Kessa
The second tracker moves again.
Not far or fast and not in a straight line. That bothers me the most.
A machine should lie like a machine. It should sit where it fell, half-buried in hot sand, leaking its terrible little pulse into the world until we find it and crush it. A machine that moves should do so with a pattern. Roll downhill. Drag with wind. Bounce when stone shifts under it.
This one darts.
The copper sphere shows the motion in ugly little flickers.
A blink near the broken cistern marker. A silence long enough for me to taste hope.
Then another blink farther south, not along any slope that makes sense.
Then another behind a tumble of red stone where nothing larger than my hand should be able to pass.
I stare at the sphere until the glow burns a ghost behind my eyes.
“Something picked it up,” Maro says.
He says it like he has discovered a new horror and would like the rest of us to admire it with him.
“Something small,” Lio adds, crouched with both hands on his knees as he studies the sand. “Or something that knows how to keep its weight off the ground.”
“That is not comforting,” I say.
“I wasn’t offering comfort.”
“Clearly.”
The seven of us have spread across the edge of the wash in a shape that would make sense to anyone who has ever hunted, fled, or been hunted while wishing very hard to become someone else’s problem.
Syin stands on the highest shelf of stone, wings folded tight, lochaber in hand.
Renn keeps to my right, young face grim enough to age him ten years.
Orek has taken the left, broad shoulders angled toward the open desert.
Lio and Maro read the ground because human feet notice different lies than Zmaj claws.
Rhazek stands too close to the broken path and too far from everyone’s trust.
His throat plates remain dark. For now at least.
The last time the tracker pulsed, the faint green under his skin answered. He said nothing. I said nothing. Syin noticed, because Syin notices danger the way hunger notices an empty bowl.
I crouch beside Lio. The sand is disturbed, but not enough to decipher what took the tracker. No deep trench. No broad drag. No heavy belly mark.
“Not zemlja,” I say.
Orek snorts softly. “If zemlja carried it, we would not be discussing the problem. We would be inside the problem.”
“Not guster either,” Lio says.
“Be certain before saying that,” Syin says, looking down from the ridge.
Lio points with two fingers.
“A guster would leave weight here, here, and here. Foreclaws deep. Back feet wide. Tail sweep behind it. This is all wrong.”
Orek grunts agreement. “A guster is an alpha predator. Second only to zemlja. It does not pick up strange metal and scamper with it.”
“Scamper,” Maro repeats.
Orek gives him a flat look. “You have a better word?”
“Not one that improves my mood.”
I lean closer to the marks. Tiny crescent pricks dent the crusted sand. A faint brush line arcs between them, light as a fingertip. Something crossed here with weight held high, then vanished onto stone.
Above us, the twin suns turn the world red and white and cruel. Heat gathers under my collar. Sweat crawls down my spine. The sphere gives another faint tremor in my hand.
Blink.
Not in the wash this time.
Up.
I lift my head.
A sound comes from the broken wall ahead of us. Not a growl. Not the scrape of spines. Not the deep, ground-shaking breath of anything sensible people run from. A tiny, offended mewl.
Maro’s face changes. “No.”
Lio squints. “Was that...”
Another mewl comes from the wall. Louder. Indignant. As if the desert has personally disappointed it.
Something yellow flashes between two stones.
Reddish undercoat. Dark stripes. A fluffy tail lifted like a banner of terrible self-importance.
The creature hops onto a cracked ledge, compact body balanced neatly on small paws, leathery wings tucked against its sides. Its eyes are enormous and bright blue, far too pretty for the amount of trouble currently in its mouth.
A kedi.
Of course.
Of all the ways for off-world hunters to threaten Tajss, today they have chosen a winged cat with stolen murder jewelry.
The kedi looks down at us with the round-eyed innocence of a creature that has never done anything wrong in its life and is prepared to continue that lie until death.
A black metal bead sticks sideways between its tiny sharp teeth.
The tracker pulse flickers.
Rhazek’s throat answers.
Once.
A pause.
The kedi’s ears perk.
“Do not move,” I say.
Everyone moves a little, because everyone here is a fool including me.
The kedi springs.
Its small wings snap open and the creature lightens itself, sailing from the wall to the next broken slab of stone with its tail streaming behind it. It lands without a sound, turns, and gives us a delighted chirp around the metal in its mouth.
Then it bolts.
“After it,” Syin says.
“No weapons,” I snap.
Syin is already moving, but his glare finds me across the wash.
“It carries the tracker.”
“It’s also the size of a ration pot and contrary.”
“The tracker is not less dangerous because the carrier is ridiculous.”
“I know that.”
I run.
The kedi streaks between two fallen blocks. Lio goes left. Maro goes right. Renn vaults over a low shelf and lands in front of it with enough precision to make any hunter proud.
The kedi stops, sits, and stares at him.
Renn freezes.
The kedi blinks slowly.
Renn, who has faced sinklines, off-worlders, and panic crowds without flinching, looks briefly unsure whether he is allowed to be challenged by something fluffy.
“Grab it,” Maro hisses.
The kedi spits the tracker into one paw, bats it once, catches it in its mouth again, and launches straight over Renn’s shoulder.
Renn swears.
I would laugh if my heart weren’t trying to beat its way out of my chest.
The tracker gives another muffled pulse.
This time Rhazek staggers.
Only half a step. Almost nothing, but enough. I cut toward him instead of the kedi.
“Rhazek.”
“I am here,” he says.
His voice is too controlled. The kind of calm people use when their bodies have become negotiations they can’t trust.
The kedi lands on a rib of ruined metal half-buried in the sand. It crouches there, tail lashing, eyes fixed on Rhazek’s throat.
“It likes the glow,” Lio says.
“Wonderful,” I say. “Our enemy built bait for a kedi.”
Rhazek’s mouth tightens. “It is attracted to the pulse.”
“So are you.”
“Yes.”
No excuse. No softening. Just the awful accuracy of him.
The kedi chirps again, pleased with its audience, and darts away before Syin can close the distance. Orek blocks the next gap. The creature scrambles up a wall too steep for human feet, wings fluttering to lighten each leap. Sand sprays. Little claw marks flash and vanish.
Maro skids to a stop below it. “Curse it.”
“It’s enjoying that,” Lio says.
“It should enjoy being helpful,” Maro snaps.
“It’s a kedi,” Lio answers.
Orek mutters something in Zmaj.
“What?” I ask.
“In old hunts,” he says, not taking his eyes off the ledge, “kedis were used to distract guster.”
I look at the small striped menace currently using a galactic tracker as a toy.
“That explains far too much and not nearly enough.”
The kedi drops the tracker onto the ledge. For one perfect breath, every one of us believes the critter has become reasonable. Then it bats the metal bead with one paw.
The tracker rolls along the stone. The kedi pounces after it, scoops it back into its mouth, and glides down into the next wash. Maro makes a sound that may be prayer or surrender.
“Stop chasing it,” I say.
Syin twists toward me. “It is escaping.”
“No. It’s playing.”
“That is not better.”
“It is if we stop playing the game.”
The kedi vanishes behind a curved slab of rust-black hull. The tracker pulse dampens. The sphere in my hand gives a weak blink, then nothing.
My fear sharpens. “Nobody run.”
“Kessa,” Syin says.
“Trust me or don’t, but stop moving like prey.”
Syin gives me a furious look that says he’d just as soon leap off a cliff himself, but he raises one hand. I note it for later. Like so many things, there is no time to worry about what the price was for him.
Silence spreads across the wash. Wind combs sand over stone. Far off, something clicks in the heat, probably cooling metal, probably not doom. I hope because that is exactly what doom would want me to think.
Slowly I lower myself onto one knee. The ground burns through my trousers.
I take my pack off one shoulder and open the side pocket. Inside are three miserable strips of dried meat that taste like regret and old boot leather. Emergency rations. Mine, technically. Survival does love making every good choice expensive.
“What are you doing?” Maro whispers.
“Negotiating.”
“With a kedi?”
“With the only person here who currently has what we need.”
Rhazek looks at me. Despite everything, a brief shadow of amusement touches his mouth.
“Person?” he asks.
“It has opinions and steals things. Close enough.”
I tear one strip of meat in half and toss it toward the curved slab. Not at the kedi. Near it. I was never allowed a pet on the ship, but I loved them. Or the idea of them. I watched so many vids of cats that I might be an expert. Or as expert as anyone can be with no actual cats to work with.
And a kedi looks like a cat, even if it is a winged alien one with an apocalyptic taste in toys. Like any cat I ever saw, it hates being told where to go. I’m running on a thin theory and a dim hope, but what else do we have?
For a moment nothing happens. I wait, then toss the second piece a little farther away from us.
A striped face appears upside down over the slab. Enormous blue eyes. Tiny teeth clamped around the tracker. One ear flicks.
“There you are,” I murmur. The kedi stares at the meat. Then at me. Then at the meat. Its tail twitches. “Come on,” I say softly. “Be greedy. I believe in you.”
The kedi hops down. It places one paw on the meat, never taking its eyes off me.
The tracker glows between its teeth.
Rhazek inhales through his nose. I keep my gaze on the kedi.
“Do not answer it.”
“I am trying not to.”
The kedi chews the dried strip twice, makes a disgusted little sound, and drops it.
“Rude,” Lio whispers.
“It prefers raw meat,” Orek says.
“Then it can develop a broader palate,” I say.
The kedi chirps, flicks its tail, and darts sideways. It’s testing me.
I slide my route token from my belt. The little bronze disk is scratched and worthless to anyone outside the City. I set it on the sand and spin it with one finger.
The token flashes in the sun.
The kedi’s pupils go wide.
There it is.
It’s not hungry, it’s interested and likes shiny.
I spin the token again. It wobbles in a crooked circle, catching red light. The kedi leaves the meat completely and creeps closer, belly low, wings half-lifted, tail balancing every tiny step.
The tracker remains in its mouth.
“Closer,” I murmur.
Rhazek doesn’t move. Syin doesn’t breathe loudly. Lio and Maro look like men watching a cliff decide whether to fall.
The kedi pounces on the token.
At the same time, I flick the third piece of meat behind it.
The kedi turns its head.
The tracker slips from its mouth.
It hits stone with a small, ugly click.
The tracker opens. Not like a flower. Not like anything alive. Like a lock deciding it has enough of the right shape to become a door. Green light slices through the seam. Rhazek makes one harsh sound.
The kedi hisses, finally offended by the game betraying it, and launches up onto Maro’s shoulder. Maro yelps. Lio grabs for him. The kedi scrambles over Maro’s head, digs tiny claws into his hair, and glides to a safer rock with every sign of having survived a great personal insult.
I throw my cloth over the tracker.
“Stone,” I say.
Renn is fastest. He slams a flat rock into my palm.
The tracker pulses under the cloth.
Once.
A pause.
I bring the stone down.
Again.
The casing cracks. A shard of black casing skips sideways and slices Orek’s forearm. He swears but stays back.
Green light spits through the cloth in thin lines. The pulse shivers up my arm, cold under the desert heat. Rhazek drops to one knee beside me, not touching, fighting something I cannot see and can feel anyway because the air around him has become pressure.
“Again,” he says.
I hit it again.
The tracker gives a small metallic scream and splits. A black bead rolls free. Not bone. Not seed. A piece of ugly off-world design no larger than the tip of my thumb.
It flashes once.
Rhazek’s throat flashes with it.
I slam the stone down before thought can slow me and the bead breaks.
Silence.
Real silence this time, or something close enough to trick my shaking hands.
The kedi mewls from the rock above us.
I look up.
It sits with my route token pinned under one paw, tail curled around itself, blue eyes wide and shining. It has the nerve to purr.
“I think it chose you,” Maro says, touching the fresh scratches across his scalp.
“Do not say that.”
“It has your token.”
“I am aware.”
The kedi licks one paw, entirely untroubled by the fact that it nearly helped announce us to the galaxy. Syin crouches beside the broken tracker, expression grim.
“This was not a carrier by design.”
“No,” I say. “It was bait, dropped loose and small enough for the desert to move it for them. They did not need to know what would pick it up. They only needed it carried long enough to test what answered.”
Rhazek’s hand curls once at his side. I notice because I’m watching for it. His throat plates are dark again, but the darkness feels like a closed hand around a coal.
“The tracker is broken,” Renn says.
I should feel relief. Instead, under the dark plates of his throat, a faint pulse flickers.
Once.
A pause.
Again.