Protector of the Realm (43 page)

When she felt a pulse on Rae’s neck, her heart fluttered in temporary relief. “Rae, look at me. Rae?” She cupped her spouse’s cheek, appalled at how cold and clammy it felt. Then she unbuttoned the strict collar and groaned in horror. Rae’s blood coated her fingers. Examining its source, she wanted to cry with fear when she saw the deep laceration on the side of Rae’s neck. Blood had soaked the shirt she wore underneath her uniform, drenching it as far as Kellen could see.

Someone knelt next to her, making Kellen reach for the plasma-pulse weapon in Rae’s hand.

“How is she?” Leanne held on to her own injured arm. “Oh, saints, it looks bad.”

“We need S’hos here. He has medical training.” Kellen’s voice trembled. “Is the situation under control?”

“Yes, for the most part. We have the guards at gunpoint and have immobilized three of their ships.” A sound in the distance made Kellen turn her head. “Look!”

Leanne following her gaze. “And here comes Captain de Vies, as delivered by saints and angels.”

The
Freedom
and
Liberty
approached rapidly, circling the area once before they landed on the other side of the stables. “S’hos!” Kellen called. “We need your help!”

Another young ensign walked up to them, her face swollen with tears. “I’m sorry, Ms. O’Dal, Lieutenant D’Artansis.” She wiped sweat from her forehead, unknowingly smearing dust over her face. “Ensign S’hos…he took a pulse beam straight to the chest…He’s dead, ma’am.”

Kellen began to tremble. S’hos had been one of the few who was friendly toward her. He had taken care of her injuries and made bashful small talk with her during the journey to Gantharat.

“The commodore’s bleeding out, Kellen. We have to put pressure on her carotid.” Leanne’s voice was low and urgent. “Also, we have to get out of here. We don’t know if the Onotharians had time to call for backup.”

“Rae!” a male voice exclaimed. Alex de Vies knelt next to Kellen, looking down at her. “Damn, she’s in trouble. Let’s get her aboard the
Liberty
immediately. Ensign Hammad has medical training. I’ll assign her to go with you.” Rising to his feet, he approached the men and woman keeping the Onotharians at bay.

“Good job, people,” Captain de Vies said. “Disable the last of their vessels and secure the prisoners. Then load the last of the casings and let’s be on our way. I think we can count on this place swarming with Onotharian hunters very shortly.”

Kellen had pushed the palm of her hand against Rae’s wound, to her despair feeling blood trickling between her fingers the entire time. “Leanne,” she said huskily, “could you put pressure on her neck while I carry her aboard?”

“Certainly.” Leanne placed a gentle hand on the side of Rae’s neck. “She’s lost a lot of blood.”

Not about to comment on the obvious, Kellen lifted her wife in her arms, cradling her. Looking over her shoulder, she glimpsed an object lying discarded on the porch. “Captain de Vies, please grab the casing over there.” She nodded toward it. “It’s important. Rae risked her life for it.”

“I’ll take care of it.” Alex ran over to get the casing. “I’ll keep it with me until we’re back on
Gamma VI
.”

Kellen began to walk quickly toward the
Liberty
, not taking her eyes off Rae, who was barely breathing. “Should I put her down? She’s getting worse.”

“No, keep moving,” Leanne urged next to her, breathing heavily. “Ensign Hammad is over there waiting for us. We’ll give her oxygen and medication when we’re in the ship.”

Almost running now, Kellen took the ramp in four long strides. The
Liberty
did not have a sick bay; instead they put the unconscious commodore on the mess hall table. Ensign Hammad, a petite woman with piercing brown eyes, had brought an oxygen tank. She placed a mask over Rae’s nose and mouth, and to Kellen’s horror it immediately became pink from the blood in Rae’s airways.

“I’ll give her a general pain reducer. Keep up the pressure on her neck, but let go a bit every ten minutes to allow circulation.” Hammad worked swiftly as she spoke, injecting the commodore twice. “Now let’s see.” Removing Rae’s clothes, the ensign revealed the major scrapes and bruises all over the compact frame. They discovered two minor high-energy weapon burns--on one of her legs and below her ribs on the same side. She had also taken a hit in her right shoulder.

Kellen suddenly noticed a large blue swelling on Rae’s right hand. “She’s fractured something.” Husky and barely audible, her own voice sounded foreign to her. “The bastard.”

Ensign Hammad was examining the deep wound on the side of Rae’s neck. “There’s a large wooden splinter in here. I’ll need to extract it, but we have a problem.”

“What kind of problem?” Leanne asked, standing on the other side of the table and wrapping a blanket around the practically naked woman.

“It’s trickling now, but it will probably start gushing when we remove the only thing obstructing it.”

“Can you have a deep-tissue fuser ready when you remove it, to fuse the vein instantly?”

“I’ll try. I’m not a doctor.”

“We know, Hammad, but you’re all we have. If you don’t do this, the commodore won’t make it.”

Kellen trembled as she listened to the other women’s discussion. “Do it,” she said. “As her wife, I’ll make the call.” She moved to the opposite side, next to Leanne, who quickly squeezed her waist. “Don’t let her die. Just do what needs to be done.”

Ensign Hammad grabbed a large set of tweezers in one hand and the deep-tissue fuser in the other. “All right, let’s get started, then.”

*

Dahlia stopped inside the door of the officer’s mess hall aboard the
Kester.
Dressed in black, the deep red scarf around her neck her only splash of color, she knew she looked striking and professional.

Over by a large, elliptic table, Ambassador M’Ekar looked at her with disdain written across his face. “I have demanded to talk with someone in authority for days now,” he complained, “and they send me a
woman
?”

“Charming,” Dahlia mumbled to her assistants. Turning back to the ambassador, she introduced herself. “My name is Dahlia Jacelon, and to ease your mind, I assure you I’m in authority.”

“Oh, for all the saints, not another one.” M’Ekar tipped his head back in obvious frustration. “How many of you are there?”

Dahlia gestured for the ambassador to take a seat. “Admiral Jacelon has briefed me.” She paused and gave the man a curt smile. “And no, the name is not a coincidence. We’re all related. I take it you’ve encountered my daughter, indirectly at least.”

“What can you do for me?” M’Ekar didn’t respond verbally to Dahlia’s last comment, but his eyes clearly relayed his contempt.

“You must have misunderstood. I haven’t come here to
do
anything for you. I have come to interview you on the matter at hand. You have some explaining to do if you nourish any hope at all about going home.”

The man drummed his fingertips on the table between them. SC military police guarded them, and Dahlia sensed their presence did not sit well with the ambassador. From the information she had received, Dahlia knew M’Ekar was sixty-nine Earth years of age. He wore his silver-gray hair down to his shoulders, and his all-white, obviously handmade suit--a long, formfitting jacket over masterfully tailored trousers--emphasized his sharp features. Dahlia thought he must have been handsome in his youth, but life had hardened him. His cynical attitude showed in his calculating eyes, like shining granite, as if he was watching her every move, waiting for her to slip up so he could crush her.

Not impressed about what she had read in the extensive file her husband and SC had put together on the man before her, Dahlia listened to M’Ekar’s fanatical raving for exactly twenty seconds before she interrupted. “What are your motives for wanting to rear Armeo M’Aido?”

M’Ekar stopped in mid-sentence. “He’s of my wife’s blood. I’m all he has.”

Dahlia punched in a short note on her handheld computer. “When did you last see him?” She knew the answer but was interested in his reply.

“I’ve never met the boy. The O’Dal woman kept him from me.”

“So when did you learn of his existence?”

“Less than a few months ago. When I heard that Zax and the girl he foolishly fell for had a son--”

“Did you know who the mother was?”

“Not at first. When I learned of her true identity, I was sad Zax had not told his father or his aunt of her nobility.”

“What difference would that have made?”

“For him to marry a nobody, a Gantharian country girl…It was beneath him. It reflected badly on the M’Aido name.”

Glancing at her computer screen, Dahlia spoke in a soft voice that didn’t hide her sarcasm. “Could you not accuse your wife of committing the same faux pas?”

M’Ekar squared his shoulders, flashing an outraged look at her. “What are you talking about?”

“You judge Zax’s choice of wife, and yet your own wife, Elinda M’Aido, married you, a country boy from the Onotharian rural areas.”

“It does not compare,” M’Ekar insisted, two burning spots of red appearing on his pale cheeks.

“Exactly how did you find out about Tereya O’Saral’s true identity?”

M’Ekar hesitated briefly. He didn’t squirm, but small drops of sweat began to form on his upper lip. Dahlia wondered if the house arrest aboard the
Kester
was what made the old fox so transparent. All reports described M’Ekar as utterly ruthless and the toughest of negotiators. He had remained as ambassador on Gantharat for many years now, and he hadn’t achieved such status by putting his emotions on display like this.

“I admit I held the young woman and Ms. O’Dal under close surveillance.”

“When did that start?”

“When my wife’s nephew was killed.”

Puzzled, Dahlia leaned forward. Something was amiss in M’Ekar’s story. “Then how can you say you weren’t aware of the child’s existence?”

“I knew there was
a
child. I was not sure it was Zax’s. The two girls lived a pretty wild life, being orphaned early on. Tereya could have had more…partners, in her life.”

Concealing her contempt for the man in front of her, Dahlia only nodded and kept taking personal notes. Her assistants recorded these interviews, but she always made notes on her own as well when something special sprang to mind. This lifelong habit had saved negotiations on many occasions.

“And then you realized who she was…not a promiscuous Gantharian country girl, but the last of the O’Sarals. Apart from Armeo, of course.”

“Exactly,” M’Ekar answered quickly, the sarcasm obviously wasted on him. “My agents confirmed it, finding enough DNA to prove it conclusively. After that, the boy’s DNA showed his double heritage.”

“Wait. Back up a bit, Ambassador. Do you mean you checked Tereya’s DNA strands? How could you do that? And the boy’s?”

M’Ekar now rose from his chair and paced back and forth. “We obtained samples of her blood at the hospital. And the child…We ordered a school health official to assist in this important determination process.”

“Dodgy methods, Ambassador.” Dahlia looked at him, knowing her eyes betrayed nothing. “Something in your story doesn’t add up. I’m not a criminal investigator, but I know when someone’s lying to me.”

She rose from her chair and placed both hands on the table between them. “Rest assured, M’Ekar,” she said confidently, knowing full well it was a crude insult from a diplomat to deliberately not use his title, “I will get to the bottom of this. You may think your homeworld’s influence means you are safe and soon to be released. I want to emphasize how foolish it is for you to delude yourself. You are not going anywhere. I’m working directly for the elders of the Council, who are not as easily swayed in your favor as the representatives of the planets dependent on your empire’s resources.”

M’Ekar looked as shaken as it was possible for a man of his stature. “Are you leaving?”

She hoped her harsh words and barely concealed threat to keep him for an extended period of time would make him more eager to feed her information the next day. Sooner or later he would slip up. “Oh, don’t worry. We’ll see a lot of each other during the upcoming days. This was merely an introduction. Good day.”

Walking toward the door, Dahlia glanced at the ambassador. He did not look pleased.

Owena appeared in the doorway to the makeshift sick bay. “Lieutenant D’Artansis, take the helm. Lieutenant Ng’Ar has medical training and will help out in here. We need to get out of here before the Onotharians send reinforcements. There’s not much time.”

“Aye, ma’am.” Leanne gave Kellen’s arm another squeeze. “She’ll be okay.”

Kellen looked down at her wife’s bleeding, bruised body. The compact frame now seemed fragile and beyond repair. “She has to,” she whispered as Leanne and Owena left the mess hall.

“I have the splinter in sight,” Ensign Hammad reported, looking into a device inserted into the deep wound. “I can reach it with the forceps, but it’s a risky procedure.”

“I have the deep-tissue fuser ready, Ensign,” a new voice said.

Kellen glanced up and saw Lieutenant Ng’Ar standing ready with the fuser. Short and stocky, he oozed confidence and a much-needed calm.