Shadow of the Warmaster by Jo Clayton

Author:Jo Clayton [Clayton, Jo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: sf_fantasy
Published: 1988-10-21T20:00:00+00:00

9

“Ondar.” A hissing whisper. The Hanifa sprang to her feet as the tall one leaned in the door. “The fuzzy says he hears lots of men coming toward us and he’s going to see about slowing them up, but you should be ready to move.”

I sat where I was, wondering what the Hanifa would do about this. I thought it’d likely be something with flair, she was that kind of leader.

She moved quickly to Adelaar. “Where are you?”

“Covering my tracks.”

“How much longer?”

“Five minutes before I can leave the Brain on its own to finish the job.”

“How much of it can we destroy without negating what you’ve done?”

“Worried about them wondering what you’ve been doing? Don’t. I’ve laid in clues that will tell them you pulled the suspect files; that gives you a reason enough for being here so they won’t look all that hard in other directions. They won’t find the loops, not without some rather esoteric, well, call it logic. Even I’d have trouble undoing what I’ve done.”

The Hanifa examined Adelaar, then me, her jawline hard through the silky knit of the cowl. “Do you need backup to get you out of here?”

“No. Do you?”

“No.” She hesitated. “In case I’m not able to meet you, someone else will be there. Hordar for sure, could be a man or a woman. He or she’ll say…” She looked around, remembering suddenly that there might be ears tuned to this place that hadn’t been there before.

“Don’t bother yourself about snoops. Can’t happen. Del has blocked access to the interface.”

“I hear. Still, um… he or she will show you this.” She jerked up the shoulder drape on her cowl, pulled a medallion on a chain from under her black shirt. She let me look at both sides, then tucked it away again. It was an oval of dark bronze, with an odd bumpy pod on one side and a complicated double glyph on the other. Nice piece. “We’re going to leave,” she said. “Before we’re trapped in here.” She swung back to Adelaar. “What about the scanners?”

“They’re down again, I sent an oversurge through. When they try to fix them, the techs will find I’ve cut them off completely from the mainBrain. The Sech won’t be able to get them functioning again until he regains control of the interface.” Adelaar was looking smugly pleased with herself and so she should, but there was a condescension in her voice which the Hanifa wasn’t appreciating. “If your transport can’t reach you before they get organized up top, you might head for the lakeside wall, either go over it or cut through one of the gates there. Don’t worry about alarms. The melters? The west .wall is off the firing circuits for the next two hours. I’ve set up some snares the techs will find, um, interesting. Avoiding them will cost time. If you can reach your pilot, let her know that.” She paused and the Hanifa started to turn away. “One moment more. After you get loose from here, you’ve got a free run for a while.

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