The Alien Trace [Cord 01] (3 page)

    "The important thing," Finola concluded, "is that the humans are incredibly wealthy and eager to trade. You, my beloved friends, are among the best Catchers on Mehira, and you're close to the port. It's time for you to profit from your talents."

    Fyrrell rose gracefully and embraced her, his fingers gently stroking her golden skin; they stood quietly, entwined. Neteel rose and embraced them both.

    "With extra income we could move to larger quarters," Neteel said slowly. "If we had a larger workshop, we could complete the… project we've been working on."

    She and Fyrrell exchanged nervous but excited glances.

    "What is this project, anyway?" Finola asked. "Fyrrell has spoken of it, but he's always made a mystery of it."

    "I haven't meant to," Fyrrell replied. He raised her hand, palm upward, and nuzzled it with his lips. They all could feel a tremor pass through her body. "It's too soon to talk about it, that's all. It's based on a wholly new approach to the problem of detecting criminal tendencies-"

    "And we're still afraid we've made some enormous miscalculation, that it will be worthless," Neteel finished. She stroked Finola's arm and then rested her hand on her husband's forearm.

    The mood in the room was shifting. Their words were now tinged with desire and need for a generous friend. For a moment Cord thought of the warm, soft body of Bird, quick and light as her name. He also thought that the three of them had forgotten he was there, and now their foreplay was bathing him with fiery caresses. He groaned, and an obvious bulge appeared in the front of his tunic.

    They turned to him in amusement. "Why don't you pay Bird a visit?" his mother suggested. "You can tell her the news-if it's all right to speak of it," she added to Finola.

    "Only if he speaks of trade-and love." Finola smiled, a sly, secretive smile that was one of her most attractive characteristics.

    "Bird is the daughter of the Third District Speaker."

    "That's all right. Fyrrell told me as much. My love-friend on the Council is a bit more powerful than the Speaker."

    Fyrrell and Neteel laughed a little. Even Cord knew that Finola's friend was the Council's head. Thanking her, Cord took his leave. Not only was he anxious to see Bird, but he could tell from the heightened emotional coloration in the room that his parents and Finola were interested in being alone to pursue their own amorous bent.

    As he left the dwelling, their rising tide of lust caught him in a backlash, making his blood pound and his loins ache. His tail whipped in anticipation.

    Before he boarded the intercity transport, he took care to close down his mind to those he would be encountering. Probably none would recognize him for what he was, but if they did, he preferred not to feel their contempt. He recited a brief but calming ancient hymn.

    The jointed, wheeled bus came quickly, and he joined the throng boarding. It was crowded but cheap.

    He spent the journey to Bird's suburb watching the other passengers. There were many lovely young women, he noticed. All had long, slim legs and soft, tinted skin. They favored short, colorful shifts that came close to revealing ail their assets. And many returned his appraising stare frankly. He'd already learned that his smooth, muscular chest and bulging arms excited many women. He had kept in top physical condition; he had to, to be ready to hunt at any time. Women found him quite attractive-until they learned of his profession.

    He closed down his mind even further. Eventually the few women who had returned his stare turned their attention elsewhere. If he maintained such control, as well as his posture and mannerisms, then he would remain invisible to notice. Being completely inconspicuous was part of his work, and, like his parents, he was very good at what he did. Besides, Bird was waiting at the end of the trip. And while she was no more fond of his work than most Mehirans, she was more understanding and certainly more loving.

    She and her father lived outside the main part of town, in an area consisting of single-family houses, not like his family's teeming building. Many of the single houses were built around garden courtyards, with beautiful sculptures, fish ponds, elaborate garden furniture. The Third District Speaker's home was less rich than some, as he made no effort to compete with those in the medical or entertainment arts. He was said to have simple tastes. All the same, Cord envied the ease of Bird's existence.

    She was still in school, studying speech and history, intending to take up politics. At present she acted as her father's aide. It was only the luxury Cord admired, however. He would not want to be a Speaker; the job entailed not only presenting his constituency's desires to the Council but also determining them by being available to the people of his district. That meant a great deal of emotional sharing. Cord was afraid to share his feelings completely. Not even his parents really knew of the forbidden delight that gripped him during a hunt.

    "Cord, I'm so glad you came this evening," Bird said, greeting him warmly. She had opened the door even before he knocked; his desire had certainly alerted her in advance. He could feel the surge of her gladness underlaid with a yearning as great as his own.

    She put her arms around his neck and whispered into his left ear, tickling it. "My father's out tonight." There was a throb of relief behind the words.

    Cord was surprised. He'd felt no other emotional signal in the house, but he'd assumed the Speaker was at home; he often veiled his feelings. Cord shared Bird's relief. He was uncomfortable with her father. The Speaker was courteous, of course. He had never shown by the least sign that he disapproved of Cord. But Cord did not think he viewed his daughter's attachment to a criminal catcher with pleasure.

    Bird took him up a polished wooden staircase to her room on the second floor. The walls were tinted in pastels, the floors covered with thick carpets. Her bedroom was strewn with beautifully hand-painted cushions. She pushed him down onto a cushion and poured something from a small jug into crystal cups.

    "I know you'll like this," she said, offering him one. It was a spiced fruit drink laced with the aphrodisiac sap of a cold-climate tree. Cord stirred it idly; the beverage was the color of Bird's skin: a rich gold. He liked the way she wore her scalplock braided down her back. The velvet on her ears and spine, which ran nearly halfway down her back, was the same color as her hair, a deeper gold.

    It was easy to forget the difficulties between them at times like this. He could even convince himself that it would all work out. After all, his mother and father had married in spite of similar obstacles. And at the very least, Bird would continue to be his love-friend, surely. And now that things were looking better for his family…

    He wanted to tell her, but she had other things on her mind. When he felt her sensations, all thought of talk left him.

    "It's warm in here tonight. And getting warmer." She smiled and undipped the jeweled fastening at the breast of her downy wrap-gown. Her nipples were like topazes. Rising from her own cushion, she pulled him to her. Caught up in the flow of her passion, Cord cupped her thrusting breasts and kissed each one in turn, too preoccupied to think about undressing. That was no bar to Bird, who stripped him enthusiastically of his tunic and pants.

    The tip of her tail stroked his loins, causing his tail to twitch uncontrollably. He didn't know why she bothered with an expensive aphrodisiac; with her it was quite unnecessary.

    She kissed him, thrusting her fruit-stained tongue into his willing mouth, while her hands never stopped moving over his body. He stroked her roughly, while his tail curved up between them and caressed the soft, tender area between her legs. Slowly the furry tip intruded farther, as Bird relaxed her interior muscles. The farther the tip explored, the more she writhed in pleasure.

    She pushed him away, the tail withdrawing, and then she knelt before him. Using mouth, hands, and tail, she teased the pouch hanging there. Slowly, his organ snaked out from the protective pouch and uncurled.

    Cord drew her down on top of him, entering her carefully as she straddled him. Bird arched her spine and threw back her head, scalplock swinging. Her pleasure coursed through him, engorging his organ even more. He grabbed her, twined his legs around her, and flipped her on her back. The aphrodisiac flowed to every sensitive part of their bodies. Using the strength she so much admired, Cord took her legs and spread them apart in the air while he began thrusting in earnest.

    His tail curled up under him and probed her anus while hers did the same to him. He felt the ache in her loins, the contractions of delicate muscles. She felt the moist, hot friction and his delight in piercing her soft flesh. His tail began thrusting in matching rhythm while her tail pressed incessantly upon a most important gland, the pressure driving him to frenzy.

    The reverberation of emotion peaked as they reached fulfillment together. They lay there gasping, while their spiking ecstasy subsided.

    "I wish you would come to a passion party sometime," Bird murmured later, when they lay close, unmoving.

    "You know how it is," he answered. As a sex partner, he was not desirable to many because of his occupation.

    "I went to one last week where one of the guests filled eight girls, one right after the other. He had fortified himself with several cups of that"-nodded at the jug-"before he arrived-or should I say 'came'?-and drank more afterward. Someone told me today that he's still out of commission. Serves him right for showing off. He wasn't the only one. The award for the most acrobatic performance must go to the young lady who contrived to have herself plugged front and back, while stimulating a third with her tail and a fourth to greater heights with the only available orifice. Though, I suppose if she hadn't needed her nose to breathe…"

    Cord shook with laughter. "Oh, stop it, Bird! Tell me how she did it."

    With unexpected swiftness, Bird sprang to her knees and leaned over Cord. His sexual apparatus had retreated into his pouch, but Bird's tongue found the opening and obligingly followed it in. After an interval during which Bird demonstrated some rather advanced techniques, she stopped and said suddenly:

    "You're certainly happy tonight."

    "I'm always happy around you," he replied. It wasn't wholly true, and both of them knew it. But he tried to tell her of his family's good fortune and felt her withdraw slightly, as she always did when he mentioned the source of his family's income.

    "I'm pleased for you," she said carefully. "I know you aren't-well provided for. But it's not an appointment to be proud of, is it? If your work were the arbitration of disputes, or entertainment, it would be wonderful. But it's almost as bad as being a criminal yourself. You use force, you hurt people-and you enjoy it."

    Cord sat bolt upright. "I
don't
enjoy hurting people!" She was accusing him of being a deviant!

    "I'm sorry," she said, a backlash of remorse washing over him. "I didn't mean that, exactly. You like hunting them, though. It excites you. I've felt it, Cord. You can't hide it completely."

    He felt a stab of alarm: he could think of no response. He had been able to deny truthfully any pleasure in others' pain, but he-could not deny the second accusation, because it
was
true. The chase thrilled him. And it did border on forbidden behavior.

    "Don't worry," she reassured him. "I won't tell anyone. But I can't help remember the time you caught that… that child mutilator."

    Cord plainly felt her psychic shiver. It was the proper response to a violent crime. Anyone who was not sickened by the idea of hurting others would have to be a hardened criminal himself. To any normal person, the victim's anguish and fear would be as painful as if they were his own.

    And emotional backlash could be bad, very bad. Cord dismissed the case of the mutilator of children: she had been vicious, but her capture had presented no great challenge. Of many pursuits, the one Cord remembered was that of a murderer whom Fyrrell, with Cord's assistance, had cornered in a walled garden in the wealthy section-not far from Bird's home, in fact.

    Their quarry expected to duck through and out another entrance in the dark, only to find that his means of escape had been locked. Cord recalled clearly how the criminal had felt, searching for a way out and realizing there was none. Then came the interior cringing he had not bothered to conceal. By then he was probably not able to govern his mind. Ordinarily, one could choose to make one's feelings opaque if it was necessary to hide them for others' comfort-that was why it took professionals to locate the committers of crime.

    The episode was still vivid in Cord's memory. It was one of the first captures in which he had played an active part. But what he remembered was the malefactor's terror, apprehension, and desire to hurt them, which were strong enough to make Cord physically ill until Fyrrell shot the trapped man with an anesthetic. Then they'd turned him over to the Council. The murderer was of influential family, which was not sufficient to save him, but in such a case the Council would carry out the execution. While still unconscious, he would be given a lethal drug, and the Council would see to it that his death was ascribed to a seizure. Possibly some would guess the truth, but appearances would be maintained, to spare the family. For the less prominent, it was not necessary to go to such lengths. Then Fyrrell would have administered the poison on the spot, and they'd have presented the corpse to the Council and been paid their fee.

    "Do you want to stay here tonight?" Bird inquired softly. Her eyes were full of sympathy: she could tell he had been thinking of something unpleasant. There was also hopeful anticipation of a night of lovemaking.