Emperor's Edge Republic (24 page)

A gentle hand settled on her shoulder. Sespian’s. “Perhaps we should see what we can do to help outside.”

“A good idea,” the captain said. It wasn’t quite a growl.

Mahliki wondered what words she would be getting if her father weren’t the former Fleet Admiral Starcrest. She probably wouldn’t have gotten words at all; she would have been thrown overboard. Or would they have even risked themselves to retrieve her? Coming from the Kyatt Islands, where there wasn’t royalty or an aristocracy, it was hard to fathom the idea of one life being worth so much more than another. She wasn’t sure what to feel about the fact that hers was apparently invaluable here, even to a bunch of marines she had never met. Especially to a bunch of marines she had never met.

“So, machetes or explosives?” Sespian asked as they stepped outside. “Which shall we volunteer to help with?”

Mahliki grimaced. The area to the stern where the first explosion had occurred was impressively clear of clinging vines, but there were more than ever clutching to the railings at other points around the ship. She pointed at two familiar figures working with axes below.

“Let’s join them. I’d rather hear purse jokes than...” She left off the rest, the part about not wanting accusatory looks from all the marines who knew they were in trouble because of her.

“Probably the safest spot to be.” Sespian smiled and led the way down the stairs. “They’re good fighters. Though I am irked at them for letting you get taken in the first place.”

“That was my fault, not theirs. I, uh, got myself into a situation from which extrication was not easy.”

“I noticed.”

“They’re hard workers though and didn’t give up until I’d completely disappeared.”

When they reached the lower deck, Mahliki nodded toward Maldynado and Basilard. Sweat dripped from their faces. Given Maldynado’s flippancy, she wouldn’t have expected it, but he seemed as ready to throw himself into danger and to lift an axe as these marines. Sespian strode forward, pulling out his own axe.

“You’re a hard worker too,” she added to him.

His grunt didn’t seem to hold a lot of agreement. She would have to work on his self-deprecation. It bordered on self-disgust at times, and she couldn’t see any reason for either. She preferred a man with a small ego to a big one, but he had no reason not to feel confident and self-assured.

“That’s seventeen for me,” Maldynado proclaimed. Speaking of egos... “And what? Three for you, Bas? Maybe four if you count that baby one.”

Basilard leaned back long enough to wipe sweat from his forehead and glower at his friend. He might have signed something, but was too busy wielding the axe. He ran to the next spot along the tendril-infested railing and smashed down with the weapons.

“Good thing those are metal rails,” Sespian said as he advanced with his own axe and machete.

Mahliki still had her collection kit and was poking through the contents, looking for a suitable weapon, when a hook clunked down a few meters away, startling her.

A marine scurried forward and grabbed it, hauling it and the long cable behind it to a sturdy eyelet in the bow. After securing it, he waved up to the navigation cabin. Two other such hooks were attached now, each with cables stretching back to the tug, which was barely visible through the towering stalks, but floated at the edge of the forest, still forty meters away.

“How did they...” Mahliki leaned to the side and squinted. “Is that a harpoon launcher?”

“Most likely,” Sespian said, hanging over the railing, hacking at a vine.

“Only on a Turgonian tugboat,” she said.

Before Mahliki could return her attention to her bag, a dark figure running toward them made her pause and gape. It—
he
—was running along one of the cables, cables that were less than an inch thick.

“Here comes the backup.” Maldynado grinned and thumped Basilard on the shoulder, nodding toward the running man.

A fast-moving vine stretched into his path, as if to intercept him. He leaped over it and landed on the cable again without slowing down. Without so much as a wobble or flailing of arms along the way, he hopped over the railing and jogged toward Maldynado and Basilard. No, not them, Mahliki realized when he cruised past with nothing but a curt nod. Sespian.

“Father,” Sespian said, standing back from the railing and flicking a severed vine off his sleeve.

Sicarius studied his son from head to toe, then nodded. “Sespian. You are uninjured?”

With some amusement, Mahliki realized that dead sprint across the cable had been borne of parental concern. Somewhere behind that stoic mask, he must have been agonizing over Sespian’s fate.

“I am,” Sespian said.

“Good.” Such a fount of relief and emotion he was... Sicarius’s expression never changed.

Sespian pointed at her. “Mahliki is the one who almost ended up as plant food.”

She grimaced, not needing another reminder that the ship was in trouble because of her. And she wasn’t sure she appreciated Sicarius’s scrutiny, however brief. He gave her a much quicker head-to-toe perusal than Sespian had received, though he did deign to say, “It is good you, too, are well.” Before she could decide if this warranted a thank-you, he held up a black dagger and continued on. “My blade cuts through the plant easily. I will assist with freeing the ship.”

“Good,” Sespian said, “because—” Another boom from the rear drowned out the rest of his words.

From her spot, Mahliki couldn’t see where the explosives had detonated, but bits of plants rained down around them. Only the vines, she noticed, not the thicker stalks. It would take more than black powder to bring those down.

“Understood,” Sicarius said. “It will be most important to free the screw for propulsion.” He jogged off toward the stern without another word.

“You must have great in-depth chats on politics, religion, and the arts,” Mahliki glanced toward Sespian.

His smile was dry. “I’m not sure he’s figured out what chatting is yet. I know he opens up more with Amaranthe, but I don’t think she would call him garrulous, either. I admit... I’d probably be horrified if he tried to chat with me.”

“Horrified?” Mahliki asked.

“Well, not horrified, but... it’s just awkward. I don’t know what to say to him, and he doesn’t know what to say to me.”

Maldynado ambled over and propped an elbow on Sespian’s shoulder. “You just described the father-son relationships of half of the men in Turgonia. You should be tickled that he cares. Not all parents do.” Maldynado lifted his fingers, grimaced at a broken nail, and sighed. “This work is hard on the physique. Not at all what I had in mind when I asked the president for a job.”

Mahliki watched him thoughtfully. For all his feigned indifference to... just about anything significant, she had caught a quick wince when he mentioned parents that didn’t care.

Basilard tapped him on the shoulder and pointed toward the stern.
Sicarius just dove overboard.

Mahliki blinked. “On purpose?”

“You should have told him to lubricate himself first,” Maldynado said. “If nothing else, it would be amusing to imagine him explaining his slimy armpits to Amaranthe.”

Sespian merely shook his head. “I’ll go tell the captain that the engine is about to work a lot better.” He waved and headed for the stairs.

Ah, yes, the black knives. Her father had one, too, though she didn’t know if he had brought it with him to Turgonia. It made sense that the blades could damage the plant, a fact that did not bode well for the city, not when they had blown up the alien ship and the only source of that technology within thousands of miles.

Maldynado nudged her. “Why so glum? Things are looking up.”

“Only for the moment,” Mahliki warned him. “Only for the moment.”

Chapter 9

A
maranthe tried not to feel out of place sitting in the plushy conference chair. Given the number of generals also sitting in the room, that was difficult. Colonel Dak Starcrest, the only officer present
not
ranked general, sat to her left. She folded her hands on the table and tried to appear undaunted. When Mahliki and Professor Komitopis came in, she relaxed an iota, though the president’s wife and daughter weren’t exactly low ranking when it came to social hierarchies. Basilard and Maldynado ambled in next, though with Basilard dressed in his country’s clothing and wearing that chain of office, he had a new status—and a reason to be here. The Mangdorian woman who followed him in, her leather and cotton dress elegantly stitched and her red hair in an attractive coif, gave even more authority to him, especially when she took a spot on the opposite side of the table, where she could see and translate his signs. Maldynado, who plopped down and immediately flung one leg over the armrest of his cushy chair, had no obvious reason for being there, much like Amaranthe, though that didn’t faze him.

Lots of friends here, no reason to feel out of place, she told herself. Why had she so easily spoken to people of all stations when she had been an outlaw? Because it didn’t matter, she supposed. When she had already broken so many rules, who cared what people thought? But now, she wasn’t sure where she stood anymore. After being gone for months, she certainly didn’t feel a part of the president’s inner circle. Indeed, she scarcely knew the man outside of his reputation. Sicarius had a closer relationship and link to him than Amaranthe did.

He was in the room, too, remaining by the door, his back to the wall, something that made at least a few of those generals cast nervous glances over their shoulders. Amaranthe had a hard time imagining a situation in which Sicarius would feel daunted. Supervising a room full of toddlers, perhaps. Not that he would likely be in that situation soon. Despite the morning’s chaos, the tug had delivered her to shore in time for her to wash up and make her doctor’s appointment. The news... hadn’t been encouraging, aside from the fact that she wouldn’t need to worry about stocking tea in the future.

The president came in last, trailed by a couple of security men. They attempted to take up positions to either side of the door, though Sicarius did not accommodate the flustered fellow on the left by moving. The guard had to stand by a potted tree in the corner.

As President Starcrest sat down at the head of the table, a couple of hotel staff came in, one to light candles and turn up the wall lamps—this interior room lacked windows, which was probably why it had been chosen, given recent bombings—and the other to take drink orders. Starcrest and several of the officers watched with some bemusement as the young man went around, explaining beverage options. Not a luxury they had typically experienced in their tents out in the field, Amaranthe supposed. Something to be said for having staff meetings in a hotel.

“Thank you all for coming this evening,” Starcrest said when the wait staff had departed. “You’re all here because you already have knowledge about the ancient alien ship that exploded in the sky a few months ago.”

Several men exchanged nervous glances. Amaranthe almost groaned.
That
was why she had been invited? She wanted nothing to do with that ship or whatever legacy it had—

She froze. Legacy. If there had been a window she could have looked out, she would have stared at the harbor.

“The plant?” she whispered.

“Hm?” Starcrest, at the other end of the table, asked.

“I, ah, well, we just got here, but I had assumed that plant was the work of a practitioner. Is that... not the case?”

“It’s not. And that is why it must now become our number one priority, rather than an inconvenience to be delegated to the municipal workers.” He frowned slightly at the bespectacled man next to him, one of the few people in the room not wearing a uniform. Amaranthe had never been introduced to Vice President Serpitivich but remembered him from the elections.

The slight man adjusted his spectacles and closed a book that he had been perusing. “I merely suggested the assassins at your door were more of a priority, Lord President.”

Colonel Dak Starcrest made a noise somewhere between a growl and a grumble.

“Let’s put the focus on the plant now,” the president said and extended a hand toward his daughter. “Mahliki?”

She had been fiddling with one of her braids, but she pushed it over her shoulder and opened a large satchel. A damp satchel that smelled of seaweed. She plucked out a jar with a bulbous brownish red object suspended in a pale fluid. It had been sliced open before being tucked into its glass home.

“This is one of the root samples I got today.” Mahliki ticked the glass. “I cut it open, and—well, here. Pass it around, and you can see for yourself.”

Amaranthe noted that the lid had been screwed on, glued, and then taped to the glass. “Is it... likely to try and escape?”

“I hope not.” Mahliki handed the jar to the general beside her, whose face grew pale as he took a closer look. “I don’t want anybody accidentally taking it out though. Who knows what it can do? Those pods... Sespian can tell you. Trying to dissect one almost got me... prematurely aged.”

Professor Komitopis flinched.

“I was lucky I had him there to pull me out of the way.” Mahliki probably would have beamed a smile at Sespian if he were in the room, but he had gone to the construction site to oversee the laying of the foundation for his building—the future residence for the president. She settled for throwing a quick smile at Sicarius. Sicarius, of course, gazed back with uniform blandness.

The jar passed through a few sets of hands before landing on the table in front of Amaranthe. She peered into the part that had been slashed open, expecting more of the same brownish-red, but a black disk lay embedded inside the root ball. It looked more like metal, rather than something natural. She slumped in her chair. Not metal, the same black material Sicarius’s dagger was made from, that the entire ship had been made from. The lighting wasn’t good, but she made out a single rune etched in the disk.

“What’s it say?” Amaranthe looked to Tikaya, assuming she had already examined it.

The professor’s lips thinned. “Roughly... Experimental Plant Number Three.”