Priestess of the Eggstone (37 page)

Luagin growled incoherently and pushed back. The gravity field dropped to half normal. Luagin shoved Tayvis across the room, lunging after him. They bumped into Jasyn, and her gun went off. The shot ricocheted around the room until it hit Jerimon. He dropped like a rock. The man behind Jasyn scrambled to his feet. He jumped on her, wrapping an arm around her neck, his other hand grabbing for the stunner. It went off again.

Luagin went down this time, dragging Tayvis with him. Tayvis’ head hit the table with a solid thump. His eyes crossed and he passed out.

I launched myself at the third man. He twisted out of the way. I landed on Jasyn. The gravity quit again. I bounced off her, twisting in midair. Jasyn kicked backwards, bending to the side as the man dodged. Her elbow caught him in the crotch. He groaned and clutched himself. Jasyn grabbed the wall to steady herself, then shot him with his own gun. He went limp.

The gravity came back, briefly. Everyone fell to the floor. Jasyn knelt beside her brother.

“Stoak?” a voice came from the engine hatch. “What’s happening?” His voice cut off in a strangled grunt.

I grabbed a stunner from the floor. I pushed off towards the engine room too hard, bashing my head on the doorframe. I blinked away stars as I dove for the emergency hatch.

A man in full Patrol battle gear exited the hatch, his blaster pointed straight at me.

I dropped the highly illegal neural stunner and raised my hands.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

I backed slowly into the cabin. The Patrol trooper followed, keeping his blaster leveled at my gut.

“What now?” Jasyn asked.

The trooper twitched the blaster at the table. “Sit. Keep your hands where we can see them.”

I sat, my hands on my head. Jasyn slid into the second chair.

Three more men in full battle dress forced the airlock, then crowded into the tiny scout ship. They checked the piles of unconscious bodies and removed the other gun.

The lead one lifted his face shield. HIs dark face wrinkled in confusion. “What in blazes happened here?”

I didn’t answer. Anything I said would probably land me in deeper trouble. We faced multiple criminal charges, at the very least. Keeping my mouth shut seemed prudent.

He talked silently on his voicecoder. The conversation dragged on.

“Take them back into the ship, one at a time,” the young soldier finally said. “Closest first and keep them separated. Captain wants to interview them before they talk to each other.”

Men and women in plain Patrol silver squeezed past the troopers guarding us. They dragged the third man’s unconscious form out first. When they moved Luagin, the leader whistled when he caught sight of Tayvis’ uniform.

“Sir, we have a situation here,” he said before he remembered to activate the subvocal circuit.

The others carried Tayvis through the airlock.

I got an armed escort to their ship. One of the troopers stepped forward motioning me to the airlock. The guard shoved me just as I got close. I lost my balance, falling forward into the tube connecting the ships. More armed Patrol personnel caught me at the other end, marching me into the Patrol cruiser.

My escort shuffled me along corridors lined with unmarked doors, up several levels to a different deck, and along even more halls. I’d never been on a battle cruiser before, but I guessed that I was on one now.

The guard opened a door into a small mess hall. He escorted me across the room, then pushed me onto a bench in front of a table.

“Keep your hands in sight.” He stepped back one pace, gun holstered but very prominent.

I put my hands on the table. We waited. And waited. I picked at my ragged nails.

I faced the corner of the room, the door at my back. My guard shifted his feet, coming to attention. The captain stepped past him and sat down across from me.

Dark hair with just a sprinkle of gray, skin tanned by years of space travel, he exuded mild curiosity as he set a palm scanner and pocket recorder on the table. He touched the recorder.

“This session is being recorded,” he said formally. He glanced at my borrowed uniform. “I know your name can’t be Simms. You’re the wrong gender, and he’s been listed as missing for over a century. Place your hand on the scanner plate. State your name, rank, and current deployment.” I flattened my right hand on the scanner. It glowed green for a moment. I took my hand back.

“My name is Dace. I’m not Patrol. My last job was a pilot on the Swan, a private family yacht. My registered employment before that was as captain of the Twinkle, a courier licensed to Belliff, Inc.”

He picked up the scanner, handing it to the guard. The captain did not look happy. “We’ll soon see if that checks out. Explain why you’re wearing a Patrol uniform. Impersonating an officer of the Patrol is punishable by at least five years hard labor.”

“Because my evening gown ripped. This was the only thing available.”

“Evening gown?” His fingers twitched.

I sighed, scrubbing one hand through my hair.

The captain tapped his fingers on the table, nails clicking a staccato rhythm.

“Let’s start with something easy. Who was on the ship with you? Identify them, please.”

“Jasyn Pai is a registered navigator, also with the Swan. Jerimon Pai is her brother. He was my copilot on the Twinkle.” I hesitated over the next name.

“And?” The fingers stilled. I glanced at the bars on his collar, silver for Patrol instead of gold for commercial, and wondered if I would ever pin bars to my collar or if I’d only be looking through them after this. The captain tapped his finger, waiting.

“Sector Commander Malcolm Tayvis.” I picked at a rough spot on a well-chewed nail. “He works for Commander Grant Lowell.”

He folded his hands, resting them on the table. “And the other men on the ship?”

“Stoak Luagin. I don’t know the others.”

“And what relation do you have to Stoak Luagin?”

“He and I were at the Academy together. He screwed up on a training flight and I had to call him on it. He blames me for being kicked out of the pilot’s course.” I twisted my fingers together. The captain waited in stony silence. The recorder ticked the seconds.

“The ship broke down. Luagin caught our distress beacon and came to salvage the ship. He was going to kill us, eventually, then sell the ship as scrap.” I stared at the captain’s folded hands, waiting for some kind of signal. “We didn’t cooperate with Luagin’s plans. Your men broke in at the end of it.”

“That explains the piles of bodies.” Another officer in silver uniform approached the table, bending low to whisper to the captain.

The captain unfolded his hands. “Your identity has been confirmed. You are also under arrest for charges too numerous to list. You are confined to quarters, since the brig is full.” He turned to the guard. “Ensign, clear out a single cabin and put Dace in it.” He watched me squirm while the guard talked into his voicecoder. “There are no locks on the door, but you have nowhere to go on this ship. You will remain in your cabin or I will lock you in the brig with the others.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “I can explain.”

He tapped the recorder. “You will make a full statement as soon as our ship’s counsel is available. This recording is a preliminary report only.” He took the recorder and left.

My guard held out a set of force cuffs. It was protocol. I lifted my wrists. The wires had cut into them. Blood still seeped from the deeper cuts. The guard hooked his cuffs back onto his belt.

“You aren’t stupid enough to try to fight or run, are you?” He sounded almost friendly.

“Run where? I’m on a battleship and outnumbered at least two hundred to one.”

“Don’t give me any trouble, and I won’t put cuffs on.”

He took my arm and marched me out of the mess hall to my temporary prison cell.

The tiny cubbyhole was barely bigger than a broom closet, with a single bunk and no other furniture. A harried med tech crowded in. He treated the superficial cuts on my wrists, then hurried away. My guard grunted, then took a guard stance in front of the open door.

I lay on the bunk, staring at the ceiling.

I’d bent and broken quite a few regulations running from Belliff and the Sessimoniss. I’d lose my pilot’s license at the very least. Each planet would have their own list of charges. Disruption of trade, piracy, public nuisance–whatever they could find to throw at me. The fines would run into thousands of credits. All I could offer for a defense was personal stupidity.

I closed my eyes. Sessimoniss memories washed through my head, disconnected but still vivid images I didn’t want to explore.

My guard brought a meal, breakfast, set it on the bunk, then left me alone. The door stayed open.

I paced the room, three steps each way, next to the bunk.

If criminal charges weren’t enough trouble, I still had to figure out what to do with Jerimon and Tayvis. I remembered Tayvis kissing me, feeling my face flush with heat. Maybe the Eggstone had been right. He was jealous of Jerimon.

That thought made me laugh. Fighting over me? How ridiculous. Why had Tayvis followed me? He’d been behind me since Viya. Why had Grant Lowell let me go on Tebros when he must have known Tayvis was chasing me? What game was he playing? Was Tayvis following Lowell’s orders when he pushed his way into the Sessimoniss raiding party? He had to have ulterior motives. He’d abandoned his command to be kidnapped with me.

Or was Tayvis doing Lowell’s bidding the whole time? Had he meant his kiss after all?

I paced and fretted until after lunch, when the ship counsellor came to visit.

She was older, square and blonde and homely. Her eyes were like blue marbles. She slapped a recorder onto the bunk then plopped next to it.

“Start talking. Tell me everything.”

“Starting when?”

She riffled a sheaf of papers at least an inch thick. “Your charges. The earliest was filed by Tebros. Followed shortly by Belliff, Viya Station, then Tebros again. Start there. What were you doing? Who were you working for? Why? All the usual questions.”

“Can I see the list?”

She squinted suspiciously, but according to Imperial law, she had to hand them over. I silently thanked the Academy professors who had beaten a general appreciation of law into my head.

I started at the top of the first page, answered each charge, in order, explaining each instance. I only bent the truth a little, especially when it came to leaving Viya Station with Leon and his toy gun.

By the time they delivered dinner, I’d completed two thirds of the stack. The ship counsel lounged on my bunk, eyes half closed, while I talked. I glanced at the dinner tray and kept talking.

When I finally finished, she collected the papers and her recorder without a word.

I ate, slept, ate, thought, and generally wasted time for another day.

Halfway through the third day, Tayvis came to see me. He wore a silver uniform with the sector commander clusters on his collar.

“They didn’t lock you up with the rest of the riffraff?” I asked.

“I’m not the one with the long rap sheet.” He nudged my foot. “Move over and let me sit.” I shifted my feet, scooting to sit against the wall. I couldn’t help remembering his kiss.

My face flushed, my collar felt too tight. “So use your rank and get me out of here.”

“I’m already pushing my luck coming to talk to you. Fraternizing with criminal elements, I think they call it. I could lose a few clusters over that.”

“I’ll get out of it somehow.” I wished I sounded more convincing.

Looking deathly serious, he shifted his weight on the narrow bunk. “There is a way to get every charge dropped.”

I frowned. “Why were you following me? I’ve been thinking.”

“It’s dangerous to do that.”

“You were right behind me, since Viya Station. Why?”

He looked away, his face a cold mask. “Orders.”

“Whose? Commander Lowell’s?”

“Yes. You can get out of this, Dace. All you have to do is sign enlistment papers.”

“Get out.” It stung, knowing I was just an assignment, orders to follow.

“One assignment. Lowell promised only one.”

“It’s one too many.” I pulled my knees close and wrapped my arms around them. How could Tayvis do this to me?

“He wants you to go to Tivor.” Tayvis’s voice had gone flat, dead.

“Get out, Tayvis. I don’t want anything to do with the Patrol. Now or ever. Go away and don’t ever come back.”

His cheek twitched.

“You work for Lowell. I don’t want to see you again. Ever.” I buried my head against my knees. How could he do this to me? My imagination conjured Lowell padding the listed charges, then sending Tayvis to wave a get-off-free card. Just join the Patrol, which meant signing away everything I’d been fighting for since I escaped Tivor.

“Just agree, Dace. Go to Tivor for a few weeks, and he’ll never bother you again.”

The offer tempted me, which made it worse.

“I won’t go back to Tivor unless I’m dead. Go away.”

He stood. The door slid open.

“He gave me a direct order, Dace.”

“I don’t want to hear your excuses, Tayvis. Just go away and don’t ever come back. You work for Lowell.” I looked up. His face reflected nothing. “He sent you to recruit me. Is that why you kissed me? Because you knew I couldn’t resist?”

He turned abruptly and left. The door slid shut.

I hated myself, but I would have hated myself more if I’d given in. I would never join the Patrol. I’d lose my freedom, a price I couldn’t pay, even if it meant losing Tayvis. I sat on the bunk, knees drawn close, and just ached inside.

I couldn’t eat when they brought dinner. For the first time in my life, I was too upset and hurt to be hungry.

The tears finally came, after the lights were out for the night. I curled in a ball on the bunk and let them run, slow and quiet, until I fell asleep.

We shifted into normal space early in the morning. Nobody brought breakfast. I didn’t care, I couldn’t make myself care.

I’d pulled myself together enough to wash my face by the time my guard came to fetch me. I still wore the exploration blue uniform, I hadn’t been given anything else. This time he locked the cuffs around my wrists.