Susan Sizemore

Pyr had no idea how the scrawny woman put herself between him and his target just as he depressed the needler's trigger. He had less idea how he managed to jerk his hand up as the weapon fired. The ceiling disappeared, as did the deck above that. The energy wave spread out in a bright flash, lighting the scene in stark white and crisp black shadows for a half dozen heartbeats, while the three of them stared at each other in the fading glow.

"Good thing the battery's low on that thing," the koltiri commented, with fearless, irritating sarcasm. "Or we might be breathing space right now."

GATES OF HELL

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional. Any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

A Speculation Press Original.

Speculation Press

P.O. Box 543

DeKalb, IL 60015

ISBN: 0-9671979-2-9

Cover art by Judith Huey

Cover design by Terry Tindill

Editing and layout by Marguerite Krause

First printing January 2000

Chapter One

Pyr absently nodded agreement, and the large woman went on her way, going up the creaking stairs just behind where he sat. Pyr kept his attention on what little was going on around him. The bar wasn't crowded; hadn't been in weeks. The only people in the cavernous room were the command crew from the Raptor, and several outcast native women. Pyr discounted the Orlinian natives.

It was his own men he studied carefully from beneath the wide, flat brim of his hat while waiting for Dosin's messenger. The four of them had been together for many years, but lately they had good reason to keep watch on each other.

Linen was seated at the bar. Silver- and brown-streaked hair obscured his thin face as he bent over a pretty fortune-teller's cards, moving them into patterns he preferred. Pilsane was alone at a table in the center of the room, seated under a half-lit chandelier. Its candles cast gold light on his fair hair and white shirt as he stared at the pieces on a game board. Every now and then he moved one, though there was no partner playing against him on the opposite side of the table. Mik, the heavily-muscled engineer, held a small silver box in one hand, his plain features fixed with utter concentration on the object. He had long, elegant hands for such a big man, capable of the most delicate work. Mik also had two girls vying with the silver box for his attention. Pyr knew the engineer would get around to both women eventually, but would tease them with his intense interest in his work for a while longer.

Pyr shook his head, not sure if he was feeling indulgent or bored by his men's habits. It was a typical downport night. Pilsane, immersed as he was in the Bucon pirate mindset, could almost play a game with himself and lose. Linch consulted the cards as a joke, possibly even as a kindness to the girl reading them. They were on a backward world where the natives feared the future and sought to protect themselves from it.

Pyr could find no unpredictable behavior from any of his crew. He supposed he should be relieved.

Pyr admitted that his tense impatience was typical as well. Patience was almost as much an affectation with him as Pilsane's studied cool was for the navigator. Pyr was known more for his hot temper and ruthlessness. It wasn't a cultivated habit; he was simply not a nice man. He was feeling less nice with every passing moment. Control it, he told himself. "Cold night," he murmured.

He looked down at the untouched glass of wine before him, allowing his men the privacy to pretend not to study him. As he inspected the facets of the cut-crystal goblet he made himself enjoy the texture of the material beneath his fingers, appreciate the primitive style. He kept his longing to crush it to sand in check. Then he took a deep breath, and counted the black-work stitches of embroidery on the hand-woven white tablecloth instead of the passing minutes.

He folded his hands before him and tried to be patient. When he was younger, he had attempted to learn something about meditation from a border-world monk; an elderly warrior who had retired to seek peace in the wilderness. The lessons hadn't taken. So Pyr eventually ran off to be a pirate. It had seemed more useful than the other occupations he'd tried. Though the Bucon pirate guild hadn't been particularly happy with his appearance in the border territory.

After watching his knuckles turn white from the pressure of being patient for a while, he noticed the red skirt of one of the girls as she came toward him. Pyr caught a trace of spicy perfume, carried to him on the cool air. He'd brought the fragrance for the girls a few months ago. It blended well with the underlying scents of candle wax and wood smoke. Simple gifts like perfume pleased Kacina's girls in the days before the plague. Now the only gift they wanted was life. Death was easier to obtain, but he'd done what he could for the women. It at least gave them a false sense of safety, so they could sit in a bar with his men and pretend all was well.

The girl did not stop beside him, just paused hopefully for an instant before she continued on toward the stairway. His sharp ears caught a whispered comment about his lack of interest from the girl to Kacina as she passed the bar owner on the stairs. Pyr ducked his head, hiding an ironic smile beneath the rim of his black hat.

The room was lit only by many candles, and a deep fireplace set in the wall farthest from his table. It was not summer on this world, and Pyr liked warmth. He especially liked the steady warmth of the controlled environment of his ship. On planets, he donned the obligatory pirate garb, and froze more often than not. Mik agreed with him, and wore a heavily fringed suede jacket to combat the chill. Pilsane probably had thermals as well as body armor beneath his flowing-sleeved white shirt. Linch ignored the winter air, wearing no shirt at all. His chest was covered by a worn leather vest, but his corded-muscled arms were bare except for the thick gold bracelet worn by each member of the Raptor's command crew. Pyr didn't know why or how the pilot stood the chill. Pyr had no use for discomfort, and besides the wide-brimmed hat decorated with a heavy silver band, he wore a long black leather overcoat to keep out the cold.

Thinking of coping with natural discomfort did nothing to take his mind off the growing ache that plagued them all. Only one thing helped the relentless hunger in his body and mind. His mind he could control, but the body made its own demands. The dependency did nothing for his temper. He gave a silent snarl as he dug into the deep pocket of his coat and fished out a clear, cylindrical bottle. He placed it on the center of the table, and looked at it with utter hatred. Then Pyr lifted his head to watch his men casually drift away from their pursuits and toward the drug that called them all. Pride and pretense was about all they had to fight with. Linch lingered the longest over the cards, then kissed the fortune teller and joined Mik and Pilsane, who had already taken seats on either side of Pyr.

Once seated opposite his captain, Linch said quietly, "I thought we were going to wait fifty hours this time."

"I don't plan to die today," Pyr answered, his gaze locking with the pilot's. He flicked the top off the bottle while the others watched. He was surrounded by their hunger, as sharp as knives. "You could wait another two hours," he suggested.

Linch's thin lips creased in a smile. "I don't plan to die today either, Dha-lrm."

Pyr lifted one eyebrow in question at the affection in the pilot's voice. Sometimes he forgot the friendship between them. "I'm happy to hear it," Pyr said, and got a slight nod in reply.

He doled out a capsule apiece to himself and his crew. They had an adequate supply of Rust, but had come to a mutual decision to limit themselves to a minimum dosage. Drugs were for fools. Dependence on drug dealers was for slaves.

"How fortunate one of Persey's ships happened to be passing when we raided Nadere," Pilsane commented after he popped his capsule into his mouth.

Mik laughed coldly, and downed the clear orange drug. "How silly of Persey's people to think they could negotiate a price with us."

Pyr didn't join in the wry conversation. He held his capsule carefully between thumb and forefinger, waiting for Linch. The pilot cupped his dose of life in his palm for a few seconds longer, then finally tossed into his mouth. He swallowed it with a gulp of Pyr's wine. Linch set the half-empty glass down next to the Rust bottle. Pyr frowned at both, and swallowed his own capsule before Mik or Pilsane decided to make a comment. With the ritual over, Pyr put the bottle in his pocket and sat back in his chair.

"We know," Pilsane answered for them all. Pyr managed not to sneer at the trio, just because they were expecting it.

"How much longer are we going to wait?" Mik questioned, glancing over his shoulder to where his girls waited. One of them was poking nervously at his silver box. He shook his head. "Good thing it's not a weapon. Siiti, hands off!" The girl gasped, and jumped out of her chair. Her companion laughed stridently. Mik gestured toward the stairway. "Upstairs, you two." He looked at Pyr.

The big man stood, and followed the sound of anticipatory giggling as the girls ran up to a bedroom.

"At least he knows how to relieve the boredom," Pilsane said, and went back to his one-man game.

Pyr rubbed his cold hands together. He wore large, heavy rings on both hands. The jewels in them set off sparks of red and purple and black in the candlelight. "Dosin said tonight."

"Teach the other datarats to be prompt," Pyr explained. "Discipline, my brother."

"The first and most important lesson of all." Linch mouthed the rest of the old saying with disdain. It mattered little what he really thought. Attitude was the important thing in the border worlds.

The door to the tavern opened as Linch stood. It let in a blast of outside air, a small man, and a slender girl dressed only in a thin white shift. Dosin. With a most unexpected companion. Pyr shivered, not sure if it was from the cold or the scars covering the girl's face and pale arms.

Kacina moved from her chosen spot by the hearth to block the girl's way. "What are you doing here, Sister?" She spoke in a reverent whisper, very unlike Kacina's normally gruff manner.

The girl shrank away from the big woman. She stood with her hands clasped before her, gaze on the polished wood of the floor. She was barely as substantial as a bad thought, but her presence riveted everyone's wary attention.

Pyr loathed the respect he heard in the woman's tone. He didn't like the way the other women drew suddenly into the room's heavy shadows. Shame and tension radiated from the Orlinians as strongly as the scent of spice perfume.

"All here are outworlders and heretics," Kacina said, gesturing at her patrons. "Soiled beyond conversion."

"I have dispensation," the priestess answered. Her voice was soft, the contempt at having to speak to an outcast icy. Kacina looked surprised at having been spoken to at all, but bowed to the girl and moved aside. She hurriedly joined her women as far away from the fanatic as they could get without showing the disrespect of fleeing from one of the Saved.

Pyr shook his head as Dosin and the priestess continued toward him. Shadow and light from the wavering candles played around them as they approached. He waited, steeling himself for an encounter with one of the fanatics, just barely keeping the snarl out of his throat. The small man took the chair opposite Pyr. The girl remained standing, hovering like a ghost behind Dosin's back. The white draperies of her dress and her long, stringy hair stirred eerily in the room's faint draft. Pyr tried to ignore her for the moment, though he could feel the fire of her insanity radiating toward him. Hardly the sort of warmth he craved.

Linch and Pilsane waited by the bar and game board, inconspicuous, but within hearing distance. Pyr lay his hands flat on the table, looking down, his hat once again shadowing his face.

"Good evening." Dosin's voice was steady, but Pyr heard the grating of the datarat's nerves. Bad news, then, or none at all. "I bring my apologies at my ineptitude, Captain Pyr."

Pyr sharply lifted his head to glare at the native. He kept his voice soft. "Oh?"

Dosin quickly pointed to the girl behind him. "This Sister is called Lita. She was sent to me, and I brought her to you." He hastily vacated his chair and pushed the girl into it. She sat with a shocked thud. Dosin clamped his hands on her shoulders to keep her from fleeing. "This one has brought many deaths," he introduced Pyr. "With your help, little Sister, he can bring many more."

Pyr forced himself to look at the girl. He didn't think she could be much more than eighteen. Some of her scars were probably nearly as old. The most recent marks seemed to be a still-inflamed trio of triangular brands on her forehead and cheeks. Marks of the highest order of the native religion, identifying her as one of Idel's own sisters. She was marked to die young and in a great deal of pain. Knowing she looked forward to it made Pyr's skin crawl.

He didn't let his revulsion show. "I am a killer of many," he told Lita. She smiled shyly at him. Her teeth had been filed to razor points. Pyr swallowed quietly and went on. "How can you help me, Sister?"

"It happens once every six years," Dosin explained. "Hunters' moons, Captain. It's a night when the goddess looks favorably on your kind."

Dosin squeezed Lita's narrow shoulders. "Lord Idel says he will speak with you tonight. Lord Idel knows a great deal about what goes on in the Empire," the datarat hurried to explain. "Death is his vocation. He makes it his business to know who deals death among the Bucon and along the borders." After some hesitation, Dosin added, "He's one of my best sources of data. But with the plague… he's only interested in fulfilling the prophecies."

"You are an instrument of the goddess," Lita added piously. Her mad eyes, a pale silver-blue, looked at Pyr with adoration.

"Idel sees your being in port during Hunters' Festival as a sign from the goddess," Dosin explained.

The girl reached into the bosom of her dress and brought out something clenched in her small fist. Pyr held out his hand and she placed a piece of jewelry in his palm. It was warm from contact with her flesh, the colors of the three jewels set in the circular gold brooch matching the ruby, amethyst, and onyx in the rings he wore. He closed his hand on the brooch. It did not feel like a copy. When Pyr looked up, he saw Linch and Pilsane standing over him, and could hear Mik clattering down the stairs.

Mik stopped behind the priestess and patted the girl on the head. His face was flushed a dark copper, and his breath came out in puffs of steam. "I don't want to end up looking like the little one here."

The girl's face was too ruined to show any proper expression, but Pyr watched her icy eyes glint with fury. Apparently she'd expected them to joyfully run off into the arms of her cult.

The engineer snatched his hand back and wiped it on his pants' leg. "That's why I'm not going to the temple," he explained. "They all bite."

"Very bad habits," Linch agreed. He glanced over at the women who'd crowded into a corner like herdbeasts. "I do have plans for the evening, Captain."

"And this really isn't any of our business," Pilsane added. He smiled. "Have a nice time."

At least his teeth weren't pointed. Pyr sighed as his three men backed off into the shadows. "It is my affair," he acknowledged.

Pyr shrugged. "It's not a strong possibility." He stood, kicking his chair back across the floor. It scraped loudly against the polished wood. "Shall we go?"

Dosin shuddered. "I've come as far as I plan on the Hunters' night. The priestess will protect you," he promised as Pyr glowered at him. "Good hunting, Captain."

Pyr didn't insist. He didn't mention any payment for the datarat's services, either. Dosin pretended not to notice as Pyr came around the table. He grabbed the girl by the upper arm, and his fingers dug into her fragile skin as he pulled her to her feet. The layers of scarring felt even worse than they looked. "Then it's into the night with us, Lita," he told her with grim cheerfulness.

She gave him a saw-toothed smile. "Good hunting for us both," she said, radiating blood-lust and anticipation.

Pyr's eyes met Pilsane's as the navigator looked up briefly from his solitary game, then he shoved the girl ahead of him toward the door.

Kacina waited before the entrance, blocking his way. The big woman looked guilty. She held out a nearly full bottle of Rust as he approached. "Lord Pyr," she said humbly. "I want to return these to you. It is unholy to hide from death." She glanced covertly at the priestess. "Even for an outcast."

Lita gave Kacina an approving nod. Pyr's hand clenched even tighter on the girl's frail arm. Her only reaction to the pain was a mildly romantic sigh.

"Demons! I have no time for this nonsense." He used his free hand to push Kacina aside. "You'll be glad of the medicine once the madwoman is out of sight." He noticed for the first time how warm Lita's skin was. Warm, with a faint film of sweat on this winter night. Early signs of the plague. The brightness of her eyes wasn't just madness, then. No happy death at the hands of the torturer for her. He wondered if he should pity her. It was a good thing he hadn't decided to wait another two hours for his own hit of the drug.

Kacina insistently pressed the bottle into his hand. He took it, tossed it over his shoulder. "Linch." He didn't have to look to know the pilot had caught the bottle.

"Have a short and specific discussion about matters of life and death with the ladies after I'm gone."

He glared at Kacina, and the repentant Orlinian lumbered hurriedly out of his way. As he pushed Lita before him into the cold darkness, he grumbled, "Women."

Chapter Two

The lumpy paving was slippery beneath his boots. The natives barred their doors at sunset, leaving the night to heretics, outcasts, the Saved, and well-armed outworlders. The small spaceport had its own lighting but, once in the streets of the primitive city, a torch, or good night vision, was necessary. Pyr had better-than-average hearing, but average sight. And no torch tonight. Even with both small moons at full, it was difficult to find his way in the post-midnight quiet.

Lita wriggled out of his grasp soon after they left Kacina's. She flitted ahead of him, her draperies doing a ghost-dance. Her insane laughter made the night seem colder as he threaded carefully after her. Every now and then he could hear the howling of the prowling Initiates. Once he heard the screams of one of the suicides who'd decided it was better to be a sacrifice to the Hunter than the plague. So far, he hadn't seen anyone but his guide.

Pyr balled his hands into fists inside his deep coat pockets and bit his tongue to keep from shouting at her. It was bad enough that his boots rang hollowly against the old stones with every step, and his leather coat creaked quietly as it swung around his legs. No use adding voice to the sounds that already filled the darkness. He glanced up between overhanging roofs of old buildings to see both moons staring down, like blind eyes turned on the dying. The Hunter's Eyes, he'd heard Kacina call them—and guiltily make the outcast's sign against death. The worst thing about Orlin's death cult, he decided, was that since the Bucons built a port on this backward world, Orlinian missionaries were spreading their religion to other border cultures.

He abandoned watching the moons as the girl came dancing out of a side street just a few feet ahead of him. She beckoned him on, then bounded ahead to explore the deep shadows of doorways. Pyr paused long enough to check on the emptiness of the street crossing his path, then stomped after Lita.

He knew someone was following him within a half dozen steps into deeper silence. Not at street level, but above, gliding along the walls of the brick and wooden buildings just a few feet over his head. Noiseless—but for the nearly undetectable hum of anti-grav pads sliding along the natural materials of the houses. Not a native killer, then. No Orlinian would use anything but blessed steel on a night like this. And no native cutthroat would venture out of the port neighborhoods to risk an encounter with blessed steel. Guild assassin, then. Persey had probably complained to the authorities.

Pyr turned his head, listening carefully as a pack of Initiates began shrieking and baying no more than a block away. There were shouts of joy and sounds of pleading. Pyr could just barely make out the slap of bare feet and thud of boots on the cobblestones. Lita ran back to him and grabbed his hand, trying to pull him forward. Her skin had gone from hot to chilled and clammy. The moonlight stripped her paleness down to corpse white.

"I've made no kill." She tugged hard, pleading, "Let us join the hunt. There's time to bring blood to Idel."

The hunt's intended victim came pelting toward them, a big man in a fringed suede jacket, his long hair flying wildly behind him. He was followed closely by a trio of white-robed wraiths. Pyr saw knives washed by moonlight in their upraised hands.

Pyr shook his head, and threw the girl off. He heard the assassin drop to the ground behind him, sensibly taking advantage of the activity in the street. The Guild operative thought he'd have time to . make his kill, then jump out of the hunt's way.

Pyr projected the thought so loudly that his would-be murderer was clutching his temples in surprised pain by the time Pyr turned to face him, weapon in hand.

Being a telepath, Pyr whispered into the Bucon assassin's stunned mind, has proved to have many uses.

His was a talent strangers found out about as they died. But instead of killing the assassin, Pyr stunned him as he started to scream, then shoved the falling body against a wall as the hunt surrounded him.

He relaxed as he saw the engineer banging a pair of Orlinian heads together. Bones crunched as Mik laughed, and kicked out at the third attacker. The third native danced agilely away, brandishing the knife like the madman he was.

The Initiate was a boy about Lita's age, and just as scarred. He saw Pyr, and lunged forward, knife aimed at Pyr's chest. Lita screeched, throwing herself between Pyr and the blade. Pyr grabbed the girl around the waist and fired his weapon, thumbing the setting to maximum. The boy glowed blue-white briefly, then died.

Mik jerked a thumb at the unconscious assassin. "I spotted the crawler a few blocks back and figured you could use a diversion. Wasn't hard to get the kids to follow me." Mik grinned. "Want me to question the Guilder?"

The girl was humming quietly to herself, her eyes shining worshipfully up at him. "It was a beautiful death," she told him. "Full of diamonds."

Pyr tightened his telepathic shields, making himself alone with the girl once more. He took a deep breath of the cold air, but it didn't help much. It was the rotting minds on this world that stank. He focused his consciousness, his concentration. An Assassin's Guild contract was one more piece of trouble he didn't need. He would have to send them a warning that their games were over in the border for now. Things were not business as usual for anybody in his territory until he said so.

He released his hold on the girl, but she continued to cling to him. She grasped his left hand tightly in both of hers, and raised it to her cheek. He resisted the urge to shake her off, and tried glaring at her instead. Her response was to bare her fangs in a parody of a smile—and swiftly turn her head to bury her sharpened teeth in the soft skin just below his thumb.

Pyr bellowed, and felt blood spurt into the girl's mouth while she continued to gnaw on him. Her filed fangs went through muscle and down to bone.

He brought his right hand up, cuffing her below the ear. She stumbled backward, her mouth and cheeks covered in dark blood. Her shoulders hit the wall of the building behind them and she slid slowly to her knees. She stayed on the ground, giggling drunkenly to herself.

Pyr kept his gaze on her while he dug into several coat pockets with his right hand. He held his injured hand to his chest, fist tightly clenched, but blood oozed out between his fingers to wet the leather of his coat. He eventually found the length of white silk he'd worn as a headband earlier in the day. He pulled out the cloth and wrapped it around the wound several times. The torn flesh throbbed painfully and was still bleeding heavily. Once he'd arranged the makeshift bandage, he grabbed Lita by the hair and pulled her to her feet.

"Why?" He shook her angrily. She giggled. Pyr loosed his hold on the madwoman, denying her the pleasure of fear and pain. "Why?" he asked again, hoping he wouldn't have to touch the twisted mind behind her actions.

"You give beautiful death," she answered. Once again her eyes looked worshipfully into his. "I have given you death in exchange for mine. A gift of the Hunting. You are my victim. I will be yours." She dropped her head and scuffed her bare feet on the cobbles. In the dim light from the full moons the horrible scars were invisible. She seemed no more than a naughty child as she said, "Idel will not be pleased." Her head came back up. "You taste of metal." She licked her stained lips. "Is bitter blood different than ours? Will the poison work slower or faster, I wonder?"

Pyr did not remember grabbing the girl's shoulders, but he seemed to have them between his hands, at least one collarbone broken before he controlled the rage. "What poison?" His voice was ragged with controlled fear. The pain in his hand was growing worse. He wished it was imagination, and knew it wasn't.

"Stralisare," she answered readily, without even the decency to wince as he broke her other clavicle. "It is the goddess's own poison. Stralisare," Lita repeated, turning the word into a snake's hiss.

She'd painted her teeth with Stralisare? He wanted to scream—not with fear or pain. He wanted to howl from sheer frustration. With the galaxy crumbling around him and him trying to pick up as many pieces as he could, he had made no contingency for this. How typically, arrogantly, stupid of him to have ignored the possibility of his own death. Stralisare. Painful. Fatal. No cure. Slow, but not slow enough. The effects worked differently with each type of humanoid, but work they did. It could be a few days, or a few weeks.

Too much to do in too little time as it was—and this damn fool girl killed him on a whim.

"Death isn't beautiful," He assured Lita. "Death just is." Inconvenient and mindless and impossible to avoid. "Don't run to it as if it held your answers." Too late for philosophy. Too late for pity. He grabbed her arm, and pushed her up the street before him. He had no intention of letting her slip away before they reached the temple. Hunting cries and screams from the prey sounded occasionally around them as she directed him to the center of the city.

Pilsane peeled himself from the deepest shadow of the temple courtyard. He'd been waiting beneath the great statue of the goddess, directly in front of the arched entrance to the windowless, marble building. The torches which normally lit the grisly, blackened visage of the goddess were extinguished for the night. None of her devotees were keeping vigil under her skeletal image during Hunters' Moon. The stench of old blood and rotting flesh from the constant sacrifices of every other day of the year lingered in the chilled air. No flowers or incense for the death goddess of Orlin.

"What happened to your hand?" Pilsane asked as he walked toward the entrance beside Pyr. He leaned against a pillar as they reached the doorway, and added, "Your little walk was to give me time to check out the temple, not get you into trouble."

Pyr pulled his hand from Lita's frail shoulder. She hunched forward, finally showing some reaction to the broken bones. "The bitch needs a muzzle. Mik reported yet?"

Pilsane shook his head. "Sensors don't indicate any activity inside or out of the temple that is in any way out of the ordinary for the locals. Bioscan reads that everyone inside the temple is Orlinian. You going in?"

Pyr thought of the brooch in his pocket. "Do I have a choice?" His whole hand was hurting now.

Pyr nodded. Pilsane pushed himself away from the pillar and faded back into the darkness beneath the statue. Pyr grimaced, flexed his aching hand, then pushed the priestess ahead of him through the door.

"Pyr of the Raptor, join me." Lord Idel smiled down from a skull-shaped throne.

An image identical to the statue in the courtyard loomed over the rounded back of Idel's throne, her bald head circled by a ring of fire.

A ring of torches circled the long room as well, throwing out light and heat. Smoke curled up to the soot-blackened ceiling high overhead. Pyr welcomed the warmth, even though the acrid air irritated his lungs. Black and red mosaics tiled the floor of the huge room. Their texture was almost as rough as the cobblestone streets of the town. The wall paintings were vivid depictions of ritual mutilations and sacrifices. One wall featured a freshly-painted mural showing the death of worlds; the spiral of the galaxy painted as a fall of glowing ashes. It was a modern addition to the native belief in the necessary destruction of all life.

Idel was alone in the room. The high priest looked casually relaxed as he leaned back on his throne, legs crossed, a silver goblet of something Pyr hoped was wine in one hand. The young high priest was imitating more than Bucon attitudes. Instead of traditional white robes, he was dressed in tight black leather boots and trousers. His chest was bare, except for a heavy pectoral collar. The design was of gold snakes twined with silver whips and jeweled chains. He smiled again, and Pyr noted a glint of impatience in the boy's pale eyes. Idel's skin was white, contrasting sharply with his leather clothes and heavy black hair. No scars.

Priests were sacred beings, raised to make sacrifices, not to be sacrifices. Idel was probably the only person on the whole planet who had never known a moment of pain. Or a moment without any wish fulfilled. A spoiled brat reared to unnatural whims. A smart brat, from what Pyr had heard about him. One with a hint of eagerness shining in his eyes.

Pyr waited. He held Lita still between his hands when she would rather have been groveling at her lord's feet. As the silence grew, Idel's welcoming smile turned into a sneer. Pyr did not believe in spoiling children, and had no intention of stepping into the fire for the boy's entertainment until he was ready. Fire was what waited between the door and the foot of the dais. Pyr had noticed the thin silver line of a personal security system that circled the walls beneath the ring of torches. Idel was in control of a toy that could be set from a warning tingle to instant death. It would be one of the in-between settings the high priest used on his guest; a little test, and minor entertainment before getting down to business. The controls were on the arm of the skull throne, where Idel's right hand rested languidly on the curved surface.

Pyr was not really interested in proving his stoic imperviousness to the world at large. Having to prove it to his own men was inconvenient enough. Warrior codes were a lot of nonsense. Pain hurt. Nothing wrong with screaming and writhing in agony if it didn't get in the way of business. But of course, screaming and writhing wouldn't get him what he needed from the boy. Pyr permitted himself an exasperated sigh.

Since the plague will take her in a few days, anyway, Pyr added silently. Here was another game he'd rather not play, even though the girl had forfeited her life with the bite. Pity it had to be done as entertainment for Idel.

Pyr bent his head and whispered in the girl's ear. "May you find a better world." She was in shock from broken bones, and starting to feel the fever. When he snapped her neck she hardly noticed dying. Pyr felt it as an easing of pressure on his shields. One less mad mind to keep out. "No diamonds for you, Lita."

Pyr dropped the body and stepped forward, hands buried deep in his pockets. The boy leaned forward in his chair, expression eager, eyes hungry. Having a wonderful time.

The space between them was immediately blanketed by a web of greenish light. Pyr walked into it as if he didn't notice the flickering ribbons of energy he had to wade through to get to Idel. About one third strength, he estimated. How flattering. He set an unhurried pace, though it felt like heated metal melting through leather and silk and flesh. The lightweb died as he reached the foot of the dais, leaving only torch light to illuminate the room. The pain died with the light. Pyr nodded slightly to Idel, who tossed away his goblet. It bounced off the statue of the goddess with a loud, grating clang.

Pyr drew the brooch out of his pocket, showed it to Idel, then put it away. "Another gift, Lord Idel?"

"It is known that you search for a traitor who deserted your ship. You hunt for him through the border worlds and into the chaos of the Bucon Empire. The traitor wore your colors on a piece of jewelry. That piece of jewelry."

"It's not so much the traitor I'm interested in," Pyr replied. "I want to find who he sold his services to."

Idel sat forward on his skull throne. "Of course. You seek to manipulate the delicate balance of power among you Bucons. Each pirate lord has territory, bases, private arrangements, many secrets."

"And traitors die," Pyr said to encourage Idel's interest. "I want death for the traitor as well. Before he dies I need to know who he works for."

"You are not like other Bucons, Captain. You are more ruthless than most." Idel beamed a smile of approval at Pyr, who nodded in acknowledgment.

"There are Outsiders on the other side of the Rose, Idel," he answered the priest. Or Borderers, as some called them. Not even the most skilled datarats knew the true name and nature of the mysterious people beyond the nebula. "Ruthlessness is required to deal with Outsiders."

"One never hears anything gentle about Outsiders," Idel agreed. The boy's pale eyes studied him carefully. "And with many Bucons seeking to take over your territory, you find it difficult to discover which poses the strongest threat." He grinned. "I love studying the complicated games of your people."

That Idel had inserted himself in Pyr's business was a good indication that the young high priest felt he'd studied long enough; that it was time to enter the game himself. Pyr began to find the hot room stifling. Heavy smells of rotting flesh and smoke permeated the air. Primitive world. Primitive schemes. "It's simple, Lord Idel," he said. "No one steals what is mine."

"The plague might take you. Steal the life you do not dedicate to the goddess. Death in many forms may destroy your power."

"Death only makes me stronger." Idel crossed his arms. "Death brings the goddess power. Most Bucons are cowards who bargain with those who cross them. You kill. You make sacrifice of traitors and would-be usurpers."

The Meek were missionaries Idel sent to preach redemption through pain and death on the pirate base worlds and on trader ships. They also served as torturers for at least a dozen minor pirate captains. Cheap and enthusiastic labor who asked no more than a chance to preach and practice their faith. Ears and eyes for Idel, Pyr realized now. It appeared the boy had ambitions to rule the border in place of Bucons or Borderers or the United Systems. It made sense for Idel to offer Pyr information. When Pyr was done, there would be fewer Bucons alive to challenge Idel's own ambitions.

Pyr couldn't spare the time to inquire into Idel's plans for the future. "Where's Axylel?"

"Paal's a thieving pimp." Pyr almost smiled. "Honorable professions, both. Where did Paal get the jewelry?"

"Don't be ridiculous. If Paal let one of your spies get the brooch to you, it's because he got it from someone else. He's trying to placate me, but not get involved himself." You're playing it too cleverly, Paal, Pyr thought angrily. We'll have to have a talk about that sometime in the future. Pyr nearly laughed aloud. He had no future. He better leave a few notes for Linch. "I'm betting you know this game. Who did Paal get the brooch from?"

Suddenly Idel seemed as tired of this conversation as Pyr. He yawned. "My hunters will be returning soon. I have a ceremony to perform. The name you want is Denvry. I am told that Paal stole the pin from one of Denvry's women."

"No one has seen the Raptor's other red-head for weeks." Idel's yawned again. "It surprised everyone when he fled your cabin for another's protection."

Pyr didn't let it annoy him. "Bucons go where the profit is, Lord Idel. The boy's only trying to do what's best for himself." On a whim, he once more fished out his bottle of Rust. As he tossed it to the priest, he said, "My thanks. Tuck that away before your followers find out it isn't a miracle that spares you from the plague."

Idel laughed cynically. "Rust is a miracle, Captain. So is the plague. Good hunting."

Pyr raised his right wrist and pressed one of the controls on his bracelet with stiffening fingers. "Pilsane."

Within moments the black circle opened before him. He walked through, away from the too-hot room and its stench of death. Inside the Door his eyes were blinded by white light that blocked out the shocked mask of Idel's face. Pyr couldn't help but think of diamonds.

"Welcome home," Linch greeted as Pyr and Pilsane stepped aboard the ship. "You look like shit, Dha-lrm," he added cheerfully.

"I look like a man in need of some sleep," Pyr answered as he pulled off his hat and shook out his long red hair.

The three of them left the Door room and walked down the long, empty corridor toward the central commons. The emptiness was odd. The Raptor was bigger, faster, and better equipped than any other raider in the border territory. It took more than four competent men to operate the ship efficiently. Many of the crew had died of the plague, two had disappeared with Axylel. The others—

"Our leader better get himself to the dispensary," Pilsane advised. "Those fangs must have made a messy cut."

"You miss her because she liked music," Pyr informed the pilot. At least that was the reason Linch gave for bringing a sixty-year-old Terran physician back from the Morkan slave market after the crew had specifically requested a pretty, young medic. Right now Pyr was glad there was no one in the dispensary who could report his little problem to anyone else on board.

Pyr ignored him as they entered the common room. Mik was seated at a long table. The room held other smaller tables, a computer station, and holo game terminals. There were doors leading to crew quarters on either side of a food prep and serving area. The common had a carelessly cluttered look, with data boards and the remains of finished meals left on the tables.

Mik had a heaped plate in front of him. He barely looked up as they entered. The crawler belonged to Persey, he reported, telepathic shields lowered so that everyone could catch the thought while he occupied his mouth with food. Had nothing of interest to say, so I spaced him.

Pilsane and Linch took seats at the table. Pyr remained standing. He took the brooch out of his pocket long enough to show the others. "We're looking for Denvry." He received three anticipatory smiles.

"At last!" Mik spun his chair away from the table. "Somewhere to go. Something to do."

"Another drug runner to kill," Linch added as he picked up the eight-stringed ligret he'd left lying across a chair. He fingered the instrument, producing an amplified, baying howl. Linch communicated with music as much as he did with words or thoughts. He continued to play quietly as they talked.

"Possibly," Pyr agreed cautiously. He pulled off his long coat and tossed it toward an empty chair. It landed on the deck. He raised a sardonic eyebrow at Pilsane's annoyed look. "Yes?"

Pilsane looked disgustedly around the common. "I don't recall being boarded and ransacked. This place looks like it, though." Linch underscored the words with a few sympathetically sighing chords. "No wonder Kristi calls us slobs." Pilsane had to speak loudly to be heard over the sound of the ligret. Over the years they'd all gotten used to talking over the sound of the ligret.

'Slob' was a word from Kristi's native Terran language; an evocative sound that had become part of the crew's pidgin language. "Very well," Pyr conceded to Pilsane. "Let Kristi and Vi out of their quarters to perform maintenance—after we've set course for Denvry's base."

Pilsane grinned, happy to hear that his creature comforts were to be looked after. The easily controlled couple were his personal additions to the Raptor's odd complement. Pilsane had taken to them in much the same way Linch had taken to the dead medic. Their attitudes toward the chattel were almost like children with pets. Better than thinking of them as friends, Pyr cautioned himself. Then, it was a nasty life he led, wasn't it? Nastier still, if he let himself think of any but his own kind as people.

Pyr sat down at the computer console. After he'd been there for a few minutes, Pilsane came to look over his shoulder. Linch played quietly on while Mik finished his meal. Pyr's hand ached as he called up data, rearranged datacubes, and tried again. Screens full of information flashed by.

"I thought this was my private code," Pyr complained when the probable location of Denvry's base showed on the screen.

"Got bored and broke it a couple days ago." Pilsane patted Pyr on the shoulder. "You're getting better, Captain."

"Thank you." Pilsane had the instincts of a datarat, and a smirk Pyr didn't have to look at to know was there. There was no keeping secrets on board the Raptor. Not that they didn't all try. "I'll attempt to make my code tougher to crack next time."

All the research in Pyr's database indicated that Denvry was on Calrod. Denvry, and four ships, and maybe eighty people. The odds were not unreasonable, but it was further into Bucon territory than Pyr had ventured until now. Hard to keep control of the border when he wasn't there.

Pyr shut down the station and turned to face the room. Pilsane took a few steps back as he swiveled the chair. Linch lifted his gaze from the ligret strings. When he had their attention, Pyr finally addressed the questions Pilsane had brought up earlier. "We'll need minimum stations manned. How's the Rust supply?"

"Approximately twenty days' worth," Linch answered. "Who of the crew do we trust?" Linch stated the heart of the matter. "And what do we offer them? Besides Rust. They're greedy bastards." He ran his fingers absently up and down scales as he spoke.

After some discussion, they agreed on three crewmembers who were vital, and still trustworthy enough to return to duty. That left forty more plague survivors locked up with their habits in the chattel hold.

"Crew's getting restless," Pilsane warned. "Kith's goading them to remember they're pirates. It's not just Rust they want. It's going to get ugly."

"Mutinies are boring," Pyr said. "They stay locked up. Let Kith know I'll consider using crew for raiding Denvry's base."

Linch set the ligret aside. The pilot suddenly had the appearance of a thin, sharp blade; a weapon that could be depended on. Pyr smiled affectionately, comfortable for the moment with the ties and trust of years, though he barely let the expression reach his face. It got him a thought-sent flicker of amusement from Linch anyway.

After they were gone Pyr let himself have a moment to slump wearily in the chair. He scrubbed his right hand across his face and through the bangs covering his forehead. Demons, it hurt! He would go to the dispensary all right, to look for painkillers. When he left the common he pretended he felt as brisk and efficient as he tried to look. He told himself this was good practice for the masquerade he was going to have to live as long as he could before his ever-watchful officers caught on. The smile that came to his lips when he entered the dispensary was genuine, as he realized he'd take a certain perverse pleasure in fooling them as long as possible. It was too bad Axylel wasn't here to wager with him on their reactions.

Chapter Three

The nebula that filled the flat viewscreens on the briefing room bulkheads was not officially designated as the Rose, though everyone called it that anyway. Dr. Roxanne Merkrates thought it was a very pretty picture, but gave only a passing glance to the dozen different views on display as she took her seat at the room's long central table for the weekly briefing. She didn't suppose the pictures were up there for decor, despite the impeccable aesthetic sense of the Tigris's captain. He looked good framed by the glowing outline of the nebula as he took his seat at the head of the table. But then, Eamon Merkrates' angular patrician features, tilted jade-green eyes, and faintly green-tinted platinum hair always looked good, as he knew so well.

Even though they'd argued part of the night away, he looked as fresh as though he'd slept with a clean conscience. Maybe he had. She had been working in the lab. After all, she had to do something, and if he wouldn't—

She focused her gaze on the holoprojection of the galaxy hovering colorfully above the center of the table. The map showed the current shapes and borders and overlapping territories of the known interstellar powers. There was the gold that marked the outline of the hundreds of worlds of the United Systems and the silver of the Bucon Empire. There was a tiny slice of rose pink for the guessed influence of the worlds beyond the Rose Nebula, the leprous, shrunken, ragged red blot that showed the estimated area currently under Trin domination, and the blue blobs and dots that showed suspected Pirate League influence. The Powers That Be didn't take up all that much space on the sparkling pinwheel shape of the map. She was used to seeing this map at every meeting, and usually only paid attention to the shape of the red space. The focus for the people aboard the Tigris was helping that red spot grow smaller and smaller, until it disappeared. Today, the familiar starfield reminded Roxy of sparks flung up from a bonfire by huge storm surge of wind. She couldn't help but think of those sparks raining back down as the dead ashes of worlds.

The fanciful image chilled her, and she cleared her emotions and carefully kept her expression innocent of anything but alert respect as the Captain's gaze took in his senior officers. Eamon was all business all the time, and tended to come down hard on her when she behaved with less than his estimation of professional while on duty. He didn't cut her any slack for her lack of Academy training, being koltiri, or the fact that she was his wife. And he was right, of course. Only—

The Captain's voice cut into her like a laser scalpel. When had that authoritative tone become irritating rather than reassuring? "Yes, sir," she answered, though she couldn't help but wonder how she'd given any indication that her attention was far from being at another damned boring meeting. She hadn't yawned, had she?

"Just checking." His glance cut to his second in command. "Go ahead, Commander Weaver."

Roxy folded her hands together in her lap, kept her gaze on the databoard she'd brought with her instead of the holomap, and simply tried to listen until her turn came. Maybe he wouldn't call on her, as he already knew he wasn't going to like her making either her information, or her position, public.

On one side of her sat the silver-furred Felinid security chief, all slim and sleek and dangerous, making even the dull black of the MilService uniform look good. On the other was big, burly, hairy Bear O'Hare—whose daddy had been Ursid and whose Terran momma had been careful. There were a lot of mixed matings in the United Systems, with its nearly eight-hundred-year history and huge population of worlds peopled by the diversity of humanoid life-forms engendered by the Neshama Seedings. She was a product of one mixed mating, when a koltiri had been bonded to a Terran. She knew she and Eamon were another mixed mating, even though the people born on his homeworld rejected the very idea of the Neshama.

"Beyond the Rose," Commander Maura Weaver's words drew Roxy's attention only because that was the title of a song her sister had written, "is unknown territory."

That one too, "Unknown Territory." What was this, a staff meeting or a retrospective of Reine Shirah's greatest hits? Roxy did not crack a smile with the thought, but several people around her did. Such was the curse of being an empath in a good mood; it was catching.

The captain didn't notice. His attention was on his first officer as she continued. "Long-range scout drones have shown a massive build up of Borderer ships on their—uh, border." There was faint laughter around the table. "It would be nice if we actually knew what the isolationists call themselves," Maura added after the room was quiet again. "It would help to not only know who they are, but what they're doing."

"Intelligence hasn't been able to provide any more than the drone data," Captain Merkrates told his officers. "But the Coordinated Services' Council has made the decision to put all long-range patrol vessels on alert."

"Us," Bear O'Hare summed up Eamon's official statement. "We're on our way to the Rose." There was a certain eagerness in Bear's tone. Roxy understood. There were fewer combat assignments to go around lately, and the adrenaline rush of danger tended to be addicting.

Roxy glanced at the pretty pink and red projection of the Rose Nebula on the wall screens. "It's their border," she found herself saying, though the ship's Medical Officer had no business expressing anything but medical opinions in a briefing. "As long as there're no Trin involved, if they want to park their whole fleet on their side of it, it's none of our business. It would be nice if they'd talk to us," she went on, as all eyes looked her way. "We don't know what they look like or what they call themselves after fifty years of trying to get their attention. Why not send another ambassadorial mission instead of combat vessels? Haven't we got more important things to do than worry about some paranoid non-aligned aliens?" She knew she'd said too much. A good officer followed orders without questioning them and didn't offer opinions without being asked. She wasn't a very good officer.

"I know, I know," she added before some other senior officer could point her faults out to her. "Stick to your job, Physician. Ours is not to reason why and this is a briefing room not the mess hall." She slouched down in her chair; not an easy position for such a tall woman to assume in a plasform chair that did its best to be comfortable at all times. She had to kick its control leg to get it to let her slump.

Eamon had steepled his fingers on the simulated wood tabletop, but was not feeling particularly annoyed as he gazed her way. He was feeling indulgent, which was ever so much more annoying to her—and he knew it. "Thank you for issuing your own reprimand, Roxy."

"Though perhaps you would care to tell us what you consider more important than defending the United Systems from another possible invasion."

Roxy was unabashed at being put on the spot. She also could tell by the warning look he gave that he already regretted giving her permission to bring up her concerns so early in the briefing. She sat up straight, every bit of amused diffidence leached from her demeanor. It was the Physician who answered the Captain's question. "Sagouran Fever."

"Which is?" Dee Nikophoris of Sciences urged. Dee already knew; she'd spent time in the lab with Roxy last night. Dee was a constant ally, but she also knew how to cover her tracks and her butt, since she and Captain Merkrates weren't the best of friends.

Roxy glanced at the childhood friend who had ended up serving with her onboard the Tigris quite by accident. They made a good team. Dee was a chemist by trade, an anarchist by avocation. Her long dark hair was pinned up primly, her expression was bland, but her big, dark eyes held their usual wickedly amused gleam. They shared a brief nod. Roxy went into her portion of the briefing without having to refer to her datapad. "Sag Fever is weird. It is also fatal. One hundred percent fatal."

Roxy didn't answer Maura's question yet, but went on. "It also jumps species faster than any other pandemic disease yet encountered in the Systems. Technically, of course, the disease does not jump species, but adapts with amazing speed to every Engendered humanoid variant it has yet encountered."

Dense annoyance was aimed her way by several members of the command staff, ones who had cultural and religious objections to Neshama Wave Theory. She was koltiri of Koltir Prime, Engendered of the Second Wave Seeding. She knew what she knew and science backed up belief, though she wasn't about to get into a creationist debate right now. This was the briefing room, not the mess hall, as she'd said once this morning already.

"The source for Sagouran Fever is not known, though the first humanoid fatality we know of is a trader named Antis Sagoura. About all that's known about the man is that he dealt in salvaged space junk and was a member of some crazy religious cult."

Of course, there were lots of those in the United Systems. Some would say that she was a member of the weirdest cult of all. The crew of the Tigris was not interested in the biography of a dead man. They probably wouldn't even be interested in news of an epidemic. This was a combat ship. Eamon's impatient frown told her to get this over with. Maura Weaver tapped her fingers on the tabletop. She tried to draw the senior officers' interest as she went on.

"The pattern of infection seems to trace back to a salvage belt near Bucon space WDS." She punched a button on her pad, and a spot on the holomap glowed green briefly to show the WDS location at a juncture of Bucon and Systems territory. "There's garbage in that section that was hauled in long before the war. Mess has only gotten worse in the last four years."

"MedService knows nothing. The Bucons are letting them send in an Outbreak Team, but the datawork is a little slow in coming."

She'd been asked to head that team, but Captain Merkrates had already refused the request. His opinion was that this was just another plague in a galaxy full of them when humanoids from so many worlds mixed and mingled so freely. He didn't think it was worth a full Physician's time. That was one of the things they'd fought about last night. And that was not news the department chiefs needed to know.

"MedService must not have found the right Bucon official to bribe to let them in yet," Dee explained.

"The Bucon Empire is now a member of the United Systems," Eamon reminded his officers. "Please show the greedy bastards some respect."

Roxy was quite fond of the Bucons she had known back when she'd hung out among the gamers and black marketeers in the Belt, but saw no reason to go against crew solidarity on this point. She and Dee did exchange a secret smile, though.

"The Outbreak team is sure to come up with some answers once they finally go in," Roxy went on, careful not to look at her husband because she didn't want to let anyone see her glaring. "In the meantime, the Sagouran Fever has spread via space traffic to four known worlds within the Systems."

"The populations of four worlds are dead?" Maura Weaver asked. The question was matter of fact; they'd all become inured to a lot during the Trin War.

Roxy held up a hand. "No, no. It's not that bad. The spaceports where the disease appeared were quarantined fairly quickly. Several thousand people have died, which is certainly bad enough, but entire planetary populations haven't been affected. Not yet," she added grimly.

"Sounds like MedService has the situation in hand," Eamon said pointedly. "Why bring this up in the briefing, Physician?"

He had that look on his face, the one that said she might be one of his crew, she might be the woman he loved, but she was too close to being a civilian and had no real concept of how the military functioned. Roxy loved the man, but hated the look.

"I am," she told him, and the rest of the command staff, though it was Eamon Merkrates she talked to, "a Physician. You use the title, Captain, but sometimes I think you forget what it means. MedService has put all Physicians in the United Systems on Medical Alert." She folded her hands on the tabletop, and quietly pulled rank. It was the most she could do right now. There was going to be hell to pay in private, but she had the itchy feeling this situation was important enough for her to cross her beloved warrior husband's ego. Nobody else was supposed to know they were fighting, but she spoke into a tense, uncomfortable, and mostly unfriendly silence when she went on. "That means I am appropriating all of the Tigris's science staff and resources for research into finding a cure for Sagouran Fever."

She might have gone about it differently if he hadn't had that look. She would have reported on the outbreak, and then arranged the use of labs and personnel with Dee and Maura Weaver. Instead, he'd been condescending and she'd reacted. She hated when she did that. He was a proud man who deserved her respect and compliance to his command.

It was Dee who spoke into the tense silence that sizzled in the room. "A full MedAlert? Isn't that overreacting?"

"One hundred percent mortality rate," Roxy reminded the Life Sciences officer who already knew the statistics. "Unknown vector, jumps species, spreading out from a minimum of four spaceports." She rubbed the back of her neck, and thought once more of ashes. "That's enough to make me a little nervous."

"Koltiri can cure anything," Bear said confidently, and his confidence was mirrored by a swell of emotion in the room as each of the command crew recalled battle wounds and diseases of theirs she'd healed. The war was long and nasty, but the survival rate on the Tigris was far higher than on any ship that had only a mere, mortal medical officer. Their recollections were vivid, and each one pricked at her shielding. They had no idea how hard gratitude and awe were for a sane being to swallow.

No one paid attention to this. The Captain's response was a stiff, "Proceed, then, Physician." And then Eamon and Maura turned the briefing to the Borderer assignment. Roxy dutifully made notes on patrol schedules, her thoughts turning to coordinating the Tigris's small research departments in ways that would blend a MedAlert with a possible combat mission.

* * *

"This thing is ugly," Bonita Hernandez, the ship's other doctor, said as she finished reading the last of the datascreens from the current download. Data gathered from every research team and Physician in the United Systems was posted once every ten hours. So far, none of the news was good. Death rates were rising, the infection was widening. "And getting uglier all the time. We still don't know what it is."

Roxy nodded. She, Dee Nikophoris, and Hernandez were seated around a table in the sickbay's lab. The meddroid floated silently in the background, keeping watch on experiments the organic personnel had set up while the organics indulged in a coffee break and conversation. "It's got me scared," Roxy said. Five other planets had reported outbreaks of Sagouran Fever to MedService in the last twenty-four hours, making nine known affected star systems. Roxy had a tip of the iceberg sort of feeling about the situation, and an urge to get out there and do something about it. And if an empath couldn't go on feelings… She sighed, and leaned back in her chair. "Wish we had a few more people to put to work on this."

The Tigris was a long-range combat vessel with a crew of six hundred, so the sickbay was large and well-equipped. As far as personnel went, however, Roxy's staff included only Bonita, two medtechs, a meddroid, and two nurses. Captain Merkrates had traded away the larger medical staff his ship rated for the privilege of counting a Physician among his crew. That the Physician was also a koltiri healer tended to make budget-minded MilService bureaucrats question the Tigris's need for even the skeleton staff Roxy supervised. Roxy had to do a lot of snarling and threatening to return to MedService whenever there was talk of transferring her crew. She didn't know how the legend that koltiri could do it all got started, but it was a real pain dealing with it here in reality. The reason she'd worked very hard to earn the rank of Physician was because the practice of medicine was so much more efficient than committing miracles. If you healed one person, they could go and get infected again; if you found a vaccine for the same illness, you'd taken care of a problem on a larger scale.

Right now she was fighting the urge to threaten the captain with her transferring back to MedService because he was using the excuse of the ship's only having a skeleton medical staff when they might be heading into a combat situation on the Rose border to keep her onboard. From her point of view, even the possibility of being needed in battle paled before the threat of Sagouran Fever. She didn't know quite when she'd stopped thinking like a combat soldier but, after months without any battles, she guessed the war with the Trin was starting to feel like it was finished. It seemed to Roxy that fighting disease on the front lines was where she needed to be these days. She truly, deeply wished that the Tigris didn't seem too small for her when it had been such a haven not so long ago. And maybe Eamon was right when he argued that her blighted mental shielding still hadn't recovered enough for her to venture away from the familiar shelter the ship offered.

"More people for research?" Dee cocked a cynical eyebrow at Roxy's complaint. "Why would Command appropriate a proper staff when we have a goddess in our midst?"

"You are referring to yourself, I hope," Roxy responded. Dee sneered. It was her way of showing affection.

Bonita looked from one to the other. "You two have a very bizarre relationship."

"Works for us," Dee and Roxy answered, and laughed. They'd known each other since they were teenagers on Terra, and frequently still acted like teenagers when they were together, much to the Captain's annoyance.

The meddroid gave a polite, musical 'ding' to get their attention. Roxy took a sip of coffee out of a bright red mug while she glanced at the results the meddroid sent to their datapads. "So much for that." She sighed again after reading down a list of negative test results. They'd been at this for two days now. Not really much linear time had passed, but it felt like weeks to her. "I feel too isolated from this," she admitted to someone besides Eamon for the first time. "I need to get a taste of it."

Bonita looked at her strangely. "That would require visiting one of the MedService onsites on a quarantined world. You haven't been off the ship since the war started."

"I'll see if I can get a sample of Sagouran Fever to work with rather than simulations. Then again," she added. "It doesn't sound like something we'd want around. Containment would be a worry for the rest of the crew, even with isolation fields and safety protocols. Ships like the Tigris that rarely make port are the one place that's absolutely safe." She shook her head. "No. Can't see Eamon letting me have a sample onboard."

Dee gave a loud sigh. "For which we are all grateful. I don't want to go near that stuff. Sims are fine with me."

"Ladies." Hernandez got sarcastic looks from Roxy and Dee. She waved a hand at them. She'd been reading through data updates while they talked. She fiddled with a stack of datacubes as she said, "Says here that a group of koltiri have volunteered to go to the quarantined worlds."

"I know," Roxy answered. She tapped her forehead. "Got a call from Racqel—telepathic call," she explained at both women's puzzled look.

"Doesn't sound like you're friendly, and I'm not going there," Bonita wisely replied. "Your family life is already more complicated than I want to know about."

Roxy gave Dee an annoyed look, but stuck to business. "I thanked koltiri Racqel for including me in the invitation, but told her that I was otherwise occupied."

Roxy didn't tell the other women that her annoyed sister—the one Roxy had never met until she went to Koltir Prime to finish her empathic healer training at the age of fifteen and hadn't seen in the flesh since—had been less than enthusiastic about asking someone as "strange and violent" as Roxanne to join the other koltiri in their peaceful healing pursuits, but supposed it was all right since it was an emergency situation with uncounted lives at stake. Racqel was insufferably self-satisfied and superior, not to mention having a naive and innocent view of the universe from the vantage of her safe, cloistered existence where war hadn't intruded.

"Eamon thinks having the koltiri show up on infected worlds to perform healings will serve more as a public relations gambit than as practical solution. Says it'll look good on the newscasts, but what real good will it do?"

"Save lives?" Dee suggested. "Do you have any opinion on the subject?" Roxy didn't rise to the bait to contradict the captain, not in front of Bonita. She merely glared at Dee, who nonchalantly finished her coffee and got to her feet. "I'm going back to the life sciences lab before you decide to strike me down with lightning, Merkrates."

Bonita rose. She glanced toward the ward doorway where one of the medtechs stood waiting for her. "And I've got patients to see."

Reine Shirah was the last person Roxy had expected to see when she slid into the privacy booth and keyed her ID into the comm panel, though why Reine was calling wasn't hard to guess. Sagouran Fever, and they were both koltiri. Roxy had had other contacts with the koltiri in the last six days as more and more planets reported outbreaks. Every time she'd had to give the same answer, each time with more reluctance. Rebellion simmered in her, but every time she approached the captain she got a stern, firm "No." Off duty, Eamon used more personal arguments.

The count was up to twenty systems' worlds infected, and now here was Reine to prey on Roxy's already aching conscience. When she'd been called to the media center to take a personal transmission, she'd been expecting someone from MedService, not someone who didn't need technology to make her voice heard to a mind across the galaxy. Of course, nobody loved technology more than her big sister.

Reine was four years older than Roxanne, and ninety years younger than Racqel, but Reine was the heart and head of the family. If Reine had one fault, in Roxy's estimation, it was her tendency to never meet anyone she didn't want to marry. Actually, Reine had many faults. She was bossy, and too smart for her own good. She was a musician, a koltiri, and held the rank of Scientist, the techno equivalent of Roxy's Physician title. Reine was brilliant enough to have been granted a permanent berth on a Sector Ship, the most coveted posting in the United Systems. Her and her wife Betheny's specialty for the last several years had been the reengineering of captured Trin technology and ordnance, which was something Roxy certainly wasn't cleared to know about.

Roxy adored her sister, admired her, fought with her, was fraught with her, and now frowned at the sight of her face on the flatscreen of one of the media center's comm booths. They had similar features, of course. Both had heavy gold hair and big purple eyes; koltiri bred true. Both were tall. Reine was something of a slender willow woman, while Roxy had a more sturdy build, amazon to Reine's high elf, in their father's Terran terms.

You're calling? She was even more surprised when Reine blocked the telepathic thought. "You're calling?" Roxy repeated aloud.

"There is a range for telepathic transmission," Reine answered. "You're somewhere out on the Rose border. I'm—not. It's easier to call than to send." Lying was not one of Reine's many talents, and she looked foolishly uncomfortable doing it.

We could find each other in hell. No answer. O—kay. Roxy sat back and crossed her arms beneath her ample bosom. Several colored lights on the console and a stream of figures across the bottom of the flat screen told her just how secure this channel was. "Hope you're not paying for this yourself."

"MedService is picking up the tab." MedService was Roxy's old outfit. Reine had always been MilService all the way. "I've been asked to deliver the message. They need koltiri working in hospitals and quarantine centers to combat this Sagouran Fever pandemic."

"You've been asked nicely. Now it's my turn." Reine gave a toothy smile. "Time to come out and play, little sister." Roxy shook her head. "You going, big sister?"

Roxy sat up straight, glaring at the woman who wouldn't even talk to her properly. "But I'm supposed to go? Why aren't you volunteering to leave your nice, safe haven? Rafe won't let you?"

"You're the one married to the asshole." Reine held up a hand before Roxy could make another sneering comment. "I'd volunteer if I could."

Reine let her get a sneer in this time. "Too busy working on classified projects? Too busy with all your husbands and wives?"

"I only have one wife. She and Rafe send their love. And to Eamon," she added after a noticeable pause. There was no mistaking the worry in Reine's eyes when she added, "Martin's not on board right now. The way this fever is jumping planets, having someone I love away from a safe environment is scary."

Roxy crossed her arms again. "You're scared for your husband, but it's all right for your sister to deliberately expose herself to contagion?"

"A doctor as well as a healer, with vows and oaths and stuff to fix people. Your healing skills are needed more than your research right now. You used to work in hospitals."

"We've got some promising research going." First, do no harm. That was how the oath Reine had mentioned started. In some ways, it was safer for the rest of the galaxy to have her in hiding aboard a warship.

Reine laughed. "I'd love to get into a really good fight with you, hon, but this is a ten-minute burst transmission. You don't want me using all of MedService's budget for this year, do you? You're needed in your capacity as a koltiri healer, Dr. Roxanne Shirah-Merkrates. That's the message. I can't go. Not because I'm involved in any secret analysis of captured Trin technology—which I am."

"Yeah, but Trin spies know who's dissecting their stuff; it's getting to me that's the hard part."

"I don't want to leave my ship. Or my husband. Or my duty to another oath we took. I'm not like other koltiri, or I wouldn't be on a warship on border patrol," she reminded her sister—the sister with the cushy inner-Systems sector-ship berth. "The Tigris needs her ship's medical officer." Okay, she agreed with Reine, but Reine had no business calling her husband an asshole. That was her job.

Reine was not moved. "How very patriotic." She sighed, and mirrored Roxy's arms-crossed position. "You now expect me to give the come out of hiding speech, right?"

"You're such a mind reader, little sister. Oops." She gestured with a pointed finger. "Shouldn't have added that. You have problems with my—"

"Being my perfect big sister," Roxy finished for her. "Damn it, Reine!" Roxy slapped a hand down on the communications console. "Stop playing me. I'm not your guitar."

Needless to say, Roxanne Merkrates, Physician and Healer, stuck her tongue out at the blank screen. Then she laughed. "Hey," she said, bouncing to her feet. "I'm gonna be an aunt!" She laughed again as she left the media center to return to sickbay. "I sure as hell hope the father's somebody she's married to." She was being unkind and unfair, but she was a sister, so a certain amount of petulance was allowable when her older sister was in manipulation mode. Since Reine really wasn't a holier-than-thou type, Roxy was over her annoyance by the time she was out in the corridor. At least her annoyance with her sister.

* * *

Roxy glanced over her shoulder and continued bouncing the orange ball on the playing court deck. Eamon winced ever so slightly with each small impact on the pale, simulated-wood surface. She didn't get that he didn't get it. "Of course," she answered. "We've been practicing for the last hour." Behind them, two dozen other crewmembers continued to drill, going through a swift-paced shootaround that Roxy longed to jump back into. Basketball was the one thing she knew she was good at. It helped that she was six foot four. Their father had given Reine and Ben music; he had passed on his love and skill with the sport to Roxanne. She, in turn, had infected a large number of the Tigris's crew. Captain Merkrates disdained "sweaty pursuits" other than sex and martial arts training, but agreed any legal activity was useful for combating the boredom of . long-range patrols.

Roxy continued to bounce the ball. She didn't try to read his mind—he didn't like for her to and didn't really trust she could do it without harming him—but it wasn't hard to know what he was thinking. She didn't try to read his emotions, either, not in the way that was as natural to her as breathing. She was trained to shield incoming as well as outgoing emotion, to turn empathy on and off. Had she and her husband been bonded it wouldn't have been possible, but no privacy-loving Alpaean aristocrat would ever consent to giving up a part of themselves in such a way. Alpaean intimacy was not Koltiran, or even Terran, and she had accepted the man on his own terms for nearly four years. Even if he didn't like basketball. Besides, she didn't have to be an empath to know that he wasn't happy with her. He wanted to go somewhere and have a long, private talk. Again.

She'd been working for sixteen straight hours, and had a fight with her sister. She wanted to get sweaty and work off a lot of frustrated energy. She eyed her tall, handsome husband up and down with a sideways look, continuing to slowly dribble the ball. Of course, sex did count for getting sweaty and working off frustrated energy. It was the one thing they'd always been able to agree on. "I thought you were on the bridge," she told him.

"I decided to take a few minutes away from staring at the Rose Nebula to spend some time with my wife."

He touched her hair, a rare gesture for him in public. "The Rose will be there when I get back. I don't know about you."

She felt the hard knot of pressure curl tighter inside her. "Afraid I won't come back?" She hadn't meant to say that out loud. She hadn't even meant to think it. "You're my husband. I love you. I want to make this work." She let the ball go, and nodded as it rolled toward the sea of bare legs and waving arms jostling under the baskets. "This is the only place I can call home."

"I know. You wouldn't be happy away from the ship. They don't understand what we're about, away from the warships."

It wasn't her happiness she was thinking of. "It's the safety of the galaxy I have to worry about." She sighed. "But Sagouran Fever is more dangerous than my bad temper."

"Oh, really?" His dry tone grated. So did the understated, sarcastic arch of his eyebrow. "You can't save them all," he reminded her. "Even if you were to throw yourself into the thick of the rescue scheme."

One of the young men on the basketball court pivoted and waved his arms. He took no notice of Eamon as he called, "Hey, Roxy, come on, beautiful! Let's play!"

"Grett," Eamon said, with a stern frown. When a second young man whistled, and also called to her, he added distastefully, "CeCe. Security people." He looked like he'd just swallowed something disgusting.

Eamon waved her toward center court. "Go. Play. I'll watch. Which ought to keep those two from pawing you."

He backed up against the far bulkhead and leaned back with his arms crossed, slim and neat in his black uniform. She trotted off to join her team. Grett and CeCe were eager, enthusiastic, cute Terrans. The brash young men recently assigned to the Tigris were on the opposite team in this game. This did indeed give them plenty of opportunities to paw her, especially in shoving battles under the baskets. She didn't mind; playing opposite a pair of horny ensigns was good strategy. Within a couple of minutes, a groping shove from Grett drew a foul and sent her to the free-throw line.

It really was a pity the sound of the alarm klaxon spoiled her concentration when she made the free throw. She dropped the ball and turned toward Eamon, who was already heading for the door. Roxy forgot the game and ran for her alert station with everyone else. The alarm tone indicated a Tertiary Alert. Her post was the bridge Med station for a Terlert. The two security men crowded her heels, heading the same way.

Chapter Four

Roxy heard the words from Eamon as she flung herself out of the lift and into her seat. Grett and CeCe took up posts flanking the bridge door. No one paid any attention to the three of them being dressed in sweaty purple shorts and tank tops rather than uniforms.

The central holoscreen showed two ships, a bulky freighter, old and obviously crippled, and a sleek white cutter, hanging in space before the Tigris. The ships were backlit by the glow of the Rose obscuring the starfields beyond. Blue lances of energy weapons connected the two ships, and the white glow of buckling shielding was beginning to obscure the outline of the freighter.

"What the hell?" she muttered. That didn't look like a pirate fight going on outside; those were both Systems ships. It did look like she needed to be ready to handle casualties from the old freighter once Eamon got the fracas stopped.

"The cutter's a Triallen defense ship. Broadcasting Triallen recognition codes now," the communications officer said.

"Get a line open to the freighter," Eamon ordered. "I want shields instantly on my command."

"Aye, Captain. Computer access codes coming up now—if they haven't been tampered with."

A few delicate adjustments were made to communications equipment, then a powerful signal was sent toward the cutter.

The name alone was enough to frighten many ships off. Roxy wondered if the cutter's captain had sense enough to turn tail and run. The Tigris had earned her fierce reputation.

Roxy didn't have time to look up as she searched for life signs amid all the confusing incoming data, but all around her she registered the exhilaration mixed with fear the crew felt as they reacted once more to a combat situation. She couldn't help but feel the adrenaline rush herself. Damn, it felt good!

"Distress signal coming in from the freighter. They only have AEI on the bridge."

"Too much interference to pick up bioscan readings," Roxy added. "Want me to do it the old fashioned way?"

"Estimating fifteen minutes before the freighter blows, Captain," Maura Weaver reported. "Energy overload in the drive has started a self-destruct sequence."

The sensors on all boards shifted across the color scale to silver, and blanked out. Roxy visually detected the faint shimmer against the rose background of the nebula just before the now-fleeing cutter disappeared completely from the main screen. Escaped. It was embarrassing. After thirty seconds, not a single trace reading had appeared on any sensor.

"Damn!" she snarled. "How did a planetary defense force get a Shireny cloak!" The cloak was so classified she'd probably broken a law by mentioning it, but being related and telepathically linked to one of the members of the top design team in the Systems tended to give her a lot of secret knowledge she didn't particularly want.

The Captain's pale eyebrows were looking like slightly off-kilter exclamation points when he glanced her way. He didn't question her knowledge. "Untraceable."

The communications officer clicked a few switches and a static-filled transmission began. "Two survivors… peaceful mission…Do not send rescue party. Repeat. Do not. Plague ship… Sag Fever on board… "

Looks were exchanged around the bridge; the emotional level soared. The reaction explained why a planetary security vessel might fire on an unarmed ship.

"Permission to lead the rescue party?" Roxy asked, coming to stand beside the captain's chair. Worried jade eyes met hers as the voice from the wrecked ship continued to frantically warn them off.

"Very well, Physician," Eamon agreed after a moment's hesitation. "A minimum party. And be quick."

Roxy hurried to her console, hastily signaling Bonita to prepare quarantine conditions in sickbay. When she headed for the lift, Grett and CeCe once more crowded in on her, both sets of eyes bright with excited pleading. "All right," she told them firmly. "You're minimum enough." The bridge doors closed behind them and they were soon trotting toward the pod bay. "I want both of you in environmental belts at all times."

"Yes, ma'am," they agreed, meekly enough, but Roxy wasn't completely convinced of their sincerity. The security men were aware of the Tigris's crew's reputation for violence, but too young to have been part of the good old days when there'd been a battle almost every day. They were eager to earn their stripes and become real members of the meanest crew in the Eighteen Fleets. Damn fools, she thought, but proudly. "Be careful," she admonished as they grabbed equipment and weapons from techs standing by in the pod bay. "I mean it."

There followed a brief flurry of activity while three bodies jammed themselves through the freighter's emergency hatch. Then they were standing in the ruins of the ship's bridge. The two security men had pulled on dark coveralls and were surrounded by the faint blue glow of environmental shields. Roxy had taken a deep breath before squeezing through the tiny airlock. She let it out slowly only after the appropriate sensor jewels on the boys' coveralls reported that, yes, Artificial Environmental Integrity was functioning. It was minimum, but functioning. The bridge was dark but for the illumination provided by Grett and CeCe's blue glow and faint emergency lighting from the helm's control board. Roxy really didn't pay much attention to sensors when it came to life readings; she could feel where the two survivors were located.

"Stay here," she ordered. The two young men, like proper grunts, cautiously spread out and followed her, grumbling colorfully about the darkness as they picked their way through the debris of crumpled machinery and dead bodies. She frowned, but admitted to herself that they were acting properly to watch her back. She was glad she'd remembered to put on a pair of boots as she moved cautiously across the littered deck.

There were two people slumped in the helm and navigation seats. Roxy ignored the one mumbling into the communications headset. She concentrated on the person slumped forward over the helm. One touch told her the woman was near death. "Oh, my."

Roxy knelt beside the woman, vaguely aware of Grett and CeCe trying to assure the other crewman that he was going to be all right. The woman's skin was parchment dry, far too hot for her type of humanoid. "Okay, hon, let's see what we can do." Roxy closed her eyes and put herself inside the sick woman.

Somewhere in the distance she heard herself shriek, and registered the boys' surprised reaction. Then she stopped paying attention to anything outside the fever.

Disease was a mindless hunger, a monster that fed on life. This one took the image of fire. With lots of teeth and thousands of burning claws. Roxy stood naked before the huge, burning creature that was feeding on the woman's life. Roxy stepped between the fever and the dying woman. She held a flaked obsidian knife in her hand. She raised the weapon and called out, "Okay, big boy, show me what you've got."

The monster snarled and reared back, huge and fierce, all fangs and claws and fire. Roxy laughed in its face. "Come and get me."

The words, spoken in a barely audible rasp, were the first hint Roxy had that she existed. She heard them, realized they came from her, and accepted that they had a connection with something that had happened. But what? She didn't open her eyes just yet, but let her other senses do some work on cleaning out the disorientation. A bit of consideration brought her the conclusion that she was horizontal on a comfortable surface. She traced her fingers slowly across a familiar texture while simultaneously sniffing and tasting the blandness of recycled air. There were sounds coming from her left. She listened, not quite up to paying attention to the words, but did recognize that the sounds were coming from her pet ensigns and Dee Nikophoris. So, here was the ship. And why shouldn't it be the ship? Specific here was probably sickbay, as she couldn't imagine being horizontal anywhere else but her quarters—and unless she'd gotten drunk and passed out at a party, it wasn't likely those three would all be in her quarters. Eamon wouldn't like that. Besides, she didn't get drunk and pass out.

The last thing I remember is Grett complaining about a foul call. Oh, well, better get on with this waking up business.

She sat up, opened her eyes, and got stabbed by the brightness of sickbay lighting. "Shit! Ouch! God damn it!" She covered her eyes with her hands. "Bonnie, I'll talk!" Roxy realized it wasn't the lights, but her, and tried to adjust her body accordingly. She took her hands from her eyes, blinked, and saw Bonita Hernandez, Dee, and the ensigns looking at her. It was still too bright, but not actually painful. She smiled weakly at the four surprised stares. "Hi."

Roxy called up a holographic diagnostic display from the foot of the bed. As usual, the oscillating lights looked very pretty. And, as usual, the reading said that she was dead, insane, horny, and 97% fat free. "I need to go on a diet," she muttered.

"The hell you do." Hernandez grabbed her wrist, taking Roxy's pulse the old-fashioned way. "Is this normal?"

"Close enough," she replied. "I have a slight headache that does not want to be reasonable, and my pupils are not reacting to light properly. I do not want to know what sort of Bucon chemical I have ingested, but I promise never to do it again." Hernandez dropped her hand and Roxy rubbed her eyes. "What happened? Why are you all glowing?"

Dee handed Roxy a datasheet. "I just analyzed a blood sample from you." She grinned like a ghoul. "Do you know that you're mostly caffeine?"

Roxy read the analysis. Only then did she realize that she must have done a healing. "Never had a reaction like that before. This looks like Sag Fever."

"Used to be," Dee corrected. "You fixed it. There's a second patient waiting for you. And we're all in isolation until you fix him, too. Can I get you a nice raw steak?"

"Sounds lovely." Roxy put down the datasheet and lay back down. She closed her eyes and tried to remember. All she got was a large gray area where memory should have been. "I did a healing?"

Grett explained about a Terlert and rescue pods and two survivors and lugging three unconscious people off a self-destructing freighter and into the isolation room in sickbay.

"Oh," she said when he was done. She took a sniff, and the aroma of approaching meat and coffee displaced any further curiosity. "Food," she said, sitting up. "Eat, Now." Hernandez swung a bed table in front of her, Dee set down a tray of food, and Roxy immediately dug into the meal.

"Better hurry it up, Sting," Dee advised. "There's one more survivor awaiting your magic touch."

Roxy swallowed quickly, then stuffed another piece of steak in and talked around it, meat juice dribbling down her chin. "Right now, Groupie?" She responded to Dee's use of her Belter nickname by fondly using Dee's.

"If you wouldn't mind," Dee answered. "Or do you want to be stuck in one little corner of sickbay forever? I knew I shouldn't have volunteered when Hernandez wanted someone to run tests."

Roxy stuffed down two more bites, then concentrated on lymphocyte production. This kind of rearranging of her insides produced a deep ache in the bone marrow, especially in her arms and legs. The pain, oddly enough, cleared some of the white noise out of her head. She finally recalled doing a healing. Circumstances? Fuzzy. There was a woman. And, yeah, there was another one. Better get to it. Sag Fever waits for no one.

She opened her eyes and pushed the table back, grabbing one last bite of meat as Dee whisked the tray away. She wiped her fingers on her shorts, then grabbed CeCe's glowing fingers and let him help her up.

"Okay, witch doctor," she said to Hernandez. "The faith healer's back in business."

"I'm going to faint now." Roxy suited actions to words as she slid bonelessly toward the deck, holding the yellow bed cover in a death grip and taking it with her. She used it to bury her face in while she sobbed like a child. She didn't know what she was crying about, or why she was being assaulted by a horrible feeling of melancholy. All she wanted to do was faint. Or take a shower. This stuff really made her sweat.

Hands lifted her onto a bed, and she felt a sting as an injector pumped concentrated protein into her system. It wasn't quite so satisfying as a hunk of meat, but it did make her feel better almost immediately. She had to squint to look at anything. "Is he okay?"

"Of course he is, honey," Hernandez answered as she scanned the readings on the patient's diagnostic display.

"I don't like this stuff. It fights dirty. Never met such a violent virus before." Roxy shook sweat-damp hair out of her face. She looked around as her eyes got closer to normal and finally paid attention to the blue light surrounding everyone but her. There was even environmental shielding surrounding the beds of the two former plague victims. Bonita Hernandez was quite correctly taking no chances. "How long before you stop glowing?"

"We're all better now," Roxy assured the ship's other doctor. She placed her hand over her heart. "Honest."

"And I would appreciate being able to enter," Eamon said from the doorway. Roxy looked toward him. The Captain's long, slender form was obscured by yet another sterile field across the doorway.

Hernandez lifted a remote and pressed a button, killing all the fields at once. Roxy was glad to be rid of the extra lighting. Dee, Grett, and CeCe lost no time in making themselves scarce. Hernandez moved with less speed back to the main sickbay, passing Eamon as he stepped into the room and approached the patients.

Both of the freighter crewmembers were awake and staring in awe at Roxy. The man was big, ruggedly built, and bearded. Roxy recalled that the woman had been in her sixties, but she'd done a very thorough job of the healing. The woman was going to be very surprised when she looked in a mirror and discovered she was a red-haired beauty of eighteen again.

Roxy shrugged at the couple and grinned sheepishly, embarrassed at the reaction koltiri got from most people. She was glad they also had the authoritative figure of an Alpaean aristocrat in black uniform decorated with lots of fancy fruit salad to focus their attention on. Her war hero was gaudy, but he came in handy in awkward social situations. Roxy slid out of bed as Eamon faced the survivors.

"We intercepted a distress signal from your vessel," he told the survivors. "Who are you?"

The man sat up, and Roxy felt his shock at discovering he was no longer weak and sick. "I'm Kelem," he said. He gestured toward the woman. "This is Sady. We're from Thensil 3. We sent the distress signal after we were overtaken and attacked by the other ship. Before they jammed our communications. We'd asked the Triallens for help. Their answer was to try to destroy us."

"Your system is under quarantine," Eamon reminded them. "You were risking spreading the plague. Is that why the Triallens fired on you?"

Roxy stood as close to Eamon as she could without looking like she wanted a reassuring hug. She did, but the man was here on business.

"Yes," Sady answered Eamon's question. "I don't blame them. Sag Fever is horrible. Horrible." She shuddered. "Our world is dying. The government tells us there is no cure."

"There isn't," Roxy said. "You were healed, not cured… but let's not go into the difference."

"You're lying! There is a cure!" The outburst came from Kelem as he sprang out of the bed to tower angrily over them.

Roxy took a step back just so she could look up at him, and she was over six feet tall. "Whoa, there, big fella," she soothed. Kelem went red with indignation.

Before he could shout again, Sady said, "We have heard of a medication that is available on Laborne. We were on our way to Laborne when we developed engine trouble and tried to set down on a Triallen repair station. The station was fully automated, but they wouldn't allow us near it. We must get to Laborne and bring the cure back to Thensil."

Kelem began to sob, the tears rolling down his cheeks and into his beard. "You don't know what it's like watching a world… people you love… total strangers… it doesn't matter. They're all dying. I don't want to go back. And I don't want to live knowing what's happened to the rest of my world. Would you want to go back to a world of skeletons?" he demanded of Roxy and Eamon.

Dee and Hernandez had come back into the room. Dee stepped forward now. "Laborne's a free-trader port. A not particularly reputable free-trader port. Sound's like some charlatan's trying to sell you a placebo just to make a profit. Some beings will do anything for a credit."

Sady looked confused and worried. She obviously didn't want to believe that someone might try to take advantage of plague victims. "We were given a name."

"Of a friend of a friend of a friend," Roxy said. She and Dee exchanged cynical looks and almost imperceptible nods.

Sady leaned out of her bed and touched Kelem on the hand. He turned to look down at her. "Why?" she asked him, voice bitter. "The Triallens destroyed our ship—our cargo. We have no way to buy the medicine now."

Kelem sat down heavily beside her and her arm came around his shoulder. He was still crying. "This can't happen." He looked up pleadingly at Roxy. "You saved us."

Kelem was suddenly on his feet again, knocking Sady back against the pillow. "You can help us!"

Roxy became aware that Eamon was holding her arm with a force that would have been bruising if she wasn't koltiri. If she wasn't koltiri—well, she was, and he couldn't change that fundamental truth any more than she could, no matter how much they'd tried. She stepped away from her husband and turned her back on the Thensilans. "Yeah," she said. "I could."

The word came like a stab between Roxy's shoulder blades and she flinched away from it, surprised and suddenly very frightened. Why? Because to heal it, she would have to leave the shelter of the Tigris. Was that all? She'd been arguing with the Captain to be allowed to do just that. Because she risked losing her husband? She remembered what it had felt like to heal Sagouran Fever. No, that wasn't all.

A voice calling for the Captain and Physician to report to the bridge to accept a communications transmission saved her from having to confront this fear. She felt like a complete coward as she eagerly followed Eamon out of sickbay, leaving the distraught couple for Hernandez to deal with.

"Do you wish the Tigris to continue with the border patrol?" Eamon asked the plump, gray-bearded Terran visage on the flatscreen after the official greetings were done with.

"No," Admiral Gunderson responded. "It's been decided to keep a large-enough force on our side of the Rose to let the Borderers know we're aware of them, but to reassign most of our combat vessels to sector patrols. Police work," he said apologetically. "I realize that you aren't used to that sort of assignment." He somehow managed to look like he was personally addressing everyone on the bridge.

The bridge crew all looked back with properly serious expressions. Roxy was glad the admiral didn't know any of them personally, or he would have recognized they were hiding amusement and annoyance at his patronizing assumption that they were a bunch of blood-thirsty, trigger-happy Trin killers who disdained anything less than major space battles.

We used to be like that, Roxy thought, but we got better. Mostly. We haven't done anything that could be prosecuted as a war crime in months, she added cynically. Reputations were hard to outgrow. Outlive. Whatever.

Admiral Gunderson beamed another kindly smile around the bridge. The bridge beamed a collective smile back—a little too toothy, Roxy thought, but not bad. Eamon's serious face helped tone down the effect. Gunderson then settled his benevolent gaze on her. She didn't have to be a telepath to know what was coming.

"Sir." She knew Eamon knew as well as she did. Her husband didn't show his fury, but the deep burn of it stabbed through her and left a scar. She kept her gaze on the admiral.

"I've been asked to relay a request to you from the Council to join the planet-based medical team on Bonadem to assist in the relief effort of Sagouran Fever."

She expected the invitation, but had thought it was MilService's turn. This time Roxy and Eamon exchanged a glance. MedService was one thing, her relatives—all koltiri were related—another, but The All Worlds Council was the ruling body of the United Systems, though only eleven beings ever sat, squatted, or floated on it at any one time. Why would The Council send a message to her? Why was an admiral delivering it?

"Your service is being requested to implement an evacuation plan. A plan that will save the lives of thousands of children on several worlds affected by the epidemic."

She had just been given the means to override all of Eamon's personal and professional objections to her leaving the ship. And she wished she didn't feel so triumphant about it. Marriages weren't about winning.

And she wished she hadn't met Sagouran Fever deep inside the Thensilans' dying flesh. Then she wouldn't really know what she was up against. She wouldn't be frightened to go. She reminded herself that this was a war for her to fight, and that she was good at that. She said, "A plan to save children? I'll do whatever I can to help, sir."

I've felt what this thing can do, she thought at her husband who did not like telepathy. I'm sorry, my love, but I have to go.

His only answer was silence, of course, along with rage, and offended pride. He didn't look at her. He didn't have any expression on his face as he said to Gunderson, "I'm sure Physician Merkrates will serve as competently on Bonadem as she has aboard the Tigris." After a brief exchange of pleasantries, it was agreed that a cutter would be sent out from Bonadem to pick her up. Eamon ordered a course change to rendezvous with the planetary ship. Then, and only then, did he address Roxy. What he said was, "Dismissed, Physician."

Roxy turned at Dee's voice. She'd just come up to the lift near her quarters. She waited for Dee to catch up with her. "Cutter bay," she answered. "I'm out of here."

"Just like that." Dee snapped her fingers in Roxy's face. "Gone. Poof. No big tearful farewell scene after all this time onboard? Not like you, Merkrates."

"I'll be back in a month or so. Besides, I've done the tearful farewell bit." The day-long scene with her husband had been both tearful and unpleasant before he finally, grudgingly acquiesced to the necessity of her leaving, since there was nothing he could do about it. "Everybody gathered in the recreation room and said goodbye an hour ago. There was cake. Where were you?"

"Packing." Dee held up a blue duffel just like the one at Roxy's feet. "I'm coming along."

"What?!" Roxy had a vivid recollection of Kelem before she'd healed him. She didn't want to see Dee in the same condition. "Why would you want to go to Bonadem? I don't want to go to Bonadem."

"Bucons," Dee answered succinctly. "If they're dealing a drug that works on Sag Fever, I want to find it and synthesize it. Chemists are good for that," she added. "Bonadem has a Bucon trading enclave."

Dee's dark eyes narrowed. "My misspent youth was more misspent than your misspent youth."

"Uh—the captain? Bonita? Me? Don't you have to get these peoples' permission?"

"Dr. Hernandez has enthusiastically agreed to supervise Life Sciences in my absence. Eamon doesn't really want you to go by yourself, not that he said so in so many words. He did initial the temporary transfer form with a particularly sentimental flourish, I thought."

How very true. "It is a good idea. But remember what happened the last time you were off the ship."

"I got wounded. It wasn't pretty. Bonadem is a civilized world." The car arrived, its doors swishing suggestively open. "And you'll be there to fix me if anything happens. Let's go." Dee stepped in and waited.

Roxy hefted her duffel and looked up and down the empty corridor. "Right," she said and joined her friend. "Let's go."

Chapter Five

"I've changed my mind," Pyr announced. It was the first time he'd spoken since coming onto the bridge. He had been silently watching the view screen and thinking until Linch interrupted his concentration to tell him the ETA to Calrod was two hours.

Pyr stretched his long legs out before him as he lounged in the bridge's center seat and looked up at the main screen through a fringe of hair. He kept his gaze on the silver-streaked tunnel of the FTL distortion field, waiting while a circle of eyes turned questioningly on him. Linch and Pilsane were in front of him, between the big screen and his chair. Mik was behind him at the engineering post. Simon and Rhod flanked him at the communications and ship's functions stations. The Raptor was running silent, but Simon was monitoring the sensors for other ships' chatter. There hadn't been any so far. Taylre was with Mik at engineering. Pyr had been listening to their quiet technical conversation, amused because the pair were having a wonderful time discussing an interface procedure.

"All right," Linch finally said after even the engineers had tuned their attention to Pyr. "What have you changed your mind about?"

"Denvry. We aren't going to kill Denvry," he elaborated. "We are going to take the time to be civilized after all."

"What if he has Axylel?" Linch's quiet question undercut Pilsane's annoyed growl.

"Then we'll kill him," Pyr answered, enjoying Pilsane's uncharacteristic show of frustration. He wondered if it was a Rust reaction at last.

This left Pilsane free to jump out of his chair and angrily approach the center seat. Simon, Rhod, and Taylre waited impatiently as well. None of them dared defy the captain for fear of being quickly returned to rot in the chattel hold with the rest of the pirate crew. Each hoped Pilsane would do the shouting for them. Mik waited too, hands hovering over his board. It wasn't likely he'd join in any verbal discussion, but his interest pressed on Pyr's shields. And Pilsane's as well, Pyr supposed. Mik was nothing if not fair.

There was heat in Pilsane's normally cool gray eyes when he confronted Pyr. "The crew," he began warningly. "A raid?"

"Did I promise?" He watched the navigator's fists clench at his sides, then Pilsane's hands relaxed, one finger at a time, while he fought his expression back to its usual placidity. Pyr knew he shouldn't be amused at Pilsane's trying to regain his calm in the face of an unperturbed captain… but the role-reversal happened so rarely. "I suppose you'd like an explanation," he offered graciously.

"Give me something I can go along with, Captain." Pilsane's voice was still tight. He glanced past Pyr to Simon and Rhod and Taylre.

"Politics." It was a dirty word, but sometimes one had to use that sort of language in front of the children. He took a deep breath to avoid laughing, and wished he could shake this sudden almost giddy mood out of his head. Along with the raging headache he was attempting to ignore. Maybe it was all a Rust reaction; defensive walls slipping inside all their minds, letting useless bits of personality surface.

"The Bucon Empire," he explained to the smoldering Pilsane and the others who silently surrounded him. "It is unstable at best right now. The government is concerned with keeping the Systems in the dark. The trading houses are sniping away at each other, and the slavers are fighting over the remains of the trading houses that fall. And the pirate's guild is playing a waiting game while things go from bad to worse."

"But the pirates are restless," Linch added, with his back still turned on the confrontation. "Greater Pirates' League is pushing the Bucon pirate guild hard to throw in with their warlords."

Pilsane shot a glance between Pyr and the back of Linch's head. He nodded thoughtfully.

Pyr continued. "There are lots of big operators looking sideways at each other, openly agreeing to keep the Emperor's Peace, but each one is looking for the slightest excuse to increase their power, maybe even head for the throne. At least three of the major operators have a chance, if the Manalo family would all drop dead and get out of their way—and if they can find excuses to get some of the other houses to follow them. No one is strong enough to hold the throne, so a coup will ultimately hand the Bucon Empire over to the pirates and then to the League, never mind the so-called alliance with the United Systems. You may have noticed that the Raptor is not exactly popular with the Bucon pirate guild."

"Our not being members of the guild might have something to do with their not liking us," Mik offered.

"Might," Pyr agreed. "And if we take out a mid-level operator like Denvry, someone is going to get the bright idea of proclaiming us a threat to the stability of the Empire. Hunting down unaligned border-lord scum like us will be used as a rallying point to draw in supporters for someone eager to try for the throne. Do we really want that?"

"We're going to have to take out whoever has Axylel anyway," Pilsane reminded them.

Pyr nodded. "Whoever has Axylel dies. Then the guild might come after us, but it's not a certainty. They'll see the situation with Axylel as taking care of our own business. Can't come down on somebody who is only playing by their rules; hard to get any enthusiasm for a jihad going that way. If Denvry has the boy, we take him down. If not, we negotiate and keep the guild off us a while longer. It improves our chances of keeping the border and ourselves intact. I'm in favor of it." He glanced around the bridge. "Anyone opposed?"

No one bothered to complain, but Pilsane said, "What about the rest of the crew? We can't keep them locked away forever. Some of them are good with locks, Captain. And we can't live without raiding—we all need the Rust. Denvry might have Rust."

Pyr had a great deal of trouble keeping from pounding his good fist against the chair arm. Tell me something I don't know, boy! Find me some way out of this hell that's overtaking the galaxy. He kept the thoughts and frustration to himself and said mildly, "We will give the crew a raid—after Denvry. There are plenty of slavers and raiders in this part of the Empire to choose from." He cocked an eyebrow at Pilsane. "Fair enough?"

Pyr smiled as he watched Pilsane force himself to relax. After a pause, Pilsane smiled back. "Fair," he agreed. "Slavers and traders are better pickings, anyway. I'll convince the crew on that point."

"As long as I make the Denvry visit short and sweet," Pyr added. He kept on smiling even though the muscles of his face hurt. As Pilsane resumed his post, Pyr looked up at the passing starfield. He tried to let go of the pain and fall into the rush of light, to remember what he knew of meditation. Maybe the exercise would help the time pass a little more peacefully.

* * *

"Excuse me," Pyr said politely, holding the hand weapon steadily on the surprised trio seated near the blazing fireplace. "Which one of you is Denvry Edin?" The door guard was peacefully asleep at his feet. Pyr stepped over him to enter, heavily armed, but not necessarily trying to look hostile. Ship's biosensors had pinpointed the location of the well-guarded mansion's main room, and the number of occupants. Pyr noticed that besides the two men and the woman, the big room held a great deal of heavy furniture made of woods and woven fabric, a huge stone fireplace, and one enormous window.

He was glad he'd donned his hat and coat for traveling down to Calrod. It was winter on the northern part of the mountainous continent where Denvry made his headquarters. The bay window took up most of one wall of the room, and leaked cold air into the room despite the environmental controls and the heat from the fire. The view showed craggy cliffs and blue-granite mountains; bare bones of rock at this height, mostly overlaid with snow. A driving wind howled noisily around the fortress and an icy glow of house shields surrounded the grounds. No intruder should have been able to walk in.

"Your shielding's intact," Pyr assured the round-faced man who took a step forward.

"I doubt that." He had a soft voice, and an air of innocence that made him seem harmless. "I'm Denvry Edin. Captain Pyr, yes?"

It surprised Pyr to discover that it was his headgear and not his reputation that proceeded him. He didn't comment. He wanted to sit down, but stayed firmly planted where he was, weapon held before him. "My engineer has a way of making pinpricks in shields," he explained. "It's a hobby I find useful. I just stopped by to make a small trade."

Denvry looked justifiably suspicious, but he smiled brightly. "You could have called first, Captain."

"I'm in a hurry. I want a woman," he went on. "Here's the trade I'm offering. You want to stay in business. Your fleet is in orbit around Calrod. So's my Raptor. The Raptor can see your ships, but your ships don't know where to look for the Raptor." And he had no intention of giving Denvry time to call any of his ships to verify this. All their transmissions were being jammed anyway. Mik estimated they had four minutes before sensors deciphered the Raptor's cloaking frequency. "Give me the woman and you stay in business. Fair?"

Denvry hesitated, eyes on the weapon. Then he gestured toward the woman seated in one of the deep chairs by the fire. "The only woman here is my sister, Captain." She was sitting very stiff and straight in her chair, a tumble of black hair framing her tense face. Her gaze moved from Pyr to Denvry the moment Pyr mentioned wanting a woman. She did not look as if she had any confidence in family affection.

"You've got a nasty reputation," the second man spoke up. He rose slowly from his chair, empty hands spread before him.

Pyr touched his hat brim with his numb hand while silently cursing his luck. "A well-earned reputation. Admiral Ral Manalo, isn't it?"

The man nodded, dark eyes warily amused above a hawk nose that nearly matched Pyr's own for its arrogant slant. It was damned inconvenient to meet a powerful member of the Bucon emperor's own family at a drug trafficker's stronghold. Pyr kept the sigh in his chest; walking in on private negotiations was so rude. And he'd probably have the Bucon Security Service after the Raptor for this little breach of etiquette. "I want to talk to the woman," he assured them. "Nothing else interests me."

"But why, Captain?" Manalo wondered, voice and smile mild. He had deep laugh lines around his eyes, and a reputation for being just as ruthless as Pyr of the Raptor. His expression was openly speculative. Pyr knew Manalo was a supporter of the alliance with the United Systems, and that the hypocrites of the Systems were trying to curtail the traditional Bucon trades. Manalo wouldn't normally be found in the same room with Denvry. A week ago, Pyr would have happily settled into manipulating whatever was going on between the Security Forces commander and the drug dealer—or at least turned it over to Pilsane, who reveled in conspiracies. But thanks to a love bite, he was left with no way to control the future, only time enough to make a few more enemies.

Manalo was known to approve even less of independents—but these were uncertain times. "If we could be of some assistance, Captain Pyr… ?" he trailed off suggestively.

"Perhaps a glass of wine," Denvry added, suddenly sociable in the face of the admiral's interest.

"No time right now." Pyr's gaze bored into the woman's. She went pale, and slowly stood, taking several steps toward him.

"Denvry," she said to her brother, pleading despite being drawn by Pyr's telepathic call.

Denvry took her arm. "How did you get in here, Captain? I've heard stories that you're a tech wizard—"

"A sort of piratical match for Shireny," Manalo added. "If you have the teleportation device that rumor claims, you could be a very useful asset to the Empire. I think we should have a long talk, Captain Pyr."

The fire blazed at their backs, and the trio he held in weapon range waited; speculatively, nervously, angrily. Pyr touched his hat brim again. "I wish you luck, Admiral." He dismissed Manalo from his attention and spoke to Denvry. "Do I take the woman with me, or do I start blowing your fleet out of space?" He wanted a modicum of cooperation from Denvry, especially with the Security Forces admiral as a witness.

She tried to pull away from her brother's grasp, but Denvry wasn't about to let her loose. "What do you want with me?" she demanded shrilly.

"A replacement for Axylel, perhaps?" Denvry suggested. He smiled benignly at his struggling sister. "An alliance with the family, Captain? Should I be flattered?"

Demons! Why must they always be trying to cut deals? "No," he answered flatly. "I've had a stroll through your stronghold. You have quite a few sleeping guards, but she is the only woman here. So I suppose your sister is the one selling secrets—yours and others—to Paal. And you know how Paal loves to talk."

Denvry's hand dropped from his sister's arm, leaving red marks on pale skin. He gave her a hard look, the innocent air completely erased from his expression. "Hanni?"

"And after you promised," he scolded. "She has this chronic problem," he confided to Pyr, "of not knowing where her best interests lie."

Denvry accepted gracefully, backing away from the woman, leaving Hanni alone in front of Pyr. She started to whirl toward her brother. Pyr reached out and grabbed her around the waist. He thumbed the recall button on his bracelet. The Door opened. He pushed Hanni through without waiting to see the looks of astonishment on Manalo and Denvry's faces as the rumor was confirmed.

Pyr pushed Hanni forward as Mik came around the control console that took up most of the small room. They stopped in front of the huge engineer. Pyr curled his arm around Hanni's shoulder, keeping her immobile while Mik's plain face veered out of focus. He kept perfectly still, hiding surprise and dizziness from the engineer.

The words echoed in Pyr's ears. He heard each individual sound, but it took him several seconds to string them together into a coherent sentence. As the words sorted themselves out, Mik's face came back into clarity, expression unchanged. Good. "Here." He pushed Hanni toward Mik.

"Hi," Mik said again, draping an arm over her shoulder. The gesture was almost friendly. She stared up at him as he added, "Don't look so scared. It won't hurt any more than it has to. I promise."

The room's fast and impersonal. Pyr didn't have the energy for this kind of job, or the taste for that kind of rape. He used to make a habit of killing any telepath he found who did. Better for everybody, yes?

Mik looked sympathetically at the frightened woman. "Non-combatants," he muttered. He sighed, and stunned her before flinging her unconscious body over his broad shoulder. "Why do I get this job?" he complained.

"Because you don't like it," Pyr answered. Mik nodded his agreement and headed for the door. My thanks, Mih-ahr, Pyr thought after him.

The words came into Pyr's mind as an avalanche growl. The crushing, rumbling debris of thought blocked out any awareness of the small, cluttered room. When his head cleared, Pyr was seated on the deck, his head hanging between his upraised knees. He was watching his hat, which lay on the deck in front of him. He became acutely aware of the smell of leather and the taste of bile in his mouth. The pain was hardly noticed at all.

How long have I been like this? He wondered as he struggled to rise to his feet. Was this fit punishment for ordering the torture of the semi-innocent? He stood, and kicked the hat across the room. Vi would come along to pick it up eventually. Better get to the bridge, he told himself. He needed to find out where they were heading. To pretend he had some control of the ship, if not his bodily functions.

And for the ancestors' sake, he pleaded with his body as he walked through the door, don't puke your guts out once you get there. Someone might think you're hung-over, Captain.

Chapter Six

"I'm tired and lonely and depressed. I feel lost. Maybe I really don't belong outside our little metal box. MilService reality doesn't seem to have a lot in common with planet-based reality—so, yes, I'm as disoriented as you thought I'd be in that way. Plus, nobody mentioned I'd have to work with other koltiri before I got here. Does the term shunning have meaning for you? You'd think I was Amish instead of Jewish on my daddy's side. I thought that might happen. The great big world outside is also full of death, which, unfortunately, I am too used to."

Roxy hit the off button and swore. She'd written Eamon several times on the trip to Bonadem, short notes he had yet to answer. This recitation was probably futile, but she needed to talk to somebody. She stared angrily at the message recorder, then around the darkened bedroom. The man was a ship captain with plenty of worries of his own. He'd answer when he could. She was on her own—and he might just remind her that she'd volunteered when he did reply. Getting an "I told you so" message from him wouldn't do their relationship any good.

"I'm not the one dying of Sag Fever," she said, curbing the impulse to feel sorry for herself. She rubbed the back of her neck, threw her long braid over her shoulder, stretched, then hit the record button again.

"Personal observations: Well, at least I don't have to wear a uniform. Or boots. It's spring in the northern hemisphere of Bonadem. Nice and warm. The sky here is green, a paler green than on Koltir Prime, but still very soothing and familiar. I'm glad it isn't blue. I got bored with blue when I lived on Terra. The hospital where Richi, Ral, and I are working is located in the capital city of Dallis. Hospital's on the outskirts of the city, next to the spaceport. I noticed a wide river and lots of gardens. The hospital grounds are covered in pastel flowers and trees with new, yellow-green leaves. It's spring and it rains a lot. I haven't been off the hospital grounds since we arrived. What I've seen of the city was in the aircar from the cutter field.

"There was something in the orientation material about the oldest part of Dallis being over seven thousand years old, and that it has always been a religious and educational center. The natives of Bonadem have this lovely pale blue-and-purple patterned skintone, and a lot of them have purple hair; most have dark blue, though. A very handsome people. They're believers in the Neshama, by the way, and the main temple complex was dedicated to the Return of the Parents millennia before their first contact with the Systems ninety years ago. It's a quiet city, now, Dee tells me. She says the business district and many of the residential districts are pretty much deserted. I guess some people got off planet before the quarantine. Others have left the cities, trying to get away from the infection. Not a bad idea, as the fever is concentrated in the cities here on Bonadem. There are slums in Dallis, and they are full of sick people; the poor are suffering the most. In my MedService days, I saw plenty of discrepancies in medical care between the haves and the have nots, but I guess I'd forgotten. I'm not sure if I've been hiding in a metal box or an ivory tower… with gun turrets.

"I'm not sure if this is my first transmission to you since I arrived. The healings are very disorienting, so if I'm repeating myself, I'm sorry. I'm not even sure how many days I've been here. Sag Fever has this way of causing memory loss. I know I'm doing healings, but I very rarely remember them. And, of course, I keep passing out. I don't want to worry you, I'm just tired.

"We've got two other koltiri and about a hundred MedService volunteers, as well as the resident staff. The evac is going pretty smoothly. We're concentrating on the younger children, and pregnant women. Now those are tricky cases. I've told you about Alice Phere, right? Married to the Hrom commando? Alice and I went to medical school together, and we shared a MedService posting before the war. She's in on this one. Richi and Ral are the koltiri. They arrived about the same time Dee and I did, but didn't bother with a ship. You know how flashy some koltiri can be. Teleporting's a convenient talent; wish it didn't make me so sick. I guess the three of us are doing some good. We heal them, then they are immediately shuttled up to an orbiting transport ship. Don't know when the kids can come home, but at least no one on the ship has Sag Fever.

"We're healing as many as we can, but the researchers still haven't come up with a cause or cure. I've been too busy—and brain-fried—being a koltiri to do any research work. And I'm the one who always says it's better to cure than it is to heal. Wish Bonita was here. So many die before we can get to them—or die in the streets and tenements and hospitals hoping a koltiri will save them. This world is dying, Eamon, and I can hear it—begging, praying, screaming, most of it silent. I can feel it. You know how that is, no shielding is strong enough to keep out millions of death cries.

"Damn. Sorry. Do you get the impression I'm feeling guilty about all this? Damn right, I'm guilty. And angry. And so fucking helpless. I want to make it all better right now. But there's no way out. I just have to do what I can, and live with knowing it's not enough. There are thousands of heroes here, but I'm not one of them. Anyone who puts their life at risk to stay and try to cope with this menace is a hero. The medical people are all heroes. The volunteers who go looking for kids in the poor parts of town are heroes.

"There's been quite a demand for environmental belts and recharge packs. Some got stolen from the hospital yesterday. Can't blame people for trying to get them. I do blame the black market that's sprung up here—probably everywhere with the fever. And yes, there's a rumor of a cure. Rumor says the drug was brought in from Laborne. There's been a Bucon trading enclave in Dallis for several centuries longer than Bonadem's been part of the Systems. Dee's trying to track down the dealer in what's a pretty close-knit and closed-mouth part of town. We have this Dr. Feelgood's name from Kelem and Sady. Dee hasn't had much luck so far. At least I don't think so. I don't think I've seen her for a couple of days. The last time I saw Dee, she was stuffing me with protein injections. I then healed her Fever one more time, told her to use the damn e-belt outside the hospital's field, then passed out. She's caught it twice. Says it's safer to expose herself to the infection than to be glowing in the streets. Guess she's right. There are a lot of desperate people out there.

"I haven't heard anything about the Borderers since getting here. Is the alert over by the Rose classified? Like I said, different reality here. Or maybe the people on Bonadem have other crises on their minds. I'm assuming we aren't at war with anyone new. I wouldn't want you or the ship to be in danger without me.

"I better get some sleep now. Have I mentioned that I miss you? Take care of yourself and everybody else, captain mine. I'll be home as soon as I can. Everything will work out, I promise.

Roxy put her seal code on the message and queued it for transmission to the Tigris. She yawned and looked around, and thought about going to bed. She'd spent a lot of time unconscious lately; being awake and lucid felt like a privilege. "I'm lonely," she acknowledged to the bare, pale-lavender walls. Every room in the hospital complex was painted some shade of purple, and that was a lot of rooms. Several hundred of them, she thought. The quarters she shared with Dee were decorated in shades that were pastel and inoffensive, very different from the vibrant colors she was used to on the ship. "Really a rather restful shade of bland," she murmured, just as the door behind her opened.

Roxy was suffused with joy at seeing her long-absent friend. "You want to make me, bitch?"

"Ha!" Dee slammed the door behind her, then looked at it in wonder. "I'd forgotten doors could do that." She grabbed the door handle and repeated the process. Roxy jumped at the solid bang. "Damn satisfying," Dee announced, then flopped onto one of the room's two narrow beds. "Ah." She kicked off her sandals; they flopped on the lilac carpeting like landed fish.

Roxy looked on with benign fondness. "This is familiar. Didn't we used to live together?"

"True." Roxy moved to sit next to Dee, and placed her hand in the center of the other woman's chest.

"Hush. You've got it again." Roxy closed her eyes and concentrated, let herself fall into the internal battle with the disease. Off in the distance, she heard Dee muttering colorfully in several languages. When she finished the healing, she let Dee help her up off the carpet and into her own bed. She stared at the ceiling and said, "That wasn't so bad. And how was your day, Nikophoris?" Roxy's head ached, but she didn't want to pass out before hearing if Dee had any news.

She lifted her head slightly to watch as Dee began to unpin her hair. For Terran hair it was quite long; waist length, and a lustrous black. Dee never wore it loose in public. It was a beautiful, private part of herself. Since their arrival on Bonadem they'd both been wearing civvies. Dee was making an effort to blend in with the local trading port style, which included elaborate hairdos for all genders.

Right now she was wearing a short, sapphire-blue skirt and low-necked tunic with a heavy silver belt.

In answer to Roxy's question, she said, "Did I find this Stev Persey? No. I have found out that he's a respectable dealer."

Only Bucons would use those two words together. "Bigger than Glover?" Roxy wondered. Glover was the only Bucon dealer that Roxy had ever met. He'd certainly seemed rich and powerful. At least, she, and Reine and Dee, and even coolest of the cool Martin Braithwaithe, had found the charming Glover fascinating. But then, they'd all been impressionable teenagers at the time. For all she knew, Glover was some small-change little fish exiled to deal drugs in the Terran Belt.

"Who can understand the Bucon hierarchy?" Dee answered. "Persey probably works for somebody who works for somebody else."

"Shut up. The Bucon I talked to said Persey has at least three ships in his own name. One works out of Laborne. Another one has a regular run from Bucon territory out to the Rose Nebula."

Roxy sat up—too fast. While the room spun around dizzily she asked, "Stopping off at Abidon and Thensil?"

Roxy lay down slowly, and went back to staring at the ceiling. It was also painted lavender, but she was seeing electric blue explosions of stars with the lavender as background. Without her having to ask, Dee turned down the room's lighting. The lavender faded to gray and Roxy's vision cleared a bit. "The Bucon were our allies during the Trin War. They've agreed to finally join the United Systems after hundreds of year of economic competition. They're decadent and insidious, but aren't exactly a warlike bunch. Still… Am I being paranoid about the Bucons?"

"I don't know," Dee answered thoughtfully. "Plague has to spread somehow. This thing can't be a spaceborne virus except in somebody's ship. It can do a lot of odd things, but it don't have FTL drive."

"Yeah. It's happened with pandemics before. War refugees, mostly, spread diseases from world to world. People get scared. They hop on a passing ship and get the hell out. That's probably the answer. The Bucons are more interested in internal politics than spreading a plague." She did not want to voice her suspicion; it was way too paranoid. And they were not on a MilService ship—some things do not get discussed outside secure MilService environments.

"And if there are Bucons involved," Dee added, sounding a tad too dubious, "it's coincidence. Most sensible scenario is that someone from a Bucon enclave that had the virus went looking for help, like our Thensilan friends, and they ended up taking Sag Fever to the next world. This thing is spreading out in a wave—but it's spreading so fast that… "

"Think it might be spreading out from Abidon rather than from Bucon territory? That the source is on a world near the Rose rather than WDS on the Bucon border? Any way to contact Persey's ship that makes the Rose run?"

"Bucon pirate guild, or League?" The League was an ancient, near-mythic multi-species organization of dark and mysterious origins and power. It was even suspected of being the refuge of the remaining Trin. People in the United Systems tended to think of the League as being the Secret Masters of the Universe; that is, those who believed the League existed at all. Roxy knew the League existed. Her sister-in-law Betheny had grown up on a League ship. The contract out on Betheny was said to be huge.

"I have no idea which pirates might have gotten Persey's ship," Dee replied. "I don't exactly have undercover security training. I have enough trouble trying to sound like a trader looking to score drugs instead of a lousy Systems narc."

Roxy rolled onto her side, too tired to keep up the conversation. "Wish I knew what was going on at home," she mumbled, wanting very much to be on the Tigris.

She was aware of Dee moving around the room and heard her say, "Yeah," as the light went on in the bathroom. "Go to sleep, Sting."

"Night, Groupie." Good night, Eamon, she added telepathically, and a bit guiltily at the waste of energy, knowing how he felt about her telepathy. But one of them had to make a start at actually getting to know each other.

Chapter Seven

"You catching a cold?" Kristi asked. She put a steaming mug of something on the main common room table before Pyr.

He looked up into worried hazel eyes. The woman was in her early fifties, middle-aged for a Terran. He didn't suppose she'd ever been considered a beauty, but he found her strong features attractive. She was long-faced, long-nosed, fearlessness always shining out of her greenish-brown eyes. She and her husband, the bald and bearded Vi, had never shown any resentment of being captives on a pirate vessel. They performed the same duties for the crew of the Raptor as they had for the passengers of a Systems luxury liner. He'd heard Vi tell Pilsane that they enjoyed the excitement of the life—and that the Raptor's crew tipped better.

He hadn't noticed her approach. His gaze flicked away from her for a moment, glad to discover that no one else had entered the common room while his attention drifted. Kristi pointed at the cup and repeated her question, then explained when he stared blankly at her, "A cold is a Terran virus, you ignorant alien scum. You look like shit." She patted his shoulder. "Don't worry so about the boy. Have some tea."

So that was what the steaming cup of something was. He couldn't smell it, and it was a paler color then her usual herbal infusions. "Medicinal?" he asked.

"Chamomile—the last packet I had. We really need to terrorize a Terran outpost so I can do some shopping. Now, drink your tea and stop worrying about the Ax."

Kristi always assumed all problems were interpersonal. She stared insistently at him, but he couldn't bring himself to lift the cup to his lips. "Kith looks hungry," he said instead, as the League representative came in and crossed the common toward him. "Go find him some raw meat."

She gave Pyr a disgusted look, but was glad enough to get out of Kith's way. "I put lots of honey in the tea," she told Pyr before heading back to the galley. "You know how your voice gets when you're sick."

"I'm not sick," he said to her back, then forgot about her as Kith took a seat opposite him.

There were legends among many races of walking dead. Kith suited the prevalent descriptions on his best days. Pyr assumed Kith must be some sort of mongrel mixture of several Pirate League races. He looked a little like several races Pyr knew about, but mostly he looked ugly, which frequently happened when beings from different worlds mated. Kith was pallid-complexioned and dead-eyed, with too many sharp teeth. His face was pocked and wrinkled, his nostrils mere slits in the center of his sharp face. His whole being radiating reptilian coldness that was emphasized by the horizontal row of fleshy red knobs across his forehead. Merely having him along on boarding parties was enough to ensure a certain amount of useful fear. Normally silent and watchful, Rust addiction had made the League rep quarrelsome. Kith was the greediest being Pyr had ever met, which made him perfect for his League assignment on the Raptor. He was Pilsane's main source of worry. The navigator was afraid the crew would decide to follow Kith in a take-over attempt.

Pyr looked at Kith as Kith glared at him, and decided Kith's life could be measured in hours. One more little problem to take care of before turning command over to Linch. He'd have to figure out a way to space him, because Mik hadn't yet figured out how to get through Kith's personal shield. Pity the shield somehow insulated him from telepathy as well.

Pyr ignored the smoldering Kith for the moment and spoke into the bracelet. "Well?"

"The ship that's following is still trailing at maximum sensor range," Linch's voice replied.

They'd picked up the reading three hours after leaving the Calrod system, not long after Pyr found his way onto the bridge. A day later, Pyr was still more concerned about his loss of control in the Door room than being followed. He expected to be followed.

Quiet laughter issued from the bracelet. "Just proving I'm more iron-willed about bridge duty than you, leader."

He'd be warming it permanently soon. Pyr still thought it was a bad idea to have let the rest of the crew out of the chattel hold, but Linch and Mik had finally backed Pilsane on the subject. They needed the crew to run the Raptor with any efficiency. With a ship chasing them, Pyr had to agree that efficiency might come in handy.

"Fine," he answered Linch. There was no need to mention that it was about time for their daily dose of Rust. He finally gave his attention to Kith. "Yes?"

Flat black eyes flamed briefly, then deadened again. "You let the ship trail us. Why don't you strike?"

Pyr held up one finger. "I'm giving you one raid. That ship is as likely to belong to Security as it does to Denvry. I'm not starting a war."

"It's expensive to maintain ships," the League rep reminded him after a glaring silence. "Expensive to buy loyalty, Captain. And then, there are the toys to pay for."

It was easy to ignore the contempt; he was used to it from Kith. "I know all that. I know anything you might want to tell me," he reminded in turn.

"There's a ship out there. Strike." Kith emphasized his point by pounding his fist on the sturdy surface of the table.

"A simple statement," Linch said, coming up behind Kith. He already had the ligret in one hand. "Even you should be able to understand such a simple word, Leaguer."

Kith growled a few words in his native language. Linch smiled, and drew his fingers across the ligret strings. Kith was not a music lover. Pyr watched Kith's cold expression for any hint of the respect Linch deserved. None. Hatred, anger, and arrogance vied with each other on the ugly face. Nothing Linch could use. Kith really would have to die. After he'd had his raid and made his report.

Pyr leaned forward, resting his right elbow on the table and his chin on his hand. "Do you understand the word 'dismissed'?"

After a prod on the shoulder from Linch, Kith answered, "I do." He swiveled the chair, lunging off the seat. But Linch was already out of his reach, grinning wolfishly. He held a knife poised to throw out of habit, not because it would do anything more than bounce off the Leaguer's shield. Kith pretended to ignore him and stomped out of the common.

Linch's knife disappeared into a forearm sheath. He picked up his dropped ligret and took the vacated seat. He settled the instrument on his lap, bent his head and began to caress the metal strings. Notes sharp as the blade were drawn from the instrument.

Kristi appeared from the galley and placed plates in front of both of them. "That Leaguer's getting boring," she observed, then left them to their meals.

"Observant," Linch said affectionately. "And she can cook. Every pirate's notion of a perfect woman."

"Not mine," Pyr answered, too quickly. He didn't want to start that old discussion again.

Linch put the ligret down, propping it carefully beside his chair. He dug into his food, and observed around a mouthful, "You always were picky, Dha-lrm."

Pyr passed a Rust capsule to Linch, and took one for himself. He made himself take a sip of tea to down the drug. The drink was cold and tasteless, and the drug did nothing but keep the plague at bay. He tried another sip from the cup before pushing it away. "She said she put honey in this."

"A type of Terran insect spit." Linch took far too much pleasure in informing him of that. "Quite sweet. I like it. You should try it. And a woman."

The smell of the food nauseated Pyr. "I have restraint," he said, finding he'd risen to the bait after all.

"You're looking for intellectual stimulation, not a mother. I've heard it before. And, oh, yes, the galaxy is going up in flames. Such poor excuses, Dha-lrm." He gave his dangerous grin again. "Of course, you'll always have me." He put his fork down and rubbed his hands together briskly. "What do you want to do about Denvry's ship? It would be easy enough to lose them."

Linch retrieved his ligret, brushed his long fingers across strings before speaking. "I see. Wonder what's taking so long."

"A romantic, our Mik." He began to play something soft and melancholy. It hurt Pyr's ears. "Why don't you keep her, Dha-lrm?"

Who was the romantic? "No." Pyr got to his feet, happy to leave the common to Linch and his ligret. "I'll take the watch."

"Fifty-nine hours," Mik said, stepping away from the padded table in the center of the room.

To one side of the table was a control console, to the other a bank of monitors. The unconscious woman was held down by padded restraints. Her hair and clothes were soaked with sweat and her head lolled to one side, but she showed no physical signs of damage.

"She was full of useful information," Mik went on regretfully. He held a datacube out to Pyr. "Only she didn't know she knew where Axylel is. She'd have been happy to tell me as soon as we got started, but all she actually had were some random facts we had to trace to a conclusion."

Pyr almost understood what Mik was getting at. "Whoever gave her the brooch intended her to pass it on to us?"

Mik nodded. "Laying down a false trail. Somebody who wanted Denvry out of the way and thought we'd do the job for him, is the conclusion we came to. She didn't understand that at first. It took her a long while to realize who must be behind the information screen she thought she was manipulating." He looked admiringly at the prisoner. "Fascinating thought processes."

Pyr waited impatiently for Mik to recall why he'd questioned the woman in the first place, but the man was lost in the details of tinkering—mechanisms or minds, Mik could easily get carried away. "Well?" Pyr finally demanded.

"Damn!" Pyr bit down hard on his annoyance. "I have to kill Robe Halfor?" Mik nodded unhappily. Bloody typical of Axylel. Boy never had been anything but trouble.

"What about Hanni?" Mik questioned, dealing with the present and leaving Pyr to worry over the bad news he'd given him.

Pyr was impressed. "Let's hope Denvry's grateful for your care." When the engineer gave him a puzzled look, Pyr explained, "There's one of his ships hovering behind us. It's scared to open fire, but it's not going away, either."

"Sneak up on them and use your Door to give Hanni back to her brother. We won't mention any of this to Kith."

Pyr patted the engineer's arm. "You weren't planning on spacing someone you worked so carefully on."

Mik tried a different tack. "What about the plague?" Linch would have been proud of him. "She's probably caught Sag Fever from us. Does Denvry have Rust?"

Pyr refused to let the engineer make him guilty. "Give her a five-day supply," he told Mik. "Then stand by with her at the Door. I'll signal you when we're ready to send her over."

Chapter Eight

When Roxy looked up, she saw pale, green sky overhead and the swaying branches of the tree she was sitting against. When she looked around, she saw the rest of the small, walled garden outside the pediatric wing. The flowers that had just begun to bloom when she first arrived on Bonadem were fading. The grass needed trimming. The fountain wasn't working. No gardener, biological or droid, had set foot or antigrav pad here for a while. Roxy closed her eyes again, and continued soaking in the warm sunlight, happy to be alone. She ignored the voice that had spoken in her head.

That was a different presence. Too long with the silents, the first presence answered the second.

You two go on without me, Roxy thought at the other koltiri. I'd hate to interrupt. The two koltiri had been avoiding her since they arrived, and that was just fine with Roxy. Having Reine and Racqel in her head occasionally was as much contact with Koltir as she wanted. They were her sisters and understood where she was coming from about most things. At least, Reine did. Racqel was usually too busy seeing the future to take much interest in the present.

Roxy didn't know why these two strangers were bothering her now, but she gave a mental sigh and told them, I live as a silent among silents, and I like it. So I'm odd. So what? I'm also on my break.

She might have asked, 'my being what?' but she knew what they meant. It was her very essence that grated on them. Live with it, Roxy responded. We're here to heal, not get along.

The two telepathic voices blended into one. It is time we spoke. You disturb our peace.

Her nickname was Sting. Their thoughts hurt, so she stung back. I disturb your presumptions—your arrogant, elitist, narrow-minded assumptions.

Roxy rose to her feet and looked around the empty garden. She was tired, lonely, and vulnerable. The healings were hard, and the whole process seemed ultimately futile, even though every life saved was a small reward. She didn't even know how long she'd been on Bonadem. Her husband didn't answer her letters. Her best friend insisted on putting herself in danger in the hunt for a drug that might not exist. She had a lot to think about; the last thing she wanted was to be thought at. She wondered where in the huge hospital complex the two koltiri were, because they put her in the mood for kicking some serious telepath butt. I put my life and sanity on the line every time I heal. Last time I looked, that was the job description for koltiri.

Good. She kept the thought to herself rather than send it. Why were they bothering her now? She forced herself to physically and mentally relax, to be calm and koltiri-like. They were older, supposedly wiser, they were deigning to share their wisdom with one who had strayed from the peaceful philosophy of their kind—the interfering old biddies. It was her duty to accept their wisdom. Right. Still, better to play along if she wanted them to leave her alone. They weren't the only ones who found the contact painful. She looked up at the calm green sky and made her thoughts as gentle as the blossom-scented breeze. How should I behave as koltiri of Koltir Prime?

When the answer came it was not at all what she expected. Koltiri have vowed to blend our gifts with the younger seedlings. The Genesis Continues.

The Genesis Continues, Roxy responded automatically. Oh, great. She'd been expecting a lecture on nonviolence, and they'd thrown religion and reproductive policy at her instead. She crossed her arms, and glared at the women who weren't there in the garden with her. Your point?

She didn't understand this one. Racqel had claimed years ago that Roxy would bond with a great warrior, and she was married to the hero of the Trin War, just like the great Seeress predicted. Okay, they weren't bonded, but she was determined to go back to the Tigris and work on her marriage as soon as the Sagouran Fever epidemic was under control. She did chafe at the unfairness of it; Reine didn't exactly have a complete bond, either, but nobody yelled at her. Roxy rubbed a spot on her forehead that was beginning to ache. Koltiri shouldn't get headaches, but it was a symptom of Sagouran Fever she couldn't seem to shed. I'm going back on duty now, she told the koltiri matchmakers, and built up her shields to keep them out. Odd girl, the thought trailed after her anyway.

Alice Phere did not bother looking away from the diagnostic board as she replied, "No surprise to me."

Roxy stepped out of the doorway of the Section Monitoring Room. She poured herself a cup of 'caffeine beverage' from the refreshment cart sitting in the center of the circular room, then took a seat at one of the other monitor stations. She was not surprised to see that Alice was the only doctor on duty. The staff, both native and offworld volunteers, was being spread ever thinner as the plague infected more and more of the population.

Roxy liked the SMR and ducked in when she wasn't napping between healings. Each diagnostic station was set up to cover an entire wing of the giant hospital. It was as modern as anything she recalled from her stays on the hospital world Nightingale. Far more modern than what MedService personnel had to work with on low-tech worlds. The monitor boards with their arrays of bright flashing lights and multiple screens and readouts gave a reassuring feeling of medical personnel being in control of any situation. She ran her hand along a row of cool, sleek touchpads. Control was a lie, of course, where Sagouran Fever was concerned, but this stuff sure looked pretty.

Alice was in uniform, and Roxy took some comfort from the sight of the familiar mint-green and cream MedService clothing, even with the added faint blue glow given off by Alice's environmental belt. She missed MedService, even though right now she was considering changing back into her black MilService uniform just to make a point about being a warrior among warriors with the other koltiri. Which they probably wouldn't get, so why bother?

Alice wore her hair in shoulder-length dreadlocks. Roxy wasn't sure if even biosensors could see through her heavy black hair. "I bet you don't have ears. I was staring at your halo."

Alice had been born on a Terran colony world settled by a Christian sect. She'd run away from home at fifteen, actually stowing away on a freighter to escape a life of rigid fundamentalism. Roxy knew Alice's history, but she also knew that when Dr. Phere said 'God' she meant the God of her fathers. She practiced her faith quite sincerely, if not as strictly as she was brought up. So there would be no heart-to-heart talk with her old friend. What truly bothered Roxy about her mental run-in with the other koltiri was that she'd been reminded that she was duty-bound to help Spread the Genesis and go and have babies with someone from another planet. She and Alice could agree that evolution was a fact, but past that agreement there could be no discussion if religious wars in the United Systems were to be avoided.

"A tarnished halo," Roxy assured her friend. Then she slumped back in the chair and asked, "It's okay to be married to someone you love, right?"

"Nothing in the rule book against it," Alice answered. She began running a medication check on an overflowing ward's patients.

"We work by different books, darlin'," Roxy muttered under her breath. She finished the poor excuse for a cup of coffee and moved to peer over Alice's shoulder, automatically checking data screens herself. "Isolation wards." The beds were occupied by patients with serious illnesses other than Sagouran Fever. The patients in each shielded ward were tended by a pair of meddroids.

"Mmm." Roxy rubbed a finger along her chin. "Wonder if we should ask the hospital administrators to put security guards on the . ward entrances just in case?"

Good question. Nobody came near the hospital if they could avoid it. And nobody inside wanted to get out. "I'm Military. We're paranoid."

Alice shot her an annoyed look. "I think the Military needs to stop fighting a war that's over."

"Over?" Roxy heard the sharp rise of her own voice, and fought down the indignant anger. Safer not to discuss the war with anyone who hadn't seen action.

Roxy said nothing, and Alice went back to tracking the flowing patterns on a quartet of screens above the console.

After she'd taken readings, Alice said, "The research people up on Floor Twenty are threatening to jump out the windows. Or throw their equipment out."

"Still nothing. Dr. Callen says he wants to talk to you. Physician," Alice added for emphasis.

"I don't have the time to go over his ever-mutating data." She wasn't quite sure she had the brains for it, either, not with what the healings were doing to her.

"Well, make some time, Physician," Alice said sharply. "I thought the Trin were bad, but this epidemic could kill the Systems."

Alice tapped instructions on a keypad and adjusted a dial on the board, followed by quick calls to meddroids in other wards. Roxy found watching all this purposeful activity soothing; she could almost pretend that Alice was engaged in normal medical procedures. She felt recovered enough to get back to work, but waited a moment longer, listening in as Alice answered a call from Dr. Jeraldo. Patrisia Jeraldo was the head of Pediatrics. Roxy admired the way the petite woman and her medtech husband handled children. Kids seemed to naturally love and trust the couple. Their own three-year-old daughter had died of the fever when it first struck Bonadem, before the evac plan had been established. Rumor had it that it was the Jeraldos who came up with the plan to get the children of Bonadem safely offworld. The Jeraldos didn't talk about their loss or take any credit, they simply worked harder than anybody else in the hospital to get as many children to safety as possible. In the time she'd been here, Roxy had never known either of them to take more than two hours of sedated rest. Seeing Patrisia Jeraldo's haggard face on the view screen made her guilty for pausing for even a brief conversation.

Alice shook her head, making her dreadlocks swing gently. "We're expanding the evac operation starting tomorrow."

"No. Neither ships nor healers are available. The Jeraldos have organized more medteams to go into the city to look for those too weak or sick or frightened to leave their homes."

"Taking it to the streets, eh? Good idea." She was rested enough. She had things to do. She drained her cup and tossed it in the recycler, and threw Alice a vague salute on the way out.

Roxy didn't bother opening her eyes; she just gulped down the hot liquid from the cup held to her lips. To her delight, she tasted really good coffee instead of the nutrient supplement she expected.

Once it was all gone and she'd healed the slight burns in her mouth from drinking something too hot too fast, she opened her eyes to find Alice peering intently at her.

"You have green eyes," she said, fascinated by this small discovery. "I'd forgotten your telling me that it was rare in Ter-Africans. Martin's eyes are brown."

She heard herself continue to ramble on as Alice took her by the arm and guided her out of the treatment room. Behind them, Roxy heard the child she'd just healed calling tearfully for his mommy. She would have liked to go back and cuddle him, but Alice's grip was fierce as she led Roxy down the corridor.

"Have I done ten yet?" Roxy asked plaintively, worried that she hadn't gotten in her ten-patients-an-hour quota. She was only allowed to perform ten healings at a time, then it was time for protein injections and some rest between sessions. Not the schedule the koltiri would have preferred, but some administrator had made the decision that this was the optimum way of utilizing an empathic healer's abilities. "Optimum for who?" she complained as she was brought into an office. She was pushed gently into a chair in the center of the room. Alice stepped back, to lean tiredly against the closed, dark-purple door.

Roxy slumped just as tiredly in the chair, fighting fatigue and dizziness. After staring for a while, she eventually realized there was a desk directly across from her, set in front of a tall, narrow window. It was dark outside, the kind of gray-green darkness you get just before a thunderstorm. Silhouetted in the grim darkness of the window were two men, their environmental belts giving their forms an eerie glow. One man sat at the desk, the other man stood beside him. They were staring at her. After a while she recognized them as two members of the volunteer research team MedService had sent in.

The standing man was very tall; it made her even dizzier to look up at him. "I'm never going to play basketball again if this keeps up," she complained as she recalled that his name was Dr. Rutherford.

The one in the desk chair was smallish and baldish. He had a doughy shape and pale eyes. His name was Callen. She could feel that he wanted her attention very much, so she tried hard to concentrate through the exhaustion. "Nu?"

Roxy hit her palm against her ear, then she glanced at Alice. "My translator's not connecting with my brain. What language is he speaking?"

Roxy smiled placidly. "Oh, good. I'm not crazy." She knew she was slightly disconnected from reality, but unable to fight her way back through the residual effects of healing Sag Fever. The bounce back was getting longer every time.

Perhaps she was less lucid than she thought, as Alice snarled, "Jesus Christ!" and reached for her belt pouch. "Sorry, hon, I forgot you need some protein."

An injection hissed into her arm, and some of the fog cleared within a few moments. She sat up straighter and made herself focus on the researchers. "What can I do for you, gentlemen?"

The men relaxed, visibly and empathically. Roxy found the hope they suddenly radiated bruising against her weakened mental shielding. She knew what they wanted from Physician Merkrates, but didn't think it was in her power to give. Rutherford waited, letting Callen do the talking. "'Ave you 'ad a chance to look at any of the recent test data?"

"Uh—" Roxy searched her sieve of a memory. "—No." Alice sighed loudly, practically in her ear. Roxy raised her gaze to the doctor's pinch-lipped face. "I'm going to real soon now," she promised. "How many days ago did you ask me?"

"'S all right," Callen told her. "Might be irrelevant anyway. Not 'avin' any luck pinnin' down the bugger. Every time we think we've got a possible treatment…" He snapped his fingers. "No joy with gettin' a sample of the street cure, either. We're not even sure it's bein' used 'ere yet—if it exists at all. We're tryin' to get a sample in from Abidon. Rumor says there's a large supply there—but no ship will go in."

"And there's an unofficial coalition of planetary defense ships patrolling infected systems' borders," Alice added. "They're hunting and shooting down unauthorized traffic."

"Nasty," Roxy said. She didn't mention the Tigris's encounter with the Triallens. Or Dee's less-than-legal forays into the city during her off-hours. In fact, she didn't remember the last time she'd seen her Terran friend, but also knew it could have been days or hours or even minutes. She was living more and more inside the healings, and losing the capacity to deal with anything else for very long. I have to get out of this, she thought, and knew she couldn't. Koltiri commitment came first, last, and always. Damn it. "So, what do you want me to do?" she prodded the researchers, wanting and hating to get back to work.

"Honey," Roxy lied to her friend, "when I say I'm committing miracles, it's no joke." Alice stepped back, looking at her thoughtfully. Roxy addressed the researchers again, making a koltiri-like effort to figure out what they wanted without bothering with verbal conversation. It wasn't easy for her, because she was in the habit of being ethical with the mind-silent beings she lived among, but she was too tired to get through the imprecise layering of verbal conversation right now. "You want me to try to analyze this thing while I'm healing it? Take the few seconds I'm infected and get to know and love the Sagouran virus like a bondmate?"

"If that's possible," Callen urged. "You're the only one of the koltiri with a medical background. If you could combine your train-in' with your talent…" His voice trailed off and he just sat there looking tired and hopeful. His colleague added his silent pleading, and all the emotion aimed at her was enough to make Roxy squirm in her seat. She focused her attention on Callen. The earnest little man was so tired, so close to despair. She wanted to hug him and make it all better.

Hugging him wouldn't do any good, so she said, "Sure, I'll give it a shot." She looked at Alice. "Can I have my treat now?"

Alice Phere replied with a weak smile. "Let's go get you some real meat. I'm buying."

Chapter Nine

"Shut up, Kith," Pilsane said automatically as he passed the table where the off-duty crew gathered, grumbling over the lack of prey. Pyr watched as the navigator turned briefly back to the seated crew before joining him and Linch at the gaming table. Kith didn't look up, but the others gave him their attention; some respectfully, some grudgingly, none happily. Pyr judged their reactions carefully as Pilsane said, "How many of you want to be locked in the chattel hold?" No answers. One by one their gazes dropped. "Thought so." Pilsane pivoted and continued on his way. He settled down next to Linch and said quietly, "We better find something for them soon." He didn't complain about letting Denvry's ship go. He was very understanding when it came to diplomacy, most of the time.

No other vessel had been detected in the over twenty hours since sending Hanni over to her brother's ship. Everybody was impatient for many reasons: they were a long way from their own territory, they worried about running out of Rust, and there was the usual greed, of course. Most important for Pyr and his officers, they now had the knowledge they'd been hunting down for weeks. They needed to get on with the job of wiping out the man who was a danger to them. Pyr wanted Axylel back alive, if possible.

The Raptor was set on a course deeper still into the Bucon Empire, deeper into trouble. All shields were up, all sensors hunting, with Mik taking the watch while everyone else slept or waited restlessly in the common.

Pyr drummed the fingers of his right hand on the tabletop, ignoring the vidgame projected between himself and Linch. He also ignored Linch's taking advantage of his distraction to make a second move. Pyr knew he'd win the game anyway.

"I begin to want this raid more than you do," he told Pilsane. His left hand and arm kept going from numb to excruciatingly painful. Either way, they had become almost useless. He tried to keep still and hoped no one noticed. He also knew he couldn't disguise anything much longer. He could hear the strain to keep the pain out of his voice. And Kristi had just gone away after telling him even Rust junkies needed to eat sometime. Even stubborn, red-headed slobs like him. He had ignored her, but Linch looked concerned despite his mocking smile.

"You've been quiet lately, Captain," he observed while Pilsane leaned forward to study the game lights.

Pyr ignored Linch's meaning. Telepathy was too disorienting. "Can't be heard over your racket," he complained. "And I'm thinking."

"Something like that." Pyr firmly kept his shields up against Linch's questioning probe, even though it took an effort. "I'm tired," he admitted. And cursed silently as something inside his mind ripped and exploded outward—

… a pair of neutronium towers looming up before him blinking curious inner eyes… flowing around them beyond them spilling into… a freezing cavern paranoia and contempt churning thoughts into a whirlpool… alien cowards kill them before they kill me think I can be replaced playing their pretending games ignoring bargains hate them slit the red one's throat and drink his blood…crashing down caught by a net of numbers danced with design schematics…flamed with grief… damned plague damned Rust damn everything she was all I cared about stayed because she liked it here trapped with the hunters and the Rust… running from the loss—damn wizard! Get out of my head!… hunger and longing and disappointment chased themselves round and round never looks at me loves music and screws the Orlinian fortune teller saw them together kill the bitch then he'll… rocking like in a cradle gentle place haven't made Pilsie makabread for a while what is wrong with that man hasn't changed clothes in two days either Rust or the Ax getting to him poor lamb—

The deep rush of color to Pilsane's face fascinated Pyr. He watched in awe as the man's fair skin darkened, then paled again, in subtle gradations. He wondered how long the reaction took.

He heard the voice. A spoken word. No emotion or thought intruded with the word. Pyr sighed deeply and blinked. He forced his gaze away from Pilsane's face and looked toward the table across the common room. He recognized faces, automatically matching people to their thoughts; Kith hating, Taylre thinking in engineer, Sumer missing the wife taken by the plague, Rhod reacting with instinctive shielding, Cope still wanting Linch after one night two years before. And he'd fallen into the affectionate mind of Kristi in her nearby galley as well.

That he was able to identify the thoughts as separate from his own was comfort and help. He sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. He could still feel all but Kith, whose artificial shield was back in place. He knew they were watching, aware something had happened, though none had any memory of his awareness tumbling helplessly through them. If he had the energy, he knew he could reach out to everyone on board, and who knew how far beyond that? He didn't. Never tested the limits. The only thing he couldn't do was find the Ax. Pyr knew Axylel lived, would answer if his thoughts touched him, but Axylel's mind remained hidden.

Get it under control, he ordered himself, or give up the game right now. There is a trio of strong, curious telepaths you trained yourself nibbling away at what little shields you've got. Keep them out. Use every trick you didn't teach them and keep your mind to yourself. He would be glad when this was over. Would he?

Pyr concentrated, using all the strength he could muster to force discipline into the effort to keep his thoughts in and everyone else's out. Subjectively, it seemed to take years, but he knew it was only a few seconds before he opened his eyes on the curious Linch and Pilsane. He might have shouted at them to leave him be if they'd been alone. Not being alone he said, "I'm going to my quarters."

Chapter Ten

"I have to get some sleep, but I can't right now." Roxy paced back and forth like a caged creature in the pale-lavender bedroom as she recorded the message. It was dark outside the window, and dark inside her soul. Dark but for the deep fury and fiery killing urge she kept so tightly under control. "I miss you, and hell—feel so awful. Not for me. Well, yes, but that's part of the job. I need to talk about this, tell someone. Don't know where Dee is. Maybe in the research lab. Out in the city, probably, and that's terrifying, too."

She didn't want to tell her husband that she didn't know when she'd last seen Dee Nikophoris, because that would lead her to explaining how she was becoming less and less lucid with each healing session. She thought she was coherent now because of the adrenaline rush of fury that had fueled her since she'd been told the latest unpleasant news an hour ago. She'd returned to her quarters to get herself under control as much as to get the rest she'd been ordered to take.

"What happened? Alice—you remember Alice Phere? Alice and Dr. Jeraldo and her husband—they're dead. Not just them, but a group of medtechs as well. Not from the plague. Yes, from the plague; a side effect, I guess. We've seen things like this during the war, I shouldn't be so surprised. But I thought civilization had returned to the Systems when we beat back the Trins. Am I a stupid idealist, or what? I can see you frowning at this message and thinking, 'Get on with your report, Physician'.

"What happened was that the hospital sent volunteer teams out into the city to find sick children. They were all wearing environmental belts, of course. They certainly had no reason to be armed—civilians! A crowd—no, a mob—surrounded them. They were attacked and killed for those environmental belts. They died trying to help. Such good people."

The door opened and Roxy turned to face Dee Nikophoris, the recording forgotten. "What are you smiling at?" she snarled at Dee, furious from worry and grief, and wanting to throw her arms around her friend in relief at the same time. She settled for sitting down on her bed as the grinning Dee strutted into the room.

Dee laughed. She wore a black and silver jumpsuit, and her normally tightly coiled dark hair framed her face and shoulders like a black veil. Her ebullience grated against Roxy's weakened shields. She tapped Roxy on the shoulder as they faced each other. "Now, tell me why I'm feeling so good, Physician mine."

They looked at each other for a while. Gradually, Roxy felt through Dee's surface emotions and realized there was nothing natural about the other woman's joyous mood. There was a certain fuzzy brain-buzz about the woman that was familiar, if not quite recognizable. She could take a good guess at what it was, though. "Dee Nikophoris," she breathed, wide-eyed with horror. "What have you done?"

"I got the drug. Already dropped a sample off at the lab. Now." She jerked a thumb toward the door. "Let's go. Put on some shoes first, Merkrates. There's debris in the streets. There's been rioting, you know."

"I'm sure there is." She put her hands on Dee's shoulders, and didn't like the feel at all. "Let's talk about the Bucon's antidote."

It was all she needed to say. Roxy dropped her hands, and looked around automatically, though they were alone. "The Glover?"

Dee nodded. With all the secret knowledge of their misspent youths between them, Dee didn't need to say anymore. Roxy slipped on a pair of shoes.

"Let's go, Sting," Dee said, urging her toward the door. "We have an appointment."

"This ought to be it—if Persey's little friend gave me the right directions." The aircar floated a moment longer before settling onto its pads. Roxy felt the gentle bump and opened her eyes. She estimated it had been a short nap, though she thought she'd slept on her feet through Dee's dragging her out of the hospital. She had only the faintest memory of being stuffed into the aircar and nothing else until now. She yawned and rubbed her eyes, then looked around as Dee lifted the gull-wing doors. They were in a narrow, deserted street. On either side of the street were five- and six-story concrete-block buildings. There were streetlights on the corners, but it didn't look as if their glow was going to be replacing the fading twilight. Either the power was out or the buildings were completely deserted. Maybe both. The windows facing the street were just dark holes in the pale surface of the walls.

"Where are we?" It wasn't a wealthy neighborhood, but it certainly wasn't a slum, either.

"Res Area Five, if that means anything to you." Roxy shook her head. "It's not important." Dee scrubbed at her eyes with the back of her hands, staining them with rubbed-off makeup. "Bright out here. Let's get inside."

It was bright to Roxy; her pupils didn't adjust properly anymore as an after-affect of the healings. But Dee was all Terran… Wouldn't a Terran see this twilight as a dim ending to a dull-pewter day? "Got a headache?" Roxy asked her friend.

Roxy let it go and heaved herself out of the car. She didn't really wake up until her thin sandals encountered the cold, rough concrete of the street. She shivered as she slogged after Dee, who was . already at the top of the steps. "Natural environments are so unpredictable," she added as she came up behind Dee. "Where are we going, anyway?"

Dee threw an impatient look over her shoulder. "Inside." She forcefully pushed the door open, letting it bang against the inner wall for added emphasis. "Come along."

Roxy followed Dee into the darkness. The interior dimness was restful on her strained eyes, but the silence of the interior of the building was even more eerie than the open emptiness of the street. The place felt deserted, as empty of residual emotions as it was of people. The residents had been gone long enough for the basic things that lingered and made up the aura of a place to also have packed up and gone. "How long have we been on this planet, anyway?"

Dee didn't answer her question. Roxy followed the silver-garbed figure ahead of her and recalled all the riots and looting she'd heard about. There was no evidence of intruders in this long, dark hallway. The doors they passed were evenly spaced, made of some dark-stained local wood. All were decorously closed, the nameplates covering the locking mechanisms neatly in place. The place was safe enough, she concluded. It just wasn't anyone's home anymore.

They soon found out the elevators weren't working any better than the lights. Dee swore inventively and led Roxy to a staircase. They were three flights up before Roxy began to feel the presence of Sag Fever. No, she told herself firmly as they approached one specific door and the awareness itched stronger into her senses. It was a person with the disease, not the Sag virus itself that she was feeling. What the hell was the matter with her? You are trying to hide the fact that there are sentients suffering from yourself, she concluded. Well, stop it. All right, all right. But distancing myself is so much easier, she pouted. Unfortunately, that wasn't how koltiri healing worked.

Dee halted at a door, so Roxy stopped behind her and waited while Dee bent to peer at the nameplate. The etched markings were hard for even Roxy to make out in the shadowy hallway. Dee continued to squint at the plate for so long that Roxy eventually told her, "It says number 508."

"That's what I've been told." Dee flipped the nameplate up and touched the code buttons.

Dee growled at her. "Yeah. Right. So I'm not used to breaking and entering." She pushed on the door and it swung open without any resistance. "But I might take it up." She stepped inside and Roxy dutifully followed. She was beginning to feel like a loyal puppy.

The windows opposite the door were large ovals; they let in enough light for Roxy to make out the lumpy blanket piled in the center of the bare room's carpet. Dee let her pass and Roxy sighed loudly as she approached the blanket. She touched a bulge she thought was a shoulder, shivered with surprise and snapped irritably, "Martin Braithwaithe, what the hell are you doing here?!"

She did a quick survey. Her brother-in-law was barely breathing, and he was pale. Considering Martin's normally dark-chocolate complexion, this was definitely not a good sign. She touched sweat-slick skin. His body was starting to shut down, and his mind was very, very far away. "This is bad." Leave it to Martin to have a really terminal case of Sag Fever. The man always had to be so damn thorough about everything. She deepened both physical and mental touch on him. "Cover me, I'm going in," she muttered to Dee as the space between herself and her patient narrowed and began to disappear.

A deep voice rumbled seductively in her ear while fingertips traced lazily down her back. Roxy moaned and pressed herself closer to the hard, muscular body. She nuzzled his bare throat, tasting the musky salt of dried sweat. She savored the taste and scent of Terran skin, and bit down, not hard, but enough to make him gasp with need. She threw her thigh across his while her hand eased between them to unfasten—

"What the fuck is going on here?" Roxy shouted as she scrambled back across the floor. She stared at the kneeling man from across a few feet's distance. He seemed to be trying to get his breathing under control. "Martin?"

He blinked, covered his ears, and grinned at her. "You always this loud?" He blinked again and took his hands slowly from his head as he asked, "You really here, Roxy, or am I dead?"

"You're both dead," Dee corrected Roxy. She took a seat on the carpet between them. "Or would have been in about five seconds if I hadn't been invited in on that little porno extravaganza." She looked meaningfully at Roxy. "Kindly put those back where Viper found them."

Roxy took time out from an internal struggle to get her hormones under control to look down and discover that her halter had been pushed down around her waist. How inconvenient. Or convenient, depending on how you looked at it. She hastily rearranged her clothing.

Roxy rubbed her temples while Martin said for both of them, "I don't remember a thing."

"I've heard that before," Dee said. She swatted him on the back of the head. "And here I thought you were sick."

Roxy felt Martin's emotional guard go up. She also suddenly recalled a vivid bit of his subconscious life. "You were hallucinating about Reine. And something the two of you did back in the Belt." She tossed hair out of her face and pretended offended pride—she was too tired to feel the real stuff. "Even you mistake me for my sister."

"Nonsense. You're prettier. But she'd kill me if she found out I died hallucinating about someone else. If I'd known you were coming I'd have added you to the hallucination." He smiled reminiscently. "Jail bait though you were back then."

Roxy remembered Martin's outrage when he'd found out she was thirteen, though he hadn't been much over eighteen himself. He'd personally dragged her and Reine into a cutter and back to Terra, lecturing them about the dangers of the Belter lifestyle the whole time. He and Reine had gone back to a party that lasted a week as soon as they'd dropped her off in Haifa. She almost stayed inside the memory, as it was far more pleasant than the soul-deadening tragedy of the present. Of course, there had been tears and shouting and teenage drama at the time.

"Reine was seventeen and knew what she was doing," he said, as though he was the one reading her mind. "You were a baby." He leaned over and put his arm around Dee's shoulders. "Thanks, Groupie," he said, and kissed her on the cheek.

"It's a groupie's job to be sensible and take care of players. You've lived up to the code." Dee made a rude noise.

"You're right, as usual," Roxy informed him. She did her best to clear out the mental fog that kept trying to envelop her. This time she had the dregs of physical arousal to deal with as well. This was a very different side effect than she was used to from a healing, and could only suppose that responding to Martin had something to do with his being telempathically linked to her sister, since she shared a link with her sister as well—in a different way, of course. All this connectedness was too much to try to straighten out… besides, she'd always had a crush on Martin and she wasn't going to try to pretend otherwise. "And you have an overactive libido, too, Viper," she added. No reason she should take all the blame.

"A healthy libido. Which is more than I could say for the rest of me until you showed up. How'd you find out I was here?" he questioned Dee again.

Dee squirmed out of Martin's friendly embrace. Her fiercely angry aura lit up the night for Roxy. "Nosy Security bastard," Dee snarled at him.

"Doing my job." His tone was mild. "Please tell me that you're not trying to protect your dealer, Lieutenant Nikophoris."

Dee's shoulders slumped, then moved in an uncomfortable shrug. Her gaze dropped from Martin's. "Maybe."

Roxy didn't understand a word of this exchange. "Dealer? Your dealer? Stev Persey's a dealer. Dee?"

"We're all in it, Groupie," Martin responded. He had kept the same gentle tone and emotions throughout the whole odd exchange. Roxy wanted to hit him.

"Explanations, or somebody goes out the window," she told them, trying to sound like a senior officer from the most badass special forces commando group in the United Systems.

Of course it probably didn't help that Dee was also a veteran of the Tigris's many combat missions and that Martin was the second most dangerous man in the United Systems. Maybe the most dangerous, because he was the only one who could actually control that crazy husband of his when Rafe Aquilar went on one of his rampages. Martin was always calm, always cool, always calculating, a psychologist as well as a security specialist. And none of this defined exactly which of them was currently in charge of whatever this situation happened to be. No, she reversed her thinking, if Martin Braithwaithe is on Bonadem, it will be for a reason that involves the protection of the United Systems. So conditions are no doubt such that Commander Braithwaithe outranks Physician Merkrates and Lieutenant Nikophoris.

Or maybe he was just passing through and decided to stop by and contract Sag Fever… Which brought the three of them to sitting in an abandoned apartment wearing civvies and talking about drug dealers. She supposed asking Martin what he was really doing on Bonadem would only get her a 'Need to Know' answer. Roxy didn't bother to ask and concentrated on Dee while she was momentarily lucid and more or less awake.

Dee sidled across the floor to sit cross-legged between Roxy and Martin. She sat very straight, staring into the darkness for a long time. Roxy waited, wondering if she was being patient, or was just too exhausted to push anything. She looked down at the rug, noticing how her, Dee's, and Martin's shadows criss-crossed and blended into each other. She supposed it was the double dose of moonlight coming in at odd angles, or maybe she was seeing shadows that weren't even there.

"I've been getting samples of the drug," Dee's tired voice finally floated out of the shadows.

Roxy wondered why she felt a shock of fear instead of joy at hearing this news. "Yes?" she prompted after the silence returned and she decided she wasn't patient after all. Martin leaned back, his palms resting flat on the floor behind him. Roxy found his persistent patience disconcerting. And she didn't like the way he was controlling this information exchange by letting her be the one to draw Dee out. Security bastard, she echoed Dee as her energy-drained body began to ache with hunger.

"Street name for the drug is Rust," Dee said. She shot a look at Martin. "I suppose you know that." He nodded. "Glover came looking for some for you." He nodded again. "Not to Persey, but to a girl that works for Persey. Persey wouldn't deal with him directly. Bucon politics?" Another nod. "The girl also works for Glover. She knows the Belt and the Games; remembered me from there. She told me about you."

Roxy waited in silence, forcing Martin to be the one to ask the thing she could feel but didn't want to acknowledge. "You addicted to Rust, Dee?"

Dee made a sound somewhere between a sigh and a sob. "Probably. I've been trying to find out the 'cure's' effects." Her cynical laughter spread to the corners of the empty room. "I've learned that without the Rust the user dies—either of Sag Fever or withdrawal, whichever comes first."

"Yes." Roxy wearily closed her eyes. Her head ached and she longed to slip back to comfortable incoherence, but she kept still, refusing to give in to the urges to either weep or sleep.

Dee's furious voice answered her out of the darkness. "Because the dealers don't deal unless you've got the fever. Without the infection, you don't find the cure."

Roxy detected a certain amount of appreciation for the dealers' methods from her security officer brother-in-law. "You worked undercover for too long," she told him. "Motherfucking Bucon bastards," she added. "Exploiting a ready-made market. Wonder how long since the Bucons first encountered the fever? Looks like the source is somewhere in their territory." Martin gave her a sharp look.

"Leave it to the best chemists in the galaxy to turn a profit on the only known treatment," Dee complained. "Leave it to the Bucon's crazy culture to hide what they know and dispense Rust like any other recreational they deal in. And I haven't just been using Rust," she told them. "I remember my job. Every now and then the euphoria—which I suspect wears off after the first few days of taking Rust—clears up long enough for me to do some lab work. I've turned samples over to Callen, as well. There's a whole series of tests being set up in the hospital chem lab. If I can synthesize it, we can bypass the dealers and start treating Sag Fever on a massive scale."

"Euphoria." Roxy closed her eyes and let her shielding come all the way down for a whisper of a moment. What she took in was cool curiosity from the well-shielded Martin, and something like lightning-laced perfume swirling through Dee's senses. "So that's what euphoria's like."

A hint of contempt bled into Dee's emotions. "Roxy… Rust feels good. I'm having more trouble staying lucid right now than you are." She laughed. "Who wants to be lucid?"

"Me," Martin answered. "I told Glover I didn't want any drugs. Not that I particularly wanted to die, either." He shrugged.

"See?" Dee pointed accusingly at him. "You wouldn't have said no if I'd offered Rust instead of Roxy."

"No, I wouldn't have, I suppose," Martin acknowledged. "Not with my record of recreational chemical intake."

"Recreational," Roxy repeated, whispering the word to herself. Something was itching at the back of her mind, but the jumbled, everyday confusion made it impossible to catch the significance. Roxy took a deep breath and shook a lot of hair out of her face. It had gotten terribly unruly of late, there being a great deal of truth to the saying about koltiri hair having a mind of its own. "All right, Nikophoris," she announced. "Time for my part in this experiment."

"Yeah," Dee agreed quickly, moving to within touching distance. "I'm getting sick of mindless elation anyway."

"Wait a minute," Martin cautioned. He held out a hand toward Dee as Roxy's fingers touched her shoulders. "What part… ?"

"What's so good about being awake?" Something shook her shoulders. After a certain amount of rumination on what was being done to her, she decided the torture instrument was probably a hand. If it was a hand, it was at the end of a wrist. Maybe she could break the wrist in retaliation. Then she realized that the touch was a gentle one; she just hurt all over and any touch burned like fire. "Stop it," she pleaded.

"Oh." No, she wasn't being touched anymore, was she? Wonder when it stopped? Does it still hurt? No. Not now. "Now, what was it I wanted to ask Martin?"

The familiar voice had the crispness of autumn wind in it. "Oh wild west wind," she murmured, and tried desperately to get the darkness back. The dreams hadn't been pleasant, but… What had she dreamed, anyway? And how did she know she was awake? And how long would this stream of consciousness nonsense go on? "Of course you wouldn't. Who are you?" Roxy lifted what she thought was her head from what she thought was a pillow. Only when she opened her eyes a hairline crack, she realized she was upright; not necessarily standing, but not lying down, either. Sitting? "How long have I been like this?" She had a theoretical notion that some time must have passed—if only because she always seemed to be waking up with great gaping holes in what used to be a not half-bad mind. These days, the once not half-bad mind sort of resembled a cratered surface after many asteroid storms. "Asteroids do not concern me," she said, and giggled, and wondered what was so funny.

"You sure she's awake?" another familiar voice asked. Familiar, masculine, and dubious; the Standard thick with a regional accent. London.

"Dr. Callen," she said, fitting name to voice and city of origin—and feeling very proud of herself. She opened her eyes just a bit more to check to see if her identification was correct. She knew there was another way she ought to be able to do it, but couldn't recall right now what that was. Didn't matter anyway; she was right, it was Callen. She smiled and hoped someone would congratulate her on her cleverness.

The room she and a trio of people were in was dimly lit, with heavy purple curtains drawn across the long windows. She had been here before. "I've been here before." The two men didn't look like they'd moved since the last time she'd seen them in the same place. She had a moment's panic that maybe this wasn't a second meeting after all. Then she relaxed, realizing that they looked scruffier. They were pallid and hollow-eyed and exhausted—and probably felt a damn sight better than she did. Besides, Alice wasn't here. Alice was—dead.

Dee was standing beside her chair. Hers was the voice Roxy had found familiar, the touch she'd felt scalding her. "Yes," Dee answered.

"You're feeling guilty. Don't." Roxy swallowed, and tried her hand at concentrating. "Have we been here long?"

"About an hour. I brought you back to the hospital. You have to talk to the nice men about helping us synthesize Rust, Physician."

"She's useless." The words came from Dr. Callen's associate. She recalled that his name was Rutherford.

"What was it I wanted to ask Martin?" Roxy inquired of the group in general. "It was important. About Bucons. I'm sure it was about the Bucons."

"We want to ask you about the Sag Fever virus," Dr. Callen said insistently. "And about this Rust."

"Sag Fever," she said, and was very angry all of a sudden. Being angry helped her keep her attention on one subject, if only briefly. "Sag Fever is a lie." She licked dry lips, and added, "A lie we all believed. Maybe believing makes it real. As a pandemic, anyway."

Callen ignored her words and forged ahead, looking at her with hopeful earnestness. "Between Dr. Nikophoris's work and our own research, we've come to a frightening conclusion. We're 'oping you can 'elp us confirm our theory."

Roxy curbed her impulse to stick her tongue out at him. It would be highly unprofessional. She made a rude gesture at him instead. He was right to be upset about her behavior, of course, so she forgave him. "Sag Fever," she insisted once more. "Is a lie."

"I know. I didn't say it didn't kill. I said it was a lie." Honestly, some people just didn't know how to listen. "The disease—the naturally occurring virus—does not exist. I should have known." She grabbed Dee's hand, squeezed it hard. "I did recognize it, but I didn't." If anyone could understand, it was Dee. "I knew it the first time I woke up from a healing."

There was a chair next to hers; Dee sat down in it abruptly. "Shit. You did. You thought it was something you'd taken. A recreational substance."

"The Bucons? No. I can't believe that even they'd… and I'm a cynical bitch."

"We've been suspecting the virus is a construct," Callen offered. At least he was beginning to get the picture.

Roxy looked at the man behind the desk. "The 'cure' is like a goddamned quadruple dose," she said angrily. She let go of Dee's hand and pointed to herself. "I'm a brain-burn case from just one healing of Rust addiction." She felt tears beginning to slide down her cheeks; it was like the touch of lava on her skin. Her eyes were not happy with this emotional development, but she couldn't stop herself from crying at the futility of the whole situation. She also felt her consciousness trying to slip sideways and knew she couldn't hold onto coherency for much longer. The researchers were going to ask her how she knew the difference between Sag Fever and Rust at any moment, how she'd finally recognized that all the little twists and turns of structure were not what they seemed while she slid around inside them. She might be able to explain it to them telepathically, if she could just stay awake. She might be able to do something to help, but it was more likely she was going to turn into a drooling mushroom before she could manage any positive action. She was such a wimp. And Rust was too fucking potent for her to survive too many more healings from it. "Wimp."

Roxy heard Dee say, "They must be trying to addict whole star systems. The Bucon bastards have been taking Trin lessons."

She knew it must be the truth, and tried to hide from it, shrinking in her chair and hugging herself tightly. She dug her short nails into her bare upper arms in the hope that the pain would help her stay alert. Instead, she just concentrated in digging little holes in herself for a while.

When she got back to the conversation, Callen was saying, "MilService is so blasted paranoid. Perhaps… an experiment that went wrong?" He was answered by a harsh laugh from Dee's direction. Roxy looked that way and noticed for the first time that Dee was surrounded by the glow of an environmental belt, as were Callen and Rutherford. She was glad to see that her friend was no longer taking the chance of being reinfected.

"If this is some sort of Bucon conspiracy, we need to alert the authorities," Rutherford said.

"On Bonadem?" Dee sneered. "There isn't any authority left. The dead are rotting in the streets. Power's been cut all over the city. . There's rioting." She shook her head. "Absolutely no one to go to, gentlemen. The Evac ships are even leaving for Nightingale tomorrow. We're supposed to be on them, remember?"

Callen answered. "The plague's spreading too rapidly through the Systems for a small operation like ours to be supported. Somebody's decided to 'centralize' the research effort. Whatever the 'ell that means."

"Spreading through the Systems? How many worlds now?" Why hadn't somebody told her—not that she'd remember if they had, which they probably had. Whoever they were.

"Where's Martin?" Roxy wondered. "I think I finally remembered what I wanted to ask him."

"I'm not sure I want to put that much faith in any Service branch right now," Rutherford said, a tendril of paranoia entwining the words.

"The plague—the drug causing the plague—is being spread far more rapidly than independent traders could manage. Service ships have the freedom to go anywhere without question. The Service has been pursuing its own paranoid agenda under the guise of Special Powers and secret orders. You people don't want to give up your crazy crusade. Maybe you're manufacturing excuses."

"We do what we must for the defense of the Systems. As someone in MedService should know. Or maybe it's someone in MedService synthesizing this fake virus. "

Roxy wondered if Dee was armed. Or if the MedService people knew much about MilService weapons—or recalled the nasty reputation of the crew of the Tigris. Weaponry would probably be optional, Roxy decided, far too aware of the angry energy crackling from Dee. "Strike 'em down with lightning," she suggested. "All you have to do is want to."

"Martin's Security," Roxy said to herself, since no one was paying any attention to her. "Why is he on Bonadem? Why is he with Glover? He did mention Glover, didn't he? Or did I just pick up the thought?" Dee had definitely mentioned Glover. "I have to talk to Martin."

She would have stood up if she could have, but her legs weren't ready to work yet… or her brain wasn't willing to acknowledge her legs existed. Whatever the cause of her immobility, all she could do was stay put for now and fume while the people around her continued to bicker.

Chapter Eleven

Martin was holding his head wearily in his hands. Upon hearing Glover's voice, he lifted it and said, "What about her?"

He noticed it was morning as he glanced out the bare windows at a steel-gray sky. He must've nodded off for a couple of minutes. A couple of hours? It had been a long night, in which he'd been unable to argue Dee out of taking Roxy back to the hospital where they worked. There'd been shouting about whose duty was more important and his refusal to explain why he wanted Roxy and there had been defiance of his direct orders as well. Roxy had not been involved in any of it, other than to make the occasional strange comment, and he'd been too wiped after a while to do anything other than let them go. It was safer for them off the streets, anyway.

"Viper?" Glover came into the room and leaned against the door after he'd closed it. Bucons always leaned, lounged, and draped. Bucons were never bolt upright or stiff. Nor did they ever droop wearily the way Martin was doing right now. He hated Bucons, Martin decided sourly. If Glover hadn't had the grace to look disconcerted at seeing him alive, Martin might have walked out on the whole Bucon business. The man doesn't look disconcerted, Martin decided after they silently looked at each other for a while. He looks scared. Bucons didn't do scared as a rule. I must look like hell. Hope I'm not catching that shit again. Should take at least thirty-six hours before another exposure takes. If Glover had been telling him any kind of truth about Sag Fever.

Glover eased away from the wall and his expression returned to a more normal variation on cheerful arrogance. "Sting's been here. Hasn't she?"

"Not enough for two." Glover shrugged. "Sorry, Mart. You don't seem to need it anymore."

At least not yet, Martin agreed silently. Glover was nervous underneath the casual attitude. It didn't do Martin's nerves any good. "Not too popular in the neighborhood, Mr. Ambassador?" And hoarding every orange capsule he could get his hands on because of it, Martin guessed. He couldn't blame the man for wanting to live.

Martin got to his feet and stretched; he was a long, lean man. He felt good, too good for a person who'd been near death just a few hours before. He could use a shower, a cup of coffee, and a hot meal, but other than those minor details he felt better than he had in years. The girl did good work. As a man with a koltiri wife, he knew what it felt like to be kept in the peak of health, and this felt better. Maybe it was simply in contrast to having felt so bad not so long before. He yawned, and added a good night's sleep, totally satiated and surrounded by his spouses, to his list of wants. Since hooking up with Glover on Terra two weeks before, he hadn't exactly gotten either rest or satisfaction. Then the Sag Fever hit him just as they'd finally found what they'd been looking for. Maybe they should have directly called the Tigris and asked… but for various reasons to do with security and family relationships, they'd relied instead on a reference in a communications transmission log to track Roxy down. Then they'd smuggled themselves onto the quarantined planet where she was working. Not an easy place to get to, officially, openly, secretly, or any other way. Though getting here hadn't been easy, staying, at least in a corporeal state, was proving even harder.

Glover swaggered toward him. He looked closely at Martin in the pale morning light before reaching out and running a finger along the Terran's jawline. Martin frowned as Glover grinned suddenly, looking like he'd just found his long lost love—which Martin was pretty sure he wasn't. He'd known the Bucon for a long time, and he'd never seen Glover take an interest in anyone not certifiably female, at least by his own peoples' reckoning. "You look good," Martin was informed.

He took a step away. "Natural beauty. What is with you? Rust burning your brain?"

Glover shook his head. "No. After the first five or six hits, the high isn't there anymore. My body just needs it to stay alive. Proof," he added, "that it isn't Bucon."

Glover had this need to convince himself that this whole monstrous situation hadn't been initiated by his people. The normally pragmatic, cynical businessman had gotten idealistic, or something. He'd come looking for his former associate on Terra Prime while Martin was passing through on an assignment away from the Odyssey and enlisted him in this unofficial crusade.

"Doesn't make you feel good," Glover promptly asserted. "Ever known one of our recreationals that didn't make you feel good?" Glover was thoughtful for a moment, then added, "Funny thing about Rust—it seems to work the same on everybody. Every humanoid sub exposed to Sag Fever has been able to use Rust to counteract the fever's effect, despite genetic drift and environmental adaptations."

"I said that. Bucons are the best drug tailors there are, but…" Glover shrugged. "I can't believe we're that good."

Martin left Glover to his thoughts while he went to look out the window. Heavy clouds obscured the green sky. It would rain soon, and it would be hot and sticky. He supposed summer was this continent's rainy season. While the Bucon fretted over his peoples' involvement with the pandemic, Martin looked out at the deserted street and worried about Sagouran Fever reaching his own world. It was just a matter of time. Then the Rust would follow, and the drug would be able to do what the Makacheyn and the Trin had not: destroy the civilization he was sworn to protect. Martin wasn't going to let it happen, and Glover's plan was all he had to work with right now.

Martin noticed people in the street below as the first large drops of rain began splatting against the thick oval windows. Just a handful of people, no air or surface traffic anywhere within his view of this side of the wide, slow river. It was hard to tell if the people on the street were just wandering aimlessly, or if they had somewhere to go—there were no food shelters, no outbound ships at the port, only the one open hospital in the city. They're probably just walking, he decided, because it's better than lying down and dying. He couldn't make out details through what had become a thick curtain of rain; what he got was an impression of skeletal figures shuffling along.

"Ever heard of Samhain Eve, Glover?" He didn't wait for an answer. "It's a time of year on Terra when the dead walk."

Martin turned from the window. Behind him, the rain was running down the pane in silent gray-green sheets, all noise muffled by the insulating glass. Martin shrugged, and wondered if he'd made the gesture quite so often before he'd taken up residence with a Bucon. "Samhain's just an old ethnic legend. Not even one of my ethnic legends. No one on Terra's been frightened by the idea for hundreds of years. It's a kid's holiday these days. No need to placate ghosts anymore, I guess."

"Your world doesn't seem to need its primitive customs. I've always thought Terrans to be quite sensible."

"Placating ghosts might not be such a bad idea. Not the way they're walking around here."

Glover looked briefly puzzled. "You are a Terran with a primitive mind, Viper. It helps you survive. Don't change. Now, tell me about Sting. Where is she?"

The Bucon obviously didn't want to hear about Samhain, and Martin didn't know why thoughts of the Wild Hunt were preying on his mind. He gestured toward the windows. "She's safe." He didn't mention Dee's involvement in the whole business, and he didn't want to think about how disoriented and weak his sister-in-law had been after healing Dee's Rust addiction. He couldn't let himself be sentimental, not after coming this far.

"The hospital?" Glover did not look pleased. "It would have been so much easier to start from here. The hospital's probably being watched. Persey's making sure none of the Systems scientists get their hands on any Rust."

"We'll get her from the hospital. We'll just have to risk Persey knowing about us. He knows you're here, anyway."

"You'll be the one going to the hospital," Glover told him. "I'm not showing my face in the same place as a koltiri. The idea is to keep this quiet."

"Right." Martin looked over the Bucon cynically. "And what does Persey think of your presence here, Mr. Ambassador to the United Systems?"

Glover took a seat in the middle of the living room floor and pulled Martin's blanket around him. Martin found the abandoned apartment to be hot, the air far too dark, still, and stifling without power. Martin took a seat in front of the ambassador. He felt Glover's forehead and grabbed a wrist from under the covering. He wished he had a diagnostic scanner on him. "What are you on, Glover?"

Glover's eyes lit with tired amusement. "A little of this, a little of that. I've got to keep functioning," he reminded Martin.

True. The man was not in very good shape; even a cursory look told Martin that. But whatever the Bucon was taking, it was no casual indulgence. Glover was actually trying to accomplish some good with this risky jaunt they were on. "What's with Persey?" Martin liked to be kept up on the shifting—connections—around him. Loyalty was too strong a word to use among Bucons just now.

"He found out I'm in town. I think he's on Bonadem trying out a new brand of Rust, but I don't know. I'm trying to make him think I'm looking for a piece of his action—as if I'd ever deal in anything like Rust. Well, he's a border runner and shouldn't be too up on my reputation. I've been buying Rust from him through one of his girlfriends. I don't know who Persey's Rust connection is, though I suspect Denvry or Halfor. But who's supplying it to the suppliers… ?" He shrugged. "All I have are rumors. Some say Plaent. Or Pyr." He shook his head. "He's a scary renegade bastard, but…" He shrugged again.

Martin listened carefully, recognizing all but the last name Glover reeled off. He was considered the United Systems' specialist in the workings of the Bucon's pirate guild and the shadow empire of the Pirate League. He figured much of what he knew was what the guild and League allowed to be known. "Pyr?" he inquired, on the off-chance he might gain some new, uncensored information while the ambassador was drugged to the gills and off-guard.

Glover looked pained. "Not exactly an honest, tax-paying guild member. Showed up on the border over by the Rose Nebula five, six years ago. They love him out that way, which keeps the guild from coming down hard on him. He's a slaver and pirate and works the techno market more than he is a dealer, but with a nasty rep, and mysterious friends on several sides of the border. You want to contact the folks on the other side of the Rose, you have to go through Pyr. One rumor is that the Rust is coming from the other side." Glover shrugged beneath his blanket. "Just another rumor."

Pyr sounded interesting. Ugly, but interesting. Martin made a mental note of the information.

Physician Merkrates, who I helped raise, Martin added with an inward wince. He wished he hadn't agreed to this. Until last night, he'd thought the kid was immortal, if not completely invulnerable. He wasn't so sure anymore, but that wasn't going to stop him from going through with this. He got up and helped Glover to his feet.

As they started toward the door, it was flung open. A petite, dark-haired woman stumbled inside and threw herself into Glover's arms. He hugged her close and let her sob for a few seconds, then held her out at arms' length. Martin noticed bruises around her big brown eyes and a swollen lip. She looked nervously at Glover.

"No," she retorted quickly. "He wouldn't beat the shit out of me over you. It's worse."

"Hello, Viper," she greeted him with a smile that lit up her bruised face. Martin recognized her from the Bucon enclave in the Terran asteroid belt where nobody went by their real name.

She gasped and went pale. "Viper, you're Service, too!" She turned a fierce glare on Glover and demanded, "What are you up to?"

Glover's knuckles went white from his tight grip on her upper arms. She tried to wriggle away, and he shook her. He said something threatening in a Bucon dialect that Martin's translator probably wasn't supposed to recognize. The concepts that were translated to Martin from Glover's words were, "Family-thieving, sex-for-nothing idiot. Everybody's action is at stake. What is going on?"

She replied with a few unpleasant words in Bucon, then blurted out in Standard, "I told Persey about Groupie! All I said was that it was odd seeing her in civvies as the last time I'd seen her she'd been in a Service uniform. He beat me up for dealing to her. Then he…" She gulped, then bit her bruised lower lip. Bucons didn't talk easily to each other.

"Then he told all his dealers to spread the word that Rust is being hoarded at the hospital. He said to tell the junkies that if they want it they have to get it from the hospital. And when they find out that there isn't any—it's going to be ugly, Glover. If it isn't already." She looked pleadingly at Martin. "I don't want to see anything happen to the doctors. They were helping the ones too young to use the Rust."

"Riot." Glover pushed the woman aside. He looked at Martin. "We have to get to the—Sting."

"Not her," Martin declared. "Persey doesn't care about Roxanne. It's Dee he's after." Dee, the very bright Service chemist who now had a supply of Rust to work with. Dee, his friend. Dee, who had just saved his life. Martin suddenly realized the people he'd noticed down in the street had all been moving, drifting as if windblown, in one direction. A strong wind. Desperate people driven by need. The walking dead. Tools for whatever Persey had in mind.

"The bastard is dead," Martin decided. "Glover, where's your air-car? We have to get to the hospital right now."

Somebody in Dallis had finally shut down the last power plant, Martin realized as Glover stopped the aircar a cautious half-kilometer away from the dark hospital grounds. The rain still poured down in wind-driven torrents. Martin wiped water out of his eyes and squinted to get a better view of the lifeless gray mass of stone and glass at the end of the wide street. Beyond the dark hospital, the port was a deserted cluster of tower, hangars, and permacrete fields. They walked up a street full of puddles and awash with streaming water. Except for the low moan of the wind, his ears were assaulted by dense, unnerving silence. He was used to the empty streets and unlit shops. He didn't know what it was that seemed so ominous about the abandoned street. Maybe because a riot should be a noisy affair. He made out a large crowd of people milling around ahead of them, moving in and out of the hospital's gates. No shouts. No angry screams—but the feeling of danger increased with every step nearer the silent mass of bodies. No one noticed two more people approaching the crowd.

Martin shook his head as he pulled out a hand weapon from a concealed pocket of his jacket. "I hate heroics," he complained. Then he gave a hard look at the equally well-armed Bucon.

Glover had his collar pulled up against the rain, but his gaze came up to meet Martin's. "Me, too." He looked almost bored.

Martin nodded. Of the two of them, Glover was probably the calmer. He was a Rust junkie, but he had everything at stake. He'd do. "Let's go."

"Bet this was a nice garden a few minutes ago," Martin commented as he stepped over the body lying across the stone-flagged path.

The body had formed a sort of dam, and rain water mixed with blood pooled where the dead man lay. There were people everywhere in the courtyard, some of them on their feet, their faces full of anger and desperate pain. Many more were on the ground, beds of summer flowers crushed beneath them. Many were dead, many more were injured, the violence totally random. The rain poured down on them all, soaking multiple shades of blood into the ruined garden, diluting and mingling it into black streams.

Martin stunned a few of the crowd when they turned their attention toward him and Glover. They fell with the same weird silence that permeated the place, thicker than the blood. What the hell did Rust do to people? Martin didn't let himself think about it. He took a deep breath and ran as fast as he could for the main entrance.

There was no blood on the white and purple tiles in the lobby, just trailed-in mud and small puddles of rainwater. They followed the mud trail into the carpeted corridors. Here people were shouting.

Some were screaming in pain, most were shouting for Rust. The first-floor corridor was lit only by skylights, the dark color of the walls absorbing much of the light. Martin found a wall map, but without the voice-activated guide it took him long seconds to make out that the labs he wanted were located on the twentieth floor.

He grabbed Glover by the arm. It took them a few more seconds of pushing through the crowd to find the emergency stairs and follow the hysterical cries and shouts of the pack of Rust hunters upwards. The stairwell was dark; not totally black, but dark enough to add to the danger and Martin's sense of foreboding. He almost missed the unconscious woman wedged into the doorway of the tenth floor.

It was the glint of gold that caught his eye. Gold that had a twenty-four-carat quality to it, but also seemed to have a life of its own. It was the kind of living color that could only be associated with one rare variety of humanoid in the Systems. He was used to waking up with hair like that in his face on most mornings.

"Roxy," he said, kneeling beside the huddled form of his sister-in-law. He had heard that there were several koltiri working at the hospital, but he figured the others would have been sensible enough to blink out at the first sign of trouble. Roxy was a MilService officer—which said a great deal for her common sense right there.

Her skull was smashed in, her lovely face a ruin, the gold hair sticky and matted with clots of blood. The damn fools had decided to kill the one thing that could save them, Martin thought furiously. He battled the fury and felt for a pulse at her throat. He wasn't surprised to find one, just overwhelmingly happy.

He and Glover exchanged a relieved glance, then dragged Roxy out of the stairwell. There were windows along one wall of the corridor. It was empty of rioters at present. There was plenty of light here to see that Roxy was covered in more blood than even a head wound could account for. Martin spotted a long jagged cut in the bare skin over her heart, but it was already healing. Luckily, her attacker hadn't known that you couldn't kill a koltiri by stabbing her in the heart. If you cut off the head of a koltiri healer or blew her up, then you might have a chance of killing her—but a knife in the heart? No. That would hurt a koltiri really badly—and make her angry. He knew from personal experience that the last thing you ever wanted to do was to get a gentle, compassionate demi-goddess really pissed off.

"My head hurts," she answered for herself. Roxy's big purple eyes blinked open. "I'm going to throw up."

"You do that, honey." Martin helped her to sit up as she began to retch. She did vomit, and it was mostly blood. "Oh, God," Martin whispered as he watched helplessly. The girl was going to need a lot of time and protein to put herself back together from this one, and he didn't have either to give her.

She got slowly to her feet and leaned against a window, her forehead pressed to the cool glass. Martin watched carefully, a part of him clinically, as the last traces of injury disappeared from the empath and the ruined face became familiar again. Familiar, but changed. Her large eyes were sunken in hollow sockets, the skin drawn tight over thin bones. She was a big woman, taller than him by several inches, but right now she looked more like a stick-figure drawing of herself than a living person.

"A one-eyed man tried to kill me," she said, her voice as thin as the rest of her. "I remember one brown eye and a big knife. Some other people had bats. Does Bonadem have a baseball team?"

She was just as loopy as when Dee'd taken her back here a few hours ago. "Where is Dee?" he asked, slowly and patiently. "In the chem labs upstairs?"

He heard people clattering up the stairs and looked around quickly. This place was not safe, not even for a koltiri. A few more stabs in the heart or any other serious injury and Roxy would probably die from exhaustion. But he didn't want to take her with them up to the twentieth floor, either. It sure as hell wasn't safe to leave her in the hallway, abandoned for now or not.

She plucked at the damp sleeve of his jacket. "Go get Dee," she said insistently. "She's with Callen and Rutherford. Get them, too. Rutherford has nice eyes, even if he doesn't like me."

She blinked a few more times, then told him, "There's an isolation ward on this floor. Safest place on the planet. Got its own power source and everything."

The stairwell door opened and Glover shot down three intruders. The door closed. Martin had the feeling the Bucon's weapon was not set on stun.

Roxy ignored the bodies piled in front of the door and looked out the window. "Viper, I think it's stopped raining."

Martin didn't let himself be exasperated. "That's nice," he said gently. He took her arm and asked, "Which way to this isolation ward?" She pointed.

Glover protected their backs as they hurried along. Glover's vigilance made Martin glad to be needed.

The faint blue glow across the doorway at the end of the corridor showed Martin that there was still a small amount of power protecting some people from the plague and violence. Anxious faces peered out of a half dozen beds in the ward beyond the force field when they reached it. Meddroids moved from one diagnostic station to next, the only care left for the seriously ill people in the shielded ward. Martin glanced at the control panel set in the wall by the entrance. Every other sterile field in the hospital was down. He thought about the Hippocratic Oath. He thought about the Bucon Empire.

"I hear them." He had no trouble remembering the codes used in every hospital in the United Systems for this kind of force field. He punched the code sequence as Glover swept his weapon across another group of intruders. They fell in a tangled heap across the corridor. The glow faded. Martin pushed Roxy through and Martin brought up the field again. "Let's go," he said to the watchful Glover.

They found another stairway around the next bend in the corridor. They saw no one else on this dark staircase as they hurried up the ten flights to the labs. Martin wasn't prepared for the bright sunlight from the hall windows as he came panting through the doorway on the research level. There were plenty of people in this part of the building. A whole riot's worth. Noisy, angry, frightened, dying people.

Martin took a step forward and pressed quickly back against a wall when a man aimed a cudgel at his head. His weapon took the man out, then he swept it in an arc, stunning at least a dozen of the rioters. "That was a baseball bat," he muttered as he stepped over the bodies.

He looked over his shoulder to check that Glover was still with him, just in time to see the Bucon's cool expression change to snarling anger. "Persey!" Glover changed his aim slightly and fired, flinging a red bolt of energy past Martin's shoulder.

Martin ducked and whirled in time to see a long-haired man dodge the weapon's ray, pushing a shrieking woman into the deadly light as he fled through a stairway door. Glover would have gone after Persey, but Martin pulled the Bucon forward as the woman's death-scream rang in his ears. They stayed close to the wall and moved cautiously toward the labs. Martin searched the crowd but didn't see any living members of the hospital staff, nor was there a single glow of an environmental belt. He cursed silently at this new way of dying from the plague as he and Glover went from one wrecked laboratory to the next, until they found what they were looking for.

There were three bodies left scattered carelessly amid overturned equipment and tables. Any evidence of research was destroyed or taken. The two men had been clubbed to death, researchers destroyed along with the evidence of Rust's existence. One of the men had nice eyes that opened on nothing; the other had been small and pudgy. Martin made only a cursory inspection to make sure the men were really dead. It was the woman he knelt beside and took in his arms. There was a thin strand of wire wrapped tightly around her neck, a few drops of blood on her pale skin. Her sapphire-blue eyes were empty, the habitual mock-cynicism wiped from her face, replaced by a grimace of pain.

Not an easy death. Somebody had wanted to hurt her. Somebody was a vengeful bastard.

Martin's fingers plucked at the wire, carefully unwinding it to reveal the deep cut that circled Dee's throat like a necklace. He swallowed hard, brushing his hand across her cheek.

"Yeah." Martin stood. "We'll have a hell of a party, Groupie," he promised her solemnly. "Let's go get Roxy."

He took a moment to change his weapon's setting to something stronger than stun.

Chapter Twelve

"Damn it, girl, this is no time to be committing miracles." Martin took Roxy by the shoulders and turned her away from the ward bed, and the healthy occupant that was looking up at her worshipfully. "Save your strength. We have got to get out of here."

"They do have baseball on Bonadem," she told him, smiling happily and pushing blood-crusted hair out of her face. She jerked a thumb at the bed. "He wants me to teach him basketball, though. There's a ball in my room. I have to go get it now."

Martin tightened his grip on her thin arm when she tried to go to the door. "We need to get off the planet, Roxy. We slipped past the blockade in an oversized darter. There is no way three people can make it out in a darter. Are you following this, sweetheart?" Roxy was watching his lips with intense concentration as he spoke. She raised her gaze to meet his eyes and smiled. He couldn't tell if it was a smile of understanding, but he went on. "You came from the Tigris in a long-distance cutter, right? Please tell me you have a cutter at the port."

She seemed to absorb his words by osmosis, then parroted them back to him. "You have a cutter at the port."

"Yes. You and—" He bit off the name, not wanting to distract Roxy by introducing the subject of Dee.

"Can we hurry this up?" Glover prodded. "Persey just might have mentioned us to people armed with more than clubs."

Martin shot him an annoyed glance. "We'll worry about that in a moment. Let's find out if we can get off this planet first. Roxy?"

She rubbed her forehead and took a deep breath. "Yes. There is a cutter at the port."

"Let's go," Glover insisted, gesturing toward the ward entrance with his weapon.

Martin took Roxy's hand. He could feel the fragility of the bones beneath the skin. Worse, he'd lived with a telempath long enough to recognize how delicate the koltiri's hold on reality was after far too much strain on her mental shielding. "Home soon," he promised. "Off planet first."

"Well, of course we have to get off the planet before we can go home. Where's Dee?"

Martin led Roxy through the door, keeping his attention on the hallway before them. Glover followed closely, guarding their rear again. The hall was empty. Martin listened carefully, heard nothing but the low murmur of questions from the ward patients. He didn't take the time to raise the door shield behind them. Better to leave the people in there a way out—so they could die of the plague like everyone else?

"No," Martin agreed with Glover. "We haven't time." Maybe he would have to knock her out and carry her, if she'd stay out.

"I have to. And Dee—" She looked around anxiously. "I can't feel her loving me." Her stubbornness began to dissolve into pained confusion.

He was good enough to easily lie to a koltiri. Roxy's troubled expression cleared. "That's all right, then. Let's go."

Martin gave Glover a furious look, not sure why it was all right for him to lie to Roxy, but not anybody else. Roxy was already moving toward the stairs. He and Glover had to hurry to keep pace with her.

* * *

"I'm sick of living like a thief." Pyr heard what he'd just said and amended, "As a thief."

He was talking to himself. Bad habit, that. But sometimes, when he was alone in his room, he forgot no one was there. At least, that was the excuse he used. He spoke while staring at the ceiling. It was lost in shadow not too far overhead, and not particularly interesting even when the cabin's lights were on, but since his body didn't care for sleep, he was passing the rest cycle staring. And thinking. And rambling on to himself about all the problems he didn't really have to worry about anymore. Letting go wasn't easy. Letting go wasn't even possible. Pyr knew that if he let go, stopped caring, permanent darkness would come crashing down on him even sooner. And he'd been rambling out loud because he had a fever. The ceiling, and possibly one of Pilsane's aural sensors, had been getting quite an earful. Pyr could only assume that Pilsie was taking lots of notes.

He chuckled, and was resentful because the mirth hurt his chest. He nursed the resentment and punished his body by forcing it to sit up. It took some time before the combination of nausea and dizziness cleared enough to allow him to swing his legs heavily over the side of the bunk. This was really getting to be ridiculous.

He went back to thinking about his complaints while he tried to focus on where exactly his feet were in relation to the deck. We have nothing, Pyr complained, on the off chance some ancestral god might be listening. Nothing but what we've stolen or borrowed. Nothing to call our own but a code of behavior that makes no sense to me. Never made any sense for me and mine. Done nothing but keep us isolated—weak and frightened children. Not to mention feared and suspected by all those silent races we hold in contempt.

He slid forward cautiously, the fingers of his good hand clutching the side of the bed for support. "When was the last time I took off my boots?" Pyr hauled himself upright. He could see now, but the pain proved harder to get under control than usual. Usual? What was usual for a condition compounded of poison on top of Rust on top of plague? What standard did he judge "usual" by?

"Stop complaining." Dead men had no business complaining. "What am I doing out of bed, anyway?" Change of watch, he reminded himself. You're supposed to be on the bridge, Captain. "Rather be changing my socks," he muttered. It was easier to go sit on the bridge, though. He needed to update the log, to make some notes for Linch. Might as well get glared at by the crew while I'm doing it.

The League rep sneered meaningfully, and didn't immediately jump to attention. He didn't even bother to stand. And here I gave him a direct order, Pyr thought, almost too weary to feel annoyed.

The sudden silence on the bridge grew thick with expectation as Pyr approached Kith. He felt their gazes on him from the few manned stations, and disliked the attention. He hadn't killed anyone for insubordination for quite a while; they assumed he was going to now. But everyone knew Kith couldn't be killed. Pyr absorbed their eagerness for a fight. The emotion directed toward the center of the bridge was fueled half by hatred of Kith and half by boredom. Pilsane was right about these people needing an outlet. And Kith was far too sure of his immunity.

Pyr had no objection to disposing of the League rep, but the Pirate League would. It was an agreement with the League that gave him the means to protect the border. It was the League who insisted they have someone on board to look out for their interests. Pyr needed the League's cooperation while he quietly developed other resources. Kith didn't always understand that Pyr's people were allies rather than just another client race of the oldest crime syndicate in the galaxy. Pyr was well aware that there were plenty among the crew still locked in the hold that would follow Kith rather than Linch if Pyr were out of the picture. When, he reminded himself. Through the growing discomfort and desperation, he'd almost forgotten his decision to somehow kill the Leaguer.

Later, Pyr decided now. He'd kill Kith later. It would be messy and hard and probably kill them both as well. If Kith's death was going to be his last act, he didn't want it to be public. He hated the idea of making one last sacrifice for the cause, but supposed it was inevitable, if he could only remember to put it on his agenda for the next twenty-four hours or so. If he had even that much time.

Right now he still had one good hand. He used it to grab Kith by the back of his collar and haul him out of the chair. He held him aloft for a moment as a reminder that he wasn't just another Bucon. "Rust is making you deaf and paralyzed," he observed as he tossed Kith away. "And forgetful," he added mildly as the Leaguer came up hard against the view screen a dozen feet away.

Snarling, Kith spun to face Pyr. His fury flailed out at Pyr, which Pyr ignored—except for taking amused note that the Leaguer frequently forgot the differences between the Raptor's captain and himself.

"He's tinkering," Kith answered. He rubbed a bruised shoulder and went to hover over the navigational sensors, his back to Pyr. Bruised through the shield? Interesting.

Simon spoke up from the communications board. "Mik said he was needed in Engineering. He left Kith in charge during watch change."

Pyr's lips twitched involuntarily. How like Mik to give the League rep a chance to act like an idiot as a subtle way of pointing out to the captain that something firm needed to be done about the resident Leaguer. Pyr carefully crossed his aching legs. "We heard anything from outside?"

"Plenty," Simon answered with a wide grin. "We've picked up a United Systems Security transmission. Tinna's decode says that they're curious about the Borderers pulling their ships back from the Rose but think it's too dangerous to send any spy ships nosing around the border right now. There are too many quarantines and blockades and intersystem conflicts inside Systems territory for them to risk provoking fights with anyone right now."

"That will make raiding in the Systems easier for us," Kith spoke up. "If you have the guts for it." Kith was always urging them to raid the war-weakened Systems. Except that, from where Pyr sat, the Systems didn't look all that weakened to him. Better for the Raptor to prey on the pirates who preyed on Systems shipping.

Pyr knew why the Borderers had pulled back, and why they'd been poised for a suicidal invasion of the Systems in the first place. Some clan factions had gotten the idea that the Unclean Evil Demon United Systems was responsible for infecting the farthest outpost worlds of the Holy Chosen People with Sag Fever and Rust. They had taken their ships and gone home because he sent the Clan Great House proof that the Systems were more affected by the disease than the People were. He and his whole clan had had to vow to find and destroy those truly responsible to stop a war the People could never win. Too bad his was a small clan, and soon to be smaller.

"Caught the signal just at watch change," Simon told him, almost defensively, shoulders hunched and gaze on the multi-level board. "Been working on it for four minutes now. It's faint, maybe an old echo. Mik said to wait until I was able to confirm it was a source and not a transmission shadow before reporting to you." Simon's fingers began to nervously rub along a strip of blinking green and yellow lights.

Something like that, he was answered. Guess you want to do something about it.

You are getting your asses up here, aren't you? Demons, it hurt to think. His mind just wanted to spread out and inhabit someplace without pain. It was so tempting to drop all shielding and…

We're on our way, Linch's mental voice intruded. It felt like ice water sloshed over Pyr's burning mind. He waited for his senior crew to put in an appearance.

Kith kept his back to Pyr, his gaze on the datascreens, but his attention focused angrily on Pyr. "We have ships to hunt," he reminded, rough voice soft with warning. "This could be prey at last."

The door opened; Mik, Pilsane, and Linch hurried onto the bridge. Mik and Linch came to stand next to Pyr. Pilsane relieved Simon at communications.

Where? Pyr asked after Pilsane's fingers stopped flying over the touch pads and control sensors.

"It's a trail." Kith whirled around. He banged a fist on the pilot's console. "Follow it!"

"A faint trail," Linch pointed out. "Perhaps the ship is a month gone from those coordinates."

Pyr frowned as he looked from Linch to the Leaguer. He uncrossed his legs, making a true effort to look as relaxed and casual as any Bucon. "I hate to say this," he drawled, gazed fixed on the main screen. "But I'm going to have to agree with Kith on this one. Let's follow the trail."

* * *

"Dr. Martin Braithwaithe, I do not like you," Martin said to himself as he came into Glover's private cabin.

He'd brought Roxy in here as soon as they'd rendezvoused with Glover's yacht where they'd left it on a dead world, well beyond the Bonadem blockade. She'd been asleep when he settled her long, skinny frame on the wide bunk, and she'd been asleep every time he'd checked on her since.

Glover had popped an orange capsule and taken over the single-station cockpit of the yacht when they'd come onboard. Glover said Rust had no effects, but Martin was all too aware of his sister-in-law's debilitated condition. The woman he remembered had disappeared into a disoriented zombie, when she was awake at all. That was from treating Sag Fever and its cure. He also remembered the silent mob in Dallis—a mob slavishly following their dealers' orders. He kept waiting for some aberrant behavior from the Bucon, though he hadn't seen any so far. Maybe the only effect was that a Rust junkie would do anything for the lifesaving drug.

Glover had made it abundantly clear that he would take care of himself. Roxy was Martin's concern. He carried two hypos with him this time, one a nutrient supplement, the other one of the few stimulants effective on a koltiri. He knew all about what drugs worked on koltiri, and every other telepathic, empathic, and sensitive humanoid being in the United Systems. In one part of his life, Dr. Martin Braithwaithe was a psychiatrist stationed aboard the Sector Ship Odyssey, who specialized in treating the physical and mental ills of the psi-gifted. But you didn't serve aboard a Sector Ship unless you had more than one specialty. At this moment, Dr. Braithwaithe was not at all happy with sharing his existence with the ruthless security agent who went by the same name. He'd had too much time to himself in the last few hours, and that left him vulnerable to the compassion that plagued his conscience.

"I'll get over it," he said, and stepped closer to the sleeping woman. He'd cleaned her up, and dressed her in a long, red, silk tunic and loose black trousers he'd found in Glover's closet. The clothes fit well enough, and had the advantage of not being crusted with blood.

He carefully injected Roxy with both hypos, then sat down beside her near the head of the bunk. "I wish we could do this another way," he said, not for the first time. "You're looking better," he added reassuringly, using a soothing tone that would help calm her as she slowly came awake. "Really. You look like hell, which is better than death warmed over, which is what you looked like twenty-four hours ago. Still too skinny for my liking. Course, Reine's looking all round and maternal right now. Baby's a boy, in case she didn't mention it. You koltiri ever figure out why you have trouble having boy babies? Physically she's fine, and telepathically, but some of the other super powers have gone down the toilet. She's not happy about that—not to mention a little on the paranoid side. Almost glad to be away from home right now. Not that I'm having any fun. I really wish we could do this another way. I'm so sorry about getting you into this."

One deep purple eye partially opened. It was sunk deeply in the skull-like mask of her face. "Oh, hush," Roxy muttered as she focused on him. "You're not sorry, not deep down in that nasty, self-righteous core of yours, Martin Braithwaithe. Almost as bad as Rafael—only without the ego." She rolled over on her stomach and buried her face in a pillow.

Martin stared hard at the back of her head. "Madam," he inquired. "Are you impugning the character of the man I love?"

"Yes," came the muffled reply. She lifted her head. "Besides, you do it to the man I love all the time."

"I let him think he does." He snorted. "If we start fighting about Rafe and Eamon, we'll be here for days. Don't have time for a good family brawl right now."

She grunted, then rolled over and sat up. She pressed her thumbs to her temples and complained, "I've got Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars running through my head. It's my sister who collects old music, not me." She glared at him. "Probably picking it up via that link sort of bond thing you have with Reine." She stopped rubbing her temples and leaned back against the headboard.

Martin settled down beside her and put his arm around her shoulder. She leaned comfortably against him. "How do you feel?"

She didn't answer for a long time, probably doing an internal catalogue of her atoms, he decided. Finally, she said, "Half of me's okay. The body is working, but the brain needs an overhaul. Reality has definitely become a subjective phenomenon. More so than usual." She chuckled. "Sounded like a sentient being there for a second."

"I wouldn't worry about it," he answered, as lightly as he could. "The sentient mood will pass."

"Unfortunately. Maybe if I can stay off the Rust and plague combination for awhile, I'll be okay."

"Always. Did I really make a fuss over a basketball?" She moved restlessly within the circle of his arm and looked around. "We're on somebody's private yacht."

"Hmmm." She sighed. "And Dee's dead." She gave him a hard look. "You lied to me about that." Tears brimmed in her huge eyes, and she wiped them away with the back of her hand.

He didn't apologize. "A Rust dealer deliberately hunted her down and murdered her."

Roxy nodded. "She was playing out of her league—and for all the right reasons." She looked up at the ceiling. "Oh, hell. She was in love with me and I always pretended I didn't know."

"Yeah. Eamon didn't—wouldn't—well, the Tigris isn't the Odyssey. We don't do group marriages."

"Every ship has its own culture. Your people are into that frontline warrior tribe thing—with the chest-beating chief having the best woman that he doesn't share with anybody. Too bad. You could use someone to love you."

She didn't argue with him for once. "I didn't exactly volunteer, now did I? I was drafted to serve on the Tigris. Hell, it was Dee who found me in the wreckage of the refugee camp and talked Eamon into taking a MedService doctor on board. She got me off that hell hole just before the Trins attacked again."

Martin knew the story very well, how Roxanne had been doing research on a strategically placed outpost world when the war started. Battles, both space and planet-based, had raged all around the system for weeks. Eamon Merkrates's Tigris had been in the thick of the fighting. The ship had taken heavy casualties, including most of the medical personnel being killed. Merkrates grabbed the chance to get his hands on a koltiri Physician, and dragged an empath into the thick of battle. The battles had lasted for nearly three brutal years, with the Tigris gaining the reputation as the most ruthless band of Trin hunters in the Systems. Empaths reflect their surroundings, and koltiri were never what they seemed. Martin supposed Eamon Merkrates loved Roxanne in his own status-hungry way, but he'd made it hard for her to take any steps back into the wider, fuller life an empath needed to stay balanced.

"I'm sorry that your first trip off the Tigris hasn't exactly been a vacation," Martin told his sister-in-law. He squeezed her shoulder. "And it's only going to get worse before—if—it gets better."

She gave him a direct, very lucid look. "Now you're going to tell me why you kidnapped me, right?"

He nodded. "Reine isn't up to the job. Besides, she doesn't have your reputation. The Tigris years are useful for that, at least. Bucons respect peoples' reps. We're going to need all the influence we can get if Glover is going to convince the Bucons to let you heal the emperor of Rust addiction." Other than to stiffen against him, she didn't react. No, her dark eyes went flat and expressionless. Not a good sign. "Roxy," Martin hurried on. "The Bucon Empire is larger than they've let on to the Systems, more influential among non-aligned powers than our intelligence thought. They know more about the Pirate League and have leads to the remnants of the Trin forces. The United Systems needs the Bucons, and our treaty with them has always been tenuous. Thanks to Sagouran Fever, the Bucons are waging an undeclared civil war. Half the people in the empire are Rust addicts, and the other half is dealing Rust to them. It's chaos inside their borders. Something has to be done about it. Glover figures that straightening cut Emperor Monolem is a big step in the right direction."

Martin's head reeled with shock. Koltiri weren't allowed to say things like that. Even war-veteran koltiri who'd spent too much time on the front lines. "Honey?"

"Sagouran Fever is an artificial virus, a laboratory construct. Rust is an antigen formed from the same matrix. Dee is dead because she knew this, not just because she got her hands on Rust. Can you think of anyone besides the fucking Bucons who could come up with a disease and sell its cure for profit?"

Of course he could, but Martin filed this news away, and kept calmly looking at Roxy. It wasn't as if he didn't have his suspicions about the plague and the way it was being spread. "We have to concentrate on what we can do," he told Roxy. "We have to save the man who can do something about the whole Bucon Empire."

"Never mind," she said, and suddenly drew him near. "I'm about to be too messed up to argue for a while. You've got the damn Sag Fever again. I can do something about this." Her fingers slid up his cheeks, fingertips sharp as shards of bone pressed against his temples.

Martin was no stranger to telempathic contact, but he was unprepared for the invasion force that was Roxy's being entering his. This time he was hit with a wall of flame that rolled over him and pushed him down under dark, drowning water.

Glover shook him, and Martin opened his eyes. Roxy was unconscious again, her arms twined around him. He rolled away from that comfort and rose to his feet in front of the Bucon ambassador. Glover was pale, unshaven, and scared, vaunted Bucon cool utterly abandoned. "What?"

Martin didn't argue with a man who sounded as desperate as Glover. "What's up?" he asked as he scooped Roxy up off the bed. "Girl, you are heavy."

Out in the corridor, Martin put Roxy down and grabbed Glover by the shoulders. "This yacht of yours is cloaked."

"That's not good." He'd heard rumors about improvements in pirate technology. Too bad they turned out to be true.

Glover gestured toward the hull and space beyond. "You want to take it up with our visitors when they get on board?"

Martin looked at Roxy, who leaned heavily against the nearest bulkhead, her big eyes once again full of confusion. "No. I want her safely off this ship." He held down his fury at the Bucon, and at himself for believing false assurances from a desperate junkie that his diplomatic status and fast private yacht would safely get them to the Bucon homeworld. Idiot. He was an idiot. "Let's get to the docking bay." Chances were the cutter stored there wouldn't suffice to get them away from the raiders, but it was still the only chance they had. He grabbed her hand. "Run."

"Where's the crew?" Roxy asked as they hurried down a long corridor. "Place feels empty."

As was evident a moment later, when the vessel was rocked by fire from the attacking ship.

"Sounds like they just took out my guns," Glover commented, almost nonchalantly.

They reached the docking bay before the intruders were through the outer airlock and raced for the shielded docking pad where the cutter rested. Martin gave them zero chance of escape, but he wasn't about to let the hopelessness of the situation stop them from trying.

Roxy, however, was more pragmatic. She halted just outside the pad's environmental shield and shook off Martin's grasp to point toward the bay's outer entrance. "They're at the door, you know. Exit's blocked. There's nowhere for us to go. Gotta gun I can borrow?"

Glover gestured toward the small United Systems ship. "Don't tell me you haven't got a Shireny cloak on that thing. We get inside, cloak, and nobody knows we're here. Nobody can detect energy signatures through one of those."

"That's a cutter from the Tigris!" Roxy shouted. "We don't get issued fancy stuff like that."

"But I'm not the right one." She looked to Martin. Warning lights lit up around the airlock door, and an alarm klaxon very nearly drowned out Roxy's frustrated, "I'm a doctor, not a—Listen, I'm not my sister."

He grabbed her shoulders. "I know that." He went very still, thoughts racing, remembering. The invaders would be through in seconds. "You're not your sister, but I—Maybe I could… "

Then it was too late. Martin barely had time to shove Roxy and Glover through the docking pad shield as the outer doors to the bay cycled open. Artificial atmosphere rushed out into space, while invaders safe within environmental belts poured in. The dangerous chaos of the transition was momentary, but it would have been fatal had they not reached the protection of the pad. It was only a few steps to the cutter. Martin didn't waste a moment in shepherding the other two onboard the little ship as the boarding party spread out across the bay. They weren't safe once they were inside the cutter, they just weren't dead for the moment. Martin immediately went to the pilot's station to start the ship's engine. He tossed Roxy his gun. "Try to stay awake long enough to use this."

She laughed, while adjusting the energy setting on the weapon. "Been trying. I'm weak, and the raid leader is mindblind."

"And they'll be here in about three seconds." She and Glover took up positions on either side of the cockpit entrance, covering Martin as he worked over the helm.

The cutter's engine began to cycle through the startup sequence, but the invaders threw up a dampening field, making the effort to use the little ship fruitless. "No engine, no shields, no nothing," Martin announced.

"No time," Roxy added as a pair of raiders appeared in the doorway. She fired. The shield of the man she targeted glowed cherry red over his chest.

Martin saw she'd overrode the safety on his gun. The energy beam from the shot was focused tight enough to cut into the environmental shield, but not forceful enough to cut completely through on its own. The power would drain quickly from the hand weapon at that setting, but it was the only chance they had. Glover quickly switched targets and added his fire to hers.

That was the last thing Martin saw, as the second raider fired on him before he had an opportunity to do anything else.

Martin was more than a little surprised when he woke up. Not surprised by the headache, though. He'd been stunned before. He opened his eyes and sat up slowly. Roxy was lying in a heap beside him on the main deck of the docking bay. A dozen men and women and a couple of unrecognizable humanoids were ranged in a loose circle around them, holding various kinds of energy and projectile weapons. Martin didn't draw attention to Roxy by reaching over to check on her. He climbed slowly and cautiously to his feet, hands visible at all times. Guns came up, but no one tried to stop him. He spotted Glover once he was standing. The Bucon ambassador was on his knees in front of a man Martin recognized from security holos. Rike Bruis. Martin remembered the slaver's stats even better than he did the heavy-jawed face. Which was why he didn't move and barely breathed as a pair of cold black eyes gave him a thoroughly professional going over. He didn't expect to be shot, and wasn't surprised by the calculated smile.

Martin didn't have time to dispute the pretty boy reference before a restrainer field blocked off movement. He couldn't struggle or speak, or even blink.

Bruis took a moment to step around Glover. He grabbed Roxy by the hair and pulled her head and shoulders up off the deck. "Could use some fattening up," he judged. He shook her by the hair and she opened her eyes for a moment. "Purple."

The slavers laughed. Bruis tossed her aside. "Keep it," he ordered. "It's funny." She didn't seem to notice the restrainer field when it was turned on her. Bruis returned to Glover. "You made this too easy, Ambassador," he told him.

"Bad luck," Bruis sympathized. He holstered the heavy-duty weapon he carried. "No hard feelings, but Halfor made it clear that your head's the only thing with a price on it." A knife appeared in his hand from somewhere. Martin didn't see him draw it. The Bucon Ambassador to the United System had his throat slit a second later.

Blood spurted and, as Glover's corpse sank to the deck, Bruis casually cleaned the knife. He then signaled with an equally casual gesture for his crew and their prisoners to head back to the boarding tube.

Chapter Thirteen

"How long?" Pyr asked the holocubes on the shelf by his bed. "How many days? Weeks? Years?"

There were three holos, one of a man and woman dressed in matching gold tunics with each other's house badges glittering on their left shoulders. The man's hair was dark red, the woman's black. Their arms were clasped tightly around each other's waists, and they looked happy. The center holo was of a laughing adolescent girl, black hair framing her face. The third was the head of a red-haired young man, expression a combination of vulnerability and challenge.

The small holocubes took up very little space on the wide shelf. There was plenty of room beside them for a stack of datacubes, wafers, and cassettes kept in no particular order. The private space Pyr occupied was never in any particular order. He let Kristi in once every couple of weeks to straighten up, but the paraphernalia of his existence really held no meaning for him. His mind was a neatly compartmentalized place; he didn't see any reason why anything else he owned should be. Only now, all those compartments were opening up and spilling out into jumbled heaps.

He sat on the side of the bed and shivered despite the room's stifling temperature, and stared into the tiny reproductions of loved and lost faces. Pyr Dhakynn Kaddani was keenly aware that everything of importance was lost. That he'd have to fight madness as well as the pain hadn't occurred to him when the priestess killed him with her poisoned bite. "I even thought I'd have more time," he told the holos… if they were holos… he kept thinking Siiyel and Duharre and Axylel and the other self holding Siiyel so confidently were standing over him. It was the other self who looked contemptuous and accusing.

"What is there to count on on the border?" the other self demanded of him. "You chose the road, Dhakynn." It was his secret name, his private name. It had belonged to Siiyel. A part of it belonged to Linch. He didn't even like saying it to himself.

Siiyel's bright smile remained forever fixed, but her words were the puzzled hurt he remembered too well. "You have no honor, Dhakynn. I don't understand why you do it."

"I can't live like this," Duharre told him. "I want a quiet place. And a husband and children of my own."

"Because others fear me," he told her again, and again. "There is no place for me - but honor requires I do what I can to protect my own."

"I've been offered my own ship," Siiyel said, regretful and overjoyed. "I have to go, Dha-lrm."

"She's dead," Linch's voice intruded. "Dead for months. You're lucky to be sane. Don't pretend your mind hasn't healed. Come with me, Dha-lrm. Follow the old custom for once, brother. Finish the healing."

Pyr shuddered, hoping his shielding was barricade enough to keep Linch out. Linch couldn't know. Not yet. "Not yet!" he screamed at the top of his lungs, then threw himself down on the bed.

Laeenin took a seat beside him, careful not to touch him. Everyone was careful not to touch him—students, teachers, friends. Everyone always looked elsewhere nervously when he was near. "You're too strong," Laeenin explained. "Telepathy like yours has never happened before."

A slight shake of the head from the desert-dwelling monk. "Train yourself and we will find a way for you."

Outcast—no matter what anyone else called it. No matter what he called it most of the time.

Took years to find and train a core of telepaths with even vaguely similar talent. Turned them into the toughest weapon in anybody's empire. But there were so few of them. Enemies all around.

He was on fire, and thought he was laughing. He knew he was alone in his quarters. "I'm on my bed. Feels like a sea of lava. Can't even stand, have to be sick in my own bed, like a child. I won't have them find me like this. Die on my feet somehow."

Axylel would think so. Axylel's a boy—full of brittle pride. Is he learning any lessons out there on his own?

Pyr opened his eyes. It was a long time before he actually saw anything but dancing, blurred shapes and blood-colored lights. Forcing his eyelids to stay up was the only victory he could manage for a while. Brittle pride.

Eventually sight returned. The room settled down—empty, no beloved demons bent over him now. They had faded back into memories. He blinked the sweat out of his eyes, became aware of the stench of vomit and urine, the reek of the sweat soaking his clothes and plastering the hair to his scalp.

Disgust drove him out of the bed. Pain drove him to his knees. Using his right hand, he was barely able to catch himself from pitching onto his face. His left arm dangled uselessly at his side, the only part of him free of the consuming fire. Numb, dead. Like the rest of him would be soon.

Pyr started to crawl toward the head. Halfway there, he changed his mind and used the back of a chair to pull himself to his feet. "I might not care how I die," he said between pants once he'd accomplished his goal. "But Pilsane would never forgive me for a lack of proper attitude. I'll walk." He took a deep breath, held it, and forced himself to wobble slowly forward, gaining balance with sheer stubbornness. He was almost steady by the time he reached the head.

It took hours, but he managed to get himself cleaned up, remembering to don a deep-pocketed jacket when he changed clothes. If he could keep his hands rammed into those pockets whenever possible, it might keep the crew from noticing he was crippled. He put on his wide-brimmed hat and hoped it would disguise his drawn appearance somewhat.

"Style," he said to the image in the mirror next to the large closet, "is everything." The sick face gazing back at him told him he was crazy. He turned from it, and kicked a pile of discarded clothing out of his way. For a moment, he stared down as shirts of bright silk and heavier black material scattered themselves into a different pattern on the carpeted deck. "What am I doing here?" It was like living in a kaleidoscope.

Get on with it, he ordered himself. Your life's not over yet. Take your few hours and use them. Get rid of Kith, at least. He took a step.

Linch lifted his head slowly, fingers still moving across the strings. The music became softer, sadder. Linch's long face was partly obscured by the fall of his hair. "A lament for the dying."

Pilsane nodded. "I've been hoping what I'd heard about Orlinian games was wrong."

"So has our stubborn captain." Linch's hands stopped moving. In the silence he held the ligret close to his chest, fingers tense on the shining, inlaid surface. "I keep feeding symptoms into the med computer. It keeps telling me the same thing. Whatever happens to him, we find Axylel. Find out what he knows."

Pyr took a second step toward the door as the telepathic images faded from his mind. He was definitely going to have to kill Kith for them.

He found Kith seated at the bridge's comm station. Tinna perched beside him on the edge of the panel. Her long, shapely legs were stretched toward the railing across from the station; silver-tipped black hair framed her dark, high-cheekboned face. Pyr valued her considerable skill in information management. Linch would need her. So he paused as he approached Kith, considering how best to separate the Leaguer from a valuable crew member. He would rather make the necessary attack somewhere other than the bridge. He wanted to do as little damage as possible to the ship; once the agreement with Pirate League was broken, repairs and replacement parts would be harder to come by.

He sighed in reaction to the pain lancing through him, and wondered what had happened to his fiery temper and reputation for impulsive behavior. He didn't know why he didn't just say to hell with consequences and jump the filthy League bastard. He leaned his head back against the door frame. The hat tipped back on his head.

He was still standing indecisively just inside the entrance to the bridge when Kith's head came up sharply from the communication's sensor. "New contact!"

Mik moved swiftly down from the engineering station to peer into the helm sensor. "Indeed we do." He rubbed his big hands together vigorously. "There's a second ship following the same trail we are. Can now confirm that there are ships at the end of those sensor trails."

Tinna whirled around to work at her station. After a moment, she announced, "I've got an ID on the larger ship that's stalking our smaller target. That's Rike Bruis's ship."

"I've got a plant on board Bruis's ship," She smiled at Pyr. "Acquired four months ago. An engineering tech. Did the implant with my own hands, Captain."

She preened. Tinna ran a string of implanted informers on quite a few Bucon ships, people who were well-paid for information—and might also someday hear a little code buzzing in their ears. A code that would tell them it was time to betray their ship to the Raptor. Or have their head explode if they didn't.

Pyr had to bite his tongue to keep from saying no. He glanced over at Kith. The Leaguer would be sure to want in on any boarding party. Pyr recalled that Kith's personal shield had been slow in responding when he'd tossed him out of the command seat. Perhaps there was a weakness in the device, or Kith's Rust addiction made him careless with maintenance. Pyr did know that Kith's greed would make him vulnerable when plundering another ship, open to distraction, ambush. Surely an accident could be arranged for him during a raid.

"Forty minutes at most. We can overtake the big fish two hours after that at current speed."

Pyr stepped down to take the command chair. "I'm interested." After a moment's thought he added, "Let's make our move a little sooner. Increase speed to overtake the raider while it's busy with the other ship. Put us on top of it in an hour."

A whoop of joy went up from the crew as Mik sent out a call for Linch and Pilsane to come to the bridge. Kith added a ship wide announcement. "Boarding parties, stand by."

The eagerness in his voice was music to Pyr's ringing ears. Which hurt. He leaned back in the comfortable chair and closed his eyes. "Wake me up when we have something to kill," he told the engineer.

Don't you hate it when you can't get a song you don't even like out of your head?

Pyr opened his eyes, and struggled upright in the high-backed chair. Even moving slowly and carefully, he could feel the energy drain from him with every small movement. Energy that would never return. He had slept, though it could not have been long, and he found it hard to fight off the dregs of a dream of a singing woman. A quick glance around showed him the bridge crew at their stations, their attention intently focused. A look at the view screen and the row of smaller datascreens surrounding it revealed the two ships they'd followed clearly before them, linked by the thin umbilical of a boarding tube. He saw that the Raptor was very nearly in position.

The thought did not belong to him, or to Linch. Pyr put his hand to his head. "Did you hear that?"

He accepted that he was hallucinating again and tried to ignore it. "Status?" he asked the anxiously watching bridge crew. One by one they reported that Bruis's ship was aware of their presence, weapons were being brought to bear on them, and that the Raptor was ready for action. At another time he might have found it all mildly exciting. "Activate your little friend, Tinna."

There was a brief wait while Tinna worked touchpads and waited, an intense look of concentration on her exotic face. Then data-boards all over the bridge began to show changes. "He's in," she announced triumphantly.

"Weapons systems down to 30% power," Kith reported. "Power loss doesn't register on Bruis's monitors."

"Confirmed," Linch said after thoroughly checking his own sensors. "We have their balls, Captain."

Pilsane stretched, clasping his hands lazily behind his head. "I like this system. So much less bothersome than nasty, wasteful, space battles."

"Then you can lead the boarding party," Pyr told the navigator. Kith growled at losing the assignment he coveted. "Don't worry," he added to the Leaguer. "You'll be going to the party." He leaned forward, pretending to be intent on the screen when all he actually saw was a dark blur. His vision came back in a few seconds. Next time he knew it wouldn't come back at all. "Mik?"

Pyr leaned back, using the back of the chair to tip his hat over his face. "Have fun." He didn't bother adding that he'd be joining the boarding party himself in a few minutes.

I am awake. Where are we now? Looks like a cell. Oh, it is. Slavers. Our situation has not improved, I see. What charming company we keep. What next, lawyers?

"Pirates," Pyr answered. He opened his eyes. "Demons!" The bridge was nearly empty. The presence was still inside his head. She was—

Pyr grunted his way to his feet. He stared at the image of the slaver ship hanging in the center of the view screen. Time had passed. A mind intruded on his and—

His interest in killing Kith was forgotten. It took all his strength to pull his dead arm out his coat pocket and activate the bracelet's comm button. "Report."

"Boarding parties on bridge and engineering," Pilsane responded instantly. "Minimum resistance. Linch is questioning Bruis. Three casualties—theirs. Rest of ship complement secured and locked in the main hold. Pair of captives from the other ship locked in one of the chattel cells. Slim fare, Captain. At least we have salvage on the two vessels."

Pyr closed his eyes, seeking through the ragged holes in his shielding. Over there—so strong. He easily picked out the mental signatures of his own kind. Pilsane and Mik were blanked, attention squarely on business. Linch's mind was linked to the slaver captain, stripping him clean. It was there on the ship with them, shielded now but too powerful to hide from him, not when all his defenses and mental guards gone, the mental energy that was his soul exposed. He could not protect himself from knowing there was something.

The worry in the other man's voice and in his thoughts was raw, painful to Pyr. "Are you sure?"

Pyr caught himself with his good hand before his face hit the deck. Taylre was waiting for him by the Door. The crewman touched Pyr's shoulder, but backed off at a warning glance.

Pyr climbed to his feet. Through a fog of blurred vision he made out that he was in a common room. His nose had nearly come in contact with a dark blue carpet when he fell through the Door.

"It hurts," he whispered, closing his burning eyes against the light and Taylre's gaping face.

"Me, too." Martin was staring at his reflection in a shiny bulkhead, long legs folded beneath him on the narrow cot across from hers. "Honey," he said, bemused. "I've been thinking."

How nice—being able to think. "It's crowded in here," she said, rubbing her temples.

"I've been thinking," he repeated. He pointed to the reflection in the bulkhead. "That's not my face." He looked at her.

He shook his head slowly. His expression held fond annoyance. "How old am I, Roxanne?"

"He's very rude—big and lumpy and in the way. Bad tempered, too. Go away. I'm hungry, Martin."

He pointed at himself. "This body is seventeen, tops. I was seventeen when we met."

"I remember. You wouldn't let me hang around the Belt because I was too young."

"Twelve was way too young for a pretty girl to be there. Reine should have known better. Strutter and Sting, what a pair you two were." He looked back at his reflection. "I've been wondering why they call me a pretty boy."

"I was. I'm an extremely handsome man—mature, well-aged, as it were. Or I was… until koltiri Shirah the younger fixed me. I think you did more to me than heal the Sag Fever. Didn't you?"

Martin went on doggedly. "I know you're a koltiri. But why'd you make me younger?"

"Oh, that. I couldn't help it. You were dying. I had to be thorough, didn't I?"

"No. Sag Fever confuses me, sometimes. You're only the second one I've screwed up on—and I just put you back the way I remembered you."

He shook his head. "Thanks, Sting. But I look like a kid. Do you know the kind of teasing I'm going to get at home?" He looked worried. "These slaver's probably going to sell me into a harem."

"As a guard." He moved to her cot and held her close. "You're doing better, hon," he soothed. "Almost have your brain back most of the time. Pretty soon you'll be able to pop out of here."

"Not without you. Besides, it makes me throw up. There's something very nasty coming this way. That's the big bad wolf out there." She pressed herself closer to him. "Don't answer the door, okay?"

There was a pale blue of the chattel hold bulkhead in front of him when he expected shiny metal, and an odd notion of huffing and puffing to blow a door down swam briefly through his head before Pyr realized that he was contained within himself once more. The door was there, though. He'd followed the mental scent to where the woman and boy were curled up together on the cot in the small cell beyond the door. He remembered little of the images, thoughts, and words he'd gathered when he pushed his way into her mind. But he remembered the important thing.

Pyr took a step toward the cell door, caught between exaltation and terror that he was imagining it all. "Slim fare," he recalled Pilsane's judgment of the slave ship's cargo. "Most valuable property in the galaxy. Mine."

The door was a thick slab of metal with a lockplate and codepad set in the right of the frame. Fire licked through every part of him not numbed by the poison. Breathing hurt. Telepathy hurt, but Pyr couldn't figure out how to use the bracelet. Pilsane! Door 833. Open it now.

No! The code must be in the manifest. Remote open the thing and leave me alone!

He waited, hunched over and shaking, counting seconds of his life tick off while Pilsane fiddled with the ship's computer.

There finally came a click and the door slid silently open. Two pairs of eyes stared at him from the cots. The male lunged to his feet. Pyr knocked the dark-skinned boy away. The boy fell back across the room's second cot. Pyr grabbed the female.

He felt thin bones beneath fragile yellow skin. The shocked face was a skull with too-big eyes, covered with a blanket of matted yellow hair.

A koltiri. A living legend, even in the border territories. Goddesses of great beauty and compassion, miracle workers, able to heal any sickness and injury with a touch. The beauty was a lie. He hoped the healing ability wasn't.

Her mind was ravaged, her body weak and broken. He felt her wanting to flinch away, wanting to deny him. She said, "All right."

Chapter Fourteen

The man in the doorway didn't speak, though his desperation came across loud and clear. Roxy spoke to him in Hebrew. The two didn't seem to have any trouble communicating.

The cell was small and the man was big, and hellishly strong. Martin hit the cot with bone-jarring impact, hard enough to knock the air out of him. He was up in an instant, wheezing and fighting dizziness, launching himself at the intruder who'd grabbed Roxy. A closed-fisted backhand knocked him down again. Pain sang through Martin as his head hit the bulkhead with a sharp crack. The intruder threw back his head and howled in pain as Martin forced himself to his feet again. The sound vibrated around the small cell and through Martin's aching head, but that didn't stop him from pulling Roxy away and getting between her and the stranger.

Martin held his breath and stared at the black and silver thing in the other man's shaking right hand. He slowly raised his gaze to look into the man's eyes, and saw that he was going to die. He took what he was certain was his last breath.

"Good thing the battery's low on that thing," the koltiri commented, with fearless, irritating sarcasm. "Or we might be breathing space right now."

He had almost killed her. She was all he had and he—had—almost—And she was joking!

Martin put a hand on Roxy's shoulder. He definitely did not like the way the big, mean bastard was glaring at his sister-in-law, or the way she was glaring back. "Honey," he said quietly. "That's a needier."

The big bastard did not look good. He certainly did not look stable. There were strictly enforced treaties banning the use of the particularly nasty energy weapon Big Bastard held in his trembling hand. It was said that the sole thing a needier couldn't penetrate was a Trin personal shield. This was only the second one Martin had seen, and he was a Sector security chief. That the other one belonged to his wife Betheny only served to illustrate how dangerous and deadly a needier was.

"No," she replied. "Not to let you kill him just so there's no witness to your weakness."

Pain poured through Pyr, but anger flared even stronger than the pain. He glared at the koltiri, or would have, if a wave of blindness hadn't overwhelmed his vision as the last of the white light from the needier shot faded. No time to argue now. You said you'd help me.

Promise first. She was adamant. Cold as a dead star. She knew what he intended. Weakness had everything to do with it, but it was nothing personal. It wasn't that kind of pride that made him decide to kill her companion. Telepath or not, she read him wrong in this. It was simple policy that decided the boy's fate. No witnesses. He could afford to take no chance of letting any word get out that he owned a koltiri. The boy posed only a small security risk—his ability to escape was slim—but Pyr never left anything to chance. I'll let you die, she warned. Do anything to Martin, now or later, and I'll let you die.

She was a healer, sworn to save lives. She had to be bluffing. He had no time to find out. No one dictated to Pyr Kaddani without paying a very high price for it. He and the koltiri would discuss her presumption later. In this instant, he conceded to her demand. He lives. Now. Later.

Roxy had barely formed the thought when the big man in black leather dropped to his knees in front of her. His hands reached out, huge grasping claws seeking to trap her in her promise. There was such a predatory, forever quality to the trap that Roxy's initial reaction was to bat them away, but she stayed put, closed her eyes, and let him touch her once more. There was one way out for her. She was koltiri, and had said she would help. Martin's life depended on keeping her end of the deal.

"I'm an idiot," she muttered. Then all the air went out of her lungs at the shock of contact. It was worse than she'd thought it would be, worse than anything she'd ever felt.

Martin's voice was miles and miles away. The stranger's pain was vivid against her skin, along her nerves, and in her mind. She was used to pain, but not like this. Pain wasn't supposed to be complicated. Pain wasn't supposed to be so strong that it communicated with a touch, but this was. That the man could move and speak and think impressed her, briefly. Then her gaze met his and the small space their bodies occupied went away.

She stood naked with a stone knife in her hand as lava rained all around. A river of fire was eating the ground from under her bare feet. The knife was a long tooth of shining black glass. Lightning ripped across a bruised purple sky over her head.

Oh, and there was the pain. Everything was made of pain. There was nothing that was not pain. The air, the sky, the burning landscape, her.

"Jesus H. Christ," she muttered—and her a good Jewish girl from Koltir. She looked at the long black knife. He was going to make a game out of it, wasn't he? "Idiot." There was nothing worse than healing a telepath. Nothing. Worse than trying to treat a sick doctor. Telepaths and doctors all made terrible patients. She knew, being both. Well, she was used to fighting at this point, even if her adversary was usually the mindless hunger of disease. She tossed hair away from her face—it wasn't hair, but long trails and streamers of orange and gold flame, searing her fingers at the touch. "Just what I always wanted," she muttered. "A bonfire for a hat." She squinted through the heat haze that roiled up off the lava. There. A large, dark shape. Movement? Yes, definitely. Hiding from her? Stalking her, more likely. He was a hunter, a warrior. Of that much about him she was certain. "An idiot. Here, kitty kitty." More of a wolf, or some great, arrogant bird of prey, she decided, as she stepped into the bright, sluggish flow of lava. Because everything was pain, she accepted and ignored the burning hair, and the fact that she was wading through a stream of molten rock. She allowed that she was real, that the weapon in her hand was real, that the man was real, and most of all, that the illness killing him was real. To get through the man's defenses to get to the disease was her true objective. This was all just symbolic imagery—that hurt like hell. Never mind that her impulse was to plunge the stone knife into the naked, red-haired warrior who loomed suddenly up before her rather than get past him and on with her job.

Beyond him was the mouth of a cave, but there was no darkness beyond the opening. A blinding, white-hot glow pulsed within. It was a heartbeat throb, slowing, fading.

"Reality is subjective," she reminded the naked warrior as he raised a blade identical to her own. His teeth drew back in a vicious snarl as he threatened her with the long shard of flaked obsidian. She ignored the knife, but her gaze was drawn elsewhere for a moment. "Is that subjective reality in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?"

The question didn't distract him, but his snarl did turn into a deep, dirty laugh. Then he sobered, and went into a crouch before the cave mouth, blocking it. "Get back."

Roxy stayed very still, her own knife lowered to her side. The pulsing white light outlining the crouching man's large form was growing dimmer. "You invited me here."

All right, not a moron, but the strongest, most elaborately shielded telepath she'd ever encountered. Defenses so strong he couldn't even unconsciously lower them. This was going to be a very big problem. "I'm not interested in your secrets," she told him.

She'd had way too much frustration lately to deal well with this. His shields were amazing, frighteningly good, and very alien. She'd never encountered a talent like his before, nor had any other koltiri, or the knowledge of how to settle into the healing would be a part of her. Besides, she wasn't used to meeting resistance on her way to treating a patient, even in a new and talented mind. The man wanted to live, she knew it. More than anything in the universe, this man wanted his life, but he didn't know how to give up the control that kept her from saving him. His eyes pleaded with her, but his hand still tightly gripped the knife, and his muscles were tensed to pounce if she moved. Meanwhile, the world burned around them and the light faded. Ashes rained down around them.

Roxy stamped her foot. It was her subjective reality and she could be petulant if she wanted to be. She moved forward and he shot to his feet. "Get out of my way you…" She tried running through him, and was stabbed in the gut for her trouble. He caught and held her as she fell to the ground.

His tears touched her skin, branded it, and burned on into her soul. His grief flowed through her, not at his own death, but hers and at the death of…

Wait a minute. She looked around the burning countryside. This was most definitely not her subjective reality. "Damn. You're good."

It was cool here, familiar, though she'd only been to this place once, many years ago. A clear dome arched high overhead, letting in night sprinkled with only a few stars. She was dressed now, in elegant draping white, slit up to there and cut down to there. He was there with her. Opposite to her white, he was dressed all in black. The alien was just as big, smart, and dangerous clothed in the garments of her imagination as he had been buck naked and carrying a primitive weapon. The gaze he turned on her was a dark, intense blue. She noticed an elaborate jeweled brooch on his collar, and knew it was nothing of her imagining. The man's control was impressive, even when she drew him into her mind. Impressive, and fatal for both of them, if she couldn't get past his defenses quickly.

A cool breeze stirred their hair and the supple silk of their clothing. They stood before a stretch of white wall and an elaborate gate, its twisting design carved of ivory inlaid with ebony. The light was hidden beyond the gate, deep in the core of the Maze.

She ducked beneath his arm and sprinted toward the gate, the entrance to the Maze. She'd run it only once, but had memorized the path to its heart. She knew the dangers, and they held no terror for her. She heard him pelting up behind her. She held her breath when she hit the first firewall, but kept right on going through the thin blue energy barrier. You lost points for hesitating. She heard his gasp when he hit the barrier half a second behind her, but didn't glance over her shoulder to see if he'd made it through. She turned right at the first cross corridor, left at the second, went through another barrier. The barriers and the twisted, confusing paths were his own mental barriers, really, but she made herself believe they were something else, and as long as he believed it as well, they'd be fine. He'd be distracted by playing inside her imagination and she'd save his life.

She didn't hear him behind her now. She'd be at the center of the Maze soon. At the Heart. Him. All she had to do was—

He was waiting for her around the next corner. She ran straight into him and went down hard, flat on her back, the wind knocked out of her. He stood over her with his hands on his hips. "I know this game. Maze. From the underground culture of the Terran asteroid Belt. It's one they let the children play."

She glared up at him from where she lay on the ground. She'd made some progress, but he was still able to block her out. "Fine. Go ahead. Die. I'm trying to help."

"Stop saying that." She was on her feet now, and furious. "What do you mean children's game? You want a game, big boy?" She backed away from him, beckoning angrily.

And they were in the paint. The hoop loomed above them, and Roxy had the orange sphere in her hands. It was very nearly dark on the court, but she didn't need a glaring spotlight to find her way in here. This was her place. Her heart. She dribbled the ball, slowly, as slow as the dying heartbeat of the man glaring at her a few feet away. They were wearing shorts and jerseys, gray and colorless, with the number 23 on hers. Saints Michael's and Chamique's number. Out in reality she would never dare such blasphemy, but they were at the center of her now.

She ignored all her inbred and highly trained compassion in favor of staying sharp and angry. And bounced the ball from hand to hand, half-crouched, making sure she stayed just out of his reach. "This is called one on one. All you have to do," she told him with a smile like a shark's as he looked around the dim basketball court in confusion, "is stop me from putting the rock in the hole."

As she spoke, she drove forward, and he moved instinctively to block her way. She swerved and slithered past, keeping the ball bouncing, down low. Another swerve, a shoulder bump. He was obviously not a post-up player and they were down under the hoop. Of course, he wasn't a player at all, that was the bloody point! She'd told him all he needed to know. He didn't like to lose. He gave her all the attention he had left, and played.

She faded back. He had enough smarts to wave his hands in the air, but not enough to watch how she set up. Not enough to block her shot. The ball sailed up, over his head in a beautiful, perfect arc. He turned to watch it. It didn't even touch the rim. The swoosh as the basketball dropped through the hoop was the most beautiful sound she'd ever heard.

"Nothing but net," she murmured, and slid down deep inside his mind, blood, bones, chromosomes, and being, where they both wanted her to be.

Chapter Fifteen

Though the woman he'd spoken to was beyond hearing, Pyr heard his own voice, deep, strong, the strain of controlled pain washed out of it. He opened his eyes and saw the blue wall first, then he felt the weight in his arms. Then he looked at the cold, limp woman he was holding. The boy was called Martin; Pyr remembered that much about his argument with the koltiri. That, and his promise. He remembered a great deal, and very little. He had learned much, but very little of it made sense. It had all been so—subjective.

Martin stood nearby, and that was not very far at all inside this small cell. Pyr had just come back from a vast and glorious place to the claustrophobic confines of the outside world. He remembered being on his knees, but now he stood, with the koltiri a dead weight clasped to his chest. He took in a deep breath of recycled air and felt no triumph or joy as it filled pain-free lungs. The absence of pain was a disturbing sensation, like being naked. He felt good, alive, healthy, but mostly he felt sad. Almost annoyed.

Pilsane stood in the corridor outside the cell's open door. Pyr ignored his anxious navigator for the moment. Death no longer hovered, but the boy did, trying to get at the woman Pyr held so close. He did not know if she lived, but he would not let her go. Martin's eyes were large and dark when Pyr glanced his way, full of desperate worry. "Her name?"

Pyr was aware of the young man straining to stay calm, reasonable, non-threatening. His concern for the woman was genuine, if complex, and of no interest to Pyr. "I will know her name."

Pilsane's shock, however, was amusing. He savored the momentary pleasure at Pilsane's reaction as a man of The People. Pyr had not been amused for a—Is that subjective reality in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?—while. Her thought flitted across his mind, and the memory of having found the words amusing, but he couldn't recall now why the words had been funny. He only knew that the thought was the koltiri's. While they had been together they had understood each other. Now they were strangers.

It sang inside him. "I recognize the truth of it. Her father spoke it at her birth. I acknowledge Roxanne." The words were ritual, spoken before two witnesses, though a court of the clans would not have agreed. Martin did not understand their significance. Pilsane let out a long, low whistle. And, because he had made a promise to the koltiri Roxanne, he looked at Pilsane and said, "The boy is called Martin. He belongs to the Raptor."

Pilsane stared at him, looked him over minutely, and finally nodded. "As you say, Captain. You're looking—How are you feeling?"

Pyr hefted the unconscious woman in his arms, and said casually, "I'll live." He stepped forward and Pilsane hurriedly backed away from the door and out of his way. Pyr snapped out orders. "I'm going back to the Raptor. Finish stripping the ships as quickly as possible and divide the booty. Make sure all caches of Rust are turned over to you. Space the slaver scum. Let Kith send the ships to the League. It's up to him to pick any crew he thinks he can trust to do the job. Once you're finished with all that, lay in a course for Robe Halfor's base. Linch has command. "

"Taking a nap." Almost as an afterthought as he walked away from the cell and the protests of Roxanne's companion, he added, "Put Martin in one of the empty crew quarters. He's our guest."

Pyr didn't want to sleep; he didn't need to sleep. He put the woman down on his bed and then very nearly danced around the cluttered cabin in joy and triumph. He did shed the heavy leather coat and tossed his hat away while he spun around gleefully a few times. He had all the energy in the world; it belonged to her. He knew that she had given herself freely, that even the small price of her companion's life did not begin to repay her for the gift of his life. It was just that, wasn't it? A gift. A bounty handed down from her superior place on the tree of life. That chaffed him, more than being under obligation to this strange creature.

There were places he needed to be, much to do, worlds to conquer, enemies to kill.

The Raptor had to reach Halfor's base before he could do that. Healthy once more, he had the will and control to put his worry for Axylel into a compartment where it could not interfere with his taking necessary action. Axylel would be found, his captors dealt with. In the meantime, Pyr needed to call a staff meeting, plan strategy, call in reports from his own network and every spy on Tinna's deep-cover string.

The first thing he did was extract the needier from the pocket of the coat that was now draped across the end of the bed and return the foolish, forbidden weapon to its hiding place. He looked at it a moment before he put it away, almost embarrassed at why he'd carried the thing onboard another ship with him. He'd had some fever-driven notion of getting Kith alone somewhere near the slaver ship's outer bulkhead, breaching the wall with the needier, and blowing the Leaguer and himself out into space. He'd have died swiftly. Kith, with shield intact, might have drifted in space for a few hours before he succumbed.

"Maybe days," Pyr murmured with a feral smile. Ah, well, the League representative's death would still be convenient, but was no longer such a high priority. He still couldn't trust the crew not to balk at invading Halfor's stronghold, but they were less likely to mutiny with Pyr firmly in command once more. He supposed that it was a good thing he'd survived, as he'd never gotten around to making those notes for Linch.

He came to stand over the sleeping woman. She was sleeping, wasn't she? He was reluctant to touch her, even to check for a pulse. The deepness of the mindtouch they had shared disturbed him. He did not want to initiate any further contact.

"Who the hell are you?" she demanded. She rolled over and opened her eyes as he took an automatic step back. Her glare caught him like a stunner bolt. "You almost got me killed, you know that, don't you?"

"You almost got us both killed." She sat up and pointed at her head. "Get out of here. Right now."

His surprised reaction to her snarling anger wore off quickly. He crossed his arms and glared sternly back. "I am in command here. You will do as I—"

"You have anything to eat?" The koltiri swung her legs over the side of the bed. "And a shower. I could use a shower. And a cup of coffee. Where's Martin?" she added, and rose unsteadily to her feet. He was somewhat disconcerted to realize that she was perhaps two inches taller than he was. He was six foot two.

She was so unsteady on her long legs that Pyr fought down the urge to hold her up. He would not touch her.

You don't have to. You're no more a touch telepath than I am. What kind of telepath are you, anyway? Where'd you get that shielding? She was yawning widely and loudly as she asked these questions. "Where's Martin?" she asked when she'd finished yawning.

"Safe. You'll have to be satisfied with my word," he added as she looked toward the door to his quarters. "You're not going anywhere."

He expected to her to argue and strengthened his shields against her thoughts, though it had felt like she'd been speaking from inside his mind rather than into his mind. It was a subtle but frightening difference, and he understood the implication very well.

"With any luck it will wear off," she said—rather than thought—but in response to his suspicions. She pointed a finger at him, then sat down abruptly, as though the gesture used up all the energy she had left. "I was about to point out dramatically that it's all your fault—and hit you if you dared to say 'I know'." She winced, and pressed fingertips against her temples. She had big hands, long-fingered, and wore a simple gold ring. "Basketball hands," she said.

He remembered how she had defeated him. For a moment he was back in that alien place, his feet planted on the smooth, light wood of the floor, saw the oddly painted lines marking some sort of territorial divisions, the open-ended mesh basket looming like a hungry mouth overhead. Basket? Ah. "So that is what you call that game." He remembered her moving around him, lithe and quick, laughing and sure-footed. He remembered the brush of contact, muscle to solid muscle, and the sharp perfumed tang of her sweat as though he'd tasted it. He remembered the way she'd teased him, played with him as she moved the silly orange ball around and around him, and the triumph that had flowed around and into him as well. "You will not do that again."

The statement was flat and hard, and she looked at him in confusion. "What? Play basketball?"

She did not seem to recognize that he was being intimidating. "Sore loser, aren't you?"

Her smile brought a flash of real beauty to her skull-thin face. "And you like to win."

"I always win." He shrugged at the tilt of her head and her long, sarcastic glance. There was no hiding from the honest assessment in those eyes. "Rhetoric," he admitted. "Attitude. It's an easier shield to maintain than telepathic ones."

She nodded. "At least you're not a complete jerk. Healing jerks is such a waste of energy."

"And you shouldn't remember being healed." She glanced up at him. Nervous, curious. "Neither should I. It's unethical and rude to go that deeply."

"It will wear off." She sounded as if she was trying to reassure herself more than she was him. "And I shouldn't be awake, or lucid, either." Her voice cracked on the last word, and Roxanne pressed her fingers harder into her temples. "Shit!"

Pyr sucked in a sharp breath as her pain burst through him and throbbed around his eyes and across his forehead. He concentrated, and the flash of contact ebbed quickly enough, and he tried not to be disturbed by it.

When she reached down to the end of the bed and dragged his heavy coat around her, he said, "I'll get you some coffee."

"And something to eat," she called after him as he went to the comm unit to call Kristi.

"Meat," he told the ship's cook. "Lots of it. Rare." He wondered how he knew. "And a pot of black coffee."

"What are you?" she asked when he came back to the bed. "Who are you?" The words came out in a jittering staccato from between chattering teeth. She curled up in the coat, shivering. "And why am I conscious?" Her eyes were very large and dark as she looked him over. He watched as an understanding that he did not share slowly filled her gaze. "Oh." The word came out soft, and bitter. "I get it." Oh, goddess, no.

She was right. He didn't. He didn't even want to guess. He wanted no more contact with the alien woman than necessary. "You will heal my men," he told her. "And anyone else I choose. That is all that is required of you."

She was still unimpressed by his tone of command. "I don't want to talk about it either. Do you have any blankets?" She curled up inside the coat, her head resting on the pillows, disturbing eyes closed. He did not like those eyes on him. He did not like them to look away. He could still see her shaking beneath the leather. "I am so sick of being sick."

"I know how you feel," he told her, and found himself touching her shoulder with a comforting gesture he hadn't meant to make. He didn't mean to lie down beside her, either, and put his arms around her to lend her his body warmth. He knew that she didn't intend to roll over and settle her long frame so naturally against his. The heavy weight of her hair covered them like a blanket. She sighed, the warmth of her breath brushed against his cheek, and caused him to shiver and turn his face quickly away.

When he tried to sit up, she thought, Didn't you tell Pilsie you were going to take a nap?

Don't push me, Roxanne. He put all the fierce intimidation that was part of his nature into the thought, but he held her closer. Minutes passed, and her silence, the withdrawal of the touch of her mind, disturbed him. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling, aware of his loneliness as he had not been for a long time.

When Kristi buzzed the door, he got up and took the tray of food from her. The koltiri remained curled on the bed, wrapped in black leather, too deeply asleep to stir when he set the tray on the table by the bed. The scent of warm meat and hot coffee made his mouth water, and he wondered how long it had been since he'd last eaten. He ended up wolfing down most of the food, standing over the tray like an animal ready to defend its kill, and not bothering with utensils. He did manage to leave Roxanne a small portion of the meat and all of the carafe of coffee.

When he was done, he stretched and smiled, and decided to leave the sleeping woman be for now. The food would be there for her when she woke. No, he owed her better treatment than that. He'd make sure Kristi brought her more food. And fresh linens for the bed, he added, noticing the sour smell of his sickness.

He changed into clothing free of bloody meat drippings before leaving his quarters. He combed out his hair and chose a peacock blue silk shirt and black leather vest. He looked self-confident, gaudy, and utterly Bucon. Linch was waiting outside Pyr's door, the koltiri's gangly young companion next to him. The pair of them leaned against the bulkhead, arms crossed, posed with equal, studied casualness. The three of them looked each other over with the merest, casual flick of the eyes. It was a wonder they weren't all wearing sunglasses. It appeared he wasn't the only one in a mood to project cool attitude. He knew Roxanne would snicker at the sight of them.

Linch looked Pyr over once more, then graced him with one of his knife-edge smiles. "I told you you needed a woman."

"You told Pilsane to set a course. You didn't say anything about engaging engines." Linch stood up straight, not so he could come to attention, but so that he could give a faintly sarcastic shrug. "Been waiting here for your orders, Captain."

"Real reason I'm here," Linch admitted. "Boy's been making a fuss about looking after his sister-in-law. Pilsane said she needed looking after, and you don't have the time. Martin says it's his duty to look after her. He claims to be a physician."

"I'm a doctor. Roxanne's a Physician. That's a title in the United Systems. It means—"

Pyr considered quickly. He had ample proof that the koltiri was not the invulnerable goddess of legend. It made sense that she traveled with someone who could care for her after she cared for others. He looked the youngster over critically. Martin looked calmly back, but most of his attention was focused on the woman in the room behind Pyr. Martin did not seem harmless, but Pyr did not sense him to be a threat or challenge to his own possession of the koltiri. Besides, the two were kindred, loyal to each other, but not linked in any way.

Pyr stepped away from the door, opened it, and gestured for Martin to go in. The young man sped inside, and Pyr locked it behind him. He gave his attention to Linch. He fingered the bottle of Rust in his vest pocket, and recalled that people besides the koltiri had needs. "Call Mik and Pilsane to the common," he told the second in command. "We have some catching up to do."

Chapter Sixteen

"Roxy? Sweetheart, we need to talk. If you can wake up now, please try. I don't know how much time we have. Wake up."

The hand on her shoulder was not the one she needed it to be. Now, there was an odd and confusing concept. Roxy turned over with a snarl. "Why do people keep asking me to do that?" She sat up. "Okay, I'm awake. Do I want to be? No." She peered past Martin's shoulder to take in the strange yet familiar room. "Nice bit of barbaric splendor we have here. Man needs a housekeeper, though. Is the coffee still hot?" She noticed that she was wrapped in leather, and briefly wondered why. Then she remembered—healings and conversations and everything—and wished she was still blissfully incoherent, the way Sagouran Fever usually made her. And why wasn't she? By rights she should be dead after what the bad-tempered redhead had put her through.

"Thanks." She gulped it down, and then gobbled down the plate of rare steak he passed to her. She didn't know what the meat was, but it was delicious.

Roxy wiped a hand across the back of her mouth, then concentrated her attention on her brother-in-law. "Why do I keep waking up in other men's bedrooms?"

She pushed a heavy fall of hair away from her face. "A great many people would be dead," she finished for him. She was not in the mood for being humble and self-effacing about her talents. "I feel like my old self again," she murmured, glaring at Martin. "And you have no idea how bad that can be for civilization as we know it."

"Civilization as we know it is going to hell," Martin pointed out. "Or haven't you noticed? For the second time in a decade," he added sadly.

She nodded grim agreement. Then she mouthed, "Can we talk?" He nodded, indicating that the captain's quarters were free of listening devices, as far as he could tell. Satisfied with his skill, she went on. "We have to get word about the plague/Rust connection to MedService—and the government," she added, before he could point out the political and military implications of what she'd learned. "And I suppose you're going to want us to bust out of here and continue Glover's mission to save his emperor." He nodded, and she frowned. Putting a stop to the spread of Sagouran Fever was her top priority. "We're going to have to actually leave," she added before he could voice the suggestion she thought he was about to make. "I'm not going to be able to get any telepathy past the big fella. Not for a while, anyway." She tapped a finger against her forehead. "He's a very strong telepath, and I'm not yet up to being sneaky."

Martin looked with fond pride upon his sister-in-law as she sat cross-legged on the bed, cradling an empty mug in her hands. Her appearance was changing as he watched, gold hair regaining some of its luster, flesh taking on a healthier tint, filling out a bit around her cheekbones and throat. And her eyes were full of shrewd intelligence and the wicked humor he loved so much. He had grown so used to dealing with a confused, half-dead healer that he'd forgotten for a while that she was one of the sharp-minded, sharp-tongued, clever, quick-on-the-uptake Shirah sisters.

"By big fella, I take it you mean Captain Pyr. Glover mentioned him. His comments were enlightening, but not encouraging for our current situation. Seems we're in the clutches of the most dangerous renegade out on the Rose border. And his crew's very thorough at searching prisoners, I might add. My best guess is that Pyr's decided to come in off the border to make a stab at widening his territory, or gotten involved in the quiet little civil war the Bucons are waging. That's his bed you're in," he added.

"Pyr." She repeated the name a few times, as though tasting it and trying it out on her tongue. Martin noticed that she did not seem particularly disturbed by his bad news. She nodded thoughtfully, smiling faintly. "Pyr. Red hair and fire inside him. Suits him. You know, even when I was inside him, I couldn't get his name out of him. Normally, that kind of information just sort of flows through the link. Names are one of the few things we remember when we sever the connection. That way, we can respond politely when people send us thank you notes. Which he won't."

"I bet." He poured her more coffee, and some for himself. "I think this bunch has a weird custom about names. He made a big deal about knowing your name. His crew's been worried about him, so getting them to talk to the kid who was making a noise about helping the woman who saved his life wasn't too hard." He glanced at a mirror across the room. "This new look has the advantage of making me appear harmless." He continued to talk over Roxy's laughter. "According to Linch and Pilsane, acknowledging your name means Pyr's claimed you as personal property—or under his protection, or as a member of his clan. Mostly they speak Standard, but my translator couldn't make out what they were talking about all of the time."

"Well, at least we're not engaged," she said, and fiddled with her wedding ring.

Martin laughed, and wished it didn't sound a little nervous. "Yeah." He took her hands in his to still their nervous fidgeting. She'd dropped the mug and let the last dregs of coffee spill onto the bed. He said, "I thought I knew a lot about the Bucons, but this name thing is new to me." She tensed, and gave him a strange look that set warning signals off inside him. "What?"

Martin rose to his feet, nerves stretched tight. He did not like not being in control. He was missing things; important details were slipping right past him. He hated lack of information. He really hated when he didn't pick up on every clue and nuance in a situation. He didn't give in to the urge to pace restlessly. He also didn't give in to the urge to insist to Roxanne that of course their captor was a Bucon. She'd been in the man's head, inside his cells and DNA. If she said this pirate who Glover assumed was one of his own kind was no such thing, Martin Braithwaithe believed her. He just didn't get it. What was he missing?

"All right," he said as Roxy watched him anxiously, reacting to the tension radiating from him. He made a reasonably good effort to calm down for the empath's sake as he added, "What is he?"

She rubbed the back of her neck, and chuckled. "Oh, I think there's any number of answers to that. But the one thing I can definitively tell you is that the man is no more Bucon than your or I."

Martin considered. "I don't know, Roxy. The Bucon Empire is larger than we thought. More secretive. Could be that there are more types of Bucons than we know about."

"Could be," she agreed. "But I seriously doubt it. The koltiri have been in contact with the Bucon for over two thousand years. The Bucons have been a spacefaring people for longer than that. They consisted of ten different subsets of the Genesis originally. The meeting of those ten subsets Engendered the current Bucon Body/Soul structure. Excuse me, Terran," she corrected when Martin frowned at her language. "Forgive me for such politically incorrect wording. What I meant to say is that the Bucon Empire consisted originally of humanoids from ten different star systems who formed trade alliances, interbred, and blended their culture over several thousand years of interaction to create what we now call the Bucon Empire. Bucons are physically identical to twenty percent of the subsets of the Genesis. That twenty percent includes Terrans," she added. "But not whatever subset Pyr belongs to."

"But the Bucon territory is bigger than we thought. Older. That's new information to the United Systems."

"Not among koltiri. You forget how long my mother's people have been around. We've only been allied with the United Systems for five of the Systems' paltry little eight-hundred-year history."

He tried not to sound annoyed as he asked, "If the koltiri know this stuff already, why haven't they passed the information on to the United Systems?"

She shrugged. "Nobody asked?" She drew herself up proudly. "You forget, Koltir is ruled by a theocracy of half-mad telempathic demi-goddesses with their own secret agenda. We have our reasons for our silence."

She grinned. "It's okay to talk to you. You're family. And Pyr is no more Bucon than you or I are. I can tell you that much. And I really don't know anything about Bucon history. Koltiri are interested in studying the Neshama Seeding, so of course I know the biological history of every race we've run into. Helps in healing," she added. "And don't tell me Reine hasn't told you at least some of this stuff in the last sixteen years."

"Sort of," he conceded. "I remember her saying that the Trin were the first race she'd heard of that the koltiri hadn't already encountered. She then told me not to ask what she meant," he added.

"And now we've met another." Slowly, and very carefully, Roxanne swung her legs over the side of the bed and rose to her feet. Martin offered his hand to help, but she waved him away. He watched her as she walked around Captain Pyr's quarters, moving as though she thought she might shatter if she wasn't careful. It was painful to watch, and a marvel as well. Dr. Martin Braithwaithe knew very well that the koltiri Captain Pyr had taken off the slave ship had been very close to death. Her swift recovery puzzled and alarmed as much as it delighted him.

"Did I mention that he's a telepath?" she questioned as she fingered objects and looked in drawers and cabinets.

"You mentioned it. His senior officers have been showing the signs. I wondered about so many Bucon telepaths in one place. They don't have that many to spread around—unless there's more telepathy among the Bucon than we know about."

"There isn't." Roxy kicked piles of discarded clothing and datacubes and wafers out of the way. "Whoever he is, he isn't particularly neat. Look at this place. Eamon would not approve. Eamon."

She sighed, and the life went out of her eyes. Martin watched worriedly as she went very pale. He leaned forward and asked gently. "What about Eamon?"

She stood frozen on a pile of bright clothing, staring at nothing. "Never mind," she said after a minute. "Eamon isn't—important—right now."

"We have to concentrate on the situation," he agreed quickly, fairly certain she had more on her mind than focusing on escape. He caught onto the memory of something she'd said earlier, asking about it to distract her. "Poison. What about poison?"

"He was poisoned," she answered. "Pyr. That was what was killing him, not the plague or the Rust addiction—though he had both."

"Someone in his crew? Was there a mutiny attempt? Can we use that? Join up with some faction onboard?"

"Couldn't we just break out of here, steal a cutter and go?" she asked in turn. "I need to go," she added, with an unreadable look deep in her eyes. "Soon."

Martin scratched his chin. "Doubt it'll be that easy. Even if we could escape from the Raptor, we wouldn't have much chance in something as small as an escape pod or whatever they might have in their docking bay. The Bucon pirates and slavers and factions of trading lords are raiding everything that moves. We need a big ship with big guns to get where we need to go. A Shireny cloak wouldn't hurt, either," he muttered. "Maybe I can do something about that if we can get control of the ship. One thing at a time," he added.

She glanced toward the door. "I think the first order of business is getting out of here." Roxy knew very well that Pyr intended to keep her isolated, but living in purdah was not her idea of a good time. Mingling with the crew of an alien pirate vessel didn't sound like much fun, either, but doing something was preferable to the passive role she'd been forced into in recent weeks. Or was it months?

"Years," she admitted to herself, with a grinding ache of bitter regret. To Martin she said, "Can you do something with the lock?"

"We'll know in a few minute," he said and rubbed his hands briskly together as he approached the door. "I'm going to look around some more and see if I can find anything useful to open the lock."

"Is she pretty?" Linch asked, leaning back in his chair and stretching out his long legs. Pyr gave his exec a stern look across the table. Linch jerked his chin at the navigator seated on his left. "Pilsane says she isn't."

"Then why are you asking me?" Pyr replied, but found that he'd shifted his annoyed gaze to Pilsane. "She's alien," he found himself going on, when he hadn't gathered his men together in the common room to discuss the koltiri. "How can you tell if an alien woman is pretty?"

"You look," Mik advised. He took a long drink from a glass of beer. "That's how I do it."

"Works for me," Pilsane agreed, and swallowed an orange capsule with a sip from his own beer glass. "Helps to look at them when they haven't got any clothes on."

"Or concealed weapons," Pyr contributed to the ridiculous conversation. "No, she isn't pretty," he added when they all looked curiously at him.

"You weren't so pretty yourself a few hours ago," Linch reminded him. "Pilsane said he looked up what she is. You should stop telling me things," Linch added to the navigator before he could protest. "If you don't want me to pass them on to Dha-lrm."

"I was going to mention it," Pilsane answered. Then he leaned forward eagerly, but when he spoke it wasn't with his voice in a room where other members of the crew were gathered. Is it true? She's one of them?

Linch looked around the room. The commons was far from crowded, with no one seated at the nearby tables. "More Rust for them?" he questioned quietly. Or do you plan to use her on everyone?

Pyr considered the question, and remembered Roxanne's physical condition. If she has to absorb too much more plague and Rust, it will kill her. Or give her permanent mind damage. He was certain of this, that there were limits to her powers, and that it was his duty to protect her. Stupid of him to have claimed her as Kaddani.

Shut up, Pyr responded to Linch's amused question. He eyed his wiry, hard-muscled friend critically. When was it, he wondered, that one of the most dangerous men he'd ever met had become an inveterate matchmaker? Pyr folded his hands on the tabletop and looked at each of his men in turn. "We have business to discuss."

"Robe Halfor," Pilsane said, very quietly. He glanced at Linch. "Tell him what you found out from Bruis."

"Halfor has ambitions beyond running the Bucon pirate guild," Linch reported. He strummed his ligret quietly as he continued. "The Bucon's ambassador to the United Systems was aboard the yacht the slaver intercepted. Halfor had a contract out on him, so Bruis killed the man and was going to claim the reward. Bruis didn't know why Halfor wanted Glover dead," Linch went on. "Wasn't curious, either. But he did give me the names of other people Halfor has targeted. Not your average pirate vendetta types—except you, Captain."

"He's getting rid of people allied to the Monolem monarchy," Pyr guessed, and Linch nodded. "And anyone else he perceives as a threat to his taking over the throne."

The worry and fear he'd told himself he couldn't afford to indulge reared up again, fiercer than ever. Pyr beat it down with equal fierceness. There was hope in the world, he told himself to counter anguish. Hope of victory. He would prevail. Even if he had to grab that hope by the throat and shake it until it gave up being so damned elusive and fickle. He knew Axylel lived, the glow of his lifethread was still a part of the weave of clan's identity. Even if that glow died, Pyr's duty was to safeguard the People. Halfor was the key, he knew, or Axylel Kaddani, who had one of the finest minds in the galaxy for intelligence work, would not have found his way into a trap Halfor had set for him.

"This will make it harder for us to get to Halfor," the ever-practical Pilsane pointed out. "His security's already the best this side of the Emperor's. If he's planning to be emperor—"

"And let the League court him," Pilsane added. "But…" He stroked his jaw thoughtfully. Pyr and the others waited while the one person among them who truly understood the Bucon mindset considered what a man like Halfor was most likely to do. "Maybe they're still in the middle of the courtship dance," Pilsane finally said. "The League is more likely to promise him toys like they let us play with, but how much are they really going to give the man who would be emperor? Enough to make him pretend to trust them while he works on ways to keep them from controlling him when he does reach the throne." He glanced at Mik. "Does Halfor have his own technicians who can improve League toys? Invent new ones? I think not."

"You're making my head hurt," Mik complained. He slapped a meaty hand on the table. "Do we fight or fool these people? That's what I need to know."

And what kind of telepaths are on Halfor's payroll? Linch wondered. Axylel, perhaps?

It was a painful, dangerous question, and only Linch could have asked it and lived.

As it was, Pyr was on his feet, hands reaching across the table before he caught himself and stopped. What buzz of conversation there had been in the room had dissipated into tense, excited silence. Every eye was on him, some frightened, most of the watching crew eager for any diversion. Pyr noticed that he'd knocked over his chair, and that Mik and Pilsane had grabbed up their glasses to keep their beer safe in case of a brawl. And that Linch hadn't moved, and was still idly strumming his damned ligret.

Pyr let his hands drop to his sides. He was about to say something sarcastic, possibly conciliatory, even agree that Linen's question had needed to be asked. What he'd been about to do became moot as the common room door opened and Kristi came in, talking animatedly to the man and woman who stepped in after her. Roxanne. And Martin.

Pyr stepped around the table as Kristi came marching past him. She spoke over her shoulder as she headed for the galley entrance. "Look at these two," she announced cheerfully. "Skin and bones, the both of them. They told me they'd been starved on that slave ship when I went to check on your lady friend, so I told them the easiest thing to do was come down to the common with me and raid the kitchen. You two take a seat," she called back to Roxanne and Martin. "I'll be back with something for you in a minute."

Pyr stood rooted in place. His men came to their feet and looked from him to the koltiri. Martin hastily moved to a table. Roxanne had the audacity to smile at him in a way that was far too smug and triumphant as she followed her brother-in-law. Pyr snarled.

He started toward the woman, but Linch touched him on the arm, and drew his attention first. "What?"

Linch tilted an eyebrow sardonically at him. "I thought you said she wasn't pretty."

Chapter Seventeen

"Looks like we interrupted something," Martin whispered as they took seats as far from Pyr's table as they could.

"Definitely," she whispered back, almost overwhelmed by the mental energy flying around the room. She'd been aware of it even before they'd entered. Drawn to it, in fact. Drawn to him. Because he was furious, and hurting, and afraid. And that was a very bad development. Compassion was all very well and fine, she told herself, and took a seat with her back to Pyr, but the big fella could take care of himself. She knew that he intended to approach her, felt his attention focused on her like a laser, but his men spoke to him. He turned aside for now, sat down, and resumed talking to them. He wasn't finished with her. Though his thoughts were shielded, his emotions made that abundantly clear.

She sighed, and tried to relax a little, to ignore her own focus on Pyr and look around at the other people in the room. The door opened several times while they waited for Kristi to bring them the promised meal, letting in a motley mix of off-duty personnel. Typical pirate types, she supposed, a dangerous and edgy-looking mixture of men and women who separated into small groups at the tables. The noise level in the room increased, drowning out any chance of picking up the already quiet conversation from Pyr's table in the center of the common. All that could be heard was the sound of a stringed instrument, played by the one that had to be Linch. It sounded like a love song. How odd, for a pirate.

She wished Pyr and his men would get up and go. Get out and leave me alone, she wanted to scream at Pyr, even though he was doing nothing to interfere with her at the moment. She kept her thoughts quiet, and her hands clasped together in her lap.

After a while, Kristi brought the food, and Roxy concentrated on it gratefully until she was finished. Renewed energy flowed through her, but she remained ravenously hungry. Martin hadn't yet mentioned that she was recovering far more quickly than usual from serious healings. Which was good, as she didn't want to explain why, and he probably didn't want to confirm what he suspected. He was linked to a koltiri himself; he understood that some things were not to be discussed. Unless it affected their survival and mission, of course. Damn, but she was still hungry!

Rather than calling attention to herself by getting up to go to the galley to ask for more, she watched Martin watching the crew of the Raptor. This was safer than turning to return the stare from the blue-eyed man across the room. And what difference did it make that Pyr had blue eyes, other than the laser analogy? Eye color didn't necessarily help identify humanoid subsets. She wondered if finding out what world he and his officers came from held a clue to what they were really up to. Martin didn't trust them, and Martin Braithwaithe was the best judge of people she'd ever met, for all his claims that he wasn't a classic empath. If anyone could manage to organize and lead a mutiny onboard the Raptor, it would be Martin. But there was a lot they had to find out first.

"What about Kristi?" she asked him after the woman smiled his way as she brought a tray of food to one of the other tables. "She could be useful. She thinks you're a cute boy."

They'd already learned a lot from the woman who'd walked in on them while they were trying to get out of Pyr's quarters. Kristi and her husband were Terran, like Martin, and they were being held as slaves on board the Raptor. Roxy found this news even more appalling because she sensed no resentment from the woman about her condition. In fact, the talkative Kristi seemed to hold the pirate captain and his senior officers in high regard. Roxy suspected but hadn't sensed telepathic brainwashing. If that was the case, she might be able to fix it, but Martin, shrink to all problems telepathic, surely could. Roxy worked better with bodies than she did with brains and souls. In fact, Eamon always said he wasn't sure she even had a brain.

"I can at least work on Kristi for more information," Martin answered. "What about Sagouran Fever?" he asked her. "Am I being exposed to it right now? Have I already caught it again? Am I going to end up needing to go to Pyr's people for Rust?"

She shrugged. "Good questions. We're in an enclosed environment. I don't know what caused you to be reinfected on Bonadem. It's likely it was airborne contagion. Maybe it was contact from someone already infected but not taking Rust. Does Rust stop the spread of the plague? I haven't exactly had a chance to ask Pyr if he has a lab where I can run some tests." She reached across the table to touch Martin's arm. "You don't have it yet," she told him after a moment, and heard the door open once more as she spoke. Martin switched his gaze from her to the newcomer.

"Well, that's something posi—" His eyes went hard. A wave of cold hatred shot through him, and over her. She froze, and caught Martin's gaze. His expression was blank, his voice a quiet command. "When you turn, Physician, do so very slowly. Don't do anything yet."

"Where is she?" a rough voice snarled loudly from the center of the room. She recognized the accent.

More than that, she caught a whiff of alien emotions that sputtered through a malfunctioning artificial shield for an instant, then blanked out again. She was sweating by the time she finally turned her head. Only force of will kept her from shaking.

Pyr moved to put himself between Kith and Roxanne. He faced the Leaguer, too aware that Kith's presence disturbed the koltiri deeply. So deeply that all her mental barriers slammed tightly shut at the sight of him. There was a physical presence behind him as he faced Kith, but for a horrible moment Pyr was so alone in the world he wanted to die. The strange sensation waned as quickly as it came. She was there again, and he was angrier than usual at Kith when he said, "What do you want now?"

"I know what you've got." Kith pointed past him. "One of my people saw you take her onboard."

If Kith noticed the sarcasm, he didn't show it. "I claim the healer," he announced. He grinned, showing too many crooked teeth.

"I claimed the woman as booty. She's mine." Pyr expected Roxanne to stand up and loudly proclaim that she belonged to no one. That she made no move was another indication of how much Kith disturbed her.

Kith sneered. "I know you don't want a woman for your bed. I claim her for the League."

Roxanne only half-listened to what was being said. What the two of them decided about her was quite irrelevant. Everyone's attention was riveted on the argument. She looked at Martin. He edged away from the table, and slowly got to his feet. She got up to stand next to him as his hand went into his jacket pocket.

She put her hand on his arm. "No. That won't work," she whispered. The Trin shield was functioning erratically, but taking it out would be very difficult. His gaze slid to hers. "Not without taking more casualties."

He waited another tense moment before he put his hand down, and gave her a brief nod. Roxy realized she'd been holding her breath, and let it out on a bitter sigh. Oh, yes, she'd done it before. She refused to let herself remember, and made herself look at the Trin. Pyr was not afraid of him. Now, that was a curious thing, not that this was the time for any sort of analysis. With a Trin you had to act, and quickly.

"She's an empathic healer," Kith said. "That makes her more valuable than a ship. Than two ships."

"Empathic healer," one of the watching crewmen got up the courage to interrupt. "What's that?"

"Look at her," a woman said, pointing at Roxanne. "I've seen ancient sculptures and temple paintings that look like her. People like her can perform miracles."

The Trin laughed in Pyr's face, sharp teeth showing. He pointed at the ship's captain. "He's holding out on you, just like he always does. He controls the Rust. You work for Rust. But it won't last forever. What will you do when the Rust runs out?" He turned to face the crowd as people gathered closer around him and Pyr. Roxanne and Martin hung back and waited, and listened. Pyr crossed his arms and carefully surveyed the crowd. His trio of officers stood at his back.

Roxy took her cue, and moved toward Pyr and the Trin. "No one has to die." The Trin watched her with ultimate greed. She paid no attention to the pirate captain beside him, though she felt him carefully watching her with all her senses. "I can commit miracles," she said, loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. "Cure with a touch. I am koltiri of Koltir. I'm sure many of you have heard of koltiri."

"Yes," Roxanne agreed. She turned her back on the Trin, though she hated doing it. "I am a healer," she told the avidly watching pirates. "A doctor. Vowed to save lives. Pyr cannot stop me from doing what I do."

She flinched when the bony hand touched her shoulder and swung her back around. The Trin was pasty-faced but for the red knobs on his forehead, pock-marked and scrawny, but wiry and strong with it. He was shorter than her, and she could see his resentment that he had to look up to her. Trin preferred people on their knees. "Pyr is too weak to control you," he told her. "He'd know that if he really knew anything about your kind. What you do can and will be controlled."

She forced a smile, and made her tone gentle when she spoke. "You want me to heal you first, I take it." She shrugged, but without trying to throw off the bony hand that clasped her shoulder. She knew Pyr wanted to break that hand, but he stood back, waiting to see what she was doing. She wished Pyr wasn't so aware of her less-than-docile nature.

Pyr was very, very annoyed with Roxanne, more so than he was with Kith, but he didn't show it yet. Her public show of defiance was not unexpected, and he'd deal with it in private. Right now, it was more to his advantage to let this go on a few moments longer. If she was going to heal Kith, Kith would have to lower his shield.

"If you want me to heal you, you have to lower your shield," Roxy told the Trin. Trins were mostly mindblind, and the shield helped deflect telepathy as well. But she didn't have to be a telepath to look deeply and earnestly into the bastard's eyes and openly show the gentle, compassionate side of her nature. And empathy, well, it wasn't something that could be shielded against when someone with her kind of power knew how to project it. She was harmless, he could feel that. Weak. All she wanted was to help. Needed to help. Him.

Trins were attracted to weakness, and so very good at taking advantage of it. This one finally reacted to her obvious frailty with a snarling smile, and switched off the shield that separated him from the rest of the universe.

With that protection gone, the rest was quite easy. She was fast, and well trained in more than the healing arts. Anyone who served on board the Tigris learned a great many different ways to kill. A swift-fisted blow to the Trin's heart came first, a stiff-fingered jab to the throat next. Then, while he gurgled and gasped and tried to fall forward, Roxy grabbed the bastard's head, pulled it back, and twisted hard. The loud crack as his neck snapped was the most satisfying sound she'd heard in a long time.

Her mental shields snapped up hard as she let the body fall to the deck, and allowed herself only the shortest moment to look at the dead thing at her feet. First do no harm, was her bleak thought, but she turned a fierce smile on the gaping roomful of pirates and gestured them forward. "All right," she announced with brittle brightness. "Who's next?"

Pyr didn't know if his roar of outrage filled the room, or if it only filled the space inside their heads. It was no telepathic gesture when he grabbed the woman, shook her hard, and demanded, "What the demons did you do?"

She looked calm, though inside she was nothing of the sort. Her huge dark eyes were full of horror, and a terrifying sense of righteous triumph. He dealt with what he saw before him: a dead body, and a healer who had—"Murder. You murdered him." That he had been only an instant away from killing Kith himself made no difference at the moment. That he wanted Kith dead made no difference. "A healer shouldn't be able to commit murder."

"We have no cease fire with the Trin. No treaty. The war has abated. It isn't over until they're all dead."

Pyr held Roxanne in a firm grip as he turned his head to look at her companion. The look the boy gave him was cold, and counted Pyr as an enemy. Around him was a room of very frightened pirates, people who did not frighten easily. They had seen a saint, and salvation, and she'd shown them that she was more dangerous than any of them. She'd killed Kith, for demons sake! Many were heading for the door. Some had drawn weapons. Most were staring at Pyr. He concentrated on Roxanne. His men could handle any necessary crowd control.

Pilsane stepped over Kith's body to face Martin. "What does the Systems have to do with the Pirate League?"

"What are you doing serving with a Trin?" Roxanne asked Pyr, and it was a very personal question.

For an instant he felt that he had failed her somehow. Then he came to his senses and shook her again. "What are you talking about?"

She didn't answer, but merely looked at him with concentrated contempt and hatred. Then he realized that explanations didn't matter. Controlling her mattered. Kith had certainly been right about that one thing. She was a telempath whose strengths and weaknesses he had yet to understand. She could cure or kill on a whim. Kith had paid with his life by trusting her for one brief moment. Uncontrolled, she put his people and his mission in danger, and that could not be allowed. At least he had a means readily to hand that let him control her. Damn.

Chapter Eighteen

She had cold-bloodedly taken a life. Roxy was almost too involved in controlling her reaction to what she'd done to pay attention to where Pyr was taking her. The biggest of his three officers hurried ahead of them, and eventually disappeared from view. Pyr dragged her down a corridor and into a lift and then down another hall, one where the thrum of the ship's engines filled her ears and the lighting was brighter than on the other decks. The brightness made her blink, but her concentration stayed fixed within herself. Even the mental roar of Pyr's fury and resolve was background to her.

She felt good, goddess damn it. That was the worst part. She hated that she felt so good. The fierce joy she took from conquering disease was an acceptable outlet for her aggressive nature. The hunt and slaughter of a sentient being should not bring the same rush of delight as killing the things that caused death to sentient beings. As hungry as she still was, she'd barely been able to stop herself from absorbing the Trin's life energy as he died. That was the difference on a basic level that had nothing to do with ethics and morality—sentient energy was nourishing, while healing drained energy even as it satisfied the koltiri's predator instinct.

Maybe she was a throwback to the ancient koltiri, but at least she wasn't so bad that she gave in to the urge to be an energy ghoul. She'd taken nothing from the bastard but his life. She wanted desperately to be able to regret taking life, but all she felt was guilt that she'd had to break her vow as a physician to fulfill her vow to the United Systems one more time.

She fought to keep from giggling as she remembered the gaping crowd in the common. They'd been afraid of her, all those hard-eyed, wicked pirates, and she'd eaten it up in the moment before Pyr grabbed her and got her focused again. She was almost thankful to him, except that he was the captain of a ship that had had a Trin on board. She couldn't remember if she'd laughed in their faces or not, just that she'd wanted to. Bad Roxy. She hadn't wanted to laugh at Pyr, not when his hands were on her and his anger burned through all her barriers. She'd wanted explanations, reassurances, wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.

There was no room for that. Special Order One was very specific. Special Order One required that Pyr's life be ended as well.

After he picked up her thought, Pyr stopped in his tracks and pushed her, face-first and hard, against the corridor wall. He held her pinned there, hands immobilized, his weight pressed firmly against her back. He had one arm around her, the tip of a knife touching her throat. His thoughts probed at hers; she made him work for it.

"Special Order One?" His lips were very close to her ear, his breath hot across her cheek.

From her current position, Roxy wished she hadn't had to demonstrate her unarmed combat skills in front of him. She couldn't blame him for not taking any chances. The knife point was pressed into her flesh, encouraging her to speak. "No one outside the United Systems MilService is supposed to know about SO1."

"I see. So you're going to tell me about Secret Special Order One." There was something almost erotically suggestive in his tone, and the way his big, hard-muscled body pressed against hers. This jarred with the biting pain as he shifted the knife point deeper. The dichotomy was meant to confuse and rattle her, and it did a pretty good job.

Blood welled from around the small wound, reinforcing the threat, while Pyr's body heat surrounded her and sent signals as primitive as fear through her. Roxy cut through this crap and decided to tell him the official policy, because he might as well know why she was under obligation to kill him. "It was decided in Council, and by a Full Systems' Star Chamber Vote, that there is only one viable solution to Trin aggression and the Trin program of galactic conquest: complete extermination of the Trin genetic subset. And the execution of all known Trin allies," she added, just so he would know. "I am an officer of the United System Military Service. I took the oath to carry out Special Order One."

Pyr's body came pressing down even harder against her. His gasp was loud in her ear. His shock was communicated to her, body to body. His repulsion was enough to twist her soul, but she made an effort not to show it. She had taken the oath, never mind her personal opinions when she'd taken it. Experience had taught her that it was the only way.

He pushed away from the wall, not wanting to touch her. She turned, aware of the knife he held in one hand. Now there was a stunner in the other. The look on his face was more hurtful than any weapon could be, though she knew she had nothing to be guilty of. She had no reason to explain to someone who had worked with the Trin. He would never be anyone's slave or puppet.

The look he gave her chilled her to the bone. Roxy crossed her arms. "Not every world voted for it." Controversy still raged in secret and in rumor over the decision. Many of the frontline combatants who'd carried out their oaths were considered war criminals by other members of the Service. Controversy and opposition aside, the secret of Special Order One had remained closely guarded inside MilService. It was agreed that if the media ever got hold of the truth, it might well lead to a civil war.

Until now, that is. Eamon had always feared she was a weak link, that her oath as a doctor would work against her oath to kill Trin. It was one of his reasons for not wanting her to leave the Tigris. Maybe his most important one, she decided, as Pyr certainly wasn't having any trouble getting her to talk about it. The biggest problem with Pyr was that she couldn't seem to not give him anything he wanted. She was definitely going to have to work on that.

"Did you vote for it?" He looked her over with an ugly sneer. "Are all koltiri like you?"

She'd work on defying him later. Right now she needed to tell him the truth. "As a matter of fact, the koltiri of Koltir did approve the Special Order. Pruning of seedling races is sometimes necessary for the strength of the whole. Of course, no koltiri ever expected they'd have to do the pruning themselves. Koltiri's are trained to be gentle."

"I was. Until I fought a war against the Trin. Terra, on the other hand, voted against Special Order One," she added, needing to explain both halves of her ancestry. "And my Terran half doesn't particularly like the notion of a Final Solution for anybody."

"Terrans!" His sneer grew even uglier, and he spat on the deck. "We've heard all about how the Terrans exterminated the Makacheyn."

"So great that they made a habit of invading worlds that were just developing space technology and stripping them of every resource. Many times. Terra was only the last world they invaded. We beat them. We beat them fair and square and the price of our not going to war with the oh-so-snotty, non-interfering United Systems was what they stood back and let us do to the Makacheyn, who they were tired of using as their military enforcers anyway."

"We most certainly did not. We simply fought them back to the stone age, liberated all their other slave worlds, took over the military arm of the United Systems, and left the Makacheyn to rot on their own homeworld. They still exist—they're hunting with stone axes and rubbing sticks together to make fire, but they're still breathing!"

Pyr did not know how he and Roxanne had come to stand toe to toe, shouting at each other in the center of the corridor. He was aware of the absurdity of it all. They were standing only a few feet away from the interrogation room. His reason for bringing Roxanne here had not been to argue with her. He still couldn't stop himself from shouting one more question. "What the demons did Kith have to do with the Trin?"

"He looked and smelled like one. You know, white skin." She ran a thumb across her forehead. "Ugly red bumps. Pointy teeth. No nose to speak of. Nasty attitude. Really bad hair."

"Fortunately, there's never been more than a few hundred thousand of that model, though they've interfered in untold billions of lives. Very few are unfortunate enough to see one up close. You usually have to hack away layers and layers of puppet races and schemes to get to the corruption at the center, go through thousands of bodies to get to the one Trin they died protecting. Most people who died in the Trin war never saw a Trin," she added with an awful sadness. "On either side."

She gave him a caustic look. "I didn't mistake that he felt like one, thought like one. Every subset has their own mental signature, you know."

* * *

So Kith was a Trin. Interesting. Irrelevant, but interesting. It was true that he had very little information on the Trin, other than knowing that they were known for the high level of their technology. He'd followed the war from a distance as he patrolled the border between his people and the rest of the galaxy. He knew the war was hard-fought and vicious on both sides, but neither the Trin nor the United Systems meant anything to him. As long as the battles didn't come near his home, he didn't care about their killing each other. The only genocide he cared about was any that threatened the People. She'd still killed Kith without Pyr's permission, and his will superseded any Special Orders aboard the Raptor. And it showed him what she was capable of.

"I'd heard the Trin had taken shelter with the League. Quite a comedown. No wonder he was always in such a foul mood."

He almost laughed. Damn the woman, why did she make him laugh? And angry, and curious. She made him question assumptions he wanted to be true. He had enough on his plate without adding the distraction of someone he found interesting.

She was looking at him intently, probing around the edges of his thoughts. "You didn't know? You—you didn't know." She took a step back, and tried to hide a smile. The relief that poured from her was almost overwhelming. He had no idea what she was pleased about. Then the pleasure she tried not to feel turned to wary curiosity. "Where have you been that you don't know what a Trin looks like?"

"On the Rose border," he told her, though he knew he should give her no more information about who he was. But then—she'd already been in his soul—and left a part of herself behind. Like a splinter.

She looked at him very steadily for a long time, then reached up and brushed away the long hair that concealed his ears. Ears that came to a delicate, sensitive point. He knew she had not seen anything like them before. Her fingers brushed across the tip of an ear and down the side of his throat. Her touch sent a shock of heat through him, but he stayed still. She had broken Kith's neck not so long ago, but he didn't move when she rested her palm against his pulse, even though he knew she felt it quicken.

"Beyond the Rose, I think," she murmured, and smiled, though it had melancholy in it. "My sister wrote a song called 'Beyond the Rose.' It's about what's hidden behind it. The nebula. She doesn't really know."

They were whispering now, and standing closer together than before. That he still held a weapon in each hand was the only thing that kept him from touching her. "It's a very pretty nebula. That isn't what we call it, but I've seen a rose, and the comparison is apt."

He'd seen how she'd bewitched Kith and knew there was a chance she was trying something similar here. That's what he wanted to believe. Pyr closed his eyes, thinking that might break the spell, but it only made him more aware of her presence, close and inviting, as vulnerable and wary of it as he was. He slipped the stunner in his belt, so that he could cup her cheek.

As he did, the door to the interrogation room across the corridor slid open. He opened his eyes to meet Mik's outraged gaze. The look shocked Pyr back to sanity, reminded him of duty, and warned him that this was not the place or time—

His response to Roxanne's thought was to whirl her around and push her into the torture chamber. It was crowded in the small space with the three of them and the monitor that surrounded the padded table in the center of the room.

Roxanne saw the table and froze, staring at it with appalled disgust. "That's a Pirate League toy. You need a high level telepath to work that thing." She swallowed. "Which you have no shortage of, actually." She glanced at Mik. "One of your jobs is to torture people? A nice man like you?" Mik actually blushed at her indignant question. Pyr felt no fear from her, but knew it would come later.

Mik gave a disdainful look at the apparatus he was such an expert at using. He nodded.

Mik's shoulders tensed, and his gaze flicked between Pyr, Roxanne, and the interrogation table. Pyr saw the worried suspicion in his friend's dark eyes when Mik's gaze met his once more. Pyr might have laughed if what Mik was thinking hadn't been so hurtful to his pride and honor. Nothing, he reminded himself. Feel nothing. I promise you that I won't enjoy it, he thought as he saw the concerned look his friend turned back on the woman.

Neither will I, Roxanne added, sliding her thoughts with too much ease into the mindlink Pyr shared with one of his own people. "Not that I'm going to put up with being tortured this afternoon. Thank you, but I've had my brain washed recently," she said, taking a step back, only to be blocked by Pyr.

He stood in front of her like a living wall as Mik left and the door closed behind him. Once Mik was gone, Pyr said, backing her toward the table. "This will happen. It is necessary." He pushed her to sit on the table, where she looked up at him with huge, angry eyes. There was no need for explanations, he needed simply to act. He said, "You pose a danger to my ship."

"Then I will leave your ship." She started to rise to her feet. He put a hand on her shoulder, though he let her stand.

He moved very close to her. She might be a bit taller, but he was larger and stronger, a big, broad-shouldered man. He used his size to intimidate. He kept his voice very low as he told her, "You will be controlled. I already told you that you will do as I tell you."

Roxanne gestured behind them. "You're being paranoid." There was still no fear in her. "You're the one who is afraid," she told him. "And it's made you irrational. I'm koltiri, I do not make a habit of killing people."

"I have to protect my people. No one outside the Rose is to be trusted. That is my Special Order."

"Stop saying that! Be reasonable, Dhakynn." She slapped a hand down on the padded surface of the table. "I don't like pain, but there's no way you can break me with this thing. There is no reason for this. This is not going to work. And I'd really like to spare us both the headache."

She accused him of being irrational? She participated in genocide. The People must be protected. There would be no Special Orders concerning his world. No contact with outsiders, and no trust that could be betrayed. It was his vowed duty to keep the People safe and secret.

He had learned some of her secrets while she had been inside his mind. "It will work," he told her as he thrust the knife into her abdomen. "When you are weak enough."

Roxy looked at the knife hilt sticking out of her flesh, and refused to bleed. She then looked at the man who had fallen to his knees in front of her. She wasn't sure which one of them had just screamed. "That is the second time this week someone has stabbed me," she told Pyr. "And it's really starting to piss me off." His hands were clutching the table on either side of her, and his head came to rest on her knees. She had the most ridiculous urge to stroke his hair comfortingly.

She was saved from this impulse when he raised his head to look at her. "Someone else stabbed you?" The question came in a croak that was painful to hear.

This was no time for even a vague—stab—at humor. Pyr's breathing was ragged, the look in his eyes wounded. "I cannot go through with this. I cannot hurt you."

"I should. For the sake of all the People hold sacred, I should hurt you until you cannot resist, then make you mine."

"The conditioning would just wear off in a few days," she told him, and it sounded as if she was trying to reassure him after some perceived failure. "Then you'd have it to do all over again. Besides, I thought you adopted me or something. Right?"

He changed his grip on the table and levered himself slowly to his feet. When Roxanne patted the spot beside her, he sat down with a heavy sigh. His exhaustion was soul deep. His guilt hurt Roxy more than the sharp metal inside her. Pyr ran his hands over his face, then tossed back his long red hair. "I overreacted to your killing Kith, didn't I?" He stared at the door rather than look at her.

"I'd say so, yes." Roxy put her hand around the knife hilt, not quite ready to face the ordeal of drawing the thing out.

His gesture took in the torture chamber. "This is no way to repay the woman who saved my life."

"Shut up." He looked at her, and for some reason she found herself smiling at him. "Perhaps I should have asked for your oath not to kill me or my men."

He put his hand over hers on the knife hilt. His gaze stayed steadily on hers. "Not even people who stab you?"

"I won't kill you." She could not stop the wide, evil grin she gave him. "I might make your life hell, but I won't kill you. But Martin has dibs on Stev Persey. Persey murdered one of our best friends."

"Stev—Persey." Curiosity blazed in him, mixed with deep anger. "Persey tried to kill you?" She nodded. Pyr laughed. "By the demons, woman, we have something else in common. He tried to have me killed a week or so ago."

"I wish you wouldn't—Ahh!" She gasped as he pulled out the knife. "Shit! Hell! I don't want to bleed on this outfit, it's the only clothes I've got."

"Yes." She eyed him with suspicion for a second, ready to move in case he tried to fasten the restraints. He stroked her hair instead and pushed up her red silk tunic to watch the wound fade. She closed her eyes rather than watch the intense concentration on his face. She was utterly surprised when he bent forward and brushed his lips across where the knife wound had been. It sent an ache through her that was far more dangerous than a knife wound. She did not let herself gasp. Her voice was far too breathless when she asked, "Will that make it all better?"

Then what did he have in mind? And how did he know about telling kids that kissing a cut would make it all—

7 have raised two children. His thumbs made swirling patterns on her bared skin. His thoughts swirled around her as well, with the same slow sensuousness that was intimate, delicious, and impossible.

Two children. Raised. She held onto those facts when what she wanted to do was soar and swirl away with him on waves of sensation and thought. She supposed that meant he was married.

It was one of many things they did not want to talk about, but she knew they would. "I'm married," she told him. She would not trust herself to share thoughts. She wished she could open her eyes, instead of just lying here and feeling too much, about too much. The room was warm. He was warm, and so very big and male. She liked the way he smelled, and the way he felt. The table—the torture table, for goddess's sake!—was ridiculously comfortable. She wanted to stretch out, to reach up and draw him down on top of her. Madness.

Yes. He knew too well what she needed to make her truly sane and strong and whole, and so rarely received.

His hands continued to move over her as she made one last effort at safer conversation. "Why did Stev Persey try to kill you?"

She knew he wasn't talking about Stev Persey. There were so many things between them that should have been important. He didn't let any of them stop him from kissing her, and neither did she.

Chapter Nineteen

She'd never been kissed by a telepath before. To say that it was more than a pleasurable joining of lips was a colossal understatement. When they touched, a circuit of pure energy connected between them, light and heat and yearning that deeply meshed soul and body and mind. No thoughts were shared, but they didn't need to be. On the physical level, his weight came down on her, solid and hard and enclosing. The only threat was that the glory would end. The danger was real, and it was all about pleasure and belonging and addicting need. Her arms went around him, holding on for dear life. Their lips touched and they drank in each other. It went on for a long time, and changed her—

At some point Roxy became aware that, despite the sensation of fireworks and champagne bubbles seething through her blood, she was lying on a torture table with a man she should call her enemy, both fully clothed, with their souls naked. She didn't want it to ever stop.

Wanting had everything to do with what was going on here, and nothing. Wanting couldn't matter. There were too many layers of obligation on both sides of this exchange of fire. Her regret was shared with Pyr in a sigh, mouth to mouth.

He made a noise, some cross between animal desperation and pure male frustration, and moved away from her. Pyr pushed off the table with a violently angry jerk, while deep, lonely cold settled through them the moment he was absent.

He was across the small room before he spun around and ran his fingers through his hair. "Damn it, woman! I was trying to get laid here!" His shout was absorbed by the room's heavy sound-proofing, but she absorbed it in her bones.

Getting laid wasn't his style, she knew that. In fact, these words spoken in Standard sounded utterly foreign on his tongue. But the words protected the aching rawness in him, and made her smile.

That eased the ache in her, a little. She rolled slowly onto her side, propped her head up on her hand, and tried to look critically at the man. He was the alien enemy, after all. Unfortunately, a good hard look didn't help. The alien enemy was too damn good looking, with his broad shoulders, strong, handsome features, and thick, burgundy red hair. In fact, he had about the straightest nose she'd ever seen, and a gloriously sensual mouth. The dark blue eyes under strong, arched brows didn't help, either. They were too full of life and intelligence. And he was so stubborn—she didn't know why that was attractive, but the man's mental toughness drew her to him.

She was trying to make it easier on them both when she reminded him, "You're a xenophobe, aren't you? You gave the impression that no outsider is good enough to meet, let alone mate, with one of your People."

He ducked his head and shrugged, then looked at her through a veil of thick lashes. It was a pose that was way too self-effacing and charming, and she hoped he knew it and was trying for self-parody. He could almost disguise the wildness he was fighting down in himself. "My men and I have lived on the border for a long time. Our standards have become somewhat lax."

"Normally. I have claimed you." She didn't want to go into that, and, obviously, neither did he. He shrugged again, and looked her over critically. "You were ugly a few hours ago. You should have stayed that way."

This was no time to point out that it was energy he shared with her that had restored her so quickly. This knowledge might just be the incentive they needed to follow instincts that would cause the sharing to deepen. There was already too much evidence that they were heading that way. "Telepaths," she grumbled under her breath, and sat up. She found that she was a little weak in the knees when she made herself stand. Better to face him on her feet, adversary to adversary on the same level, both doing their best to hide every possible sign of weakness. She sneered, and slashed her hand at the table, a hard, dismissive gesture. "I suppose that was an attempt to use sex to control me." It was an out she gave them both.

"It wouldn't be the first time." Too late, she bit down hard on her tongue. But the truth had escaped into the space between them—space that was growing more fragile with every moment they shared. "Shit!" she snarled, and then his hands were on her again, and she had to look into his angry eyes. Anger that wasn't at her, damn it. Why the hell couldn't the man be angry at her rather than for her? She didn't give him time to demand an explanation from her, to make any declarations.

"I have a husband," she told him. "A brave man who needed me, but doesn't like me very much. I don't like him, either." There. She'd admitted it, as her family and friends had wanted her to do for a long time. Only she'd admitted it to the wrong person. This wasn't even a good time to acknowledge it to herself. "Sex was all we had—keeping me sane after healings in the middle of a war. We're still married," she told Pyr as she pushed his hands away from her shoulders. "The marriage may be over, but it isn't ended. I keep my vows."

Pyr wanted to remind her that he already had ample evidence in Kith's death that she broke vows, but it was easier to accept her claim. He accepted what she said about her husband, and fought down his sense of outrage. He tried to find some sense of irony in wanting to rush to her defense after having stabbed her quite recently. Her blood was quite literally still on his hands, while the memory of her taste was still burning through him. "Telepaths," he muttered.

He nodded, and hated that the gesture of agreement came so hard. He hated her desperate hope that separation was possible. And he hated that he shared that hope. He shook his head. "We don't need personal complications."

They didn't have time for what was happening between them, which they both knew and accepted. "We are not a pair of selfish children."

Why were they standing so close together again? Pyr took several steps back. When he reached the door, he almost fled. But Roxanne would still be with him if he walked away, standing just inside a doorway into his soul. Standing in a place where another belonged.

"My wife died," he told her, giving his own best excuse. "But I will not let the bond that was between us be completely lost." Even though Siiyel took the first steps in severing that bond long before her death nearly broke him in two. "It would dishonor her memory if I—"

The thought came hard and harsh, surprising them both. Roxanne, utterly stunned by her own jealousy, dropped back onto the table. She rubbed her temples, and looked up at him apologetically.

"I have no idea where that came from. I think it's time you and I got back to reality for a while." She stood up slowly and looked around. "It's a little claustrophobic in here, don't you think?"

"This is a place for extracting information from your enemies. If you want information, I suggest you take me out for a cup of coffee first."

"We could go back to my place," he suggested, and failed in the effort to smirk when he said it. Linch would have been proud.

She took this scrap of information with a calm nod. After her reaction to Kith, he'd expected a certain amount of outrage. "I've got Leaguers in my family," she told him. "I can live with the disgrace if you can. But I would like to know why you're in league with the League."

"But is it innocent or evil? For or against the Systems? It's a little claustrophobic in here too." She tapped a finger on her forehead as she spoke. "I've spent a lot of time at war. It's gotten me into this mindset of thinking that anyone who isn't on my side is automatically an enemy."

He nodded reluctantly. "It is the same with me since the Bucon Empire started falling apart. My mission on the border was fending off Bucon trade incursions and Systems spies, until the plague came along. I've been trying to keep the plague away from the People, and the People from starting conflicts we cannot win. But I have never been at war with your people."

"We don't know anything about each other, Pyr—other than the fact that our telepathic selves have the hots for each other."

"Which is my fault," he added before she could. "Can I buy you a cup of coffee, Roxanne?"

He did not hold his hand out to her, and she carefully clasped her hands behind her back as she came toward the door. They left the room side by side anyway.

Pyr didn't understand coffee any more than the other Terran food Kristi cooked. He always ate the food, even liked some of it, but he often suggested that there were many other cuisines he found acceptable. She continued to make Terran food, and Pilsane encouraged her because he had a fondness for sweets made from Terran chocolate. Pilsane told him that Kristi made excellent coffee. From the way Roxanne cradled the mug of steaming brown liquid after he brought it to her from the galley, Pyr assumed Pilsie must be right. It pleased him that the koltiri was pleased in this small thing. She took a sip, smiled up at him, and the lights in the common room brightened for him.

It was disconcerting to realize that sitting on the other side of a table rather than beside her had to be a conscious decision. He watched her carefully look away from him after their gazes had been locked for a few moments.

"Martin's here," she said. "Making friends as usual, I see. Who's the woman with him?"

"Great legs," she said, and her gaze moved from table to table. "And your friend, Linch, in the opposite corner, is watching Martin. What's that he's playing?"

Pyr was so used to the background sound of the stringed instrument he didn't always notice it. "Ligret."

Do you have any idea how many hours have passed since you left me with the con, Dha-lrm?

"Excuse me." Pyr got up and crossed to where his second in command was sitting. "Report."

"Mik has the con. He was very worried about you, until the sexual temperature of the ship warmed up and we figured you had a better idea than torture in mind." Pyr refrained from commenting, or even being embarrassed, so Linch went on, "Pilsane and I have been going over everything we have on Halfor's home base, but I'm on a break. We spaced Kith's remains. I killed one of his people and the others have decided that they won't miss him after all. The Terran boy is watching us for weaknesses, and I am watching him. Currently the Raptor is cloaked and pretending to be one more asteroid in a belt in the Canyer system. If we don't move the ship, we shouldn't be noticed."

"No pirate activity, but there've been Bucon military patrols in the area. I didn't think you'd want to talk to anybody."

Pyr took in the information and nodded his approval. "At least you haven't been idle while I was—away."

Linch looked up from his ligret, and peered around Pyr. "Nice to see that you two are getting along better. Crew's been talking about making another Rust raid," he added when Pyr refused to respond to the bait once more.

"We don't need Rust." Pyr nodded toward Roxanne. "We have the koltiri to heal us."

Linch's hands stilled on the ligret. The silence was brief, but thick. "As you wish, Captain." He bent his head and began playing once more.

Pyr returned to Roxanne. Her coffee mug was nearly empty on the table before her. Everyone in the room watched them, not surreptitiously at all. After years of being careful, he simply did not care anymore. Let them watch and listen; now was the time for honesty. Pilsane would be annoyed at this lack of discretion, but Pilsane would also make sure no information left the ship.

Pyr sat down and she slid the cup toward him, a hopeful look on her face. Her face mesmerized him for a moment. High cheekbones, huge eyes, a complexion like gold dust mixed with cream. People stared at them, he stared at her, she stared at the coffee cup. It was all quite ridiculous.

"Could stand to put on ten more," she replied. "I'm a big girl. Rare steak is always appreciated," she wheedled.

"I promised you coffee on this date," he reminded her, and she stuck out her tongue at him. "Talk first, eat later."

She sat back in her chair and stretched out long, long legs. "Where do we start? What's the one thing you most want to know?"

"Axylel is my reason for being this deep into Bucon space," he told her. "Axylel is the reason I am going to destroy the head of the Bucon pirate guild, because Robe Halfor is holding him prisoner. Axylel has vowed to help me stop the plague from harming the People. Axylel is my son." He sighed and ran his fingers through his shoulder-length hair, pushing the concealing strands away from his sharply pointed ears in public for the first time in years. He hated all this concealment. It was time for pretense to be over. He wanted very much to—

He slanted an eyebrow at Roxanne as she looked at him with a calm that pretended she had not just shouted loudly inside his head. "And in order to save your people from Sagouran Fever, you've decided you have to save every other world as well. Lucky guess," she added as he tilted an eyebrow at her.

Some things were better left unsaid. Many, actually. But discretion didn't seem likely between them. More's the pity. Pyr reached across the table and took the mug from her and drained the rest of the coffee. He would have preferred beer, but found the slight buzz from caffeine more satisfying than usual. Perhaps he could learn to like this stuff. Roxanne watched him with an air of proud anticipation that worried him greatly. Finally he met her warm gaze and said, "I'll do whatever I have to do. I made a vow. Your turn to answer my question," he added before she could make a fuss.

"Basketball," she told him, "is the one thing I know I'm really good at. When I'm playing basketball, I'm happy. It's an ancient Terran game," she added, "that my daddy taught me when I had this huge growth spurt when I was only ten. Everywhere else but on a basketball court I was awkward and clumsy, but he showed me a place where I could shine and make him proud. He died when I was eleven," she added.

They looked at each other for a few moments, and neither gave in to the urge to touch the other in any way, except that they both knew that they wanted to. "The People need to be protected from outsiders," Pyr went on, rather than dwell on indulging their personal curiosity any longer. "I do not say this out of xenophobia. Contact with other worlds has proved painful and disastrous for us, and cannot be allowed if we are to survive. I say this because I am a member of a telepathic people that, as a whole, do not have the shielding necessary for contact with beings who think and feel differently than we do."

"I and my men, yes. At home, we are considered freaks of nature. Mine is a fragile race, Roxanne. Even though Mik, Pilsane, Linch, Axylel, and I are vowed to the protection of the People, the People want nothing to do with us. We hurt them. In ancient times, people like us were sent out into the wild empty places to die." He shrugged. "We still are."

He had expected a goddess-like telempath to argue that such fragile shielding was impossible for an entire people, to ask questions about how they had survived long enough to develop a space-going culture, possibly even sneer at the weakness of his people. Instead, she said something enigmatic and confusing.

"Maybe I'm being a little melodramatic. Koltiri aren't sent out to die. Our job is to help, serve, and spread it around, but the effect is the same. Still gets us off planet." As his bemused look turned into a glare, she smiled and said, "There are Koltirans, and there are koltiri. Your average, regular telepathic Koltiran can no more interact with alien sentients than one of your people can. Being able to interact telempathically within a mindset that's evolved over millions of years is one thing. Being able to communicate with seedling cousins that have thought processes that developed while being equally isolated for millions of years is another gift entirely. It's biological and electrochemical as much as it is cultural, when you get down to the nitty gritty of how people think. We all come from the same root stock, but the environment where the seeds took hold contributed to how the seeds grew."

"Never mind. What I started to explain is that it's only koltiri who interact with beings from other worlds while the rest of our people go quietly about their lives. Very quietly. Koltiri leave our world, but no one else, and no one comes in. You say your people fear the strong ones. The Koltirans worship the strong ones. We're still outsiders in our own cultures." She shrugged, with no great concern. "Them's the breaks for being different."

He had never heard of Koltirans—any more than she had heard of the People. He was willing to bet that the United Systems knew very little about Koltirans as well. The koltiri protected their own from outsiders, while still wielding power within the United Systems. How had they managed that?

"Your people live your secret lives more out in the open than mine do." She smiled and nodded at this summing up. "Are there many races like yours and mine?"

She shook her head. "There are two races we know of that can easily share thoughts with people from other worlds. Most telepaths have to rely on translating and enhancing hardware, like that little torture machine of yours. Many telepaths can touch other minds, but not without damaging the non-telepath involved. Non-telepaths have been known to become hostile about getting their minds stripped," she admitted. "Telepaths are wary of being overwhelmed by numbers, since we'll always be in the minority. There is a certain paranoia on both sides."

"Or contact could help them. Depends on who does the contacting. Most seedlings—sentient species, in official Systems language—develop some form of telepathy and have the potential to develop even further, but very few have the time and luxury to evolve to that potential. It is our belief on Koltir that we are one of the oldest of the sentient species. The population has always been small, the climate gentle. We didn't have to fight off predators or each other, so we developed our mental abilities. The strong ones developed certain aggressive tendencies, which were channeled into eradicating disease by using their minds. The koltiri took that skill out into space, eventually, after another telepathic race contacted us and taught us a few things." She waved further explanations away. "You don't want me preaching a detailed lesson in koltiri history and religion."

He did, actually. He had just learned what he had suspected but cautious spying had not been able to prove while exiled to patrol the unsophisticated border planets: that his world was not the only one where everyone had mental gifts. And she wanted to move on to other subjects!

Yes. She leaned forward to rest her elbows on the table. "Tell me what a nice man like you is doing working for the Pirate League, and then maybe I'll tell you what I know about Sag Fever and Rust."

That answer came easily. "Four men I could trust, one ship, manned mostly by the dregs of the border. I needed the League's technology to give me an edge in keeping the border clear."

"They do have the best toys money can buy, even though their greatest engineer defected to my side."

"But their associations with the Trin makes up for the loss, or so Kith assured me." He scowled, and she scowled back. "No. I didn't really know what he was—and it makes me feel naive. The League's price," he explained, "was to take a significant share of the booty from every pirate, slaver, and illegal trading ship I stopped from crossing the border. All Kith did aboard the Raptor was ensure that the League got their fair share."

There were many more things he could have told her. About the governments on border worlds that he controlled, his many other alliances, his spy system, the moles he planted wherever he could, mostly among the Bucons. Of course, there were many things she must know that she would not tell him. They were working on trusting each other on levels that were more than personal, but they weren't fools or traitors to their own loyalties.

"Simple business vendetta. I hijacked one of his Rust shipments. Why'd he try to kill you? And what were you doing on a slaver ship?" He thought back to where and how they'd met. It seemed years ago, rather than hours. Something tickled irritably in his memories, a faint connection was made. "You were on board a slaver ship where the ambassador to the United Systems was killed," he said, suddenly very sharply suspicious. "Why is that, Roxanne? Who is also an officer in the United Systems Military Service. How are you connected to Persey, and Glover?"

Roxanne considered him for a few moments. "It has everything to do with Rust," she said. "You might want Linch in on this." She looked across the room, and called out loudly. "Martin, stop fomenting revolution and get over here."

Chapter Twenty

Martin was quite happy to join the conversation. Roxy and Captain Pyr looked far too comfortable together for Commander Martin Braithwaithe's peace of mind. Besides, he hadn't been able to overhear too much of their conversation from where he was sitting. He was more than a little anxious to find out what was going on between them, and interfere if necessary. When Pyr dragged Roxy off, Martin had been under the impression that dire things were planned for her. When they came back they were practically holding hands, and trying not to gaze romantically at each other. Knowing koltiri, Martin wasn't altogether surprised at Pyr's reaction to Roxy. It was Roxy's returning the attraction that was disturbing.

Pyr looked sternly around the common and made a sharp gesture. It was enough to send everyone but Martin and Linch quickly out the door. Martin rose from his seat and moved to the table with an easy-going slouch as he continued to ignore Linch paying close attention to his every move. Despite his efforts to project "harmless kid" as he gathered information, he figured the only reason he wasn't dead or locked up was that Linch was curious to see what he would do. Linch, Martin thought sourly, reminded him of himself. He shrugged half-apologetically at the pirate captain and pulled out a chair as Linch moved to the table as well.

"I said she'd be fine," Linch told him. "He was worried," Linch added to Pyr. "So I let him work on an escape plan to take his mind off things."

Too damn much like me, Martin thought, perfectly capable of projecting that much of a thought to the group of telepaths. "So, what are you," Martin asked as he glanced at the captain's pointed ears. "An elf?"

"He's not working for the Trin," Roxy rushed to answer as the pirate captain turned a glower on Martin. "That's as much as you need to know. Elves are magical creatures from Terran mythology," she explained to Pyr. "So he didn't insult you."

"Much," Martin added. "I know they aren't working with the Trin," Martin answered Roxy. "I've been asking around."

"You see a Trin, you react," Roxy cut him off. "Those are the rules we play by."

"We're going over old ground." Pyr's gaze settled on Roxy. "First, I want to know what you know about the plague, and Rust."

Martin relaxed a little. Wary as he was of the unknown aliens who disguised themselves as Bucons, his inquiries had established that the crew of the Raptor spent most of their time looking for sources of Rust rather than dealing in it. They were victims of Sagouran Fever as much as anyone else. Besides, Linch's giving him free run of the ship had allowed Martin to discover something that might prove useful. Before Roxy could answer, Martin reached over and put his hand over hers. "Do I have it?" He glanced at Pyr. "Does he?"

Roxy reached her other hand across the table to touch Pyr—or Pyr moved to touch her. The gesture was so swift and automatic from both of them that Martin couldn't tell which one was the instigator. For some reason, he found himself exchanging a look with Linch. The other elf, or whatever he was, showed more amusement than concern. Yeah, well, he's not married to Roxy's sister, Martin thought. He could picture himself going home and breaking the news to his beloved wife that her little sister was carrying on with one of the more dangerous pirates from Rose border. Then again, after Eamon, Reine might not mind Roxy's new model all that much. He deliberately turned his mind away from thoughts of home and family.

She took her hands away from them, and went on with brisk professionalism. "I have no research data on this, of course, but my educated opinion is that Rust does inhibit the likelihood of contagion, at least in an enclosed environment."

For all that Commander Braithwaithe would rather that they not share any information with these unknown aliens, Dr. Martin Braithwaithe encouraged her line of thought. "I don't suppose that we've developed an immunity?"

"Not likely. It must have been tailored so that immunity isn't an option. My guess is that if somebody onboard stopped taking the drug, you'd be reinfected. And that they'd die, of course."

Pyr caught the reference as well. "That's an odd way to describe a plague. Drugs are tailored."

Roxy turned her attention completely to the pirate captain once more. "Diseases can be tailored as well. Sagouran Fever is not a naturally occurring disease, as I only recently discovered. Rust and Sagouran Fever were tailored from the same base. They work together. Trying to keep anyone from finding this out was why Persey killed every researcher at the hospital on Bonadem. With that information and samples of Rust, it shouldn't be too hard to find a cure. And why aren't the two of you looking surprised at this?" Roxy asked as Pyr and Linch gazed at her calmly.

The two of them looked at each other. "We had our suspicions," Pyr admitted. "No proof."

"Our ship's doctor was talking about researching the idea," Linch added. He played a sad riff on his ligret. "But she died before she could."

Roxy said, "I'd like to have met poor Antis Sagoura, myself. If I'd been called in fast enough, I could have managed a far more thorough autopsy than the meddroid who handled the cadaver." She laughed when Martin gave her an anxious look, and patted him on the arm. "I know all about that time that Reine managed to communicate with the dead, but that wasn't what I was talking about."

"Good." Martin just barely managed not to shiver. "That was too spooky for me. Who was this Sagoura? How'd he get the plague?"

"How was he given the plague is a better question, and by whom. The bio that came along with the autopsy report wasn't exactly full of details. We know that Sagoura was a scrap dealer with an unregistered ship that died after coming out of a salvage belt in the WDS sector, and that his last words were something like, 'I die meek and blessed.' His physiology was pretty standard. We don't know planet of origin, just that he was religious and that he met enough people on his travels after he was infected to get the plague rolling in the United Systems. I'm assuming from what you told me that the plague was developed somewhere in Bucon space. I doubt it was done under Bucon government auspices."

"The last I heard, the Bucons were still dragging their heels about letting researchers into the area Sagoura's ship had been salvaging," Roxy went on. "But it would be stupid for the perpetrators of this crime to have their lab in the same spot where they let loose their Typhoid Mary."

It was obvious that Pyr picked up on this alien saying when he asked, "Can it be possible for one person to do so much damage?"

"Accidentally? Or did Sagoura volunteer to die for the cause?" Linch added. In an aside to Pyr he said, "Pilsane isn't here, I'm thinking deviously in his place."

Martin kept his attention on Roxy. "MedService is sure that this Sagoura was the first person who was known to have contracted the plague? I don't know anything about the history of this thing."

"I thought you traveled as her assistant," Pyr said. "That you are her brother-in-law."

"He is married to my sister." Martin was seriously annoyed at the wicked, teasing smile she gave him. "My older sister."

That the woman had accidentally given him a cover that might aid their escape, and was now intent on blowing it to amuse Pyr, was infuriating. Or maybe she was doing it to distract Pyr. He hoped this was proof that she didn't trust the alien completely, because Pyr was looking at him in a way that was far too alert and insightful. "Let's stick to important issues, Physician Merkrates," Martin suggested. "Such as your stopping the epidemic. You have the opportunity to do that, Physician. She's a Physician," he added to the pirates. "Which is better than being a koltiri for eradicating Sag Fever on a massive scale."

Roxy tapped her forehead. "I stuffed my head full of every scrap of information we had on it before I went off to Bonadem and lost my mind. Fortunately, I have my brain back. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about it onboard the Raptor."

"There's a supply of Rust, and there is a medical lab on board this ship," Martin told her. "I've had a look through it. It's not that well equipped, but a Physician should be able to manage."

"Martin, the best minds in the United Systems are working on this. What I need to do is—"

She let out a breathy laugh. "Right. What do you want me to do, save the universe with a hairpin?"

He tilted his head to one side and looked her over critically. "Reine could do it."

She leaned back in her chair and pointed at him. "That's cruel." She laughed again.

"Works every time," Roxy admitted. "Fine. I'll see what I can do." She glanced at Pyr. "With the captain's permission, of course."

Pyr sat back and watched Roxanne interact with the boy—who was clearly no boy. The Terran's manipulation of Roxanne was obvious, and affectionate, but Pyr still didn't like it. Had it not been for Roxanne's amusement at her brother-in-law, Pyr would have done more than frown with annoyance at this Martin from Terra. And what was the connection between Martin, Roxanne, and the Bucon ambassador to the United Systems? He still had many questions for both of them, but the prospect of Roxanne's formulating an actual cure for the plague right here and now excited him. And why not? He had vowed his clan would stop this thing, and Roxanne was acknowledged of Kaddani. "I claimed you for your healing gifts," he answered her.

"And it will keep the two of you out of trouble," Pyr added with a warning look at Martin. "You will not be leaving the Raptor anytime soon, so you might as well stop putting out feelers to my crew about a mutiny."

Martin was neither surprised nor frightened. "I agree that finding a cure for Sagouran Fever is top priority at the moment."

Pyr doubted that the cure was Martin's absolute top priority, but at least it was second on his list. "I think you are wise enough to do what you can where you can," he said to the Terran. He looked at Roxanne and said, "How much Rust will you need? What else can we do?"

Roxanne tapped a finger thoughtfully against her lips for a moment. "I need Rust, of course, but…" Her attention was very much turned inward as she went on. "Dr. Callen suggested I work with the virus from the inside out—study it as a scientist while I was inside people healing it. I've never tried that before, but if I could actually do it…" She shrugged. "That ought to speed up the process somewhat." She looked around hopefully at the three men who watched her. "Don't you think?"

Linch put down his ligret and stood. "You need a volunteer to be healed," he said, without bothering to look toward Pyr. He gestured toward the door, and the medical lab, Pyr supposed. "I would be honored to be your first patient, woman of the Kaddani."

Roxanne bounced eagerly to her feet, and Martin rose as well, but Pyr put his hand up before the trio could leave. "A moment." He keyed his communication's bracelet. "Pilsane?"

"Yes, Captain. I've been passing the time running identification checks on everything our scanners pick up."

"Commendable. Would I be safe in assuming that the largest, fastest, and most heavily armed of those naval ships is the flagship of Admiral Ral Manalo of the Monolem family?"

"Yes, Dha-lrm, that assumption is correct." There was admiration in Pilsane's cool voice. Roxanne looked at him curiously. Linch smirked. Martin had no expression at all, and that lack of expression was most telling.

"I don't flatter myself," Pyr answered. "But he's looking for someone, and I know who it is." He smiled possessively at Roxanne. "Contact Manalo," he ordered Pilsane. "Tell him that I would like to introduce him to the koltiri Glover was sent to the United Systems to fetch for the emperor. Lucky guess," he added in an aside to the wide-eyed Roxanne.

Martin swore. "I doubt you're just going to let us get on with our assignment," he added as Pyr got to his feet.

"I will let you heal the emperor," Pyr told Roxanne. "But not until after Manalo helps me occupy Robe Halfor's stronghold."

Martin was seething, but Roxanne threw back her head and laughed. The sound elated Pyr. A solution was finally in sight. Axylel would be home soon. He let himself hope for a moment, and shared a look of open optimism with the woman who should have been prisoner and pawn. The fire he saw in her eyes promised a fight, but for him rather than with him.

Her voice was deep and rich and sultry. He did not think she meant to sound that way. He knew he did not mean for his own voice to sound teasing and seductive when he answered, "You have yet to learn how good I am."

The furious look Martin gave in response to her question didn't help Roxy's headache any. She'd known Commander Braithwaithe wasn't at all happy with her and the whole situation when they accompanied Linch to the sickbay, but now that they were alone she figured he'd want to talk about it. Her head ached because she had healed Linch as soon as they'd set up some testing protocols. It had not been an easy healing, not that the combination of plague and Rust ever was, but this one had been complicated by Linch's telepathy and her own quest to learn what she could of the disease and drug she fought. She'd been quite pleased that she'd managed to come out of the healing and dictate information to Martin before passing out.

He was glaring at her when she woke up, exhausted and with a blazing headache. He glared at her while he gave her protein injections and a cup of coffee. She sat on the edge of the sickbay bed now, cradled the warm cup in her hands, and said again, "What?"

Martin felt about as petulant as a sixteen-year-old, which he supposed, hormonally, he was. He shook his head, and forced himself back to his usual equanimity, but it wasn't easy. "All right, we're getting the chance to accomplish our mission" he said. "We're getting what we want, but I hate that this pirate is using us in his play to take over the Bucon Empire."

"What you want, you mean." Roxy shoved the coffee mug back into his hands. "I have yet to agree to heal the emperor, if you recall. And Pyr's not trying to take over the Empire."

Martin put down the cup and crossed his arms. "Go ahead and convince me you aren't going to do anything this Pyr wants you to do, oh woman of the Kaddani."

Roxy hopped off the bed to face him. "The name's—Shirah," she said, after a painful hesitation. "And at least nine-tenths of my loyalty is to the United Systems. Seven-tenths," she added, after another pause.

The numbers were not reassuring. Martin stood back and looked her over closely. She had recovered quickly after healing, both physically and mentally. He knew one possible cause of such sudden resilience, and he didn't like it a bit. He knew how Reine drew energy from himself and Rafe and Betheny. "Are you bonded to this elf?"

The denial came too quickly. When she tried to turn away from him, he grabbed her by the arm and spun her back. "Sting."

"Not bonded," she said. She turned, squeezed between Martin and the bed, and went to the sickbay's computer station. He came to stand nearby and watched her work for a while. Eventually, Roxy looked up and admitted. "Sort of linked. Proto-bonded."

"Oh, God, yes." Roxy pounded a fist on the top of the workstation. "It isn't as if either of us wants this."

Martin knew very well why telepathic links happened. Bonds were even worse; well, stronger. That kind of connection had nothing to do with want, and everything to do with need, and not on any conscious level. So, whatever Pyr needed, Roxy had, and Pyr complemented her. If caught soon enough, the condition could be corrected. He hoped so, because it was very disconcerting to see those two creatures of fire together. He put a hand on her shoulder and said, "Our little girl's engaged to an elf?"

"I heard some of that stuff about protecting his people," Martin conceded skeptically. "Sounded very patriotic, but the fact is, Pyr finances his operation by raiding and pillaging. He's a pirate. He'll do what he has to."

"To save his son. Did you overhear that part?" Her fierce need to defend the pirate almost overwhelmed Martin's distrust of Pyr. "Wouldn't you do anything you had to for your child?" she demanded. "You are expecting a son yourself, remember? Put yourself in Pyr's place."

"No. I won't do that. I can't. I don't blame him. From his point of view, he's doing the right things, but I can't let it matter."

"I assume they aren't friends until I'm ordered otherwise. That's my job. You can't let yourself trust him, Sting."

She whirled around to face Martin. "And what have we been driven to do to protect the Systems? Our solution for the Trin doesn't give him any reason to trust us. And I don't trust him, Commander," she added. "I just—"

"I think," she said, "that we have a lot of work to do." She turned stiffly back to the workstation.

Martin moved to take the place next to her. The ship's late doctor had been Terran, and Linch had seemed genuinely fond of her.

At least he sounded that way when he told them he'd pillaged the regulation Systems medlab equipment they were using as a present for her. They worked quietly and efficiently together for a while, Physician and doctor. They ran tests and simulations, checked data, exchanged insights, suggested new areas of investigation. The work was almost exciting and engrossing enough to eclipse the tension between them. He couldn't help but notice her occasionally glancing toward the door.

Eventually she pushed her chair away from the console, stood up, and stretched. "Time for another volunteer, I think. Why don't we call in that nice engineer-torturer and let me save his life."

Martin turned his chair around and looked her over carefully. "You up to another healing?"

"I feel fine. Actually," she admitted as she rubbed the back of her neck, "I feel like shit and I think a little fading to black will do me good."

"No. I want to kill something. Taking on Mik's fever and addiction will do. Why don't we give him a call?"

Chapter Twenty-One

"The mighty one has spoken." Roxy felt warm and safe and not alone. This was not a feeling she was used to when waking up from a difficult healing, and she allowed herself a few more moments to savor it, eyes closed and mind free, Pyr's essence surrounding her like a dark velvet blanket. Pyr's hand was on her shoulder, large and warm and outrageously comforting. She knew they were alone in the sickbay, and that it was hours after she had performed a healing and given Martin more information about the basic structure of the Sagouran construct. Apparently it had been good news, as the last thing she recalled was Martin whooping with joy before everything went black. She sighed, reveled in the feel of the sickbay bed beneath her, and said, "I've actually been asleep."

"Good for me." She opened her eyes. "I think I might have saved the universe." She turned her head to look at Pyr, who was seated on a chair beside the bed. "Or did I dream that?"

He smiled, the gentleness of it transforming his normally stern features. His mouth was too attractive. So were his thickly lashed, dark-blue eyes. His shoulders were far too unreasonably broad. His burgundy red hair was held back by a sapphire-blue headband that matched his eyes. His shirt was the same color. She really wished she could find something massively wrong with his face and form and personality, or even his taste in clothes. She had to fall back to recalling that he had tried to torture her, and that he wasn't likely to let her off the Raptor at the next planet even if she asked him nicely, but these seemed like flimsy excuses. She didn't feel like a prisoner or a victim. She felt—safe. No, not safe. Eamon had made her feel safe and protected after every battle. She barely remembered what Eamon looked like; she regretted that. What she felt when she was with Pyr was not safe. If anything, being with him made her even more aware of danger, and she did not mistake his genuine concern for her as a promise not to use her as ruthlessly as he had to.

Roxy forced her thoughts away from emotional analysis. There really was no point.

Pyr took his hand from her shoulder. She was sad for a moment, until his fingers twined with hers. That was even nicer. "Martin said you were close to a solution. He says he's cautiously hopeful."

"Oh." She'd hoped the work was over, but if they were close… well, she'd better get up and check over her own data. "Where's Martin?"

"Even one with his youthful enthusiasm has to sleep sometime. Just how youthful is he, really? Did I dream his reminding you he was in his thirties, or is that a memory?"

She ignored the questions as she looked at him suspiciously. "You haven't locked Martin up somewhere, have you? Cause if you do anything to him," she went on as he continued to smile, "my sister will get you."

"While several of my crew are locked up," he admitted. "Your Martin is not among them. Kristi would never allow it." She laughed, and he tugged on her hand, helping her to sit up. "Of course I did have to have him escorted from your side at gunpoint. Family loyalty? Or doesn't he trust you not to betray the Systems because you want to sleep with me?"

"Lucky guess?" she asked, looking him steadily in the eye. "Or were you monitoring our conversation?"

"I don't want to sleep with you; we want to have sex. Sleeping with someone implies an intimacy we are trying to avoid."

"Good point." After a moment, he added, "What I feel when you heal—that's an intimacy I don't want." His hand touched her cheek, briefly. "When you were with Linch, and with Mik, I felt—something. Intimate."

"Nothing you can put into words, even thoughts." she said, and he nodded. She longed to feel mortified, violated, at least a little embarrassed for both their sakes, but what sang through her was elation. Not to be alone—in that place where she was most vulnerable and most herself—that was wonderful. At least, when he—

"You're wonderful," he said, and shrugged, and gave her a sardonic grin. "I'll try not to tell you again."

"I'd appreciate that. Ours is an adversarial relationship." He thought she was wonderful! Damn it, damn it, damn it. She looked down at their linked hands. "Maybe Martin can help. Martin understands our problem, better than we do, probably. He specializes in taking care of telepaths. And he's linked to my sister," she explained. "Not bonded, but he understands the differences."

Of course, he wouldn't realize that there could be differences in how telepaths and empaths from different worlds could bond, meld, link, and mate with each other. He and his wife had shared whatever link was natural to their people. She could sense that there was definitely some connection between himself and his men, especially with Linch, but he had no reason to be aware of all the nuances, gradations, and variations that could link telepaths from many worlds. For the most part, sharing thoughts between races was difficult, if not impossible, except where bonding was concerned. Sometimes it didn't matter where you were from: it just happened. Some links were light, and fragile as gossamer. There was a koltiri bond that went so deep that, to form it, minds and bodies and souls blended in one ecstatic instant, and severing the connection was fatal. Her parents had shared that bond for nearly two hundred years, and losing it had burned away her wise and powerful koltiri mother's mind and stopped her heart in the same instant the accident killed her Terran telepath father.

She waved away the question, and the concern. "I don't think I'm going to try to explain about the type of bond we could have," she told him. "We don't have the time. But if we want some—counseling—Martin's our man."

He laughed. "Yes, of course. I do agree with Martin. But sometimes I forget I agree with Martin."

"Your wife's memory, my husband's existence, our being on different sides," she reminded him, too aware that these were becoming flimsier excuses with every passing hour that they were connected to each other. Then she stomped her foot. "If you were half the villain you pretend to be, you'd force the completion of the bond on me and then we could live happily ever after and not have to worry about our ethics!"

He snatched his hand away from hers so he could make an extravagant gesture. "I'm sorry! I will not bond with anyone simply because it's best for the People. Not against your will. Or mine."

It was definitely time to change the subject. Roxy looked around frantically, and spotted a neatly folded pile of clothing on the end of the bed. She noticed that she was still wearing the red tunic and black pants from Glover's ship and turned her attention to the fresh clothes. And she wanted to wash her hair. Of course the man didn't want to bond with her—she was a mess!

"I'm really quite vain, you know," she told him as she picked through the selection he'd brought. "And flighty." Apparently he wasn't the only person on board the Raptor who favored bright colors and soft, clinging materials. She held up a saffron-yellow skirt that looked like it might fit. "Little short."

She was all too aware of Pyr's eyeing her long legs. "Not on Tinna. She and Kristi have been raiding closets." He didn't need to tell her that some of those closets had belonged to crew women who'd died of the plague. It was a reminder that she didn't have time to worry about fashion, or her own private life. "That's pretty," he said as she shook out a length of gold embroidered purple silk. "I promised you pretty dresses."

She could wear it as a sari, she thought, or as a sarong. She found an emerald-green crop top that would also do. There was a head with a fresher unit in the sickbay. "I'm going to get cleaned up now," she told him. "Then get back to work. You don't have to be here when I get back."

He was still there when she got back, clean, with her thick hair neatly braided down her back. Dressed in fresh clothes, she felt ready to face Sagouran Fever, but not so ready to encounter Pyr Kaddani again. He was seated at the medical computer. She walked up behind him and saw that he was looking at data of one of the simulation tests she'd set up.

"It's very pretty," he said of the scrolling colors on the holoscreen, "but I haven't the faintest idea what it means." He sounded a little sad and disappointed when he added, "I was trained to be a warrior and nothing more."

"Then why aren't you off being a warrior?" she asked. "Instead of checking to see if I'm really doing my job?"

He turned the chair to face her, and his lips curved in a slow, appreciative smile as his gaze swept over her. She quite deliberately did not preen in response. "Pilsane is monitoring this computer station," he told her. "He thinks you're doing your job quite diligently. I was admiring your handiwork." He waved his hand through the holo. "What does this mean?"

"It means we're close to developing a vaccine for Sagouran Fever." She sneered cynically at the thought of all her and Martin's hard work. "Truth is, this is redundant. Whoever tailored the disease and the drug already has a vaccine. You don't develop something like this without immunizing yourself."

"But isn't the point that you'll have something you can give to people who don't yet have the disease?" She nodded. His features lit with eagerness. "You'll have this vaccine for me to send to my home-world soon, yes?"

His enthusiasm warmed her, and helped tone down her frustration at repeating someone else's work. Having their own preventative for the disease made hunting down those responsible a bit less complicated. Less complicated in that they could kill the bastards instead of having to consider making deals with them.

"We will have something we can send everywhere," she informed him. "Your world and the United Systems." His expression and emotions blanked, and his eyes narrowed warningly, but he didn't argue the point. She didn't, either. She'd wait until she had the actual vaccine before bargaining with Pyr about it. "It still won't be a cure for the plague or the Rust addiction—having to deal with that combination is tough—but we will be able to prevent anyone else from contracting the original variation of the disease. We will have to assume that the Trin who oversaw the development of the disease and Rust has also developed newer and nastier variations waiting to take Sagouran's place if Sag Fever is stopped."

As she said the word 'Trin' she was very attentive to his reaction on every level she could fathom. It was not that she didn't believe that he hadn't knowingly dealt with the Trin, but what she believed and her duty to the United Systems could not be allowed to mesh. Experience told her that anything as massively destructive as the plague had to be a Trin strategy. Complete trust was out of the question.

He knew that she probed him, and accepted it, even opened his shields for an instant while he looked her in the eye and said, "Your hatred of this enemy is truly frightening."

"And necessary." She felt nothing from Pyr in response to her mentioning the Trin, nothing except disgust at her paranoia. She had not expected to uncover any deeper connection than his having unknowingly worked with Kith, but was still relieved at finding only a reaction to her. She was not offended by his disgust.

"For a while, after I found out it was a construct, I thought it was the Bucons who developed the disease, but it really isn't like them. I suppose its seeming like something the Bucon would do buys the Trin some time and camouflage." She sat down beside him and flipped off the datascreen. "Let me tell you about the Trin." She kept her hands busy setting up another a series of simulations. It was best not to look at Pyr, or let herself be too aware of Pyr looking at her. And it was certainly best not to let herself remember the nightmares she'd lived through while she described them. "The Trin are arrogant. That's the one thing you have to remember when you deal with them—and it looks like you're going to be dealing with them to stop the plague."

"Suicidally, recklessly arrogant," Roxy went on. "They don't care what they have to do to get control of the known galaxy."

"Trin think it is their right to own the universe simply because they want to. They are boundlessly ambitious—and not even that well organized about it. They're a loosely affiliated band of technologically advanced warlords. Extremely technologically advanced."

"Everyone is aware of that much, Roxanne." There was a warning impatience in Pyr's tone. He reached out and covered her left hand, stopping her work, and offering slight comfort at the same time. "Now, tell me why it is the Trin and not the Bucons who are responsible for this plague."

"Because they don't care how many lives they have to take to control what's left. Bucons are not murderous. Bucons like to negotiate, to trade. Trin make ultimatums, always go for complete victory. The Trin have done this sort of ruthless thing before. Not a disease," she hurried on. "But the Sheets." A sharply indrawn breath from Pyr told her he knew what a Sheet was. Trying to suppress information about that particular weapon of mass destruction had not been completely successful. "Most people who have heard of Sheets are not aware of how often they were used, or the extent of the devastation. The United Systems government kept a great deal of information from the media. If you ever saw a Sheet you'd think it was lovely," she added, unable not to call up the memory of the sight of the delicate scarf of energy as it floated across the Tigris's main view screen a million miles away. "They glow and sparkle and scintillate with light—and they eat worlds. What they touch, disappears. Every time the Trin used a Sheet they would send a message to the Council, only one word—'Surrender.' One word for an entire planet—billions of years of evolution gone for nothing, and all to gain control of what was left. I saw a Sheet released on a star once. The damn thing absorbed the energy of a star. Took the star and put it somewhere else. There were three inhabited worlds circling that star, and everything on those worlds died in absolute cold and dark." She did not go into lurid detail of what she'd felt and seen on those dark, murdered worlds. She looked at Pyr and said, "And that is only one of the reasons I am certain that the Trin are behind the plague."

"Experience rather than proof." He waved away any argument. "Doesn't matter who is responsible."

She didn't realize how terrified she was until she heard herself blurt out, "Because I don't want you going against the Trin on your own!" The next thing she knew they were both out of their chairs and her arms were wound tightly around him, holding him so hard it was as if she was trying to take him inside of her. He held her close and stroked her hair and gave her comfort she hadn't asked for and wanted desperately. "Shit! Shit! Shit!" she finally managed to spit out, and tried to push him away. He held her for a moment longer, thinking I'm not alone. She muttered, "Shit," again, but not in disagreement.

She felt like an idiot, and was glad when he let her go and changed the subject. "The last thirty hours have been quite productive for me, too," he said.

That reminded her that there was a world beyond her research, and her concerns. She turned and went back to her chair, sat down, and primly folded her hands in her lap. Pyr went to sit on one of the beds. They gazed at each other from this reasonable distance, and she asked, "You've contacted this admiral you were looking for?"

"Yes. Turns out he was looking for me as well as looking for you. Seems he had a plan to eliminate Robe Halfor and wanted my help. He seems to think I might be interested in taking Halfor's job with the pirate guild after Halfor is stopped from trying to topple the Monolem dynasty."

"What makes him think a border-running renegade like you would be interested? He does think you're Bucon, right?"

"He most certainly does. We've met before, Admiral Manalo and I." He crossed his legs and hooked his clasped hands over his knee. He looked smug as he added, "He's tried to broach the offer before. Since he watched you heal Mik, he's even more interested."

Roxy shot to her feet. "You can't have a Door! Shireny hasn't invented it yet!" Reine and Betheny had been working on adapting captured Sheet technology into a teleportation device for the last two years. They were close, but Roxy was certain they weren't there yet.

He regarded her outburst with high good humor. "You shouldn't know what a Door is," he pointed out.

"Unless, of course, you are privy to a great deal more classified information than a medical specialist should be," he added. "Unless your formidable sister Reine is the 'Shir' part of Shireny and your League relative is the 'eny' part. I believe her name is Betheny, the Pirate League engineer who defected a few years ago. And you still shouldn't know about such highly classified research."

She shrugged. "Sometimes Reine thinks in her sleep. And how do you know about Doors?" she demanded.

"Mik is a very talented man. The League provided him with some data and equipment—they are working with the Trin these days, you know—and he did the rest." As she stared at him, wide-eyed and barely able to take in this revelation, he went on. "Ours is a prototype device, but it works quite well so far. Comes in quite handy," he added. "Breathe, Roxanne. Even you need oxygen."

She drew in a deep, ragged breath, and then anger overtook her shock as she remembered the planetary defense ship that had disappeared when the Tigris stopped it from attacking plague victims. "The cloak! You stole the Shireny cloak and have been selling it!"

Pyr looked thoughtful for about half a second. "No. I think Mik would have told me if he'd done that. Someone else must have acquired those specs and is bootlegging the cloak. I'll have to go looking for them. We have a very good cloak, but not up to Shireny standards yet." He got to his feet. "I have to go now, Roxanne. We'll be attacking Halfor's base in a few minutes."

Roxy was only taken briefly by surprise. In thirty hours, an alliance could be formed and an attack planned. She sat back down by the research computer. It was hard work to remind herself that she was an officer in the United Systems Military Service, officially making her a neutral in this fight. She had no business wanting to know the details of someone else's war. "I hope you're not expecting me to ask to come along."

"I've been in enough field battles, Pyr. I'd rather fight with Sag Fever. Good luck finding your son," she added, as he glanced toward the door. "I'll have the sickbay standing by for casualties."

He nodded. "Good. Much appreciated. I'll bring you back a Trin's head as a present, if I find one."

"Much appreciated." She shooed him toward the door. "And bring back all the Rust you can find. I need it for the vaccine."

Chapter Twenty-Two

Pilsane and Mik joined him in the corridor outside the infirmary. Pilsane tossed Pyr his hat and leather coat. "Hear it's cold down there," was his comment. "There" was the moon that was the heavily fortified main base for the entire Bucon pirate guild.

The body armor inside the coat added a nice layer of insulation. He touched the jeweled gold brooch he'd pinned to the collar of the coat, and gave himself a moment of hopeful anticipation of returning the clan insignia to its rightful owner. That hope was tempered with amusement that Roxanne had not told him to be careful. Instead, she'd presented him with a shopping list, implying confidence that he would return triumphant. He tried not to think that he had something to go for, and something to come home to, but only of the job ahead. Still, Pyr's step was buoyant as he walked with his men toward Engineering and the Door.

"It was nice of Denvry to bring another half dozen minor players with him at the last minute and add their ships to the regular Bucon security forces," Pilsane commented. "Halfor would not make a popular emperor, it seems."

"Wasn't all that last minute," Pyr said. "Manalo's been working on this coalition for weeks. The admiral thinks that the Raptor's joining with him is what finally swung all the others to his side. He's very grateful."

They reviewed tactics and gave a few new orders as they hurried along. It was a relatively simple plan; all it really required was a lot of firepower, brute force, and a Door. Simplicity was generally the best strategy, especially when one could hide a trick within the obvious attack. One ship, even with a good cloak and a teleportation device, would not have been able to get near the pirate base, not that Pyr wouldn't have tried if it had come to that. Being one ship amid many provided the Raptor with sufficient cover to carry out a mission other than open attack.

He was grateful Denvry had brought a herd of ships to join the battle. They needed many ships, for many reasons. For one thing, his Bucon crew could now be counted on to go along with an attack that promised booty, when they might have been a bit reluctant to join in a suicide mission to attack the heavily fortified base. Many different types of ships, with many types of weapons and cloaking devices, would be harder for the defenders' sensors to identify and keep track of. That gave the Raptor even more cover for breaking away from the main battle and carrying out the rescue mission.

The Bucon admiral had wanted to send a large commando force through the Door to do the job the three men planned to do, but Pyr would not allow any but his own people to use Mik's clever teleportation device. Manalo had no choice but to agree to do it Pyr's way. The Door worked best within orbiting distance and directly over the target destination. Linch's job was to break away from the battle long enough to get them over Halfor's headquarters, drop them off, then move back into the cover of the battle until the ship was called for pickup. Their job was to get in, find Axylel, and disable the defensive shields from inside the fortress while they were at it. Pyr planned to personally kill the man who held his son prisoner as well, but hadn't mentioned this to the Bucon admiral when they agreed on the attack plan.

"Envirobelts?" Mik asked as they reached the Door room. The engineer made the offer with an air of apology rather than with any conviction that they'd follow standard procedures for going into combat in an artificial atmosphere.

Pyr glanced only briefly at the case where safety equipment was stored. He could think of a dozen different ways to disable an environmental belt in a combat situation. Besides, they were vulnerable to sensor detection as well. The point of using a Door was stealth. "We'll just have to hold our breath if the moon's atmosphere factory takes a direct hit." Chances were it was too deeply buried for that.

"Thought so," Mik said, and moved to the Door's control station in the center of the room. He looked up at Pyr. "Where to?"

After a moment of deep concentration, Pyr sent sensory impressions to Mik of where he wanted to go that the engineer was somehow able to turn into coordinates for a target destination.

Pyr and Pilsane went to stand within the metal ring of the targeting mechanism. Mik joined them a moment later to wait for Linch's signal that the ship was in place. They all held weapons, while Mik also held the small silver box he used for remote activation of the Door. The ship shuddered a few times under the impact of enemy fire. Pyr wouldn't let himself worry about the battle, though Mik looked pained that anyone dared shoot at his ship. A few seconds passed like separate eternities before Linch's thought reached them.

"Mik, you have got to stop closing your eyes when you go through the Door," Pyr answered the engineer as he looked around the room they'd stepped into. "Bedroom," he added. He had not expected a cell; Bucons were too complicated to use simple, crude prisons to hold their captives.

"I can see that," Mik said. He and Pilsane turned to guard the door while Pyr looked around with all his senses, examining the end of the mental trail. It was a small room, untidy in a most familiar way, with clothes carelessly scattered around. Father and son were much alike in many ways. Axylel was not here, but he had been, not long before, his lifethread muted and muddled.

No one in the corridor outside, Pilsane reported after a telepathic probe beyond the room. Your turn, Dha-lrm.

Pyr concentrated his awareness away from Axylel and sent it questing delicately across Halfor's pirate base. Mik activated a holoprojector that showed a blank architecture template. One by one, Pyr reported the position of each mind he brushed past and what details the encounters brought. One by one, some of those encountered fell as Pyr touched, then passed them by, an invisible angel of death to those whose natural mental shields were weak. Mik used the information to map out the interior of the stronghold, turning organic encounters into the outlines of rooms, corridors, stairways, and lifts. Pilsane used the information to decide the probable interior security system. They'd used this method before, and while it took time when Pyr would rather have been storming through the stronghold burning down every Bucon he saw, this was the safe, sane way to run an invasion of three against several hundred.

"Done," he said after long, careful minutes of probing. "And it's a shame the sensor shielding in this place was too damn good to penetrate from the ship." The Bucons were the only ones he knew of who'd found a way to build telepathic scramblers into their defense shields. If not for the clan connection, there would have been no way to sense Axylel from outside, and even that had been deflected by the exterior shielding.

"Where I'm going," Pyr answered. He looked from one man to the other, and each nodded, prepared to carry out his own assignment. The door was soon opened. Pilsane and Mik turned left in the corridor. Pyr went right.

He walked alone until he reached a domed plaza where a group of gaudily dressed women were gathered to look nervously up at the dark sky overhead. He glanced up himself, just as much a spacer as these Bucons; like them, he still half-expected to see some evidence of battle in the blackness overhead. Nothing showed above the curve of the dome but stars, and Pyr moved on through the group of women like a black bird through a tropical rain forest. Some of the women looked after him, but not with hostility or suspicion. Their half-interested glances were almost enough to make him smile. Their lives were in jeopardy, but these women weren't dead yet. Bucons. Sometimes he almost liked and admired them—but the feeling usually passed quickly.

Pyr crossed the plaza with a pirate's swagger that changed to a purposeful stride as he entered another long corridor. There were guards before many of the doors in this section of the fortress. More moved along the corridor, carrying away the bodies of those he'd telepathically blasted. Pyr squinted and kept his gaze straight ahead, his attention focused on a door at the end of the corridor. He followed the lifethread of his son while giving the appearance of a client pirate on his way to report to his patron. He was aware of the gazes that followed him and the hands that tightened on weapons as he went by. Attentive silence gathered around him; after a few moments, the only sound in the corridor was the firm, fast tread of his footsteps.

He was not surprised when none of the guards challenged him. Pirates were not the most disciplined of people, not even dues-paying members of an official guild, and they certainly weren't given to wearing uniforms. He looked and acted like one of them, and their minds were on the battle and the mysterious weapon that had silently killed some of their number a few minutes before. They watched, but no one tumbled to the idea that he might be an alien intruder. They knew very well that the defensive shields surrounding the fortress were firmly, tightly, safely in place. He was Bucon to them, unknown but not necessarily an enemy. At least not to their employers.

Most of the guild's loyal defenders were in the guild ships in the thick of the fight. These left behind were mercenaries, the personal bodyguards of high-ranking pirates. The ones left standing in the hall were the strong-minded ones that had not been affected by his earlier mental assault. But that did not mean they weren't vulnerable to more subtle, close-range manipulation, at least briefly. Pyr knew that as long as he thought good thoughts and made no move toward the doors that were being guarded, he was safe enough. The closer he got to the wide door at the end of the corridor, the greater the danger. Robe Halfor's personal bodyguards waited there, gazes locked like laser sights on him. Laser sights were locked on him as well, from large weapons held in steady hands.

He was smiling as he halted before the three men and two women standing in front of the entrance to Robe Halfor's command center. He was relaxed, glad the time for subtlety was at last past. "Halfor wants to see me," he said to the tall man who took a step forward to block his path. "Pyr," he added before the glaring guard could point out that he'd had no orders about visitors. As the Bucon's eyes widened, he repeated. "Pyr of the Raptor. He'll want to see me." One of the female bodyguards was running a biosensor over him as he spoke. Normally the sensor deflectors built into his leather coat would have nullified any readings, but this time Pyr let it go. "Same species as the prisoner from the Raptor," he informed the guard before she announced it to her companions.

The bodyguards looked at each other, and elected to pass this information on rather than come to any decision on their own. Pyr waited while the leader of the group raised a comm unit to his lips. The attention of the other guards flicked ever so briefly to their leader as he moved.

Pyr grabbed the woman with the sensor with one hand. He held her in front of him while he drew his weapon and fired. The guards all got off at least one shot, but hit the body Pyr used as a shield rather than him. Two of the Bucons wore personal shields. Mik had taken Kith's shield off the Trin's dead body, and learned how to nullify the field. The enhancements Mik had come up with let Pyr's weapon cut like a laser through butter with these standard shield models. The guards all wore body armor, but faces and throats were still vulnerable.

Pyr continued to smile as killed the remaining bodyguards. He was still smiling when he blew open the heavily shielded door with another of Mik's little toys and walked into the room beyond through a billowing cloud of white smoke.

"Too dramatic?" he asked as two more guards came at him from the sides. Pyr barely noticed the men as he killed them. There were only two living people left in the big, bare room now. His gaze fixed on the young man seated on the floor across a wide expanse of black tiled floor.

Axylel raised his head, showing bruises and drug-dulled eyes. He was disheveled, his body slumped dispiritedly. He did manage the faintest of smiles as his eyes met Pyr's. "Maybe a little dramatic," he answered, voice a low, pained rasp.

"I thought it might be you when people started dying mysteriously," the man standing beside Axylel said. "I've learned quite a bit about your telepathic talent from Axylel. The history of The People. All sorts of things. There are things he hasn't told me yet, but we're working on it. Aren't we?" He touched Axylel's long red hair, an affectionate, possessive gesture, and Pyr saw his son try not to flinch. Axylel's clouded gaze stayed as focused as possible on Pyr.

Pyr tilted an eyebrow at Axylel, but didn't bother reacting to the Bucon. He hated having conversations with the bad guys before killing them, but Bucons made such melodrama hard to avoid.

"The boy has such useful information," Halfor went on. "I certainly intend to use it. It started with his trying to trade his knowledge of your operation for what I know about the plague and Rust, but the rules changed quickly." He gave Axylel a pat on the head. "Ridiculous of you to bother showing up for him, really," he added as Pyr walked forward. "Waste of resources to go to so much trouble for one offspring. You could always make more, you know."

"I like that one," Pyr told him. "Why start over when I haven't even paid off this one's education yet?"

They spoke to each other in casual, conversational tones, like any pair of Bucon traders—with bodies and twisted metal around them and a battle raging overhead. Robe Halfor stood with his back turned to a holo display showing the guild moon and the firefly flicker of defending and attacking ships as cloaks were unmasked and then remodulated to escape detection. Pyr could not tell who was winning from the projection. Not his problem, as long as Linch kept the Raptor safe. He concentrated on Robe Halfor.

Halfor was a small, skinny man dressed all in gray, with a thin patch of pale hair, his features sharp and forgettable. The only thing that looked dangerous about him were his eyes. And the long fingers that casually stroked a jeweled pendant that hung from around Halfor's neck. It was a pretty thing, and Pyr had no doubt that it contained a deadman trigger that would kill Axylel if anything fatal were to happen to Robe Halfor. His seeing the pendant before taking a shot at Halfor was the reason they were having this conversation. He was going to have to get very very close to the Bucon in order to get his son out of here alive.

Halfor waved his other hand at the holo behind him. There was a tinge of anger in his bland voice when he said, "You brought a lot of friends for a family matter."

Halfor shrugged. "You keep too much of the business beyond the Rose border to yourself."

"Which is a little bit too much. Your death seemed like a good way to open up trade."

"Seemed like a good idea. Axylel has been persuaded to tell me a great deal about your people. And having a telepathic assassin on staff will also prove useful."

"But…" He shrugged again. "I'm certainly open to negotiations. I want what you have, and I have what you want. We can still come to a deal. After you tell your friends to leave."

"Who says I'm with them?" Pyr told Halfor. He spread his hands before him. "I came with Manalo's force, but I wasn't given much choice. Besides, this was where I was heading anyway. I could have led an invasion force in here." He spread his hands. "But all you see is me."

"That's alien ally, Your Majesty. Glover's dead," He went on without waiting for a reaction. "I know all about his mercy mission to the emperor, and I put a stop to it. Manalo offered me your job," he added, as Halfor watched him closely.

The Bucon sneered, and it suited his sharp features far better than a smile would have. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking behind that cynical expression, unless you were a telepath of exquisite skill. Pyr wasn't even trying very hard. The man thought he was wearing a brand new prototype League-designed telepathic shield. He was wearing it, but it was no longer functioning. Pyr knew that by now Mik had bypassed and disabled every type of shield—personal, defensive, telepathic, medical—in the fortress. The Bucons simply weren't aware of this bad news yet, or that you could never trust the Pirate League to give you every technotrick you needed to survive. They would become aware of their misplaced faith in the League as an ally when the Bucon navy started bombing the pirate guild fortress in the next few minutes. Pyr didn't have much time to safely conclude the conversation.

"I might be interested in your current job," he went on, taking a step closer to Halfor. "If Emperor Halfor were the one offering it."

"You're not emperor yet, either." Pyr took another step, and aimed an exquisitely seductive thought to Halfor. "Why limit your ambition to taking the Bucon throne? I've learned a great deal from living among your people, Bucon." He carefully came closer and Halfor still didn't notice. "The People disowned me, did Axylel tell you that?" Halfor nodded. Pyr went on. "I owe them nothing, and I like the Bucon life."

"I prefer to think that you civilized me." Pyr carefully sheathed his weapon and spread his hands. "Taught me a certain sophisticated outlook. I see no reason why I shouldn't betray a small group of paranoid telepaths for the sake of greater riches. My son might be able to help you with the People, but I can do the job better and faster." His gaze flicked briefly to his son. "But I do like your idea about a telepathic assassin."

Not that it's a particularly new idea, he thought at Halfor as he rushed forward. He didn't bother wrenching Halfor's hand away from the pendant. There were many things that Bucons did not know about the People, including their physical strength.

He tore Halfor's arm away from his shoulder instead. A shower of blood spurted into Pyr's face, blinding him as he pressed his own hand around the fist that still clutched the pendant. Pyr was aware of footsteps rushing up behind him.

He turned and thrust the bleeding arm at the nearest man. "Do not let that fist open."

Halfor screamed and Axylel screamed and Halfor fell to his knees in his own pooling blood and barely had time to look up as Pyr grabbed his head, and twisted. Pyr had an odd, fleeting thought about what basketball must be like as he tossed the dead man's head through a circle of ships outlined by the holoprojector. He wondered if Roxanne would approve the shot. The head hit the far wall with a meaty thump and Halfor's body fell forward across Axylel.

Pyr snatched his son from under the corpse and cradled the long, lean body in his arms as he turned to face Pilsane and Mik. "We have what we came for," he told them. "Let's go."

Chapter Twenty-Three

"I don't see what you have to pout about," Roxy said to Martin, who didn't answer.

Martin was seated cross-legged on one of the nearby beds, watching her work at the computer station rather than helping her. The time since Pyr left sickbay had dragged by, though she'd gotten . some significant work done. In fact, she should be dancing around and howling in triumph. Instead, she had the small pharmaceutical synthesizer cooking away while she continued to run tests and simulations.

Every now and then the ship veered a little, but that was the only outward sign that they were involved in the space battle. To her, this indicated that Linch was a very good pilot, and that the Raptor was somewhere on the fringe of the battle. She could feel the occasional prick of individual deaths against her empathic shielding, deaths of strangers, far away, but she sent up a prayer for the dying each time.

There had been a time, not very long ago, when the kind of awareness of anonymous death she experienced during battles tore into her and shredded her soul, even though she managed to keep functioning. She had always been able to adjust her shielding to absorb the deaths she'd been forced to inflict, but feeling death she had no control over was another matter altogether. She'd had to use drugs to strengthen her empathic shielding enough to function during battles aboard the Tigris. She used wild, frantic sex with Eamon to reawaken her emotions when the drugs wore off. The connection with Pyr strengthened her to the point where she was touched, but not bruised, by what happened in the fighting.

Eamon had pitied her, referred to her blighted shielding, made her so damned dependent on his love. No wonder he hadn't wanted her to go away from him and rediscover who she really was; a telempath who needed the tie to another mind and emotions far more than any physical craving. She should have figured this out before. The koltiri on Bonadem had been right. She was an odd girl—until Pyr came into her life.

She tried not to be aware of Pyr, or let him feel any awareness of her. He didn't need the distraction. She hated that she wished she'd gone with him. She wished she'd asked what his plan was, but she firmly kept herself from trying to take a peek. If Pyr needed her, he'd let her know. No, she shouldn't think like that. This was not her battle; he wouldn't think so, and neither should she. She hated that she was worried and restless, and wouldn't mind if Martin wanted to get into a roaring argument to pass the time.

She turned around to look at him. "You're getting what you want, after all. Or are you pouting because you weren't asked to go along on the raid?"

"I'm thinking," Martin answered. "Trying to figure out all the ramifications of your alien pirates having technology the Systems doesn't have, and of the Bucons fighting each other. I dislike being used by the pirate or by the Monolems—"

"You don't like being used? I think I'm the one you set up to be a pawn in the first place. I didn't get to Bucon space on my own, Martin."

"I don't like the Systems being used or threatened," he clarified. "The point of dragging you out here was to prevent a civil war, not for you to be the hinge piece in the middle of two different power plays. Still…" He ran a hand through his short, tightly curled hair. "The pirate guild has been officially outlawed. The Bucon government promised to curb their influence, if not outright get rid of them, when they signed the treaty with the Systems. And the Bucon government's effort to dismantle the guild could easily have led the guild to getting involved with a Trin plot to attack the Systems with the plague and the drug."

"In which case, we'll have to look elsewhere for the Trin's hiding place. Maybe your elf's mysterious people are the Trin's catspaw this time. But I like the idea of it being a faction of Bucon drug dealers."

"Is the United Systems Sector Security Chief wishing he was taking part in the battle instead of being stuck locked up in a sickbay with his crazy sister-in-law?"

"Yes," he admitted, then shook his head. "It would not look good if it was discovered that a Sector Chief was anywhere near this battle of Bucon versus Bucon. Appearance of impropriety is not politically wise, especially when dealing with anyone as slippery as the Bucons. Though I'd love to get my hands on some proof of what the guild's been up to before the Bucons get a chance to cover it up."

"If the Bucons turn out to be working with the Trin, appearances aren't going to matter."

He gave a cynical laugh. "If. Big 'if. Big, hard to prove 'if. We won't get a chance to prove it, Roxy. The Bucons can't afford to let the Systems think that there's been any contact with the Trin, even by an outlawed organization like the pirate guild or a bunch of renegade dealers."

She recalled that the Bucons had joined with the United Systems as a defensive move, before the Trin attacked them and after General Order One was issued. She didn't know whether the Bucons had agreed to the destruction of the Trin, or if the timing of the agreement would affect any decisions made by the All Worlds Council. She didn't much care about the facts of politics when there were countless lives at stake. "Important thing is to stop the plague."

"I just wish I knew what was going on. Linch could have at least let me on the bridge as an observer. You don't need me to help you find a cure for the plague." As soon as he said it, Martin's attention left the battle and focused sharply on her. She felt his anxiety soar as they looked at each other. "Roxy," he said slowly. "We have a problem."

The last time she'd counted, they'd had a lot more than one problem. Her exasperation soared along with Martin's worry. "Oh, lord, now what?"

"Excuse me? Leave where? Sickbay? When there might be injured brought in at any moment?"

Martin got up and came to sit beside her. He drew his chair very close to hers, and said quietly. "How do you plan on getting the data about the vaccine and cure back to MedService when you're ready? Will Pyr or the Bucons simply let you send a transmission?"

Roxy understood that she possessed some very valuable information that had to be shared. She didn't actually think Pyr would try to stop knowledge of the cure from being distributed, but he would try to control it. The Bucons were as likely to try to sell the cure in the same way they'd been selling Rust. None of that really mattered, of course, though getting past Pyr's telepathic blocks would prove tricky if he decided to be stubborn about her giving the formulas away.

"How do you plan to get the data out from the heart of the Bucon Empire?" Martin persisted.

"Borders don't matter. And space and time is somewhat relative," she pointed out. "At least with my relatives."

"I am a koltiri and Terran telepath. A combo of the two tricky kinds of telepaths, remember." And Pyr was equally tricky, the strongest telepath she'd ever encountered.

In theory, yes. Well, in practice, actually, under all the right circumstances, and the circumstances were very rarely all right. "It makes me throw up." And that was the only thing that could go wrong she was willing to talk about. "It will be much easier simply to contact Reine with the data."

He shook his head. "No. That's an order. You will not transmit any data telepathically, Physician." He shook a finger at her. "I mean it, Roxy."

Roxanne recalled that her sister had been evasive when she'd asked why Reine had made a comm call rather than making telepathic contact. Her sister had given a strong impression that it was more than pregnancy that kept her from using her telepathy. "Don't tell me, there's some sort of telepathic spying going on."

Oh, great, here was another complication she didn't need. She leaned closer to Martin, so that their foreheads were almost touching. Tell me.

Martin was from Terra, the one world in the United Systems where telepathic contact with beings from any other world came easily for everyone. Most Terrans weren't telepaths, but even the ones that weren't had incredibly adaptable thought processes that allowed them to deal with telepathy. This was one of the reasons . Terra had become so important, even though it had only been part of the Systems for a couple hundred years.

Martin pulled away from her and waved the air as though slapping away stinging insects. Well, Sting was her nickname. After a moment he focused on her again, annoyed amusement in his deep brown eyes. "The Pirate League has been engaged in telepathic spying." He ignored her skeptical snort. "It's happened to Reine. Someone, probably a very strong Terran telepath with technologically enhanced power, has intercepted long-range telepathic messages from her." He held up a hand before Roxy could inquire how he knew and why Reine hadn't burned out the brain of any eavesdropper. "We have proof that data for Shireny projects has been plucked out of Reine's head while she was transmitting it. It was always thought that long-distance mind-to-mind data transfer could not be tampered with. We were wrong. Reine is not the only one it has happened to. We have a serious security breach."

"I do not believe this. The League must have found some way to steal information and gotten Systems Security to believe in this phantom telepathy thief."

"I sincerely hope that's true, Roxy. But you are still not to risk any long-distance telepathic data transfers. Not even to koltiri other than your sister. You are going to take the knowledge with you when you leave."

He put his hands on her shoulders. "Because if you send the data for the vaccine and cure, this phantom League telepath might pick up the message. Then the League will know that Sag Fever can be stopped. What the League knows, the Trin will find out."

Roxy nodded her understanding. The way the Trin were scattered now, it was likely that the pandemic was the power play of only one of the warlords. But that didn't mean that the single warlord wouldn't have access to any information the League gleaned from the United Systems. "The other Trin will admire his play, but he won't have given his secret formula for the plague to any rivals."

"My thought exactly. They aren't cohesive anymore. They're waiting to see what happens." His laughter was hollow and sad. "Millions dead, and the Trin will think of this as a minor victory, at best, or a prelude to further aggression. But the main point for us is to get the cure home without alerting the bad guy that we can counteract the plague." He gave her a stern, commanding look that was thoroughly incongruous on his currently teenage face. "If they know we can stop it before we have time to disseminate the cure, they'll throw something else at us. Or they'll bolt and set up shop somewhere new while we're still tracking down the original source point. We need to hit the place where the virus and Rust are manufactured, and cut the Rust distribution lines without giving any prior warning. That's why you need to personally take the data back to the Systems."

She decided not to argue the point. "I have cured several cases of plague and Rust addiction recently. While I'm handling the healings better, I have no energy for teleportation right now."

He didn't look like he believed her, but she managed to stare down his suspicious gaze. "When you have the energy, go."

He shook his head. "No. I never was." He looked back at her with a smile. "I just have a soft spot for the Shirah girls."

And Lord knew the Shirah girls had soft spots for him, but Roxy wasn't going to let Martin talk her into anything right now. She figured he wanted her away from Pyr more than he feared any telepathic spy. "I'm not going over to Pyr's side, you know." She ignored the sharp, wary look he gave her, and forced herself to smile despite the suspicion her darling brother-in-law aimed at her. "Besides, you don't want me going anywhere until I've healed the Emperor for you. It's good strategy for the Systems to have the Bucons owe us for their ruler's life."

He shrugged. "Wouldn't hurt to show them the practical advantages to the alliance, but you have to decide what's important for saving the most lives, Physician."

Nice of him to recall that she did have choices. She was well aware that the decisions and political advantages were hers to bestow and manipulate if she so chose. Which she probably wouldn't, but, still, she was the one with the magic touch. Where did people get the notion that koltiri were selfless and self-effacing?

Somewhere far away, but very close in her mind, she felt a man die. Not for the first time, but this one mattered. It was as though she had committed the act herself. It filled her with Pyr's fierce satisfaction, and also his sense of exhausted futility. Her fists clenched briefly, and she sighed, but otherwise she showed none of this to Martin. She said, "Wouldn't it be nice if we were arguing over nothing? Maybe this will be all over in the next few minutes. With luck, the pirate guild will turn out to be behind the plague, and they'll find the Trin responsible for it all dead in the rubble."

She laughed cynically. But the air around them rippled and shimmered before she could make an equally cynical comment. Purple and white lightning crackled around the sickbay, then coalesced into a wild glowing circle in the center of the room. The circle spread outward, swiftly whirling, blinding white light shooting out from it. Then it was gone. Pyr and his people stood where the circle had been.

The smell of blood was the first thing Roxy noticed when the white light that took her vision cleared. Then Pyr spoke her name and she was beside him as he gently settled a long, lean body onto one of the sickbay beds. Axylel. She exchanged one swift look with Pyr, gave the briefest of reassuring nods, then concentrated on his son. The young man's hair was the same deep red as his father's, the cheekbones as sharp. He looked to be somewhere in his late teens, but appearances were deceptive. His eyes were closed, but she knew he was not unconscious. His face was badly bruised. She only had to run her hands over his body a whisper's distance away from his skin to detect the heat and agony of other injuries. She was aware of his effort not to show pain. Beneath that effort was a mind filled with chaos. Roxy moved away from the evidence of madness, cupped his face in her hands, closed her eyes, and concentrated on what she did best.

Pyr stepped away from the bed, then turned his back at Roxanne's sharp gasp. He would not watch; if he did, it would break him. He would drag her away from the pain she took into herself, or he would urge her to sacrifice herself for his child. Even without watching, it was hard enough to endure as images of huge fiery monsters and black obsidian blades flashed across his mind. Lines of fire shot up his arms and legs and faded so swiftly it might have been his imagination. He was left with a half-remembered sensation, as though he'd experienced Roxanne's bones burning from the inside out. The temptation was strong to follow her into the healing, to somehow help, but he left her to her business, and concentrated on his to fight off the fear for Axylel and the woman who fought to heal him.

Pyr turned his attention to his men, and was not unaware of Martin's standing back and watching them all. Mik had placed the severed arm on one of the infirmary beds and was working on disarming the trigger in Halfor's pendant. He spared a glance for Pyr, and gave a confident nod before he went back to his work.

Pilsane placed several metal cases on the workstation. "The Rust you asked for, Captain. As much as I could find in the time I had." He turned and held up several datacubes. "And as much information as I could get my hands on as well."

"Battle's over. We won. The fortress's defense shields register as completely inoperative," Linch's voice responded. "But you knew that already. Axylel?"

He'll be fine, Dha-lrm. "Manalo is already landing troops. The remaining pirates have surrendered."

"Of course he is. The Bucon admiral has called to say he's delighted with our performance." Did you find the rest of what you were looking for?

Pilsane tossed the datacubes negligently from hand to hand, but he tilted an eyebrow impatiently at Pyr when Pyr glanced his way. He was anxious to start deciphering the information he'd downloaded from the guild's computers—information that Manalo would not find when he set his own people looking through Halfor's records. Pyr gave him a nod and Pilsane sauntered out to begin searching for everything the pirate guild knew about the plague and the People. Pyr knew it was a pity he hadn't had the time to rip the information from Halfor's mind before killing him, but that couldn't be helped. The source of all this hell was what Axylel had gone looking for. Pyr hoped the boy had completed that mission before falling into Halfor's trap, and that he'd soon be making a detailed report on it.

Linch's cool voice reminded Pyr that the Raptor was surrounded by a fleet of Bucon ships, and that their usefulness to the Bucons had ended when they'd used the Door to lower the enemy's defensive shields.

"We have the koltiri," Pyr reminded his second in command. "Has the looting started on the planet?"

"Then send our landing party down for our share. We're pirates, let's act like it."

Pyr broke the comm connection and turned to Mik. The engineer held up the pendant, dangling it by its long chain. "All clear. Can I go look at the Door controls now? I hated bringing us back to the ship through here. Might have screwed up the Door by not returning to the exact origin point."

"I was in a hurry. Go," Pyr added. "And work on adding to the defense shielding around the Door room while you're at it. Don't want the Bucons trying to steal your baby."

Pyr had no choice now but to look at his son, and—his woman. Roxanne in her vivid silk was draped over Axylel, one hand still cupping his face. The bruises had faded from Axylel's pale skin, but his eyes were closed, his expression blank and lifeless. Roxanne's head was turned away from Pyr. The thick, long braid of her hair fell to the deck. It reminded Pyr of a golden rope, and made him think of hangings. He touched his own throat, and it was tight with the pain of fear. Concern for both of them tugged him inexorably to the bedside, and held him there, immobile and helpless as endless seconds passed. He didn't even notice Martin's hand on his shoulder immediately. He absorbed the warmth and weight and comfort of the Terran's touch slowly, and eventually turned his gaze away from the bed.

The dark brown eyes that met his were not young—perhaps they had never been young—but they held unexpected compassion. Unexpected, but not unwelcome. Pyr recalled that this man was linked to a koltiri himself. No doubt Martin had experienced his wife perform a healing many times before. He supposed this man who was no adolescent boy had children of his own.

Martin looked back at Roxanne and Axylel. "Do you know what happens if you flunk koltiri school?"

"That's right. Roxanne graduated. She isn't going to die now, and neither is your son."

Pyr knew that he had almost killed her, and he had wanted his life to be saved. Axylel was as afflicted with the plague, as addicted to the Rust—and there were other drugs in his system, Pyr was sure, and the residue of telepathic torture. Axylel might not want to be saved. Perhaps the attempt to heal would kill them both.

"She's stronger than when she met you," Martin said. "Thanks to you." Martin didn't sound happy about that. "And Axylel isn't as talented a telepath as you, is he?" he guessed.

Except Roxanne. He shied away from thinking about how it felt to have met a match for his gifts at last. He wanted to shy away from any thoughts at all for a while, but couldn't.

"You've won," the Terran who was not a telepath but was very perceptive said. "You deserve to rest." Martin gestured toward the bed. "As soon as they wake up, of course."

Roxanne stirred as Martin spoke. She lifted her head and turned it toward them, and blinked. He didn't think she recognized them for a moment. Pyr helped her to sit up, then to her feet. She was warm and solid beneath his hands, exhausted but very alive. She looked at him with annoyance in her dark purple eyes. "You Kaddanis are a pain in the ass about getting fixed. Physically, Axylel is now perfect. Except for that drop of organic explosive implanted next to his heart. It's neutralized but needs to be taken out." She glanced at Martin. "Now it's your turn, Dr. Braithwaithe."

Pyr saw that Martin's attention was focused on Axylel. Pyr moved to touch his son. He stroked Axylel's forehead. He was asleep, deep, dreamless, Pyr could feel that, and the disturbance beneath the sleep. "What can you do?" he asked Martin. "What does he need?"

"I've told you about Martin," Roxanne reminded. "He specializes in taking care of telepaths. Axylel needs someone to talk to."

"There will be things he can't say to you," Martin said. He spread his hands out before him. "But to a stranger… ? Sometimes it's easier to talk to a stranger."

"Especially Martin." Roxanne looked at her brother-in-law with pride and utter confidence. "He fixes people like you and me all the time, Pyr."

"Axylel might be comfortable talking to someone near his own age," Martin added. "Like me."

Pyr liked the answer. He liked Martin. He suspected everyone did—if Martin wanted them to—but didn't resent this gift of the Terran's. "Whatever Axylel needs," he said. "He will have."

"I'll do what I can. We'll talk when he wakes up. Speaking of sleeping…" Martin looked at Roxanne. "Get some rest."

Pyr put his arm around her shoulder. She leaned against him. They fit together, comfortable and comforting. Rest sounded wonderful. He couldn't stop the yawn, so wide it made his jaw hurt. "Sleep," he said, and Roxanne sighed her agreement. He turned her toward the door. "I want to sleep with you," he told her.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Roxy's sleep was delicious, totally restful. Maybe not altogether dreamless, but no specific memory of dreams tickled against her rising consciousness. Waking up, now waking up was a different story. She knew what waited upon waking up, so Roxy put it off as long as possible and tried to allow in only sensory impressions. This didn't completely work, of course. The world waited beyond the comfortable, comforting bed, complex and confused and completely unfair.

No, no, don't think yet. She let herself be aware of the warmth of the wonderfully hard body beside her—beside her, draped over her, peacefully breathing, heartbeat matching her own, naked flesh against her own, surrounding and shielding her. She sighed, and heard the gooey contentment in the sound. She snuggled closer and buried her face in the thick darkness of his hair. Felt good. Smelled good. Heavy. The man was heavy. She liked that. Knew where to find him in a bed.

Hadn't they agreed that they didn't want to do anything so intimate as sleep together? Why then, damn it, had sharing her sleeping hours with this man been the best time she'd ever had? And I wasn't even awake for it.

Maybe. "Damn!" Her eyes flew open to find him looking at her, grinning. She hadn't felt him move, but Pyr was half-rolled onto his side, his head propped up on his hand. "You look disgustingly well-rested," she told him. Smug, too. As self-satisfied as if they'd made love a dozen times in a dozen different ways.

He slowly and thoroughly proceeded to scratch his chest and flat stomach. Her gaze followed the movement. His gaze moved slowly over her. Funny thing was, she was wearing clothes, but didn't feel like it when he looked at her like that.

She was willing to accept his explanation. Why not? He had only stripped down to his trousers, but he seemed more naked half-dressed than any man she'd ever seen completely bare. Roxanne shook her head, and wondered when her hair had come unbraided. "It has a mind of its own," she said as she pushed thick strands out of her face. "More than I can say for the rest of me." She blinked. "Which makes no sense, of course." Pyr kept smiling. "I am generally an inane person," she warned him. "Really. You wouldn't want to wake up beside me every day." Which sounded exactly like an admission that waking up with him was exactly what she wanted. She pressed her palms against her temples. "Let's start this day over again, shall we?"

Pyr sat up and glanced at the table next to his bed. Not just at the chrono, but at the holos of his family resting there. Roxy slipped out of bed and stood watching him look at the pictures of his grown children and dead wife. This was a man who did not want or need to start over, she thought, and that was good. It tore into her, but it was all right. Necessary.

"The pirate and the prisoner," he said, still turned away from her. "I cannot call you an enemy or an alien, but I understand why you need to think that way."

"It would be best if I could keep thinking that way. It would make Martin happier."

He chuckled, not a pleasant sound. The muscles of his broad back were tensed. "I'd kill you." He gave another low, dangerous laugh. "It's come that far, that I'm jealous of even the thought of you with another man." He turned his head. "I sound ridiculous."

She caught her breath at the sight of his sharp-planed, high-nosed face in three-quarter's profile. "But you look damned good." His hair was sleep-tousled, with the tip of his sharply pointed ear showing through. She wanted to touch his ears, and run her hands through his hair and across the smoothly defined muscles of his shoulders. He had beautiful skin. "Why'd you have to be so damned handsome?"

He stood and faced her, heavy arched brow lifted sardonically, hands on his narrow hips. "I notice that you are not affronted to hear that I can be jealous of you."

She tilted her head to one side. "I'm worth it." She was used to it. Eamon was a jealous man; they'd fought over it a lot.

"Besides, we both know you don't need to be jealous. Somehow that makes it flattering. Ought to irritate the hell out of me."

There shouldn't be another time. "Perhaps." She stepped back with a sultry, arrogant smile and looked him over with completely blatant interest until she had him blushing. The line of hot color that spread across his face and throat fascinated and attracted her. "I notice you don't take affront at being considered gorgeous."

There was the bed and much of the width of the room between them, but she doubted the distance would last long. "I'm not quite sure what we're doing, Captain, but I think we ought to stop."

"We know what we're doing." His face changed, the smile and life going from his eyes. "And we will stop." He went completely still, his shields tightly guarded. He gave her a stiff nod. "My apologies, Roxanne." He turned away, toward the holos.

And apologies to Siiyel, the beloved late bondmate, Dhakynn ? she wondered, and wrestled with her own bout of intense, unreasonable jealousy. If Pyr picked up her thought he did not react. She was sad and guilty as well. It would be good to have her love for her husband as a shield against her attraction to Pyr. She could no longer think of one good thing about Eamon Merkrates, and she knew that wasn't fair.

Nothing unreasonable about being jealous of Pyr, she decided, but it was not acceptable behavior for Physician Roxanne Shirah of the United Systems. Dhakynn was not a name she had any right to call him. He had never spoken or thought it to her, though she had the feeling she'd known it all her life. She told herself not to care. She was a citizen of the Systems, and the Systems needed her very badly. All the blessed sweetness of resting beside him, all the bright joy of teasing and talking to him was gone now, replaced by tension and the knowledge that her connection to this man stood between her and sworn duty.

"I don't suppose you have any intention of letting me return to the United Systems?"

"I know what is at stake, and I wish it could be as simple as sending you home to save the universe all by yourself. But saving the universe is my job. Glare all you want, Roxanne, and protest, but I need that data and you to help me find the source of the plague."

"I will provide your services to the emperor for a price, yes. But that is not all—"

"I will buy you jewels and pretty dresses." He smiled at her sneer. "You are not going to try to talk me into sending all the information you have gathered about the plague to the Systems. Not until I know I am in complete control of the situation. What advantage will that bring to the People?"

"I'll take that as the insult it is intended to be. I have dealt with the Bucons for years, kept them and the Systems and the Pirate League away from the worlds I love."

"But who don't love you. The fools." She caught her breath, and damned herself for drifting into personal territory again. "We should not spend time together," she told him. "The more contact, the worse it gets."

"Bonding." He looked like he wished he hadn't said it. She'd been trying not to even think it. "To bond with someone from outside the People is unthinkable."

"You're thinking about it right now." So was she. With unsettling longing. What was taboo for him was a religious obligation for a koltiri. And lord knew what sort of unguarded frolicking their subconscious minds had gotten up to while they'd cuddled up asleep together in the same bed.

"And I have named you of my clan. That, too, is not done with outworlders. Even at the time, I knew it was a foolish romantic gesture."

"Not with any success, you will have noticed. Perhaps…" He sounded way too thoughtful, as though he was contemplating what they'd already decided would not be expedient. She unconsciously backed up a step, and ran into a piece of furniture. It turned out to be a chair, so she sat in it rather than stand there making melodramatic gestures that he could snicker at.

Pyr, however, continued to look thoughtful. "You asked once why I didn't force a completion of the bond."

How very true. She thought about them together, what they could do. Probably conquer the galaxy, if they wanted to. It would be fun. But it wouldn't be right. "What about Siiyel?" she asked. "You said you didn't want to replace your marriage bond with her with another."

"Siiyel was my flimsy excuse." Pyr threw back his head and laughed. The harsh pain of the sound drove her out of the chair. She was just barely able to stop from rushing to crush him in a comforting embrace. "Siiyel?" The name came out bitter, almost a curse. "Siiyel left me years before she died." He looked at her and through her, down into her soul. "My marriage was as much a sham as yours."

"But still she went," he answered her appalled confusion. "The bonding was arranged. She came to me like a sacrifice, a form of payment to the protector of the clan, but I loved her. We were happy enough, when I kept my thoughts as far from her as I could. I was still too strong for her. When she could take my intrusions no more, she found an honorable excuse to go away. Leaving me with no one in my bed, no one beside me, because she was afraid to stay."

Roxanne wanted to protest, to announce angrily that such treatment was not right or fair or deserved. To tell him that his strength was wonderful, that he was a good man, a great man—a man who deserved understanding and support and love as a gift freely given. But to say those words would be to offer them, and she could not, would not. Millions of lives stood between them; the security and interests of the United Systems stood between them. What she could give to him was not the same as doing her duty as Physician and MilService officer. She wished desperately that she had never put on either the green or black uniforms of the services that defined who she was and what she had to do.

She could see how lonely it had been with Pyr, how his daughter had gone back to their people and he had raised his son, the boy an eager exile from a culture he'd never known. His three fellow anomalous telepathic friends, Axylel, and his stubborn honor were all Pyr Kaddani had. And her. She could easily see herself running into his arms and promising to ease his loneliness, to stay with him forever.

She concentrated on the commonplace. "You should check on Axylel and the rest of the troops." She glanced toward the fresher. "You have the universe to save, and I need to take a shower."

Pyr nodded, and stepped aside to let her go into the other room. She heard him activate the comm unit as she closed the door between them.

The hostility in Axylel's voice was not unexpected. Martin kept his expression carefully blank as he turned from the medical workstation to face the young man on the bed. "Martin Braithwaithe." He had gotten some information about Pyr's son from the other elves, enough to help him decide on his initial approach to the young man.

Axylel was sitting up, glaring at him. The peace of healthy sleep had left him. Awake, every tense muscle spoke to Martin of remembered pain. There was hate for the world and himself in Axylel's eyes, but the young man tilted his head at Martin's answer, interest pricked. "I've heard that name."

Axylel swung out of the bed and came toward him, a lean young predator with more curiosity than caution in his eyes. "Why don't I feel like shit, Martin Braithwaithe?"

"Long story. Tall blonde. But she likes your dad, so don't get any ideas." Inquisitiveness: Axylel fairly quivered with it. It overrode, if only briefly, the hell inside his own head. Good.

"Martin Braithwaithe's famous. You don't look famous." Axylel touched him. Martin stayed very still. He detected no use of telepathy, but the young man said, "You feel like a Terran. Braithwaithe is Terran. MilService Sector Security Chief, Sector Eleven, stationed aboard the USS Odyssey. Secondary and tertiary specialties for sector ship assignment involve medicine and poetry."

"Song lyrics. I write song lyrics, not poetry. Real men don't write poetry, datarat. I'm flattered you have files on mere sector chiefs." And need to find and eliminate your source when I get home, he added to himself.

Axylel took the second chair at the medical station. "Why would Commander Martin Braithwaithe tell an alien spy who he is?"

"To distract you from your troubles," Martin admitted. He tapped his temple with a forefinger. "Anybody tries to interrogate me, my head explodes, effectively getting rid of me and the interrogator. Besides, if you're as good a datarat as Pilsane says you are, you'd figure it out when you get filled in on what's happened while you've been missing." Axylel's expression went blank. He grew even stiffer with tension. "Hungry?" Martin asked. He reached across the console to let his hand hover over a comm button. "Should I call Kristi?"

Axylel looked interested for a moment, then a hint of controlled panic flashed across his face. He shook his head. He wasn't ready to face friends and family.

"People are going to be in here demanding to know all you know pretty soon," Martin told him. "You're going to say you don't remember a lot of it."

He wouldn't. Martin had seen the way Axylel looked before Roxy went to work on him, and had removed the deadman implant himself. Only a combination of drugs and pain would have kept a telepath from calling for help. Linch and Pilsane and Mik had each been in to have a look at Axylel while he slept. Martin had garnered a little information from each of them. Linch had told him about Pyr's not being able to contact Axylel. So, lots of drugs were involved. Pilsane had told him about Halfor sending a message about training a replacement for Pyr to the Pirate League. Mik had told him about Axylel's insatiable curiosity and skill at finding information. Only he'd been caught, tortured, and used against his father and people. Between the drugs, Halfor's attempt to condition him, and his own sense of failure, Axylel was going to bury everything that had happened to him for a while.

Martin supposed telling the young man about some of his own bitter failures might sound condescending at this early point. He said, "Want me to tell you why you don't feel like shit? Starting with when the koltiri and I come into the story?"

Roxy made sure the door slid all the way shut, but the controls wouldn't lock the door at her voice command. Of course, Pyr could override any lock on the ship, so true privacy wasn't possible. She laughed silently at the notion of being private from Pyr at all; the man was inside her head, for the Great Goddess's sake! And he would stay there, and she would remain a part of him, but she would leave him. She would be another Siiyel.

"But for a better reason," she murmured, with her hands balled into fists and tears streaming down her face.

He would be alone and so would she, but Sagouran Fever would be wiped from all the worlds where this ugly death had been spread. You paid the price you had to. He would understand that. He had a Door, she had her own way of traveling through space in a blink. It was difficult, teleportation terrified her, but she was strong enough, had to be, even though she'd spent much energy in healing Pyr's son.

In fact, she and Pyr fed energy to each other, the connection already ran that deep without the shalsae connection that was possible between them. Shalsae. The full, complete, total completion. Her Terran father called it finding your soulmate, in spades. The Koltiran concept—reality for a very few koltiri—of shalsae was the great quest, almost as important for koltiri as continuing the Genesis. That she and Pyr could achieve shalsae was fanciful nonsense, or so she would tell herself in years to come. Centuries. Millennia. Being functionally immortal was about to turn into a real emotional pain in the ass. Perhaps she'd cut her hair and drape herself in mourning black—or the memory and melancholy would fade in time, and either way she should stop stalling.

It occurred to her that Martin might have lied to her about the telepathic spy to get her to do just this. Martin could lie to God and get away with it, and he would do it for God's good, too. And the United Systems'. They were two good men, Martin and Pyr, but each saw only as far as their own borders.

Roxanne took a very deep breath and closed her eyes. The way to teleport was really quite simple. You only had to think of somewhere you wanted to be, and then be there. Of course, the trick was that you had to want to be there so badly that you could bend space, time, and reality to get you there. Where did she want to be that Pyr was not? The only place that came to mind at first was the final 1998 NBA game between the Bulls and the Jazz, but that was a few centuries away from the current crisis, and time travel really was too hard for most koltiri, despite any claims to the contrary in the recruitment brochures.

She opened her eyes and took another deep breath before closing them again. Where was the best place for what she needed to do? Easy answer. Nightingale, of course. The whole planet was a hospital and medical research facility, and deep, deep within United Systems territory. Pity she didn't have any Rust on her, then she wouldn't have to work completely from memory. Maybe she should go to the sickbay and get some. No, that was an excuse, she had all the information from her research stored in her head. Damn, she wished she knew what data Halfor had on the plague and the drug. Were the people inside his fortress Rust addicts or had they been given an already existing vaccine? She bet Pilsane knew. Another excuse. No time to talk to him.

Nightingale. Right. She'd studied there, worked there, knew the place well enough to envision the exact room where she wanted to be. All it required was the power of a demi-goddess and an act of will.

Chapter Twenty-Five

"Decryption of Halfor's files coming along nicely, Captain," Pilsane said. "But the news isn't promising. Lots of great information about the guild and the League, but no luck yet in finding out if Halfor knew where the Rust originates. I think I have his list of suppliers, but haven't broken the code to know for sure yet. Too bad you took his head off before you or I could get into it."

"Door shields upgraded. Working on cloak at the moment," the engineer answered. "Figure it might be fun to be able to slip away from those six ships if you decide you'd rather not visit the emperor."

Pyr laughed. "I would like to be ready for that contingency. How close to the Shireny cloak have you gotten our cloaking device?"

"Not close enough. As it is, we could disappear, but the Bucons would pick up our signature within eight minutes. I'm trying to get it up to ten."

Ten minutes would be a nice head start, but Pyr would like better odds than that if he was going to have a fleet on his tail. Cloaks were useful for quietly hiding, but only the Shireny design completely masked the use of a stardrive for more than a few minutes. "Keep working on it."

He turned off the bracelet and pulled on a blue shirt from a pile of bright clothing. He would go see Axylel now. He might go through with the agreement to take the koltiri to the emperor. He was not opposed to keeping his word on principle, but it was wise to be cautious, and always prepared to bolt if things got complicated. Where were his boots?

A throbbing ache grew in his head while he moved around his quarters. He stopped looking for his boots and ran his hands over his face as he muttered, "Why do things always get complicated?" His vision blurred for a moment when he took his hands away.

He turned toward the door, but froze on a sharp intake of breath. The room around him shifted and changed. The walls went all white, the floor a cool empty blue; a curtained window looked out over a blooming garden. The temperature in the room dropped like a stone. There was a taste of tears in his mouth. Emptiness swelled up and around him. He stretched out, and fell forward.

Space. Cold and dark and endless. He hung in darkness and all he heard was a far-off, anguished scream.

Pyr wrapped his body around him in a fierce rush of will. He stood in his messy cabin, made his lungs and eyes work and looked around. Frantic urgency tugged at his heart. Fury raced through his blood, along with fear. He had to hurry, do something. Now!

He stepped toward the fresher, but knew that was no good. He stood in the middle of the room, gathered all his power.

Darkness turned into a long, endless tunnel with twined threads of gold and fire running through it. He followed the fire. Chased the gold. Was tangled in both.

She moved ahead of him, beside him, in him, all at once. She was there and gone. Her pain drew him, filled him, became him. Her longing was his. She was leaving. Going. Gone. He ran and fell in the dark and ran again, reeling in the gold that was her, gathering her in, held her soul in his hands, fueled his determination with fury while she fought for freedom. She would not leave him. Not her. He would not be alone. Not again.

Claws and teeth bit into his flesh. A hard blow connected with his jaw. A kick smashed his knee. He kicked back. Blocked a second blow to his head. His smile showed all his teeth. A stone knife flashed toward his gut. He broke her wrist and took the knife.

She turned, tossed her hair, and put her hands on the curved flare of her hips. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded. Fierce, furious, beautiful-when-she-was-angry Roxanne.

He didn't let her get away with yelling at him. "What am I doing? What by all the demons beyond the veil do you think you're doing?"

"I'm in the middle of teleporting. You're in the middle of getting us both killed."

He looked around and saw that they stood close together in the middle of nothing. Empty blackness stretched away in this place where only they existed. Inside the mind, infinity is distracting even more than it is disconcerting. He recalled another time they had been locked within each other's thoughts. Subjective reality, she'd called it, and had passed the understanding of how to manipulate it to him without thinking. He used the knowledge now to put ground under their feet. It was a desert, an empty place under a harsh red sky, a reflection of his own bleak rage.

Pyr watched Roxanne look around and frown, and then a few succulent green plants appeared on the stony ground, and a tiny spring bubbled up out of a rust- and red-striated boulder. Small gray and green birds settled to drink at the shaded pool beneath the boulder. She did not change his creation, but added life to it.

"Improves the real estate a bit," she said when she looked back at him. She stepped back but he followed her, keeping barely a breath's distance between them. She finally bumped into the boulder and stayed put. She put her hands on his chest and tried to push him away. He noticed that his chest was bare. He hadn't noticed before now, but she was naked, too. He smiled. He liked her naked, and it was his subjective reality.

"What were you trying to do?" he demanded, before his attraction to this alien woman overrode his outrage.

"Escape, of course. Why else would I be trying to teleport? You ever tried teleporting?" Her hands had moved to his shoulders. She continued to try to push him away, but the effort was desultory. "It's a wonder I'm not throwing up all over you right now. Actually," she added, as she looked past his shoulder at their desert world. "We're probably in a coma. We might even possibly be dead."

He then kissed her. Her hands had stopped pushing him away and had drawn him closer instead, until kissing her was the only possible response he could make. It didn't feel as if they were comatose or dead from the way they responded to each other. When her hands moved slowly over him, he became quite certain that he was not dead. She didn't taste dead, or feel anything but soft, warm, and female. He kissed and stroked her for a long time. There was a lot of her to touch. She moved beneath his hands and made small alive sounds that deepened his own desire, sent him searching for more ways to please her.

Then subjective reality set in again and he found himself standing at least ten feet away from Roxanne, aroused, but shaking with outrage as much as with need. She stood opposite him, fists balled at her sides, her anger and need a mirror of his own. He did not know which of them had moved from the other. He didn't think Roxanne knew either, as her angry eyes looked dark as midnight and as lonely.

"What are you doing?" he heard himself ask, forlorn and aching when he wanted to be outraged and righteous. "Why leave me?"

The words were sharp with sorrow, sharp enough to tear at his flesh and heart. She did not want to leave him, and he could hardly bear the happiness and confusion brought with that knowledge. It was not because of him! Not because he was an alien outcast. Not because he frightened her. They were one and the same being breathing in two different bodies.

Roxanne waved her hand and the desert became a sea of corpses—all with dead, accusing eyes turned on her. Another gesture and the bodies were gone. The chill of death remained just the same. It was a cold wind that blew between them.

It was an unfair and damnably true thing to say. But not so true as it had once been. "Your soul is a part of me." He held her in his arms again. Roxanne clung to him, her head resting on his shoulder. She shook with sobs as he touched her, gentle and fiercely protective at once. He felt her heart beating against his, with his, the same heart, stronger for being doubled.

Roxanne lifted her head and looked deep into his eyes. "Your soul is a part of me." The words were part of a ritual they knew without having been taught. There was nothing of ritual in the way their mouths sought and clung to each other, sharing a hard, demanding kiss that gave away every last secret of need and desperate wanting. Their souls were naked, vulnerable, and trusting. And they rushed together at the speed of light and with the inevitability of the rise of continents. Nothing could stand between them. Nothing should.

It was but a step, a movement that had no actual movement, but Pyr sensed himself take one small step—off a cliff, into infinity, across a boundary of smoke and fire. A whisper-thin barrier blew away.

He stood naked, with a black stone knife in his hand. He held it aloft. He could kill the universe with this thing.

She held the clan symbol in her hand; the trio of shining flat stones stood for everything that was good and right and true.

He handed the knife back to Roxanne. She gave the jewelry back to Pyr. They tossed the symbols aside. And smiled at each other.

"Shalsae," Roxanne said. She hit the pillow beside Pyr's head with her fist. "Damn. I knew this was going to happen!" At least they were alive and back in the solid objective world. Shalsae didn't kill you, but changed you forever. She recalled with an angry groan how the ceremony was begun—with a koltiri teleporting. The rite was also called Soul Catching. Well, Pyr had caught her, all right. She'd brought this on herself, but at least this time she wasn't nauseated as an after-effect of teleporting. No, this time she was married in the most permanent, perfect way it was possible to be! "God damn it! Why'd we have to do this now?"

She wrapped her legs around his hips. "That's easy for you to say," she complained. "You're not scheduled to be saving the universe this afternoon."

"It's on my agenda," he said, and slowly kissed her breasts. "After we're through here." She had large breasts, and he had to be thorough. Nipples to kill for. She gasped as he touched the tip of his tongue to one.

"Who says we're going to get through here anytime soon?" She sank her nails into his shoulders and drew him down for a long, hard kiss.

"Rather do this," he said, and moved his mouth lower still. He knew she enjoyed it because he felt her pleasure as much as she did. She giggled. It was an unexpected sound. He didn't think he'd ever made a woman giggle before, certainly not in such a low-down dirty, sexy way. He laughed, couldn't stop it from bursting out of him, and vocal laughter was something he indulged in very rarely.

He didn't know if the thought was his or hers, but it only made him laugh harder. The sound filled the room as he collapsed on top of her, shaking with merriment. It occurred to him that he'd interrupted a supremely romantic, erotic moment, and that made him laugh as well.

Roxanne watched Pyr's face when he began to laugh. The sight and sound of his pleasure sent a shudder of love and longing all the way through her. When had she ever been aroused by laughter? she wondered. And why hadn't she been? Humor was integral to life, and she loved life. She loved the man who was laughing, even when he dropped his considerable weight on her like a hard-muscled slab of permacrete. She laughed with him, and kissed the top of his head and ran her fingers around the tip of his elegantly pointed ears to see if they were ticklish. From the way he responded, she discovered that his ears were indeed sensitive, but they weren't ticklish.

"Oh, good, a new erogenous zone," she said, and began exploring the possibilities of what she could do with his ears. Within a few moments, Pyr wasn't laughing, but he was making some very interesting sounds. "Temples," she whispered huskily to him. "Touch my temples and I'm yours."

"Really?" The look of euphoria on Pyr's face was replaced by curiosity. The bright glitter of his eyes fascinated her. They were the most beautiful, sharp blue she'd ever seen. She'd thought that since she'd first seen him, and she'd hardly had reason to find the man attractive at the beginning. And how few days ago that had been? Now she couldn't look at him without finding him perfect, and she'd pretty much found him perfect before melding into Shalsae with him.

"My parents were bonded like this," she said while he kissed her temple, the words coming out in sporadic bursts.

Stick with me, kid, and we'll explore lots of possibilities. But we have to save the galaxy while we're exploring each—

They swore at the same' time, and found themselves kneeling on the rumpled bedclothes, facing each other. Their desire was in no way diminished, but their attention turned outward once more, to life and death beyond the shelter of this room. Damn! Roxanne swore again. She was aware of his arousal and of how his body glistened with sweat. She was on fire. Her pulse raced and all she wanted to do was touch him and stroke him and feel him inside of her.

No, it wasn't all she wanted. Or her conscience wouldn't have suddenly kicked back in when her body was demanding completion and satisfaction. "What is the matter with me? Do I have some sort of martyr complex?" She kept her gaze locked with his as she pushed hair away from her face. Pyr reached out to take her hand. He kissed her palm, then placed it over his heart and held it there. She turned a bleak smile on him. Why did I have to remember so soon—

Why was she always getting married in the middle of a crisis? Why couldn't she and Pyr make time for each other? "Why now? Why did we have to bond because you wouldn't let me escape?"

He tilted his head to one side; humor sparkled in his eyes as much as desire. "I think it has something to do with our being born to be together. That is correct, isn't it, koltiri?"

"I'm told I'm something of a romantic. While you are more of a bloody-minded pragmatist."

He nodded. A smile curled his mouth. She wanted to kiss him while he smiled. She'd become quite fond of kissing. She sighed instead. "Wrong time and place, right man. A big wedding would have been nice. Why couldn't I be able to pick out a dress? And have a wedding shower? A honeymoon would be a lovely thing." She slapped her fist down on the bed. "Instead, we still have to cure the known galaxy of Sagouran Fever and kill whoever's spreading it."

He grabbed her free hand and pulled her to him. "Perhaps I should have let you go," he said. "So you could work on saving the galaxy while I concentrate on the bad guys."

"I'd rather we do it together." She held him close and took comfort in the strength of his embrace. The heat and scent of his skin was distracting. She wanted to make it completely distracting. To give herself—give them—at least a few hours of bliss. They had to get something settled first, for both their sakes, because he was as likely as she was to suddenly revert to responsible adult behavior in the middle of what should be a magnificent, intimate moment. Instead of wasting time with making love in fits and starts, it was best to get things settled now. "But we have to do it for everybody," she went on. "Your people, the Systems, the Bucons. Everyone."

"I've never been opposed to that. I was looking for a way to save my people first. That's all."

"That's fair. I was going back to Nightingale when you stopped me. I was going to cure the Systems first. But if the Systems government decided not to make the cure universally available, I would see that the koltiri didn't let them get away with it."

Pyr shifted his weight and eased her backwards. They settled on their sides, limbs entwined. Roxanne was almost comfortable, except for the aching need coiling through her, and the damnable conscience that wouldn't let her do anything about it yet. His erection pressed against her stomach. She closed her fingers around it, and began a slow, subtle stroking motion.

Pyr made a small needy sound in response, but his thought was quite coherent when it entered her mind. You've compromised enough.

Killing Trins is one thing, she agreed. "That's as much of my soul as I can sell."

I know. My soul is yours. Trust and respect flowed to her through their bond, as intense as physical desire. And my honor is yours.

He closed his eyes and simply let her go on touching him for a while. His pleasure seeped through her, giving her pleasure and urging her on. After a while his thoughts surfaced once more. Do you have the cure?

A flash of joy went through Roxanne, but Pyr gave her no time to respond to his words. He kissed her with an intensity that left her gloriously mindless. Fireworks replaced words and all friction between them was the sexual kind. They needed and they gave, desires blended. There was nothing separate about them. He moved over her and into her. She held him and rose to meet him, but at no point did he end and she begin. Not for a long time, and even then they only parted a fractional distance into two separate satiated bodies, tangled up together in the equally tangled bed linen.

Chapter Twenty-Six

"Pretty sure," Martin answered Axylel. He stood by the sickbay bed where Axylel sat. He held the hypo in his hand and waited patiently. The vaccination was as much a test of the boy's progress as it was a precaution against catching Sag Fever again. That Axylel didn't violently object to having any kind of drugs administered was a good sign of his mental resilience. He certainly didn't look happy, though.

Axylel looked even more dubious at Martin's answer. He concentrated on studying Martin's face rather than look at the injector. "What's it made from?"

He'd explained about the plague and the drug being a construct. As expected, Axylel showed no surprise, though he made no comment. Now Martin said, "A vaccine is made from a small amount of the disease agent. Rust is already a sort of twisted variation of a vaccination. We just twisted it a little more. One shot will immunize you. No addiction."

"Everything about this is twisted." Axylel hopped off the bed and turned his shoulder toward Martin, presenting a bare arm.

Martin administered the shot before Axylel could change his mind. Then he leaned against the bed and watched as Axylel began to pace the room again. He noticed that Axylel never approached the door. They were not locked in the sickbay, but the young man showed no interest in leaving the confined space they shared. Axylel didn't want to be alone, either. If he was alone, Martin concluded, the humiliating memories he didn't want to let surface might start working their way up out of the dark.

They were working their way out, quiet-like, with the gentle urging of a nonjudgmental stranger. Martin had done most of the talking during hours of conversation. "They aren't going to leave you alone much longer," he said now. "Your friends and your family."

Axylel stopped pacing and turned to him. "The people I owe a report to, you mean."

"One and the same, aren't they? I always have the same problem," Martin said. "Being married to the executive officer of the Odyssey makes it hard to give complete and full reports sometimes." He stretched his long legs out as far as they would go in the narrow space between the beds. "One time, I calmly and professionally reported that I slept with a woman to obtain much-needed information. Commander Aquilar calmly and professionally noted this information source. Then Rafe Aquilar took me someplace private and beat the shit out of me—and I let him. Fortunately, he didn't let Reine and Betheny take a turn. Course, Betheny's pretty forgiving about doing what you have to do, but Reine would have given me one of those disappointed looks she's got a patent on. You know about those kind of looks?" Damn, he was homesick. Talking about family was supposed to be for Axylel's good, but it didn't make Martin Braithwaithe feel any better. At least, ensconced aboard a giant sector ship surrounded by its own fleet of warships, they were safe from the plague. Unless he was missing for too much longer, at which point Rafe and maybe the others would come looking for him. He had to get out of here before his family put themselves at risk. Maybe he could get Roxy to teleport back to the Odyssey, if he could get her to leave at all. Big if. Her and that big stud elf were—

Axylel's answer brought Martin's attention back to his patient. "Your dad have a gift for looking disappointed?"

"Really?" The engineer was an interesting man, and his relationship with the captain's son a subject worth pursuing.

Before Martin had a chance to ask another question, the door to sickbay opened. Martin came to his feet as he watched Axylel face the person who entered. Martin turned to see Pilsane crossing the room. The blond alien carried datacubes and had completely dropped his cool Bucon mannerisms.

"Time's up," Axylel murmured. There was a flash of mindless panic in his eyes, gone almost before Martin saw it, but resentful-ness remained. Martin watched as the young man squared his shoulders and faced the officer. "You decided we'd talked enough. Was it something you overheard?"

"I wasn't paying much attention," Pilsane responded to the implication that he'd been monitoring their conversation. He put the datacubes next to the access slot at the lab station that hooked into the main ship's computer. "Just background noise while I worked on these."

Martin shrugged. "I never admit to overhearing anything on the Odyssey. What they don't know they can't court-martial you for. Right, Pilsie?"

"Something like that," Pilsane said. "You do what you have to when most of your crew are pirates." He took one of the chairs at the workstation, slotted a cube, and swiveled to look at them. "Time is up, Ax. I'm sorry, I wish I could give you time to recover from what that bastard did to you, but we have to deal with this thing right now. Today."

"Thing?" Axylel asked. He stood with his arms crossed, a gesture both defensive and defiant. "Which thing is that?"

Martin rubbed the back of his neck. "I can think of three or four emergencies myself. Which one is top of your list, Pilsie?"

"Imminent destruction," Pilsane said. "We have a fleet surrounding us, ready to escort the Raptor to Bucon Prime. Waiting with less and less patience, I might add. If we go to Bucon Prime, the renegades from out on the Rose border won't be leaving, even if we do have the admiral's word. I trust him, but his word won't keep the other warlords around the emperor at bay. We have no friends at court. If we hand over the koltiri to Manalo right now, we're likely to be shot out of space. All those trader lords that joined Manalo's fleet know that Pyr is a candidate for taking over Halfor's job—and they don't like it. If Manalo leaves without us, we'll have to fight our way through the trader fleet." He looked sternly at Axylel. "Away from the border, we are vulnerable. We left the border to find you. Make it worth our while to have found you."

"No pressure," Martin said, coming up to put his hand on Axylel's shoulder without taking his gaze from Pilsane's. "No pressure at all."

"Has to be done," Pilsane said. He concentrated on Axylel. "We have to find the source of the plague and the Rust. For the People, and to use as leverage with the Bucons."

"It's more important than politics," Martin put in. "But I understand your point," he added at Pilsane's look. "By being responsible for taking out Halfor, controlling the koltiri's getting to the emperor, and stopping the epidemic, your People will put the Bucons deep enough in debt to do anything you want. They pay their debts."

"Not just the Bucons will owe us if we stop the plague," Pilsane replied. "The United Systems is dying as well."

"Maybe we should let them all die and keep the cure for the People," Axylel spoke up. "It's a thought," he went on as both Martin and Pilsane turned incredulous looks on him. Martin was glad to see that Pilsane didn't like this idea. Axylel shook off Martin's touch. "Why not let the demons, with all their wars and scheming, die? All they want to do is use us."

"And we need to use them. We can't hide behind the Veil anymore." Pilsane stood up slowly. "Ax, you're the one who's always admired the demons. Outworlders," he corrected, with a polite nod to Martin. "Studied them." He chuckled. "Without you, I don't think I could have learned to think like a Bucon. You like the outworlders."

"Halfor was a bastard," Martin said. "Every world has people like him. The Halfors of every species are in the minority, even among the Bucon." Except the Trin, he thought, they are all bastards, and still felt like a hypocrite. "Not everyone on every world the plague touches deserves to die."

"I don't deserve to die of Sagouran Fever or to be addicted to Rust," Pilsane said, reminding Martin that he had yet to be cured by Roxy. "I want to stop this plague for very selfish reasons. And if we do only keep the cure for the People, we still have to destroy the source of the plague. Finding out who and where was your assignment, Ax. You volunteered for the job."

Axylel spun away from them. "I know that!" He turned back. "I don't remember anything. Halfor—" He pointed at his head. "Halfor wanted to know what I knew. If I knew anything, I hid it too deep to get back."

"You better get it back," Pilsane said. "Because if we can get out of here, we need somewhere to go." He tapped his stack of datacubes. "Lots of good stuff here, but Halfor didn't have a clue who makes the Rust he got from his suppliers."

"What about the suppliers?" Martin asked, professional curiosity piqued. "Stev Persey on that list?"

"First name I looked for. Used it to break the encryption code. Used to think he only had two or three ships and we got one of them. I thought wrong. We need to be able to track these suppliers back to their source. The last message we received from you," he reminded Axylel, "was that you were close to the source."

"Was it?" Axylel shook his head in confusion. "The last thing I remember was—I don't remember the last thing I remember."

"I spoke to the captain a few minutes ago," Pilsane said. "Managed to find out the suppliers' names just after I talked to him. Thought I'd run them past you and see if they shake out any memories before speaking to him again."

"And he's sure to be here to talk to me himself pretty soon," Axylel said. He closed his eyes for a moment, and an expression of weary resignation made him look years older. "He's going to get into my head."

"Don't want anyone to know," Axylel said, looking at Pilsane. "Don't want to know myself."

"Sit down." Pilsane gestured toward the chair by the computer console. "Start by going over the list. Maybe that'll jog a memory."

So you won't have to do it for him, Martin thought. He retreated to sit on a bed as Axylel sat down reluctantly to study the datacube. Pilsane moved away from the computer and joined Martin on the bed. They sat and watched Axylel. After a few moments Martin turned his attention away from the young man's tense profile and ran a scanner over Pilsane, who frowned at him.

"About time you got off the Rust regimen, don't you think?" Martin asked. "I think I should call Roxy down to heal you." He checked a chrono. "She's had plenty of time to rest."

"I am showing a doctor's concern for you as a patient with a terminal illness," Martin replied. "Yes. I want her away from Pyr. Permanently."

Martin took exception to Pilsane's comment. "She's a wonderful woman. Gentle. Civilized. Far too good for pirate scum like Pyr."

Pilsane stroked his jaw. "I'm referring to the psychopathic witch Pyr left here with. Who are you talking about?"

A rush of heat went through Martin at the thought of Roxy, blonde and buxom and legs that went up to—"Yeah," he said. "Good-looking woman. That Tinna, though," he went on as a buzz of pleasure went down his spine and settled into a hard ache in his groin. "Now, that's a fine-looking woman."

Pilsane ran his hands through his long hair and shook his head. He and Martin exchanged a look. "Warm in here," he said.

"Yeah." Martin leaned back and supported himself on his hands. He looked at the ceiling as a burst of desire shot through him. Heat sizzled along nerve endings. Lust, yes. Unquestionably. Great stuff. But that wasn't all it was. There was something else in the air. Intense. Edgy—but—nice. Warm, but not fuzzy. Romantic. Didn't stop him from getting horny, though. He continued to look at the ceiling. He heard a sharp intake of breath beside him. "You hard, Pilsie?"

"You want to know what's going on?" Not that Martin didn't have a good idea. There was a powerful telempath on board the Raptor. Best guess was she was getting laid. By a very powerful telepath. Very rude of them, not keeping their thoughts and feelings to themselves—or at least inviting everybody else to the party.

Martin sat up, and fought down the arousal with all the will he could muster. "Bonding." He shot a frantic look at Pilsane. "You know what it feels like when your people bond?"

Pilsane's fair complexion was already flushed, now his skin went bright red. "None of your business, demon!"

At the same instant Axylel surged to his feet, sending the chair flying. "Father!" he shouted over Pilsane's outrage, and ran for the door.

Linch was already standing outside Pyr's door when they reached the captain's quarters. Mik came hurrying up a few seconds later. Linch squarely blocked the door, and the look he gave them dared them to try to get by him.

"What's going on in there?" Mik demanded. They all looked at him and he went bright red beneath his white hair. "I know what's going on—but what's happening?"

Was that a hint of regret Martin saw in the pilot's eyes, along with joy that could only be called fierce? Interesting relationship Pyr had with his crew. "That's my sister-in-law in there," he pointed out to the man who'd set himself up as guardian of the gate. "I would very much like to go in there and put a stop to what's happening."

"Should you?" Mik asked. "We've been wanting Pyr to find a companion for years. He shouldn't be alone."

"She hasn't saved your life yet," Mik said. "You'll change your mind about her after she fixes you."

Martin knew it was true. The sizzle and shimmer in his brain and body was quickly fading into a pleasant afterglow. He wanted to smile, to wish everyone well, maybe even hug all these elf-eared alien in-laws. If he'd had some rice, he would have thrown it.

And he wanted to shout in outrage, and to change the steps that led him to this door. She was a little sister he'd dragged into danger. This was his fault. But he could have done nothing else with so much at stake.

"Why not an outworlder? Who but an outworlder?" Mik said to Pilsane. "The five of us are all more like the outworlders than we are the People, aren't we?" He clapped Martin on the shoulder. He was a huge man, with a hard hand. "Welcome to the clan, little brother."

Martin was about to argue with Mik, and Pilsane looked ready to protest as well, but the door to Pyr's quarters opened before anyone spoke and everyone's attention instantly shifted. Pyr was dressed, Martin noticed, but he looked distinctly disheveled. He didn't look particularly happy at being disturbed, either. Then he looked at Axylel and his expression changed to one of profound pleasure. He spoke a few words in the language that made Martin's translator implant buzz. The implant was an organic AI device, and Martin was certain it was annoyed at not recognizing the language of the People. Axylel set off more buzzing when he answered his father.

Then Pyr said in Standard, "Come in," and everyone in the hall hurried into the captain's quarters.

Roxy was seated in a chair, calm and regal as she worked her waist-length hair into a thick braid. She had the purple and gold cloth wrapped around her sarong-style. She was not looking inutterably smug, as Martin had somehow expected her to. She did smile when she saw him, and there was something new and sweet in it. No, not new. Her open happiness reminded him of the kid he'd known back on Terra, before the war and Eamon Merkrates took their toll on her. He wanted to ask if being bonded constituted an official divorce, but didn't think this was the place to bring up the subject.

"May I be the first to offer my congratulations," he said instead. Martin didn't know if he meant it, but it was too late to protest the inevitable.

She finished the braid and tossed it over her shoulder. "I was prepared for an argument, Martin, not meek acceptance. Can't I even whine about how it's all your fault?"

She folded her hands in her lap. "Actually, this is all probably Racqel's fault. It would have helped if she'd specified which great warrior I was going to end up with. Of course, if you hadn't talked me into trying to teleport… You weren't lying to me about the telepathic spy, were you?" She stood up. "Cause if you were—"

Martin held his hands up before him. "That was the truth. I swear it on your sister's honor."

Martin began to comprehend the seriousness of what had happened. There were lots of different ways telepaths linked with lovers, but only one that involved teleporting. Of all the telepathic races, koltiri were the only ones he knew of that could teleport. Sometimes, telepaths from other species were able to join them in that space between space where koltiri went when they teleported. Join them and bring them home. If they were meant to. He understood about shalsae and how it came about—hadn't Reine and Rafe been fighting against it for years? No Shirah wanted that sort of connection after what had happened to their parents. If Roxy hadn't looked so happy, he might have apologized again.

"We have a great deal to do," Pyr interrupted any further conversation between Martin and Roxy. "A great deal to talk through."

Pyr came to stand beside Roxy, his hand on her shoulder. The room wasn't small by ship standards, but it wasn't big enough that seven people could fit into it with enough psychological space to be comfortable. They all moved as far apart in the confined space as possible; Mik sat on one side of the bed, Linch in the room's other chair, Pilsane leaned against a table, and Martin perched on a cabinet.

It was no surprise to Martin that Axylel was the one who stood by the door. The way the young man looked at Roxy was surprising. Martin could have understood hatred, hostility, anger, curiosity, or even masculine interest in the woman who was so intimately involved with his father. Axylel exhibited none of those understandable reactions to Roxy. Instead, he looked at her with a strange brightness in his eyes and a numb expression on his handsome young face, as though gazing upon the source of some great revelation.

Martin watched him for a few moments, while everyone else in the room waited for Pyr to speak. Martin broke the tense silence instead. "What?" he asked Axylel.

"Meek." Axylel's gaze swiveled to him. "She called you meek." His shudder was violent and visible. "Are you one of them?"

"Blessed." Roxy, Pyr, and Pilsane spoke the word as one. Roxy and Linch jumped to their feet.

Pyr slapped his left palm against his forehead. "I'm an idiot." He held his hand out in front of him, staring at it. He flexed it into a fist.

"That's an Orlinian expression," Pilsane said. He glared at Roxy. "How do you know about Orlin?"

Mik got up and went to Axylel. The young man was very pale. Mik helped him into the chair Linch had vacated. "You're remembering. Good. What do you remember about Orlin?" he asked Axylel. His words were gently urging, and Martin knew Mik was being as gentle with telepathic probing, helping Axylel open the door Roxy's words had cracked.

Linch also stared at Roxy. "I heard you speak of meekness recently, but I had forgotten where I'd heard the saying before."

"Sagoura," Roxy said. "The person who brought the plague into the United Systems. He said he died meek and blessed." She looked at Pyr. "What do you know about this?"

"Not enough." He looked to Pilsane. "I don't pay much attention to those crazy fanatics."

"My job," Pilsane agreed. He turned to Axylel. "This Sagoura was one of the Meek? Is it the death cult that's spreading the disease?" Axylel was wide-eyed with shock as buried memories rushed to the surface, but he nodded.

Pyr went to his son and knelt in front of where Axylel sat. He made sure he had Axylel's undivided attention before he said, "Tell me."

"The whole thing led me in a circle," Axylel answered. "I was able to make them believe I had defected, that I wanted to get in on the Rust trade and take over the border. No one ever doubted my motives. They knew your reputation, that you'd come looking for me. I was the one who suggested using your hunt for me as a trap for you." He laughed. "I was certain I would find the information and get away before any trap could be sprung. I went from dealer to dealer, helped deliver shipments, got closer to the source each day. I finally met Persey. He claimed to be the top man and the source of it all. Got into his head as much as I could, planted the notion that he wanted to introduce me higher up the line, and he bit." He laughed soundlessly. "Took me back to Orlin. Got into one of the priest's orgies. His priestesses are the ones who know how to bite."

"They make the Rust and store it in the temple," Axylel went on. "But the priest isn't the one in charge. Neither is Persey."

"They work for a Trin," Martin said. He and Roxy exchanged a look, sure of what they knew no matter how Axylel responded.

Axylel looked Martin's way briefly. "Do Trin look like Kith?" Martin nodded. "Then they work for a Trin. He lives in the temple. Lurks deep in the holy of holies. I met him there. It was his idea to send me to Halfor." He fought down panic. His voice was angry when went on. "A gift. A way of distracting you. A hope that you would eliminate Halfor for Persey, or that Halfor would kill you, since Persey's assassins kept turning up dead. They wanted you both out of the way. They drugged me and—made me forget about them before they sent me to Halfor." He looked up accusingly at Mik, then his gaze slid to Martin. "Hard to keep a telepath from remembering."

"Persey wants to be emperor of the Bucons as reward for helping this Trin," Pyr guessed. "Idel simply wants to help the universe die."

"Bring them in on a Trin hunt?" Martin said before anyone else could get in a protest. "I don't think so, Sting."

"I won't allow a Bucon fleet that close to the border," Pyr added. "I know how our fleet on the other side of the Rose would respond."

"It's likely that Persey has informants on board one or more of Manalo's ships," Pilsane said. "We don't want to risk his receiving any prior warning."

"Fine, fine," Roxy said. "It was only a suggestion." She turned a quizzical look on Pyr. "Suicide mission, dear?"

"The question is how?" Linch interrupted before Roxy could explain. He looked to Mik. "How do we escape being chased back to Orlin with only a ten-minute head start?"

The big engineer threw his hands out. "You tell me, Li-nal. With a Shireny cloak, we could get clean away with no one able to track us. But we don't have a Shireny cloak, and there's nothing I can do about that."

Axylel was the only one in the room who looked Martin's way, but only for a fraction of a second, and he didn't say anything. Martin pretended not to understand what the datarat implied as the aliens who wanted to save the worlds went on talking about how to go about it. Martin noticed Roxy fold her hands in her lap and firmly not look his way. Hmm. He watched and listened and thought about duty on lots of different levels. Duty and friendship and trust and doing what was necessary for the greatest good despite the world you came from. And what it came down to was a matter of trust.

"Oh, hell," he said loudly after about five minutes of listening to improbable escape plans. Everyone looked his way. He looked at Roxy. "It all comes down to the matter of who's family, doesn't it, Sting?"

She smiled at him, in a serene and mystical fashion that made her seem far older than her real age. "On the universal level proclaimed by the Neshama Seedings?" she asked. "Or on a more personal level, Viper?"

Martin gestured around the room, taking in Roxy, Pyr, his crew, and himself. "We're all family here, right?"

One by one all the others nodded or spoke their agreement, though Pilsane looked pained when he added the final, "Yes."

Martin rubbed the back of his neck. He sighed. He opened his mouth and committed treason. "You want the Shireny cloak, I can give it to you."

Everyone stared at him. It was Roxy who pointed out, "You're not an engineer, Martin."

"No, but I am married to a couple of the best. I've been acting as a courier for the Systems' premier design team for nearly a year now. What do you think I was doing away from the Odyssey when Glover found me?" he asked Roxy. "Delivering a bit of Shireny data that Reine put in my head, that's what. Ever since the telepathic spy was detected, Reine's been planting information in my mind that a touch telepath extracts at another point, away from the Odyssey. I have to leave the ship occasionally for official business, so—until now—the secret of how the data's transferred to the people who build all that crap my wives design has been safe." He touched his temple. "You want the cloak, Mik, it's in here. But you have to promise to be gentle with your probing," he added with a leer.

Mik was already grinning eagerly, but Axylel spoke up first. "But you said your head would explode if you were interrogated."

"Only if I want it to," Martin said. "And right now, I'd rather go Trin hunting than get myself blown up."

Martin looked at Roxy and Pyr. "Consider this a wedding present," he told them, and followed the engineer.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Roxanne leaned across the big table in the center of the common room and graced her bondmate with a dangerous smile. He felt that smile all the way down to his bones. "Your point, dear?"

From the opposite side of the table, Pyr returned the smile with an equal edginess. "I wasn't disagreeing, merely making a personal comment."

It was the best idea anyone had come up with in the three days since the Raptor suddenly disappeared from Bucon sensor detection and raced back toward where it had all begun. As far as most of the crew knew, they'd collected booty from Halfor's stronghold, slipped away from the hated regular Bucon navy, and were now running for one of the Raptor's most frequented ports. The crew had plenty of cash, and a supply of Rust. Several more had been healed by Roxanne, including Pilsane, and all was the way it should be, according to their pirate mindset. Pyr hadn't bothered explaining that they were on a mission to destroy evil and save the universe. Why complicate his crew's simple lives? It was something to keep inside the clan, if only the clan could come up with a way to do it.

So they were having one more meeting to discuss possibilities over a large meal Kristi had fixed for them. Roxanne suggested her solution near the end of dinner, after staring into a mug of coffee cradled in her hands while the rest of them ate dessert.

They were within orbiting distance of Orlin now and final decisions had to be made. They had the Shireny cloak to keep them from being detected, and they had the Door to get them into the death-cult temple. Now all they needed was a way to distract or combat Persey's Bucon guards and Idel's fanatical followers while they eliminated the leaders of the Rust conspiracy.

"It might work," Axylel said. He flushed faintly as he looked at Roxanne. "If you really think they'll respond to that sort of stimulus."

Roxanne's laughter interrupted the engineer. "Don't need an amplifier. Do I?" she asked Pyr. Pyr couldn't think of a circumspect comment, so he glared at Martin's chuckle. Linch picked up his ligret and began strumming an ancient and bawdy ballad.

"It would be nice if we could simply vaporize the place from orbit," Pilsane said, wistfully.

Pyr was certain the temple would now be too shielded for anything that simple. Using the Door in front of Idel had been a mistaken bit of bravado. Once the Raptor was away from Orlin, the conspirators would have stopped hiding behind the facade of a primitive temple and improved the place's defenses. Using the temple to manufacture Rust had been a good cover for a time, Pyr thought, though he also felt a fool for not suspecting Idel was involved when they'd met. For some reason, the fact that a bioscan of the huge building showed nothing but Orlinians when he'd gone there for a meeting had seemed proof that Idel was no more than he seemed. Pyr looked at his left hand, where the girl's teeth had sunk into flesh. He had been rather distracted that evening.

"We don't have a very big bomb," Mik said. "We could go somewhere and steal that sort of materiel, but I don't think we should risk taking the time."

"I don't want to risk harming the civilian population," Pyr said. "They aren't all religious fanatics. They aren't all demons because they aren't of the People," he added, with a stern look all around. There wasn't a hint of argument from anyone else at the table. He remembered that Linch and Mik had Orlinian lovers.

"Perhaps we should call our ships from the other side of the Rose," Linch suggested. "No," he said before anyone else could. "That would only draw the attention of United Systems sensor probes. Then the Systems would send a fleet."

"It would send Bucons to Orlin as well," Pyr said. "This stays a private party."

What she suggested would require her going into the temple with them. Pyr hated the idea of risking Roxanne's life on this mission. He looked around the table. They were all there, all the people he cared for; Axylel, Linch, Pilsane, Mik, even Martin. He hated the idea of risking his son, his friends, and his family. "You're right," he said to Roxanne. "This plan has the best chance of working." He looked at Linch. "Put us in orbit precisely over Idel's temple. Get the Door ready, Mik."

"This will work, right?" Martin asked her as they waited for the go-ahead inside the Door room.

There was a flatness to his expression, a faint dullness to his chocolate brown eyes, as though he was alert, but slightly removed from his own emotions. That was as it should be. He was feeling the effects of a little something Roxanne had whipped up in sickbay and administered to the commando party. It wouldn't work for long, but it didn't have to. It would give them an edge while she got to work.

"Ready," Mik called before Martin could voice any more skepticism, and they moved into the position.

They all stood in a circle, facing outward with weapons drawn. She was back-to-back with Pyr. She leaned into him, fitting her curves against him, aware of his warmth and the hardness of his back, the breadth of his shoulders. She let herself think of his thighs, and the tight muscles of his ass. He smelled of leather, with silk beneath and bare, beautiful flesh under that. She smiled, and thought of sex.

When the brilliance cleared, the room was made of blood-stained stone, and the air was cold. Roxanne did not have time to consider the wonder and glory of having teleported without having to do the work herself.

She kept her mind on erotic, arousing acts rather than trying to take in many details of their surroundings. She saw the flash of eyes, and knives, and sharp, serrated teeth, but looked into souls instead of faces. She aimed her emotions at all those bodies, sent need deep into cold, isolated flesh, tapped the erotic fantasies lurking near the surface in every mind—and twisted them to her own desire.

She sent out all the longing in the world into the minds and bodies inside the temple of death. She hit the enemy as hard as she could with a hot, aching, distracting fireball of total lust.

Pyr was aware of the distraction as no more than a pleasant sizzle on the edge of his senses. He kept his attention on business as they appeared in the grizzly temple chamber. Mik had put them into one of the lesser chapels. The shielding on the place had indeed been upgraded since their last visit, making a proper bioscan impossible. So they'd taken their chances on the emergence site, and hoped the place would be deserted. It appeared they'd interrupted a service. The chamber was crowded with Idel's followers, armed with knifes and energy weapons. Their numbers were disguised by smoky torch light and deep shadows. He caught a glimpse of a body spread out across an altar as the worshipers swung their attention to the intruders.

Weapons were raised, and immediately began to drop. A cry of alarm was choked off, another turned into a low moan of desire. Hands reached out, but not to take them prisoner. The Orlinians turned on each other, eyes hot, hands groping, melding into heaps of urgent flesh. Axylel had mentioned the death worshippers holding orgies. Roxanne's telempathy thrust them into that already established mindset. An orgy should be starting all over the temple right now. It was an excellent diversion, hopefully diverting enough to buy the Raptor's crew the time they needed.

Some of the enemy were mindblind, of course. Pyr shot two of the unaffected believers who came at him with knives raised, heard another shot over the gasping groans of an aggressively aroused woman on the floor in front of him, then turned to face his crew. "Split up," he said. "Good hunting."

Each had their own assignments. Linch stayed put to look after Roxanne. Mik, Axylel, and Martin went out a rear entrance of the chapel. He and Pilsane cautiously moved through the doorway that led toward the main sanctuary of the temple.

Roxanne concentrated on projecting emotion without being caught up in it for a few more minutes. She wanted to give it enough time to effect as many people as she could reach. She started the fire, but the blaze grew on its own after that. She was going to have to remember this diversion for future use; it was much better than killing people. It was good that the Orlinians used sex as part of their worship, and she'd never met a Bucon that didn't like to have fun. But she couldn't think about sex all the time. And the drug she'd given her own people would wear off soon.

She raised her empathic shields, put her mind on what else needed to be done, turned to Linch and said, "Want to go look around?"

He moved up out of the shadows where he'd been protectively lurking. "Want to go kill a Trin?"

She smiled. "Always to the point, I like that about you." They stepped over bodies on the way out. She noticed that there was a lot of biting and scratching and other rough stuff going on, but people seemed to be having a good time. That some of them were dead disappointed her, but then Roxanne recalled that this was a religion where death after degradation and suffering was the ultimate goal. Weird, but if it made them happy…

She made herself stop thinking about theology and sent her thoughts out in search of the enemy, hunting for a single mindset alien to Orlinian and Bucon thought. She briefly touched Pyr, Martin, and the others from the Raptor. There were many Bucons in a separate area of the temple. She let Martin know about them. She could sense the mindblind in the building; they left a blank pressure against her shielding, but her thoughts passed over them like water over smooth stones. She sighed when she found what she was looking for, and walked out of the chapel with Linch close on her heels.

"Bucons ahead," Martin said, without bothering to check the bioscanner clipped to his belt. Roxy's word was good enough for him. He put away the projectile weapon he'd been given and took something else out of his pocket.

The corridor was lined with deep niches, black holes that looked like open, screaming mouths. Some of the niches held grotesque statues, others held even more grotesque piles of bones. The torches that lit the place were few and far between. He gestured Mik and Axylel further back into the shadows of one of the niches while he considered options. Neither the engineer nor the datarat questioned his leadership. He almost wanted to remind them that he was still ostensibly a prisoner, but he guessed he'd earned their trust as well. He followed them into the alcove, careful not to disturb a pyramid of skulls along the way.

Mik's broad-featured face registered shock when he saw what Martin held. "That's Pyr's," he said.

"I know. Found it when I ransacked his quarters," Martin explained before Mik could ask. "He never noticed that I ransacked his quarters."

"He wouldn't," Axylel said. He started to laugh quietly, then the sound died and he whispered, "That's a needier."

"Forgot Pyr had that thing," Mik said. He rubbed his jaw. "Could have figured out a way to convert it into a big bomb and we wouldn't have to be down here."

"Pyr's right about civilian casualties. Besides, big bombs don't always do the job by themselves," Martin pointed out. "Sometimes you need to deliver them in person."

Axylel put a hand on Martin's arm before he could respond. "How long have you had that thing?"

"No. Anytime after the Bucon fleet showed up, maybe, but not before then. But I let it play out," Martin told Pyr's son. "Logic told me not to, self-interest told me not to, but my instincts went along with the rescue plan. I trust my instincts even when they piss me off." Besides, Roxy had said something about being a parent himself that had completely messed up his rational thinking where these aliens' problems were concerned. So, here he was now with a needier in his hand. "And Stev Persey had better be beyond the next door."

"You want prisoners to interrogate?" Martin asked him. Mik shook his head. Drug dealers, Martin thought. Drug dealers who spread Rust addiction after the Meek died spreading the plague. Drug dealers who worked for a Trin. He looked at the small, powerful weapon in his hand. There wouldn't be any prisoners. "I think I should go in first," he told the other two.

There were no guards before the heavy wooden door. It was shielded, but Mik took care of that defense quickly enough. Martin burned down the door and a section of wall rather than bothering to knock. The huge, low-ceilinged room beyond the rubble was better lit than the temple corridor, and warmer. The Bucons had installed modern appliances for their comfort and convenience in this refurbished section of the fanatics' base. The walls were covered in dark tapestries, the floor was carpeted. Soft, comfortable Bucon chairs, chaises, and floor pillows made up most of the furniture. The place was their private recreation room, Martin guessed. They were certainly involved in recreational activities before Martin knocked down the wall and spoiled the mood.

The lights made them easier to see when he swept the needler's focused energy beam around the room. Most of them were making love when he killed them, but Martin refused to dwell on the irony of it all. The only meaning that mattered was that he was ridding the universe of a dozen or so pieces of vermin. The bright light did help him pick Persey's long black hair and sharp profile out from the rest of the group. Martin halted the sweep of the needier before it reached Persey's naked form.

Persey rose to his knees, grabbed a weapon, and fired as Martin came toward him. Martin dodged the projectile and heard it ricochet off the thick stone wall to his right. He also heard Mik and Axylel enter behind him, their weapons taking out the Bucons Martin hadn't hit with the needier. Persey took shelter behind a thick pillar and kept shooting. Martin held his fire and moved forward cautiously, using furniture, pillars, and fallen pieces of wall for cover. He wanted to get very close to Stev Persey. Close enough to choke the life out of the bastard who had wrapped a wire around Dee Nikophoris's neck, who sent a pack of addicts into a hospital to murder the staff, who had stabbed Roxy in the heart and left her for dead. Mostly he wanted to kill Persey with his bare hands for Dee's sake. He owed Groupie Persey's life, taken in as brutal a way as hers was taken.

Only problem was, about halfway across the wide room to where Persey lurked, Martin could have sworn he heard Dee Nikophoris laughing at him. "What's with the macho crap, Viper?" he could imagine her saying. "I'm too dead to be impressed. Just kill the bastard for me." It was his imagination, but it was also very much the sort of thing Dee would say—the sort of thing she would never say again.

Martin laughed. He laughed very loudly, and not altogether rationally. Then he thumbed the control of the needier, stepped out from behind cover, and vaporized the pillar Persey hid behind, and Persey with it.

The Bucon bastard was dead. Honor was avenged. Martin looked up at the ceiling. He didn't think it was going to stay up much longer without the pillar to support it. He gestured for Mik and Axylel to back toward the entrance. "I think we better get out of here." A rumble from overhead punctuated his words. "Fast!"

"This place is ugly," Roxanne whispered as they moved down a long, winding staircase. The way was narrow, the stones cold and damp, and she spoke mostly for the reassuring sound. Linch wasn't much of a talker.

Just like a Trin to hang out in the basement. Trin weren't much for decor. Trin warlords were into power, competing with each other for the Galactic Villain championship, and building bigger and better death-dealing stuff.

What good was power, Roxanne wondered as they reached the last twist before the bottom of the stairs, if you didn't build centrally heated palaces with big bathtubs and great scenery? They paused for a moment, two telepaths sensing out the unknown territory beyond the dark shelter of the staircase. "I mean, what good is ruling the universe if you don't even go out to dinner occasionally?" she muttered, knowing her words went unnoticed by anyone beyond them. Power for power's sake? Hell, she had that, if she wanted to use koltiri gifts that way. She'd build a big house and throw great parties if she ruled the universe. And institute universal peace and happiness and all that other stuff that sounded great but really didn't work in practice because people always refused to cooperate with anybody else's idea of peace and happiness even if you put a lot of drugs in their water… "Okay, that won't work, but I'd like the house."

There were guards at the bottom of the stairs. They were making love. Roxanne and Linch stepped over them. After a moment, Linch turned back and dispatched the guards. Roxanne nodded to him. No use risking an escape route. They hurried down a low, dim corridor, through an arched doorway, and down more stairs. This time it grew lighter as they went further down. Torches had been replaced by glowbars. The moisture in the air disappears i as well, as did the faint scent of decay. The gruesome temple of the death goddess had completely changed into a sterile, efficient little world by the time they reached the first protective shield stretched invisibly across the stairway. It was easily burned out; Mik had been playing with the shield he'd taken off Kith's body. He'd passed out his brand-new shield disrupter to them all before they left the ship. They used Mik's disrupter twice more by the time they reached the bottom of the stairs.

Linch cocked an eyebrow at her. "When the Trin knows the Systems is vowed to kill him?"

There was a small room beyond the staircase, brightly lit. It contained a surveillance board and banks of screens. There was no one behind the control console to monitor all those screens and sensor readouts. There was a security door on the other side of the room. The shield that should have sealed it was turned off. The door was partly open. Roxanne and Linch exchanged a look. Trap?

Let's go have a look, shall we? They shared the thought, and moved together to the doorway.

Roxanne felt the presence of the Trin and one Orlinian. She took a cautious look beyond the open door. Linch pushed the door open a fraction further, any noise he made covered by a cry of pain. Roxanne had shielded herself from most of the violence since they'd arrived in the temple, but the woman's fear and the hunger that fed it hit hard against her senses. The Trin's contemptuous anger added salt to psychic wounds.

The Trin had knocked the woman to the floor. She scrambled to her knees and touched him imploringly. "I love you," she said, and rubbed her forehead against his thigh. "Love me." The Trin raised his hand to strike her again.

Roxanne was sick with the knowledge that the Trin's abuse of the aroused woman was her doing. She snarled with fury and pressed the pad that deactivated the Trin's personal shield. She ran forward as the Trin raised his bald, bumpy head to look at her. He thrust the Orlinian away and raised a hand weapon with lightning speed. Roxanne saw his finger begin to press the trigger, knew that she had no time to dodge.

And the knife flew past her shoulder, so close a whisper of air caressed her skin, and then the blade lodged hilt deep in the Trin's exposed throat.

She felt the bastard die. He was dead even before the weapon fell from his hand and he dropped to the floor. She looked down at the body, and was aware of Linch stunning the Orlinian woman as she fought off the reaction. Then Roxanne took a deep breath and looked at Linch.

"Twelve mindblind that I can detect," Pyr said. "Idel among them, I think." Specific identification of someone with natural telepathic shielding was tricky, but one of the impressions Pyr received could be described as a dark star made up of pure ego wrapped in overwhelming pride. That was the high priest he remembered. "I think he's pissed. And I detect eight others too suspicious to fall for Roxanne's diversion. Sixteen, all on the move." He stood just beyond the reach of the light thrown by the nearest torch, pressed his back to the mosaic of a dying galaxy that decorated the wall, and closed his eyes to concentrate again. "Heading our way. Do it now. Hurry."

He and Pilsane had made their way cautiously from the chapel to the temple's great carved entrance doors without encountering any opposition. It looked like that was about to change. Pilsane rushed over to the doors. Pyr stepped forward to cover Pilsane's back as he sealed the entrance and set a portable shield that would keep any angry mob of rescuers rushing from the city streets at Idel's call for help.

"Done," Pilsane said after a few seconds. He trotted back to Pyr's side. "Now what?"

Now all they had to worry about were vigilant fanatics and their furious leader on the inside. "Going to be fun," he said. He looked around the great chamber with its huge, open expanse of tiled floor. Not a lot of places to take cover. Pillars were few and far between. There was more space than anything else between the doors and the fire-crowned statue of the death goddess and the skull throne to the side of it. The place had been brighter the last time he'd been here, illuminated and heated for the Hunters' Festival by hundreds of torches. "We wait here," he decided. "Let them come to us."

Pilsane looked at the soot-blackened ceiling and the silver line of Idel's security lightweb. "That's going to be activated any second now."

Pilsane gave him a sour look. You're going to do something melodramatic, aren't you? He sent the thought as he dashed across the chamber to take up his position.

Pyr waited in the shadows without answering the navigator. It had nothing to do with his being melodramatic. He hated melodrama. He did have a few questions he wanted answered. He needed to get close enough to Idel to ask them. It was the young high priest's sense of theatrics that Pyr counted on to get him where he wanted to be.

While he waited for the troops to arrive, he turned his thoughts to another part of the temple, shifted the focus of his attention into the other half of his soul.

Roxanne turned a half-amused skeptical look on Linch. "Situational ethics, I'd call it. If she'd been holding a weapon—"

Roxanne didn't argue the point. She nudged the dead Trin with her foot, then bent down and slowly drew the knife out of his throat. She cleaned it on the Trin's clothes and handed it back to Linch. Then she looked around the room, grinned, and rubbed her hands together. "Data storage everywhere. One thing I've always admired about the Trins is that they document everything. This room will hold the formulas for the disease and the cure and—"

I still have a battle to fight up here. I will need your help in a moment. Be prepared.

With that, Pyr focused back on his own situation as Idel and his followers rushed into the great hall. Idel's disciples were creatures with pale, scarred skin. They were wraith-thin, ghost-people dressed in white rags. Instead of carrying the traditional bone blades of the Orlinian religion, they all held Bucon energy weapons clutched in their fists. It would have been much less work for Pilsane if the fanatics carried knives, but Pyr was confident his navigator could cope with odds of a mere fifteen to one for at least a few minutes.

Pilsane opened fire as the Orlinians started to spread out around the room, drawing their attention. Pyr found the dark-haired and black-clad high priest in the center of the white crowd and considered simply stepping forward and shooting Idel down. But Idel dashed away from the group and up the steps to his throne before Pyr could get off a clear shot. A moment later, the green spiderweb lights of the defense system came to life. The criss-crossing bars of deadly glowing energy could have blanketed the huge room. Instead, they covered an area that took up no more than a five-foot circle around the skull throne. The high priest was now safe in the center of the lightweb and nothing else mattered to him. Idel then sat down, crossed his legs, and prepared to watch his followers fight for him against the invader lurking behind the cover of the death-goddess statue. An excited smile lit Idel's unmarked face. He looked perfectly relaxed and happy to watch the show.

Pyr smiled. He had counted on this childish behavior. The guards rushed to circle the throne. They formed another band of protection beyond the perimeter of the energy web rather than rushing the lone enemy behind the statue. Pilsane began picking them off from his more protected position. The return fire was blistering, but Pilsane continued to cope. Pyr used Pilsane's diversionary shots to edge his way along the wall. Once he was in position, he decided he would have to take care of the guards behind the throne himself. He would lose the advantage of surprise, but it couldn't be helped. But the world shook and buckled as he raised his weapon to fire. Pyr was knocked to his knees as a great rumbling roar filled his ears. For a long moment it seemed that the whole building was going to fall down around them.

Earthquake? Martin and Mik, Pyr thought as he jumped to his feet. He didn't know how or what, but he was certain his engineer and the Terran were somehow responsible for whatever had just happened. It felt like half the temple had just been blown away, but the main shrine seemed to have suffered only a good shaking and some fallen masonry. The defense web still glowed its vicious green. Idel was still safe, but his protectors were in disarray. The two Pyr had to get through to reach Idel had been thrown to the floor. One looked to be unconscious, the other was just starting to get up. Pyr grabbed the opportunity and was on the man instantly, giving him no chance to ever rise again. With the Orlinians out of the way, Pyr took a deep breath and turned to the energy web.

He wanted to close his eyes as he stepped into the deadly green light, but he couldn't afford to indulge the wish. The last time he had walked through this fire it had been set at a low level. This time it was cranked to kill. This time he didn't walk, he ran as fast as he could. The pain seared into him and through him and—

Pyr had the briefest image of Linch holding her as she absorbed the agony and smiled through his own pain as she shielded him from the worst the energy web could do. Moving up the stairs and through the security field took a few excruciating, eternity-long seconds, then Pyr stepped out of the pain and remembered how to breathe.

Sorry, he thought to his wife. Then he stepped around to the front of the dais and smiled at Idel. "Did you miss me?"

The young man screeched in surprise and fury. It was the most satisfying sound Pyr had ever heard. Idel lunged for the security web controls on the throne arm and started to call for his guards. Pyr grabbed him by the throat and lifted the high priest from his seat before Idel could complete either gesture. He held Idel aloft one-handed, fingers pressing hard into the priest's neck.

"Let's talk," he said. He dragged the young man to the edge of the dais, and loosened his hold enough so that Idel could breathe.

Pyr couldn't help but smile proudly as he answered. "Because my goddess is cuter than your goddess."

"And more beautiful and powerful," he added quickly. Roxanne's laughter echoed in his mind, but he concentrated on Idel. He looked into the young man's eyes. There was no arrogance there now, only terror—and fascinated curiosity that bordered on religious awe. "Yes," Pyr told Idel after a moment. "I am death. Worshipping me might be a good idea." What Pyr wanted were answers, not adoration. He wanted to know how many Meek missionaries Idel had sneaked across the border to infect the Outsiders, as the Orlinians called the People. He wanted to know where each death-loving parasite was now. He wanted to know how the high priest had made his bargain with the Trin and every other detail of the conspiracy, but he would take all that from Idel's head soon enough.

He asked, "Was the girl's biting me an accident? A whim on her part, or did you order it?" Pyr looked forward to shaking the boy like a rag doll if he didn't answer fast enough. The sound of weapons fire grew louder and more intense in the background. Pyr became aware that Mik, Axylel, and Martin had arrived to help Pilsane, that Roxanne and Linch would be in the sanctuary in moments.

"No death is an accident on my world," Idel answered without any urging. "The plan the Bucon and Trin agreed to was to get you off world, draw you to Halfor. It was thought you would die deep in the Empire and take some of our other enemies with you along the way. I didn't trust that the Bucons could finish you off. I commanded Lita to poison you and tell you she killed you as a festival present. It was my own private diversion. It amused me to know you were already dying when I set you on the scent." Idel laughed, a low, fatalistic sound. The slight movement he made might have been a shrug.

They looked at each other with the understanding that nothing further needed to be said.

Pyr took a few efficient moments to strip the death goddess's high priest of every thought in his mind. The process was brutal by its very nature, but over quickly. When he was done, Pyr knew what he needed to know and Idel of Orlin no longer existed as an intelligent being. Pyr did Idel a favor and quickly broke his neck. Then he shook off the despondency brought on by such an act, switched off the security web, and turned to face the triumphant crew of the Raptor.

They were all there, everyone he loved, standing at the base of the dais, unhurt, and radiating satisfaction. His bondmate, his son, his friends—covered in pride, glowing with the triumph of the moment. All of them had been in enough fights to appreciate how transitory the sensation was, but right now they didn't care. They were all looking at him and grinning. There was much left to do, but he smiled as he started down the stairs. The universe wasn't saved, it never was, but a little part of it was going to be all right. They'd killed enough people for one day. They could rest now.

And party, Roxanne thought as she rushed up the shallow steps to meet him. "We need to party. And have lunch."

He held her close and kissed her. "Of course," he said. "Acting omnipotent always makes you hungry." Then he put his arm around Roxanne's shoulder, she put her arm around his waist, and they went down to join the others.

"It's been—eventful," Martin said. "And that's probably the least incriminating thing I can say about the last couple of weeks."

"Incriminating?" Roxy laughed. "Okay, so there's the thing with the cloak, but you've behaved in exemplary fashion otherwise. If anybody's going to get court-martialed…"She shrugged. "I think I've got a way around that."

Martin leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table. "I'll be interested in hearing it."

It had been four days since they'd walked through the Door back to the ship from the temple with their arms full of the dead Trin's data. Martin wasn't actually sure how much time had passed since the day he and Glover arrived on Bonadem, but for all practical purposes, a couple of weeks would do. Besides, he'd lost over a decade in those two weeks. He wasn't sure if Reine could adjust his age back to normal. Roxy had told him she didn't know how to age someone, but she'd looked so teasing when she made the claim he wasn't sure he believed her. Girl was downright giddy with love at the moment. He decided not to worry about it until he got home. Home. Damn, but he was homesick. And he thought the most surprising thing about this whole long, strange trip was that Pyr was letting him go home. In fact, he wasn't the only one Pyr was letting return to the United Systems.

There were several reasons, and Martin wasn't sure which Pyr found the most compelling. There was all the disease data he was allowing Martin to take back with him. Then there was Pyr's little problem with the Pirate League. Pyr's heroics might make him the darling of the galaxy, but wouldn't impress the League loan sharks who'd helped finance his pirate operation one little bit. The League was ancient and evil and insidious, its influence so well hidden that its existence was frequently disputed. Even heroes didn't want the League mad at them.

But the League had underestimated the United Systems' determination to exterminate the Trin and those who helped them. Taking in the surviving Trin warlords had been a very bad policy for the League. And a good excuse for the United Systems to eat into the League's huge power base. The Systems might not be able to destroy the League—it was ancient, powerful and insidious, after all. But it wasn't omnipotent. Every little piece of intelligence that the Systems could gather on the League's operations and weaknesses was being compiled. MilService and the SysSec were carefully plotting out a secretive and insidious offensive of their own. Pyr's datarat son had a nice collection of useful information on the Pirate League. This information would contribute to keeping the League too busy fighting the United Systems to go after Pyr.

Of course, Martin felt half-sorry for anybody who was suicidal enough to go after someone as tough as Pyr. He chuckled, thinking, and God help anyone fool enough to disturb the domestic bliss of one of the Shirah girls.

Martin looked around the central common-room table where they all sat. Axylel was beside him, glad of the company of those he loved, yet itching to be away as well. Mik slouched in his chair, tinkering with something as usual. Pilsane had a stack of datacubes in front of him, and held a cup of hot chocolate in one hand. Pyr was sipping a glass of wine. Everyone else had coffee. Pilsane pushed the datacubes across to Martin when Martin looked his way. Linch was playing his ligret, his head bent forward so that his blade-sharp features were obscured. Roxy and Pyr sat opposite Martin. They held hands.

Martin still wasn't sure how he felt about their being bonded, but there wasn't anything he could do about it. He did have this vague feeling he should take Pyr aside and give him a stern, fatherly lecture about looking after his little girl. Martin also had the feeling that Pyr was a lot older than he was, a whole lot older than he was, even without Martin's current teenage status. Pyr didn't look much over thirty, but Axylel was around twenty, and had told Martin that he was twelve years younger than his sister. It looked like the aliens on the other side of the Rose had long lifespans. Reine would be interested to know that. She'd always been curious about who lived beyond the Rose, had written a song about it and—

And Racqel had always known that Roxy would bond with a great warrior. Martin stroked his jaw. Hmm. Maybe the Shirah sisters weren't going to be at all surprised at the news he was bringing home. Maybe the koltiri had always known where their little sister was destined to end up. And maybe this had something to do with what Roxy had to say about her status with the rules and regs of MilService.

Roxy sat back in her chair and looked smug. "By resigning my field commission and accepting a different position, of course."

"Mrs. Kaddani is now an official position? Or are you becoming Roxy the Pirate Queen?"

Roxy said, "I'm being appointed the United Systems ambassador to the People. Not exactly officially," she added. The People at the table looked at her, expressions ranging from mild surprise to mild indignation. "I am of the People now," she said, looking at each member of the clan in turn and bringing her gaze back to Martin when she was certain they'd been mollified. "But I am also koltiri of Koltir Prime; my duty is to continue the Genesis. My genetic gift now belongs to the People. The koltiri will communicate my mission to the Council, and the Council will put up with it for the chance to finally have a communications link to the Borderers. Besides, you and I saved the Systems' ass from the plague and took out two Trin, with a great deal of Borderer help," she said. "They owe us and the Borderers and know it. You always know how to collect your debts."

"That I do." Martin sorted through the datacubes in front of him. He was taking a great deal of information home with him. There was certainly enough here for Roxy to get away with just about anything. Well, there was one person who wouldn't forgive her her trespasses in exchange for what she'd accomplished. After a few minutes of considering how to approach the subject, Martin looked at his sister-in-law and settled on bluntness. "What about Eamon?"

Roxy was neither surprised nor indignant. She pushed a sealed message disk across the table. The small square of black landed amid the multi-colored stack of datacubes, looking ominous but unimportant. "I wrote him a letter," she said. She laughed, a soft sound with no humor in it. A discordant sound from the ligret added more punctuation to her words than her laughter.

Martin glanced at Pyr, but had no clue to what the alien was thinking. This was disturbing, because he rarely had trouble figuring out what anyone was thinking. He tried to accept that what went on between Pyr, Roxy, and Eamon was none of his business, but he wasn't much good at accepting that anything wasn't his business. "What's the letter say, Sting?"

"That a shalsae bond rescinds a contracted marriage," Pyr answered for the indignant Roxy. "She also gave the name of her family's lawyer, should Captain Merkrates wish to pursue legal action. I added the place where I would be happy to fight a duel to the death should he choose a more permanent form of divorce." Pyr's laugh was relaxed, and had a great deal of humor in it. It was also punctuated by Linch on ligret. "Satisfied, almost-father-of-my-mate?"

Axylel reached over and touched Martin on the arm. "Everything's settled. Can we go now?" He rose and made a formal gesture. "Bye, Dad. Farewell, Second-Mother. Good fortune to my clan and friends to my clan." He looked impatiently at Martin and jerked his head toward the door.

They had stolen a Bucon cutter from the spaceport on Orlin and modified it with a small-scale version of the Shireny cloak. With the modifications complete and all the Trin data sorted, Martin was taking the cutter home. Axylel was coming along. The idea had been Martin's, but Axylel thought it was his. The kid's head still needed a lot of work, and Dr. Braithwaithe didn't fancy leaving a patient if he didn't have to.

On an unspoken level, Axylel knew full well what Martin was up to but, on the conscious level, he accepted that his natural curiosity was leading him to find out what life was like on a sector ship. There were always thousands of civilians on board sector ships, for education or doing research or simply being transported to colony worlds. It would be easy enough for the chief of security of the Odyssey to sponsor a young man from one of the Bucon border worlds who had helped save the United Systems from the Sagouran plague for as long a stay as he liked.

Pyr wasn't keen on letting his son out of his sight after so recently getting him back, but he also knew Martin's reasons—and how valuable having the clan datarat on board the same ship as Betheny and Reine Shirah might prove to be. Martin had assured Pyr that the challenge of trying to find ways around the security screen that protected the secrets of the Shireny team would be a therapeutic challenge for Axylel. And Martin assured himself that Axylel would learn exactly what Martin thought might come in handy for the defense of the Rose border for both the Systems and the People.

The others rose as well. Linch even put down his ligret. Martin did not expect the tight embrace he received from the taciturn pilot. Or the whispered, "I will take care of them."

"And I will do the same," Martin whispered back. Then Roxy grabbed him and gave him a fierce hug. Then she held him out at arms' length and they said together, "It's been—incriminating." And her laughter this time was genuine as they hugged again. Martin kissed her and Pyr made a noise, but when Martin looked up Pyr was embracing his son. The next thing he knew he was folded in a huge bear hug by Mik, and finally Pilsane shook his hand and touched his shoulder. Martin would check himself for bugs planted by Pilsane later.

Then is was time to go, with Mik the only one who elected to accompany them all the way to the cutter bay. The time for sentiment was over. Martin accepted that. They all had a great deal of work to do. There was still plague to be stopped on many worlds, and the chaos among the Bucon could not be allowed to spread. Roxy had said she might go cure the emperor after all, and Pyr said he'd think about it. Martin had his own work to do. He wanted to get home before his son was born. He wanted to take his family in his arms singly and in groups and hold them tight and make love to them in celebration. He wanted to go, but he turned his head once more as he reached the common room door.

Over his shoulders he caught one last glimpse of Roxy and Pyr. The pirate and his queen were kissing.

"Going to be a hot night," Martin said, and followed Mik and Axylel out the door.

One year in the life of a woman that changes everything. Challenging what she believes to be true, and making her see what she doesn't believe. Susan Danville can be the best weapon mankind has ever had against disease, or the mother of a new plague.

"… an intriguing medical thriller… a unique, very enjoyable tale." Midwest Book Review

Kherin is the Goddess' Chosen, Prince of the golden lands of Khassan. Rythian is a skilled hunter and scout, destined for greater glory. They meet on the Tribute Trail, one a slave, the other a ruler. Together they forge new destinies for both their people.

"… more than enough twists and turns to keep even a jaded reader reading faster and faster." Fantasy Reviews

Gates of Hell

By

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

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Chapter Four

Chapter Five

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Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

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Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

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Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven