The Seek (25 page)

As they turned back to the camp, Kyn saw them. Gustas, the Primo, and Dona. Lying close together. They could have been resting at a picnic, except for the unnatural angle of their bodies and the blood on their chests.

Asha was standing nearby with Tabi. He shrugged helplessly, his eloquent grey eyes heavy with horror. ‘I couldn’t hold them all off,’ he said. ‘Not even with the Primo. They were determined to get to her.’ He pointed to Dona, dead and bloody on the ground. ‘I only just saved Tabysha.’

Tabi nodded, her face white as she looked down at the red-haired girl who had briefed them all so comprehensively moments before.

Of course. Somehow, the Haitites knew that the Explorers were the key to all of this. They wanted to shut them down.

Kyn didn’t need to know the details of how it had gone down. It was horrible, but she felt only intense relief that Tabysha was safe. She bent down to check for pulses, her stomach heaving as she found none.

As she did, she felt Symon beside her. ‘Gone?’ His face was a tight mask.

She nodded, studying the hard set of his jaw. ‘You did know her, didn’t you?’

‘Yes,’ he said.

Kyn couldn’t help herself. ‘A lover?’ Even now, asking it, that white-hot stab of pain in her gut. How pathetic was she? Jealous of a dead girl.

Symon sighed and shook his head. ‘An ally,’ he said.

Kyn closed her eyes and stepped around the two bodies. She really didn’t want to know. Not yet.

‘Five minutes,’ she called to the others. ‘Get only personnel, weapons and essentials. We move out before they have time to plan a counter.’

The Avengers moved off quickly, but Kyn placed a restraining hand on Mirren, and drew her away a little, under the cover of some nearby trees.

‘Don’t ever do that again,’ Kyn said, feeling her voice tremble with the effort of not screaming at the girl. ‘I had it under control. You don’t need heroics.’

The girl turned to Kyn, her eyes red. ‘I’m no hero,’ she said bitterly. ‘I’m not even brave.’ She swallowed hard, and brought her hands up to her chest. Kyn could see they were shaking. ‘Back there, when I thought…’ She paused.

‘You what?’ Kyn’s heart went out to the girl, so full of fight and fury. And right now, so confused.

Mirren blinked quickly. ‘I was sure that was it.’

Kyn nodded. ‘And it would have been.’

‘I was so scared.’ The girl’s lip trembled.

‘Of course you were,’ Kyn said. ‘But still, you fought.’

Mirren looked at Kyn, her big blue eyes wide and wet. She looked like she wanted to say something, like it was straining at her lips, desperate to be free.

‘Tell me, Mirren,’ Kyn said.

The girl opened her mouth, but no sound came.

Kyn placed her hands on Mirren’s shoulders and turned the girl towards her. ‘Tell me what happened, with your family.’

Mirren closed her eyes. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, squeezing her eyes shut harder. ‘And there isn’t time now.’

Kyn shook her a little. ‘It does matter,’ she said, knowing it was true. It mattered to how Mirren fought, and it mattered to Kyn. Kyn wanted to know what had happened to this girl.

Mirren’s eyes flicked open, but she hesitated. Kyn squeezed her shoulders.

Quietly, she began. ‘We lived on a trading post. My mother, my father, brothers.’

She started slowly, shakily. Kyn needed to push it along. ‘Who taught you to dance?’

Mirren’s eyes narrowed. ‘How do you..?’ She shook her head. ‘My mother. She’d learned, back on Earth. She never gave it up, even after the Edicts.’

Kyn nodded. ‘So your father was a trader?’

Mirren shook her head, hugging herself with her hands like she was cold. ‘I thought so, we always thought so. But it was strange. He was…’ She paused, looking up and to the right as she tried to find the words. ‘He was almost obsessed with teaching us to fight. He’d been a warrior, in the battles before the Apocalypse’.

Kyn shrugged. Not so strange. If she ever had kids, she’d make damn sure they could fight before they could walk. She shook her head quickly.
Kids? Where the hell had that thought come from?

‘Fighting matters.’ It was all Kyn could manage.

‘Mmm.’ Mirren seemed very far away now. Kyn watched a fine trail of blood as it worked its way down her cheek from a slash on her forehead. ‘But it was weird. He…my father…became more and more obsessed with it. Teaching us to fight. And more secretive, and paranoid. No matter how good we became, we could never be good enough. Then the Enforcers came.’

Kyn’s attention shifted quickly from that blood to Mirren’s eyes. ‘Enforcers?’ They both knew what she was asking.
Our Enforcers?

Mirren nodded gently.

‘How do you know about Enforcers?’ Kyn’s pulse quickened. The solar whip scars on the Haitite; now this.

Mirren’s lips pressed together. ‘Because they killed my whole family.’

Kyn closed her eyes. ‘Mirren, I’m so —’

‘Don’t be,’ she said. ‘Don’t be sorry for me. I don’t know what my Dad was into, but it makes sense now. All that training for us.’

Kyn nodded. ‘You were there, when it happened?’

The girl swallowed. ‘I tried my hardest to stop it.’ She brought her hands up to cover her eyes. ‘But after I saw Jento — my last brother…’ She stopped, dragging in long breaths. ‘After I saw him go down, I ran.’

Things started to fit together. But…

‘Asha? Asha saw you? He saw you fighting. But how?’

Mirren raised an eyebrow at Kyn.

She felt the ground tilt under her feet. Asha, an Enforcer. But why? They were…secret police. Not warriors.

‘He saved me,’ Mirren said softly. ‘He found me, but he didn’t give me up. He should have, they were looking for me.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t really know why. Anyway, he told me to run, hide. When he covered me, I knew where to go. I knew that star so well. They didn’t find me. And then, later, he came back for me.’

Kyn put her hands on the girl’s shoulders again. ‘You did what you could, Mirren,’ she said. ‘That’s all you could do.’

‘But you’re…’ The girl stopped again, her breath coming rapidly, and Kyn could see how hard she was working to keep the post-fight adrenalin under control. ‘You never waver. You’re so brave. I want to be like you.’

Kyn shut her eyes briefly, then opened them. She turned Mirren to face her. ‘No, Mirren,’ she said quietly, wishing she could imprint the force of what she was about to say into every cell of the girl’s body. ‘No, you do not want to be like me. I have nothing.’

Mirren’s eyes widened a little. ‘Neither do I,’ she said simply.

Kyn thought about all the girl had told her; learning to fight; watching her family murdered; running. She thought about her face in that club that night. And how she had fought out on the rocks moments before.

Kyn assessed the girl — her beauty, her boldness, her insecurities — and the confusing, protective instincts that had surprised her since she met this girl settled into her skin.

Rules were made to be broken
.

‘Yes you do,’ Kyn said. It was out before she could stop it. ‘You have me.’

Symon had not left her side since the battle on the ridge. He wasn’t making a big deal of it; he just trudged along beside her, silent and unreadable.

Kyn had no intention of talking about it all right now. The forest was dense and dangerous; she was sure they were being stalked by the rest of the Haitites; and she had no idea whether they would make it back to the pod alive, let alone off this planet.

And maybe that was it. Maybe it was the thought that it might all be over here, today, that changed her mind. She had been planning to hit him up about all of it once they got back to the ship safely.

But what if they didn’t? What if she died wondering?

‘What does
demos
mean?’ Kyn planted one foot steadily in front of the other as she asked the question, not stopping or pulling her eyes from her endless scanning of the trees and bushes ahead of her.

Symon didn’t break stride either. ‘C’mon, Kyn,’ he chided her. ‘You had some schooling.’

She shook her head. ‘Nope. I got nothing.’

‘It’s Greek,’ he said, keeping step beside her. ‘Ancient Greek, to be precise. It means
the people
.’

Kyn snorted. ‘Like
we, the people
?’

Symon shrugged, but he didn’t look her way. His eyes were as deeply involved in scanning the terrain as hers. ‘I guess.’ He slashed at a low-hanging vine with exotic red flowers. ‘It was one half of the ancient word for democracy. Demos — the people. And kratos — power.’ He paused. ‘Or maybe
force
is better.’

‘People power?’ Kyn didn’t even try to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. She scanned the group quickly, both to make sure everyone was in formation and to check no-one was within earshot. ‘Because that worked so well for us when the shit hit the fan.’ She kicked at a small tree in her path and tramped forward. ‘With The Ultimatum and everything.’ She injected a girly optimism into her voice. ‘Yeah, it was so cool that as we were all voting they were planning their invasion.’ She swallowed, trying hard not to think about that night, dancing on the veranda, the blackness then the light. ‘Made me feel so powerful, all that. So all filled up with people power.’ She said the last two words bitterly.

Symon laughed darkly. ‘No institution is perfect,’ he said, stepping slightly away as he manoeuvred around a larger tree. ‘Doesn’t mean you throw the baby out with the bathwater.’

Kyn scanned the tree line ahead as they stepped into a small clearing. All clear. She held up a hand to those following —
keep moving
.

‘So what about the chains?’ This time she did sneak a look at his face. He met her glance, and his eyes were dark and hard.

‘Some things change you,’ he said, his voice even more growly than usual. ‘They leave scars on your body, but it’s harder to explain the scars you can’t see.’

Kyn got it. Oh boy, did she get it.

Symon continued. ‘You ever run across the Laotites?’

Kyn wrinkled her nose. She knew a little about them. ‘Not much call for Avengers in the neutral territories. They’re pacifists, right?’

Symon grunted confirmation. ‘They’re interesting folks,’ he said, picking up the pace a little. ‘Great tattoo artists. I’ve spent some time there. They helped me pick the image. The one you saw on my arm.’ He paused. ‘When you were spying on me.’

Kyn almost stopped so she could punch him. ‘Hey, I wasn’t the one stripping off in plain view by the stream.’ She tried not to think about his semi-naked body. All that hard, brown muscle and caramel-coloured skin.
The chains, focus on the chains, girl
.

‘Silly old me,’ Symon said drily. ‘Here I thought I was taking precautions. Guess they’re not that effective if someone has a scope on you.’

Kyn decided she had no intention of apologising. Too late to break the habit of a lifetime now. Besides, if he could do secretive shit, so could she. ‘So what do they mean? The chains?’

‘They’re a reminder,’ he said, swinging a little closer to her as he rounded another tree, ‘of the people who are left.’

‘On Earth Three?’

Symon grunted again.

Kyn pressed forward, wondering if it was worth the argument. ‘Every society has to have consequences, Symon,’ she said finally, ‘if it’s going to survive. Just like every family.’ Symon knew better than anyone about discipline — Pietr had been a hard taskmaster; he’d expected a lot from his children, and was not afraid to dish out a belting if he felt one was required. But all that had changed when the Apocalypse came. On the day they grew up forever, he never hit his children again.

He just taught them how to fight.

She pressed on. ‘Those people, the ones on Earth Three, they’re the bad guys.’ She tried to quash the rebellious thought in her heart.
And Mirren’s brothers? And the Haitites?

Symon exhaled audibly. ‘No, Kyn, they’re not.’

Kyn had almost had enough. She stomped closer to him and whispered though gritted teeth, ‘Goddamnit then, Symon, spill. What the hell happened to you?’

Symon came very close, but they continued their march forward. At this moment, Kyn couldn’t remember which thing she wanted more — to get to the pod and get the hell off this star, or to find out what had happened to the beautiful boy who had been her best friend; who had hurt him; what he had done to deserve it; how he had survived.

She leaned against him a little as he swung closer. ‘Tell me, Symon. Maybe I can help you.’

His next words were sharp. ‘I don’t need your help, and I wouldn’t take it. You need to do what you do. And most of all, you need to stay safe.’

Okay, so Kyn got this. He didn’t want to implicate her. This she could work with. ‘Okay, I get it. You don’t want to get me into trouble. So what
can
you tell me?’

Symon kept walking steadily on, scanning the tree line in front of them, slashing at the odd plant. She knew he was considering her question. This was so Symon. Careful Symon: the thinker, the planner. The cleverest boy she ever knew.

‘I can tell you I got caught,’ he said. ‘Doing something that was forbidden, asking some questions I shouldn’t have. But I was young then, only twenty.’

‘Two years after I left,’ Kyn interrupted him.

‘Yes,’ he agreed, his voice heavy. ‘I was more foolish then. I was kind of…’ He paused for a second mid-stride, then started up again. ‘…I was kind of rash, obsessed. Once I knew you were okay, I slowed down a little.’

So she had started him on this quest for answers?
Oh no
. ‘So you got caught and you got taken to Earth Three.’

‘Yep.’ His voice took on a different tone, darker and further away.

‘Was it very bad?’

He was silent for a moment, and the only sounds Kyn could hear were the crunching of the boots through the undergrowth. ‘Yes,’ he said finally. ‘Very, very bad. And I didn’t have anything to tell them. I didn’t know anything then. But I did know the one thing I couldn’t tell them.’

Kyn knew. ‘Who you were,’ she said.

‘Mm,’ he agreed. ‘They would have found out, eventually. But it’s…it’s different there, not what you’d expect. One interrogator per prisoner. The Enforcer who captures you is the one who processes you is the one who…works on you. It’s personal. And private. No records are kept. It’s all hand to hand.’