Ice Baron (Ice Chronicles, Book One (science fiction romance)) (19 page)

Anya didn’t trust Richert any
further than she could proverbially throw him. At the same time, he had pledged
to help them fight Onred. In the interest of their temporary truce, how much
should she say?

It wouldn’t hurt to tell him what
he probably already knew.

“He’s about to meet Onred.” She
checked her watch. “In ten minutes.”

“Why isn’t he flying your airbird?”

Anya bit her lip. “He locked me up
so I couldn’t meet Onred. As soon as he left, I took this bird. I’m following
him.”

“Where’d he get the new craft?”

Richert didn’t know about Zebra
Charlie Alpha. So she’d better think up a plausible story, and fast. “He met
some old friends. They’re helping him out.”

“Didn’t see him leave Tash.”

“Probably jamming radar signals.
Do you see me?”

“Only on the monitor.” Richert
sounded surly. “I’m trying to help you, girl. Stop treating me like the enemy.
Tell me the full truth.”

“The truth is, Joshua’s going to
meet Onred. He’s got a crazy, hair-brained scheme that’s going to get him
killed.”

“Find that hard to believe.”

“What do you
want,
Richert?”
Anya’s patience frazzled to nothing. “I’ve got to figure out how to fly so I
don’t kill myself. I don’t have time to talk to you.”

“You don’t know how to fly?”
Richert’s cackle blasted, reverberating through the tiny cabin. “You
are
a damn fool. Or a brave one. Haven’t decided which.”

“What do you
want?
” Anya
repeated through her teeth.

“I want to help.”

“How?” she asked with thinly
disguised impatience.

“Are you tied into Joshua’s
communications network?”

“Yes.” She hoped.

“I’m on blackout here. Can’t hear
anything unless Onred blasts the Alpha. They’ve gone and switched up all their
networks. Tell me what Joshua says, word for word.”

Anya supposed it wouldn’t hurt to
pass along general facts. Although she’d certainly censor any ZCA sensitive information.
“Okay. Now, if you’ll be quiet…”

“I’ll teach you to fly.”

“What?”

“It’s been awhile, but I’m the best
pilot ever flown the skies.”

“And the most modest, too.”

Richert unexpectedly smiled. “You’ve
got a mouth on you that’s nothing like your mother’s.”

Anya rolled her eyes, refusing to
accept that as a compliment. “Fine. Tell me how to land. I’m afraid I’ll kill
myself.”

Richert gave terse instructions on
landing and then more complicated lessons on interpreting radar. Thanks to his
insights, she speedily read the satellite atmospheric images and learned that
the thickening flurries outside heralded the arrival of a severe snowstorm.
Great. Another difficulty to navigate. He had instructed her to pull up a third
screen to monitor sound wave disturbances—and thereby track radar cloaked
ships—when Joshua’s first, terse words spit through the tiny ear piece. Anya’s
heart jerked with quick relief. He was alive. And she was following the right
network.

“Richert, I just heard from
Joshua.”

“Repeat everything he says. Leave
nothing out.”

Anya would not repeat Joshua’s
code words to their old enemy. But as soon as he said something intelligible,
she would. “Wait,” she told Richert.

Soon, it was obvious Joshua had
set his transmitter on permanent broadcast. And moments later she gasped when
the bloodcurdling order came to kill Joshua.

“Repeat, girl!” Richert snapped.

Anya repeated the ensuing
conversation as best she could, and felt supreme relief when Joshua was
dragged—obviously still alive—into the enemy aircraft. When Joshua gave the new
coordinates, she punched them into her navigation system, and was relieved to
see she was only seven minutes distant from the location. Should she tell
Richert the coordinates? But what if he took the opportunity to shoot down
Joshua’s forces? On the other hand, what if he joined them in fighting against
Onred?

She didn’t know what to do. Clouds
of snowflakes drove into the windshield, and a faint shudder indicated that the
storm winds had arrived.

A few moments later, Belar’s words
wiped all thoughts of the storm and Joshua’s coordinates out of her head. “Our
mission is complete, Onred. You can blow up Omsk.”

Anya swiftly repeated the message
to Richert. “They’re going to blow up Omsk!”

But Richert’s screen had gone
blank. He was gone.

“Enjoy hell,” Joshua said, and
then sharp static hissed into her ear.

Joshua! What had happened?

Anya zoomed in the radar to
magnify the birds swarming upon each other ahead. A faint orange dot separated
from the pack and plummeted toward earth. What was that? Or
who
was it?

A sick feeling in Anya’s gut made
her fingers fly to disengage the navigational autopilot. Gripping the hand
controls with trembling fingers, she flew toward the spot where the figure had
plummeted. It couldn’t be Joshua. It just couldn’t be. She couldn’t be too
late.

He couldn’t be dead.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Pain and blackness
engulfed Joshua, and a light,
filmy weight covered his face. Michael’s capsule had worked. The parachute had
triggered. It was the only coherent thought that registered through his fog of
pain.

Sizzling sounds rent the air. What
were they?

Airbirds fighting? Lasers
searching the ground—for him?

Joshua opened his eyes. Or had
they been open before? He saw only pitch black. Unless he had fallen in a pit,
it shouldn’t be so dark. These facts gradually seeped into his sluggish mind.
His left cheekbone hurt like crazy. So did his right shoulder and knee.

Mind still moving with frustrating
slowness, Joshua took inventory of his injuries. His hands were free. The impact
must have snapped open his shackles. He flexed each of his limbs. Everything
worked.

Something spit and sizzled nearby.
It smelled like a burning tree. Onred’s lasers had set it on fire. Birds were
looking for him. Smothered by this large parachute, it would take only moments
to find him.

Joshua clawed the filmy fabric
from his face. His shoulder felt like a ball of fire. He ignored it. Fresh,
cold air bit into his skin; it was the only indication he was free. The gossamer
parachute had not blocked out the light.

He was blind.

Joshua sat up, shoving the chute
off the rest of his body. Turning on his good knee, he awkwardly climbed to his
feet. His head swam and his brain pulsed in agony. Softly, he swore. He lurched
forward. A tree scraped the right side of his face and slammed into his hurt
shoulder. Joshua swore again and hung onto the tree, trying to orient himself.
Trying to clear his foggy mind and figure out what was going on around him.

He appeared to have landed in a
forest. The solar wind of a multitude of flying aircraft ruffled his hair.
Snowflakes brushed his cheeks, too. When he concentrated, he also heard the
faint whoosh of the swooping aircraft’s engines. Laser fire spit and sizzled
off a target overhead.

He had to put distance between
himself and the parachute. It would give Belar’s men a bull’s eye to start searching
for him. Joshua left the safety of the pine tree and shuffled forward, arms
outstretched. His toe stubbed a rock, but he managed to regain his balance
before falling.

Air sheeted off an oncoming
aircraft. Faint orange entered his right field of vision, and something sizzled.
His chute?

For safety’s sake, he needed to
hide in the forest, but he couldn’t see the trees. Frustration mounted, but
Joshua ignored the temptation to sink into self-pity. He was alive. He would
survive.

Joshua increased his pace, falling
more than once, and taking comfort when rough tree bark rammed into his
searching hands.

Orange flares grew brighter in his
right eye. Those brief flashes also illuminated large, black shadows. Trees. He
sought the dark, formless shapes, knowing they were his only, fleeting
protection. Belar’s men probably tracked his body heat. It was only a matter of
time before they found him. He wished he had Anya’s heat reflecting tarp.

Anya. The warm thoughts of being
in her arms beat away the cold and despair. He imagined a warm fire, and going
to her. “Anya,” he murmured. He needed to sit and rest. His brain felt fuzzier,
and the cold threatened to take over his mind. Combined with shock and unknown
injuries, it tempted him to slow down. To rest and take comfort in warm dreams.
“Anya,” he whispered again.

Behind him, a tree branch
splintered. Joshua ordered his sluggish legs to run, and managed a half-jog
before he rammed into another tree. He hung onto it, telling himself to wait
for another flash so he could see where to go next. The truth was, his energy
was ebbing, and fast. He must have an open wound. He must be losing blood.

Joshua ran his hands down his arms
and legs, and then stopped below his right thigh. It hurt like the devil
beneath his frost stiffened pants and snow wear. Fingers clumsy, he pulled off
his belt and cinched it hard above the wound. That should stop the worst of it.

Overhead, brighter orange lit the
sky. Joshua pushed on, heading deeper into the forest. The whoosh and spit of
laser fire hit the tree behind him. A pine ignited into a towering inferno,
pushing Joshua’s dim field of vision out a few more meters. The ground appeared
fairly level. Dark forest loomed ahead. He ran.

He needed a snow bank to burrow
inside, to hide his telltale body heat.

Men’s shouts reached his ears.
Joshua increased his pace and ordered his lethargic mind to assess the
situation. It wasn’t hard to reach a conclusion. With airbirds overhead,
tracking his heat source and relaying his coordinates to the men on the ground,
he didn’t stand a chance. He would be lucky to survive another five minutes.

*  *  *  *  *

Anya’s ship flew into the middle
of a brilliant, violently explosive air battle before she realized what had
happened.

Slow down, Anya.

She cut the throttle to 100 kph,
and the abrupt loss of speed felt like hitting a wall. Laser fire spit across
her craft’s nose. Was it Donetski fire? She
was
flying Onred’s airbird.
Stormy wind gusts buffeted the bird.

She needed to land. Joshua was
down there, just ahead somewhere, according to the radar sighting of the
parachuting figure. It had to be him. She felt it in her gut. An airbird shot
by her starboard side, and laser fire spattered at her. Panic hit, and she
nosed downward at a steep angle. The fire passed over her, but the tree tops
rushed closer at an alarming rate. She pulled the nose up, leveling the craft.
Her heart felt like it might beat right out of her chest.

“Oh, God help me,” she murmured.
Anya had never prayed so much in her life as she had in the last twelve hours.
Was God listening to her?

Joshua should be just ahead. She’d
touched a trace on his falling figure—if it had been him—shortly after she’d
spotted it. Thank goodness, Richert had taught her how.

Now she flew under most of the
pecking, spitting airbirds. A few, however, flew just above the treetops,
shooting fire to the earth—toward the location where Joshua must have fallen.

An airbird bearing Altai’s
distinctive red lights suddenly cruised alongside her, as if trying to look in
her windows. It gave her the creeps. She had no idea what the pilot might be
trying to communicate to her. Richert’s men must have disconnected it from
Altai’s main communication channels when they’d tampered with the bird.

She needed to land.

Onred’s airbird veered left and
joined a pack of others hovering above the forest floor, and creeping forward
bits at a time.

They were tracking Joshua.

She had to get in front of them
and land. The best place would be somewhere just ahead of where Joshua might be
running. The only trouble was, a jagged cliff loomed directly ahead, bordered
by tall, thick spruce.

Anya remembered the tunnel in ZCA’s
hangar. Surely these pines were no closer together than that tunnel. Or maybe
they were, but she didn’t want to think about it. She had to land now. She had
to rescue Joshua before Onred’s men killed him.

Reducing her speed to 50 kph, she
cut down, speeding through the forest. She swerved between trees, cutting left
and right in jerky swoops around half fallen trees. Radar helped. Her eyes
frantically searched for a moving shape on the screen. Joshua should be
somewhere to her left. There! A hundred meters north, a man-shaped blob moved.
Another hundred meters south, three figures converged on the first man. She
dodged another tree.