Page 20
They left Q within the hour, flying out with a wing of dals supported by a full battle group, one of two deploying from Q in a rare combined offensive. While Jos had been preoccupied with Tyelu and the Choosing, his dal and others had been harried by the Sweepers. They’d followed one group through a jump and reentered space in the middle of a system overrun with Sweeper ships. Two dals had sacrificed themselves and their ships so that the others could escape with a warning about the amassed forces.
The Sweepers had entrenched themselves in a homebase, and their numbers were far, far greater than anyone had suspected.
The battle group was headed back now to hammer at the Sweepers’ apparent base. Even Jos had been shocked by the news. Sweepers were nomadic more often than not, drifting from system to system in search of materials, technology, and slaves. The uptick in Sweeper child-ship development had been bad enough. This was horrifying. If left unchecked, Sweepers would devour the sector.
He stifled an impulse to message Tyelu, flinched as her emotions and his rebounded through their growing bond. He focused instead on his d’gas, anchored into the transport deck’s walls, and the steady updates coming through Apedemak ’s dedicated comms. First jump. Clear space. Coordinating with the battle group.
The faint pull of a second jump pressed him against the deck’s webbing. As soon as they reentered norm space, the comms went wild.
“Contact, contact, contact!”
“Incoming fire! Brace for impact!”
Frek. This system was supposed to be clear .
A quieter message informed him that his dal would be ‘porting into one of the mother ships they’d encountered upon jumping into a system. Jos relayed the message to his dal as a spike of adrenaline flooded his system.
His armor automatically administered countermeds, and almost immediately his focus narrowed to the task at hand. His dal snapped out of their webbing and stepped onto the transport pad, Jos leading the way.
He triggered his helmet, closing it around his head, and exhaled. Time to go to work.
After showing her how to use Jos’s pass, Inisru and Ezo took Tyelu to their favorite restaurant, tucked away in the old quarter of Q’s capital city. Their firm kindness eased much of Tyelu’s worry, helping her orient herself to the massive, urbanized landscape.
There were no suburbs here, as there were on Abyw, no quaint villages or open roads. During the ride from the spaceport to the restaurant, she caught a glimpse of mist-shrouded mountains in the distance, beyond the imposing skyline. The entire city rose stories above the elevated rail system and seemed to go on forever.
Tyelu clamped her teeth together to keep from gaping. Even Domor, as developed as it was, had more greenspaces than Q.
“Lovely, isn’t it?” Inisru said, a gentle smile in her eyes.
“Beautiful,” Tyelu agreed. But also overwhelming. Different from Abyw, perhaps too different. She felt like a lubber set adrift in the vast reaches of space, her only tether the faint echo of Jos in her heart. Lost, alone. She forced her spine straight and vowed to love it as much as she loved him.
The weather was pleasant during their ride through the city, almost balmy as the sun set and Q’s solitary moon rose. The time disoriented her somewhat; she was still on Abyw time, where it would be nearing the midday hour.
The restaurant was a tiny hole in the wall serving traditional Q cuisine family style. The aroma of frying meat and spices made Tyelu’s stomach growl, and she realized she hadn’t eaten in hours. Tyelu allowed Inisru to order for her and carefully filed her companions’ conversation away for later thought. The older couple laid a foundation of Q’s settlement and growth for her, beyond the barebones encyclopedia articles publicly available on the net. Q was a water world dominated by strings of islands. Vidarr, the capital, had been built atop the largest, located in the planet’s northern temperate zone.
Tyelu broke in during that explanation. “But where does your food come from? Have you no farms or ranches?”
Ezo grinned. “Ah, spoken like a true Pruxn?!”
Inisru elbowed him gently. “Leave off, Ezo, or the poor girl’s liable to abandon us.”
“Not until the meal’s done,” Tyelu assured her wryly.
“Smart girl,” Ezo murmured. “Always eat when you get a chance.”
“Spoken like a soldier,” she replied, grinning.
“She’s got you there, lover.” Inisru pushed a plate toward Tyelu, filled with steamed greens tossed with slivers of other vegetables and a chewy, salted meat. “We have sea farms, naturally, because of the oceans. Some of the islands near the equator were left wild, allowing edible native fruits and vegetables to flourish.”
Ezo picked up the explanation there. “The rest is grown on floating islands or in skyrises. And we import quite a bit. Meat, mostly, and exotics that can’t be grown here. I believe one of the prime reasons we’re trying to improve relations with the Pruxn? is because of your abundant bovi herds.”
Tyelu lowered her gaze and busied herself with sampling the greens. Taq Zhina might wish for closer ties with Abyw, but that evidently did not include having closer ties with her grandson’s new wife.
After their meal, the couple offered to escort her to Jos’s apartment. They’d made it back to the rail station when an odd sensation pressed against her heart. She placed a hand there, puzzled, then the connection with Jos snapped and went silent.
“Jos!” she gasped.
Inisru’s expression shifted to concern. “What is it?”
Ezo shot an unreadable look at his wife. “I know this one. Don’t worry, Tyelu. He’s not gone.”
“Adrenaline suppressant,” Inisru said, nodding. “It has the added advantage of shutting down emotions.”
“Or disadvantage,” Ezo murmured. “Come along, Tyelu. We must get you settled in so you can rest.”
“But Jos!” Tyelu cried.
Inisru wrapped an arm around Tyelu’s shoulders. “He’s still there. You’ll see.”
How could he still be there? The loss of connection had left her hollowed her out. She’d only begun to get used to the idea of him being there when the connection had been ripped away. Or felt like it had.
“Tell me about the suppressant,” Tyelu demanded.
“It’s in his armor,” Ezo explained. “Automatically administered ahead of battle along with a cocktail of other drugs. Perfectly safe, I assure you.”
Of course, Tyelu thought. She’d known the armor administered some meds, just not what effect those would have on her bond with Jos. Fatigue washed over her, a harsh reminder that she’d just arrived on a new planet using a different time configuration and her new husband was very likely in the middle of fighting the sector’s deadliest enemy.
Her stomach churned, threatening to upend her recent meal. She placed a quelling hand over it, refusing to embarrass herself by vomiting in front of fellow warriors. “Which way is Jos’s apartment?”
The couple kindly refused to leave her side until they escorted her safely home.
As soon as Tyelu entered Jos’s apartment, she secured the door behind her and set off to explore. It was unsurprisingly located near what Ezo called Vidarr Prime, the military-only spaceport located across the city from the civilian one.
Wise, she thought, pleased. Very wise indeed. Q’s planners must have been quite the strategists in their day.
The apartment was roughly as spacious as her diplomatic quarters in Forro. A short hallway ended in a well-appointed kitchen separated from a spacious sitting area by an uncluttered bar. The far wall was one enormous window overlooking the city and a small, attached balcony. Jos’s bedroom was accessed through a door set roughly dead center between the two areas. An en suite bathroom branched off of it as well as a walk-in closet holding spare uniforms, casual clothes, and a wall of weapons.
Tyelu grinned as she ran her hands along blasters, knives, and the collection’s lone short sword. This was why they were a perfect match, a small part of why she loved him. He was a warrior through and through, one of the many ties binding them together.
She backpedaled to the hallway and the inset door she’d passed, discovered a tidy clothes-freshening unit, a temperature modulating unit, and cleaning gear. Then backpedaled again to the kitchen and quickly inventoried his food supplies. She frowned at the empty cooler, was a little happier with the icebox, and somewhat satisfied by the selection of dried goods.
Well. Nothing for it. She’d have to figure out how to order fresh foods during her stay, or risk going out.
Her musings were interrupted by a chime. Quickly, she strode toward the door and checked the security feed. A crisply uniformed young man holding a covered basket stood outside the door. The feed identified him only as Minion 4. Tyelu snickered. Jos had to have done that.
Minion 4 turned out to be one of Taq Zhina’s many underlings, the basket held a marital gift from the taq’s staff, and the man himself apparently served as Tyelu’s welcome committee. Tyelu took the basket and the man’s card and shooed him off as quickly as she could, promising to contact him if she ever, stars forbid, needed to speak with Jos’s formidable grandmother. She shut the door on the poor man asking her if she required a personal bodyguard, then sniffed at the question. As if!
That done, she found the apartment’s net access and called her parents.
Alna greeted her with a bright smile. “How’s the reconnaissance going?”
Tyelu laughed and settled onto the comfortable sofa in the living area, facing a large viewscreen. “So far, I’ve seen the spaceport, a restaurant, and Jos’s apartment. The city is amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“You sound relaxed.”
“Not quite,” Tyelu admitted. “Jos deployed as soon as we landed.”
Alna’s expression melted into sympathy. “You can always come home.”
“This is home, too, or will be if I can ever figure my way around. There’s a rail system running through the entire city. I’m thinking of taking a day and getting lost on it.”
“You should!”
They settled in for a good chat, talking of matters back home and Tyelu’s plans while Jos was away. Gared interrupted a while later, to remind Tyelu of the upcoming Council of Kafhs.
“Will you make it back in time?” he said.
“If I can get things settled here.” She hesitated, then added, “Do you need me there?”
“I’d like for you to attend. It might save some trouble down the road.”
Tyelu didn’t ask what kind of trouble. She already had a good idea what form that might take.
The conversation shifted to trade, and finally, when a yawn caught Tyelu by surprise, Alna pried her husband away from the net-point’s miniviewer and signed off.
Tyelu replaced the viewer and turned on the wall-mounted viewscreen to a channel showing planetary news. Immediately, she was bombarded by a livecast compiled from direct feeds embedded into armor, accompanied by a news anchor’s voiceover identifying the battle as an incursion against the Sweepers. The sight horrified her. Not because of the gory battle taking place. That didn’t bother her at all. She’d seen her share of battles, both during and after her time with the Queen’s Guard, and had no qualms whatsoever about watching Sweepers being gutted.
No, what horrified her was that the video would be shared roughly as it was created. What if a soldier was killed in front of such a camera? What if that soldier’s family was watching the livecast and saw their loved one being torn apart?
After a moment, though, she noticed the nearly seamless gaps where feeds were stitched together. Bits were being omitted. That was easy to tell, once she got the hang of it. The feeds’ identifiers were anonymized, to protect the soldiers’ identities. No one was seriously harmed or killed. There must, she mused, be enough of a gap between the action and it being aired for an editor to snip out the truly nasty parts.
She retrieved her knitting and relaxed into the sofa without bothering to unpack. Plenty of time for that later. Just then, knowing how the battle was going seemed far more important than trivial things like making space for her clothes among Jos’s.
She fell asleep at some point, there on the couch, and woke to the feeling of Jos wrapping himself around her.
“Jos?” she murmured sleepily.
The apartment’s lights brightened automatically at the sound of her voice, and she sat up, searching the space around her for her lover. But he wasn’t there, only the warmth of the connection strumming between them.
He’s safe , she thought, and collapsed back into the cushions on a teary laugh.
The feelings of loss and return occurred several times over the next few days as Tyelu explored the city and began integrating her and Jos’s finances. She made copious notes for him, each one sent to his official net address. From him, she heard little, but so long as she could feel him coming and going, she was satisfied.
During those few days, she was officially introduced into Q society, first to the support group for the spouses of the deployed Q-mercs, then at one of Taq Zhina’s many formal functions. Tyelu endured each with as much grace as she could muster, smiling and nodding until she felt like a doll playing a role.
Once Minion 4 alerted her to it, Tyelu took a great deal of satisfaction from spending part of Jos’s entertainment allotment on formalwear. Apparently, the entire ruling family had such monies budgeted to them for diplomatic and other occasions, out of the family’s trust. Knowing that made it much easier to spend the credits. She cut a wide swath through local dress shops accompanied by Inisru, who was amused by the fervor and shrewdness of Tyelu’s shopping frenzy.
When the conflict showed no signs of ending, Tyelu booked transportation to Abyw on an armed passenger ship, packed only what she needed for the voyage, and set off for the civilian spaceport.
Minion 4 met her there wearing yet another crisply pressed uniform, a travel duffel slung over his shoulder.
When he approached, Tyelu stopped dead and stared down her nose at him. “Why are you here?”
“Security,” he said mildly, appearing not the least bit intimidated. “At the taq’s request.”
“How did you know I was leaving?”
“Your accounts are flagged.” At her icy look, he added, “Even your personal accounts. The safety of the ruling family—”
She held up a hand, interrupting that nonsense before he got going. “Spare me. The ship is leaving soon. I don’t have time to book another berth.”
“I took the liberty of upgrading your ticket when I bought my own.”
His mouth tilted at one corner into one of Jos’s smiles, and suddenly, she missed her mate so much, she had to glance away briefly lest the taq’s idiot minion catch sight of it.
“You’re related to him, aren’t you?” she growled.
“We’re cousins,” he admitted.
She saw the resemblance now, not just in the way they smiled, but in the set of their eyes, the breadth of their shoulders, the arrogant tilt of their chins. As they approached the gate, she sighed. “What’s your name?”
His eyebrows flattened. “It’s on my card.”
“Which you know very well I haven’t looked at,” she said crossly. “Jos has you input into his security system as Minion 4.”
The man stared blankly at her for a moment, then threw back his head and roared with laughter, drawing bland stares from the surrounding crowd. When his amusement dimmed to a grin, he said, “Sorry. Inside joke. Call me Oron.”
Tyelu glared at him, only mildly annoyed now. “What’s the relationship?”
“Cousins. My father is the current High Commander of Q Command.”
“You’re one of Zhina’s grandsons and you let her turn you into an errand boy?”
In a huff, Tyelu scanned her credentials and boarding pass, then slid beyond the automated gate into the docking tube.
Oron followed closely behind her. “Hardly an errand boy, Tyelu. Your security is of the utmost importance.”
“I can handle myself.” She paused long enough to rake a gaze over his slender frame. “Certainly better than a reed like you can.”
“I’ve had the same training as Jos,” he said, so mildly she did a double take and, yes, caught a glint of anger lighting his eyes. People pushed around them in the narrow docking tube, murmuring polite nothings. Oron lowered his voice and hissed, “The only reason I’m not out there fighting right now is because my body rejected the implants. No implant, no active duty. Now can we board, please, before my grandmother and father take it upon themselves to come down here and check on us?”
Tyelu huffed again and resumed her journey, her long strides eating up the carpeted runway.
Their flight passed remarkably smoothly. Oron had booked them in an elite suite comprised of two small bedrooms joined by a tiny common area. The passenger ship was slower than the taq’s courier, though not so slow as to annoy.
They arrived at the connecting port within a standard day, then switched to a mid-sized hauler, a mixed passenger-cargo ship headed straight for Abyw.
She and Oron passed the time chatting with the other passengers, remaining as anonymous as possible. On their initial leg, anonymity dissipated once the ship’s cabin invited them to take the evening meal with him. But on the hauler, where every cabin came in one, efficient size and the passengers were a mixed lot, they were treated the same as everyone else.
Tyelu, for one, reveled in the distinction, secure enough in her own worth to become irritated by those fawning over her purely because of her tenuous connection to Q’s taq. Oron seemed more sanguine even as he shared quietly amused glances with her. Perhaps he was simply used to the attention, Tyelu mused, or perhaps he found humor in her reactions.
Still, she was happy when the ship docked at Abyw’s orbiting port and they boarded the shuttle home.
When Tyelu had originally booked her trip, she’d planned to spend one night with her family and select appropriate clothing for the Council of Kafhs from her home wardrobe. Oron, however, had shifted the arrangements slightly when he’d upgraded her ticket, having them land directly in Pr?thum, the Pruxn? capital. Convenient for Oron. Not so much for Tyelu, who had not brought appropriate clothing with her.
When she said as much, Oron replied, “I’m also here as a diplomat. I’ve been tasked with pleading funds from Sigun to support our efforts against the Sweepers.”
“He’ll likely concede on some level.” She narrowed her eyes at Oron. “That doesn’t excuse altering my itinerary.”
“You’re expected to liaise as well,” he countered smoothly, “and you should take advantage. While she was here, Zhina purchased a suite near Capital Hall for diplomats and high-level visitors. We’ll stay there. I’ve got credit chits for food, clothing, and essentials.”
“You could’ve told me this beforehand.”
Oron laughed. “And spoil my fun?”
She nearly stamped her foot at him in childish temper and made do instead with a mini shopping spree, happily ordering appropriate clothing for them both, much to Oron’s bemusement.
Her parents met them at a local restaurant the next morning for a hearty breakfast. Kodh, unfortunately, joined them, glowering down at both Tyelu and Oron, who was roughly Jos’s height. Tyelu smirked at her cousin, remembering the way Jos had taken him down. Kodh sneered back, and poor Oron cast a bewildered glance between the two of them.
“Children,” Alna said, mildly reprimanding them all. “You’ll be on our best behavior today as representatives of Myunad Province. And you two,” she added, spearing Tyelu and Oron with a pointed gaze, “will remember that you’re also representing Taq Zhina and Q today. We’ll have no quarrels between us. Now Oron, try these sausages. You’re naught more than a reed, child. We’ll need to put some meat on those bones before we can find you a proper wife.”
Oron couldn’t quite mask his alarm. He turned a pleading look on Tyelu, who grinned and, relenting, whispered, “She said nearly the same thing to Jos. You Q are a lean bunch.”
“We have to fit into armor,” he muttered. “They only make it so big, you know.”
Gared came to his rescue, launching into a brief history of Pruxn? culture as background for Oron, in preparation for the council meeting. Tyelu listened with only half her attention, being well-versed in it, as all good Pruxn? were.
After humans fled Origin Space, during the Great Migration, a small band of Ancients sought a new home. They came upon the Fluma system, rich in planetary bodies, and discovered two planets within the central star’s habitable zone: lush Narus, in the zone’s inner orbit, and icy Abyw occupying the zone’s outer edges. Naturally, the Ancients settled on Narus, thinking it would be the easier biosphere to adapt.
Soon, however, the Ancients fell ill, victims of a previously undetected pathogen that altered certain segments of their DNA, rendering a small number of their population sterile. In fear, they retreated from Narus to Abyw, hoping to quell the sickness in the frozen climes of Fluma’s fourth planet. The alterations to their genetic code remained. As fewer and fewer daughters were born among them, their scientists worked feverishly to correct the flaw.
Over time, their population decreased to the point that it neared collapse, causing unrest and instability. Desperate, the Ancients sent their strongest sons to nearby systems to procure suitable wives from among their closest neighbors, by any means possible. Their motto became keep what you can hold , and hold they did, for no other culture dared raid the Abywians in return. Eventually, such habits became a necessary tradition, settled into law, and their neighbors learned to defend against habitual raids. The Pruxn? had never stopped trying to fix the genetic flaw, but had had little success even with help from alien scientists.
Oron seemed fascinated by the brief history lesson, his breakfast forgotten until Alna herself shoveled more food onto his plate. He studied her now, his sharp gaze astute. “You’re a stolen bride?”
Alna’s mouth twitched into a half smile. “Indeed. Gared claimed me on the eve of my induction into the Queen’s Guard.”
“And Tyelu served as your replacement.”
Tyelu shrugged. “The duty suited me well.”
“It did,” her father agreed, gazing fondly at her. “She became a fine warrior. Only a warrior of equal skill could’ve claimed her, eh, daughter?”
Oron talked right over her amused snort. “And you, Kodh. What of your own raids? Have you stolen a wife from some unsuspecting planet?”
Kodh froze, his expression stony. He stared at Jos’s cousin so long, Oron’s own expression hardened, startling Tyelu. She’d allowed her opinions of him to be colored by Jos’s nickname and his relative youth, though he couldn’t be more than two or three Standard years Jos’s junior. Here, though, was the warrior Oron had claimed to be, the battle-worn Q-merc whose own body had betrayed him.
An idle thought pricked her mind: so it was true, then, that all Q studied the warrior arts, as all Pruxn? learned to raid and protect their own.
She shook the thought away as Kodh rose and leveled a glare on her.
“Trust you to spread malicious gossip,” he growled.
She popped out of her seat, her temper twisting into hot flame. “Me? I said nothing! Why would I?”
“For your own juvenile pleasure,” he popped back. “’Twas no one else’s business, cousin. I’ve a mind to challenge you for repeating old history as gossip.”
Oron shoved back from the table, his gaze livid. “She said nothing to me, Kodh. It was an innocent inquiry, nothing more, but if you challenge her, know that you challenge me as well.”
Alna slapped one hand against the table, her tone sharp as the restaurant’s other patrons scooted casually away. “Children, must I remind you of your positions so soon? Can we not have one meal in peace, free of this bickering nonsense?”
Kodh sketched a bow toward her. “As you say, Aunt.”
He stalked away as Tyelu sat and tugged Oron down into his own chair. Gared blithely turned the conversation to the day’s business, and the meal was finished in the peace Alna had demanded of them.
Later, Oron pulled Tyelu aside and asked what he’d done wrong.
“Nothing,” Tyelu murmured. “Kodh went out on the raids during his twenty-second year, not long after becoming eligible. The candidate he brought back for the Choosing found favor with another.”
Oron winced. “No wonder he’s so bitter.”
“Aye,” Tyelu said, and for the first time found sympathy for her blustery cousin. What would she have done if Jos had claimed another woman on the Choosing fields? Would she be any less embittered than Kodh? Would she have found a purpose outside of helpmeet and children, as he had?
Yet he hadn’t tried again to find a bride. Had his pride been so wounded by that early rejection that he couldn’t risk another blow?
She frowned as they made their way to Capital Hall. Had she not despaired, in her own way, of finding a suitable mate?
The question made her squirm, for she’d descended into pride too often in her search for a good husband. She sank into reflection as Sigun called order among those attending the Council of Kafhs and the meeting began.