Battle Queen: Red Ruler Series (Book 1)

by Kahaula

  “It was how they met,” his gaze pierced right into me. I didn’t know where he was going with this but it was making me nervous. K’Tos was never nostalgic. “They kept telling me we weren’t always this way. That before The Shift the Rentok were poets, philosophers—shit, can you imagine? My grandfather said he was an apprentice to a famous orator at the time of The Shift!”

  “Considering he was one of the most ruthless High Generals in our history, I really can’t,” I looked at K’Tos with suspicion.

  “Believe it! In fact it was my grandmother who was a soldier before The Shift, my grandfather was just some useless civilian who tried to patch up her wounds from a recent engagement,” K’Tos laughed and I couldn’t help but smile, “She said she punched him unconscious when he refused to let her leave the medical facilities to go back out and fight.” We both laughed before K’Tos became deathly serious. His whole face was set in hard lines like he was chewing on something bitter.

  “There were laws set up to protect people like my grandparents,” he enunciated each word slowly, giving me a purposeful and pointed look. “Our people may have forgotten them, but they’re still there.”

  “What—“

  “Think, L’Ryx,” he growled, “and think quickly because sooner rather than later you’ll be seeing me.” I stood there stunned, just staring at a blank screen. All around me, my men shuffled and looked at each other. High Council didn’t trust me, or they didn’t trust me to accomplish my kill order. They had sent General K’Tos as insurance and he was giving me a heads up.

  But why all the talk about his grandparents and how there had been laws to protect people like them? He said he had given me a hint earlier when we were in the meeting with the High Council. I looked over at R’Tok and he was already pulling up the conference video and isolating every time General K’Tos had spoken.

  “Tell us, L’Ryx, did you see stars when she kissed you with her skull?”

  “This is the only phrasing that seemed odd,” R’Tok stood shoulder to shoulder with me. His look of absolute concentration matched my own. We replayed it twice before he huffed in frustration, “I just know this is key to his warning but I don’t know what he’s trying to say!”

  See stars.

  She kissed you.

  Stars.

  Kissed.

  “Star Kissed,” I gasped and took two steps back, “Holy Darkness, he means Star Kissed.” I clutched my chest at the sweet pain of my racing heart. My mother had told me the stories when I was young. She whispered them to me as I lay in my bed, as if she was sharing the greatest secret she had to give.

  I ran my hand reverently along Welo’s claw marks down my chest. The claw marks that had never healed. The yearning to always be near her that sat in the back of my mind. The need to hold her, to touch her that never faded. The vicious disgust at doing anything that might cause her harm. The rage that anyone would try to touch her. The possessiveness.

  “R’Tok pull up the laws added after The Shift,” I looked at him frantically, “NOW, R’Tok! Use the keywords ‘Star Kissed’.” I had no idea how close General K’Tos was or if he was bringing his entire armada.

  “Yes, sir!” R’Tok scrambled to a console, pushing aside the officer sitting before it.

  “Find out where General K’Tos is and how many ships are traveling with him,” I snapped out my orders and my men ran to the remaining consoles. I didn’t dare to even think or feel hope. I ran my hands across my skull just trying to come to terms with my world exploding in front of me.

  Ding!

  I looked around me for my personal holoscreen.

  Ding!

  “Damnit, where’s my holoscreen,” I felt unhinged and the scene around my feet showed as much. The chair I ripped away from me had hit the nearby low table, scattering everything on it to the floor.

  Ding!

  Moving around sheets and boxes I found my holoscreen. It was blank. Had I missed the communication?

  Ding!

  What was ringing if my personal holoscreen was blank? A few of my men saw me standing with the blank holoscreen in my hand. Their faces scrunched up in confusion. I looked to my left and saw R’Tok staring over my shoulder, his face ashen in shock. One by one my officers stopped what they were doing and stared with him behind me.

  On our main holoscreen was a mark, a crest, I had never seen before. A round black shield bordered around the edges with red, gold, and silver inlay. The inlay were star maps of Ula Nui. The inner circle of the shield was blood red. Bold black strokes formed the fierce gaze of Menrva, which stared straight forward into the eyes of any who would challenge her. The Battle Queen was calling me via our own command centre hardware.

  Ding!

  “Open the—,” before I could finish, Welo’s impassive face popped onto the screen.

  “General L’Ryx,” she greeted me, making no reference to how she was able to greet me. From the look on her face I also doubted that she wanted to greet me. “I see you and your men are comfortably settled in their accommodations.”

  “Yes.” What was I supposed to say to that?

  “I know I haven’t been available so I wanted to personally extend an invitation to tomorrow night’s Ambassador’s Welcome Ball to you and your men,” I was clenching my jaw so tight I could feel the muscles twitching. There was nothing but bland cordiality in her expression and words. This wasn’t my Welo, this was the politically savvy Battle Queen, poised and polite. I fucking hated it.

  “That’s very gracious of you,” I ground out.

  “I know you aren’t an ambassador,” her lips pursed in a false sympathy that bordered on condescension, “but as the only Rentok High General currently on Ula Nui, I felt it was my duty as Battle Queen to ensure you weren’t left out of the festivities.”

  “We’ll be there,” I tried for cold professionalism but even I could hear the dark promise in what I said.

  “Oh,” Welo tapped her lip as if just remembering something, “Please do extend the invitation to General K’Tos and his men as well, they should be arriving by morning.” I could see all her teeth, fangs included, as she bared them at me in the challenging smile of a predator. She was baiting me and I was too pissed to care.

  “I wasn’t aware you kept such a close eye on the Rentok,” I could be just as flippant as she.

  “I keep a close eye on all my enemies,” her eyes narrowed. It was as if we stood on the Blood Sands all over again but this time she wasn’t here to play the game. She was here to end it.

  “I was never your enemy,” it was both a lie and the truth. The pain that flashed briefly across her eyes mirrored my own.

  “But you were never my ally,” a hint of sadness touched her voice before it was buried under cold calm.

  “We each have responsibilities, people we answer to,” I was drowning in a toxic cocktail of emotions that threatened to pull me under, “Isn’t that what you said?” My men flinched around me as Welo’s laugh filled the room entirely. It was cruel and cold.

  “No,” she sneered and her eyes became darker. Her claws sprung from her fingers and her fangs pushed against her bloody lips. “I answer to my people. They are my only responsibility. But you?” She scoffed, her eyes mocking me as they held fast to my heart, “You have orders.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about—“

  High Council Leader R’Til’s face and my own filled every holoscreen we had.

  “Then you know your orders, we follow the directive set from The Shift. Kill her.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Welo hadn’t just cut off my lie before I could insult her with the rest of it, she’d cut off my head.

  “How?” My question was barely spoken but I knew she heard me.

  “Does it matter?”

  “It matters to me, Welo!” I yelled. Desperation and betrayal sliced through me but nothing overcame the feeling that I deserved anything she could throw at me. She had every right to kill me.

  “
Ask me tomorrow night at the welcome ball,” the holoscreen blanked once more but not before I saw the hurt pouring from her eyes like a slit throat. That look. That hurt and disappointment killed me more than if she had looked at me in anger or recrimination.

  I doubled over and a keening whine fell from my lips. I had never in my life made such a sound. I had never heard such a sound in all my years either. It was the sound of my soul being ripped to shreds. Grief gave way to rage and I snapped upright, my hands gripping my skull tightly.

  “She. Fucking. Played. Me!” I roared and rammed my fists over and over again into the main holoscreen. I could hear shouts behind and around me but ignored it all. Black droplets of blood splashed my face as I continued to pound my fists into the smashed mess of a holoscreen barely hanging on the wall.

  I felt hands grip my arms and body but struggled in their grasp. I elbowed behind me and heard grunts and gasps of pain. No pain was comparable to what I was feeling. I had fucked up so badly and on such a scale that my brain couldn’t even fully comprehend it.

  “Stop, General,” I knew it was R’Tok but I kept fighting the hands that were trying to hold me back from my rage. “L’Ryx! Stop, please,” R’Tok was no longer asking, he was begging. I turned to where I had heard him speak. My men had packed into the room and circled around me. Some of my officers were sporting bloody lips or swollen eyes.

  The wheezing, heaving sound I could hear was my own heavy breathing. I flexed my fingers and felt the sting of holoscreen shards still imbedded in my flesh. Black blood dripped slowly to the floor from my fists.

  “I betrayed her,” I gasped as a physical pain made me stumble forward, “She knows.” I didn’t even know when my uniform shirt had been ripped off. My bloody hand splayed against Welo’s claw marks on my chest. Ragged breaths sawed through my lungs and I wished it could cleave my heart from my chest.

  “General...,” R’Tok gasped in astonishment. The men moved collectively closer and stared at me in wonder. “Your skin... General it’s like seeing star patterns across your chest!”

  “That’s why it’s called Star Kissed,” my soul broke a little more, “they appear when you’ve found your mate.” I stumbled back into the wall, feeling the sharp points of the broken holoscreen pierce my back. “They appeared for Welo,” my words were a whisper but they might as well have been screamed. A sea of emotions flowed across the faces of my men, some confused and others drifting between awe and pity. I ran my hand down my face, smearing my black blood everywhere.

  “But, I don’t understand,” R’Tok was only a century old. This was the one leap he couldn’t make because he didn’t have the upbringing that I or K’Tos had. “Rentok are hyperadaptive, we don’t have perfect mates like some other species.”

  “It wasn’t always that way, R’Tok,” I sagged against the wall. Whatever strength I had left was leaving me as hopelessness replaced it, “We became that way because after The Shift there were fewer and fewer Star Kissed.” A thought popped into my head and I laughed bitingly, “That’s how they did it! That’s how they knew what to look for in someone. Oh, those hypocritical bastards.”

  “What?” Asked R’Tok urgently. My men leaned in as well, their faces shocked but eager to know whatever realisation I had come to.

  “The directive,” I spat, “We are to destroy any of the ancient technology we find or kill anyone who knows of it. We were always told it was too dangerous. The scale that the ancient technology could affect was too great,” I didn’t care if it sounded like I was rambling. I finally understood something so profound that I had to speak it out loud, “They knew.”

  “Who? Who knew?” I couldn’t see who had asked but I answered them anyway.

  “The High Council,” I growled, “We had already lost so many in the different conflicts and wars after The Shift and then on top of that, our population wasn’t growing because there were so few Star Kissed. By the time I was born, it was just a bed time story, a myth.” I took a deep breath, I knew my eyes were wild because I felt a kind of manic understanding bubble up in me, “They must have adjusted us, using the same ancient technology that altered Welo. Our whole species became known for being hyperadaptive and no one batted an eye because the galaxy was in total chaos.”

  “But they couldn’t take the chance that it would be used against them so they created the directive,” R’Tok’s look of horror passed over all the faces around me. We had benefited as a species from the ancient technology but were sent here to kill a woman who had had it forced on her. And Darkness only knew how many others before her.

  “K’Tos tried to warn me,” I felt my determination and drive rise above the hopelessness trying to pull me back down.

  “What are your orders, General?” R’Tok’s loyalty and the loyalty of my men shone bright all around me. I stood a little straighter with pride. The Battle Queen wasn’t the only one who was loved by her people.

  “Find out what law or laws K’Tos was referring to,” I stepped up to my men, “And everyone get your best uniforms ready, I want us to look damn good when we arrive at the welcome ball tomorrow night.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Welo

  “It’s done,” I looked up at Hs’tar, Merooth, Ally, and Mel. They had all sat silently as I had spoken with L’Ryx.

  “The girls and I will be ready for our part at the ball,” Ally appeared fully solid but I knew this was just her particle projection being relayed up into my office from deep below in the facility. “I’ll be the only one in my original form and unmasked, the rest will choose their own forms but you’ll know it’s us.” Her gaze swept over all of us. “This should be fun, Welo.” She winked at me, and with a small smile, disappeared.

  “I bet that bastard is shitting himself knowing that we infiltrated his secret High Council meeting,” smirked Hs’tar. I didn’t know whether he didn’t like L’Ryx for any particular reason or just in general.

  “Not to mention the implications,” Mel ran her fingers through her short hair in thought, “I’ll admit it was a ballsy play tipping our hand like that, Welo.”

  “It was the smartest way to get him and the rest of the Rentok to the party,” added Merooth, “if we hadn’t they would have been forced to gate crash or worse try and concoct some rushed operation before the ball.”

  “Agreed,” Hs’tar nodded, “this way we’ve flushed them straight to us by leaving no option except to attend,” his lip curled up in a nasty sneer, “And they’ll behave because L’Ryx will need answers about how we broke into their mighty central world systems.” I rapped my knuckles on my desk and all heads turned to me.

  “We’re in the final phase,” I was calm. We had done everything we needed to do, and now, the die was cast. My eyes passed over each of their faces. Maybe I was memorising every line or maybe just this moment in time. It didn’t matter. One more day and night then our world would change. “Mel—“

  “When General K’Tos gets here let his personal warship through but deny entry to his armada,” Mel had already run me through her part since she would be the first point of contact on that front. “I’ll tell him we’ve acquired a brand new defence system,” she paused to chuckle, “which we started rolling out tonight, and oopsie! It’s got bugs! That means—for safety reasons—only one ship at a time can be given safe passage through.”

  “You’re so accommodating, Mel, to let him skip the line so he can make it to the ball,” teased Merooth.

  “Yup, bibbity bobbity boo dickhead!” Mel threw up some jazz hands motions, “I’m his space fairy godmother here to ensure that his pumpkin makes it in time for the ball.” The two of us broke out into raucous laughter as Hs’tar and Merooth just stared at us like we were insane.

  Hs’tar had brokered hundreds of trade agreements in just the past six months. The influx of central world representatives and proxies, funnelled by Merooth to Hs’tar, had increased our viewership and entertainment agreements as well. Mel’s and Hs’tar’s offworld spies, along
with the new semi-official Faces, were feeding into our cistern of actionable information.

  Our pleasure and breeding contracts were some of the most sought after because of our variety and high quality. We also didn’t discriminate and catered to the poorer outlier worlds with a sliding scale of connected fertility services. We were even receiving inquiries as to whether people could establish their own gladiatorial houses here on Ula Nui. Businesses not from our own people were slowly sniffing around to see whether or not we were going to be a good long term investment.

  All of that sounded great on paper but we had made our plan for a reason. Prosperity, Wealth, Fame, Notoriety? They were all transient. Too often out here in the farther reaches of space larger governments could get away with whatever they pleased. Or worse, they stood by while monsters like the old leader toyed with Life and Death unchallenged.

  We were skirting a fine line.

  “Merooth?” I asked.

  “I’ve coordinated with Hs’tar, Mel, and Ally,” Merooth’s electric blue eyes shimmered in excitement. He loved nothing more than to string along prey into a trap, “One Pit worker, One visible Sylean guard, One Face, and one of the girls per team.”

  “My Syleans will be the stationary guards in each throne floor chamber,” added Hs’tar.

  “Most of the Pit workers chosen are already Faces or in training so that worked out perfectly,” Mel looked at Hs’tar and continued, “we didn’t want to press our luck so the Pit workers will have their masks on. They and the Faces will mingle in teams of two from room to room at 30 minute rotations so we always have mobile eyes on the floor.”

  “Good,” I scratched the back of my neck absently, “Ally said she’s going to have the girls rotate but even with her full pod of 16 it’s going to be a big drain on their focus.”

  “They’re having to do a deep dive in a short amount of time plus make an appearance to get a physical tag on the 5 ambassadors,” Mel sighed and ran her hand through her hair again, “That’s why we’re relying on all the distractions to lower their guard and their inhibitions. The quicker we get things done the faster the girls can get back on task.”