Price of Ransom Read online

  “I don’t want any trouble,” said the bounty hunter. He handed over the slate.

  Scallop had only to glance at it briefly. He sighed, heartfelt, and turned to Lily. “I’m sorry, Captain. This is quite legal. My hands are tied. If you have an advocate you wish me to call—” Her expression betrayed her incomprehension of this remark. “No, I don’t suppose you do. I can’t understand how Concord could have—unless your story isn’t true …” He trailed off, clearly at a loss what to believe.

  “Come on, boys,” said the bounty hunter. “Pick ’em up and let’s go.”

  “But, boss,” said the one holding Lily. “I thought we was only taking in this one.”

  The man jerked his head to indicate Jenny. “You want her at our backs? No thanks. Hoist them.”

  The two aliens simply picked up Lily and Jenny bodily, as if they were no more than light sacks of food.

  “Wait a minute!” began Lily, looking at Scallop. “This is outrageous. What about—”

  “Hold on,” said Scallop. “Min—Windsor, is it?” He regarded the bounty hunter with obvious distaste. “You only have license for this woman. I suggest you leave the other with me.”

  Windsor hesitated, taking in Scallop’s authority as well as the stiff politeness with which he was being treated. “All right. Fred, move it. Stanford, you wait here. Give us enough time and then release her and follow.” He began to walk quickly, Fred in front of him.

  Lily attempted to struggle, but she might as well have tried to bend steel, so she gave it up.

  “Captain!” called Scallop after her rapidly receding figure. “I’ll notify Thaelisha.” Foot traffic had ceased, people from all around turning to stare at the scene. “I’ll make sure that …”

  But Fred’s smooth, loping gait took her out of earshot before she could hear what Scallop would make sure of.

  It did not take long to reach a berth, to enter the ship docked there, and to dump her into a tiny cabin where Windsor efficiently cuffed her hands and feet in some metal tubing.

  The hairy Fred sat back on his haunches, resting his long arms on his knuckles, and grinned at her. “You all right?” he asked, friendly. “Sometimes I squeeze too hard.”

  “Don’t know your own strength,” muttered Windsor. He finished securing Lily and stepped back to regard her, his mouth a thin, tight line.

  “Who the Hells are you?” Lily demanded, glaring at him from her undignified seat on the cabin’s only bunk. She tried to shift to give herself more authority.

  “Korrigan Tel Windsor, at your service,” he replied, bowing in a way that suddenly, and bitterly, reminded her of Kyosti. “Bounty hunter, to the polite. I won’t bore you with the other names I’ve been called. This is Fred.”

  Fred grinned.

  “I have no idea what I could possibly have to do with you—” began Lily, still furious, mostly at the ease with which they had captured her.

  “That’s what they all say,” murmured Windsor. “Say.” A spark of interest lit his otherwise jaded eye. “Do you know Gwyn?”

  “Gwyn? Who the Hells is—” An unexpected memory of Kyosti back when she first met him, calling Heredes “Gwyn,” struck her with such force that she ceased speaking. Suddenly, surely, convinced that it was Heredes he meant.

  “Yup,” said Fred succinctly. “The lips always give it away.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Windsor, speculative now. “That might explain—I suppose you knew Hawk, too.” His gaze was piercing, touched with suspicion.

  “What makes you mention them now?” she asked carefully.

  He shrugged, but the gesture was brimful of some other emotion. “I found Hawk hours ago, half out of his mind. I’m not sure he even recognized me. But I paid what I could for short passage on the Sans Merci. She was scheduled to break dock about”—he checked a thin band clasped around his wrist—“forty minutes ago. So even if you were after him, he’ll be well clear of Diomede by now.”

  “If I were after him?” Lily cried. “What have you done?”

  “Don’t scold me,” Windsor snapped. “Fred, search her.”

  Fred’s touch was remarkably light, rather prim, but efficient. He handed Windsor her com-screen, which Windsor took without a word, and finished his search. “Nothing but this, boss,” he said, and flipped out the chain that hung around Lily’s neck, revealing the medallion Heredes had given her.

  Windsor stared at it. “Oh fucking hell,” he exclaimed. He whirled and flung himself out of the cabin, leaving Lily and Fred to regard the closed door in silence.

  7 Hard Luck

  “I’M SORRY,” THAELISHA PAUSED to examine the conference room on the Forlorn Hope’s gold deck—the room itself more than its six other occupants. “Teak,” she murmured mysteriously, running one hand along the grain of the table’s frame. “Quite remarkable.”

  “I don’t understand,” demanded Yehoshua, impatient with her distraction, “how there could be nothing you could do. If you are indeed the local representative of this—what is it called?”

  “Concord,” said Pinto.

  “Surely you have some authority to override this man’s license.”

  “Let me attempt to explain.” She surveyed her audience. Her gaze rested longest on the Mule. Its presence alone, Yehoshua felt sure, had gone far to convince her that their story was true. Much against his own instinct to caution, Yehoshua had given her access to their navigation log, which he did not suppose anyone had yet learned to fake over such a complicated journey.

  “Yes, Concord is the administrative center of League space, but each system is autonomous, with its own local government. “Concord resolves intersystem disputes only when such things arise. Its usual task is as an overseer and, again, as an administrative center. Just, as Diomede sends a representative to League Council, which meets at Concord, Concord sends a representative—in this case, myself—to be available to Diomede should they need advice or a negotiator.”

  She smiled apologetically around the table. “That is the short explanation. I’ll see if I can get you an abbreviated library of League history and law, which ought to help. As it stands, bounty hunters are licensed from Concord as an intersystem covenant to deal with that small element of society which has been declared dangerous Leaguewide. The man’s license and bounty were quite legal. And they issued from Concord itself. Now do you see why there was nothing I could do?”

  Yehoshua glanced at Jenny. Her face was tight, desperate in a way that it had not been since the days just after Lia’s departure. “But what were the charges?” he asked.

  Now Thaelisha looked uncomfortable. “Aiding and abetting a dangerous fugitive. Felony accessory to intersystem flight. The physical description was accurate, but they had part of her name wrong.” She met Yehoshua’s gaze. “It listed her as ‘Heredes,’ not Ransome.”

  Yehoshua looked at each person at the table in turn: Jenny next to him; then Pinto and the Mule, both quiet and sober looking; Finch sitting tight-lipped beside the Concord representative, and finally Paisley, who had insisted so loudly on attending the meeting that he had thought it easier to give in than to try to keep her out. Bach, out of a sense of prudence, he had kept hidden. Currently, the robot was in the adjoining tac room recording the conversation.

  “Ransome is the captain’s real name,” he said carefully. “I believe Heredes is a name she used for expedience during the war.”

  “The war?” Thaelisha could not hide her surprise. “You had a war?”

  Yehoshua exchanged startled glances with Jenny. Jenny shrugged. “We called it a revolution,” he said, even more carefully. “The old Central government was quite corrupt.”

  “I must get you to Concord. When they hear about this they’ll certainly send an expedition with all haste. A war.”

  “But what about—” Jenny began hotly.

  Yehoshua, daring much, laid a hand over her clenched fist, and she broke off and, her lips thin with anger, glared down at the smooth sheen of the table
top.

  “You must understand that we can’t go anywhere without our captain,” Yehoshua said, quiet but firm. Then he realized he was still touching Jenny and, a little embarrassed, he removed his hand. She did not seem to notice.

  Thaelisha frowned. “I understand your concern. But in any case, you will be going to Concord as well. Although there are a number of routes you could potentially take to get there, one is most direct. I can only assume the bounty hunter will choose that one. When min Provoniya comes aboard to go over this with your”—here another glance for the Mule—“navigator, it would be an easy enough question to ask. Whatever ship the bounty hunter has commissioned is listed on the public register by berth. Of course, I can give you no help officially, except the open credit.” She reached into the pocket of her shirt and removed a thin, hand-size slate and pushed it across the table to Yehoshua.

  He fingered its slim casing but left it resting on the table. “So you suggest we follow the bounty hunter’s ship?”

  “I don’t suggest anything,” Thaelisha countered. “Although I will tell you frankly that I have always disliked the Intelligence Bureau’s use of bounty hunters. It seems to me that most bounty men are no better than the criminals they’re sent after.”

  “Yes. Well,” Yehoshua murmured. “We have bounty hunters in Reft space, too.” For a moment, he felt that he and Thaelisha shared an unspoken concordance on this subject, at least.

  “There is one more thing.” Thaelisha’s gaze took in Jenny again, that taut tension that informs the body of a soldier at alert, before she encompassed the whole group with her attention. “A warning. Once at Concord you’ll want to tell them about the—troubles in Reft space. But until you get there, I wouldn’t talk about it. You’ll find that people”—she hesitated—“will treat you differently. We don’t—have wars anymore. We don’t—” hesitating again, she seemed at a loss for what to say.

  “Well, we don’t commonly have wars either,” said Jenny tartly. “But you have to stay prepared.”

  “I’m not sure what to say,” replied Thaelisha. “Some people will judge you for coming from a society that is prepared to have wars. Others will work so hard not to judge you that they’ll act”—she smiled ruefully—“rather like I am now. I only mean to advise you to be cautious in what you say.”

  Yehoshua nodded. “I think I understand,” he said, although he was not altogether sure that he did.

  She sighed, as if a burden had been lifted from her, and pushed back from the table and stood up. Yehoshua stood as well. “Now. Min Provoniya should be arriving soon, to discuss navigation. I don’t doubt you’ll want to leave as soon as possible.”

  The sudden movement of Paisley jumping to her feet startled everyone. “What about min Hawk?” she demanded. “We can’t just leave him here. Captain wouldna’ like it. You know it be so,” she finished, staring fiercely at Yehoshua.

  “Min Hawk?” asked Thaelisha, regarding Paisley with a slight frown. “Ah. The former saboteur. We are looking for him, min—Paisley, was it?”

  Paisley nodded, only just civil.

  “We can’t afford to wait,” said Yehoshua, brusque because he knew that he would just as soon leave Hawk behind whatever the circumstances, and he could not help but wonder if that prejudice was affecting his judgment.

  The look on Paisley’s face changed. Around the table, people braced themselves, because it was clear a tirade was coming.

  “I must go,” said Thaelisha calmly into the encroaching storm. “If anything further has come to light about min Hawk, I’ll let you know.”

  “I’ll show you out,” said Pinto quickly, with uncharacteristic politeness, and he escaped just behind the representative. The door hissed shut.

  “You can’t just abandon min Hawk!” Paisley cried. “It be wrong o’ us to do it, just cause we feel ya cool at what he done before. But Captain will feel ya more hurt and sore if we show up without him. What do you think—”

  “Paisley,” said Yehoshua, “the captain has to be our first priority.”

  “You just say that cause you be scared o’ him.”

  “I think—” began Finch.

  “You think?” Paisley rounded on Finch without mercy. “You be ya worst o’ all. B’ain’t none o’ us here got ya right to judge min Hawk. We all killed, for min Jehane, so what be so different in us? And he never treated people different just cause they be tattoos. Bain’t no one else you would leave if—”

  “Paisley,” said Jenny in a deceptively quiet voice. “Shut it up.”

  Paisley, mouth still open, stopped talking.

  “Maybe you’d like to volunteer to stay and look for him,” muttered Finch. “Since you feel so strongly. What, were you sleeping with him, too?” His mouth curled down with scorn.

  “I asked,” said Paisley with dignity. “And he refused me ya proper way, showing respect for ya offer.”

  “You asked him!” Finch stood up. “That’s disgusting! How could you even want to touch him? How could you—”

  “He be attractive. He never treat me like there be something ya wrong with me just cause I got ya tattoos,” she retorted.

  “You little slut—”

  “Finch! That’s enough!” Yehoshua moved swiftly around the table to put himself between the two. “Mule,” he said in a softer voice. “Is there anything you wanted to say before I—disband—this meeting?”

  “Yes,” hissed the Mule, standing up. “I shall go await this min Provoniya in quieter quarters. As for min Hawk, while I have sympathy for his predicament, I also see the need to follow the captain while we still have a chance to keep track of her.” Its hiss was fluid with sta-ish laughter as it glanced at Paisley. “I leave the decision up to you.” It left.

  “Thanks,” said Yehoshua. “Finch?”

  “I guess I’m too prejudiced to have a vote,” he said bitterly, and he left before anyone could answer.

  “Well, it be true,” muttered Paisley, unrepentant. She glanced at Jenny and did not attempt to say anything more.

  “Jenny,” said Yehoshua, sitting down as if he was too weary to stand. “What should we do?”

  But Jenny was still staring at the table. “I can’t believe I let them take her,” she said in a low voice. “I can’t believe, with all my training—I feel like I”—her voice caught—“betrayed her.”

  “Don’t be an idiot!” snapped Yehoshua with real anger, hating the look of self-reproach on her face. “Trey and Pinto said there was nothing you could have done. I don’t doubt their word.”

  “You didn’t ask Trey to this meeting, did you?”

  “Someone had to stay on the bridge,” he replied, but the excuse sounded lame.

  “Min Seria.” Paisley set her hands on her hips, a remarkably prim, old-fashioned gesture in her. “She be gone now, so it be no use casting blame. We mun get her back.”

  Jenny let the barest touch of a smile curve her lips. “I suppose you’re right, Paisley. And damn my eyes, but that thing—that alien—was strong. I wouldn’t have believed it if it hadn’t happened to me.”

  “Then,” said Yehoshua, sounding relieved, “that’s settled. Flower wants to talk to the Stationmaster about the patients we have in Medical. As for Hawk, there’s a simple enough solution. We have an open line of credit. Once Hawk is found, we ask Representative Thaelisha to send him—guarded, I suppose, since he’s not quite all there—on to Concord after us. Then we’ll all end up in the same place.”

  Paisley sighed ostentatiously, but was forced to be content. Jenny, however, remained seated until Paisley left the room.

  “Is something wrong?” Yehoshua asked, aware of a foolish hope that perhaps she had stayed behind just to be alone with him.

  “A saboteur. And we know he came from League space originally, before he got to the Reft. But I never found out how he got to traveling with Lily. Yehoshua, what if he’s the dangerous fugitive? If he is, then Lily as good as admitted to those charges at the meeting, however unwittingly.”


  “But that’s impossible. How could they have known she was traveling with him in Reft space? That road has been lost for generations.”

  “How did Hawk get over, then? And what about that privateer, La Belle Dame?”

  “Or the one,” Yehoshua mused, “who gave me this arm.”

  They regarded the arm together, with misgiving. “Maybe there’s something Lily hasn’t told us,” Jenny said finally.

  “I hope not,” Yehoshua replied, but he looked skeptical.

  When Lily woke, she merely lay still, breathing for a moment. One of the Ardakians was with her—one always was. She could tell by its scent: she wondered if this was how Kyosti always sensed the world, with such strong smells, or if his sense of smell was tuned to subtler differences. Sighed, thinking of him, and turned over, hoping it was Fred with her now.

  Seeing her open her eyes, the Ardakian grinned.

  “Hello, Fred,” she said with relief. Stanford never grinned, aping human mannerisms in that way; she supposed he thought it beneath his large and imposing dignity. “Can you unbuckle me so I can use the washroom?”

  “Sure.” Fred undid her leg bindings and loosened the ones around her wrists. Finishing, he glanced around the tiny cabin and then leaned closer to her. “Most humans ain’t so clean.”

  His head provided a tempting target, but Lily had tried once at shift change to break out. The attempt had been a dismal failure, although, in fairness, neither of the Ardakians seemed to hold the attempt against her. Windsor she had not seen since they left Diomede some five days since.

  “It’s the only recreation I’ve got,” she said instead, sighing as he scooted back to his guard post beside the door.

  “What is?”

  “Washing.”

  “Oh, that. Yeah.” He grinned again and appeared to be thinking quite hard. “Could get you another disk for your slate if you got done with the text Stan got for you yesterday.”

  “No, I’m not done with them yet. But thanks.” She swung her legs off the bunk and did some leg warm-ups and then more strenuous exercise, what she could in the cramped space.