Nojan (The Vartik King Chronicles Book 2)

by Liza Probz

  Chills suddenly ran down Mayra’s spine. In her unease, she instinctively clutched at the charm around her neck, needing to the feel the weight in her hand.

  “What’s that, child?” the woman asked, and Mayra realized she was staring at her.

  “Oh, it’s nothing,” Mayra said, letting the charm drop. “Just a bauble, nothing more.”

  The old woman’s eyes widened. “A bauble, you say?” she murmured, rising to her knees to shuffle closer. “May I have a look?”

  Mayra suddenly wanted to tuck the necklace away, to grab Nojan by the arm and haul him out of the tent. Instead, she sat frozen while the woman crept closer to peer at the charm.

  “How did you come by this bauble, child?” The old woman’s voice was strange. No longer playful, Mayra could sense the steel beneath her words.

  “I—I don’t remember.”

  The woman was attempting to stare into her face as if she could will her way past the reflective surface of the visor. “Who are you?” she whispered.

  “No one,” Mayra said, backing away. Before she could climb to her feet, the woman leaned in and, fast as a whip, snatched the visor off her face.

  “It’s you,” she moaned, her jaw falling open, her eyes wide. Blue eyes similar to her own, Mayra realized now.

  “You know her?” Nojan asked, his face a mask of concern. “How do you know her?”

  “Why shouldn’t I know her?” the old woman snapped, then gave a deep belly laugh. “She’s my daughter.”

  Mayra felt as if the world had dropped out from underneath her.

  Chapter 18

  Nojan wasn’t sure how to react to what he was hearing. Could Mayra have unwittingly led them to her own mother? And if so, what did this reunion have to do with their mission?

  Perhaps it was more likely that the woman was a charlatan, that she was working some angle that would end with them departing with much fewer rubbals than when they’d arrived. Although actual oracles existed, they were exceedingly rare, rare enough that Nojan had never had the pleasure of meeting one in his long lifespan.

  He assumed a real oracle wouldn’t bother to tell the future out of a ratty old tent on the lunar colonies. She’d be ensconced in some palace somewhere, at the beck and call of a ruler who needed sage advice. She wouldn’t be hustling tourists for tarot readings, would she?

  “My mother?” Mayra’s face was pale, her lips quivering. He could see tears welling in her beautiful eyes. It caused a pain to invade his chest.

  Nolan moved close to her, putting an arm around her and pulling her in protectively. “What game are you playing, woman?”

  “No game,” she replied. “Believe me, I’m as shocked as you are.” She peered into Mayra’s face, a hand rising as if to touch that face but stopping before she could. “You look so much like your father when he was your age. But you have my eyes.”

  Mayra’s face hardened. “I don’t believe you,” she hissed. “You’re a fake, a fraud. Why would I ever think you’d be my mother?”

  The old woman recoiled, then shrugged. “That’s as may be. I won’t deny it. But perhaps I should be asking you how you found this old fraud. Or am I to believe that you just showed up on your mother’s doorstep with a paper-thin story?”

  Nojan could see the flush that spread over Mayra’s skin and knew she was barely holding on to her anger. “Look, before we fling accusations at one another, let me just ask how you recognized your long-lost daughter?”

  The old woman sniffed. “The charm around her neck. It used to sit around mine.” The woman reached into her sizable bosoms and pulled out an old chain. “Now I wear this. Guess I got used to the weight of something around my neck.”

  What she wore was a locket, and Nojan leaned in to examine it. She hit a button and the locket sprang open, revealing a small holo-picture inside. It was of a young man with ginger hair and a lopsided grin. Nojan had to admit, the man bore a strong resemblance to Mayra.

  “Your father was only nineteen when he seduced me. I was much older, but not much wiser. I’d lived a sheltered life on Territh, the last of an old guard whose wealth and notoriety was fading fast. Your father was one of our few remaining servants, and he took a liking to me.”

  The woman looked down, her eyes filling but her voice strong. “When my parents discovered the pregnancy, they fired him and threatened to have him shipped off-world. Instead, he came to me that night and begged me to run away with him. That’s how I ended up here, in the lunar colonies.”

  It was with a heavy sigh that she continued. “This wasn’t to be our final destination. Hell, no one thinks they’ll wind up on the moon permanently. Your father signed up for a high-risk mining job on the dark side, figuring that one big payoff would be enough to get us passage to another colony, maybe Venus, maybe even Centauri. He died in a mining accident his first week on the job.”

  Nojan couldn’t help but feel compassion for the woman. Either she was the world’s most accomplished actress, or life had dealt her a shitty hand. “So you stayed here, alone?”

  The old woman shrugged. “What choice did I have? My family wouldn’t take me back, not in the state I was in. Even if they would have, they would have made my life even more unbearable than it previously was. There was a little insurance money after your father’s death, and I was frugal with it. I decided to go back into the old family business here in the colonies, and it’s provided enough of a living for me to be comfortable.”

  “The old family business?” Mayra shook her head. “You mean telling fake fortunes?”

  Laughing, the old woman nodded. “They weren’t always fake, but yes. That charm, the one you called a bauble, it’s called the Eye of Tomorrow. It was a gift to our family from a goddess, if you believe the legends. It once graced the neck of the Kings of Arth who were beloved of the goddess and protected by her. It was said that she even granted them gifts, among them, the gift of foresight.”

  The woman gestured toward the charm. “I don’t know if any of the legends are true, but my family comprised the last descendants of the Arth line. Over time, our fortunes fell, and the only way to get by was to trade on our name and our supposed goddess-given gifts. The family took up fortunetelling, figuring it was an easy enough way to make a buck. Children of the line were raised on antiquated methods from old Territh, tea leaves, Tarot, star charts. We were once again invited into the finest households, the most prominent among us taking the title of ‘the Great Oracle of Territh,’ and we were able to pull ourselves back from the brink.”

  Her eyes were far away. “I was to be the next Great Oracle. At least that’s what my own mother intended. She kept me shut up in the library for most of my life, studying, preparing to use the ‘ancient arts’ to do my part to rebuild our fortunes. Your father would sneak behind the shelves to watch me.” She gave them a wistful smile.

  Nojan’s brow furrowed. He was beginning to sense a connection between his mission and the story that was unfolding. “Do you believe any of it? The goddess giving your family gifts?”

  The woman’s face was sincere. “Oh, yes. I might not have believed it when I was a child, but now I know it is true.”

  “How?” Mayra asked, her voice little more than a whisper.

  “She came to me. The Goddess of Light. She told me that I was carrying a girl child in my belly. A girl child with a special power.” The old woman swallowed hard, her eyes growing sad. “And she warned me that danger was coming.”

  Nojan’s ears pricked up. “What kind of danger?”

  He realized the next part was hard to tell because the woman seemed to stare off into the distance, her voice becoming quiet, the words tumbling out as if she couldn’t stop them. “She was so beautiful, the Goddess. She said that we really were blessed by her presence, and that she had watched over our family for eons.”

  A tear made its way down her wrinkled cheek. “I asked her, if she was watching over us, then how had so many difficult things happened to our family. Why had she
let your father die? What good was her protection? I could see that my questions made her sad, but she was strong, so strong, and she bore my anger well.”

  “She said, ‘I know that your line has experienced your share of challenges, and I could not assist with them all. Know this: there are things that must happen because future events depend on them. It is never easy to accept that, and I share your pain, but when it is time for the Battle of the End, we must be ready.’”

  “The Battle of the End,” Nojan mumbled, remembering veiled references to an apocalyptic battle pitting good against evil in a final showdown.

  The old woman nodded. “Yes. And my daughter was to be a part of it, she said. But to keep her safe, I would have to send her away.”

  Tears were spilling down her face now, and he could feel Mayra begin to shake in his arms, clearly affected by the tale.

  “The goddess said that evil forces were conspiring against her and that they’d learned of my daughter’s conception. They knew that one from the line of Arth was fated to hasten the final battle and that she would be gifted with an amazing power. They would find me, the goddess warned, and they would destroy my child.”

  The woman turned to Mayra, this time not hesitating to grab her hand. “I had no choice,” she wept. “I never wanted to give you away. But you see, I had to. The danger was too great. The only way to make sure you lived was to send you away. I was too well known, too recognizable as a member of Arth’s former ruling clan. I couldn’t go with you because they’d find me and get to you.”

  Mayra was crying now but she said nothing. She stared at her mother in silence.

  “So,” the woman finished lamely, “I followed her instructions. I met a nice couple who were heading out to Saturn’s Belt. They were obviously in love, and they’d come to me to see if there would be children to bless their union. The woman was infertile, but they refused to give up hope. You were only a few days old then, but I realized that this was my chance to get you off the moon, to give you a good life. So I gave you to them. And before you left, I put the Eye of Tomorrow around your neck.”

  Mayra spoke at last. “A good life? Is that what you think happened? I don’t remember any happy couple, Mother. All I remember is slavery.”

  Nojan realized then what must have happened. A young couple headed out to the Belt, probably with little to call their own. They’d probably met a slaver who’d offered them a king’s ransom for the infant. Enough to set them up properly in a new colony where they could continue to hope for a baby of their own seed. A female infant from Territh was prized on many worlds, and somehow, likely as a gift meant to curry favor, that infant had landed on Vanfia.

  “I didn’t know,” the old woman said, wiping at her tears. “I prayed to the goddess every day that you would have a better life.”

  “Your prayers fell on deaf ears.” Mayra stood and Nojan leapt up after her, putting his hands on her very stiff shoulders.

  “Wait a minute, angel,” he said into her ear. “Not so fast. I know you’re upset, and you have every reason to be, but your vision brought us here for a reason, and we need to see it through.”

  She was trembling under him, her skin as cold as her tone. “All about the mission, eh, Vartik? Can’t miss out on any little tidbit of information, even if it tears me apart.”

  Nojan opened his mouth to speak, to reassure her that he cared and that this was about more than the mission, but before he could, Mayra’s mother stepped in.

  “Daughter, please hear me. The Goddess of Light had one more warning. She told me that one day I would come into possession of something that would help you in your struggle against the evil forces who plot your downfall.”

  The old woman made her way to the curtain she’d entered through. Before sliding past it, she turned back. “Please stay. This is important, I swear it to you.” Then she disappeared.

  “I’m leaving,” Mayra said, pulling herself out of Nojan’s grasp. “You can stay if you want, but I’ve heard enough.

  He stepped in her path. “I understand how this must feel for you. To learn how you came to live on Vanfia, to meet your mother, to—”

  “My mother,” Mayra sneered. “At best, my mother is a talented liar who is pulling our leg for some eventual payout. At worst, she gave up her child to strangers on the basis of a spiritual hallucination to rot alone in these cursed colonies.”

  Nojan was taken aback at the hostility in her tone. He realized he didn’t understand how difficult this was for her. He was a treasured son of a stable family, one in which he’d been given every advantage in life. How must it feel to be meeting your family for the first time, to learn that you’d been willingly given away at the behest of a dream?

  Still, there were too many connections to Jazmine’s situation here for him to doubt what the old woman had said. He’d met the light goddess’s daughter, had seen the cerulean radiance that she emitted. Nojan believed in the light goddess, believed that Jazmine was her divine offspring. It wasn’t much of a leap to learn that Mayra had her connection to the goddess as well.

  “I get it,” he said, his tone soft, well meaning. “And I won’t deny that I do have a commitment to the mission and that I believe this meeting has bearing on it, but I’m also telling you to stay for your own good. While she might have admitted to being a phony, I don’t think she’s lying about being your mother. She knows too much. And you do have her eyes.”

  Mayra opened her mouth to retort, but he held a finger against her lips. “Hear me out. Some day in the future, you’re going to reflect on this meeting, and if you leave now, your future self will regret it. And while I might not agree with your mother’s decision to send you away, I do respect her desire to keep you safe. It’s a desire I share.”

  She stared at him, her gaze seeming to assess his very soul. He wondered what she saw there. Was it the fast-developing emotion he was trying to hide from himself? Was it the fact that he already dreaded the day they would have to part?

  The moment was shattered when the old woman bustled back into the room. “I found this in a market two colonies over, nearly a decade ago. It was from a vessel that crashed on the dark side, some kind of smuggler’s ship I suppose.”

  In her hands was a book. Nojan’s pulse quickened. It looked ancient, the cover coated in some kind of grime. “May I?”

  The old woman hesitated, her eyes flashing to her daughter. Mayra turned away, her arms crossed over her chest. With a sigh, the woman handed the book to him.

  Nojan carefully cracked it open. The pages were uneven, written by hand in some language that appeared totally unfamiliar to him. “You think this artifact has something to do with the light goddess?”

  Nodding, the old woman spoke. “As soon as I touched it, I felt it. It was as if it echoed inside me. I had a flash of insight, a memory of the Eye, and then…”

  “Then what?” Mayra asked, turning back.

  “And then, in my mind, I saw myself stabbing someone, someone who meant me harm. I saw his blood splash my white dress. Then the vision changed, and I was begging a feline man for mercy. And then I was in the dark, with the Eye providing the only light, and a man was begging me for mercy.” The old woman hugged herself, a chill seeming to run through her body.

  Nojan looked to Mayra, who was clearly affected by the woman’s words. “Mother,” she said at last, the hard mask of her face breaking to expose anguish. “It’s true. It’s all true.”

  The old woman let out a sob and rushed to Mayra, pulling her into her arms. “I’m so sorry. I never wanted to give you up. Not for a second. And there isn’t a day that goes by when I don’t think of you, when I don’t regret everything that happened.”

  Nojan smiled, relieved that the reunion was ending in a more satisfying fashion than it had begun. Taking another look at the book, he knew he’d have to wait until he got back to his lab to analyze it properly. He tucked it into a pocket inside his jacket. While the women talked softly and exchanged tearful sentime
nts, he considered all that they had just learned.

  Mayra was the last of the line of Arth. He knew from his own studies that the family line stretched back to Old Territh, millennia in the past. The last king of Territh, Cheden Bel, had been of the Arth line. He had never married, had never bred, so after his passing, his remaining relations had bickered over the throne, leaving them weakened. One of Bel’s relatives made a backdoor deal with the Alliance, a galactic power of that era, and they’d come in, betraying the Arths and toppling Territh’s government. The Alliance takeover was short-lived, however, as the league of worlds aligned against them, ironically created by Cheden Bel, moved in to try and wipe out the enemy. And for the next century, Territh had been contested territory for several different groups.

  And now the last living Arth was fated to become the oracle that would lead them to Jazmine’s brother and, apparently, into the apocalypse. The book in his pocket felt heavy suddenly, and he wondered if he wanted to uncover the secrets hidden in the pages. He was beginning to fathom that their quick rescue mission was going to be anything but easy.

  Nojan swallowed, feeling as if he’d swallowed a rock. The thought of putting his angel in danger made him sick. Almost as sick as the thought of letting her go.

  Chapter 19

  She wasn’t sure how long they stood, arms entwined, telling each other of their days. Mayra expected it was both longer and shorter than she thought. Having lost track of time, she was surprised when her mother finally pulled away, clucking her tongue and commenting on the late hour.

  “I have loved every moment of seeing you, daughter, but I fear that if we remain together for much longer, we may arouse suspicion.”

  “Surely, you can’t think evil forces will descend in just these short hours?” Mayra was incredulous. Too much had happened too fast, and she desperately needed time to process it all.