ARC: Under Nameless Stars Read Online Free PDF

in the corridor. She didn’t think the steward had noticed her yet. But he surely would in the next few seconds.
    She spotted an archway between her and the steward. It appeared to lead into some sort of public room. Quickly, she walked down the passage and ducked inside.
    It was a lounge of some sort, with a bar along one wall. Passengers sat on stools, drinking at the bar and at half a dozen tables. Zenn pushed her way to the back, where another archway opened into a smaller, more private space.
    The room was half-obscured by a fog of low-hanging smoke that smelled of cherry and tobacco. She was able to make out the near end of a table. Seated at it was a long, upright reptilian form: an Alcyon. He held a fanned array of playing cards in one clawed hand.
    “Looking for someone?” The Alcyon spoke in a deep, wheezy voice, his long jaws and lack of flexible lips causing him some difficulty with his enunciation. “The Lieutenant? Or Master Vancouver?”
    “Yes! Master Vancouver,” Zenn said, picking a name, any name, anything to get her as far as possible from the steward.
    The Alcyon glanced at her, flicked his long forked tongue into the air three times in her direction and turned back to his cards. He sported a bright red-and-blue tinted crest of skin that rose like a small sail on his scaled head. This marked him as a mature alpha male of the human-sized crocodilian species from Hyria Nine in the Alcyon star system. From the size of the crest, Zenn guessed he was most likely a clan leader of some sort and, judging from the golden chain mail vest he wore, a wealthy one.
    “Ah, you can perhaps distract Master Jules for me,” the reptile said, lifting a long, claw-tipped digit to indicate the outline of a barely visible figure at the far end of the table. The Alcyon took a long drag on a flexible tube connected to a large hookah resting on the floor next to his chair, then puffed out double plumes of smoke through his nostrils and added, “He is too quick in the eye to allow my cheating.” The reptilian’s short, sharp laugh was a low-pitched coughing sound, accompanied by another cloud of smoke.
    A voice sounded from the other end of the table, now partially visible through a gap in the haze.
    “Yes! Do distract Master Van-coo-vehr for us, will you?” At the sight of the speaker, Zenn recoiled involuntarily – another Skirni. “Perhaps you could wave at him some old fish-heads. Har.” His voice sounded as though he was gargling oil as he spoke. He was short, like all Skirni, and more rotund than usual. He wore a heavy green velvet robe, and a thick half-circle of carved ivory dangled from the septum of his snub nose. Several of the teeth jutting up from his lower jaw appeared to be made of some copper-tinted metal. “Fish heads! That would draw his attention, would it not, Lieutenant?”
    The one he called Lieutenant, a human, now became visible through the smoke. The human didn’t smile at the Skirni’s joke and looked up just long enough to give Zenn a quick once-over. Zenn guessed he was late-thirties, his clean-shaven face tanned and handsome in a square-jawed sort of way, with close-cropped light brown hair. His crisp crimson uniform jacket bore golden epaulets on each shoulder, with a black leather strap cutting a smart diagonal across the chest. The immediate impression should have been the very model of a dashing, archetypal young hero, but there was something… unusual… about his appearance. Zenn found herself staring, and only pulled her gaze away when the curtain of drifting smoke lifted enough to reveal the farthest end of the table. Seated there was possibly the last creature she expected to see on a starship orbiting Mars.

 
    FOUR
     
    A whimsically smiling face looked up from playing cards held in a big, four-fingered mech-hand. Two jet-black eyes set against downy gray skin caught sight of her, and two sounds emerged as the creature spoke: one sound, the fainter of the two, like a rusty