Queen & Commander (Book One of the Hive Queen Saga)

Chapter Seventeen: Blackmail

A/N: The complete ebook of this story is on sale for 99cents (similar international pricing) from April 15 - May 15, 2014 at Amazon, B&N, Kobo, iBooks, and Smashwords.

Luciano strolled into the dining room one minute late, daring Rhiannon to notice his defiance. He’d always shown up early to classes, to job sites, to parties. Did she know that? Did it matter to her?

His Queen continued her speech, not pausing to reprimand him. Llewellyn sat on her left, a sucking void. “—is now working, but we only have so much. We’ll need to restock our oxygen when we dock at the station tomorrow. Until then, Gwyn will be busy constantly monitoring the carbon scrubbers.”

She did, however, look pointedly at first him and then the clock on the opposite wall.

She cares! Oh God, she really cares.

His shoulders relaxed. He hadn’t even known that they’d been jammed up to his ears until they fell back to normal height.

His face flushed scarlet. The sudden heat of rushing blood reminded him of the earlier airless cold. He drew a few strong breaths just to make sure that he could.

God, the one time I decide to be a little late, everyone else decides to be early. That’s the last time I try this trick.

His Hive mates all sat at the drab, grey dining table, listening to their Commander’s announcements. A distance existed between Alan and the rest. Even more distance separated the Hive from the sinister outsider.

Rhiannon was resplendent in the haloed lights, fully in control of her meeting. “I’d also like to thank Gavin for making the necessary fixes and discovering the problem. Gavin, please stand up.” The day’s hero straggled to his feet and made sweeping bows to each side of the table, bending himself in half. “Gavin is our new Handsman. You should all call on him when you have any physical engineering problem. Congratulations, Gavin.”

Luciano slid into a seat next to Alan on the Hive-side and jostled his friend for attention. Luciano smiled a greeting, but Alan didn’t smile back. Instead, his startled eyes met Luciano’s for a moment before falling to the table. Luciano followed his friend’s gaze and watched Alan’s thumbnails clean each other, as if that were the most important thing here, as if he weren’t listening to Rhiannon or noticing Luciano or letting himself be a part of the evening’s conversation.

Alan couldn’t give up. Alan, with his genius and his funny way of looking at the universe, was the most alive person on the ship. He couldn’t give up on himself and his Hive. Luciano wouldn’t let him.

Resolve firmed, Luciano gave himself over to his Queen anew. He reined in the devil under his skin, the baser impulses that exhorted him to throw things and lose faith whenever life got hard. Instead, he rededicated and Devoted inside his own head. My sword and my service, my body and my blood, my agency and my anima. They belonged to her, always and forever. As he watched her in the bright lights that illuminated her energy and her purpose, he knew there could be no better Queen for him.

I trust you, Rhiannon. I love you. Trust me back.

She didn’t look at him, but she didn’t need to. He could feel the connection flowing between them, just as described in the films and the books. Generations had documented the feedback loop of Devotion. His Devotion made her a better Queen. His intense love made her love him back.

If he ever lost her, that feedback would drag him down into an unbalanced depression. That dark spiral could turn good Devoted feral.

Her voice carried throughout the room, ringing truth and power against the walls. Her presence coiled around him, wrapping him in her charisma.

“Going forward, we’ll have choices. I’ve narrowed these down to the most interesting. Going forward, we’ll lean on each other to make the right decisions for our Hive as a whole, not for ourselves individually.” She took a moment to single each of them out with her eyes, meeting gazes until Hive members faltered before her, ashamed to ever have acted independently. “Going forward—”

The politician cleared his throat and stood to overlook the room from Rhiannon’s side. His height made him seem as though he overlooked her as well. “Going forward,” he said, “you’ll do me a little favor.” His strident nasality, too loud, obliterated the echoes of Rhiannon’s speech.

Walk with the Devil! Luciano balled his hands into fists, and saw Alan’s head fly up to stare straight at the man. Did the bastard really mean to tread over his Queen? Well, this Hive would teach him a lesson in manners. Luciano looked behind him to the three others. They didn’t notice him, too busy gripping each other’s hands as though they could save themselves from falling if they just held on to something else.

If he’d have no help from that quarter, then his Queen would stand up for herself, and she’d be pleased to have him stand with her. He sent all his thoughts and anger and muscle into that Devoted feedback loop. He’d lend her the strength to push back, though she’d be fine on her own.

“No, we will not,” Rhiannon denied the politician. Luciano rejoiced. She stood for all that was good and sacred in this world, and he loved her intensely for it. “If nothing else, I need to discuss your proposal with my people. Say your piece, sir, and we’ll let you know what we decide.”

The man flapped his silly sleeves like a stupid owl, stealing her breath. “Then I have no choice. You’ll do me this little favor, and I won’t tell anyone about your illegal activities. This is a matter of life and death, my life and death, and I can’t chance your deciding the wrong way.”

Luciano shook his head against the term illegal, the mere suggestion that their Hive could be so. Shut your beak, owl. Rhiannon would set him right. She’d defend their unorthodox structure. She’d explain that the man had no power over him. Luciano noticed for the first time that the passenger and Gwyn were both in the room at once.

Why is she here?

Rhiannon bit her lip and pushed her hair behind her ear, looking past everyone and not challenging the passenger’s authority.

The man’s oil-smoke voice crept in through ears and noses, slimy and unchecked by any barriers of hope. “Don’t look so glum, children! It’s just a little favor. You’ll take this package to coordinates that I give you.” He plucked a trunk from the seat beside his former one. “Don’t open it, now. It will never do if someone... official should decide to question you about your involvement.” A muscle ticked on the side of his mouth, giving him a cruel and uncontrolled look. “Really, that’s all. I’ll even top up your tanks for you at the station, free of charge. There are perks to saving me from certain demise, as if that good deed weren’t a cause worthy enough.”

And when they’d completed the deal, for contraband or drugs or some other terrible exchange, how would they pay for fuel and air to return? Would the politician’s largesse extend past his delivery date?

The politician gave Rhiannon an overfamiliar kiss on the cheek. The act obscured her from the room, as if he’d eaten her up and hid the evidence in his flappy sleeves. “I’m so pleased to have met you.” He took Rhiannon’s wrist and rested her hand on top of the delivery trunk. That done, he walked past them all and left the room.

Freed at last from some magical gravity, Luciano rocketed to his feet, pleased to see that Gavin and Victor did as well. How dare he lay hands on her? Presume to dictate her movement! They three converged on their stricken Queen, statue-still with her DNA leaking all over the evidence box.

Luciano fell to his knees at her side. He took her hand off the box and laced her frozen fingers through his own. He rested his head against her upper thigh, lending her his heat and his strength. For long moments, he waited for her to regain herself.

He was not disappointed. She squeezed his hand, then dropped it to point at the box. Energy and command emanated from the straight line of her shoulder to her square nail.

“We’re going to open this package,” she said. “The moment he leaves the Cauldron.” She lowered her arm, energy sapped once again. “But I’m afraid we’ll have to deliver it, no matter what’s in there.”

She’d confirmed it, then. The politician’s story contained a pit of truth. But it didn’t matter. Luciano loved her, respected Alan and Gavin, and knew he’d settle into his place here. Even if that place stretched the bounds of legality.