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  “Thank you, Captain. I knew I could count on you.” Her smile made dimples.

  Kojo pulled me into the wardroom. “What do you think?”

  “It’s beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  Kojo slapped my shoulder. “The Patrol, idiot. Could that rock be something looted from a Gav temple? Some kind of icon?”

  “I don’t think so. The Sage temples I’ve seen have lots of fancy art, ornate metalwork, jewels. Not that sort of thing at all.” And how bitterly I’d resented being forced to attend Sage worship and seeing all that useless wealth on display. “Besides, how could a couple of Terrans pull off a robbery of a Sage temple?”

  “Even if they had a Gav to help them?”

  I shook my head. “It doesn’t make sense. Not all Gavorans worship the Sages, but they all worship something. Even a slave wouldn’t turn something sacred over to Terrans.”

  Kojo rubbed his chin. “Hmm. You’re probably right, but Miranda’s pretty slick and Grimbold’s a burzing liar if I ever saw one.”

  I twisted a lock of hair. “Maybe we should divert to a Cartel outpost just to make sure.”

  Kojo nodded slowly. “Maybe even lie low for a while, until the Patrol finds whatever it’s looking for?”

  “The passengers won’t like it.”

  “I’ll tell them we need repairs or something. Captain’s prerogative.” He flashed his wolfish grin.

  That night I wakened in the early hours from a nightmare about fighting the currents in some desperate effort to get home—only, home wasn’t the friendly inns of Palermo, but some distant, peaceful place I’d never been.

  Unable to get back to sleep, I brought a couple mugs of ale to the engine room.

  Archer was wide awake, squirting Prestolube into the engines’ orifices and wiping specks from the console. A streak of lube marred his forehead.

  “Ah, thanks. You’re an angel.” He took a long draught.

  I settled into the second chair, sipping my ale.

  On a pallet in the sleeping cubby, Fandar snored heavily, a furred lump.

  “How’s he doing?” I asked.

  Archer waggled his hand. “Not so good. He’s not really interested in how engines work. I even caught him skiving off toward the forward cabins. I guess he’s just killing time till we get to Oakdale.” He tapped both feet. “He talks to himself a lot. When I asked him about it, he said he was praying. Is that a Gav habit? Praying all the time?”

  “Not that I ever saw. Maybe he’s still grieving for his lover.”

  Archer snorted. “I doubt it. Do you know he has a kid?”

  I shrugged. “Gavs start young. Females are expected to provide a child to the clan as soon as they reach adulthood.”

  “Well, when I asked if he missed his baby, he didn’t even seem to understand what I was talking about. Can you believe that?”

  “It’s different with them. Gav children are raised by their mother and her clan. Men don’t help raise their children, it’s just the clan and the maternal line that counts.”

  “That’s awful. When I have kids, I want to be with them every day. Don’t you?” His eyebrows drew together, like he really wanted to know. “I mean, assuming you want kids.”

  “Sure. I’d like to have a baby some day.” I smiled at the thought of teaching a sturdy little girl the ins and outs of trading, the way Papa had taught me. Or a little boy, or one of each. Making Sparrow a real home, teaching them to pilot and sharing with them the wonders of all the different worlds we visited.

  “Did your father help raise you?” I’d never asked Archer about his family.

  “Sure! Me and all my brothers and sisters.”

  “Uh, all your brothers and sisters?”

  “Two of each. I’m the second youngest of five.”

  “Wow.” I tried to imagine a room full of five little Archers in assorted sizes, all with halos of curly hair, all bouncing and jiggling. It was frightening. “You must miss them.”

  “Sure, I miss them. I call them, whenever we’re in port. But I like it here, too.” He looked around the orderly consoles and propulsion coils. “It’s quiet.”

  “Quiet? Not when we’re at sublight.”

  “I don’t mean sound. I mean everything in its place and acting like it should. Predictable.” He wiped a bit of dust from a console. “Not like people. Take those passengers—they lied once. They might lie again.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m no hatchling.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “Maybe not, but you don’t always notice things about people, either.”

  I grinned at him—that was funny, coming from someone so shy he rarely stepped out of the engine room and who never noticed the dirt on his own face.

  For all his odd ways, I liked having Archer aboard. It was sort of like having another brother. One who, unlike my actual brother, had to follow my orders.

  “Hold on,” he said, glancing at the scanner. “The gate’s coming up.”

  With a long slide that ended with a bang, Sparrow dropped out of the star corridor.

  This jump gate was busier, with three ships already waiting in the queue. None were big haulers, just transports no larger than Sparrow shuttling between Selkid mining colonies.

  After swapping in fresh jump cells and returning the spent cells to cold storage, I climbed to the command deck, nearly running into Kojo coming out of the wardroom.

  “What’s the news?” I asked.

  “Somebody got lucky, just not us. Some freighter captain turned the goods over to the Cartel and claimed the reward.”

  “Look on the bright side. The Cartel will hand the loot over to the Patrol and the searches will stop. Everyone can go back to business as usual.”

  Kojo stretched and yawned. “I guess Miranda’s on the level after all—we might as well go on to Oakdale. Get some sleep. We’ll be at the next gate in a few hours, and after that, the sailing is going to get a lot rougher.”

  With the familiar slide and bump, Sparrow came to rest at the jump gate at the end of the third jump. Hiram steered us away from the few waiting ships to begin the sublight leg of our journey. The engines whined and hiccupped and roared to life as Sparrow turned her stern to the gate and headed into the ether.

  Soon we were rumbling along the swift current used by Selkid supply ships heading for the Lazuna mines. The scanner showed warning blips all around as the current barreled between eddies and gravity sources, dense ether pockets and radiation hazards. Hiram adjusted course constantly to remain in the safe part of the stream, and with every course change, there was that momentary feeling of falling or accelerating as the grav generator adjusted.

  I pulled the jump cells from the engine room to put them back into cold storage—we were draining them faster than I’d planned.

  “Check the scanner,” Archer said. “We’re not alone. See that ship, just at the edge of scanner range? It’s been behind us since we left the jump gate.”

  I peered at the blips. “That’s not a Selkid ship.”

  Archer bobbed. “Terran hull with some funny add-ons. Why was it hanging around the gate if it wasn’t waiting to jump?”

  There could be a dozen innocent explanations, but I didn’t like the way it kept pace with us. “Maybe it’s just going to the mines. Stay sharp.”

  I climbed to the wheelhouse. “Hiram?”

  “Yeah, I see it. That damn oddball shadow. Been ducking in and out of scanner range.”

  I moved Tinker to my lap and took her place at the watch station. “Transponder?”

  “I flashed him. No burzing response. Kojo’s gone to the gun turret, just in case.”

  Not a Cartel member, then, even though we were still squarely in Selkid space. That was bad.

  With a whistle, a hail blasted through the ship.

  “Ahoy, Sparrowhawk, heave to. No need for arms, just a talk. You’ve got something we want to buy, fair terms.” The accents were Terran, from outlier sectors.

  They knew our ship’s
name but didn’t identify their own.

  Very bad. A freebooter.

  Kojo called from the turret, “Rabbit, Hiram.”

  Grimbold squawked something into the salon’s com about being sensible and making a deal. I shouted into the com, “Pirates don’t make deals. Shut up and strap in.”

  Hiram pinged the engine room. “More power, lad! We’re gonna run.”

  As the ship shuddered into acceleration, Tinker yowled and ran for the sanctuary of her snug sleeping cubby—she knew what that roar from the engines meant.

  I was shaking, and not just from the engines’ vibration. “You think somebody found out about the synthreactor?”

  “You know any other reason somebody’d waylay us, missy?”

  “How far are we from a beacon?” I hated to cry to the Patrol for rescue, but it would be better than being boarded by a pirate.

  “Too burzing far. They waited until we were all alone to jump us.”

  Kojo called from the turret. “Hiram? They’re gaining on us. Head for the lanes to Lazuna, see if we can lose them in the traffic.”

  Ancestors! That damn synthreactor was going to get us killed.

  CHAPTER 6

  Duck and hide

  If pirates were after us, Archer would need help in the engine room.

  I ran down the steps, running straight into Fandar.

  “What are you doing here?” I demanded.

  He looked upward in confusion. “Archer sent me for power modules.”

  “Not this way—this leads to the passenger quarters. Modules are in cold storage.” I led the way and helped him load extra modules on the handcart and wheel them to the engine room. Archer set me to keeping the propulsion drives balanced while he tittered and twitched, fine-tuned the maneuvering rockets, adjusted the coils, and complained that the propulsion cylinders needed reaming.

  “Are we in danger?” Fandar asked. “Perhaps we should call to the Corridor Patrol for help.”

  “Are you space-happy? If the Patrol found you, they’d send you right back to the mines.” And probably arrest all of us for helping him. “Besides, we’re outside the corridors now. There’s no Patrol anywhere nearer than the gate.”

  He looked down. “Ah, I do not like the life of a runaway.”

  Sparrow shook and shuddered. Hiram sped through the current like a fish swimming down a rapid, dodging hazards while using the faster streams to add to our speed.

  The com node squawked. “Who’s driving this rig?” Grim shouted from the salon. “We’re shaking to bits up here!”

  “You all just sit tight,” Hiram drawled back. “Just part of the ride.”

  Fandar rushed to the head and came back clutching his stomach. “At least the mine stayed still,” he mumbled.

  I kept an eye on the scanner while helping swap power mods. Our shadow had the hull of a Terran clipper-class passenger transport, but it had odd projections on the thrusters. The gun turret had a suspiciously Gavoran silhouette.

  “That’s bad,” Archer said. “See that energy signature? They’ve grafted on a Gav propulsion. Chances are, they can outlast us.”

  I called the turret. “Kojo? Archer says we can’t outdistance them like this. We may have to fight.”

  “Bad idea,” Kojo responded. “Those are Gav guns, they’ve got more range. Keep accelerating.”

  The viewscreen lit up with a silent flash. A moment later, Sparrow jolted.

  Archer hustled to keep the stabilizing rockets aligned. “What was that?”

  I helped Fandar back to his feet. “Concussive charge. They’re trying to knock out our propulsion.”

  “Whatever Kojo has in mind, he’d better do it fast,” Archer muttered.

  A few shots flashed from our gun turret. The raider was out of our range, but now they’d know Sparrow was ready for a fight.

  I called to Kojo, “If you need space, I can arm a couple drones with grenades. That would slow them down.”

  “Do it.”

  I turned toward the cargo hold. “Fandar, help me.”

  Sparrow bucked and swayed as Hiram took evasive action. Our grav generator—not the best quality even when it was new—was having trouble keeping up, giving us a bruising jolt at every course change.

  The ship shook again as another concussion wave hit us, followed by a dull vibration as Kojo trained the guns on the raider.

  In the cargo hold, Fandar helped me push a heavy drone—designed for delivering bulky cargo—into the launch bay. He hooked on its mooring lines while I took three grenades from the ship’s magazine. I set them to detonate on remote signal, threw them into the drone’s payload, and slammed the hatch shut.

  Fandar shoved the drone in the launch airlock and sealed the airlock hatch.

  From the drone console, I opened the airlock to the ether and punched the launch control. With a soft tremor, the drone departed the airlock.

  “Drone launched,” I called on the com node.

  Hiram answered, “Give ’em hell, missy.”

  Fandar was already pulling another drone from the locker. From the drone console, I snaked the drone into the raider’s path. It helped—the raider began to concentrate its guns on the drone, and not on Sparrow. Still, it was getting closer.

  I was used to using drones to deliver goods in space, to the delicate process of guiding a drone into a customer’s airlock or a station’s grapplers. But usually we were in a nice stable orbit at the time, not tearing through ether eddies. And usually no one was firing on us.

  Fandar positioned the second drone in the launch bay. He was proving surprisingly useful. “The drones are not effective,” he said. “The brigands will detonate them before the drone reaches it.”

  “They’re mostly for diversion.” I threw three more grenades into the payload.

  Sparrow rocked as another concussive detonated nearby.

  There was a flash as the first drone exploded, too far from our pursuer to damage it.

  I slapped the launch control and set the second drone on a twisting, turning path toward the raider. I hit the com. “Second drone away. Kojo, I hope your plan kicks in before we use all the drones.”

  “Soon, Patch. Archer, keep accelerating.”

  There was a flash as the second drone detonated—close enough to the raider to give them a good shaking, but not close enough to stop them.

  Hiram broke in. “Kojo, I got the Lazuna lanes in sight. There’s a big carrier a-coming. Time to earn your pay, boy.”

  “Good. Patch, secure the hold and get to the engine room. Archer, prepare escape thrusters, half bore, three second burst. Time to duck and hide. We’re going to join the traffic in the shipping lanes.”

  Archer’s reply was a disbelieving shriek. “Shipping lanes? You’re going to hide in the shipping lanes?”

  Hiram snapped back, “Do it, boy.”

  I sent Fandar back to the engine room while I secured the drones and grenades.

  The Lazuna system was a mining hub where every moon and large asteroid sprouted a Selkid excavator and every planet had a dozen refineries to feed the huge carriers of concentrated ore.

  Sparrow’s engines chugged steadily, accelerating us toward a stable, high-velocity ether current dedicated to ore carriers traveling from Lazuna toward the central sectors. Blips on the scanner pulsed with warnings to stay away.

  Archer shifted settings, readying the engines for a massive thrust. If our speed wasn’t nearly that of the current at the point of entry, the sheering forces would tear the ship apart.

  Kojo went ship-wide, telling all hands to strap in for a rapid course change.

  Fandar buckled himself into the engineer’s bunk. I took the second chair at the propulsion console. Ancestors, give me courage. And please spare a little wisdom for Kojo.

  Kojo announced, “All hands, brace. Thrusters in three, two, one—now!”

  Archer slapped the thruster controls.

  Sparrow surged forward.

  The three seconds of half-bore thr
ust felt like three minutes being crushed under a load of bricks. By the time the thrusters cut out, my head was reeling.

  Kojo screamed, “Maneuvering!”

  Thanks to a thick Gavoran skull, I recovered quicker than Archer. I worked the controls until Archer swore and told me to let him do it.

  Still accelerating, we approached the current sweeping away from Lazuna. Sparrowhawk shook and slewed as we passed through the eddies spawned to the edge of the current. One long slide, our grav generator slow to adjust as usual…

  Then, quiet. The current had us.

  A long ore carrier traveled in the current’s stable center—dozens of ore-filled carriages, each carriage large enough to house a small town, strung together for the journey to the central sectors. Far too big to withstand the stresses of a jump, the carriers plied the dedicated shipping lanes, accelerating to breathtaking sublight speeds, stopping for nothing and no one until they reached their destination.

  Kojo edged Sparrow closer, close enough to see every scratch and seam on the long carriage.

  Faster and closer we went, until the carriage seemed to stand still beside us.

  No pirate would be crazy enough to follow us there.

  “Cut propulsion.”

  Sparrow trembled as Kojo brought her closer to the giant carrier’s flank. With delicate touches, Kojo tucked us next to the carrier’s belly.

  The carrier was steady as a rock. Carried along by the current, we could ride there at rest as easily as orbiting a planet. But the carrier was no planet, she was a ship in transit. She’d need to slow and leave the current as she approached Lazuna. If we were anywhere near her when she fired retros, it would mean certain destruction.

  Of course, I didn’t say any of that to the passengers when I went to check on them.

  “Why the hell are we standing still?” Grim asked. From the salon’s viewscreen, filled with a close view of the carrier’s side, we might have been parked on a Lazuna dock.

  “Lying low,” I said, serving a hasty meal. “Making sure whoever was following us loses interest.”

  “We should have just stopped and talked to them,” Grim groused.