Raen touched its scent-patches, accepted and gave taste in the insist kiss. It backed, disturbed as Warrior had been disturbed; but it had Warrior’s knowledge of her, and Grouped, with a delicate touch of the chelae.
“Meth-maren,” it breathed. Its fellow came forward, and likewise desired taste; Raen gave it, and saw distress in the working of mandibles and the flutter of palps. It resolved its conflict after a moment, touched at her.
They were hers. They followed, as she crossed the littered floor. The two guard azi were still standing against the wall; no one had claimed them, and they seemed in a state of shock. They had lost their employers. They had failed. Merek Eln and Parn Kest were dead, both bitten. One of the businessmen was decapitated; the others had been bitten. So had the third guard azi, and a number of bystanders.
The luggage carrier had been thrust back into a recess beyond the counter. Raen walked that way, and found Jim, jammed within that recess, sitting with his knees tucked up and both hands clutching a gun set upon them. His face was white; his teeth chattered; he had the gun braced and stable.
Guarding the luggage, as she had told him.
For an instant she hesitated, not knowing what he might do; but he did not fire…likely could not fire. She approached him quietly and disengaged the gun from his hands, realised Warrior’s presence at her shoulder and bade it and its companion stay back. She knelt, put her hand on Jim’s rigid arm.
“We need to get out of here. Come on, Jim.”
He nodded. Out of near-catatonia, it was a wonder that he could do that much. She patted his shoulder and waited, and he wiped at his face and began to make small movements toward rising, shaking convulsively.
She thought then of the other two azi, who had been in the shuttle with them, who had heard what was said. She flung herself to her feet and pushed past Warrior, past the counter.
The two azi stared at her; they had not moved. But by now Security police, betas ITAK-badged, had arrived on the scene, and some of them started gingerly forward.
“You,” she said, rounding on-the two azi, “belong to me. Is that clear? I’m transferring your contract. The formalities will be taken care of. You say nothing… nothing, hear me? I’m buying you out only because I don’t like terminating azi.”
The two seemed to believe her. She turned then and faced the police, who had hesitated at a safe distance—the majat were still near her—and now started forward again.
“There’s been enough commotion,” she said, turning toward them her hand, that, with her cloak, was identification enough. “This was a hive-matter and that’s enough said. It’s settled.” She walked to Merek Eln’s body, bent and took from his pocket the identity card she had seen at customs. There was, as she had expected, an address. It seemed to be in an ITAK executive district. “I want some manner of transport for myself, three azi, our baggage and two Warriors at once; and an armed officer or two for escort, thank you.”
Possibly they thought that this had to go through channels; they stood still a moment. But then the senior gave orders to one of the officers, who left, running.
“Chances are,” Raen said, “that the matter is confined to the hives; but you’ll kindly call and put this number under immediate surveillance. And you can escort us to that vehicle.”
The officer looked at the ID, made a call on his belt unit…would have retained the card, but that Raen held out her hand and insisted. She turned, pocketing it, and gestured to the two guard azi to take charge of the baggage. Jim was leaning on the counter, seeming to have recovered himself, although he was still shaken. She returned the gun to him and he hastily put it in his pocket, missing the opening several times in his agitation. He walked well enough. Warrior and companion stalked along with them, and the shop personnel and the terminal employees and others who had reason to be in the cordoned area stared at them uneasily as they sought the door.
“The car will be there,” the senior officer said. “There’s an executive from the Hoard coming out to meet you, Kontrin; we’re profoundly embarrassed—”
“My sincere regrets for the next of kin. I want a list of the names and citizen numbers and relatives of those killed. There will be compensation and burial expenses. Relay the information to that address. As for the executive, I’m more interested in settling myself at the moment. There’s another call I want you to make. I understand there’s an Outsider trade mission in the City. I want someone from that mission… I don’t care who…at that address as quickly as possible.”
“Sera—”
“I wouldn’t advise you to consult with ITAK on it. Or to fail to do it.”
Outer doors opened. She heard the officer behind her speaking urgently on the matter through his belt unit; it would be relayed. An ITAK police personnel transport waited outside, armoured officers with rifles ringed about it. Raen kept her hand near her own weapon, trusting no one.
It took time to load baggage in, to have the azi and the two majat settled in the available space in the rear of the transport. “We can find a car,” an officer said; Raen shook her head. She did not trust being separated from her belongings. She still feared majat, a solving shot; their vision could hardly tell one human from another, but they were stirred enough not to care for such niceties.
The majat must go in last. Warrior fretted, nervous at so many humans it must not touch. Raen touched the sensitive palps, held it attentive an instant. “You must not touch the azi in the vehicle, Warrior. Must not frighten them. Trust. Be very still. You-unit tell the other Warrior so.”
It boomed answer, protest, perhaps; but it boarded, its partner with it. The officer slammed the door. Raen hurried round and flung herself in beside the driver. A man slammed the door. She set her drawn gun comfortably on her knee in plain sight as they moved out, watching the shadows of the pillars as they whipped past the terminal entry for the exit ramp.
They were clear. She gave the officer driving the address she wanted and relaxed slightly, trying not to think of Warrior and its companion and the azi in the rear, behind the partition, and what misery they were severally undergoing, two Warriors forbidden to touch and three azi pent up with majat in near darkness.
Night-time city whisked past, lines of domes marching out into dark interstices of wild land, asterisk-city, mostly sealed or underground. The flavour of the air was coppery and unpleasant. The stormclouds boiled above them, frequent with lightnings, and a spattering of rain hit the windshields and windows, fragmenting the lights. Then they were underground again, locked into the subway track, whisking in behind a big public carrier. Raen hated these systems, this projectile-fashion passage through public areas; but it was, perhaps, the safest means of travel this night.
Majat hives did not have communication equipment-no links with station—but majat had been ready for them: red. hive, with ambush prepared. Humans had participated in it almost certainly.
And more than Warrior had died: two beta envoys were gone two who had been in prolonged contact with a Kontrin, who had perhaps talked too much.
She was not about to trust ITAK, She doubted, at least, that they would move against her openly: it might be—if they knew she was alone, that there was not behind her an entire Kontrin sept and House—
But one bluffed. It was all, in fact, that Kontrin had ever been able to do among betas, in one sense—for the armed ships that rested solely in Kontrin hands were inevitably far away when one might need them; but the ships did exist. So did the intimate knowledge of the psych-sets with which the original beta culture had been created. So did the power to license and embargo, to adjust birth quotas, to readjust any economic fact of a beta’s existence, individually or by class.