Chapter 25
Chapter
Twenty-Five
Wake up before your enemies do
No alarms had gone off in the night.
I lay there taking stock of that, which had become a habit. No alerts from the perimeter devices. Nothing from the wrist comm or B2. I got up, pulled on my clothes, and walked out to the deck. Now, we were all in a state of waiting. Alert vigilance was what it would be until the Rivonok arrived.
The morning was cool and clear. The ocean below looked invitingly calm. Silli rolled over in the little fluffy bed I’d made for him in the living room.
I reached for my fishing pole and checked the hook. I broke off a fresh piece of bait from the tin and reattached it and stood there a moment.
The guild had remained silent. I had expected that.
After what I’d sent them, I’d probably been written off as a lunatic, and I couldn’t argue with the logic.
If I’d stuck to requests and tactical information, and not handed them a personal declaration in plain text, they might still be passing me intelligence.
They might have told me something useful.
Something about timelines. Something about whether the Rivonok had rerouted after the Durbok’s complaint.
I had no one to blame for that gap except myself.
I checked the surveillance indicators on my wrist comm. No alerts. Whatever was coming, we’d hear it before it arrived.
I took the pole and started down the path to the beach.
Halfway down, I stopped.
Smoke.
I turned north and saw it above the tree line. Gray-white columns rose against the clear morning, more than one, rising from the direction of the village. Too thick. Too much of it. Not cooking fires. The wind was carrying it north, otherwise I’d have smelled it sooner.
I dropped the pole and ran back up the path. “B2.”
No response.
“B2, respond.”
Nothing. But I couldn’t wait to figure out what was happening with it. Silli chirped in alarm, but I ran past him to the hangar before he could follow. Fleck. What was going on? My only thought was to get to the village.
The shuttle’s power-up sequence took ninety-three agonizing seconds. I counted each one. I ran the preflight as fast as it would go and lifted off and banked north.
From the air, it was worse than the smoke had suggested.
Three buildings fully engulfed, two more had largely been destroyed and others had caught.
The docks were in flame, the fishing boats with them.
I came in low and saw nothing moving below.
No people, no activity. Just fire eating through wood, and smoke in the morning air.
I set down in the clearing at the south edge of the village, took the blaster from the weapons compartment, and jumped out of the hatch before it had fully opened.
The village was quiet, and it was the bad kind of quiet. My skin crawled as I moved through the main path with my blaster raised, scanning each doorway I passed. Open doors. Overturned things, but no bodies, no blood on the ground. I didn’t know yet whether to be relieved about that.
The smell found me in the center of the square.
Burning wood and hot stone, and underneath both of those, a chemical undertone I really didn’t like.
Plenty of combat groups used it in the early stages of a containment operation to establish control and induce panic, including the mercenary guild.
I knew this before I’d processed it consciously, because the last time I’d smelled it I’d been standing in the remains of an ancient forest that had been obliterated because of some little purple mushrooms.
I bent over with my hands on my knees.
The thought that arrived was not strategic.
It was: I failed them. All that training and positioning and surveillance, and the Rivonok had walked in while I was sleeping soundly in my bed.
I had let the guild go dark by sending a message I never should have sent.
I had not convinced Maive to evacuate when she was still willing to argue about it.
I’d had the chance to force the issue. And I didn’t.
Now, I needed those who had done this. And I needed them dead. I straightened up.
Standing in the square, cataloging my failures, was not useful. I would do that later, at length, at my own expense, when there was time for it. I raised the blaster and I bellowed at the empty village.
“Come out! Come out and face me!”
It was a bold demand for a man standing barefoot in the middle of a burning village. Yes, I’d left in such a hurry, I literally wore what I’d slept in.
Then, from behind the long storage building on the east side: a figure. Tall, gray face mask, black uniform with no visible insignia. He emerged without urgency into the open square, pulling a child behind him by the wrist.
Aila.
She had her feet planted and was dragging against his grip. Then her gaze found me and her eyes went wide. I had enough time, in the space of one breath, to see the relief in her face before everything in my gut turned to tight knots.
“Stand down,” the figure said. His voice was flat, processed slightly by the mask.
He stopped in the center of the square. He picked Aila up and held her against him with one arm, her feet off the ground.
She went still as his grip tightened around her.
“You lost. Tell me where your people are and we can resolve this quickly.”
What? How did he not know where they were? “Don’t play games with me,” I snarled. “Let that child go.”
“Did you not hear me?” He tilted his head.
“Forgive my lack of formalities and allow me to start over. I am Ambassador Yeaven Morra, representing the Rivonok Alliance interests in this system. You are Gilrox Ban-Ver-Mos, Rank V, Level Ten Mercenary. I’m sorry—ex-mercenary.
Now, I’m not asking where you hid them as a matter of curiosity.
I’m asking because this will go faster if you assist me. ”
“You make no sense.” I had to admit, the name Yeaven Morra didn’t ring any bells. He wasn’t someone I’d fought with or against, which meant he might be new to his position. That could be an advantage. “You took them. You know where they are.” Didn’t he?
Morra shifted his weight in a show of impatience.
“I have fifty-seven personnel in that forest running a sweep pattern. I’ll locate your people within hours, regardless of what you say.
You can ensure that fewer of them are made an example of, or not.
” He paused. “My drones are down. I’m aware that’s your work. You planned for us.”
I didn’t answer. My mind was busy doing a different calculation.
If he didn’t know where they were—and it was clear that he didn’t—then the Runams had gotten out.
Some sort of warning must have reached them in time.
They weren’t in the boats; the boats were burning.
They’d gone on foot into the forest, which meant the grid and the concealed positions were between his fifty-seven personnel and whatever Maive had organized.
Maive was out there somewhere. Possibly alive.
I stayed focused on that probability and not on what the other possibility meant.
“You burned the village,” I said.
“So? We thought they were hiding in the buildings.” He glanced around at the burning buildings with no visible reaction to them. “I’d like to move past this stage.” He looked back at me. “Now, where are they?”
“I’m not saying a word unless you release that child.”
“I’m not releasing anyone until I have what I came for.” He looked at the blaster in my hand. “You’re a capable shot, I’d imagine, given your background. Run the calculation yourself. At this range, with that weapon, you’ll catch the girl in the discharge radius.”
I had already run it. He was right.
“I’ll offer you a simple trade,” Morra said.
“Help me locate these people you’re so attached to, and they live.
We don't want them harmed. We want the production running. That requires living producers.” He further tightened his grip on Aila, who looked positively livid.
“If you decline, I’ll work through whoever I have available until someone in your forest decides to cooperate. I’ll start here.”
I held the blaster for another three seconds.
Then I lowered it.
“Put her down,” I said. “Let her go and I’ll help you find them.”
He paused for effect, then he set Aila on the ground.
She stomped on his foot with everything she had, which was the very least of what he deserved, then bolted straight at me.
Morra made a sharp curse, but all I could think was, thank the stars, as I dropped to one knee and caught her in my arms. She slammed into me hard and her arms went around my neck and locked there.
“I’ve got you,” I said, voice shaky. “You’re all right.”
Her mouth was right at my ear. “Gilrox.” Her voice was barely a breath. “Others came. In the night. I couldn’t get home in time.”
I went still.
My gaze lifted over the shaking form of the child who was as good as blood to me and fixed on Morra, who stood there, waiting. I rose, still holding Aila and thinking about what she’d just said, and what it meant, and whether the calculation I’d been running had just changed entirely.
“Now,” I drawled. “Who was it you were looking for again?”