“What was her talent? Telepathy?”
“No. Oh, some rudimentary ability perhaps. I have read that all psi talents have several latent abilities in addition to their one developed strength. But Mother could not read minds. She had some empathy, although her cure had twisted it curiously, so that the emotions she felt literally sickened her. But her major strength, the talent they took five years to shatter and destroy, was teke.”
Melantha Jhirl swore. “Of course she hated gravity! Telekinesis under weightlessness is—”
“Yes,” Royd finished. “Keeping the Nightflyer under gravity tortures me, but it limits Mother.”
In the silence that followed that comment, each of them looked down the dark cylinder of the driveroom. Karoly d’Branin moved awkwardly on his sled. “Dannel and Lindran have not returned,” he said.
“They are probably dead,” Royd said dispassionately.
“What will we do, then? We must plan. We cannot wait here indefinitely.”
“The first question is what I can do,” Royd Eris replied. “I have talked freely, you’ll note. You deserved to know. We have passed the point where ignorance was a protection. Obviously things have gone too far. There have been too many deaths and you have been witness to all of them. Mother cannot allow you to return to Avalon alive.”
“True,” said Melantha. “But what shall she do with you? Is your own status in doubt, captain?”
“The crux of the problem,” Royd admitted. “You are still three moves ahead, Melantha. I wonder if it will suffice. Your opponent is four ahead in this game, and most of your pawns are already captured. I fear checkmate is imminent.”
“Unless I can persuade my opponent’s king to desert, no?”
She could see Royd’s wan smile. “She would probably kill me too if I choose to side with you. She does not need me.”
Karoly d’Branin was slow to grasp the point. “But—but what else could—”
“My sled has a laser. Yours do not. I could kill you both, right now, and thereby earn my way back into the Nightflyer’s good graces.”
Across the three meters that lay between their sleds, Melantha’s eyes met Royd’s. Her hands rested easily on the thruster controls. “You could try, captain. Remember, the improved model isn’t easy to kill.”
“I would not kill you, Melantha Jhirl,” Royd said seriously. “I have lived sixty-eight standard years and I have never lived at all. I am tired, and you tell grand, gorgeous lies. Will you really touch me?”
“Yes.”
“I risk a lot for that touch. Yet in a way it is no risk at all. If we lose, we will all die together. If we win, well, I shall die anyway when they destroy the Nightflyer, either that or live as a freak in an orbital hospital, and I would prefer death.”
“We will build you a new ship, captain,” Melantha promised.
“Liar,” Royd replied. But his tone was cheerful. “No matter. I have not had much of a life anyway. Death does not frighten me. If we win, you must tell me about your volcryn once again, Karoly. And you, Melantha, you must play chess with me, and find a way to touch me, and…”
“And sex with you?” she finished, smiling.
“If you would,” he said quietly. He shrugged. “Well, Mother has heard all of this. Doubtless she will listen carefully to any plans we might make, so there is no sense making them. Now there is no chance that the control lock will admit me, since it is keyed directly into the ship’s computer. So we must follow the others through the driveroom, and enter through the main lock, and take what small chances we are given. If I can reach my console and restore gravity, perhaps we can win. If not—”
He was interrupted by a low groan.
For an instant Melantha thought the Nightflyer was wailing at them again, and she was surprised that it was so stupid as to try the same tactic twice. Then the groan sounded once more, and in the back of Karoly d’Branin’s sled, the forgotten fourth member of their company struggled against the bonds that held her down. D’Branin hastened to free her, and Agatha Marij-Black tried to rise to her feet and almost floated off the sled, until he caught her hand and pulled her back. “Are you well?” he asked. “Can you hear me? Have you pain?”
Imprisoned beneath a transparent faceplate, wide, frightened eyes flicked rapidly from Karoly to Melantha to Royd, and then to the broken Nightflyer. Melantha wondered whether the woman was insane, and started to caution d’Branin, when Marij-Black spoke.
“The volcryn!” was all she said. “Oh. The volcryn!”
Around the mouth of the driveroom, the ring of nuclear engines took on a faint glow. Melantha Jhirl heard Royd suck in his breath sharply. She gave the thruster controls of her sled a violent twist. “Hurry,” she said loudly. “The Nightflyer is preparing to move.”
A third of the way down the long barrel of the driveroom, Royd pulled abreast of her, stiff and menacing in his black, bulky armor. Side by side they sailed past the cylindrical stardrives and the cyberwebs; ahead, dimly lit, was the main airlock and its ghastly sentinel.
“When we reach the lock, jump over to my sled,” Royd said. “I want to stay armed and mounted, and the chamber is not large enough for two sleds.”
Melantha Jhirl risked a quick glance behind her. “Karoly,” she called. “Where are you?”
“Outside, my love, my friend,” the answer came. “I cannot come. Forgive me.”
“We have to stay together!”
“No,” d’Branin said, “no, I could not risk it, not when we are so close. It would be so tragic, so futile, Melantha. To come so close and fail. Death I do not mind, but I must see them first, finally, after all these years.”
“My mother is going to move the ship,” Royd cut in. “Karoly, you will be left behind, lost.”
“I will wait,” d’Branin replied. “My volcryn come, and I must wait for them.”
Then the time for conversation was gone, for the airlock was almost upon them. Both sleds slowed and stopped, and Royd Eris reached out and began the cycle while Melantha Jhirl moved to the rear of his huge oval worksled. When the outer door moved aside, they glided through into the lock chamber.
“When the inner door opens it will begin,” Royd told her evenly. “The permanent furnishings are either built-in or welded or bolted into place, but the things that your team brought on board are not. Mother will use those things as weapons. And beware of doors, airlocks, any equipment tied into the Nightflyer’s computer. Need I warn you not to unseal your suit?”
“Hardly,” she replied.
Royd lowered the sled a little, and its grapplers made a metallic sound as they touched against the floor of the chamber.
The inner door hissed open, and Royd applied his thrusters.
Inside, Dannel and Lindran waited, swimming in a haze of blood. Dannel had been slit from crotch to throat and his intestines moved like a nest of pale, angry snakes. Lindran still held the knife. They swam closer, moving with a grace they had never possessed in life.