“Or what contingency plans his Levarc allies may have?” Laila asked.
“Right.”
“Well, let’s go and find Lord Ilian then,” Alia said. “He’s probably somewhere where he can meet with Lady Valinski, without Lord Valinski’s knowledge, right? And he can’t meet too many prominent naval personnel from his quadrant without someone there stumbling onto the fact that their supposedly ‘kidnapped’ lord is hanging around the upper ranks of his defense fleet. That’s got to narrow it down somewhat.”
Admiral Roth nodded, a slight smile playing on his lips. “It does. Although, I don’t suppose it would do for the members of a diplomatic envoy to go charging into someone else’s territory and extract someone.”
“Perhaps the Empress could organize something,” Laila suggested.
“Perhaps,” Roth said, “but that would take the advantage of surprise away from us. If Lord Ilian has enough cunning to orchestrate this little conspiracy of his, then he’ll certainly be smart enough to detect an official investigation coming his way and disappear.”
“I don’t think I like this,” Laila said, shaking her head.
Roth leaned back, folding his arms. “I wonder if our friends aboard the Harpy might be interested in a little job.”
At this, Alia sat bolt upright. “If they’re not, I’d be. What kind of money are we talking about here?”
The admiral smiled. “You truly are a charitable soul. However, I can assure you that the reward I’m talking about here would be quite substantial.”
“But can you authorize that?” Laila asked him, not entirely convinced.
“One of the many benefits of supreme command,” Roth replied.
10. Arrival on Felarias
“Well,” Zak announced as the lone world rose from the black ocean to meet them. “Here we are. Felarias.”
“It’s incredible,” Maia murmured as they saw the large areas of scorched brown across its surface.
Zak took a deep breath. “Yeah. It’s hard to see how anyone could have survived.”
Maia pointed to streaks of green near the eastern edge of the northern continent. “That area looks a little more promising. Maybe that’s where the survivors are.”
“Well, there’s one way to find out. Would you like the honors?”
Maia hesitated. Her mother’s people - the only remaining link to that side of her heritage - and they had survived the devastation that had befallen their world.
“I’ll do it.” She tapped the communicator switch and sent out a general frequency. “Felariam control. This is the Lady Hawk, requesting permission to land.”
They had to wait a few moments for a reply. “We read you, Lady Hawk. Visitors are rare but are always welcome to our world. What is the purpose of your visit? Are you in need of fuel or supplies?”
Maia tried not to let her nervousness show in her voice. “We have important matters to discuss with the Felariam leaders.”
There was a pause from the Felariam controller. “Are they expecting you?”
“No.”
“I see,” the controller said. “I’m sure you’ll understand that such matters are a little outside my authority. However, I will arrange for someone to meet you at your ship when you arrive and you can discuss the matter with them further.”
“I understand. Thank you.”
“Very well. I’ve just activated the landing beacons. Can you see them on your scopes?”
“One moment.” Maia glanced at Zak, who gave her a nod in return. “Yes, we see them.”
“Then just follow them down and land on platform forty-three. But before you do, I must inform you we scan all incoming vessels to assess whether they pose any threat. Is there any weaponry on your vessel that might constitute a threat?”
Maia swallowed. She hoped this didn’t ruin everything. “Um... unfortunately, yes. We’re flying a ship that is sometimes used for escorting transports and cargo. And it has weapon emplacements for that purpose. However, I can assure you they’re all powered down.”
“That’s fine. Thank you for your honesty. Just follow the beacons down and someone will meet you at landing platform forty-three.”
“Thank you.”
“Not at all. Control out.”
With that, the comm fell silent.
“Okay,” Zak said, taking the controls. “Let’s bring her down. And it looks like you were right. The landing beacons are transmitting from those patches of green you spotted earlier.”
“It looks like a huge network of wide canyons,” Maia said as they broke through the upper layers of the atmosphere and got a clearer look at their destination. And a better look at the landscape that surrounded it.
As she made the remark about the canyons, Maia felt tears well in her eyes as she remembered the stories about Felarias her mother had told her as a child. It had been a world teeming with life. The great benevolent Laeshar that had grazed the plains of the southern continents. The playful Deltines who swam the oceans. Had they all died during the Levarc attacks?
“The canyon sides must have provided some protection against the bombardment,” Zak said and then stopped. “Are you all right?”
Mist dissolved into a watery image and Maia saw the man she loved, his face full of concern and his pain at seeing her own mirroring it in its intensity. And somehow, it was enough. Not to make that pain disappear but enough to help her bear it.
She nodded, words being too difficult to form. Zak looked far from convinced but he turned his attention back to the landing ahead of him.
It was strange, Maia thought to herself. When people first met her, she always radiated a feeling of being somewhat distant or closed off but once she let them into her life, she inevitably laid her soul open to them. It was hard to believe that when she first met Zak, she hadn’t even said a word to him. Right after he and Asten had risked life and limb for Selina and her as well. Life really drifted in unnavigable directions.
Then before she realized it, the landing gear had engaged and they were on the ground.
“Now, are you sure you’re all right?” Zak asked as he powered down the shipboard systems. “Because I can go out and talk to whoever’s waiting for us.”
“No,” Maia replied, wiping her eyes and climbing out of her chair. “It’s sweet of you. I know that. But let’s go down together.”
“All right.”
As they stepped on the landing platform, it was dark and overhead the sky was a mixture of browns and grays. Scattered storm clouds were gathering for a late night show and there was a faint light from a sun that had set ten minutes earlier. In the gloom, the glowing embers of two red eyes revealed the waiting representative of the Felariam before the features of his face came into focus.
He was middle-aged, with a set to his expression that suggested more smiles than glares in his youth and even now, faced with two strangers, he gazed on them with warmth. Maia wondered how someone who had suffered as much as this man undoubtedly had could still smile and she realized that this was strength, far more impressive than the physical feats of youth and far more enduring.
“Welcome to Felarias,” the man said. “I’m Chief Commander Cyraes. I’m in charge of the Felariam Defense Network.” He looked at Maia then broke his gaze away to greet Zak with a firm handshake. “And to whom do I owe this pleasure?”
“My name is Zak Materson. I’m a squadron leader in the Koratav defense forces, although my companion and I aren’t here under Koratav directives.”
“I see. You’re on leave?”
“In a way,” Zak replied. “Although we’re presently on an errand in the interests of the Federation, the Frontier systems and your own.”
Commander Cyraes smiled. “It sounds like most pressing business.” He turned to Maia. “And do my eyes deceive me? You appear as one of our own.”
“My mother was,” Maia told him, “but my father was Minstrahn -”
“Demas Kaleilae!” Cyraes exclaimed, falling into a kneeling p
osition and clasping her hands. “You are Maia!”
Frozen in shock, Maia blinked back tears. “He... knew me? Mother said he never returned.”
“What she says is true,” Cyraes told her, standing back up. “He gave his life defending our people.”
“For what good it did,” Maia murmured.
Cyraes sighed. “Yes. In the end, the devastation the Levarc brought to our world was outside our power to prevent. However, your father and the warriors who fought for our people allowed us to withdraw to the relative safety of hidden fortresses deep in the bedrock. Not all our fasts withstood the bombardment but as you can see by the evidence of your own eyes and by virtue of the fact that I stand before you today, some did.” He looked at her hopefully. “What of Iriana?”
“Mother died during the war,” Maia told him. “She was on a transport in the Saeban system when she was caught in the middle of a Levarc strike.”
Cyraes was quiet for a long moment before he found his voice. And when he did, tears flowed from his eyes. “I am so sorry, Maia.”
“You speak of both my parents as if you knew them yourself,” Maia said, startled by the other’s reaction.
“I did,” Cyraes said at last. “Iriana was my sister.”
Lady Valinski was just entering her late thirties and with exotic dark eyes, complimented by sharp features and luxuriant black hair, she was very much a stunning woman. And with her beauty combined with a charisma she had honed down to a fine art, she was accustomed to getting things her way... at least until this stupid business of her movements being restricted to Minstrah had come up.
“I’m not trying to reach the landing platforms,” she explained to the stubborn young guard in front of her. “I completely understand the need for myself and my fellow lords and ladies to remain here a little while longer. I just wish to see Lord Admiral Calendres. There are matters I would like to discuss with him.”
“Forgive me, my lady,” the guard replied. “You are certainly not restricted to your quarters but it appears strange that you wish to convene in private with another quadrant’s lord admiral. Perhaps if Lady Admiral Karaeli were here instead, that would be a different matter. Two professionals in the same field of expertise exchanging opinions would not seem out of the ordinary. But this... It is most irregular.”
Lady Valinski gave a rehearsed sigh, conveying a mixture of sadness and embarrassment. “All right. It’s just that... Well, the lord admiral and I are childhood friends and I haven’t had a chance to see him for years. I just thought that with us both being restricted to Minstrah anyway, this would be as good a time as any to see each other again.”
The guard thought about it for a moment and relented, stepping aside and lowering his ceremonial pike. A subtle weapon that looked like an ancient spear but, with a flick of a switch, could burn a hole through a reinforced wall. Lady Valinski wondered if their guests from the Federation, with their rather simpler weapons, knew that.
“My apologies, my lady. Speak with your friend and go in peace.”
She curtsied to show her appreciation. “Thank you, young man. Thank you very much.”
The guard blushed slightly. It was a little awkward for him, seeing a lady of one of the ruling families prostrate herself before him. And the glimpse down the front of her dress as she leaned forward didn’t help either.
That last touch had probably been overdoing it, Lady Valinski thought as she walked down the pathway, but the look on the guard’s face had been worth it. The fact she could weaken the knees of a handsome man ten years her junior was always nice to know.
Not stopping to admire the lake view, framed by a leafy vine, she strode down the path and tapped the communicator outside Lord Admiral Calendres’s apartment.
“Yes?” came a curt voice.
“It’s me,” she replied.
“Is it now?” Calendres said, his tone thoughtful. “You’d better come inside then.”
The door slid open and Lady Valinski stepped through. The lord admiral was standing by a small bench top with a drink in his hand and another already poured. He was fast, she had to give him that.
She nodded to the ceiling and gave him a questioning look.
In response, he reached into his pocket and pulled out two small devices, barely larger than flattened pinheads. “It’s all right. I found them both twenty minutes after our gracious hosts left me. Disabling them required very little effort.”
“Was that wise?” Lady Valinski asked the proud, stern featured man standing before her.
“They were recorders only,” Calendres replied. “No transmitters. Here.” He handed her the drink he had prepared and she took a long sip, savoring it as it played over her taste buds and moistened her lips.
“That was just the thing I needed,” she said. “Now -”
He raised a gentle hand to stall her. “If we are to discuss business, then let us make ourselves more comfortable.”
“Yes,” she agreed as they seated themselves on the lounges at the far end of the room, overlooking the lake in the distance.
“So I suppose you have come here with some means in mind on how we may maneuver our way out of our current predicament,” the lord admiral said, his voice conversational. “I have been giving it some thought myself.”
“And where have you arrived?”
“One of us will have to effect an escape from this restriction, that is a given. However, that’s not what you have come to discuss, is it, my lady?”
“No,” Lady Valinski said. “We can discuss the method of my escape shortly.”
“Your escape?”
“Of course. You disagree?”
Calendres took another sip of his drink. “Not at all. I suspect we may have arrived at the same conclusions as each other.”
“Changes must now be made to the overall strategy,” Lady Valinski said.
“Yes, that is my opinion as well,” Calendres said. “This Admiral Roth has proven to be far more clever than we anticipated. However, he is an intriguing opponent, is he not?”
Lady Valinski nodded. “He is. I must admit that I’m somewhat excited by the challenge he has presented to us with his opening move. Now, let us see if the counter move I have planned is the same that you devised.”
Chief Commander Cyraes turned away from the now dimly lit jungles of the canyon to the lights of his main living quarters and the two remarkable guests seated there, the young man and the woman. His niece.
“You are remarkably well connected,” he said. “And the council and I are in agreement that we would welcome closer ties with the people of the Phalamkian system. And this proposition of the United Frontier is also interesting to us. While I know we have little to offer the other systems in return, such an alliance could be very valuable.”
“This world could potentially be a useful port if the Minstrahn wished to have better ties with the rest of us,” Zak pointed out, “not to mention its value as an outpost that can warn other systems against incoming threats.”
“True,” Cyraes agreed, sitting down, “well, at least with regard to the latter. As for the first suggestion, I’m rather under the impression from what my niece has told me that the Minstrahn are poised to tear themselves apart. Can your friends really prevent this?”
Zak smiled. “I hope so, sir. If they can’t, I may be a little disappointed.”
This brought a little grin to Cyraes’s face too. “Well spoken, young man.” The smile, however, soon faded. “However, I fear this development with the discovery of another Levarc settlement. Does Admiral Roth really believe they would threaten us all the way out here?”
“I don’t know... Uncle ,” Maia replied. “However, he is certain they have a hand in this affair that’s presently undermining the stability of the Minstrahn Empire. And the only conclusion he can draw is that they have their sights on the surrounding systems. They wouldn’t be assisting Minstrahn dissidents unless there were some benefit for them. And if they’re anything like the
leaders of the original Kingdom were, then there are only a few types of benefits that would be of any interest to them.”
“The conquest and destruction of those worlds that are not their own?”
“Basically,” Maia said.
“Then these dissidents in the Minstrahn Empire are playing with fire, are they not? If they’re making deals that somehow preclude any possibility that the Levarc may move against them, then they are most certainly deluding themselves. Once the Levarc have whatever they want from them, what bargaining power do these dissidents think they’ll have left to them?”
“I doubt they’ve thought that far,” Maia told her uncle. “However, there’s nothing we can do about that. All we can do is prepare ourselves and that’s my mission in coming here.”
“Actually,” Cyraes replied, “we may be better prepared than you might think.”
“What do you mean?” Zak asked.
“Our planetary defenses have been considerably upgraded since the devastation of our world.”
“I didn’t notice any weapons on the way in,” Maia said.
Her uncle raised his eyebrows at this and smiled again. “You didn’t? Good. Approaching ships shouldn’t be able to easily detect them. Although perhaps you remember the controller informing you that all ships are scanned on the way in?”
Zak nodded as he got it. “Right. Anyone who says they’re unarmed when they’re carrying a multitude of weapons blisters gets blown out of the sky.”
“Pretty much. And there are other weapons as well... of, well let’s say, a different nature. However, I am keeping you.” He paused.
Maia knew there was so much more her uncle wanted to say, so much more he wanted to ask.
“It was a surprise, to say the least,” he said. “Meeting you, I mean.” He looked at Maia. “And if your mother and father could see you now, and see the bright hope that you have brought to our people, they would be very proud of you.”
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