Read Online Dark Beneath the Moon by Sherry D. Ramsey - Free Book Online Page B

their end destination might be, but they weren’t stopping to pick up or deliver cargo. That meant they were headed somewhere with a purpose beyond the normal hauling jobs—maybe an important passenger. I figured their roundabout route was an attempt to confuse or lose anyone like us, who might be following them. Now their route suggested that they weren’t in Delta Pavonis to go to either Rhea or Renata, the two inhabited planets. At first I thought they might be heading for the Split, since I’d seen them travel that anomalous and dangerous wormhole twice lately, but they turned away from its coordinates as well.
    I tapped my fingernails on the console. We weren’t close enough to get a visual signal, so the Tane Ikai was nothing more than a tiny, hologrammatic dot on my fancy new display. “Yeah, this just got more interesting. What are you doing, Luta Paixon?”
    “Should I pull back? They could catch us in a long-range scan.”
    “Sure—no, wait.” I stared at the glowing dot and considered. “Hang here a little longer and see if they spot us. If they do, I’m not averse to a little cat-and-mouse. It’s been getting a little boring.”
    Pita chuckled. “Who’s the cat, and who’s the mouse?”
    I smiled. “Meow.”
     
     

Chapter 8 – Luta
Take a Deep Breath and Jump
     
     
     
     
     
     
    WE’D MADE AN uneventful skip into the Delta Pavonis system, and Yuskeya laid in the coordinates for the new wormhole. Lanar had sent them as a classified datapacket, so the Protectorate must have been able to keep its whereabouts a secret so far. Our instructions were to start long-range scans early and not get too near the wormhole unless we were certain there were no other ships in the vicinity. It wasn’t likely we’d been followed, but the Protectorate didn’t like to take chances.
    Their paranoia turned out to be a good thing. The scans showed a ship outside the range of our short-range scans, but close enough to monitor us if it wanted to.
    “Can you get a drive signature?” I asked.
    Yuskeya shook her head. “Still too far out.”
    I sighed. “Well, we’re not supposed to get too close to the new wormhole if there’s anyone around, so let’s pretend we’re passing through. Keep heading past the wormhole and checking on that ship, and once they’re out of range we’ll double back.”
    “What a waste of time,” Baden grumbled. “They’re probably not paying any attention to us, anyway.”
    I patted his shoulder. “I know, but we’re on a Protectorate mission, so we’ll play by Protectorate rules. I’m not willing to screw it up by being impatient. We’ve got lots of time to get Cerevare there. Let’s be cautious for once.”
    A half-hour or so later Baden commed me over the ship’s system; I’d gone to the galley for some lunch. “Guess you were right, Captain. I think that ship is following us.”
    “Really?” I hadn’t actually suspected anything of the sort. I was just following the precautions Lanar had asked me to take.
    “They haven’t gotten much closer to us, but they haven’t moved off, either. Unless they’re following a route parallel to ours, and I can’t really see where that would be taking them, since we’re only marking time.”
    I chewed the last bite of my sandwich while I thought about it. “Hmm. Okej , give them another half hour. If they’re still keeping pace, we’ll head over to their position and see if they want to talk about anything.”
    They hadn’t changed course in the allotted time, so I gave Rei the order to move toward the ship. I hadn’t decided what to do. I could make contact with them, get their story—but I didn’t know if I wanted to come right out and accuse them of following us. That would imply that we had a reason for someone to follow us, and I didn’t want to put that idea in anyone’s head.
    We didn’t get to ask any questions, anyway. We did, however, get one answered. The ship took off quickly as soon as we’d