by Nia Mars
Tiam pushes me behind him, his body moving into a fighting pose as he rises to his knees—a protective reflex. “How in stars did the security system fail?”
The next second, he orders the displays on while I’m still looking up through the glass dome, seeing nothing. But the screens on the wall tell the truth. Once I look at them, heart pounding, I can’t look away from them. Pirate ships are floating in orbit around the planet. Must be thousands, a motley mix of shapes, sizes, and colors. Silver Federation ships are mixed in with the enemy, clearly marked and identifiable, a face-off in space.
As far as I can tell from the images on the screen, nobody is shooting yet. Thank God.
“When did this happen?” Tiam demands.
“Just now. They popped out of nowhere.”
They’d done that to us before, but not on this scale. They make so much money from raping the Frontier, they can afford better technology now than the Federation, which has been a problem.
“Are they going to blow us up?” The irrational thought that I don’t want to die naked flashes through my head, and I jump from the bed to dress. Then I realize that dead is dead, clothes aren’t going to make a difference, but I scramble for my clothes anyway.
“Every city on the planet has its own protective shield, as a precaution. Our shields can withstand simultaneous attacks from hundreds of enemy ships at a time,” Dason tells me, but the knowledge isn’t making him the least relaxed, so it doesn’t help me relax either.
“Hundreds?” I yank on my pants. “Meaning, not thousands?”
“Not thousands,” he admits while Tiam is shouting commands at the computer.
I find my uniform top tangled in the covers. “What is he doing?”
Dason fishes my shoes from under the bed. “He’s opening a secure channel for negotiations straight from here.”
I dress faster.
Chapter Five
The first thing the yellow-eyed leader of the space pirates says through his curved, sharp teeth—when Tiam finally manages to hail him—is, “I will only negotiate with the Oath Forger, and only in person.”
“No,” Tiam and Dason say at the same time, their voices tempered steel.
I don’t contradict them, because I figure they know more about negotiating with pirates than I do. I also don’t want the pirate to think there are cracks in our ranks. I stand there with my spine as straight as can be and wearing my best poker expression. Thankfully, I had time to exchange my skimpy nightgown for my uniform, the one made of all the kreks’ colors.
“What are your demands, Gaden?” Roax asks as he sails through the door with purpose, dressed all in black. He reminds me of a sharp blade flying through the air. He only spares one glance at the screen to identify the man there, then his gaze seeks me out to make sure that I’m all right.
I feel better for having him in the room.
“I will discuss my demands with the Oath Forger.” The pirate doesn’t pay any more attention to Roax than Roax pays to him. Those creepy yellow eyes are definitely fixed on me. “When she’s here on my ship.”
“Not going to happen.” Koah strides in, his indigo hair spilling down his wide shoulders to the middle of his back. He’s a consummate warlord, somehow always looking ready for battle, even in the middle of breakfast. The thunderous look on his face right now should be considered a deadly weapon. I’m sure it could give a lesser man a heart attack.
Gaden the pirate lord, however, remains smug as shit. He has us surrounded. He has the upper hand, and he knows it. “You have one hour to come up, Oath Forger, for a little chat. I’m sure you prefer the minor inconvenience of a visit to the death of billions of people.”
Before I can respond, the display goes black, the connection cut.
Uthan rushes through the door, straight to me, making sure first that I’m okay before he glances from one krek to the next and the next. “What happened?”
Tiam explains. Roax provides the swearwords.
“Not a chance,” Uthan protests as soon as he hears Gaden’s demand. “Absolutely not.”
At the same time, I say, “I’m going.”
As I head back to my closet for the Oath Forger’s robe, five masculine arms shoot out to hold me back. I evade them all, skipping backwards. “I’m not going to be responsible for the destruction of an entire planet.”
“If you go,” Roax warns, “they will take you, and we might not be able to find you. They’re going to use you as a bargaining chip. They’ll demand our recognition of their territories in exchange for your continued survival.”
While he spoke, I stopped moving, and now the others have me surrounded. Drat.
I lift my chin. “I’m willing to make that sacrifice.”
“I’m not!” Roax snaps, and yanks me away from the other four. He puts both of his hands on my shoulders, then bends forward until our noses are an inch apart. “You will not go anywhere near Gaden.”
He says this as if he knows the man well, and what he knows is cause for serious concern.
Uthan steps toward us. “Can we not come to a compromise with the man? If only until we figure out how to get rid of his ships?”
Roax snarls at him.
“No,” I rush to say. “The pirates can’t have the Outer Territories.” Because that’s what Gaden will ask for, isn’t it? That’s what the pirates want. Their own sanctioned empire. They want to become the sixth alliance.
“How about some territories?” Uthan is determined to remain reasonable. “For now? Not Earth, of course. But to avoid imminent war?”
“There has to be another solution.”
Koah looks up from his comm unit, from whatever he’s been reading. “They have twelve thousands ships in orbit. We have five hundred military vessels present.” His gaze finds mine. “We sent our forces to the Frontier. A small compromise might be smart.”
I stare at him. Compromise is so not part of Koah’s dictionary. It’s as if Roax was going around reminding people to be kind and smile, and handing out lollipops while he was at it.
“What do you think is going to happen?” I ask Koah.
Each of the kreks have some powers, some stronger than others. Koah’s precognition is not particularly potent, but he had felt me coming when I’d been kidnapped from Earth. And that feeling had been strong enough to compel him to attend the Zebet hearing where we’d met.
He stays silent. His neck muscles are tensing. His jaw moves, as if he’s pressing his teeth together.
I step right up to him and lay a hand on his arm. “Koah?”
“People are going to die,” he grinds out. “On a large scale. Fire rains down on Merim. Soon.”
Roax swears. “We can’t bring the fleets here fast enough.”
I look at the men. “What about my powers?”
Uthan answers me. “Your powers are great, but you’re far from fully trained. I’m sorry, my Ava. You’re not ready. Not on this scale.”
I hate it that he’s right. Why haven’t I practiced more? The realization that I have the power but I’m not able to use it to save us is infuriatingly frustrating. If there was one pirate ship, I’d go for it right now, and I don’t think I’d have any trouble. But I’ve never practiced on multiple targets. And our Federation ships are mixed in with them.
Koah is back on his comm unit, checking on how fast his fleet will reach Merim. Dason is doing the same. Tiam is mapping the position of all those thousands of pirate ships all around us, now back on the display screen.
“Can you take me to Gaden?” I ask Uthan.
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, my Ava. Ask me anything else but to put you in danger.”
Roax’s chest rumbles at Uthan’s my Ava. “She needs to accept us all. Now. It will increase her control, and strengthen her connection to us. If we are to go to battle with pirates, we need both.”
I whip around to look at him and Dason. Roax’s expression is stubborn, Dason’s is hopeful.
My heart is beating wa
y too fast. “Now?” Like right now? “Both of you?”
As Roax’s dark gaze holds mine, sweat beads on my forehead.
“It would help,” Uthan puts in quietly.
Forging a connection is important. It’s sacred. I don’t want to go into it with fear. Not just because I’m pushed. I stop on that thought.
Am I being pushed? Or am I simply scared because this is the final piece of a very large puzzle, and I don’t feel ready, don’t feel prepared?
Don’t freak out. Too late. The planet is under siege. We’re about to be blown into pieces, and I’m supposed to calmly have a threesome somehow on my way to a ruthless pirate lord for negotiations. Right.
I’m freaking out so freaking hard...
Yet I can’t say no. When people’s lives depend on what happens with the pirates, I don’t have a choice. I thought I’d have more time, but—
I catch movement in the garden from the corner of my eye. I look. There’s nothing there. Yet I feel irresistibly compelled. Like I will die, if I don’t feel grass under my feet in the next three seconds.
Tib? I swallow a groan. I so don’t have time for my father right now. Yet I can’t afford to offend him either. There are too many things stacked against us already. The last thing we need is an angry spirit.
I swore I’d never ask him for help again. Maybe I could just as him for advice.
I glance back at the men. “Let me have a minute alone in the garden.”
Even just being next to Tib usually improves my powers.
“There’s no time, my Ava,” Uthan says in a soft tone.
“A minute.” I move toward the door. “Just to catch my breath.”
Koah is back on his comm unit. Tiam is analyzing the enemy positions on the screen, calling out commands. Roax lets me go without a word of protest. His gaze follows me to the door, and so does Dason’s. Roax’s eyes are darkly possessive, while Dason’s are full of undisguised longing.
I hurry out, then down the hallway. I run down the path to the waterfall. “Tib!”
I wait with my hands clenched at my sides. Of course, this is the time when he ignores me.
“I need you!” I shout at the top of my lungs, and above in the trees, birds call back. Maybe they’re telling me not to do this, not to make this big a mistake.
I don’t listen to them. What do I have to lose, at this stage? I wasn’t going to ask for help, but to save an entire planet, to save the men I love...
“Tib! I need to ask a favor. I’m willingly putting myself in your debt.”
I wait, holding my breath.
The garden seems to hold its breath with me. Even the birds quiet. Then the air thickens, and I sense a presence, a much heavier and greater presence than Tib’s. The light changes, as if the rays of the sun are coming through a filter. Everything is brighter, the water and the trees in vivid contrast.
The air tastes thin. I can’t even explain it. It’s as if smell and taste have merged, as if all my senses are muted, and at the same time, amplified. I blink against the sensation, and swear I can hear the colors around me.
I twirl around, still seeking Tib, even while I know that I’m facing something entirely different here. Something that covers my skin with goosebumps and an overwhelming sense of foreboding. I’ve woken a bigger monster than I can handle, the thought pops into my head. And, God, I hope I’m wrong about that.
The presence is all pervasive. It fills the space between molecules of air. I’m breathing it in.
I can move, yet I’m certain that I would not be able to leave the garden if I tried. Then suddenly I am moving. Up. As in vertically.
Holy meteor shower of shit.
I’m floating in the air. Fear is my first reaction, a mad scrambling that solves nothing. For a second I think I’m caught in a tractor beam of a pirate ship once again, but there are no spaceships that close to the surface that I can see. And if they were close enough to lock on to me, they’d be close enough to spot. The tractor beam’s range is limited.
But, no, this is something different. This is a sentient presence that’s lifting me now. I can feel the intent behind the movement.
The presence doesn’t feel malevolent. It feels curious, which reminds me of my first meeting with Tib.
Another lesser spirit?
Except, nothing about this entity feels lesser.
Especially when, from the height of at least a hundred feet, I look down, and I see my body below, sprawled on the grass.
I suck in a panicked breath of air.
Do not fear.
All at once, I can see, smell, and taste the words, even though I hadn’t heard them with my ears.
You are different from the others.
Is that a compliment? And others what? Women? Earthlings? Humanoids in general?
“Thank you?” I’m not really speaking. For one, I have no mouth, no vocal cords.
I could swear the spirit is laughing. Smys?
As I clear the palace roof, I try to look back at my body again, but the next second I’m somewhere in space. No Merim. No pirates in orbit. Nothing but darkness, stars twinkling in the distance.
It’s breathtaking. It’s peaceful in a way that I can’t begin to explain. Like floating in Uthan’s ocean, but infinitely better. I could float forever in this peace. No worry exists here, not in this vastness. This is deep space. These galaxies have existed for billions of years, and will exist billions of years after me.
Yes. The single word appears in my mind.
I watch the movement of the stars. I could watch them forever. I’m not sure how much time passes—maybe minutes, maybe years—before I realize that as starkly beautiful as deep space is, it’s also relentlessly lonely.
Yes.
I shudder at the thought of billions of years of loneliness.
Spirits have a different sense of time.
I imagine so. “Why are you showing me this?”
You are part of me.
“I am insignificant.” I’ve never felt as insignificant as I do at that moment, faced with the vastness of time and space.
Yes.
I feel as if Smys is watching me, testing me, tasting me, inhaling me, and more—consuming me in ways for which I have no words.
You came from Tib.
“I think so.”
Tib came from me.
“Did he?”
Smys doesn’t answer for a long time. Then, My power has scattered.
I swear I feel its melancholy. And then I feel panic—my own—because it occurs to me that maybe Smys is thinking about gathering her shards back together. Is that why I’m here?
Yes.
I have no body. I can’t run. My heart can’t burst. Yet it feels as if it’s doing just that.
“No. Please.” I beg, and then I hold my nonexistent breath, hoping I haven’t just insulted Smys.
Why?
I think of The Five. “Love!”
That explanation had worked with Tib. It’d made him reconsider.
It’s a puzzling concept.
Images flood back from the past: meeting the men, kissing them, trying to resist them, accepting them. I’m not trying to remember. I can’t control the process. Smys is watching my memories. And since I can’t do anything to stop Smys, I wait.
Again, I feel that curiosity from the entity that surrounds me. I can’t tell if Smys likes what it sees or not. I think if it decides to absorb me back into itself, it will do so without much deliberation, without emotion. When I walked in the garden, if a speck of dust attached to the hem of my dress, how much time did I think about that? I’m less than a speck of dust to Smys.
I knew your grandmother.
The next thing I know, I’m floating down to Merim, to the garden.
The Five surround my body in utter panic.
The presence is gone.
“I’m fine! I’m here.” A second passes before I realize that although I spoke the words, I made no sound.
Roax keeps r
oaring for the medics. Uthan’s ear is pressed to my chest. He lifts away and shakes his head, tears reddening his eyes as he holds my hand.
He squeezes his eyes shut, and I feel him reaching out to me. He wants to take me to his sea, to his island, to heal me like I had healed him. But even in this mystic space, he can’t find me. I sense him, but he doesn’t seem to be able to sense me.
“Uthan!” I try again, this time with more force.
No reaction from him.
Dason is sitting so my head is on his lap. Tears are rolling down his face. “Come back to us, Oath Forger.”
Koah is stripping off the top of his uniform. “They can give her my blood.”
“She doesn’t need blood.” Tiam snaps at him, pacing like a wounded animal. “We don’t even know what’s wrong with her.”
“Do you think the pirates did something to her?” Dason asks, the sorrow in his voice breaking my own heart.
“I don’t see how.” Tiam snaps again. “No alarms have gone off. There’s been no attack.”
My spirit floats among them while they hold onto my body. “I’m here!”
They don’t react.
I focus on my prone body next, even as medics rush down the path with silver bags of instruments. I focus on my chest. Breathe. Suck in air.
The medics cut my clothes off without a thought to my modesty. It’s the least of my worries. I’m dead!
The realization is pretty startling. Oh God.
Smys has taken my spirit or my consciousness or whatever you want to call it out of my body, and Smys hasn’t put it back.
On the heels of that thought, comes the next: I don’t want to stay dead.
Breathe. Breathe!
The medics are restarting my heart. I’m being respirated. Questions fly. “What happened? How long has she been like this?”
I tune out their noise along with Roax’s threats of what he’ll do to them if they don’t bring me back. I focus on nothing but air. Lungs. One breath.
Roax shoves the men aside. He grabs me and shakes me. “You will return to me, Ava Mine. Now.”
His voice breaks. I’ve never seen him broken. It’s startling enough so that I think it might startle me back to life. But it doesn’t.
