Tethered (4 page)

“I’m sorry,” she told him, and meant it. Right now she was missing being part of Refuge, of sharing auras with her kin. It hurt to think how long it might be before she could unshield herself again and share that warmth, but it was probably a pale shadow of what he felt. To know that warmth, that companionship had gone for good.

“I thank you for that. However, during our time together that is the part you must play. I know her talents were somewhat flawed, and that yours are not. Your council tells me that you’re their most skilled assassin. Intelligent, quick, talented. Perhaps not always...compliant?”

Heat flushed across her face.
Damn right!
“Independence and self-sufficiency are generally encouraged. An assassin who can’t act on her own initiative would soon be a dead one.”

D’joren chuckled, and the warm sound sent a thrill through her. Damn it, how did he do that? A few moments ago she had made a vow to herself to be a thorn in his side for drafting her to this role. Perhaps it was his ability to put others at ease that explained why he’d risen so high and so fast among his peers. Perhaps that’s why he was so essential to this treaty. “And you, Master D’joren, what are
your
talents?”

He spread his elegant fingers over the golden surface of their table. “All those that a diplomat should have. Charm, intelligence, patience. A soothing voice and a delicate touch.”

For an instant, she imagined what it might feel like to be touched by those long fingers before hastily shaking off the image. She scowled at the vaguely mocking tone of his words, but Zander seemed perfectly serious.

“Forgive me; I shouldn’t be teasing you. I’ve no doubt you are finding this situation as difficult as I am. We’ve both had to make sacrifices, and will have to make many compromises and adjustments over the next few days together.”

His words reminded her subtly of how much more he had lost. “You’re right, of course. I’m being cranky.”

“That is understandable.” He rose and offered his hand. She took it uncertainly as she lifted to her feet. “You have traveled a long way to reach here, to a strange place and new people. And I have no doubt the shielding is aggravating. It always had that effect on...” He stopped, and she saw him wince again. “I’ll have Pevanne take you to your rooms. The walls are shielded so you can switch off your personal device and relax. We’ll have to spend most of our days together preparing for the treaty, but rest assured you may return to your private quarters at any time you wish.”

“Thank you.” Tyree dipped her head, and he matched her gesture.

“I hope you might dine with me later though?”

Oooh, a dinner date!
her inner snark chimed in, and she quashed it. “Of course.”

Pevanne stood at her side and, with a last glance at Zander, she allowed the majordomo to lead her from the room.

***

The inside of the space station had been decorated to replicate the interior of a grand house on Terris rather than the more utilitarian versions she’d seen on her travels. As a sanctuary for people such as Zander, so vital to humanity and yet at risk, perhaps it had been intended to make them feel more at home. For Tyree, that was the last thing it made her feel. The corridors were rectangular but with the sides sloping in at a gentle angle and made from a mottled bronze-colored metal attempting to look like natural stone.

Tyree watched the majordomo walk ahead of her. Those few on the
Seclusion
not forming part of the extensive security knew who she really was. They had been too close to the genuine Mirsee to be deceived, and the Terrans feared a sudden staffing change might only raise more suspicion. Pevanne and Visaya were both there to help her pass as the real thing. There was also a Taluvian medic she had yet to meet.

“Pevanne, did you know Mirsee very well?”

“I did, lady.”

“What was she like?” It seemed odd that she should be asking a human about her own kin, her closest flesh and blood. Part of her felt she should know more. Part of her felt she should know by instinct how to be her unknown twin. But she’d never even met the woman. All they’d ever shared was DNA and a conception chamber.

“What would you like to know, lady?”

Where do I start?

She’d read plenty of things in Mirsee’s file, but they hadn’t really conveyed a sense of the woman, only the things that most people might list in their bio. “Well, what did she enjoy doing most?”

“She liked to be outdoors. At the main house, she had a garden and a conservatoire for the tropical varieties. Flowering plants were her favorite. The more exotic the better.”

Great. Well, no garden here that she knew of, and what she knew about the growing of plants could be handwritten on a nano-crystal with space to spare. “Anything else?”

“She liked music and reading.”

“Reading what?”

“Books. Particularly old stories, of times before the Galactic Commission and the Territories. Stories of ancient Earth. The Legend of the Nine Lost Worlds. She especially liked the Tales of the Travelers.”

Tyree snorted. “She read fairytales?”

“You asked, lady.”

I did, didn’t I?

Mirsee sounded as if she’d been mentally flawed as well as psychically. And yet she’d been a diplomat.

“Can I have access to her library?”

“Everything is keyed to her voice and is available anywhere on the
Seclusion.
You have only to ask the Monitor for it.”

That, at least, was something she was familiar with. The pseudo-intelligence running the ship and all its systems, like an invisible parent, would respond to both her vocal requests and to any extreme changes in her body. She loathed the worlds that didn’t use the Monitor system.

“She also liked to dance,” Pevanne added, interrupting Tyree’s musing. She felt a sudden rush of familiarity.

“Oh, I dance too. Will her routines be in the Monitor?”

“I believe so, lady.” They arrived at a door and Pevanne gestured for Tyree to enter. “These are yours. They have been set up to replicate Lady Mirsee’s preferences in all respects. Her clothing has been transported here, along with all her personal effects.” Pevanne’s voice echoed the same discomfort she had heard in Visaya’s. And Zander’s. Clearly the majordomo remembered her with affection, and the prospect of turning all her belongings over to what amounted to a stranger must be painful. “The master has said for you to use them all as if they are yours, and hopes they bring you some enjoyment.”

“Thank you, Pevanne.” The idea made her insides squirm a little, but more from how it would affect those who had known Mirsee rather than any qualms about using a dead person’s stuff. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

The majordomo looked her full in the face. “Thank you, lady.” He hesitated before adding, “The Lady Mirsee was a quiet, gentle soul. We honor her memory and the master’s grief for her, by doing our utmost to aid you in your role. You may ask anything of me that you need, lady. Anything at all.”

Tyree opened her mouth, but any words locked solid in her throat and she could only incline her head in acknowledgement as Pevanne bowed and then left her. The hushed sorrow of his words and the intensity of his final pledge to her squeezed her chest. There suddenly seemed more at stake than playing her role and signing a treaty. She felt she owed Mirsee tribute herself.

With a sigh, she surveyed her new quarters. A large part of her previous assignments had been spent in anything from the mud of a non-tech, uninhabited world to luxury mega-hotels on pleasure planets. Adaptability was another part of her credo, and her talents. And yet this room filled her with unease.

Echoes of the dead?
She mocked herself.

After all, Mirsee had never really been here. And yet a shadow of that failed Su lay over this place, in the collection of cosmetics and crystal-clad bottles of scent laid out, in the huge double wardrobes full of her clothing. In the memories of all those who had known her and would now serve Tyree in her stead.

“Music,” she demanded, wanting to break the depressing silence falling over her.

“Specify,” returned a soft, androgynous voice.

“Rhythmic trance.”

Bubbles of light fell from the ceiling and formed a cylinder of gently swirling color and sound in the center of her room. The track wasn’t familiar, but the pulsing beats and synthesized notes flowed over her, and she felt the shadow lifting. If this was Mirsee’s choice, then it seemed they had something in common after all.

The room, five times bigger than her one in Refuge, perhaps fifteen meters by ten, had cream-colored walls. A holographic print of a landscape, full of wind-stirred trees and flowers in garish hues, decorated the entire main wall. Was that Mirsee’s garden? Or simply a representation of the kind of thing she liked? It made Tyree shiver to imagine the breeze stroking the plants into motion, making them brush over her skin.

“Can the image be changed?”

“Specify.”

“I’d like a sky full of clouds.”

The image shifted to one that mirrored the view she’d expect in Refuge, although it was missing the sky towers. For an instant she considered asking for them, and for flocks of lowri, and then dismissed it. Banishing the garden was enough for now.

She shed the copper dress Visaya had persuaded her into, but guilt poked at her as she stepped out of it. With a little more care than she would have shown her clothing back in Refuge, she gathered up the garment and draped it over the back of a plush, plum-colored sofa that curved around one corner of the room. The white silken shift she wore underneath clung around her torso and hips, but left her limbs free. Swaying to the music, she pulled the pins and clasps that bound her hair, releasing it one braid at a time. With each loosened and the soothing rhythms, her tension eased. She could do this. It wouldn’t be so hard.

The last braid fell and she massaged her scalp, breathing out a thankful sigh. The music wrapped around her like cammer, a mild tranquilizing drug favored by some rhythmic trancers. She’d taken it a time or three while waiting on a target, though their use was forbidden in Refuge.

Warmth flowed through her body, and all her concerns seemed to wash away. This would be easy. She twirled beneath the bubbles of light, submerging into the pulsing beat of the song. It filled her thoughts, blanked all her worries. The music possessed her, moved her body without her conscious control. Her arms lifted of their own volition. Colored light glided over her vision, and the room seemed to vanish. She giggled as she floated.

But I haven’t Misted out,
she thought suddenly, with a faint twinge of alarm at the strange euphoria that filled her. She couldn’t feel her body, only a heated glow and the racing pulse of her heart in time with the music.

She tried to draw breath, panic coming in a cold sweat and a convulsive jerk of her body. The floor smacked into her side and pain crashed into her skull. She lay on the carpet, her limbs twitching spasmodically and her throat closed tight. The rhythm of the music spiked into her mind, agony piercing her body.

Drugged!

But how? She fought to pull in air but nothing responded. She tried to move her arm and it jerked, not fully under her control. Her vision shifted in a sickening lurch that tossed and turned the features of the room in a miasmic swirl. Light and music continued to play over her skin, hypnotic in their intensity.

No!

The paralysis deepened, and yet her body juddered as she went into a spasm.

The ring
.

She needed to squeeze the ring.

Her hand twitched; the circle of silver a gleam of hope. She tried to crush it between her fingers, but they’d gone numb, all sensation a vague and distant thing.

Suffocating, heart pounding, she couldn’t even manage a whimper as darkness swamped her mind and blackened her vision.

Chapter Three

A million burning needles ripped through her flesh. A high-pitched sound filled her ears, pierced her skull. She moaned. Choked. Air scorched her lungs but she sucked in more in desperation.

Can’t breathe.

“Easy.” The voice, smooth as capprey, eased her panic. Someone held her, an arm under her shoulders. “I hadn’t expected you to need my gift so soon.”

“Zha?” Her mouth wouldn’t form the words correctly. She still felt numbed, although not enough to stop the fiery agony cascading through her veins.

“I’m here. You’re safe.”

She pried her eyelids open. Several blurred images filled her sight, gradually resolving into an avian medic with a crest of bright blue feathers, Visaya, Pevanne, and two security officers, one of whom was in the process of yanking fiber-optic cables from a hole in her ceiling.

“Mmmusiic?” she mumbled.

“Tranquilizing sonics,” D’joren confirmed, his voice rumbling by her ear. It was his arms that held her, cradling her shuddering body close to his own. “The media system was accessed externally and sabotaged. We’ve closed down the Monitor system until we’re sure it’s safe.”

Her body spasmed again, and she croaked in pain. The avian medic pressed a hypo to her neck. The faint sting bled a sudden heat into her body and some of the agony receded.

“Callista?” Zander said.

“The sonics were set to paralyze her nervous system. These are neuro-blockers. I’ve had to shock her system to stop its degeneration. A neural reboot, if you like.”

Tyree convulsed and a whimper escaped her throat.

“What is it?” Zander demanded.

“It’s nothing,” Callista assured him, and Tyree gave a faint growl. The medic should try it from her point of view. “There’ll be some side effects as it wears off.”

“Pins and needles,” Tyree squeezed out, her voice still slurred. “Bad ones—oh!” Her breath snagged as more stabbing pains ran riot through her body.

“That’s the nano-therapeutics rebalancing your system.” Callista shrugged. “It may take some time to wear off. Su metabolism is slightly more sensitive than human.”

“Wonderful.” Tyree shuddered again as another spasm gripped her.