Phantom of the Wind (9 page)

“The Burgon?”

Munchkin licked a paw, unaware and uncaring that the humanoid called the Burgon was the most powerful man in the megaverse.

“The other men?”

“One looked a bit like the Phantom and the other was a truly handsome specimen with dark hair and golden eyes. He carried himself like a lupine though, which I found disconcerting.”

“What were they saying?”

“I did not hear words. I garnered impressions. Your mate did not want to do something the powerful ones wanted him to, but was given no choice in the matter.” Munchkin narrowed her pink eyes. “Like when you foist worm pills down my throat.”

“He was upset? Angry?”

“Sad,” Munchkin revealed. “I sensed great sadness but resolve.”

“Something isn’t right here,” Kendall said. She slid her back up the wall until she was on her feet. She snatched the towel and wrapped it around her. “Quinn is too good a warrior to let himself get caught by an Amazeen.”

Munchkin’s ears twitched. “Is that what you call the tall one with white hair and teats encased in gold swirls? I have heard of her race.”

“The Amazeen was in his dream?” Kendall asked.

“Later. You humanoids have strange mind wanderings when you sleep. The tall one was at his side, her hand on his arm,” Munchkin reported. “There was great affection in the tall one’s gray eyes. She seemed to be comforting him.”

“Affection? You mean love?”

“Affection,” Munchkin repeated. “Such as appears on your face when you speak of the Phantom. If that is love, then aye, she looked at him with love.”

“And how was he looking at her?”

“Like he would let her share his catnip and other interesting things if she asked nicely.”

Kendall sat down on the mattress with a grunt. “Really?”

“Do they share things, your mate and the tall one?”

Kendall’s green eyes turned hard as beach glass. “I’d like to know the answer to that myself.”

“He was in great distress in his dream,” Munchkin told her. “His thoughts were on you as he lay broken on the ground. He wanted nothing more than to reach you and have you help him.”

Turning her head, Kendall stared at the Elfinish. “He wanted me to help him?”

“The tall one was bending over him, crying, but all he could think of was you.”

“Son of a bitch!” Kendall sneered. “He was on Cengus, but he didn’t know how he got there, huh? She was on Cengus—supposedly chasing him—with two ‘bots, one of which said it was sorry.”

The workings of a humanoid mind confused Munchkin and bored her. She hopped up on the bed, lay down, hiked her back leg into the air and began cleaning her vulva. She’d lost all interest in her companion now that the humanoid was up and about.

“The ‘bot said it was sorry,” Kendall repeated, and got up from the mattress. She walked over to the wall of closets and slid open one of the doors, ripping a fresh tunic from the hanger and tossing it to the bed. She took a pair of matching pants from among many hanging in the closet and threw them to the bed as well. Rummaging inside her lingerie drawer, she picked up a bra and pair of panties and began dressing, her jaw clenched tightly. When she was dressed, she thrust her feet into her shoes and stood looking down at Munchkin with her hands on her hips. “The ‘bot said it was sorry.”

“I have no idea what a ‘bot is or why it would say it was sorry, but if it makes you feel good to relay such trivia to me, then so be it,” Munchkin said then yawned hugely. “Are you going out again?”

“Aye,” Kendall answered. “I’m going to see a snake about a rat.”

Munchkin’s eyes lit up. “A rat for me?” She hopped down and wove in and out between her companion’s legs as Kendall stomped to the door. “A nice juicy rat? A smelly, musty, hairless rat that crunches well when its head is bitten?” She began purring loudly. “A crunchy rat, humanoid? A fresh crunchy rat? Huh? Huh? Huh?”

“A lying, underhanded rat,” Kendall said, slapping at the door’s control panel.

“Don’t forget the milk!” Munchkin called out as the pneumatic door slid shut behind her companion.

* * * * *

0329 CMT

Quinn’s eyes fluttered open and for a moment he had no idea where he was, but then a movement out of the corner of his vision brought one of the med techs into view and he relaxed. His knees were still hurting but not quite as badly as before Kendall had injected him with the fiery liquid that had felt as though it were melting his veins from the inside out.

His dream had been so vivid, so real, and his heart was still aching from the bittersweet memory of the time he last held the woman he loved in his arms. What had started out merely as a bad dream had become a nightmare then a brutal hurt that brought tears to his eyes.

“You need something for the pain?”

The older of the two med techs had come to stand beside the TAOS unit. He seemed a friendly enough fellow and there was genuine concern in his gaze.

“How much longer do I have to stay penned down like this?” Quinn asked.

Andrews glanced up at the screen. “At least another two, maybe three hours.”

Quinn groaned. “Why the hell is it taking so long?”

“Your knees were shattered, Milord,” Andrews answered. “If you ever want to walk again, you’ll just have to give it some time.” He glanced at the two ‘bots. “Having them drag you over here by your armpits didn’t help matters. The weight of your body was hanging on your knees.”

“Aye, then. Give me something to put me back to sleep,” Quinn agreed. His entire body was anchored to the diagnostic sled. Even his fingers were individually strapped down—his feet encased in some kind of restraint that made it impossible for him to wiggle his toes. Having bad dreams was better than lying there immobile, unable to move anything save his eyes.

Andrews checked the notations Kendall had made on Quinn’s chart then went over to fill a vac-syringe with tenerse instead of the drug the
Scaan
had been previously given. He administered it into the cannula at Quinn’s neck. He flinched when his patient sucked in a pained breath. “Hurts like a mother,” Andrews commiserated. “I know, but it works faster and better than the pairilis.”

“Did Kendall invent that to torture me with?” the Phantom grumbled.

“It’s been around a long time, Milord,” Andrews told him.

Lassitude was setting in so he let his eyes drift shut. The soft, fleecy cloud that awaited him was floating across the room. His body was becoming pleasantly numb, the godawful pain in his knees just slipping away. He could understand why addicts liked narcotics so much. They made even an agonizing world soft enough to live in.

“
Vel oo dooisht?
”

She was asking him if he was awake. He smiled without opening his eyes. “Aye
, my ghrai
,” he answered her, calling her his love.

“Can you hear me clearly, Phantom?” she whispered.

He opened his eyes. “Aye, wench. I hear you.”

“He is known to you,” she told him. “The man I’ve been seeing.”

He looked up through the glass, his gaze locked on her face. “Who is he?”

“Tell me about the Amazeen?” she said.

Quinn’s left eyebrow crooked upward. “The Amazeen?” he repeated.

“What is she to you?” Kendall whispered.

“Who are you seeing now, Kendall?” he countered.

Kendall smiled. “Why do you care, Phantom?”

His jaw clenched. A muscle worked in his cheek. He spoke to her through grinding teeth. “You belong with me,” he said. “You belong
to
me.”

“
Cha feer shen
,” she whispered.

“Aye, you do!” he snarled, her telling him she didn’t making his gaze burn.

“You threw me away like a worn-out pair of boots, Rory Quinn,” she said, holding his stare. “
Dy yannoo peccah not leigh, te daanys, agh dy yannoo eh not graih, te dwoaigh.”

“Stop with the gods-be-damned Cengusian, wench!” he shouted at her.

“Then let me make it perfectly clear to you, Quinn,” she said, translating her words. “‘To sin against the law is boldness, but to sin against love is hateful.’ Can I be any clearer than that in how I feel about you now?”

Kendall spun around and left the room despite her patient yelling at her to come back.

“Kendall!” Quinn bellowed.

“Milord, you should try to lie calmly,” Andrews told him. “Please calm down.”

“Who is he?” the Phantom spat. “Who is the man she’s sleeping with?”

Andrews glanced across the room, exchanging a look with Parks. “Milord, I can’t answer what I don’t know.”

Quinn was so enraged, so hurt, he could feel moisture gathering in his eyes. He was in a living hell being confined as he was and the pain in his knees—though nearly gone—still plagued him enough that he was uncomfortable. As long as he was strapped down, he couldn’t make himself invisible and that bothered him more than anything else.
Scaans
had to be able to move freely in order to cast a cloud of invisibility over themselves. It was all an illusion, a mind trick that made them virtually unseen by human eyes. He was so upset he didn’t notice the med tech administering another dose of tenerse until the brutal, fiery sting spread through the veins in his neck.

“
Don’t do that anymore
!” he yelled.

“Doc’s orders, Milord,” Parks said.

He wanted to shout, to vent, but his world was shutting down again and he groaned with the helplessness of it. He didn’t want to dream anymore. The dreams hurt worse than the pain in his broken kneecaps and torn ligaments. He fought it for as long as he could then his eyes closed, a single tear falling slowly down his cheek.

* * * * *

The dream was in black and white this time—which was unusual for him. His other nightmares had been in full, vibrant color, and because this one was different, it seemed all the more ominous. Something else about the dream unsettled him even more. He was reliving a day he had hoped never to think about again…

Rain was pouring from the overhang of the cottage where he had bid her meet him on Aduaidh Prime. They were alone in the greensward where the Burgon had a hunting lodge not too many klicks away. Beyond the back door of the cottage—about fifty feet away—the mighty Darkstan River was nearing flood stage for the rains had been falling for nine straight hours and showed no sign of letting up. Lightning was forking across the sodden heavens and the sharp shriek of the discharge and the resulting roll of thunder shook the cottage.

He had been distant, distracted, and even his kiss—normally enthusiastic and filled with desire—was perfunctory, almost brotherly when he met her at the door. He knew he appeared tired, his face showing lines she had not seen before.

“This will be the last time I’ll have off for at least six months,
Lhiannan
,” he’d told her as he shut the door behind her and began helping her out of her rain gear.

“Six months?” she questioned, shocked. She turned as he opened the door again. “Where are you going?”

“To unsaddle your mount, wench,” he lied.

Before she could tell him what he already knew—that she’d seen to her horse and the steed was stalled safely in the barn—he was out the door, running across the muddy yard, his boots splashing water around him.

A sharp crack of lightning made the barn’s tin roof vibrate and he heard Kendall yelling for him. He was sitting on a bale of hay, his horse and hers ensconced in their stalls, munching contentedly on bags of oats. A lantern cast the barn in a rosy glow but it did nothing to alleviate the damp that was seeping into his bones.

“Quinn?” the call came again.

“I’ll be there in a minute!” he yelled back.

His teeth were chattering as he sat huddled there with his arms wrapped around him. It wasn’t that he was all that cold. He barely felt anything save the dampness for he was soaked through, his hair plastered to his forehead and neck, his shirt sticking uncomfortably to his chest and back.

“Ah, Kendall,” he said, his voice filled with hopeless misery.

Kendall Bryne was not psychic like him, but she often received impressions that left her uneasy. Call it a woman’s intuition or some residual leftover from human evolution. Whatever it was, he could feel it manifesting itself and knew his lady was troubled. Though his back was to the barn door, he could see her clearly in that part of his supernatural mind where she always dwelt. She was standing on the porch, wisps of rain speckling her face as she watched for him. She was shivering from the cold that was sweeping down from the higher elevations.

Although it was summer, they were in the Highlands of Aduaidh Prime and the evenings and nights turned chilly—sometimes dropping to well below fifty degrees with a howling wind that shook the rafters and tin roof. Quinn had laid a fire and the flames had been catching, the smell of cherry wood wafting through the cottage when she’d ridden up. He’d hung a cast-iron kettle over the burgeoning fire for she would need the warmth of a hot toddy to ward off the chill.

“Go back inside,” he shouted to her. “I’ll be in shortly!”

He saw her go into the cottage, easing the door shut behind her. He followed her to the fireplace with his mind’s eye and saw her hold her hands to the warmth of the flames.