Dragonback 03 Dragon and Slave

Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37

With a slight change in engine pitch, and a small ripple of
vibration through the deck, the
Essenay
came off the ECHO
stardrive.

They had arrived at the planet Brum-a-dum.

Stretched out on his belly on the dayroom floor, Draycos hunched
himself up onto his front paws and looked around. Over by the wall,
fourteen-year-old Jack Morgan was seated at the narrow table, his
elbows on the edge, his chin propped up in his hands. He was peering
down at the table's surface, moving his lips silently. Concentrating on
his studies, the boy had apparently missed the fact that the
Essenay
had returned to normal space.

Draycos turned his attention toward the camera/speaker/microphone
setup that allowed the ship's computer to monitor the room's
activities. In the dark lens of the camera he caught a distorted
glimpse of his own long, triangular head and the spiny crest starting
between his glowing green eyes and extending down his long back. Like a
dragon the size of a small tiger, Jack had said at their first meeting.

The description had intrigued Draycos, and he'd spent several
hours over the past two months researching the topic of dragons in the
Essenay
's
library. Some of the stories he'd found had been rather flattering.
Others had definitely not been. "Well?" he called toward the camera.

"Well what?" Uncle Virge's voice came back, sounding grumpy.

"I thought perhaps you would like to announce our arrival,"
Draycos said mildly.

Jack looked up from the table. "We're here?" he asked. "Uncle
Virge?"

"Yes, we're here," the computerized voice confirmed reluctantly.
"Don't get excited—I'm still scanning the area. That could take a
while."

Jack threw a knowing look at Draycos. "Come on, Uncle Virge, quit
stalling," the boy said. "We already know where the Chookoock family
estate is. Just plot us a landing course and take us down."

"It's not that simple, Jack lad," Uncle Virge protested. "There
are airway lanes to be located, arrival procedures to be observed,
Brummgan customs documents to be filed—"

"And you can do all of that with your eyes shut," Jack
interrupted. "Just take us down, okay?"

There was an audible sigh from the speaker. Uncle Virge was a sort
of ghostly echo of Jack's Uncle Virgil, the conman and safecracker
who'd raised the boy after his parents' deaths when he was three.
Before Uncle Virgil's own death a year ago, he'd somehow managed to
implant a version of his personality into the
Essenay
's
computer. With only that personality to keep him company, Jack had
continued on, taking odd shipping jobs to support himself as he flew
alone between the stars of the galaxy's Orion Arm.

Alone, that is, until Draycos, poet-warrior of the K'da, had
crashed unexpectedly into his life.

Uncle Virge didn't like Draycos. He didn't like Draycos's
warrior's ethic, or his continued presence aboard the
Essenay
,
or the fact that he had dragged Jack into his private mission.

And he
certainly
didn't like this plan. "Jack, lad, really
now, this is just plain crazy," he said, his voice soft and earnest.
"Even by
my
standards. Can't we take just a little more time to
think about it? There
has
to be a better way to find these
mercenaries of yours."

Jack looked back down at the tabletop, his eyes avoiding
Draycos's. He was trying hard to hide his feelings, but Draycos could
see the tension in his face. Jack didn't like the plan any more than
Uncle Virge did.

Which made it unanimous, because Draycos didn't much like it
either.

But they were running out of choices. More importantly, they were
running out of time. In four months the main fleet of K'da and Shontine
refugee ships would reach the Orion Arm after their long, weary voyage
across space. Their final goal was the uninhabited planet of Iota
Klestis; but first they would be stopping at a rendezvous point known
only to the fleet and the commanders of the advance team.

Except that all of those advance team commanders were dead. Their
ships had been attacked as they arrived at Iota Klestis, and everyone
aboard except Draycos had been killed by the unstoppable Death weapon
of their enemies, the Valahgua. The attackers had then taken control of
the ships, and by now had surely discovered the location of the
upcoming rendezvous.

All Draycos and Jack had to go on was the fact that the Valahgua
had picked up some allies among the various human and alien beings of
the Orion Arm. A mercenary group, almost certainly, one which they
already knew employed Brummgas. If they could identify that group, they
might have a chance of locating the rendezvous point themselves before
the refugees arrived.

If they couldn't, the fleet would fly straight into an ambush . . .
and the K'da and Shontine peoples would cease to exist.

"Maybe there
is
a better way, Uncle Virge," Jack said.
"But I'll be stripped, sanded, and varnished if I can come up with one."

"You could still take this to StarForce," Uncle Virge said.

"We've been through all this," Jack reminded him sourly.
"StarForce, the Internes, and every other government agency is out
because we don't know who we can trust."

"Then how about Cornelius Braxton?" Uncle Virge persisted. "He
owes you big-time for pulling his marshmallows out of the fire the way
you did during Arthur Neverlin's big power grab."

Jack shook his head. "You don't create a megacorporation like
Braxton Universis without a lot of brains and a lot more ruthlessness,"
he pointed out. "Grateful or not, ten to one he'd try to twist all this
to his own advantage." The boy's lip twitched. "Besides, I don't think
Neverlin's given up, and I'd rather not be standing anywhere near
Braxton when he makes his next move. No, for right now it's got to be
just you and me and Draycos."

"But to throw yourself into a slavemaster's lap?" Uncle Virge
protested. "What if he doesn't go for it?"

"He will," Jack assured him. "Slavemasters are in the business for
the money. All we have to do is make sure the offer is too good to pass
up."

"And if you can't get out afterward?"

"What, with my trusty K'da poet-warrior at my side?" Jack threw a
strained smile at Draycos.

"I'm sure he'll be a big help," Uncle Virge said, his tone making
it clear he wasn't sure of that at all. "But why go in as a thief? Why
not as a soldier looking for work?"

"I've tried being a soldier," Jack said. "You saw how well it
worked."

"You lived through it," Uncle Virge countered. "That says a lot."

Jack snorted. "Not really," he said. "Anyway, what do you suggest
I use for references? Ask them to get in touch with the Whinyard's
Edge?"

"Besides, the Chookoock family already has many mercenaries to
hire out," Draycos put in. "That is why we chose this particular slave
dealer, after all."

"Yes, I remember the logic, thank you," Uncle Virge said icily. "I
just don't think it's going to be easy for a slave to get into their
personnel records."

"It'll be a lot easier from in there than it would be from out
here," Jack said. "Look, it's not that big a deal. A quick flip-and-dip
into their computer, you swoop the
Essenay
in, and we all fade
together into the sunrise."

Uncle Virge sniffed. "You make it sound so easy."

"Easier than the job we did aboard the
Star of Wonder
,"
Jack said. "At least here I'll have you and the
Essenay
on hand
to back me up."

"Maybe," Uncle Virge said ominously. "Maybe not. Slavemaster
estates aren't the easiest places in the world to break into, you know.
When push comes to shove comes to a poke in the snoot, I may not be
able to do much from the outside. In which case, you and your K'da
poet-warrior will be on your own."

"We've been on our own before," Jack reminded him. Still, Draycos
could see the boy's throat muscles tighten a little more. "Quit
stalling. Let's get to it."

Uncle Virge sighed. "If you insist," he said. "I suppose you'll
want a look at the place before we land."

"That would be nice," Jack said dryly. "Pipe it back here, will
you?"

The display screen on the dayroom wall had been showing a
pleasant, peaceful scene of a sunlit mountain pass. Now it changed to a
view of a cloud-mottled, bluish-green landscape far below. "How soon
till we can see something?" Jack asked.

"Give me a chance, Jack lad," Uncle Virge huffed. "We've only just
reached the planet."

"Okay, okay, don't pop a port," Jack said soothingly. "I can work
on this awhile longer."

"What help may I offer?" Draycos asked, padding across the room to
Jack's side and looking down at the table. Jack had turned the surface
transparent, and on the displays beneath it were rows of what looked
like wiggled tracks made by extremely startled worms.

"It's a group of common Brummgan words, written in Brummgan
script," Jack said. "Most Orion Arm computers have automatic
translators built in, so I shouldn't have any trouble reading their
data lists once I'm in. But there might be other stuff along the way
I'll need to be able to read."

"Very likely," Draycos agreed. "How may I help?"

"That screen over there shows the translations," Jack said,
pointing to the far end of the table. "I'll mix these up and then try
to read them. You see if I get them right."

They went through the drill twice, with Jack missing only seven
words the first time and four the second. By the time they were
finished, the dayroom display was showing a high-resolution image of
the ground below them.

"You'll have to settle for an angled view," Uncle Virge said as
the image shifted direction a little. "We're heading for the Ponocce
Regional Spaceport, at the southern edge of Ponocce City and about
three miles from the Chookoock estate itself. Given our current vector,
it would look suspicious for us to fly directly over them."

"Just do the best you can," Jack said.

"Right," Uncle Virge said. "Anyway, that's it coming up on the
left, pressed right up against the eastern edge of the city. That white
line there—see it? That's the estate's outer wall."

Stretching out his long neck, Draycos studied the image scrolling
slowly across the display. The estate was a huge one, covering nearly
as much territory as the city alongside it. The ribbon of white that
Uncle Virge had identified as the outer wall snaked across the
landscape, disappearing here and there behind low hills or tall bushes
until it finally vanished completely behind the trees of a thick
forest. Along with the forest, the estate also included neat rectangles
of cropland, areas of bushy undergrowth, a rock quarry, several ponds,
and a small river.

The wall itself was deceptively plain and simple-looking, with no
signs of guard towers or patrolling aircraft. It was almost as if it
was there just for show.