The Warlord's Daughter (17 page)

He should have told her of his impending madness. How hard he fought not to end up like Karbon. And how weary he became sometimes of the struggle. But he was too far along in his plan to derail it. For years he’d planned and plotted to destroy the empire, annihilate his father and rescue Awrenkka, bringing her under his protection. He’d pursued his plans to the point of obsession. Now she was with him and he realized he didn’t know what
to do
with her.

Because he still hadn’t ended his personal war, a war declared on a long ago day when he saw his school teacher murdered by a monster. His war with Karbon.

“Fool boy, you need to learn when to stay and when to give up. Don’t you see the lesson I am trying to teach you? Stubbornness equals stupidity to persevere for the sake of persevering.”

Giving in equaled letting go. Moving on. He’d told Kaz to move on. Apparently he couldn’t take his own advice. Or Karbon’s. Repulsed, he rose from the mat. He would not be reduced to the level of taking his father’s advice. Blast the dreams. “How much did you hear?”

“Enough to know you had a terrible nightmare.”

Urging him to run after Wren before he lost her. The five lights were dangerous. The dream told him so. If
he took her to the treasure he’d expose her to more danger than she was in now. It was as close to reality as any dream he’d ever had.

He stalked to a sink to splash cold water on his face then scrubbed a towel over his face and neck. He fought hard not to throw the towel down then throw her down on the bed. Ever since the ice had been cracked between them last evening, he’d been painfully aware of her presence…the heat of her skin…her scent. And her voice, her manner, her eyes, her little nose—every freepin’ thing about her.

“You said you have trouble sleeping. Is it always because of the nightmares?”

“Yes. But I don’t recall having this particular dream before.” There were many versions of his past. He’d rather see none of them. Unfortunately, he was forced to relive all of them. His skull throbbed. Tipping his head back to stretch his neck, he stifled a groan. His throat ached, too. All things considered, he felt better than how he used to feel following a beating before nanomeds kicked in to wipe out the pain. Too bad the meds never could eliminate the pain on the inside, the pain no one could see. “Did I yell?” The very idea embarrassed him. He’d never showed such weakness in his waking moments.

“Only my name. You begged me not to leave you.” She searched his face, her expression worried, tender.

He crossed the room to don a fresh shirt over his tank. He felt the need to keep in motion around her. He wasn’t certain what would happen if he stopped.

“You need to go back to sleep. We’re going to be at Issenda tomorrow.”

“The only way I can is by exercising to the point of exhaustion, or drinking whiskey. I don’t care to medicate.” Numbing himself like his father did, he’d risk accelerating down the same path.

She lay down on his sleeping mat. “I’ll sleep with you.”

“Ah, fates. Wren, there’s no privacy. There’s—”

“Sleep with you. Not anything more.” She sighed. “Sabra was right when she told me that males had simple minds—sex and food, and that’s all.”

“That’s far from the truth.” Wasn’t it? “Sleeping with me is dangerous for another reason. I thrash about in my dreams. I may hurt you.”

That won him a withering look.

He heaved a sigh of defeat. Feeling a smile on his lips, he lay down next to her, on his back. She removed her glasses, then dropped her head on his chest as she slid her arms around him. He embraced her, carefully at first, then with increasing relief. She’d come to give him comfort. By the fates, he’d take it.

And so they lay there, Wren tucked close. Having her near steadied him as no meds, no shot of whiskey or even hours of brutal exercise could. None of those avenues brought a sense of safety, the knowledge that he wasn’t alone. His thoughts floated back to his childhood on the estate. The beatings he cared not to think of, but afterward, made pretty again by nanomeds, he’d run out to play with Kaz and Bolivarr, both of who remained inexplicably untouched by Karbon’s cruel hand. He’d run to them to be made human again in his soul.

Wren made him feel human again in his soul.

Aral stared at the ceiling, feeling warm and hollowed
out, and oddly reassured. It wasn’t just her physical closeness; it was something else. Something more.

Something totally outside his experience.

Sex for him had always been a purely bodily pursuit. He’d never remained with a woman afterward, let alone actually spent the night with someone. Refusing Wren’s attempts to sleep with him had been a kneejerk reaction, a compulsion to distance himself that had become habit over the years. Yet it felt natural wanting to hold her like this, good, and right, somehow. They belonged together. Perhaps that’s what they saw in each other’s eyes that long ago day.

Judging by the sound of Wren’s slow, even breaths she’d fallen asleep. Carefully, he turned, holding her against his body. He let his eyes close, hoping perhaps sleep would come.

Sometime later—his sense was that it was hours later—the ship’s wake-up chime sounded, rousing him and Wren from bed.

“Did you sleep?” she asked.

He paused, thought about it, and let out a quick, quiet laugh. “I did.” He lifted up on an elbow, leaning over her as she drowsily searched his face, trying to see him without her glasses. “Sleeping with you could well become a habit.”

Heat radiated off her powerful little body, and his loins tightened. His initial intentions were not sexual, but her sheer proximity, her scent, her curves, her mouth, it was overwhelming, to say the least. “Other things may be habit forming as well,” he confessed, winning a grin from her as he ran a hand up her thigh. The muscles in her legs flexed at his touch. Someday, he wanted her to
know the pleasure those strong thighs could bring them both, wrapped around his hips as he made love to her.

“Aral.” She sighed and brought her hand to his face, tracing his features, “seeing” him. He lifted her hand and pressed his lips to the heel of her palm. He followed the ridge of her tendons to the pulse on the inside of her wrist and felt her shiver. Her other hand slid around the back of his head to pull him closer, her lips parting.

“All right—everyone up!” Vantos was marching through the ship, banging on a pan to rouse them. “I’ve got Issenda on my scopes. No time to dilly-dally. This ain’t a hotel—”

He came to a halt by Aral’s sleeping mat. “Well,” he said. “I stand mistaken. Happy honeymoon.”

This time Wren turned red. Aral brought his mouth to her ear. “Let him think what he wants. Let everyone.”

A datapad dropped onto the mat. “Got the morning news. I think you two lovebirds might be interested. I know I was.”

Aral took the pad and sat up. “Bloody hells.” For a few blissful moments he’d forgotten about the galaxy they’d left behind. Now reality returned to slap him in the face. “Mission: Origins Seeks to Unravel Mystery of Ara Ana.” He scanned the text as he wrapped his mind around their new dilemma. “Ara Ana isn’t a person. It’s a place.”

“That’s right,” Vantos said. “And unless our asses get moving the Triad’s about to beat us to it.”

A
S THE
C
LOUD
S
HADOW
neared Ara Ana, Hadley listened with increasing dread to a security bulletin coming from the Ring. Another Borderlands settlement had been attacked. She and her central staff gathered in her office at Bolivarr’s request.

Hadley’s first officer reacted to the news with alarm. “These are remote outposts—almost as far away from everything as we are.” Garwin was understandably nervous. The archaeologist had spent a career avoiding war.

“Copycats?” she asked Bolivarr. The incidents brought back memories of her previous assignment when the
Unity
had pursued a group of Coalition extremists masquerading as Drakken skulling raiders. They’d wanted the treaty to fail by turning sentiment against the Drakken. But that was many months ago. “Or maybe loyalists.”

Bolivarr nodded. “The resistance was my first thought, too, but these attacks are deliberate and specific. They’re targeting religious sanctuaries only.”

“Horrifying,” Sister Chara said. “I thought peace would bring an end to the persecution.”

Bolivarr shook his head. “I don’t think it’s motivated by intolerance.”

“The slaughter of believers is exactly that.” Garwin shook his head. “Your people were committed to genocide.”

“My people.” Bolivarr’s flat tone caught Hadley’s attention. His normally placid gaze had sharpened with anger. “My people are your people now.”

“My people wouldn’t desecrate sisters of the goddess.”

Hadley placed her hands flat on the desk. “Lieutenant Tadlock, these are unprovoked terror attacks. Acts of hatred. Battle-Lieutenant Bolivarr is a full-fledged member of this crew, and a Triad citizen, as are we all. As members of my crew, you will treat each other with respect.” It reminded her of the conversation she’d had with Cadet Holloway the first day out. Now the adults needed a refresher.

He cleared his throat. “Captain. My apologies. It’s just that no coalition-born citizen would do…this.”

The rape and skulling of nineteen priestesses. It was, Hadley thought, a deed too horrible to contemplate.

“Monsters did this,” the man said.

“Yes,” Bolivarr said. “
Monsters
did. My point exactly. I may not know what I was, exactly, but I know the man I am now. I despise the warlord and all he’s done. I’ve made it my life’s commitment to see atrocities like this stopped and the creatures who commit them punished and stripped from the face of the galaxy.”

Garwin seemed to accept Bolivarr’s statement, but the division was troubling. When pressured, her crew tore apart along old scar lines. It had been like that on the
Unity,
despite its lofty name, and it would be like that for years to come, she was afraid.

“That said, I don’t think intolerance was the motiva
tion,” Bolivarr continued. “We are seeing a systematic sweep of priestess sanctuaries. In each case they ransacked the sanctuary’s stash of valuables. Evidence also points to interrogations taking place before the killings. They’re looking for something.”

“And here we are headed for a planet supposedly loaded with religious relics,” Garwin put in, his gaze darting outside as if dreading the sight of Ara Ana.

“No one knows the destination coordinates.”

Thank the gods.
“In light of our destination, and its religious overtones, and the nature and location of the attacks, I’ve placed the ship on level-two alert as a precaution,” she said. She stood, pausing to look at each of her senior staff in turn. “What happened here tonight and across the Borderlands should remind us all why our mission is so important. The birthplace of the goddesses, ladies and gentlemen. We might very well rediscover it.” She thought of the day Prime-Admiral Zaafran had called her to his office:
A fable the lost scripture may be and the treasure that surrounds it, but to entertain the promise of such a discovery, to dream of it…it is what our weary, war-ravaged people need. To know the goddesses existed…that they were real. That true goodness exists, Hadley.
“Gods know this galaxy could use some goodness right now. It starts with us. We can’t find what we don’t know ourselves.”

She redoubled her commitment to complete the mission without incident. She would not fail Zaafran. She would not fail this galaxy.

B
ORROWED
T
IME
DROPPED
to a landing on the odd little world of Issenda. It was lumpy and small, warmed be
tween two suns, one as primary and the other distant, never letting night engulf the world fully. Wren’s deteriorating glasses made seeing the new world around her difficult. It smelled fresh, unlike Zorabeta, and the air was still and temperate. The gravity was lighter here, making her feel as if she could run and leap great distances. There was no time to test her theory. They had to load up on supplies, see a doctor and leave. If they didn’t, the Triad expedition would beat them to Ara Ana. Mission: Origins. She’d not be able to complete her promise to Sabra.

Wren, like the others, was dressed as a simple trader. Disguising herself as a priestess when amongst them was not a good idea, they’d agreed. Hefting her gun in her hand, she marched down the gangway, the gravity making her feel a bit dizzy. Aral caught up to her. “Slow down,” he said.

“I’m nervous.”

“This place is about as safe as we’re going to get. We took every precaution.”

“About my eyes.” She adjusted her glasses, squinting up at him. “I’ve never seen how everyone else sees.”

“That will be a wonderful thing—to be able to see well for the first time. Or are you afraid to know what I really look like? Perhaps my looks will frighten you away.”

He actually made her smile. Then her doubts returned. “Will sight give me too much power? Is my vision all that’s holding me back from becoming like the warlord?”

“Your heart is good and pure. That’s what keeps you from becoming your father.”

“You see what you want to see.” She couldn’t look at him. His eyes would have that tender look she wasn’t
sure she deserved. She didn’t know herself well enough yet. “I know what’s inside,” she insisted, softer. “And I will keep it from hurting anyone else.”

“I know your heart,” Aral argued. “And I will keep anyone from hurting
you.
”

The others commented on the beauty of the surroundings. If she squinted hard enough, Wren could make out a lavender sky, red, conical peaks that reminded her of the castles she used to build with dribbled sand at the lakeshore as a girl. Some of the red hills wore tufts of trees like funny, feathered hats.

“Twilight here is downright eerie,” Vantos said.

“Why?” Wren found the landscape interesting but not frightening. It was then she noticed the shadows across the parched ground: long, dark ones, crisscrossed with fainter ones at an angle. “The shadows look like fingers.”

Kaz agreed. “Like light passing through someone’s hands.”

“In prayer.” Vantos laced his hands together. “The heavenly mother Herself prays over Issenda, keeping watch. That’s what the sisters here say.”

“Is that what you found so eerie, Vantos?” Kaz asked.

“Hells yeah. I was a mixed-up seventeen-year-old boy, and not religious at all. I was terrified thinking the heavens were keeping an eye on me. I behaved while I was here—I had to. It settled me down enough to find a job when I left and actually hold on to it.” He whispered. “I’m kind of glad they won’t remember me.”

Two priestesses waited at the gates to the sanctuary, a vast area of reddish, mud-colored conical huts, squashed versions of the hills. A lively market promised a source of supplies. Incense sweetened the still air.
The sisters didn’t resemble the ones she’d seen everywhere else. The Order of the Hand of Sakkara, they wore body-hugging robes. Strong and athletic, they flexed arms that were bare from the shoulder down, their skin covered in henna tattooing. One woman had blond hair, thick and unadorned, reaching to the backs of her knees. The other was dark, her skin tone almost too deep for the henna to show, with equally long and curly dark brown hair. Except for long hair allowed to fall free from under silken wrappings, their heads and their faces from the nose down were wrapped in the same silk as their robes, allowing only a view of their eyes, ageless and serene, like the priestess she’d seen on Zorabeta. Nothing would seem to unsettle these women. They were eternally calm. Several times Wren had felt that kind of calm steal over her. Then her inherited temper would run roughshod over it.

“Your instruments of war, please. Place them here. We will watch over them as we do all such items.” The blond priestess waved at a polished, flat rock. Vantos had already told them to expect to be disarmed.

Wren had gone from never wanting to touch a weapon to not wanting to let it go. The vulnerability made her stomach ache. Aral pressed reassuring fingers on the small of her back.

“Blessed are all who enter here,” the darker priestess said, allowing them to pass while her partner observed them. “Welcome back, Vartekeir.”

The runner almost stumbled. Her dark eyes crinkled, suggesting a smile. “We remember
all,
” she said without him having to ask the question. The sister’s gaze shifted to Wren, lingering on her long enough to spark
alarm. Then she greeted her with a pointed nod and waved their group past.

“She acted as if she’s seen me before.” Pushing on her glasses, Wren stared over her shoulder until Aral yanked on her arm, tugging her forward. She felt for the pendant snug beneath her bra band and made sure it wasn’t showing.

As “godless Drakken,” she, Kaz and Aral couldn’t be expected to know of Ara Ana, the mythical birthplace of the goddesses. Vantos had been raised with almost as little factual knowledge of religion. “Soldiers prayed twice,” he’d explained. “When going into battle and when coming out, first to plead for survival and second to give thanks for it.”

Wren took in the sanctuary of Issenda with wonder. The priestesses looked like goddesses themselves, fit and strong. In one area, she saw several women training with long sticks, trying to knock each other off an elevated log. Others practiced martial arts. All of it under the strange shadows. The praying hands.

Sabra would have fit right in. She’d have been so happy here. But her duty to Wren and the warlord never would have allowed it. She’d sacrificed for Wren. She’d died protecting her. The Triad expedition would not keep Wren from fulfilling her vow to Sabra. The Triad would not keep her from atoning for her family’s misdeeds. Misdeeds on a grand, almost unimaginable scale.

Kaz and Vantos went to the market to gather provisions for the next leg of their journey. Aral accompanied Wren to the sanctuary’s hospital. The closer she got, the more slowly she walked. “It will give you more control, not less,” he tried to convince her as they neared the large hut.

They kneeled at the bowl where they were to leave their “gifts,” an indirect payment for the procedure. To Aral’s funds, Wren added one of the pouches of gems she’d brought all the way from Barokk. It was far more than needed, but not to Wren. Nothing would ever make up for the killings ordered by the warlord, but every small bit helped. Wren kept her gaze trained respectfully on the ground the entire way into the room where the procedure would be performed.

A short, well-swathed sister attendant escorted them to a small, clean room. Like the others here, she used few words, speaking only when necessary.

“She’s a bit nervous, Doctor,” Aral said as the healer examined Wren’s eyes.

“It’s a simple procedure. It won’t take long.”

“What are the risks?”

“Virtually none. The nanomeds are engineered to reform the lens. If the eye itself was damaged, perhaps then I couldn’t offer such an optimistic prognosis, but her eyes are healthy, only the lenses malformed.” She smiled at Wren. “You’ll be able to see for light years in just a few moments.”

“A hundred paces would suit me fine.”

Aral clasped her hand.
Easy.

The doctor applied the nano-drops. Tingling and itching began as the specifically programmed and targeted meds went to work, knitting, stretching and healing. Her eyes watered and stung.

Aral’s hand tightened over hers. “Does it hurt?”

“It feels like pinpricks.”

“The sensation will soon go away,” the doctor said, and handed Aral a towel to help wipe the tears. “Blink.
Keep blinking. Now dry your eyes and keep them closed until I return.” She patted Wren on the hand and stood, addressing Aral. “Make sure she does.”

“I will.”

They were left alone in the quiet room, an ex-battlelord and the daughter of his former leader in the care of a deeply religious sect. It seemed surreal. “I used to think my father was a powerful man and respected across the galaxy,” she said quietly. “I thought he did what he had to in order to keep the empire strong and free of religious fanatics who wanted to tear down our civilization. I figured some might not care for him because of that, but he was a good and fair leader.” Even now, a tiny part of her held out hope that Aral would agree and dismiss all that she’d heard to the contrary as jealous gossip. All the wickedness she’d begun to suspect in herself would go up in smoke.

“A good and fair leader? Is that what they told you on Barokk?” He made a disdainful sound in his throat.

“I worshipped him.” And it mortified her now. “I was never able to live up to his expectations.”

“Be glad, Awrenkka. Be proud that you’re not someone whose actions he’d admire. And that you never had to dirty your own hands in his demise.” He paused. “The Triad wasn’t responsible for Karbon’s capture. I was. I tracked him down and handed him over to the high command.”

He said it matter-of-factly, but it didn’t quite hide his struggle with what he’d done. What he’d had to do. She squeezed his hand. “I heard the queen killed my father. Queen Keira. She’s my age. Can you imagine how mortified he must have been? I’m not sure how much
thought he ever gave to his death, but if I had to guess, he’d have wanted it at the hands of a real warrior. Like you, Aral.”