Chapter 6
He immediately recognized the small form lying in the middle of the corridor, a few feet from the bridge hatchway. It took several moments before he was convinced the small form recognized him, even though her green and lavender eyes had fluttered open as he'd dropped to his knees by her side.
"Gillaine? Lie still." He made a quick appraisal, ignoring the tight cold feeling in his chest. No visible blood or bruises, no apparent broken bones. But lots of pale soft skin. A skimpy pair of silver-gray shorts barely covered her thighs. The bottom of the matching sweatshirt had bunched up around her waist. He pulled it down, noticed the white socks dangling from her pockets.
No shoes, either.
"Gillaine."
Her gaze focused on him when he spoke her name, but other than that, she didn't respond. Had her concussion been more serious than Doc Janek had believed?
Janek. Sickbay. He had to contact sickbay.
"No." Her breathy command stopped his hand halfway to his badge. "I'll be okay." She tried to prop herself up on one arm, failed.
He caught her shoulders as she slumped against him. His arms went around her, not as tightly as he would've liked. He wasn't convinced she hadn't broken something, somewhere, in her fall. He had to call sickbay, get med techs here. But to do that he'd have to let her go.
Holding her for just a few moments longer won out.
"I'll be okay," she repeated, softly, against his chest.
He could feel her trembling. A rush of emotions, unbidden and unlikely, washed over him. He ached with the desire to protect her, and from a delayed reaction to the fear he'd felt when he'd found her lifeless on the floor.
"You're cold." He tugged the sweatshirt more securely around her waist. It was a practical response. He understood practical, replaced those very un-Mack like feelings with pragmatic concern. "What happened?"
"Nothing."
"So nothing put you flat out in the middle of the corridor. Tell me what you were doing before this nothing happened."
She let out a long sigh. "Repairs."
Barefoot? In shorts? And with no equipment? There was no utility belt around her waist or nearby. The only tool kit he'd seen was at the bottom of the rampway.
She pulled back slightly. Some warmth emanated from her and color had returned to her cheeks. "I guess I pushed myself too hard." Her voice was throaty, strained. "I will be okay. Honest."
Damn it! He'd been staring at her again, caught by those eyes, by the dark sweep of her lashes, by the curve of her mouth... He swallowed hard, found his voice. "You belong in sickbay."
"No, Mack. Please."
"Then let's at least get you off this cold floor."
She started to stand. He scooped her into in his arms. She yelped in protest.
"Objection logged and noted, Captain Davré. Now, where's your cabin?"
"The bridge will do fine."
He glanced down the length of bare leg. "You need to put some clothes on. Something warmer."
"I-oh. Just aft of the main hatch. Second door on the right. I'm sure I can-"
"You can't." He did a careful about-face. Her arms tightened around his neck. Warmth blossomed in his chest, flowed down his arms, seared his skin where he held her against him. He spied the dark outlines of the second door, headed quickly for it before he lost all control and kissed her.
His almost overwhelming urge to do that shocked him. He cordoned off his unexpected feelings. He was just naturally concerned for her. That was all.
Her cabin was plain, utilitarian, without the personal touches he would have expected from someone like Gillaine Davré. He lowered her onto a bed covered by a gray blanket, stepped back as she sat up. "Put your socks on," he told her. She probably had sweat pants in one of the drawers, or the closet. He was about to ask their location when the logo and wording on her sweatshirt jangled his attention.
Khalaran Fleet Stellar Academy. Class of 5415.
"Any particular reason you chose that year?" The sweatshirt had to be a joke. It looked new, not three hundred and forty-two years old.
She glanced down quickly, then up at him, her mouth making a round "O" before she clamped it shut. "No," she said after a long moment.
He arched one eyebrow.
"It was a gift."
Then something else jangled his mind. The year 5415. That was the year of Lady Kiasidira's Sacred Sacrifice. "You said you're not a follower of the Lady."
"Simon is." She plucked the front of the shirt.
Boyfriend? Lover? Those words started a small chill invading his earlier warmth. Mack had no objection to this Simon trying to convert her. As long as that was all he tried to do.
The jealous thrust of his thoughts startled him again. "Sweatpants?" He turned away, stared at the closet behind him before she could see the emotion in his eyes.
"Bottom drawer. But I'll-"
"I'll get them." He unlatched the drawer. The gray pants were on top.
She took the pants from his fingers. "I'm fine. Really."
But Mack wasn't. He was far from fine. He was hot and cold and losing his mind. And losing his heart to a woman who was probably fifteen years younger than him, or at least looked like she was. And who'd be gone from Cirrus, and his life, once her ship was repaired.
Which was for the better. She couldn't have come at a worse time, he told himself. Convinced himself. He was the Fleet's newest, and youngest, admiral. Even if he didn't have the stars-and-bars to prove it yet.
But maybe it was time he started acting like he did.
"I'll wait in the corridor while you change. Then you can bring me up to date on your repairs. And provide me with an estimated date for completion." He gave her one of his infamous "Don't Mess with Makarian" frowns. "I don't think I need to remind you you're tying up a military repair bay with a civilian ship."
"I have a better idea." Her eyes narrowed slightly. "I'll have a report detailing all that transsed to you in an hour. That way you don't have to waste any more military time talking to this civilian captain."
"Fine."
"Good."
"I'm leaving now."
She pulled on one sock. "Bye."
"Send that report."
"Consider it done." She fluffed out the other sock.
"You won't forget."
"Nope."
"I'm leaving."
She scrunched the sock in her hand, tilted her head slightly. "Mack."
Mack. Not Admiral Makarian. He realized she'd called him Mack earlier, when he'd held her against his chest. Mack. He liked the way his name sounded on her lips. A trickle of warmth seeped through the cold wall he'd just erected around his heart. "Yes?"
"Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out."
It didn't.
* * *
Gillie slumped back, her head thumping softly against the bulkhead. I thought he'd never leave. Simon, you okay?
She'd been aware of Simon's presence since she'd awakened on the decking, with Mack staring at her in distraught concern. But that same concern and other emotions pouring from the dark-haired admiral had kept her from fully linking with Simon.
That was a most unladylike parting comment, my Lady.
Stuff a-She unclenched her fingers from around the sock, felt Simon's low chuckle. You're feeling better.
I would feel very much better had my recovery not put you on the decking again. It wasn't necessary for you to drain yourself to that extent.
I was worried.
And I am far more capable than you give me credit for being.
And devious. She thought again of Mack, kneeling beside her, panic lacing through him. I locked the bay. You let him in.
I did not. Simon sounded affronted. He was perfectly capable of letting himself in.
Gillie pulled on her other sock. "He just happened to be strolling by, is that it? Decided, what the hell. Let's see what ol' Gillie's up to."
She stepped into the sweatpants, knotted them. They did feel nice and warm. She'd forgotten how chilled she'd been. And how warm Mack's body had been against hers.
I have no idea what brought him here.
"Liar."
An odd mixture of tenderness and fear washed through her from Simon. I couldn't wake you.
She nodded, her throat suddenly tight. "I guess we both overreacted."
All three of us. He-
"Gets angry every time he gets near me. So the sooner we finish repairs, the sooner all of us will be a lot happier." Gillie shoved her feet into her boots without sealing them, clomped back down the corridor to the bridge.
She'd felt more than Mack's anger. She'd felt his compassion, his attraction to her. And the fact that it disconcerted him.
But not half as much as it disconcerted Gillie.
She couldn't remember the last time a man had reacted to her purely because she was a woman. To her people, the Raheiran, she had the cumbersome distinction of being a Kiasidira. A sorceress of the highest level, marked by the Gods. Someone born with talents, and the responsibility that went with those talents, far above even the average Raheiran.
To the Khalar, well, even before they'd made her into a damned deity, they had still tended to trip over their tongues when she was around. No matter how often she had crawled through their seedier spaceport pubs-and she'd crawled through a goodly number, no matter how often she had worked side by side with their drive techs and cargo hands-and she could wield a sonic-welder with the best of them; she was still a Raheiran.
Everyone had wanted her to officiate at their daughter's wedding.
No one had ever asked her out on a date.
But to Rynan Makarian, she was just Gillaine Davré. Rim-trader captain. Someone to have coffee with before the start of his shift. Someone to share his complaints with, about living and working on Cirrus One.
Someone to be with. Far, far too comfortably.
It would be too easy for her to get to like that. To like hearing the sound of her name on his lips, to like the steady warmth of his arms around her. To like the way his dark gaze seemed to devour her, draw her in.
It would be very, very easy to more than like that tall, undeniably handsome man with the glossy dark hair and shyly sexy, somewhat quirky smile. This pantrelon of a man, graceful and powerful.
But as Simon had taught her, being Kiasidira meant what you liked was often to be found on the bottom of the priority list.
It was one of those lessons she was learning in life.
Plus, she couldn't stay here. She couldn't risk someone finding out who she was.
She sighed softly, tabbed up her screen. Mack wasn't going to like her report. She didn't like her report. She didn't like the gaping hole in her ship's side, either. But she couldn't tell Mack about that, couldn't tell him Simon needed two weeks to reform new crystal, and another week or more after that to temper it. Only then could she be sure it could hold the spellforms she'd weave, so the ship could eventually withstand the stresses of Riftspace. Providing, of course, all other systems worked optimally.
They weren't. That much she could tell Mack, though in Rondalaise freighter terms. Not Raheiran terms.
Two weeks. She needed his precious military repair bay for two more weeks. Minimum. Then Simon might be strong enough to move the ship somewhere else to finish his recuperation. An out of the way dirtside spaceport, perhaps. Where Simon could let the ship phase back, without fear of being seen. And she could openly use her magic, without fear of being discovered. And deified.
And then they could find out just what in hell the Fav'lhir were doing back in this quadrant. Because she was the Kiasidira. She'd helped the Khalar before, and would do so again. Goddess or not. She owed the Khalar that much before she went back to Raheiran space.
In the meantime, she needed more information on current happenings on Cirrus One. Real information, not the sanitized data Simon had been finding in the station's databanks. She knew exactly where the information lived.
She sealed the front of her shipsuit, pushed up the sleeves. Funny how that particular piece of attire had changed little over three hundred years. But others had. Brightly colored fringed shawls seemed to be the latest fashion find on Cirrus. Woman wore them knotted at the waist, the fringes shimmying as they walked. Other than the long fringes getting snagged by too-quickly closing lift doors, or tangling in the swiveling mechanisms of the station's deck-locked chairs, the accessory was new, but not unattractive.
However, she had a hard time not staring in amusement at some of the young stationers-pubescent males-in their long, side-slit skirts. Plaid. And others, both male and female, with their hair braided tightly under the chin, hanging down like a frontal tail to midchest.
Must be great fun when it dragged into the soup.
But functional, practical clothing had, for the most part, stayed functional and practical.
The orange-suited techies plodding up the stairs in front of her were no exception. They took the corridor at D9, her destination as well.
They kept walking. She ducked into the Fifth Quarter.
"Gillie!" Petrina, waving from a corner table. Petrina, in an orange jumpsuit. Her Teddy, cue stick in hand, nodding, then heading back to the billiard tables.
"Bit of a scare we had the other day, wasn't it?" Petrina asked as Gillie swiveled a chair around then sat. "Couple of rim-traders with too much ammunition and not enough brains, I hear."
Gillie's reply was interrupted by the appearance of a short round-faced woman with curly brown hair. The patch on her light blue shipsuit read Ander Transport.
"Trina!" The woman grabbed the redhead's shoulder as she slid into the seat Teddy had vacated. She glanced at Gillie, then back at Petrina again. "Goddess be praised! You won't believe what I just found out."
"The magefather's agreed to let you sing at services."
"Better than that, heartfriend."
Gillie didn't know the title magefather, but heartfriend was a Raheiran term. She listened more closely.
"The Vedritor found a piece of the Lady's ship, out in Runemist. They're bringing it back here!"
A piece of her...my ship? Gillie frowned slightly, made sure her link with Simon was open.
Petrina fluttered her fingers in Gillie's direction. "She's not a believer, Lissy. You might want to explain."
"But her hair's... Oh. Well, Lady Kiasid-"
Gillie nodded. "I know the story. The, um, legend." Ixari help her, how could she keep from insulting her own people? "Go on."
The woman called Lissy did, but only to recap what Gillie had discovered in perusing Cirrus's databanks while she lay in sickbay four days ago.
"Evil Melandan mages controlled the Fav'lhir Empire, you know. They viewed people like us," she motioned to herself, then to Gillie, "anyone without magick talents as 'impure,' and who they felt must be manipulated or eliminated. That's why they began threatening us, attacking our rim worlds and mining stations. This was, oh, about three hundred fifty years ago."
Three hundred forty-two years, five days and-
Hush, Simon.
"But the Lady Kiasidira, sent by the Gods-you are Tridivinian, no?"
Like the Khalar, the Raheirans worshipped the three deities: Merkara, God of the Sea; Ixari, Goddess of the Heavens; and Tarkir, God of the Land and the Underworld. Only the Khalar had recently pushed the Kiasidira into those exalted ranks as well.
At Gillie's nod, Lissy continued. "Okay, then you understand the Lady was sent to protect us from the Fav'lhir."
No, Captain Gillaine Davré of the Raheiran Special Forces had been sent to the Khalaran Confederation because they seemed the perfect match to her somewhat irreverent, definitely un-Kiasidira-like nature. The adventurous Khalar were in the early stages of perfecting interstellar space travel. In addition to her Special Forces training, Gillie had spent her formative years stowing away on any starship she could find. When she was supposed to be studying runes and wardstones, she'd been pouring over stardrive data instead. Her herb garden withered while she racked up medals in lightsword competitions. And while other adepts were on their knees in prayerful contemplation, Gillie was in seedy spaceport pubs, cue stick in hand, bent over a billiards table.
You were one of the more difficult Kiasidiras I've had assigned to me.
Life with me is never boring, eh, Simon?
"So when the Fav'lhir attacked," Lissy was saying, "the Lady and our Fleet were ready for them. We destroyed their ships. But their commodore's mothership, the Hirlhog, was under control of their mageline. You know, their sorcerers, witches. It escaped. So the Lady, using magic, opened a miraculous doorway to the Rift. You know about the Rift?"
She knew it very well. A distortion of space-time maintained, and manipulated, by the Raheirans. It was much narrower and much more powerful than jumpspace. Only a Raheiran, like Gillie, could navigate it. And only crystalships could transit it, and survive.
"She made the ultimate sacrifice and forced the Hirlhog into the Rift with her," Lissy said.
No, she didn't force the Fav'lhir ship into the Rift. It was simply crystalship versus crystalship, the natural progression of the battle. The Khalar had always been reluctant to accept that the Fav'lhir's Melandan heritage and abilities were not dissimilar to Raheiran. Their mageline had descended from the Witch, Melande. Only the morality of their magicks-and their classifying of any nontelepathic beings as Impures-were juxtaposed.
Which was why Gillie and Simon had decided to take the battle into Riftspace. Raheiran magicks were stronger there.
They just never realized the destruction of a Fav'lhir-Melandan crystalship would react with those magicks. And send herself and Simon almost three hundred and fifty years into the future.
"She gave her life to destroy their mageline and save us." Lissy's eyes misted slightly. "And now sends us a portion of her beloved ship, as a token of her continual blessing of us."
A portion of her beloved ship. How big a portion? Gillie thought of the gaping hole in her ship's side. That big? That missing piece of hull that could take weeks to regenerate?
But only hours to reintegrate. If it were in decent condition, and she could get her hands on it somehow.
Simon?
I doubt it's for sale on the open market. And the Gods have strict guidelines prohibiting theft.
Gillie chewed on her lip. I don't suppose I can just ask for it back?
How will the Khalar handle the reappearance of the Lady Goddess Kiasidira?
There is no Lady Goddess Kiasidira!
Do you want to be the one to inform them of that? If nothing else, it will put all those kiosk merchants in a serious financial bind.
Gillie smiled innocently at Lissy. "When's the Vedritor due in with this holy artifact?"
Behave yourself, Gillaine Davré!
"Rumor has it, tomorrow morning."
We'll think of something, Simon. We'll think of something.