To think, our star system’s greatest resource will fund its destruction. To think, one pitiful terrakin is all that stands between my people and another catastrophic war.
It’s not her fault, but I hate her a little bit. That doesn’t make her special. I can’t think of anyone I don’t. Even my mother, I hate a little bit for birthing me. Why wasn’t she content with Lothan, the son who would be Emperor, the son who would make her proud? Why am I tasked with this terrakin’s rescue when I’m the one who cares the least about her? These are the mortal questions I put to the goddess that never merit divine answers.
Rest and prayer fill the remainder of the days-long journey, until my navigation system alerts me that I’ll need to alter course to avoid R’Hiza’s hazardous rings. I switch to an angled approach, cutting between the ring and the planet until my bird heats with the burn of atmospheric entry and the power shuts off, letting gravity do the work.
I hate this part. Trusting. Being pulled, helpless to resist.
Bile rises in my throat as the planet’s surface swiftly approaches, the jagged ice on the topo view hidden in thick, shame-colored clouds. My ship’s alarm sounds, and the systems switch back on, begging me to resume manual control, like I didn’t want it to begin with.
My stomach settles once I have the controls in my hands. I ignore the view out the wide window in front of me, using the topo map to navigate through the icy canyons, following the pings of the rangefinder through the opaque, frozen fog. It’s alittle like the simulator I practiced on in flight training, and the thought unclenches me a little more.
This is not the hard part, I remind myself. Rescuing the terrakin will be more difficult. And there’s the tiny detail that my fuel cells are two-thirds depleted. I have enough fuel to get of the planet surface but not much more. Those are problems for another day, though. Today’s problems are enough to handle.
I don’t know what to expect when I arrive at the illegal base. The terrakin may be held by many guards. Or perhaps it will only be Harl, the Frathik whose ship transported her. It’s his ship my rangefinder is tracking, not the female, but that’s for the best. It means there’s somewhere to dock. I’m not sure there’s a spaceport here, but if Harl can land there, so can I.
As my ship nears the target, I dip the bird’s nose down, hoping to break through the frozen water vapor and get a visual, but an alarm blares, warning me of uneven terrain, so I pull it up again. I’ll have to trust the nav and land blind.
Trust is not my strong suit.
Frix, I hate this.
I push myself through the protocol, switching the controls over to the ship before I initiate the landing sequence. Then I tip my head back against the seat, shut my eyes, and pray to Alioth. I trust the goddess far more than this frixing Frathik-made nav system.
Why am I doing this again? Of course, because of the strings. Tug, tug, and Lyro dances. Go there, kill him, find her, or else.
This is the last time. When this is over, every thread will be severed. Every debt paid. My mother will be free or dead. If she is free, the terrakin and I will both be free. If she is dead by Zomah’s hand, I’ll enjoy killing the terrakin in front of him, making him watch his chance at power drain away on the floor.
And if my mother is still captive because my brothers failed her or dear Emperor Lothan rescinds his promise of power, theterrakin dies for that, too. I did not keep our mothers safe for over a decade for nothing.
If I can’t have my prize in power, I’ll take it in freedom. And if I can’t have it in freedom, I’ll take it in blood.
Those are my last thoughts before an alarm screams, and everything goes dark.
I WAKE UP TO THE TASTEof copper, a throbbing tongue, and rough shouts telling me to free my safety harness. I fumble the clasps and fall out of the pilot’s chair, crashing into the ceiling that is now the floor. My teeth pierce my tongue a second time.
“Why didn’t you warn me I was upside down?” I growl, spitting blood and trying to right myself. The ship must have crashed. The R’Hiza-damned nav system fucked me. I knew I should have flown manual.
“If you open your lids once in a while, Two-Eyes, you’d have known,” a Frathik voice barks. “Here is a tip, pilot-to-pilot. When you’re landing, don’t do it on top of someone else’s ship!”
My blurry vision clears just in time to see two huge, Frathik-shaped figures stuff some kind of bag over me, and then I’m heaved over one of their shoulders and dragged out. My attempts to free myself from his grasp are futile. “I can walk, you idiot.”
“What’d he say?” the other Frathik asks.
“Thinks he can walk.” They both laugh, and a heavy slap lands on the back of my thighs. I’m going to kill this braxa-fucker as soon as I get a chance. “Maybe I should let him try.”
“Nah, let’s get him inside. My balls are freezing off.”
“I can remove them for you,” I offer, and they laugh again at my empty threat. I don’t have my weapons; they’re in a cabinet inside my ship. Even if I did, I can’t move my arms inside this bag.
But I’m a patient male. I’ll kill them later.
Chapter 3
Lena
“How was your date?” Rose teases over firstmeal in her and Oljin’s quarters.
They live in part of a decommissioned spaceship, the one they escaped on all those years ago. Rose has decked it out in full hippie glory, with handwoven tapestries covering the old electronics on the walls and dozens of houseplants under grow lights adding life to the corners.
