Hearts and Stones (Celta HeartMate) Read online

  “Yeah, looks bad.”

  After a sigh, the woman answered, “The leaders of the psi-mutants purchased three starships in total, all of them built at least thirty years ago and decommissioned and warehoused. Only Lugh’s Spear will leave from here, taking our colonists.”

  Levona jerked a head at the gleaming white vehicle, old but beautiful. “Aren’t you going?” She could tell by the woman’s clothes that she came from a richer family than Levona herself, might even have enough money to buy a place in the cryonics tubes instead of being one of the crew. She smelled clean, with a touch of pretty floral scent that might be perfume.

  The woman glanced at the ship wistfully, shook her head and met Levona’s gaze again. “Someone has to stay and fight. For liberty, for the rights of mutants like us.”

  Levona dipped her head. “I hear you.”

  “But you don’t agree, do you?”

  Clearing her throat, Levona didn’t answer but said, “You know who I am. I don’t–”

  “You don’t know me, and you would if you identified with us as psi mutants.” With a dip of the head, the woman said, “Karida Bonfils.”

  “I’m sure you have a title,” Levona said.

  “Senior liaison between the CentralConglom psis and the leadership of Lugh’s Spear. “I’m a …” Her face twitched into a smile that was more of a grimace. “Negotiator.”

  “A politician.”

  “Maybe. But you shouldn’t be here.”

  Levona opened her eyes wide. “Just looking.”

  “Uh huh.” Karida snapped her fingers. “Let’s see your I.D. bracelet.”

  Suppressing anxiety, Levona detached it and handed it to Karida, who accessed the info and shook her head. “Minerva Starshine.”

  Levona shrugged.

  “Smart, using the surname of the only old and powerful mutant family in the city.” Karida weighed the bracelet in her hand as tension tightened in Levona. “A family with many members and several offshoots. But I don’t think they’d approve of your use of this.” She tucked Levona’s only ID in a pocket of the expensive trousers.

  “I’m a psi mutant freak,” Levona stated. “I’m here and I believe in your – our – policies to keep our freedoms.” She especially believed the best chance for every psi on the planet was to get off Earth.

  Karida’s lips firmed. “Our main policy is to protect ourselves. There will be more of us born.”

  “Oh, for sure. If the govs don’t kill us when born,” Levona said, “Or, better yet, prevent us from being conceived or born.”

  The liaison shuddered. “We have to fight that, too.”

  Levona shrugged. “The gov keeps secrets. Who knows what they do to our bodies in hospitals if we go there for pre-natal care, or to give birth? I won’t take that chance.” Her parents had lived in fear all of their lives and still had died from a weapon aimed at psi-mutants.

  “You say the right things, but I believe it would be best if you come along with me as I walk you off the landing field.”

  “Or?”

  Karida said, “Or I hand over your ID bracelet to our head of ghetto security, and we … ah, detain you, until the ship leaves.”

  Fear spurted through Levona. Hide the emotion, hope Karida didn’t sense the panic. Terrible to be locked up, stuck on Earth and in the barrio. No, that must not happen. Retreat, and think, and figure something out.

  Pizi squeaked.

  “What was that?” Karida demanded.

  “My young cat, my animal companion,” Levona said. Pizi raced from the direction of the field behind them, stopped and mewed. Levona stooped down to pick her up.

  YOU NEED AN ANIMAL COMPANION! Pizi shouted.

  Karida gasped. “I heard her.” The other woman lowered her voice, “Telepathically.” She held out her hands. “Please?” It was a plea.

  Levona set Pizi in Karida’s hands.

  “Her fur’s so soft,” Karida said, and cuddled the cat against her cheek in a gesture revealing her inner child, one with a spark of hope that she yet felt, and contrasting with the thick jacket over personalized body armor.

  Another little yeep from Pizi. I know where there is a nest of young Cats, some nearly as smart as Me!

  Karida’s caught breath matched Levona’s.

  Not very far from here. Pizi gazed at Karida with big eyes that probably glowed in the dim light. They need human companions to help Them be all They can be. Come with Us and I’ll take you to Them.

  Karida’s jaw set and she looked around suspiciously. “There are only the two of you?”

  Yes, Pizi and Levona said at the same time.

  “Not distracting me so someone can sneak in?”

  “No. And you have patrol guards on the grounds.”

  “Mostly to give alarm if the gov incites the mobs against us again. Not so much to guard the ship, and not military trained, just doing their duty to pay their passage as crew.”

  “Yeah,” Levona said. “No one having second thoughts now that they see the ship where they’ll be living in the rest of their lives and maybe that of their children’s and grandchildren’s?”

  Karida hesitated. “Perhaps.”

  “Some of the singles, maybe, ’cuz they’ll have to find mates from the folk on board?”

  Another pause and a hard look at Levona. “Perhaps.”

  More hope unfurled inside Levona.

  Pizi revved a small purr, touched Karida’s face with a paw. You need an animal companion. And someone needs YOU!

  More wistfulness emanated from Karida, but not aimed at the hope of the colonists, a new planet of their own, but yearning for a living being, an animal friend, here and now. She held the cat in front of her, and Pizi dangled. “You say these cats are like you?”

  Not as SMART as Me, but …

  “They can talk telepathically?”

  A teeny bit. Images, but still can be a true companion to You. Bond with You.

  “Okay,” Karida said. “Let me instruct the head sentry and we’ll go.”

  She handed Pizi to Levona, walked over to the one on the right side of the ramp, and began talking. Levona petted Pizi with shaking hands and wondered if there was any way to finesse the situation and elude Karida and get on the ship. Or at least get her ID back. Levona’s mind spun with thready plans, more hope than real. She couldn’t give up hope.

  Soon Karida joined them and Pizi leapt from Levona’s fear-damp grip down to the ground to lead the way to the other cats.

  They walked off the field and traversed several blocks in silence, all three of them female psi mutant-freaks, accepting of their gifts and themselves, but the humans wary of each other.

  In a few minutes they reached the darkness of an alley off a street of small restaurants that made Levona’s mouth water and stomach grumble — she hadn’t wanted to try the dubious food The Frigid Rush served. There Pizi led them to a cat stink corner holding a box and stained cloth scraps. All the while she mentally broadcasted, We come with food and love and love and food for YOU!

  Two skinny gray tabby cats, smaller and younger than Pizi herself, hovered over a heap of rags. Their muscles tensed as they readied to spring away and bolt from the alley.

  “I don’t have any food,” Karida whispered.

  “I do,” Levona said, louder. “Radiate love and acceptance.”

  Yes! Pizi agreed.

  “That’s simple to do,” Karida said, and the whole alley filled with reassuring, positive feelings, most from Karida, with a good amount from Levona and Pizi.

  The cats relaxed and turned toward them, sending a yearning need back, until Levona’s stomach rumbled with their hunger. Tentative hope unfurled from them to Levona and Karida.

  They don’t know where to go to find peoples like Us and human companions, Pizi said.

  “I didn’t even know cats like these existed,” Karida muttered.

  It is good You all know of each other now, Pizi insisted.

  “Absolutely,” Levona said, shrugg
ing off her pack and opening a long pocket containing food bits she kept for Pizi. With a spellword, she rehydrated and heated them and the beef smelled tasty.

  A chorus of mews erupted and the cats stropped their ankles.

  “Here, hold out your hands,” Levona said to Karida. When the woman did, Levona dumped most of the bits into her hands, and Karida hunkered down to feed the felines.

  Yowls stopped abruptly.

  They’re WONDERFUL, quite, quite, incredible, Karida said mentally. Levona sensed that the woman’s throat had closed with emotion too thickly to talk.

  The cats ate greedily, licking Karida’s hands.

  “They’re hardly more than kittens,” Levona murmured, squatting to offer her hand with some bites, too.

  They is much younger than Me, Pizi said, though she only neared her four-month mark. You should give Them ALL my treats. They need it more than Me, she ended virtuously.

  We’ll get more for you, Levona said on their private channel.

  Of course. Pizi had no doubts of that. She licked Levona’s hand, then sauntered around the alley, lifted her muzzle and sniffed loudly, tilted her head.

  There are more out there. The dam of these and the sire and others!

  “We should bring them in, all of them, and take them to people who’ll appreciate them,” Karida said.

  She meant folk in the barrio, and no doubt Karida believed in her community, but Levona had followed her parents’ example and not stayed where she’d be specifically targeted for her psychic gifts.

  Karida called out loud to the cats, and two more short-haired grays poked their heads around the alley wall. One trotted forward. Karida sat down right there in the alley, and projected a hypnotic mental song that stilled Levona, too. Come to me, cats. I will find you homes with loving people who will cherish and respect you.

  Pizi nipped at Levona’s thumb and she jerked from the trance, frowned at the summoning, and said, “You need to use less words and more images, and definitely send emotion. That way they’ll feel that you’re sincere and not wanting them for … experiments … or whatever.”

  Karida glanced up at her. “Right.” Holding her hands flat, she inhaled and drew on her power. A moment later raw hamburger lay on her palms.

  “Translocation,” Levona breathed. “An impressive power.”

  “Yes, thank you.” Then Karida turned her head to stare down the alley that opened into a rubbled space. “You have good maps in your head, that’s one of your gifts.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then you probably know all about the routes into the ship.” She cleared her throat. “Into Lugh’s Spear.”

  “Maybe.”

  And once We get into the ship, We will FEEL it, and know all its passageways, too! Pizi burbled.

  Levona grit her teeth at Pizi’s revelation.

  Karida wiggled, settling into the spot, body angling away from Levona and Pizi, as if dismissing them to go their way. “I believe that having semi-intelligent animal companions like these cats is very important to our cause here on Earth.” She sighed, then reached out when another late-kittenhood feline zoomed toward them. The little black tom leapt and attached himself to Karida’s jacket, crawled up to snuggle against her neck. “Lady and Lord,” Karida murmured. “This one is mine!”

  “Lady and Lord? Oh, the Divine Couple.”

  “Yes, a very good religion to forge a community, generous and with the tenet to do no harm.”

  “I can believe in that,” Levona said.

  The cat revved his purr. The soothing sound filled the alley. Levona sensed he, too, sent out a telepathic call.

  “Better get going,” Karida said.

  “Yes.”

  “There’s another cat,” Karida whispered.

  “They are psi mutants like us,” Levona said. “They must be nurtured and cherished.”

  And become heart friends to peoples! Pizi put in. We will alls help each others. Here and there and everywhere.

  “That sounds good to me,” Karida said.

  “I want one of these little cats to go to Bartek,” Levona said.

  Karida nodded. “Done, and I’ll keep an eye on him.” Her mouth flattened. “Quite a few of us are keeping an eye on Bartek. I’ll watch out for him and the cat.”

  “Good.”

  Levona recalled words painted on the graffiti wall. “Blessed be.”

  “Blessed be, go with the Lady and Lord,” Karida answered. She dug into her pocket and tossed up Levona’s fake I.D. bracelet, didn’t watch as Levona caught it.

  I will do nothing to frustrate your … plans, but I do not condone them, came Karida’s whisper in Levona’s mind. She turned squarely away from them.

  The tom rumbled his purr even louder, using psi magic.

  Show off, Pizi grumbled as Levona tip-toed out of the alley. Her purr had always been rather thin.

  They found a cheap food window and Levona parted with a few singles for a veggie smelling handpie filled with stuff that promised to be nutritious if not tasty, and treats for Pizi.

  They had to get on Lugh’s Spear as soon as possible, before whatever good will Karida had for Pizi and Levona dried up. Sneaking on wouldn’t be as difficult as hiding until the ship launched.

  So they waited in the darkest of shadows through long hours with fear and anticipation rising and fading, but keeping Levona’s teeth on edge and sending Pizi running under the long ship front and back.

  In the earliest hours of the morning, even the relief guards nodded sleepily. Mouth drying, Levona crept near the tail of the starship, there she fell to her belly and crawled the last twenty meters until she was partially shielded from sight by the runners. The scent of winter grass and odd ship tech smell rose from the dirt around her.

  Then she walked carefully, step by step over frost-crunchy grass for several meters, senses strained for any shout of alarmed discovery.

  She stopped where Pizi indicated and drew out her multi-tool with the focused beam of light. Her tool showed the crack, smaller than she’d thought, and at a difficult angle to get in. Pizi assured her that she could fit.

  Levona sucked in her breath and drew on all her power and jumped up and in. Pizi pushed with her power, too.

  With much squishing of stomach and breasts along with bruising, Levona wiggled through the outer skin of the ship and lay panting and rubbing her hurt chest, trying to recover not only physical, but her psychic energy.

  Pizi ran off to explore.

  Levona lay in a space between the walls, maybe a service area. The intense darkness gave no clues about the blueprint of the vehicle. S would wait until she got her breath back before standing and sending out her psi senses to determine a rough map. Meanwhile her nose told her of old dust collected in the walls, and oil and fuel.

  After a minute she sat and flicked on her tool-light, but she couldn’t identify some of the materials of the ship . She stared at a girder that looked — not really solid — touching it, the material felt like metal, but made of tiny cavities.

  So she didn’t know as much about the ship as she should have, desperately ignorant of everything, the crewing, the structure, the timeline … Yeah, despite her loner tendencies, she should have come down from the mountains months ago and joined the psi-mutant community, in the barrio or out.

  Before she’d interacted with Bartek and Karida, Levona hadn’t truly realized how isolated she’d been from her own kind.

  But she couldn’t regret lingering. Pizi’s trailing mew sounded in Levona’s mind and a flush of love swept through her. As her cat companion pointed out earlier, if Levona had returned from the mountains earlier, in time to be accepted as part of the crew for Lugh’s Spear, she’d have missed saving Pizi.

  More than ever, Levona decided the cat was special, of the utmost importance. A genetic switch had flicked to make Pizi The Prodigy. The young cats they’d found that night seemed generations behind Levona’s own animal companion. Pizi was a genius savant, and a higher priorit
y than Levona herself for the gifted community.

  She let the dimness of the ship, the odd smells and the feel of the atmosphere wrap around her, settling her emotions from the last few days. She and Pizi had arrived and accomplished their goal. So far.

  As she calmed and became fully aware of her surroundings, she understood that more than her hope sparkled through the air of the ship. The vehicle itself carried the vibrations of the psi leaders who’d bought it, who’d already traveled on it, those of the … pilot and the colonists.

  Hope.

  She felt comfortable here. For the first time, she could accept living her life on this ship, with these people.

  If they ever accepted her.

  At that moment Pizi traipsed back into sight. As soon as she saw the glow light, she trotted toward Levona, who opened her arms.

  Pizi flung herself at her and Levona cradled the cat tight, closing her eyes, feeling the softness of her fur, smelling the dust and mountain tang of her cat and more, a coating of psi from the ship lingering on her fur. Slow and steadily, she petted her friend for long minutes. Pizi vibrated with her quiet purr.

  I love you, Pizi, Levona sent mentally.

  I love you, too, Pizi said, then I have found a place I like, a little nest where We can stay.

  For now, Levona said. We WILL be discovered at some point in time, probably when we go out for water and food.

  I know.

  We are trying to hide until after the ship takes off.

  “Yessss,” Pizi hissed audibly.

  “Yes,” Levona muttered.

  Follow me. Pizi hopped from Levona’s loosened grasp, and moved from the web of metal pillars to a short corridor with metal panels, tail waving.

  Keeping her steps as soft-footed as possible, Levona trailed her cat, who turned from a passage heading to the interior of the ship to one running the length of the ship, and too dim.

  As they walked, Levona kept her hand against the inner wall, fingertips picking up dust and grime, but her mind drawing maps as they went, correlating with what she’d seen outside — a symmetrical vehicle top to bottom and side to side for four-fifths of the ship. The last fifth of the ship, the nose, angled to about three stories. From the feeling of that particular space, Levona thought the pilots and other crew who controlled the ship had their own living space there.