Read Online Rebel Ice by S. L. Viehl - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: S. L. Viehl
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction, Space Opera, Speculative Fiction, Interplanetary voyages, Life on other planets, Human-alien encounters, Slave insurrections, Amnesia
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insolence in speaking during your business." Sogayi's tone was only slightly apologetic. "You are wiser than I and must see much in this ensleg that I cannot."
"Were we not on the brink of war, I would play the skela and skin her myself," Navn said. Sometimes, like now, his wife needed to be reminded of the absolute power he wielded over her and every soul within the iiskar. "Her life remains mine."
"As does my own." Sogayi crouched at his feet, completely subdued now. "Forgive my foolishness. I know it will be as you say."
Navn felt his ire soften. Sogayi's devotion was one of the few things in this life he could depend on, and he would not shrivel her feelings with too much harshness. "I cannot discount any advantage now," he told her. "These are dangerous times, and it is prudent to plan with great care." He rested a fond hand on her head. "Do not be afraid of this female. She is nothing to us."
"As you say," his wife repeated as she pressed her cool cheek against his knee.
Chapter Four
Duncan Reever had not told Xonea Torin or anyone on the Sunlace that ten years past he had
If he failed, on the other hand, someone should know.
He took out the handheld recorder and switched it on. "It was TssVar who sent me to Akkabarr to spy for him, just as he had sent me to Kevarzangia Two. The Faction had never been able to determine how the Toskald had turned their world into an armory for hundreds of other species. There were concerns about the League using Akkabarr as a front for their own move against the Faction. I was sent to infiltrate the Toskald and scout the planet for its potential to be taken."
He paused the recorder. Coming to Akkabarr all those years ago had been Reever's first contact with free humanoids since being enslaved by the Faction himself. Yet while the Toskald were warm-blooded humanoids, their emotions seemed limited to self-absorption, ranging in intensity from greed to paranoia. Among the Toskald, appearances were everything, and Reever had no difficulty blending in. They had prejudiced him, though, and for years afterward he thought all humanoids were equally as trite and shallow.
Until he had met Cherijo.
Reever switched on the recorder. "I gathered evidence that showed Akkabarr's violent atmospheric conditions rendered it impervious to scanning and impregnable to any attack force. Then I learned the secret of the shifting dead-air zones, and how the Toskald pilots located and used them to get from space to their floating cities, and from the air cities to the surface of the planet and back again. Those facts I did not relate to the Faction, as part of the balance for what had been done to me."
As a spy, Reever had betrayed the Hsktskt countless times. It was payment for the three revolutions they had forced him to fight in slaver arenas. Saving lives seemed the most adequate expiation for the many he had taken.
Hate!
Reever thought of his former owner, a centuron with a heavy fist who liked to beat her slaves as much as she enjoyed starving them. She had been the one to give him that name after he began killing on the sands. Her cronies had taken to chanting it every time he had entered the arena, when his reputation for efficiency had begun drawing larger crowds.
Hala in Hsktskt meant "death," and death was what he had given them, until the day he had saved TssVar from an assassination attempt, and had been elevated from slave to the Hsktskt OverLord's equal.
"Being made TssVar's blood brother took me into the ranks of the most powerful raider division within the Faction," he told the recorder. "His protection and trust gave me the opportunity to sabotage the Faction from within, which I continued to do until he sent me to evaluate Kevarzangia Two. That was when I met you, Waenara . When you saved me."
He was talking to her, not the recorder now.
Reever shut off the unit. He knew he now had to erase the voice file; he couldn't risk the Toskald's confiscating the unit and learning when
"Were we not on the brink of war, I would play the skela and skin her myself," Navn said. Sometimes, like now, his wife needed to be reminded of the absolute power he wielded over her and every soul within the iiskar. "Her life remains mine."
"As does my own." Sogayi crouched at his feet, completely subdued now. "Forgive my foolishness. I know it will be as you say."
Navn felt his ire soften. Sogayi's devotion was one of the few things in this life he could depend on, and he would not shrivel her feelings with too much harshness. "I cannot discount any advantage now," he told her. "These are dangerous times, and it is prudent to plan with great care." He rested a fond hand on her head. "Do not be afraid of this female. She is nothing to us."
"As you say," his wife repeated as she pressed her cool cheek against his knee.
Chapter Four
Duncan Reever had not told Xonea Torin or anyone on the Sunlace that ten years past he had
If he failed, on the other hand, someone should know.
He took out the handheld recorder and switched it on. "It was TssVar who sent me to Akkabarr to spy for him, just as he had sent me to Kevarzangia Two. The Faction had never been able to determine how the Toskald had turned their world into an armory for hundreds of other species. There were concerns about the League using Akkabarr as a front for their own move against the Faction. I was sent to infiltrate the Toskald and scout the planet for its potential to be taken."
He paused the recorder. Coming to Akkabarr all those years ago had been Reever's first contact with free humanoids since being enslaved by the Faction himself. Yet while the Toskald were warm-blooded humanoids, their emotions seemed limited to self-absorption, ranging in intensity from greed to paranoia. Among the Toskald, appearances were everything, and Reever had no difficulty blending in. They had prejudiced him, though, and for years afterward he thought all humanoids were equally as trite and shallow.
Until he had met Cherijo.
Reever switched on the recorder. "I gathered evidence that showed Akkabarr's violent atmospheric conditions rendered it impervious to scanning and impregnable to any attack force. Then I learned the secret of the shifting dead-air zones, and how the Toskald pilots located and used them to get from space to their floating cities, and from the air cities to the surface of the planet and back again. Those facts I did not relate to the Faction, as part of the balance for what had been done to me."
As a spy, Reever had betrayed the Hsktskt countless times. It was payment for the three revolutions they had forced him to fight in slaver arenas. Saving lives seemed the most adequate expiation for the many he had taken.
Hate!
Reever thought of his former owner, a centuron with a heavy fist who liked to beat her slaves as much as she enjoyed starving them. She had been the one to give him that name after he began killing on the sands. Her cronies had taken to chanting it every time he had entered the arena, when his reputation for efficiency had begun drawing larger crowds.
Hala in Hsktskt meant "death," and death was what he had given them, until the day he had saved TssVar from an assassination attempt, and had been elevated from slave to the Hsktskt OverLord's equal.
"Being made TssVar's blood brother took me into the ranks of the most powerful raider division within the Faction," he told the recorder. "His protection and trust gave me the opportunity to sabotage the Faction from within, which I continued to do until he sent me to evaluate Kevarzangia Two. That was when I met you, Waenara . When you saved me."
He was talking to her, not the recorder now.
Reever shut off the unit. He knew he now had to erase the voice file; he couldn't risk the Toskald's confiscating the unit and learning when
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