The Skypirate Part 30

"Who I am."

Her silky brows drew together. "But you said someone recognized you."

"Yes. His name is Mordred."

She smothered a gasp. "Corling's aide at the conquest of Trios?"

He nodded. "The same."

"What's he doing here?"

"He appeared to be on leave, like most Coalition officers who come to Alpha Two."

She looked thoughtful. "I remember hearing something...that he used to like..."

She trailed off, and Dax finished it for her in acid tones. "Little girls? I heard that, too. And there's no place in the Coalition better able to cater to that kind of taste than Alpha Two."

She grimaced. "It was he who recognized you?"

"Yes."

"Odd. I wouldn't think someone as high up as he is would be bothered about something as... mundane as a skypirate. Not enough to order out a destroyer, anyway."

"He wasn't after a skypirate," Dax repeated.

Califa gave him an exasperated look that he found, perversely, enticing.

"Then who was he after?"

Dax took a long, deep breath. "He was after a warrior not accounted for after the fall of Trios."

Although he wouldn't have thought it possible, she seemed to blanch, her already pale Arellian skin going even whiter.

"But you weren't there!"

He smiled, a bitter, tight little curve of his mouth. "I know. But I'm sure they had all our records before they were through. And I'm sure he'd study carefully anyone he thought had slipped through their fingers. He probably knows what I look like better than my own"

He broke off, laughing with harsh rancor at himself. Even after five years he'd almost said his mother.

"At least your mother would know you," Califa said. At the unexpected words he lifted his gaze to her face. "Mine didn't," she said with a shrug. "I went back to Arellia once. I wanted to brag, I suppose, that I'd made it through the academy in spite of her saying I never would. She didn't even recognize me."

He let out a long, sighing breath. "Ah, Califa, how do you do it? You always seem to know just what to say to distract me. Or make me think about things I never have before, or never wanted to. Or to make me"

"furious?" she suggested, sounding only half joking.

"That, too," he admitted wryly.

She smiled tentatively, but the expression faded as she asked, "How can you be sure? That Mordred recognized you as Triotian, and not just"the smile again, stronger this time"the infamous skypirate?"

Dax had to look away from that smile, it was far too tempting. "Because," he said, staring down at the gleaming toes of the boots she'd shined, "he used...my family name. I...haven't heard it in five years."

"Oh."

She sounded as if she could think of nothing else to say, and he supposed that, in truth, there was nothing else to say. But he knew she wouldn't give up for long, and he was right. Immediately she began to a.n.a.lyze, with that quick, trained mind of hers.

"How good a look did he get at you?"

"Good enough. Short, but in full light."

"Still, how sure can he be?"

Dax felt heat creep up his cheeks. Most times he could shrug off his own impulsiveness with a laugh, but somehow it was more difficult with Califa. Her stare as he explained that Mordred was no doubt positive, because he by now must have learned of the flashbow bolt Dax left behind in the Archives, made him decidedly uncomfortable.

"You left the bolt in place of that holograph disk?"

"No. Something else. More important, though they didn't know it."

She just looked at him.

"I know, I know," he said. "It was stupid."

"Probably," she agreed. "But I'm not sure you'd be capable of resisting that particular temptation."

That's not the only one I can't resist, he thought sourly.

"Actually," Califa said, in musing tones, "I'm not sure anyone would be. Especially any Triotian."

That surprised him. He'd realized how completely she'd turned her back on the Coalition when she'd appeared on the bridge to help them. She'd given them information about the destroyer's weaponry that could only be considered treasonous, yet she'd never hesitated. But for her to realize that as a Triotian, albeit a very wayward one, he'd truly had no choice, at least not at that moment, but to leave the bolt in place of the royal circlet, was more than he'd ever expected.

"Thank you. I think. From you that's high praise."

"If you want praise, then take it for that little escape plan of yours."

His expression changed, cooling suddenly. "I told you, it wasn't my plan."

"But Larcos said"

"It was Dare's. I just adapted it a little to the circ.u.mstances."

He saw that she remembered then the story he'd told her, of theSunbird's encounter with the skypirate Cryon and his ship theWanderer, and how Dare had blown up theSunbird's own shuttle to incapacitate the bigger ship so they could escape.

"Are all Triotians inherently so...inventive?" she asked. Dax only shrugged. "I wonder," she went on, her eyes going distant as she pondered the idea, "what would have happened if Trios had not so long lived in peace, so long that they were far too generous to strangers. If they had had enough weapons, and leaders like you and Dare, perhaps even the might of the Coalition could not have overpowered them."

He knew she hadn't meant it as an accusation, but the old guilt goaded him. "But they didn't. They had none but the simplest of weapons. The rest were stored away in caves up in the mountains outside of Triotia, where they'd been for years. They were taken by surprise, tricked by their own goodness, and their legendary" he spat out the word"flashbow warrior was off sulking, while they died."

In a motion so quick he couldn't move in time to stop her, Califa darted forward and grabbed his knife from his boot. He tensed, his eyes flicking from the gleaming blade to her face. Then, startlingly, she reversed the blade and handed it to him.

"You'restill sulking," she ground out. "Here. Take it. Slit your d.a.m.ned throat and get it over with. If you won't give yourself the mercy of a quick death, then give it to me. And Rina. And all the others who will mourn you when it's finally done."

His breath caught in his throat. On some deep level, his mind was clamoring that she was right, that he'd been clinging to his guilt like a child clung to a broken favorite toy. But on another level, that quick, instinctive level they called gut-reaction, all he could take in was that she'd said she'd mourn him.

"Perhaps we could even get word to your old friend," she went on, never letting up. "Perhaps when you are finally dead, when you finally atone for the heinous sin of survival, even your king will mourn."

Shaken by the slicing truth of her words, Dax tried to speak. "Califa, I"

"Do you think he will?" Her tone had shifted suddenly, as if she were now merely considering an interesting question. "Will the king care what happened to the boy he grew up with? Will he"

She broke off suddenly, her eyes widening. She dropped the knife. As it clanged on the floor, she looked away from him. Foreboding welled up in Dax, sweeping his chagrin at the truth of her battering words before it. He'd come to recognize that action of hers, and it told him she'd made one of those connections that always seemed to be right.

"That's it," she whispered, and the dismay he saw cloud the clear blue of her eyes told him he was right; she'd come to some conclusion, and she didn't much like it.

"What?" he prompted, and the way she looked away then told him he probably wasn't going to like it, either.

"They want you alive..." she began, then stopped, biting her lip.

"We already deduced that," he said gently, trying to ignore his body's instantaneous reaction to the reminder of the softness of her mouth.

"It makes sense. It's just what they would do."

"Califa..."

"Don't you see?" She began to pace, short, quick steps. "Roxton said he'd heard talk that confirmed what you'd heard, that the rebellion forced Corling to withdraw and has been holding off the Coalition for months now. Whatever they're doing, whatever weapon they have, the Coalition hasn't been able to budge them for nearly a year. They can't risk that kind of news getting out, it would undermine their position everywhere. And they must know the story is already getting out."

He knew all that; he'd prodded Roxton for as much information as he could get without drawing the old man's lively curiosity. The news had only added to the tangled ma.s.s of his emotions, a quandary he was having to work harder and harder to ignore.

"But what has that got to do with why they want me alive?"

"They're desperate. They have nothing to bargain with."

Something knotted up deep in Dax's belly. "What does that mean?"

At last she turned and met his gaze. "They want you alive...to get to Dare."

The knot tightened. "What?"

"If they have all the Triotian records, they must have learned you and Dare were...close. They think they've got their lever. That's why you're no good to them dead."

"Are you saying," he asked, p.r.o.nouncing each word with precise care, "that they think if they take me alive, they can use me to...negotiate something with Dare?"

She nodded. He stared at her.

"That's insane. Dare would do anything in his power to rescue a fellow Triolian"

"Not just a fellow Triotian," Califa said.

Dax shook his head. "No. Any Triotian would be equally important to us all."

"The Coalition would never understand that. To them, the anonymous one is easily sacrificed for the whole."

"Dare may have to adopt that stance, since he's at war. But no matter what, he would never deal with the horde that destroyed Trios."

"Not even for his oldest friend?"

Dax's throat tightened, making his voice gruff. "He might have. Once. But I doubt I mean anything to him now." He beat down the emotion that threatened to engulf him, and forced his mind to work logically. "What do they think they could get out of him? Surely they don't think he'd ever let them back in?"

Califa shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe an agreement to keep silent. Or to refuse any refugees from other Coalition-owned worlds." Her mouth curved in a bitter, knowing smile that made him think yet again how far she'd come. "Or perhaps they just hope to trick him, as they tricked his father."

"Then they'll find themselves in deep trouble," Dax said. "Triotians are peaceful by choice, but we were warriors once, and we can be again. And Dare has the finest tactical mind I've ever known." He gave her a sideways look. "Except, perhaps, for Major Califa Claxton of The Coalition Tactical School."

She blushed, as much now, at his praise of her mind, as she ever had at his praise of her beauty, even when she'd been naked beneath him. This time it was he who turned away, to fight the fierce arousal that swept him even amid the chaos of feeling her revelation had brought on.

He walked over to his bunk and stood there, staring out the viewport. He sensed rather than heard Califa follow him. She came to a halt close behind him, close enough that he swore he could feel her warmth.

"He won't bargain," he said flatly. "Not with them. Not for me."

"Don't be so certain that everyone paints you with the same dark brush as you yourself do."

"He won't," Dax insisted. "Even if he doesn't hold me to blame, he would never risk his people for the sake of his own personal feelings. I know that. And he knows I would never expect it, even if thingsif Iwere different. In war, you do what you have to to preserve what is left."

"But would it be easy for him?"

Dax suppressed a shiver. "No. Even if he...hates me now, it would not be easy for him to condemn me. He is not that kind of man. But he would do it, if he felt he must."

He heard her sigh behind him. "Then I suppose you'd best avoid capture."

He nearly laughed. He turned around then, and she seemed startled by his expression.

"Always straight to the heart of it," he observed, smiling at her.

She looked at him, perplexed. "You are a very confusing man," she muttered.

He did laugh then. "Ah, little snowfox, it's only fair. You've confounded me since I first saw you."

He felt the heat building between them, and knew what would happen if they stayed so close much longer. As if she realized it, too, she backed up a step.

"What will you do now?" she asked.

He battled the urge to grab her and kiss her into once more melting in his arms, summoning up every painful, aching memory of his inevitable frustration to do it. He tried to concentrate on her question.

"Do?"

"You can't continue to risk running into Coalition patrols, not when you've become such a priority to them. They'll be looking for you everywhere." Her brow furrowed. "In fact, you probably shouldn't linger here much longer. Clarion is a vital cog in the Coalition machine, with the Starworks shipbuilding facility here. You won't go long unnoticed."

"We're skypirates," Dax said simply. "We can't help but risk running into Coalition patrols. And it wouldn't be fair to ask the crew to give up going after prizes just because I've managed to move to the top of the Coalition's most wanted index."

"They would give it up for a while. For you."

"Perhaps. If I asked it of them."