Shadow Run

by Michael Miller

  “He’s telling the truth,” Basra said without hesitation, and stepped into the room. Drips of blood trailed behind him.

  “How do you know?” Rubion said with a sleek, raised eyebrow.

  “I learned to read faces like yours when I was five,” Basra said, keeping the rifle trained on him, obviously assuming I’d handle the unarmed Bladeguard if he—she—made a move. She stood still in her segmented armor, arms folded behind her back, as she’d been ordered.

  Rubion sneered at Basra. “And just who do you think you are?”

  Basra’s smile returned. He’d flipped on his emotional switch again, because his eyes were filled with nearly malicious pleasure as he stared at Rubion over the table. “You, Dracorte, might know me as Hersius Kartolus.”

  Without losing his sighting down the barrel, he lifted one hand from the rifle—his uninjured one, even—shook up his sleeve, and curled up his fingertips to press his wrist. A design appeared along on his forearm, which then went a step further to project itself in a glowing holograph, hovering a few inches over his skin. It was like a double helix, all glittery blacks and blues, but with each end looped closed instead of left open.

  I had no idea what the name Hersius Kartolus meant, but I’d seen holo-tattoos like these. They were often licensed for use by one particular individual, often for life, and sometimes against their will in the case of prison inmates. It was meant to prove Basra was somebody…I just didn’t know who.

  Rubion did, though. The effect was instantaneous. His jaw slackened and his eyes popped. He was stunned…and quite possibly terrified. “You…That’s you?” His eyes roved the design, as if counting the number of overlapping spirals in the lineup. There looked to be around a dozen.

  “Yes, and believe me when I say I will wreck you and your family beyond belief.”

  “Wait, what?” I slurred, swaying. I had to reach for the wall to support myself. The Bladeguard tensed but didn’t move. “What does all this mean?”

  Basra didn’t respond. To me, anyway. “That is, unless you release Arjan Uvgamut. I assure you, it’s in your best interest. Your family’s interest.”

  That didn’t sound right. Maybe this, a name and a tattoo, was somehow Basra’s secret weapon. But I had seen his anger, and I knew he wouldn’t just let Rubion walk away after merely threatening him.

  Rubion’s fingers tightened on Arjan’s shoulder. “No, Hersius, this boy and girl are the only things working in my family’s interest right now. If only you knew what we could do with them, I’m sure you’d be on board. With your resources—”

  “Resources?” I asked, glancing at Basra.

  “You didn’t even know who you had on your ship?” Rubion graced me with his attention again, if only in the form of a disdainful glance. “Hersius Kartolus is richer than the Great Unifier. A financial genius. He has major investments in every royal family, including significant stock in Dracorte Industries, never mind the top five commoner corporations in the galaxy.”

  “How…,” I sputtered, glancing at Basra. “You’re only a few years older than me!”

  “And you’re the best pilot in the galaxy,” Basra murmured. “Give me some credit.”

  Rubion smiled at Basra like he knew yet another thing I didn’t. And he was right. “That’s the half secret that isn’t widely known beyond certain circles. The name Hersius Kartolus has existed for hundreds of years, possibly dating back to before the Great Collapse. Whoever is the current Kartolus finds a pupil to train, a rising star to take his—or her—place as the sun around which so many revolve. I haven’t known any other Kartolus but the Twelfth.”

  He hesitated, then spoke directly to Basra again. Not that his eyes had ever left him. “And now I meet the Thirteenth. My father, Axandar, told me the Twelfth was considered young when he gained the name in his middle years. If you didn’t have the mark, I would never have believed. Even with his ill health, you must be very skilled indeed for the Twelfth to have considered you ready.”

  There wasn’t quite insinuation in the words, more of a question.

  “You have no idea,” Basra said shortly. “Now, as you know, my time is rather valuable, so what’ll it be?”

  “Allow me to make you a counteroffer.” Rubion’s eyes practically glowed with eagerness from across the table. Arjan’s one remaining eye was shut. The other socket still gaped. I couldn’t stop looking at it.

  My vision pulsed. Whoever Basra was, I didn’t care. We needed to end this before either I collapsed or my fury wiped us all out.

  “I can’t imagine one that could interest me,” Basra said. “And I have a pretty good imagination. Outside of Arjan Uvgamut, who will already be coming back to me with less of him than there was before, I don’t need anything.”

  “I will give you Arjan without fuss if you incapacitate his sister—with maybe a shot to the knee so you don’t cause too much damage—and then join me.”

  Basra laughed outright, the most disdainful laugh I’d ever heard in my life.

  “You don’t understand,” Rubion insisted. “With my research and your resources, we don’t even need my family. This isn’t about them. This isn’t about wealth and power either, though we will have that beyond even your wildest dreams. It’s about what we could do with her abilities. If you join my enterprise, we will be gods.”

  I glanced at Basra in alarm. As someone who usually appreciated a good offer, I wasn’t sure how he could pass up one like that. Even as someone who claimed to have everything.

  But the rifle didn’t waver. He only said, “I’m not interested in godhood, I’m afraid.”

  I released an unsteady breath and shook my head at Rubion. “I don’t know what you think this is, but it’s not godhood. No one can do what I’m doing for long. I don’t know how I’m still alive. You’re an idiot if you think—”

  “You’re an idiot if you think all I want to do is play with fire,” Rubion said, tossing his head at me in dismissal. “Your abilities are only a stepping-stone to something greater.”

  I blinked, too surprised to be angry. “To what?”

  “The portals.”

  Now Basra blinked. “Impossible.”

  Rubion’s eyes grew even brighter now that he had Basra’s interest. “Not impossible. You see, the myth is that Shadow caused the Great Collapse of the portals. But I know the truth. Shadow has something to do with the portals, yes, but quite the opposite of common belief.”

  “You’re stalling,” Basra said.

  “Wrong—”

  “Prove it,” Basra nearly snapped, the pain he was suppressing audible in his tone. “Show me something I haven’t seen yet, because so far, your bluffing is textbook.”

  Rubion glanced up at the cameras, and with deft flicks of his wrist, he shot them out with his plasma pistol.

  The Bladeguard started. “My lord—?”

  Without a moment’s warning, he shot her in the head. His pistol was back against Arjan’s temple and his eyes on Basra before she even finished crumpling to the ground. I jumped in shock, but Basra never flinched, his aim steady on Rubion.

  “You asked me to shoot the other Bladeguard, but you probably didn’t expect I would, did you? How does that work for getting your attention? No one to overhear now,” Rubion added, as an afterthought.

  Basra hesitated, and my breath caught as he said, “I’m listening.”

  “You see, Shadow didn’t collapse the portals. A refined version of Shadow is what ran the portals. Scientists had a special Shadow affinity from working so closely with them for so long, and they were the ones who kept the portals open.”

  “You’re telling me…,” Basra said, and couldn’t finish. I could barely complete the thought in my own mind.

  Someone with the right knowledge, and the capability, could reopen the portals. Reconnect our galaxy to the rest of the universe. It was an idea that people would kill for, die for. That people would do anything for. And the capability—that belonged only to me, and to Arjan.
r />   I was watching Basra now, almost as closely as I was Rubion.

  “We could reverse the Great Collapse,” Rubion said in practically a whisper. A whisper in my brother’s ear, even if he was talking to Basra. “Everything will open.”

  The blackness in my vision surged with rage.

  Basra raised his head from the rifle a fraction, and Rubion lowered his pistol an equal fraction, his finger relaxing on the trigger.

  My hands balled into fists. I didn’t have much strength left, but I had to do something now, especially if Basra—

  Basra pulled his trigger and took off half of Rubion’s head—the half farthest from my brother.

  Arjan collapsed onto the table with Rubion, but before he could follow him to the floor, Basra shouldered his rifle, leapt over the table, and caught his shoulders. I’d lunged to do the same, but the floor had shifted, making me lose my balance.

  Basra shoved Rubion’s body away. “That,” he said, his lip twisting in disgust, “is how you bluff. I told you I wasn’t interested.”

  He’d nearly had me fooled. I could barely keep up with him, all that he supposedly was, or even wrap my unraveling mind around the fact that Rubion was dead.

  “Captain,” he said, snapping my attention away from all the bodies on the floor that still seemed to be moving, muscles flowing and limbs twitching in unnatural ways. “Can you please find something for Arjan to wear?”

  I glanced at my brother and then quickly away. The white towel that had been around his waist had slipped off. I stumbled toward the cabinets lining the room and lurched against the counter. Keeping one hand on it for support, I wrenched open cupboards and drawers until I found a blue medical gown.

  Basra had already unhooked all the needles, tubes, and cables from Arjan’s limbs by the time I made it over to them, and he helped me maneuver the gown over Arjan’s shoulders, especially since I had to grip the steel table to keep from falling over myself. I tried to ignore Rubion’s gaping skull at my feet. The half of his face that was still intact seemed to be smiling up at me, torn lips moving as if continuing to whisper his secrets.

  The portals…If he’d been telling the truth, that could change everything, change the galaxy…

  But Basra was right. Next to Arjan, it didn’t matter.

  I still felt useless compared to Basra’s bustle. He checked a miniature infopad he’d untucked from a pocket, scrolling through a list as he maneuvered around the room. Searching through cabinets, he scooped everything from bandages and tape to injectors and glass vials into an empty containment bag. He was assembling his own medi-kit, I realized. Before I could offer to help, he secured the bag over his shoulder with the rifle and bent for Arjan.

  We both looped one of his arms around our necks. I tried to avoid touching the wounds in his skin as best I could. They were plastic-sealed against infection, but they still hurt him. He groaned as we hefted him, his head lolling.

  “It’s okay,” Basra said, his voice softer, more feminine, than I’d ever heard it. “We’re getting you out of here.”

  Our lumbering walk was painfully slow. Basra and I had to drag Arjan between us, and my own legs kept trying to buckle. Sometimes it felt as if Basra were carrying the two of us, if only with moral support.

  “Keep going, a few more steps,” he kept murmuring, even while he left his own blood spattered behind us. “We’re almost there.”

  We weren’t almost there. We had seeming light-years of hallways to follow, and I didn’t even know what would be waiting for us when we got back. Even if I still had my ship, my crew—Don’t imagine otherwise, I told myself—I had no idea if either the Kaitan or I could actually fly. In spite of the damage she’d taken, the ship was probably in better shape than me. One thruster was entirely down, another nearly there, but between it and the solar sail, we could maybe limp far enough off-planet to engage the Belarius Drive. But I didn’t know if I could fly us that far. And there was no question that Arjan couldn’t.

  There was also no chance of me helping whoever was trapped on the opposite sides of the many doors we passed. They were people with Shadow affinities from other planets, perhaps insane or only weak, who’d no doubt been tortured like Arjan. And yet I had to leave them. I could barely walk, let alone break them free.

  At least no other guards seemed to be coming. Maybe we’d killed them all. There were too many corpses already, and we seemed to be dragging them with us. Out of the corner of my eye, whenever I turned, I could see half-faced Rubion and the two Bladeguards, one burned and the other trailing brains, clawing along the floor behind.

  “Basra,” I breathed at one point, “are those bodies following us?”

  He cast a glance over his shoulder. “No, Captain.”

  I would have laughed that one of the richest, most powerful people in the galaxy was still using my formal title now that I knew his, but I had other things on my mind. Or rather, nightmares from out of my mind, come to haunt me.

  “I can hear them,” I said. “I can see them. The walls are collapsing.”

  Basra’s wary eyes were on me, now. “You can do this. Just a little bit farther.”

  I almost laughed in despair then, but the sound died in my throat. Because he was right. We rounded another corner, and the massive, ruined space of the hangar opened around us with the late red sunlight filtering through the cavernous hole we’d torn. But if I’d hoped we’d left the nightmarish scene behind, I had been wrong.

  Near the battered, hulking shape of the Kaitan, Nev stood over Eton. Eton was on the ground, holding his leg in a puddle of blood. Blood was all around them. Nev was still for the moment, chest and shoulders heaving, swords held out in either hand. His jacket was in tatters, his arms covered in dripping cuts.

  Around both Nev and Eton, dozens of bodies lay sprawled and twisted, radiating out as if the two of them were bombs that had detonated.

  At least they were still alive, though they looked nearly as finished as Basra, Arjan, and I were. But then I heard the unmistakable pounding of boots from the opposite end of the hangar.

  Armor and weaponry glinted in the bloody sunlight, and I heard the shouts for us to put down our arms. None of us listened. Nev raised his blades and Basra his rifle, leaving me to support Arjan. Even Eton fumbled for a gun with sticky red hands, and Telu appeared on the ramp with a pistol in one hand and a knife in the other.

  She waved for me to hurry toward the ship, but I couldn’t abandon the others like this. Besides, I didn’t think I could carry Arjan all that way on my own. I tried to reach for the last of the Shadow still lurking in the caches below, but it slipped away from me. So did my balance. I slid to the floor, dragging Arjan with me.

  I couldn’t help my gasp. “I can’t. I can’t.” I closed my eyes. I didn’t try to seize the Shadow again, or force it away like I usually did. I simply surrendered.

  Lights danced in the darkness behind my lids, and I thought I heard whispering—beckoning me to oblivion.

  Tired. I should have been feeling pain, or fear, or anger. And I suppose I did, but I simply felt more tired than anything else.

  As the first two of the newly arrived Bladeguards reached me, we engaged in a rapid-fire series of cuts and thrusts, my blades working in a defensive pattern to keep them occupied and at a distance. We engaged and disengaged, clashed and retreated twice. It would have been just another day at the Academy if they hadn’t been significantly better than most of the students there—and drawing blood. They were willing to hurt me, but none of the wounds were serious.

  It was the realization that they wouldn’t kill me that set the exhaustion rolling in as we parted, circling.

  What’s the point? I wondered. How was I supposed to fight and kill someone who refused to kill me? My heart could never be in that, any more than it could be in torturing people for our gain. It’s impossible, anyway. There are too many of them to do anything. That rational thought intruded as the exhaustion set in further.

  “How about you
gentlemen put your weapons down,” I suggested, “and we discuss some more attractive options? I don’t want to hurt you.”

  They didn’t answer. One kept his blade at cross angles to me, and I realized they had been maneuvering me so one of them could get closer to Eton.

  They don’t have to hurt me to kill everyone else. Anger flared somewhere deep in my chest. It wasn’t about me; it never should have been. I wasn’t defending myself, I was defending my friends, who at no point had done anything to deserve any of this. My exhaustion vanished.

  Clarity descended upon me. I brought both blades together in the fastest spin of my life, and the Bladeguard nearest Eton lost his head. A moment later, the body toppled.

  I’d made the choice to fight against my family before, but now it was time to defend family. Not my royal family, but the one that needed me most.

  “Run,” I snarled, strength coursing through every fiber of my being.

  The Bladeguard nearest me did not flee. He swung his blade at my legs in what was meant to be a debilitating slash.

  I spun again, blocking it with both swords, and kicked him in the helmet, staggering him. This time, I didn’t hesitate, and he lost both hands for his effort. Nor did I stop to see what else happened to him. I ran, blades out to my sides, straight at the next enemy.

  When I had been four, my father had taught me how to punch. When I had been five, I began to train with a blade. When I had been thirteen, I fought off my first group under the tutelage of Devrak.

  There are four principles to fighting multiple assailants, Nev: First, control your environment.

  The guards might at some point choose to fight me with deadly force for survival, but I would never be the priority target—that was everyone on the Kaitan. I had to keep the attention of eleven attackers on me long enough to let the others board the ship and make their escape.

  “I’m coming for you!” I shouted at the door, where their commander had been. “You’re going down, along with this entire hangar!” A bluff, but then, I had been taught how to manipulate by my mother from my earliest years. These were the Home Guard, defenders, and I was threatening their leader with destructive force.