A growl escaped my throat.
“Suit yourself,” she said, “but you know they’re going to cause trouble later.”
No way am I killing anyone, I thought. Not unless absolutely necessary. I would have to keep an eye on the woman, in case she tried anything.
The scholar glanced back at me thoughtfully while I gave him directions to the bay where his captured ship was docked. After I’d Charmed a cluster of crew members into passing us by with glazed eyes, he said in a low voice, “I’d always thought the old stories were exaggerations. Apparently not.”
I was dying to ask why, if he was so impressed with my magic, it didn’t seem to be having much effect on him.
As if he’d divined my question, the scholar smiled. It wasn’t a happy expression. “I may not be the best scholar,” he said—and I was reminded that he’d gotten his position by faking his credentials—“but some of my knowledge of the old lore is genuine.”
That lore presumably included ways to resist fox magic. I longed to ask him how he was doing it, but he had no reason to tell me. I’d have to see if I could coax it out of him later. Assuming we all survived.
More guards awaited us at the docking bay. I practiced my glare some more, reinforced by Charm. Even if the Pale Lightning’s crew was intimidated by Captain Hwan, his decision to reunite the prisoners with their ship was going to make them hesitate.
While I’d grown more confident in wielding magic, I was throwing a lot of it around, and my headache had intensified. Just a little longer, I told myself. Once we got off the Pale Lightning, I could ease up.
“There it is,” the pale-faced man breathed. I wished he would stop sweating so heavily, even though I knew he couldn’t help it.
The mercenaries’ starship rested on several struts. For something that had caused us so much trouble, it was dwarfed by the expansive space of the bay. It had a blockish, rectangular shape with protrusions for its various missile launchers and laser cannons. Most of them had been melted into blobby shapes like tree fungus. Good, I thought vindictively. Then I remembered I was going to be a passenger on it, and I gulped.
The ship’s hull was dented and blackened with laser marks. No one had done any repair work on it—there was no reason they should have—and I winced, wondering how reliable the ship would be. But it was my only way off the Pale Lightning.
I followed the three mercenaries to their ship. The scholar smelled calm, but the woman swore when she looked it over. “We’ll be lucky if we can get the maneuver drive to work,” she said as she opened the hatch.
“You’re going to have to do your best,” the scholar said to her. I gathered that she must be the engineer, or the closest thing that remained.
I glanced about as I ascended the ramp. Considering the amount of damage on the outside, the interior wasn’t as messed up as I had expected. Part of the airlock had been sealed off, but that was it.
The woman started toward the back of the ship. When I twitched, she said impatiently, “I need to check on the engine. You want to launch, don’t you?”
She smelled sincere. “Go on,” I said. I holstered the blaster. I didn’t want to be caught unawares, but I also needed to avoid antagonizing the mercenaries too much. I hoped they’d remember that they owed me a favor for releasing them. I leaned on Charm to strengthen their feelings of gratitude.
In the cockpit, we waited tensely while the pale man asked the computer for the ship’s status. I held my breath until the comms crackled on and the woman’s voice said, “We can make do. Just don’t try any fancy maneuvers.”
As much as I wanted to let go of Captain Hwan’s shape, I held on to it a little longer. It would be useful for confusing the Pale Lightning’s crew until we got out of there. I prayed the docking bay’s guards would stay Charmed long enough to do nothing.
“Ready?” the pale man—the ship’s pilot—said, his glance flicking between the scholar and me.
The scholar looked my way, and I nodded crisply. Time to go.
“All systems go,” the pilot said. He sounded grimly cheerful, or cheerfully grim. “Everyone strapped in?”
The scholar and I both said yes. The lights on the control panel changed to blue. The glow sheened over the pilot’s face and pooled in his eyes, making them resemble windows to another world.
I shivered. It wasn’t dread. Rather, I felt the ghost-wind again. Jang must have followed me off the Pale Lightning and onto the mercenaries’ ship. I hadn’t expected that. Ghosts typically stick close to the location where they died. Maybe now, without him around, the broken meridian on the Pale Lightning would heal. But would Jang curse my mission with bad luck?
The ship surged forward. A new light came on, this one red. The pilot hit it out of reflex and laughed sourly.
The real Captain Hwan’s voice snarled from the communications channel. “Scholar Chul.”
The scholar flinched.
“You have one minute to power down your stardrive and exit your vehicle with your compatriots. After that, I make no guarantees for your personal safety.”
“Ignore him,” Chul said quietly. “There’s no going back, not anymore.” His mouth pulled up in an expression that would have resembled a smile if not for the exhaustion in his eyes.
“Right,” the pilot said. He thrust a joystick, and the ship surged forward.
I bit back a shriek as we headed straight for the docking bay’s hatch. A glance at the cameras revealed that two squads of fully suited soldiers had burst in and were opening fire on the ship. Lucky for us that antipersonnel weapons didn’t have much effect on it, despite the damage it had already taken. I kept expecting to feel impacts, however small, or hear the clatter-shatter-bang of projectiles hitting the hull.
I was worried we’d crash on the way out. But the pilot was prepared. He blew open the hatch with a missile at short range. Red lights flashed crazily throughout the docking bay as air whooshed out into hard vacuum.
Acceleration slammed us sideways as our ship veered hard to starboard, then rolled. Alarms clanged and flashed red, this time inside our ship. I narrowly avoided biting my tongue as I clutched the seat’s armrests.
“They can’t fire at us so close to their own hull,” the pilot said, rapid and breathless, “but I can only keep this up for so long.”
I started to ask what he recommended doing, then realized he wasn’t talking to me.
“Well, you’re going to have to buy me a few more minutes,” the engineer’s voice snapped from the internal comm channel. “You don’t want us botching the Gate.”
I had an idea. “Put me on the channel to the Pale Lightning.”
To my gratitude, the pilot didn’t argue. He punched another button without looking at me. Good thing, too. I wanted him to concentrate on what he was doing.
I thought of how much Captain Hwan intimidated me. I could use that same predatory presence to my advantage. “This is Captain Hwan,” I said, pitching my voice low, and adding a growl for good measure. “Stand down immediately.”
I heard bewildered murmurs and gasps on the other end. “C-Captain?” someone said.
“Ignore them!” Hwan snapped. “It’s an imposter.”
The murmurs quieted. I imagined the scene on the bridge. While I didn’t think the captain would face an out-and-out mutiny, any hesitation or confusion would work in our favor.
I had thought the pilot would harangue the engineer to hurry up. Instead, he kept silent. I was impressed by his discipline. It made sense: The more he distracted her, the harder it would be for her to get the job done.
In the meantime, I had a part to play as well. “Don’t listen to the real imposter,” I said, torn between taking pleasure in toying with Captain Hwan from a safe distance and feeling guilty about tricking the cadets and crew members. “Don’t you know he’s deliberately been sabotaging the ship? You need to stop him.” I deepened my voice further on that last sentence.
“Not bad,” the scholar said, softly, so the crew on the Pale Lightning wouldn’t pick up his voice.
Our ship’s internal comm channel crackled to life. “Ready,” the engineer said tersely.
The pilot stabbed the channel to the Pale Lightning closed in the middle of Captain Hwan’s answering tirade. I felt a vengeful glow of satisfaction, like when I had slammed the door on my mom’s lectures when I was a kid, except better, because this time I was going to get away with it. I hoped.
“Go,” the scholar breathed.
The pilot didn’t have to be told twice. He pushed the joystick again. I bit my tongue as the ship suddenly rocketed away from the Pale Lightning.