“Good work,” she said, praising them equally. It didn’t matter how a man went down, only that he did. “Wills!”
In answer, he loped around the corner wearing an expectant expression, like they’d stopped for a picnic. “Time to go?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Let’s move.”
Apart from a shallow slice on her ribs and teeth marks that hadn’t broken the skin, she wasn’t too bad off. Of course, that was just a single patrol, and they had a long way to go. The ship was the size of a small city, with the salvage bay nestled to the far east and down several levels, not within Katur’s Warren, but close enough that there might be complications. Dred had never met Katur or any of his aliens. They usually stayed close to their own territory, not prone to roaming. That made sense since there were relatively few of them, and Mungo in particular had a hate on for anybody who wasn’t human.
“Injuries?” she asked.
“None,” Einar said.
Jael showed her the cuts on his arm, but most were already healing. She shook her head, incredulous. “Someday, you have to show me how you do that.”
“It’s the power of my mind. I can also use it to order food and repair electronics.” He threw her a cocky wink.
She pretended to believe him as Einar snorted. “Really? I thought you didn’t use it for much of anything. Since I’m wrong, you can help Wills with the droids.”
The new fish laughed. “I’ll save my massive psychic displays for a more worthy cause. As it happens, though, I’m a fair tinkerer. I’d be happy to lend him a hand.”
“Is there anything you can’t do?” Einar muttered. “Besides shut up.”
“Can’t carry a tune to save my life. Most unfortunate because otherwise I’m pretty enough to be a vid star. Opine?” Jael pursed his lips in an expression so sultry that it was sure to rile Einar, and sure enough, the big man went for him.
Dred hated to step between them. But she did. “Save it for Grigor’s people. Come on.”
“Next time, I’ll break your neck,” Einar promised with a dark look.
Before the new fish showed up, there hadn’t been tension. Given they hovered on the verge of an invasion, things were tense enough without adding internal conflict. But try telling a bunch of criminals to dial it down. Still, she couldn’t let it get out of hand.
Jael shrugged. “Go ahead.”
Really? You just invited him to kill you? Just when she thought she had a handle on the new fish, he demonstrated another way of being unpredictable. The big man cut his eyes to her, asking a silent question. Yes, she answered with a tap of a finger to the head. He’s a little crazy. But so was everyone else in here. She’d never caught him talking to people who weren’t there. Well, not yet anyway. Wills did that all the time, and she was still taking him on the mission.
Beggar queens can’t be choosers.
14
Pitfalls for the Unwary
Jael took two steps after the princess in chains when the first burst of not-right exploded in his veins. He stumbled, feet refusing to cooperate and it took both hands flattened on the wall to keep him upright. Dred stepped closer, but there were two of her, four green eyes peering at him. The images wavered, then warped, until nausea rushed in to accompany the heat prickling up his arms. He stared at his wounds. All but two had healed. The ones remaining were limned in black, and he felt like his arms were on fire.
“I don’t feel right,” he tried to say, but the words came out as gibberish.
“Mary curse it,” she swore. “The wounds on your arms, did they come from knives or the spikes on their armor?”
His head was fuzzy, and he couldn’t answer by this point anyway. But he was pretty sure some came from the spikes. Jael had no idea why that mattered until Einar said in disgusted tones, “The arse has gotten himself poisoned. Won’t be long now.”
If he could’ve, he would’ve broken the big bastard’s neck, but his knees crumpled, quite beyond his volition. It’s some kind of paralytic. Wonder if it’s enough to kill me. If his lungs shut down and his brain was robbed of oxygen long enough, his body might regen, only to find his mind damaged beyond repair. The idea of living as a shambling monster sent a thrill of horror through him, but he couldn’t act on it, couldn’t beg her to cut out his heart or chop off his head before that happened. He had no practical experience with asphyxiation; it was one of the few tortures that various labs had chosen not to test, fearing permanent damage to the specimen.
“Let’s go,” the big man added. “He’ll only slow us down.”
Dred watched as he slid down to the floor. Jael had never felt more helpless because he couldn’t move, apart from the spasms contorting his muscles. Fighting did no good. He sat where he’d fallen, head tilted back. Speculative calculation lit her green eyes, then she shook her head.
“You saw how fast he healed those cuts. I’m guessing he’ll come through this, too. If I’m wrong, we have to turn back anyway because we can’t breach the salvage bay without him.” Her tone became brisk. “So set up a perimeter. Wills, keep watch from the south. If you see anything, run like hell back here, and we’ll take care of it.”
“Of course, my queen,” said the madman, sounding remarkably composed.
“I’ve got the north,” Einar finally growled.
Jael could tell the giant wasn’t happy with Dred’s decision, but he was a loyal goon, incapable of defying her majesty’s judgment. Which was good for Jael. His face went numb, then his whole head. It became a struggle to breathe. A slowing heartbeat warned him that he might not process the poison in time. Odd. I can actually feel systems shutting down, one by one. If anyone had asked, he’d tell them death from this poison felt an awful lot like sleep.
He lost control of his eyelids last. Then he couldn’t see what was happening, only hear. He thought he recognized the distant noises of battle; this came and went as Jael lost any sense of time passing. The sounds blurred into an imprecise cacophony, like a busy market he’d once visited on Gehenna, with all the voices speaking at once, languages fusing in nonsense syllables, impossible to separate from the roaring in his head. Madness gnawed at him from the inside out while a little voice whispered, Let go. And oh, he tried, but something tugged at him, relentless.
A pinch started as heat and ended in pain. He tried to strike out in protest, but his muscles still wouldn’t answer. Anger boiled up, impotent as regret.