"I make no doubt," she murmured, and of a sudden
did
smile—faintly, but with real warmth. "I feel for you most strongly, new-brother—joined to a clan as outlaw as it is odd!" She glanced aside. "Shan, surely he wants some wine."
"Surely he does, as he's hardly a lackwit," their brother replied, and put a big hand on Ren Zel's shoulder, urging him gently toward the bar. "Come along, child, let us fortify you. Red? White? Brandy?"
"Red, if I may."
Shan extended a long arm and held the decanter high, apparently considering its all-but-full state.
"This seems sufficient to fill your glass, and mine, too. Though I fear we're out if Priscilla is drinking red."
"White, please," her deep voice said.
Ren Zel turned in time to see the door to the innermost chamber—the quarters she shared with her lifemate—slide shut behind her. She smiled.
"Good shift, brother. Have you resigned yourself to your fate?"
He felt his mouth curve into an answering smile. "As fates go, it appears . . . less tiresome than some," he told her. "I do look forward to a conversation with my lady. There are those things that we must settle between us."
There was a sound to the right, as if Nova had sneezed, but Priscilla merely nodded gravely.
"You may then rejoice in the news that our sister brings us," Shan said, putting a glass of the red in his hand. "We are returning to Liad, immediately!"
"Do not allow Shan to persuade you that you will be with your lady
immediately
," Nova cautioned, stepping forward. "The delm's word is that we are to raise Liad, yes. But there we will hang in orbit until he releases us to the planet."
"Weeks, months, years!" Shan intoned, with mock dismay, handing Priscilla her glass.
"Very likely," his sister said gravely, though Ren Zel thought he saw the glimmer of her faint smile.
"Well, in that case, we do what we can to strengthen our spirits. I see a feast has been laid for us, and the only thing that keeps us from enjoying it is Gordy." Shan raised his glass, silver eyes quizzical over the rim. "Or, shall I say, lack of Gordy?"
Priscilla smiled. "He'll be here—soon."
The request for entry chime sounded.
"Or even at once," Shan said and called, "Come!"
The door slid away to admit Gordy Arbuthnot, foster-son of Shan and Priscilla, as well as Shan's true-cousin, on the Terran side.
"Cousin Nova." He bowed, correctly, as between kin, and then walked straight up to Ren Zel, face and eyes serious, shoulders, just a little, stiff.
"Hi, Ren Zel."
"Hello, Gordy," he said, gently, careful of the moods and manners of a halfling. It was not impossible, after all, that Gordy held his cousin Anthora in . . . esteem—and who was Ren Zel dea'Judan to call him a fool?
"Priscilla says you're lifemated—truly lifemated—to Anthora. Is that true?"
"Yes."
The young face relaxed into a smile. "That's great. I'm really glad." He bowed, jauntily. "Ge'shada, pilot. I wish you and yours a life of joy."
Ren Zel felt tears rise, hid them with his own bow. "My thanks."
"And now," said Shan, "we can eat."
THE MEAL was rather less boisterous than the informal reception, for Nova bore news of yet another kinsman. It seemed that Pat Rin yos'Phelium had not followed protocol in terms of reporting in. Nova was inclined to find this disturbing, and solicited the advice of kin. The conversation turning on where Cousin Pat Rin might most reasonably be supposed to have taken himself, and strategies for finding him, Ren Zel was left to listen, and watch, and grow acquainted with these who were now his family.
Listening, he reached for his glass—and froze as his ears became filled with a roaring, not unlike wind, and a voice edged with panic rang inside his skull.
"Ren Zel! I need you!"
There was a moment of heart-numbing cold, and a sensation not unlike passing through a bank of particularly tenacious fog. Ren Zel shook his head, banishing the mist, and discovered himself kneeling on an icy metal floor. Beside him was Anthora, on hands and knees above a char mark.
"Ren Zel?" she whispered.
"Here." He stood—say, he tried to stand, but the ceiling was too low to allow him to do so in comfort; he must need round his shoulders and duck his head. Uncomfortably bent, he looked around him, taking in the hard silver walls, seeing the bright lines of fire bent and twisted back upon themselves, warped and pale, excepting only the conflagration that streamed from the kneeling woman down into the cold floor, for all the worlds like blood rushing from a wound.
"Anthora!" He dared to use the mode of Command. "You must stand."
"Yes." Clumsily, she gained her feet, to stand bent as he was, her hair draggled and limp around a face that was shockingly pale.
"What place is this?" he demanded, moving to her side, crabwise, and slipping an arm around her waist.
"I don't know. I—it is drinking me. The walls—they reflect any ripple of power back, at double—quadruple!—strength. I dare not force the door . . . " She made a breathless sound he scarcely recognized as a laugh. "If I could." She swallowed and pushed her head against his hunched shoulder. She was trembling. He raised a hand and stroked her cold hair.
"Then we open it another way. There must be a control box . . . " He frowned at the featureless walls, the bitter floor, but all was—
"There!"
Anthora stirred, lifted her head a fraction and shook her hair away from her eyes. "Where?"
"Below the decking, there, do you see?" He released her and hunkered down, studying the various relays and switches in the box below the floor. He felt her hand on his shoulder as she lowered herself beside him, peering.
"Yes, I see it," she breathed. "But, beloved, it's on the other side of the floor."
"Hmm," he said, tracing wires with his eyes. "I believe . . . " He pointed. "Do you see that connection? If that were bent aside, the door would open and we could walk away."
"Ren Zel, I cannot reach those elements, and neither can you." Her voice caught. "We're going to die."
"No." He spun on a heel, nearly bowling her over. "We are
not
going to die. Believe it and you do their work for them!"
For one heartbeat—two—she stared at him, eyes wide. Then, she extended a hand to touch his cheek. "I see. Forgive me, denubia. I'll not be so fainthearted again." Her eyes dropped and there was the control box, plainly visible to Ren Zel, and through him, to her. The connection he had pointed out was a fragile thing; why, a cat might bend it aside . . .
"Yes!" Ren Zel whispered. He bent forward and she lost contact. The floor solidified; her inner vision fogged. She grabbed his shoulder.
There, beneath the floor plate, the connection. Hooked around the connection were four pearlescent claws adorning a large and rather furry white foot. The foot pulled, down and sideways. The connection bent, twisted—broke.
Across the tiny silvered room, the door slid open.
Anthora half-rose, staggered, vision whiting, and felt strong arms around her waist, sweeping her off her feet . . .
"RUN!" REN ZEL shouted, his voice already shredded by distance.
She tucked, and hit the floor of the antechamber rolling. She heard a shout; felt hands on her shoulders and wrenched out of the guard's grip, slamming into the legs of a chair, the hidden pistol falling into her hand. The guard lunged, trying to grab her; trying to throw her back into the box.
She fell sideways, and fired point-blank into his face.
The room was quiet; bird song wafting in the open window. Anthora lay on the floor, her back against the chair legs, retching, unable to escape the sight of the guard's head exploding, though her eyes were closed.
Something furry slapped her cheek. She opened her eyes to slits and encountered a familiar furry face very close to her own.
"Merlin." Clumsily, she disentangled herself from the chair and clawed her way to her feet. The door leading to the Council Chamber had an ancient mechanical lock on it, which she snapped into place, singing the praises of whichever god or goddess held soundproofing among their honors.
Door locked, she leaned her back against it, feeling Merlin pressed against her leg. A pleasant breeze informed the room, spiced with the scent of the tripina tree shading the open window. After the draining silver horror of the box, she felt entirely safe and secure here.
And that
, she told herself sternly,
is illusion. Look to reality, dramliza!
Unwillingly she moved from the door; forced herself to approach her former cell, and look within. Empty. That was good. Ren Zel had indeed escaped to safety.
Which she should do—and that quickly. For surely whoever had set the trap would return to remove it. She attempted a scan; wincing as the din from the Chamber slammed into her abused senses.
"We must leave," she whispered. "Merlin . . . "
But the cat was already moving, purposefully, away from the door to the Council Chambers and the misshapen black box, its door gaping open on horror. Anthora turned her face away and followed, averting her eyes as she edged past the body of the guard.
Merlin set a brutal pace through the service corridors. She was soaked with sweat and shaking badly by the time they gained the door that opened to the outside. At that, the luck had held; they'd met no one else on their escape route.
The luck changed when they hit the sidewalk.
"Wait!" She heard a man's voice shout, quite close at hand. "That's her!"
Anthora ran, the sound of pursuit too close behind; caught a glimpse of gray to her right and slightly ahead.
Dodging respectable pedestrians, she turned a corner, and heard the roar of a familiar motor.
"Jeeves!"
The car accelerated, door rising.
"There she is!" came the shout from behind. Involuntarily, Anthora glanced over her shoulder, saw her two pursuers round the corner, saw the guns in their hands—and the streak of gray, which was Merlin, launching himself, claws extended into the face of the lead gunman.
Roaring, Jeeves arrived, Anthora threw herself into the open hatchway. "Merlin! Come quickly!"
The cat leapt—not for the safe haven, but for the second gunman. He hit the man's shoulder, claws sunk deep.
"Merlin!" Anthora screamed, acceleration pressing her into the seat. The door began to drop. "No! Jeeves, we cannot leave Merlin!"
Implacably, the door fell, locked; the car surged forward, braked, back end swinging 'round and they were hurtling forward into the everyday traffic of a Solcintran afternoon, considerably exceeding the public safety speed, leaving her pursuers, and a large gray cat, behind.
Anthora began to cry.
"RUN!" HE SHOUTED. "The door is open!"
Gasping, he fell, his shoulder slamming against the hard floor, his vision a chaos of images, overlain by fiery threads. He concentrated, saw her hit the floor rolling, as a pilot would, gun in hand as she fired and—and lost that image entirely, replaced by a bright-lit room and the unmistakable taste of ship's air. An arm came 'round his shoulders, easing him up; a squeeze bottle was forced into his hand.
"Drink, " said Priscilla Mendoza. "Electrolytes."
He managed to get the bottle to his lips, squeezed a healthy mouthful and swallowed with a shudder. He felt the vile stuff hit his stomach, mixing uneasily with dinner and terror.
"Easy." Priscilla's hand was firm and sisterly on his shoulder; squinting through the haze of golden lines, he made out Nova standing above him; purple eyes holding an emotion he identified as astonishment.
"Drink again," Priscilla told him. "Then food."
"And at some point, when you feel it proper," said Nova, "you will tell us what just happened to you."
"Nova, let be," Shan said sternly, from beyond Ren Zel's vision.
"Let be? Did he or did he not sit there—frozen and scarcely breathing—for the best part of half-an-hour? Does he have these fits often? I wonder what will go forth, should he have one at the board."
"Nova . . . " A clear warning note, there.
Ren Zel finished the stuff in the squeeze bottle, concentrated and set it carefully on the floor. He looked up into Priscilla's face, squinting a little to bring her into focus among all the pulsating golden threads . . .
"Better?" she asked.
"There is a device," he said, "that eats dramliz."
Her face hardened. "There have been several such, throughout history."
"This one is new," he told her. "It—they caught Anthora."
"What?" Nova drew nearer. "Anthora is at Jelaza Kazone. Not even she would be so shattered-brained as to—"
"Wait." He held up a hand, agitated. "Wait, I . . . " He closed his eyes, and memory flowed.
"The Council—Korval is called to answer—to answer for kinstealing, for murder—and dea'Gauss—dea'Gauss is missing, and he has hidden the dies. They asked her to wait in a Clerk's room and the trap—the trap was there."
"In a room off the Council Chamber?" That was Shan again, his voice as serious as Ren Zel had ever heard it. "Sister, if the Council itself is hunting us, I doubt the delm's wisdom in returning to Liad."
"We must," Nova said, but she hardly sounded certain. "At least to orbit—but Anthora is a prisoner!"
"No, she's not," Priscilla said coolly. "The door was open—you heard him say so."
"The door opened," he agreed. "But I could not stay with her. I do not know . . . " It came to him that he might use those glowing lines of power to his own ends. He might, in fact, go back to her, stand at her side and work with her to the destruction of their enemies. He—
"Gently, friend," Shan said, dropping into his range of vision in a veritable burst of gold. "You have done much this hour. Eat first." He held out a sandwich. Ren Zel took it, suddenly ravenous, despite the food he had already eaten, and wolfed it in three bites. A second sandwich appeared and he accorded it the same treatment, then drained the glass of tea that came after.
He sighed. "I am glad," he murmured, "to find the gridwork so strong here. Inside the box, one could hardly see the threads, and those that could be seen were pale and fragmented."