The Lereni Trade (4 page)

She could make sense of these aliens
if they let her. It was her gift, her one useful
talent—interpreting languages. In time, she might learn Torik's
language, but she didn't want to stay to learn it.

Karik and the others frightened her.
They didn't like her here either. Torik might have been
sympathetic, or it might simply be pity for her ineptitude. He was
one of them, these strangers who abducted her.

She still didn't know what they
wanted. They must have wanted her alive for something, or why would
they have saved her and why would Torik have treated her ankle or
Karik have left her alone when he clearly didn't want her to
live?

Upon thought of the appendage, she
flexed it slightly and felt only a minuscule twinge. Even if it
healed, it wouldn't do her any good. She was stuck on a ship in
space with nowhere to go but to roam the corridors.

While the lump in her throat melted,
the tears flowed silently, tickling down her nose to where she had
to use her shirt sleeve to wipe them away.

The occasional pattern of steps tapped
across the room behind her, but none approached. By not seeing
them, she could pretend they were human, that she was in a dorm
somewhere. She could pretend she was on Earth.

The tears soon dried, leaving her eyes
heavy and her head clear but groggy. With her arm as a pillow, she
let the low background hum lull her into a fitful sleep.

At one point, she became aware of a
cushion beneath her head but drifted into darkness
again.

By the time she fully opened her eyes,
she was surprised not be on a couch in an apartment. It took a few
seconds to remember that she had been taken on a spaceship with
aliens.

The sight of two of them at the table
beyond her feet slammed that point into her brain.

Krissa let out a heavy sigh and rolled
onto her back with the pillow beneath her head. It was real. She
hadn't dreamed the whole abduction thing.

Now what?

"She will awaken soon."

Karik's hard stare would have unnerved
a raw recruit, but while he wasn't hardened by the worst of the
war, Torik was far from raw.

In the tight space of his quarters, he stood unflinching
under the critical stare of his captain. He'd had worse than Karik
before this, each of them masking fear in the cold exterior—fear of
losing control of others and themselves, fear of the unknown, fear
of failure. Unlike the
Seres
they had picked up who readily exhibited her
emotions, Karik and others like him preferred to keep everyone
away.

But they had other concerns with this
task. Torik should be keeping her at arm's length, but he
sympathized with her situation, as he had often wished others would
of their homeworld's occupation, and couldn't bear to see her
afraid. Fear would make her more dangerous, if she had any
inclination to be a threat.

"And you
will
refrain from telling her," the captain said.

"You overestimate her." Torik's reply
earned him a snarl from the captain. "How can she be a threat if
she doesn't know what she is?"

Karik's eyes twitched narrower, vertical pupils as thin as
slits. "Do not lecture me,
Lieutenant.
Why would House Raou, the ruling nobles of our
enemy, the Tah'Na, demand that we—the Lereni—find the daughter of
Naperi of the Onduun?" He paused and inched closer, his eyes
searing the point into Torik's brain. "Because they know she is
dangerous. The later she discovers what she is, the better for us
all."

He eased back, and Torik let out a
breath he hadn't realized he was holding. The threat of Karik's
closeness had set off instincts that primed his muscles in
preparation for a fight.

But Karik wasn't careless about his
crew that way.

"This is a challenge. They don't intend to release our
world, but I do intend to prove them wrong. This
Seres
will not learn of
her capabilities until she is among them. Let the Tah'Na and the
Onduun fight it out."

Something about that didn't fit, and
it clicked in Torik's mind as Karik turned to the door.

"Won't the Onduun turn their anger on
us?"

Karik paused, his hand at the control
pad. "Possibly, but they're supposed to be civilized."

Torik gave a soft snort. From the
reports he had heard about Onduun punishments, they were hardly
what he would consider "civilized". Ironically, the Tah'Na used
derogatory terms for the Lereni that indicated they thought them
less than civilized.

"There was a reason they abandoned her
on that remote world."

"Earth."

A low growl came from the captain's
throat.

"She calls it Earth."

Karik gave him a look that warned of consequences he didn't
want to ponder. Rumors about the abilities of the Onduun
Seres
were both
intriguing and frightening.

Ignoring Karik's threat, he said, "If
she learned the truth, she might trust us. She doesn't know any
better."

"Exactly—she doesn't know better. I prefer to keep it that
way." Karik fixed him with a hard glare. "Don't say anything to
her. We can't take the chance that she would destroy us before this
mission is complete. A creature, in fright, will attack to escape.
She will not take well to her fate, and we have no defense against
the power of the
Seres
."

Torik took a breath. Although not
agreeing with Karik but understanding his reasoning, he sighed away
his argument and said, "Yes, sir."

Krissa's insides gurgled, waking her
to the oddity that was her reality. Her dreams had been more
normal.

Food. What kind of food did they have
on that ship?

Krissa looked about the lounge,
briefly caught the eyes of the two at their hologram table, and,
seeing nothing, stood.

Where was Torik, the one who was
willing to listen?

No sooner did she wonder than he
stepped from the narrow corridor at the back of the ship behind the
one in charge.

"Torik." Anxious for someone to help
her, she rushed to reach him, aware of the scowling face that moved
away with the creature in charge of that ship. "Do you have
something to eat?"

After a puzzled frown, he exchanged a
few words with the two at the table.

"Repeat," the computer translated one
of his words.

She made a mental note of the word and
its translation and said, "Food?"

When he turned back to the short
corridor, she followed him to an open door. At the touch of the pad
next to it, it slid aside to reveal a small room containing a round
fixture in the center with several bins around it and an arch of
table with benches around it secured to the floor.

"What is this?" She hoped it was some
sort of food depository, since it clearly wasn't a
kitchen.

However, when he pulled up on one of
the bin doors, the light inside revealed a pile of small packets.
Torik pulled one out and handed it to her.

"What is this?" She turned it over in
search of an answer other than what it seemed to be. The silver
packaging revealed nothing about the contents, except some strange
marks along one edge.

He let the door down and, with a hand
on her shoulder, guided her back to the common room. Past the
others, he stopped her at the cushions where she had
slept.

"Sit," the computer translated his
word. The word and its translation cemented into her brain with the
ease of walking through a door. That door of understanding had
opened a crack, and she intended to "see" through it to understand
as much of their language as she could. Already, she understood two
basic words and some of the rest was beginning to make
sense.

Torik sat next to her and put his hand
on the foil-like package. "Like this…" He pulled back one corner
where she hadn't seen any way to open it and left the rest to
her.

Hungry but uncertain, she lifted the
corner to her nose and sniffed. Not exactly cake and donuts, but
she was too hungry to argue.

Feeling his eyes on her every move,
she peeled back the rest to expose a dark, lumpy slop.

"Ugh. What is this stuff?"

His grimace burned off any hope.
"Rations…Nutritious but not good."

"Not good? You don't like
it?"

He shook his head, confirming what she
suspected.

"But you must eat," the computer said
from his words. "Keep your strength."

She set the pack in her lap and
studied his alien face for some human, familiar sign of what they
weren't telling her. "Why?"

He looked away to the others, who had
paused in their work to stare at Torik and her. "You are
important."

Important enough to keep alive but not
enough to explain why.

Sooner or later, she was going to
learn for herself.

But first, she needed something in her
stomach.

* * *

Krissa dumped the half-eaten slop in
the dining area incinerator chute, glad to be rid of it after what
she was able to choke down. The food left a bitter taste in her
mouth that left her grimacing and wanting to wash her mouth clean
with something more tasteful than recycled water.

"That stuff is awful."

Torik gave a less than enthusiastic
nod.

"How do you survive on
that?"

"Necessity," he said.

It would be pure necessity that moved
her to eat it, but until that was a problem, she wasn't
desperate.

At the approach of steps, both of them
turned. Karik, whom she recognized by the bars on his shoulder as
much as the greater depth of his chest and jaw, stopped in the
doorway.

"Torik."

He turned fully to face his commanding
officer.

"Command center." Saying nothing more,
Karik marched out.

Torik gave her only a glance and
followed in obedience.

Curious, Krissa trailed him from the
food area to the main hold and across the common room. At the
narrow hall to the control room, Karik turned, stopping Torik. His
eyes pressed her to halt.

"Not you," the bigger alien said and
marched away with Torik following.

They disappeared when the door
closed.

The computer hadn't interpreted. She
had understood those simple words.

The corner of her mouth twitched into
a satisfied smile. She was getting it as quickly as she had hoped.
Soon, they couldn't keep secrets from her except through closed
doors.

If she played dumb, maybe they would
reveal the secret Karik held close to his chest. Or maybe he
understood too well, which was why he had taken Torik into their
command deck and had spoken to him privately in one of the other
rooms that morning.

Karik wasn't stupid; he knew what she
wanted. But he wouldn't give her the satisfaction of revealing
anything.

At the ruffle of fabric, she turned to
the other two aliens at the booth table. They watched her with what
she could only interpret as curious gazes.

A shiver of discomfiture made her
shift on the spot and look for a place to wait for Torik where she
wouldn't be constantly under their surveillance. He was the only
one who seemed to care, and no one had ever cared for her. They had
always kept their distance, like these two. Karik was also
different than most people she met, if she was going to consider
these beings people. She couldn't yet place it, but it wasn't the
same as school friends or family who would make her feel like she
wasn't there. Rather, he seemed to go out of his way to be cold to
her.

Or she was imagining it all. She
hardly knew them.

Rather, she only knew that she
appreciated Torik, but even he kept a secret from her.

A secret that Karik commanded him to
keep from her.

What did they want with her? Why had
they sought her specifically?

If the other two weren't watching, she
might have been able to sneak up to the door to listen.

Like that would do her any good. She
might be learning a few words, but she was far from fluent in their
language. In time, that might work, but for now, she was in the
dark.

Krissa looked about the quiet hold,
watched the two at the table long enough to realize they played a
game and soon tired of their slow strategies, and returned her
attention to the door.

Karik had kept Torik for a while
already. That might stretch into some time yet, and she was on a
ship in space, a real spaceship.

Excitement coursed through
her.

How had she missed that?

She'd been too confused and hurt and
injured and scared to be excited. However, now that her ankle had
mostly healed—thanks to the ministrations of Torik and their
advanced medical knowledge—and now that the initial fear had
succumbed to curiosity, a sense of exploration took
root.