Kinsman's Oath Page 5

  The crew was not so mannerly. If not for Cynara's presence, one or two of them might have confronted Ronan the same way Janek had done. Among those who hated the shaauri, no creature was more despised than a human loyal to the stripes. Even an unwilling prisoner might fare little better in their eyes.

  All the more reason for her to determine the truth.

  She led Ronan past her own quarters and to the guest cabins at the end of the corridor. She stopped at the first, where the lock awaited imprinting by a new occupant.

  "Place your palm here," she said, indicating the lock, "and the door will open only to you and those who have override codes for this section—myself, Scholar-Commander Adumbe, and O'Deira. Your privacy will not be violated except in an emergency."

  Ronan hesitated, studying the ID grid carefully before following Cynara's instructions. The door opened onto the small, spare cabin with its Spartan furnishings. Ronan's nostrils flared like an animal scenting the air for danger. He stepped inside and placed his back to the nearest bulkhead.

  "The Pegasus was not designed as a passenger vessel," Cynara said. "I trust you will find these accommodations adequate for the time being."

  "More than adequate, Aho'Va."

  She sat on the edge of the bunk. "You've called me that several times. What does it mean?"

  He blinked slowly, just like Archimedes, and frowned. "I did not realize I had lapsed from your language. Aho'Va means First of Will."

  "First, as in captain—that much I understand. But 'Will'…"

  "You called the way of Paths a 'caste system,'" he said. "It is the foundation of shaauri culture. 'Will,' vali, is the Path of leaders and administrators—va'laik'i."

  She mouthed the word silently, testing the slight guttural break between each syllable of the alien term. "Then any captain would, by definition, be this… va'laik'i."

  "Va'laik'in, yes. Though sometimes ve'laik'i, those of the Blood Path, become Firsts of warships, and often Seconds or Thirds of Houses or even Lines. Aho'Va is a title of respect given in general to all va'laik'i Firsts." He gave the words "House," "Line," and "First" the kind of emphasis that suggested capitalization. "Each Path and vocational residence within a House-holding has its own First, Second, and Third as well. Crew of shaauri vessels are always of one Line, but—"

  Cynara laughed and held up her hands. "Wait, my friend. I think cultural instruction will take more time than I have at the moment. Please, sit."

  He obeyed, perched on the edge of the bunk with his feet planted for swift movement. He appeared as ready to fight as he had been with Zheng, and her mind called up the image of those terrible wounds over his body. Perhaps he expected constant abuse, even from humans.

  "I want you to understand one thing, Ronan," she said. "You are safe aboard the Pegasus. No one will hurt you or force you to do anything you don't wish, as long as your intentions are peaceful."

  "I understand."

  Poseidon. Was that clear-eyed gravity the only emotion he was capable of? Even when he had threatened Janek and fought Zheng, his expression had hardly changed. What would make him react?

  "I think you understand a remarkable amount for someone who has been a prisoner most of his life," she said, muting her smile. "How did that come about?"

  She had not expected to achieve such swift results, but his vulnerability was so strong that it touched her mind without even the smallest effort on her part. "I have no memory of the time before my sixth year," he said. "I was raised in a shaauri House, and some of my adopted kin spoke your language. There were occasions… when other humans came to the House."

  Humans. Kinsmen. Cynara discovered a tightness in her chest and knew that it was not merely sympathy for what he must have suffered. It came from Ronan, emotional leakage her shields were not designed to filter.

  Loneliness. That was at the core of it, the pain that underlay his solemnity. So few men or women had the power to make her feel, unbidden, what they felt. He did.

  No memory. Of parents, of human warmth. He might be lying, of course—everything he said might be a lie—but this had the ring of truth that echoed in her bones.

  She sat on the bunk, keeping her distance. "You said something to the effect that Kinsmen had stripped your mind of any telepathic ability. How well did you know these people?"

  "I know their history. They chose shaauri over their own blood."

  There. That was anger, contempt, invisible to anyone who hadn't the skill to look for it. "But you did not choose, did you?"

  "No."

  "What do you think of such men and women, Ronan?"

  "N'akai Ne'li," he said, the words spat between his teeth like acid. It was a curse and also a name. Cynara tapped her wristcom and linked the Voishaaur-Standard dictionary to her earpatch audiofeed.

  "Ne'li, noun, plural of ne'lin," a flat female voice pronounced.

  "Ne'lin, noun, singular. Definition one: shaaurin who returns from Walkabout unselected and exists on the fringes of shaauri society. Definition two: wraith or ghost. Definition three: outcast. Usage: Ne'lin is frequently used as a derogatory term of contempt."

  The only definition that seemed to apply in this case was the last; Kinsmen certainly had a place in shaauri society. So Ronan had no love for the only fellow humans he had seen during his captivity. Or so he wished her to believe.

  "This is a very important question," she said. "Some of my officers are afraid mat you may be Kinsman and a shaauri agent, sent to us in the guise of a fugitive."

  His head jerked up in very convincing shock, and a stream of alien words, half growls and whistles, poured out of his mouth. The single term Cynara recognized was ne. No. Emphatically no.

  "Then I must ask why, as a prisoner, you were of such value to the shaauri that they sent a striker after you."

  She couldn't misinterpret the confusion in his eyes. "I… know things," he said.

  "About the shaauri? Things that might hurt them if humans knew?"

  "I listened. I learned what I could. They feared what I could tell."

  "And now that you've come to us, you're prepared to share what you know for the benefit of humanity?"

  His gaze cleared. "Yes."

  Cynara leaned back against the bulkhead. "Kinsmen have been sent by shaauri to penetrate Concordat defenses. None of them have succeeded, but the danger is always there. That's why I must be sure of your loyalties and your background."

  At first she thought the sound Ronan made was one of distress, perhaps some form of weeping, but it came to her that he was laughing. He puffed out a series of almost silent breaths drawn deep from his lungs, his eyes narrowed in unmistakable amusement.

  "My loyalties," he said when he could speak again. "I will show you my loyalties, Aho'Va D'Accorso." He unfastened his sleeve at the wrist, peeled back the cloth to reveal the underside of his arm and rotated it slowly, displaying the bitter landscape of pale scars. Cynara opened her mind just enough to read the outer skin of his thoughts.

  Loneliness, and now shame so deep that it amounted to self-loathing beyond what she had felt when Tyr died and she survived with his knowledge inside her. Ronan despised himself for these scars, for his weakness, for everything he was. All the waters of Mother Sea couldn't wash away such shame.

  Cynara shrank behind her shields, and through the blur of her vision she saw Ronan roll down his sleeve and fasten it with calm indifference.

  "Why?" She heard herself ask the question even as she knew it was a mistake. "Why did they hurt you?"

  "They are shaauri."

  Barbarians. Demons. "Was it Kinsmen who brought you to them?"

  The muscles in his temples twitched. "I do not remember." He shifted, turning his body toward her. It was only a matter of centimeters, and yet she felt him draw closer as if the bunk had contracted beneath them. She dared to touch his hand.

  He slumped against the bulkhead, eyes open and unseeing.

  "Ronan?"

  He didn't react. She raised him by the sh
oulders, cradled his head in her hand, and shook him.

  "Ronan!"

  No response. Clenching her teeth, she cuffed him lightly in the face.

  He blinked. For a moment he seemed confused, unable to focus. He braced his hands on the bunk and shook his head.

  Cynara kept a firm grip on his arms. "Do you know what just happened?"

  "Aho'Va?" He pressed his palm to the center of his head. "Did you speak?"

  "You've had another blackout. I'm taking you back to the infirmary."

  He resisted her pull. "I am well."

  "Do you remember what we were discussing?"

  His hesitation was answer enough. "Scylla's teeth—"

  "I have suffered no harm." As if to prove his contention, he sat up very straight and rested his hands on his thighs, palms up, in an attitude of complete serenity. "May I also ask a question?"

  She laughed, spilling out her relief. "Forgive me. I am not laughing at you, my friend. Only at myself."

  "Yes." He tilted his head again in that disturbingly charming gesture. "That is the second time you have called me 'my friend.'"

  It occurred to her that he might regard such an address as being of greater significance than she intended. Papa had always accused her of being far too informal with inferiors and strangers, and the habit had only grown stronger with the vast changes in her life.

  Her crew knew how to regard such little pleasantries. The word "friend" might have an entirely different definition in Voishaaur. It might indicate a lifelong bond, or the relationship between lovers.

  All the awareness Cynara had felt in the infirmary returned like a well-placed blow to the solar plexus. She sat in a tiny cabin less than thirty centimeters from a man she found sexually attractive and intellectually fascinating. She thought about the generous bunk in her quarters, lights dimmed and Ronan VelKalevi naked in her arms.

  Then her fingers would touch the scars.

  She jerked herself back to reality. "Among humans, friendship is regarded as a way of expressing liking and trust. I want to be your friend, Ronan."

  He gave her that hooded, catlike stare that reminded her so much of Archie. "I think I know what humans call 'friendship.' It is as important as kinship, is it not?"

  "Sometimes. Kinship can be very important, but much depends upon culture, and friendship extends between members of different families, even different clans and worlds."

  "It is like… be'laik'i on—" He hesitated, consulting some mental translator. " 'Walkabout.' When shaauri at first adulthood leave House and Line and wander at will until they reach Selection. There are no limits then. Companionship among be'laik'i occurs freely until the return of the selected ones to their Houses, but it is rare that such relationships endure across Paths. With mating it is much the same."

  Cynara had heard some rumor of shaauri mating rituals—that they allowed their adolescents to experiment with sexual relationships and even bear young without regard to political boundaries or what most human societies would regard as moral restraint. Such freedom would be considered obscene on Dharma.

  Her mouth went suddenly dry. "Have you been on this Walkabout?"

  "I was a prisoner, and not permitted." He stared down at the bunk. "I remain unselected."

  Selected—chosen for or by a Path, which would determine a shaaurin's future. Ronan meant that he had never crossed the threshold of shaauri adulthood. Was it possible that intelligent beings could look at such a man and consider him still a child? Was that why they had beaten him over and over again?

  "You were alone among aliens. Were you…" Maidenly modesty now, Cyn? "Did you ever have the opportunity to take a mate?"

  Ronan dared to look up again, for the pity he had expected to hear in her voice—the pity he had seen when he had revealed his scars—was entirely gone. Instead, what he sensed in her was the brightness, the boldness, the intensity she had shown at their meeting, when he had felt the first incongruous stirrings of desire.

  He had not been permitted to satisfy the sexual needs of a be'laik'in like a normal shaaurin. Now they sprang upon him full-blown, years of restraint and deprivation shed like a winter coat at New Sun. Desire made him long to touch Cynara now as he had on the bridge.

  But that contact had yielded unexpected consequences. He had collapsed, much to his shame, aware in the burning moment just before darkness that Cynara D'Accorso was no ordinary human female. Something of her very self had bled into him like candlelight through a paper screen, shadows just beyond his grasp.

  She was like the Kinsmen—a telepath, a reader of minds. He did not know how he understood her nature so clearly when he was not of her breed. She did not make a show of her ability, yet if she chose, she could drain his thoughts from him as a myl'vekk sucked the lifeblood of its prey.

  She had not, though she undoubtedly wished to learn all he could tell her of shaauri ways so that humans would have an advantage in the long battle. Perhaps she, like Kinsmen, held to unwritten laws against stealing thoughts.

  Why should she steal? She believed she commanded him as any First might do one of lesser Path. Was he not ne'lin, and OutLine? Was 'us life not at her mercy?

  Then why did that brief sharing of her being, her scent, and the silent signals of her body—even her question—tell him that she was ready and very willing to take him as her mate?

  Kalevi-kai assist him—all she need do was command, and he would throw aside all propriety and join with her here and now. It was a deviant compulsion he had no will to resist.

  "Is it not true," he asked, his voice rough and strange to his own ears, "that humans mate freely all their lives, regardless of Path?"

  Her breath caught, and she smiled though her eyes held nothing of amusement. "You didn't answer my question."

  "I have mated," he said, "but only when humans—Kinsmen—came to Ain'Kalevi."

  "Kinsmen?"

  After a moment he recognized the source of her confusion. "Females of the Kinsmen."

  "There were no… children?"

  "I was not permitted." His ears pulled back. "One without path has few privileges."

  "And those of other Paths?"

  "It is different for each. Va'laik'i may choose their own mates for offspring or pleasure, among other va'laik'i, ve'laik'i, or rarely those of other Paths."

  "Indeed." Her gaze withdrew into some place he could not follow. "It's not always so, among humans."

  Sorrow spoke in the small muscles about her eyes and the corners of her mouth. He wished to smooth those creases with his fingertips, as close kin might do, or mates. She was neither to him. He clenched his fist at his side and averted his gaze, permitting her the dignity of her rank.

  "I'm sorry," she said. "You must be eager to understand human ways, and I haven't been very helpful."

  He copied the human gesture of denial, shaking his head once. "You have saved my life, Aho'Va D'Accorso, and done me honor."

  She smiled, and her hand came to rest on his knee. "If I am to be your first true human friend, you must call me Cynara."

  Her delicate fingers with their blunt, inoffensive nails seemed to rake through his shipsuit into flesh, branding it as even the worst beatings had never done. The hair bristled along the back of his neck, and arousal tightened his siv'alku to the brink of pain. The deck and bulkheads spun as they had on the bridge.

  Ronan caught at the one support available, the source of his confusion and the raging desire he could barely contain. Cynara's wrist felt surprisingly fragile in his grip.

  "Cynara," he said, forcing the words out between his teeth. He turned his hand about and hers with it, so that her palm lay face-up. He bent to smell her inviting fragrance, the slight dampness and flush of surprise. He grazed her soft skin with the tip of his tongue. She flinched.

  "This is not appropriate, Ronan," she said, breathing quickly. "Please release me."

  He tasted her palm again, savoring the complex palette of flavors. The need to join with Cynara D'Accorso scatter
ed all thought of race and rank like so much chaff. "Is it not your wish to mate?"

  * * *

  Chapter 4

  « ^ »

  Cynara's mouth dropped open, revealing a row of white, even teeth. She shut it firmly and became First again, the leader he had met on the bridge.

  "I understand that you have been deprived of most human contact, Ronan, and that your circumstances are difficult," she said coldly. "Among humans, seizing another in this way is a hostile act. I advise you to release me immediately."

  His hand opened in automatic obedience to her will. She snapped free, jumped up, and strode to the door, setting her back to it but disdaining its support. She seemed to draw upon some human breathing exercise to calm her agitation, just as Ronan chanted out the Eightfold Way to steady his racing pulse.

  He should have looked away, acknowledging his error. He did not. He met her gaze in the challenge of equals, holding his body rigid against the need to seize her again.

  "Ronan," she said, as if speaking to a child, "we have had a misunderstanding, which I regret. Humans may touch in friendship, to give comfort and for no reason beyond. That is one thing you should learn immediately if you are to live with us."

  Sihvaaro had told him that among all sentient beings there was a darkness that sometimes claimed the soul, overcoming all sense of rightness and tradition. Rejection was nothing new to Ronan, no more than shame. But that insidious darkness crept upon him now, sinking its needle-sharp teeth into the core of his reason.

  "You are still my friend," he said, "even though I am of no Path, and you are First of this fine ship? Even though this ne'lin dared to offer mating to one so great?" He exposed his throat in mock submission. "One is prepared to die for this offense, Aho'Va. It is your right under shaauri law."

  She let out an explosive breath and laughed. "Your law permits one shaauri to kill another because—" She shook her head, loosening the red hair she kept confined in a knot at the base of her neck. "We truly don't understand each other. You speak as though you are nothing. You're wrong, Ronan. You—" She stopped, a new expression of deep concentration on her face, and touched the tiny receiver cradled in the hollow of her ear. Ronan listened. A faint human voice buzzed from the device, pitched in tones of alarm. When Cynara turned back to Ronan, her eyes were hard as skystones.