Falco Invictus: On the Forge of War (29 page)

Sharr cleared his throat. Images of the
destruction of his home state flashed in his mind. “Connecticut did
not fair well. The Strategic Oil Reserves in New Haven harbor were
bombed. The environmental disaster that followed swept across the
state. Groton was targeted as well. Everyone we knew and cared for
perished.”

It was not the exact truth Sharr knew, but
it was the most succinct way for him to explain to her the world
she had left was no more.

“And how did you survive?”

“Planning and luck.”

His aura of command began to have an effect
on Aria. She actually felt herself swoon as he spoke. His raw,
animal like power attracted her.

It was hard not to miss the brooding
expression in Sharr Khan's blue-gray eyes. True, he had always been
the strong silent type, a condition of his poetic nature Aria had
seen and even appreciated that she was his muse. But the sense of
darkness had grown palatable.

“For someone with so much, you look as
though you are very sad, Roderik.”

“Do you really think Aria that one achieves
such power without paying a price? I am not that unsure poet who
loved and lusted for you so long ago,” Sharr said. “Choices of life
and death are daily in my hands. Decisions that could spark war
rest before me to grapple with. Such things change a man. One
discovers that one's dark side is also strength.”

She took in his words, at last coming to
terms with what Sharr had become. Aria gave him a sultry smile and
a strand of hair fell across her eye.

Oh, he felt his heart thud painfully in his
chest. He felt weak with her here. Sharr wanted nothing more than
to hand her his uniform dagger so she could cut out his broken
heart with it. Perhaps it would free him at long last, her hand
ripping out his heart?

Lightning flashed outside.

“Are you hungry?” Sharr at last asked.

“Still trying to feed me, Roderik?” Aria
said a gleam in her eye. “You're determined to make me fat.”

Apparently Aria still had her fixation with
her weight. Ironic given her slight frame that she was so weight
conscious. It was a something that had always annoyed Sharr.

“Now, there will be none of that. You look
perfect,” he pointed out. “You always looked perfect.”

Aria melted. He was so forceful, almost
arrogant. It actually turned her on.

“I wish I could let you see yourself through
my eyes. You are a vision of beauty.” He cleared his throat again.
“I have one of the finest sushi chefs in all of Asia. The Shogun
sent him here as a gift. However since you are pregnant you won't
be eating raw fish. Perhaps some tempura and sticky rice?”

She moved incredibly close to the Shotar.
“That would be very nice.”

A ghostly specter passed across the room.
The cloaked female figure walked between Sharr and the reboot,
wavering slightly as it occupied the same space as the cloned
woman. Aria jumped with a start and gasped at the female
apparition.

Falcania glared at Aria, an envious pout on
her light-rendered face. She gazed at Aria, shaking her head in
disgust. A tiny ironic laugh emitted from Falcania's perfect maroon
lips and moved across the room toward the wall.

“W-what is… is she?” Aria stammered. She
thought for a moment that some wrathful spirit had just laid the
evil eye upon her.

“A hologram. An Artificial Intelligence.”
The Shotar watched the hologram fade back into the wall. Of all the
women to have lust after him, the AI Falcania was the strangest.
“Falcania's personality was based partly upon Nadia. I suspect she
simply expresses those emotions she shares with my T'krin.”

Sharr noticed when Falcania made her abrupt
appearance that Aria had grabbed onto his hand and was pressing
tightly. The contact of her hand felt good. He had dreamed of this
for so long.

Aria could not but notice how he went rigid
around her. She would have thought that having so many women at his
whim Roderik would finally be able to loosen up around her.

“Relax. I won't bite,”she murmured and saw
him at last fall at ease. “Hold me, please. Just let me rest in
your arms.” Aria wrapped her arms around Sharr, placing her head
against the leathery jodtok.

Pheromones, he thought.

He curled his tail around her possessively.
Sharr knew his body continued to pump them out since the first had
seen Aria in the throne room. Her lavender scent was more than
enough, achieving nearly the same chemical effect as a drug of
seduction on his senses.

The Shotar ordered the meal to be brought
for them and allowed Aria to rest against him. Clearly she was
quite comfortable in his embrace. At last, he had won the one thing
in the entire Universe that he would have sold his soul to have.
Now that the women of his dreams, the female who shaped his image
of the type of woman he desired, rested happily in his arms. In the
midst of his contentment, Sharr feared the dream would shatter and
he would wake to a nightmare.

Without any sense of her dignified station,
Nadia huddled in a corner of the hallway beside a lattice
partition, not far from her mate's office. She held herself,
canopied by her rose-colored wings and sobbed in despair.

In this most sorry state Frederika happened
upon the Queen. Frederika pulled Nadia to her feet and made the
Falcanian look her directly in the eyes.

Nadia did not really see her. She was too
lost in her emotional devastation.

“Nadia?” Frederika pushed attempting to
break the Queen out of her state of collapse. “Nadia! T'Kara,
please talk to me.”

Nadia regained her senses, her remarkable
blue eyes coming back into focus. She stared at the blonde who held
her firmly by her shoulders. Such compassion rested behind those
emerald eyes. It was almost incongruous with what the girl had been
designed to be.

She considered what her mother told her of
why Frederika had been created. It was a pleasant surprise to find
such strong compassion in her. No doubt Turhan had seen some value
in an overseer able to relate to her victims. In her mind's eye,
Nadia beheld a mirror version of Frederika, the ruthless overseer
who could enslave humanity. Most fearful to look upon, knowing such
violence rested inside the augmented girl made the Queen realize
just how dangerous a weapon Frederika could be.

Frederika was glad it was she the who found
Nadia. It would not have been prudent for one of the palace guards
to stumble upon their Queen in such a sorry state. “Are you all
right my Lady?”

“Never think that he will love either of us
more than he loves the woman with him now,” Nadia sobbed. “Do you
know what she did to him? Aria broke him. She destroyed Sharr once
and she'll do it again. I know it.”

“I'm sorry for all the trouble I have
brought to you und your family.”

“No.” The Queen touched Frederika's face.
“This is not you're doing. The weakness is his.”

“Is one woman so powerful she could unmake a
man the likes of Sharr Khan?”

Oberon once told her that Sharr had one
weakness that they knew of: women. Perhaps what he had meant to say
was that there was one woman that was his weakness?

“Yes, Aria is that woman. The fixation that
drove him to build this empire is the same passion that drove him
toward her.”

“Surely you can warn him, keep him from
failing?” hoped Frederika.

“Do you really think that I can act against
Aria without consequence?”

“You're saying that if you attempt to
dissuade Sharr of his affection for Aria you will only put a wedge
between the two of you.”

“As if her mere presence weren't enough to
do that?” The Queen nodded. “I cannot act against her. His love for
her overwhelms his judgment. Worse still, in her womb is his child.
It will be a male. I am sure of it.”

At this information Frederika gasped, held
the Queen closer.

Mention of Aria's baby caused the Queen's
hand protectively to fall over her own womb. She felt the life
throb within her. It had been so very long since she had
experienced such a connection. Frederika did not miss the
gesture.

“Und you. You are also pregnant.”

“How do you know?”

“There’s a glow about you. But since you
touched my mind, I just know. I think you unlocked something
psychic in me.” Frederika smiled. “Does he know?”

The Queen turned away, shook her head.

“Aren't you going to tell him?”

“Of course.” Before they left Kuras, Nadia
knew she had quickened. It had been difficult to keep it silent
this long. “I’d meant to do so after the Rashalon started. These
things must be handled in the right manner.”

“How can you tolerate being in Aria's
shadow?”

It was beyond the blonde's comprehension
that such a noble woman like Nadia would allow the dream of a
hopeless love to come to mean more to her mate than she
herself.

“Because,” said the Queen, “my mother forced
me to make a choice. Sacrifice my beliefs and dreams by giving up
on Sharr knowing he ached for Aria, or accept him as he was, flawed
so that together we could build an empire. My choice was to be with
him. To Sharr, I am fully devoted. And it will always be like
this.”

Frederika nodded.

“Have you picked yourself a Falcanian name?”
Nadia had at last gathered herself, once more and remembered that
she were Queen. She now stood tall, proud.

“I have. A good, strong one.”

Nadia winked. “Feel lucky. Usually Sharr
bestows them. You at least got to choose.”

“So I've heard.”

“Well, I must go reconfigure the Rashalon
Engine to accommodate the genetic mishmash my Papa used to shape
your genome. We wouldn't want to undo any of your enhancements.”
With motherly affection, Nadia touched Frederika's cheek. “Not only
do you have the DNA of nearly every royal house on the planet, but
there are traces of panther as well. Turhan was a genius.” She
smiled. “How fitting that I his daughter shall get to extend upon
his work.”

“Persian, Finn, und Bengali, you’re quite a
mix yourself,” Frederika laughed.

Both women embraced one another. “Go enjoy
your last hours as a human,” Nadia whispered. “Three days from now,
you shall be reborn a Falcanian valka.”

“Aren't you scared, Rika?” Mia asked.

Admiration glimmered in the younger woman's
eyes. Mia had come to respect Frederika since the duchess
volunteered to take the punishment which was rightfully meant for
her. When she learned the blonde was also a spy, it only added to
Frederika's the mystique. Late into the night she remained with her
friends Mia and Sabina in the apartment which had been furnished
for her within the Imperial nodor.

“Not at all. I've been in more frightful
situations.”

“No doubt,” Sabina commented, in reference
to Frederika's profession as an operative for the Teutonic Dukedom.
She now looked on Frederika in an entirely different manner. The
German girl’s compassion had won her over. “Thanks a lot for
getting us into it.”

“I think you'll enjoy life as a Falcanian,
Sabina. Und think, then you can have the Shotar's attention
whenever you like!” teased the Duchess.

“Not if the rumors about that girl your
'uncle' brought here are true.” Sabina had kept her ear to the
gossip of the harem. News traveled quickly in the palace. “A lost
love, the women say.”

“Sharr craves women. He'll be in your skirt
soon enough,” Frederika laughed. She couldn't imagine Sharr Khan
putting aside the pleasures of his harem, even for Aria. “Don’t
doubt it.”

A chime rang at her door, Frederika got up
from her place among the elaborate cushions to see who was there.
She expected Sharr might come for a visit.

“Sitara!”

“May I come in?” the Princess asked.

“Of course. It's your palace.” The blonde
stood there and gaped at Sitara, very surprised to find her here.
“I must admit I did not expect to see you.”

The Princess nodded and almost looked
embarrassed. “Rika, I must apologize to you.”

“Don't, Sitara, I understand. I had no
desire to use you.” Frederika was amazed to have heard the apology
at all from the Falcanian Princess. “I respect you und your people,
but I had to act for my own.”

“My people are now also your people,” Sitara
pointed out and licked her lips to reflect on how to explain her
presence here. “That's why I’ve come. My mother thinks that since I
let you know so much about who we are, I should stand with you now
on the eve of your Rashalon.”

So the Princess's contrition had not been of
her own accord. Queen T’Kara had sent her child here to see that
Frederika be fully prepared for the dawn. The Duchess welcomed it
all the same. Frederika wanted to be Sitara's friend.

“Here.” Sitara offered the blonde a small
wooden box.

Frederika opened the container and found one
of the triangular crystals she had seen other Falcanians wear. Her
brow raised in question. “What is it? I never asked, though I
notice everyone has one.”

“It's a trikir,” the Princess said. “They
bind us to our over-soul. It’ll begin to attune to your biorhythm,
merge with you, and allow for you to access Char, our cybernetic
afterlife. Upon your death, the trikir shall record your essence so
it’s never lost to us.”

“A soul catcher of sorts?”

“You might call it that.”

“Does this device imply resurrection?”

Abhorrence sparkled in Sitara’s violet eyes,
and she shook her head. “You noticed revulsion at the reboot. Our
forerunners debated linear resurrection, such arguments even
motivated high theater. To fully appreciate life, one must confront
the abyss and enter that gulf between here and there,” Sitara
explained. “Changeless linear resurrection it had been realized
could cause us to fall into an irrevocable stagnation. Falcanians
are proud sexual creatures. The DataStream is setup so our sparks
are recycled within each new generation.”