by Pam Uphoff
He chuckled, and turned to the couple approaching them. "General Trick, Lady Azure."
Tanner grinned. "Not so formal, brother. Garit gives you a good review."
Asti shook his head. "I really hope I wasn't judged on my military prowess."
"He did rather skate over your time at Fort Otter."
"I was sea sick for six straight months. I think I set a record."
"So, invitations to go yachting will be rejected?" the General asked, innocently.
"Vehemently, dear brother."
Quicksilver, Deena and Easterly strolled over.
"You look fantastic, Heliotrope." Q said, beaming in approval. "You're glowing."
The rest of her sisters found them, with much hugging and giggling.
"I think Mother threw this big party to get even with Answer over what she said about Azure's marriage." Inky looked smug.
Heliotrope sniffed. "Mother would have thrown just as big a party if Azure hadn't practically eloped."
Azure jumped in. "The garden looks great. Someone must have been horrible busy, getting it done in time."
Kohl giggled. She'd bleached her hair, or the magical equivalent. "We've been making rose bush charms for weeks, it was great fun! All we had to do was hang them up and start them going, which we were doing all morning while the bride was primping at the Througuses house."
"Their house is right on the Park, so it was more convenient to the Hall of Records, before Dad set up the Corridor." Heliotrope sighed. Sisters. If Beige didn't get her hands off Asti . . . And Yoderite was batting her eyelashes at Asti's friend Dominic, who looked a bit smitten. Poor sod, someone should warn him she was a nothing but a tease.
Tanner nodded a bit uncertainly. "That was quite convenient, but a bit, begging your pardon, of a waste, wasn't it?"
Asti nodded. "I'm still coming to terms with a few of these things that they say are 'just natural phenomenon, like using the wind to sail.' Of course I consider sailing a profoundly unnatural and hazardous activity . . . "
Tanner laughed. "Yes. Magic isn't hocus pocus and dancing naked in the Moonlight."
"Unfortunately." Lord Onray muttered.
That made them all laugh and Heliotrope managed to get between Asti and Beige. Poked her sister with a fingernail. "Go find your own," she hissed.
Yoderite abandoned Dominic for Onray, and Sandy smiled to see the abandoned man looking steamed. Scarlet patted him on the arm and said something, diverting his attention.
"Oh, there you are!" Inky sounded gleeful, and Heliotrope braced herself for the little bitch's latest surprise. Yep. She knew one of the sisters was bound to invite him.
Xen.
Looking surprisingly low key. He had his magic so tucked-in he wasn't hardly recognizable. Garit was right behind him. He shook her hand and Asti's and then he, Garit, Dominic and Onray hauled Asti off to be toasted as the third man of their Rotation to be brought low by matrimony.
"And they're falling like flies," Xen said. "Phillip and Lester are both engaged now."
"Miss him, Heliotrope?" Inky purred, looking ever so smug.
Q shot Inky a cool look. "Do you sisters ever have trouble with the Hell Hounds?"
"Cheers! To the future." The male group downed their champagne, and broke up laughing.
Inky adhered herself to Xen, earning her his resigned expression. Heliotrope knew it well. "Poor Xen." She looped her hand under the arm of the man whose eyes lit up at the sight of her.
"He doesn't like Inky?" Asti was still a bit prickly, there.
"He doesn't . . . he's got his 'I'm going to be polite and not run away from this idiot' look on. I ignored that same look and behavior and pushed enough to get myself lectured. Well, I grew up enough to realize he just wasn't the man I wanted to spend my life with. Hopefully Inky will too." After the bitch gets her feelings bruised a bit.
And then Beige was accosting the pair, and smiling up at Xen.
Heliotrope turned Asti away. "We should mingle, chat with other people."
"So as to not be there to see your sisters get into a cat fight over Xen?"
"Exactly."
Of course the problem with having so many sisters, blood and pyramid, was that they were very hard to avoid. Zeolite was slinking around with a rich banker, some new sparklies around her neck. Lemon was with a group of women, all looking sympathetic. Heliotrope wonder what the idiot had done this time. Honestly some people were their own worst enemy.
As the sun set, little lights were coming on in the shadowy hollows, twinkling and outlining the paths.
They followed one path around the house to the back door and found Lord Andre and Sashi getting a demonstration in the kitchen.
"I think your father wants to put Dad under a microscope." She whispered.
Asti steered her away. "More like, make him sit down and talk from now until forever, about everything."
Her mother was holding court in the main room, and they got dragged into a round of congratulations from a pack of the Karista High Society Matrons. The dogs and children were still completely out of sight, she was delighted to see.
But this party is getting all of the sisters back here at least part time.
They escaped back out the front doors, and spotted Xen, Garit, Onray and Dominic in a cluster with Scarlett, Kohl, Inky and Beige. Several large men in uniform were a bit more obvious than the Kings Own usually were. Inky and Beige must have gotten a bit nasty. Garit looked amused, and Dominic was eyeing Scarlet thoughtfully. Good grief. Little Miss Easy.
"Do you know," Asti murmured in her ear. "I believe we've done our social duty . . . "
Heliotrope beamed up at him. "We certainly have. Let's escape."
Chapter Nineteen
Winter 1398
Karista, Kingdom of the West
". . . and have therefore granted your petition to adopt this girl." The judge smiled down on Lord Andre and Lady Sashi Througus. "Congratulations. Take this to the clerk and he'll issue a birth certificate."
Heliotrope beamed as she followed them out. Asti had his arm around her.
"Now you really are going to have to settle on a name for your new daughter, Sashi."
"Oh dear. It was fun calling her Ivy like she was a proper witch baby, but perhaps we should try for something a bit more . . . "
"Proper?" Heliotrope smiled at her mother-in-law. Asti has a wonderful family. "Why don't you keep Ivy for her middle name? Then she can be proper in either society."
Asti nodded. "Perhaps name her after great grandmother Tanya?"
"Oh, that's perfect." Sashi beamed, as they turned into the clerk's office to take care of the paperwork.
Then home to celebrate.
Lord Andre was strutting along, showing off his family, but looked back a bit worriedly. "I hope they find and stop that Black Widow. It's frightening to think that she could scramble genes."
Heliotrope nodded. "Fortunately she didn't do much to Tanya. Just changed her hair and eye color for the most part."
Dhe smiled at her family. Life was good.
"Sashi, did you talk to Lord Crisip about the University Research Fund? I tackled the Wolf Company and got a whopper of a contribution. With a little more push we'll have the funding secure for all three main projects for five years."
Lord Andre looked around. "You amaze me. They did this sort of fund raising on that One World, eh?"
Heliotrope laughed. "All the time, and I've heard they do the same on Earth."
Asti chuckled. "Perhaps I shouldn't bring up the subject of an observatory on Mount Jasco? We were talking about it, and how the university still wasn't willing to shell out for the instruments . . . "
"So you think it might be time to turn to the public to raise the funds directly?" Heliotrope pondered. Telescope, science . . . "It might be best as a joint project between a number of Universities. You could apportion the viewing time according to the percent of funding raised by each college, get a contest going between the colleges, have
the students do the actual fundraising . . . "
Epilogue
Late Winter 1398
Black Island, Southwest Cific Ocean
"Can I help you, Miss?" The Tall Dark Stranger looked down from his horse's high back at the girl. Thirteen or fourteen, perhaps. Tear streaked face, trembling.
"I don't know what to do or where to go."
"Sounds like you need Harry's Tavern."
Her eyes widened. "Yes! Yes! But how do I get there?"
Peter reached down to her. "Take my hand. Trust me." He pulled her up behind the saddle, easily. She didn't weigh much. Red turned around on the rough lava strewn slope, and trotted into the Tavern's stable yard. "There you go, Miss." Peter handed her down and tipped his black hat. Why did he always have a black hat? At least there was no sunset, just the pre-dawn chill. He could hear the faint clatter of Flare starting the ovens for the day's baking. The girl bolted for the door.
He heard Flare's voice. "Centauri!"
:: No fighting that time.:: Red sighed.
"Yeah. I wonder where we were?"
About the Author
I was born and raised in California, and have lived more than half my life, now, in Texas.
Wonderful place. I caught almost the first bachelor I met here, and we’re coming up on our thirty-fifth anniversary.
My degree's in Geology. After working for an oil company for almost ten years as a geophysicist, I “retired” to raise children. As they grew, I added oil painting, sculpting and throwing clay, breeding horses, volunteering in libraries and for the Boy Scouts, and treasurer for a friend’s political campaign. Sometime in those busy years, I turned a love of science fiction into a part time job reading slush (Mom? Someone is paying you to read??!!)
I've always written, published a few short stories. But now that the kids have flown the nest, I'm calling writing a full time job.
Empire is my twelfth novel. I've also issued three collections of novellas and short stories, and published separately three other short stories.
I'm planning to bring out at least four more books this year. Two of them are manuscripts that I've pulled out the batch making the rounds of publishers, so they should go up quickly. I've got two new books in the Wine of the Gods Universe under way. And then a third "Zoey Ivers" book in the Doors series. So I may manage to squeak in a fifth book before the end of the year.
I need to find the time to get more books out in print, out to Kobo, Sony, B&N . . . I need to find the time to invent a time machine . . .
Email [email protected] to join the mailing list for notifications of new releases
Other Books by Pam Uphoff
Wine of the Gods Series:
Outcasts and Gods
Exiles and Gods (Three Novellas)
The Black Goats
Explorers
Spy Wars
Comet Fall
A Taste of Wine (Seven Tales)
Dark Lady
Growing Up Magic (Four Novellas)
Young Warriors
God of Assassins
Empire of the One
Warriors of the One
Dancer
Earth Gate
Mages at Large
Art Theft
Triplets
Sea Wolves
Bad Karma
The Lawyers of Mars
Fancy Free
Writing as Zoey Ivers
YA Cyberpunk Adventures:
The Barton Street Gym
Chicago
Atlantis (2016)
Fantasy:
Demi God
Except from "Beauty and the Thief"
Kevi was not having any luck with the unnoticeable charm. Inside his pocket, nothing. Outside, rolling it around in his fingers, nothing.
Oh, the soldiers sort of stopped eyeing him, but the waitress, the dark girl they called Nighthawk was watching him like a hawk.
Does she think I'm going to steal the silverware? He smirked down at the mismatched ironmongery he was eating with. Nope. I have better plans. He gave up and dropped the charmed bit of gold back in his pocket. I'll have to do this on my own . . . and after all, if I am the God of Thieves, the collective subconscious should be helping me. When I need to know something . . . He eyed the locked door under the staircase . . . I'll know how to do it. Right?
He scowled at the two scrawney boys who were timidly clearing away the dirty dishes and carrying them back to the kitchen.
Nighthawk swooped up to him. "Desert? Cherry or apple pie."
"Cherry, please." He bit his lip and reluctantly pulled out his purse. Stealing a mere meal is beneath me. Plus by paying, maybe she'll relax and stop acting like an ax murderer eyeing her next victim.
Harry, the God of Travelers, was off somewhere. Traveling. Very appropriate, especially in the Traveler's wagon. So it was just Flare, the cook, who luckily was busy enough to have not come out here—she might have recognized him—that Nighthawk and another young witch named Lapwing to worry about. The two boys . . . probably they'd be on his side, want to come with him, away from this place.
He jumped a bit as a plate with a generous wedge of cherry pie slid in front of him. "Thanks, umm, how much . . . ?" I need to be more alert. How am I going to avoid guards if a teenage witch can sneak up on me?
"Five crowns." She stared down at him, as if doubting he had that much, then turned a stalked off.
Cheap. But then again, this isn't the New Lands where everyone has gold nuggets in their pockets, and the food gets shipped in from thousands of miles away. And Harry probably doesn't pay the witches hardly anything.
He scarfed his pie and plunked six crowns down on the table. Sniffed and added another. Thinks I'm cheap, does she?
Four soldiers got up from their table and walked out, talking. The other patrons glanced that direction.
Kevi slipped out of his chair and threw his strongest unnoticeable spell on himself as he stepped over to the door under the stairs. The knob turned a few degrees and stopped. Kevi rotated his finger around and around the lock, a kinetic spell . . . caught, the locked clicked and the door gave.
Now to find the Spear of the Traveler.
This will be my first Great Theft.