The Tangled Shore had been one more terraforming project by the Awoken when they first colonized the asteroid belt. They had excelled in lashing together asteroids and ships into continents. Somehow they set them rotating and gave them atmosphere and gravity. The Renegade didn't ask how. With the Awoken, it was better not to know.
While many of their terraformed continents were inhabited, the Tangled Shore lay close to the outer edges of the Reef and had been left vacant. Before long, it became a haven for criminals, pirates, and Eliksni with no ties to any House. Cruelty and cunning were the only laws, at least until Spider moved in.
Spider was an Eliksni crime lord, and he brought a semblance of order to the Tangled Shore. His webs stretched far and wide, and he had gathered many Eliksni under his banner who might otherwise have died. In that respect, the Renegade supposed Spider had done some good.
The Renegade approached the Tangled Shore from the back, drifting the Talion among the asteroids, watching for other ships. He had been followed from Aries Station, so he had made several near-lightspeed jumps, angling his trajectory for Mars and Venus, before doubling back and hiding in the debris field of the Reef.
Aerith sat beside him, a small, upright figure in the copilot seat. Her bright eyes watched his hands on the instruments, and often turned to his face. Every so often, she asked a question.
"What's your name?" she asked.
"Shin Malphur," he replied.
"It's my pleasure to meet you, Mr. Malphur," she said, and made a tiny Reef bow with her hand before her face.
The Renegade cracked a smile for the first time in years. His face had nearly forgotten how.
Aerith was quiet as he worked through the jumps, disposing of his tails. Once they returned to the Reef and slipped into the welcome cover of the asteroids, Aerith spoke again. "You're a Lightbearer."
"Yes."
"Are you dead?"
"No."
"I heard that all Lightbearers were dead."
"We were dead once," said the Renegade. "Not anymore."
"Because your Ghost brought you back?"
"Yes."
"May I see your Ghost?"
He summoned Ghost with a thought. She appeared at his shoulder in a swirl of transmat energy, and her blue eye turned to the girl.
"Hello," said Aerith, smiling. "What's your name?"
"Ghost," said Ghost.
"How come you're a girl?" Aerith asked. "I didn't know Ghosts could be girls."
"How come you're a girl?" Ghost asked.
Aerith laughed. "I was born a girl."
"Same for me," said Ghost.
"You were born?" Aerith asked. "I thought the Traveler made you."
"The origin of a life is its birth," said Ghost, twirling her shell good-naturedly. "Creation happens in many ways."
Aerith nodded and held out a hand. "May I touch you?"
The Renegade pressed her hand back into her lap. "Never touch a Lightbearer's Ghost."
"Oh." Aerith folded her hands in her lap and gazed at them. "I apologize. I didn't mean to offend."
"You didn't know," said Ghost. "It's all right."
Silence filled the cockpit. The Renegade concentrated on navigating along the length of half a colony ship.
"Your ability, now," said the Renegade abruptly. "You see the future, right?"
"Do I?" said Aerith.
"You saw those men coming minutes before they came," said the Renegade.
"Oh, that," said Aerith, as if had asked her about her mathematics scores. "Yes, I have second sight. But I can't control it. It comes on its own."
"If you could control it," said the Renegade, "no one could ever hurt you again. You'd see it coming."
"I know," Aerith said in a low voice. "I try to see things. Sometimes I'll be sitting and doing school work when I get a flash of what we're having for lunch. But it never comes when I want it. It's why those men were able to grab me."
"You have this power, and yet you were in an orphanage," said the Renegade.
Aerith turned her glowing purple eyes on him in an expression of sadness, but did not answer.
The Renegade read her expression at a glance. His instincts, long trained to detect lies and half-truths, told him that something didn't add up. Awoken children with rare powers did not wind up in orphanages. They were sent to train as tech witches.
The Renegade asked no more questions. He drifted with the debris field, watching for trackers. Finally, after a long time, he drifted into the Tangled Shore.
He landed the Talion in a crack between two asteroids. The deep shadows concealed the ship's outline, and it looked impossible to fly a ship in or out. Which was why the Renegade used it.
"Bundle up," he said, unstrapping his flight harness. "The Shore's a cold place." He found her one of his old jackets and a helmet with warm padding inside. The jacket hung on Aerith's small frame like a trenchcoat. The helmet was too large, but it hid her glowing purple eyes. That was all the Renegade wanted.
In his mind, Ghost asked, "Is it wise to take a child to the places we're going?"
"She can't stay here," the Renegade thought.
Ghost began to protest, then thought better of it. She, too, thought uneasily of what might happen if their ship was found unattended with the child inside.
The Renegade set out into the cold wind with the child at his side. It was not far to the buildings in the distance, but the girl's short legs could not keep up with his long strides. She stumbled twice before he halted.
"Sparrow," he thought.
"You?" Ghost replied in his head. "Use a sparrow?"
She transmatted the vehicle in from his ship, dusty and disused, a motorcycle with hover thrusters instead of wheels. He wiped off the seat and helped Aerith aboard.
"I've never ridden a sparrow before," she said, her eyes shining with excitement even through the helmet's visor.
The Renegade climbed on behind her. "Don't get used to it, kid."
It was barely two minutes to the buildings of Sorik's Cut, but Aerith was so elated at their speed that he circled a couple of rock formations, just to entertain her further. When they pulled to a halt before a domed, metal building, she let out a cry of disappointment.
"We still have to ride back," the Renegade pointed out, stepping down.
As she dismounted without further protest, he added, "This is a rough place. Stick close to me and keep quiet. You have any visions, poke me."
"Why are we here, then?" Aerith asked, looking at the thick metal door and hugging herself in sudden fear.
"Information," said the Renegade. "On you and the men who captured you. Quiet, now."
He approached the door and knocked twice. A tiny window opened in the door, revealing a set of four glowing Eliksni eyes. "What?" it barked.
The Renegade held up a glimmer cube.
The alien eyed the cube. Then it slammed the peephole and unlocked the metal door. It ushered them into a dim, smoky room heavy with the odors of ether and greasy food. There were a variety of tables made of repurposed scrap metal, no two alike. Chairs had been made of everything from old tires to coils of chains welded together.
At the counter stood a huge Awoken man in a dirty apron. His head was shaved, and his blue skin was marked with Corsair tattoos. He was filling an ether bottle from a tank in the back, chatting with an Eliksni customer in his own tongue. There were several Eliksni scattered among the tables, as well as humans, Awoken, a couple of Corsairs, and an Exo.
Aerith's hand found his and clung tightly, conveying her fear. He squeezed it encouragingly, and led her up to the bartender.
"Cor," said the Renegade.
The huge Awoken man nodded. "Shin." His glowing eyes flicked to the child beside him. "Taking in strays, now?"
"Someone already did," said the Renegade. "I need to know who, and why."
Cor shrugged. "I ain't seen no kids coming through here. You might try the Crow. He sees everything around the Shore, especially cargo." He nodded to a cloaked and hooded figure at the far end of the bar, nursing a small bottle of something strong.
The Renegade eyed the figure up and down, making note of the black scale armor, the once-expensive boots, now caked with mud, and the faded embroidery on the brown poncho.
"Crow?" he muttered.
"Lightbearer," said Cor, his own eyes flicking to the hooded figure. "Spider's enforcer. Watch yourself."
The Renegade glanced at the girl beside him, but she stood quiet, holding the hem of his cloak and watching an Eliksni inhale ether. No visions of danger.
The Renegade moved down the counter, picked up a stool, and sat beside the Crow. He helped Aerith sit beside him on another stool.
The Crow peered sideways at them, under the hood. Glaring eyes. Upset at being disturbed.
The Renegade leaned his elbows on the counter. "I'm after information," he said without looking at the man. "Someone is kidnapping Awoken kids. I need to know who."
The Crow straightened slightly, looking at the girl on the stool. He hunched down again. "I don't know anything."
The Renegade slid him a cube of fifty glimmer bits.
The Crow swept the cube under his cloak. "Not here," he muttered. "Out back."
The Crow finished his drink, slid off the stool, and sauntered out the door. A moment later, the Renegade nudged the girl, and they followed.
The back of the pub was fenced off with barbed wire wrapped around metal beams driven into the ground as fence posts. Crates of goods filled the yard, all under tarps lashed to the ground to protect them from the relentless wind. Crow waited for them behind this fence, arms folded, his tattered cloak whipping against his legs.
The Renegade leaned against the fence beside him, and followed his gaze to the distant hills. They were barren and rocky, with a road winding out of sight between them. Aerith crouched in the shelter of a crate and hugged herself.
"Awoken kids?" Crow said without preamble. "Or Eliksni?"
"This one happens to be Awoken," said the Renegade. "Found her in one of Bender's auctions."
The Crow shook his head. "I told Bender if he ever set foot in Thieves' Landing again, I'd put a bullet in his head. Caught him swindling a couple of starving females out of the ether they needed for their young."
The Renegade grunted. This was normal business for Rod Bender. "No kids?"
"No Awoken kids," the Crow said. "Plenty of Eliksni. The various Houses catch them young, dock them, bring them up as Dregs. Never even give them a chance. I've been putting a stop to that."
The Renegade grunted approvingly. Whoever the Crow had been in his past life, he seemed a decent man in his new one. The Reef needed more decent men.
"Any idea if Awoken kids are being trafficked, now?" the Renegade asked. He glanced at Aerith as he spoke. She was crouched low, out of the wind, watching in fascination as a rock beetle made its bumbling way up a boulder.
The Crow shook his head. "Haven't seen a sign of any. If it's Rod Bender, though, I can give you the names of his suppliers. I keep records of every scum who does business with Spider. You know. In case the deal goes sour."
"Thanks," said the Renegade. "I have to stop by Thieves' Landing to return some cargo. I'll pick up your data then."
He passed Crow another fifty glimmer bit piece. Crow accepted it without a word. He walked off in the direction of a beat-up jumpship docked among the rocks. The Renegade beckoned to Aerith and led her back to where he'd left his sparrow. As they climbed aboard, Aerith said, "It was that Exo."
"Who was?" said the Renegade.
"The Exo with Mr. Bender," she said. "He's the one who kidnapped me. He's very strong."
The Renegade had no doubt of that, remembering the spiked club swinging at his head.
As he reached for the handlebars, Aerith grabbed his arm. "Men up ahead," she whispered. "With guns. They're waiting for us to return to the ship."
"How many?" The Renegade's eyes swept the landscape. No sign of anyone.
"Four," she said. "In dirty armor."
The Renegade thought about it for a moment. The girl's second sight was a few minutes ahead of reality. The men probably weren't in position yet. The Renegade wasn't worried about a firefight, but he couldn't risk Aerith picking up a bullet.
"New plan," he said. "I walk. You keep the sparrow. Drive over that ridge over there and hide in the gully. Stay on the sparrow. You see danger, you drive."
She looked up at him and nodded fearfully, her purple eyes very bright.
The Renegade stepped off the sparrow and watched her carefully drive away, accelerating in spurts as she learned the controls. He watched until she crossed the ridge and disappeared. Then he strode toward his ship.
"Ghost, how many?" he thought.
"Four hostiles, like Aerith said," Ghost replied in his head. "Three are poorly outfitted. Looks like hired thugs from around the cut. The fourth is Sutter."
"Sutter's here?" His hand dropped to the iron at his hip.
"In the flesh," Ghost replied. "He's wearing Guardian armor under his cloak, the dirt bag. Bullets will have a hard time getting through."
The Renegade ground his teeth. "We'll make them count." He reached for the Light, opening his connection to the Traveler. The flicker of Solar Light awaited him, in every form that fire could take. Above it crackled Arc light, and beneath them both waited the Void, shimmering and still.
Deeper still lay the ice, but the Renegade wasn't as desperate as all that.
The Renegade drew the Last Word and checked the cylinder as he walked. One bullet missing, so he reloaded. Carrying the hand cannon loosely at his side, he rounded a bend.
Four men stood in a row in a choke point between two rock outcroppings. Three of them drew their weapons and held them ready to raise and fire. The fourth stood still, hands at his sides. Sutter.
"Afternoon, gentlemen," the Renegade called, strolling toward them as if greeting friends. "Anything I might do for you?"
"Where's the girl?" one called. "We'll let you live if you give us the girl."
The Renegade grinned. "What girl?"
"Shoot him," Sutter said to his gang.
The men raised their guns and fired.
The Renegade dropped and rolled behind a wedge of stone protruding from the left rock face. Bullets pinged off the stone, chipping it. The Renegade waited until the firing stopped, listening to the gunshots and the way the sound echoed. Then he leaned out of hiding and fired, dropping one of the thugs in the dirt. He glimpsed them closing on his position as their fire drove him back into shelter.
"Ghost, ideas," he thought.
"Shoot them all," she replied. "Fast. Especially Sutter."
The Renegade swung out of hiding and shot the other two thugs in quick succession. But as he swung toward Sutter, the man raised a hand. Ice crawled down the Renegade's arm and froze the Last Word to his hand. More ice formed around his feet, holding him in place. The ice burned with cold, as if his limbs had been dipped in liquid nitrogen.
"You're slowing down, old man," said Sutter, grinning. He had a narrow face and bad teeth, and his eyes had an emptiness that marked him as a Shadow of Yor.
The Renegade stood still, keeping his free hand at his side, so Sutter wouldn't think to ice it. "What's your game, Sutter?"
"That's Dredgen Rise to you, bastard," said Sutter through his teeth. "I told you. I want the girl. I'll get it out of you if I have to freeze every inch of your worthless hide."
"You always were a damn conjurer," said the Renegade. "Making pacts with the Darkness. I should have let the Praxic Order deal with you."
"The fact that you got me off Earth is the only reason you're still alive right now," said Sutter. "I went straight to Europa and experienced baptism. They granted me Their blessing of stasis. You should speak to Them."
"I'm not giving you the girl," said the Renegade.
Sutter's dead eyes did not change expression. "Pity."
As he drove his ice up the Renegade's arm and legs, intending to freeze his heart, the Renegade lit his fire. He summoned his Golden Gun to his left hand in a flash of radiant heat and unloaded all three shots into Sutter's chest. The heat of the sun's core burned the man to ash from the inside out. The heat vaporized the ice, which poured off the Renegade in steam.
As the Renegade inspected the Last Word for damage, he remarked to no one, "I know your games, Dredgen. I learned them so I could beat you at them." He thought to Ghost, "Where's Sutter's Ghost?"
"She's not here," Ghost replied. She appeared at his shoulder, opened her shell, and expanded into a sphere of blue Light. She sent out a search pulse, scanning the area. "Not detecting her anywhere, Shin. She may have left him when he sold his soul to the Darkness."
"Let the Darkness have his soul," said the Renegade. "He was a good man, once."
He stood for a moment, looking at the three bodies and the smear of black ash on the ground, and he was troubled. "Why would a Shadow of Yor be after an Awoken child? Second sight is fairly common among their race. She can't control it well enough to be a help or hindrance."
"There are layers, here," said Ghost, looking sadly at the corpses. "These men knew your reputation. They had to know they wouldn't live through a confrontation."
"Time to learn what I can," said the Renegade.
He frisked the bodies and found wallets bulging with glimmer. They had been well-paid for this. One of them also carried a brick of ammo synth, which the Renegade gave to Ghost to add to her storage. But there was no identification, no further clues as to why Aerith was so important.
He surveyed the bodies. "The poor dogs deserve some kind of burial, I suppose. Hard to do when the ground is rock."
"There's a crack in the ground about one hundred meters from here," Ghost suggested.
The Renegade hauled the bodies to the crack and pitched them in. It was a good, deep crack, extending downward at least a mile. In the end, the deed was done, but the Renegade was tired, and fresh blood had stained his poncho. He hated that smell.
He made his way over the ridge and down into the gully where Aerith was supposed to wait for him.
She wasn't there.
"Ghost, track my sparrow," the Renegade said, shading his eyes against the swiftly-setting sun.
Ghost sent out a couple of radar pulses. "Your sparrow is down the gully, that way. It's abandoned."
The Renegade picked his way down the rocky watercourse until he found his sparrow. It had been backed under a crag in the shade, as if Aerith had attempted to hide it. He had Ghost transmat it back to his ship. Then she sent out more radar pulses.
"Detecting a lifeform up the hill, that way," Ghost said, gazing north. "It's not moving."
The Renegade climbed the hill, dreading what he would find. He hurried among jagged rocks and blowing dust, until he glimpsed a small figure huddled in the shadow of a stone.
Aerith was curled up as if sleeping, his huge jacket pulled tightly around her. But she did not rouse when he shook her
"Unconscious," Ghost said. "And very cold. Hypothermic. But I don't think her temperature is the reason she's out."
"Why's that?" the Renegade said.
Ghost flew to the other side of the rock and hung in midair in silence.
A gang of Scorn had crept up on Aerith as she had waited for him. The Renegade counted eleven bodies of the undead Eliksni, their bodies still bloated with the dark ether that animated them. They lay in a trench in the stone, so freshly carved that the edges were still crumbling. The trench was a hundred feet long.
"Ghost?" the Renegade whispered. "What caused this?"
Ghost played her scan beam over the dead Scorn, then the broken ground. "I'm picking up a fading heat signature, but nothing else. No Light, no Darkness, no radioactivity, nothing." She turned her blue eye to his face. "I think Aerith has more secrets than we know."
Shaken, the Renegade returned to the girl. She still would not awaken, so he picked her up and carried her. "Transmat us to the ship. She needs warmth."
The transmat was far faster than walking, and he had already carried enough bodies that day. Once aboard the Talion, he put the girl in his own bunk, then dug out some chemical heat packs and slid them under the blankets around her body. Ghost hovered overhead, monitoring her temperature.
The Renegade went to the cockpit and started the engines. "Too dangerous to hang around. Somebody had to notice a little girl destroying eleven Scorn at once."
Ghost flew to the cockpit, too. "Thieves' Landing?"
"Yes," said the Renegade.
Ghost's eye turned to his face thoughtfully. "After that, rest. Eat."
"Not until I'm sure we won't get jumped," he replied.
The Renegade maneuvered his ship out of the crack in the rock with practiced care and roared out of the thin atmosphere. In three minutes they were in space. He cut the thrust and only fired his engines in short bursts to change directions. In space, inertia was enough to keep the ship moving.
His hands were damp against the flightsticks. He released them and dried his palms against his pants. As much as he wished to deny it, that trench in the ground had rattled him. Dead Scorn … an unconscious girl … and a trench that looked as if it had been dug with a bulldozer. What was he dealing with, here? Even a Shadow of Yor hadn't bothered him unduly. If the girl hadn't tapped Light or Darkness to unleash some sort of attack, what else was there? The Awoken had large amounts of both powers in their blood and bone. But a third power?
The girl should be in a Techeun coven, not an orphanage. And she had been plucked from an orphanage and offered for sale.
Rod Bender must have known and lied. But something didn't add up. Only one Awoken child had been kidnapped and sold. An Awoken child with flabbergasting power. Who was truly behind this? And what sort of monster was asleep in his bunk?
These thoughts kept him company as he flew down the Tangled Shore to Thieves' Landing, a town built into the hollow side of the land mass. Long metal docking platforms extended out into space, always hosting several ships of various sizes and makes. Spider did his business here, and a freighter was being loaded with his goods as the Talion docked.
The Renegade went out on the dock and spoke to the harbormaster about unloading his freight. The Eliksni guard told him that he would need to meet with Spider in order to claim his bounty. The Renegade agreed and returned to his ship. He had learned his lesson about leaving Aerith behind.
She still lay in his bunk, burrowed beneath the blankets, but her purple eyes were open and tracking. The Renegade knelt beside the bunk and scrutinized her. "Are you all right?"
Aerith smiled. "I'm all right, Mr. Malphur. These warm packages feel very nice."
"What happened out there?" he asked, sitting back on his heels.
"I was waiting for you, and I heard gunshots," she said. "I was frightened, so I drove the sparrow a ways, looking for a hiding place. I came around a bend and there were these bad Eliksni there. They were very sick-looking, with blue sores all over them."
"Scorn," said the Renegade. "They're undead."
"Oh, I've heard of them," said Aerith. "Anyway, they ran after me with their weapons. I couldn't turn the sparrow because it was too narrow, so I jumped off and ran. They caught me at the top of the hill. Then Thomas came, and I don't remember anything else."
"Thomas?" said the Renegade.
Aerith nodded. "He's like your Ghost. He's my friend."
The Renegade gazed at her in silence. The girl had a familiar of some kind? A familiar that could kill Scorn and tear up the landscape?
Aerith sat up and picked up a heat pack, hugging it. "This is so warm."
"Is Thomas here, now?" the Renegade asked.
"No," said Aerith. "He only comes when I'm scared. He's very nice." Her purple eyes turned to him. "I'm not scared when I'm with you, Mr. Malphur."
The Renegade didn't know how to take this. Most people feared him, except his Ghost and a few people in the Vanguard. He liked it that way. If this girl didn't fear him, did that mean he'd gone soft? Or did it mean that she trusted him to protect her? Light's fire, he didn't know anything about kids.
"Well," he said, rising to his feet, "I have to speak to Spider, and you can't stay here. Can you walk?"
Aerith climbed out of the bunk. "Oh yes, I'm all right. May I bring the heat pack?"
The Renegade stuffed her pockets with heat packs, both her thin envirosuit and the heavy jacket he had given her. Then he helped her put her helmet back on, and they departed.
