Dragon Pearl(48)

I dug out the notebooks and sniffed again, giving thanks to my ancestors for my fox heritage. I tried to detect traces of Jun’s scent, and also something more—emotion.

The captain’s scent was all over the notebooks, of course. But I could tell that some had been handled more recently than others. One in particular reeked of desperation. I snatched it up and leafed through it, skimming the passages of vertical text. I hadn’t seen this kind of writing since the aunties had taught me old-fashioned calligraphy, as part of our “cultural heritage.” Back then I’d thought it a waste of time. Most humans didn’t learn it anymore, because everyone used digital slates. Now I was glad I could decipher the writing.

The captain had legible handwriting, but it looked like he wrote quickly, with heavy strokes. A passage caught my attention because of the texture. He’d crumpled the page at some point.

The Dragon Pearl is vital, Captain Hwan had written, but not in the way those fools in the Pearled Halls think. The scholars would lock it away and study its religious significance, while the Dragon Society would use it to make the wealthiest worlds even wealthier. I doubt they would allow it out of their hands to benefit others.

My hand spasmed, and I carefully unclenched it to avoid wrinkling the page. The thought of the Pearl being used to make the wealthy core more fertile, more vital, made me scowl.

The Pearl could win wars for us, he went on. As a weapon, it would be the ultimate threat, able to devastate an entire world as easily as it could make it blossom.

I didn’t like where this was going. I’d always thought of dragon magic as benevolent. But deep down I knew it wasn’t that simple, as Haneul could have told me. True, you could use dragon magic to terraform worlds so life could flourish on them, or make the weather pleasant, or encourage crops to grow. That same magic could, as the captain suggested, destroy worlds and turn them into wastelands. It made sense that Hwan would think of the Pearl’s benefits in military terms.

The next several pages contained terse notes about disciplinary matters on the ship. Under other circumstances I would have lingered over them, but I had more important things to worry about than gossip.

Then I found another passage about the Dragon Pearl. And this one revealed an interesting detail.

The cadet is a fox. He will be useful.

I bit my tongue against a gasp. It had to be Jun! But why had he revealed his gumiho heritage to the captain? And “useful” how? I didn’t like to think of my brother as a pawn.

I continued flipping through pages, looking for more mentions of Jun or the Pearl. Another sentence jumped out at me: I can’t make a direct approach to the Pearl’s site until the ship is in good repair.

So Captain Hwan knew where the Dragon Pearl was! That explained why the Pale Lightning was lingering in this area. But we couldn’t land anywhere yet. Last I’d heard, the engineers were still working on Deck 3’s damaged meridian.

If only I had more details about the location. Myung was only able to tell me so much before her untimely demise. It’s a pity her family didn’t know more about their ancestor’s plans.

Could Myung be the comrade Hwan had mentioned to me earlier? I remembered the captain’s words: The blaster burned her life short. Whose blaster? Had she known too much for her own good? Was her ancestor the shaman who had vanished with the Dragon Pearl? It all sounded very fishy. . . .

The next words caused ice to run through my veins.

The fox cadet is aware of the risks. Short of myself, no one has a better chance of helping the team survive.

Jun and his comrades hadn’t deserted after all! The captain had sent them on a secret mission.

The investigator had implied that Jun had shamed our family. I had to find my brother and bring him home. Then Mom would have her son and the truth.

I flipped ahead a few pages, didn’t see anything more about the site, then backtracked. My heart skipped a beat when I read a line I’d missed the first time.

We are reasonably certain Charm will work on the dead.

The dead? Ghosts, I realized, with a sickening feeling.

This could only mean one thing. Captain Hwan had sent Jun down to the world from which the entire Ghost Sector took its name. The Fourth Colony, better known as the Ghost Colony.

And if I wanted to retrieve my brother, I’d have to go there after him.





Heart hammering, I flipped through the rest of the notebook. I didn’t spot anything else obvious in the writing. But a folded sheet of paper had been slipped into the back. I took it out, opened it, and saw that it was a sketched map. The captain had written a set of planetary coordinates on it. He’d also marked a landing site, and a destination.

For a moment I was tempted to take the map with me, but the captain would notice if it went missing, and I didn’t want to make him more suspicious. Anything that caused him to step up security would make it harder for me to do what I needed to. I studied the sketch with narrowed eyes, committing it to memory.

My vision grew blurry, and nausea was starting to creep in. If the captain caught me in his quarters, my throwing up all over his carpet wouldn’t help my case. Time to get out of there.

I made sure to gather Charm around me like a cloak of whispers. I’d hate to have gotten this far only to get caught now. I replaced the notebook in its drawer, making sure the latch closed properly, then padded across the expanse of carpet and out the door.