Read Online The Lost Stars: Shattered Spear by Jack Campbell - Free Book Online

Kommodor?”
    Marphissa took a long, slow breath as she considered her options. “Our orders are to warn Iwa and to establish contact with Granaile Imallye. Midway is already aware of a possible threat from Iwa. Moorea is not. Neither is Palau. We will continue on to Moorea, try to speak with this Imallye, and warn everyone that the enigmas have an alternate attack route into human space. And we will not waste time. Proceed toward the jump point for Moorea at point two light speed, Kapitan.”
    “Yes, Kommodor.” Diaz glanced at his display. “That jump point is four and a quarter light hours distant from us. The transit will take a little more than twenty-one hours.”
    “Very well.”
    As
Manticore
came about and accelerated toward the jump point for Moorea, Diaz gazed morosely at his display. “Do you think the enigmas will try to establish a base at Iwa, Kommodor?”
    “Maybe. Maybe not. Black Jack reported that Pele has remained completely vacant since the enigmas pushed the Syndicate out of that star system. But Iwa would be a toehold in human-occupied space.”
    “Why, Kommodor? Why do the enigmas do this? Didn’t Black Jack tell us they don’t want us to know anything about them? Fine. We’ll leave them alone.”
    “They are afraid that we won’t stop trying to find out things about them,” Marphissa explained. “They must view the entire universe with fear, and fear creates cruelty and ruthlessness.”
    “It does in people,” Diaz agreed.
    Marphissa closed her eyes, wanting to block out the vision of what had been done to Iwa Star System. “We are fortunate they could only reach Iwa. This is a tragedy, but there wasn’t much here. If the enigmas could have hit Taroa or Ulindi the loss of life would have been much, much greater.”
    It was cold comfort, but it was the only comfort that Iwa offered.
    And it helped distract her slightly from the even colder fear that the enigmas might have also found a way to get the extra jump range they needed to reach Taroa and Ulindi directly.
    *   *   *
    HABITS taught during Syndicate rule died hard. The ambassadors from Taroa and Kahiki sat apart from each other, uncomfortable with their bodyguards forced to remain outside. A woman who represented what was left of Kane after the civil war and Syndicate bombardment had taken a chair to one side, her eyes shifting rapidly about the room as if expecting ground attackers or a weapon dropped from orbit to strike at any moment. A young man who had somehow survived the snake purge of suspected traitors on Ulindi looked both determined and frightened.
    Iceni noticed that the representatives from Taroa, Kahiki, and Ulindi all kept glancing at Drakon as if regarding him as the one who was in charge. Drakon was the one they knew from his time in their star systems. The woman from Kane gave those kind of glances to Iceni, who had herself visited there. All of the representatives gave theappearance not of ambassadors for their star systems but like junior executives facing Syndicate CEOs who could ruin their lives and their worlds on a whim.
    “Not much, is it?” Iceni murmured to Drakon where he sat beside her. “Four star systems, and only Kahiki is intact.”
    Drakon nodded, keeping his eyes on the star system representatives as he answered in the same low tones. They didn’t have to worry about their comments being overheard since the security field would hide both their words and the movements of their lips, but still they spoke discreetly because another lesson of the Syndicate was that you never knew who might be listening despite all of your security measures. “None of them can even defend themselves, let alone contribute to defending anyone else.”
    “Not today,” Iceni agreed. “And not tomorrow. But Kane, Ulindi, and Taroa have the resources and the worlds to support decent defense assets someday, and the labs on Kahiki might produce the advances we’ll all need to hold off the Syndicate and the