FORGELIGHT, JHERAKO, DROSERO
Seated at the long, narrow table, not far from King Vorn and even closer to the grand duke, Isaura was grateful for the young Lirra beside her. The ever-stiff Prince Rezik sat across from them and worked quite hard to ignore the beguiling, skittish princess. Conversation tittered, swelled, and fell. Mostly around Isaura but not to her, making her again feel as if she didn’t belong, no matter how often she argued the lie. It also made the ache for Dusan much keener, the longing for his smooth baritone, his steadiness. His strength.
A laugh resonated from across the room.
Dusan!
She was turning in that direction before she caught herself. No. Of course it wasn’t him but the Master Hunter. Their gazes connected, and she could not help but smile. Her hunter had not landed far from the Citadel. The parallels between the two were uncanny. Roman deBurco’s ancestral line bred strong, powerful men. It had been his influence, his sage words that had grown Dusan into the man she met in Moidia then fell in love with. What was Roman’s story? His journey to become the man who taught Dusan to choose honor over selfishness, sacrificing love for a people and realm he did not even know.
“He is a . . . hunter like Medora Marco, is he not?” came Princess Lirra’s quiet voice at her left.
Isaura smiled. “Aye. His name is Roman, and he trained Marco. They are very alike.”
“Kyria Isaura,” punched a commanding tone from her right.
Isaura jerked toward the voice and flinched at the man now seated there, having replaced Rhayld in the chair. Black-haired and olive-complected, the man smiled at her. His dark beard and neatly trimmed hair were a striking complement to his near-black eyes. She straightened, somehow feeling caught in some wrongdoing. Where had he come from? More importantly—who was he?
He inclined his head but little. “Would ask speak true, yes?”
His broken use of the Kalonican language made her work to understand his meaning. “I . . . of course.” Or was he saying he would speak true? She silently begged him to supply his name and relieve her ignorance.
“Months four past, seen on waters queen and king.” His eyes seemed to spark. “Yes?”
She faltered, her mind untangling the strange manner of speech—and the offended inflection in his jumbled words. What waters? When he said king and queen, did he mean her and Dusan, or Vorn and Aliria? She and Dusan had been on a waterborne vessel once about four months ago on their way here to speak with Vorn.
“Yes?” Even as she answered, she recalled the king mentioning an emperor whose speech gave him a headache.
His lips flattened. “Yet no come honor to Strune and Selqie.”
“I . . . I do beg your mercy,” she said, shifting to face him, hoping that might help her decipher his meaning, “but your words confuse me.”
“Strune and Selqie are the sigils of Shadar and Saigo,” whispered Lirra at her back, a slight touch as she leaned closer. “He’s Czar Asrak, twentieth of his name. He implies you and your bound dishonored him by not coming to see him when you were on the ship.”
How the plagues did he know they had been on a ship? “It was a very short trip,” she reassured him. “In fact, we fled in fear of Medora Marco’s life. There were raiders—”
“Nej.”
“No,” Lirra whispered the translation.
Asrak jutted his jaw, the silver and gold threads of his tunic—finer than any she had seen before—glinted beneath the candles and touchstones. “Nej, did not honor Strune.” He spat to the side. “Spit out aetos.” He made a pfft noise and brushed his hands as if to dry them off. “Shed disgrace by not bring.”
Aetos, she assumed, referred to Kalonica. Her heart hammered hard, indignant that he would assault Dusan’s honor, especially when he was not here to defend himself. Surely, he would know what to say, how to salvage this. “I see your point,” she began, remembering a first rule her father had taught her long ago to help soothe wounded egos. “I do beg your mercy . . .” Yet something in the air or his demeanor warned her not to placate. “You saw our boat?”
“Jes! With eyes two.” He pointed at his black eyes. “Rude. Disgrace.” He spat again. “Peace make not with aetos.”
“And yet,” she said, cocking her head as if parsing his meaning, “you did not honor us with your visit. To see us, you must have been in close enough proximity to make an introduction possible.”
“It land not.”
“Shadar and Jherako are not on the best terms, so he was unlikely to come,” Lirra explained.
“But you were close enough to see us.”
His face mottled, reddened. “Jes! And nothing say to Strune honor. Dis aetos king no great.”
Fury tightened her chest and made it hard to breathe. His stubbornness and insistence on clinging to a perceived slight when she had apologized . . . Mayhap she would take a turn about the hall. Anything to remove herself from this man, who thought to chastise her and Dusan. “You dishonor me again, Czar—”
“Shame!”
She rose quickly, unwilling to hear him assault Dusan any further.
He clapped his palms together, pressed the fingertips to his nose, and inclined his head. “Jur servant me. With all mercy beg.”
Chin lifted, Isaura stared down and to the side, where his black hair shone nearly blue beneath the massive iron candelabra light. She suddenly became aware of the near silence of the hall. Eyes fixed on their encounter. She swallowed the rising anger, her stomach churning with nerves and nausea. What was she to do? She needed fresh air and some breathing room. To leave these nobles to their politicking.
Don’t walk away, don’t walk away.
Roman watched from the side with King Vorn as the encounter between Kalonica and her uneasy ally, Shadar, played out before the gathered crowd. The young beauty his nephew had taken to wife had no idea the quagmire she stood in and how easily she could upend those tentative relations.
“I thought she didn’t do politics,” Vorn muttered with more amusement than was proper.
“Doesn’t do them and doesn’t understand are two different things.” Roman anak’d the room, taking in the nervous scents. Shadar was small, but they were fierce, relentless about their perverse sense of honor. Not like the Kynigos Code, yet not terribly unlike it either. Where hunters would remand a subject to authorities for justice, Shadarans would simply chop off the heads of those who dishonored them.
Unbelievably, the older dark-haired man pressed his palms together and inclined his head to her. Shock rippled through the room, melding with Roman’s.
“Well.” Vorn huffed a laugh. “I know not the last time a czar of Shadar bowed to anyone.”
Yet this young queen in her green silk gown, golden hair, and crown had reduced the ferocious Asrak to cowering. What would Marco think? Likely, he would’ve laid this man out for speaking to Isaura so rudely.
“He is making things worse. Save her,” Vorn prodded. “Before this is undone.”
Isaura glowered at the czar, her efflux rank with disgust and censure.
Roman almost chuckled. “I do not think it is the kyria who needs saving.”
“You misunderstand.” Vorn nudged Roman forward. “He will now want her for his harem. With Marco missing, it would be too easy for the czar to say he was dead and claim the queen for himself.” He strode forward. “Go.”
Stranger things had happened on this planet. “You take care of the czar.”
“I prefer my head where it is, thank you,” Vorn said with a wry grin but aimed for the two all the same.
Roman homed in on Isaura and kept his expression dark as he erased the distance.
Her gaze struck his and she started. Others would not see it, but he did—as well as the spurt that rushed through her Signature. She was stressed, tired, overwhelmed, all agitating into an angry concoction that had stolen over her by surprise. He extended an arm to her.
“I think it is time to present our proposal to the masses.” Delivering a seething glare to the czar, who indeed reeked of admiration and much more, Roman put the lascivious man in his place as he guided her away.
Relief emanated from her, then scurried into a ball of nerves. “From one fire to another,” she muttered. Halfway across the room, she sighed. “When is he coming home, Roman? I tire of politics.”
“If you think politics will draw Marco home, you are gravely mistaken. He detested them.”
She laughed, then touched her forehead. “Aye, more than I do, which did not seem possible.” Her Signature now swirled with grief, ache, and desperation as they settled into a quiet corner. “Was it that obvious I needed a rescue? I could think of nothing but throttling him or sending my moon discs spinning.”
“You do Marco justice here, but not all are of the same mettle. Asrak, according to Vorn, will now want you for his harem.”
She scoffed but then paled. “Does he not know I am with child?”
“That likely makes you more attractive.” He appreciated the way she recoiled.
A bell tinkled through the room.
“I would welcome you all officially to Forgelight and the opening of the Conclave of Sovereigns.” King Vorn’s voice boomed across the ballroom. Forks came to rest, glasses set down, and chatter died as the formidable ruler stood at the head of the feasting tables. “It is an honor to host this event. While no expense was spared to bring in the finest food from across Drosero, the real treasures sit here at these tables.”
“Roman,” Isaura said, turning to him slightly, chin tucked. “I would ask—” Her hands were on her stomach—womb. “Dusan knew . . . he knew Kersei carried a son. Are you also able to tell gender?”
An easy deflection. “Marco was gifted with the brand that enabled him to see the adunatos of a person reflected in their eyes. Kersei had two lights—hers and the babe’s—a boy. I’m afraid I have no such gift.”
“I thought . . .” Confusion rippled across her tawny brow. “So you . . . you cannot tell . . .”
“Ask him, Isaura. Ask Marco when he returns.”
“You are right.” She fell quiet, her sadness nearly palpable as she gazed up at Vorn on the dais. For several long ticks, she stood in silence, but her efflux swam with a gamut of emotions. “Dusan invades my dreams . . .”
Something in her Signature shifted with those words, with whatever she recalled, and betrayed a fervent hope. She was dreaming of Marco, but did she realize . . . “The dreams . . . how often?”
She blushed prettily. “Often. A lot, yet . . .” She sighed. “Not enough. Never enough. I would have him back.”
Mayhap he had guessed right. It ignited hope in him that mirrored hers. That Marco would return and bring the answer, the response to the great war foretold for centuries.
“The thing is,” she whispered, as he led her back to the table where he assumed the now-empty seat beside hers, “the dreams are not like most. It is like we are together. Really together, not some intangible place in my thoughts. And he speaks of things too impossible for my mind to conjure—things I have never before heard, so how I can dream them?” She sighed. “He tells me what is happening with him, and I tell him of all . . . this.”
So it was more than dreams. “It keeps hope alive.”
“Yes,” she said urgently, nearly laughing. Tears glossing her eyes. Then she remembered the speech Vorn was giving and whispered, “Yes, exactly.”
No, he would not tell her. Not yet. “Keep dreaming, Isaura. Dream and lead him home.”
Darkness collapsed on the ballroom, stealing her response. Isaura stilled, attuned to her surroundings, wishing she had her discs. “What . . .?”
“It is well,” Roman said calmly. “The king’s demonstration.”
“And now,” intoned Vorn, “lights!”
A strange but powerful light surged through the ballroom. Too bright, yet not as bright as the sun, it made the guests squint. Fingers to her brow, Isaura looked up to the candelabra. Wicks still smoking, the candles were not what gave off the light, but instead a different candelabra lowered.
“Electric light,” Vorn said with a barked laugh. “Is it not magnificent? The entirety of Forgelight even now undergoes renovations to be fitted with the electrics. Revealing it here seemed appropriate, considering what must be addressed on this floor before you return to your fortresses and palaces.”
“You cannot push this on us,” Emissary Rudan of Iaizon snapped. “The people are not ready, and Iaizon’s infrastructure is complicated by the tundra.”
“Regardless of readiness, with the Symmachian infiltration, technology is upon us and we must either seize it,” Vorn asserted, holding both hands as if he gripped horns, “or be destroyed by it!”
“Destroyed?” balked a short, bearded man.
“President Sotui,” Roman muttered to her. “Afraid of his own shadow.”
“How can we be destroyed by technology that is not present?”
“Surely, he cannot be this naïve,” Isaura whispered.
“It is here. Kalonica has been directly affected by technology,” Vorn said. “I would have Elder Mavridis speak to what he witnessed.”
Her father stood, his gaze striking hers for a moment. “It is not every day one must put his disgrace on display.” His grumbled words earned a few chuckles, though she saw the pain it cost him. “Months past, we were in Trachys along the eastern shore of Kalonica. Medora Marco and our kyria”—he inclined his head respectfully to Isaura—“were there for a short diversion. Marco was stolen from us in the middle of the night. The Plisiázon and I, along with the medora’s regia, gave chase to the enemy, losing them when they boarded an aircraft with our medora and stole away into the sky.”
His words shoved that terrible night into her mind’s eye again.
Dusan’s gaze hit hers. “Isaura.”
Alarm speared her, aware that something was terribly wrong. Shadows moved, tore at them. “Dusan!” She thought of the garden, of the man who attempted to harm her there. They were here. They had come for her—them.
His expression went wild and frantic as men ripped him away from her.
A painful crack against her temple plunged her into darkness.
Tears burned, but Isaura restrained them, the memory all too fresh. She suddenly wondered—had Dusan seen two lights in her eyes as they touched, as he was taken? Is that why his eyes widened? By all accounts, she had already conceived . . .
“Dream and lead him home.”
A touch at her elbow pulled her back to the present, to the table. Roman nodded to the crowd, who sat watching her. She had the uncomfortable realization she’d missed words directed at her.
“Kyria Isaura,” Vorn said, likely repeating his words, “would you please share what Medora Marco told you, what he saw . . . here?” He nodded, encouraging her.
The ships? Earlier, they had agreed it should be mentioned, but she had not fathomed being the one to do that. “Of course.” She wet her lips and managed a smile. “During a tour of the wastelands, Medora Marco, who is also a Kynigos”—she indicated to Roman—“detected a scent in the air that both excited and concerned him. He was certain there were airships here, somewhere on Drosero.”
Nervous titters and gasps skittered around the room, but she plunged onward. “Marco was determined to rout the fetor, as he called it, so we traveled south to meet King Vorn and Queen Aliria. One night, he inquired.”
“Inquired?” Vorn barked a laugh. “No, that is too tame for the medora in the north. Marco was a bloodhound on the hunt. He all but demanded I come out with it.”
“With what?” grumbled Emperor Yhachi.
“Forgive me, Queen Isaura,” Vorn said. “Please continue.”
“As a hunter responsible for the care and maintenance of his own ship, he recognized the fetor easily and asked King Vorn if he had ships, though he knew they were here.” She looked to the gregarious Vorn. “When he returned after seeing the ships with you . . . in earnest, I have never seen him so giddy. He loves flying and knew that, faced with a formidable enemy in the skies, Kalonica needed more than blades or discs.”
“What ships?” Prince Rezik demanded. “Where?”
“That,” Vorn said, his grin vanishing, “is a very well-guarded secret.”
“Why?” Princess Lirra asked quietly. “The purpose of this conclave is to encourage openness and unity. If you are to keep your secrets, why taunt us with them?”
“And your treasure storeroom vault, Princess,” the king challenged, “will you grant us all access to the jewels and coin locked within?”
Lirra blanched, her gaze skimming the room until it fell on her plate. But then she straightened. “Treasures of Giessen do not hold the hope for our planet. Those ships do—can.”
“Aye,” Vorn said, a dangerous glint in his dark eyes, “and how am I to know you, a beautiful young princess with her throne at stake, has not been bought by Symmachia the same as our Hirakyn neighbors?”
Lirra startled. “I would never!”
“Perhaps.” Vorn remained unyielding. “And neither would I.” He scratched his beard, glancing to his queen. “The time will come when their location will no longer be a secret, but that time is not now. The skycrawlers have made no secret of wanting Drosero as their own and have shown their willingness to do whatever they must to make it happen, from controlling the rex next door to stealing the medora in the north.”
Isaura’s heart sputtered at the way he trampled those words so quick and light, as if he talked of nothing more than a dog in the street. She knew that was not his intent, but it smarted all the same.
“Symmachian traitors are here. They may even be among us,” Vorn challenged.
“They may be you,” Prince Rezik asserted.
Vorn sharpened his gaze on the young prince at the same time Isaura noticed Roman ease forward, narrowing his focus on Waterflame’s ruler.
What was this?
“Aye,” grumbled Emperor Yhachi, “the sapling has a point. What if it is you and you are controlling the ships?”
“Then,” Vorn said with the charm of a man courting a woman, “you are all in a trap and as good as dead.”
A wave of something rushed through the room, and Isaura drew away from it as she would a flame.
“Good friends.” Queen Aliria rose, her belly nicely round with the Jherakan heir she carried. “It is true what the king states—the enemy has shown itself shrewd and swift, willing to seize both doubt and fear. Capitalize on them. Twist those fears into irrationality and”—she gave them a sorrowful look—“mistrust and mistakes.”
She glided to Vorn’s side, and though she was a good head shorter, she seemed completely his equal in stature and presence. No wonder the king was smitten with the lady . . . Or was it Lady as Crey of Greyedge and his men had insisted? “The pilots are training, learning—an enormous feat as they must understand the mechanics of an aircraft before they have even used electricity to light their homes. So please—let us guard those heroes with zealous fervor, as they are our best hope.”
“But what can a few skyships do against the skycrawlers?” someone shouted.
“It’s true,” said a man Isaura had not yet met. He leaned forward, sliding his plate out of the way and resting his forearms on the table. “Symmachians have thousands. Their armada is comprised of people from across Kedalion and now Herakles. They are trained, some new to flying, some having served in the fleet for decades. There are even those known as Eidolon, the elite of their elite. The best. They are said to drop from the sky and are equal to your”—he looked to Mavridis—“what did you call yourself?”
“Plisiázon,” Mavridis answered with a scowl.
“Then this is impossible!” Rezik proclaimed. “We should just surrender—”
“No!” Czar Asrak banged a fist on the table, porcelain plates and cups rattling. “No, not surrender.”
“There will be no surrender.” Vorn’s ferocity charged through the debate.
“But it’s impossible to win,” President Sotui balked, his face a mixture of terror and rage. “They outnumber us. One planet against an entire Quadrant is madness!”
“No.” Vorn thrust a fist up. “It’s a start.”
“A start? What does that mean?” Yhachi demanded.
“There are others who can help us. Who were long ago sworn to assist mankind.” Vorn glanced at his queen, and the look she gave him seemed to silence the room. “Please?” he whispered quietly.
Mouth tight, she appeared stricken. “I told you they will not—”
Vorn considered her for a long moment before turning to the gathered. “I have a hope that my beautiful Lady tells me is foolish and impossible.”
Aliria now looked livid, shaking her head as if to beg him.
“I would beseech the help of Deversoria in defending this planet.”
Silence gaped, then a swell of laughter rushed in, mocking the king. “No wonder you are called the Errant.”