by Pam Uphoff
Ngratei winced to see how thin her wrists and hands were. I didn't mean to destroy her happiness, I never thought my enemies were so brutal. I never thought I could make her want to die, certainly not to take the slow road of starvation. I have . . . much to make amends for.
Her brother, Lord Bahrass, was escorting her, a look of distaste on his face. He handed her through the door of the outer office and stopped there.
Ngratei had always found him irritating, hadn't seen him in years until he'd turned up last month. Second son of his Warlord father, his martial prowess had proven insufficient to get him a marriage match that would elevate him to Warlord of one of the islands. His older brother supported him, and had probably sent him to support their sister in her bereavement. Or worm his way into Ngratei's confidence.
Ngratei took her arm. She turned her head from him, slumping.
I will rekindle that fire.
"Come." She hung back and he tightened his grip. "Mbassi, the worst has not happened. Come."
He pulled her through the door, into his inner office, turned her toward the couch.
"Mom!" in two voices, as the children flung themselves on her.
Tears as she gathered them up.
Ngratei glanced around as Bahrass stepped in the door. Shock on his face.
Sudden silence from the children. Ngorei recoiling, one hand going to her ear, mouth rounded in horrified recognition.
Ngratei snapped back toward his wife's brother, registering the small gun in his hand as he raised it . . .
as his hand flew off in a spray of blood . . .
Zhodan stood, left hand outthrust. Half the room away. Head up and eyes narrowed. He lowered his hand.
Bahrass collapsed.
Jklep nearly tripped over him as he halted his attack. He straightened and looked at Zhodan. Blinked at Ngratei.
Ngratei nodded. "Yes. A force blade. From that far away."
Zhodan nodded stiffly. "Warlord Ebsa taught me." He touched his ear. "Why did he hate us? Hate you?"
Ngratei sighed. "He must have thought that if I lost my heirs, he could step into that place. Vicious little Elf. Bind his arm. If he lives . . . he will regret it."
Mbassi glanced over and away. "I wondered if he might have." Her arm tightened around Ngorei. "I thought . . . that I must die so that he was nothing to you."
He knelt beside her. "I know I have not been the husband you deserved, but you were the wife I wanted, from our first meeting. Please do not die to tell me something." He kissed her brow gently, as she shook her head.
Then rang for a servant.
"Eat. Please. We have two powerful children to finish raising." He smiled then, looking at Zhodan. "And learn from, as they learn from us."
Excerpt from an upcoming release
Prologue
10 Jumada 1408 yp
Izzo Withione Alcairo was a spectator today. But rumors of his pending appointment were circulating already, and many eyes turned his way. No doubt some poor slobs were assigned to note his every twitch and nose scratch. He resisted an urge to find a toothpick to chew.
The Assembly room was large enough, barely, for the audience today. Izzo eyed the empty arches in the walls at the height of a second floor. "They're going to have to expand, pretty soon."
His cousin shrugged. Idzo was the Subdirector of Embassy Affairs for the Directorate of External Relations. Izzo thought Spymaster would have sounded better, but the Subdirector of Intelligence might have objected. Omsi was also here today, as his demesnes covered all the non-Empire Worlds, including this one.
The Ambassador to Embassy, a Ministerial Appointment, was a few meters away. No doubt he also had an Intelligence officer.
Overkill, for a World with a population of less than a quarter of a million. Except, of course that most of those people are associated with the embassy of one or another of close to a hundred Worlds.
Down on the floor, representatives of Earth, the Empire of the One, and the World of Granite Peak presented four different views of a sticky situation. When the One World had discovered Granite Peak, it had been the first habitable World they'd discovered, across the dimensions. As such, and in view of their own over-population and periodic famines, they'd claimed ownership, settled it, farmed it. And pretty much ignored the thin population of stone age nomadic hunters and pastoralists.
Fifty-six years later, the Earth had discovered Granite Peak. Izzo had been twenty-three. Not even officially an adult by Oner standards. He remembered the series of shocks vividly. Another world with dimensional abilities. Hostile and aggressive. The unprepared Oners had been overrun, and only closing the gate in the face of the last fleeing settlers had kept the Earthers from attacking the homeworld through it.
Today, sixty years later, the Earth was arguing for their ownership, the One was pointing out that they had a presence there that predated the Earth's, and the nomadic herders were arguing for not just political independence, but the removal of both warring polities' citizens from their World. Two groups of laborers, brought in from other Worlds to work the mines for Earth, were arguing for redress or at least to not get turned back over to Earth as virtual slave labor. They'd all interbred with the local Nomads and each other, so there were no clear cut lines.
Neither the Oner families with over a hundred years residence, nor Earth families with fifty-five years wanted to leave. The mine workers and all the crossbreeds had no place to go.
". . . where even the youngest of the Earther children have grandparents who were born on Earth, we Oners are on our fourth generation of children who have never seen the One World, children fluent in the Native languages, children born on the plains and in the mountains of Granite Peak. It is our home. We have, despite the Earther's attempted genocide, ten times their population. We comprise almost forty percent of the population of the World, the Earthers, even counting their laborers and their halfbreeds, are less than five percent."
Disco – the Department of Interdimensional Security and Cooperation had set a time table. Today the first arguments. Then diplomacy. If there was no agreement in one standard Earth Year, Disco would make one, and enforce it.
It was going to be an interesting year.
Chapter One
1 Rajab 1408
Granite Peak
"Hey, Nomad, you dropped something."
Flu ignored the snickers from the children. They'd all gone to school together, but somehow the pure Oners didn't seem to be getting jobs and getting down to work. They were unhappy with the situation they were trapped in . . . just like everyone else. She sniffed. Which is no excuse for suddenly acting like a jerks. Every. Single. Purebred. Idiot. If they can't start college this year, they ought to do something. And if we're going to be so independent, why don't we have at least a tech school here? How are they going to keep the mines open, the farms even marginally productive without any tech training?
She set the stack of reports down on the work table. Unnecessary labor. Maybe the boys were right.
Ahme looked over with a frown. "Well? Did you pick it up?"
"Not yet, Grandfather. I didn't want to drop the whole stack." She turned and walked out. The hallway floor was pristine. Of course. The boys, whatever they'd been doing here – checking out the pretty blonde who worked in the traffic department, probably – had left. She waited long enough for the old man to get distracted then walked back in. Ahme, better known as "Ahem, Cough Cough" was one of the Heroes of Granite Peak. When the Earther's had cut off their retreat through the gate, he'd ripped the power from the Governor who was counseling the people to prepare to join the One, and marched them into the mountains. He'd kept them alive and free, and raided and sabotaged the Earthers for almost twenty years. He'd married a Native crossbreed and raised his daughter to as close to Oner standards as their nomadic, hit-and-run lifestyle had allowed. Most of the unmarried men had taken Nomad wives, during that chaotic period. The next generation of girls married halfbreed boys, or the mine slaves th
e Resistance had freed.
Until the Earther's gate was destroyed. Then he'd led them to victory, recapturing their towns and farms. The town was named Cough in his honor.
Flu's mother had eschewed marriage, but not celibacy. So Cough Cough was helping to raise Flu. And keeping the Colony records. All the notes and copies of orders and lists of supplies, all on paper, all in boxes.
Fourteen years ago, a new gate from the One World had opened. Flu had been two years old, and oblivious to the huge change that was coming to her world.
After the return of the One, no one, no One would marry the halfbreed girls.
With the trial, the records had suddenly been evidence of their continual occupation of the World, and they'd had to be sorted and available.
Everyone had looked at the boxes in dismay, and no one had questioned the presence of a hundred thousand Oners on Granite Peak for the whole twenty-two year occupation by Earth. Once the gate was open, it had taken couple of more years for the Empire to get control of the Earth colonized areas, a thousand kilometers to the east A dozen years of rebuilding what the Earth had tried to ruin or take over, all with limited movement to the One World. Not even much trade. The Earthers hadn't maintained the robotic farming machinery, they were ruined and rusting and not even paid for. Lawsuits were still circling over the defaulted loans. In the mean time, they were feeding themselves and self sufficient in the basics. Affluent enough for luxuries like imported cloth. Affluent enough for the kids to stay in school most of the year, until they were seventeen or eighteen.
Flu blew out her breath and started scanning the first file. At least I've got a job for the short term. Then what? I get to be a second class citizen of the Empire, an Enemy Alien in Earth Territory or a worthless foreign woman the Nomads won't want either. Maybe I should listen closer to Governor Arry. Maybe there's a fourth way, and maybe I can make a place for myself in it.
***
Jack Hemmingway had everything he wanted out of life except lots of money. He eyed the blonde girl and knew that even that could be his, if he played it right.
A Comet Fall Witch, just released from prison, working a menial job on a foreign world.
Arrow Albdaut. The youngest of the witches jailed here, and so far, the only one released.
"You don't want to be here, you want to find your friends. Good. Because I want to find them too. Not to hurt them. To hire them. So I figured I should start with you. I'm what most people call a mercenary. I hire myself and my people out for various duties, generally involving protecting them from Bad Guys." He couldn't read her emotions, her eyes were opaque.
"Now, you and you buddies are Bad Guys, but generally you just steal things—you aren't in the business of killing people. Some of your guys get carried away, now and then—the robbery at the Senator's manse was funnier than hell."
He shifted. Damn it, what is she thinking? "But what I really want is a World all my own, with a Gate or three to go shopping, to pick up a job here or there. So I need a magical person. You've got two problems, from what I've read. This Chain thing." He leaned forward and touched it. She didn't flinch. "And some genetic changes. Where can you go to get these fixed?"
Still no reaction.
"I've been exploring through some of the backwards, behind times, Earths. Some of your former buddies like them, for their raids. Other people study them. And I found the Maze. I found a back route to Comet Fall."
She straightened at that. A spark lit in her eyes. "On Comet Fall I can fix the genes. For the Chain—I just need to meet the right person."
"I figured we'd better hurry, in case your friends decided to take down the Gate." He held out a blue uniform jacket with his company log on it, like the one he was wearing.
She stood up and reached for the jacket. "Right. Let's go."
External Relations should be published in May of 2018
About the Author
I was born and raised in California, and have lived more than half my life, now, in Texas.
Wonderful place. I caught almost the first bachelor I met here, and we’re coming up on our thirty-seventh anniversary.
My degree's in Geology. After working for an oil company for almost ten years as a geophysicist, I “retired” to raise children. As they grew, I added oil painting, sculpting and throwing clay, breeding horses, volunteering in libraries and for the Boy Scouts, and treasurer for a friend’s political campaign. Sometime in those busy years, I turned a love of science fiction into a part time job reading slush (Mom? Someone is paying you to read??!!)
I've always written, published a few short stories. But now that the kids have flown the nest, I'm calling writing a full time job.
Project Dystopia is my twentieth novel, eighth story in the Directorate series universe. Fractured Loyalties number nine in the Directorate series should out in April of 2018, with External Relations—as well as two or three short stories—planned for this year.
I also have some unrelated work in progress . . . The first Marshal to the wild frontier of the Asteroid Belt, and an orphaned werewolf raised by very nice (and very tolerant) foster parents who goes off to seek his blood relatives—and might live to regret it.
Email [email protected] to join the mailing list for notifications of new releases, or follow me on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pam.uphoff
Other Titles by Pam Uphoff
Wine of the Gods Series:
Outcasts and Gods
Exiles and Gods (Three Novellas)
The Black Goats
Explorers
Spy Wars
One Alone
Comet Fall
A Taste of Wine (Seven Tales)
Dark Lady
Growing Up Magic (Four Novellas)
Young Warriors
God of Assassins
Heirs of Crown and Spear
The Fiend
Empire of the One
Warriors of the One
Dancer
Earth Gate
Mages at Large
Art Theft
Triplets
Sea Wolves
Bad Karma
Dark Side of the Moon
Cascades
Olympian
Embassy
Rael
On the Run
God of the Sun
Cannibal World
No Confidence
Pure Poison
Flying
Last Merge
Nowhere Man
Black Point Clan
Mall Santa
Saturday Night
The Directorate Series:
Directorate School
A Tale of Three Interns
Trouble in Paradise
First Posting
Surveillance
Fort Dinosaur
Shadow Zone
The Lawyers of Mars
Fancy Free
Time Loop
Writing as Zoey Ivers
YA Cyberpunk Adventures:
The Barton Street Gym
Chicago
Atlantis+
Fantasy:
Demi God
