Rebel Princess(9)

He returned to the bed, this time sitting farther away, by her feet.  "The same reasoning applied to you, but the point was moot. There was no  way I could let you know without involving far too many go-betweens.  Think, Kiolani. My entire crew had the same problem. All of them had to  agree to letting their loved ones think they were dead."

"You couldn't have turned your whole crew, I don't believe it."

"Over the course of two years of planning, I transferred everyone I  couldn't rely on. When Orion made that last run to Nyx, only my own  people were on board."

"And Fleet didn't notice?"

Ah-ha, he had her interest. And the amber eyes were no longer sparking flame. But they would be. He wasn't finished.

"Not so much as a ripple, let alone any rumors. I had a long time to  plan, and it went more smoothly than I'd thought possible." Tal  maneuvered for time, letting his gaze drift around the small  compartment. "Now comes the hard part," he told her, and watched a scowl  instantly shutter thoughts that might have been tending in his  direction.

"Even rebellions have a hierarchy. If you're trying to get away from a  government that dictates every aspect of your life, then you have to  form a new and better system. Which means that even a rebel leader,  particularly the founder of a rebellion, can't become a dictator  himself. He has to listen to a nonmilitary council and to the thoughts  of the people who followed him into rebellion."

The look she gave him was so full of incredulity, Tal groaned. "Think,  Kass! What's the point of a rebellion if it means another military  dictatorship in place of the one we already have?"

"You would allow ordinary people to tell you what to do?"

There spoke the child of a planet governed by a monarchy. Tal's lips  curled in a chagrined smile as he recognized he didn't always practice  what he preached. "Sometimes I balk," he admitted. "The Hierarchy was  dead set against this mission. Too risky."

"But you came anyway." Kass considered, nodded. "They were right. The rebellion couldn't afford to lose you. Or Archer-Gemma."

"I argued that you were an asset, a valuable weapon to aid the  rebellion. And in the end I did what rogue captains have always done-I  did what I thought best. But the reception when we get back could be a  bit rocky."         

     



 

"How?"

Tal tried not to look at the two falls of black hair, fastened with  silver bands at neck level on each side of her head. He tried not to  look at the delicate features, marked by those glowing amber eyes, regal  nose, and full inviting mouth. He tried not to be distracted by the  curves so much better displayed in her personal clothes than they were  in Fleet uniform. But it wasn't easy. "They will want you to  demonstrate-"

"I do not perform tricks like some huckster in a circo. You know I do not-"

"Be quiet and listen! Fyd, Kiolani. Your arrogance does you no favors."

Sullen, lower lip pouting like a child, she glared at him.

"If you are asked to demonstrate your gifts, you will demonstrate. You will cooperate. You will make everyone happy-"

"You mean like this, Captain?"

She was smiling sweetly, while the tip of a dagger hovered an inch from  his throat. His own razor-edged dagger with gem-encrusted hilt, picked  up at an open-air market on Gyges. Tal looked back up, keeping his cool.  "It might be best, Kiolani, if you refrain from using a lethal weapon  for your demonstration."

Kass's smile disappeared, but she continued to hold his gaze. Five  seconds. Ten. "And it might be best if you put the dagger away yourself,  Captain. I am better at removing it from its sheath than I would be at  putting it back."

Tal grasped the dagger's hilt and restored it to its customary position,  strapped to his lower right leg under a nondescript pair of khaki  pants. "Just how did you know I carried a dagger?"

For the first time she offered a genuine, if impish, smile. "Girl talk,  Captain. You'd be amazed at what sharp ears can learn, even on a ship  like Orion."

Tal rose to his feet. His little Psyclid was indeed everything he had  thought she was. Now all she had to do was prove it to the others.

Which could be problem. Stubborn little witch.





Chapter 6


Silence. Without the hum of her engines, the scout ship was nearly as  quiet as the Archives. Kass checked the time on her chrono. Ten Regulon  hours since they'd exited jumpspace, so they must be docked. But where?  Without a porthole, she was blind.

Kass frowned, counting the number of meals that had been brought to her quarters. Four . . . five? And not a sign of Tal Rigel.

Abandoned again.

What had she expected after putting a knife to his throat? Just because  her Tal Rigel would have been glad to see her for reasons other than  malfunctioning trajectories . . .

She'd had one terse communication from him, delivered by Lieutenant  Stagg. A handwritten reminder to cooperate with the examining committee,  dazzle them with some simple Psyclid tricks, enough to shut them up,  and she'd be free to be the asset he knew she was going to be. He'd  added an emphatic No daggers! and underlined it three times.

Kass held the letter tight, assuring herself it was real. The scout  ship, real. Tal Rigel, real. She had not been shut away for so long that  she had dropped into fantasy.

She had actually been liberated by rebel forces. And yet . . .

A long-deceased Captain Talryn Rigel rescuing her from the Archives? Absurd.

Or perhaps the fantasy was not of her own making. Tal Rigel could be  lying through his teeth, this whole rescue part of some diabolical  Regulon plot. Which made far more sense, because Captain Talryn Rigel  would never desert the Imperial Fleet. It was unthinkable. He was a son  of the Empire, devoted to duty. Very likely the drama of the last few  days was designed solely to get her cooperation, to plumb her secrets to  Fleet's advantage. Tal Rigel had visited her only once because he was  afraid her mysterious Psyclid powers would penetrate his lies . . .

And the two pilots he'd told her to splash-were they expendable?

No. The Captain Tal Rigel she knew would never kill two pilots just to  convince Kass he was a friend. Not the stiff-necked, ultra-honorable  captain of Orion.

A rap on her door. Kass's heart hiccuped.

Not Tal, of course not Tal. This was Fate knocking, the signal she was  about to find out where they were, and perhaps a clue to what was  waiting out there. More prison? Hope?

Kass opened the door. Lieutenant Stagg nodded his approval when he saw  her bag was packed, ready to go. Kass hadn't really looked at him when  he took her from the Archives. Nameless, faceless, he and his men were  the enemy, taking her into the unknown. But over the long hours in  space, with a marine guarding her door every moment, the lieutenant had  checked on her several times a day, becoming the most familiar face in  her new life aboard Archer. No, not Archer anymore. What had the  lieutenant called her? Gemma, that was it.

Anton Stagg, Kass thought, was the kind of marine they featured on  recruiting vids. An exemplary Regulon warrior, he was even taller than  Tal Rigel. A hint of brown hair cut military short peeked out from under  his flat-topped hat. Hazel eyes, darker than her own, nose off a Roman  coin, thin lips, and not an ounce of him that wasn't military fit. And  yet he was a true successor to Cort Baran, treating her with nothing but  the utmost respect. Captain's orders? Or was this actually a rescue and  she was among friends?         

     



 

If so . . . why the guards?

After an inward sigh, Kass followed the lieutenant down the corridor,  head high. Sergeant Quint, a shorter, equally well-muscled version of  the lieutenant, brought up the rear.

The inner doors of Gemma's airlock slid open, and they walked through.  The outer doors, locked open while in port, disgorged them directly into  the pressurized docking bay. Something about it was familiar, but every  docking bay from Regula to Nyx looked pretty much the same. Some were  just cleaner, more modern than others and painted in brighter colors,  distinguished only by the language on their signage . . .

Kass broke into a run, dashing past Stagg, bursting through the door  into the main terminal. Tears running down her face, she darted through  the sparse crowd of people, the majority of them Psyclid, and skidded to  a halt at the large viewport overlooking the land mass below. Far below  the orbiting space station where they'd docked, sunlight shimmered off a  pale blue mist that covered the planet, but not so densely it obscured  masses of dark green forest that seemed to stretch into infinity. Not a  planet but a terraformed moon. For glowing in the sky behind the misted  land below was the huge land mass of Psyclid, four hundred and three  thousand marks out.

Blue Moon. They were docked above Blue Moon. Tal Rigel had brought her to her favorite place in the whole universe.

"Feel better, Kiolani?" Lieutenant Stagg asked from just behind her.