Her words came back to him, along with the look in her eyes when she’d said it. He hoped she was right. If she was, then he had a chance to become half the leader his father was.
Or perhaps not. Perhaps you had to go through something like what his father had gone through to be that kind of leader. He suspected only his mother knew the whole truth about what he had been subjected to. The bond between them was strong, unbreakable, and the rock upon which his own life had been built.
And in fact, what his mother had done, turning her back on her life and everything she had always known, leaving a career that had included medals and great acclaim, all to save the man she hadn’t even known was a prince, was as courageous as any heroic action in battle. He respected her as much as he loved her, and that was a great deal.
Shaina emerged from the trees, hands in front of her. “I found some rockfowl eggs,” she said. “I don’t have a vessel to put them in, but I think that thin, flat rock there will heat enough to cook them.”
“I have a few life bars left,” he said.
“A meal fit for a prince, then,” she teased. She was obviously in a better mood now. Or was simply doing as he’d suggested and not thinking about what had happened and why she was here at all.
He made his own visit to the stream to wash, and when he returned she had already begun the eggs, he suspected it was more to find out if her rock would work than from a desire to cook. It was working, and she was smiling.
“I just had to get it as hot as possible first, so the eggs started to cook right away and didn’t run off the edges,” she explained, clearly thinking it more a logistical exercise than a cooking chore.
“You should be in charge of the cooking, then,” he said, knowing how she would react.
“You would subject yourself to that? You would starve in a week.”
He laughed, glad to hear her usual bantering tone once more.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he finally told her when they’d finished the last of the eggs, garnished with some organics she had found growing on a small, protected ledge. And he meant it. Even with all the complications it had brought, even with the tangle of his emotions around her, her presence brought the balance back to his life.
“Then can you do something about these zipbugs?” she asked, swatting at one buzzing her ear. But she was smiling when she said it, and he knew his words had pleased her.
“I’ll stir up the fire a bit, that should help.”
He leaned forward and stirred the coals, then added another piece of wood. It flared up slightly, and the bugs retreated. He settled back, and finally brought up what had been on his mind since before he’d left Trios, in fact since the moment she’d announced she would not be present for his first official act. He thought he knew, but he wanted to hear it from her.
“I know you did not wish to come.”
Her mouth tightened. For a moment he thought she would not answer. Finally, with a slight shrug, she said, “What I really wish is for it not to happen at all.”
His brow furrowed. “The celebration?”
“Your part in it. Your official part. Because it’s the end.”
“End of what? Childhood, youth, carefree days?” For it did signal all of that, and he also was reluctant to see those halcyon days end. Yet he was eager to go on, to take his place as man and prince in the world he loved above all others.
“This.” She gestured around the small encampment. “The days of racketing off on some adventure, no one’s company but our own, responsible only for getting ourselves back in one piece, and convincing our parents we’d never really been in any danger, and . . . all that.”
“There will still be times for this,” he said. “Even my parents occasionally take their own moments. As do yours. Remember when we both stayed with Paraclon and my mother had to come get us?”
She laughed. “How could I forget? I swear, if we’d only had time to tweak the fuel formula a little more, that rocket would have launched.”
“Instead of nearly blowing up Paraclon’s lab?”
She waved away the destruction with a smile, but it faded as she looked at him.
“It’s not really that, Cub.”
She hesitated, which was enough unlike her that he focused on her completely, not speaking for fear she would retreat behind a mask of teasing and jokes. So had her father been, according to her mother, when he had first come home to Trios. Assuming he would be hated for his life as a skypirate, he had shown himself the contempt he expected from his people, wearing that same sort of mask.
“It’s . . . us,” she finally said. “It’s the end of us I really fear. You will be busy with affairs of state, learning to be king.”
“And you will be—”
He broke off suddenly, aware that whatever she might have planned for her life, whatever hopes and dreams she’d had, had been wiped away. She met his gaze, and he saw the acknowledgment there, both of what he’d thought, and that he’d stopped himself from saying it.
Silence spun out for a moment. He didn’t know what else to say, and therefore resorted to the safety of saying nothing. And what could he say that didn’t involve things she didn’t wish to hear? That was pointless now, when he knew she had no choice about being tied to him, flashbow warrior to royal. If he’d known, perhaps he could have stopped his changing feelings early on. Her father had a great deal to answer for in this.
He waited, hoping the silence would move her to speak. But this was Shaina, who unlike many felt no need to fill the air with words.
“We must discuss it, eventually,” he finally said.
“Yes.”
“Then why not—”
He stopped abruptly when she threw up a hand for silence. She was suddenly tense in an entirely different way, and her gaze had taken on that distant look that told him she was sensing something beyond his reach.
They waited. He heard nothing, sensed nothing, but he trusted her instincts completely.
“Do you remember that old man who brought us that lovely brollet to roast?” she asked then, in a tone of nothing more than casual remembrance, as if the event had happened years ago, not mere hours. At the same time she turned her hand, moving her fingers in the gesture that told him to keep speaking. They’d developed the system of hand signals as children, to communicate without words in the presence of adults.
“I was just thinking of that myself,” Lyon said, confirming that they were agreed someone or something was out there.
Shaina reached out to stir the fire unnecessarily, using the movement to surreptitiously draw her dagger. Lyon picked up his own, casually, as if he had no other concern than cleaning the blade to sheath it.
The ceremonial weapon was all he had. Dax had wanted him armed more completely, and his mother had agreed, but his father had had to accede to the fact that sending his son fully armed to an official ceremony with an ally seemed contrary. Diplomacy trumped caution in this case. Besides, there had been no trouble of note on Arellia in years.
Which didn’t mean this world of “wonder and mystery,” as the old man had called it, didn’t have its own slimehogs. He hoped Shaina, who was under no such restrictions, was better equipped.
Almost on the thought, there was a rush of sound from all sides: crashing, and the snapping of branches. Four men broke through the underbrush and stepped out of the forest.
They were surrounded.
Chapter 7
RINA STOPPED at the end of the gangway and looked around. In the predawn gray, and from the elevation of the skyport, she could see the lights of the city of Galatin spread out before her. Just to her right were the city gates, behind her the broad river that formed the western boundary gleamed dark. To the east were the hills, and to the north the mountain, a weathered, ancient peak that looked down upon the
city at its feet. Somewhere in the middle of it all was the square where the statue of Dax stood, and across from it the Council Building where the last stand had taken place.
That brought up painful memories she quashed—quickly from long practice, but never easily.
“Rina? Rina Carbray, is that you?”
She turned at the sound of the voice.
It took her a moment to place the man who had been walking past her; he had grown much in the years since the battle for Galatin. In fact, he had become rotund, both in body and face. Bratus Onslow had been a young major then, in charge of Galatin’s defenses. And a bit in awe of her, once he realized she had indeed flown with Dax.
He wore a fancy suit now instead of a uniform, far too bright for her taste. But he’d obviously done well.
“Major Onslow, how are you?”
“It’s ‘Mayor’ now,” he said with pride. “But you may call me Bratus, of course.”
So he was a speechmaker now, she thought as he shook her hand vigorously.
“How . . . perfect for you,” she said, keeping her tone as level as she could.
“You look wonderful.” She doubted that: she had slept on the transport, and had merely run her fingers through her hair and washed her face before they’d landed. “But then, Triotians are the most beautiful race, after all,” Onslow said.
“Unless you’re of the Coalition,” she retorted, uncomfortable with the overblown flattery, “in which case we’re the plague of the system.”
“Along with Arellians,” Bratus added proudly. “Come, there is a small place down the block, let me get you a warm brew. You are here early, the ceremony is not for days yet.”
Somewhat sleepily she answered, “That’s not why I’m here.”
He frowned. “But they are coming, are they not? The royals and Minister Silverbrake and his mate?”
“They will all be here for the official ceremony. Prince Lyon is already here.”
Bratus blinked, stopped walking. “He is? I saw nothing in the bulletins.”
Rina smiled. “He came in quietly, a couple of days ago. He wished to see something of Arellia, and of the celebration, before he steps into his official role.”
Bratus frowned. “But that’s a breach of protocol. He should have been greeted properly, provided a guide for whatever sights he wished to see.”
Bratus, Rina remembered suddenly, had always been a bit of a stickler for protocol. It had been hard on him when the battle for Galatin had gotten so ugly, so bloody, that protocol was shoveled. Apparently, in the years since the war, he had regained the attitude.
She started walking in the direction he indicated. It was as well, she could look away as the memories assailed her. Bratus wasn’t the only one who had quailed at the task before them back then. Many had—and some simply ran, terrified. If it had not been for the courageous young captain who had stepped up when Major Onslow had broken, the battle for Galatin might have gone very differently.
She shook off the images in her head. Images of that man had haunted her for years, and somehow stopping herself from useless grieving had never gotten easier.
She made herself focus.
“You’ll find Lyon an independent sort,” she said, mentally marking Bratus off her list of people who might help her find him, and thus Shaina. For she was certain the queen was correct, that Dax’s daughter had come here to unburden herself to her lifelong friend. She had watched the two grow up together, in fact had often found herself, still at a young age herself, their caretaker.
She hadn’t minded. Shaina was Dax’s, after all, and she would to this day lay down her life for him. Watching over his child had been little enough to ask, and of course being entrusted with the king’s son had been an honor. It had been difficult at times to resist their rambunctious charm, and she had often found herself sucked into one of their adventures. There were still things kept between the three of them, things they had all agreed it was best their parents know nothing of.
“—hard to believe he could go unnoticed,” Bratus was saying.
“There are many Triotians in the capital for the anniversary celebration.”
Bratus’s mouth twisted. “Along with most of our own population, I think. The onworld transport companies have been running double schedules, just trying to keep up. And the skyport is overcrowded.”
“It would not be difficult to disappear into the throngs. Have you seen or heard anything of Dax’s offspring?” she asked.
Bratus looked even more alarmed. “She too is here already? And told no one? This is just not correct.”
Rina laughed. “Did you but know her, you would know that the word correct is not often used with her name. She is her father’s daughter, with his spirit and recklessness. It is as well Prince Lyon possesses his father’s charisma. It has gotten them out of more than one tricky situation.”
Bratus frowned. “You believe they are together?”
“They were raised together. They are rarely apart for long.”
Even as she said it, she thought of those days long ago, when the babies were tiny, having been born within a year of each other. There had been much teasing then that the two were destined, the final cementing of the ties between Trios and Arellia begun by both the Triotian king and the flashbow warrior taking bonded mates who were from their ally. But Trios did not believe in forcing such arrangements, and so such suggestions were quieted as the children grew old enough to understand.
She noticed, as they entered the small brew shop serving the strong, thick Arellian coffee the planet was famous for, that many looked up as they passed. She doubted any of them recognized her, so assumed the frowns and darting glances were aimed at Bratus. She nearly protested when, with a wave of his hand, a table was vacated by two men who were clearly not finished with their morning cups. But they left quickly, and she suppressed the urge.
“Where do you think they might be?” Bratus asked after a woman had hastened over to take their order.
She opened her mouth to reply, knowing they would likely be off in the countryside somewhere, exploring, as was their wont. Then she shut it without speaking as it occurred to her that Bratus was likely to send out an official search party, and announce to the gathered crowds that the prince and Dax’s daughter were hiding among them. Neither Lyon nor Shaina would thank her for that, and she couldn’t blame them.
She was saved from trying to answer by Bratus’s sudden frown as he looked past her into the room. “Be warned,” he said. “Tarkson is here.”
“What?” Rina’s breath caught in her throat.
“Tarkson. I caution you not to listen to his—”
“Tark is . . . alive?” she interrupted, her mind suddenly an odd combination of numbness and energy poised for explosion.
“Of course,” Bratus said. “What—oh, I recall now. You had already gone back to Trios when he and his unit returned.”
She was shaking, and didn’t care that it was evident in her voice. She was glad they were already sitting, for she was certain she would have collapsed. “But we heard he—that they were all dead.”
She had long refused to admit, had tried not to even remember how devastating that news had been. The dashing young captain had single-handedly kept the Arellian rebellion going with his daring raids and guerilla tactics. And he had made quite an impression on her youthful, impressionable self. Even Dax had spotted his skills early in the fight, and pulled him up to be his second in command, ruffling the feathers of some older members of the Arellian forces. But Dax was Dax, and no one was about to try to face him down.
“They were presumed so. That was why no rescue was attempted. It was really a shock,” Bratus said, sounding as if he were reluctant to talk about it.
She wondered if he had been the one to decide not to send anyon
e into that pass to search for any survivors. It would be just like him. And the way he avoided her gaze made her think she was right.
“What happened?” she demanded.
“They held off an entire Coalition battalion for nearly two weeks. A handful of fighters against hundreds. The odds were impossible, there was no reason to believe they could have survived.”
She knew then she was right. He had been the one who had abandoned them to die.
Alive. Tark was alive.
The words echoed in her mind in a careening loop. She remembered the moment when hope had died in her, when she’d finally had to accept the truth of his death. Some part of her had died in that moment as well, and she had never been the same.
“And yet they did? And escaped, right under those Coalition noses?”
“Yes,” he said, clearly not happy with having to admit it.
She swallowed against the tightness in her chest. Fumbled for ordinary words in the face of the abrupt upending of her world. “Dax will be pleased to hear it. He, too, thought him dead.”
And tried to comfort me when it was impossible.
“As long as he doesn’t have to deal with him. Tarkson is much changed. Physically and otherwise.”
And who would not be, after that? she wondered.
“It was a heroic act, I must admit. Earned him the promotion to commander before they retired him.” He didn’t sound happy about that, either, Rina noted. “Yet Tarkson wished no fanfare. The end was declared soon after they made it back, and he wanted only peace and quiet and time to heal.”
“Heal?”
“He was grievously wounded. Nearly died after all.”
Her stomach knotted up even tighter. She couldn’t bear thinking of Tark being hurt so badly.
“I’m afraid it affected his mind. He does not speak much, at least not to me, but he has made some ridiculous claims of late. He has even been associating with that crazy Reyks woman.”
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