Conquerors' Legacy

12

"We'll want to wait until all the incoming passengers have gotten off and the cargo's been unloaded," Kolchin said quietly. "Keep an eye out for anything that strikes you as odd."

Cavanagh nodded. "Right."

Twin gangways came down onto the dock with twin thumps, and a handful of figures emerged from the shadows on the deck and started on down, carrybags or backpacks slung over their shoulders. Most were human, but there was a sprinkling of other races as well. All had the weathered but freshly scrubbed look of sap miners returning from a brief visit to the conveniences of civilization, in marked contrast to the generally grimy condition of those waiting on the dock with Cavanagh and Kolchin for their turn to go aboard. From the aft section of the ferry a collapsible crane unlimbered itself and began lifting cargo crates from the fantail onto the end of the dock.

For no particular reason Cavanagh found himself counting the passengers as they lumbered down the gangways. There were twenty-seven of them, roughly the same number as were waiting to go aboard. A fairly standard-size group for a midweek evening run back to Puerto Simone Island, or so Kolchin's discreet questioning had determined. Cavanagh would have preferred a larger crowd for them to hide in, but apparently even on weekends the traffic didn't swell all that much. It took a festival or other special occasion to attract any truly large groups of miners to the island.

An elbow touched his side, and he turned to see Kolchin gazing off to their right. "We've got company," the bodyguard murmured.

Cavanagh followed his gaze. Passing beneath one of the dull overhead walklights, ambling directly toward them, was a broad-shouldered Avuire. "Is that...?"

"Sure is," Kolchin confirmed, waving his hand in an Avuirlian salutation toward the newcomer. "Greetings, Moo Sab Piltariab."

"Greetings to you, Moo Sab Plex," Piltariab said, gesturing back to them. "I thought that was you and Moo Sab Stymer. You are heading to the island this night?"

"Yes," Kolchin said. "You, too?"

"Yes, indeed," Piltariab agreed, coming over and standing beside them. Cavanagh sniffed carefully, but the smell of the ferry's locally grown fuel oil completely overwhelmed the more subtle Avuirlian aromotional cues. "Without you there to hunt fresh prey, Moo Sab Plex, my mining group has run out of proper edibles. It is necessary for me to return to the island to purchase more."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Kolchin said. "Though of course the quality of edibles from the island is superior to anything your group could capture in a hunt."

"More tasteworthy, but also more costful," Piltariab sighed, a burst of lilac and pepper momentarily beating out the fuel oil. "I must agree with you, Moo Sab Plex. But to our venture organizer, cost is what is important. If I may say so, he is most upset with your departure."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Kolchin said. "Though even if we hadn't left the group three days ago, we would have had to do so now. Moo Sab Stymer has hurt his arm, and we need to seek out medical attention."

"Truly?" Piltariab said. "How so?"

"Oh, I just twisted my wrist," Cavanagh improvised, holding up his left arm. "Silly accident; but Moo Sab Plex insists it be taken care of."

"Hmm," Piltariab said, stepping close to Cavanagh for a better look, a musky aroma wafting along with him. "I see nothing."

"It's in the wrist joint, beneath the skin," Cavanagh told him, wincing for effect as he turned the wrist slightly. "Human skin doesn't change texture over internal injuries."

"Oh, of course," Piltariab said, stepping back again. "I hope you will find healing, Moo Sab Stymer."

"I'm sure it'll be fine," Kolchin assured him. "So you'll be selling your sap and buying edibles and then heading back here?"

"Yes," Piltariab said. "But I will also have enough time to show you to Moo Sab Bokamba's home, if you wish."

Cavanagh glanced around them. As near as he could tell, none of the other miners in the area were paying attention to their conversation. "Thank you for the offer," he said to Piltariab. "But we can manage."

"If we even go see him, that is," Kolchin added. "We're really only going across to get Moo Sab Stymer's arm treated."

"Moo Sab Bokamba seemed very interested in seeing you," Piltariab persisted. "I think he would be most disappointed if you did not visit him."

"Really," Kolchin said, sending a leisurely gaze of his own around the dock area. "Did he tell you to tell us that?"

Piltariab recoiled with a gush of burned vanilla. "Of course not, Moo Sab Plex. If he had given me any such message for you, I would truly have told you when we last met. I wish only to offer my services, for the sake of our short acquaintanceship."

Kolchin cocked his head slightly. "Is that the only reason?" he asked pointedly.

"To be fully honest"—Piltariab blushed the odor of freshly cut grass—"I had privately hoped for a fit and proper reason to visit Moo Sab Bokamba again. The aromas in his house were most, most intriguing. There is also an excellent spice market near to Moo Sab Bokamba's home, so I may also make some of my purchases there."

Cavanagh looked at Kolchin, caught the other's microscopic shrug. If the Avuire was lying or up to something devious, Kolchin apparently couldn't smell it in his odor, either. "In that case, Moo Sab Piltariab, we would be delighted to have you show us the way."

"I am truly indebted to you, Moo Sab Plex," Piltariab said, his aroma switching to the overly fermented soy sauce of Avuirlian eagerness. "Come, let us board the ship."

Cavanagh looked at the ferry. The fantail crane had shifted now to bringing aboard the cargo bound for the island, and the outbound passengers were beginning to file aboard. "Yes," he murmured. "Let us."

It took just over thirty minutes to cross the thirteen kilometers of Sereno Strait. Cavanagh had expected Piltariab to stay with him and Kolchin the whole trip, but they were barely away from the dock when the sap miner went forward to join two of his fellow Avuirli standing near the bow. Cavanagh couldn't make out any of their conversation over the rumble of the ferry's engines, but an occasional whiff of smoked fish or peppermint pine drifted back to them on the wind.

The ferry reached the island and found space at the fifty-year-old starburst-shaped docking system built by the original Mexican colonists in their initial burst of optimism for Granparra's future. Cavanagh found his muscles tensing as the gangways slapped down, his eyes darting across the structures and shadows of the docks, which were only marginally better lit than the one they'd just left on the mainland. If Bronski had somehow learned he and Kolchin were here and had laid a trap for them, here was where it would be sprung. Trapped on the ferry, their backs to the sea, there was nowhere to run.

But there were no groups of Peacekeepers waiting in the shadows as they filed off the ferry with the rest of the passengers and headed down the rickety walkways toward the lights and sounds of the island. "Looks like Bokamba didn't turn us in," Kolchin murmured as they reached the faded archway that welcomed all and sundry to Puerto Simone Island.

Cavanagh frowned. "Were you expecting him to?"

"Not really," Kolchin said. "I was only giving him odds of one in three."

"Only one in three," Cavanagh echoed, staring at the bodyguard. "And you didn't think this worth mentioning to me?"

"Not with odds that low," Kolchin shook his head. "You'd just have worried. Now, where did Piltariab—oh, there he is."

"Ah—Moo Sab Plex," Piltariab said, hurrying toward them, his two fellow Avuirli close behind. "I feared I had lost track of you. These are two of our fellow sap miners: Moo Sab Mitliriab and Moo Sab Brislimab. They will be accompanying us to Moo Sab Bokamba's home."

"Oh?" Kolchin said, his forehead creasing slightly. "Why?"

"Mu Sab Piltariab tuld us abuut the udurs at Mu Sab Bukamba's hume," Mitliriab said, his voice quiet and measured and with a noticeable Avuirlian accent. "He urged us tu cume smell them urselves."

"And you had nothing better to do?" Kolchin asked.

Mitliriab's eyes flicked to Piltariab, back to Kolchin. A very measured gaze, in Cavanagh's estimation, with a heavy weight of years and life experience behind it. "We were intrigued," he said simply.

"You feel the same way, Moo Sab Brislimab?" Cavanagh put in.

The third Avuire stirred. "I too wish to smell these odors," he said. Like Mitliriab's, his voice, too, carried both age and experience, though not the heavy accent.

But there was something more than just experience in their voices and faces. Something was seriously wrong....

Kolchin had obviously picked up on it, too. "Sir?" he murmured.

Cavanagh took a deep breath, trying to detect and sort out the mixture of Avuirlian odors emanating from the group. Piltariab's were easy: the flashes of peppermint pine added to the fermented soy sauce, a growing edge of impatience melding with his eagerness to be on their way. But the aroma hanging around the other two was a complete mystery to him. In all his years of dealing with Avuirli, he had never smelled aromotional cues like these.

But whatever was going on here, one thing was clear: short of hauling out their flechette pistols, there really wasn't any way to stop the three Avuirli from tagging along with them to Bokamba's house. Even with the flechette guns the point was problematic.

And besides, if he and Kolchin were the target of this unknown Avuirlian emotion, chasing Mitliriab and Brislimab away would be only a temporary solution. "Sure, why not?" he said, beckoning them along. "I'm rather curious to see what these interesting odors are, too. Lead the way, Moo Sab Piltariab."

"It is this way," Piltariab said, heading eagerly forward. His broad shoulders brushed past Cavanagh, trailing soy-sauce aroma in their wake. Either he had completely missed his own companions' aromotional cues, or else he was just as completely ignoring them. Offhand, Cavanagh wasn't sure which possibility bothered him more.

Considering the lateness of the hour, Puerto Simone's streets were still surprisingly crowded with pedestrians. The large NorCoord cities Cavanagh was familiar with were similarly active, of course, but in those places most of the traffic was vehicular, with the majority of pedestrians merely making the short trek from mart or restaurant to their parked ground- or aircars. Perhaps in the island's more tightly knit community and culture, nighttime crime wasn't as big a problem as it was on some of the Commonwealth's more advanced worlds.

Or perhaps the island's narrow streets simply discouraged groundcar traffic. The Parra vine, of course, discouraged anything else.

The Parra. Cavanagh looked up as they walked along, peering past the lights at the dark branches of the thick vine lattice arching over the city only meters above the taller buildings around them. Centuries earlier in the leisurely herbaceous war going on all over Granparra, the Parra vine had won the battle for Puerto Simone Island, choking out the other, more deadly forms of plant life that still held sway on the continent across Sereno Strait. That victory had made the island livable for human beings; but at the same time the Parra's dominating presence had presented challenges all its own. The lattice was home to thousands of monkey-sized grooma, living in an only partially understood symbiosis with the vine, who swarmed to screaming attack against anyone who attempted to cut or sometimes even just move a section of the Parra. Livestock who chewed on the vine got the same treatment, a problem that was aggravated by the groomas' unexplained fondness for investigating, playing with, and ultimately wrecking the fences the herd keepers used to keep their livestock away from the Parra.

And hanging over it all was the dark, unpleasant question of whether the Parra was in fact sentient. Whether it was listening or watching everything these upstart humans were doing on its island. And if so, what it was thinking.

The group had walked for perhaps fifteen minutes when they finally reached Piltariab's landmark. "There," he said, waving a hand and soy-sauce aroma toward a cross street fifty meters ahead of them. "There—just past the spice market. To the right, down at the end of that street, is Moo Sab Bokamba's home."

"Great," Kolchin said. "I hope he's in tonight." He brushed up against Cavanagh; and out of sight of the three Avuirli, he caught the older man's wrist and gave it a brief but sharp squeeze.

Cavanagh caught the cue. "Ow!" he grunted, lifting his supposedly injured left wrist.

"What is it, Moo Sab Stymer?" Piltariab asked, stepping close to Cavanagh, a rush of baking-oat-bread concern momentarily supplanting the soy sauce. "Is your injury worse?"

"I brushed it against that vegetable stand," Cavanagh said, wincing for effect as he cradled his left wrist protectively with his right hand. "I'll be all right."

"I'd better take a look," Kolchin said, shrugging his backpack off as he eased Cavanagh to the side of the street. "This will only take a minute, Moo Sab Piltariab," he added, opening the pack and rummaging through it. "Why don't you and your friends go on ahead, make sure Moo Sab Bokamba is home and willing to see us? We'll be right with you."

"There is nu need fur haste," Mitliriab said. "We can wait fur yu tu finish with him."

"No, no, let us not wait," Piltariab said, his solicitude lost again to his eagerness. "They will be all right. Come—Moo Sab Bokamba's home is close at hand. Come."

Mitliriab and Brislimab exchanged glances, and again Cavanagh caught a whiff of that unidentified aromotional scent. "As yu insist," Mitliriab said, looking at Kolchin. "Yu will catch up with us, Mu Sab Plex."

"Of course," Kolchin assured him.

For a handful of heartbeats the Avuire stared at him. Then, without further comment, he turned away. With Piltariab at the lead the three Avuirli rejoined the pedestrian flow and continued down the street.

"That sounded like an order," Cavanagh muttered as Kolchin pulled their medkit from the backpack.

"It certainly wasn't a question," Kolchin agreed, pretending to treat Cavanagh's wrist. "There's something about all this that Mitliriab and Brislimab are definitely not happy with."

Cavanagh chewed the inside of his cheek. "You think it has something to do with us?"

"I don't think so," Kolchin said slowly. "At least not directly. Annoyed Avuirli usually aren't very subtle—if they were mad at us, we'd have heard about it by now."

Cavanagh shivered. As a species, Avuirli were pretty even-tempered; but all sentient creatures could get angry, and Avuirli had the muscle power to make anger a distinctly unpleasant experience for everyone in the vicinity. "Something about Piltariab, then?"

"That's getting closer," Kolchin said, returning the medkit to the backpack and pulling out the binoculars. "But that's not quite it, either," he added, handing the binoculars to Cavanagh and sealing the backpack again. "Let me know when they've turned into that side street."

"Right." Cavanagh peered over his shoulder as he looped the binoculars' strap around his neck. "They're going in now."

"Good." Kolchin slung the backpack up onto one shoulder. "Let's go."

They hurried ahead, ducking around and between unhurried shoppers to the side street Piltariab had indicated. Instead of turning right, though, Kolchin led them to the left, into the street branching off in the opposite direction. Unlike the right-hand branch, which Cavanagh could see now was narrow but basically residential, this side seemed to be a cross between an alley and a garbage-storage facility. A half-dozen highly aromatic chest-high garbage bins lined each side at this end, with random bits of broken boxes and decaying refuse scattered around. Like most of the streets they'd been on since leaving the docks, the alley's surface consisted of closely fitted flagstones; unlike those other streets, no one here had seen fit to put much effort into maintenance. "What now?" he asked as Kolchin positioned them on opposite sides of the alley, behind the last of the garbage bins.

"We see what kind of reception the Avuirli get," Kolchin said. With his left hand he lowered his backpack to the ground; with his right he drew his flechette pistol from beneath his jacket and clicked off the safety. "We also see how good your memory for faces is."

Cavanagh grimaced as he turned on the binoculars and held them up to his eyes. He'd met Bokamba only once, back at the Parliament's Copperhead hearings. Whether he could recognize the man now, several years later, was going to be problematic.

The three Avuirli were about three quarters of the way down the street, approaching the house at the end. "They're almost there," he told Kolchin, adjusting the light-amplification contrast slightly. "Piltariab must really be anxious to get there—he's practically running."

"Interesting," Kolchin said thoughtfully. "I can't remember ever seeing an Avuire run before."

Cavanagh frowned, searching his memory. Now that Kolchin mentioned it, he couldn't either. Avuirli were built for strength, not speed. "You're right," he agreed, an odd feeling starting to twist through his stomach. "What could Bokamba have said to him to spark that much enthusiasm in coming back?"

Kolchin never had a chance to answer. At that moment, from behind them in the alleyway, came a quiet voice, barely audible over the noise from the nearby shops. "Hold it steady, both of you. Kolchin, lose the gun."

Cavanagh turned his face away from the binoculars and looked sideways across the alley at Kolchin. The young bodyguard hadn't moved, nor had his expression changed. But the tendons of his gun hand were suddenly pressing visibly through the skin. Preparing for violent action... "No," Cavanagh murmured urgently. "Not now. Not here."

For a long moment he thought Kolchin was going to try it anyway. Then, to his relief, the other let out a long, strangled-sounding breath and lowered his hand from the garbage bin, letting the flechette pistol drop to the ground. Lifting his hands shoulder high, he turned slowly around. Swallowing hard, Cavanagh did the same.

Brigadier Petr Bronski was standing alone three meters away in the middle of the alley, holding a small flechette pistol in a no-nonsense marksman's grip. The gun, and his full attention, were fixed on Kolchin. "Smart lad," Bronski said approvingly. "You know the rest of the routine: hands on top of your head, fingers laced together. You too, Cavanagh."

"So it was a trap, after all," Kolchin said as he and Cavanagh complied.

"No, it was just me playing a hunch," Bronski said. "Nice to know I've still got it. Just kick the gun over this way."

"What kind of hunch were you playing?" Cavanagh asked as Kolchin complied, sending his flechette pistol clattering across the uneven flagstones toward Bronski.

"That you'd gone to ground on Granparra," Bronski said, taking a step forward and stooping down to pick up the gun. A loose paving stone rocked under his feet as he straightened up again. "I was able to locate and pull a copy of the message the Klyveress ci Yyatoor sent to your son Aric on Edo."

Cavanagh frowned. "She sent Aric a message? What was in it?"

"She wanted him to collect some electronics modules and bring them to her on Phormbi." Reaching under his jacket at the small of his back, Bronski produced a set of wristcuffs and tossed them onto the ground at Cavanagh's feet. "Put them on Kolchin," he instructed. "Hands behind his back, of course."

"I don't understand what a message from Klyveress has to do with anything," Cavanagh said, his mind racing as he picked up the wristcuffs and crossed the alley to Kolchin. No backup had yet appeared—could Bronski really have come there alone? If so, they might still have a chance of getting away.

But only up to the point where Kolchin's hands were cuffed. After that their chances dropped nearly to zero. Somehow Cavanagh had to find a way to stall the completion of that order.

Or find a way to fake it.

"Like I said, it was a hunch," Bronski said. "We had an alert out all over the Commonwealth watching for the Mrach fighter you stole on Mra-mig. When it didn't turn up anywhere, I figured you must have talked the ci Yyatoor into trading ships with you, which meant you were going to owe her something."

"That's it exactly," Cavanagh acknowledged, pausing beside Kolchin and looking at Bronski. "She insisted I send her some command/switching modules in exchange for the ship she gave me. How did you know?"

"With Yycromae there's always a quid pro quo." Bronski waved his gun slightly toward Kolchin. "Come on, get those cuffs on."

"Only I haven't been able to send them," Cavanagh said, stepping around behind Kolchin and fastening one ring of the wristcuffs onto his left wrist. Standing behind Kolchin this way, he was partially out of Bronski's sight... and unbeknownst to the brigadier, he still had Kolchin's backup flechette pistol hidden beneath his jacket. Should he try to ease it out and slip it into Kolchin's belt, where he could get to it with his cuffed hands?

But even if he was able to do all that without Bronski's catching him at it, what then? Could Kolchin get the drop on Bronski and persuade him to surrender? Because if not, the only other option at that point would be to shoot him, and there was no way Cavanagh could justify shooting a Peacekeeper officer who was only doing his job. "We've been here since leaving Phormbi," he added, hoping to keep Bronski talking as he pulled Kolchin's hands down behind his back.

"Which is why she sent that message to your son," Bronski said. "If you'd sent the modules like she wanted, she wouldn't have needed to do that. To me that said you'd gone to ground someplace where you couldn't get to a CavTronics supply house." He shrugged. "Granparra seemed the most likely spot."

"Especially when you found out that Quinn and Aric had been in touch with Wing Commander Bokamba," Cavanagh nodded, positioning the second wristcuff ring around Kolchin's right wrist and trying desperately to figure out how to make it look secure without actually locking it in place. But he couldn't see anywhere else for the locking hook to go. "How long ago did you and he set up this little charade?"

"What charade is that?"

Cavanagh paused, frowning over Kolchin's shoulder at Bronski. The brigadier was eyeing him, apparently in genuine puzzlement. "You know what charade. We had Piltariab take a message to Bokamba three days ago. He sent back a note that we should stay off the island at least two more days."

Bronski's eyes flicked past Cavanagh's shoulder. "Bokamba's not here, Cavanagh," he said. "He was called up to the reserves nearly a month ago."

Something cold shivered along Cavanagh's spine. "But Piltariab said—"

And abruptly all the pieces suddenly fell together in his mind. A trap, all right, but not one orchestrated by Bronski. A fake Bokamba had been set up as a lure, set up by someone who had manipulated Piltariab so well that the Avuire had been impatiently eager to bring him and Kolchin to see him. So eager, in fact, that he'd gone out of his way to persuade two others of his species to join them.

And there was only one group of beings who, expecting humans to walk into their trap, would also have known how to mesmerize a simple Avuirlian sap miner so thoroughly. The same group of beings who, now that Cavanagh knew about their subtle war against humanity, might have felt it worth this much effort to have him silenced.

The Mrachanis.

Cavanagh took a deep breath. "Brigadier—"

And suddenly, from directly behind him, came a blood-chilling roar.

Cavanagh dropped the loose end of the wristcuffs and spun around. Standing beyond the garbage bins at the near end of the alley was the squat, meter-wide figure of a Bhurt, his arms spread wide in challenge. One of the same Bhurtala, if Cavanagh remembered the facial stripe pattern correctly, who had threatened Bronski in the Mrapiratta Hotel back on Mra-mig.