Sacred Planet: Book One of the Dominion Series

by Austin Rogers

  “May I assist you, master?” His voice carried more dignity than that of most noblemen.

  The “master” bit felt odd, but Kastor could get used to it. He could also get used to being waited upon, and by a man older than him no less. The footman’s eyes remained attentive, jawline perfectly parallel with the ground. His crisp, black-and-silver livery cut precisely across his shoulders and neck.

  “No,” Kastor said, restraining a grin. Respect felt good. “Oh, wait. Yes. Something to eat. Something small.”

  “Any preference, master?” the footman replied.

  Kastor sipped wine as he pondered his mood: Proud. Exultant. Distinguished. Wily. “Your finest fish. Off-world, obviously. Nothing from a farm. Thin slices, smoked and seasoned.”

  The footman’s eyes widened, but he dipped his head anyway. “The chef would be honored. I’ll have it out momentarily.” He strode off with nervous haste, perhaps worried their kitchen had no off-world fish. Triumph lacked any natural sea life, being that the planet held no liquid water and that its people likely ate nothing like it.

  The planets of Eagle had the best fish in the galaxy—exotic and firm and succulent. And the seas on Tyrannus, where Kastor had been birthed and trained at academy, boasted the finest of all: vast schools of bluntnose scale-fish, long as his arm. No flesh tasted as sweet as bluntnose, especially caught by one’s own hand. It intrigued him to find out what the royal chef of Diamond Castle could muster.

  He stepped across the mosaic of glossy tiles and leaned against a thick column to look down on the atrium, a vast garden of trimmed greenery and milky stone pathways. Neat hedges formed the contours of a sprawling bow and arrow—the emblem of the Sagittarian Regnum. Interspersed through the garden, vines twisted in the latticework of golden trellises. Bulbous Everbloom flowers, bigger than Kastor’s head, blossomed in bright purple, yellow, and magenta. Among them, in grassy clearings, diamond statues depicted great Sagittarian forebears, the luminaries who built the spacebend gates and founded the Regnum. Appropriate that they should be represented by diamond, the hardest substance in nature and Triumph’s main resource, produced by the constant tectonic grinding deep in the planet’s torrid crust.

  In the center of the garden, a full a cappella choir in white robes sang in some ancient language, harmonious voices resounding through the massive chamber. A pleasant, luxurious sound. And yet, none of it seemed excessive. It was majestic—the seat of Sagittarian power could not be otherwise.

  Kastor sipped from his diamond goblet. Yes, he could get used to this.

  Shoes tapped the tiled ground, approaching with light footsteps. A familiar pattern. The feet of a woman.

  “How do you like your new home, old cradlemate?”

  He smirked. “The luster’s faded here and there, but it’ll do.”

  Pollaena let out a small, subdued laugh. Polite and professional—not the spirited girl he grew up with, but her purity had not changed. She stopped beside him, gazing out over the great garden.

  Kastor kept his eyes forward like an impassive sculpture until, in the corner of his vision, he saw her turn to rest her eyes on him. He met her fierce gaze—sharp eyebrows and coy, tight, maroon lips framed by waves of golden locks spilling down past her neck. Courtly nanoflex armor cupped her shoulders and formed a heart shape over her breasts, coming to a point just above her shallow navel. Thicker covering ran down her spine and into a tail of wispy cloth hanging to her ankles. A handgun holster hugged the tight nanoflex around her thigh.

  Kastor nodded at it. “I heard you’ve been promoted. Part of the royal entourage now. Congratulations.”

  Her coy lips curled up. “Let’s save the congratulations, Kastor. We both know I owe you more than you owe me.”

  “Why do you think I said it?”

  She laughed that same laugh again, and when she settled, her flawless, brown eyes—brilliant as gemstones—lingered on him. Her smile faded back to its usual sly state. Her shoulders shifted to face him. How powerful it made him feel when her body opened to him. He turned to face her.

  “Alright, I’ll say it first,” Pollaena said. “I missed you.”

  A new elation bloomed in Kastor’s chest, a satisfaction only she could give him. But for that moment, he made no reply, only basked in the glory of the hanging words. Destiny, the same force that had driven him from the pits of the military academy to the Diamond Castle itself, now reunited him with his lifelong maiden, the girl he’d shared an incubator with as an infant, and so many cold nights since.

  He drank deeply from his goblet, draining the last of the wine. Then the diamond cup became nothing more than a lavish distraction. He dropped it onto the ground—making a loud clink, probably chipping the tiles—stepped to his maiden, grabbed her by the sides, and kissed her. Their lips slid together in that effortless sensation, unfelt for the universal-year since she had left Tyrannus at the Queen Matriarch’s call.

  His hands slid across her skin until he felt nanoflex at the center of her back. She nudged him away and studied him thoughtfully. “Is that all I’m getting from you, Kastor, Champion of Triumph?”

  “Wasn’t it enough, m’lady?” He pulled her close again.

  Pollaena planted a finger against his lips, halting him. Her coy smile returned. She moved back and stepped to the side, stooping to retrieve the diamond goblet. She moved with such grace—poetry set to motion, her every gesture rhyming with the one before. The genesmiths had crafted them as a perfect pair, their strengths an optimal compliment to one another, each magnetized to the other’s uniquenesses. Twin lovers, born of fate, built for glory.

  As she poured wine into his cup, the footman returned, balancing a silver platter on his gloved fingertips.

  “Quick service from the royal kitchen,” Kastor said.

  “Already partaking in your spoils?” Pollaena asked with an arched eyebrow.

  The footman lowered the platter and removed the covering. Seven thin ovals of pink meat were draped over a bed of lettuce, speckled with seasoning, decorated in the middle with some carved purple fruit.

  “Kelterfish from the Korgus Isles of Balamar,” the footman said.

  Kastor pinched a slice of Kelterfish and tore off half with his teeth. A tad chewy for his taste, but the pepper made up for it. He looked at the nervous but stalwart footman.

  “Tell your chef he’s worthy of his position.”

  The footman cracked the slightest of smiles and let his shoulders relax. His smile disappeared in a flash, almost as if it had never been there. He bowed his head. “The master chef will be pleased.”

  Kastor pointed to an empty stand. “Leave it there.” He watched the footman obey mechanically, pondering what thoughts went through commoners’ heads as they performed their menial tasks. “Also, tell the chef to cancel all future orders of fish from Balamar. From now on, the Diamond Castle only serves freshwater bluntnose from Tyrannus.”

  The footman bowed his head once more. “As you command.” He hastened off and disappeared behind a column. Pollaena stepped beside him and offered his diamond goblet, half-filled now with purple-red wine. He took it and sipped as she sipped from her own. A moment of tacit recognition slipped by between them. They had finished their brutal childhood years. They had made it to the land of plenty, the nobleman’s paradise.

  Pollaena snatched a slice of Kelterfish and ate. Her face scrunched. “Your compliments to the chef were misplaced.”

  “Were they?” Kastor took another slice, sniffed it. “It’s not bad for Balamar fish.”

  She took another bite, recoiled, and set the rest back on the lettuce. “Careful, cradlemate. Don’t let the castle life make you too magnanimous.”

  “Magnanimous,” Kastor repeated, turning the slice of fish around in his fingers as he examined it. “Is that what they’ll call me? Kastor the Magnanimous.”

  She inclined her head and arched her eyebrow knowingly. “You’d need a lord’s title for an epithet. Whichever lordship will you succeed, dear Kas
tor?”

  Kastor dropped the Kelterfish back onto the tray and captured Pollaena in his arm, bringing her so close her breasts pressed against his ribs. She looked up at him like a vassal at her lord, like a queen at her lumis.

  “The one I came to Triumph for,” Kastor whispered in his deepest, most regal voice. “The one I was born for.”

  Pollaena’s eyes hardened, even in submission. Her jawline sharpened. “The one we were born for.”

  Chapter Ten

  Great doors of carved obsidian stretched high overhead. Beyond them awaited the Royal Court, the highest court in Sagittarian space, throne room of Zantorian the Fox and Raza the Tireless, the Grand Lumis and his Queen Matriarch. Sculpted panels depicted victories of the Grand Lumis’s reign, spanning half the length of the doors. The panels at the bottom harkened back to the early days of Zantorian’s rule, a century before Kastor was birthed.

  One in particular caught Kastor’s eye: a fox-headed man of beastly strength plunging his sword into the heart of a traitorous nobleman while firing a gun through the skull of an evil noblewoman. Everyone in the Regnum knew the royal history. It was taught from the time a child could comprehend language.

  Zantorian succeeded the title after his predecessor, Vradiman the Conqueror, was lost in an exploratory mission to the outer rim—an event shrouded in mystery. Vradiman had granted Zantorian heirship by official edict, but several regions rebelled. Once a generation or so, as they said at the academy, the nobility needed reminding that independence was not an option.

  A man and a woman stood before the great doors, blocking Kastor’s way—Guardians of Court. Thick nanoflex armor covered them from neck to feet. They remained still as statues, holding stout-barreled laser rifles that could slice a man in half. Long, silver cuffs covered their forearms, ready to snap into flex-steel shields at a moment’s notice. Their eyes stared straight forward, unblinking.

  “How long must I wait?” Kastor asked.

  The Guardians didn’t flinch, didn’t open their mouths to answer, didn’t even look at him. They might as well have been machines, bred and trained not for thought but for obedience, capable only of mechanical tasks. Plain and simple. No point in talking to them.

  Kastor glanced around the antechamber, where huge screens in the walls shifted between images of planets in the Regnum, each labeled with their names and the names of their lord and matriarch. Orange planets. White and gray planets. Bright blue moons of gas giants. A display of the diversity within the Sagittarian Regnum.

  Kastor detected a slight movement from the Guardians—tiny and quick. Most wouldn’t have noticed, but he did. Simultaneously, their faces turned, and their eyes focused on him. Quite an unsettling sensation.

  “The Grand Lumis is ready for you,” the woman said.

  Their guns snapped up, parallel with their rigid bodies. They pushed the heavy doors with all their might, putting their weight into it. Kastor swallowed, tightened his cuffs, and strode through the open doorway. The sight overwhelmed him and seized his breath.

  A long, vast chamber extended fifty meters across a glossy, mosaic-tiled floor of blue and white, arranged in a simple design of broad lines, embedded diamonds giving a splash of glitter. Square columns of white stone, carved intricately along each facet, rose up to a series of arches. Above the arches, a gilded balustrade lined the second floor of the court. Massive Corinthian columns stretched twice as tall as the stone columns below, supporting the vaulted ceiling and the colorful, dark-shaded frescoes framed by elaborate gold trim. Each image illustrated Vradiman in some glorious pose or another, always encircled by his loyal vassals—pictures harkening back to the Renaissance art of millennia past.

  Such history in this chamber. It almost moved Kastor to tears. Almost. He had an audience. Crowding behind the balustrade of the upper floor, the faces of a thousand silent nobles and courtiers looked down on him.

  Straight ahead, down the lines of Guardians standing ready in front of each stone column, marble steps pyramided up to a golden dais. An enormous silver shield embossed with a brass fox hung behind the Diamond Thrones. And there, seated on the thrones, crowned in lustrous diamond, clothed in diamond-encrusted robes, sat the Grand Lumis and his queen. Across Queen Raza’s lap rested the Diamond Scepter, and the train of her robe twisted around her throne, draping across the steps. Zantorian, holding the Diamond Sword in its silver scabbard, fixed his gaze on Kastor across the chamber and stood.

  “Approach,” he uttered, voice deep and full like two men speaking in unison.

  Kastor held his elation at bay. The sheer glory overwhelmed him, swept him up in its grandeur. As he grew closer to the Diamond Thrones, he detected a light trickle of music reverberating through the cavernous hall. Young girls of nymph-like beauty played ornate harps on either side of the dais, producing soft chimes with graceful strokes of the strings. It provided the perfect final touch to the Royal Court’s elegance. Such majesty. Such . . . power. It made the blood rush in Kastor’s veins. Intoxicated him.

  The Grand Lumis, eyes encircled with the traditional lordly black paint—curving spikes pointing up his temple—smiled casually, relaxed in his awesome power. The queen, with feline black points painted to the sides of her eyes, examined him as if he were some ambiguous work of art. Her dark, bobbed hair bowed out like Cleopatra incarnate.

  “Kastor of Eagle, son of Tyrannus, fourth planet of the Zyna system.” Up close, the Grand Lumis’s voice bellowed as if from some deep cavern. He spread his hands. “You have won my tournament.”

  Light applause pattered from the upper floor and ricocheted throughout the vast chamber. The Grand Lumis raised his hand to silence them, eyes staying on Kastor, studying him.

  “Are you ready to take up your role as my champion?”

  Kastor swelled with pride, jittered with exhilaration. He inclined his head and uttered the ceremonial words. “If it be your will, my lord, I am ready.”

  “To whom belongs your loyalty?” the Grand Lumis asked.

  Kastor’s eyes flicked up, and then he forced them back at the ground. “To you, my lord. To Zantorian the Fox, Grand Lumis of the Sagittarian Regnum, and to his Queen Matriarch, Raza the Tireless.”

  The Grand Lumis did not smile, did not show any sign of satisfaction. The queen’s expression did not change either. Kastor fixed his jaw tight. Perhaps the court was caught up in some formality, waiting for a retainer to bring a ceremonial chalice or perform some solemn ritual. Instead, footsteps tapped down the marble stairs.

  Kastor straightened and felt his throat clench as the Grand Lumis, Zantorian himself, stopped before him, standing at his level. Not the fearsome giant the portraits depicted him as—only a few inches taller than Kastor—but he wielded a different sort of authority. The ruler showed no intimidation, only calm and cool repose. He appraised Kastor as he would a weapon.

  “Of that I’m still unsure,” Zantorian said, voice now quieter but equally rich.

  Kastor’s muscles flexed defensively. “My lord?”

  “Walk with me,” the Grand Lumis said, ambling down the long corridor.

  Kastor remained at Zantorian’s side as the Grand Lumis drew in a breath to speak again.

  “Why do you think I keep a champion, young Kastor?”

  The simplicity of the question took Kastor aback. It almost insulted him. “To represent you on the field of battle. And to lead your armies in war.”

  Zantorian nodded, resting his hands behind his back, a rather vulnerable position. “Indeed. Any champion worth his armor does that. But why does the Grand Lumis need a champion? I have many generals who bear my insignia. They represent me well.”

  “But they fight for the Regnum,” Kastor said. “Not on behalf of Zantorian the Fox.”

  “Ah.” Zantorian’s eyes brightened. “So you’ve come to fight specifically for me, to defend and uphold my honor.”

  “Of course, my lord.” The obviousness of it made Kastor feel as if walking into a trap.

  Zant
orian stretched out his hand to the glossy floor, and instantly, the tiles illuminated in an expansive display of the galaxy, large swaths of stars curving outward from a central axis of bright light. He turned over his hand and lifted, zooming in on the central arm of the coil—the Regnum. “Loyalty, young Kastor, cannot be bought. Nor changed on a whim.” He brought his fingers together, and the Sagittarius Arm began to glow. Hundreds of individual stars flickered in purple, save a handful around the margins, which flared red. “How many systems in Sagittarian space still stand in defiance of me?”

  That one was easy. “Thirty-three, my lord.”

  “And what would be your duty if you were to become my champion?”

  “Reduce that number to zero.”

  “For whom?”

  Kastor hesitated, sensing the trap again. “For you, my lord. For the Regnum.”

  His answer was the right one. Kastor knew it, but the words elicited no reaction. Leaving the starmap in the floor, the Grand Lumis opened his hand beside Kastor. From his cuff, a faint hologram of light and color emerged in the air. It showed a video from the perspective of a hover-drone looking down on the arena the day before—Kastor leaning against a boulder.

  “Guarin,” Kastor’s holographic image called out from the cuff’s tiny speakers. “I know why you hide. It is who you are, and who I am. It’s in our nature. The Swan will always kneel before the Eagle.”

  Zantorian cut off the video. “Why did you say that? You knew the entire Regnum would be watching, including Swan.”

  Kastor hesitated. “I . . . it was merely a taunt, my lord. A way of flushing him out.”

  “An effective tactic, I noticed. But worrisome, all the same.”

  “Worrisome, my lord?”

  “Naturally,” Zantorian said. “When the Regnum is ruled under the Fox rather than the Eagle.”

  Kastor fumbled to assuage his ruler. “Eagle . . . is my homeland, but my ultimate loyalty resides with the Regnum.”

  “Yes, I do believe that,” Zantorian said. “Eagle’s academies may produce Spartans, but they’re patriotic Spartans.”