Read The Price of the Stars: Book One of Mageworlds Online

Authors: Debra Doyle,James D. Macdonald

The Price of the Stars: Book One of Mageworlds (33 page)

BOOK: The Price of the Stars: Book One of Mageworlds
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Beka gripped the Mark VI blaster so hard her fingers ached, watching her copilot’s blows come slower and slower while his blocks and counters made it with less and less time to spare.
I wish Owen could see this. Or Llannat. Maybe they’d be able to make sense of what’s going on. I certainly can’t.
She bit her lip, and concentrated on keeping the Mark VI trained on the stranger.
An opening came that she couldn’t see, and the stranger lunged. His staff struck the Professor full in the torso. The crimson aura died, and her copilot slumped to the floor in a puddle of black robes.
Beka raised her blaster and took aim.
A hand fell on her wrist, pressing the weapon downward. “Gently, Tarnekep,” murmured a familiar voice beside her. “Watch.”
Out in the center of the floor, the stranger bent over the fallen form. He removed the mask that covered the dead man’s face, and recoiled upward with a cry.
Beka felt the weight leave her arm. The Professor stepped forward and away from her, still dressed in the shirt and trousers he’d been wearing when all this started, his staff ready in his hand. The stranger saw the movement and turned.
“Surprised?” asked the Professor. “You shouldn’t be. You spent all your strength and passion in fighting yourself.”
The stranger gave a harsh laugh. “You always were good at illusions; that much hasn’t changed. But don’t worry. I still have enough strength left for you.”
The Professor raised his staff. His aura flared up in a blaze of red, far deeper and brighter than the stranger’s.
“We worked in the same Circle once,” her copilot said to the stranger. “You can still yield.”
“You betrayed our Circle!” shouted the other. “With you as First, we could have had the galaxy … and now look at us. Bodyguards for the likes of Nivome the Rolny!”
“An honorable profession,” said the Professor, “if you choose to make it so. Once more—do you yield?”
“No!” cried the stranger, and struck out.
The Professor beat the other’s staff aside, and lunged for his head. The other blocked, and the two men sprang apart.
If the fighting Beka had seen before had been deadly and beautiful, what she watched now had a vicious elegance that made the previous exchange look like a backstreet brawl. She let her blaster fall to her side—the combat was moving too fast for her to keep the weapon trained.
Attack built upon attack, counterattack followed parry at a pace that never slackened. Both men were moving easily, and neither had been hurt; it seemed to Beka that the two of them might well keep up their duel forever, while the Citadel waited in some kind of suspended animation for them to finish.
Suddenly the fighting stopped. The two men froze, facing each other in guard. At last, the stranger lowered his staff. “You have won,” he said. “I admit defeat.”
The Professor lowered his own weapon as well. “Stay, then, and fight beside me again for old times’ sake.”
He tucked the staff back under his belt while he spoke. And as he did, the stranger raised his weapon and swung on the older man.
Beka cried out. Her blaster was down at her side, and the Professor, damn him, was right in the line of fire. But her copilot ducked under the staff as in came in, and caught the stranger by the shoulder with his left hand. With the other, he embraced his foe.
She finished her sidestep and took aim, then lowered the blaster without firing. The Professor pulled away his right hand to reveal a bloody knife.
The black-robed body sagged forward. The Professor caught the stranger as he fell, and the two men sank together to their knees. Tongues of pale green witchfire flickered about them both as the Professor cradled the other in his arms.
At length Beka walked forward. “Professor, we have to go. We have things to do.”
The Professor looked up. “What? Oh, yes.”
“We have to go,” she said. “Now. We have to find Nivome.”
“Nivome.”
“You remember,” she said urgently. “He killed my mother.”
“I remember,” said the Professor. His face was older than she had ever seen it—old, and tired. “Nivome has little enough time left, child; give him a moment more. This man was my friend, once.”
“I heard,” she said. “Do whatever you have to.”
She stood by, watching, as the Professor laid out the other man on the floor, folding the black-gloved hands around the ebony staff. The dying witchfire clung to the body, outlining it in eerie light, even after the Professor rose to his feet.
“That way,” he said. He pulled his own staff free of his belt, and pointed to an archway at the other end of the hall. “It’s not much farther.”
The aura surrounding her copilot was deep purple now; it gave only the faintest of illumination, and the air all about them was chill. Beka shivered inside her black velvet long-coat as she and her copilot walked together through the archway into yet another corridor.
Once outside the reception hall, the Professor shook off whatever emotion had been holding him in its grip. He strode along at a rapid pace, looking to right and left as if searching for something. He began to speak aloud as he walked, a thing he hadn’t done earlier.
“Along this way. Third turning, then up. Down the hall. Door on the left. Two rooms …”
He stopped.
Beka looked at her copilot. His foot was touching a floor tile that had somehow sunk a quarter-inch below the level of the rest. Above that tile, a mechanical spear had thrust out of the wall on his right, and the bloodied metal tip protruded from his side. He looked back at her over one shoulder.
“My lady, I am sorry. I had hoped to be with you until the finish.” He glanced down at the spear, and a look of confusion passed across his features. “Oh, dear. I seem to have ruined my shirt.”
The staff dropped from his hand. The violet aura died, and the hallway was left in total darkness.
She couldn’t see anything. “Professor?”
Nobody answered.
“Professor!”
She grabbed blindly for his arm. It was limp and unre-sponding—no life there. She was alone in the heart of the Citadel, and the pitch-black darkness pressed around her.
Then the black ziggurat came to life like a giant waking. She heard the hum of electronics, loud after the long silence, as the light panels returned; then a whirring started, and the automatic cameras mounted at intervals along the ceiling switched on and began to track.
But she didn’t care; she didn’t care about any of it. She grabbed up the Professor’s fallen staff even though Tarnekep Portree had no use for such things, then raised her blaster and shot out the nearest spy-eye before it could come to bear.
“Third turning, then left,” she muttered.
Gently, Tarnekep,
the voice of memory whispered in her mind.
“Gently, hell!” she snarled, and blasted another spy-eye as she ran forward. “If I see them, they die.”
 
J
ESSAN SLID shut the access plate and crawled out from under the aircar. “Well, Llannat, I think that just about does it … Llannat?”
No answer. The alley was quiet. Jessan looked around. A black-clad body lay facedown in the alley ahead.
“Oh, no.”
He ran forward to the junction, skidding down onto his knees by the body. It wasn’t Llannat. The unknown wore black robes instead of the Adept’s plain black coverall, and someone had smashed in his face. A molded mask of black plastic hid what was left of his features. A short ebony staff lay on the pavement next to the unknown’s body.
Jessan checked for a pulse: none.
Not surprising—the poor bastard probably choked on his own blood.
He sat back on his heels and looked around. Another blackrobe lay nearby, as dead as the first.
Slowly, Jessan stood up. “Llannat!” he called out. “Llannat!”
Nobody answered. He looked down the main alley toward the street—nothing. No bodies, no tracks, no blood. He drew his blaster. Holding it at the ready, he ran down the other alley to the next fork and checked to right and to left.
The right-hand alley dead-ended in a ground-transport loading dock, its doors down and locked. In the other direction, he could see a hint of green somewhere beyond the alley’s mouth. He turned left.
He stopped where the alley opened out into the main road. The greenery turned out to belong to a little park across the street. Inside the park, two black-clad figures sprawled on the close-trimmed grass, surrounded by a Small knot of people. One of the bodies wore black robes like the first two—but the other—
Jessan reholstered his blaster and strolled across the street to the edge of the crowd.
“Let me through,” he said. “Let me through. I’m a medic.”
He kept on walking forward as he spoke, and the circle parted. The smaller of the two bodies was Llannat Hyfid, all right. He knelt and put a hand to her neck. Her pulse was thin and weak, but it was there.
She’s alive. I don’t see her staff anywhere, though.
He checked the second body: no pulse, no anything.
Dead
.
Time to get out of here, I think
.
“Anybody see what happened?” he asked the crowd in general.
“There wasn’t anybody there at all,” said a voice from the back somewhere. “Then all of a sudden, there they were.”
“Yeah,” said another voice. “Like they fell out of the sky or something.”
Interesting .
. .
but not what I’d call useful. We still have to make it to the aircar before Security gets here.
He bent over and put his mouth next to the Adept’s ear.
“Llannat,” he called softly. “Llannat, we have to go now. Wake up, Llannat. Please wake up.”
Her eyelids flickered a little, and her lips moved. Jessan bent closer.
“Ari?” she asked.
“It’s Jessan,” he said. “Wake up. We’ll go find Ari. Wake up. Ari needs you.”
Her pulse grew stronger, and her breathing deepened. She began to stir.
“Get back, everyone,” Jessan ordered. “Give her air.” The crowd moved back a little. He slid his arms under Llannat’s knees and shoulders, and stood up.
“Hey, wait a minute,” someone said. “You shouldn’t move her.”
Jessan sighed.
There’s always somebody
. “I have to get her to the hospital,” he said. “My vehicle’s over that way.”
A shadow glided over the grass as he spoke. He glanced up, and saw an aircar with Security markings circling to make another pass.
“NOBODY MOVE,” bellowed a voice from the sky. “STAY WHERE YOU ARE OR I WILL OPEN FIRE.”
Jessan looked at the alley—only a street’s width away, but too far to run while carrying another. He kept on walking.
“HALT OR I SHOOT.”
Jessan froze in midstreet.
Maybe I can break for the alley once they’ve grounded,
he thought, without much optimism.
“Put me down,” said a faint voice. “I can walk.”
“You’re probably lying,” he muttered, lowering the Adept to her feet. “But what choice have we got?”
He put one hand on his blaster, and the other around Llannat’s shoulders. “The alley, on three.”
The aircar circled over them again. “DROP YOUR WEAPONS.”
“One … two … three!”
They dashed for the alley. Jessan supported Llannat as much as he could. He hated to think what reserves of energy the Adept must be drawing on to match his pace.
Overhead, the Security aircar whipped around in a tight turn and started firing down at them. Jessan drew his blaster and fired back, still running.
Energy bolts chewed up the pavement to either side of them as the aircar passed by overhead and climbed away, trailing black smoke from a hit to its underbelly. The aircar made a rollover at the top of its loop and headed back toward them for another run.
I’ve been here before
, thought Jessan, staggering into the alley with Llannat in tow.
In the Professor’s game room. And I didn’t like the way it ended.
They plastered themselves against the wall as the Security aircar made a second pass, then stumbled on down the alley to their own craft.
“Blast,” said Jessan, panting. “We can’t take off with our nose against the dead end like that. Feel up to helping me turn this boat in place?”
“No time,” Llannat said.
“Blast,” Jessan said again. The Adept was right: he could hear sirens converging on the area from all directions.
“Get in the aircar anyway,” Llannat said.
“But we don’t have room for takeoff!” he protested, helping the Adept into the cockpit ahead of him as he spoke.
“Don’t worry. Switch on the engines when you think it’s time.”
“When I-right.”
Llannat closed her eyes and placed both hands on the aircar’s instrument panel. The console started to vibrate, and its readouts and telltales blinked from green to amber to red to green again. A moment longer, and the whole aircar began to shake. Then, slowly, it lifted straight up.
Energy fire came down the alley from behind them.
I think it’s time.
Jessan hit the main engine ignition switch. At the same instant, he fed forward power. The craft began to move through the air, building speed until true lift took over.
He put the aircar into a climb and looked over at Llannat.
“Now what?” he asked.
The Adept had collapsed back into the copilot’s seat. Her face was mottled and her jacket was soaked with sweat. She didn’t open her eyes as she spoke. “Set course for
Warhammer.”
“What about Beka and the Professor?” he demanded. “What about Ari, if it comes to that? You were worried enough about him five minutes ago.”
“We can’t help them here. Please, Jessan … .” Almost angrily, he punched the
Hammer
’s coordinates into the aircar’s little on-board navicomp. “All right. We’re heading home.”
He pushed the throttle all the way forward and banked the aircar into a turn. The Citadel, looming black and featureless on the horizon, slid from the cockpit’s front windows around toward the side as he added, “But we don’t lift from Darvell without the captain.”
Llannat didn’t respond. The Citadel disappeared from the side window, and reappeared in the rear monitor. In the tiny screen, the tip of the black ziggurat blazed for a second with a burst of brilliant light. Heavy smoke followed, billowing out to hang over the Citadel like a low-lying cloud.
“Now that looks interesting,” Jessan said. “Check it out, Llannat—Llannat?”
He glanced over at the Adept.
I ought to have my license revoked
, he thought.
Labored breathing, shivering, cold sweat—she needs to be flat on a hospital cot, not running around Darplex levitating aircars.
“What we want now,” he said aloud, “is the autopilot. Get this bird headed for home, and I can forget about playing daredevil flier and go back to taking care of casualties.”
He reached out to lock in the automatic controls, but his hand never got there. Alarms began pipping all over the console instead, and seconds later colored light boiled in the air outside the cockpit windows.
Fighters,
thought Jessan. He cut right to ruin the other pilot’s firing solution, then left to regain track.
I wish I were better at this.
 
“Up the stairs,” the Professor had said.
Beka took the metal staircase two steps at a time, the Mark VI ready in her hand. Something moved on the upper landing, and she fired.
Beka Rosselin-Metadi sometimes missed; Tarnekep Portree never did. The hunter/killer robot disintegrated in a shower of white sparks and fragments of hot metal, and Beka kept on running.
She reached the landing. The door out to the corridor began sliding open. She fired into the gap as it widened, then took the door in a low dive, firing again as she came up.
A man lay in the hallway, his torso a mess of bone and seared meat. A second Security guard crouched in the shelter of his partner’s body. He fired, and the blaster bolt whined over her head into the now-closing doorway.
She held her fire. The security man half-rose to get a second shot at her; she pressed down the firing stud on the Mark VI and held it there. When she released it, the second man was as dead as the first.
Something rolled under her hand as she pushed away from the floor and stood up: the first guard’s blaster. She tucked the Professor’s staff out of the way under her belt, and picked up the blaster with her free hand.
More movement—hunter/killers, floating into action at either end of the hall. She fired both blasters. One robot exploded and the other went wild, caroming off the walls and firing at random.
“‘Down the hall,’” she recited, like an incantation. “‘Door on the left.’”
A half-dozen strides, and the door was in front of her. She took out the lockplate just as the Professor had taught her, with a precision burst from her right-hand blaster. The doors started to slide apart.
She brought the two blasters up waist-high, and stood in the open doorway firing at everything that moved. She didn’t stop until the room was still.
Beka went inside. Dead men and burnt-out security monitors were everywhere. The room smelled of blaster fire and burning electronics. A mobile fire-extinguisher unit emerged from its cubbyhole and began scuttling about amid the corpses, spraying the smoking comp units with inert gas. She watched it work for a second, and then shot it as well.
“Let the damned place burn,” she muttered, looking about at the wreckage. “‘Two rooms …’”
The sign on the far door read, simply, DIRECTOR. She walked up to it and shot out the lockplate. The door slid open.
A man sat behind a massive desk on the far side of the room, in front of an allegorical tapestry representing the Sundering of the Galaxy. “You didn’t need to do that,” he said. “The door wasn’t locked.”
Unless all the flatpix and Jessan’s memory were lying, this was Nivome the Rolny. She took a step into the room and looked about. Nivome kept his hands flat on his desk.
“Ah,” he said. “Tarnekep Portree. I’ve heard of you. In fact, I’ve developed more than a casual interest, ever since you were spotted on-planet.”
Go ahead and talk
, she thought, still checking out the room. Her blasters never wavered from their target.
See how much good it does you.
“For the last year or more, Captain Portree,” Nivome continued, “you’ve delighted in interfering with our plans. May I ask why? Who could possibly be paying you enough?”
She had the holoprojector spotted now, and shot it out by way of answer. Nivome and the desk both vanished.
The tapestry remained; she took a moment to set her right-hand blaster to low stun, then strode up to the wall hanging and yanked it aside. She wasn’t surprised to see another door behind it.
Pulling aside the tapestry must have sent some kind of signal, because this door opened before she could even touch it. A blaster bolt flashed out, taking her low in the right side.
Beka fired back, right-handed, and the man who had shot her crumpled. She looked at the unconscious body.
It was Nivome for real, this time. Except for the two of them, the room was empty. She walked over and prodded the Rolny’s motionless form with the toe of her boot.
BOOK: The Price of the Stars: Book One of Mageworlds
13.03Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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