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“Your attention please.” The voice was not one Dream had heard before, crackling over the comms that were usually crystal-clear. “This is the White Horse, commanding the intergalactic liner Lachesis to prepare to be boarded!”
Pirates.
Dream’s first reaction was instinctive fury and indignation. You dare?!
But everyone had heard of the White Horse and her captain. According to all reports, the ship always appeared out of nowhere, usually in FTL, which was a feat in and of itself. Maneuvering in FTL was a chancy maneuver, even for the best pilots.
No ship had successfully evaded them. Some few had attempted to fight, either ship-to-ship or hand-to-hand. Most were never heard from again; the few that made it back to their ports told stories of the ruthless and occasionally brutal executions.
The White Horse did, indeed, dare.
Lachesis was an intergalactic transport, not a military vessel. Its weapons were minimal, designed for pulverizing stray asteroids, not warding off other ships. The crew didn’t carry anything more lethal than a stunner. They had no chance of fighting, and if the captain was smart, he’d let the pirates board, take a share of whatever valuables were on board, and file an insurance claim when they got to Cassiopeia.
That didn’t make Dream any less worried, though. Rumor said that the White Horse would occasionally board a ship and take people in addition to goods. Not many, usually only one or two, but those captured nearly always wound up dead. Dream’s position as a scion of the Endless empire made him a very tempting target for would-be kidnappers, if he were recognized.
A gentle vibration announced the White Horse’s connection to Lachesis’ docking port, and the comms crackled to life again.
“Thank you, Lachesis; we do prefer things to be peaceful and smooth. We are in possession of the ship’s interior controls and the comms, so please remain calm and don’t try to break open the hatches. Someone will be with each of you shortly to assess your valuables. If everyone will cooperate, then we’ll be on our way within the hour with no harm done to anyone.”
An hour. Dream glanced at the ship’s status panel, mounted above the cabin door. In addition to indicators for gravity, atmosphere, and FTL, it also displayed the current local time at Lachesis’ home port, the port they’d most recently left, and the port they were traveling to. The duration of an “hour” varied somewhat from planet to planet, since humans preferred to have a tidy whole number of hours per planetary day, but they didn’t usually vary by more than five percent from Earth Standard.
An hour. Dream wondered if it was worth the effort of trying to hide his valuables. Surely these pirates would know all the tricks, where to look. He tucked his ruby down inside his shirt and put on several rings -- perhaps if they claimed the ostentatious and expensive pieces quickly, they’d move on rather than searching him more thoroughly and finding his primary datacrystal.
It was only then that Dream thought of Calliope, and winced to himself when he did. He should perhaps have considered sooner the wife he had yet to meet in person. It was a good match; she belonged to the Muse conglomerate, as powerful in Andromeda as Endless was in the Milky Way. Their union brought with it business mergers and trading markets. Dream had actually enjoyed their correspondence, and if the pictures could be believed, she was very lovely. So they had been wed, by proxy, and he was now on his way to join her in the Cassiopeia system, where Muse was headquartered.
But he didn’t know her as well as a person ought to know their spouse. He didn’t know her even as well as he’d known the pleasure-flings his family had so despised. She didn’t fill his thoughts and dreams. He hoped that someday, they might come to love one another, but he wasn’t in love now. He barely knew her as an acquaintance.
Well, no doubt this event would become an adventure to recount, when they finally met. He was quite good, he had been told, at spinning a story. He might make of this something to charm or amuse or impress her.
He was considering how best to open the tale when the door to his cabin opened. “Stand and deliver!” a cheerful voice said.
Dream looked up, steeling himself, and-- froze. He knew that man.
“Dream,” the pirate said, still cheerfully. “I told you we would meet again.”
“Robert Gadling,” Dream gritted out. He felt dizzy from the way his mind was whirling with the implications. “You’re a pirate?”
“Pirate is such a political term,” Hob demurred. “I prefer to think of myself as a highwayman. Much more romantic.”
Hob’s smile was exactly as Dream remembered it from their first meeting, guileless and sunny, teasing but not cruel. Dream’s heart and stomach both turned over within his body. “Did you mean any of what you told me?” he wondered bitterly. “Or was it all a ruse to gather information for your captain?”
He’d met Hob while the merger of Endless and Muse was still being discussed, and they’d fallen into a whirlwind affair. He’d known at the time that it could only be temporary, that his marriage to Calliope would be part of the merger, but he’d half-fallen for Hob anyway, and he’d thought Hob had become somewhat fond of him as well. They’d flitted all over the globe for over two months. Enjoyed extravagant feasts, slept in the most sumptuous hotels. Made love for hours, then talked late into the night, rising the next morning to do it all again.
Dream had hoped to have those memories to cherish later, but to learn now that it had all been a ploy... Dream felt quite literally sick, he was going to throw up any minute.
“I meant every word,” Hob said fiercely. “Every one of them.”
“Do you expect me to believe it’s merely coincidence that our paths have crossed now, in this way?” Dream demanded.
“No, of course not. I’m here because I was reasonably certain you’d be here, too.” He hesitated for the space of a breath, then asked, “Do you love her?”
“What?”
“Your prinkípissa,” Hob said, “the one you told me you were going to have to marry. It’s been a year or more since we parted ways. Did you fall in love with her?”
“No,” Dream admitted.
“Do you even like her? Do you like her even as well as you liked me?” Two steps brought Hob far too close for Dream’s comfort, but before he could evade the pirate in the small cabin, Hob had cupped Dream’s cheek gently.
Dream wrenched his head away from that searing touch, though it felt like leaving part of himself behind in Hob’s grasp, yet again. “Your captain may be disappointed. I am not traveling with any great treasure, and I can assure you that Endless will pay no ransom for my safe return.”
Hob chuckled. “You are the treasure, dove, and I have no intention of returning you, safe or otherwise. And I can assure you that the captain and I are of one mind on this, as I am he.”
Dream blinked, and blinked again. “You are the pirate captain,” he said, and his lips felt numb.
“Highwayman,” Hob corrected, smiling, “and yes.”
“And you plan to kidnap me.”
“No.” Hob swept a hand down in firm refutal. “I plan to seduce you into running away with me.” He grinned. “Like a true highwayman.”
Dream barked out a disbelieving ha! “You can’t possibly believe that will work. I have so many responsibilities--”
“And so few joys,” Hob broke in, wistfully. “Dream, listen. You hate your responsibilities. You hate being part of Endless, and I can promise you will hate being part of Muse just as much. Neither conglomerate will fall apart without you, or even be hurt for more than a standard or two. I’ve even got a plan -- or rather, my second does -- for faking your death so no one would come after you. You would be free, in a way I know you’ve never been.”
“Free to become a pirate,” Dream said, eyebrow raised. “Or perhaps you meant only for me to be your bedwarmer. The captain’s whore.” He spat the words out, bitter as hemlock.
“I’m not saying I wouldn’t jump at the chance to have you in my bunk,” Hob granted, “but it’s up to you. I can drop you on a Rimworld planet, or even one of the non-human worlds if you’d prefer. Or you can join us, with or without a place in my cabin.”
It was absurd, it was too much, it was entirely unbelievable. Dream’s head spun, and the universe spun with it. He abruptly found himself sitting on the side of the bed, Hob’s strong and careful hand pushing his head down toward his knees.
“Lower, dove, that’s it, let the blood find its way back. I know it’s a lot to take in. You’re going to breathe with me now, all right, nice and slow. In, two, three, four, and out, two, three four. In...”
Hob counted and Dream breathed until the dizziness faded, and then he just sat there, head hanging low, while he tried to wrap his thoughts around Hob’s plan.
Run away with pirates, fake his own death, start over again. It was the most ridiculous, impossible thing that Dream had ever heard of. He couldn’t possibly agree. The very idea was ludicrous. It was nothing he’d ever even thought of. He wanted it more than he’d ever wanted anything. But all he could think was--
“Why?”
Hob was crouched in front of him, looking up at him with those soft warm eyes. “Why what, dove?”
“Why would you do that for me? Without any promise of reward or...”
“Ah.” Hob took one of Dream’s hands, calloused brown thumb stroking over Dream’s ivory skin, leaving a trail of heat in its wake. “You’ll think I’ve gone space mad.”
“I already think you’re mad,” Dream muttered.
“Well, in that case.” Hob’s lips twitched, the barest suggestion of a smile. “Went and fell in love, didn’t I?”
“You-- But I told you--”
“You told me you were bound for another,” Hob agreed. “But I couldn’t help it. You were so... you.”
“I knew you’d grown fond,” Dream said, “but I had no idea you felt. Strongly.”
“Didn’t want you to know.” Hob slowly, cautiously wove his fingers through Dream’s. “You’d told me we could only be a fling, that you were bound for another. I tried to respect that, truly. To give you what you wanted, and no more. But the more I thought on it, on all the things we’d talked about, the more I knew it wasn’t what you wanted. Not truly. And so I decided to come after you.”
“And you convinced your desperate crew to rescue one of the most powerful men in the galaxy,” Dream surmised. He straightened enough to look at Hob directly, knowing that his lips were pulling into a smile that betrayed the thawing of his initial panic and fury. “How, exactly?”
“Oh, you don’t sign on to ride the black unless you’re at least a bit of a romantic,” Hob said blithely. “‘Sides, I’m the captain. They have to do what I say.”
Dream gave him a skeptical look.
Hob’s smile twisted and he tugged sheepishly at his ear. “Yes, well. Didn’t hurt that Lachesis is chock full of rich passengers and a massive surplus of ice and oxy. Besides, we’ve done it for a few of the others before. Rescued family, loved ones.”
“The other abductions,” Dream murmured, seeing the rumors anew in fresh light.
Hob grinned outright. “Aye. And not all of them have stayed with us, either. So--” A soft chime went off in Hob’s pocket. He sighed and pulled out a personal comm. “I know, I know, I’m just winding up,” he told it.
“Wind faster,” the voice on the other end advised. “We need to jump if we’re going to make a clean break.”
“Jumping,” Hob agreed. He stuffed the comm back in his pocket and straightened up. “Time to decide, dove. You can go on to your lady in Cassiopeia, and I promise, you’ll never have to see me again. Or you can come with me, right now, and find a new life.”
That queasy, dizzy feeling was coming back. He wanted it, but it was a fantasy, not a real life that a real person could have. Certainly, not one of the Endless. Dream stripped off his rings and pressed them into Hob’s hands. “I. I’m sorry. But I can’t.”
For an instant, so quickly Dream could almost convince himself he’d imagined it, Hob’s expression crumpled in devastation, and then he was straight-faced again, the smirking, self-confident pirate. “Your choice,” he said, barely audible. “I hope you have a good life, Dream.”
Hob turned toward the door, and Dream thought he would actually throw up, right there and then, except it wasn’t his stomach in his throat, it was his heart. He lurched forward, stumbling over his own feet and falling to his knees. “Wait! Hob!”
Hob paused, his hand only inches from the waveplate, but didn’t turn. “Yeah?”
“I didn’t mean it. I.” Dream swallowed. This was insanity. He looked up, the bare curve of Hob’s cheek just visible, and didn’t care. He dragged in a ragged breath and threw everything he was into the void. “Take me with you.”
And then Hob was there, pulling Dream up, holding him so tightly that it forced Dream’s racing heart back down into his chest.
“Highwayman through and through,” Hob said, his own voice rough enough to belie the teasing tone. “Come on, then; time is short. We’ll talk once the White Horse is safely away.”
“Aye, Captain,” Dream said. He would need a new name, he thought, when he became a pirate. “Lead on.”