"He's right," Neverlin seconded. "I'm sure she won't mind hanging around another day or so." He sent Alison a cultured sort of smirk. "After all, she's the one who suggested we should listen to the colonel more often."
Carefully, Alison suppressed a smile. She'd been afraid she would have to find a way to make that suggestion herself. "Not a problem," she assured them. "Just remember that another job will cost another twenty thousand."
"Understood," Neverlin said. "Colonel, would you escort Ms. Kayna back to her room?"
"I'll have Dumbarton and Mrishpaw do it," Frost said. "I think I'd better stay and help you check this out."
For a long moment the two men gazed at each other. "Whatever you'd like," Neverlin said at last. "Ms. Kayna, we'll see you later."
The afternoon dragged by. Alison spent the entire time alone in her room, wondering each minute if someone was about to arrive, hand her twenty thousand, and escort her out through the gate.
Kicking her off the Chookoock estate before she and Taneem had a chance to find and open the other safe.
But no one came. Shoofteelee arrived with her dinner at the usual time, with his usual polite but somewhat distant attitude. Alison and Taneem ate, then settled in for an evening that promised to be as long and nerve-wracking as the afternoon had been.
Again, no one had arrived by the time the lights-out warning tone came over the room's intercom. Alison was already in bed by then, getting in a little pre-bedtime doze in anticipation of a sleepless night ahead. Once the house was quiet, she and Taneem would go in search of that final safe.
And they would succeed. Alison had no doubt about that. Not anymore. Taneem's quiet faith, plus the afternoon's triumph, had blown away her earlier crisis of confidence like mist in a windstorm.
It was an hour after lights-out, and the slave areas around her had gone silent, when she heard the sound of her door being quietly opened. "Kayna?" Dumbarton's voice called softly.
"Who is it?" Alison asked, slurring her words slightly as if she'd been startled out of her sleep.
"Dumbarton and Mrishpaw," Dumbarton said. "Come on— Mr. Arthur wants to see you."
Alison winced. They weren't going to throw her out now, were they? "What about?" she asked, throwing off her covers and pulling on her shoes.
"You always go to bed with all your clothes on?" Dumbarton asked suspiciously.
"Hardly ever," Alison said, standing up. "I was resting and fell asleep."
"Sure," Dumbarton said. "Quiet, now."
They headed up through the slave areas, crossed the deserted kitchen, and emerged into the starlight through the same door Alison had used on her own midnight trip a few nights previously.
But it wasn't Neverlin who was waiting for her in the darkness.
It was Frost.
"There you are," he greeted her in a low voice. "Good news: the data diamonds gave us everything we needed to know."
"Glad to hear it," Alison said, the skin on the back of her neck starting to tingle. "Where's my money?"
"Where you'll never see it." Frost jerked his head toward an open-topped car waiting a few feet away. "Take her to the slave area," he ordered the two mercenaries. "And kill her."
CHAPTER 25
They had Alison to the car before she could untangle her tongue. "Wait!" she said, the word coming out more like a croak. "Wait! You can't—"
"Good-bye, deserter," Frost said. Turning with military precision, he disappeared back into the house.
"Just relax," Dumbarton advised as Mrishpaw picked her up and deposited her into one of the car's rear seats. "If you struggle, he'll just make it hurt more." He turned his back and started to climb into the driver's seat.
And in that instant, Taneem struck.
She exploded out of the back of Alison's shirt collar straight into Mrishpaw's face, slapping her forepaw against the Brummga's head with enough force to slam him bodily into the car's rear fender. The reaction from the blow sent Taneem herself flying in the opposite direction, dropping her nearly three yards away. She hit the ground and spun around, leaping at Dumbarton just as he turned his head to see what all the commotion was about.
His hand was diving for his gun when the K'da's second blow slammed into his head and dropped him like a limp puppet over the steering wheel.
"Are you all right?" Taneem asked Alison anxiously, her whole body trembling like a leaf as she crouched on the grass beside the car.
"Yes, I'm fine," Alison said, shaking a little herself. This was the second time she'd seen Taneem attack, and there was still something about it that brought out all her deepest, darkest fears. The price of having read too many books of dragon legends when she was young, she supposed.
Meanwhile, she and Taneem had real problems to deal with. "We need to get them out of here before some patrol trips over them," she said, looking around. Mrishpaw had slipped off the back of the car where Taneem's slap had landed him and was now sprawled on the ground. "Give me a hand."
Together, she and Taneem managed to hoist the big Brummga up into the backseat. Pushing Dumbarton out of the way, Alison got into the driver's seat and started the car. Choosing a pathway heading northwest, aiming them midway between the main gate and the slave areas where Frost had been sending her, she drove off. "Where are we going?" Taneem asked, crouching low on Mrishpaw's body.
"I wish I knew," Alison said grimly. "There have to be places in an estate this size where we can hide for a while. Unfortunately, we don't know where any of them are."
"Can't we simply leave?"
Alison shook her head. "The gate is way too well defended," she said. "The wall's even worse."
"Yet Jack and Draycos were able to escape," Taneem reminded her.
Alison hissed a curse at herself. "What am I thinking?" she growled, reaching over to Dumbarton's collar and pulling off his comm clip. "Here—you drive."
"What?" Taneem asked, sounding startled.
"Just take the wheel—I'll handle the pedals," Alison said, leaning out of the way. "Come on, you can do it."
A pair of K'da paws reached over her shoulder and gingerly wrapped themselves around the wheel. Keeping half an eye on the road, Alison tuned Dumbarton's comm clip to the Essenay's frequency. "Thanks," she said to Taneem, taking back the wheel. "Cross your toes." Fastening the comm clip to her collar, she clicked it on. "Jack?"
"This is Uncle Virge," the computerized personality came back instantly. "Are you all right?"
"Not really, no," Alison told him. "We just had to clobber two of Frost's men and we're on the run."
"You don't know the half of it," Uncle Virge said grimly. "I've been monitoring their transmissions for the past half hour. Frost is organizing a group to go back to Semaline. They've figured out that Jack is there."
"He's still there?" Alison echoed, frowning. "Then what in blazes are you doing here?"
"I'm here because once those two goofs picked you up, I knew they hadn't gotten Jack, and I knew then where he had to be," Uncle Virge said. "I figured he'd be safe there for a while."
"Yes, but—"
"And he'd ordered me to watch out for you and Taneem," Uncle Virge snapped. "All right?"
"Sure," Alison said hastily. "Sure. Calm down."
"I am calm."
"I can tell," Alison said. She and Taneem were still in trouble, but with the Essenay here, at least she now had the beginnings of a plan. Maybe. "Okay—first things first," she said. "Do they know where Jack is?"
"Probably," Uncle Virge said.
"How?"
There was just the briefest pause. "I don't know."
"No more games," Alison said coldly. "Jack's in danger, I'm in danger, and if we don't do something about it real quick you're going to find yourself all alone in a very big universe. Understand?"
"Yes," Uncle Virge said, his voice subdued. "What do you want to know?"
"Let's start with Jack," Alison said. "Who is he?"
Uncle Virge sighed. "The son of the late Stuart an
d Ariel Palmer," he said. "Both of them Judge-Paladins."
Alison felt her mouth drop open a fraction of an inch. She'd already pegged the Essenay as some kind of diplomatic or governmental ship. She'd proved it, in fact, by activating the computer's built-in privacy lock system on the trip back from Rho Scorvi.
But she'd assumed Virgil Morgan had conned or stolen the ship from some minor official or else bought it on the black market from a corrupt diplomat. For it to have been stolen from a Judge-Paladin, let alone two of them—
"I know what you're thinking," Uncle Virge cut into her thoughts. "But it wasn't like that."
"Whatever it was like, it can wait," Alison said. "How do they know where Jack is right now?"
"Because he's probably at the scene of his parents' murder—"
"Their murder?" Alison cut him off. "I thought Jack said they were killed in an accident."
"Because he wasn't ready for the truth yet," Uncle Virge said. "Besides, there was still the little matter of assembling evidence to identify their killers."
Alison felt cold all over. Was that the little problem on Semaline Neverlin had mentioned earlier?
And if so, did he know who Jack really was?
"Anyway, I think some of the residents of the area must have recognized him as the Palmers' son and taken him back there," Uncle Virge went on.
"Why?"
"Probably to judge their disputes for them," Uncle Virge said. "They're all alone out in the middle of nowhere—"
"Okay, okay—not important," Alison interrupted. "What's important is that we get Jack and Draycos out of there, and fast. How soon can you get back to Semaline?"
"I can do it in four days if I really run the fuel tanks," Uncle Virge said. "That'll get me there about the same time as Frost's ships. Maybe a couple of hours sooner."
"Sooner would be nice," Alison said.
"Tell me about it," Uncle Virge said with a grunt. "Problem is, pushing it that hard will drain our credit balance. We might end up stranded there."
"Don't worry about that," Alison assured him. "There are a bunch of fuel credits in my cabin. You and Jack can use those when you come back to pick me up."
"Wait a second," Uncle Virge warned. "If you're counting on Jack to get you out of there—"
"Don't worry, I'm not," Alison assured him. "But I'll need you to send an InterWorld message for me before you take off."
"Who to?"
"The nearest Malison Ring Class One base," Alison said. "I think the one on Tristram Four is the closest, but you can check."
There was a brief silence. "The Malison Ring," Uncle Virge said, his voice gone flat. "Frost's friends."
"Not exactly," Alison said. "You're going to send the message using the voice of General Aram Davi, the Malison Ring's commander in chief."
"What?" Uncle Virge demanded. "Who do you think I am, girl?"
"I think you're a computer," Alison said. "And the voice-print and tonal patterns you'll need are already installed in one of the files Jack set up for me to use."
There was another brief pause as Uncle Virge accessed the file. "You must be out of your apple-buttered mind," he said, sounding as flabbergasted as Alison had ever heard him. "Where in space did you get all these?"
"My dad's a collector, okay?" Alison said briefly. "You never know when someone else's voice might come in handy. So can you do it, or can't you?"
"I can do it," Uncle Virge said, still sounding a little floored. "What's the message?"
Alison grinned in the darkness. Frost was going to love this. "Tell them that Colonel Frost is being held prisoner at the Chookoock family estate on Brum-a-dum," she said. "Order them to scramble a force to rescue him."
"I was right the first time," Uncle Virge said. "You are insane."
"Not at all," Alison said. "They won't question an order coming from General Davi. Especially since you'll also be giving them one of his authorization codes."
"Where am I—oh," Uncle Virge said. "I will be dipped in butter. You have his security codes, too?"
"I had access to a Malison Ring computer system a •while back," Alison said. "I got in a little deeper than anyone thought."
"And then what?" Uncle Virge asked. "All Frost has to do is tell them he wasn't kidnapped and they'll go home."
"He can't, and that's the real beauty of this," Alison said, smiling again. "They won't accept any response while he's still inside the house—he could be talking with a gun to his head."
"Then he comes out and shows them he's all right."
"He can't do that, either," Alison said. "He's been using Malison Ring troops and equipment for his own private scheme, remember? For all he knows, this kidnapping story could be nothing but a ruse to lure him out into the open so that they can nab him."
"I like it," Uncle Virge said approvingly. "Anyone ever tell you you had the makings of a very devious person?"
"That's high praise, coming from you," Alison said dryly. "Send the message, do what you can to make sure they've bought it, then hightail it back to Semaline."
"All right," Uncle Virge said. "But look, even if they buy it, Tristram Four is a good three to four days away from here. Are you going to be all right that long?"
"If I say no, what are you going to do about it?" Alison countered. "Right; that's what I thought. Don't worry, I think I know a place where we can hide for a while. You just concentrate on Jack and Draycos."
"I'll get them out," Uncle Virge promised grimly. "You watch yourself, lass."
"I will," Alison promised. "Oh, one other thing. How did you even know I was here?"
"Through your comm clip, of course," Uncle Virge said. "Your kidnappers practically gave me the Chookoocks' address."
Alison thought back. "But the clip was off."
"Well . . . not exactly," Uncle Virge said, sounding a little embarrassed. "Jack rigged that clip to be permanently on. You know, as a precaution?"
Alison felt her lip twist. So much for Taneem's question about whether Jack trusted her. Just as well that he didn't. "Remind me to be mad about that later," she told Uncle Virge. "In the meantime, go get him out of there."
She clicked off the comm clip and slipped it into her pocket. "Do you really know a place where we can hide?" Taneem asked.
Alison shrugged. "Let's find out."
The landscape around them changed from grassy lawn to sculpted trees, and the path split three times before they reached Alison's objective.
The wall.
"I don't know," Taneem asked as they sat in the car looking up at the wall's wave-shaped overhang. "This seems very uncertain."
"In theory, it should work just fine," Alison said, studying the white ceramic gleaming in the starlight. The shadowed underside of the wave was much harder to see, but she was almost positive that the inward-curling edge of the wave curved upward a little right at the end. The big question was whether it curved up enough to form a trough where she and Taneem could lie hidden from view.
The even bigger question was whether they could get up there to find out.
"The entire wall's about thirty feet tall, which puts that wave trough between twenty and twenty-five," Alison went on. "First thing to do is see if you can jump that high."
"I'll try." Crouching down, Taneem gathered herself and leaped.
Alison held her breath. The K'da soared upward, and with a faint scrabbling of claw against ceramic she caught the edge of the wave. For a second she hung there, then stirred and pulled herself up and disappeared into the trough.
Alison looked around. There were no aircars or other ground vehicles visible. Apparently, her escape was still undiscovered.
Which wasn't surprising, actually. Frost was busy organizing the Semaline attack force, and Alison doubted that anyone else in the house knew about his order to kill her. Until the colonel started wondering why Dumbarton and Mrishpaw hadn't shown up to give him the good news about her death, she was unlikely to be missed.
There was a flicker of mo
tion, and she looked over as Taneem dropped again to the ground. "I think there is enough room for us," she reported. "Though it is filthy with feathers and bird droppings."
"That's okay," Alison assured her. "Now the big question: can you carry me that high?"
"No," Taneem said, ducking her head apologetically. "I could lift you perhaps half that distance, but not the entire way."
Alison chewed at her lip. Desperate needs, the old saying whispered through her mind, called for desperate measures. "Halfway it is," she said. "Help me get Dumbarton and Mrishpaw out of the car."
It took some creative maneuvering, plus a lot of grunting, but within a few minutes Alison and Taneem had the two mercenaries out and settled under one of the nearby shrubs. "Here's the plan," Alison said, doing a quick search of the unconscious bodies. Neither was carrying a gun, but Mrishpaw had a slapstick belted at his side. Pulling it from its holster, she held it up. "We're going to back the car up a ways and get in. I'm going to wedge the accelerator with this, and we'll charge full-bore toward the wall."
"Toward the wall?" Taneem asked, her neck arching.
"Straight toward it," Alison confirmed. "With the wall curved that way we should run up along it like a Great Galaxy Romp roller coaster heading into a crazyloop. You'll be holding on to me, and when the car's at its highest point, you'll jump us toward the lip. If we do it right, we should land nice and neat inside the trough."
Taneem's tail was lashing agitatedly at the air. "I can't do that," she said, her voice trembling. "No. I can't."
"We have to try," Alison said firmly. "We don't know the grounds. The Brummgas do. They'll know about any other place we might find to hide. This is the only spot they might not think of."
"But we could be killed." Taneem looked up at the frozen white wave above them. "Draycos could do it—he has the strength and skill. But I'm not like him. I can't."
"Taneem." Reaching over, Alison put her hand on the side of the K'da's snout and pulled her head gently around to face her. "Earlier today, I didn't think I could figure out the safe," she said. "But you had faith in me, and I did it. Well, I have faith in you. You can do this. I know you can."