Inherit the Stars Read online

  “Maybe the Rector was right. You got a deal with the Aldaakians, Kiv? They let you go pretty easy. Shock Troopers showed up all nice and quick, too. That almost got us killed.” Sar glowered at her.

  Kivita poked a finger against Sar’s polycuirass. “Then maybe you should explain all that bullshit about a deal with Shekelor. You were practically kissing his ass. For all I knew, you planned to sell me into slavery after Orstaav led me from that hall! Hell, I wanted my ship back, okay? Not my fault the Aldaakians arrived so soon.”

  “You knew the Aldaakians would surely be coming?” Cheseia flinched as if bitten by a wood snake.

  Sar frowned. “How, with all that radiation in the Expanse? No way they’d have detected us so soon.”

  “The transmitter room in the fortress had Sarrhdtuu tech,” Kivita said. “Seul sent out a signal, okay? I told her that her commander could have the Juxj Star for my ship. I changed my mind, though, once I neared their cruiser on Fanged Pauper. Seul let me escape, believe it or not.”

  Sar shook his head. “Lot of good it did. Seems the Aldaakians were on our trail, anyway. Dammit, I told you to trust me. I wanted Shekelor to confuse any who might be following us while we escaped the system.”

  “He violently tossed us into a cell after you left the hall.” Cheseia smoothed her mane with frustrated strokes. “Shekelor mentioned he would certainly sell you to someone.”

  “The bastard was expecting us, Kiv,” Sar said. “Knew your name, everything.”

  Kivita’s guts churned. “C’mon, sell me to the Sarrhdtuu? Why?” Did her visions have anything to do with it? If what Jandeel said about Savants were true, and that story of the executed Susuron queen . . .

  “Has to be the Sarrhdtuu,” Sar replied. “Someone put one of their beacons on your ship, and Shekelor didn’t have all those Sarrhdtuu enhancements the last time I knew him.”

  The vision of Sarrhdtuu torturing humans taken from a wrecked ship came to mind. Her hand bumped into Sar’s, and she blinked the thought away.

  Sar jerked his hand back, lips tight. Cheseia gave him a confused look.

  Kivita’s cheeks burned again. “Well, excuse me. Guess you don’t want my services, huh? Got your Ascali beauty for that. Well, you’ve got your answers. Get the hell off my ship. I’m sick of your games.”

  “Dammit, this isn’t a game!” Sar grabbed her by the shoulders. “I see things when I touch you, Kiv! Stars, planets, images I don’t understand. Seeing them even now.” He jerked her close. “What did Jandeel tell you? That you’re a Savant?”

  She’d never seen him explode with such emotion. The cold, fearful look in his eyes appeared again, and now she realized its origin: he’d feared for, and had been afraid of, her since entering the Umiracan system.

  “Let go of me.” Kivita trembled at his touch.

  “Shekelor had a brain-pulse analyzer in his throne room. He knew what you were the whole time on Umiracan. How long have you known? Son of a bitch, Kiv. How long?” Sar’s last question came out in a whisper.

  “Ever since touching that datacore from Xeh’s Crown, I’ve had headaches. Weird dreams. After touching the Juxj Star, now I see them all the time.”

  “Don’t you understand?” Sar asked. “The Rector must’ve known, too. Inheritors scan all adults on a regular basis. He knew about you. You can’t go back. You can’t just sell that gem now.”

  Kivita recalled the tingling she’d felt on the hive ship, up until the pirate had turned off the small device. Jandeel’s words about Inheritors executing Savants made the tremor in her stomach grow until it shook her whole body. She’d been set up for something. Something beyond her ken.

  “Now you’re seeing some of the things I’ve dreamt about since Xeh’s Crown.” She stared off into space as an image of Kith guarding Vstrunn entered her mind.

  “Kith on Vstrunn,” Sar murmured, then slowly released her. “I know a few Savants. None can put thoughts into another’s mind like that.”

  “Jandeel’s a Thede, isn’t he?” Kivita stepped back from Sar. “So are both of you, right? What’s happening to me? Why’d this gem choose me?”

  “Wish I knew,” Sar replied.

  Cheseia plopped on the floor and jerked her mane from its headband. “You will never be truly free of enemies again, Kivita. Sar, we should definitely leave Tejuit and take her to the Thedes.”

  “She’s right, Kiv. Until the Arm is free of the Inheritors, you’ll never be safe. The Thedes are the only ones you can turn to now.”

  Kivita blew out a breath, rattling her lips. “Wait right there. Since leaving Vstrunn, you two have dragged me across the light years. Wow, now you’ve saved me twice. But this is me you’re talking about, not just this damn gem anymore. If we go anywhere, I’ll be the one deciding.”

  “With that Sarrhdtuu beacon on this ship? They’ll track you all over the Arm. Longer we stay here, sooner they’ll find you.” Sar’s face fell, as if all the years he’d spent in cryostasis now weighed down on him. Cheseia, though vibrant with typical Ascali vitality, possessed haggard eyes. Maybe they really intended her no harm and wanted her safe.

  Sar paced Kivita’s quarters. “Shekelor will be watching out for us. Need to lose him somehow. Need to scrap or hack your beacon, too. Don’t know how myself, but we’re a meteor running from a supernova until it’s deactivated. They will catch you.”

  “I’m not ditching Terredyn Narbas,” Kivita said.

  “We need to leave this hive ship.” Sar looked straight at Kivita. “You help the Thedes, it’ll bolster resistance in the Arm. There might be some information in the Juxj Star to bring this war into the open. This won’t be a salvager run, Kiv, with a big payment at the end. The Inheritors will want you dead afterward. Will you help us?”

  Kivita studied the old placard of her with her father. What would he think of his daughter being a Savant? Now she was the salvage everyone desired, the most wanted individual in the Cetturo Arm. That meant she needed friends, allies. Her gaze bored into Sar.

  “What if I won’t help the Thedes? Will you refuse to help me then? I need to know, both of you: does your friendship depend on what I can do for you? If it does, then just go. The airlock’s right there.” Kivita crossed her arms.

  Cheseia rose, her beautiful features pinched in anger. “You unfortunately accuse us too much! Why would we truly save you if all we wanted—”

  Sar touched Cheseia’s shoulder. “Kiv’s right to ask. You know what I hope you’ll do, sweetness. But if you don’t want to help the Thedes, hell, I’ll still help you any way I can.”

  “Will you? You once told me that no one with an agenda could be trusted.” Kivita pursed her lips.

  “Trust me like you did in the old days,” Sar said.

  Cheseia pushed Sar’s hand away and faced the airlock, her jaw set.

  “First we lose Shekelor Thal . . . then I’ll decide.” In truth, Kivita preferred the Thedes over the Inheritors, but she wouldn’t be used. You don’t waste air on a fair-weather crew.

  “Good enough. Cheseia, care to find some refugees who want to earn a crate of foodstuffs?” He didn’t take his gaze off Kivita. The way his eyes roved over her, the glimmer in them . . . it was the same way he’d looked at her when she’d wore those flashy clothes on Frevyx.

  “What for?” A flush came over Kivita.

  Sar smirked. “Diversion.”

  “I will definitely meet you back at Frevyx’s airlock in a few minutes,” Cheseia said in a low voice, then exited Terredyn Narbas’s airlock into the hive ship.

  As soon as the airlock slid shut, Kivita wanted to ask Sar so many questions, but none of them reached her lips. Chest tight, her eyes roved everywhere and paused on her hammock. His computer chit still lay there—a promise at future passion she doubted either of them would keep.

  Kivita bit her lip and rubbed her hands. The knuckles on
her right hand still shone red from breaking the pirate’s nose. As she walked to the bridge, Sar took her hands and rubbed them himself. His fingers kneaded the soreness from her joints and digits. The flush on her skin blazed into a furnace at his touch.

  “Sar, don’t—”

  “Salvagers need good hands. Gripping the manuals, using excavation tools.” He studied her hands, not looking up.

  Kivita took shallow breaths. Saliva filled her mouth. His fingers caressed her skin the same way he’d done over Gontalo. As much as she adored his attention, Kivita wanted to shoulder her own pain.

  “I’m not the same lonely salvager you teamed with at Xeh’s Crown,” she said. “I can survive whatever this universe throws at me. But I’m sick of wanting you back, sick of needing you. Sometimes I hate you for it. Don’t you understand?”

  Her lips quivered as he continued massaging her hands. Sar said nothing.

  “You’re not being fair to Cheseia. I see her love for you in her eyes. Doesn’t that make you feel guilty?” Her question came out as a whine.

  Sar pulled her close, still looking down. Heat flooded her body.

  “You can’t save me every time, Sar. Sometimes I don’t want you to. Are you listening to me?” She reached up and tilted his chin until his gaze finally met hers. “I don’t want you to.”

  “What about right now?” he asked.

  Kivita kissed him on the lips.

  Her fingers ran through his black curls; her thighs rubbed against his. Cupping his face in both hands, she tasted the pseudoadrine residue in his mouth as their tongues writhed. Her nipples tingled while her legs rubbed against each other in eager anticipation. A hungry moan traveled up her throat.

  Sar didn’t touch or embrace her.

  Moaning deeper, she sucked his lower lip, squeezed his rump, and swished her tongue farther into his luscious mouth. Kivita loved and hated him in the same moment. Wanted him to feel her pain, her passion. She would make him want her; just a few more kisses, a little more touching. All the hurt from being left alone, all the tenderness she’d saved just for him, gushed from Kivita.

  He pulled back, lips moist from her kisses.

  Her skin cooled in an instant, and she turned away. “Guess you cashed in that chit.”

  Sar grasped her by the shoulders and made her face him. “Don’t you understand? Every time we touch, I see those things. It hurts my own brain, trying to break down these images and sensations. How you manage it, I don’t know. Guess the universe is telling you what I’ve always known.”

  Kivita trembled in his grasp. Their bodies were so close, yet light years away. “Yeah. What’s that?”

  “That you’re one special woman.”

  Shivering, she pushed away. “Don’t. Nothing will change once this is over. I know you.”

  “Kiv . . .”

  “I loved you once. It already isn’t easy to want you so much, but then to be told I can’t even touch you now? Goddamn pirates didn’t seem to mind.” She bit off the last words to keep from sobbing.

  Sar pressed her against his chest. “That’s bullshit! I try to tell you how much I . . . But you just keep being so damn fickle.” He shoved her away and stormed toward the airlock.

  Kivita ran after him and barred the airlock doors with her arm. “The hell I am! Just tell me one thing. Did you feel anything while sleeping in the cryopod with me from Vstrunn?”

  He tugged her aside; she’d forgotten how strong he was.

  “Anything at all?” she asked, voice thick with emotion.

  He reached for the airlock lever.

  “Goddammit, did you?” she cried.

  Kivita tried to bar him again, but Sar wrapped an arm around her waist and kissed her. While his fingers brushed through her hair, Kivita squeezed herself to him. She languished against his chest after their lips finally parted. A long moment passed with him rubbing her back, her inhaling his scent.

  The emotions inside wanted to spill out and drown him, cleanse them both of ill feelings and lost time. Kivita tightened her hold. The universe had taken so much from her—her parents, her career. Sar could still be hers, if she just—

  He gently pushed her back and wiped tears from her cheeks. Before Kivita could say anything, he hit the airlock lever and left Terredyn Narbas.

  “I know you did,” she whispered.

  19

  Kivita hit the speaker button on the bridge console. “Yeah, Sar?” Her voice came out sure and strong, contrasting the uncertainties in her heart.

  “Shekelor will be watching for you to leave the system. I’ve got a way to lose him; then we’ll discuss plans.” Sar’s voice sounded flat, unemotional. She wished she didn’t love him.

  “You mentioned a diversion?”

  “Kivita, I truly hired three humans,” Cheseia’s smooth voice came over the speakers. “They have happily agreed to help us before we demagnetize airlocks.”

  “Going to ditch a few food crates in the refugee fleet traffic,” Sar said. “With commotion on both the hive ship and in the orbital lanes, we’ll make for the exit lanes. Our beacon signals should get mixed with all the other ships there, and we’ll escape during the confusion.”

  Kivita snorted. “Sounds like an insane plan. We’ll never be allowed back in this system again.”

  “It’s either this or abandon your ship, sweetness,” Sar replied. She imagined him smirking. Damn, he was such an asshole!

  “Fine, whatever. Ready when you are.” Kivita strapped herself into the gyro harness and turned off Terredyn Narbas’s gravity. Several red and orange lights blinked on the console, reminding her of the damage the ship had suffered over Umiracan. Her chest tightened.

  “Kiv . . . keep up. You’re more important than you know,” Sar said.

  Important to him or his ragtag rebellion?

  Kivita took a deep breath and demagnetized Terredyn Narbas from the hive ship. Nudging the manuals, she edged away from the Naxan collection of vessels and waited.

  Outside her viewport, dozens of Inheritor, Tannocci, and Naxan ships passed in an orbital traffic lane around Tejuit Seven. She counted three ships across, five ships deep. Although it was originally done for protection against pirates, she’d heard that some ships magnetized with others and never departed the system again. Families and renegades dwelling in fluctuating gravities, exiled to a blue, green, and pink horizon of uncertainty.

  She closed her eyes and inhaled again. To what horizon was she flying now?

  Sar’s voice crackled over the speaker. “You might hear some Naxan radio chatter, but try to keep the channel open.”

  Kivita rolled her eyes. “Great. Let me know when something happens.”

  Three hundred feet away, an Inheritor transport docked to the Naxan hive ship demagnetized and drifted away. Then a Tannocci cruiser did the same. Both ships drew near the orbital fleet traffic. Unease crawled up Kivita’s spine.

  “What the hell? Sar, got two ships here, ready to collide with the—”

  Sar’s voice blared from the speaker. “Those people I hired released these ships for us. Wasn’t cheap, either. Try to follow my lead.”

  Before she snapped back a reply, Frevyx skimmed past her port-side viewport, aft thrusters flaring. Naxan traffic controllers spoke over her speaker on an open channel.

  “Attention! Two unmanned vessels have departed Naxan Consortium Fifteen Delta and are on a collision course with traffic over Sector TJ-Seven-One-Eight. Repeat, two vessels . . .”

  Kivita flew after Frevyx as the two unpiloted craft entered the traffic lane. Incoming ships veered in every direction to avoid collision, and numerous thrusters fired throughout the traffic, resembling small starbursts. She squinted and dove under a cargo barge angling to starboard. Terredyn Narbas shuddered; more red lights activated on her console.

  “Sar! You crazy ass!” she calle
d into her mic.

  Pulling the manuals back, Kivita fired all port-side thrusters. Terredyn Narbas evaded two incoming craft as they avoided the rogue Inheritor transport, while the rogue Tannocci cruiser slowed under the planet’s gravity well. Two refugee vessels stalled and cut their engines. More craft swerved around the growing obstacle.

  Ahead, Frevyx dove around three refugee ships, then ascended between two Inheritor barges. Backwash from its thrusters dusted the ships’ hulls. Kivita shrugged and, without even glancing at her proximity readings, copied Sar’s maneuvers with ease. Smirking, she increased engine power and corkscrewed around eight refugee craft.

  Naxan traffic controllers practically screamed through the speakers.

  “Yeah, let’s see you top that.” Her smirk fell as three craft flew in tandem with her, and three with Frevyx.

  Off to port, Fanged Pauper mirrored her movements.

  Frevyx’s thrusters flared, and Kivita activated hers, as well. Shekelor’s ships kept pace as a new grouping of orbital traffic came up ahead. She deactivated life support and heating aboard Terredyn Narbas, save for the bridge. With slightly more engine power, Kivita gunned her trawler straight into the traffic.

  “Kiv, pull up,” Sar’s voice broke in between Naxan warnings.

  She winced while her port-side braking thruster, damaged over Umiracan, sputtered. Terredyn Narbas wobbled as traffic sped past.

  “Pull up!” Sar shouted.

  “Dump the cargo!” she shouted back into the mic.

  Refugee and Inheritor ships flew out of the traffic ahead, though longer Tannocci ships tried to maintain course. Kivita swerved starboard, port, then starboard again. She braked the port thrusters and pulled the manuals back as three crates tumbled from Frevyx’s loading bay.

  One port-side braking thruster lost all power. Terredyn Narbas jerked toward a Tannocci cruiser.

  “Kiv!” Sar called, but she pulled the manuals and wove right between Fanged Pauper and the two other pirate ships. One pirate vessel swerved toward the other. A bright flash almost blinded Kivita as the ships smashed into each other.