My little scientist shocked me when she murmured a single name: Koratalin. It was both the most likely answer and the most surprising, all the same. “What?” I snapped, catching her chin in one hand to raise her eyes to my face. “How do you know the name of a crimelord? Why do you think it’s her?” She was trembling like a leaf, her mouth a firm line that told me she didn’t want to answer.
I cast my eyes once to the giant hiding deep in the trees, watching and waiting, but he wasn’t moving. Then I covered her mouth with mine and kissed her, just because I knew it would melt the iron in her spine. She was still shaking when I lifted my head, but now she was clinging to my chest, fingers curled in the leather of Bex’s strap. “Tell me, Dani. Why Koratalin? What do you know?”When she still seemed unwilling to answer, I wondered what secret she was still hiding from me. I made a daring offer then, one I knew I’d never make to anyone else. “Tell me your secret, and I’ll tell you one of mine, little one.”
She gasped, and then her eyes lowered to my chest, and I knew exactly which secret she’d demand in exchange for her answer. I nodded, so be it, if that was what it took. She took my nod for the promise it was, and, with a trembling bottom lip, gave me the answer I wanted, but not the one I expected.
“Koratalin is my half-sister. She and I share the same father… Hadralin.” She did not say anything else, but then she didn’t need to, because I knew both names very well. Hadralin had died a few years ago, but he’d been a crimelord of some power, and an Aderian at that. Of course, given my occupation, I knew better than most that evil livedeverywhere—even in a society made up of empaths and healers.
Koratalin, though, had risen to power after her father’s death and begun ruthlessly expanding. Where her father had been complacent, satisfied with the fiefdom he ruled, his daughter had sought to become one of the big names in the criminal world. She did not come anywhere close to rivaling the likes of Jalima and Drameil, but she was definitely dangerous. As an Aderian herself, she might have been uniquely positioned to know of Dani’s work. As Dani’s sister, she had probably been spying on my little scientist her entire life.
“It’s not a big deal,” Dani denied vehemently when the silence lingered between us. “I broke ties with my father the moment I discovered what he did. He was never part of my life. And Koratalin said she had nothing to do with it…” Nothing to do with it? How was it possible that my empathic female had been so deceived by her sibling?
“Are you still in contact with her? Did you tell her about your work?” She shook her head at both questions, but with a sadness in her eyes that I knew was misplaced, even if she didn’t know it yet. “I hate to break it to you, little one, but your sister is worse than your father ever was. She’s one of the twelve crimelords who control the underworld of the Zeta Quadrant, and she’s an ambitious one. This is right up her alley, and I don’t doubt for a moment that this is her doing.”
The way she sighed and nodded told me she’d already suspected some of it. This didn’t come as a complete surprise, but it wounded her all the same. I hugged her tightly again and sighed in relief when she settled her ear against my chest and accepted the comfort. Of course, that’swhen she chose to remind me of the deal I’d made. “Now tell me why your chest hurts. I need to know, Jaxin.”
“A Shade Stalker claw,” I said. “But Bex protected me.” I touched the cannon hanging from her strap, and for the first time, realized that it didn’t feel entirely wrong to call her that. That cannon wasn’t the Bex of the past, and it wasn’t a replacement for the sister I’d lost. Ithadprotected Dani, though. It had done a great job at that.
My little scientist was too clever by far, her eyes going to the cannon, then turning thoughtful. She was the only one alive who knew the story of my sister, who even knew her name. Her clever brain was already making the connection: Bex the cannon, Bexlin my sister. I’d let her in on a secret that only I knew, and I didn’t know how to handle that.
“It was several months ago, and it does not affect my ability to protect you. I swear.” That was very important to me. Even if I knew that, long term, there might be consequences for pushing my body too hard, I would not fail her here on Radin. There was nothing that would stop me from keeping Dani safe.
She traced my chest with her hands, then eyed Bex again, as if that would give her more answers. “So it happened on Xio,” she said thoughtfully. “How much had to be replaced? Are you responding well to the grafts?” I hissed, annoyed that her training meant she’d instantly leapt to the right conclusions. She was a scientist, but she was a doctor too.
“Sternum and most ribs,” I admitted gruffly, “but my heart and liver were undamaged.” My liver was far larger than hers and very fatty, because it helped with buoyancy in the water. It also helped me absorb salt safely when I swam in saltwater. I’d been very lucky both those organs had survivedas well as they had, or I wouldn’t have lived. Just as I’d been very lucky that the Sineater had stemmed the blood flow so soon after the injury occurred. Dravion, our talented half-Aderian doctor, had also had assistance with the grafts from a very ancient visitor, a Son of Ragnar. If not for all of those circumstances combined, I would be dead right now.
She stroked her fingers along my chest, directly over the strain I felt in the muscles there. “These aren’t fully healed yet. That’s why you ache.” Then she touched Bex and gave me a stare that told me she thought carrying all that weight was too much for me. My fingers tightened on Bex’s strap, and I shook my head. Her smile was tremulous but there. “Fine. But once we’re safely aboard your ship, you’re staying in bed for a couple of days at least. Got that?”
“If you’re going to be in it too, I don’t see any problem with that.” Her laughter was music to my ears.
Chapter 15
Jaxin
I called the Varakartoom once we’d resumed our tired walk through the jungle. Dani had her small hand in mine, and I very much enjoyed that casual touch. Now that I wasn’t constantly trying to suppress all my feelings, it seemed a little easier to accept the things that came to me. It also meant I could not ignore the danger that hung over our heads with every step we took.
“Jaxin, I was just about to reach out to you,” Mitnick answered. “You’ve got a giant right on top of you.” I laughed, because that was old news, then joked about how that would be extremely inconvenient and had the pleasure of stunning the hacker into silence. “Who are you, and what have you done to Jaxin?”he demanded after he’d recovered.
“Listen.” I ignored the jab to focus on the much more serious matter at hand. “The giant does not intend harm, at least for now. What I need to know is if there are any other nearby signals. I fear they might have been tracking Dani’s tablet.” She was quiet as she walked beside me, and I was beginning to recognize the look on her face. She was focusing on her empathic gift, perhaps searching for a threat in the jungle in her own way.
“I’ll have a look,” Mitnick responded immediately. His words were followed by a silence filled with a murmur of voices in the background; other crew aboard the bridge on theVarakartoom. In the jungle, there was the rustling of leaves, the chirping of birds, and other local fauna, but nothing to indicate danger. It was peaceful, but I knew better. Dani abruptly yanked her head up to the canopy above our heads, her timing matching Mitnick’s, who swore, “You’ve got a shuttle right above your fucking head!”
I took in the situation in a heartbeat. We had managed to cross a couple of miles and angle ourselves back to the bank of the river in the past couple of hours. Darkness had truly begun to fall, but the heat from the planet hadn’t faded yet. The hum of the shuttle that Mitnick and Dani had both sensed came shortly after their combined warning. No, not one. My ears picked out a second, so close to the first that it had appeared as one to Mitnick’s sensors.
They came to a hover above us, and it was too late to urge Dani into a run toward the river in the distance. Pushing her to her knees, I aimed Bex up toward the hovering shuttles just as their hatches opened and warriors began dropping out along ropes. A tactic I’d employed a million times myself fora quick deploy in dangerous terrain, it wasn’t one I was about to let them use to corner us.
Too dark for my eyes to make out how many men there were or what their species were, I just aimed and fired. Bex exploded with a sizzle of dangerous laser fire, lighting up the dark. A dozen silhouettes lit up as the laser streaked past before it exploded against the hull of the nearest shuttle. Males screamed as their ropes snapped and they plunged to the unforgiving ground. The shuttle roared as its engines blew and it spun sideways, narrowly avoiding its buddy.
“Run,” I told Dani, yanking her with me. It was a good blow, but if this was a well-trained crew—and I didn’t doubt that it was—they would quickly recover. We had only a small window to escape.
My little scientist kept pace at my side boldly, even though she’d curled both her hands over her ears and was grimacing in pain. Then she stumbled, and I caught her by the waist and slung her over my shoulder. That definitely wasn’t good for the aching muscles in my chest, but I’d worry about that later. I could smell the water, we were close, and I knew they would not be able to follow me in there.
Shots were fired, but their aim was wide; they didn’t want to risk striking Dani, and cradled over my shoulder, she was essentially shielding me. I hated it, hated that it put her in danger, that I was using her that way, but it worked. Then shouts and laser fire were drowned out by a huge roar. At first, I thought it was the shuttle I’d fired at crashing into the jungle, but then I recognized the sound. These mercenaries had stumbled into the path of the giant, and he was fighting back.
I dove toward the river’s edge with a shout, a last push of strength in my legs, and then we were there. Dani struggled instinctively in my arms as the water closed over her head. I held her tight and let the current sweep us downstream. We could not rise to the surface yet, not when the threat was still so close. She had to be nearly out of air, but she’d calmed rather than continued to fight. I saw her long braid coil through the water next to my shoulder, the improvised ties coming undone.
Surfacing cautiously, I curled onto my back and kicked my feet as I helped Dani draw breath. It was too dark for my eyes to see everything, but I wanted the use of my gills more than I needed the night-vision mode my helmet could provide. The Radin giant was visible on the riverbank where we’d gone in, his tail whipping through the firing mercenaries with a dangerous blow.
The second shuttle came around, using the open area over the river to get a clean shot at the massive target. I kicked my feet to propel us farther away, covering Dani’s head with my hand so she couldn’t see. I thought for sure the giant was done for, and she didn’t need to see that. If I could, I’d shield her from the empathic backlash she’d surely feel from this. What if it burned her out again? Would it harm her even more, so soon after the first time?
