Eliah kept the smile out of his light with an effort.
These two-hundred-year-old seers always groused about the past.
Is she all right? Chandre sent finally.
Well enough, yeah. He let her feel his frown. Threw up when she came to, and she won’t talk about it. Physically she’s fine. She’s out on the balcony—
Get her back inside. Now.
Pardon my saying, sir, but no. She wants to look at the water, let her bloody well look at the water. It’s dark...no one’ll see her. He paused.
Has he checked in?
No. She exhaled a Barrier sigh. Vash said it’s up to us to determine what’s needed to keep the situation under control. You said she won’t press charges. Do we discipline him for breaking vow? She could be waiting for him to come back. To stab him, try to hurt him, whatever...
Eliah gave a humorless laugh.
I don’t think so, he sent. She still thinks too much like a human to let herself go on that kind of thing.
Feeling Chandre’s skepticism, he added,
...And if by disciplining him, you mean shooting him in the head, I’m all for it. His thoughts leaked anger. He didn’t shield it from her at all. If I had to guess, I’d say he pulled her into it deliberately.
Recommendation, Eliah? Chandre sent dryly. Beyond the firing squad for Dehgoies for the crime of wanting his wife?
Separate them, he returned promptly. Keep him away from her. When she’s up to it, I’ll ask her what she thinks.
Fine. I leave them to you. She clicked to herself in irritation, folding her light arms. Watch her, Eliah...and no taking advantage of the situation to talk her into your bed! We still don’t know why he did it. You get Dehgoies coming up here in a jealous rage and we’re going to have ourselves a real problem. That is one piece of bullshit I don’t intend to deal with tonight.
Understood, he sent.
You’d better. Or so help me I’ll let him shoot you.
Eliah was still laughing a little as he clicked out of the Barrier, feeling his legs against the hard padding of a stateroom chair.
He waited for his eyes to clear, then faced the window out to the balcony where he’d last seen her and startled, jumping to his feet.
The balcony, the entire cabin in fact...was empty.
The elevator car came to rest on the higher of two main floors, dumping me and seven other passengers into a wide foyer filled with people on red and gold patterned carpet. From human minds milling around mine, I surmised I’d arrived during the later of the two dinner meals served for general passengers...a stroke of luck in that it provided visual cover at least.
I hadn’t had much time while Eliah had been in the Barrier, talking to Chan or whoever else about me. As soon as I saw him shift out of his body, I ran for the wardrobe.
In seconds, I’d yanked on jeans and a tight-fitting tee from a band I’d seen years ago in Oakland. I donned my boots and a sweatshirt to deal with the cold, throwing the hood up to cover my head and putting in the brown contacts I’d fished out of the trash and washed. I projected some of my consciousness out on the balcony while I dressed behind the wardrobe door, just in case Eliah looked for me at any point in his conversation with Chandre.#p#分页标题#e#
That was another trick Revik taught me.
Grabbing a pair of mirrored sunglasses I’d found in one of the drawers, I stuffed them in my pocket and headed out the door.
I’d come up with a whole story for the guards at the end of the row of staterooms, but hadn’t needed to use it, because, well...the guards weren’t there.
Not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth, I walked to the elevators as fast as I could, donning the sunglasses clumsily as I hit the button.
That had been at least fifteen minutes ago.
I got off on a few random floors, ran into several different groups of humans before I decided to head for the lobby and look for a place where I might hide out in public. I figured my best chance of getting even an hour out from under the Guard would be to find a place where no one would be looking at me. Meaning, somewhere where I could disappear into the crowd.
Of course, the Guard might be looking for me by now.
It crossed my mind that I also might run into Revik. Particularly if he went out trolling again, maybe going for round two.
When my light reacted at my own bleak attempt at humor, I shoved it aside, but not before the image of me collapsing on the atrium floor flickered through my thoughts, along with a taste of what it had felt like the first time. I really doubted I would be able to control it any better if it happened again.
Keeping my mind carefully blank, I focused on my surroundings.
The decor hovered somewhere between Vegas, which I’d visited once with Jaden, and a suburban shopping mall. Except here, only about half of the signs and VR projections were speaking English. Most switched languages as they scanned room keys, following customers with higher credit limits and adjusting products until the person waved them off or stopped to listen to their pitch. Corridors twisted off in all directions, making it hard to track which side of the ship I was on until I stood still long enough to feel the whole thing moving.