Fizzit! She absolutely did not want to like the man. He might be a target someday.
“Please accept my abject apologies, Colonel, for such egregious mis-speaking. I hope it can be attributed to the folly of youth and not be thought of again.”
A long look. “Done.” The colonel took her arm. “Shall we see if our hosts have put together a tolerable punch?”
Still quaking at how close she’d come to another disaster—would she never learn!—M’lani allowed the colonel to escort her back inside, where she spent the next two hours playing the role of Princess Royal with cool perfection even though quivers still shook her stomach. She even danced with the Archeron Ambassador, who spent the entire time glowering at her. She understood his pique. Not only had she revealed her rebel sympathies to a Reg colonel, but Jagan was still smarting from being forced to depend on her to rectify his mistake with T’kal Killiri.
A graceful pattern dance came to an end, the musicians disappearing for a much-deserved break. The king and queen rose, about to make farewells, when a great gasp swept the crowded ballroom. M’lani, who had been talking to a friend she hadn’t seen in years, swung round sharply, and added a heart-stopping gasp of her own.
There, hovering in the air above the orchestra’s dais was a full-length replica of the Sorcerer Prime, garbed in a long black robe, his magic crystal hanging from the heavy gold chain around his neck. His cowl was thrown back, revealing his pale face, long black hair, and piercing black eyes.
Jagan—the illusion of Jagan—looking every inch the mysterious, almost mythical, wizard that he was.
A few screams echoed before being quickly cut off as the apparition raised its hand and announced, “I am Jagan Sitric Cormac Mondragon, Sorcerer Prime, returned from exile. And I am here to tell you we will sweep the Regs from Psyclid, casting them out until not one is left. And then we will strike at the heart of the Empire, showing the Regs what it is like to be an occupied planet.
“It will happen. I, the Sorcerer Prime, know this. But not without the help of every last Psyclid and those in other star systems who must rise up and aid the power of our magic.”
The hovering illusion allowed its dark eyes to scan the stunned guests from one end of the room to the other. “Psyclids, our rebellion begins now. Be ready when you are called upon to help.” The figure swirled its arms wide, hands rotating to palms up, each displaying a miniature dragon, breathing jets of fire. “I am Jagan of the dragons, and I swear it.”
The illusion winked out. Shocked silence remained. M’lani searched for the Archeron Ambassador, finding him leaning nonchalantly against a doorframe, examining his fingernails. Having an idea of the difficulty of maintaining both illusions—the ambassador and his own incarnation as the Sorcerer Prime—she suspected he was using the doorframe to hold himself up. Magnificent! She hadn’t thought Jagan had it in him. Had he planned it? Or had her fiery slip with the colonel inspired him to a sudden burst of bravado?
It didn’t matter. As excited voices rose around her—the Psyclids awestruck, the Regs consumed with fury—she knew Jagan was right. It was time Psyclids knew a rebellion was under way.
Chapter 10
M’lani?
Exhausted as M’lani was from the drama of the evening, the silent call woke her from a sound sleep. A heartbeat, two at most, before she separated illusion from reality. The dark shadow sitting on her bed was Jagan in the flesh. Which, though astonishingly unlikely, her burgeoning powers confirmed was true. Instead of some clever quip or stinging barb about invading her bedchamber, the only words that came out of her mouth were a woefully inadequate “What are you doing here?”
Silence.
“I’m not quite sure,” he said at last. “Perhaps to have you tell me I am not an idiot. That the Regs are not currently engaged in increasing security to the point a kito couldn’t fly through the city undetected. That Killiri won’t want my head, Rigel too, when he hears of my latest dragon stunt. That I haven’t blown the Psyclid cause to Hell Ten—is there a Hell Ten, do you know?”
“Jagan, be still! You were magnificent and you know it. Fishing for compliments is beneath you. You didn’t plan it then?” she added more softly.
He heaved a sigh M’lani felt all the way to her soul. “No. But you were such a grand patriot, spitting fire, when you flew at Strang like that—”
“You heard the whole of it?”
“In my soul, every word.”
Fizzit! Dushani—thought-sharing—meant they were soulmates, that the goddess approved their union. But somehow, even though she had asked for this, experiencing dushani with Jagan Mondragon was terrifying. Particularly when she knew he had no wish to be her soulmate.
Yet there could be no other reason why he had heard her tirade to Colonel Strang, or she his warning to control her power. Or his silent call that had waked her out of a sound sleep. Surely if the goddess had gifted them with this special bond, perhaps there was hope for something more . . .
“I’d been thinking we needed a grand gesture to propel the rebellion into life,” Jagan said, cutting off her speculation. “I’d thought to conjure an illusion in the night sky, but the moment was there and, goddess help me, I took it.” His voice trailed off into the darkness.
“Jagan? I’m glad you wanted to talk to me. I mean . . . B’aela would have been so much more convenient, living right there in the ambassadorial residence. She is, isn’t she?”
“I recall now why I so delighted in tormenting you when you were a child.”
“Little has changed.”
“Unfair,” Jagan snapped back. “A great deal has changed.” Jaws tight, fists clenched, he paused, staring into some vastness where she could not go. “B’aela is a gifted witch,” he said at last. “She is an integral part of what we must do to win this battle. D’nim, T’mar, and B’aela followed me to the far reaches of the Quadrant. And after they help me teach enlasé to the rebels in Crystal City, they will risk their lives taking the message into the countryside. Because I ask them to, and because they are Psyclid. No one could ask for more loyalty than that. They are a part of me and will remain so.”
Darkness swallowed her. Despair. And the bitter recognition that he was right, though she could scarcely bear to meet his gaze.
Jagan’s fists unclenched, he finally turned to face her. “When—perhaps I should say if—we are married, M’lani, I will put the physical side of my relationship with B’aela aside. That is the best I can offer. The rest remains. She, like D’nim and T’mar, are my partners. The fate of Psyclid rests on our talents.”
Jealousy exploded, surging toward hate, an evil as much shunned by Psyclids as violence. If B’aela Flammia, on her mission as priestess of enlasé, was swallowed by the Psyclid countryside or a Reg patrol, never to be seen again, M’lani Orlondami could only rejoice. Batani witch! How dare she raise her eyes to the Sorcerer Prime? The man who would be king.
For that’s what Jagan was. Everyone knew that. By Psyclid law, as well as a thousand years of tradition, a Sorcerer Prime ruled jointly with his queen.
M’lani bit her lip, bottling up every last word that threatened to tumble out. Ruthlessly she quashed the rage that could not only destroy them both but end the rebellion before it was more than a dream. No battle to come would be as difficult as the one she was fighting this moment. And Jagan knew it.
“M’lani.” His hand brushed back a curl that had flopped onto her forehead. “Do not be angry with me. I know this is not easy, but if we are to survive, we must work together. In harmony, not hostility.”
She sought the dark pools of his eyes, searching . . . she wasn’t quite sure for what. Some faint hope of a happy ending, perhaps. “Can we ever make it work?” she asked. “You want L’ira. B’aela has been your mistress for so long it’s more like a marriage. Not only that, the two of you work together, a private enlasé that might stretch but will never break. Where do I fit in? No one has ever accused Jagan Mondragon of having a heart big enough to enc
ompass the world. Nor am I willing to share.”
He pulled back, crossed his arms over his chest. “Since when do either of us have a choice?”
True as the words were, they hurt. Even if she had not volunteered within moments of L’ira’s and Tal’s wedding, her father would have had them on their knees pledging their troth and vowing to free Psyclid from the Regs. But somehow she had hoped Jagan did not feel trapped. That keeping his hold on being the heir apparent might make their union pleasing. “Is it so hopeless then?” she asked.
He sat there, thumb to his chin—thinking or merely posing?—until M’lani was seriously contemplating a hard push that would send him tumbling to the floor. And then he was on his feet, towering above her. “A question that demands further thought,” he said. “Next time I come, let us explore the possibilities.”
As the intent behind his words sank in, M’lani blinked, and in that moment he was gone. The door to her room opened and closed, seemingly by itself, the light from the corridor revealing not a sign of the sorcerer’s passing.
Goosebumps rose. She shivered.
Next time . . .
She would never be ready for next time.
Fool! Her inner voice was so horribly right. Jagan had come to her on the night of his opening salvo in the Psyclid rebellion. To her. And she had quarreled with him, as she had every time they’d met since his return to Psyclid. He had made his way into the palace at great risk . . . wanting to share with her, rejoice, and she had thrown L’ira and B’aela in his face. Instead of acting the role of a proper princess and lifetime mate, she had shown him the shrew.
And still he promised to return? He must be mad.
Jagan, sprawled in a chair at the veriball clubhouse, shut his ears to T’kal Killiri’s roars. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t expected the explosion.
“What happened to ‘we’re going to work together,’ you fydding idiot? ‘Agree on our next moves? Keep each other informed’? Oh, no, the great Mondragon has to challenge the Governor General and the general staff of the Reg occupation force. Every batani one of them.”
“But it was so dramatic,” L’rissa interjected. “So patriotic. He stirred every Psyclid in the room. In the city, the country—”
“What do you mean?” Jagan demanded, turning toward her. “Surely rumors haven’t made it into the countryside already.”
“Oh, didn’t you know?” L’rissa offered a pert smile, as if taunting him for not being omnipotent. “The Emperor’s ball was being vidcast live to the entire country. Evidently Yarian thought the sight of so many Psyclids and Regs enjoying themselves at the Emperor’s Birthday Ball would be a good bit of propaganda.” She beamed at him. “Everyone saw you, Jagan. Everyone. The vid was shut down immediately, but recordings were made. They’re surging from comp to comp, from portapad to hand-held even as we speak. That’s why the Regs aren’t just furious, they’re frothing at the mouth.”
So that’s why he’d been feeling a strange buoyancy all day—he’d wondered if it might be his surprising anticipation of his next late-night visit to M’lani—but this—this was triumph. So what in the name of the goddess was Killiri ranting on about?
Jagan stood. Perhaps it was the look on his face, but the entire roomful of rebels took a step back, including T’kal Killiri, whose jaws snapped closed. The sudden silence was broken by the voice of the Sorcerer Prime once again addressing his people. “I did not plan what I said last night. But when I heard a sheltered, pampered princess tell the Governor General’s aide what she thought of a remark he made—when M’lani Orlondami displayed more love of country than anyone else at that benighted ball—I knew the time had come to stand up and be counted. So I did. That I was speaking to the entire planet comes as a shock—but a good one. We have made a strong beginning. Now it’s time for you to know how we plan to finish the job.”
Jagan crossed his arms and surveyed Killiri’s band of rebels, many faces still blatantly skeptical. “Nothing has changed since the night I first spoke to you. I apologize if the word sends shivers up your spine, bringing back memories of old wives’ horror tales, of madness, destruction, and death. Take my word for it, most of the rumors are hipok, tales designed to keep any one group from growing too powerful, from falling into megalomania and off the scale of what Psyclids believe is right.”
Jagan paused for effect, noting with some satisfaction that more than half of his listeners’ faces reflected a reluctant willingness to listen. T’kal Killiri was one of those who remained grim, as Jagan intoned the inevitable, enunciating every word with care. “We will defeat the Regs by using enlasé. With a melding of minds, a mix of talents, each exponentially increasing the power available, we can send the Regs running back to Regula Prime, shaking in their tall black boots.”
“Nobody’s getting in my mind,” one of Killiri’s lieutenants declared.
“What does it feel like?” a girl whispered.
“Not like what you hope,” came a reply from the back, setting off a wave of nervous laughter.
“I have my own people with me tonight,” Jagan said. “Many of you may remember our participation in celebrations of the goddess, back before the Occupation.” Heads nodded. “Did you think we managed those feats by acting separately? Of course not. You must have known we were working together. Did the sky fall in? Did towers crumble to dust? Did small children cry or their elders drop dead from evil forces? Of course they did not. D’nim, T’mar, B’aela and I did it together, using enlasé. Just as we helped S’sorrokan and the Princess L’ira defeat an entire Reg battle formation on our way back from Hell Nine.” Again he surveyed the rebels, allowing just a tinge of superiority to creep into his his tone. “We are battle-tested. Are you?”
“You’ve made your point. As much as I don’t like it,” Killiri conceded.
“Then let us begin.” Jagan nodded to his three followers, as Tor, the giant from Hell Nine and the two Reg marines, stood behind their small group, clearly ready to inflict mayhem, if that’s what it took to bring this bunch of skeptical rebels in line. “Enlasé,” Jagan announced, “can be performed without the participants touching, but it is quicker, easier, if we do. So that’s how we’ll start.”
The sorcerer and his acolytes, rescued from Hell Nine for just this purpose, formed a ring, hands touching, heads bowed. Now! One tiny squeak—from L’rissa, Jagan thought—and the room went totally silent. The four dropped hands and regarded the rebels, keeping their faces carefully blank. “This is the power we would teach you. Just four of us—admittedly the best and most powerful—and you all are immobilized. You cannot move, cannot speak. Yes, our power decreases by distance—we can’t freeze Reg battlecruisers and hunterships in place—but who knows what twenty might do? Or fifty?”
Jagan waved his hand, and the rebels returned to life, sputtering and angry. But awed.
“Killiri, divide your people in four groups, one to each of our teachers. It’s time the rebellion turns dangerous.”
Blue Moon
Today, Kass was stuck checking the provisions for Astarte’s next foray off Blue Moon, while Tal and his lieutenants, Dorn Jorkan and Mical Turco, met to decide whether this would be another recruiting and reconnaissance mission or something more aggressive. Well, fizzit! You could take a Reg off Regula, but you couldn’t completely eliminate their upbringing. For all the females with positions on the bridge, Reg officers still thought it was men who fought wars, women who checked the fizzeting inventories!
Not true. Kass sagged in her comfortably upholstered desk chair. Captain Jordana Tegge, who had brought the rebellion its second huntership, was likely meeting with the men this very minute. It was only lowly ensigns, like Kass Kiolani, who got stuck with inventories while senior officers planned revolutions. Pok, dimi, and fyd! Tal could have at least made her a lieutenant for this next mission. After all, didn’t extreme acts of heroism merit promotion? And what else was teleporting Astarte and her crew from certain annihilation to the mouth of a wormhole?
Ah, just wait until tonight—S’sorrokan was going to get an earful.
A broad smile—just the mouth, no face—jiggled in front of her, as if suspended from the ceiling on a string. Kass groaned. At least whatever K’kadi had to impart, it seemed to be good news.
The smile was replaced by a vidcast, as sharp and clear as if she viewed it on a screen. Jagan speaking to a colorfully garbed crowd. Dear goddess! The reluctant warrior said that? A second vid—Jagan’s speech to Killiri and his rebels. Tears flowed down Kass’s cheeks. He’d done it. Seized both Regs and rebels by the throat and forced them to his will. Psyclid was going to be free. Not tomorrow, not next week, perhaps not even next year, but it would happen.
Kass, wiping away her tears with the hem of her gown because she never seemed to have a handkerchief when she needed one, charged out from behind her desk and followed the homing instincts that took her straight to Tal Rigel.
Chapter 11
Regula Prime
Alek Rybolt, captain of the battlecruiser Tycho, glanced at his groundcar’s nav screen. Not far now. Grimly, he noted the prickles shimmying up his spine. Battle-hardened starship captains never suffered from nerves. Cold, calculating, ruthless—those were the adjectives usually used. But Regulon Fleet captains were not summoned to private meetings at the country hideaway of one of the nation’s highest-ranking military officers without some extraordinary reason, and Alek feared he had a good idea what it was. Fyd! He was going down and taking his crew with him.
Or maybe not. Because that officer was Admiral Vander Rigel, which complicated the whole batani mess by a factor of a thousand. As he did a hard right onto a dirt road winding through heavy forest, Alek groaned. Whatever happened, the next hour was going to be interesting.
The admiral’s hideaway was classic. Constructed of logs, it overlooked a lake with a modest dock and a small boat with nothing more powerful than a trolling motor. Memories flooded back. He’d visited here as a boy—the Rigels and the Rybolts had known each other for years—he and Tal had run, fished, played together, while they tried to avoid the two younger Rigels who insisted on following them around . . .
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