“They’re coming,” Dielel whispered from Haftan’s shadow. “Haftan, I can see feet.”
Dolfan had to lean back to see where the last prince sat, perched on the lip of a huge vase and at Haftan’s side as always. That one would definitely prefer Haftan to rule. Dielel didn’t have the spine for more than sycophant status.
Dolfan guessed it would be Haftan or Mofitan. Shayd had the Seer’s gifts. His succession of Syradan had seemed certain. Peryl’s youth as well as his manner were against him, despite the fact that he carried King Pelinol’s blood, and regardless of the fact that the king wanted so desperately for the boy to take the crown. No, it would be Haftan or Mofitan, and for his sake Dolfan prayed it would be the first.
The curtain drew aside and Peryl pranced back through. Shayd followed, tall and stiff as a statue. He fit in here, amongst the incense and the spirals. Not one of the rest of them could hope to take Syradan’s place. He tilted his head to acknowledge Dolfan’s arrival or possibly to chastise his tardiness. Reading Shayd’s stony expression rivaled psionics amongst the list of things Dolfan couldn’t do well.
“Is he ready for us?” Haftan’s eagerness swelled to embarrassing proportions. The man wanted to be king enough for all of them. Dolfan frowned. Maybe too much. Perhaps Tondil could succumb to the Heart, even if it meant a single mate from that point on. Perhaps even Peryl might—
“Yes,” Peryl answered where Shayd would only nod and gesture to the curtain. “It’s time.”
Too late to wonder now. Dolfan stared through the gap into the sanctuary. The room lay dark and full of rolling smoke. The ceremony they’d come for was a mystery to everyone on Shroud, to all their people and to anyone who hadn’t been a member of a Council, who hadn’t been a prince. He’d never spared it any curiosity. Now he stared it in the face and set his jaw. He could take whatever Syradan might summon.
Seven princes formed the Council, one for each remaining Shrouded bloodline. Each held the hopes of their line in their veins, the hopes of all the Shrouded. Each had been chosen by their predecessor to take up a ring and form the new Council, and one of them—any one of them—would be the next King of Shroud.
Just don’t let it be me. He could take anything, even Mofitan enthroned, if it meant Dolfan could remain himself. Let it be Haftan. He chanted in his mind and stepped forward, beating Mofitan to the archway and following Tondil straight into the darkness.
CHAPTER TWO
THE CHROMIAN SAVED HER LIFE. Vashia caught the glint of a Haji card as she ran. A stubby arm tilted it to catch the light and, when she drew even with the alley, gestured for her to follow. She veered without slowing, ducked through the side alley and followed the waist-high alien through a crack between buildings.
She could feel Jarn’s hounds breathing down her neck. At every crossroad, the gray hulk of a hover car had blocked her, steered her like a hare before the hunt. Vashia couldn’t guess where the man drove her, but she didn’t care to be herded any more than she liked being chased, blocked, or cut off.
Her veins throbbed. She struggled for breath as the Chromian led her deeper into the narrow space. She couldn’t run here, and, for an instant, her panic flared. If Jarn cornered her now, she’d be hard pressed to escape him. She considered squeezing back out the way she’d entered, but the lumpy little man thumped his tail hard against the ground and caught her attention once more.
He held up the corner of a tarp, stringy with age and slick with things better left unidentified. When she balked, he thumped his tail again and glanced back to the alley. Vashia took the hint and dropped down, wiggling under the scrap that couldn’t possibly hide someone her size. She scooted closer to the building, the cover’s weight pressing her crouch even lower, and tried to make herself invisible.
Her legs dropped into a hole. She fought the urge to snap them back out again, but only half managed to stifle her scream into a barely audible squeak. The tarp rippled and the Chromian’s round face pushed into view. It vanished as he dropped the cover back into place, but Vashia felt him brush past her. She heard the click and purr of his speech as he urged her to follow.
She’d gone from the governor’s estate to the bottom of a pothole in one short day. If it meant escaping a life as Jarn’s wife, Vashia would happily take the pothole. She shook her head and pushed against the ground, slipping over the rim and into the pit.
She expected to hit bottom a great deal sooner, and her arms flailed outward before the jar of impact darted up through her knees. What she’d taken for a shallow hole reached well over her head. She could just tip the rim with her fingers if she stood on tiptoe. The walls felt rough and wet. She stopped exploring after a brief touch.
Her savior clicked near her heels. A fleshy hand touched hers briefly. She dropped to a squat and peered into the darkness. A lighter circle outlined the Chromian’s tunnel. He’d been at more than potholes apparently, and Vashia thanked her luck and her few extra coins for winning her such an ally. She smiled and crawled on hands and knees after the fat tail. The tunnel curled to the left and opened suddenly into the cellar of the building overhead.
Whatever business operated there, her plump guide didn’t seem to fear discovery. He slipped out of the tunnel and out of her view without hesitation. Vashia followed, but paused at the tunnel’s edge and scanned the space. Dust hung in curtains from the ceiling, the sheet webs of some stray arachnid. Shelves lined the walls, broken and hanging in places but sturdy enough to hold an impossible assortment of trash.
Vashia swung her legs out and stood up. She noted other dark circles and tunnels leading out of the room that she now assumed had to be the Chromian’s home. She’d never imagined anything so bizarre, so precious could exist beneath Wraith’s filth. The shelves lining the storeroom overflowed with treasures scavenged from the city’s trash. She assumed her new friend had collected and stored the odd contents, an impressive undertaking for a diminutive creature that the rest of the galaxy considered a hair’s breadth above vermin.
The shelves bulged with things cast off from the streets above. Vashia saw more tarps, piles of rope, cable, and metal parts to gods knew what sort of contraptions. There were ratty boxes and soft bundles wrapped tight and stashed into the narrow spaces. She wanted to peek, even took a step nearer and leaned in to inspect the nearest carton, but the Chromian clicked again, and she spun around to face it.
“Sorry.” She couldn’t read a thing in his doughy expression. “Is this yours? Your home?” He squatted next to his mat, had his cards out again. His answer purred incoherently and she shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
One stubby finger lifted to the thing’s lips in the universal sign for quiet. Vashia nodded and crossed to the middle of the room. She knelt beside him, met the dark, inhuman eyes and whispered. “I need your help. You know that, right? I need to find a way out of here, but I haven’t any money this time.”
The creature smiled and nodded back at her. Vashia would have bet what was left of her luck that he didn’t understand a word she said. He waved his hand over his shiny cards and plucked one circle from the spread, holding it up for her to examine. The silver disk flashed even in the low light of the basement. She could see the symbol on its face as the plump hand spun it before her. It flashed, from silver to red to silver as the card went round—a perfect, ruby red heart.
The smoke choked in his throat and nostrils. Dolfan watched Syradan hunch over the brazier and struggled not to cough. He couldn’t imagine choosing to live in this, couldn’t ever understand the appeal of devotion to darkness and fumes, no matter what the bonus. He needed to breathe.
He’d seen Syradan struggle with it when he left the comfort of his temple. The man’s lungs could hardly process clean air, even the artificial kind. His old skin had darkened until he carried an ashy hue to match his sags and wrinkles. Dolfan watched him now bent so low his long beard sizzled in the brazier’s heat. His beady eyes shone with the reflected fire, and his thin lips twisted with th
e incantation no one—well maybe Shayd—could make any damned sense out of.
The old Seer lifted his eyes to catch Dolfan’s look. He could read thoughts, perhaps, but then he’d already know Dolfan had no designs on his position. The old spine straightened, bringing Syradan up to his full height—not quite what it used to be, but still imposing enough. He crooked one wizened finger and swept it through the smoke, making more patterns, more nonsense. When he spoke, his voice boomed, and at least half of the waiting princes flinched.
“The Kingmaker approaches!”
A gasp crept round the circle. It was early for the Kingmaker’s arrival. They’d yet to even cement their status as princes, and the new king’s bride already showed herself?
“The Heart must be readied.” Syradan spared none of them any attention. He continued to read the smoke with eyes glassy and dark. “We are in time, but only just.”
Dramatics—the Seer swam in them. He’d have announced a pimple just as vehemently. Still, Dolfan felt his own pulse quicken, his genetics and his upbringing wouldn’t let him take the Seer’s words lightly. The Kingmaker. The Sacred Heart. Any Shrouded from the lowest to the highest might take a bride through the Heart, but the first of them to do so, the prince who found his match before the others, would be declared the next ruler of Shroud.
“The blessing must be given,” Syradan said. “So that all princes will be pure and ready for the choosing.”
Around the brazier, heads nodded in agreement. They looked to one another. Dielel to Haftan for reassurance, Haftan to Mofitan in challenge, and Peryl to Tondil for god knew what reason. Dolfan watched them all. Only Shayd kept his gaze riveted on Syradan and his smoke. Had he not been here as a prince, if his lot hadn’t been tossed in with the rest, Dolfan might have enjoyed the scene, the humor of it all. Seven grown, capable men, waiting with breath held for the words of one ancient lunatic, waiting for the Kingmaker.
The Seer took a deep breath and exhaled slowly so that the rasping echoed through the huge room. The vapors puffed in and out of his nostrils. He snapped his fingers to the side and a silver bowl appeared from the incense mists. The acolyte who brought it remained invisible beyond the brazier’s light.
“Now, princes.” Syradan stood taller. His eyes burned with the fumes he breathed. He held the bowl over the glow so that the smoke broke and swirled around it. “Your rings into the vessel.”
Not one of them moved. The ring must never leave the finger. They’d all been told the same. Dolfan remembered his election as his bloodline’s prince. He remembered his predecessor’s words as he placed the heavy gemstone in his palm. “You’ll do us proud, Dolfan. You’ll wear the ring well. Never let it leave your finger.” They’d all received the same instructions. From different people perhaps, but the rituals never faltered.
“Now!” Syradan commanded. “The blessing must be done.”
“But the rings…” Mofitan, of them all, had the balls to question the old man.
“Silence!” Syradan hissed with the full force of his office behind him. Even Mofitan stepped one pace back. “Do you think the secrets of the blessing ritual are free for the sharing? Do you think that there will be no tests along the way? Fool prince.” He squinted directly at the one who dared to speak aloud what they all had thought. “Do you think the king would hesitate to take the blessings of the Heart?”
Haftan cleared his throat. He stepped up to the brazier before Mofitan could recover from the verbal lashing. Stunned, Dolfan watched as Haftan slipped off his ring and dropped it obediently into Syradan’s bowl. The brazier flared as metal hit metal. The smoke boiled around the pot, turned back on itself, and made deeper patterns. Mofitan practically ran forward to toss his ring in. Dolfan waited his turn, but in the end, all of them followed the Seer’s command. Seven rings in a silver bowl, seven flashes from the fire below, and Syradan grinning like a vulture sheathed in his own mysteries.
“What can I getcha?” Samra leaned an elbow on the mesh bar and gave her a bored look. “You drinking or just holding up my counter?”
“Samra.” Vashia peeked between the tendrils of shiny, blue hair and tried to keep her voice from shaking. “It’s me.”
“Holy meteor showers, Vashia?”
“Shhhh.”
“Where did you scrounge up that outfit?” Samra eyed her glittery ensemble and raised an eyebrow. “It’s not you, sweetie. Not at all.”
“You ever lost or thrown anything out in Wraith?”
“Hell yeah. Who hasn’t.”
“Well, let’s just say I found out where it all ends up.”
“I bet that’s one hell of a story.”
“It is. But right now, I could use a place to lay low. Out of the public eye, if you catch my drift?”
“Sure, I get you. I wouldn’t want to be in public in that get-up any longer than I had to either.” Samra grinned and nodded toward the back of the Comet. “Head back and I’ll catch up.”
“Thanks, Sam.”
Vashia wandered through the tables and high stools toward the back of the club. She’d stayed with the Chromian most of the night, sorting through each bale or box he tugged out for her until she found a wig, and the first outfit that fit her. She had little to thank him with aside from her gratitude and the locket her father had given her when she turned seven, after her mother died. She suspected the gift had been motivated by guilt, had guessed even then that her father’s thugs were responsible for his wife’s demise. What she’d never worked out was if he’d ordered it or not. She wouldn’t have put it past him. That he might feel guilt had surprised her. She doubted the necklace was even gold, but the little alien took it eagerly enough.
She left him before dawn so that the crowds would still provide some shelter, but there’d been no sign of Jarn on the short walk to the Comet. Vashia hadn’t seen a single one of her father’s cars in the street. Maybe they’d given up and left her to run out of friends and come crawling home. She pushed through the swinging doors and stomped into the back hallway.
She wasn’t going home, damn it. But where the hell else was there?
Before she could settle into another fit of panic, Samra pushed her way into the back and grabbed her by the elbow. “You’re in a world of trouble, kiddo.” She pulled Vashia toward the rear office. “What the heck happened up on your hill today? Jarn and his idiots have been in and out of my place three times.”
Vashia cringed. Three times was not a good sign. She followed Sam into the tiny office and dropped onto a crate of booze with a shrug. She had no idea where to begin. This trouble had been brewing since the moment her poor mother left her at her father’s mercy. She felt tears again and ground her teeth against them.
“Every time I see that weasel he looks more pissed off.” Sam slid into her desk chair and spun it round to face her. “He’s bad news.”
“My father just told him he could marry me.”
“Shit.”
“Shit.” Vashia’s hands trembled. She stuffed them under her thighs and watched the trashy skirt shimmer.
“How much money do you have?”
“They froze my credits.”
“Shit.”
“You said that already.”
“You want a job?” Sam smiled. “I can set you up with something.”
“And when Jarn comes back?” Vashia watched the club owner’s face fall. Jarn owned Wraith as much as her father did. She’d seen how fast he could ferret her out, how hard it would be to avoid him. “I need to get off-planet,” she said.
“With no credits that’s going to be tough to pull off, kiddo.” Sam leaned back and closed her eyes. Her forehead creased with thought. “Not a lot of free tickets off this rock.”
“I’m almost ready to consider indentured servitude.” Vashia meant it lightly, but the words landed too close to home. She felt the tears break free and her panic surged to the forefront. Maybe she could suffer marriage to Jarn, maybe it would be a step above slavery, above a brothel. A sob sh
ook her shoulders and she dropped her head into her hands.
“Hang on, hang on.” Samra reached a hand out to pat her on one shoulder, gingerly without real contact. Vashia sniffed and tried to regain her composure. She’d managed to stretch their thin friendship to its limit already. But Sam surprised her. She turned back to the desk and drew a paper from inside the drawer. “I don’t know just how desperate you are, but there is this.” She shoved the flier into Vashia’s hands, as if she didn’t want to touch it any longer than she had to. “Guy comes round every few cycles and drops one off. Usually, I toss ‘em out, but Neel was on shift when he came last.”
The paper felt weird, textured and thicker than most of the scraps pinned up on the street. She read the words in ink that seeped into the fibers and frayed the letters ever so slightly around the edged. Bride Candidates Needed on Shroud.
“Are you kidding?” Vashia’s head snapped up. She thrust the paper back out, but Sam didn’t move to take it. Her grim expression told the truth, the fact Vashia hadn’t wanted to really believe. She was out of options. “But, Shroud? As an imported bride?”
“It’s not slavery.”
“Isn’t it?”
“It’s better than Jarn.”
“Maybe, maybe not. Who knows? Who knows anything about Shroud?”
“They couldn’t find you there, at least.”
That much was true. No one got onto Shroud, but not for lack of trying. The culture was shut down tighter than a drum. The closest any nonnative got was some base point on the planet’s moon. At least—she eyed the flier one more time—that’s what everyone thought.
Vashia frowned and ran a finger over the lettering. She felt the divots where a pen had pressed into the fibrous parchment. They wouldn’t find her there. Nobody would. Her eye drifted to the bottom of the page. Written there were instructions outlining who and where to meet to sign her life and her freedom away to some stranger. Along the edge, a ruby red symbol shone in thick ink. Its smooth surface reflected the overhead light, flashing in the perfect shape of a heart.
Shrouded: Heartstone Book One Page 2