it in. Rache had known she didn’t approve of his mission.
Thank you for the warning. We heard something similar from a contact of Qin’s, but I will let Casmir and the others know that it is a certainty. She wondered if Shayban’s people knew. With so many ships coming and going at the busy station, they might not have thought much of mercenaries heading this way, especially if they were several days out. Or they might know about the possibly hostile ships but hadn’t wanted to announce anything. After all, a mass exodus would be chaotic and bad for business. Are you in the area? I don’t expect you want to get involved in a battle between mercenaries and a space station, but…
But what? She wasn’t sure why she’d even asked if he was close. There was no reason for them to work together again. Rache wished to serve Dubashi, and Kim and Casmir and the others wanted to stop Dubashi.
Casmir has his crushers, and I believe he promised you one. Or was it two? You’ll have to let us know where to have them delivered. Kim rolled her eyes at herself. Why hadn’t she said she was worried about him, and the choices he was making, and was wondering what he was up to?
Minutes passed as she waited for a reply—the Fedallah probably wasn’t anywhere near the station now—and Natasha stirred.
“The sultan and Nalini are on their way to see me,” she said.
“Do you want me to leave?”
“No. I’m sure they won’t mind if you’re here.” Natasha glanced at Reuben and managed a wan smile. “I hear Sultan Shayban likes crushers, so he won’t even mind your bodyguard.”
“A bodyguard should be expected in the company of such an important scientific researcher as Scholar Sato,” Reuben said.
“Please tell me Casmir didn’t program you to say things like that,” Kim murmured.
The crusher’s head tilted in a human-like gesture. “He did not, but since I have been assigned to protect you, and I am a powerful and sophisticated being, I must assume your importance. A lesser individual would not receive a crusher bodyguard.”
Kim looked at Natasha, feeling vaguely that she should apologize for this arrogance—and that Reuben was joining Zee in developing a personality. Maybe it started happening after someone named them.
“Seems logical to me,” was all Natasha said.
I hope you’ll forgive me, Rache’s reply came in, for not telling you exactly where I am. I do not believe that you or Casmir would approve of my current goal. I do have a post office box in System Cerberus that I can give you if he wants to ship a crusher to me, but it’s possible the postmaster would be alarmed at the arrival of such a large and deadly package. Though he does receive all manner of packages for pirates, mercenaries, bounty hunters, and the like, so it’s possible a crusher wouldn’t even be the most disturbing thing to arrive that week.
The fact that he didn’t want to tell her where he was bothered her. He couldn’t go after Jager until the gate was fixed, so that couldn’t be what he was up to. What if he was trying to find a way to open the gate? Did he know where Kyla Moonrazor was?
Sultan Shayban and Princess Nalini came in with Tristan tagging along. He’d depilated his beard scruff and was finally in new clothing, and he looked much better than he had since he’d stowed away on Rache’s ship.
Nalini came up and gave Natasha a hug while Shayban patted her on the shoulder. Tristan, who hadn’t lived here long enough to know her that well, stopped beside Kim.
“I hear trouble may be coming to Stardust Palace,” he murmured. “Not Rache, I trust.”
“You mean the mercenaries? Word gets out. No, I think he’s…” She only had a hypothesis on what he was doing, so maybe she shouldn’t share it with others yet. “Elsewhere.”
“Harrying the Kingdom ships?”
“That’s a possibility.” As plausible as her possibility, she supposed.
“This is heinous news,” Shayban announced, lowering his hand and turning from Natasha. “I want Dubashi dead. I’m tired of him interfering with my business, my family, and my people.” He squinted at Kim and also included Tristan in the look. “Let us go speak with Professor Dabrowski. I want to know what resources I can lend him to help him capture Dubashi once and for all.”
“Has he made progress on, ah, extending the range of your slydar detector?” Kim hadn’t heard from Casmir since the previous