by Viki Storm
“What?” Ayvinx blurts. I can tell that whatever he expected, it was not this. “How can you tell all this from the coordinates? From a string of octal numbers besides.”
“It’s my business to know,” I say. But the truth is, it was more difficult than that. We had to trace the navigation message through the satellites and broadcast tower logs. It was difficult work for me and Droka, considering we have less than zero knowledge of interstellar communications. But it is my business to know and I am willing to learn. I have a quick mind and the utmost motivation right now.
“We traced the message’s origin to our planet,” Droka explains. “We were able to do that by combing through the transmission logs. It wasn’t fun and it wasn’t fast, but since we knew what we were looking for, we found it. But as far as tracing the origin to a particular sender? To one user’s personal comm-panel? That’s above our skill level.”
“Sounds like the whole damn thing is beyond my skill level,” the mercenary says. “There’s a traitor? Someone in league with the Kraxx? That’s low. Really, really low.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Droka says.
“Whoever it is, if he can plot an invasion, it will make me look weak. He can steal power and declare himself High King,” I say, hating to voice my deepest fear.
“Or they can set you up as the traitor,” Ayvinx says. “Send the message through your personal comm-panel. Run a cloaking program to make it look like you sent the coordinates. Paint you as a traitor and seize power. That’s how I’d do it.”
What a diabolical sneak. How did I end up just telling the most sensitive bit of planetary security to such a slithering serpent?
“Either way,” Droka says, “that is why we do not want news of the Kraxx spy to spread. We need a few days to sort out this business. Find the traitor and hang him upside-down from the Magneto Spire.”
“And if you do that, you expect the Kraxx to go on their way?” he says. I exchange a worried look with Droka. This is one of the points we argue about. Droka insists that the Kraxx will slink away if the plot is exposed. Whatever payment they were promised will not be honored and they will have no reason to risk a war with our planet. We have beat them before, after all. They will go raid other, weaker planets, as is their style.
I, however, am not so sure. Once they get their shriveled, blackened hearts set on war… who knows.
“Even if you find this rat,” Ayvinx says, “the Kraxx might already be excited about the prospect of burning our capitol and raping our women.”
I nod my head solemnly. “That is why we need allies. That is why we need minerals.”
“You’re going to need prayer,” the mercenary says. “Because if the Kraxx invade, that’s the only thing that will save us.”
Holy void, as the Zalaryns say. Except, I don’t want anything to do with their language or customs or way of life. I knew better than to think any different.
The comm-panel is trembling in my hands. Xalax showed me how to perform some basic functions, like read books in English and control the room’s temperature. I know that this larger comm-panel syncs data with the smaller, portable one that he keeps in his waist pouch at all times.
Too bad he also showed me how to alter the settings and change the display language.
I switch it to the Earth lingua franca which, thankfully, gives me the choice between English and Chinese. If I had to read this in Chinese, I’d be clueless, but the English it displays is awkward yet readable.
I nose around, looking at the communications transmissions. I feel no guilt. I need to know. It’s not like I’m reading his secret journal or anything. I just need to know if he is part of the High Council plan to ally with the Kraxx.
My heart says no, that there’s no way. He’s too fair and just. Too honorable. The way he broke that sleazy male’s hand in the auction house. He was upholding justice. Right? Not an angry spoiled prince who wanted to get the first shot at breaking in the shiny new toy?
Then my stupid brain comes in and says things like that. Reminds me that he’s a member of the race who decided it was fair and just for Earth to send shipments of fertile twenty-year-old girls to another galaxy in tribute because they saved us from total annihilation. That he’s going to be a new king on a council of elders who do not respect him. What better way to test his meddle, to prove his worth than to become the High King during wartime. With none other than the Kraxx.
I swipe my finger across the screen. The panel is so light and smooth, yet so hot. I can just tap the screen and it displays what I want it to. My grandmother talked of technology like this. She said that everyone’s phone could take a picture and store books and songs and videos—but she only talked about such things when she was old and drunk, so who knows what to believe.
I navigate to his messages. My heart starts to beat in my chest, a flood of adrenaline jangles my nerves. Like I’m a child again, about to sneak a look at my classmate’s paper during a test. Like I’m about to do something wrong.
But this isn’t wrong. I have a right to know if he’s selling out my people in order to… I don’t know why he’s doing it, but if the Kraxx are involved, then it can’t be good.
I still don’t understand the dates and times on this planet, but I scroll back through his messages, one by one.
And then I see it.
Our sat-nav does not patrol this region during the mornings between 11010 and 11110. Wait 101 weeks until our suns are aligned—their magnetic field causes glitches in the sat-nav and security comm. You must walk to the fortress, but I will receive you and we can discuss our plans. But know that I am not prepared to wait more than 101 weeks’ time.
And I know. This is it. He sent instructions and coordinates to some Kraxx bastard, divulging the exact time and date where he could land his spaceship unnoticed. So they could discuss plans. Plans. Yeah, like how many virgins the Kraxx warlord would get to sweeten the deal, the way a farmer at the market will have free apple slices for sample, to entice you to buy an entire sack.
Of course Xalax is involved in the plot. He’s the High King. Or Crown Prince. Whatever. He’s the head of the whole cursed race. Anything this big must get through him.
I slam the comm-panel down so hard that the glass shatters, a spiderweb of cracks spreading from corner to corner.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I can do. Pack all my things and move out? I’m stuck here. He bought me.
He owns me.
And even if he didn’t, where would I go? Buy a ticket for the next spaceship to Earth? Go back to the auction house and roll the dice, hope to get picked up by another well-positioned and handsome and respectful alien?
Respectful? Handsome? Didn’t I just read a communications message that proved that Xalax is neither one of these things?
I hear the whoosh of the door and I whirl around, a guilty flush of shame over my face. Shame at everything. What I am reduced to on this planet. That I was stupid enough to believe his nonsense about bonding and mates. That I betrayed his trust and snooped on his comm-panel.
“Are you well?” he asks as he starts to unlace his boots. He smells of the cheap fermented grain mash and the musky smoke of the weird vapors they smoke out of long glass pipes. He’s been in a tavern. Celebrating his shrewd political and military prowess no doubt. Raising a toast with the Kraxx bastard who landed his spaceship out in the waste and walked to the fortress.
“I am not,” I say through gritted teeth. I gesture to the broken comm-panel.
“It’s okay,” he says. “I’ll have another one brought up and calibrated—”
“No,” I shout. He thinks I’m upset because I broke his fancy electronic device. “I know all about the Kraxx and—”
It is his turn to interrupt me. He crosses the room in two long strides and takes me in his arms, putting his hand over my mouth to silence me. His lips graze my ear as he speaks, his voice low and deep, full of that jagged raw power that sends a bolt of heat down to my core
. Why does he make me feel like this, even after I know the truth about him? “Silence,” he whispers. “It is not safe to talk here.”
“What are you talking about?” I say.
“We need to relocate,” he says, his voice so low and quiet I can barely hear. He lets me go and starts looking around the room, turning things over, looking underneath things.
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” I say. I don’t know what he’s talking about. It’s not safe and we have to leave? It’s got to be something with his deal with the Kraxx. Maybe his plan backfired.
“We need to leave,” he says. “I’ll tell you everything. But not here. There can be hidden voice recorders.”
“I already know everything,” I say. “I read your message that you sent to the Kraxx. I know about sending them the human girls and the proteins.”
“What?” he says. He is bent over, inspecting underneath one of the tables, probably looking for one of the voice recorders that he thinks is in here. He’s insane if he thinks that someone put voice recorders in the royal bedchamber. He looks at me and straightens up. “What’s this about human girls and protein?”
“I overheard everything,” I say. “And then I saw that you sent one of them a message, telling him where he could land his spaceship. Telling him that you want to meet and talk.”
He comes to me, grips my arms tightly. “What did you say?” he says. And this time his voice sends a shiver down to my core, but it is an ice cold bolt of fear.
“Let go of me,” I say. “I can’t believe you could do this. I’m leaving.”
“Leaving?” he says, sounding honestly perplexed. Is he that egotistical that he can’t understand why I’m angry about all of this?
“Yes,” I say. “You’re brutal. I can’t believe you would do this.”
“I did not do what you think,” he says. “Don’t you trust me? I swore that I would protect you and never do anything to hurt you. I swear it again. And I swear that I did not do this thing. But we cannot talk here. Word cannot get out about this.”
“Is that all you care about?” I say. “What people will think? If you don’t want them to think bad about you, then maybe you shouldn’t have done it. And what about what I think? I think you are dishonorable.” And the second the words are out of my mouth I realize that I can’t take them back.
But I don’t want to.
- - -
The sneaking, conniving bastard. Whoever it is, they are good. Ayvinx was right—he’s a sneaking conniving bastard too, but he’s luckily got no ambition beyond a full cup of freykka and a female to warm his bed.
The coordinates were sent from my comm-panel.
And if the traitor has figured out a way to do that, if he is planning on framing me for this entire alliance with the Kraxx, then it is more than likely my chambers are teeming with voice recorders.
Wouldn’t it be perfect to get a recording of Resa saying ‘I know that it was you who sent the coordinates to the Kraxx’ to go along with my confiscated comm-panel?
Perhaps even worse would be a recording of me pleading with Resa, saying, ‘someone on the council went behind my back and brokered the alliance.’ That weakness might be worse. A king should be able to control his own council. That would all but seal my fate as the first High King to be mutinied before his official coronation ceremony.
I try to silence her, drawing her close and putting a hand on her mouth. This close, I feel an overwhelming need to protect her. The feeling is so strong it’s like a weight on my chest and I find it hard to breathe. I must get her out of here. A shuttle to Fenda might be nice. I could have Droka take her off-planet and find her suitable lodgings until this mess is resolved. I can’t risk having her here if the Kraxx attack. I know what those bastards did to her home planet Earth all those years ago.
I try to get her to leave with me, but she will not listen. I cannot explain it to her until we leave the fortress, but I cannot get her to leave the fortress with me.
Screwed, is the Earth expression for this type of situation. Completely screwed.
She is saying something about human females and protein. Is that what this secret deal with the Kraxx is about? I need to know what she overheard. But I cannot risk her divulging the details here where it could be recorded. If she knows too much, then she will be in even more danger—not just from the Kraxx invasion, but from the traitor.
“We need to leave,” I say again.
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she says. I can’t believe what I’m hearing.
My mate is betraying me.
She does not trust me. She is not submitting to my will and judgment, knowing in her bones that I would only ever do anything to protect her and keep her safe.
I feel rage brewing and I fight to keep it down, but it is a hard thing.
On Earth they speak of love. Resa has described it as more than just an exchange of genetic material and turning purple.
Maybe love is something more and my race does not experience it.
Maybe bonding is something more and her race does not experience it.
The final betrayal comes in her words: “You are dishonorable.”
I have been struck down in the battlefield. I have had a wound cauterized shut without benefit of anesthesia. Once, on a raid to the distant moon of Umbra, a coleoptroid burrowed inside my ear and the medic had to pour hot oil into my ear to kill it.
And this hurts the worst of it all.
“Then leave,” I say. I am not angry anymore. In a flash, the rollicking, roiling rage is gone. I am deflated. Hollow. There is nothing but a blank feeling of grey inside me. “Go back to the auction house. That’s the only place you can go. You are Marked, remember.”
I don’t mean it. I don’t want her to leave. She has to realize that she can’t leave. We are mates. Maybe that doesn’t mean anything on Earth, but it means something here. There is no place for her on this planet except by my side. Which is exactly where I want her.
“Maybe I will,” she says.
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Is she so angry that she is not thinking clearly? “Do you know what happens to the human girls who were stupid enough to lose their purity before they were claimed as tribute? You think the virgin auction was degrading? We were treating you with respect. Girls who are not intact? They let the males fuck before they buy, to see if they like it. Why not? It’s not like you have anything valuable to preserve. You’re already tainted so might as well let the males test you out first. Until one of the brothel owners buys you to be the spectacle attraction at his failing establishment. Buy four cups of freykka and get ten minutes with the Live Human Female for free. He’ll tie you to a table with your legs apart. He’ll put you in a cage when you’re not working.”
I don’t know why all of this hateful speech is pouring out of me. I’m hurt and I want to hurt her.
“I don’t believe you,” she says.
“Go then,” I say. “See what it’s like to have intercourse when you’re not bonded. It’s not the same. It will be brutal and ugly. And it will sever our bond. You will come back and I will not feel the same. I will sense the genetic material of another male and I will not respond to you the same way.”
I do not want her to go. But I do not think she will. Especially not after the horrible picture I painted of her life as a human female on my planet. But she must listen to me. She must obey me. I cannot raise a hand to her. I cannot throw her kicking and screaming over my shoulder. I cannot tie her up and put her on a ship to Fenda. Even if it would keep her safe.
All I can do is hurl insults and try to bend her to my will. Because that’s what my race does. We scare and intimidate and force people into doing what we want them to.
She stops pacing frantically between the broken comm-panel and the bed. She walks towards me.
Good. I can take her in my arms and get the hell out of this fortress and explain everything about the treacherous plot and then she can tell me about this busine
ss with human females and proteins.
Then I realize she isn’t walking towards me.
She’s walking past me.
And straight out of the door.
I cannot find the maids’ quarters. At night (well, there is no real nighttime on Zalaryx, except that provided by the mechanical discs that blot out the sunslight) this fortress is even darker and colder. The passageways that looked similar in the daytime are now completely indistinguishable from each other. The little markings in the rock and decorative carvings are masked by shadow.
I need to find Khiza. I can at least stay with her in the maids’ quarters tonight until I figure out what to do. What to do? Ha, that is a laugh. There is nothing for me to do, except go back to Xalax. It is my fate. And not the fate he talks about with his superstition about bonding and mating.
The fate of a Marked human female. To be sold to whichever alien has the most money and become his property. Accept his genetic material and bear his children.
Why did I think that my feelings ever factored into it?
But I can’t go back tonight. Tomorrow morning, maybe I can slink back into his chambers and try to listen to what he has to say. Maybe he was telling the truth about voice recording devices in the room. That sounded like a convenient excuse for him to not have to explain himself about the Kraxx. How would someone get into the Crown Prince’s bedchamber to plant such a device?
Tomorrow I will have no choice but to find Xalax and hear him out.
But not tonight. Tonight I am trembling with anger, sick with fear—and more than a little heartsick at the betrayal.
I finally find a tele-lift and hop on. I fiddle with the controls to take me to the sublevel. That’s where Khiza said that the maids’ quarters are located, in the warm dark below the fortress.
“Need a helping hand?” a voice says. My bowels feel like they are going to drop out of me. My heart beats so fast I can feel it in my stomach.
