Free Resistance: Hathe Book One by Mary Brock Jones

feet, stricken and beseeching him
to forget that damning chuckle. He ignored her plea. It wasn’t
surprising. She knew what he saw: her body highlighted by the
simple lines of her shift and her ease with the enemy. She couldn’t
blame him when he turned to gaze insolently forwards.
    Beside
her, Radcliff had watched their unspoken signals. Deliberately
taunting, he released the force restraining her and put his arm
around her waist. Then he pulled her with him as he walked towards
his other prisoner, forcing her close to his side. She could only
guess what it looked like to Jaca.
    “ Identification of prisoner, Sergeant.”
    “ Answers to Jaca, sir, but we checked the old Hathian records
as you ordered. His full name is Jacquel des Trurain.” The guard
handed over the file. Radcliff scanned it then looked up, raising a
querying eyebrow at Marthe.
    “ Another abandoned Lieger? Your step-cousin, it seems, my
dear.” She was unable to answer him, her throat too full. Suddenly,
with a strength the Terran did not expect, she flung herself away
from him and into the shoulder of her childhood friend.
    “ Jaca, forgive me. I can save you if I answer their questions,
but I can’t,” she pleaded in their own tongue.
    At
first there was no lessening, no giving way in her oldest friend.
Then he looked down into her face. What he saw, she couldn’t say,
but there was a tightening of his mouth and he met her eyes for the
first time. “Hush, Mimi. It’s all right, I understand. The Terran
has been playing his games with you?” She nodded. “Don’t worry,
he’s probably bluffing. The depths of Hathe keep you safe,” he
managed to add before they were pulled roughly apart.
    The
Major dragged Marthe towards him, pinioning her arms behind her as
he harshly ordered that Jacquel be taken out.
    “ Very touching, madame, but I do not bluff. Whatever your friend may say.” He spoke in Harmish—just to remind her of
his fluency, she didn’t doubt. “And don’t count on des Trurain’s
value as a prisoner. I am fully aware that he is potentially as
useful as you, but I need information now. If one of you must be
killed to make the other talk, then so be it. Sadly for des
Trurain, he doesn’t possess the advantage of your sex, and so he
will be the sacrifice. I need the information you hold and I will
do anything to get it.”
    “ You’re mistaken. I know nothing of use to you.”
    “ I
don’t think so. In half an hour, unless you start talking, des
Trurain dies. You see the red light there?” She nodded. “When that
goes out, so does he.”
    Marthe
stared, transfixed. She did not move, not a muscle, not an eye, for
the entire half hour allowed, staring intently at the light and
willing it to stay red.
    “ Five seconds to go. Well?”
    Slowly, as if in pain, she shook her head. The light went
dead. It was over. She slumped to her feet, silent tears cascading
down her cheeks.
     
     
    A long
while later, she looked up.
    “ I
grew up with Jaca,” she said as if in a dream. “I dare say that one
day we would have married. Now I’ve killed him.”

CHAPTER FIVE

     
    Hamon
said nothing, turning abruptly and walking from the room. It was
many hours before he could bring himself to return. He knew he
should have pressed the attack while she was vulnerable; every
single thing he had ever learnt told him he must. He refused to
listen. There was nothing under the stars that could have made him
keep questioning her then, not with that sheer human misery in her
eyes. Nor could he forget her words as the light signaled the death
of Jacquel des Trurain.
    “ We
would have married…”
    Haunted by her face, he spent the day searching through the
files for every piece of information he could find on the Hathian
man. Maybe in knowledge of his enemy, he could find a justification
for his actions. Or relief from your guilt, jibed the silent
thought.
    He was
not to be so lucky. Despite his hopes, it was an intriguing picture
that