by P. J. Fox
Not much was known about life in the Alliance, apart from the horror stories told by those who’d fled its grasp. The Union and the Alliance were currently in a détente, each side cautiously patrolling the neutral zone—the no man’s land dividing their territories. The emperor’s home, Brontes, was described as a planet of unparalleled beauty and natural resources. Ironic, then, that its expatriates referred to it as Hell.
Aria didn’t usually put much stock in what her government had to say, or her father, but on this one subject she trusted them both. He’d told her a great deal about this highly stratified society, much more than what she’d learned in school, and convinced her beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Alliance was the enemy of all that thinking men and women cherished.
The wounds from the Great War were still fresh. Naturally, nobody on Solaris admitted that they’d lost. The Union hadn’t lost, it had wisely retreated. Leaving the heathens to their own devices, it decided to forego outward expansion in favor of focusing on educational and social programs. Solaris believed itself to be the center of the known universe, a viewpoint its majority religion heartily endorsed. And so history had passed into legend, and legend had passed into myth, and still the threat of the Alliance loomed.
Now that she couldn’t, Aria wanted to go home. She looked up to find Doctor Nandi studying her thoughtfully. The idea that leaving was permanent hadn’t really occurred to her. She’d known it in the abstract, of course, but she’d never dreamed that she’d end up in a situation that she couldn’t get out of. In the back of her mind, she’d thought of her flight not so much as the start of a new life but as something more like summer camp.
The doctor got up and, a moment later, returned with more water. She accepted it gratefully. He seemed like a decent man, but even such an evil group of characters as the Alliance must have doctors. She hoped the rumors weren’t true, that they simply killed their old and infirm.
She tried her first question again. “And you’re from…?”
“Braxis.”
She nodded. She’d never seen a Braxi before, obviously, never so much as seen a picture. She’d never seen anyone from the Alliance, although she’d heard disturbing reports of them being…different. Five thousand years was a long time. They still spoke the same language, although certain subtle differences were obvious even in this short conversation. New words had been added and subtracted and idioms and inflections changed until her language and the doctor’s evolved into markedly similar—but alien—dialects.
“Who…how did I get here?”
“The commander found you,” the doctor replied. His careful neutrality worried Aria a great deal. “As to the rest,” he continued, “I am afraid that you must speak with him.”
The commander—was that who she remembered? All she could remember was a looming shadow. She wondered what different meant. Different in what way, precisely? A tingle shot up her spine. “Who…?” Aria trailed off, chewing her lip. Who was this commander, and why was Doctor Nandi so obviously afraid of him? Why was she here? Were the girls alright?
“But…the girls are fine?” she probed.
“Yes,” he assured her, patting her knee through the coverlet. She wondered if all Braxi had red eyes or if Braxis was like Solaris, where people came in all different hues. “Perhaps we can arrange for you to visit them, if the commander permits.”
“Am I…?” Was she a prisoner? What did Doctor Nandi mean by arrange for her to visit them? And who was this Commander? For some reason, it alarmed her that she didn’t even know his name. She wanted some personal information about the nameless, faceless presence that controlled her life, something that would make him seem more like a real human being and less like a phantom from nightmare.
The doctor’s eyes softened slightly. This time, the pity was unmistakable. Seeing it, Aria felt her stomach drop. Oh, God, she thought, her mind going blank. Something awful was going to happen to her, she just knew it.
“The commander,” he began again, apparently trying to ease her fear, “is both a good commander and a good man. Fair, I think.” He considered. “Hard, but fair. He has more than earned his reputation.” What reputation was that? Oh, God. The doctor chuckled. “When he passes, we quake in our boots. Which is as it should be, I think. But you need not be afraid of him, as you are…clearly different.”
Aria’s blood ran cold. There was that word again: different.
“He is not,” Doctor Nandi said carefully, “a wantonly cruel man. Or at least I do not believe so.”
Her eyes widened. “What…what if I want to leave?”
The doctor stood, their interview at an end. Aria wished he’d stay, if only so she didn’t have to be alone with her thoughts. She was sick with apprehension and as lonely as she’d ever been in her life. “The commander can answer your questions,” he told her, with some degree of finality. “He is responsible for you now.” And, nodding, he turned and left.
He hadn’t, Aria realized some minutes later, answered her last question.
Or maybe he had.
FOUR
“This is madness, Kit.”
Commander Kisten Mara Sant ignored his second, unwilling to live through yet another rendition of the same sentiments that Aros had been recycling for the past half hour. Aros Askara-Brahma was a capable man in a number of respects but had yet to learn that when Kisten wanted his opinion, he would ask for it. And until such time as that fantastical and unlooked-for event occurred, Aros could damn well keep his mouth shut.
He strode down the hall, ignoring the men who snapped to attention. Beside him, Aros repeated himself. Again.
Kisten stopped and turned. Their eyes met. “I know,” he said, his voice low but heated. “I know.” And he did.
“What are you thinking?” Aros demanded, if anything even more horrified.
“I’m not,” Kisten replied honestly.
Or, rather, he was thinking things that he had no intention of sharing with Aros—or anyone else. Reaching his office, finally, he threw himself into the chair behind his desk. Aros, annoyingly, occupied the chair on the other side and composed himself to wait for the explanation that most assuredly would not come. Kisten couldn’t explain it to himself, which was the first problem, although he had no intention of admitting this embarrassing and alarming problem.
His office—or, rather, his father’s office—was more luxurious than he personally preferred or, indeed, was comfortable with. There were rugs on the floor and pictures on the walls, and leather furniture that made him think of a high-priced brothel. Fourteen years in the military had cured him of whatever interest in decorating he might have originally possessed; he valued efficiency, not curio cabinets filled with adorable little statuettes.
But Kisten’s chair was comfortable and the desk in front of him had a certain imposing air.
“She’s a child.” Aros sounded aggrieved.
Two years Kisten’s junior, Aros was a loyal man who’d unwisely chosen, out of some misplaced loyalty, to follow Kisten into exile on a mostly uninhabited rock. Their current destination, in fact. And while Kisten couldn’t support the intelligence of his friend’s choice, he was nonetheless grateful that he wouldn’t be going into exile alone. A number of Kisten’s men had, surprisingly, chosen to support him and their careers were over as a result.
Since Brontes had thrown off her oppressors nearly five thousand years ago, there had been nothing but squabbling—between the Union and the Alliance, and among the varied factions that made up Alliance politics. This latest intrigue, the one that had resulted in him being right here, right now, was nothing special. Except in the fact that Kisten had rolled the dice and lost. Badly.
The man who’d won—for now—was undoubtedly enjoying a delightful dinner in the company of beautiful women while Kisten stared at Aros and wished his friend would turn into a newt.
Aros was tall, and thin, and plain, and unfortunately given to moralizing.
“I don’t think she’s as yo
ung as she looks,” Kisten said eventually, after sending for coffee. “She’s been half starved and God knows what else. Once she’s had a good night’s sleep and something to eat, I think you’ll revise your opinion.”
“What are you going to do with her?”
Kisten arched his eyebrow.
“You’re not!” Aros seemed scandalized.
Kisten didn’t respond, only favored Aros with his markedly unpleasant half-smile.
“What will your father say about this?”
“My father,” Kisten replied with some force, “has nothing to do with this.”
“Oh, excuse me.” Aros’ tone was sarcastic. “Because for a minute I thought—”
Kisten silenced him with a look. “You’re dismissed.”
Aros paused a beat before standing, saluting and, blessedly, leaving.
Kisten put his feet up on the massive thing in front of him and leaned back. His father didn’t have anything to do with it. This wasn’t about his father’s political position but about his, Kisten’s, personal life. If he was being sent to this backwater—governor, his foot—he’d damned well do as he pleased and that included the women he had in his life.
Commander and Prince Kisten Mara Sant was the newly appointed governor of a planet called Tarsonis. When his death sentence had been commuted to exile, he’d been optimistic—until he found out where he was going. Governor was a nice euphemism for sacrificial lamb, and so long as he held a theoretically useful position no one had to actually use the word exile.
Or execution. The planet’s last three governors, all together, hadn’t lasted five years and this was a lifetime appointment. His father, also a prince and the Chancellor, had pulled every string at his disposal and this was the best that could be done? Kisten reminded himself not to cross swords with the heir to the throne again.
Crown Prince Karan Mara Sant, his father’s first cousin, was the embodiment of all that festered within the empire. When Kisten had challenged him—rather roughly, he had to admit, he’d almost killed the man—Karan’s response had been to order his execution. Which, in Kisten’s viewpoint, was a bit of an overreaction. Karen was alive; his finger could be reattached. Moreover, that fat little bog troll of a man had more than brought the punishment on himself and everyone at court knew it. They were just afraid, or disinterested, or too busy currying favor to look beyond their own noses and see what was happening.
Kisten was a popular commander in the navy, and the same thing that had made him so threatening—no emperor had ever ascended to the throne without the support of the navy—had also saved his life. That, and his father’s and grandfather’s intervention on his behalf. Killing him, openly at least, had proved impossible; but Kisten knew that it was only a matter of time before the assassins came. Or the locals did. And the sad part was, he’d still be safer there than at court. Live today, he reminded himself; fight tomorrow. His uncle’s day would come, but first Kisten had to survive the night.
His uncle had, he reflected, been unwise not to simply kill him. But his uncle was a weak, foolish man. Kisten was neither of these things and never had been; although he was beginning to suspect that he was, in fact, crazy. If attacking his uncle in open senate hadn’t proved that argument fairly convincingly, the unholy mess with the girl certainly had.
Aros was right: this was madness, pure and simple.
Even by the standards of his overbearing culture, what Kisten was proposing—taking this girl, this child and what, forcing her to be with him?—was insane. Beyond insane. He was thirty-two years old and she, he suspected, was a teenager. He was hardly ancient, especially by the standards of his long-lived people; indeed, he was astonishingly young to be a commander. But she was underfed and defenseless and if not a child than little more than one; on that score, Aros had—God damn the man—also been right.
Kisten found the entire situation infuriating to the point of distraction. He hated that Aros was right and hated even more the fact that, for the first time in his life, he was unable to understand his own choices. He’d always been a rational man; to a fault, really. He lived for his work, for his duty to the navy and to the empire, and his successes in those arenas had always brought him tremendous satisfaction. He was no virgin, to be sure, but he’d thus far avoided serious entanglements. Even the women he’d seen on a long-term basis had been little more than diversions, as both he and they had known at the time.
But this…. He let his head fall back against the chair and closed his eyes.
Figuring that he might as well do something worthwhile, Kisten had taken Atropos on a little detour to dismantle a slaving ring that’d been plaguing the sector for some time. Several merchant vessels had been attacked and forcibly boarded, resulting in catastrophic loss of life. But wherever they’d been hiding out, so far no one had been able to find them.
He’d taken one of the shuttles and, with a skeleton crew, hung back and shadowed the slavers’ ship. Finding it had been easy enough and tailing it had been even easier; the slavers’ technology was primitive and no match for their cloaking device. Atropos, that great bear, had waited where he’d left her. The Alliance flagship was a great many things but not stealthy—and the best cloaking device in the universe couldn’t compensate for a disruption that size. No, Atropos was best suited for her intended purpose: intimidating other ships. And she didn’t need Kisten on her every second of every day. His presence, at any rate, was largely ornamental—to his chagrin.
Was that why he’d done something so stupid? To prove something to himself?
Atropos could defend herself well enough, but should any actual fighting be required smaller and more maneuverable ships like Kisten’s old command, the Nemesis, would be called in. Kisten missed the Nemesis, missed being a naval commander and nothing else. He’d known, coming from his family, that politics would catch up to him eventually. He just hadn’t wanted, or expected it to be so soon—and he most certainly hadn’t wanted to resign his commission in favor of a civil post as governor of a restive and unsettled planet.
Which brought him back to the girl, which brought him back to the fact that he was taking her with him to that planet. He didn’t relish the idea of explaining this to her face to face—or of explaining how it was that he knew her when she didn’t know a thing about him.
He’d hidden the shuttle behind an uninhabited moon, watching the unsuspecting slavers and monitoring their frequencies. Usually his men did the monitoring but this one time he’d been at the console when he’d heard something. He’d taken a turn, thinking that something in the endless chatter would mean more to him than it might to an untried ensign. And he’d wanted to feel like he was doing something.
Instead of the hoped-for intelligence about possible contact with larger and more successful slaving rings, he’d heard Aria Hahn of Cabot Lake Township—whatever that was—talking to herself. Presumably in front of a mirror, since she was lamenting her, to use her term, mouse-like appearance. He’d also learned a great deal about her family and her friends and her thoughts on the wider world, all of which had been clever and witty and…sad.
He’d known he had to rescue her. He would have, anyway, but not for the same reasons. The captain’s ruse was common enough: he’d promised his cargo one thing and promised the slavers another. Ironically, the dolt had managed to crash land on almost the same coordinates he’d planned for the rendezvous.
Aria was, he’d discovered over the course of the next several days, a great one for talking to herself if not to others. He could hear everything that happened aboard ship and noted, with interest, that she seemed almost excessively reserved in company. A useful trait, he’d thought, for a governor’s woman.
And that was when he’d realized that he’d gone insane.
He found her charming, but there was more to the attraction than that. Her parents had sounded perfectly dreadful, and on some level he supposed he pitied the poor thing. Not that his planned conduct would, he supposed, do much to ai
d her in that department. He’d been interested to learn that she was a refugee from the Union and thus a potential mine of useful information. Even better her father was, he’d gathered, someone of at least middling importance in the government.
That she’d left, herself, was brave; that she’d risked her own life to help a group of girls she barely knew made her more courageous than many of the men he’d served with. She was so innocent, and so angry, and so certain of her own point of view and she made him laugh because he admired her and because he understood what it was that she railed against. But even then, he’d told himself that he wasn’t trapped. He’d never even met her. He consoled himself with the idea that she’d undoubtedly turn out to be five hundred pounds and hideous. Then the spell would be broken.
And then he’d seen her, in the clearing. He’d known that this was Aria, instantly. He’d remember that moment for the rest of his life: he felt like he’d been struck with a thunderbolt. He almost hadn’t raised his gun in time to shoot the man who’d been trying to kill her. When he’d bent to pick her up, his only thought had been that this is the most beautiful woman in the world. He couldn’t explain the nature of this reaction, or its force. Or the strange feeling he’d had, as he’d carried her back to the shuttle, that holding her like this felt right.
Kisten wasn’t a man given to sentimentality of any kind, particularly not about the fairer sex. These wholly unwanted thoughts surprised and disquieted him. But from that moment, as nonsensical as it was, there had never been any doubt. He couldn’t imagine how he was going to explain it to her or his family or anyone else; even hours later, he was still confounding himself. But the more thought he put into the problem and the more he looked for some means of escaping it, the more certain he became: small, frightened Aria Hahn was unlike any woman he’d ever met and he had to have her.