Sanctuary

by Chris Fox

  “I am.”

  “I need a first officer.” I tapped the field controls, and lowered the barrier. “You’re the most qualified officer on board. We’ve killed Jolene. You’ve served your time. You want penance? We need you to step up and help turn this into a real warship. I need to be able to prosecute a war, and I don’t have the experience to manage a ship this size. You do.”

  Bortel’s eyes widened, and he didn’t reply. Instead he returned to his bench, and set the tablet down next to him, forgotten. “You’re giving me a chance to redeem myself? How can you trust me after…how can the kids trust me?”

  “You were a soldier, following a contract.” I extended a hand in friendship, and Bortel rose to accept it. “People will accept it, in time. Not everyone realizes we need you, but only my say matters right now. The role of XO is yours if you’ll take it.”

  “Done.” He shook my hand, and stepped out of his cell. “Where do you want me to start?”

  “I’m going to teleport you and Vee to the bridge, where I’ve already got mages working around the clock,” I explained. “You two are going to figure out what needs fixing. Bortel, you’ll get crews on it, and Vee will set up forges to print whatever we need to fix damaged areas of the ship. I want a complete report on my desk this time tomorrow on where we stand, and what we need. Prioritize the cannon and internal scrying. Voria will want a combat readiness estimate, and I want to be able to tell her we’re ready to sail into that storm and hunt down Necrotis without worrying about spies in stray cargo holds.”

  Bortel snapped a salute, and Vee gave me an approving smile. I teleported the pair of them to the bridge, and then considered where I needed to go next. Vee still hadn’t figured out her brother was missing.

  I was in so much shit when she found out.

  A problem for tomorrow. I teleported back to my room, and sketched a void sigil to exit my armor. I tensed when I realized the bed was occupied, then relaxed when I spotted Miri.

  She’d fallen asleep curled up on the far side of the bed, uniform and boots still on.

  I stumbled over to the opposite side, and wormed my way into the sheets. I’d done enough for that day. Everything else could wait until the morning.

  Epilogue

  Necrotis couldn’t be more pleased with the situation. Her daughter had been properly sacrificed, and just in time, too. Her power had eclipsed Necrotis’s own in some ways, and had things played out a little differently, the Devourer of Names would have killed the fire god, and the fledgling life god, and claimed the Spellship for her own.

  She would have had the Word of Xal, the Spellship, and the trade moon, plus access to the unclaimed Great Ships. Necrotis would have had an endless storm and a rusted, broken fleet, plus a single Great Ship. Granted, the Maker’s Wrath was the greatest of those ships, but it could still be bested by the forces her daughter would have brought to bear.

  “That would have been terrible.” Necrotis stroked her unwilling companion’s cheek. The old crone had been restored to a vat-grown body, but one lacking limbs or magic, or power of any kind. She was a stationary advisor, whose sole purpose was to watch as Necrotis took everything that had once belonged to the shipmother. “My daughter was a true threat. We owe that demon a debt of gratitude. It’s a pity he’ll die fighting the Confederacy. I can’t imagine why they’d think him the true threat. Such an upstanding Outrider.”

  Her laughter pealed across the bridge, though none of her servants reacted. The shipmother said nothing, merely glared, as she almost always did.

  “Your son is gone as well,” the woman finally rasped. “You have lost both your children, and while the daughter was a threat, she was also a powerful asset. All the Great Ships are in the hands of the Confederacy now, and your trade moon has been destroyed.”

  “My trade moon?” Necrotis stroked the shipmother’s cheek again. She knew the woman hated it. “That belonged to the Inurans, my sworn enemy. I should thank the demons for blowing it up. The Inurans certainly won’t. Now they’ll come for the demons, and not us. Instead of blaming me, who destroyed the moon, and murdered its inhabitants, they will blame Xal’Aran. Their true aim will be power. They’ll all seek to possess the Great Ships, and since we don’t have them, we won’t be a target.”

  She returned to her throne, and sat back against the cool bone. It had come from the body of the shipmother’s largest soulshackled Wyrm, and Necrotis used the remains to taunt her now.

  “Perhaps. You might incite a war.” The shipmother smiled for the first time since her incarceration. “More likely they’ll see through your deception, and come for you. And my children are still out there. You might be able to hide from the Confederacy, but not from them. If the two should ally…why, you might suddenly find yourself facing multiple Great Ships. This storm is my home. I could flee. You? You are an interloper. If they find you, not even this great beast will save you. A couple shots from the Word to disable your engines. The Spellship to counter your cannon. The Bulwark to deliver millions of demons inside your vessel.”

  Disquiet swept through Necrotis, and she backhanded the shipmother, then immediately regretted it. It showed a lack of control, and proved that the woman’s words had an effect. She’d have it back if she could.

  “You overestimate them. I will huddle here, and be no threat.” She smiled as she considered her devious plan. “I will harvest the mining colonies along the edge of the storm, and gradually build up my fleet while I let the Confederacy sort out their own issues. I do not need to pray for war. I can nudge it into existence, and then use the distraction to prepare, while weakening my foes. When they come I will be ready, whatever you think, crone.”

  “Why does what I think matter, I wonder?” The woman ventured, tone thick with innocence.

  It truly bothered her that Utred had been lost. He’d been powerful, but not ambitious, so far as she could tell. Her most able advisor. He wanted only to build and tinker, though his mad quest for the Cycle showed that he wanted to do it on a cosmic scale.

  She’d loved him. Now he was gone. Out of her reach, perhaps forever. She’d gone from a powerful family to standing alone, save for the eager ward Utred had left behind, the lurker boy Kurz. Her enemies were many, and while she remained confident in her victory it rankled that there would be no one from the beginning who understood.

  No matter. She’d have had to murder Utred eventually anyway. Now she never would, and that was a small comfort.

  The coming days filled her with uncertainty. What if her forces were not up to the task? She needed allies. The time had come to purchase them, though it meant going to the very edge of the sector to do so.

  The Eleph were excellent mercenaries who produced some of the finest ships and weapons in the sector, though they did not sell beyond their own kind. The Eleph also famously hated demons more than anything else.

  When Aran overcame the Confederacy, as seemed more likely than them overcoming Xal, she would need aid in slaughtering the survivors. The Eleph could provide that. The cost would beggar a government, but after sixty millennia of manipulating stock markets and trade routes she had abundant credits.

  By the time her forces deployed, the Confederacy would be a memory, and the forces of Xal weakened. If the opposite occurred it hardly mattered. She’d simply slaughter the winner, whichever it was.

  And if they came for her before she was ready, then she had contingencies they couldn’t even guess at. All routes led to victory. She had outlasted her father, and every other damned god from her youth.

  She would outlast this war too.

  Note to the Reader

  If you enjoyed Sanctuary, we have a complete seven-book prequel series with an ending already available, and it leads seamlessly into the book you just read.

  Our pen & paper RPG successfully Kickstarted and the game is live on DriveThruRPG. You can learn more by signing up to the mailing list, or visit magitechchronicles.com and our Magitech Chronicles World Anvil page.

/>   We’ve got maps, lore, character sheets, and a free set of rules you can use to generate your own character, plus a Facebook group where we geek out about this stuff.

  I hope you enjoy and we can’t wait to meet you! If you have any trouble finding what you need email me at chris@chrisfoxwrites.com and I’ll get you sorted.

  -Chris

  The Void Wraith Saga

  Enjoying The Magitech Chronicles? Check out The Void Wraith Saga, which is set in the same universe.

  Destroyer

  Void Wraith Book 1

  1

  Debris

  Commander Nolan ducked through the hatch into the combat information center of the UFC Johnston. It was smaller than he was used to, the consoles set closer to each other than they’d been back at the Office of Fleet Intelligence. Seven people made the room positively claustrophobic, and he imagined that this was what sailors had experienced aboard submarines just a few centuries past.

  “Captain, we’re clearing the sun’s corona. Inductive field down to twelve percent. I’m bringing thrusters online,” Emo called over his shoulder in a strange southern drawl, completely at odds with his appearance. Waif-thin and pale, he wore black lipstick and white makeup. The left side of his head had been shaved, while the shiny black hair on the right side drooped over his face. He sat near the far end of the CIC, his simple chrome chair aimed at the view screen.

  That view screen showed the most breathtaking vista Nolan had ever seen. Pillars of flame hundreds of miles high shot up around them, more than one coming perilously close to their destroyer-class vessel. Emo deftly maneuvered around the flares, slowly gaining distance from the star. The fact that it was even possible to escape a sun’s gravitational pull was nothing short of miraculous, but the Helios drives made it commonplace. They simply harnessed the sun’s own energy.

  “Commander, are you going to join us?” called a gruff voice. Nolan turned toward the voice, which had come from a chair on the opposite side of the room—one that was set a little higher than the rest, a subtle reminder that the person sitting there was in charge.

  In this case, that person was a short man in his early sixties, a person Nolan had revered his whole life. The legendary Captain Dryker, hero of the Tigris war. His white beard was scraggly and his hair hadn’t seen a brush since Nolan had boarded three days past, but the captain’s eyes were sharp and his leanly-muscled physique was still that of a much younger officer.

  “Yes, sir,” Nolan said, realizing he was still standing just inside the narrow hatchway. He threaded between the communication consoles, wishing he knew the names of the two techs working there. He stepped up next to the captain’s chair, folding his hands behind his back.

  “You’re two minutes early,” the captain said, though his eyes were fixed on the view screen.

  “Yes, sir. I prefer being early,” Nolan said, though he had the impression that the captain wasn’t really listening.

  “Captain,” Emo called, spinning his chair to face them. “You’re going to want to see this. Check grid 729, sir.”

  “Noted,” Dryker said, scanning a data pad sitting in his lap. He loosened the collar of his uniform, revealing a coffee stain on the cotton shirt underneath. Nolan waited for several moments while the captain scanned. Dryker finally looked up, meeting Nolan’s gaze. “What do you make of this, Commander?”

  He handed the pad to Nolan, who quickly scanned the data. “It’s a debris field, sir. From the alloy, I’d suggest it’s probably the remains of a Tigris vessel. It’s smaller than I’d expect, though. A science vessel, maybe?”

  “Very good,” Dryker replied, giving a tight nod. “And what can you deduce from the situation?”

  Nolan was silent as he glanced between the view screen and the data pad. There were a lot of disparate pieces, but he knew they added up to something—something the captain was already aware of. “There was a battle, and that battle was recent. Tigris don’t generally send their science vessels outside their own space, and they certainly don’t send them to a human colony like Mar Kona.”

  “Good, but there’s a more urgent fact you’re missing,” Dryker said, eyeing Nolan frostily.

  Nolan resisted the urge to blush. He’d only been aboard the Johnston for a few days, and didn’t mind admitting that the war hero intimidated him. “Sir?”

  “The debris is close, maybe three hundred thousand clicks from the sun’s corona,” Dryker supplied, raising an eyebrow.

  “Ahh, I should have caught that,” Nolan replied, finally understanding. He tensed. “The battle was recent. Very recent. If this had happened even a few hours ago, the debris field would have already been pulled in by the sun’s gravity.”

  The Johnston had cleared the corona, and was accelerating toward the debris field. As they approached, the view screen’s magnification shifted to provide a close-up. Large chunks of bronze-colored alloy floated in space, sinking gradually closer to the sun.

  “Set condition one throughout the ship,” Dryker barked.

  A blonde lieutenant in her early twenties gave a quick nod and a murmured response, then the lighting changed. The bright halogens faded to soft red, and a single warning klaxon rang across the deck. Nolan had never seen a ship of the line enter combat readiness, but he’d been trained for it back at the academy. He moved a step to the left, clipping himself to a handle on the side of the bulkhead.

  “Captain, do you think whoever did this is still here? Wouldn’t we be able to see them?” Nolan asked. It might be a stupid question, but he was genuinely curious.

  “It’s possible they could have retreated back into the sun, and they may have already used the Helios Gate,” Dryker conceded, his eyes never leaving the view screen. “I don’t think so, though. I’m guessing they’re still in system. Emo, give me a system scan. Where could a vessel run to?”

  “There are only two real choices,” Emo said. “They could go for that asteroid field that used to be a moon, or they could be hiding in Mar Kona’s shadow.”

  “They’d have to be damned quick to make it to the planet already,” Dryker said, rising from his chair and crossing the deck to stand next to Emo. Nolan considered following, but chose to stay clipped to the bulkhead.

  “Sir, if they are in the asteroid field, what are we planning to do about it?” Nolan asked.

  “Captain,” the blonde snapped, drawing Nolan’s attention. Her blue eyes had gone wide. “Another vessel is emerging from the Helios Gate. It’s clearing the sun’s corona now. It’s broadcasting an ident. Looks to be a Tigris Warship.”

  “Battle stations,” Dryker barked.

  2

  You're in Charge

  Nolan tensed as the Klaxon blared a second time. That was the only sign that anything had changed. The techs manning the comm stations didn’t so much as flinch, instead keeping their focus and continuing to monitor the individual metrics that every warship needed in combat.

  “Commander Nolan,” Dryker said, brushing lint from the arm of his uniform. He looked up to meet Nolan’s gaze. “You have the bridge.”

  “Excuse me? Uh, sir,” Nolan said, trying to keep the shock from his voice. The idea that a captain would desert his bridge during a battle was unthinkable.

  “Did I stutter? The shift has changed. It’s 0800 and you’re scheduled to take command, aren’t you? I’m going to go get some chow,” Dryker said. His tone was flat, completely devoid of emotion.

  Nolan paused, glancing at the view screen. The Tigris warship loomed behind them, slowly clearing the sun’s corona. The spike-shaped vessel dodged a solar flare, disappearing for a moment before returning to view. The thing looked like a high-caliber bullet: long, lean, and deadly. Three ports ringed the midsection, each capable of launching one of the dart fighters the Tigris so loved to employ. Above those ports were a smaller ring of turrets, designed to launch harpoons that would pin their foes long enough to grapple them.

  “Sir, I’m not sure that’s appropriate. I’ve only been aboa
rd ship for three days, and I—” Nolan began.

  “Nolan,” Dryker snapped, taking a step closer. Nolan could smell coffee on the captain’s breath. “You’re an officer of the UFC, are you not? You’re trained to command in combat—by OFI, no less. If the Office of Fleet Intelligence hasn’t prepared you for battle, then why the hell are you on my ship?”

  “Well, yes, I have been trained,” Nolan began again. “But, sir, you’ve seen at least a dozen battles. Are you certain that—”

  “I’m going to see about breakfast,” Dryker said, ducking past Nolan and through the hatch. He paused to poke his head back inside. “Figure it out, Nolan. Or we’re all dead.”

  Nolan took a deep breath and focused on the view screen. The warship was closing, but because it was exiting the sun’s corona it hadn’t had time to accelerate yet. They still had a little time to react. That time would be critical. The Tigris warship was three times their size. It was faster, better armored, and packed wall to wall with a race that lived for combat.

  “Pilot,” Nolan barked, trying to affect the same tone of authority Dryker had used. “Set course for the asteroid field around Mar Kona.”

  “Acknowledged, Commander,” Emo replied in a lazy drawl. Nolan couldn’t feel the ship accelerate, but the asteroids loomed larger as the Johnston made for them.

  “You,” he said, pointing at the blonde comm tech. “What’s your name?”

  “Lieutenant Juliard, sir,” the woman said, blinking at him.

  “Juliard, open a channel to the Tigris vessel and put it on screen,” Nolan ordered. He moved to the captain’s chair, pausing to inspect the smooth chrome. Then he sat, resting his arms on the cold metal. The chair had been designed for function, not form. Just like everything else on this rust bucket. The Johnston had been old when the war with the Tigris began, and should have been retired when that war ended.