The Veiled Masters: A Twilight Imperium Novel by Tim Pratt

Author:Tim Pratt [Pratt, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: science fiction, space opera, media tie-in
Publisher: Aconyte
Published: 2022-06-07T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

Severyne

“Nothing, captain,” Voyou reported, face impassive on her screen. She was in her office, and he was reporting from the bridge. Everyone worked better there when she wasn’t obviously watching them. She made most of her crew nervous. She even made Voyou nervous, but at least he’d gotten better at not visibly wincing when he had to give her bad news.

Severyne made a sound of disgust and leaned back in her chair. “What about that cargo ship? It’s big enough to hide an entire pride of Hacan.”

“We detected only one life sign, and we confirmed that was the pilot,” Voyou said. “There’s no sign that the fugitives have left the moon.”

“The admiral’s reputation does not suggest a great tolerance for failure, Voyou.”

“No, captain. It does not.”

“Hmm. What are the Coalition forces doing now?”

“They’ve just returned to the Temerarious. They did not appear to have any prisoners with them, and they were escorted off the moon by local security forces – there was some jurisdictional argument there, it seems.”

Severyne smirked. That was amusing, at least.

Voyou continued. “We’re monitoring communications from the Temerarious, and they haven’t sent any messages out of the system. If they’d succeeded in capturing or killing Terrak, I’m sure they would have sent word back home by now.”

“Give me something, Voyou, or you’ll find out the admiral isn’t the only woman who doesn’t like failure.”

“I was already aware of your feelings in that area, captain. We did find the place where Terrak and his escort landed on the moon. We were able to obtain security footage from the port, including one fairly clear image of the human assisting Terrak, though she did a remarkably good job of avoiding the direct view of the cameras. We’re going to run her through our databases. Perhaps if we identify her, we can better understand Terrak’s plans.”

“Let me see,” Severyne said.

Voyou’s face vanished from her screen, replaced by a still image of a human woman’s face, half turned away.

Severyne stared. She hadn’t seen that face in some time, but it hadn’t changed much. Her features were sharp, and her expression faintly amused, like the world was a joke only she truly understood. “I know her.” Severyne’s voice croaked, and she cleared her throat before continuing. She’d never expected to see that face again. She ruthlessly suppressed the feelings that welled up when she did. “That woman is a Federation of Sol covert operative named Amina Azad. I have crossed paths with her before.”

“The Federation is helping Terrak escape?”

“It makes sense, if Terrak is one of our operatives, attempting to defect,” Severyne said. “Of course he would go to our most hated enemy for help.”

“But, ah…” Voyou clearly didn’t want to say, ‘but we thought the admiral was lying to us’ on a Barony communications channel, even a supposedly private one like this.

“Yes,” Severyne said. “But.” What was going on? Why was Azad involved? And – Severyne did her best to suppress a flutter at the thought – was she going to

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