Invaded (24 page)

Still in a daze, Cara stammered a few times before getting the words out. “It never
rang. Or buzzed, or whatever.” She pointed at the bloody trail and tried not to let
her voice
crack. “I didn’t do that.”

“Of course you didn’t,” Jaxen said. But he dropped his gaze to the floor and puckered
his brow. “Now that you’re here, you can help us understand.”

“Understand what?”

“During the last class change,” Aisly said, “two clones found Dahla brutally stabbed,
along with a message scrawled in blood.” Her gaze flickered to Jaxen’s.
“It said,
I’ll come for you next
. But it was written in English.”

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Cara argued. “Lots of people here speak English.”

Jaxen hesitated twice before telling her, “The boys claim they had a feud with your
brother—and that you and Dahla have had several altercations.”

Cara closed her eyes and tried to think. Someone was still trying to frame her, but
it couldn’t be Dahla. Maybe Odom and Skall were to blame. Both boys had access to
Dahla’s
breakfast that day in the dining hall. “I’ll bet one of them attacked her and wrote
that message.”

“But the guard searched your room,” Aisly said. “And found a bloody kitchen blade.”

“Along with several decapitated animals and a
h’urr
blossom,” Jaxen added softly.

“No,” Cara whispered. She didn’t even know what a
h’urr
blossom looked like, let alone how to extract a neurotoxin from it. “I swear I didn’t
do
it.”

Jaxen took a tentative step toward her, holding both hands forward like a crossing
guard. “You’ve been under a lot of pressure,
Cah
-ra. You’re alone and worried for
your people. If you feel hopeless or depressed, perhaps you require…help. We can provide
that for you.”

So now they thought she was criminally insane? “I don’t need help,” she cried. “Someone
planted the knife and blossom, and Vero put dead animals in my room as a
present.”

Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say if she wanted to avoid sounding crazy.

The group exchanged worried glances and began using Silent Speech to cut her out of
the conversation. A vise tightened around Cara’s lungs. She could use Silent Speech
to clear her name,
but her instincts begged her not to let Jaxen and Aisly find out she could communicate
with her mind.

But what choice did she have? The siblings were in control here. One word from either
of them would deem her innocent beyond reproach. As members of The Way, their decree
was law.

Wait.

There were
ten
members of The Way, and even Jaxen and Aisly answered to a higher power. Cara had
one other option to save herself. It meant putting her trust in an Elder she barely
knew, but she’d gladly take the risk. Cara licked her lips and stood tall, faking
a confidence she didn’t possess.

“I held a
Sh’ovah
,” she declared. “I’m a citizen and I have rights.”

Aisly tipped her head in confusion. “Of course you do.”

“Then I request a private audience with Alona,” Cara said. “And only her. I want to
go to the capital.”

A
elyx couldn’t stop thinking about the probe—and more specifically, who’d sent it.
When the Voyagers had discovered Earth,
they’d descended in a cloaked shuttle to explore the landscapes and urban centers.
After determining a reasonably low safety risk, a crew of twelve had integrated with
the human population,
altering their eye color with medicated drops and wearing street clothes to observe
human culture. Later, they’d reported their findings to The Way and received authorization
to make official
contact.

But that wasn’t happening on L’eihr.

The fact that an advanced race had launched a fleet of scouting devices meant one
of two things: either the society lacked the capacity for interplanetary travel—which
Aelyx doubted based
on the probe’s extensive language database—or the senders didn’t wish to establish
personal contact. If the latter were true, he had to consider the possibility of an
invasion.

Had The Way kept the probes a secret for fear of alarming the citizens? Was L’eihr
covertly preparing for war? No, that couldn’t be the case. The Aegis would train the
clones for
combat if an outside force posed a threat, and from what Cara had told him, the routine
hadn’t changed.

Curse it all, what was going on?

He wanted to ask Stepha, but then Aelyx would have to explain how he knew of the probe’s
existence. And Syrine was no help. Her mind was so clouded by infatuation that Aelyx
had refused to
engage in Silent Speech with her until she regained control of her libido. He wished
she would simply bed David and be done with it. The tension inside the hotel penthouse
was thick enough to
spread on toast.

Aelyx leaned back in his leather armchair and watched Syrine, who in turn ogled David
from her place on the sofa. Their bodyguard had taken Aelyx’s advice of giving Syrine
space, and it
had worked too well. She wanted David so badly she’d begun daydreaming torrid fantasies
about him…which was a disturbing thing to glimpse through Silent Speech.

In the interest of figuring out what was going on, he needed to clear Syrine’s mind
so they could work together. Which meant giving her “relationship” a little nudge.
“David,” he said. When his friend glanced up from his magazine, Aelyx suggested, “You
should show Syrine that card trick you did for the guards last night.”

David made a show of considering the request, then waved it off. “She doesn’t want
to see that.”

“Yes, I do,” she said in a rush. Aelyx could practically hear Syrine mentally chiding
herself for answering so quickly. She faked an unaffected shrug. “I mean, there’s
nothing else to do while we’re trapped in here.”

David continued playing hard to get. “Nah. You’ll figure out the trick and call me
a stupid human.”

“No, I won’t.”

“That’s what you say every time you beat me at backgammon.”

“Because you deserve it,” she criticized. “You make careless mistakes. Sometimes I
think you’re losing to me on purpose.”

Aelyx rolled his eyes. “Let’s make it interesting,” he said. “Syrine, you pick a card,
and if David guesses it correctly, you give him something. But if he can’t
guess it—”

“A bet?” she interrupted.

“Exactly.”

She thought for a moment, then gave a decided nod and nudged David’s leg with her
socked foot. “What shall we wager?”

Though David maintained a disinterested expression, his eyes brightened. “I don’t
know. What do you want?”

Aelyx knew exactly what she wanted. “How about this,” he said. “The loser has to bring
the winner supper in bed tonight.” If getting them alone in a bedroom while the
ambassador was away didn’t set something in motion, nothing would.

Syrine smiled as if she’d already won. “Perfect. I’ll have a turkey club sandwich
from the hotel deli—on freshly baked rye, no condiments and no tomatoes.”

“That’s what you think,” David said as he threw his magazine on the coffee table and
pulled a pack of cards from his back pocket. “I’ll have a calzone from the
deli, and then you’ll feed me grapes while I lounge on a stack of pillows.”

“You’ll feed
me
sliced pears,” Syrine countered. “Drizzled in cinnamon and honey.”

“Honey?” David’s throat bobbed. “I love honey, especially…drizzled on stuff.”

Sacred Mother. Aelyx was going to be sick. “Just do it already.”

“Patience, my friend.” David collected himself and shuffled the deck. “I don’t want
to give Syrine a reason to accuse me of cheating when she loses.”

And she
would
lose. Aelyx had watched David stump his fellow soldiers a dozen times last night
when he’d stepped into the hall to put out the recycling. Afterward, David had
confided that the deck was marked. He’d bought it from a specialty store in New Jersey.
The cards were decorated in an intricate—and deftly coded—design that only David could
interpret.

He offered Syrine a chance to cut the deck and then fanned out the cards so she could
choose one. When she made her selection, David told her to hold the card in front
of her face and study it
closely. The pretense was that he would try to read her thoughts, but in reality,
it gave him a clear view of the encrypted symbols in the upper right-hand corner.

“Do you have it memorized?” David asked.

“Mmm-hmm.”

He handed her the stack. “Then put it back in the deck.”

Thinking she was clever, Syrine slipped her card on top of the pile and snatched the
deck to shuffle it. “I know how this trick works,” she boasted. “You positioned a
key card
in the deck when I wasn’t looking. But now it’s out of order.” With a beaming smile,
she handed him the stack. “You’ll never guess my card.”

Aelyx held back a laugh while David searched the deck, pretending to seek a card he’d
already identified. David held one up and announced, “The jack of clubs.”

“No, it was the five of hearts!” Syrine bounced in her seat, clapping wildly. “I win!”

Flashing a wry grin, David wrapped a rubber band around the deck. “Yep, you beat me
fair ’n’ square. Guess I’ll be feeding you pears and honey tonight.” He peeked
up at her. “Hey, any chance you’re hungry? Dinner’s not for a while, but I spotted
a fresh pear in the fridge. If you want, you can go get comfy and I’ll bring it to
you.”

Aelyx hid a smile. He should be taking notes, because David was a damned genius.

Syrine was too busy gloating to realize she’d been played like a game of sticks. “Okay.
Make sure you slice them extra thin, and don’t forget the cinnamon.” She
practically skipped to her room and left the door open for David to follow her into
paradise.

“And that, my friend,” David said, pointing at Aelyx, “is how it’s done.”

Needless to say, Aelyx spent the rest of the afternoon alone.

At dinnertime, he prepared a bowl of lo mein noodles and settled at the dining room
table with a data tablet he’d borrowed from the ambassador. While Aelyx ate, he scanned
the Voyager
archives for information about the life-forms they’d discovered. He’d read most of
these files in past years, but perhaps he’d overlooked a crucial detail that would
lead him to
the identity of whoever had launched the probes.

To shorten the possibilities, he sorted the list by intelligence, which left eleven
sentient species. He eliminated ten of those because their technology hadn’t advanced
beyond the use of
basic gear systems. The remaining race of beings had gone extinct fifty years ago
from a lethal pandemic.

After an hour of research, Aelyx was no closer to solving the mystery. All that remained
to explore were various academic theories on the existence of interstellar travelers.
It was worth a try.
His first search yielded a thesis by Larish, who believed aliens called “the Aribol”
had abducted a legion of ancient humans from the Black Sea region and relocated them
to
L’eihr, where the soldiers had perpetuated Aelyx’s entire race. Other scholars argued
that humanity traced their lineage to L’eihr. But what none of these dissertations
told him
were any details about the Aribol.

Did the society truly exist? And why would the Aribol send probes to investigate L’eihr
if they had already been there, thousands of years ago, when they’d allegedly seeded
the human
battalion? Aelyx was more confused than ever. He wondered if it would seem suspicious
to contact Larish for more information.

He was still debating whether to message the scholar when Syrine’s bedroom door clicked
open and she drifted into view as if floating on air, an intoxicated grin dimpling
her cheeks. She
stopped in the kitchen to fill a glass with water, then sat opposite Aelyx at the
long wooden table and rested her chin in her hand.

She sighed dreamily. “That was an amazing pear.”

“Oh?” Aelyx laughed and checked his watch. “Then why did it take three hours for you
to finish it?”

Instead of blushing or stammering as he’d expected, Syrine widened her smile with
a contentment that said nothing in the world could provoke her tonight. Aelyx noted
the sheen in her eyes.
This was no mere infatuation—she was completely smitten.

“When each bite is that heavenly,” she said, “you want to savor it as slowly as you
can.”

Aelyx wrinkled his nose. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“We probably shouldn’t use Silent Speech for a while,” she added with a giggle.

“I appreciate the warning.”

He’d never seen Syrine so happy. The perpetual smile on her mouth made his own lips
curve in response. He’d wanted this for her—a morsel of normalcy and comfort in the
wake of
Eron’s death—but still, Aelyx couldn’t stop the tentacles of envy from gripping his
chest. Until today, Syrine had never kissed a boy, and now even
she
knew more about
physical love than he did. Sometimes he worried it would never happen for him, that
he and Cara were jinxed.

Syrine must have read his heart. “Only one month until you see your
Elire
.” Her gaze was sympathetic, even as she teased, “If you’re nice to me, I might give
you
some pointers.”

Laughing, Aelyx grabbed the nearest object he could reach—a cloth napkin—and threw
it at Syrine’s head. “You can shove your pointers!”

David strode into the dining area, refastening a gun holster around his hips. “What’s
so funny?” When he stood behind Syrine and rested both palms on her shoulders, she
reached
up and covered his hands with her own, not the least bit ashamed to show him affection.
Aelyx attributed the uncharacteristic behavior to the rush of dopamine in her system.
A post-sex haze.

“Nothing,” Aelyx said. “Did you tell Syrine the secret to your card trick?”

David dropped a kiss on top of Syrine’s head. “Nope. A magician never reveals his
secrets. Besides, I might want to raise the stakes and win a bet with her someday.”