Outcast: Echelon, #3

Outcast

Z.A. Waterstone

Outcast

Written by Z.A. Waterstone

Copyright © 2019 by Amy Keeley

Sunrise over planets in space by Sebastien Decoret | Stockfresh.com

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. For permission requests, contact the publisher through her website listed below, subject Permissions Request.

http://amykeeley.wordpress.com/

This is a work of fiction. All people, places, things, and events are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person, place, thing, or event, past, present, or future, is purely coincidental.

1

Maia stood at the edge of the platform, the city of Skielach laid out before her and on fire. She clutched her belly, but it was flat.

Tara was gone.

Maia!

She looked behind and saw she was still in the dock of Idierd’s airship, smoke all around her. Had that been Kaylan calling out to her?

She had to find Tara. Where was she?

Stepping off the platform and going back inside the burning airship, she looked through room after room, all of them full of junk she didn’t recognize, but that looked mundane: chairs, tables, desks.

She shook her head, heart pounding. Tara! she called out.

Lindsay’s scream sounded out through the ship, tearing Maia apart inside. She raced toward it.

Maybe Idierd knew where Tara was.

Flinging open the door, she nearly stepped off the ship. And down below was Lindsay, arms stretched out toward Maia, her mouth wide in a silent scream, Idierd curled up beside her, as if he were asleep.

Maia looked around, frantic for something to throw to Lindsay, some way to help. But there was nothing.

She looked down just in time to see Lindsay fall into the fire below and to feel her own hands lose their grip on the airship, her feet sliding. Down she fell towards Lindsay, her own scream splitting reality into shadows and light and a world of color that she couldn’t reach.

Matriarch?

She jerked and stared, wide-eyed, at the inside of Kaylan’s ship. The ship she was on. Not Eishan Idierd’s airship. Closing her eyes, she let relief flood her, then rolled over to see how Tara was doing.

She slept on her side, quiet, peaceful, blond curls framing her chubby infant face, small hands resting against each other. And Maia relaxed further.

Six months. She’d kept an eye on the news from various planets, aggregated by Roz, Kaylan’s ship, and nothing had changed after six months. Planets owned or otherwise in debt to the Darushee said nothing about what had happened at Skielach. Those who owed the Darushee no loyalty speculated wildly about what it could mean, and under it all ran the speculation: had a non-sentient creature been given the Gift of Daru?

In other words, could a species without telepathic abilities gain them? And how could they be gained?

There were some who didn’t believe it. Some who said it was an outright lie. Others pointed out that if it were a lie, the Darushee wouldn’t be ignoring this news so pointedly.

Some couldn’t help noticing that the Darushee had, in their official statement of Idierd’s death, said nothing at all, and that meant there was nothing to say.

And to the rest? Well, no one else had accused the Darushee of hiding anything, not among the few worlds that were stronger than the Darushee.

Six months had gone by while they waited for things to die down, for the universe to find something else to chat about. The dreams had started a week or so after the death of Idierd and his beloved human slave, Lindsay. The reality split had started two months afterward and always within the dreams.

It’s just an effect of the birth, she thought, remembering how reality had altered during that event.

But this is different, part of her said. The darkness had been Tara’s viewpoint. Now, the darkness was something else and felt suffocating, like death itself. And Tara was here.

Shoving those thoughts aside, she got up, careful not to make any noise or movement that might wake up Tara. Silently, she began doing the meditation exercises she had once learned as part of her late husband’s plan, his rebellion against the Darushee that had taken over their world.

The Noritarsha clan. Learning the basics of each of the clans had been one of the first things she’d done after Tara’s birth. And the Noritarsha, as Idierd had hinted, were at the bottom of the Darushee hierarchy. Sent to live in the desert on the home world, Darunal, until they took to the stars and taken over Earth, selling the supposedly non-sentient humans to pay for it.

Which is why she was here and not on Earth, raising her daughter like a normal infant.

She no longer had to ask for the few modifications to her room that she needed to complete the bodyweight exercises her husband preferred. You can do them anywhere, he’d said, and anytime. Useful when you end up confined to a series of caves in the Missouri wilderness.

And useful when recovering from a birth that was going to be your one and only for the rest of your life and you still have to figure out a way to survive outside the ship and outside the generosity of a Darushee bounty hunter.

One who was currently on the surface of the planet they were orbiting, and one who would be back soon. Hopefully.

She finished the series her husband had devised, glad she didn’t have to do as many modifications as she once did, and very glad all the other effects of the birth had stopped. She stretched, feeling better than she ever had in her life. And that worried her.

Just like the split in reality in her dreams worried her.

After exercising, she debated waking Tara up. Deciding against it, she pulled up Roz’s files on Nirick’s planet, the one they’d be visiting eventually. There were few screens on Roz. In the cabins there were holographic screens that responded to touch. A modification made especially for her and Kaylan, since the default was to use the echelon and simply think the request.

Her echelon, made especially for her just before Tara’s birth, sat on a small table. She had only touched it once. Never since then.

Alternating between learning such things as Koponal was ruled by the Koponai from an ever-moving capital called The Islands of Floating Caves and basic phrases in Koponihan that might be useful, she kept going back to the clans of the Darushee, to reviewing basic phrases a slave would be expected to know, to mouthing mock conversations Roz supplied so if anything happened to her comm (Heaven forbid) she might actually stand a chance of understanding Kaylan’s commands while he got them out of there.

Stretching, she looked over at Tara. All right, she whispered. If she didn’t wake Tara now, she wouldn’t nap at a decent time and she’d end up cranky.

And that was the last thing she wanted when she tried to convince Kaylan to go ahead and visit a planet that was still on everyone’s radar. Figuratively speaking.

The first thing Maia did was ask for something that would gently wake Tara. Classical. Bach. J.S. The Little Fugue.

Idierd had called rock folk music. And yet, when the labels were all translated on the files that he’d given Kaylan before his death, they were organized just as they would have been if a human had done it. Which meant either that Lindsay had done the job herself, or that he’d known far more about Earth music than it had first seemed.

She could feel the colonization program, Ventra, around her like a brightly colored thread in a sweater.

Tara’s breathing deepened and she twitched. Slowly, bit by bit, things had begun to settle into a rhythm with her new baby. Maybe other babies were different, but Tara had very few needs and rarely cried. Of all the first and only children she could have had, Tara was possibly the best baby she could have ever had.

And that made her nervous.

Tara rolled over and opened her eyes, bluer than an Earth sky just before twilight. Her daughter’s baby curls glinted white in the reflected light of the planet. She blinked once, twice.

Maia picked her up. Hello, sunshine.

Tara smiled, a human grin that pushed all other concerns out of Maia’s head.

It was John’s smile. Hungry? Maia said.

Tara looked up at the ceiling and made a cooing sound.

Yes. Beautiful, isn’t it? That’s Solista. Sol-is-ta. Tara wasn’t supposed to talk yet, but there was no harm in pointing things out. Let’s get you changed and get something to eat before Captain Kaylan gets back.

Her echelon caught her eye once more. That curl of gold that would thread through her ear, if she let it, would allow her a greater control of all the ship’s systems. She didn’t have to wear it. If she wanted, she could just hold it and it would have a similar connection.

She left it where it was.

How is Kaylan doing today, Roz? She took Tara to a small changing area that had appeared out of the wall.

Well. He’s caught Gellista and will return today.

Great! What time?

One hour.

She frowned. The time was longer than she expected. Although getting from the surface to the ship often didn’t take long at all, getting the bounty secured could sometimes take a while, given the terrain. Was it a difficult catch?

No.

Difficult terrain?

No.

Maia blinked and quickly finished changing Tara. Roz whisked away the dirty diaper for cleaning through a hole that appeared underneath it. It closed, leaving the surface as smooth as if there had never been an opening. So, he’s almost done securing her?

He has finished securing the criminal.

Maia stood, taking in that information. What’s he doing?

I’m unable to s—

Silence.

Roz? Maia’s concern grew.

I am sorry, Roz said, as calm as if nothing had happened. He is talking to some people in a bar.

Maia nodded.

Ventra had been an unknown program, one even Kaylan, the ship’s captain, hadn’t known existed. But ever since Scott had tried to take over the ship, waking up Ventra in the process, she hadn’t trusted that things would run smoothly, to put it mildly. And now that Ventra had been activated and accepted her as its Matriarch, there had been…glitches, now and then. Near as Kaylan could tell, it was because Roz and Ventra would sometimes argue, as he put it. It’s the simplest way to describe it, he’d said.

Another reason she wanted to get to Nirick’s planet. Once Kaylan was free of his need for her presence, Kaylan would be free to get rid of Ventra without destroying Roz, the colony ship itself.

Because that was what currently housed her. A colony ship. Big, spacious, perfect in ways she hadn’t realized until after Tara was born.

And she didn’t want it. Not when there was a planet somewhere with winds and grass and sunlight. No ship could compare to that.

There has been a change, Roz announced. The captain will be leaving the planet now.

Great, Maia whispered, hoping there wasn’t any trouble following him.

Do you not wish him to return? It was Roz’s voice, but something in the tone, in the phrasing itself, and in something she couldn’t even define, told her it was Ventra.

I do, she quickly added. I just hope no one is following him.

No one is. Roz answered that time and Maia breathed a small sigh of relief and headed toward the dining area.

Becoming a Ventra-approved Darushee Matriarch meant that she’d learned to be very careful about what she said. A wish would be granted as soon as Ventra or Roz could manage it, and both could manage pretty darn fast. She was expected to do very little beyond study and take care of Tara, and even taking care of her own daughter was something Ventra didn’t really approve of. It was only allowed because the Matriarch was given the option to teach and train her own Heir.

And she’d learned that outcasts, like Kaylan, could be left to die without even a thought in their direction.

If she hadn’t intervened, Kaylan wouldn’t even be in charge of his own ship. The Outcast would have died of some infection, or might have even been jettisoned into space.

Only her word had kept him in charge. Only her word had gotten him the help he needed. And with one word, all that could be taken away.

Given that humans were usually the ones at the mercy of a Darushee’s word, she wasn’t sure what to think of the reversal. If it had been anyone else but Kaylan, she might have enjoyed the power.

Kaylan had done too much for her to enjoy it now.

In the six months since Idierd’s death, she’d learned that Kaylan never went directly to his room after he’d finished hunting someone down. And so she took the small container of creamy cereal (made from a grain found on the Darushee home-world) and Tara down to the second level of the ship, down a circular stair that ran down the side into a spacious room that would have been a commons and barracks area if Roz had been used as the colony ship she’d been designed to be.

But there were no bunks, no extra Darushee, and no colony. Just her and her daughter and the echoes that came with playing around in a large, featureless room big enough to have at least one basketball court.

Time passed. She’d been playing the Make the Same Sound game with Tara when she heard Kaylan’s voice, the words translating through the comm to say, Aren’t you a little above this?

She looked up to see Kaylan leaning against the doorway that led to the Hold on the bottom level, arms folded. The door was only partially visible at the end of a ramp that led down to it. Though there was more than one way into the Hold, the ramp was Kaylan’s preferred way after he picked up another bounty. She’d only seen him a few times, never on purpose. Most of the time, she tried to avoid him after a catch. He tended to be irritable, his angled Darushee eyes half-closed as he walked, his usually pale skin almost white making his copper-red hair even redder than usual. His long limbs looked even longer as he moved slowly to the higher levels of the ship.

Seeing that exhaustion made his comment easy to ignore. She even smiled and kept a playful tone. No mom is above this.

One corner of his mouth twitched upward. A good sign. He began walking toward the top level, the one that held not just her quarters, but his own, the dining room, and the navigation room, where he spent most of his time. Except after a hunt.

Maia scooped Tara into her arms and followed him.

He turned his head, but that was the only sign he gave that he’d noticed her presence. And she got the feeling, as she sometimes did, that it was a studied act. She sometimes thought he didn’t need to turn at all to know where she was at any given point.

Which brought up questions she pushed aside for the sake of a more important one. Easy catch?

He grunted and reached behind his neck to disengage the armor he wore under his shirt. She’d learned that his armor didn’t just protect him, it gave continual readings to Roz on his health and safety. Taking it off meant he wasn’t going to leave the ship for a while.

What did you hear? she said.

He stopped and turned at that, one foot on the bottom step of the stair leading upward. Is that really what you want to ask?

No. Direct was always best with Kaylan. But I know you wouldn’t spend time at a bar after a catch unless something important needed to be learned.

Another twitch at the corner of his mouth. Roz or Ventra?

Roz.

He nodded, then went back to climbing the stairs. After I eat.

Do you want me to make you something?

Will Ventra let you?

If I have a sound reason for it, I’m sure she’d let me do anything.

They both knew the truth, which is why she wasn’t surprised at his suppressed guffaw. She followed him up the stairs and put Tara down on the floor while he collapsed onto the couch in the dining area. He said nothing, just stared at the picture screen on the opposite wall. This time, it showed an image of a sunny beach, with shimmering items Maia couldn’t quite make out, lying on the golden sands.

Maia took a ball off a low shelf and gave it to Tara to hold. Turning back to Kaylan, she stepped closer, hating how tired he looked, and not just because it would mean she couldn’t talk to him. Trying to sound matter-of-fact, she said, May I?

Go ahead. His tone made it sound as if she’d offered to do some awful task he was helpless to keep her from.

That wasn’t the truth. The truth was he needed this moment as much as she had found she enjoyed it. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to explore that.

She reached out and touched his hand. Simple. And yet, she watched as Kaylan’s skin got a little more color, his exhaustion seemed to fade just a little. With each second that passed, he looked better, until finally he sat up and pulled his hand away.

There were moments when he’d made a point of being near her, but not for the same reason a human would. Darushee lived in their clan with a level of sociability that transcended anything humans had. To be cast out, as Kaylan had been, meant eventual death as their body shut down. To be accepted as part of a clan, or any similar group, prolonged their life.

And right now, Maia was the best thing Kaylan had to one. Sometimes, just knowing she was on the ship was enough. Sometimes, he needed to be closer to her than usual. And sometimes, like now, he needed a brief touch.

But it surprised her to find that she needed him as much as he needed her. No one in her husband’s group would have believed that, since she had been the wife of the prophet and all. But until she had become pregnant with Tara, no one had really needed her. Not even her husband, though she wanted to believe he’d loved her anyway.

Maybe it was sick, feeling better after helping Kaylan. Maybe it was twisted. It didn’t matter. It wouldn’t last anyway. That was the point of visiting Dr. Nirick.

He looked up at her, long arms folded, supported by his knees. Then, he stood and took off his jacket as he spoke. How are your Darunihin lessons advancing?

Well enough.

How ‘well enough’?

Roz says I’m thirty percent fluent.

He nodded again, then hung his jacket on a peg and looked down at Tara. She looked up at him and grinned then went back to playing with her ball. Maia caught the faint quirk of his mouth as he looked back and smiled.

She shouldn’t be smiling at any sign of friendliness from him toward Tara, part of her said. That part helped her gain some confidence. It’s been six months, Airie time, and the news hasn’t died down.

I’m aware of that.

Great. She was already irritating him. I know you wanted to wait until things calmed down out there, and I know you’re still trying to get into those storage areas.

Kaylan’s good mood vanished entirely, but she knew his increasingly bad mood wasn’t directed toward her.

I’m sure you’ll get in there, given time. You found them, didn’t you? Even when Ventra kept changing where they were?

I ‘found them’ because you told Ventra it might be good for me to know what’s on my own ship. And she took two months, two Airie months, thinking about it before she agreed. Took less time for her to decide to make an Airie a Matriarch.

Maia didn’t like either one: the fact that it had taken two months for Ventra to finally come to a decision and the fact that she’d been made a Matriarch in the first place. But there had been no other option at the time.

Two months. And she still hadn’t let even Maia know what was inside those storage areas. It seemed even a Matriarch didn’t have the right to know everything. And Kaylan was the one to suffer for it.

As if knowing where her thoughts might be going, he said, I’m not blaming you.

This time, she was the one who nodded. I just think it might be time to go to Koponal.

Can we talk about this some other time?

Instead, she folded her arms and waited.

He made a small growling sound in his throat, one she’d found she’d grown to like over the past several months, even though it was a sign of frustration. Ignore it, she told herself, not for the first time. Ignore how much you’re starting to like him. There’s no point, not when it’s him and when it’s you. Pausing, he looked at Tara. How much longer until she walks?

Another six mo—Airie months. Maybe. It varies.

Is there anything you can do to help it along?

Dread began to knot her stomach. Why?

There’s a rumor being spread through the systems. No proof, only a rumor based on what was found after Idierd’s death. He had a slave with the Gift.

Not true, she thought, but there was no need to say it. Kaylan had been there as well. Lindsay had only been able to enter the shared space. She was sentient. Nothing more. As if that were nothing to talk about all by itself.

She felt the color drain from her face. Is that what you heard in the bar?

Yup.

Did anyone there believe it?

Only the ones who wanted to. His features softened. No one has mentioned you by name or face. Right now, they’re looking toward Crossroads Station. Rumor says the Airie who was part of the destruction of Idierd’s arena, a friend of yours, might be heading there.

Control? I hope not.

Same here. Near as I can tell, Koponal has a cloud of hunters around it, waiting for someone to approach Nirick.

Because Nirick had helped Idierd. The hunters, do they know for certain?

No, but Eishan has quietly put out a bounty on Nirick’s head. Alive. They want to speak to him. That’s the rumor.

She fought to keep her breathing even, her thoughts from scattering. How much…I mean, how big…?

After waiting a moment, probably to see if she’d finish, he said, In the place where a payment would be offered, it only says, ‘favors’.

And that means?

That Clan Eishan’s offer is more than credits. It’s whatever the hunter asks.

She felt all the strength leave her knees.

"Do I need to help you now?"

She shook her head. But Nirick is still on Koponal.

Yes. He’s on the Island of Floating Caves. No one finds that. The Islands find you.

And this is all being done quietly, she whispered.

Because none of the Airie are sentient, let alone have the Gift. He snorted, then said softly for the first time, What they’d do with you. He didn’t need to say anything more.