Page 74 of Star Prince

“Overprotection was why I left home. With youI found everything I’d always dreamed of.”

And hadn’t he too?

Twenty-eight minutes.

He glanced at the air-remaining readout and grimaced. Strangely, he wasn’t afraid of dying; just incredibly pissed. But if he was going to go out, he was going to do it right. He took hold of Tee’s hands. “This a little after the fact, but considering the circumstances, I ask that you bear with me.” He brought her knuckles to his lips. “‘My love, I give you my heart, my allegiance, my promise of fidelity and protection...’”

“The promise ceremony,” she whispered.

“Yes,” he said, and finished reciting the passages that dated back to the birth of the Treatise of Trade.

Tee’s chest rose and fell, faster now. She squeezed his hands, her expression a heart-wrenching blend of grief and joy. “‘My love, I take your promise. In return, I give you my heart, my devotion, my promise of—”

His personal comm crackled. It used a discreet frequency, known only by his crew, but someone, or something, had just tried to reach him on it.

For a few shocked seconds he and Tee’ah stared at each other. Momentum had carried them toward death and desperate, last-minute pledges. Now rescue had arrived. Unexpectedly. Dazed, they had to shift gears.

Tee stumbled to her feet. “Look! Ships! Two—no three of them.”

Ian cupped his hands around his eyes and peered into the blackness of space. TheSun Devilhad long dwindled into a speck of light. But the dark form of another starship coasted past at close range. Two more hovered beyond, maneuvering around the pod. The stuffy air and warm temperature dulled his senses, but the likelihood of rescue dragged him to full alertness. Ian brought his comm to his mouth. “Mayday, mayday. Survivors in pod. Mayday, mayday. Twenty minutes of air remaining. I repeat, twenty minutes of air.”

Muffin’s voice blared loud and clear. “Captain, we’ve got you in sight. I copy the minutes left. We’ll have you onboard in five. Standby for emergency tow.”

Their pod was equipped with minimal communication equipment, making it impossible to hear all the transmissions between the ship Muffin was on and the other two, but after a few moments the other pair of would-be rescuers wheeled around and accelerated away.

Muffin’s ship closed on their pod, using valuable minutes to decelerate sufficiently to allow the delicate task of pod retrieval to take place.

Ian asked, “Is the rest of the crew with you?” Muffin replied, “They’re on theSun Devil.”

“TheSun Devil?The computer’s gone crazy.”

“We know. When we got there, the computer claimed the ship no longer existed. Quin, Gredda, and Push boarded in life support suits.”

Quin’s voice chimed in. “You ever hear of nano-machines, Captain?”

“Microscopic computers?”

“Someone got them in our computer. Early in the mission, I’d say.”

“Klark?” Tee speculated.

“Likely. High-tech terrorism at its worst. He turned our computer into an unwitting traitor. Any one of the spare parts we bought could have carried the invaders. Over time, and unknown to us, a battle’s been going on inside the ship’s computer between the ship’s backup and warning system, and the rudimentary artificial intelligence sent in to destroy it. It’s an easy fix, though. Now that theQuillie’scomputer pointed out the little saboteurs.”

Ian exchanged glances with Tee. “That explains all the problems we’ve been having,” she said.

He nodded grimly. Klark’s malevolence proved his willingness to kill. How to bring Klark to justice would take some thought, though. Ian was still, in many ways, an outsider. Rushing to the Great Council with the accusation that one of their princes had tried to assassinate him would be as ill thought out as slalom skiing on his Harley.

On the side of the rescue ship, clamshell doors opened to a maw revealing an empty cargo bay.

“Prepare to be swallowed whole,” Tee said.

He laid his arm over her shoulders. “I am.” In more ways than he ever imagined.

A claw-arm extended from the bay, reminding Ianof a tongue. With a thunk, it grabbed hold of the pod, tossing he and Tee to the padded floor. Then it slowly, deliberately drew them inside the ship.

As soon as the gigantic outer door closed behind them, Muffin’s voice blasted through the comm. “The bay’s pressurized.”

Ian cracked the hatch open. Cold, dry air rushed inside. He and Tee filled their lungs with it. Sitting together on the floor, they felt the ship accelerate.

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