Hammer of Time (The Reforged Trilogy) (12 page)

On the other side of the table, Panna grinned. "On Prianus, I really thought you two hated each other."

"We did," Maeve admitted. She shook her head. "It took Tiberius' loss to mend our relationship."

Panna fell silent, perhaps thinking of the Blue Phoenix's old captain… or maybe of another man lost on Prianus. Maeve knew she was not the only one who suspected that Panna's feelings for her teacher had been more than a student's respect. Not unlike her own affection for Orthain, Maeve realized. Xen had protected Panna's secret in defiance of his own Ixthian culture. It was easy to understand her infatuation.

Infatuation? Maeve wondered at her own thought. Was that fair to Panna?

Duke Ferris cleared his throat. "What of the other human?" he asked. "The man who was with you this afternoon?"

Maeve blinked and looked around the crowded cargo bay for Logan, but he was nowhere to be seen. Where was he?

________

The horizon was crimson, as though Sunjarrah itself burned a smokeless scarlet. Brilliant silver stars were already kindling overhead, especially thick along the blurry line of the galactic plane. The river of stars flowed over the Blue Phoenix, bright and inviting.

"Waited until, by wind's tempest

I came to the old one's claim

'For a summer, I have searched…'"

The note went sour and Logan stopped singing. He looked down. He sat on top of the Blue Phoenix, between two broken sensor spars. They had snapped off during the flight through Sunjarrah's autotraffic belt and there was no money left to repair them. His guitar lay across his lap. It had been battered and worn even before Logan bought it from one of the Poes Nor students on Tynerion, but now the neck was criss-crossed with deep scars. The wood was splintered in several places and held together with black engine tape. Logan plucked one of the strings and carefully slid his metallic left hand up the neck to tighten it for the seventh time in an hour. He twisted too hard and the string snapped. Second one in an hour.

Logan put the instrument aside and took a mylon tangle of spare strings from his pocket. He had bought every one of them that he could find at Poes Nor, but his supply was dwindling swiftly. Logan unwound the broken string and replaced it, then tried to thread the other end through the tiny hole in the tuning knob. The guitar slid in his grip and Logan's fingers tightened reflexively. The wood crunched in his cybernetic grip and one of the fret bars twanged as it snapped free. Logan reached into his pocket again.

He had to glue the fret back into place before replacing the string. Logan was tempted to glue the tuning peg into place, too, but knew that guitars didn't work that way. He examined the battle-scarred instrument as he waited for the glue to dry. Despite damage done by his cybernetics, this guitar was still an improvement over his first.

He had been seven years old, running from another gang of bullies. Young Logan Centra had flung himself into a trash bin to hide. The reek of rot and the sharp pain of something jutting into his back were far better than the beating that awaited him if the older boys found him. Only when their rough voices and rougher words had long since retreated did Logan finally dare to haul himself out of the bin and he finally saw what had been spearing his spine – the broken neck of a guitar. Little Logan had taken the instrument home and painstakingly repaired it. The guitar never sounded quite right, but he had loved it all the same. There was no money for lessons, but Logan watched every video he could find on the mainstream. The work was even more meticulous and difficult than the repairs, but Logan learned to play.

A cop's income was better than a schoolboy's, though not by much. Logan's second guitar had not been new, either. It came to him second-hand, already dented in places and on its fourth set of strings. But it was a good instrument and Jess had painted a falcon over the largest stain in the varnish. It wasn't perfect either, but it was beautiful.

Logan tilted the guitar up to catch the light, inspecting the replaced fret bar. It was hard to see much. A scattering of yellow and green indicators glowed on the Blue Phoenix's sensors and antennae, but they didn't help very much. Some glue had bubbled up around the thin line of metal. Logan picked away as much of it as he could with the tip of his knife and began to play again.

"Two hundred eighty-eight days of light,

Will be desired by a night…"

Panna said that the Lay of Cavain was a piece of history, a story of how Cavain had conquered the pyrads and founded an empire that lasted over ten thousand years. A long and very, very proud history to which Maeve was now the heir.

She had never wanted it. Logan knew that much. Maeve did not particularly like being a princess, much less a queen. But Panna was right – there was no other way and no one else who could do it. After one hundred centuries, the Arcadians were used to the rulership of Cavain's raven-haired descendants. Of course, that meant many of them would go to Xartasia, too.

With the sun gone, the night grew quickly cold and Logan's fingers were going numb. He flexed the stiff knuckles and kept playing. His voice echoed quietly through the dark and dilapidated settlement below.

Panna said that the Lay of Cavain was about more than just history. The Arcadians believed that their rulers were literally descended from the gods. According to the song, Cavain was the son of the sun goddess, Aes, and an unknown fairy man. Their divine blood entitled House Cavainna – the
Nights, a'shae
– to the respect and codified admiration from all.

Maeve was a queen. Maybe she didn't think of herself as one yet, but Logan knew she would be a great queen. She was an amazing woman, strong and clever, though she would be the last to say so. There was nothing Maeve Cavainna would not give for her people. Panna and Duke Ferris knew it. Maeve's speech today had been awkward and unrehearsed. Beautiful and striking as she was – the desire to seize and kiss Maeve was never far away – it wasn't words that convinced Ferris. Not words alone, at least.

She was down there, in the Blue Phoenix's cargo bay with her new subjects. It was a sad and shabby sort of court, but Maeve would make the best of it. She was more resilient than even Panna realized. Maeve would build a new kingdom from nothing. Logan would protect her as she did it. He was no longer a bounty hunter, but he still had his Talon-9 and he knew how to fight. Logan Coldhand didn't know much else – the guitar twanged tunelessly in his hands again – but it all belonged to Maeve.

The aft hatch clanked and popped open. Logan looked back to the small airlock. A black-haired head emerged from the Blue Phoenix, then white-feathered wings and a pale, lithe body. Maeve kicked the hatch closed behind her and came to sit beside Logan. "There you are," she said. "We missed you at dinner."

"I wasn't hungry," Logan told her and his jaw clenched. He didn't like to lie to Maeve. "That's not true. I don't want to embarrass you, dove."

"You? Embarrass me?" She stroked one soft wingtip along Logan's spine and smiled coyly. "You stood beside me today as I fell through that terrible speech.
You
cannot shame me, my enarri."

"A dinner party is a long way from playing the silent bodyguard. You're a queen now, Maeve. I'm a… not even a bounty hunter anymore. And that cost us a lot of colour we couldn't afford this week."

"You are
my
hunter," Maeve said. Her cheeks were flushed in the starlight. "My enarri. I always want you by my side."

Logan kissed her, cradling his guitar under one arm. Maeve cupped his face in her tiny hands and then ran delicate fingertips down his chest and arms to the guitar.

"I do not care much for dinner parties, either," she admitted with a sly grin. "And am in no hurry to return. Will you sing for me, my love?"

Logan kissed her again and began to play.

"Retreat isn't the same thing as running away. They're spelled completely differently."

– Duaal Sinnay (234 PA)

There was a loud thump from the next room, the sound of a body hitting the floor. Jessica Centra ran out of the kitchen and skidded to a stop, hands splayed protectively over her belly. Logan was sprawled on the floor, eyes closed and laying absolutely still. Jess put her hands on her hips and scowled.

"Vorus Reginald Centra, did you shoot your father again?" she asked.

The little boy standing on the threadbare couch hung his head, but his unruly blond hair did not hide the grin. Jess sighed and threw her hands into the air. "Well, go kiss him back to life," she told her son.

Vorus jumped down from the couch and scampered across the living room to kiss his father's cheek. Logan sat up suddenly and wrapped his arms around the boy, who screeched and wriggled in delight. "Dad, no!"

"That's
Captain
Dad to you, rookie."

"Logan, you know I don't like you playing shooting games with him," Jess said. It was not the first time.

"What? But we were playing Cops and Also Cops. We were training," Logan announced. Vorus giggled and his father finally released him. "Go set the table for dinner. Commissioner Mom wants to talk to me."

Vorus pouted a little and then scampered off to do as he was told. Jess winced and pressed her hands to her back. Logan jumped up and helped his wife to sit. It was a sweet gesture, but she wasn't letting him off the hook that easily.

"Vorus is too young for those kinds of games," she told Logan. "It's just too violent."

"He already knows," Logan said. Logan's left hand went automatically to the worn old badge on his chest. He was still in uniform. "Vorus knows I'm a cop. He's already asked what happened to the man he's named after. He wanted to meet him."

"And you told him?" Jess was aghast.

"What did you want me to do? Lie? To our son?" He took her hands in his. His fingers were warm, rough and strong. "Jess, this is Prianus. There's no point in pretending it's safe."

"But it is safe in here," Jess said. "In our home. Besides, cops don't shoot other cops. Let's keep it to shooting bad guys, hawk. Imaginary ones."

"That's fair," Logan relented. He smiled and kissed his wife. "What's for dinner? It smells great."

________

The Blue Phoenix made daily flights to other Sunjarran cities, searching out more Arcadians. Maeve gave several speeches, better rehearsed this time but still admittedly unpolished. The crowds were small, though. Sunjarrah was not one of the original worlds to which the Arcadians fled when the Devourers ravaged the White Kingdom. Fairies had come to Sunjarrah over the century since then, but never in great numbers. And most of those had already gone over to Xartasia. After a week of searching and speeches, Maeve's new kingdom was far from impressive. With only thirty-seven members, it was more like a gang than a kingdom.

"This isn't working," Duaal said. "Not the way we want it to. That we need it to."

Maeve looked at the young mage's reflection in the mirror. He stood behind her, helping Panna to arrange her hair. Again. Panna held the comb while Duaal settled black curls around Maeve's shoulders.

"Xartasia is spreading her message aggressively. We need to do the same," Panna said.

"If we weren't so damned poor, we could. Maybe hit the mainstream–" Duaal broke off with a sigh. "But we are."

"We could take a job," Maeve suggested. "This is still a cargo ship."

"I don't know that it is." Duaal stopped fussing over Maeve's hair long enough to pat the fibersteel bulkhead affectionately. "We're cramming thirty Arcadians into the hold every night to eat and to listen to you. There isn't room for cargo."

"And I don't know if we can just take a week off to haul it," Panna agreed. "We
have
a job. We just need to figure out how to do it."

"We won't have much time to do it," said a new voice.

All three looked up, Maeve already beaming, but Logan's expression was serious. Even more serious than usual. The Prian did not come into the room, but remained in the hall, holding the door open.

"What is wrong?" Maeve asked.

"Xia just called," Logan said. "We have to get back to New Hennor."

"We'll be there tonight." Duaal inspected Maeve's wings for ruffled feathers. "After the speech."

"You need to get us in the air," Logan told the captain. "The police are at the settlement right now. They're accusing Ferris and the other Arcadians of trying to start up a sovereign government on Sunjarran soil."

"What?" Panna cried. "How did they even know about that?"

"Ferris told them," Logan said. "According to Xia, he was quite indignant when the police arrived. He seems to think that Maeve should have authority over them."

"Shit." Duaal ran out of Maeve's room, past Logan and up to the front of the Blue Phoenix.

"We're not even Alliance citizens and yet they expect us to respect their government," Panna fumed. "Typical CWA politics."