Kai shook his head. "He never fought anyone named Lear."
"I know. My father was Peter Armstrong, the first man he killed in the games on Solaris. Your father ambushed and killed him. My father never had a chance." Her voice grew small. "For a year or two, when I was just a little girl, my father was a martyr. The evil Justin Xiang had killed my father, as loyal a son of House Davion as ever there was in the Inner Sphere. Wolfson and Capet were also heroes. When my mother remarried, I didn't want to change my name even though my stepfather was a good man—a surgeon ... Roy Lear. At school, I had many friends and everyone liked me.
"Then your father turned out to be some agent who helped win the war. People started to refer to my father as a no-good renegade. The same kids who used to want to hear stories about my father now teased me. They said he was as bad as the Usurper, Stefan Amaris, and that they were glad Justin Allard had killed him. Some of their parents even said I was tainted by bad blood and they wouldn't let their children play with me."
Kai pulled back, spotted his knife, and picked it up again.
Slowly he began to dig at the ground surrounding her leg. "That's why you became a doctor?"
Deirdre looked down at the ground but focused on nothing. "No. I became a doctor because I had so often fantasized about being able to save my father had I been there. I joined the Armed Forces of the Federated Commonwealth as a way of proving I was not from a traitor family. I wanted to give something back to the Federated Commonwealth to atone for whatever my father had done. Whatever his crimes had been, I didn't think they deserved death."
"My father's not a murderer." Kai scooped some of the dirt from the hole around her leg and pulled free a slender wooden stake that had been pointing downward. "He didn't want your father to die."
"How can you say that? He ambushed him and killed him. It's on a holovid available almost anywhere."
"I know." Kai pulled a second stake free from the hole. "When I was a child, in school, I got into one of those 'my father is tougher than your father' arguments that ended up with another child running home in tears. I told him my father could kill his father."
Deirdre shuddered. "Other children used to tease me about Justin Allard coming after me, too."
Kai sat back on his haunches, a lump rising in his throat even as he began to speak. "My father took me home that day and showed me the holovid of the fight with your father. He turned the sound off and told me what he had been thinking instead of letting me hear the announcer describe the fight in glowing, dramatic terms. His job was to play the stereotype of a treacherous Liao fighter, both to justify his split with the Federated Suns and to attract the attention of Maximilian Liao. With the first barrage he loosed against your father, he knew he'd damaged your father's 'Mech too much to continue the fight. He wanted your father to punch out and kept hoping he would."
"He didn't. He died in that Griffin ."
"I know. My father said he'd underestimated the strength of the training Philip Capet had given his proteges. My father then told me that killing men was nothing to be proud of. He said killing was a last resort, when nothing else would work." Kai glanced back at Corbin. "Case in point."
Deirdre reached out and brought Kai's chin up. "Exception to the rule. You did have a choice: you could have surrendered to him. You didn't, but chose to fight to save me." Her blue eyes met his. "After the way I've treated you, why would you do that?"
Kai pulled his chin from her hand and dug at the ground some more. "You saved my life. I owed you."
"No, Kai, not good enough." She picked up one of the birch stakes and started helping him free her leg. "I've been so hateful to you over the time I've known you, but I was very attracted to you that morning on Skondia. I was thinking the New Year would be very good to me, indeed."
Kai laughed lightly, then stopped as a twinge of pain shot from his ribs. "Yeah, I was thinking that, too."
Deirdre swallowed hard. "Then when General Redburn introduced us, I felt I'd betrayed myself and my father. After that, I lashed out at you, trying to drive you away and make you hurt the way I felt your father had hurt me. I kept trying to find a way to focus my hatred on you, but the harder I tried, the less I found in you to hate."
As she spoke, Kai felt the distance between them melt away. In the two years he'd known Deirdre Lear, he had always puzzled about the apparent duality of her feelings toward him. Now that he understood, her actions made sense. The part of him that had been afraid she hated him for being himself wanted to shout with joy. He wanted to sweep her into his arms and never let her go.
But a cold dread twitched to life in his belly and seemed to rise up to claw at his throat. Now you know her secret, Kai Allard, but that does not change the fact that you are a killer born of a killer. You are her antithesis and she will at ways revile you for that fact.
Kai's faced closed. "You just didn't look hard enough Doctor. There's plenty there to hate, like my penchant for making mistakes, getting other folks killed, or forcing people to do things they don't want to do, like shooting someone. Why was I willing to sacrifice myself for you? Because the world would be better off with you in it than with me."
He ripped the last stake from the hole. "You're free."
She slowly pulled her leg from the hole. "You're wrong, Kai."
"Wrong?" He frowned. "Your leg is no longer trapped."
"Not about that." She shook her head, then refused to meet his gaze. "The world wouldn't be, better off without you because I, for one, would be much worse off without you here."
"You'd survive. You know enough."
"Physically, yes, perhaps." She shocked him by leaning forward and lightly brushing his lips with hers. "Inside, I'd die without you."
22
Diosd
Wolf Clan Occupation Zone
2 April 3052
Phelan smiled to see the ilKhan had chosen to preside over the Trial of Bloodright being held in the Grand Hall of what had once been the Third Rasalhague Freeman's base. Various members of the Wolf Clan stood at the far end of the hall, but Phelan recognized none of them. He knew most of the Thirteenth Wolf Guards were resting up from the previous two days of fighting, and Phelan would have liked to be doing the same.
The ilKhan waited until an Elemental brought in one of the gravity-well devices, then he started the ceremony. "I jam the Oathmaster and accept responsibility for representing House Ward here. Do you concur in this?"
"Seyla," said both Phelan and his opponent.
"Then what transpires here will bind us all until we all shall fall." Ulric, who looked a bit weary himself, nodded approval. "As this is your third battle, you know well the honor for which you fight. You, Phelan Wolf, have seen twenty years. Why are you worthy?"
"I was chosen by Cyrilla Ward to be heir to this Blood-name. I was adopted into the Warrior Caste after proving my worthiness through service as a bondsman. I trained and tested out as a Warrior. Singlehandedly I conquered Gunzburg, and on Satalice I captured Prince Ragnar of Rasalhague. On Hyperion I led the defense of the Simmons Dam and hunted renegades in the badlands. On Diosd I participated in the coursing and killing of the Third Freeman's Command Lance. Prior to the battle today, I defeated an Elemental, Dean, and a flyer, Glynis, for the right to participate here."