“You, too, Mother. I was worried about you,” Davi said, silently thanking God she was safe. It felt good to be with her again.
“They told me you’re a war hero? My own son, the Worker Prince,” Miri said, looking him over in the way mothers inspect their children after a long absence.
“I’ve done what I could, Mother. Really. I’m fine.” And looking around him at all those he loved, he knew he would be.
Miri smiled, embracing him again. “It’s a mother’s prerogative to be sure.”
Over Miri’s shoulder, Davi saw Lura embrace a man on the platform a few yards away as Tela greeted someone at the foot of the ramp.
“There’re some people I want you to meet.” Davi and Miri said in unison. Davi laughed.
“You first,” Miri said.
Davi took her hand and led her toward Tela, who was embracing a man in his mid-fifties. His features were similar to Tela’s, except he was taller, with graying hair.
“Davi, I’d like you to meet my father, Telanus.”
Telanus smiled and clasped Davi’s hand, his grip firm. “So this is the young man I have to thank for taking care of my little girl.”
“She did a pretty good job of it herself, sir,” Davi said. “In fact, you might say it was more the other way around.”
Miri smiled, offering her hand to Tela. “Then it is I who must thank her, I suppose.”
Tela grasped Miri’s hand as Davi said: “Tela, this is my mother, Miri.”
“I am so honored, Princess Miri,” Tela said, reacting with surprise as Miri pulled her into an embrace.
“From what I hear, soon you may be calling me Mother as well,” Miri said with a wink at Davi, who blushed.
Tela laughed.
Davi turned as Lura approached with a tall and thin man who looked a lot like him. His face and hands appeared hardened from manual labor, and his hair had turned gray but he walked with confidence. A familiar necklace hung around his neck.
“I never thought this day would come,” Lura said, tears flowing down her cheeks. “This is your father, Sol.”
Sol and Davi stood a moment, taking each other in, and then Sol grabbed Davi and pulled him into an embrace. Sol’s eyes filled with tears as he spoke. “I have so dreamed of this day, my son.”
“I have, too, father,” Davi said, fighting back tears of his own.
“Your mother, Princess Miri, has told me so many stories in the past few days,” Sol said, smiling at Miri, who was wiping her own eyes. “We are so grateful for all she’s done for you.”
“Thank you for taking care of our baby,” Lura said, voice full of emotion as she grasper Miri’s hands.
As the two mothers hugged, Sol continued, “We’re also grateful for all you’ve done, and very proud.”
Davi couldn’t fight the tears any longer. They poured from his eyes as he embraced Sol again. “Thank you for saving my life!” It seemed to be the one thought out of several in his mind which he could manage to form into words right then.
They took another shuttle back to the WFR base where an elaborate banquet had been prepared for them in a large cavern. The WFR leadership, pilots, and other guests stood waiting for them. The banquet table contained a spread beyond imagination—every delectable delight they could have imagined and enough to feed an army. They all ate until their stomachs were ready to burst.
Everyone exchanged congratulations as they celebrated together. General Matheu even thanked Davi for his contributions and shook his hand.
Telanus, Miri, and Sol stared in amazement at what the workers had built, and it touched Davi to see the three of his parents—birth and adopted—getting along so well.
Later, he and Tela slipped off to one side and cuddled, watching them.
“I can’t even begin to describe this,” Tela said.
Davi nodded. “Me neither. It’s so hard to believe, but somehow more than anything else, this feels like victory.”
Tela smiled, pulling him close, and they kissed and then strode hand in hand back to rejoin the others.
(To be continued in The Returning coming 2016)
Glossary
Agora—One of Vertullis’ two moons.
Auto-bot—Prototype robot created to perform basic human tasks.
Barge—A smaller transport used primarily to carry loads between neighboring planets.
Boralis—The larger of two suns in the solar system.
Bots—Robots designed to perform tasks formerly assigned to humans.
Cab-bot—Bots designed to drive air taxis and interact as tour guides with passengers.
Charlis—The smaller of the solar system’s two suns.
Chrono—Watch.
Council of Lords—The elected body that works with the High Lord Councilor to lead the Borali Alliance.
Courier Craft—Round, silver craft designed to carry supplies and papers between planets in the solar system with light speed drives.
Daken—Large, blue, predatory birds, coveted for their beautiful feathers.
E-post—Messages sent over the computer, like e-mail. Usually sent via computer terminals or kiosks in public places.
Feruca—A black fruit with a thin skin and soft pulp.
Floater—A floating platform with two seats facing a control panel at the front; which moves by manipulating the air underneath to float above the ground. The largest floaters have benches to hold as many as twenty troops—more if ten stand in the middle. Smaller models are typically designed for four or five passengers.
Gixi—A round, purple fruit grown in orchards on Vertullis and Italis with a delicious, tender pulp and sweet juice.
Gungors—Six-legged brown animals with yellow manes raised for their tasty meat.
High Lord Councilor—Leader of the Borali Alliance, elected by the Council of Lords. The post typically passes down through members of the same family until the Council decides new blood is required.
Iraja—Capital city of Vertullis.
Italis—Ninth planet in the solar system, home to the Lhamors.
Jax—A blue and oblong fruit with crispy pulp and a bitter taste, which becomes tart and sweeter when boiled; often used as an ingredient in salads.
Legallis—Seventh and largest planet in the solar system and capital of the Borali Alliance.
Legon—Capital city of Legallis and headquarters of the Borali Imperial government.
Lhamor—Native to the planet Italis. Lhamors have green-scaled skin and disproportionally large, orange eyes and four arms, the lower two extending from either side of their large, round stomachs, parallel to the arms which extend out of their shoulders above them.
Lords—Elected members of the Council of Lords, usually of high bloodlines from the upper echelons of Legallian society.
Mech-bot—Bots used as mechanics in starports.
Off-worlder—Person not from the same planet as a person calls home.
Plutonis—The 12th planet in the solar system, an icy world suitable only for natives and the Qiwi antelope. Also the location of the Borali Alliance’s outermost post, Alpha Base.
Presimion Academy—The Borali Alliance’s leading school for future military leaders located on Eleni 1, one of Legallis’ largest moons.
Qiwi—Antlered creatures native exclusively to Plutonis, with dark brown fur and white spots lining either side of their spines. Waist high on most humans, qiwi have four long legs ending in black hooves. Their antlers can grow up to forty centimeters out from their skulls.
Quats—Striped creatures with long tails similar to Earth’s cats but larger, like Cocker Spaniels.
Regallis—Thirteenth planet in the system, habitable only because of its development as a major indoor resort.
Royal Shuttle—Smaller version of the shuttles (see description below) reserved for the Royal family and their guests.
Serve-bot—Bots used for serving patrons in bars and restaurants.
Shuttle—White personnel transport with light gray interior. The cockp
it has two black chairs facing a transparent blast shield, surrounded by controls, and is separated by a bulkhead from a passenger compartment containing four rows of seats—two lining each exterior wall and two back-to-back down the center. Each has its own safety harness. Intraplanetary models operate without lightspeed capabilities, while interplanetary models are equipped with ultra-lightspeed drives.
Skitter—One-man ground craft that operate on a system allowing it to fly above the planet’s surface, higher than a floater. Sleek and fast, skitters are easy to maneuver through trees and other obstacles and are known to handle much like Imperial VS28 starfighters.
Talis—A warm beverage brewed from beans grown on Vertullis—somewhat like the old Earth beverage, coffee.
Tertullis—Eighth planet in the solar system, home to tall humanoids similar to humans except for their orangish tinted skin and purple eyes.
Transport—Larger craft used to transport supplies, food, and other loads across the solar system.
Vertullis—Sixth planet in the system and home to the humans known as workers, the only slaves in the solar system.
VS28—Sleek and black starfighters with snub noses and three wings—two longer wings out of each side, and a third shorter wing extending vertically above the fighter’s four engines. Each bears its squadron’s insignia, and a few bear names given them at a pilot’s indulgence. They have laser cannons on each wing as well as in the nose. The cockpit lay beneath a gray, transparent blast shield through which the pilot can see the stars in space around him.
WFR (Worker’s Freedom Resistance)—An organized resistance formed by workers on Vertullis to seek freedom from the Borali Alliance’s rule.
Workers—Residents of Vertullis, and age-old enemies of the Legallians; they live and work as slaves for the Borali Alliance.
Acknowledgements
The idea for this story came to me when I was a fifteen-year-old science fiction fan living in a small Kansas town where it sometimes felt like dreaming was the only way out. Over the years, I lost my original notes, but the idea in my head and the names Xalivar and Sol stayed with me.
It took me twenty-five years to start writing it and I wrote daily through some of the toughest trials I’ve experienced in my life. So this book you hold in your hand is a victory in many ways, and I’m very excited and proud of it and hope you’ll enjoy it and share it with others.
Thanks go first to Lost Genre Guild for inspiring me to try writing for Digital Dragon and to T.W. Ambrose for encouraging me to write more space opera stories, and then agreeing to publish them. An abridged version of the prologue to this novel first appeared in Digital Dragon’s May 2010 issue.
Secondly, thanks go to fellow authors like Blake Charlton, Ken Scholes, Jay Lake, Mike Resnick, Leon Metz, Moses Siregar, and Grace Bridges who have supported, encouraged, and advised me time and time again, no matter how silly my questions were or how many times they’d heard them before. Special thanks to Blake and Grace for taking time to read and offer more specific advice to help me grow as a writer and to Mike Resnick for advice in figuring out this crazy business.
Thirdly, thanks to first readers and friends like Larry Thomson, Tim Pearse, Jeff Vaughn, David Melson, Todd Ward, Mike Wallace, Andrew Reeves, Chris Zylo Owens, and the members of the FCW-Basic Critique Group for actually seeming to enjoy my writing even in its roughest form and for giving me feedback which helped me to improve it greatly.
Fourthly, thanks to friends like Charlie Davidson, Aaron Zapata, Mark Dalbey, Nelson Jennings, and Greg Baerg, who, along with some of the guys above, have helped me escape from behind the desk and keyboard and laugh a little bit when I needed it.
Fifthly, thanks to Kevin J. Anderson, Rebecca Moesta, and Peter J. Wacks at WordFire for the chance to release an improved, polished version and finally conclude the trilogy. And thanks to Vivian Trask, Randy Streu, Jen Ambrose, Paul Conant and Darlene Oakley for their editing and advice, the El Paso Writer’s League for encouragement and fellowship, and Mike Wallace for the science of the Boralis solar system. Thanks also to Jeana Clark for the solar system map which brought it to life for me.
Thanks to you, the reader, for taking a chance on a new, unknown writer. I hope you like it enough to come back for more.
Thanks to God for making me in His image and giving me the talent and inspiration to do this and continually opening the doors. I look forward to seeing what’s behind the next ones.
About the Author
Bryan Thomas Schmidt is a critically praised author and Hugo-nominated editor of adult and children’s speculative fiction. His debut novel, The Worker Prince received Honorable Mention on Barnes & Noble Book Club’s Year’s Best Science Fiction Releases for 2011. His short stories have appeared in magazines, anthologies, and online. His anthologies as editor include Shattered Shields (2014) with co-editor Jennifer Brozek, Mission: Tomorrow (2015), Galactic Games (forthcoming), Little Green Men—Attack! (forthcoming), and Monster Hunter Tales with co-editor Larry Corriea (forthcoming) all for Baen, Space Battles: Full Throttle Space Tales #6 (2012), Beyond The Sun (2013) and Raygun Chronicles: Space Opera For a New Age (2013) as well as Joe Ledger: Unstoppable co-edited by Jonathan Maberry for St. Martins Griffin (forthcoming 2017). From 2010 to 2015, he hosted #sffwrtcht (Science Fiction & Fantasy Writer’s Chat) Wednesdays at 9 pm ET on Twitter as @SFFWRTCHT.
Website/Blog: www.bryanthomasschmidt.net
Twitter: @BryanThomasS
Facebook: www.facebook.com/BryanThomasSchmidt
Goodreads: www.goodreads.com/author/show/3874125.Bryan_Thomas_Schmidt
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