Blood of a Thousand Stars

by Rhoda Belleza

  She could hardly believe what she’d just witnessed, the evidence they now carried in Lahna’s precious living moss. She half expected the evil of it would shrivel the thing to black.

  Rhee should’ve focused on what they would say when they stood before the United Planets: Nero hacking cubes, controlling people, destroying lives . . . But every time she tried to structure any kind of argument, her mind wandered back to that voice she’d heard on the holos: Joss’s.

  Get your hands off me, she’d said.

  Rhee, Julian, and Lahna fell into a single-file line behind Jeth. His wide frame filled the entrance to a narrow hallway; he was the biggest soul she’d ever seen. They walked past end tables and mirrors and platters of imported fruits from Nau Fruma and Fontis—including Dom, the berries from a sentient plant species. A plant that could perceive, feel, some said even think. She tried not to take it as an omen.

  “This is the service hallway?” Julian commented. Rhee had to admit it was surprisingly opulent, and she wondered, a bump in her pulse, how many of the United Planets representatives Nero had already bribed to support his agenda—how many diplomats might already be looking the other way? Kalu’s coffers were deep. Almost as deep as individual greed.

  Lahna echoed Rhee’s growing suspicion. “Jethezar, has the council been notified of the Empress’s arrival?”

  “A few key members—representatives from Derkatz and the larger asteroids in the Desuco Quadrant. But we’re concerned about security.” He half turned as he spoke to them, a quickness to his step. “Call me Jeth.”

  “You haven’t been working for the resistance long, Jeth?” Lahna fumbled the shortened name, much like Dahlen had the first time he’d said her own—Rhee. Fontisians didn’t shed formalities easily. Nor suspicion.

  “No.” Jeth’s smile faltered when he caught her implication. He blanched, probably remembering an archer’s predilection for soft throat tissue. “Less than a week, honestly. But I’m here now.”

  “And what made you abandon the UniForce?” Julian asked.

  “It got weird in the ranks as soon as Nero accused Aly of killing you.” He nodded to Rhee.

  “Alyosha?” She could tell by the look on Jeth’s face that he had some connection to Nero’s chosen scapegoat. Another life Rhee had ruined, and one she’d never made amends for. “You said you knew him?”

  “Knew him? We came up in UniForce together. I was there when he broadcast his playback on Rhesto, proving his innocence. I helped him.”

  “So where’s Alyosha now? Is he okay?” She clung to the idea of this individual life spared, this boy redeemed, to keep from thinking about the horrors of Nero’s plan, and the fact that he now had Joss in his custody.

  Jeth shook his head. “We were split up after the broadcast. I stayed on in the UniForce to gather intel until I could leave my post. But as far as we know, he broke out of a camp on Nau Fruma and went off the grid.”

  The hallway opened through a small door into a big, dimly lit area with dark curtains on either side. They were backstage of the main theater now. In the sudden darkness, Rhee felt totally disoriented. She could hear the murmur of conversation. But where were the council members?

  Just then a bright light dazzled them. Rhee took a step backward; they were standing behind a massive hologram, now alive with a reel of current events, and she felt hopelessly small, like she was face-to-face with the sun. She watched the war raging across the system. Even inverted, the horror was no less.

  The holoprojection was partially transparent, and Rhee broke into a sweat as she realized she could see all the planetary representatives seated in the theater. Could they see her? She hoped that the light and color, intensified on the other side, kept her invisible.

  How would she convince everyone of the truth of what she knew? The council needed to trust her, believe her, believe in her. But some of the politicians were most likely in Nero’s pocket. It was exactly what she’d been trained to do—and it was exactly where she had always failed. There were at least fifty members of the United Planets, representing just as many nations and sovereign asteroids. They sat stadium-style facing the stage.

  0088-A, Abernath, Bazorl, Bbiy . . . Rhee began to recite them in her head in alphabetical order, like her father had instructed her to do as a girl. She’d always gotten them wrong, and never bothered to learn them correctly. It was Joss who knew them backward and forward. It had been her job as future empress to always be perfect. And now here was Rhee, falling short, always less than she needed to be.

  Joss. She longed more than ever for her older sister. Joss would know what to do. Joss knew how to command a room.

  The coin in her pocket hung heavy with a thousand regrets.

  Honor. Bravery. Loyalty.

  Rhee hadn’t even thought of the words since Dahlen left. She took her hand and threaded her fingers through Lahna’s. She was surprised when Julian took her other hand. Surprised—and grateful.

  A deep voice boomed from somewhere in the stadium of seats. “We know the war has already cost an enormous amount of lives. That’s why Nero called for a cease-fire.”

  The daisies located the speaker in the theater, and his face emerged, zoomed in, on the holo. Rhee’s pulse began to race. The man with the eye patch. It was Nero’s right-hand adviser, Yendit. A chill ran through her.

  Yendit was Nero’s eyes and ears. How could she make a plea for understanding, how could she convince the United Planets of his evil, with Nero watching her through his adviser?

  “The cease-fire is a load of taejis,” someone else hollered. “The galaxy is crawling with UniForce under the thin veil of ‘peacekeeping,’ thanks to Nero’s new treaty.”

  “Nero might’ve been out of line, but it’s the Fontisians who were responsible for the Empress’s disappearance,” a woman spoke up.

  “The Fontisians? No more conspiracy theory, please,” said another representative. “Empress Rhiannon returned with them willingly to take the throne.”

  “Excuse me?” It was the Fontisian representative. He stood up in his place.

  At that point the chamber exploded with arguing voices.

  Rhee took a breath. It was now or never.

  But as she took a step forward, Jeth seized her arm. “Not now,” he whispered. “Not until they stop fighting.”

  “And when will that be?” Rhee fired back. She shook her head. “I’m tired of waiting.”

  But this time, it was Lahna who caught her and held her back. Rhee turned to look at her quizzically—and a split second before she heard the approaching footsteps she saw them, in Lahna’s tension. A UniForce soldier was coming for them. Then another, from the opposite direction.

  Before Lahna could even fire an arrow, Yendit emerged from the darkness. Rhee felt her stomach pooling at her feet. How long had he known she was there?

  Suddenly there were guards—at least twenty of them—lining the walls and blocking doors. The Tasinn—the royal Kalusian guards. There were too many to fight. They were surrounded. A robosoldier pinioned Jeth. Another snapped Lahna’s bow in two, pushing her to the ground. One of the Tasinn grabbed Julian and flipped him to the floor. And before Rhee could reach for her knife, one of her own guards seized her wrists and locked them behind her back.

  Yendit sidled next to her, brought his face too close to hers. In his eyes, she saw a strange darkness, a blankness that was terrifying. “Rhiannon Ta’an. We meet again,” he whispered.

  The holo shielding them from the rest of the theater flickered once before it disappeared entirely, dropping like a curtain to expose them to the council. A gasp went up around the room. An eruption of screams. Cries to help her, to free her, to let her go.

  But no one moved. And no help came.

  Yendit’s eyes flickered over Rhee. “Hold her there so she can watch,” he commanded.

  She struggled against the gua
rd who held her. He was twice her size, and crushing her wrists with his grip. “Let go,” she said, though she knew it wouldn’t help. “I have the power to see you executed.”

  Yendit shook his head. He looked amused. “There is no greater power than the power of the mind.”

  She froze, terror grabbing her by the throat. It was exactly what Nero had said to her, just before their speech. “What do you mean?”

  Yendit grinned. Something in his eyes shifted. Now, when he grinned, he reminded her of Nero himself.

  “If two minds are better than one, think how much better infinite minds will be.”

  And then, as if in slow motion, all of the Tasinn, weapons in hands, looked up, facing them. “Infinite,” they all echoed in unison. And that was when Rhee knew: Nero had possessed them—had taken over their cubes, and was somehow controlling them. All of them.

  Nero wasn’t there. He didn’t need to be—he could work from a distance, without dirtying his own hands.

  As one, the Tasinn pivoted. As one, they leapt into the seats. Rhee saw a man’s throat slit at the first arc of a long knife, the way the blood poured out like it was tipped out of a pitcher of wine.

  Then came the screaming.

  Drowned, drowned, all of it drowned, under a tide of more blood.

  TWENTY-TWO

  RHIANNON

  NO.

  Something inside Rhiannon rose up; the thing that made her who she was, whether it was pride or stubbornness or her soul, she couldn’t say, but it was like a power, pulsing inside her, waking her up from this nightmare, telling her there was still a way.

  The Tasinn were trained in the same set of arts Veyron had taught her. Even now, every time she struggled or sidestepped, the Tasinn bodyguard knew exactly how to neutralize her—and Yendit just watched, smirking.

  This man’s face, the screaming, the fear—these weren’t going to be the last things she’d see before she died.

  Because she wasn’t going to die.

  She thought of Veyron and what he had always told her. She needed to be three steps ahead of her opponent.

  Three steps—that was all she needed.

  With her hands still behind her back, she took a deep breath and stepped off her right foot lightly, charging at Yendit. One. Two. Three. It all happened fast—she launched herself into the air, pushed off his thigh with her right foot and his chest with the left, then brought her feet together and back—releasing a two-legged kick, her heels snapping into his face, and her head, thrown back, cracking into the nose of the guard behind her.

  Satisfaction flooded Rhee’s body as the Tasinn guard stumbled backward, releasing her.

  Yendit staggered, and before he could recover Rhee gulped in a deep breath of air and spun around, kicking his face with all the momentum she’d gathered. But his jaw was like iron; Rhee felt her foot shatter, shards of bone grinding against each other. When she tried to stand on it, pain exploded all the way up to her spine.

  Yendit laughed, looked like he was chomping at the air. “Alloy reinforcements,” he said as he stood, stroking his jaw.

  He took a long stride forward and punched her in the chest. Rhee couldn’t tell up from down, only that she was gasping for air, mid-flight, dead weight falling backward. When she hit the ground pain exploded, a minefield all over her body—echoing an unbearable bomb. Then everything went silent, and she remembered the peace of the desert on Nau Fruma, and how you could see every star when you looked up into the nighttime sky.

  The quietest place in the world, Julian had said. Julian. Things were good then. The entire world in that moment had funneled down to two things: darkness and his voice.

  Then the blackness parted and she saw glimmers of light, heard that same voice, only it was screaming.

  Someone flew at Yendit—a man? No, not a man. The Fisherman.

  “I’ve arrived!” he boomed as he socked Yendit in the face again and again. His harpoon gun was strapped to his side, but he didn’t need it. Yendit’s face was already pulpy, wet with dark blood.

  Rhee rolled over and saw Yendit catch the Fisherman and choke him, pinning him up against the wall with both hands. Rhee got to her knees, unable to pull herself up on her weak foot, her breath still tight and hard in her chest. The Fisherman wedged his hands between Yendit’s arms and stuck his thumbs in his eyes so that the man screamed, but if he eased up on the hold Rhee couldn’t tell.

  Keeping as low to the ground as possible, Rhee crawled toward them. Julian and Lahna were still struggling with their respective guards, but Rhee wanted to help.

  There were yells from the slaughter, though they were alarmingly quiet, already expiring. The Tasinn had done enough. The place was awash in the smell of death, the feel of it, like a weight in the air, making it hard to breathe. She reached Julian’s knife that had landed on the floor. The chamber floor, she saw, was flooded with blood.

  Julian grabbed her. Rhee realized the Tasinn he had fought was on the floor, and only Lahna’s guard was left—pinning her to the ground.

  Julian took the knife out of Rhee’s hand, and Rhee could barely protest, unable to find her voice. Julian held it with such ease, as if it been part of his hand all along. She saw Julian’s eyes meet the girl’s, and fought the urge to look away as he pulled the knife back and brought it down hard on the back of the guard’s neck, no hesitation. No alloy reinforcements there. He slumped forward, transforming in a split second to a corpse. Lahna scrambled up with a quick thanks, then kneeled to pull the knife out of the guard’s neck. Blood poured out. Lahna wiped the blade clean on her tunic.

  Meanwhile, Yendit had stopped struggling, while the Fisherman berated his unconscious body and yelled what seemed to be a string of curses, possibly in multiple languages, none of which Rhee recognized.

  Jeth limped up next to them. He was in rough shape but still standing, and with the robosoldier’s comm unit in his hand; he’d managed to disable it. “Who’s this?” he said over the Fisherman’s curses.

  “I am the second most important person in the galaxy as far as you lot are concerned,” he called over his shoulder. “Because I’m supposed to keep this impossible brat of an empress alive!”

  When the Fisherman seemed satisfied that Yendit was dead, he let his body drop to the floor before spinning around to face them.

  “Were you planning to tell the head of security that you were entering a literal bloodbath, then?” he asked Rhee as he heaved her up to her feet. Her foot ached visciously.

  “I’m sorry. There wasn’t time.”

  “There wasn’t time to call for your personal security detail?” He threw his hands up in the air. “Isn’t she supposed to be clever?” the Fisherman asked of the three people at her side. He got up close to Rhee and pointed a stubby finger in her face. “You nearly died. If I hadn’t followed you here, who knows—”

  He didn’t finish his sentence. The tip of the harpoon burst up through his chest. It would’ve stabbed Rhee directly through the heart had Lahna not pulled her away.

  “No!” The word nearly ripped her throat in two as Julian kicked in the side of Yendit’s head. His neck tilted at an odd angle and his body went limp yet again, falling in such a way that he cradled the harpoon gun to his chest. The Fisherman’s harpoon gun.

  The Fisherman collapsed. Rhee fell to her knees and grabbed the Fisherman’s hand. “I’m so sorry,” she repeated as his heavy-lidded eyes fluttered open.

  “In the Outer Belt we don’t do sorries, Empress.”

  “I shouldn’t have come here . . .”

  “Enough already on what you should or shouldn’t have done.” He paused to spit up blood. “I’m not a political man, but I’m a betting one. You’re fierce, and impossible, and you’ll do all of us right on the Outer Belt, won’t you?”

  Rhee nodded her head vigorously. He squeezed her hand in response.

 
“Then I put all my credits on you.” Out of his elaborate belt that kept countless weapons, he produced a telescope—Julian’s telecope—the very one she’d given him in exchange for his help on Tinoppa. “Take it back. I’ve no use for it where I’m going.”

  Rhee took it, the metal cool in her palm, and watched him collapse, realizing how much effort it had taken him to sit up—to perform such a gesture of forgiveness and generosity. She dropped it into her pocket and burst into tears when the life left his eyes. Too many deaths. Too many deaths at her expense.

  Lahna kneeled by her side, and pressed her index fingers first to her eyes, and then closed the Fisherman’s eyelids. Julian had closed his eyes, moving his mouth in what looked like a prayer.

  It was silent, save for the unconscious guards who stuttered and twitched in unison near them. She wondered if Nero was using some kind of server to infiltrate minds—they moved as if they couldn’t talk or communicate when too much data streamed through them.

  “I know an exit,” Jeth said. “We should move.”

  And yet Rhee was frozen, staring hard at the man who’d killed the Fisherman. Behind her, the Tasinn weren’t done. They gutted the ambassadors one by one, trapped them against exits barred for this purpose, drilled them in their seats, spilled their guts out with a single swipe of their swords. But she drowned out the sound and went back to that moment on board Dahlen’s ship, floating on the outer edges of the Desuco Quadrant. How vast it had seemed, how insignificant Rhee had felt, and how she’d found peace in that.

  The Fisherman had made his livelihood there; he’d fished out creatures who could survive without light and atmosphere, with nothing but a suit and an alloy harpoon gun.

  And yet he would never find that solitude, that peace, again. Yendit had taken it away from him.

  She snatched the harpoon gun from Yendit’s limp hands now. He was still alive; she could tell by the way his chest rose and fell. Taking aim, she pointed it at his chest.