Ammonite Stars (Omnibus): Ammonite Galaxy #4-5 (29 page)

ARCAN DROPPED THEM directly into the first floor medical centre of the 367
^th
skyrise, back on Valhai, and Vion 49 appeared in front of them, transported at the same time from Coriolis.

Vion didn’t seem at all surprised to see them. He smiled around at them, both at the people he knew and those that he didn’t, until he realized that Cimma was lying unconscious on one of the beds. His face fell. “What happened?”

Six, Diva and Grace looked at each other. Grace was the one to speak. “It is a long story, Vion. Basically she was under severe mental stress, and became unconscious.” She wasn’t sure how much more she should or could tell him.

The doctor was already checking Cimma’s vital signs. “Hmm. Her constants are within acceptable limits. I need space here, though. Please all go away.”

“All of us?” asked Grace, in a small voice.

He nodded. “You too, Grace. You are only in the way at the moment. I will let you know when Cimma comes around. Will you be in the 256
^th
skyrise?”

Grace nodded, and they vanished, leaving Vion to tend to his patient. Arcan took them straight to the 21
^st
floor of the 256
^th
skyrise, and hovered as they sat down around the large table in the eating area.

The man who spoke to canths looked around the skyrise with interest, but was anxious to get back to the New Independence. “I should really get back to the ship now. The canths will need careful care if they are to get their strength back quickly.”

“Then Arcan will take you back to them straight away,” said Six. “Won’t you, Arcan?”

Arcan shimmered. “I would first like to hear exactly what happened on Pictoria, if you don’t mind, and then I will make sure that you all get back to where you need to be.”

So they told him everything, one of them starting part of the story and then somebody else telling him what happened next. Most of them hadn’t heard the whole story, so there were exclamations and gasps as the full details came out. Even Tallen and Petra chipped in with their own experiences, Tallen for once managing not to sound hostile. Arcan listened intently, light rippling up and down the shadowy figure. At last he was satisfied.

“Then we do not have to worry about the Dessites?” he asked.

“I think we do.” Six was adamant. “They have just been worsted in a battle, but they will attack again, unless we can convince them not to.”

“You think we should try to negotiate with them?” Diva raised a dubious eyebrow.

“Not necessarily. But I am sure they will be back, so in the end we may have to convince them – one way or another – that what they are doing will have no good consequences for them or anybody else.”

“But for the time being they will stay on Dessia,” said Arcan. “They cannot have come out of that experience unscathed. It will take them time to regroup, and to come up with new ways of attack. The canths have gained us time.”

Diva looked curiously at Arcan. “Have you managed to make any progress on finding a way to escape those carbon nanographite traps?”

Arcan shook his head. “One thing at a time. At least now we know that the canths can combat the mental attacks.”

Grace was worried about something else. “Who are we going to tell about all this? Do you think the whole Binary System should know?”

Diva shook her head. “Of course not!”

Arcan gave a shimmer of gold, a ripple of light. “I will not allow the safety of the morphics to be risked by telling the transients here about them.”

The man who spoke to canths looked concerned. “This is of enormous importance to the Xianthans,” he said. “We have found the link between the lost animas of Xiantha and the canths. Why, we have found their original planet! I cannot promise to keep it quiet.”

“It is not for you to share,” said Arcan. “From what you said, the canths let you know what they wished, that they wanted you to take some of them to Pictoria?”

The man who spoke to canths inclined his head respectfully. “Yes, they did,” he said.

“Then they will let others on your planet know about the situation when they think it necessary, will they not?”

The canth keeper thought for a long moment. His face showed his doubt; it was clear to all of them that it was a difficult thing for him to contemplate. “But—”

Arcan darkened. “Contact your canths. See what they think, whether they want the rest of the binary system to know, whether they wish you to share this information with the other panchromes.”

The canth keeper’s eyes lost their focus as he tried to speak to the canths. The others were silent, out of respect.

Then he stirred, and gave a sigh. “You are right,” he said. “They do not wish me to share their secret. How did you know?” The canth keeper looked uncomfortable. “I must keep their confidence, it seems, but I lose colour by doing so.”

Arcan shimmered. “I am unfamiliar with the rules of your home planet, but I do not think you will lose colour by listening to the canths and the lost animas. After all, they have trusted you with their secret.”

Six looked around at all of the group. “Then, can we agree to maintain what happened on Pictoria a secret? Are you all in agreement?”

All the others nodded, except Tallen and Petra. Six met their gaze unblinkingly and waited. The brother and sister finally looked at each other, exchanged some sort of unspoken signal, and then reluctantly nodded their heads. “We agree,” said the boy.

“In that case, could I please be transported back to the ship, where I can attend the canths?” The man who spoke to canths stood up.

Arcan nodded, and the Xianthan disappeared as Arcan transported him away.

The others sat down to wait, except for Diva, who made her way purposefully towards the sleeping area, where she could get a bath. There wasn’t enough wine in the whole of Sell to make it into anything like a decent soak, but hot water and soap were definitely better than nothing.

TWO HOURS LATER, Grace was on her way back to the medical skyrise. She knew that Vion had told her to stay away, but half a day had gone past, and she thought she was entitled to check out her mother’s progress. Since Six and Diva were trying to show Ledin how to dance on the musical squares, amidst gales of laughter, she had decided to slip over to the 367
^th
skyrise on her own.

When Grace walked into the reception chamber she felt immediately that something was wrong, something was slightly out of kilter. She froze, and her eyes searched her surroundings, trying to pinpoint just what it was that had made her feel so wary. She put one hand on the scabbard of her catana, and listened attentively.

Sure enough, after a few seconds, she became aware of the sound which had disturbed her senses. There was a soft dragging noise coming from the small hospital section of the first floor of the medical skyrise; a slow rustling and shuffling that was completely out of place.

Grace stopped breathing, and melted out of sight behind one of the enormous magmite pillars separating the reception area from the hospital area.

Amanita came into sight, walking cumbersomely backwards, slowly dragging a dead weight which had been placed on a blanket. There was a mask pack dangling from her waist, and she was dressed in a bodywrap. The widow was breathing heavily; the task of dragging the burden was clearly proving almost too much for her. All her concentration was on the task; she had detected no movement behind her.

Grace found herself staring at the weight in the middle of the blanket. It was Cimma, unconscious, and with her hands and feet tied together. As Grace looked upon the prone figure of her mother, lying at the mercy of her own daughter-in-law, for the first time in her life she felt a hard white, unstoppable fury overtake her. Adrenalin coursed into her veins and pure instinct took over.

Without knowing quite how she got there, or what her intentions were, she found herself behind Amanita, and her catana was at the woman’s throat. Grace herself was breathing quickly now, and her heart was racing.

“Just where were you planning to go with my mother, Amanita?” she asked softly.

Amanita had dropped the corners of the blanket as soon as she felt steel at her own throat. Now she turned around slowly, and Grace saw that her face was distorted with hatred.

“Going to kill me, are you, Grace?” she jeered. “My husband and Atheron not enough for you? I knew you and your traitor friends would crawl back to Valhai at some stage. I have been waiting for you.”

Grace considered. Some of the rage had left her now; a small voice of reason was attempting to make itself heard above the clamour for revenge inside her head. She looked along the length of her arms. Some distant part of her brain noted a small cut on her sister-in-law’s neck, where the catana had sliced into her flesh. Bright red blood was welling up in the wound, and drops of it were trickling down her neck. Grace’s own hands were trembling as they held the catana pressed against Amanita’s throat. Part of her was insisting that she finish all this, that she get rid of the woman once and for all. Amanita must have read that intention in Grace’s normally composed eyes, for she took an involuntary step backwards, fell over the edges of the blanket and tumbled down on top of Cimma. Instead of righting herself, she drew the back of her hand nervously across her mouth and lay where she was.

Grace stared down at her, surprised to feel no shadow of compunction. “I suppose you weren’t about to kill Cimma?” she said. “Or have you already injected her with a lethal dose of Trenexadine, like you did with me last year?”

Amanita laughed, a light, high-pitched laugh that would have curdled the blood of her children, had they heard it. “I would have,” she admitted in a far-away voice, “but Vion had locked the drug storeroom when he went away. Luckily I had … back-up plans.”

Grace sent Vion heartfelt thanks for his carefulness. Her mother would already be dead if he hadn’t been meticulous about safety. Then she looked back at the inert body of her mother, and another unreasoning haze covered her eyes.

“Last year I was helpless,” she said. “I had no means of retaliation; I couldn’t even protect myself, let alone anybody else. Today I can. And I will.”

Amanita raised one hand, as if to ward her off, and cowered back theatrically. “You killed my husband,” she accused. “I am entitled—”

“
Entitled
? You are crazy. I wasn’t even in the cage when he and Atheron were killed. They had pushed me out … twenty miles up! Be reasonable, Amanita. How could it possibly be my fault?”

“I suppose you are going to say it was their own fault?” demanded Amanita.

Grace blinked. “Of course it was!” She shook her head slightly. Was it her, or was Amanita not making sense?

“They were defending the true Valhai. You have made them martyrs to the cause. A cause I shall carry on – to my dying day. I will make sure that they are never forgotten!”

A cold sensation of inevitability ran through Grace, and she stared down at her sister-in-law. For a long moment she wished that she had been a different sort of person, as the anger ate away into her resolution. Then she made up her mind. “I cannot let you harm anybody else. I am sorry.” She lifted the catana with both of her hands. Amanita twisted, and fumbled inside a deep pocket as Grace tilted the blade towards herself, and swung at the widow with all the power of the hilt of the catana, aiming only to knock her out cold.

The hilt caught Amanita on the jaw. But the slight movement she had made saved her from the full force of the blow. As her jaw snapped back, she extricated a canister of the same spray she had used to put Cimma into an unconscious state, and aimed it firmly into Grace’s face.

Grace dropped the catana, and put both hands up to her face. Her eyes were misting over, and she began to collapse to the floor, horrified. As she slipped into unconsciousness herself, she saw Amanita through the increasing haze. Her sister-in-law had slipped on a mask pack to avoid breathing in the spray herself, and was grinning with triumph.

“Perhaps you should have killed me when you could!” she crowed. “It’s too late now!”