knives at the small of my back. “What do you know? Life really is full of second chances.”
The Sarcodinay’s eyes glowed, shifted into the yellow-orange of annoyance. “You don’t want to kill me.”
“There you go telling me what I want again. Didn’t we just have this conversation?”
Lorvan fingered the edges of his khani robe nervously, long slender fingers starting to turn to wrinkled, mellow gold. He eyed Paul uneasily, as if he were the carrier of a contagious disease. Lorvan looked back over at me. “Does he know?”
“Know what?”
He licked his lips. “You know.”
“Spell it out for me like my IQ was normal.”
Lorvan glanced back at the bodyguards. “Go away.”
They both seemed surprised. One of them managed to stammer, “But our orders...”
“I couldn’t care less. Go to the bar, go outside, go elsewhere. Now.”
They stared at Lorvan and then at each other before turning around and walking to the front of the restaurant. Lorvan watched them leave with nothing like pleasure in his expression. Then he turned back to me. “I need to speak with you. And I think you want to hear what I have to say.”
Maybe I let my curiosity get the better of me. “What do you want, old man?”
He stabbed at Paul with his chin, never taking his eyes off me. “Does he know about you? Are your abilities still latent?”
Paul sat up straight, and his eyes went from wide and scared to narrow and calculating with commendable swiftness.
Personally, I hesitated a fraction of a second too long before answering. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t lie. I was the head of the school. You think I couldn’t figure out why you were sent there? I never knew the exact reasons they—” He paused for a second, as if his train of thought had wandered. “I need to know if the blocks are still there. If they are, they need to come down. It’s very important.”
“If ignorance is bliss, you’re going to be a happy man.”
He scowled. “Your power—”
“My only power is the ability to shoot you in the head and have everyone in this restaurant swear you tripped and fell on a steak knife. Why don’t you leave? You’re annoying my friend.”
Paul had been studying Lorvan carefully ever since the Sarcodinay had made a mention of my powers. He was no longer scared, but calm, very calm. “No, Mallory. I think we should listen to what he has to say.”
“What he wants is obvious, but I don’t like being blackmailed any more than you do.”
“I’m not here to blackmail anyone,” Lorvan protested. “I’m offering answers.”
“Go on,” Paul urged.
Lorvan looked around to see who might be listening before addressing me. “You were never meant to be in that school. You were a last minute addition, because there was nowhere else we could put you. You may not remember, but you were dangerous.”
“I’m still dangerous, or haven’t you watched the news?”
“I’m not talking about hijacking shuttles or breaking into computers. You were different, and normally I would have ordered you killed, but no, I had to give you the same training as everyone else, even though you made my skin crawl.”
“Oh by all means, go on. I so enjoy listening to a man dig his own grave.”
He startled, eyes wide. “Don’t you want to know why? You must want to know!”
Again, I hesitated. “I don’t care.”
“You must! I can tell you everything. It’s not blackmail. You help me and I’ll help you. The situation has changed. Everything has changed. Don’t you understand? I need you. I have made a terrible mistake. I didn’t look at the template, I just used it. It was convenient. I didn’t consider the ramifications. Now it’s being used against us, and you are the only one from the school I can trust!”
“You threw Paul and me together in that pit of hell for six years, and now you march in here and talk about trust? Aren’t you forgetting why we left? Why don’t you play your mind games somewhere else?” I started to walk past him, perfectly willing to leave rather than continue the conversation, forgetting Paul entirely in my anger and my desire to escape.
No one was more surprised than me when Lorvan grabbed my arm and spun me back around. “Please, Seris! I’m begging you—”
I stopped in mid-stride and stared at him, open-mouthed.
Sarcodinay didn’t beg. Ever. They commanded, they ordered, they threatened, but you’d probably live your whole life without hearing one say please and could count on the sun turning to a big fat red giant before one ever begged. They didn’t have to beg. They were the undisputed masters of the biggest chunk of galactic civilization that anyone knew about, and had been since before the Pyramids existed. Even the new Emperor’s withdrawal smacked of condescension.
“What do you want?” I whispered.
“Keep me alive! 24 hours. My shuttle leaves in 24 hours! You’re the only one who can protect me!”
“And here I thought no one loved me.” I shook my head. “Lorvan, you made my childhood a horror. I hate you. You know I hate you—”
I stopped. Something was wrong. What—
“DOWN!!!” Medusa screamed into my ear.
I was diving to the floor before I was consciously aware of moving. As I fell, time slowed down to a baby’s crawl, weak and mewling. A ripple of surprise, fear, and terror spread through the restaurant diners like an earthquake’s shockwave, moving from a source I could feel, but not see. Eyes widened, bodies started to drop to the floor, some pushed and some falling.
Gunfire. Not the masers the Sarcodinay preferred, but good old-fashioned human automatic gunfire. I could hear the whir and click of each slug being loaded into the chamber, the tang of burning gunpowder, the scrape of bullets in the barrel, the thunder stroke of rounds passing the sound barrier. I became hyper-aware of Paul’s cologne, my own deodorant, the redolent smell of Sarcodinay herbs and the acrid stench of sharp fear, sulfur, and burning flesh.
I hit the floor as the bullets hit Lorvan.
The Sarcodinay’s eyes darkened in front of me as he twitched and died, their luminescent color dimming to black death. His mind faded like the screams of a drowning man; my own mind screamed for answers.
ggg
I nod as he pulls up the holographic image. “A new find, your majesty?”
The Emperor smiles indulgently, looking pleased with himself. “This find is very special. Very special. Look at the reconnaissance imagery that our deep exploration pilot brought back.” He touches the panels with his fingertips, brings up new images. They are grainy, fuzzy things, not made with the sort of technological sophistication that marks our own race. The first images are architecture: buildings of unknown design, bleached of color, white globes and carved pillars joining strangely carved boxes. Some of the buildings are monumental in scope: beautiful lace-like towers piercing the sky, mile-high buildings of glass and steel like giant sticks shoved into the ground. The view draws closer, moves its perspective from buildings to the people who live in and around them. It takes a second for me to understand exactly what I am seeing, and then I cannot help but gasp.
“By the Keepers—”
“Yes,” he says, grinning. “The resemblance is remarkable, is it not? Of all the races in the Empire, this marks the first time, the only time, we have encountered a race that looks so much like our own. They have made no successful forays into space beyond their own solar system, but they have a rich culture involving space travel. Shaniran’s reports indicate they will certainly become highly expansionistic—or destroy themselves. It could go either way.”
“Shaniran?”
“Ran-Dolis Shaniran. The explorer who discovered their system. He understood the magnitude of his find immediately and came directly to me.” The Emperor stares at me with an intensity that makes me shiver. “This will need to be handled very carefully. This is my charge to you.”
ggg
&n
bsp; What the hell was that?
There was no time: I’d deal with it later.
I scanned the restaurant. Lorvan’s killer was human, dressed in a plain gray maintenance jumpsuit. He had a slave caste-mark on his forehead. The man was using an old-fashioned submachine gun, pumping out rounds with cheerful and random abandon. He was grinning like—well, forgive the cliché—like a madman.
The two Sarcodinay bodyguards were firing from across the room with their microwave bracers. The assassin was still firing, and a contemptuous flick of his wrist drove bullets into one of the Sarcodinay with impossible accuracy. Submachine guns just didn’t do groupings that precise. If any League people were in the room, I’d be willing to bet my forged season passes to the gladfights they’d be firing too in a second. It would be old-fashion free-for-all. All they needed was the excuse.
I kept a pistol in a holster strapped to my thigh for just such occasions. My fingers twitched in that direction, but I silenced the urge. Too much chaos. I wasn’t going to add to it. The odds I’d hit a bystander by accident were less probability than certainty.
I rolled to my feet and ran up behind the killer. I hoped that in the confusion he wouldn’t pay any attention to one more running, screaming patron. He had his hands busy with that last Sarcodinay bodyguard, who tumbled over behind a table and took aim with his vambrace. The killer was using non-metallic bullets of some kind—maybe ceramic, maybe carbon diamond—so the web gloves were useless. The Sarcodinay fired several times, aiming carefully.
I only knew the