Price of Ransom (16 page)

Lily opened her eyes and yawned and stretched, as well as she could, then rolled up to sit. Out in Admitting a steady stream of stretchers flowed from the hospital wards out toward the concourse beyond. Most of the injured had some kind of tubing attached to their persons.

“What’s going on out there?” she asked casually, abruptly recognizing three sets of paired Ridanis carrying stretchers: Rainbow and Paisley, and four others of her
Forlorn Hope
crew.

Stanford glanced up from his slate. “Evidently they got a ship in to transfer more casualties to Turfan Link. They must be loading.” He looked out as well, surveying the scene. “A primitive method of transference, certainly, but doubtless their usual system is so overloaded that they have to resort to such measures to expedite the process.”

Yehoshua walked through Admitting, speaking with—to her great surprise—Deucalion. Deucalion did not even glance at the secure room, but Yehoshua did. His eyes met hers for a measureless moment and traveled on, seeming uninterested in her presence. Behind, several more pairs of the
Hope
’s crew went past, bearing stretchers. None looked her way.

Rainbow and Paisley appeared, carrying a stretcher. A sheet rested on it, covering a large, spherical object. At that same moment, from one of the wards, a je’jiri emerged. Lily thought it might have been the Dai, but immediately after, a second je’jiri appeared, and it was hard to tell which was the Dai—or even if either of them were.

Yehoshua stopped just beyond the door of the secure room, consulting a slate. Rainbow and Paisley, as if waiting for him, paused at the door itself, the stretcher lifted a little high, up against the lock panel.

A few moments passed. The two je’jiri approached the door, one carrying a basket of needles and tubing, the other a thin slate. They spoke briefly to Rainbow. Looking apologetic, she and Paisley moved away from the door.

Stanford sat up forward on his haunches. “What do they want?” he growled. He tucked his slate into his front pocket and shrugged his shoulders. It looked like a gesture of readying for battle.

The door slid open.

“What do you want?” He growled again, lower and not a little threatening. “I’ve got a prisoner in here. We have authority to hold her here without being disturbed.”

The je’jiri regarded him with an expression Lily could only call dispassionate. “I believe we have encountered before, honorable,” she replied, her formality contrasting with his belligerence. “I have authorization from the Administrator of this complex to draw blood from this human. Her blood type is relatively rare, and there is urgent need for transfusion.”

“How’d you get in here?” Stanford did not relax his aggressive posture. Lily sat still on the bench, drawing her feet up so that she could stand quickly if necessary.

“The Administrator gave us the key, honorable,” answered the Dai smoothly. “You’ll find it all in there. Now, min.” She turned to regard Lily with those large, fathomless eyes. “If you’ll lie down. My companion, who is also female, will draw the blood.”

Lily lay down. The other je’jiri knelt, close in against the bed and began to assemble a needle and several vials. Stanford wrinkled up his nose and studied the slate. He held it gingerly between forefinger and thumb, as if it smelled bad.

Yehoshua walked in the door. “Is this the other casualty we’re supposed to bring along?” he asked. After several days with Windsor and the boys, his voice sounded oddly unaccented to Lily’s ear.

“No.” Stanford shrugged his shoulders twice and took one shuffling step forward. “Get out.”

“Sorry,” Yehoshua replied meekly and turned away.

Stanford looked beyond Yehoshua. “Orthodox tattoos,” he muttered. “I don’t like this.” Yehoshua was in the door, back to him. At that moment Jenny entered, obviously having missed her cue, from the concourse. Stanford clicked his teeth together. “Windsor,” he said to the air. “Trouble.” He launched himself at Yehoshua, pushing past the two je’jiri.

Someone cried a warning. Lily thought she might have. Yehoshua whirled and instinctively threw a back hand to Stanford’s chest—it connected with his face instead.

The force of the blow slammed Stanford backward. He hit the wall hard and collapsed on the floor, his eyes open but dazed.

For an instant, everyone just stared, including Yehoshua—who transferred his attention to the arm that had done the damage.

“It is fortunate,” said the Dai in a matter-of-fact voice, “that Ardakians have thick skulls.”

“Get me out of here,” snapped Lily, recovering from her shock.

The je’jiri retreated. Rainbow and Paisley entered, rolled her onto the stretcher without ceremony, and covered her to the top of her hair with the sheet. At her feet, Lily felt a cool, humming curve. Bach began to sing softly, but his words were muted by the sheet and by the sudden rush of noise as they hustled her out through Admitting.

“We be putting you in a van, min,” Paisley whispered.

The stretcher was lifted and rocked as they set it on a level surface. Lily could only see the pale sheet. A motor, already humming, rose in volume and the van moved. Lily began to lift her manacled wrists, to pull the sheet down. A hand stayed her.

“Best to keep it up, Captain,” said Rainbow in a low voice. “We still mun get you onto ya ship. It be ya best as well not to talk, I reckon.”

Lily nodded and kept silent. The van motored along. She could hear the sounds of other people, shifting, asking a question; one moaned. A child’s voice asked plaintively for its mother. Bach had stopped singing.

After a bit, the van came to a halt. Shoes scraped as a few people—presumably Rainbow and Paisley and the other mobile ones—climbed out around her. Then her stretcher was lifted and she was carried again.

They paused.

“Chaim Sovvanna. Ten forty-eight. Severe trauma to the head,” said Yehoshua as if reading off a list.

“Check,” said a second male voice. It sounded familiar.

They carried her on. She felt the subtle change of pressure as they went through the link bubble.

“Engineering,” she said quietly.

A few minutes later they set her on the floor and pulled back the sheet. Jenny, Paisley, and Rainbow stared at her, their faces ecstatic.

Lily rolled up to sit. “Thank the Void,” she said. “Good work. Bach, get these things off me.”

Bach snaked out an appendage and began at her ankles, singing all the while:

Fallt mit Danken, fallt mit Loben

Vor des Höchsten Gnadenthron!

“Fall down with thanks, fall down with praise

before the mercy seat of the Most High”

“Bach got the dock unlocked back in Hospital, didn’t he?” Lily asked. “And you coordinated it with the je’jiri.”

“The
who
?” Jenny asked. “Oh, them. Yes. I guess all this time Hawk was trying to look like them. I can’t imagine why. They give me the creeps.”

The last of the manacles fell away. Lily stood up, carefully, rubbing her arms and stretching her legs. “What’s Yehoshua doing?”

“Checking off the manifest. You were in the last group. Then he’ll close the berth and we leave.”

“Did the je’jiri family get on board yet?”

“Get on board!” Jenny paused. Her puzzlement faded abruptly as enlightenment dawned. “
That’s
what she meant. You’re taking them on board as
crew
?”

“We’ll discuss it later. Come on. If Windsor was alerted to my escape, we’ll need to get secured and locked down quickly.” She turned to find Blue gaping at her from where he stood by the main engineering console. “We’ll want engines within the hour.”

“Yes, Captain.” His reply was brisk. “Paisley, get over here and run the checkout.”

Paisley cast a last, elated glance at her captain and then returned to her duties. Bach and Jenny and Rainbow followed Lily out of Engineering and down the blessedly familiar corridor of the
Forlorn Hope
to the main berth access.

It was empty. They passed through the link bubble, Jenny and Rainbow in front now, and paused to stare down the short tunnel. Yehoshua stood talking, or arguing, with Deucalion. He looked impatient. Beyond him, the van had gone, already returned to the hospital for its next task. But clustered just beyond the two men stood a group of je’jiri. The very alienness of their presence was disconcerting. All of them wore packs of varying sizes of their backs, even the small children.

Yehoshua glanced down the tunnel. Saw Lily. And moved so that Deucalion had to step back, and in the space that created, the entire je’jiri family quickly filed past him into the tunnel.

As they approached, Lily gave a sharp nod to Rainbow. “Show them to Engineering for now,” she ordered. “Once we’re clear, we can decide about their living quarters.” She met the Dai’s bow as that female halted and inclined her head, acknowledging Lily’s presence.

“Captain.” Her tone was respectful.

“Min Rainbow will show you to a place. Wait there, and then we will find you quarters.”

The Dai nodded and spoke a few words in a smooth, alien language to her people.

Lily counted while she spoke. Ten adults—after what she had seen on the
Sans Merci
, and learned from La Belle herself, she guessed five of each sex: mated pairs. And five younger ones: one a babe in arms, three older, and one who was almost of adult height yet who had an indefinable air of incompleteness.

It was staring at Jenny, an uncomfortable intensity in its gaze. As Lily watched, it abruptly transferred its gaze to her.

His
gaze. The way he stared at her, it was obvious it was a male—young, not quite an adult, but quite male. Interested in her.
Desiring
her. She felt it like a wave of heat. He had a high-boned face, light blue hair that shaded the startling green of his eyes—and he suddenly reminded her of Kyosti. She could see a resemblance, felt herself respond, felt the same passion in her for him that she felt for Kyosti—

She blushed and consciously, with effort, broke off his gaze. That was when she realized that two of the adult je’jiri were restraining him bodily, one holding onto each arm. Was
this
an adolescent je’jiri?

“You
can’t
take them on board without proper clearance,” said a voice, close—too close.

“Get on board,” said Lily. The Dai, heeding the urgency in her tone, herded her family past. Rainbow led them into the link bubble.

Yehoshua hurried up, trying to ignore a righteous Deucalion, who dogged his trail.

“It is imperative with a family of je’jiri that all obligations are being met in full. Given the nature of the risks involved in hiring them, it would be irresponsible for any Concord representative not to insist that you”—Deucalion halted in surprise, seeing Lily, and narrowed his eyes as he tried to remember her—“Didn’t we just meet?” he asked.

“Stop them!”

Out on the concourse, Windsor appeared with Fred and Stanford at his back, flanked by two confused-looking civilians in hospital jackets.

Deucalion turned.

“Retreat,” said Lily. She and Jenny and Yehoshua quickly moved back into the link bubble. “Bach, commence sealing.”

Bach began to code into the link panel. Deucalion turned back.

“Wait one minute,” he said, and came forward.

“Don’t come in,” snapped Lily. “Once we lock I’m not unsealing.”

Deucalion, either oblivious to this statement or else disbelieving it, walked into the link bubble.

The seal slid shut behind him.

“That man has a license for you as bounty,” Deucalion said, looking at Lily as if he could not possibly comprehend her. “It’s illegal to flee a bounty. What are you doing?”

“I’m taking the casualties on this ship to Turfan Link,” Lily replied. “Yehoshua, get up to the bridge and start detach procedures. Jenny, put the je’jiri in one of those empty labs. We need them isolated.”

“But Lily—Captain—all of the labs are filled with casualties.”

“Double up the casualties somewhere else. Believe me, we’re safer if they’re isolated. I’ll explain later.”

“All right.” Jenny sounded skeptical but she left with Yehoshua. Lily followed them out of the link bubble, Bach trailing after her.

Deucalion kept at her heels. “But you don’t understand,” he continued. “Do I have to list how many laws you’ve just broken?”

Behind him, the second seal slipped shut, cutting them off completely from Akan Center.

“Feel free,” said Lily, turning to head for the bridge. “You’ll have plenty of time to give me the details because you’re not getting off until Turfan Link.”

“You’re really prepared to go through with this?” He
still
sounded disbelieving. “It’s kidnapping.”

“So be it,” sighed Lily.

“And furthermore, as a member in good standing of the Intelligence Bureau, I have the authority to arrest you. Perhaps you don’t understand how serious—Wait one minute. How
do
you know Adam and my father?”

Now Lily did stop. “Adam is my half-brother. So are you. I’m Taliesin’s daughter.”

This news so confounded Deucalion that he followed her quite meekly all the way to the bridge.

Y
EHOSHUA AND JENNY TRAILED
discreetly behind the captain as she conducted min Belsonn—whom she continued to call Deucalion—on a tour of the casualties crowded aboard the
Forlorn Hope
.

“The Mule can’t be serious,” said Jenny in a low voice to Yehoshua as they paused, not wanting to seem too much like a bodyguard, three meters behind Lily as she stopped to discuss the state of the injured with the physician detailed from Akan to supervise this shipload.

“Quite serious,” replied Yehoshua. He looked at her: her doubt was beginning to dissolve in the face of the Mule’s, and his, adamancy. “I heard from the captain myself that he was only half-human. The Mule had already guessed it. How could he look so much like them if he wasn’t half one of them?”

“He did always say,” Jenny mused, “that blue was the natural color of his hair. I thought it was just his peculiar sense of humor.”

“Peculiar, all right,” muttered Yehoshua.

“I
still
find it hard to believe,” protested Jenny stubbornly. “They’re so”—she hesitated, opening and closing her hands to make up for her lack of verbal description—“so weird. I can’t imagine sleeping with one.”