Stitching Snow (11 page)

Three attempts to knock it from her face failed, and I took three slamming blows to the gut in return.

She swung at my head, and I moved my left forearm to block.

My arm didn’t slow hers down at all. Her fi st crashed through my defense and collided with the side of my head.

From there, the fi ght came unhinged.

I staggered away but kept to my feet, weathering a small shock from the cage. She stayed right with me. Another swing, and another. My blocks did nothing—I felt them more than she did. A bone in my left forearm snapped, and I cried out.

It’s not real it’s not real it’s not real.

It felt real enough.

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I let myself get angry, let the rage flly. It bought me a little space and a few bruises for her, but she kept coming.

I’d lost fi ghts before, plenty of them. Most times, I knew it would happen long before it was decided. This was no different, and I always shifted to the same strategy.

Hang in as long as you can, Essie. And hope you don’t get yourself killed.

99

10

FOUR ROUNDS.

Somehow I pushed through four rounds before my body and brain both refused to cooperate any longer, and I passed out.

Passing out while hooked up to the VT unit was not a pleasant experience.

As soon as the fi ghting ring faded, a jolt ripped through me, waking me in the real world. My body still wanted the oblivion of unconsciousness and rebelled. I didn’t have a single injury, but the lower functions of my mind wouldn’t accept it, convinced I was a bleeding pile of broken bones. My eyes blurred as I shook, sending even more phantom pain shooting through my body. I wanted to throw up, but my brain couldn’t get the signals worked out right.

“What’s wrong with her?” Dane’s voice.

“She pushed too long.” Liza. “The beating she took, she should have blacked out much sooner. She overloaded on neural stimuli.”

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“What does that mean?”

“It means her brain is very confused. She’ll be fi ne once she sleeps it off.”

“Knock her out, then.”

“We can’t interfere with her neurochemistry more. That’ll make it worse. Let’s get her back to your room.” Hands on me, touching me, but I was in too much agony to stop them. Then I was moving, but my feet didn’t touch the ground. Someone might have been carrying me. Too hard to tell.

A standard year must have passed before I stopped moving.

Something soft cradled me. Probably a bed.

“You’re too blazing stubborn, Essie.” I remembered how to make my mouth form words. “Another fi ght or two should do it.”

“No. You’re not doing that again.”

I had to. I had to get away. Before I could rig an argument, my brain got what it wanted, and I passed out for real.

I spent a full day in and out of consciousness. Sometimes I saw Dane, and sometimes I saw my mother, so I fi gured it was better to assume everything was a dream.

When I awoke the following morning, the pain had faded, and my surroundings felt real. I pushed myself to sit up—still a right mess of aching—and spotted Dane occupying my usual corner of the fll oor. He was awake, staring at the ceiling.

“We should get back to work.”

He turned to look at me with a strange stillness in his face, but didn’t get up. “No, I should. You should rest.” 101

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I found my boots on the fll oor and pulled them on. “Done enough of that already, haven’t I?”

“Maybe. How are you feeling?”

“Like I went through the pulverizer back at the mine. But it’s not real.”

“Your brain decides what’s real. That makes it real enough.” I groaned, stretching my arms over my head. Maybe if I gave my muscles some legitimate signals to send, my brain would unconfuse itself. “Very philosophical of you.” If he had a retort, I didn’t get to hear it. A chime sounded to announce someone at the door. When Dane opened it, Tobias entered with a man I didn’t recognize.

“Oh, good, she’s up,” Tobias said.

“I am. What do you want?” I asked.

“For you to fi nish paying off your debt. Come on, time to go.” Tobias took one step toward me, but Dane moved to block him. “She’s not doing another fi ght.”

“You’re right. She isn’t. Harper, tell them what you found when you checked the Thandan networks.” The other man smirked, making me wonder if he and Tobias were related. “A lot more than a fi ghting record. The safest, most productive mine on the planet, and it’s all down to Essie.”

“What does that have to do with anyone’s debt?” I challenged.

“The payment is simple,” Tobias said. “You’ll tell us everything you know about merinium mining on Thanda and hand over complete schematics and codes on the drones you upgraded.”

I got my aching body up off the bed to stand next to Dane.

“You’re all so sharp, design your own drones.” Harper raised an eyebrow. “You don’t realize what you’ve 102

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done, do you? Drones with the ability to make decisions, with complete autonomy. We’ve tried for years, but no one’s managed it.”

“Now that you know it can be done, I’m sure you’ll fi gure it,” I retorted. “Why is that worth so much to you anyway?”

“Because if you’ve made mining operations on Thanda less of a death sentence, we know quite a few Garamites who’d be willing to take over.”

“Why would you do that?” Dane asked.

The pieces of the puzzle clicked into place, and I had the answer before either Garamite could give it. “You need more merinium for the solar screens, more than Matthias gives you.

That’s how he keeps you in line, how he keeps you supplying him with tech, how he keeps your colonies small and limited.

The tiny amounts of merinium that black-market traders manage isn’t enough to make a difference.”

“Very good, Essie.” More condescension from Tobias. “If we control the merinium, we can transform the rest of this planet.

No more answering to Windsong.”

“What about the Thandans?” I demanded.

“They’re nothing but grunts King Matthias keeps alive to work the mines, and you’ve made them expendable. No great loss.”

I couldn’t breathe, and it had nothing to do with the false aches lingering in my body. Tobias was talking about war between Garam and Thanda—a war Garam would easily win even without uniting the colonies.

Another war.

Did it matter? Certainly if they wanted to blast Moray to pieces, I’d hand them the ammunition. But Petey, and the 103

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men who’d left me alone like I wanted, and the families in the Bands . . . I didn’t want any part of hurting them.

“I won’t do it,” I said.

“Trust me, you will.”

Harper’s hand locked onto my arm. A jolt of panic triggered the push-and-pull on my consciousness—just like when I’d body-hopped Moray—but I fought it down. Before I could break Harper’s grip, Dane did it for me, knocking the Garamite’s hand away. When he did, I saw something on Harper’s belt.

Something that looked like a gun.

This could turn into a disaster right quick.

“Those aren’t the terms we agreed to,” Dane said.

Tobias snorted. “You know the rules, Dane. If you Candarans want to trade with us behind Windsong’s back,
we
dictate the terms. And we reserve the right to change our minds.” For fi ve seconds, Dane said nothing. No one did. Everyone just glared. When he fi nally spoke, his mouth barely moved.

“Go with them, Essie.”

My shock at Dane’s words rendered me immobile. Harper took the opportunity to grab my arm again, and Tobias latched on to the other. They guided me out into the hallway, despite my efforts to break free. I couldn’t decide who to be angrier at, the Garamites or Dane. For all the things Dane was, I couldn’t believe he’d let anyone destroy the lives of all those Thandans.

I twisted to look over my shoulder, to yell at him or spit at him or
something
.

He looked right at me and held up two fi ngers.

I got the message.
Two of them. Two of us.

If I did it, if I body-hopped, the rest of me would be helpless.

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But Dane was a full Exile. He had to know what he was doing.

I tilted my head toward Harper, and Dane nodded. I focused on the contact between Harper’s hand and my arm, remembered the feeling the night Moray broke into my shack. The push-and-pull returned, and I rode it into Harper’s mind.

A moment of dizziness makes me tighten my grip on the Thandan girl’s arm, even though she’s stopped struggling. It’s strange—I was feeling fi ne before. I get my focus back and pull her along. We can’t afford any mistakes. Her knowledge is too valuable.

Where are his doubts? There! In the corner, push them
forward, Essie. Make him hear. Harper, what if you can’t get
enough Garamites to unite behind you? What if Windsong
intervenes and defends the Thandans? What if the Exiles do?

Can you—

Dane punched Harper in the back, and the pain shoved me back to myself, stumbling as my legs turned to lead. The body-hop had been brief, but I was already worn out. Adrenaline would have to make up the difference.

Tobias, who’d taken a hit of his own from Dane, was retali-ating. While Dane handled him, I didn’t hesitate, slamming my fi st right into Harper’s face. Without any protective hand-wraps, my knuckles stung sharply, but I embraced the pain—it was
real
.

In moments, both men were on the ground, unconscious.

Dane caught his breath and went back into the room. After several taps on the computer terminal, he snatched up the few items we had with us, tossed them in a bag, and came out. He 105

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grabbed my arm, more gently than Tobias had, but I still pulled away.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Fine, but we’ve got to go.”

“Where? The shuttle repairs—”

“Are fi nished.”

Unbelievable. “Those little brats fi nished it already?”

“Essie, come on.”

Too many thoughts, too many changes, too much for my weary head. It didn’t fi t my plan. I’d never get to the spaceport, but Dane seemed to have a plan of his own for getting to the shuttle. No one was in the hall, but that could change at any moment. If they found out we’d body-hopped . . . Not good. Better the Exile I knew than the Garamites I didn’t.

When Dane went for the exit, I stayed right with him.

Outside, some early-rising Garamites walked along the causeway. They gave me more funny looks than Dane, so they probably didn’t know who—or what—he was. Still, the obvious offworldliness of my clothes meant they knew I should be escorted. I thought about the size of the colony. Was it possible they would think Dane was one of their own, assigned to accompany me?

It seemed so for the fi rst link or two, as we walked quietly through the residential sector without incident. Then a voice called out behind us.

“You there!”

I turned and recognized the woman as the suspicious one from the greeting party when we fi rst landed. She defi nitely knew who Dane was and knew we shouldn’t be out on our own.

“Time to run,” Dane said.

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It was exactly what my instincts had longed to do for days, so I did. The woman shouted at a man up ahead to stop us, but his face blanked. I had no proof, but I suspected Dane had body-hopped him. A total stranger, without touching him, without missing a step—a full Exile’s abilities, just like my mother’s. The man turned away as we passed him.

I glanced back at the woman again. She was older and not very fi t. She wouldn’t catch us on foot, but I fi gured she wouldn’t have to.

“We can’t run our way out of this crater,” I said, pushing to keep up with Dane’s long-legged stride. My body tried to tell me it wasn’t up to a workout like this just yet. I ignored the burning in my muscles. “She’ll have someone in a sand-skimmer on top of us in two minutes.”

Dane dodged a startled couple walking a dog. “Taken care of.”

“What do you mean, taken care of?”

“Didn’t you see how they have
everything
connected to their network? I launched a virus at all their ground transports.

They’ll have to do a full reboot.”

I blinked, remembering the brief set of commands he’d tapped in before we took off. Too brief to be code for a virus.

“You had it ready?”

He didn’t answer. Clearly I wasn’t the only one who’d found some extra time in the support lab.

Blazes, why didn’t I think of that?

We left the residential area, which meant fewer people at that time of morning. Any we came across either chose not to get in our way or got body-hopped by Dane. I couldn’t be sure which most of the time, except once when he slowed down. This much 107

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was an effort, even for him. Fewer people also let me think about where we were going.

“Dane, the solar screen! We can’t go through that.”

“On it.” He took something from his pocket—my wrist transmitter. Rage fll ared up again, seeing it in his hand. “Dimwit, get to the solar screen and disrupt a sector, just like we discussed.

Cusser, get the shuttle ready to go.”

“Dimwit Dane help Dane.”

“That’s right, and hurry.”

He had this all planned out so well, I didn’t bother asking how we’d get to the top of the crater. As we approached the wall, I saw the answer for myself.

“A ladder?”

“They have lots of old evacuation routes. Go on, you fi rst.” I didn’t argue, just started climbing. And climbing some more. Less than a quarter of the way up, my arms and legs screamed. Most of the false pain had disappeared, but my body was still worn and didn’t appreciate the strain. I paused near the halfway point to catch my breath and glanced back.

A glint of light below me caught my eye. The shiny surface of a sand-skimmer. The Garamites had gotten through that reboot.

I climbed faster.

At the top, I dropped to my knees for a second of rest. The edge of the solar screen was less than a link away. A faint gray blur on the other side might have been Dimwit.