Shrouded: Heartstone Book One

by Frances Pauli

  “Proof that you’ve done what I paid you for.” Jarn watched for any sign of hesitancy. He saw her flinch against her conscience and knew she’d obeyed. He felt the first shiver of success and let his smile stretch. “You’ve done it?”

  “Yes,” she practically snarled.

  “And?” If he didn’t need the answer and some proof, he’d have killed her straight away.

  “She took it.”

  Jarn waited. He held back his ire and kept silent. She’d spill eventually; her guilt was thick enough to smell. She’d have to talk to be rid of it.

  “I dropped her at the spot.” She reached below the bar and pulled out a dingy cloth. “She went in and she didn’t come out.”

  “How long did you wait?”

  “Till the deed was done.” Samra wiped at her counter and stared at the blur of her own reflection. “She signed right up, just like you said.”

  Jarn held back his elation. Now was not the time to gloat. Not yet. He had a long road ahead before the celebration could begin. “You have the proof?”

  “You said there’d be more credits after it was done.”

  “Of course.” He smiled. It would be a pleasure to have her killed. Later. Right now he wanted to be absolutely certain. “The amount we agreed on. Transferred immediately.”

  Samra bent down and rustled under the bar again. This time she brought out a thin, filmy sheet of paper. “Secretary printed me a copy.” She shoved it across to him as if it would turn on her and eat her soul, as if it already hadn’t.

  He read the contract twice, almost not believing. The child had signed away her life, just like that. Kovath would be thrilled. He drummed absently and read the paper again. The next step would be harder, but there would actually be a next step now.

  Samra cleared her throat and snapped his head up. “Yes?”

  “The credits, Jarn.”

  “Of course.” He waited for her to produce a palm scanner and key in the transaction before offering his hand. She could take the money. She could take whatever she wanted. Vashia had trusted the wrong person. Samra had made the same mistake. She eyed the screen and waited for the approval message, waited for the credits to really be hers.

  Jarn wanted to laugh. He wanted to tell her to spend them quickly…very quickly. But warning the woman would take away half of the fun.

  In the crevices and craters of the core, the Shrouded built roads, inlaid magnetic byways that never shifted and never had to be tracked. Dolfan flew over these, between the market domes, past the rows of Shrouded houses and up through the weavers’ mills and the gem setter sheds to the very edge of the core surface.

  Here he paused at a platform just below the Shroud itself to check in with security and don the necessary protection from the planet’s natural atmosphere. He wriggled into his filter, pulled the mask fully over his head and checked visibility. He tapped the side of the face-mask and the readings flared at his peripheral—Gauss normal, no variance.

  He punched a release beside his thigh and the bike’s drone popped from its casing. The ball hovered next to the vehicle. Dolfan snatched it from the air and set his preferences into the system. He punched in the parameters and released the device. It sped straight up the canyon wall and waited for him at the rim, the red light flashing a steady beacon.

  The bike’s engines revved again. Dolfan followed the drone guide up out of the canyon’s protection and into the Shroud. They passed the ring of emitters that kept the air below the surface breathable and disappeared into the thick gasses, into a wall of yellow and dusky pink. The drone flashed ahead, faint but visible. It would follow the planet’s natural road now, the magnetized highways in the core’s stone surface. A receptor inside the orb would gather readings from the waypoints and relay any variance to the bike’s rider in time to change course or, in the event of a serious storm, to ditch safely.

  Dolfan steered the bike, his eyes wandering from the gauges to the flashing drone and back. He’d pass twenty-two relay points on the way to the platform. Each was situated just far enough apart to maintain a useable system and still allow anyone not familiar with it, anyone without the codes and drones, to find themselves lost between points. He grinned and leaned low over the bike, letting its speed and the colors of the Shroud lighten his mood.

  The Shrouded were not a populous people, nor were they a militant one. He imagined that’s why they ended up here, hidden in the gasses and content to live without interference. They had been refugees at one point, conquered and expelled from their home world. Little was said about it.

  On the topic of their new home, however, it had a great deal to say. He saw the drone ahead wobble and felt a rush of adrenaline. It steadied immediately, before the gauges even registered the fluctuation. Never trust the Shroud to be constant. But they did trust it. They trusted the Shroud to hide them, the core to shelter them and the storms and confusion to keep away anyone that didn’t have a proper invitation.

  The brides were on their way. The Kingmaker approached, bringing with her a Heart choice and a new face on the throne. It was a proper invitation. The Heart brought the right candidate. Every Shrouded had faith in at least that much. Riding under the full depth of the Shroud, Dolfan couldn’t help but feel its weight. He couldn’t help the flash of fear, the thought that faith was, perhaps, a very thin armor.

  CHAPTER SIX

  VASHIA WRIGGLED her hands against the restraints and fought off another wave of panic. She glanced around the hangar bay, took in the filth, the rows of chained slaves, and cringed. What have I done? The roar of ships departing shook the bench where they sat. Fourteen lost souls who’d passed the prescreening and signed away all their worldly rights.

  And she’d done it too.

  She eyed the dirty, bruised legs across from them and couldn’t remember for the life of her why she’d signed. Her mind reasoned that it was all an act. That the poor souls opposite their line were the real slaves, but her doubt argued, how do you know? She’d trusted complete strangers because of one word: offspring.

  After the exam she’d been informed of her acceptance and handed a simple contract. There’d been no small print, no secret clauses. She’d checked. It just said two things: That there’d be no return for the “candidate” and that she and any offspring born of her union would be full-fledged citizens of Shroud. She’d never thought about having a child. The idea caught her by surprise.

  Beside her, a girl called Murrel glowered at the waiting slaves. She spoke as if she’d snagged Vashia’s thoughts from the ether. “Can you imagine if this whole thing turned out to be a trap?” Her voice still held a note of disdain, but there was a tremor of fear behind the words.

  “I was imagining that exactly.”

  “Yeah. Me, too.” Murrel attached herself to Vashia as soon as they left the exam room, despite her previous snarling on the couch. Vashia couldn’t decide if the woman had just relaxed once they’d passed screening, or if she clung to Vashia because they were the only two in the group that didn’t come from the brothels. She didn’t care either way. It felt good to have someone to talk to, even someone a little snarly. Snarly at least felt familiar.

  The far doors slid open with a bang and three port officials entered. Their footsteps slipped against the steel floor, echoing in the huge space. The coordinator—who’d driven the transport the short distance from the screening warehouse to the hangar—snapped to attention. He stood and faced the spaceport staff. The slaver in charge of the other line of broken souls mirrored his actions.

  “What now?” Murrel whispered at her shoulder. They’d been given rags to wear along with their shackles, and the smell they carried made the Chromian’s hole seem fresh.

  “I’m not completely sure. They’ll probably check his manifest and pass us or confiscate us.”

  “Great.”

  Vashia nodded but kept her eyes riveted on the port officials. They approached the slaver first––the one she knew for sure was a slaver––and wai
ted for him to provide proof of merchandise. The man had the tucked tail look of someone who made a life off of others’ suffering. He slunk forward and handed off his pad. His eyes flickered sideways, always moving, waiting for the attack that he knew had to come eventually whether from those he exploited or those he dealt with.

  The officials nodded and handed him back his device. Vashia felt a stab of shame. This happened every day. It happened under her father’s nose, with his blessing even. The line of slaves stood and followed the jackal to the front of the hangar, out to his ship and away to a life that Vashia could only guess at. She looked to their coordinator with a sudden shiver. It could be exactly where she was headed.

  She’d lived in Wraith in relative luxury for nearly twenty years and done nothing. All that time, there might have been something she could have tried, some influence she might have had. She’d never even attempted to help the people in Wraith on Eclipsis. She’d been far too wrapped up in her own misery.

  The bench rattled as her line stood. The coordinator flashed a nervous look back in their direction. Vashia scrambled to keep up, but the restraints still jerked her forward. She listened to the pattern of their feet against the steel and wondered if she could have made a difference either as her father’s daughter or even as Jarn’s wife. Her feet slowed and she was rewarded with another sharp tug. Murrel, chained in front of her, hissed under her breath.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Running away.” Vashia stared at her feet, stuffed into the wrong sized boots. Suddenly, she felt certain she should stay.

  “Duh,” Murrel snapped. “Who isn’t?”

  The chain jerked and they both stumbled forward. Vashia caught Murrel’s dirty look and took it to heart. She could screw this up for all of them by dragging her feet. Her shoulders came up and she straightened, kept pace, and didn’t falter again, but as they marched through the hangar doors, across the grease-stained landing platform to the back end of a ramshackle ship, Vashia felt the sting of tears. Regardless of their destination, she was certain that here on Wraith she’d made a grievous mistake.

  The platform sat in the middle of nothing. The only entry or exit point from the planet’s surface, it had been built near enough the palace to serve the king, but far enough away from anything to prevent the threat of invasion. Any attacker that managed to get this far would find themselves lost without an intimate understanding of the core’s magnetic strips and the assistance of constantly relayed Shroud readings. The small security detail and half-dozen hover crafts stationed there at all times only reinforced that.

  Dolfan left his bike under the hangar roof, clamped safely and waiting for the next rider, and watched the Shroud swirl around the space elevator. A car had already descended the tether to return him to the moon base. The readings on the hangar screens registered within normal, with no threat of storm to delay his ride.

  He looked up and frowned at the blur of colors. Mofitan had put in for duty on the base. He read the message relayed through his comm for the third time. Not exactly subtle, Mof. He’d barely arrived at the platform when the order came, which meant the other prince had petitioned for it the second he’d kicked off from the pad.

  He pulled his wrap around his mask and frowned. Let him come. Refusing the request would only cement Mofitan’s suspicions that he wanted the throne, but allowing the transfer would leave him tripping over the hostile prince. He doubted there’d be room on Base 14 for both of them—at least not peacefully.

  He shrugged and frowned at the spot where the cable disappeared. Once the brides arrived, Mofitan could keep busy wooing his future queen. At least then, he’d be out of the way. In the meantime he’d just have to dodge the son of a bitch. His lips twitched into a grin. Mof was too big and too loud to dodge for long. There’d be no avoiding a conflict in the confines of the base. He caught a glint of silver as the car’s bottom broke through the Shroud. The nearest guards watched along with him. The supply crates waiting for the elevator had long since been prepped. They’d have it loaded in minutes. He wasn’t waiting for Mof—that was certain. The thorn in his side could catch the next lift. After that, he just prayed the brides would arrive soon and keep the man out of his way.

  As soon as the cargo doors slammed shut, the coordinator started apologizing. He didn’t stop once they’d been un-cuffed, or even after they’d strapped into the padded harnesses lining the bay that would secure them against a rough liftoff. He drifted down the line, checking straps and offering his assurances until Vashia almost decided she liked the slaver better.

  “How did you get the buckle in?” Murrel struggled with her harness, trying to fit the clasp in the wrong side.

  “Here.” She reached out and clipped it, then demonstrated how to adjust the fit. “Haven’t you been off-planet before?”

  “Of course!” Murrel answered just a little too quickly. “My father used to take me off-world with him all the time.”

  From the way she had said, “my father,” Vashia guessed she’d never seen the inside of a spaceport, let alone traveled on a ship. “That must have been nice.” Vashia smiled despite the lie. Her father had taken her along on business more times than she cared to count. She’d been paraded and positioned in front of his colleagues in his efforts to fake some semblance of legitimacy. “What does your father do?”

  “He was a merchant trader.” Murrel looked at her feet. “He died last month.”

  The ship’s engines roared, cutting off Murrel’s grief and pushing them both firmly back against the bulkhead. For a slave ship, Vashia noted, someone had gone through a great deal of trouble to install padding, to make the passengers comfortable, even if they were being shipped as cargo.

  That part was brilliant. Their manifest read to the port authorities exactly like a shipment of crates would. Fourteen slaves and no questions. They hadn’t even scanned her. How many people had gone missing like that? How many had slipped in or out of Wraith as cargo? She didn’t want to think about it, but as the force of their departure pressed her against the padding other unfortunates were not so lucky to have, what else could she think of?

  She could hear Murrel’s teeth chattering. The woman’s green eyes stretched wide open and her already pale skin shone practically translucent.

  “It’ll be all right.” Vashia tried to ease some of her fears. “It’s always like this at takeoff.” Though a nice comfy passenger couch would ease some of the rattling.

  “I know.” Murrel managed to snap at her, but a big tear had formed in the corner of the girl’s eye. She played it tough, but Vashia had seen her don a clean, fashionable jumpsuit at the screening. She’d seen the neatly plaited red hair and the fingernails that had never seen work. Whoever Murrel’s father was, his daughter hadn’t lived on the streets any more than she’d traveled off planet.

  He could even have been one of her father’s associates. Vashia’s brain shuffled through a series of faces. If any of them had family, they’d never spoken of it. She’d have to leave it a mystery. Hell, she had her own secrets as well. All she could say for sure about Murrel was that the poor woman was scared to death despite her snarl and her tough-shit façade.

  The ship’s engines settled into a steady rumble as they broke free of Eclipsis. The coordinator sprang to his feet so fast he nearly tripped over them. His nerves had gone a long way to relax her. No legitimate slaver had that sort of conscience. He twitched and flitted from harness to harness, getting everyone free and apologizing all over again.

  “That guy’s freaking me out.” Murrel found her voice again.

  “Me too, but he doesn’t strike me as a slave trader.”

  “Yeah.” Murrel’s voice quavered. “He doesn’t seem like any that I’ve met either.”

  They unhooked and stood along with the twelve prostitutes. Their coordinator opened the inner bay doors and waved them forward as a group—no restraints, no lines.

  “Maybe we really are going to Shroud,” Vashia mused. The idea sen
t an electric flash through her nerves. What was it like? She’d never even listened to the stories at her father’s table. Now, she wished she had. So far, the only impression she had of her new home was that nobody knew anything about it.

  “Of course we are.” Murrel asserted, sounding like she tried to convince herself more than Vashia. “They bring in bride candidates all the time, you know. They don’t have any women of their own at all.”

  “Really?” Vashia stopped for a second and stared at the girl. She hadn’t sensed any bravado in that statement. “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. They only have male children, and their genes are completely dominant. It’s why they need us.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “My father—” there she went again—“was actually at Moon Base 14. He knew all about the Shrouded.”

  “I didn’t think anyone knew about them.” She watched Murrel flush and shake her head. She was younger than Vashia, and stood a good head shorter, but she pulled herself up to her full height and stuck out her chin.

  “My father did. That’s why I signed up. He told me all about them.”

  The bay had emptied. The coordinator cleared his throat to get their attention. They joined the rest of the candidates in the ship’s main hall, and followed the group along the row of oval doors while their host assigned them temporary quarters. Each room, it seemed, would house up to three women. Vashia followed along, but her mind whirled and digested what Murrel claimed. If she knew anything even partially factual about the Shrouded, Vashia didn’t want to let that opportunity slip away.

  They’d lingered, and thus were the last two assigned a room. Murrel wandered over the threshold and disappeared behind the open door. The coordinator waved her in, smiling for the first time since he’d taken charge of the group. Apparently, he felt they’d passed any need for anxiety. She didn’t share his faith, but when he shut the door behind her, she didn’t hear it lock. She waited for his steps to ring away and then tried the handle. Open. Weird.