The Alien Trace [Cord 01] (18 page)

    She smiled in drowsy satiation. "You didn't come, Cord. I wish you had."

    "The afternoon is young. By this evening, you'll be too sore to do anything but go to bed, alone. I swear."

    In spite of her contentment, her nipples hardened as soon as he touched them, and her pelvis angled up to meet him.

    

    

    The sun was setting when the aircar lifted with Cord in the pilot's seat. In the distance he could see lights coming on in the towns that edged the waste. Cord kept the aircar over the desert, with the nearest towns off to their left. He began to bear north. Soon the port would be in sight.

    "That cluster of lights over there must be Delell," Bird said. "You'd better land here and let me out."

    Since takeoff they had kept their speech to the simple exchange of information. There was nothing more to say, unless they spent their last time together in argument.

    Cord brought the aircar down on the sand without difficulty. Fortunately it was a fine model, with a full complement of equipment to make it operate safely even with an inattentive pilot. He turned to speak to Bird.

    "Goodbye, Cord." She had already opened the door to leave.

    He put his hand on her arm to stop her.

    "Wait! Bird, what are you going to do? What have you got to go back to?"

    She did not look at him. Her eyes were on the town lights ahead.

    "I'm going to campaign against easing trade restrictions with the humans. They're too loose already. Eventually, I'll be a Speaker. Maybe I can keep the Council from making more mistakes. Oh, I have work to do. Good luck, Cord. I did love you."

    She slipped out, letting the door slip shut behind her. Her pale gown whipped around her legs in the night wind.

    Cord watched her walking away, very straight, very purposeful, a woman who knew where she was going.

    A woman walking away…

    He recalled a story about his great-great-grandfather, who had gone north into the lava-rock wastes to track a bandit. He had failed to catch the robber but he found a woman there, walking all alone. No one ever knew where she came from or why, but she married Cord's ancestor when no one else would, because of his trade. The history of his family, Cord thought, was bracketed by women walking in solitude.

    His eyes could no longer make out Bird's form in the darkness. He touched the instruments and felt the aircar swing around in response. Bound northeast, he left the desert behind. His course would take him to the city, not to the spaceport.

    He had let Bird suppose that he intended to go directly to the humans. It would have caused her anxiety to know that he was making a little detour first. He could not leave Mehira without gathering the rest of his parents' instruments. He had a premonition that he would need all the leverage he could get.

    Cord veered the craft toward the city's northern precinct. Finola lived in an outlying suburb in a small, luxurious house. If it were not for her, and the fact that she lived on the outskirts, he would hesitate to go back. As it was, the foray was dangerous but worth the risk.

    He landed on a public airstrip a short walk from her home. There were many advantages to living in a prosperous section. Cord left the vehicle unconcernedly; it would not occur to law-abiding Mehirans that the aircar parked here with half a dozen others might be stolen. In fact, it was possible that no one had yet realized it had been taken from the port's lot.

    He found his way to Finola's door without difficulty, having visited her many times with his family. Pausing in the small front garden, Cord hoped she was not entertaining any of her love-friends tonight. Still, it was a risk he had to take, he thought, looking up at the tall, narrow house. He struck the entrance gong and waited.

    At last the door opened, and Cord saw Finola's inquiring expression change to gladness. But she did not exclaim at seeing him. Instead she glanced around furtively and pulled him inside.

    "One cannot be too careful," she explained. "Now, Cord! Tell me everything. I thought you were… gone, like Fyrrell and Neteel. Where have you been?"

    "From the way you greeted me, I think you know," he responded with a wry smile.

    She answered in guarded tones, "I know the Council is eager to interview you. Your 'assistance' is 'requested,' according to the bulletins. I am loyal to the Council-naturally! -but when it advertises for a citizen to give it assistance, it is seldom to the citizen's advantage."

    At least there was no city-wide hunt in progress for him. When Cord did not speak immediately, Finola asked, "What happened? Maybe I can help."

    "To be honest, I hoped you could. There was no one else I could go to."

    Her smile made her shrewd, sensible face almost pretty. Cord realized what his father had seen in her: the humor, courage, and loyalty.

    "Thank you! I'm glad you felt you could come to me. Now if we can pass the evasions and get down to whatever is bothering you, perhaps I can think of something. And while you're making up a good story to tell me, I'll get you something to eat."

    "No, don't bother, Finola. I'm not evading your questions, and I don't want to put you to more trouble."

    "Don't be silly. Be comfortable. I'll be right back."

    He was hungry, he decided, as well as tired. Settling onto a cushioned platform, he was quite content to wait.

    Finola soon returned, bearing a tray with bottles, beakers, and plates of delicacies. She poured them heartening drafts of blue-root wine diluted with fruit juice, and gestured to Cord to help himself to preserved fish, fruit, and other dishes he did not recognize.

    He nibbled a bit of dried melon which had been stuffed with a sweet, spicy paste. "It feels like a year since it happened. The aliens put us all out of the spaceport, except for Bird. It was when I was going back to learn who killed Fyrrell and Neteel that I discovered she was a prisoner." He did not want to tell Finola more.

    "So you rescued her," Finola interpolated.

    "Yes." Cord sought for a way to gloss over his murder of several Terrans. He wondered how much his father had talked about his work to his mistress. If he had spoken of it freely, Finola might not be horrified, not the way Bird was.

    "The humans were not willing to surrender your friend easily, I suppose," Finola said dryly. "So there was trouble. I begin to see why the Council wishes to talk to you."

    Cord relaxed. Finola might not commit the indelicacy of referring to violence, but she evidently understood what had occurred.

    "You did get her out?" she inquired.

    "Oh, yes. We spent last night and most of today in the Yellow Desert. Now Bird is on her way home. It wasn't wise to come back together."

    Finola's sapphire-colored eyes seemed to fathom the trouble between Bird and himself, without a word being said. Without even a sharing of emotions, for Cord was too weary of others' condemnation and shock to open himself to anyone.

    "I don't think you should answer the Council's summons," she said.

    "Nothing was farther from my mind."

    "What will you do, then?"

    Cord drained his beaker. "I am going back to the spaceport. I am going to execute the murderer. And then I will leave Mehira."

    Having expected her to be amazed and to try to dissuade him, Cord was taken aback when Finola remarked, "It appears there is no alternative. Do you need transportation to the spaceport?"

    "I've got an aircar parked east of here, thanks. And I don't want to involve you more than necessary. But if you don't mind a little risk, I do need transportation back home. I can't take the aircar into the center of town safely. If you drive me in your ground car, I'll hide in back; when you stop near our building, I can slip in and get what I need. It should be easy enough if you wouldn't mind waiting awhile before we start." He was aware that he seemed to be taking her agreement for granted, and hoped that friendship would excuse the liberty.

    "It seems a reasonable plan, provided you let me drop you off outside the port afterward. If you insist on coming back to get your aircar, you'll increase the odds of being seen."

    "My equipment…"

    "We'll pick it up on the way to town. It's settled." She half reclined on the dais, looking so friendly and safe that Cord couldn't help smiling back at her.

    "Thank you, Finola. I wish there were some way to thank you."

    "There is. Come closer and I'll tell you what it is."

    He slid over beside her and felt her lips brush his ear. Instead of whispering, they played over the soft furry tip and around the base. Finola's hands kneaded his back and shoulders. She smelled warm and salty.

    "I hope I can please you," he whispered, embarrassed, "but it's been a long day, and…" Of course, he could fill in with his tail, if worst came to worst.

    "And you've already been with Bird," Finola concluded. "Never mind, I'm sure there's something left for me."

    Finola's body was firm and agile beneath her rainbow-colored shift. Cord stripped the garment from her, drawn by her nearness and her scent. Her limbs were sleek, and strong as those of some jungle animal. Cord remembered his father saying that Finola too had come of poor family and had worked hard.

    She was working hard now, he reflected, and not without results. It was no wonder: sexual prowess was highly regarded, and Finola had climbed up from obscurity as much by her erotic ability as by her intelligence. She drew responses from Cord that he would not have believed possible. He ached with pleasure. Finola's own buckings and outcries confirmed her ecstasy.

    

    

    It was late when they left Finola's elegant little house. They met no one on their way to Cord's stolen aircar. Few of the dwellings in the section showed any light; of those that did, most were only dim nightlights. Once they had transferred Cord's gear to Finola's vehicle and turned back toward the city, Finola kept to the sidestreets. She avoided any area where someone might be awake and watchful-the Council buildings, the utility center, a hospital.

    She drove the ground car to a parking square down the street from his family's living unit. The square was half filled with modest vehicles, freight haulers, rental skims, and the like in every state of age and repair. Finola's trim three-seater should pass unnoticed.

    "Shall I come and help, Cord?"

    "No, thank you. There won't be much. If you stay here, you can keep watch. If you see anything that looks like trouble, go home. I'll come to you there. Otherwise, I won't be long."

    She bowed agreement.

    

    

    The unit was not home now. The room was close from lack of ventilation, in disarray from his last visit, empty. He would not regret never seeing it again. Quickly he stuffed the diagrams and notes he had left behind into a cloth bag. Next he chose equipment that might be even marginally useful or salable. There was the tray of precision instruments, several sensors, other small things which might be valuable to him once he was offworld. There was nothing else he cared to take.

    No. That was not quite true. He paused at the shrine: generation upon generation of ancestors, who perhaps did not care about their descendants at all. He found he still cared about them. Soon no one of his family would remain on Mehira to remember. He removed the ancestral relics from the shrine. He could not leave them behind.

    "I don't have a new shrine to take you to," he told them. "For a time you must travel with me. When I can make you a home, I will." And new mementos-for his father and mother.

    The task done, he stood for a moment, pondering. Had he forgotten anything? Was there anything which should be destroyed before he left? No, to both questions, he decided. The Council might guess he had been here a second time, but what did it matter? Now the unit might remain undisturbed until it was reassigned.

    Strange that the Council had not searched the unit or sealed it. He was willing to swear that if anyone at all besides himself had been in it he would have known. All the signals he and his parents had customarily set were in place-the thread which any unwary person would have dislodged, the faint sprinkling of powder under the window, the little table set close enough to the normal traffic pattern in the main room that anyone unfamiliar with the room would jostle it out of place.

    Of course, it might not have occurred to anyone on the Council that he would return. Cord shouldered his pack and let himself out of the unit, striding down the dim corridor toward the exit. His parents had been assigned a ground-floor unit because their work sometimes required them to keep unusual hours. It was convenient now, as it permitted him to come and go without waking the other residents.

    A dark figure loomed before him, framed in the arched doorway. Its right arm moved in a hideously familiar way; Cord did not need to see the dart gun in its hand to know it was there. He threw himself to one side, certain that the unseen finger had contracted against the trigger. He heard a crunch followed by a liquid
plop
! as the dart splattered against the wall.

    Before the other could fire again, Cord reacted as he had been trained to do. The knife came to his hand as naturally as if it were part of it. A split second later, the hilt protruded from the attacker's left eyesocket. His attacker's death throes smashed against the barriers of his mind. Like acid, the emotions tried to eat their way into his brain. Despite the mental assault, Cord threw himself down as the Catcher's hand, jerking in death, released the weapon's entire magazine, a potentially fatal ejaculation. Unaimed, it hit the walls and floor harmlessly.