“Come on,” Kira told the driver of Jason's wagon.
She rode along the column until she entered the open area and saw something that made her heart leap. Her mother and father, Alain in his Mage robes and her mother in her dark jacket, the white Mage mark in Mari’s dark hair shining brightly in the sun.
“Well, Captain,” General Flyn said, “what are you sitting there for?”
“Orders,” Kira said.
“You are detached, Captain of Lancers. You and that young man of yours. Mind that you invite me to the wedding!”
Kira grinned and saluted Flyn, then urged Suka into a quick trot toward her parents. She dismounted in a flash, her lingering aches and the pain from the wound in her side momentarily forgotten. Her parents enfolded her in a tight embrace and for that instant she was just a seventeen-year-old girl again, grateful for all she had.
Her mother drew back and smiled, but her eyes were serious as they searched Kira's eyes. “How bad was it?”
Kira inhaled deeply. “Pretty awful at times. We survived. I…really want to talk…sometime…about some of it. But it could have been worse. A lot worse. I'm okay.”
“Okay?” Her mother shook her head. “Just remember that the sun will keep rising, dearest. There is still much joy out there, much life to be lived. Keep that within you to fight the darkness when it comes.”
“I will. Mother, Father,” Kira said, nervous, “Jason and I are engaged.”
Mari nodded. “We’ve already heard. Most of the population of Dematr appears to have been told about it before we were.”
“I only told General Flyn! And I guess he told Aunt Asha and Uncle Calu. And…really? I’m sorry!”
Mari grinned. “That’s all right. Do you really think I could be angry with you about that?”
“Father?”
Alain smiled at her. She had always valued her father's smiles. “I believe you and Jason have both shown wisdom in your choices.”
“Jason is here! Oh, this is Suka, my mount. He's a good horse,” Kira said, leading them to the wagon where Jason lay. The driver had parked the wagon, setting the brake, and stood off to one side to give them privacy. “Jason! Mother and Father are here!”
“Um, hi,” Jason said, looking up at them with visible nervousness. “Um, Kira and I are, um…”
“Engaged,” Alain said. “We are aware of this.”
Mari smiled at him, grasping Jason’s hand in hers. “We’ll get you home. You’ll have all the time you need to recover there.”
Jason nodded to her, still looking anxious. “Danalee will be on your way back to Tiae, so that shouldn’t put you out much.”
“The only reason we’d need to go to Danalee on the way back is to drop off Calu and pick up anything of yours that’s still there. Your home is in Tiae, Jason.” Her mother looked at Kira. “With her, and with us.”
Kira stared at Mari in amazement, then wrapped her in a tight hug that pulled at the stitches still in her side. “Thank you.”
“Somebody has to try to keep you two out of trouble,” Mari said, still smiling. “Is something wrong, Jason?”
“I…I just don’t want to wake up,” Jason said, looking stunned.
“Do you feel all right?”
“He’s fine, Mother,” Kira reassured her. “Jason sometimes says he thinks he’s imagining all this, that none of it is real.”
“Nothing is real,” her father agreed.
“Did you have to give him an opening to say that?” Mari asked Kira.
“It shows that Jason understands wisdom,” Alain said. “All is imaginary. Except the people. You know that, Jason, do you not? Kira is real.”
“How can she be?” Jason said, smiling. “She’s…mostly perfect.”
Kira laughed. “You remember that? Good.”
“You told your parents about the blackout, right?”
Her laughter died as Kira saw her parents giving her concerned looks. “We can talk about that later.”
“Blackout?” her mother asked.
“I was really stressed,” Kira said, trying to keep her voice unconcerned as her stomach tightened for reasons she didn’t understand. “And I hadn’t eaten or drunk anything for a few days.”
“You thought it had something to do with a Mage spell,” Jason pressed.
She frowned at him, unhappy that Jason kept pushing the issue. “That was a lot of extra effort. Of course it might have contributed to having trouble remembering.”
“That’s the only time it’s happened?” Mari asked.
Kira felt a surge of her old resentment about her mother interfering in her life. Maybe that, combined with her own fears, fed what she said next. “Yes.”
Her father’s look on her sharpened. He knew that she had lied. When was the last time she had been stupid enough to try to lie in front of Master of Mages Alain?
But her father didn’t call her on it. Instead, Alain’s gaze on her altered, promising there would be more discussion of this in private. Alain spoke up, his voice calming. “We should give Kira time to rest. I am confident that she will tell us anything of importance when she has had a chance to recover.”
* * *
As they finally walked up the gangway of a new steam-powered ship, Jason being carried on a stretcher ahead of them, Kira sighed.
“What's the matter?” Mari asked. “We're going home.”
“But I don't have a home anymore. I don't belong in Tiae.”
“What did Sien tell you? Your home is where your heart lies, and Sien will always value your presence there. So will your father and I.”
Hours later, after the ship had cleared the harbor and the crowds had been left behind, the afternoon wending toward a calm evening, Kira stood by a railing looking out over the water, surprised that she had felt nervous as the ship began rolling in the swells. One more thing she would have to get past to keep her life from being bent by her recent experiences.
Mari and Alain came to stand by her. “How are you doing?” Mari asked.
“Trying to convince myself this is real,” Kira said. “I finally understand why Jason has trouble accepting that at times.”
“He looks really good for a guy who took a bullet,” her mother said.
“Yes, but he still needs a lot of rest. I left him sleeping and came out to get some more fresh air.” She rubbed her mouth nervously, which suddenly made Kira remember other things that had happened. “Mother, I have a confession to make,” Kira said, nerving herself. “Something I did, more than once, and I know you won’t approve, but—”
Her mother shook her head. “You're engaged. Anything that you and Jason did—”
“Mother! Jason and I didn’t!”
“You didn't?”
“Why do you sound so surprised? We didn't exactly have a lot of free time!”
Mari held her hands out in surrender. “What is it then? You sound like it’s something you expect me to be unhappy about.”
Kira shut her eyes tightly. “I pretended to be someone to scare the Imperials.”
“Someone?” Mari asked.
“The daughter of Mara.” The resulting silence stretched until Kira risked opening her eyes and glancing at her mother.
“What do mean ‘pretended’?” Mari asked in a voice that sounded too calm to Kira.
“I mean I…acted like I wanted…to drink…stuff…”
“Blood.”
“Yes. And I told the legionaries I was…really hungry.”
“Stars above.”
“And Princess Sabrin caught me with blood around my mouth and thought I’d been drinking it from a guy I’d stabbed and I sort of played along with that because I wanted her to think I’d be a powerful ally and so she wouldn’t try to kill me,” Kira finished in a rush.
Her mother covered her face with one hand. “I was hoping the stories we’d heard were exaggerated. You deliberately pretended to be Mara.”
“No, I deliberately pretended to be Mara’s daughter,” Kir
a said. “The daughter of the Dark One. That's different.”
“The daughter of darkness,” her father said. “That is what the Imperials are calling you.”
“Really? That almost sounds cool.” Kira saw her mother’s glower deepen. “It’s not that bad! So I’m the daughter of darkness. You’re the daughter of Jules.”
“You think that’s the same thing?” Mari demanded.
“Not exactly. Mother, they think Jason’s a demon! A demon that you summoned from Urth to be my boyfriend.”
“Why would you need a demon boyfriend?”
“Because no normal guy could survive being my boyfriend,” Kira explained.
Mari shook her head. “The Imperials might have a point in that regard. It's hard enough surviving being your mother. How does Jason feel about his demon status?”
“He thinks it’s funny!”
“Good for him. But I don’t think this is funny. You know how I feel about that garbage about Mara!”
Kira slumped over the rail, unhappy. “I’m sorry. I was trying to escape, and not get killed, or get taken prisoner again. I did it because it was all I could think of. I know you never would have pretended to be Mara no matter how bad things were, but I’m not you.”
Kira’s father cleared his throat loudly.
She gave him a puzzled look, then turned the same look on her mother. “What is Father saying?”
“Your father promised me that he would never actually say anything about it, but there was that one time—” Mari began.
Alain cleared his throat again.
“Those two times,” she finished. “When it was absolutely necessary.”
“You’ve pretended to be Mara?” Kira said.
“Yes.”
“Twice? All those years I wasn’t allowed to even say the name and you had pretended to be her? Twice?”
“Guilty as charged,” her mother said. “When absolutely necessary. Although I drew the line at smearing blood on my mouth, unlike my daughter!”
“I had a nose bleed!” Kira paused, remembering events in the Northern Ramparts. “Did you do the seductive look and the hungry eyes and the stupid ‘come here and have the night of your life’ talk?”
“Yeah,” Mari said. “It does feel incredibly awkward, doesn’t it? Hey, young lady! Just where did you learn about that kind of thing?”
“I didn’t say I was good at it!”
“Neither was I,” her mother confessed, then startled Kira with a giggle. “But you should have seen the looks in their eyes.”
“I know! Right? Hold on. I’ve been terrified of telling you about this. And it turns out you’ve done it, too,” Kira said, her expression growing accusing. “Another secret kept from me!”
“What other secrets have we kept from you?”
“My real name?”
“All right, I admit you should have been told about that.”
“What else haven’t I been told?” Kira demanded. “What other truths haven’t been revealed, what other deceptions not yet uncovered? How many other horrible family secrets are still hidden from me?”
Mari shrugged. “Your grandfather is an accountant.”
“Mother, I know my grandfather is an accountant! And that is not the same thing. Most accountants are not evil.”
“Are you sure?” her mother asked. “Have you ever seen your grandfather working through a ledger?”
“It is disturbing,” her father said.
“I don’t know why I even talk to you people,” Kira grumbled, leaning on the rail.
Her mother leaned on the rail next to her. “I’m sorry, Kira. But don’t you also have trouble watching my father at work with a ledger? All that red ink. Like spilled blood. Doesn’t it make you thirsty, too?”
Kira stared at her mother in shock that dissolved into laughter. “You are making a joke about that? Who are you? And what have you done with my mother?”
Mari stopped laughing long enough to answer. “You should have seen your face! I’ve finally decided that if my daughter is going to keep feeding the flames of that story I should try to own it with mockery.”
“It’s not like it’s ever bothered Father, has it? I mean, he wouldn’t have to worry now anyway because he’s so old, but when you two were first going together he was young enough to supposedly be in danger from Mara.” Her mother started laughing again. “What? Father, did I say something funny?”
Alain shook his head. “No. I am certain that your mother is thinking how fortunate I am that, according to our daughter, I am so old I am no longer among the favored prey of Mara and her daughter of darkness. Jason, however, is much younger. I am concerned for him.”
“You are, huh?” Kira said, grinning. “Are you going to warn him, Father?”
“I have already tried warning him numerous times about what he was getting into,” Alain said. “But he nonetheless accepted your proposal and made his own to you. His fate has been sealed.”
Kira hugged her father. “I think he’s pretty happy about that.”
“He should be,” her father said, giving her another one of his rare smiles. “He should be the happiest man on Dematr. Except for me, for I have been fortunate enough to be the chosen companion of your mother.”
Mari managed to stop laughing and rolled her eyes at Kira. “Delusions.”
“You ought to hear Jason,” Kira said. But that made her think of the fight against the legionaries, of her and Jason pretending there was still hope when they hadn’t really believed it. Memories of the past few weeks rushed into her mind and she sobered, stepping back to look at both of her parents. “You helped me through it, you know. Through everything. Because you were there. The hardest time I went through was when I was in my prison on that ship and I thought I was alone. But then I realized that I wasn’t alone, and I never would be alone. Not as long as my mother and my father and Jason are here.”
“That’s right,” her mother said, her smile reassuring. “I felt so helpless. At least knowing I was out there helped you a little.”
“It helped me a lot,” Kira said. “I knew I could escape my room on Maxim's ship because you had escaped the dungeon in Ringhmon.”
“Then you set the ship on fire.”
“Yes. A little.”
“Kira, it blew up. We saw it. There’s nothing left but a burned-out hulk.”
“It is a serious mistake to lock up either of you where anything flammable is present,” Alain commented.
“I’m doomed to become you, aren’t I, Mother?”
“If you’re lucky,” Mari said. “Kira, we’ll figure out whatever caused that blackout. Whatever it is, we’ll get through it. You, me, your father, and Jason. You do realize how happy we are that you two are engaged, right? And when we get back to Pacta Servanda there’s something that Jason should be able to help us with. It could be serious, but hopefully not. For the moment, you’re safe, we’ve short-circuited the march to a major war, and there doesn’t seem to be anything awful about to fall on us.”
Alain nodded. “It does not require foresight to realize that probably means something awful is about to fall.”
“Yeah, probably. With any luck we’ll get at least one good night’s sleep before it hits. Oh, by the way, Kira, you've got a brother or a sister on the way,” her mother added casually.
”By the way? You're—? How—?”
“How? Do I really have to explain that to you?”
“No, Mother, you don't have to explain it! Stars above!” Kira hugged her mother.
“I'm glad you're not jealous,” Mari said. “We can talk more later. Are you coming in, Kira?”
She shook her head. “Not yet, Mother. Jason should still be sleeping. I want to watch the sun set.”
Kira stood at the rail, the wind blowing across her, the sea running out to where the distant mountains to the north met the sky, and to the west where the sun was sinking below the horizon, the ship moving beneath her to the eternal rhythm of the waves. To the ea
st the stars were beginning to peek out of the darkening sky. Somewhere on deck she heard sailors talking. One of them laughed. Overhead, the shape of a Roc could be seen, flying south, its feathers rendered golden by the last rays of the setting sun. “Thank you,” she said to the world, and as night fell she went inside the ship to be with her family.
There would be more challenges, but tomorrow the sun would rise, and today she was free.
ALSO BY JACK CAMPBELL
THE PILLARS OF REALITY
The Dragons of Dorcastle*
The Hidden Masters of Marandur*
The Assassins of Altis*
The Pirates of Pacta Servanda*
The Servants of the Storm*
The Wrath of the Great Guilds*
THE LEGACY OF DRAGONS
Daughter of Dragons*
Blood of Dragons*
THE LOST FLEET
Dauntless
Fearless
Courageous
Valiant
Relentless
Victorious
THE LOST FLEET: BEYOND THE FRONTIER
Dreadnaught
Invincible
Guardian
Steadfast
Leviathan
THE LOST STARS
Tarnished Knight
Perilous Shield
Imperfect Sword
THE GENESIS FLEET
Vanguard
PAUL SINCLAIR/JAG IN SPACE
written as John G. Hemry
A Just Determination
Burden of Proof
Rule of Evidence
Against All Enemies
ETHAN STARK
written as John G. Hemry
Stark’s War
Stark’s Command
Stark’s Crusade
SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS
Ad Astra*
Borrowed Time*
Swords and Saddles*
STANDALONE NOVELS
The Last Full Measure
* available as a JABberwocky ebook
THANK YOU FOR READING
This ebook has been brought to you by JABberwocky Literary Agency, Inc.
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