,” Bronse remarked. “We can flash his picture to the desk or we can stake out the place.”
“Or we can spring Trick from downtime and he can hack into the guest records,” Justice suggested.
“Better idea,” Bronse agreed.
“I’m game!” Vivi piped up. “Let’s kick his ass!”
“It’s not going to be that easy,” Lasher said wisely. “If JuJuren can get someone in here, knowing in only three days where Bronse moved to, it means he still has a network here in the IM. Do you have any idea how hard it is to make an unauthorized access into this station? This man’s a soldier.” He indicated their prisoner. “There’s no telling how many more of these types JuJuren has surrounded himself with. There are too many variables. We just don’t know enough.”
“We have no choice,” Bronse said. “If we call in security before JuJuren is brought to justice, this whole setup is blown. We all know that no one can protect these kids like we can. No one is better for this job. I won’t let JuJuren rob me of—”
He looked up and met Ravenna’s eyes.
The understanding that he would do anything, go to any lengths to stay with her, hit him like a sucker punch. The time for excuses and outside explanations had just come to a crashing halt. As he stared into those expressive and knowing eyes of hers, he realized that nothing else mattered to him more than she did. As angry as he was at her for holding out on him, as betrayed as he had felt in that moment, it was all insignificant.
“I agree.” Lasher filled in the unspoken moment for him. “Whatever it is you did to rivet his attention onto you, the only way to shut it off is to get JuJuren. But we can’t walk up on the situation thinking it’s going to be easy. That’s how people get themselves killed.”
“All we need is one shot,” Ravenna said, her voice so strangely dispassionate that it was making everyone else uncomfortable. “We follow every lead to the next and then the next, and we won’t come back until he’s captured or dead.” She clenched her fist, tipping her chin down just slightly. The prisoner on the floor suddenly soared into the air. He let out a hoarse screech of pure fear, his eyes wide as he faced a truly awesome power that he would never be able to understand. With a mere thought, she sent him flying across the room and crashing into the rear wall. She held him pinned there, only the finesse of her well-practiced ability keeping her from crushing the life out of him.
“Holy shit,” Justice said with impressed awe.
“It’s news to me too.”
Ravenna didn’t notice the byplay. She was focused on the man trapped against her living room wall. “You would have killed Bronse and every person in this house to get what you wanted,” she pointed out. “But know this. One word from me and Fallon could erase your mind of everything you know yourself to be. He could steal it all away, leave you as numb and stupid as a newborn baby. It would serve you right.”
“Rave …,” Fallon said with obvious discomfort.
“Don’t worry,” she absently calmed him, though it was clear that the tenderhearted Ravenna was nowhere to be found in that moment. “I’ll let him remain whole. For now.” She turned to glare at her victim. “But if you make so much as a single sound, blink so much as a crooked eye, he’ll wipe you clean. Do you understand me?”
Easley nodded, sheer terror etched deep into his every feature.
Just like that, she shut her power off and let him come crashing down to the floor in a limp, shuddering heap. Ender didn’t need direction from her or from Bronse to go up to the soldier and begin to tie him up. But Ravenna wasn’t through. She turned to Vivienne.
“Scramble him.”
Vivienne was used to obeying every order that Ravenna gave, so she didn’t hesitate to move forward.
“Wait!” Bronse stepped into her path, looking at Ravenna and trying to find the woman he knew in the cold masque that her face wore. “What does that mean?”
“The brain is nothing but electrical impulses,” Vivi said. “I control anything and everything that works with a current. If I scramble him, it means I send his whole brain out of whack. It lasts a few days. Basically makes him harmless.”
“If Fallon can erase memories and thoughts, why not simply erase what he knows about his mission?” Lasher asked. “Then nothing will be at risk.”
“Fallon cannot control it like that. Erasure happens in huge gaps, not specific details,” Ravenna explained. “Perhaps one day, when he’s older and stronger, it will be different, but for now it’s our limitation. Consider it an all or nothing option.”
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