Our Dark Stars

by Audrey Grey

  Talia

  Talia Starchaser thought being sold to a prince on her eighteenth birthday was a terrible present. Worse than the picture her little brother was forced to draw—from real crayons, not the computerized painting most people preferred these days. Worse, even, than the public scrutiny that was now allowed due to her age and status as Junior Sovereign.

  Turning eighteen meant she wasn’t just a princess anymore. She was public property, adorned in makeup and a pretty little dress and a smile for her betrothed.

  She shuddered at the thought of Prince Cassius. A Starchaser hadn’t married a Thorossian Royal for three centuries. Thorossians were crude, hardened by a desert planet with more ore than water.

  Which is why we need this alliance, she reminded herself for the umpteenth time. But the truth didn’t soften the blow. Being sold had a certain aftertaste she couldn’t wash away with words and logic.

  For Talia, the idea of ruling the Seven Planets was a constant cloud hanging over her head, like the twin moons orbiting her planet, or the cloying hyacinth perfume her grandmother bathed herself in. According to the wrinkled ex-Sovereign, Talia’s rise to the throne was ordained in the stars. It was the supernova her life revolved around, warming her and burning her in equal measure. Just like her father. Her grandfather. And so on. The entire Starchaser Dynasty would take at least an hour to name in a single setting, if one were inclined to do so.

  Talia was not. Especially when that title was being sold for a planet’s worth of ore. Was that really all a Starchaser was worth these days?

  Sighing, Talia flung her thick auburn hair over her shoulder, the heavy tresses tickling her bare back, and a flurry of attendants rushed to finish securing the fire opals that speckled her hair. She should have been ready hours ago, but flight training ran late.

  One attendant tightened the sun-gold ribbons of Talia’s corset. Her ribs groaned to the point they were ready to crack, and she cried out, biting back the urge to slap the poor girl. Two more attendants braced Talia’s arms as the other yanked harder, and her vision eclipsed. One more tug, and her already slim waist shrunk to almost nothing, as did her ability to breathe.

  It reminded her of the first time she experienced G-force inside a Predator-Class Mig-12 Starfighter. Except that had been fun and a lot less painful.

  You’re a future Starchaser Sovereign. Pain is not only expected but welcome.

  According to her father, continuing to fight the mock rebellion across the Outer Fringes required three things: soldiers, starships, and ore to mine for the metal and fuel. And the Thorassians needed a Starchaser princess to secure their rising status.

  The marriage was the perfect solution for everyone . . . everyone but her.

  “Shouldn’t have had those honey-biscuits this morning,” Ailat teased, disrupting Talia’s thoughts. Her junior companion popped up from the four-poster bed near the back wall, ducked beneath a dusk-rose panel, and flitted over to assess Talia’s outfit, heels clacking against the moonstone floor.

  Wide blue eyes blinked above Ailat’s high cheekbones. She was tall and slender, and she’d traded her dark-gray flight suit from their practice session earlier for a gorgeous azure gown few others could pull off. Her pumps made her tower over Talia, even though the girls were around the same height. “At least, not if you want your husband to fit his hands around your waist like he can with Baroness Crenaline.”

  Heat flared across Talia’s chest, and she stabbed her hand over her hips. “What do I care about that social climbing daughter of an ore smuggler?”

  “Her father was exonerated.” Ailat lifted an exquisite black eyebrow, mischief sparkling inside her eyes. “Perhaps that’s why Lord Cassius has taken such an interest in her lately.”

  Talia braced herself against her attendants and sighed. Ailat was right. A Starchaser left nothing to chance.

  Not even love.

  Talia needed to look ravishing, a princess every man in the universe would die to marry. She needed to close the deal.

  “Tighter,” she ordered, and her attendants cinched and yanked until the pittance of air that remained in her lungs fled. When they were done, tears of pain streamed down her cheeks, but Ailat smiled.

  “There,” Ailat said, reaching over to turn on the Broadnet, which Talia had purposefully left off. Talk would all be about her today anyway. “Just try not to eat anything. Or, you know, breathe.”

  “Stars and skies!” Talia rolled her eyes at her companion’s pleased voice. “Cassius will marry me no matter the size of my waist.”

  “True. But now he won’t be thinking of Baroness Crenaline while he does it.”

  An image of Talia as a baby—all wispy hair and fat cheeks—broadcasted on the far wall, followed by the few images the public had been granted access to over the years. A voice droned on about her education and hobbies, leaving out the one thing she enjoyed—flight training. As if the intergalactic hordes knew anything about her!

  Rolling her eyes, again, Talia glanced at Ailat. Usually Talia adored her companion’s frank humor, but today was the exception. “Maybe . . .” she wheezed. “You should be Sovereign.”

  As soon as the words left her lips, she wanted to take them back. They were a cruel joke. Despite the life that poured from Ailat’s eyes, despite the lopsided dimple in her cheek, her dark humor, and the way her face lit up at the sight of the handsome courtiers around the palace, she was a mock.

  Not a real human—a droid. Built by the best creators in the land to be a junior companion to Talia. To help shape her master into first a princess and then a ruler. Every single quality, every single quirk. All held a purpose that had nothing to do with Ailat, and everything to do with Talia.

  Even her companion’s name, Ailat, was Talia spelled backward.

  Suggesting Ailat be Sovereign was the same as suggesting she get married and have children someday. That she grow old and dote on grandchildren.

  Impossible.

  And yet, sometimes—in the darkest hours of night when the two moons hid and the palace was as quiet as a sarcophagus—Talia thought her companion would be better suited to rule. A droid created by man, with wires for veins and metal instead of bones and a microchip where her heart should be.

  “Maybe, Princess,” Ailat teased, her even voice giving no hint at offense, “you should stop complaining and think about Cassius’s biceps. I hear they’re nearly as big as his bank account.”

  But as Ailat fingered her sleek curtain of shoulder-length ebony hair, her bottom lip twitched to the side. Not for the first time, Talia wondered if that was a programmable trait, or one of the 752 unique behaviors Ailat’s model would develop over time.

  Not that it mattered. Not really. Even if she felt slighted, it would be a fleeting emotion, drowned out by her devotion to Talia. Loyalty and love for their master companions were the two most dominant traits in every mock.

  The attendants scurried from Ailat as she slipped behind Talia and towered over her. Only a mock could get away with seven-inch platforms. Unlike Talia, whose very human feet ached inside her diamond-studded heels, sweat clinging between her toes.

  Brushing the petty thought aside, she glanced over her reflection in the mirror. A princess on the verge of adulthood. Not that she felt like an adult, but the sable dress clinging to her body said otherwise.

  She ran two fingers down her constricted waist. The silken material could have been poured from the midnight sky. Little twinkles of diamonds caught in the golden light gushing from her bedroom windows that overlooked Palesia, the royal capitol of planet Calisto. Fire opals burned like comets inside her long, flowing auburn hair, a hundred burning suns against a dusky sky. Even the smattering of freckles dusting her porcelain skin were barely visible.

  She looked every bit a Starchaser Princess on the eve of her coronation as Sovereign-in-waiting. From tonight onward, if anything were to happen to Father, the current Sovereign, she was first in line to succeed the throne. Which was why her engagement wo
uld be made official today as well. Two birds with one stone.

  But was she the stone . . . or the bird?

  Shuddering, she swallowed down the panic that came surging upward every time her thoughts ventured down this path. Don’t think about that. Tonight is simply a formality. Father isn’t going anywhere.

  Yet she clutched at the ruby-crusted hem of her corset, the air suddenly too thin, every sound unsettling. A Starfighter shrieked from the skies above the palace, rattling the windowpanes and vibrating her bones. For a heartbeat, she was flying through the stars. High above her home planet and all the troubles that came with it.

  The thought of flying should have calmed her. Instead, cold sweat slicked her palms, warning of another panic attack. She started having them after news of her marriage. Stars, please not today. She couldn’t show weakness in front of her attendants. But a wave of heavy darkness tumbled over her, and she was powerless to stop it. Just like all the other times.

  Grasping at her throat, she stumbled to the window overlooking the city. Half-open UV blinds parted at her presence. She splayed her palms against the hot windowpane, sweat streaking the thin glass, and blinked as her new kingdom waned in and out of focus. A balcony spread beneath her fingertips, too humid to actually use nine months out of the year, and a stretch of ivory buildings dotted the hills and colored the land around the palace white. Farther in the distance, the dark steel buildings of the mock side of the city rose to the sky, cruel and unforgiving and hers.

  Soft fingers slipped over her bare arms, gently turning Talia away from the window. Ailat. One long-boned hand gripped each of Talia’s arms. “You are Talia Starchaser. You fear nothing. You own the stars and the planets and the galaxies. You rule billions.” Ailat’s fingers gripped harder. “Say it with me, Tal.”

  And Talia did. Just like when she was a little girl, afraid of traveling on her family’s massive starship for the first time. Or the time she refused to step foot on planet Minos because she’d never before seen ice and snow.

  The words calmed her frayed nerves, the sharp edge of panic fading beneath Ailat’s familiar voice. But a string of curse words drew Talia’s attention to her door just as it slammed open, allowing some anxiety to creep back in.

  Even before the potent hyacinth perfume of her grandmother, mother regent and former Sovereign, swamped the room, Talia’s attendants had flattened themselves into synchronized bows. Their too-perfect movements were the only indication they were mocks, just like Ailat. Although they weren’t quite as complex, or special.

  The former Sovereign was ageless inside a mauve gown, her taut skin stretched over rounded cheeks that nearly obscured her shrewd golden eyes—the only Starchaser trait she shared with Talia. Piles of silk fabric dragged across the floor, weighted with colored pearls to represent the solar systems under their rule. Although only seven were inhabitable, many more off-world planets had been colonized to mine for the natural resources the Seven required.

  A nervous breath escaped Talia’s lips as her gaze swept over the pearls; one day, she would own not just the dress her grandmother wore but all the planets the pearls represented as well.

  Two attendants shadowed Grandmother, scrambling to gather the heaviest portion of her train. A crown of onyx nestled over her thinning, silver hair, and her pointed chin was held high, as if her head was supported on an invisible string. Only the hunch rounding her back whispered of her true age, a number Talia could only guess.

  Grandmother scattered Talia’s attendants with the flick of a manicured hand, and their boots squeaked across the floor as they made a hasty retreat. The matriarch was a cluster of storm clouds on the horizon; all sorts of destruction hid inside her dark depths. Talia never knew if her father’s mother would drown her in barely-veiled insults or strike her down like lightning. The sting of her grandmother’s cold palm slapping her cheek was as frequent as her smiles—perhaps more so.

  And yet, Talia found herself smiling as her grandmother cursed beneath her breath and swatted at a poor girl who got too close to the matriarch.

  For a moment, Talia locked eyes with her companion, nerves steadied as the skin around Ailat’s wide blue eyes crinkled. Then Grandmother’s gaze slid to Ailat, and Talia could have sworn something cold flickered across the woman’s severe face.

  “Look at you, girl,” her grandmother said, focusing her attention back on Talia. “Without your body hidden beneath that hideous flight suit you wear, you might stand a fighting chance at winning the Prince’s favor.”

  Her mouth fell open. “How did you—?”

  “Know? Dear, I know everything that happens inside these walls. You think I wouldn’t be told that my oldest granddaughter and the future Sovereign is training to fly shuttles?”

  “They’re not called shuttles anymore . . .” Her words trailed away under her grandmother’s piercing gaze.

  “Well, whatever you youth call them these days, that part of your life is over. Common soldiers can die in the skies against the rebels—you’re a Starchaser.”

  Talia tried to swallow, but her throat was drier than the sands of Thoros. So she simply nodded—then froze as her grandmother’s bony hands, speckled with bleached sun spots, lifted a golden crown from the folds of velvet her attendant held. The delicate adornment settled uneasily on Talia’s head.

  “There.” Grandmother’s golden-eyed gaze swept over Talia again, slowly this time. “That son of a fool, Cassius, will melt into a puddle when he sees the gift your father has given him.”

  Perhaps it was the mention of a betrothed Talia had never met, or her grandmother’s cruel voice as she discussed selling her granddaughter to a Thoros prince, but Talia said, “I thought it was you, not Father, who arranged my marriage.”

  Talia braced for a slap, or at least the biting words she’d grown so accustomed to. Instead, her grandmother’s hearty laughter filled the room. Apparently selling her granddaughter to an ore prince had put the matriarch in a very good mood.

  “Of course I did. This intergalactic war has made everything uncertain. And in troubled times, it’s the women who hold everything together.”

  War? Talia was used to words like skirmish and conflict, which is how the news described the rebellion.

  “The ore prince may not be what you had in mind, my dear,” her grandmother continued, crooked fingers worrying at one of the pearls around her belt. “But, sometimes, you must reach up and align the stars in your favor. Even the dimmest ones have their uses.”

  “And . . . this star. What if I can’t stand him? What if he thinks I’m ugly or he beats me?”

  “You are a Starchaser, dear. You’ll endure whatever comes your way with a smile. And if he hurts you, darling, well there’s always poison. But give it a few years, for appearance’s sake.”

  Talia didn’t know if she was supposed to laugh or nod . . . or cry. “Yes, Grandmother.”

  One second longer and she’d say something that would ruin everything. So Talia crossed her chamber, pretending she needed to approach the mirror to adjust one of the fire opals secured in her hair.

  Inside the glass, she watched her grandmother turn to leave. The news had switched over to commentators discussing the rebellion, their arguing voices echoing off the moonstone walls of her room and reminding her what was at stake this evening.

  As she crossed to the door, her grandmother had one last piece of advice to add. “Have your mock change her shoes, dear. A mock should never be taller than her master companion.”

  As soon as the door clicked shut, Talia scoffed. No way she was going to demand Ailat change shoes. She looked divine in those pumps.

  Besides, Talia had bigger things to worry about. The coronation of a royal Starchaser child was as secret as the moods of her grandmother. What if Talia suffered another attack like earlier? What if she hated her betrothed?

  What if . . . no. Whatever happened tonight, Ailat would be there for support. Just as she had Talia’s whole life.

  The door c
licked shut behind Grandmother, reminding Talia to breathe. And then Ailat and Talia fell into the comfort of her enormous bed and giggled until fat tears darkened the folds of their dresses. They gossiped about the notoriously handsome Cassius, whom Talia couldn’t decide to like or hate. They talked of the gaudy gowns and jewels they would most likely see tonight, half of them probably knockoffs and fakes. Few could afford true luxuries, not with the war raging.

  Like always, at some point the conversation steered back to flying. Both girls trained together every day after Talia’s long line of tutoring lessons. At first Ailat was included because Talia needed a copilot to practice with the double-seaters. But Ailat was just as good as Talia—maybe better, though she’d never admit that—and soon they both flew their own Starfighters.

  That was a secret no one but Talia and their instructor knew.

  Ailat went quiet. Then she took Talia’s hand. The steel beneath felt just like bone, Ailat’s creamy skin warm and alive and not the least bit synthetic in feeling. “They shouldn’t have married you off to Cassius, Tal. Not against your will.”

  Talia found herself laughing, a hollow, shrill sound that was too much like her mother’s. “I’m a Starchaser. That’s what we do.” Her voice went low. “Sacrifice and honor for the Seven.”

  “I mean it though. I know I joke with you about him, but I’ve known you since we were kids. You deserve someone who sees you like I do.”

  After weeks walling off her emotions for this day, the kind words shattered her defenses, but Talia straightened hopefully before Ailat noticed her sagging shoulders and limp smile. “If Cassius likes me, and the engagement proceeds, we’ll have to leave our home.”

  Something cool and hard poked her palm. A swan-shaped brooch. Pink and yellow diamonds sparkled against the rose-gold metal. The yellow diamonds signified the Cygnus constellation the first Starchaser explored. It was part of their crest.

  Ailat was grinning.

  “What’s this for?” Talia asked.

  “An early wedding present.”

  “But this must have cost you . . .” Talia was embarrassed to even think about it. And she’d never inquired how many credits her family provided Ailat monthly. Talia made a mental note to secretly repay her friend. “It’s too much, Ailat.”