DarkWind: 2nd Book, WindDemon Trilogy (24 page)

“We’ve nourishment for our beast, Thalia,” Sejm said.

Kahmal nodded. “In cargo bays two through five.”

“Aye,” Sejm agreed.

The Captain shuddered, the thought of the dead Terran men littering the cargo bays providing food for the Reaper making her physically ill.

“But we’ll still have to extract him from the E.S.U. in order to feed him,” Kahmal said. “We have no containment cell aboard The Aluvial.”

“There is a containment cell on Montyne Vex,” said Sejm. “Or did you forget?”

“What if the young Reaper found a way to escape our Sisters and has broken free of the containment cell?” asked Kahmal. “What if he has slaughtered our kin and is even now lurking about the caves in wait for Sustenance?”

“Two Reapers,” whispered Melankhoia Chanz. “By the goddesses, the thought does not sit well with this warrioress!”

“If that is the case, the young one will be the only Reaper we will have to worry about. Kamerone Cree is no threat to us in his present condition,” observed Sejm.

“Begging your pardon, Captain,” Lt. Sern broke in, “but I ran a diagnostic of Montyne Vex and there are no lifesigns registering.”

Kahmal flinched. “Reaper heat signature?”

“No, Ma’am.”     

“That means they killed the young one’s parasite,” Lt. Chanz said on a long, relieved-sounding breath.

“Praise to Aluvial for that!” Captain  Chakai breathed.

“As grieved as I am that your Sisters did not survive their encounter with the young Reaper, I must say I am relieved that he did not, either,” Sejm said, “though I was looking forward to seeing the Bloodsire’s anguish as he watched his surviving bloodsons fried to a crisp!”

“You are an evil woman,” said Sern.

“I am a practical woman,” Sejm responded. “I enjoy watching Cree’s pain and knowing he is that much closer to atoning for his sins. He is helpless to keep us from exacting our revenge!”

“He is still a danger to us,” the Captain told them. “Just getting him from the E.S.U. to the containment cell could cost some of our crew their lives. He’s close to Transition, isn’t he?”

Sejm shook her head. “Time in the E.S.U. will have slowed down the Transition sequence for our bloodthirsty monster. But to be on the safe side, when we land, evacuate the oxygen from his unit. That will stop his heart and brain functions long enough to break the seal and allow me to inject him with a heavy doze of neuroinhibitor.”

“He has enough in his system now to cause potential brain damage,” Lt. Melankhoia Chanz declared. “Won’t oxygen deprivation along with another strong dose of the IH cause irreparable harm?”

“Do we care?” the Captain snorted.

“The Tribunal will care,” Kahmal replied. “They want him cognizant of what is happening to him when they send him to the guillotine.”

“If they’d done that the first time around instead of hanging him, we would not be having this discussion!” Sejm snapped. “But to answer your question, no, it will not cause brain damage. His parasite will not allow him to be so incapacitated.”

Kahmal looked at the scientist. The Major had studied Reaper anatomy and physiology extensively. She was an expert on the subject-from what could cause the Reapers intense pain to manipulations that could bring intense pleasure. There was nothing about the Dearg Duls she did not know. Because of this, she knew Hael Sejm was lying, but she did not challenge the woman’s words.

“This containment cell,” said Kahmal, “I am assuming has titanium bond shackles imbedded in the walls.”

“Titanium shackles attached to ten inch thick cormax rods that have been drilled through two hundred feet of solid bedrock and anchored with triple-reinforced krilonite cement to four foot deep iron stanchions,” Sejm said.

Chanz whistled. “Not even Cree could break free of that.”

“The cell was designed specifically for Khiershon Cree,” Sejm reported, “and I imagine we will find the ashes of that one when we arrive.”

Kahmal’s fierce eyes locked on Sejm, “What happens once the ship is repaired and we are ready to put him back in the E.S.U.? You can’t draw the oxygen out of the containment cell. You can’t expect him to hold still for you to inject him with another high-powered dose of IH this time around.”

“Why not?” asked Sejm with a nasty smile.

“You don’t have his woman’s life to threaten,” Chanz put in.

“But we have his whore,” Sejm said in a singsong voice.

Kahmal sat back in her chair. “Burkhart.”

“Aye,” Sejm agreed, “and I am wagering he’ll behave just as docilely for us with a blade to Dorrie’s throat as he did to the throat of his lady.”

The crippled ship
landed in the thick dust of Montyne Vex, causing a cloud of suffocating particles to rise up from the desert floor. As the ship’s thrusters shut off and the craft settled, a strong smell of ozone shot through the ventilation system.

“The breech must have widened with the weight of the landing,” Chanz reported. “We’re pulling in gases from the planet’s surface.”

“Even through the seal on the lower deck?” asked the Captain.

“It would appear so. I’m registering heavy concentrations of ammonia and cybrilon, but the scrubbers have come on line.”

“What that tells me is we’re going to be here awhile,” said the Captain. “Tyrian, try hailing Charon 8.”

Lieutenant Tyrian did not reply. She knew the situation was hopeless, but she tried to raise the nearest Amazeen outpost anyway. When all she got was subspace static, she turned to Captain Chakai. “Nothing, Ma’am. Not even a beacon is coming out of the wormhole.”

The Captain nodded, not having expected help from that direction, but obliged to try. “Put out a distress call on a frequency you know those piddling Terran vessels can’t intercept and cloak us. We don’t need to borrow trouble as Sejm says.”

“Aye-Aye, Captain,” Tyrian responded.

“I suggest we move the bodies to the containment cell before we take Cree there,” Kahmal told the Captain. She turned to Hael Sejm. “Will the shackle chains be long enough for him to reach the bodies for consumption?”

“Please, Major!” the Captain said, gagging.

Sejm grinned. “Aye, Akkadia. He’ll have plenty of stalking room about his cell if you don’t want him plastered tight to the wall.”

Kahmal stared at the Chalean woman, surprised to realize she loathed the scientist. As much as she, herself, hated Kamerone Cree, it would appear Sejm, his blood aunt, hated him more. She knew why, of course, but it seemed to her-and to most people who tried to reason the maniacal hatred Sejm bore the Reaper-the woman’s animosity far outweighed the crime of Cree’s existence.

“Feeling a touch of pity for him are you, Major Kahmal?” Sejm challenged.

The Major refused to rise to the bait and remained silent. The older woman’s chuckle as Sejm turned to leave set Kahmal’s teeth on edge.

“That one is to be watched,” whispered Melankhoia Chanz.

“She will kill him if we aren’t careful,” Kahmal replied in a low voice.

“Will the evacuation of the oxygen cause him irreparable harm?” asked the Captain.

“Most assuredly it will,” Kahmal answered in a matter of fact tone, “but the parasite will heal him eventually.”

“How quickly?”

Kahmal shrugged. “That can not be determined at this time.” She relaxed in the chair. “It will be to our advantage that he be incapacitated as much as possible.” She looked at the Captain. “That is why I did not protest her obvious lie.”

“She knows it will harm him,” stated Captain Chakai.

“She knows and she’s looking forward to it,” confirmed Kahmal.

Sejm stood beside
the E.S.U. and listened as the oxygen was sucked out of the unit. She turned her head to one side as the ruddy complexion of the man lying inside began to take on a bluish tint. As the alarm bell sounded-warning no air was left within the E.S.U. to sustain life-she smiled.

“Cut it open,” Lieutenant Cirolia Sern ordered and two crewwomen from engineering attacked the titanium seal of the unit with laser torches.

“How long before you will have the lid off?” asked Captain Chakai.

“Fifteen, perhaps twenty minutes, Ma’am,” Sern answered.

Chakai looked up at the chronometer above the sleep unit and frowned. “Enough to kill a normal man.”

“The key word here is normal, Captain,” Sejm said archly. “It takes fire or a blade to completely destroy one of his kind.”

“Then why hang him?” Chakai asked.

“Because it will cause him pain, of course,” Sejm replied. “Suffocating pain before the guillotine lops the head from his worthless body!”        

The Captain sighed. The scientist’s presence was becoming worrisome and she would be glad to see this journey to its end and be rid of the vicious hag. Her displeasure at having a Chalean on board her vessel was second only to her intense dislike of having to bide time with a member of the Rysalian Tribunal. Every female in the Quadrant knew Rysalian Tribunalists were not to be trusted.

Akkadia Kahmal watched from a few feet away as the engineering team cut through the titanium bond. She leaned against a support beam, arms folded across her chest, and never took her eyes from Sejm’s vindictive face. She studied the old woman much as she had studied ugly insects when she was a child. A part of her ached to pin Sejm’s arms to a board as she had pinned the insects’ wings and watch the crone struggle to free herself.

“Planning how you will rid us of her, ‘Kadia?” Melankhoia Chanz asked in a low voice.

“How important is she to the Tribunal?” 

“I believe once she brings Kamerone Cree to his knees before them she will have lived out her usefulness,” Chanz replied. “If rumor is true.”

“What then?” the Major asked.

“She will be retired with full honors.”

Kahmal’s smile was slow. “I do not believe she will live long enough to retire with honors, ‘Khoia.”

“One can only hope such will be the case,” Chanz agreed.

“We’re almost through the seal, Captain,” Sern reported.

“Are you ready with the IH injection, Dr. Sejm?” asked the Captain.

Sejm nodded and reached into her lab coat. She moved closer to the E.S.U., a full vac-syringe clutched like a dagger in her gnarled fist. “I am ready.” The engineering team stepped back as the lid lifted then arced up the dual tracks behind the unit. Sejm moved in, aimed the vac-syringe at Cree’s neck and plunged the needle in as far as it would go.

The Reaper’s body convulsed violently and everyone in the room gasped. All but Akkadia Kahmal scrambled away from the unit and ran for the door. The Major unfolded her arms, pushed away from the beam, and walked to the unit.

“Kahmal!” the Captain shouted. “Come away!”

“He can’t hurt us. For all intents and purposes, the man is dead.” She reached into the unit to place two fingertips against Cree’s still neck. When she felt no pulse, she looked around. “Get the gurney and let’s get him to the containment cell before the parasite works its magic and he wakes, ladies.”

Cautiously, the others moved closer to the E.S.U. Satisfied the Reaper was out of commission, they worked to lift him from the unit and onto a gurney.

“These chains are heavy,” one of the security team complained as she took hold of the thick links attached to the manacles around Cree’s wrists.

“And you should be glad they are, my dear,” Sejm told her.

“Every precaution was taken to incapacitate the bastard,” Chakai muttered as she helped the security team members lay the heavy chains on the gurney.

Sejm wished they would leave her alone with the Reaper for only a moment or two. Deep in the pocket of her lab coat was another syringe filled with a lethal toxin that she was sure would kill the parasite given the chance. If not, it would most certainly stamp out any ember of life remaining inside the humanoid body of Kamerone Cree.

But she was being watched-most closely by Akkadia Kahmal-and she suspected Cyle Acet was responsible. The Great Lady had more than likely issued strict orders that the crewwomen of The Aluvial not allow her unsupervised access to the Reaper. 

Though a problem, it was not a major setback for Sejm. She had no intention of allowing Cree to reach Rysalia Prime alive. Never again would she risk the chance of him surviving another execution in the courtyard of the Titaness.

“We’re ready to transport into the caves,” Chanz told her Captain.

Captain Chakai nodded. “Engage,” she commanded.

Akkadia Kahmal tensed, wondering what they would find once they gained the caves. The thought of seeing the ravaged body of her youngest sister made the heart inside the Amazeen Major’s body ache.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“No sign of
them at all,” Lieutenant Deon told the others. “The containment cell walls are splattered with Reaper blood and tissue, but it is months old.”

“The Terran vessel,” snarled Sejm. “I’ll wager the bastard was on the Terran vessel we passed!”