Dark Space - Marianne de Pierres [26]
The man forced a laugh. ‘What would a Latino crossbreed know of illegal life forms?’
Mira summoned the haughtiness she had practised well as defence against the Silvios and the Elenas. ‘More than you know about nobility, signor. I am an educated woman—do not underestimate that. I also have a sound deductive ability. The smell and composition of these objects is as undeniably alien as your companion. And if your cargo were legal you would not be coupled to this isolated berth, you would be attached to quarantine. I assume you must be paying someone well to go unnoticed.’
The man crossed the space between them with frightening speed. ‘How does your education and breeding help you when this happens?’ He jerked a knife from a shoulder harness beneath his jacket and pressed it to Mira’s throat.
She retreated from the sharp pressure on her windpipe, stumbling backwards, falling.
He leaped forward, pinning her down, and she felt his male urge swelling against her abdomen. For a long, terrifying moment she thought that he would abuse her. His ragged breath and grasping fingers told her that he was thinking about doing so.
‘Signor,’ she pleaded.
‘How did you get onto my ship?’ he whispered into her ear. ‘How did you override the locks?’
Mira strained her neck to turn her head aside and put some distance between their breaths. ‘I-I am an Intuit. Your biozoon let me in.’
The man rolled off her and sat back on his heels in surprise. ‘Not possible. Intuits are as rare as quixite and female Intuits ... I have never heard of one. Anyway, the organic component of the ship is inactive.’
Mira lay still, fearful that any movement might bring him back closer. ‘You can never entirely repress its cognitive processes unless you kill it, in which case your ship would not be able to fly.’
‘What has the ship said to you, then?’
‘It told me that it is starving, that you are keeping it in silence. I asked it for help and it let me in. That is all.’ She did not tell him that she thought the biozoon was unstable.
The man stared hard at her. He was not a person, she thought, who believed in trust.
‘Who would miss you if I used this?’ He brought the knife up before her face.
Mira closed her eyes to his cruel expression. ‘I would rather be dead than in the hands of the Carabinere. Yet truthfully I would prefer neither. I can . . . will use my talent to harm your ship if you alert them.’
‘You cannot do that.’
He was right. She could not—at least, not without serious injury to herself. ‘If I can stay here until they have finished their search then I will go without interfering.’
The man pressed the knife to Mira’s throat again. This time, though, she could feel the length of the blade’s sharp edge across her neck, in the killing position.
‘Jancz?’ growled the Balol in a warning tone. ‘Listen.’
Mira opened her eyes.
The man, Jancz, had become still and alert.
A moment later the dim floor lights went out and the air became thick and silent.
The Balol flashed the beam of her light to the ceiling vents.
Sal? Is that you? Have you stopped the air?
You said you would wound me? The biozoon sounded hurt.
No. Understand that I am bargaining for my life. It is a game.
What game?
I am hiding from humanesques who would close down my . . . my feed. Your captain would hand me to them.
‘What have you done, Intuit?’ Jancz hauled Mira to a seated position. He sheathed the knife and pinched the front of her throat with his bare fingers, constricting her breathing.
‘The—ship—is proving my point—’ she gasped.
‘Improve it!’
‘What—of—me?’
Jancz’s grip became intolerable. It was as if he would squeeze words from her mouth, or crush her breath. Little explosions of light pinpricked her eyelids and her senses diminished. She could hear nothing; feel only