by Ben Hale
They were moving at hyperlight, the stars sweeping by like sparks in a breeze, gone before they could be identified. But why was she being transported with a ship?
She frowned at the question, disliking the possibilities. World Gates connected entire systems to each other and transported goods, krey, dakorians, and slaves throughout the Empire. Ships were mainly used for conquest, exploration, and for shipping large quantities of products to market. Ships were also used by smugglers that transported slaves to the black-market cages.
The Empire had strict laws over the treatment of slaves. The sanctioned cages were at least clean and the slaves moderately well treated. But Laurik bought plenty from the illegal cages, where the prices were cheaper, and Siena had heard plenty of disturbing stories.
She retreated from the window and reclined on the seracrete bed to stare at the ceiling, but instead she imagined Laurik’s expression with roak blood on her face. It brought a smile to her face. Whatever punishment Siena would face in her future, she’d already received her reward.
Her fingers traced the scar on her elbow where Laurik had once used a knife to punish her instead of the inflictor. It had been two years, but the flesh was still bumpy and hard. She mentally counted her other scars, most from Laurik’s hand, although some had been from Laurik’s sons.
Sighing, she closed her eyes and tried to recall the face of her mother, but instead she saw her six givers. She pictured her own mother in another world, a giver for another daughter.
Some slaves spoke of a time when their families were not divided. A time when, by Imperial law, children had to stay with their parents until adulthood, and couples had to be sold or purchased together. Siena had heard the tales in the kitchens when the slaves were at their evening meal, and she’d sat curled on a topmost bunk, smiling at the image of what might have existed. She’d asked her giver at the time, a woman named Selda with long red hair and green eyes, if humans had ever been free.
Selda had pushed a stray hair out of Siena’s face and smiled. “Some say that long ago, humans and krey lived together in harmony, that we were allies and friends.”
“Really? When?” Siena had replied, eager for a story.
“Who can say?” Selda tucked her into her bed. “The krey have the genesis machine, allowing them to perfect their genetic code.”
“That’s why they live so long.” Siena yawned and tried to stay awake. It wasn’t often that Selda—or any of the slaves—spoke so freely.
“They live for tens of thousands of years, while we live a hundred,” Selda said. “But rumors always have a fragment of truth, and I suspect there was a time we were allies. Before the war. Before the krey created the genesis machine.”
“Are humans ever allowed to use a genesis?”
Selda chuckled. “Never, but dakorians that prove their loyalty are given a perfected body, making them stronger, faster, and capable of regenerating entire limbs.”
“Bloodwalls.” Siena’s eyes were wide, and she imagined what it would be like to possess such power.
Selda must have seen the brightness to her eyes, because her smile faded. “Whatever dreams you’re thinking now, you must extinguish. Bloodwall Theg is brutal and unforgiving, as is Secondous Laurik and the other krey. Whatever happened in the past, they own our entire race. Those who disobey are branded as rebels.”
“But some escape.”
Selda reached up and made a cutting motion on her ear. “They call them earless because they remove their outer ear, so they can never be chained again. Any that are discovered are killed.”
“Will we ever be free?” she asked.
Selda regarded her for a long time and then slowly shook her head. “No, little one. The Krey Empire has all the power.”
Selda tucked the blanket around Siena’s body and stood before climbing down a bunk and into her own bed. Siena tucked into her pillow, her features determined. In that moment, she resolved to find a way to free Selda from the Krey Empire. She just needed a genesis machine.
Siena sighed and rolled over on the seracrete bed, the memory replaced by reality. She was now a ferox, and her childlike dreams had long since died. She was a branded captive, destined for horrors beyond her imagination. Because she was a slave.
For the first time in a long time, she thought of Felis. She still remembered the man’s gaze burning into her soul. She still remembered his voice telling her she was a fighter, that she could change the Empire. A tear escaped her eye and fell to the floor.
“I’m sorry, Felis,” she whispered.
The minutes turned into hours, and food was passed into her cell through a narrow aperture at the side of the room. The cup of horg contained all the nutrients, proteins, and vitamins essential for survival, but it tasted like feet. She wondered what Laurik would have looked like with horg on her face. Her dark chuckle reverberated in her cell. Perhaps she really was a ferox.
She thought often of Kensen, wondering where he was or what House now owned him. How long before he forgot about her? How long before he found another girl he sought to kiss? The question rankled, even though she’d refused his affections. Her sixth giver had been far stricter than Selda and hammered the truth into Siena’s bones:
Slaves were not meant to love.
Slaves were not meant to be happy.
Slaves were not meant to hope.
She repeatedly tried to forget Kensen, to banish him and his rakish smile from her thoughts. But he kept showing up in her vision, a smile on his lips, his black hair unruly and captivating. Her givers had been right. The mistake wasn’t almost kissing Kensen—it was getting close to him in the first place. Now he was gone, and she was left haunted with regret. Never again.
After six hours, the ship finally slowed, the gravity drive emitting a dull whine as it dropped from hyperlight to enter a star system. She peered at the constellations through the window but didn’t recognize them. Where was she going?
They passed a giant brown planet with enormous white rings, the ship banking deeper in-system. She’d seen plenty of images of systems on the vids, which even the slaves were allowed to watch, but never such a planet.
The engines whined, pushing them to sub-light. They passed another gas giant, this time blue, with giant swirling storms across the surface. Despite her dire future, she could not help the surge of awe. She’d spent her whole life watching vids and holos of starships and planets and yearned to see them for herself. There was a stark beauty to the gas giant, a perfect sphere so large it filled the breadth of her window.
She shuddered at the possibility of being sold to the Bone Crucible. Some slaves liked to watch the bloody contests, where dakorians, krey, and humans were pitted against each other in combat. Anyone could enter, and those who excelled earned a great deal of glint. Slaves rarely lasted more than a few contests, and Siena hated to watch the vids.
The current champion was Blackhorn, a dakorian with dark horns that had bested every contest he’d entered. Even slaves cheered for him, and wagers for and against him were common. Siena knew what would happen to her if she was entered into the Bone Crucible. She would die, quickly and painfully. She resolved that if that was her fate, she would face it without tears.
The ship dropped toward an asteroid belt, gliding through the dark expanse. She pushed her face against the window, catching a glimpse of one of the larger asteroids, a knobby rock the size of a small moon. A giant crater in one side had a darkened dome, hardly visible with the light from the red sun. A black shield required extra power, not to prevent more damage, but to make it less visible to scans.
The ship descended to the hidden dome and passed through the barrier, the two shields crackling as they came in contact, sparks washing across the outer hull. On the inside, the scope of the hologram was revealed, and Siena’s eyes widened. The rock didn’t exist at all. It was merely a hologram, a projection from hundreds of emitters. The dome was just one tiny curve of a spherical shield.
Inside the as
teroid-sized holo was hidden half of a capital ship, the hilt and part of the blade of an Emperor’s longsword vessel. Heltorgreathian class, the largest in the Empire.
The severing had obviously not been intentional. Scoring at the ragged end looked to be from combat, although plating had been installed to seal it off, turning the partial ship into a serviceable star base.
A hundred years ago, House Thresh’Sin had gone to war with House We’Belikan. The Emperor had sided with Thresh’Sin, committing two capital ships to settle the conflict. Both had been destroyed. They still showed vids of the battle, and Siena had watched them as a child. Broken ships floating in space, spewing debris and venting air. Seracrete glowing with heat, cooling into melted slag. One capital ship had broken in two, cratered by stolen worldbreaker missiles. No one had attacked an Imperial ship in ages, and the shock had reverberated throughout the Empire.
The Emperor had dispatched half his fleet in response: hundreds of Heltorgreathians, thousands of Delvinoriqs and Jennorfitens. House We’Belikan had been obliterated, their worlds ripped into chunks of rock. Many had sought to salvage the broken ships, with pieces of wreckage gradually disappearing to smugglers, thieves, and enterprising Houses.
A shuffling footfall came from outside the cell, and Siena had just enough time to turn before the door swung open. Bensin stood in the doorway, along with Theg himself, Bloodwall to House Zeltil’Dor.
“The girl who defied Laurik.” The krey chuckled. “You gave up your future for a single act, but what a moment of glory.”
“You’re not angry?” she asked.
“Me?” Bensin snorted and motioned her out. “Why would I be? I captured what you did on a vid, so I can use it later when I need to take the role of Primus from her. My mother’s humiliation will be everlasting.”
“Isn’t she trying to take the office from her brother?” Siena stepped outside and walked with him down the hall. Bulkheads curved above, and seracrete flooring connected to white walls, tinged with purple borders. She wondered why he was even talking to her, but then she realized she was the only one to whom he could speak freely of the incident. She glanced to Theg, but dakorians kept a rigid code of confidence for their employers. What they heard never left their skulls.
“What happened to Kensen?” she decided to ask.
“I sold him and a few other slaves to the cages of Thendigor.” He swept a hand to a nearby window, where the approaching star base was visible. “Best black-market slave auction in the sector.”
“At least Secondous Laurik didn’t kill him.” She hoped she would see him and then reminded herself that slaves were not permitted to have hope.
“Laurik doesn’t kill any of the slaves.” Bensin approached a door, and it opened sideways.
Siena shook her head in confusion. “I’ve seen them die.”
He chuckled. “My mother prides herself on the ability to inflict enough pain to bring slaves to the point of death. Then she sells them, and the rest of you think they were killed. It lets us sell them for a tidy profit, and it breaks the spirit of the rest of you.” He eyed her out of the corner of his eye. “Well, most of you.”
“You’re getting into the slave business,” she said.
“Of course,” he replied. “Mining is an occupation, and Verdigris has plenty of ore. But the real money is in slaves. Some krey need ships. All krey want slaves—preferably pliable and hard-working.”
Siena gazed about the ship with interest. She knew it to be a Meltia class, with a glass hull and aquatint walls. Other krey usually purchased them as pleasure cruisers, but Bensin had modified it to have a larger cargo bay. Kensen had been on it once and described it as the nicest ship he’d ever seen.
The ship glided to a halt as the airlocks linked the ship’s central cortex and the station’s cortex. A handful of krey appeared and disappeared in the corridor, all members of House Zeltil’Dor. Instead of regal cloaks of purple, they wore white uniforms emblazoned with the purple crest of their House. Slaves were also present, mechanics that labored on the gravity drive or made other repairs. All glanced at Siena’s brand and drifted away—the slaves out of disgust, the krey out of fear.
The ship was like a tiny spear in the shadow of the space station. The deck hardly moved, the gravity manipulated by the ship’s engines. Then the door at the end of the tunnel opened, and the air of Thendigor wafted into the ship. Bensin snorted in disgust.
He turned to Theg. “Tell my lieutenants to make sure the air scrubbers keep that stink out,” he said. “I don’t want to leave here smelling as bad as we did on our last visit.”
“I should not leave you alone with the ferox,” the towering dakorian rumbled, motioning to Siena.
“She’ll be fine.” Bensin smiled at the dakorian’s concern. “She may be branded, but she’s as demure as the rest.”
“That is untrue,” Theg said. “A slave willing to attack a krey is willing to kill.”
Bensin snorted in disbelief. “She’s just a teenage human who lost her temper. It could happen to any of them.”
“I saw the vid,” Theg said, glaring at Siena. “She is defiant.”
Siena actually smiled. “Thank you.”
Bensin laughed. “I don’t think he meant that as a compliment.”
“It’s still the nicest thing a dakorian has ever said to me.”
“She confirms my suspicion,” Theg said. “And I still advise you kill her.”
Siena swallowed at the burst of fear, but Bensin shook his head. “You know my mother’s orders. She wants this one to suffer. Now go tell my lieutenants to check the air scrubbers. Or at least have a human do it.”
The dakorian glared at Siena and then grunted. “As you order.”
“Thank you, Theg.”
The dakorian passed Siena, his cold gaze stabbing into her own. She looked away, unwilling to provoke the dakorian. Laurik was one thing, but Theg would probably grab her head and crush her skull. She hated the krey. She feared the dakorians. At least her House didn’t have many employed.
Her former House, she mentally corrected. The sadness was surprising, especially considering how little she cared for anyone in the Laurik’s mansion. But it had been the only thing she’d known, so perhaps it was the sense of comfort she regretted leaving behind. As she followed Bensin toward the airlock, she braced herself for what came ahead. Whatever happened, she vowed she would not shed any more tears. She might be a slave, but deep down she still wanted to prove that Felis had been right. She was not a fallen.
She was a fighter.
Chapter Thirteen
On their way out of the ship, Bensin paused and lifted an innocuous plate of seracrete to reveal a hidden door crystal. He activated his holoview, and the whole panel opened to reveal a secret room. Inside, a young boy lay with his back to the door. Siena frowned and for the first time realized she was not the only captive being transported. Then he stood and turned.
“Quis?” Siena blurted. “What are you doing here?”
The boy retreated to the back of his cell, his features twisted in fear. “I told you, I was not part of what she did,” Quis said.
“But you were a witness,” Bensin said, motioning him out of the cell. “And my mother cannot have stories of what happened circulating among the other slaves.”
“But he didn’t do anything,” she said.
Bensin’s purple eyes narrowed. “You want to be burned? I enjoyed what you did to Laurik, but don’t mistake me for a human lover.” He turned to Quis. “Out.”
With no other choice, Quis exited the cell but kept a distance from Siena, as if just being a ferox was contagious. Siena wanted to comfort him, but it wasn’t like there was anything she could do.
Bensin’s holoview beeped, and he activated it, receiving a message from one of his lieutenants. Irritated, the krey gave him several orders, and Siena used his distraction to take a step closer to Quis.
“I’m sorry,” Siena whispered.
“Why did you do
it?” Quis asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I didn’t mean to get you into trouble.”
Quis looked away. “I thought they were going to kill me.”
“Me too,” she said.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“The Cages of Thendigor,” she murmured. “A black-market slave port.”
“Black market?” His eyes were wide.
His expression made it clear he’d been bought at an Empire-sanctioned cage, and like her, he’d heard plenty of stories of how slaves were treated on the black market.
“I’m scared,” he whispered.
“I know,” she said. “But I’ll try to protect you.”
She thought he would retreat, but he nodded and wiped at a tear. She reached out and tousled his hair, just as she’d done when they were hunting roaks. He actually smiled.
Bensin finished his beamcast with a sigh. “Turns out I have somewhere to be. Let’s see how much glint we can get for a ferox with a bad genome.”
He walked them down the corridor to the airlock, a circular breach with glass walls. Siena had never imagined Quis would be punished with her, and she reached out and took his hand as they walked through the airlock and into the star port.
He clung to her, and her guilt turned to anger. The boy had been in House Zeltil’Dor for a single day, and now he was probably going to the worst House in the Empire. She recalled his desperate plea for Laurik to stop and grimaced.
She pulled him to her, her protective stance causing Bensin to snort with amusement. She didn’t care. The boy was terrified, and as long as Siena was nearby, she would protect him.
“Stay with me,” she murmured. “I’ll keep you safe.”
The boy stayed at her side as they entered the space station, which was guarded by an assortment of dakorians. Two of the soldiers were older, their bone armor tinged gray. The third was missing a horn, and the bone spikes on his right shoulder had also been severed. The fourth and fifth soldiers were short and stocky, probably undervalued based on their size. All carried lance hammers.
