Asarlai Wars 1: Warrior Wench (7 page)

After a few minutes she found the number and tapped it into the ship’s comm system. “Flarik? I know you’re going down for sleep, but I need you.” Vas tried to sound as understanding as possible but she’d had a shitty twenty-four hours and wasn’t in the mood. However, pissing off a sleepy Wavian often led to a radically shorter life, even for a mercenary captain.

A low voice chimed in after a few seconds. “What is it, Captain? I need to hibernate.”

“You’ll have time to go under before we take off. But I need you to come to my ready room.”

A sigh on the other end told Vas that Flarik fought off her sleep. “I will be there.” 

Terse, but not bad for a Wavian who had been awake for a month.

Deven’s idea of bringing in the lawyer was a sound one, even if he did it to keep Vas out of the space station cops’ way. She also needed someone who enjoyed mystery, deceit, and drama to look into other things for her. A lawyer, particularly a Wavian lawyer, would be the perfect choice.

Flarik had only taken a few minutes to get to her ready room, yet as always, she arrived impeccably dressed and groomed. No matter which gender she chose, or those disturbing times of being neither, Flarik always appeared immaculate. Vas fingered her wild red hair and sighed in envy.

She waited until Flarik took her seat with a slight ruffle of her perfect white feathers. The feathers were very short, but perfect, whatever color they were at that moment. Along with switching genders, Wavians could change their coloring at a whim.

“What did you need to see me for, Captain?” Flarik folded her delicate, clawed hands neatly in her lap. She looked prim and proper until she went into action with those claws. Vas would have hired her regardless of her legal skills based on the claws alone.

“Sorry for dragging you out. But there’s been an explosion.” Vas called up the images from outside the ship on her screen. She quickly played the explosion and resulting fireball. “That was Skrankle, the bastard who’s responsible for us being on this ship.”

Flarik nodded as Vas spoke. “You mean the fine individual who gave us this ship as recompense for the accidental dismemberment of our own? He did give you the papers, yes?”

Vas laughed softly. “I forced him to
give them to me, but yes, he gave me the papers. This is ours.”

“Excellent,” Flarik said. “I will explain this to the officers when they arrive. I’m sure they will not wish to detain us.” She flashed a grin, but unlike Deven’s it didn’t comfort. Even after all these years Vas still wasn’t used to those teeth. Three rows of razor sharp, albeit very tiny, teeth. She didn’t want to think about the rumors that went around about those teeth before the Wavians joined the Commonwealth.

“It’s a good thing that we were still in port when this happened. It might have appeared as if you were leaving the scene of a crime.” Flarik rose and turned toward the door. “Good day, Captain.”

“Actually, us still being here is something else I wanted to discuss. How long will you be sleeping this time?”

Flarik clicked her teeth in thought, literally reading her body. “I’d say through the arrival at our next battle. It is in six days, yes?” At Vas’s nod she continued. “Yes, I would say I should wake right when we get there.” She cocked her head. Her golden eyes focused sharply, giving the unhealthy impression of staring down prey. “Why?”

“There have been too many unhealthy things happening lately. I need someone to see what the pattern is. I’d like to have Gosta start looking into it. He can hand off anything he finds once you wake.” A surge of embarrassment snuck in, but she pushed it aside. Vas had always dealt with her personal problems on her own, asking others was a new and uncomfortable situation. Delegating was needed for her line of work—she didn’t like it in her personal business.

Flarik gave a tight nod. “That will be acceptable.”

Vas waited a few minutes after Flarik left then went back on the bridge.

“Gosta, can you come here?” Vas motioned for him to come over to a small console near the command chair. “We need to find our ship, our real ship. I pulled up the idents before I left Skrankle’s, but I couldn’t get a clear fix. I need you to find at least the star systems where the
Victorious Dead’s
 parts went.” She frowned. “Skrankle might be gone, but the damage he did continues. Can you locate the parts?”

“I think so,” Gosta said as he fiddled with the computer. When he didn’t find anything immediately, Vas went to her own console and fussed with pulling up system records for Lantaria.

“Captain? You may wish to see this.” Gosta beamed, a few minutes later. “A few bits of ship you might want to see again.” He tapped a few green spots on the crowded screen. “It looks like Skrankle parted the ship out quickly once you didn’t show. Or he did it right after you dropped it off. Regardless, those parts took a fast trip to the outer rim. But most of them aren’t incorporated into any ships yet.”

She studied the screen; once he pointed them out she saw where the parts were. “So, fourteen? He split her up into fourteen parts?” Not too bad. The main part to find would be the core. That held the brain of the
Victorious Dead
. “You said they weren’t all incorporated. Which parts? Are they in a nearby ship?” The idea of raiding a ship stupid enough to take illegally removed parts sounded lovely. Especially after the way things had been going lately.

Gosta practically rubbed his hands with glee. “That, my dear Captain, is the best part of all.” He pulled the screen toward him and fiddled with adjustments. “See here? This is the
Warrior Wench
, as we sit in dock waiting to leave.” He tapped the center. “And this is the core of the
Victorious Dead
.”

Vas poked at the screen. That idiot Skrankle had put a warship’s core in a pleasure cruiser? “Are you certain? Is it damaged?”

“Yes, I’m certain. And it’s not damaged. Skrankle put a block on it so the
Warrior Wench
would work without tapping into the
Victorious Dead’s
memory portion of the core, but she’s there. He didn’t clean her. He simply overlaid the block.”

She allowed herself her first real smile that day. The most important part of her beloved ship was with her; she only needed to dig it out. The rest of it would have to be gathered, on principle if nothing else.

Finally she shook herself. No reason getting too happy. Things were still far from normal. “Can you check to see if the
Warrior Wench’s
core had been damaged?”

The grin faded from his face. “Already thought of that, Captain. No damage. The
Warrior Wench
is only a few years old, her core still factory perfect and I hate to say it, more advanced than the
Victorious Dead
.”

She swore. “So why did Skrankle gut my ship to add its core into this one? We’re missing something.”

“We may never know now that Skrankle’s gone.”

Flarik broke up the introspection as she came on deck. “The officers completely understand our loss, and hope that we continue to enjoy this ship as the last gift of our gallant supporter, Skrankle.”

Vas continued to be amazed at Flarik’s ability to keep a straight face in any circumstance.

“If you no longer need me, I will resume my sleep preparations.” More statement than request, but Flarik did wait until Vas had acknowledged her with a nod before turning and marching down the hall.

“Why do I always feel like I’ve been chastised when she does that?” Deven spoke from behind her.

“Because you are being chastised,” Vas said. “We all are. I’m grateful she’s on our side. Now, Gosta—”

“Now, Captain,” Terel cut her off as she came into the bridge. “I’ve been calling you for the last ten minutes. We have to get another shot into you. And I want to do more tests on that poison.”

Vas started to argue but Terel wouldn’t let her. “If you’d prefer we can stop the treatments and see if what’s left of that stuff in your system can find a way to kill you.” The look on Terel’s face said there were two options: her way or her way.

“So be it.” Vas raised her hands. “I’ll go let you shoot me with that archaic torture device. Let’s get this over with.”

****

Deven waited until Vas and Terel were gone before turning toward the rest of the room. “Mac, prepare to move out. Gosta, you have the bridge.” He turned toward his own small ready room. There were too many things that he needed to sort out.

One of the most disturbing items concerned his recent reaction to Vas. The last two days he felt an odd tingle in his telepathic senses whenever she stood close. Like he would when near a lover. However, while he and Vas were close, they’d never gone past a solid friendship. Not that he would say no—his captain was a stunning woman. However, she made it clear from the first time they’d met that she would never be involved with a telepath. So why was he thinking about it now?

Something had happened during her extended trip. He’d venture to say a lot of somethings happened. Vas had never been an hour over-due let alone two weeks. The fact that she wouldn’t, or couldn’t, talk about what she had been doing disturbed him. The fact that he couldn’t tell which was the case made things even worse.

He fingered the cuffs on his wrist in thought. If he took them off he would know instantly what had happened to her. However, alarms would go off in Vas’s comm, and he couldn’t risk anyone, even her, knowing that he could remove the cuffs himself.

He’d come close to exposing his ability in the desert, but Vas obviously thought she’d stayed conscious long enough to free him. In truth she had been all but dead when she fell to the desert floor. He’d barely been able to rip off the cuffs in time.

Drells were rarely used even before the Asarlaís were destroyed. The making of them was so arcane, so deadly, that half who tried died slow horrible deaths as the creations destroyed the creators.

So how did one end up on an obscure gambling planet in the body of his captain? A woman who, while well respected in her field, wasn’t anything more than a merc captain. Far more gifted than any he’d ever seen, and after four hundred and fifty years of life he’d seen more than his share, but still not a person who should have people trying to slaughter her with such a weapon when a blaster would do the job.

Had someone tried to poison him and got her? Or decided to poison her to find out how strong of a telepath he really was?

Deven swore under his breath as he packed a small bag. Either could be true. And he knew who to get answers from. He’d be cutting it close to get where he needed to go and be back before the battle began, but he didn’t have a choice. If someone had targeted Vas, he needed to find out why. And if someone had done it to find out the level of his esper abilities, he needed to leave the Commonwealth immediately.

Too many people both inside and outside of the Commonwealth council would love to get their hands on an esper of his level.

He pulled up the star charts, looking for a small planet that he knew would be hidden from him. It took longer than he wanted, but he found it. Now he needed to find a way to jump ship, get his answers, and then return before the battle. And he was going to have to try and talk to someone who would rather kill him. Slowly. Repeatedly. Someone the Commonwealth would also love to get their hands on.

Not all of the Asarlaís were dead.

Chapter Six

“Where’s Deven? I need to talk to him.” Vas scowled at the console while she called the bridge. She hated when Deven turned off his comm. Even though she had said to get the med work done quickly, Terel had managed to confine her for two hours to run “one more test”. Now Deven had wandered off.

“Out. He’s gone out.” Mac spit out the words and cut the comm.

Vas concentrated on the documents she needed Deven’s opinion on, for now ignoring the abrupt cut off from Mac.

A few minutes later she buzzed the bridge again. “Out? Out where? We’ve only left dock, which, by the way we seem to be doing at an advanced speed.” She called up their specs. “Take it easy, Mac. Flarik managed to get the nice cops to leave us alone, but she’ll come out and chew off a few heads if we have to wake her again to deal with a speed warning.”

The silence told her that he weighed the danger. Nevertheless, even he wouldn’t want to be on Flarik’s bad side. “Aye Captain, two clicks below posted speed until we’re out of the station.” Then he cut the comm. Again.

Vas called back. “Mac, where did you say Deven went? I wanted him in my ready room five minutes ago.”

“He’s out. Didn’t tell me where he went. Took that shuttle we came up on and said he’d meet us at Lantaria.” The words came out so fast it didn’t sound like Mac speaking.

It took a few seconds for his gibberish to sink in.

“Wait—he left?” Without so much as a,
hey I’ve got errands to do
? She strode out onto the bridge. “Xsit, flag down that damn shuttle. I want to talk to him now.”

Xsit cringed, and the light yellow feathers on the back of her head ruffled up. “I’m sorry, Captain. He cut communications and left the station.” Her voice went softer. “It looks like he is blocking us.”

Vas stomped around the deck. She’d kill him. Then toss the body in the nearest black hole. She glanced up and noticed how carefully her command crew watched her. She’d stomp in private. The issues between Deven and herself were growing stranger, but the rest of the crew didn’t need to know about them.

“I knew that. He mentioned something. I didn’t think he’d go so soon.” She tried to ease her pace as she went to her ready room. “Gosta, you have the bridge. Keep Mac under control.”

If her crew chose not to believe her, there was nothing she could do. But for now she could leave menacing messages for that bastard and plan how many ways she might kill him.

****

Deven carefully ignored the flashing message light on the shuttle’s console. He knew Vas would be pissed, but he also knew he couldn’t explain what he needed to do. Hell, he hadn’t wanted her, or anyone else on that ship, to know he was old enough to recognize a two-hundred–year-old poison. He sure as hell didn’t want to explain anything beyond that. Marliress would take a lot of explaining.

Marliress Gtill Sorlian kept a lower profile than even Deven did. The Asarlaí had been a race of beings with enormous powers, technology that even Deven’s people hadn’t reached yet. They had ruled this entire quadrant, Deven’s home galaxy as well, for thousands of years. Two thousand years ago they were brought down by the weight of their own cultural demands. They lingered on for centuries but only as a shadow of their former power, finally dying out during the Westergail Wars.

Marli was the only Asarlaí left as far as Deven knew.

Deven watched as the comm light continued to flash. With a sigh he covered the light and continued entering his destination into the shuttle’s navigation system. He couldn’t let Vas distract him. Marli might decide to follow through on her threats and kill him; he needed to be alert if he was going to survive. Even if she didn’t, she could make things extremely uncomfortable for him.

He took out the vial of Vas’s blood he’d smuggled out of Terel’s lab. He hoped the answers he found were worth the risk he was taking.

***

A few hours later, an alarm squealed over the ship’s system and pulled Deven out of his thoughts.

      “Whoever you are, if you don’t clear my airspace now, I’m blowing a hole in your aft.” Deven leaned forward with a grin. At least he knew he’d found Marli.

“Marli? It’s me.” He hoped that he would be able to bring up the heavier shields before she guessed who it was. Marli was a wanderer, one who made herself immortal long before the Westergail Wars for the sole purpose of having enough time to see all the wonders of creation. She also had a temper and a memory to match her eons of life.

“Damn it.” The response coincided with a drop in energy coming from the small artificial moon below him. Deven swore; he hadn’t realized she’d already taken aim until she dropped her charge.

“Deven? What are you doing out here? Didn’t I say I would slaughter you if you ever came back?” The rich dry voice brought back memories. Usually things were great between him and Marliress. She knew his secret, he knew hers, and they protected each other. However, twenty years ago she’d been in a mating cycle when he’d come for a visit.

Not that he had issues with assisting females with sexual needs, but the Asarlaís’ natural mating form wasn’t conducive to sex with other species and often ended up with the non-Asarlaí partner dying or losing a limb. Marli wouldn’t have wanted him to die, but she thought a good friend should be willing to lose a limb. He could get a new one, right?

He left immediately and they hadn’t spoken since.

“I knew you didn’t mean it.” He checked the readings coming from the moon. “Besides, you powered down. You could have blasted me once you knew who was up here.”

Marli’s laugh echoed in the small shuttle. “You always were a cheeky bastard. I forgive you. Get your ass down here and share some wine before I change my mind.”

Deven shook his head. If all of the Asarlaí had been like Marli, it was amazing the rest of the universe survived.

“Aye, ma’am. I think I have an interesting mystery for you to go with your wine.”

Her laugh deepened and she uploaded the landing coordinates. “You know I do love a good mystery.”

After landing, Deven locked up the shuttle. The terra-formed moon seemed to be abandoned, but if Marli was here, others could be as well. Besides, depending on Marli’s mood he might want it locked against her.

The tall woman waited for him outside of what looked like a pile of rocks, her long white hair reaching the ground. At just under seven foot tall that was a lot of hair. Marli honored him by letting him see her in her natural form, or as natural as she could be seen by non-Asarlaí eyes. The Asarlaí appeared differently to their own people, or so she claimed.

“So, did you change your mind?” Marli folded her arms and tilted her head; her ruby red eyes peered at him closely. The serious look she gave him stopped Deven dead in his tracks. Had he miscalculated and she was in state again?

Marli held her pose for a minute, and then let a huge laugh loose. “I’m kidding, boyo. I’m good for a few more years yet. And I found a species outside of the Commonwealth who isn’t as fragile as you to take care of my needs anyway.” She turned and walked toward the pile of what Deven had thought were rocks but were in fact three fighter ships, or rather the remains of three fighters. Marli smiled as she saw him study the ships before turning into a hidden doorway to the right. “Get inside. Dinner is getting cold.”

As they ate, Deven enjoyed the comforts of Marli’s secret home. Far larger than a single person needed; artifacts from thousands of worlds covered the walls and floors. He relaxed and for a moment allowed himself to forget why he came.

However, Marli wouldn’t.

“As much as I know you enjoy my company, why are you here?” Her grin revealed tiny fangs, also usually hidden by glamour.

He pulled out the vial. “I have a friend who was poisoned by a drell, a Larkerian drell to be exact. I’d like your help on finding out why, how, and whom.”

A series of emotions flashed across her sharp features. That surprised him; Marli rarely showed any emotion. The emotion that stayed unnerved him though: pity. “I’m sorry, Deven. Did your friend die quickly? Poison is such a coward’s way to kill.”

“She’s not dead. Not yet any way. And when she does go it won’t be because of the poison. I neutralized it and we’re working it out of her.”

Marli knocked over a plate as she jumped to her feet. “You saved someone from a drell?” She began pacing, muttering more to herself, or voices only she could hear, than to him. “Of course it has been quite a while since my involvement with any of the drells. I suppose cures could have been found. And he is powerful. But still….” She stopped in front of him, peering down as if he were an errant child. “What did you do? Exactly what steps did you take?”

Deven rose to his feet to close in the distance between them. “I purged as much of it out of her blood as I could. We found a counter poison and she’s getting injections to chase the rest out.”

Without asking for permission Marli placed one hand on either side of his head. Her long fingers covered his skull completely. She stared into his eyes, her clear red ones searching with a frightening intensity.

“Ah yes, you have grown stronger. But why? How were you able to…?” Marli released his head and stepped back. “Have you had recent gene therapy?”

The release of his head and her question slammed Deven backwards. More than that, a brief buzzing almost brought him to his knees. “What? No. What did you just do?”

With a frown she went to a small chair next to a desk that faced a blank wall. A few terse commands opened a large vid screen. She turned to him before calling anything up on the screen. “No gene therapy, yet you have changed.” She placed her hand on the screen and series of codes filled the blank space. Calling up a keypad, she entered more numbers.

“This is my recent scan of you. Don’t worry what the numbers mean, nothing but an old out-of-date Asarlaí way of tracking species.” Marli punched a few more numbers and a second series joined the first. They hung there one suspended over the other for a few seconds, then overlaid each other. “The second set of numbers I put in was you twenty years ago. Your abilities have grown.”

Deven crashed back to his seat at the casualness of this ability. He was used to being far more advanced than the people of the Commonwealth, but he felt like a child next to Marli, especially now. She’d never been so open with showing him her technology before.

“Bio implants? Do you have them in your hands?”

Her laugh carried an odd bitterness, but she still smiled. “Not unless you call my entire body a bio implant. It’s part of who I am, part of who the Asarlaí were. In my youth I wouldn’t have had to touch you. Alas, it’s not that easy anymore.” She punched a few more buttons, shaking her head when the results weren’t helpful. “Unfortunately, I can’t tell what’s changed in you; something has though. If you didn’t do it deliberately, then it must have been another person trying to change you. Do you know who is doing this? Who knows what you are?”

Deven tried to process all of the information. He began to understand how Vas felt when he threw too much detail at her. “No one knows who I am, not even my shipmates. As for enemies,” he said, “I’m a mercenary now, sometimes a smuggler, and on occasion a pirate. I have a feeling I have more than a few enemies. But that’s not why I’m here.”

Marli studied the screen a few moments longer, glancing back between it and him with a growing frown on her face. “I don’t like it. But very well, tell me about your friend, how did she get poisoned?”

“I don’t know how she got poisoned. My understanding is that the drell poisons could be activated any time within thirty days of contact?” At Marli’s nod, Deven continued. “Then we have no idea. Vas had been gone for the last month.”

“Vas? Your lover?” A mischievous light filled Marli’s sharp eyes.

“Vas, my captain.” Deven scowled at Marli, but couldn’t hold it. “There is more to life than sex, you know. She almost died yesterday. I want to find out if you know of anyone who’s bringing back the old ways.”

Marli’s frown deepened.

“Damn it, you know something.” He didn’t grab her. To do so would mean a slow, painful death. But he wanted to. This new Marli was far more open than the old one, which was more disturbing than the drell itself. He was pretty sure knowing Marli’s secrets could be deadly.

“Let me see the blood. At least I assume that’s what’s in the bottle?” She held out one long-fingered hand. Once he placed it in her hand she stared at the bottle for a few minutes, her frown growing deeper. Finally she glanced up and handed the vial back. “Your friend still has the drell in her system. Whatever your people are doing to remove it is too slow. I’ll give you another drug that will purge it completely.” She tapped her fingers on the small desk. “They poisoned her sometime in the last two weeks. I can’t get any closer than that since you were able to get so much of it out of her system. One other thing, does she know she’s also got a tracker in her blood?”

Deven pocketed the vial. “How can you track blood?”

“It’s an old trick, not as old as the drell, and not one the Asarlaí created, at least not officially. However, I have a bad feeling more of my extended family are alive out there. Or someone who wants them to be.” Her eyes lost focus for an instant then snapped back. “A blood tracker is an insidious artificial insect that is transmitted into a person through a thin needle. It spreads throughout the bloodstream quickly and once established it is impossible to remove. Within a month it would be fully integrated into her body and unmovable. Someone recently decided they wanted to follow your captain. Very recently.”