Chapter 22
DHOMHES
The image from the visitor room reached Dhomhes while he was running.
A guard's camera, crooked against the floor. An overturned chair. Sereya's voice, clear before the struggle dragged it farther away.
East loading bay.
He sent the location to every unit already moving.
“Intercept them at the apron. Disable outgoing craft. Medical team to the guest corridor.”
His lead came down the adjoining stair, two guards behind him.
“Holding block was hit. Two males brought a cart from an occupied service bay and fired before the outer guards could stop them. They cut a gap in the inner door and threw a stun charge through it. Both guards inside went down. Burk is out.”
“How long?”
“Four minutes. The guards are alive.”
Dhomhes took the next turn hard enough to strike the rail with his shoulder. Armor drove up beneath his coat. The fabric caught across his back, tightening until a seam gave.
Four minutes. Someone had put their hands on Sereya and dragged her toward a waiting craft.
A sound pushed out of his chest, low and ugly.
His lead glanced at him and quickened his pace.
Sereya had given him a direction.
He would use every second she had bought.
“Stron has Adryel secured with her guards,” the lead said. “He's coming from the west access.”
“Tell him there are at least three attackers with Sereya. Roemary is with them.”
The exterior door struck its stop as he pushed through.
Wind cut across the service lane. He smelled hot metal from the processing sheds, felt grit beneath his boots, heard his own breathing as he ran past the nearest freight stack.
The first guard reached the corner and dropped to one knee.
“There.”
Sereya stood against a container beneath the floodlamp. Her shoulder was crooked, one sleeve torn. Two males blocked the route back to the building.
Burk approached from the skiff with something bright in his hand.
The nearer gunman turned toward the service lane. Dhomhes caught the guard's shoulder and pulled him behind the corner as a shot tore grit from the wall.
Every muscle in his body pulled toward her.
The gunman shifted his aim, and Dhomhes dug his fingers into the container's edge.
A charge fired at him would cross straight through Sereya's position.
His lead signaled from the wheel housing opposite. Dhomhes pointed to the raised weapon, then to Sereya.
The lead shifted left, drawing the gunman's attention.
Dhomhes moved along the container, teeth bared, close enough now to hear Burk speaking to her.
The armor across his shoulders forced the torn seam wider. He lowered his head and moved faster.
Sereya pointed toward the observation walk.
“You won't get to say you weren't here.”
Burk caught her sleeve. She twisted away and drove her heel into his foot. His hand came up with the knife, trying to pin her against the container.
Dhomhes broke from cover as she ducked. The blade caught her near the hairline. Her shoulder struck metal, but she kept moving sideways, clear of Burk's reaching arm.
Blood ran toward her eye.
Dhomhes roared.
He struck Burk's weapon arm with his armored forearm. The knife flew.
Burk reached for Sereya with his other hand, and Dhomhes seized him by the coat and drove him into the container hard enough to buckle the panel.
To his left, his lead drove one of the other attackers down behind a wheel housing.
A shot struck the cargo stack above them. The second attacker ran for the skiff.
Stron stepped out from behind its open hatch.
He hit the male hard enough to fold him against the hull, stripped the weapon from his hand, and pinned him there with an armored forearm.
Burk gasped. Dhomhes hit him again, shoulder first, crushing the reaching arm between them. The male's knees gave. Dhomhes hauled him upright.
He could break him.
The certainty was terrible and immediate.
Burk's throat was bare, his breath coming in short, frightened pulls.
Dhomhes had never hated anyone as much as he hated the male beneath his hands.
“Dhomhes.”
Sereya stood beyond his shoulder, blood on her fingers. She reached toward him, then braced herself against the container.
He turned Burk and forced him to his knees. His own breathing rasped through his teeth.
“Restrain him.”
The guard reached them with cuffs already open. Dhomhes held Burk pinned until he heard both restraints catch. Even then his fingers would not open easily. He peeled them out of the coat and stepped between Burk and Sereya.
“Sereya.” Her name came out rough. He tried again, reaching for her. “Sereya.”
She pointed upward.
Roemary was moving along the observation walk toward the far stair. Dhomhes signaled the guard beside Sereya and ran for it.
Roemary reached the bottom step as he turned the corner.
She stopped. Her expression changed before he'd taken his next breath.
“Gol-Vett. Thank the Light. I was trying to get help. They took us—”
“Put your hands where I can see them.”
She looked at the armor along his shoulders. He could feel it straining higher as she tried to edge past him.
“You cannot possibly think—”
He stepped into her path. “Your hands.”
She lifted them. Her right wrist was swollen. A cracked communicator protruded from her wrap.
He took it and passed it to the guard arriving behind him.
“Preserve it. No one opens or transmits anything until it's isolated.”
“That is my personal property.”
“Roemary, you are being detained for your part in these attacks. Speaker Fowles will hear about this within the hour.”
Her eyes moved past him.
He knew what she was looking at. Sereya beneath the floodlight, wrapped now in a guard's coat. The attackers on the ground. Burk struggling to draw a full breath with his hands bound behind him.
The things she could no longer arrange by choosing the right voice.
Roemary looked back at Dhomhes.
“My father will bury you.”
“Let him come.” Dhomhes's voice scraped low in his throat. “He can hear what you did to my mate.”
The guard closed the restraints.
Sereya was arguing with the medic when he reached her.
“The guard in the visitor room. Has someone gone to him?”
“Yes,” Dhomhes said. “He's alive. They're treating him.”
She shut her eyes.
“He believed me.”
“I know.”
“I told him she was threatening me. He called. He did exactly what—” Her voice failed.
Dhomhes stopped close enough for her to reach him. He had to unclench his hands before he could offer one. There was blood drying at her temple. His gaze kept returning to it.
“He sent the alarm. He gave us the room recording. You gave us the destination.”
Her eyes opened.
“They wanted to take me away. Make you get the chip to bring me back. The thing with Adryel—she was going to take me either way.”
“She doesn't have you.”
“Her communicator. There's a message. My old name, a picture. Please don't let her send it.”
“The device is isolated. No transmissions. We will check what went out before we took it.”
He wanted to promise that nothing had left it. He could not know that yet.
Sereya nodded, hearing the distinction.
The medic held a small dressing against her hairline. Sereya barely seemed to notice.
“Your coat,” she said.
Dhomhes looked down. The seams had split across his shoulders, and one sleeve hung open beneath his armor.
“I never liked it.”
Her mouth shook.
He held out his hand.
She took it with both of hers and stepped into him so hard he had to brace his feet. His arms closed around her, carefully at first, then tighter when she caught the torn cloth at his back.
He lowered his face into her hair. Under the smell of blood and scorched cloth, she was warm and familiar. He drew her scent into his lungs and held it until she moved against him.
“You're shaking,” she whispered.
He couldn't deny it. His arms trembled around her, and the armor would not settle.
“I saw the knife touch you.” His voice broke on the last word. He pressed his mouth to her hair and tried again. “I thought I was too late.”
Her fingers tightened in his ruined coat. “You came.”
He held her while they both shook. The medic stayed beside them, one hand ready beneath Sereya's elbow.
“I didn't bring her,” Sereya whispered.
“I know.”
“I said no.”
“I heard you.”
She leaned back far enough to look at him.
“I'm going to fall down now, I think.”
“No,” Dhomhes said, “you're not.”
He caught her beneath the knees and lifted her. The medic gestured toward the building, already telling him where she wanted to examine Sereya.
Stron met them at the door.
“I've got this,” he said.
Dhomhes nodded.
“Adryel?” Sereya asked.
“Annoyed that I wouldn't let her come out here. She'll want to see you.”
Sereya made a small sound that might have been a laugh.
“Tomorrow,” Dhomhes said.
Stron's gaze dropped to the hands locked around Dhomhes's neck. For once he kept his observations to himself.
Dhomhes carried her inside.