by Hotter Edge
Pilar’s hand shook as she checked the travel time back to Nyer, a place supposedly so dangerous that her husband had shipped her weak self away. Weak, flighty, vain, indulged.
Her second mistake was not making sure that Hakan knew what she was capable of. Indulged women reputedly got their heart’s every desire; she wasn’t about to be disappointed now. Not now, with her sharpest hopes at stake. She’d go back all right. She’d get her hands dirty. She’d partake of the best and worst that Nyer had to offer.
She’d secure Frust, make Hakan burn, and then she’d leave him wanting.
Chapter Three
Pain was a heavy, sodden blanket on Hakan’s right shoulder and arm. His body was slicked with a sweat that carried a sharp odor best for luring jungle animals to wounded prey. His heart raced to a primal rhythm, and even the slightest movement darkened his sight.
He lifted his mind over the agony itself, but the pain rumbled like an engorged river, just below his consciousness.
His one warm satisfaction was that Pilar was all right. She was away from this. And Drummond Sol was a lion of a man. Hakan hoped Drummond’s affront would be so great that he’d send a solar flare roaring in the Hub’s direction and roast Victor for supper.
Hakan would welcome the heat; he was shivering just now. He was locked in a small, unfurnished room with no windows. The only way out was the door.
But the stump of his arm had been wrapped in a white bandage, very tidy and sterile considering the conditions under which he’d lost his hand. If his uncle had taken this trouble, he’d probably shot him up with nanites as well, to fight infection and promote healing.
Huh. Victor was obviously keeping him alive for some purpose, or else he’d have simply killed him and announced to the sector there’d been a ‘terrible accident.’ So grievous a loss… Or maybe his uncle was anticipating trouble from Sol. Or maybe he thought that he’d be able to control his upstart nephew now that his point had been made. Regardless, Victor needed him.
Needed him.
Well, his uncle was going to be disappointed.
Hakan was trapped in a cage, snarling for a fight. He’d already won the thing that mattered most to him and all it had cost was a hand.
Not so very high a price at all.
He smiled to himself, and in so doing released the tension in his neck and shoulders. Pain still radiated up his arm, his head throbbing in time. His heart trembled at odd moments, but whether from his injury or the vision he’d called up before his eyes, he didn’t know.
Pilar, her bare back, the sinuous curve of her spine, glossy black hair escaping its pins. She’d slanted a look over her shoulder, her mouth drawn into an ironic smile, as if she knew the seduction was both cliché and effective at the same time.
You going to fall for this?
Dear gods, yes, he would. Over and over and over.
And her laugh, bubbling up from somewhere deep.
There’d been a moment when she’d almost given her prized dowry to a charitable cause, and he hadn’t cared.
“Don’t be mad at me, sweetheart.”
The stakes were set.
No cooperation. The only way Victor was taking the Hub was with Hakan’s life. And Hakan wasn’t giving either up without a fight.
***
“Entry refused. Cardinal LeFrese Merribung owes docking fees in excess of 3k pax,” the docking agent said over the firebird’s comm.
“And if I pay on his behalf?” Reina looked over to Pilar for confirmation.
Pilar nodded. They had to dock to get back inside the Hub. And she preferred to do so as this Cardinal, whose name was on the ident-tag of the firebird, rather than as herself on a passenger shuttle from a stall in space to the Hub proper.
The Nyer Transit Hub was a massive city of light, energy, and movement—an uplifted torch of humanity in the black. A spear had been shot through the seventeen concentric rings where life and business drove the exploration deeper. But the Hub wasn’t a destination, an end; it was the organ through which everything was constantly moving. Pilar knew a heart when she saw one.
“We’ll need an escort,” Reina said when the firebird settled into landing. “You wait here; I should be back within an hour with a team of Sol-born guards. The ones I trust most.”
Pilar shot her a look over her shoulder as she used Hakan’s key to lock the comm. “And these Sol guards would do what?”
Reina smiled. “Keep you alive for starters.”
Ummm…? “I’ll be in more danger. Victor will know exactly where I am if Sol guards surround me. And I won’t be able to do anything from my pocket of safety. No, Reina, listen—this isn’t me refusing to comprehend that someone wants me dead. I was there when the assassin tried.”
“I can’t guarantee your safety alone, and your safety is the substance of my contract to you. I can’t get you into the residence—”
Ah. That’s where they were missing each other. “I’m not going to the residence. We’re finding alternate lodgings, if we can’t resolve this quickly.”
Her attendant’s eyes widened as if this were a new, even more alarming departure from judgment. “Then not only will the Frusts be after you, but all sorts of hangers-on. You’re a magnet for interest.”
True. Pilar had already been considering this very problem. “So I won’t be me.”
Reina blinked and shrugged in a controlled kind of panic. She was probably on the verge of acting against contract and contacting Sol. “A disguise? You’re joking. Even you must understand…”
Even I…what? Never mind. Arguing wouldn’t solve anything. Maybe Reina needed to learn something about her too.
“There have to be hundreds of Pilars on the Hub right now,” Pilar said. “I’ll just be one more me in the crowd.”
That’s the disguise she’d planned to be able to get out and explore the Hub on her own. Royal cosplay. She’d be…herself. The wedding furor had gone way beyond the invited attendees to the general populace. People had even physically altered themselves to look like her. Some tried for an exact match; others had taken interesting liberties. She hadn’t known whether to feel violated or flattered—the former mostly. She’d comforted herself with the knowledge that all things trendy eventually went out of style. She would too.
“You can’t be serious.”
“I’ll make a deal with you.” So you don’t comm my father. “Give me a stroll down one byway. If anyone recognizes me as the real me, then you can call in the Sol guard.” In that case, the rest of the plan wouldn’t work anyway.
A muscle twitched in Reina’s forehead. She was considering it, and she was doing so because it made good sense. They’d laughed about the Pilars together upon arrival at the Hub. Why not use them?
“One byway, that’s it,” Reina said.
“Done.” Pilar headed for the belly of the bird to find something to wear. She was still in the silk chemise of her presentation gown’s undergarment. She had to go for standard walkers—a universal fit—but managed some style with one of the Cardinal’s tunics—a deep red satin, belted into a very short skirt. She had the legs for it. A twisted knot of her hair at her nape, and she was ready.
Once onto one of the Hub’s thoroughfares, the commotion of the byways enveloped them. They’d come out on one of the entertainment and shopping rings. Groups of buzzed youth wearing nothing but garish glitter, business people in their more conservative tunics, but somehow still wearing their wealth, vendors with their multi-dimensional pixel balloons, advertising everything from food to tiaras—all were happy to keep up the fun of the wedding, even though the bride was missing. The smell was a little funky—two hundred years of foot traffic—but Pilar loved the pulse. This is what she’d been missing.
She turned when a stranger grabbed her arm. Reina ducked to intercede, but Pilar shook her head. It was just a party girl. She had high-bladed shoes and a spiraling green ribbon wrapped around her breasts, waist, and then hips. A dress. “Gods, you look just like
her! Can I do a vid grab?”
The girl’s friend—in a purple version of the dress—held a memory bob ready.
Reina had gone white with terror, but Pilar nodded—she had a duty to the people, after all—and hugged an arm around the green girl. More bystanders stopped to watch, which made Pilar sparkle inside. She twisted into an hour-glass position, her fingertips casually lifted to her chin. It was her signature pose.
The bob did its revolution scan, while the small gathering laughed out loud. “The Sol simper! Do the pout! Do the pout!”
Pilar flushed, confused. Simper? She looked over at Reina.
Reina’s concerned expression had recovered, and now mirth gleamed in her gaze.
Which just irritated Pilar. She didn’t simper. She didn’t pout.
The crowd cheered. “Yeah!” More memory bobs were thrown in the air, so she held the expression of her displeasure for everyone to record and share with their friends.
Apparently she’d gotten the pout just right. So happy to oblige.
The green ribbon girl grabbed her arm. “You are the best Pilar I have seen yet. Come to my party? Please?”
Pilar winked. “My husband awaits.”
Everyone laughed again.
The green girl’s eyes got very big. “Gods, if you have a Hakan, you have to come!”
Pilar laughed out loud. This felt so good. Nice people, parties, everyone having the time of their lives. Yes. “Tell me where, and I’ll try to come by.”
Reina took the party info, and they started again on their way.
Pilar couldn’t keep her gaze off the sweep of shops, restaurants, and clubs that flashed onto the thoroughfare. Her eyes had never been so dazzled. Her mouth watered at the heady smells coming out of the restaurants. The loud chatter all around made her confident no one cared who she was. She was just one more person here to celebrate.
They were stopped several more times to pose for memory bobs until they encountered another Pilar, this one with an Adam’s apple and a baritone voice. They posed together, too…pouting.
“Okay, maybe we should rethink this idea.” Pilar pulled out her bun and arranged her hair to cover the side of her face. The pictures were one thing; the impersonations were getting to her.
“I was thinking your normal appearance is an incredibly effective disguise,” Reina said, cheerfully. “And you’ve made your point. For the time being, this is safer than surrounding you with guards—that is, as long as we stay within crowds. What’s our next step?”
Pilar had been thinking about that too. “We find out who is backing Hakan’s uncle, and we have him cut off.” She was sure it would be more difficult than it sounded. For starters, whatever deal the backers were getting with Victor had to be improved upon.
“That could take time. Your family is already on edge about you.”
“I’ll comm Mica and tell her that I’m fine,” Pilar said. “That I had a fight with Hakan and that I refuse to do the wedding events until it’s resolved.” Capitalize on her history of melodrama. “I can stall them for a day or two.”
Reina shook her head. “You do not understand the probable scope of the situation.”
“Then I have to learn,” Pilar snapped. “And I cannot do it from my satin pillow. ‘Do the simper; do the pout.’ No wonder he put me on a bird back to Sol.”
She would not spend her life as a living caricature.
Reina pressed her fingertips to her forehead, as if to keep her sanity in check. Pilar gave her a minute to grapple with the inevitable.
“Lodgings, then,” Reina finally said. “And they won’t be what you’re used to. Am I authorized to use credit for that too?”
“No. Hakan will trace us.” She’d control when and how Hakan learned about her. Regardless, he’d know she was on the Hub when he learned that the firebird had returned. But that’s all he’d know. Just a little mystery to torture him.
“Then we’ll be sleeping in an alley or a transit car.”
“Break some laws,” Pilar said.
Reina gave a mocking smile. “How many?”
Pilar smirked back at her. “All of them. I don’t care.”
“And you’ll do my time in the work camps?”
“No,” Pilar answered sweetly. “When it’s time for work camps, then we’ll comm my father.”
***
Hakan launched himself forward as soon as the cell door opened. A man’s shape loomed in the rectangle of light. Hakan plowed his good shoulder into the belly of the beast and they crashed like lovers onto the passageway outside the room. A reach around to the guard’s back and Hakan found and gripped what he sought.
Another Orchid, who had to have been waiting just outside, kicked him in the belly, and Hakan jack-knifed, his prize going into the bend at his waist. He was grabbed by the neck of his tunic, by his screaming right arm, and dragged back into the cell. A bowl of soup was pitched in after him, and it splattered like savory vomit across the floor.
The door was closed again. Locked.
Curled into the fetal position, Hakan groaned against aches in his arm, his back, his skull. But none of that mattered.
His good hand grasped a slicer, the handle of the gun nested firmly his palm, finger on the trigger.
The next person to open the door would die.
***
A commotion down the Hub’s thoroughfare drew Pilar’s attention. Reina was already stepping surreptitiously in front to protect to protect her. Pedestrians all around them picked up their pace to head toward the end of the byway, where they were blocked from continuing by barriers across the ring’s central intersection.
“We’ll need to get into the Hall of Commerce to research Victor’s contracts,” Reina was saying, “and even then, his partners might be concealed by any number of entities.”
“I know the major partners.” Pilar had researched at length so that she’d know what to say when introduced at the many gatherings. She’d wanted to appear knowledgeable. Had even prepared questions that would show her understanding of the dynamics of trade at the Hub. She’d intended to invest as well, but in her own name, not Sol Corp’s. She’d intended to be Hakan’s wife, damn him.
The crowd at the intersection thickened. Children went up on shoulders for a better view. Memory bobs hovered high in the air.
“Who is it?” Pilar overhead someone ask as they jog-walked to join the throng.
“Hell if I know,” another answered. “The princess is supposed to be sick or something.”
Pilar made a face at Reina. She was sick, all right. Sick of not being taken seriously.
A convoy of personal cabs, which reminded her of horseless ancient roman chariots, was moving slowly down the blocked street, the Frust insignia emblazoned on the door of the first. Everyone had gathered to see who was passing.
Pilar’s heart clutched. A knot formed in her throat. Her eyes watered. Hakan?
She ran forward, disregarding Reina’s shout. Was he here? She felt powerless on this side of the barricade.
If he could just see her. He’d recognize her.
Her bastard husband might learn right now what she was made of, and just how stupid he’d been. He better be sorry. Very sorry. Begging sorry.
She went on tiptoe to glimpse him, her lungs filled with an extended breath as if to lift her higher. Did he still—or had he ever—loved her?
But it was just that scab Barton, the cousin, who’d made that lewd remark about her ass. He had an entourage going, a drunken party comprising ‘enhanced’ women and men with their tunics hanging open. Barton sported a bruised cheekbone, which Pilar was sure he thought looked tough. But it just made him look more like a prick to her. Whoever had given him the bruise deserved a reward.
Wait. There was only one person who Pilar could think of who would dare strike Victor’s son.
“Reina!” Change of plan.
“Here,” her attendant answered. “And I’m thinking the same thing.”
The motorc
ade was moving slowly, Barton basking in the attention of the crowds, though even now many were losing interest and peeling away from the mass in twos and threes.
Pilar dodged among the dispersing pedestrians, this time ignoring those who stopped and called her by name, as if they knew her personally. No more bob stops. Her pout was needed elsewhere.
To her left, she passed food carts steaming with dubious protein and an accompanying sour stink. Blinking lights from a low-end apparel shop assaulted her retinas. The grate beneath her feet was buzzing with the bass tones of music coming from a multistory club up ahead, the outer wall of the edifice made of mottled black gold. Cain and Abel, here I come. The motorcade stopped in front, and Barton and his party leapt from their cabs and disappeared into the dark mouth of the door. A line of pitifuls outside screamed a welcome.
“We’ll never get in,” Reina hissed into her ear.
Pilar turned to survey the goods on the racks lining the entry to the apparel store. Everything seemed cheap and dirty, made of who knew what kind of synth, but she went for the high blades in a silver glitter. The fit was tight and pressed on her pinky toes, a far cry from her custom footwear. “Spot me some credit?”
“This is impossible.” Reina tossed the shop keeper a chit.
“Only if you think so.” Pilar drew herself up to her new height, ran her fingers through her hair, while scoring her lips with her teeth. With a practiced twist of her fingers, she coiled her hair into a long snake down her back.
“Dear gods,” Reina groaned.
“This has to work.” Pilar stalked down the byway, long strides rolling through her hips. She could feel the heads turning, attention fixing on her, like a sixth sense. Her body warmed with power. She tilted her face and gave the crowd a smirk for their bobs.
She didn’t join the line.
“We’ve got two Pilars inside already,” the short, mean man at the door said.
Pilar gave him a look of restrained distain. The impersonation would be spot on, every muscle trained to the Princess’s expressions from birth. She radiated heat like only a Sol could, and communicated that the distance between her and him was not the two feet that separated them, but eons of bloodline and breeding.
