A wind as sharp as daggers drove through the fabric of cloak and clothing. It was winter in the northern hemisphere of Pashati. I was blinded by the lights of the landing pad, helplessly herded through the driving snow by the soldiers around me. Their shouted orders and the calls from the media just outside the fence filled my ears. Then we were inside, and a blessed silence descended.
“Keep it up,” Emmory hissed when I moved to push my hood back. We marched forward, past the gawking onlookers, and into a side corridor barred with a heavy metal door. The two BodyGuards in battle armor didn’t salute as we approached, and I heard the all-too-familiar whine of weaponry being powered up.
Emmory pulled down my hood and stepped forward.
“Scanning.” The hollow voice came from one of the Guards, indistinguishable as female or male, though the former was more likely. “Confirmed, Tracker Emmorlien Haris Tresk, Level Eight.”
Level eight? I nearly swallowed my tongue. Tracker levels were determined upon their entry to the program through a series of tests. It was less a rank and more a way to track the innate skill people like Emmory and Zin were born with.
Emmory was a damned expert tracker, the highest rank they had. Even if Portis hadn’t ratted me out, Emmory and Zin would have found me eventually.
“Confirmed, Tracker Starzin Hafin, Level Five. Visual scan commencing. Cressen Stone, identified. Gunrunner wanted on seventy-eight counts of arms trafficking and three counts of petty theft by the Solarian Conglomerate, forty-three counts of assault with a deadly weapon by the Galactic Security Board in addition to another one hundred and six counts of—”
“We’ll be here all night if you try to list everything,” I said, holding my hand up to the Guard. “Get on with it.”
“DNA scan commencing.” The woman slid up her faceplate and pressed her gloved hand to mine. “Cressen Stone, identified.”
The tension ratcheted up a notch. I examined my nails with a poorly concealed smile. Apparently, that mod was even better than I could have hoped for if it was fooling a palace Guard.
“I have record of a confirmed scan,” Emmory said.
“Your scan cannot be counted as verified, Tracker. Commencing with deep scan.” The Guard closed her hand around my wrist. The heat was immediate and intense and pretty much burned away any hope that had sprung to life about dodging this mess.
“Confirmed, Her Imperial Highness Hailimi Mercedes Jaya Bristol. Second daughter of Empress Mercedes Aadita Constance Bristol, and Heir to the Throne of Indrana.”
“Gods damn, that’s a mouthful,” I muttered. Someone behind me choked on a laugh. The soldier frowned at me.
“You are cleared to enter the palace,” she said. “Not the Squad,” she continued when we all stepped forward.
“The ITS should have been cleared,” Emmory protested.
“They are not. Proceed alone.”
I dared a glance behind me, and caught Fasé’s tentative smile. There was no time for one of my own as Emmory took me by the arm and propelled me through the now opened door. It slammed shut behind the three of us.
That frozen hand of unease was still wrapped around my spine. The booming sound of the door made it tighten further, and I felt my knees go weak.
“I don’t like this.”
“I’m in agreement with you, Highness.”
I hadn’t realized I’d spoken out loud until Emmory answered me. He released my arm and we continued in tense silence down the hallway, the rough-cut rock walls giving way to smooth-polished obsidian then white marble with bluish veins as we turned left, right, and then left again.
I’d taken this passage twice before in my life; the first time at the age of four after the state funeral for my grandmother. My father had carried me. Cire walked next to him, and Mother carried Pace until we reached the ornate double doors at the end of the tunnel.
She’d stopped just inside them and knelt on the ground, still holding Pace. Father set me down as Mother gestured us closer.
“I love you all,” she said with a reassuring smile, still our mother even though she looked so regal in the heavy brocade of her coronation sari. “Remember that, and nothing’s going to change.”
God, how she’d lied. Everything changed when we walked through those doors. Everything.
The second time I’d walked this corridor had been for my father’s funeral. A casket, my weeping sisters, and my granite-faced empress-mother, who had no time for softness in the face of a war.
I balked when we reached the ornate doors, bumping into Zin’s solid chest. He closed big hands on my shoulders with a murmured apology.
These doors looked like pretty things, decorated with a painting of Indrana’s break from the Conglomerate in the sixth century of Gaia Diaspora. But I knew from my long-ago studies that they were five feet thick, bonded metal, and virtually impenetrable.
“Highness?”
“Give me a moment, please?” I hated to beg on principle, and doing it to the men responsible for landing me in this mess seemed even more humiliating. But I needed a gods-damned minute before I walked through those doors and into the throne room. Even if all I could use it for was to lament the life I was leaving behind.
It’s all gone, Hail. I heard my father’s voice again, a long forgotten memory shooting to the surface. You can weep about it or get on with things. I can’t make the choice for you, but for my part, I never much cared for crying over spilled milk.
I threw my shoulders back, tipped my chin up, and let the royal mask slip into place. “All right,” I snarled. “Let’s get this fucking production over with.” I took a deep breath and pushed the doors open.
The massive chamber was packed to the gills—even at 2 a.m.—with nobility and anyone else who could wrangle an invitation to my homecoming. Nothing like this had happened in the history of Indrana, and more than a thousand pairs of eyes stared at me in breathless anticipation.
The stillness in the throne room couldn’t have been more absolute if someone had dropped a silencer-nuke.
However, the whispers started before I reached the halfway point, growing like a rolling wave on the Lakshitani Sea.
I kept my eyes fixed on the golden rays protruding from the top of the throne rather than looking at my mother as I walked over the slick white marble floor.
We hit the line of jagged black stone, the obsidian jutting up in sharp spikes from the smooth floor. No one, not even family, crossed the line without the empress’s permission.
I dropped to my knees. Nearly twenty years of habit had me almost keeping my eyes up. A necessary requirement in Po-Sin’s company, it would have really started things off on a sour note with Mother—the kind of sour notes that ended up with someone bleeding. So instead I lowered my eyes and bowed until my face was just a hairsbreadth from the sharp edges of the rock. Emmory and Zin flanked me, echoing the motion.
“Mother,” I said, without looking up. “I am come home.” My voice echoed throughout the room, silencing the whispers.
“Two deep scans confirmed and still we are reluctant to believe it.” Mother’s voice didn’t sound any different, that same biting derision and weary annoyance I’d suffered for years. “Child, what have you done to your hair?”
There was more murmuring in the crowd, and I bit my tongue hard enough to taste blood. Answering that question would be a bad idea.
“Your Imperial Majesty—” a smooth voice started to speak.
“Yes, we know,” Mother said under her breath. She raised her rich voice so it rang through the room. “You’ve seen her, vultures. Now get out and let us talk to our heir in peace.”
I flinched at the word. Heir. I was the gods-damned Heir to the Throne.
My Trackers didn’t move from my side, remaining still with their palms pressed to the white marble just in front of the barrier. I stayed on my knees, listening to my joints protest and trying not to drip sweat onto the jagged rock about to kiss my face while the royal court filed out, taking their sweet-assed time.
“Get up.” The command was somewhat strained, and I rocked back on my heels, rising easily to my feet. Emmory rose with equal grace, while Zin pushed to one knee and then stood. I filed away the idea that his left leg might not support his weight. It could come in handy later.
Then I looked up, and it took every ounce of self-control I had not to gasp. This wasn’t the loving mother I remembered from my childhood. It wasn’t even the iron-cold bitch of an empress I’d come to despise.
Mother looked old, far older than she should have. There was silver woven through her black curls, and her dark skin was aged and creased with lines.
“Hailimi.” Mother’s cool greeting shook me from my shock.
“Namasté, Mother.” I folded my hands together, pressing them both to my forehead as I gave the traditional greeting. It was an old ritual my ancestors had brought from Earth, resurrected here in our new home among the stars. “It is a great pleasure to see you well.”
Ven wasn’t in his spot. I longed to ask what had happened to Mother’s Ekam. But I’d learned a long time ago that interrupting my mother fell in the category of Extremely Bad Ideas.
The new BodyGuard at her side was unfamiliar. His angular golden face looked like it had been fashioned by a lazy god with a razor. He raked unusual light blue eyes over me, and they were filled with disdain he couldn’t quite hide.
“Since we are not well, we are also not surprised to hear you say that.” Mother snorted, smoothing a hand over the skirt of her crimson dress, and flicked her black eyes to Emmory and Zin. “You’ve done us a great service, Trackers. How can we repay you?”
“We need no payment, Your Majesty. It was our duty,” Emmory replied. “One we were happy to provide for the good of the empire.”
I choked down the laugh at that cowshit. Always for the good of the empire. No one gave a shit about the good of Hail.
Mother’s Ekam watched the exchange between my mother and Emmory with detached interest. A woman stood next to him. She was about my age, and stood at attention in a dress uniform of shimmering black and crimson. She was too damn pretty for her own good, with black dreadlocks pulled back into a short ponytail.
“Nevertheless.” Mother smiled at Emmory, and I recognized the sly look as it slipped across her face.
Brace yourselves, everyone.
“You’ve already shown excellent judgment where our wayward daughter is concerned. We think we’ll continue along that path. Bial, we will have Emmorlien take over BodyGuard duties for the princess. He shall be Ekam.”
Oh, bugger me.
Emmory’s head whipped up and he very nearly made the fatal mistake of arguing with my mother. I reached out, digging my fingers into his forearm, and cut off his protest.
Cire had said keep him close, and even though Mother probably meant it to be an insult, I’d take it. He couldn’t get much closer than my damn primary BodyGuard.
Bial, mother’s Ekam, looked equally shocked, and the face of the pretty BodyGuard standing next to him was so crestfallen I had to choke back hysterical laughter. No doubt she’d been the one picked to be my primary and thought it was some kind of honor.
“Swear on your life, Tracker?” my mother asked with a smile on her face. It was impressive how she circumvented the normal formality of the BodyGuard oath with those five words.
“Your Majesty, my partner.” There was just enough desperation hovering behind Emmory’s words to make me feel sorry for him, and out of the corner of my eye I saw how pale Zin was.
If she said no, this was going to get ugly. I was willing to put good money down that one or both of them would go crazy and die if they were forced to part ways.
“Ah, yes. A separation would be most unpleasant.” A strange smile curved Mother’s mouth. “Starzin may accompany you as BodyGuard also, Emmorlien. I will let you pick the rest of your team as you see fit, with the exception of Nalmari here. She shall be your Dve. As your second-in-command, she can help you learn the requirements of your role.” She waved a hand at the woman to Bial’s left. “Does that suit?”
“Yes, Majesty,” Emmory said, because it was really the only answer he could give.
“Then swear on your lives.”
“I swear, Your Imperial Majesty,” Emmory replied. Zin echoed him just a moment later.
“Good. It is done then.”
“Your Majesty.” Bial was choosing his words carefully. “Tresk is an accomplished Tracker, a fine officer of the empire, but he has not been trained—” He broke off when Mother raised a hand.
“Nalmari can be his Dve, as we said. We are sure whatever gaps there may be in his outstanding abilities can be filled in quickly by a competent second-in-command.”
“Majesty, it is traditionally improper to have a man guard the princess—”
“Don’t argue with us, Bial,” she snapped.
“I would never, Your Majesty.”
“Good.” She swayed in her seat for a moment, and I stopped myself from jumping forward. Mother closed her eyes, her face paling until the skin on her cheeks was like old paper. She opened her eyes and fixed them on me. They were fever bright.
“Your sisters have gone to temple, Hailimi. Best that you go clean up and present yourself to the priests. We will speak with you again at a decent hour.” She rose from the throne with difficulty, grasping Bial’s offered hand and using it to steady herself.
“Mother, I—”
I stopped myself, swallowing back the rest of the sentence, but it was too late.
“Your sisters have gone to temple.” Now the cold, royal voice I’d always hated came from my mother’s mouth. “Two loyal daughters lost to us. All we have left is one unfit, ungrateful daughter who wished to see the universe more than she loved her own flesh and blood. You are a disgrace to the sahotra. Know that we didn’t want you back, but you are all we have left. Go see the fruits of your selfishness.”
Her words punched the air out of my lungs, and I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming as my mother turned her back on me and walked away.