Behind her, fire burst from the tops of industrial smokestacks. The city of smog, metal and stone was no place to trifle in. She coughed violently. Even the snow here was as black as death.
Looking down, she knew she’d really done it this time. They wouldn’t care that the man had attacked her, thinking to have a bit of morbid sport. On a planet like Rayvic, the mayor’s son had every right to take whatever he wanted—including an unwilling woman. They ran their city like the medical mafia ran its mob. One look at her ugly face and they’d kill her—slowly and painfully.
Grabbing her knife, she wiped the bloody blade on the man’s shirt. Next she took the wad of space credit slips from his pocket, before burying the body beneath a pile of refuse. Pia took a deep breath and one last look around before taking off down the alleyway. Daylight would be hitting the cold planet soon. Then all the goons in the city would be looking for her. She had to get out of there.
Pia sprinted, taking the back streets she’d memorized like the roadmap of variegated flesh on the back of her hand. She climbed down to an old, abandoned space dock nestled on the grey shores of the lapping inky river. Going to a pile of rubble, she uncovered the personal transport that would take her off the desolate black planet of ice.
* * *
Two weeks later...
Pia didn’t move. The doctors of Galaxy Brides Corporation eyed her, their patient. The pristine white of their walls matched the white of their jackets and even the white of one doctor’s beard. As they searched, they couldn’t see her face beneath the heavy fold of her hooded cape, but they had seen her hand—a wrinkly, scarred mess of disfigured flesh.
“Miss Korbin,” one of the doctors said delicately. “I’ve brought a specialist to speak to you. Your blood tests have all come out fine. But we need to see your face to determine if we are going to be able to correct the damage you described.”
Pia lifted her scarred hands. Her eyes were hard as she pulled back the hood. Instantly, she saw the doctors flinch as they took in her face. She refused to show a reaction. It was the same every time—horror, fascination, repulsion, a rush of unasked questions, followed by a few rudely asked ones.
She knew what she looked like. Read the facts in the reflection of their gazes like a checklist moving over her face.
One eyelid drooped with a covering of flesh, pulling it down at the corner to partially hide the hazel eye beneath. The lashes and brow were long since melted away. Her right eye always watered and she dabbed it with a tissue. Part of her hair no longer grew, except in splotchy patches, which she kept cropped short like the rest of her locks. The burns continued down her skull to the left side of her face, burying an ear, over her neck and shoulder, down her arm, to cover over sixty percent of her body. The scars no longer hurt her when she moved, and she’d gotten used to their tight feel.
The doctor with the white beard cleared his throat. “Yes, well, Miss Korbin, you’re in luck. The burns haven’t affected the structural, ah, integrity of your face.”
“So you can fix it?” she asked with emotional detachment.
“Yes,” the woman doctor answered. Her eyes strayed to the side, trying not to stare at the patient. “But it will be an expensive procedure. With no Medical Alliance insurance...”
“So long as you agree to sign an exclusive contact with Galaxy Brides, it will be covered completely,” the bearded doctor said when the lady hesitated. “We have a shipment—forgive me, a load of eager young women just like you going to Qurilixen in about a week for their Breeding Festival. I can give you a brochure on the planet if you like. I’m told royalty might be there.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Pia had been over all of her options. The Rayvikians were looking for a scarred woman with her description. Soon every lowlife in the galaxy would be trying to collect the price on her head. No, a scarred woman was too easy to see and remember. It wasn’t like she could just change her hair color and blend into oblivion. She had to change her face and, thanks to the Medical Alliance jacking up the cost of every medical service in the galaxy, this deal was the only way she could afford to do it. “Give me the forms. I’ll sign.”
“Wonderful,” the doctor said, evidently claiming the company commission for himself. The others looked at him, as if irritated that they were in for a lot of work. “I’ll order some uploads brought down for you so you can learn about Qurilixen while we perform the surgeries. It might take your mind off the procedure, having the facts of your possible future homeworld loaded into your brain. It will give you something to concentrate on.”
“Miss Korbin,” the lady doctor said pensively. The bearded man walked to the intercom to call for the contracts. “We want you to understand that, due to the nature and advanced age of your scars, it will be a painful procedure. We won’t be able to put you out completely for the entire time.”
“It’s fine.” Her eyes stared forward. “Let’s just do it.”
“Very good. I’ll go set up. We need to get started right away. The first ship leaves in a week and then there will be about a week in a secondary transport before meeting up with the main ship. We only have two weeks to get you looking like the bride you were meant to be.” The bearded doctor smiled. He pushed the intercom again. “Dr. Charles, ready room twelve, please.”
Pia nodded. She touched the scars she’d grown used to. There was a strange comfort to their familiar pattern. She was almost afraid of what she would look like underneath them.
“We also need a waiver from you so we can document the procedure,” the woman doctor said, getting an electronic clipboard from the wall.
“No,” Pia said, stopping her. “I evoke the right of privacy. I don’t want anyone knowing I was here. And I don’t want any pictures taken of me before, after, or during the procedure.”
“But, think of all the people who will be inspired by your story, Miss Korbin,” she insisted.
“Don’t worry, Miss Korbin, if you don’t want pictures there will be no pictures. Our lawyers will even put a privacy clause into your contract if you like. I’m the best in my field, so you have nothing to worry about.” The bearded doctor gave the woman doctor a look of displeasure. The compensation for finding brides was great, as there was a shortage of willing women in the galaxy. He clearly didn’t want to scare the prospective bride off. “We’ll have all your scars removed in no time. Soon it will all be a bad dream. You’ll be very pleased, Miss Korbin, I promise.”
“All but the gash on my ribcage,” Pia said calmly. This doctor knew nothing of bad dreams or the nightmares that could haunt a person even when wake. “Do what you can with the others, but that scar stays.”
* * *
Six weeks later...
Pia stared at the mirror. No matter how much she looked at herself, she didn’t recognize the smooth face or wide hazel eyes that stared back at her. The doctors had worked miracles on her. All her burns were gone, her cheek had been reconstructed, her hair follicles stimulated to grow, so she again had a full head of hair. The doctors swore she looked exactly like she would’ve if she hadn’t been burnt.
It was like they scraped off the top layer to reveal what lay hidden beneath. The scars had also been removed from her body. Her left breast was made to match the right, both of them lifted and reshaped. She saw muscle definition, where before the flesh had been so tight she hadn’t been able to see the form beneath it.
Oh, how it had hurt!
The transformation was worse than she could have ever imagined. Sometimes her limbs still ached with the memory of it. She’d never complained, not once during those two weeks of hellish surgeries. What would have been the point? The doctors had done their job. The Rayvikians would never find her. How could they? She couldn’t pick her own face out of a crowd. When she imagined herself, she still looked as she had before. In her dreams she was scarred, running away from a stranger that looked like her.
Pia spent most of the voyage alone, getting check-ups from the robotic doctor on the
flight. She couldn’t find common ground with the other women on the ship. They were nice, but they talked of things she knew nothing about—cosmetics, men, marriage. They all seemed fixated with marrying one of the four princes rumored to be attending the mass wedding festival.
Thinking of the festival, she frowned. She had to find a husband. The exclusive contract she had been required to sign said she would go on any voyage Galaxy Brides had until she was married—whether it was this one time, or a hundred times. In the end, the result would be the same, she would be a wife. Until she agreed to take a husband, she was Galaxy Brides’ property to be shipped around from planet to planet, to endless planets. Pia didn’t relish the thought of making more of these trips, and she couldn’t risk a delivery possibly taking her to Rayvik or one of their affiliated districts.
Besides, she thought, Qurilixen doesn’t sound so bad.
The planet was inhabited by primitive male types similar to the hardcore warrior clans of Medieval Old Earth. They had been peaceful for nearly a century—aside from petty territorial skirmishes that broke out every fifteen or so years between a few of the rival houses. They kept to themselves, had a simple religion, favored natural comforts to modern technology, and even prepared their own food.
Really, the Galaxy Brides’ uploads went on and on about how perfectly simple life was for the Qurilixian people. Whenever she tried to sort through the facts, it gave her a migraine. Jamming so much information forcibly into the brain couldn’t be a good thing. Humans were meant to learn organically, through study and determination. Not with artificial brainwave transfer.
Pia took a deep breath, forcing herself to concentrate.
Qurilixen suffered from blue radiation, and over the generations it had altered the men’s genetics to yield only strong, large, male, warrior heirs. Maybe once in a thousand births produced a Qurilixian female.
She sighed, pressing her finger to her temple to stop the throbbing. This would be better than being on some high-tech planet run by dimwits. Pia liked the idea of warriors and combat training. She’d be in her element in such a place. She’d have a better chance of finding herself a job.
And, thankfully, since the planet’s onworld women were so rare, Pia wouldn’t be surrounded by housewives all day, being forced to plan dinner parties.
Well, she thought with an unamused look around her, no women but these and others like them.
Pia was so used to standing off by herself and being rejected before a conversation ever began that she’d been unwilling to make a move towards friendship with any of the other women. With men, you just had to prove yourself in a fight and they would allow you into their ranks. They treated her just like one of the guys. Women were generally much more fickle.
The spacecraft was outfitted with the best accommodations and services the star system had to offer. It all made her uncomfortable. The personal droids followed her around like prison guards. More than once they’d startled her in the mornings, and she’d punched them in the circuit boards before coming fully awake. Even the doctor, that Pia had spent all those hours finishing her treatment with, had been biomechanical.
Cooking units materialized whatever she wanted to eat. If she cared to, she could have probably chosen something beyond mineral supplement paste, but really all food simulator food tasted on the bland side.
The women onboard the ship weren’t all bad and a few Pia even liked, though she hadn’t indicated as much to any of them. They were the only company she’d had in the last month of travel, as they were confined away from the crew members.
Tonight the ship would be landing, and she would walk her imposter’s body toward a future of convenience. Marriage. Even the word felt as unreal as her smooth skin. She really didn’t have an opinion on the subject, as she’d never in her life had cause to consider the question of life mating. She supposed being married was a lot like forming a battle alliance—choosing a partner to aid in mutual survival.
That reasoning made sense to Pia. What didn’t make sense were the upswept hair, short veils and wedding gowns. Surely alliances could be made just as easily in pants.
She looked at her fellow brides. They were all being readied for the Breeding Festival. It was the one night of darkness on the otherwise light planet, and considered the only night the men could choose a mate. It was a primitive ceremony, but Pia thought simple was good. She didn’t fancy standing in front of an audience in her new body. She wasn’t comfortable in it yet and even missed the protective, familiar shell of her old scars.
Gena, one of the women Pia absolutely couldn’t tolerate, laughed. Her voice was abrasive and harsh, as she announced, “Rigan finished her Qurilixian uploads first. It would seem she is most eager to please her new husband.”
Pia rolled her eyes.
“Or to be pleased by him,” someone added from across the circular room.
Pia hated to admit it, but she was nervous. She didn’t know anything about attracting a mate. From what she’d been told, her parents had been happy before her mother died. As to having children, she knew even less. Perhaps there would be a nice blind man in need of a wife—a nice blind man who was sterile and couldn’t have children.
Well, a girl could always dream.
Pia sat still as the beauty droid worked. She’d refused its services for most of the trip. But now, seeing as it was her best option to get married, she let the robot tend to her. Feeling it pull on her overly long blonde locks, Pia frowned. The miles of hair on her head were going to be the first thing to go once this whole marriage business was settled.
“I wish I could be so ambitious. I’m afraid I didn’t sit through a single one of those boring uploads,” another woman said.
After the uploads, Pia was sure she knew more about the planet than most of its inhabitants did. Qurilixen was on the outer edge of the Y quadrant. The planet’s surface was plagued by a soft green haze of light because it had three suns—two yellow and one blue—and one moon.
“I tried on my gown this afternoon,” Gena said, much to Pia’s annoyance. She glanced to see the woman fondling her own breasts. Pia closed her eyes so she wouldn’t be subjected to the scene. Unhampered, Gena continued, “They are gorgeous, but I think I am going to go get my breasts enhanced again—just a little bigger—and I’m going to have my nipples enlarged. Those princes won’t be able to resist me. Maybe, I’ll marry all four of them just for fun.”
Unable to resist poking holes in the annoying woman’s logic, Pia said sarcastically, “How will you know who the princes are? I’ve heard all the men wear disguises. You could end up with a royal guard.”
“Or a gardener,” a brunette offered with a laugh, joining in the fun.
Gena’s face fell. Pia closed her eyes to her. Mission accomplished.
“I hear they wear practically nothing at all.”
Pia shot Olena Leyton an amused grimace, not liking to be reminded of that little fact. Good thing they couldn’t have sex that first night. She didn’t want anyone touching her.
“Except a mask and some fur,” Olena finished.
Pia could take no more. She blocked them out of her mind as she turned to look into the mirror. Again, the stranger’s face was there in place of hers. She willed the skin to melt into the familiar. After a lifetime defined by one moment, to have that definition taken away, left her doubting herself.
When she turned back around, breaking from her own troubled thoughts of getting married, she noticed that most of the women had already left and her beauty droid was long since finished with her. Nodding kindly at Olena, Pia said nothing as she went back to her suite to get dressed.
Lost in thought, she trailed down the long metal corridor to her room. She startled in surprise to hear the medical droid’s voice say, “Miss Korbin, this way. It’s time for your last treatment.”
Pia stopped walking, embarrassed. Seeing the reserved blue gaze of Nadja on her, she knew the woman had heard. Nadja turned quickly away.
Pia
changed her course, glad that the treatments would soon finally be over with. Slipping her ID card over the wall scanner, the medic room door opened and she stepped inside a machine. Dropping her white cotton robe, she stood naked as the medical droid closed her in. Instantly, a bright green light shot all around her body. The rays tingled on her naked flesh.
Closing her eyes, Pia swallowed nervously. It was almost time to meet her future husband. She just hoped one of the Qurilixian men would want to bring ugly little Pia home with them.
Chapter 2
This was never going to work. Pia’s heart stopped and tears came to her eyes. She’d spent the last six weeks resigning herself to a Qurilixian husband and now that she saw the grooms, she knew she would have to go back and start the journey all over again. When the uploads had said large warriors, Pia assumed they were politely meaning fat, potbellied fighters. She couldn’t have been more wrong.
But why were men like these paying for brides? Surely a small flight to a neighboring space dock would have been more cost effective. Even for a society that rejected space exploration, though they had the capabilities, the trip to find wives would have provided only a little inconvenience.
Before her were two rows of Qurilixian bachelors. They were large, fighting men. They were warriors. And, to Pia’s everlasting horror, they were all in incredible shape and exceptionally handsome. A few had battle scars on their flesh, but nothing so dramatic that it took away from their beauty. If anything, it only added to their dangerous allure.
The men were nearly seven feet of pure bone, muscle and sculpted flesh. She could tell, since they were practically naked. Pia was no out of shape Wulian debutant, but even she was dwarfed by their thick arms and chests.
Fur loincloths wrapped around their fit waists to leave bare their powerfully built legs and upper bodies. The fire glistened off their smooth, oiled skin. Jewelry clasped around sinewy biceps in golden rings of intricate design. From their solid necks hung crystals bound with leather straps.
Dragon Lords Books 1 - 4 Box Set: Anniversary Edition Page 77