Ruler of Naught (52 page)

They were a long way from safe.

o0o

Marim was swung off her feet when a strong arm snaked out
from a dark doorway and snagged her. A mouth pressed hard on hers, and a hand
ran down her body.

“You forgot me—you left me waiting for you at Ebo’s,” a
thick voice mumbled. “You won’t forget me now.”

Furious at herself for lagging behind the others so she
could boz Rex undetected, she twisted her head and stared up at this new
problem. Who was this blit? The sweet/sour scent of drug-laced tabac was on his
breath, and his eyes were red-rimmed. She didn’t recognize him at all.

“This time’ll be better,” he mumbled.

She exhaled in relief. He didn’t want a fight, he wanted
bunny. She wouldn’t have to kill him.

“Captain wants me now,” she breathed, kissing the working
lips. “Boz me.”

“But you
promised
, next time you docked. ”

“Captain’s call. You know now it is.”

He freed her arms at that, then whined, “Boz me.”

She ran flat out for the refit portal, skidding through the hatch
to the sound of accelerating thunder.
They almost didn’t wait for me.
She was surprised at the spurt of anger. As if they owed her—as if anyone
really owed anyone.

Relief washed through her when she saw the ramp still down. As
she raced to it, she heard Vi’ya’s voice through the bridge connection:
(Marim,
close it up.)

Uh-oh. She’s rasty.
She was smiling on the
run—what’s happened now?
Marim’s nose wrinkled. The airlock stank like the
entire level’s sewage had backed up into it.

After getting the ramp stowed in record time, she caromed
around a corner and flung herself into her pod a heartbeat before Vi’ya smacked
her palm down on
Telvarna
’s go-pad.

No one spoke as the ship maneuvered with deceptive slowness
out of the jungle of tubes and constructs. Marim used this time to scan the
other faces. Vi’ya was filthy and bloodstained, a bruise darkening on the side
of her head.

A quick glance showed Lokri with blood caking his jaw, and
his eyes were, for once, wary and somber.

In Fire Control the Arkad sat, safe and secure, but his
face—which was barely recognizable for the scrapes and blooming bruises, and
swelling contusions—wore that expression Marim had long ago privately dubbed
Markham’s Blastshield.
Something happened, all right. Just now? Or back at
Snurkel’s?

It’s got to be Lokri. What’s he done?

“We’re out,” Vi’ya said. “Lokri, listen for anything
remotely resembling Karroo codes.”

Marim fought a sudden yawn as she ran her gaze over her console.
Everything shone either blue or green.
So glad I didn’t get my gear off
ship—and Schoolboy and my coin are safely stowed
. Her heart sank when she
saw Ivard at his post. Some idiot had gone and gotten him out of the surgeon’s.

A quiet voice spoke from the background: “I wish to know
where we’re being taken.”

The gnostor entered the bridge, his face polite.
Sanctus
Hicura, Marim thought. Can’t he feel the rads? He couldn’t have come in at a
worse time.

Vi’ya said, her gaze on her board, “I do not yet know.”

“Then I must request you tell me our status. If we are not actually
prisoners, I would like to request we be set down as soon as possible at some
location where no harm will come to either of us.”

‘There is no such place,” Vi’ya said, her voice hard.

“That’s true,” Marim said, trying to ease the atmosphere.
“Rex off the
Tantayon
told me a lot. Some of Eusabian’s allies have gone
on a sacking spree like no one’s ever seen, not even in a wiredream.”

“Captain,” Omilov said. “My request—”

Vi’ya kept her eyes on her screen. “Denied.”

Marim watched Omilov incline his head and go out.

Jaim’s voice came over the comm: “They know about the Arkad.”

Marim gathered her courage. Vi’ya had to be told about the hyperwave,
right now. She kept her eyes on the screens as she spoke, “And they got some
sort of FTL comm—they can talk between systems just like being in the same
room. But not all their ships have it.”

Her voice failed as Vi’ya turned, her eyes narrowed to
pinpoint beams of cold light. “You knew this?”

“I just found it out from Rex,” Marim added hastily.

“Thirty minutes to radius,” Ivard put in.

Brandon closed his board, stood looking thoughtfully down at
it, then he went to Vi’ya’s console. Marim strained her ears, but she could not
understand his low murmur.

Vi’ya got up. “Ivard. Let me know when we’re three minutes
to radius.” She walked out, Brandon following.

Marim whirled around and fixed Lokri with a glare. “All
right, blit. What happened?”

Lokri sighed, twisting his neck slowly. “Outrun, outgunned,
and unmanned.”

Marim eyed him, then took a risk of her own. “I hate it when
you talk like those chatzing nicks.”

A flush of anger ridged Lokri’s cheekbones, and his face
tightened. Then he shrugged, giving her his old, lopsided grin. “We won at the
Galadium. And I tried to drink all our winnings. Lost it all over the
corridor.”

“We?”

“I took Brandon for a tour of Rifthaven. Masked, but for the
end.”

“You blungeloving scum. Why?”

Lokri sighed and shut his eyes. “You may as well hear it.
Get me something to drink first.”

“You can get it, you—”

Lokri’s eyes opened briefly, very, very tired. “If I could
get out of this chair without passing out, I would. We also,” he breathed
shakily, “drank Negus.”

“I’ll get you something,” Ivard said in a subdued voice.
“Watch my console?”

“I will.” Marim waited until the boy had gone out, clutching
his shoulder as if it pained him. Then she said soberly, “No wonder she’s mad
at you. Snurkel’s going to call out all Karroo after us.”

Lokri opened his eyes. “Maybe. But I promise you this: she
is more angry with herself.”

o0o

Osri impatiently waited in the dispensary to wait for his
father to return, which happened quickly. Too quickly. It could only mean that
they were still prisoners. He bit back the ready anger when he saw how gray his
face was. Montrose also seemed ill, judging by the hiccoughs and belches he
emitted, not to mention an occasional waft that made Osri’s eyes water, though
he didn’t seem discommoded otherwise.

The surgeon thoughtfully reached over and notched the tianqi
to an even higher level, until the astringent-smelling air stirred Osri’s hair.
That irritated him, too.

But he kept silent as Montrose frowned in concern and
started fussing over Omilov, who suffered his ministrations without any
lessening of the strain in his eyes.

Vi’ya and Brandon appeared, and Osri sustained another
shock. The woman had two bleeding wounds, one on her arm and one on her temple,
which she ignored. Her dark skin showed the shadow of a bruise at her jawline.
A golden torc over one arm added a counterpoint of barbarity. Brandon looked
far worse. Osri would not have recognized him but for the familiar clothes and
the Faseult signet on his hand. He smiled, the swelling bruises on his face
shifting.

Montrose moved to Vi’ya’s side, extending a bandage. She
held out her arm, but her attention was on Omilov.

She said abruptly, “I lost the Heart of Kronos.”

A spasm of pain tightened Omilov’s features.

All the control in the world could not have prevented Osri
from saying with heartfelt bitterness, “I trust you got a good price.”

Vi’ya ignored him. “I promised you I would try to find out
its powers.”

“It’s not a weapon,” Omilov said, his voice hoarse. He
looked up, his eyes dark with strain. “How did you lose it?”

“I took it to an antique dealer I’ve done business with. He
had mentioned Urian artifacts once before. Eusabian of Dol’jhar must have posted
an impossibly high reward for the retrieval of this artifact.”

She drew a short breath. Osri wondered if some of his
father’s pain must be echoing back on her. He hoped it was as she said, “There
was a fight.”

“I was there, Sebastian,” Brandon spoke up. “We did our
best, and nearly lost ourselves in the process.”

Omilov winced and put up a hand to shade his eyes.

Vi’ya said, “The Arkad was seen by this merchant, which is
why we’ve departed Rifthaven.”

Comprehension worked its way into Osri’s brain, dousing all
the anger. Two thoughts occurred:
There is nowhere we can go.

And
, Brandon did not betray us.
“Then we are all
hunted creatures,” Omilov murmured. “‘And they ran unto the borders of
darkness, pursued by the Daemons of Hell.’” He pinched his fingers to his eyes,
then looked up tiredly. “What do you intend to do with us?”

Vi’ya shook her head. “I don’t know. The Eya’a seem to think
we should go to their planet, but I’m not sure we’d live long there, supposing
we aren’t followed and slagged.”

Montrose signaled Vi’ya with a glance, then tipped his head
toward Omilov. Vi’ya nodded fractionally, then turned to go.

Osri said, “I wish you’d let us go back to our own people.”

Vi’ya stopped and faced him. “Where?” she said. “Perhaps
once, your Panarchy represented a kind of order. Now it is gone. Whatever you
do, it is gone forever.”

“We can rebuild,” Osri said. “We will rebuild.”

Brandon said softly, “Gone or not, we have to try.”

The captain hesitated, as if about to speak to him, then
over the comm came Ivard’s panicky voice. “Vi’ya!”

She whirled and ran to the bridge.

o0o

Brandon followed Vi’ya in spite of the exhaustion settling
over his brain like a blanket. The euphoria of their successful escape through
the streets of Rifthaven had dissipated, leaving the old
bleakness—purposelessness. It seemed to be his place in life to have a clear
goal, but none of the wherewithal to carry it out.

Self-mockery prompted not-quite-laughter at the earnestness
and futility of his carefully built campaign to obtain justice for Markham by
flushing his betrayer, except he’d been completely wrong.

And ‘justice’ would not bring Markham back.

He looked at Vi’ya.
Mates
. Another blow, from an unexpected
direction: it seemed impossible, but one thing he’d learned from his dealings
with Anaris, the hostage from Dol’jhar, was that Dol’jharians did not lie.

He thought he had known Markham better than anyone. Yet the
Markham he knew would have been more likely to share his bed with Marim, or
Lokri, the ones who never looked back. For that was the kind of liaison both
Markham and Brandon had sought, back in the days of their companionship. The
Markham he knew would never have shared his heart.

Mates
. That meant commitment. The idea that Markham
had changed enough to form a serious relationship seemed to push him farther
into the shadows of memory, to make him the more unreachable.

He blinked, fighting the slow spin-stop of vertigo. He had
to get control of himself, to focus.

Every muscle and bone in his body ached as he dropped into
the fire-control pod, but his hands stayed miraculously steady as they brought
up the Tenno glyphs. He had to concentrate on the danger. On impending action.
They were not at all safe. He leaned forward, squinting at his console and the
viewscreen.

There were several ships moving in on them as Rifthaven
dwindled behind. The Telvarna moved at the exact same speed as the pursuers, an
absurdly slow crawl.

“Why are we moving so slowly?” he asked.

“The chase mines. Rigid speed limits. Here are the
parameters,” replied Vi’ya.

The Tenno grid rippled as the information flowed from
Vi’ya’s console. Brandon blinked and opened his eyes wide, fighting the blurring
surge that washed over him. the Tenno glyphs took on an air of numinous
clarity, reaching directly into his visual cortex. The Vilarian Negus...
the
Negus won’t be denied...

He glanced at Lokri, to discover an abstracted gaze that
probably mirrored his own.
This should be interesting. It’s a good thing
that Tenno glyph-thinking is mostly visual and automatic...
Then there was
no more time for conscious thought as missiles streaked toward them from the
pursuing ships.

Brandon’s fingers raced across his console, strike and
counterstrike, thrust and parry. Assured as the days when he had run the Tenno
with Markham, whose shade stood at his shoulder.... in memory. Only in memory.

A random gleam of light reflected off the Faseult signet on
his hand. Images from the fight in Snurkel’s shop mingled with memories of the
booster flight....
it is the Phoenix House that is honored...
The
glyphs waxed large in his vision, a palimpsest over the reality of the screens.

More ships appeared, some ahead, responding to the chatter
of code emanating from Lokri’s console. The slow pace imposed on them by the
chase mines lent the battle the aspect of a nightmare.

... the arid sands stretched to the horizon, flinty rocks
punishing his feet, slowing him. Behind him the wrecked chariot lay on its
side, one wheel spinning lazily in the shimmering heat...

“Other Syndicates are joining Karroo,” Lokri said hoarsely.
“I can’t read the codes, but if enough of them agree, they’ll release the
passcode to the mines, and then we’re vapor.”

... entangled in its traces, two sphinx panted as their
life-blood drained into the sand... A near miss buffeted the ship.

“With that damned hyperwave, they’re probably talking to
Eusabian right now—he’ll promise them anything to get the Arkad.” Marim’s voice
was strained.

... now the pungent scent of cinnamon rose up around him
as the shredded bark of the nest crunched under his claws. Around it, the
lean-haunched, hunch-shouldered predators closed in... there was no safety here...