The Twisted Way (Champions of the Crystal Book 3)

Chapter 24.1

"It's beautiful," he breathed.

"You never saw it!" Sabrina insisted. With belated realization, she demanded, "What are you doing here?"

"What do you think?" he replied, looking up at her.

"Next time," Sabrina muttered, maneuvering herself and Asnefer over toward him, "remind me to order you to do the opposite of what I want you to. Maybe that way, for once, I'll be obeyed!"

Tassan grinned, and she shook her head in fond exasperation. But in the next moment their expressions changed as they heard Tirqwin yell angrily, "Sabrina!"

They moved out of the way of the entrance as Tirqwin catapulted through, catching himself expertly on the nearest protrusion. "What do you think you are doing?" he demanded. "Give me that!"

Tassan handed over the matrix. "What, this? I never saw it," he said.

"Tirqwin," Sabrina protested, "she was powering up the Way engines! It would have killed us all!"

"That is no reason," he said through gritted teeth, "for an assault on Khediva!"

Sabrina, guiltily aware of the disconnected leads behind her, tried to change the subject. "Why didn't you evacuate?"

Darice, just floating in, said, "We couldn't get the airlock to operate, and then the Tirqwin woke up and refused to go."

Sabrina peered into the gloom behind the bodyguard and saw Chavadanafra standing there in the magnetic boots Darice had been wearing earlier. "Lady Chavadanafra, could you take Asnefer up to the infirmary and strap her in?"

"Yes," Chavadanafra said, holding out her hands. Sabrina pushed Asnefer at her, floating in the opposite direction in reaction. Tassan reached out to catch her but only managed to send them both in a slightly different direction.

"Where's that other pair of boots?" Sabrina wondered.

"I have them, and I am keeping them," Tirqwin said. "These repairs are too delicate to be done without them." Carefully righting himself and balancing the matrix in one hand, he reached down and switched the boots on.

"Tirqwin," Sabrina said, protesting his cold tone, "I didn't do that. Asnefer did."

"And you helped her!"

"No, I didn't!"

"Well, at any rate, you did not try to stop her! You profess to be fond of Khediva—you should not have stood back and let anyone do this to her!"

Sabrina drew breath to protest again, but Tassan said softly, "He's beyond reason, Sabrina; let it go."

She swallowed hard. "What can I do to help, Tirqwin?"

"Take your bodyguard out of here, for a start," he replied. "Bad enough that this had to happen, without Homeworld accusing us of practically handing Wayship technology to Praxatillus!"

"I saw nothing, and understood less," Tassan declared.

Tirqwin gave a skeptical snort, half buried in the crystal matrix's housing. Sabrina pushed Tassan at the stairs. "Tassan, go and see if you can get the airlock working. Asnefer needs treatment and she's probably not going to get much of it here."

"Sabrina, I'm not leaving you—"

"Tassan!" Sabrina said in a low voice. "I may not speak with the Queen's voice right now, but I am warning you, I am only going to tolerate so much defiance. If you value my respect at all, you will get your butt out of here in the next ten seconds!"

He faced her for a moment, reading the expression in her eyes, then left. Sabrina, who was still drifting gently backward from the push she had given him, let herself float back toward the brain globe. One hand brushed it, and she got a mild shock. "Ow!" she exclaimed.