I had decided she was insane—only in the Legion it was sometimes difficult to tell. I had done the same thing in the same raid, slaughtering an unarmed Coldmarker. The difference was I had been surprised and terrified and acted out of panic and instinct. Boudicca had had plenty of time—and she had not been afraid. Wasn't that the difference?
I had been in a blind panic—how could I blame myself? How could I compare myself with her? She was insane—completely insane. I shuddered. I had never reported Boudicca's crime. I was not sure why—possibly because I thought I was just as guilty as she was.
Snow Leopard finished his speech. We slowly dispersed. Boudicca and the remnants of her squad were silent—they did not seem surprised. Boudicca must have been briefed on this beforehand, otherwise she would have surely exploded. I prayed to the Dead that she would not be in a leadership position over Beta. She had lost most of her squad—nothing could change that. Whether it was her fault or not, the hand of death was on her now.
"Thinker." Ironman said. He settled down beside me, leaning his E against a dropbox. "Got something for you." He was keeping his voice low. "Don't let anybody see it."
He slipped me a tiny, carefully folded square of silky cloth.
"It's from Moontouch," he added. A chill shot through my system. I looked around guiltily. Priestess was lost in dreams, looking up at the sky. Nobody was paying any attention to us.
"How in Heaven's name did you get this?" I asked Ironman quietly as I unfolded the silk. Moontouch was a Taka girl—a sorceress, a princess, and my secret obsession.
"I just received it last night. I got one from Morning Light—Moontouch wrote it for her. Morning Light can't write. That one was enclosed for you." It was covered with spidery, silvery Taka runes.
"Last night?" I gaped at him. We were thousands of K from Sunmarch. Alpha Base was on the opposite side of the planet. We had not seen the girls since we had left on the Coldmark Mission. The Legion had been a tad busy lately, and there was no time for nonsense. "How did they do it?"
"Never mind how they did it. The Taka are very resourceful—as you see." Ironman flashed his innocent little boy smile at me. He was quite a guy.
"Right, how do I read this?" I was so excited I was not thinking. Atom could read Taka by now, but I could only speak it.
"Your Persist can read it, Thinker."
Right. The tacmod, dummy! My comtop was clipped to my waist. I left it there, powered it on and pressed the message up against the visor.
Nobody was paying any attention to me. "You get that, Sweety?" I spoke softly into the shoulder mike.
"Yes, Thinker," my tacmod replied. "This communication is addressed to you. It is written in classical Taka runes from the Age of the Book."
"Translate, please."
"Translation follows: 'For Slayer, my Lord, my King, my Master, my Maker, my Sword, my Heart and my Soul'." Sweety's metallic voice was devoid of emotion. "'Your slave sends her love, from the land of the living dead. You are in my prayers and in my dreams. My nights are yours alone. You walk with me in the halls of the Holy Dead. All of the power of Those Who Went Before is yours now. The Dead be with you, marching before you, in the name of the Book. I bless you, in the name of the Book. My prayers rise in the dark, carried by incense, to the Realm of the Gods.
"'I await you, alone with the dead. I write my Book of Sorrows, for you to read under the Moon upon your return, and burn in the dawn of our new life. I cry, haunted by your ghost. I pray for your return.
"'I knit a cloak of treesilk, for you. When it is finished, you will return to me. When you come, I will kneel before my King and cry grateful tears of joy. I will sing a song of love, for you. I will make warm tea of flowers and herbs, for you. I will bathe your weary limbs in oil and perfume—for you. All this I do for you every night in my dreams and every day in my mind. My days are only a passing mist, not quite real.
"'The past is real and strong. I pray on my knees, in fields of bones, for your glorious return. Tears streak my cheeks, and the chanting of my prayers rises in the halls of the dead.
"'Your child stirs within me. It is strong and active. I pray for a boy. He will be a King, in our bright new world, and King of the Dark as well. I will guard your child with my life, and present him—for you—when you return.
"'I am your slave, and the vessel of your love. She Who Was Moontouch.' End translation."
I sat there stunned, cold rivers running through my veins. Moontouch was pregnant! She was going to have my baby!
###
"We're in dock mode." We crowded around a viewport of the assault craft, anxious to see our destination. We were in deep space, unimaginable light years from any inhabited world. Billions of cold silvery stars glowed against a field of velvet black, and glittering phosphorescent nebulae of gas and dust swirled in frozen splendor as far as we could see. This was the Outvac, further from anything than I or anyone else had ever been, or probably ever would be again. It was so far and lonely that the fear was on my skin like a frost, and my heart had slowed. How far can you really go before you die? Surely there must be a limit. And we must be almost there, for there was nothing here—absolutely nothing. Only the Outvac, and billions of strange stars from billions of years ago; some of them not even there any more; ghost stars, the light hitting our retinas, a magical picture of the past, and every star was a lie. I feared maybe there was really nothing there at all, only us, alone in the vac, microbes falling into infinity, a fragile sliver of life.
"There! Look!" A tiny silvery speck, reflecting starlight. Growing.
"Prep for docking. Secure all personnel." We ignored the command and maintained our post by the viewport. It was growing, glittering, gliding silently through space. A microscopic silver ship, lost in the immensity of the vac. What could it be? They had told us nothing.
Larger. The details coming into view now.
"It's a cruiser!" A magnificent vision, a cruiser of molten mercury, in cold starlight. A Legion cruiser, growing larger and larger. A vision to die for, growing like magic as we approached.
"It's the Spawn!" Unmistakable—a ragged cheer. The Spawn had carried Beta to Coldmark, then to Andrion 3. She was an old friend.
"Yes, it's the Spawn," Snow Leopard said quietly. "Our old friend, the Spawn. Come back, to finish the job. She has a surprise for us. A surprise." His pink eyes were far away.
One had been very quiet lately. We did not dare ask him anything. He knew what the mission was, and he didn't like it. I looked around at the others. It did not matter—we were back to the Spawn!
###
"Permission to board, sir—Beta and Gamma Two Four, Second of the Ship." Beta One gave a smart salute. It was returned by the Spawn's docking officer.
"Board, Beta. Welcome back. There's a delegation waiting for you—come on in."
A delegation? We filed through the triple docking lock and four troopers were waiting for us in black dress uniforms, braced, ready for inspection. A thrill of recognition shot through my veins.
"Element reporting for duty, sir!" It was Beta Two, Coolhand, snapping a salute to One. He looked terrific—tall and lean, a mop of curly brown hair, tanned and handsome, in perfect shape.
"Is the element fit for combat, Two?" One paused before Coolhand, looking over the troops.
"Ten sir! We are all cleared for unrestricted duty."
"How's the leg, Coolhand?"
"Excellent, sir! Better than before."
"Good." One paused before Beta Four. "Merlin? How are you feeling?"
"Perfect, sir! Fully recovered." Merlin looked a bit tense, but he always looked nervous. We could certainly use him, wherever we were bound. He was smarter than the rest of us put together.