Centaur Read online

  Pholus knelt at the foot of the bed. “Tell me about Pholus.”

  Opal hoped the story would forestall the fate Pholus seemed to have in mind for her. “He was a friend of Hercules. One day, when Hercules was visiting his cave, Pholus opened a jar of magical wine for his friend. The smell of the wine drove the other centaurs mad, and they attacked the cave. Hercules defended the cave with his poisoned arrows, and chased the centaurs away. While he was gone, Pholus picked up one of the arrows, was pricked by it, and died.”

  He grunted. “So you named me after an idiot?”

  “It’s the only centaur name I know besides Chiron.”

  “Why did it have to be a centaur?”

  “I don’t know. It just came to me. I guess, in some ways, you seem a lot like... a horse.”

  That seemed to satisfy him. “I came to tell you that I’m leaving.”

  “That’s kind of you.”

  He grunted and crawled forward on the mattress. The light shifted, and Opal saw that he was impressively naked.

  “I’ll scream.” Opal’s hands started to tremble.

  “No, you won’t. If you were going to scream, you would have already.” He laid his hand gently on her thigh, just above the knee.

  His hand barely gripped her but it felt like an iron clamp around her leg. She whispered, “What do you want?”

  “I want you. All of you, before I go.” He leaned in close.

  He smelled musky. “And if I say no?”

  “You won’t.”

  “Won’t I?”

  “So say it.”

  Opal drew a deep breath and summoned all the confidence she could muster. Her voice quivered. “Pholus, take your hand off of my leg.”

  Pholus sat back and removed his hand, but kept his gaze locked on hers, burning.

  Opal cocked her head and squinted. “You obeyed me.”

  “Yes.” He looked away.

  “Why?” She reached out and lifted his chin with the tips of her fingers. “Tell me. Why did you obey me?”

  His gaze darted over her face. “I don’t know. It doesn’t make any sense. You shouldn’t be able to command me. No woman should. It’s impossible. You don’t… it’s not possible.”

  “Chauvinism? Well, impossible or not, here we are.”

  Pholus started to back away off the bed.

  “No. Wait. Stop.”

  Pholus halted with one leg off the bed.

  “As long as you’re obeying me, you’re going to answer my questions. Sit down.”

  He sat cross-legged on the foot of the bed.

  “Who are you?”

  “Pholus is the name you gave me, isn’t it?”

  “Which military do you serve?”

  Pholus took a deep breath. “Blackstorm.”

  Opal frowned. That didn’t sound good to her, not at all. The Blackstorm mercenaries enjoyed a worldwide reputation, none of it good for ordinary people. “Why are you here?”

  Pholus swallowed. “I can’t tell you that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Orders.”

  Opal looked towards the tent flap.

  “Are your comrades going to come looking for you?”

  “Yes. No one is left behind.”

  “What will they do when they find you? To me, I mean, to the clinic.”

  “We have secrets to keep. They will make sure those secrets are kept.”

  Opal nodded gravely. The medical data she gathered, those files were exactly what he was talking about. She could understand how they would be useful to Blackstorm’s enemies. “Pholus, can you protect me?”

  “I don’t know. If I’m found here... no.”

  “Then we have to go.” Opal climbed out of the bed and pulled on her pants. Pholus didn’t say anything, but she could feel him watching her. Opal usually didn’t feel ashamed of her body—living in the bush one couldn’t really be very modest—but a thrill ran down her spine. She heard an appreciative grunt from Pholus’s direction.

  “We?”

  She pulled the shirt over her head and turned around. “Yes. If they’re going to find you, I want it to be somewhere else. If your comrades are going to look for me, I don’t want to be here, either. They have enough trouble just getting by day to day. They don’t need a bunch of mercenaries stomping around. Pholus... you’re going to get me off the island.”

  He scowled.

  Opal spread her hands pleadingly. “Pholus. Get me off the island. I can’t be safe here. Once I’m on the plane to Sydney, you can go back to your unit.”

  Pholus put his palms over his eyes and took a deep breath. “Alright.” He got up and pushed open the tent.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I need some clothes.”

  “Oh... right.” She smiled sheepishly, as if just noticing his nakedness for the first time. “Your pants are in the storage shed. It’s…”

  “I know where it is. Get your things. Shut off anything that can transmit a signal. Burn anything you can’t carry. Don’t carry any more than you can handle all day.” He vanished into the darkness.

  A pair of socks and a heavy pair of boots completed her attire. Opal stuffed her laptop into a backpack and started gathering food and survival gear. She tried to focus on the strange obedience she seemed to command from Pholus, but her mind kept drifting back to the faint image of his naked body, burned into her memory. She shook her head. “What’s wrong with you, Opal?” she asked herself. “It’s not like you to fall for someone this way.”

  Natago’s voice brought her attention back. “Doctor Opal? What is this?”

  “I’m leaving, Natago. There’s big trouble coming. Burn everything after I’m gone. Pile it all up and burn it.”

  “But...?”

  “It’s all replaceable, Natago.” She turned and put her hand on his shoulder. “You and your family aren’t. I’ll be back after this is done. I promise.”

  “We will miss you, Doctor Opal.”

  “I’ll miss you too.” She hefted the pack. It felt heavy, but Opal felt confident that she’d be able to handle it, even with more gear hanging from her belt. She sighed and touched the bed. As much as she would miss the village, she would miss the bed more. “Ah, well.”

  She stepped out of the tent. “Remember, Natago. Burn everything. Oh, Harry is going to be here tomorrow. Tell him I’ll catch him in Port Moresby.”

  Natago grunted assent. “Goodbye, Doctor,” he said, in English.

  Pholus’s massive form loomed in the darkness. She spotted the handle of a machete poking up over his muscular shoulder, and for a moment she worried that he intended to do violence to Natago. His calm voice eased her fears. “Time to go, Doctor.”

  Chapter Two

  Opal lay bruised and bloodied. Rough encounters with rocks and branches left her shins and forearms scraped raw. Her shoulders ached from carrying the pack, and she kept banging her head on the overhanging rock that sheltered them from the downpour. The memories of the flight from the clinic swirled through her blurred, exhausted mind. She reminded herself that she was still recovering from the loss of the blood she had given Pholus.

  Opal checked Pholus’s dressings to make sure he wasn’t doing himself damage. Luckily, he seemed to be healing well, and the danger of ripping open his wounds had mostly passed.

  “Sleep, Opal,” said Pholus. “We’re safe for now.”

  “I can’t. I’m sore, I’m worried about the village...”

  “And you’re not sure you can trust me.” He lay back, under the rock, and folded his arms over his stomach.

  “I can’t forget what you came into my tent to do last night.”

  “I didn’t...”

  “Oh, please. Don’t deny it. You didn’t even bother to get your pants.”

  He sighed. “What did you expect when you came with me? When did you think you were going to sleep?”

  “I don’t know. This isn’t rational, alright? I’m having trouble sleeping with you here.”

&n
bsp; Pholus moved like lightning. His body pinned her against the dirt. His thigh, as thick as a tree trunk, pressed against her sex. His hand clamped over her mouth, and his voice felt hot in her ear. “If I wanted to rape you, I could have done it whenever I wanted. I could have done it back at your clinic. Things would have been a lot less complicated if I had. Instead I’m leading you across three hundred miles of the worst terrain in the world. We can’t even use roads. Telling me you don’t trust me isn’t exactly going to make me the most grateful guide in the world, now, is it?”

  He released her and rolled back to his side of the rock. She lay panting, trying to calm her hammering heart.

  “Don’t...ever...do that again.”

  “I won’t. I have made my point though?”

  “Yes.” Opal rolled onto her side, away from Pholus, pulling her legs up protectively.

  Get your head together, Opal. This is no time for a breakdown! For now, at least, he’s not going to hurt you and you need his help. You have to find a way to trust him.

  Opal steeled herself and uncurled, stretching out and returning to her back. “So, um… where are you from?”

  “What?”

  “I’m making small talk. I’m trying to get more comfortable around you.”

  “Oh.” Opal felt Pholus shrug. “I was raised at an orphanage in Nevada. When I was twelve they sent me to military school. They called me a ‘discipline problem.’ There was never any question about joining up when I graduated.”

  “What do you do for fun?”

  “Fun? Sims. Football. Cards. Usual stuff.”

  “You have a girlfriend?”

  He snorted derisively. “No.”

  Opal turned to face him. “Why not? You’re a good-looking guy. You ought to be able to get any woman you want.”

  “We’re pretty busy. No time.”

  “What do you want to do when you retire?”

  “Retire?” He shrugged. “That’s a long way off.”

  “You don’t want to settle down somewhere, maybe raise a family?”

  “What is this, some kind of proposition? I wouldn’t be a good husband and I wouldn’t be a good father.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I kill people. It’s what I do.”

  Opal lay back in the dirt. “You’re not making it easy for me to trust you.”

  “I have to be a father type for you to trust me?”

  “No, but...”

  Pholus rolled onto his side and fixed his gaze on Opal’s. “Listen to me. I don’t know how you managed to make your command stick, but now that I’ve got a mission, I’m on it. I won’t do anything else until it’s done. Right now, you can trust me better than your own mother, but I can’t do this job right unless you figure that out.”

  Opal nodded.

  “Now sleep. If you don’t get some sleep, you’re going to slow us down. I’m not going to do anything.”

  Opal’s interrupted sleep the night before and the morning’s exertions had left her exhausted, and as the adrenaline from Pholus’s mock attack drained away, she felt a wave of fatigue wash over her that defied resistance. She didn’t bother to try.

  * * * *

  Pholus woke Opal with a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Opal. Rain’s stopped. We need to get moving before it heats up.”

  Opal moaned and tried to pull away from Pholus’s touch.

  “Let’s go.” Pholus crawled out of their hiding place, and unceremoniously hauled Opal out by her ankle. She shrieked and scrambled.

  She picked herself up, sputtering. “What was that for?”

  “No time to waste. A float went over a few minutes ago. They may have spotted us, we need to get moving.”

  Opal composed herself quickly, scanning the breaks in the tree cover. “That’s probably Harry. He was going to bring in a shipment today.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Pholus hefted his duffel and handed Opal her backpack, then set off.

  Opal swung the backpack over her shoulder and winced. Her muscles still hurt from sleeping on the hard packed earth, and she knew that the upcoming exertions would only make them worse. “Harry’s a friend. He wouldn’t sell me out.”

  Pholus just kept walking.

  The heat and tedium soon drained any desire for conversation out of them. Opal trudged behind the massive mercenary, allowing him to chop through the undergrowth with his machete.

  Around noon they reached the edge of the canopy forest.

  Opal sat down on her haunches and looked up at him.

  “Have a rest,” he said. “We’re going to have to cross this at a run.” Pholus peered out across a valley covered with cycad palms. Their thick hairy trunks stood about six feet tall at the most, crowned with disk-like clusters of spiny fronds.

  “That’s gotta be three miles or more,” said Opal, peering out at the opposite side of the valley.

  “Doesn’t matter. Gotta be done.”

  Opal scanned the sky while she dug out a protein wafer and unwrapped it. “Who’s going to see us?”

  “Satellite, camouflaged float, drone, solar glider, doesn’t matter. There isn’t enough cover. We just want to be across it as quickly as possible, in case they’re looking away right then.”

  “And if they aren’t?”

  “Then they might take us for a couple locals out for a jog, but I doubt it.”

  Opal washed down the food bar with some bottled water and stood up. “I’m ready.” She cinched her pack’s straps.

  Pholus counted to three. They raced down the slope, weaving between the spiny dwarf trees. Not for the first time since leaving, Opal wished she had worn a sports bra. Her legs pumped, and she concentrated on breathing deeply and evenly and conserving her energy. Too soon, she was winded, and by the time she reached the river her heart pounded in her ears and her steps faltered. Pholus was quickly outdistancing her. With a splash, she fell into the rain-swollen river.

  The water wasn’t deep, only a meter or so, but it easily carried her downstream on its rushing flow. The water closed over her head, and the rushing torrent and the bubbles drowned out all other sounds. Rocks scraped her arms and legs. Her lungs ached for air, but her strength failed her against the chaotic, powerful water. It poured into her mouth, and blackness with it, stealing away the edges of her vision around splashes of colored light. Cold and overpowering, it promised a terrible peace.

  Light and air and pain burst through the black shell. Lips pressed on hers, firm lips, filling her lungs. She coughed and sputtered and the lips pulled away. She rolled on her side and vomited water and bile into the dirt.

  She finally focused. Pholus knelt over her, his mouth set in a grim line and his brows knit. “Breathe,” he said. “We have to get back under cover.”

  Opal nodded and tried to get up, but her limbs wouldn’t do as they were told. Pholus shook his head. “Hold on,” he said softly, and scooped her up in his arms. Opal wrapped her arms around his shoulders and did her best to maintain her grip as Pholus scrambled up the gentle slope towards the far side of the valley.

  “Shit,” she heard Pholus mutter under his breath, and through the pounding in her ears she could hear the drone of a small, high-speed turbine. With a groan, he set her down in thick brush on the edge of the cycad grove and collapsed next to her.

  “What’s happening?” she managed to whisper between gasps.

  “Drone. Flying down the valley. If it didn’t see me, it sure as hell saw my duffel bag. We’re going to have visitors if we don’t get out of here.”

  “How long have we got?”

  Pholus gritted his teeth. “An hour. Probably less.” He put his hand to his side.

  “Are you alright?” Opal sat up.

  Blood seeped into the bandage on his abdomen.

  “I’m going to have to check that.” Still a little breathless, she took her medical kit from her backpack. Luckily, the damage was minimal, and she managed to seal the wound, in between ducking down in the foliage to avoid patrolling
drones. Pholus had lost minimal blood, but the time they lost was irreplaceable.

  Pholus got to his feet. “If we’re done saving each other’s lives then we need to go.”

  Opal stood, her hand against the tree trunk for stability. “Wait… look.” She pointed out towards the cycad grove. “That’s Harry’s float.”

  The big, disc-shaped lighter-than-air craft hovered over the valley, its engines barely running in the still air.

  Opal started to walk out into the open, but stopped when Pholus put his hand on her shoulder. “No. You can’t trust him.”

  “Yes, I can. I know it’s a risk. But if you’re right and those drones spotted us, Blackstorm is going to catch us anyway, and running risks your wounds opening up. We’re too weak to run anymore. Our chances are better with Harry.” Opal stepped out into the open, between two of the thick palms. “Harry!” she shouted, “Over here!”

  Pholus watched warily from behind cover.

  Harry’s voice boomed from a loudspeaker mounted on the rim. “Opal! Good to see you. Natago said you might be out this way. Need a ride?”

  “Yes, please!”

  The huge dirigible maneuvered slowly downwards, until it hung about thirty feet up from Opal. A panel opened in the underside and a winch inside lowered a cargo cage. Opal climbed in. She waved to Pholus. “Come on, let’s go.”

  Pholus climbed in, warily. “I don’t like this. Even if he talked to Natago, he could still be working for Blackstorm.”

  The cage swayed as the winch drew it back up into the belly of the airship.

  Harry, a lanky fellow with a mop of dirty blonde hair, waited on the cargo deck to greet them. “Opal!” He wiped his hand on his grubby coverall and offered it to Pholus. “Who’s your big friend?”

  “Harry, this is Pholus.”

  Harry’s hand disappeared in the mercenary’s huge mitt. He quailed at the glare Pholus gave him.

  Opal put her hand on Pholus’s arm. “Harry, Pholus is worried that you’re selling me out to Blackstorm. Did they hire you to find me?”

  “Opal! I’m shocked.” Harry climbed the ladder leading up towards the control cabin. “Don’t you trust me?”

  “I trust you, Harry,” said Opal, following behind. “How much are they paying?”