Charlotte Boyett-Compo- WIND VERSE- Hunger's Harmattan (24 page)

The Transition began as the pain increased
tenfold within her back. She felt her body temperature soar to an unbelievable
height that drenched her in sweat as the clothing on her body ripped apart as
her flesh expanded. Fur wriggled out of her flesh, her bones popped then
cracked then compressed. Her sinews stretched, her muscles cramped then
re-formed themselves. Her nose thrust out, her jaws snapped and fangs erupted
where teeth had once sat. Her eyes seemed to expand, her vision sharpen and her
sense of smell elevate, her hearing intensify. She could barely move within the
firm restraint of Leveche’s arms and legs but she could feel her organs
rearranging inside her, making hideous squishing sounds as they altered. Her
fingernails became claws and she dug them into his forearms. She struck out at
him with her back legs that were now paws and heard him grunt as her claws
raked him but he kept a firm grip on her, not allowing her to move all that
much and that—in itself—was agonizing.

“It will never hurt you this bad again,
Shanee,” she heard him say, but that meant nothing right then for she was in
such pain she would have begged for death had she been capable of human speech.

Leveche was surprised when her
shape-shifting ended and he found himself holding a very beautiful cinnamon red
wolf with thick hair tipped in black—around fifty pounds of very mad, very
strong lupine.

“Easy, sweeting,” he said in its ear. “I’ve
got you.”

Shanee threw her head back and howled, her
fangs bared but she made no move to snap at the vulnerable neck that was within
inches of her mouth. She struggled against him and made a keening sound of
misery.

“I know, baby. I know,” he whispered.

When it was over and her body began to
return to its human form, Leveche released her and she scrambled away from him
to press into the corner of the cell, hiding her nakedness from him as best she
could, her long hair covering her like a living blanket.

Leveche looked away from her just as Ryden
Bakari came in with a blanket. He walked to her, leaned over and covered her
with it.

“I’ve brought the tenerse,” Bakari said.
“And I am having the duplicator fashion a Reaper uniform for her. One of the
yeomen will bring it to her.”

“Shit, I’d forgotten all about that,”
Leveche said. His own black silk shirt was drenched with the combined sweat
from her body and his own. He pushed up from the floor. “Will you give her the
tenerse?”

“Sure.”

The ex-Burgon drew a vac-syringe from his
pocket then hunkered down by Shanee. “I must give you this, dearling,” he said
in a gentle voice.

Shanee was trembling and made no sound as
he swept her hair aside and placed the needle of the vac-syringe to her neck.
She barely flinched as the fiery payload spread into her carotid artery. She
shuddered once then laid her head on her knees, the blanket tight around her.

Because she had withdrawn, they left her
there alone to come to terms with what had happened. They knew when she was
ready she would come to them.

Chapter Thirteen

Polemusa had been too nervous to just sit
still while her only child was becoming a creature whose very existence made
the defense queen uneasy. There had been times in the history of the Amazeen
when the tribes had tried—unsuccessfully—to incorporate a male Reaper into
their bloodline. That time was still spoken of in hushed whispers for it had
not been one of Amazeen’s finest hours. Because she could not allow herself to
dwell on what was happening to Shanee, Polemusa had volunteered to pilot the
Raptor
toward R-9. She was expertly maneuvering the massive Class 9 Star Destroyer
through asteroid fields like a hot knife through butter. Such things kept her
mind occupied and her thoughts away from Deck Five. She had already
outdistanced the three Delta Division Sub Cruisers that had been assigned by
Fleet Command to aid the mission.

“We received a message that Captain Breva
along with three other Star Cruisers have reached R-9, your grace,” the com
officer informed Leveche as he and Bakari took the bridge.

“Open a channel to the
Sangunar
,
Lieutenant,” Leveche ordered.

The happy face of Raoul Breva appeared on
the vid-com. “How goes it,
chanto
?” he asked his half brother.

“Slowly but surely,” Leveche replied. “Are
you in position?”

“Aye, and we’re cloaked and waiting for
you,” Breva reported. “And that’s the new cloaking device just in case you were
worried.”

“I knew you’d handle it,” Leveche said.
“Have you done any recon at all?”

“We know there are two ships on planet. One
is a Diamhair LRC and the other a short-range sub cruiser with a Riezell
registry. We are reading six life forms—four female and two male—and three ’bot
heat signatures.” He frowned. “One life form is very weak.”

Leveche and Bakari exchanged a look.

“Keep us informed,
chanto
,” Leveche
said. “We’ll be there in less than an hour at the rate our pilot is pushing
this baby.”

“Make sure no one leaves that planet before
we arrive,” Bakari commanded.

“Will do, Burgon,” Raoul acknowledged then
his handsome face vanished from the vid-com screen.

“You’re going to have to take back the
Burgonship from Ben-Alkazar,” Leveche said. “Authority becomes you.”

“Aye, well it’s sat on my shoulders for so
long, I don’t know how to act without it,” Bakari replied. “I…”

Colonel Shanee Iphito took that moment to
come onto the bridge and every eye snapped to her tall, lithe frame. Before her
Transition from human to Reaper she had been a beautiful, alluring woman. Now,
she was extraordinarily stunning with skin that was perfectly flawless and dark
gray eyes that seemed to pulsate with sensuality. Her white hair had changed to
an unusual silvery shade that was breathtakingly lovely. She had about her an
allure that every man—Reaper and humanoid alike—felt to the very pit of his
soul.

“She shifts into a red wolf,” Leveche told
Bakari, “and I thought that was extraordinary but now…” He shook his head.
“Ailyn is going to have his hands full with this one.”

Rory Quinn was staring at his ex-lover as
though she were a banquet that had been placed before him to devour. He had to
shake himself to remember that he was a married man and that he dearly loved
his lady.

Striding forward in the Reaper uniform that
hugged her shapely body as though she’d been poured into the black silk and
black leather, Shanee seemed totally oblivious to the commotion she had created
on the
Raptor
’s
bridge. She walked up to Leveche and stood there
with her hands on her hips.

“Thank you, Lord Gabriel, for your help. It
was greatly appreciated,” she said, and every male there felt his groin tense
at the husky tone of her voice.

“It was my honor, Lady Shanee,” Leveche
replied in the time-honored greeting of one Reaper to another.

“I have programmed my ’bots to take out
those of the Ceannus,” she said. “Unless there is any reason you can think of
for us to keep them intact.”

“None that I know of,” Leveche said. “You
might instruct your constructs not to destroy the mem-chips just to be on the
safe side.”

“I already have,” she said then switched
her gaze to the vid-com. “I would like to see the planet.”

Bakari ordered R-9 brought up.

The planet was covered in a red haze that
gave evidence of the desert sands that continuously swept over the barren
sandstone rocks. Dust storms were a hazard on R-9 and one of the reasons it had
been chosen by the Alliance as a penal colony in the beginning.

“I’ve a stronghold on the other side of the
planet,” Leveche told her. “It’s sealed but it can be reopened if need be.”

“Are there provisions there?” she asked.
“Water?”

“Everything you might need,” he said.
“Would you like to make use of it while Ailyn is recouping?”

She looked away from the vid-screen. “I
would.”

“Consider it yours for as long as you need
it then,” he said. “I’ll make sure there are additional provisions—Sustenance
and tenerse—transported in. There are two fully fueled runabouts still there if
you need them.”

“Once again, your help is appreciated, Lord
Gabriel,” she said.

“I would not like to be in Elspeth
Harmattan’s shoes,” Quinn said softly to Polemusa. “She’s going to make
mincemeat out of that old hag.”

“It is her right to do so,” Polemusa
replied. She was staring at her daughter, unnerved by the power, the authority
and the strength Shanee had in spades. She wasn’t so sure she liked seeing her
only child in such a way.

Bakari put a hand on Shanee’s shoulder.
“Gabe and I need to go over some things with you before we reach R-9. Is now a
good time?”

Shanee agreed that it was and the three of
them left the bridge.

Once in the
Raptor
’s conference
room, the three Reapers sat down at the long oval table and Leveche leaned
forward, his fingers threaded, elbows on the polished oak top.

“You heard the hellion speak to you and you
heard Her promise. Listen to Her. She will not lead you astray.”

“You are younger and in better condition
than your opponent,” Bakari added. “She also has the disadvantage of having
been near death. The parasite will be working overly hard to vanquish all the
poisons and diseased cells in her body so it will not be up to strength.”

“You are also a warrioress—bred and
trained,” Leveche reminded her. “Though at one time she might have been a
warrioress as well, many years have slipped under that bridge and I seriously
doubt she’s stayed in shape or kept up on the advances in fighting. You should
defeat her easily.”

“But as Gabe said, listen to your hellion.
It will not allow you to do anything foolish, believe me,” Bakari commented.

“Have you ever witnessed Ailyn fashioning
clothing?” Leveche asked.

“Rearranging molecules?” she countered.

Leveche nodded. “Aye. You will be able to
do it too but it takes a great deal of energy for such things. Don’t do it
unless you have the time to recharge that energy. It can weaken you at the
wrong time. Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“While you are engaging her, she might
shift into animal form,” Leveche told her. “Let her but don’t be tempted to do
the same in order to duel with her. That will have taken a lot of energy and it
will have weakened her. Maintain your human shape. Understood?”

“Aye.”

“You can’t kill her when she’s in lupine
form but you can break her back, her neck and disable her to the point that she
will be forced to change back to human form. As soon as she does, take the
killing blow,” Leveche said.

“Which is?”

“Take her head,” Bakari said. “That’s the
only way you’ll be sure to kill her. Her head must be separated from her body
and the juvenile queen growing in her burned to a crisp. Otherwise, she can
rejuvenate.”

“The head has to come off and the
body—especially the parasite—must be flash fried,” Leveche stressed. He reached
into his pants pocket and took out a phospho gun and laid it on the table.
“This is an X-54 Magnum DC and it has the most takedown power of any weapon
available from Fleet Command. Its range is fifteen feet with a pulse discharge
of eight hundred amps to get your opponent’s attention. A sustained direct
discharge of two thousand amps to break the initial resistance of the skin and
cause instantaneous unconsciousness takes roughly five seconds. If you are
dealing with a human, that is lethal but with a Reaper, it will only put her
down long enough for you to take the killing blow.”

“With this,” Bakari said, and slid an
obsidian dagger beside the phospho gun.

“After you’ve taken her head, hike the amps
up on the gun to the SDD range again and incinerate the body. That’ll take
about ten to twenty seconds. Watch for the parasite. It will try to scramble
away and hide,” Leveche warned.

The vid-com chimed and Bakari answered.
“Aye?”

“Breva just informed us the LRC on
Riezell-Nine is powering up. Looks like they’re getting ready to skip,” Quinn
reported. He grinned. “Queen Polemusa wanted me to inform you that you’d best
get back up to the bridge. We may need to activate the Maze as soon as we’re in
range so I can shut down that ship.”

“Damn,” Bakari barked. “All right. We’re on
our way.”

“And FYI,” Quinn said, “that LRC has been
programmed for
an Éilvéiseach
.”

“They’re going after the money in Ailyn’s
inheritance account,” Shanee said, her eyes blazing.

No one on the bridge said it but the
implication was on each of their minds. If his mother and brother were headed
for
an
Éilvéiseach
, they had somehow extracted both a signature
and the password from Ailyn. It did not bear thinking on for too long how that
had been accomplished.

* * * * *

He knew he was alone. His Reaper senses
told him as much. He had come out of Transition in a remarkably short span of
time and that concerned him but not enough to worry about right then. His
mother and the others were on the ship and they were leaving him behind and he
had to find the Sustenance and tenerse Cean had told him would be there.