by Lizzy Ford
Talal paused in an open doorway leading to a large, green field behind the dwelling occupied by hundreds, perhaps thousands, of warriors organized into sparring groups of four and five. Talal’s gaze sought out Ne’Rin before she stepped out of the house. Kiera trailed. Lines had been drawn on the grass, large squares like those used for wrestling, with a circle in the center. Two men populated each circle, sparring with each other, while the other two or three watched. The battles were silent, the swords clashing without the clang of steel she expected to hear. At her entrance, those in the nearest circle with Ne’Rin ceased their activity and bowed, then stood in a line and waited.
She tried hard not to stare at the men. They were magnificent, wearing nothing but snug, dark pants. Their upper bodies were tanned from exposure to the sun, their dark hair and eyes pinned on her. It was not the polite, curious glances of Romas’s people but direct looks that made her skin crawl with awareness.
Talal appeared oblivious and approached Ne’Rin, whose body glowed with sweat. He’d been fighting, but tucked the sword behind his body, as if to protect Talal from it. She spoke to him for several moments before his eyes rose and lingered on Kiera. A brisk nod, and Talal stepped away, waiting. Ne’Rin returned his sword to a rack containing half a dozen similar swords in plain grey and approached Kiera.
Talal followed. Kiera stood aside, not as much out of deference but out of sudden realization that if she didn’t, the man was likely to run her over. She didn’t know why, but Ne’Rin hadn’t seemed to like her. A’Ran’s behavior was just as distant, but there was something bordering on resentment in the way Ne’Rin looked at her that made her uncomfortable.
They walked a short distance to an open atrium in the center of the house, complete with a small oasis rising up from white stone and curved benches. Trickling water circled the oasis, its source a small spring in the center. Talal handed a translator to Ne’Rin, who accepted it and motioned for them to sit. Kiera sat beside Talal.
“Nishani, your lifemate was called away suddenly. Talal says you have no knowledge of our war.”
She nodded.
“We have been in war for fifteen sun-cycles, since the death of the previous dhjan of Anshan. He was overthrown and killed when A’Ran was off-planet. On his death, one of his advisors, who betrayed him and allied with the Yirkin invaders, seized the title of dhjan. He struck when dhjan A’Ran was away at battle along with most of the Anshan men, thus leaving the throne of Anshan unguarded. Dhjan A’Ran’s family was forced to flee with his few trusted advisors. We have hidden on this moon in an unoccupied galaxy since.”
“How is dhjan A’Ran going to retake his throne?” she asked, surprised at the information.
“Until now, the Council has obstructed his efforts, but that is no longer true. He has gone to them with word of his breaking allegiance to pursue his title without their mediation or interference.”
It then dawned that the tale’s hero was one of the men she was angry at: the man who claimed to be her lifemate.
“So …” She trailed off, not sure where to start. Images from their first touch replayed themselves in her thoughts.
“Our people have suffered for fifteen sun-cycles,” Talal added. “The mines have gone empty, and the women barren since the rightful dhjan bloodline has been cast from the land.”
“You’re cursed,” Kiera said with a frown, thoughts on the dead planet from her vision.
“Is it not so in your home? A dhjan is bound to his planet. Should his blood and those who carry it be exiled, the planet dies.”
“My world is nothing like that,” she assured them. “How long do wars last here?”
“As long as they must, nishani,” Ne’Rin said almost gently. She eyed him, not sure his patronizing tone wasn’t meant to rile her. She took the high road and ignored him.
“The men here are training for battle?” she asked.
“When dhjan A’Ran calls for battles, we leave the moon and go to Anshan, where we have a small base.”
“Does dhjan A’Ran fight?”
“My brother is the best warrior,” Talal said proudly.
“Dhjan A’Ran endangers himself,” Ne’Rin countered. He looked at the younger woman hard, and Talal apologized quietly. Uncomfortable, Kiera cleared her throat.
“Maybe you can convince him not to fight, and then convince him he’s made a poor choice of a mate,” she said. “Or maybe I can learn to fight and go with him, if there’s no time limit to the war.”
Talal gasped, and Ne’Rin studied her. When neither responded, she returned to a safe subject.
“What does Anshan mine?”
Ne’Rin’s response was garbled.
“That didn’t translate,” she said, pointing to her translator.
“This material.” Ne’Rin pulled a dark grey knife from his boot. “It is rare and native to Anshan. Every ship and weapon in the Five Galaxies is made from it.”
“Wow. We just stay here until the war is over?” she asked.
A brisk nod.
“Do you have sketch pads here? Or pens?”
Both gave her blank looks, and she sighed, wondering how she’d be an artist in a world without even pencils.
“Do women have a part in the war effort?” she asked.
“To honor their men,” Ne’Rin replied.
“That’s what I thought.”
“We had hoped Ne’Rin’s sister would be made nishani,” Talal said. “But my brother did not choose her.”
“He did not feel the signs,” Ne’Rin said with another sharp look. Kiera sensed his anger on the topic and said nothing. “When the suns fall into night, I’ll speak to dhjan A’Ran over the communicator. You may come.”
She hesitated. She had nothing to say to the man, unless it was to condemn him for kidnapping her, wedding her against her will, and dropping her like a sack of potatoes for his sisters to retrain.
“No, thank you,” she decided.
“We expect visitors to arrive soon. As the nishani, your duty is to welcome them on behalf of the dhjan,” Ne’Rin said with a glance at Talal. “However, I do not feel you are prepared for such a duty. You may accompany me, without your translator, so you do not embarrass the dhjan by speaking.”
Offended once again, she said nothing as he rose and returned the translator to Talal. He walked down the hall from whence they’d come.
“He’s angry about his sister,” Talal said. “He feels it was an affront to him because the betrayer who murdered our father came from his family. He is condemned by many people and hoped his sister would restore his family’s honor.”
“He seems like a dangerous man,” Kiera murmured.
“He is, but he’s loyal. Just very angry.”
“I think I need to rest,” Kiera said, beginning to like A’Ran’s trusted commander even less. “Can you take me back to my room?”
“Nishani, you have duties you must learn before my brother returns,” Talal said timidly.
“Does he beat women?”
“No, nishani.”
“Then take me to my room.”
Talal obeyed. Kiera was hungry and overwhelmed once again. All she wanted was the coziness of her studio, where she could block out everything and paint. Her room on this planet contained none of her comforts. She didn’t stay long in the boring room. Her mind was too busy, and she felt as if she hovered on the verge of a mental breakdown. Instead, she forced herself to leave and find something to do.
After exploring the halls and grounds for an hour or two, she returned to the main atrium, where she heard one of the sisters call her name.
“Nishani.”
She turned to face Talal.
“Nishani, if you are rested, we must start your behavior training.”
Kiera frowned and rose, walking away.
“Nishani, please! My brother requests it!”
“No!” she said over her shoulder. “That’s so ridiculous! I’m not going to anything of the sort, and if you
think you’ll make me …” She stopped, unable to help the tears welling in her eyes. Talal gasped, as if she’d never seen anyone cry, and took a step back.
“Forgive me, nishani. Another day,” Talal said. “Are you well?”
“Fine. But I’m not going to training,” Kiera answered. Talal gave one of her small bows and stayed where she was as Kiera walked away again.
The scene would repeat itself several days in a row, whenever one of the sisters tracked her down. They were quick to backtrack when they saw she was upset, but their persistence annoyed her. She could think of only one thing that would turn her into one of the cookie-cutter women of this world, and she refused to be brainwashed. Kiera liked her mind the way it was, liked roaming through the hallways and spending the mornings in training with the little boys out back.
It was toward the end of her first week in the sprawling mansion that was her new home that she wandered down a hall previously unexplored. She opened the only door in the dead-end hallway with a wave of her armband.
The conference room behind it was large and open, its ceiling cathedral and one wall twice the height of the others. Unlike the cheerful white walls of the house, the tall wall was the unwelcome shade of dark grey that she’d begun to despise after days in the spaceships surrounded by it. There were rows of grey chairs and several white benches in the rear, a handful of tables next to yawning windows, and a wall of what looked like constellation maps.
From the layout, she expected it was A’Ran’s conference room for meeting with his advisors. She wandered through the room, trailing her fingers across the tables. A round table in the center had an access pad attached to the top, so she passed her armband over it.
To her surprise, what appeared to be a video game popped into 3D life in the center of the table. It reminded her of one of her favorite space empire-building games, Homeworld. The table top lit up with a blank grey screen and four dozen multi-hued buttons, with geometric symbols she assumed was writing. The video game showed two holograms at once, a space battle and a land battle.
Excited to see that even this world had video games, she sat in the chair behind the buttons and screen, studying all three in an attempt to figure out how the game worked. The tiny specs indicating crafts or personnel in the 3D image moved and changed; the image itself spun slowly, as if to present her with all sides of the battle at once.
Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much she missed passing away her nights playing her games! She sat and began playing with the buttons to see how they affected the holograms. As the afternoon wore on, she puzzled through what buttons controlled what, which were oriented toward the space battle and which toward the ground. The displays on the table ran through dozens of scenarios based on what she told it, most of them disastrous as she learned what the buttons did. The game consisted almost entirely of strategy, and it was dark outside before she realized how long she’d been at it.
Mentally exhausted from the intricate game, she rose to return to her room for bed. The next morning, she went to the game room after her sparring session and sat the entire day, learning more and more about the game and experimenting with how the symbols on the keyboard interacted with the images before her. Certain symbols pulled up certain features of the ships or angles of battle, similar to how picture-symbols in her video games on earth brought up different functions, allowing her to maneuver characters in the game or review the armament and skills of her opponents. The game room was the only place the sisters didn’t bug her, and for the first time since being kidnapped by Evelyn and A’Ran, she found herself having fun.
She spent the next day in the game room, and the next. Two days turned into a week. Ne’Rin only came for her once during the third day, to bring her to stand by him while he received visitors. He removed her translator from her ear as promised after a stern warning about not speaking to anyone.
She liked him even less after that occurrence and chose to hide in the conference room every day after that, unwilling to deal with him again.
CHAPTER FIVE
“You endanger yourself, dhjan A’Ran.”
A’Ran tested his injured shoulder. It would heal once he reached the main craft with the help of the medical unit but was useless in the meantime.
“A leader is a warrior first,” he replied. “We have taken the land advantage, which is all that matters.”
He stood in the confined main deck of the transport craft after his own craft had been disabled in an ambush. He preferred land wars to the space wars and had been returning to the main craft when the ambush occurred. He sat in the only seat in the tiny craft, studying Ne’Rin, who transmitted from A’Ran’s battle command center on the moon that was his interim home. He’d chosen to leave Ne’Rin on the moon this trip. If what Jetr suspected were true, Ne’Rin would do less damage if he didn’t know what A’Ran did while away.
“The Council contacted me,” A’Ran said.
“They weren’t pleased with your message about Qatwal,” Ne’Rin assessed.
“They have no means to control me, which makes them less lazy than they have been for a millennium.”
“How have they decided to react to your freedom?”
“How do you think? By threatening me, by condemning me, and finally, by seeking a discreet audience with me.” A’Ran let a rare, mirthless smile cross his features.
“Their support can be won,” Ne’Rin said in satisfaction.
“We will meet them soon at our temporary home. I have warned them I no longer play their games.”
“They may find a way to temper Anshan’s defiance.”
“For their support against our enemy? I will owe them my life,” A’Ran said.
“We may not need the Council’s support if you maintain as you have,” Ne’Rin replied. “They need our ore more than we need them. We can risk their anger. Do you need me to write any new battle plans?”
A’Ran was silent, studying Ne’Rin. For over a week, he’d hoped his instincts to be wrong. He’d hoped Ne’Rin to be the one sending him daily updates to the battle strategies and plans. His trusted advisor had never done so before, but A’Ran hadn’t thought any member of his household capable of the complexities of battle planning. In the past three days, he hadn’t made a single change before releasing the plans to his battle commanders.
Somehow, he had known the plans weren’t Ne’Rin’s. They were too … different, too unlike the tactics and war planning taught by Anshan or anyone in the Five Galaxies. Over a period of a week, the tactics had gone from infantile to novice to advanced, as if someone were learning the intricacies of battle planning. Some plans he couldn’t use for lack of manpower, timing constraints, or other battle-related reasons, but some were brilliant. Given his experience and lauding as one of the most capable strategic battle planners in the Five Galaxies— the only reason he hadn’t been driven out by the Yirkin despite his tiny army— he found himself learning a tidbit here and there. And he was impressed. He wondered if all women from his lifemate’s planet had such a skill.
“No,” he said at last. “You’ve not mentioned nishani.”
“She is well,” Ne’Rin said with shortness. A’Ran waited. If that were the best Ne’Rin could say of the difficult woman …
She should have settled by this point, adopted her role and been properly behaved. She apparently wasn’t, and it made him uneasy. He didn’t need his people to see someone quite so … unusual. Their confidence in him would fall further.
“She’s been … training with the boys,” Ne’Rin said at the long silence.
“Training?” he echoed.
“Swords.”
“Women are forbidden to fight.” Even as he said it, he knew he was contradicting himself. He hadn’t stopped her yet from creating battle plans. Swords, however, were different. The chance for physical harm was too great.
“Your sisters do not possess the temperament needed to deal with her,” Ne’Rin said frankly.
A’Ra
n listened. He intended for the problem to right itself in his absence, once she adjusted. If his sisters could not handle nishani, he must.
“You have direction?” Ne’Rin asked.
“I will handle her upon my return,” he said.
“Yes, dhjan. When will you return to meet the Council here?”
“In two days’ time. I have matters to settle first.”
“We will make preparations,” Ne’Rin said.
A’Ran reached forward to sever the connection. Ne’Rin’s face disappeared from the screen. He relaxed and tested the muscles of his arm again, dissatisfied with being injured.
Nishani. Kiera. He could think of one solution to his problem, and his jaw clenched. He altered the course of his tiny craft for Qatwal.
He traveled for a day and slid beneath the radars of Qatwal easily, having stolen the codes needed to jam their tracking systems during one of his scuffles with Kisolm. He landed outside the main city, in the center of which sat the royal family’s residence. Waiting until nightfall, he changed into clothing more suited for the Qatwali society and covered his face with a hood to creep into the city.
Evelyn sat at the window seat, gazing at the dark sky as she had every night since Kiera disappeared. One hand rested on her expanding stomach. She tugged gently on the moon dangling from the necklace Kiera gave her for her wedding. She relaxed after a nice, long soak in the bathtub, her thoughts wandering among the stars.
Suns, she corrected herself with a small smile. They didn’t call the distant suns stars in Qatwal. One of those distant suns was hers, and maybe, one of those distant suns might be Kiera’s.
Evelyn’s smile faded. She had already declared her intention of naming the babe Kiera whether it was a boy or girl. Her days were long but peaceful, wrought with duty and rest. It was a good, perfect little life, so much more than she ever expected, with the exception that her best friend in the universe— Kiera— might as well have been dead to her as far as Romas and his clan were concerned.
