Relic of Sorrows: Fallen Empire, Book 4 by Lindsay Buroker Page A

bed.”
    Beck turned, a miso jar in hand. “Er?”
    Yumi set her candle on the table. “Just let me go check on my chickens. I’ve been worried about them due to the radiation exposure. I convinced the doctor to modify his cocktail for them.”
    “I bet that was fun,” Beck said.
    “He grumbled about not being a vet, but he did supply me with something.”
    As Yumi continued through the mess hall and toward the cargo hold, Alisa slid into the table, hoping Beck would share whatever he was making if she looked hungry enough.
    “Are you shedding?” Beck asked.
    “Pardon?” Alisa asked.
    He held up his gloved hand. “It’s like I have a sunburn that’s peeling. I’m not sure whether to blame the radiation or Doc’s medicine.”
    “The radiation, I think.” Alisa hadn’t experienced any skin issues. Only the side effects from Alejandro’s “cocktail.” If she had known about her special blood before, she would have passed on that treatment.
    “Hope the chickens aren’t shedding,” Beck said. “Or de-feathering. They’re homely enough as they are. They’d look funny without feathers.”
    “They’re not so homely that you object to eating their eggs.” Alisa frowned. “We may want to pass on that for a while.”
    “Seems smart.” Beck pulled out some sliced meat and a knife, which he flipped and caught a few times without cutting himself. “Something on your mind, Captain?”
    Everything.
    “Why do you ask?” Alisa resisted the urge to glance back toward Leonidas’s cabin.
    “You don’t usually show up for Yumi’s meditation sessions.”
    “Do you?”
    “Me and Mica do sometimes, though I prefer it when it’s just me and Yumi.” He gave her a wink, though his expression soon turned sour. “Last night, the Starseer showed up too. That was intolerable.”
    “Is he not a skilled meditator?”
    “That’s all he wanted to do. He got cranky with me when I asked Yumi questions. He said people aren’t supposed to talk when they meditate.”
    Maybe Alisa would tell Abelardus she was meditating the next time he spoke into her head.
    “But since we haven’t started yet, you can talk if you want to,” Beck offered. “I’m making a sandwich. Want one?”
    “Yes, please. Do I look like I need to talk?”
    “Well, maybe. I heard what happened in NavCom. Wish you’d called me up there when they were all trying to bully you into changing course. I was working out and didn’t know anything was going on.”
    “I don’t think anyone else would have fit in NavCom.”
    “If you don’t want to go on this diversion, just let me know.” He waved his knife, then sighted down it, as if it were a gun. “We’ll lock you in NavCom, and I’ll stand outside the hatch and deal with anyone who tries to come force you to go where you don’t want to go.”
    “You’ll deal with Leonidas and Abelardus?”
    “Absolutely. They both eat my food, you know. I can do dire things to them, if not with poison, then with some undercooked meat. How’re they going to make you change course when they’re doubled over in the lav for hours with crippling—”
    “Thank you,” Alisa said, flinging up a hand to stop the imagery. “I’ll keep your offer in mind. Though I do think Leonidas’s enhanced taste buds might warn him when he’s in danger of… being crippled.”
    “What about the Starseer?”
    “I’m not sure. I’d settle for being able to keep him out of my head. I wish I knew some Starseer tricks myself for that.”
    Alisa remembered Yumi mentioning some drugs she had that supposedly made it hard for a Starseer to see a person’s thoughts. Should she ask for some of those? She could see a time coming when it would be useful to keep Abelardus from rummaging in her mind. Too bad she had some busted genes but not actual Starseer skills. It would have been helpful to have the mental powers to block him from intruding.
    “Then you’d be one of those freaks,” Beck said with distaste, spreading