Resistance: Hathe Book One (5 page)

“
There’s more dust over there, girl. Behind the far
seat.”

His
sudden words after the tense silence reverberated throughout the
room, as he had intended. He’d startled her but then saw her
deliberately steady herself. Steady, then walk across to clean the
pristine area. He increased the tension.

“
While you’re there, the plant leaves should be polished every
day,” he drawled in the most officious tone he could
summon.

This
time, the woman did show an infinitesimal stiffening, but still she
bent to the assigned task. She left the Terran plant till last,
hesitating fractionally as she approached it. As if she must force
herself to obey him. Not as calm as she tried to appear, then, he
guessed, and he allowed a nasty smile to spread over his face. This
might be interesting.

He’d
read his victim better than he could have guessed. So that is the
way it is to be, thought Marthe angrily. Two can play that game,
Terran.

She
had been discreetly studying her target since he’d marched so
cavalierly into the room. Why he chose to watch her working, she
couldn’t imagine, but she again checked the escape routes she’d
identified on her first visit with Agnethe. Jaca may think she
could best the Terran if it came to a struggle, but now she’d seen
him, she wasn’t so sure. The man was tall and lean, with a breadth
of shoulder suggesting strength, and the easy balance in his gait
was that of a trained fighter. It was possible she could take him,
but only by using the kind of deadly tricks not usually known by a
cowed and beaten Hathian maidservant. Her cover would be blown as
soon as she tried any of them. No, the only hope she had lay in
Jaca’s words of warning. Charm was this man’s weapon of choice. His
guile against hers. So be it, Terran. She bent to rearrange the
objects on a side table as per his latest, meaningless command,
turning her head slightly as she did so in order to observe his
face.

He
scowled at her, eyes closely tracking her movements, and she was
suddenly grateful for the concealing hood of her outer robe that
hid her face from his scrutiny. In the feared Terran uniform and
with his dark hair, deep earth-green eyes and sun-darkened skin,
there was an air of real menace about the man. The downward twist
of his mouth only added to it.

Yet a
smile would have softened that hard face.

Her
hand jerked, touching a small, translucent globe, a perfect circle
of light caught in stone. It nearly toppled, saved only by a quick
recovery of her hand that made the movement look deliberate, and
she turned carefully to wait his next order, head bowed in
submission and innards churning. Where had that thought come
from?

He
snapped the next command and she obeyed thankfully. She had herself
in hand again but was ever more wary with each ridiculous command.
Wary and rather angry at this game the Terran chose to inflict on
her. She fought back in the only way possible, and each
increasingly humiliating order was obeyed with an unchanging
blandness of demeanor. I will outlast you, Terran.

Hamon
watched her in stony calm, his bored voice pronouncing his demands.
Inwardly, he was fuming. This one was either particularly
thick-skinned or far cleverer than any native he had yet come
across. He stood, and quietly walked to a spot just behind her. She
was carefully wiping an imaginary speck from the wall. His hand
rose to twitch away the enshrouding headgear. Too late. Like a
startled deer, she had sensed his movement and whirled out of
reach, ducking her head. Her hands clutched at her wrists, fingers
tapping a nervous staccato on her pulse.

“
You
require something, sir?”

“
Yes, blast you. I require that you take off that stupid
hood,” he snapped, angered at being caught out. “Come here and see
how generous a Terran can be to a friendly young woman.” He
softened his voice, let it deepen seductively, but at the same time
his hand reached out to grab her arm as she sidled away. He held
her still, not hard enough to hurt, but firmly enough to let her
know she was going nowhere. “Stand still. You’ve had your little
game. Now we play by my rules.”

She
kept her face turned away as he drew back the hood from her head.
Then paused. Something was not right. Here was the common cloth
cap, dull grey this time and jammed down right over her ears. It
was dirty enough, but his fingers felt drawn to touch all the same.
She flinched back, but his hands were strong. He caught both her
wrists in one hand, holding her tightly as the fingers of his other
hand confirmed what his eyes suspected. He gripped the cap and
tugged it back from her hair.

He
stopped, shocked into stillness. What exactly he had suspected, he
knew not. It wasn’t this. Here was no greasy, odorous mess. His
hand resumed its motion with a mesmerizing slowness, releasing a
cascade of rich, nugget brown waves, shining with the lights of sun
and earth. As the cap slid farther back, he reached out in wonder.
A wordless gasp escaped him as his hand lightly caressed the
tantalizing strands. Gently, oh so gently, he reached to tilt her
chin round, eager to see the face beneath this unique
halo.

There
was a cough from behind him and the spell was broken. He turned to
blast the intruder. It was a mistake. Swift as the Hathian loeth,
the girl was fleeing out the nearby service way. He whirled to stop
her. Too late. All he caught was the sliding of the door and a
stray lock of hair peeping from beneath its imprisoning hood. Eyes
blazing, he turned on the native responsible. It was a young man,
desperately bowing in appeasement.

Hamon’s temper snapped. “What is it? And do not ever again
come in like that! Sneaking around like the currish lot you are.”
Head still down, no answer came. “Well, come on, you’ve done your
damage. What was so important that you should interrupt me at such
a moment?”

“
My
deepest apologies, sir. Please, I did not mean… I did not know.
She’s only a native girl, sir.”

Goaded
by disappointment into a rare need for violence, Hamon silenced the
man with a crashing blow. Stumbling, the Hathian rose again, bowing
low to soften any further blows. “The Colonel is an important man,
sir, and he told me to bring you immediately. Please,
sir?”

With
an impatient shrug, Hamon turned to leave. What could his blasted
commander want, and why now? He had no choice but to answer the
summons and marched out, fully intending to continue his study of
the strange native girl in the very near future. For once, he knew
a hint of anticipation and smiled maliciously as he strode
off.

Jacquel des Trurain stood forgotten by his enemy, staring for
a long moment after Radcliff’s retreating figure. One day, Major,
you will pay for today, he promised himself. Then, with a silently
mouthed oath, he quietly turned to leave by the service
door.

CHAPTER THREE

Marthe was overtaken by Jaca halfway down the next corridor.
After checking for passing Terrans, he drew her into a nearby
service room. Then he exploded.

“
You
really do have a talent for making trouble out of nothing. That
precious hair of yours may have just been your downfall. How many
times have I told you in the past—tied up and powdered? If you
imagine that His Lordship of Radcliff,” and he gestured rudely, “is
not going to comb the entire native section to find you, then
you’re wrong! He’s notorious for pursuing beautiful women, with a
vigor that’s matched only by his confounded success!” He slumped to
the floor, cradling his head gingerly. “And damn me if I haven’t
gone and set my head ringing again. Your Major swings a mean
cut.”

Marthe
crouched down beside him, guilt riding her. “I’m so sorry, Jaca. I
had to call you. Anything else would have blown my cover.” She
reached out to examine the bruised tenderness, but his hand caught
hers.

“
It’s all right, Marthe. I’m fine, really. But you see now why
I warned you about that man. After this, you have to hide that hair
of yours. We’ll change the roster and get another maid sent in to
cover your duties.”

He put
a hand on her face, tilting it to look her directly in the eye. “I
know you want to find out more about Radcliff, but leave it to
others. There’s only one way you’re likely to learn anything from
him, and that’s out of the question. Your face was too well known
to go long unrecognized once he starts parading you as his latest
mistress. Don’t say no,” he added, touching a finger to lips
already forming a denial. “You’ve seen the man. If you stay as his
maid, he will get that hood off you. And once he sees what you
really look like, how beautiful you are, do you really think you
would have any choice but to stay and do whatever he wants? The
kind of hunt that man could start if you disappeared would end up
exposing us all. No. We’ll have your duties changed.”

Marthe
was torn between angry denial and reluctant acceptance. Reality
won.

“
You’re right, of course. Not about the beautiful bit,” she
had to add. It was an ancient argument between them.

He
shook his head as if to say ‘not now’.

She
touched a hand to her hair. “It’s just … it was my last stand, you
see. We may have humbled ourselves and blighted our world, but
while I kept my hair as it was before, it felt as if I still kept
the real me alive.”

“
I
do understand, Mimi,” said Jaca gently. “We have fallen so, so far.
But remember, we descended to these depths of our own free will,
that we might one day ascend again. We have yet to be forced
downwards. Your pride is untouched. The free choice of a free
people, even if it be degradation, is never shameful.”

She
had to grin at that, even if somewhat weakly. “Your politician’s
mind was always able to render a useful sentiment poetic.” Then
practicality returned and she glanced up nervously. “We’d better
not linger here. And if my hair must be bound so horribly, you
should have the honor. I could do with a hand down to the bottom of
the pit.”

So,
solemnly but with a smile in his eyes, Jacquel took the vibrant
mass, divided it into four plaits, and twisted them into a knot at
the nape of her neck. Then he took a green powder and lightly
sprinkled it over the whole, changing the glowing, earthen sheen to
a mousy lifelessness.

“
You
look disgusting,” he teased. “Come wench, to your
chores.”

“
And
you, boy, to yours, for if I look disgusting, then you look
downright filthy.”

Side
by side, she went with him back to the kitchen area, where levity
was soon dispelled by the fussing Agnethe. She bustled up as soon
as she saw them enter, scolded their lateness and set Marthe, whom
she knew as Riarda, and Jaca, whom she did not know as anybody,
never having bothered to discover a name, to work at the massive
cauldron of grey, watery soup. It was the staple diet of the
prisoners. The Terrans never tasted it themselves, her briefings
had told her—so were not to know of certain powder concentrates
secretly added by the cheery, harmless old head woman—and merely
assumed that the peasants were a hardy breed, able to thrive
despite the poor food and everlasting toil of their
lives.

Agnethe was indefatigable, bustling everywhere in her huge
kitchen, chiding here, praising there. For all its miserable grey
walls and thin wisps of sunlight, Marthe found that an atmosphere
of contentment pervaded the cavernous hall. Terrans seldom
intruded, relying for control of the prisoners on the surveillance
vids that constantly monitored the Hathians. Or so the Terrans
thought.

At one
end of the kitchen were the four enormous cooking pots: two for the
morning gruel and two for the evening soup. Fortunately, the less
than appetizing odors from these were vented to the outside and did
not pervade the large work benches extending the length of the
room. When she first arrived, these were crowded with workers,
chopping, cutting and slicing the ingredients to be added to the
large pots. Then later, after a thorough scrubbing, the same tables
became dining tables for the hundreds of natives confined here in
the fortress—so many that they had to run the meals in
shifts.

For
all the hustle, working in the kitchens was rather pleasant, mused
Marthe later. Her surroundings may have lacked the elegance of the
Major’s apartment, but there were no Terran guards here, and she
was ideally placed to hear the gossip so necessary to her mission.
Hathians from throughout the fortress passed through in a constant
stream, bringing news and many of the secrets of their deluded
captors to her receptive ears. Everything had worked out rather
well. She checked the temperature of the great pot, absentmindedly
watching the one beam of sunlight that penetrated the gloomy hall
and dreaming of good times to come.

Suddenly, her reverie was broken. Two guards grabbed her by
the shoulders. Without explanation, they pinned her arms behind her
back and swung her round to march her out, forcing her to almost
run to keep up with their brisk, military stride. She searched for
a familiar face and was reassured to see a quick nod from a nearby,
averted head.

Up the
steps they shoved her, across the courtyard and through a heavily
guarded doorway to a set of offices far more imposing than any she
had yet seen. A wary foreboding filled her. She was brought to a
rough halt in front of a stark, white door as her guards signaled
their presence.