Rayne's Return (Hearts of ICARUS Book 3) (6 page)

“Of course your parents can join us, if that’s what you wish,” he said.  

“What about ICARUS?”

“ICARUS?” Landor asked blankly.

“This is an ICARUS ship, isn’t it?”

“No, it’s not,” Landor replied.  “The
Armadura
is owned by Clan Bearen.  We accept assignments from ICARUS when our security expertise is needed, but we are not under contract with them, nor do we have any obligations to them, or anyone else, at this time.”

“I think I remember Nica saying that you were going to assist the Khun with setting up planetary security for Garza.”

“We’ve already submitted our detailed recommendations, and we supervised the installation of the first level of security before the wedding.  It will not be difficult for others to step in and finish carrying out the plan.”

Rayne sighed.  Landor seemed to have an answer for everything, leaving her no choice but to tell him something else she’d remembered, but had intended to keep to herself.  “I don’t remember why I have to go there, or what I have to do.  But I do know that it’ll be dangerous. 
Very
dangerous.  There’s no reason for you to risk your lives to accompany an unknown person for an unknown cause.  I’m truly grateful for all that you’ve done for me, but you don’t have to do any more.” 

“Nonetheless, we will remain with you.”

Rayne didn’t understand why he was so set on this and, for that matter, why she was so set
against
it.  She was missing something, but what?  She studied Landor for a long moment, then turned to see the same guarded expressions on Ari’s face, and then Con’s.  She thought about their behavior since finding her on the mesa; their attentiveness, their worry, their tension, and some of the things they’d said.  And she thought about her own reaction to their scent, her unquestioning trust of them and, lastly, her horror at the thought of them being in danger. 

She shook her head at herself, surprised that she hadn’t figured it out before.  Even taking her current weakness into account, it should have been obvious to her.  “I’m your
berezi
, aren’t I?”

They stared at each other, then her, but this time she couldn’t decipher the expressions on their faces.  After a pause that lasted a few beats too long, Landor answered.  “Yes, you are.”

“Why didn’t you want me to know?” she asked even as one hand rose half way to her head.  She remembered her reflection in the bathroom mirror and, suddenly feeling unspeakably sad, she let her hand fall back to her lap.

Not wanting them to know how she felt, she checked her shield to make sure it hadn’t slipped, then stilled, realizing that she’d been keeping her shield up since shortly after arriving in this time.  Before this moment, there’d been no reason for her to think that the Bearen-Hirus could feel her emotions.  So why had she hidden them? 

“With everything else you’re trying to deal with right now, we didn’t think the time was right,” Landor said, answering the question she’d momentarily forgotten she’d asked.

“This is why you want to take me to Buhell, isn’t it?”

“Not entirely,” Landor said.  “Even if you weren’t our
berezi
, we wouldn’t simply turn our backs on you and walk away.”

“We would not have had you find out this way,” Con said, his brow creased more deeply than usual.  “But, now that you do know, it certainly makes this situation easier.”

“Does it?”

“Of course,” he said, surprised.  “You must understand now why we can’t let you go to Buhell without us.”

There were so many thoughts racing through Rayne’s mind that she couldn’t seem to latch on to any one of them.  She pressed her fingers against her temples and closed her eyes.  It didn’t help.

“Rayne,” Landor said, then waited for her to look up at him.  “You don’t have to say or do anything.  We didn’t tell you about this because we didn’t want you to worry about it right now, and that hadn’t changed.  When you regain your health and strength, then we’ll revisit this subject.  Agreed?”

Rayne stared into his eyes for a long moment, but all she saw was honest concern.  She took a slow breath and nodded.  Landor smiled at her but he didn’t like the ashy color of her skin or the guarded withdrawal in her eyes.  “You said that you remembered a couple of things,” he said, changing the subject.

“Yes,” she replied.  “I remembered that the
BS
after Buhell stands for
Blind Sight
.”

“Blind Sight?” Con asked, frowning again.  “The old Xanti technology?”

“I suppose.” 

“What about it?”

“Whatever ship takes me to Buhell will need it.”

“Do you know why Blind Sight is needed?” Landor asked.

“No,” she replied.  “I just know that without Blind Sight, there’s no point in going at all.  Is there no way to get one?”

For one brief moment Landor was relieved by the thought that Rayne wouldn’t be able to return to Buhell because they didn’t have Blind Sight, and getting one would be impossible.  Then Con spoke. 

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I think we can get one.  I’ll go down to Garza and speak with Khurda about it.”

“Khurda?” she asked.

“One of the Khun,” he replied.  “He knows more about Blind Sight than anyone I’ve ever heard of.  I think he’ll be able to help us with this.”

“In addition to keeping Rayne’s presence secret, we should also keep any plans we make to ourselves,” Landor said, letting go of his momentary hope.  “You’ll need to find a way to convince Khurda to help us without telling him why we need it.”

“Khurda is a good man,” Con said.  “As long as I can assure him that there’s no impending threat to his people, he’ll respect my need for secrecy without becoming offended or inappropriately curious.”

“Be very careful that no one overhears you,” Rayne warned.  “They have spies everywhere.  If they get even a hint of my presence here, in this time, or of a ship heading in their direction, they’ll move the
Facility
and we’ll never find it.”

“Who are
they
, what’s the
Facility
, and what sort of spies do they have?” Con asked.  Rayne blinked in surprise at the rapid fire questions, unconsciously leaning away from him and into the pillows behind her before shrugging helplessly.

Landor shot a look at Con that was unnecessary since he’d already realized his mistake and regretted it.  Landor turned his attention back to Rayne.  “Why won’t we find this
Facility
if it moves?” he asked, trying one question instead of three. 

“Because it’s hidden with Blind Sight,” Rayne replied, not knowing the answer until he’d asked the question.  She smiled, but it faded quickly when she saw the expressions of surprised concern on the men’s faces.  “What is it?”

Landor picked up the napkin from her tray, then leaned over to dab at her upper lip with it.  It was only when she saw the bright red blood against the white of the napkin that she realized her nose was bleeding.  She touched her upper lip with one finger, relieved to find that there was no blood on it when she looked.

“It was just a little,” Landor said.  “Does your head hurt?”  She shook her head.  “We need to put you in a healing tank, Rayne.”

“No healing tank,” Rayne declared as firmly as she could in a voice that refused to rise above a whisper.  “I can’t remember anything if I’m in a healing tank.”  All three men stared at her, but she could do stubborn with the best of them when she had to.

“Then you must allow us to summon Tani,” Landor said.  “I know you don’t want to take the risk of others knowing about your presence here, but you need to be healed, and I think you can trust your sister.”

“Of course I trust my sister, but she’s on her honeymoon and I’m not interrupting that.”

Landor exchanged looks with his brothers that, once again, she couldn’t interpret.  “Do you accept the fact that we’ll be taking you to Buhell?”

Rayne hesitated, but she knew that on this subject, stubborn would get her nowhere.  These were Clan Jasani males, and she was their
berezi
.  There was nothing short of death that would prevent them from accompanying her no matter what she said or where she went.  That made her choice fairly simple.  Take her parents
and
the Bearen-Hirus into danger, or just the Bearen-Hirus.  She had no desire to see any of them come to harm, but going with the Bearen-Hirus was the smarter choice simply because it put fewer people at risk.  “Yes, I do.”

“Thank you,” he said softly, then cleared his throat.  “Do you still want to see your parents before we leave?” 

“Yes,” she replied.  “I remember how difficult it was for them when Tani went missing.  I’m not going to do that to them if I can help it, and I know they’ll keep the secret.”

“Good,” Landor said.  “I suggest that we ask their advice in the matter of your health.”  Rayne nodded her agreement.  “When do you want to see them?”

“This morning, if possible,” she replied.  “Since they can speed travel, I think it would be safest for them to come here.”

“Agreed,” Landor said.  “Do you want to meet with them in this room?”

Rayne looked around, realizing that the room was too small for eight people, especially since six of them would be large Clan Jasani males.  “Is there a better place?”

“We could use a conference room, but I think you’d be more comfortable in the master suite,” Landor said.  “It’s also a lot easier to keep the meeting private if we do it there.”

Rayne had been about to tell him she preferred the conference room, but his comment about privacy changed her mind.  “I’d like to bathe first, if that’s all right.  And um…I’d appreciate it if you’d warn them about how bad I look,” she whispered softly, dropping her eyes to the tray in front of her.  “I don’t want to upset them more than I have to.”

“Of course you can bathe,” Landor said.  “And don’t worry about your parents.  I’ll prepare them.”

“Thanks,” she replied.

“What’s bothering you?” Ari asked.

There were several things bothering her, which gave her the opportunity to choose the one they were least likely to argue with her about.  “I’m not looking forward to causing my parents more worry and fear.”

“We don’t have to tell them,” Con said.  “Everyone is going to have to believe that you’ve been abducted anyway.”

“No, I’m not putting them through that,” Rayne said, reaching for the spoon on the tray.  “They deserve the truth.”

Landor watched as she ate, pleased to note that she’d finished the egg, and that her hand barely shook until she was nearly half way finished with the broth.  When she set the spoon down and reached for the tea, he could tell she’d eaten all she could.  It wasn’t very much, but it was more than she’d been able to eat the night before which was a good sign.

“I’m concerned about the second line you wrote on the shift,” he said.  “The one referring, we suspect, to Controllers.  Do you have any further memory of that?”

“No, I don’t,” she said.  “Do you think my parents are in danger?”

“Not exactly,” he said.  “My concern has more to do with your comment earlier that there are
spies
everywhere
.  We need to find a way to warn everyone, without giving away too much in case the person warned turns out to be a spy.”

“Yes, I see what you mean,” she said.  “I don’t think it should be put off until after…whatever I have to do.”

“I agree,” Landor said.  “This is information that must be shared, especially since it isn’t a question of trust, but of whether or not a particular person might have had a Controller placed in them without their knowledge.  I don’t think any of us are immune to that.”

“Actually, we are,” Ari said, surprising everyone.  “One unused Controller was found in the safe of the mining office on Garza after the Nomen were killed and the android deactivated.  That Controller was taken to Jasan, where one of the Council members voluntarily injected himself with it.”

What little color Rayne had regained after the revelation that she was their
berezi
once again drained from her face, but this time it was accompanied by a wave of sick fear.  Since her shield was up and Landor’s and Con’s attention was on Ari, her reaction went unnoticed.

“How long have you known about this?” Landor asked.

“About an hour,” Ari replied.  “It was in a report I finished reading just before Rayne woke up this morning.

“Did the Controller work?”

“Yes, actually, it did,” Ari said with a tiny smile.  “Until he shifted.  After he took his alter-form the liquid metal that the Controller nano-bots are made of was left in a small puddle on the floor.”

“Excellent,” Landor said.

“Rayne?” Ari asked worriedly, finally noticing her reaction.

“What’s the matter?” Landor asked, moving closer to the bed and touching the back of her hand with his fingertips.  When she looked up at him, the sheer terror in her eyes nearly sent him over the edge.  He forced his mind to go back over the past couple of minutes in search of an explanation for her fear.  Ari found it first.

“You’re worried that they put a Controller in you,” he said.  Rayne nodded her head jerkily.

“More than that,” Landor said.  “You’re afraid the warning you wrote on your shift was about you.”  She nodded again.  “It’s all right, Rayne.  We can find out right now.”

“You can?” she whispered so softly that he didn’t hear her so much as he read her lips. 

“We are strongest in Fire and Air, but we do have some strength in Water.  I don’t think it’ll be too difficult to determine whether or not you have metal in your body.  Hold still for just a moment and try to relax, all right?”

Relaxing was impossible, but Rayne made herself be so still that she barely breathed.  Then the Bearen-Hirus looked into her eyes, focusing their energy on her.  She returned their gazes steadily, one at a time, beginning with Ari, then Con, and then Landor, surprised to feel an immediate connection with each of them.  Before she had a chance to figure out what that connection was, exactly, they all relaxed and looked away.

“There’s no metal inside of you that we can find,” Landor said.  “I think it’s safe to say you don’t have a Controller.  Your fathers have much stronger Water magic than we do, so we’ll ask them to check as well, just to be certain.”