Prophesied: Interplanetary League series

by Liz Craven

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  They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

  577 Mulberry Street, Suite 1520

  Macon GA 31201

  Prophesied

  Copyright © 2008 by Liz Craven

  ISBN: 1-60504-060-6

  Edited by Heidi Moore

  Cover by Angela Waters

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: July 2008

  www.samhainpublishing.com

  Prophesied

  Liz Craven

  Dedication

  Wendy—What can I say? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for reading and rereading. You’ve been a godsend.

  Chapter One

  She hit the wall. Hard.

  Only after impact did she register the roar and heat of the explosion behind her. It had to be the retractor. The dilapidated relic was long past due for a massive failure, having been considered an antique decades earlier.

  She twisted around for a look at the machine and felt a searing pain in her side coupled with a sudden falling sensation. She hadn’t realized she’d been hanging three meters above the cavern floor, impaled on a metal spike. Wincing more in fear than pain, she clamped a hand over her injured side. Even the simplest injury in the mines might be life threatening.

  Her personal concerns fled as she twisted for her first look at the retractor.

  Smoke and flames belched from its ruptured center, filling the small cavern with an acrid, burning gas. It had split open, scattering central gears around its perimeter along with the remainder of belts and metal housing. Even from a distance, she knew the retractor couldn’t be saved. Despair clenched her stomach. As bad as the machine had been, it was critical to the miners’ safety—and something the Mining Guild ranked low on its priority list.

  As Lia struggled to her feet, she watched her fellow miners begin pushing the retractor’s carcass towards the ledge. She had spent the past two shifts dangling from that ledge and scraping precious ore from the crevices in the side of the cliff. Ignoring her body’s protest, she made her way towards the group.

  Though the cavern was small, by the time Lia reached the others, the retractor had disappeared over the cliff’s edge with a creaking groan. Peering over the ridge, she watched it fall until it disappeared from sight. It would drop at least five kilometers before it struck ground.

  The miners stood as somber as a funeral gathering, staring into the dark void below them. The retractor was critical to their safety and now it was gone.

  Lia finally broke the silence with a whisper. “What happened? One minute I was unstrapping my harness and the next I was across the cave.”

  Gentle hands began prodding at her side. “You need to sit down.”

  She turned to find Lynaya studying the bloody wound. Surprise quickly gave way to concern at the sight of the elderly woman. Not only did Lynaya’s age make her a hindrance inside the mine, but she possessed the only healing skills on the moon. Gods knew the Guild wouldn’t pay for medical treatment. Those skills were too valuable to be risked in the mines where death came easy.

  While she sat on the ground out of deference to the wise woman who kneeled beside her, Lia continued to stare at the void where the retractor had vanished. “Is anyone else injured?”

  Lynaya didn’t pause in her examination. “No.”

  “But we had two miners over the ledge,” a new voice clarified.

  Lia closed her eyes as Monteg squatted next to Lynaya. “Who?”

  “If I’d wanted her to know about them, I would have told her,” Lynaya snapped.

  “Talle and Misha,” Monteg answered, sounding more subdued in the face of the healer’s displeasure.

  Lia pictured the two boys in her mind. Identical twins, they had been full of life and humor. Too young to work anywhere but in the mines, the two had spun wild tales about the riches they would earn and the adventures they would have when they were old enough to work at the Guild-run, gambling port of Kastal City. Now those futures were gone.

  “We have to tell their family,” she said quietly.

  Monteg shook his head. “We can’t. The explosion caused the entrance to collapse. The whole tunnel filled in.”

  Resignation tinged his voice, and Lia immediately understood the seriousness of the situation. The Guild had gotten rich off xyreon ore and richer off the exploitation of the miners, but a new, more efficient power source had come onto the market almost three decades earlier. As more and more worlds adapted to the new source, the price of xyreon ore plummeted.

  As a result, the Guild had directed its energies and resources into other areas. Kastal City was one of its greatest successes. It offered easy access to League citizens while not being subject to all those irksome laws and police forces. Gambling, entertainment, and prostitution were its main attractions, and the Guild raked in the credits. With Kastal City bringing in so much, they invested little on the mines. The Guild often decided reopening collapsed mines would cost more than the ore in it was worth, choosing to leave the miners sealed within.

  “Makes you wish you’d gone to work in the City, huh?” Monteg offered a weak grin.

  “What? And give up all this?” Lia replied, hoping her smile didn’t look as forced as his.

  Most female miners had jumped at the chance to work in the City. Those who remained in the mines were either disfigured or were in hiding—like her.

  Lynaya pressed a cloth against Lia’s side. “Hold this in place. Keep pressure on it,” she instructed.

  Lia winced and nodded. “What are you doing in the mine?”

  Lynaya was the only healer in the camp. If the Guild left them to die, Lynaya’s loss would hurt the rest of the miners for a long time to come. Not only would they lose her healing skills, but her occasional ability to know things before they happened—a talent that had likely saved more miners than her medicinal treatments.

  “I wanted to talk to you and knew we’d have time in here,” Lynaya explained.

  “Oh, we’ve got time,” Monteg grumbled as he sat heavily on the ground beside Lia. “We’ve got the rest of our lives.”

  “It will only take them an hour to dig us out,” Lynaya replied.

  “It will take longer than that for them to do the cost-benefit analysis on whether to rescue us,” Monteg shot back.

  Lynaya settled beside them. “They are already working to free us.”

  Monteg gave his usual scornful snort in response to one of Lynaya’s predictions. “No doubt they are rushing to rescue a handful of mine rats.”

  “What did you want to discuss?” Lia interjected to forestall their budding argument. She didn’t want to focus on her impending death.

  “Your destiny.”

  “Mine rats don’t have destinies,” Monteg pointed out. He wasn’t trying to start an argument, but merely stating the way of life in the mine.

  “We don’t,” Lynaya agreed. “People who come to work in the mines are running from their pasts. We had our chance and lost our destinies. But Lia isn’t running from her past. She’s running from her future.”

 
; “Hard to run from anything when you’re buried in a collapsed mine,” Monteg sniped.

  Lia laughed. Only miners lived such a hard life that even a slow, looming death couldn’t hurt their sense of humor. “He has a point.”

  “I’m giving you advice, girl. I suggest you listen.”

  Out of respect for the older woman, Lia refrained from rolling her eyes. Lynaya loved to give advice and tended to wax on and on with vague gibberish cloaked under the veil of so-called soothsaying.

  “Might as well,” Monteg drawled. “We haven’t got anything else to do.”

  The last thing Lia wanted to do was sit through one of Lynaya’s long-winded lectures. Hoping to create a distraction, she leaned back and scanned the cavern. “Did the water trough survive the cave in?”

  Monteg leaned back as well. “Looks like debris is covering half of it. I’ll check and see if any water’s left in the other half.”

  He lumbered to his feet and shuffled off in the direction of the trough.

  Lynaya patted her knee fondly. “Your future is now.”

  So much for putting off Lynaya’s prattling. “I see.”

  “No, you don’t, but you will,” the crone replied with a conviction that made Lia uneasy.

  Monteg reappeared with two battered metal cups in his hands. He handed one cup to each of the women before sitting back down. “The remaining part of the trough is about half full.”

  Lia wrapped a hand around the warm metal. In the dim light of the cavern, she couldn’t make out the amount of liquid in the cup. She raised it to her lips and took a careful sip. The water was warm and metallic in taste, but it was wet.

  She tilted her head back and stared at the weak light filtering down from the overhead bulb. The sweltering heat had sweat pouring down her back. It was a good sign. When she stopped sweating, she would be dehydrated and facing the very real probability of heat stroke.

  A deep breath filled her lungs with the taste of roasting air and dirt, a flavor unique to the mines of Tmesis. She set the cup down on the packed earth beside her and awkwardly tore a strip of cloth from one of the layers of clothing she wore.

  Lynaya anticipated her next action and placed a gentle hand over the makeshift bandage at Lia’s side to hold it in place. With a deft maneuver, Lia wrapped the strip of cloth around herself and tied it off. After adjusting the many layers of her protective clothing to cover the area, she lifted the cup for another sip of fetid liquid.

  “Did you tell Lia about your latest ‘vision’ or whatever?” Monteg asked.

  “She did,” Lia rushed to assure him, still hoping to cut off Lynaya’s prattling. She figured they had enough air to last about six hours, and she didn’t want to spend the rest of her life listening to Lynaya’s “predictions”.

  Monteg sat back down with loud groan, and two of the other trapped miners came to join them.

  “Well, Lynaya, looks like your visions ain’t working any more if you’re trapped in here with the rest of us,” Tila told her, settling cross-legged beside Monteg and running a seductive hand along his thigh. “Well, handsome, how do we want to spend the last hours of our lives?”

  Lia bit back a laugh and exchanged a knowing look with Lynaya. Tila had been pursuing Monteg since Lia had arrived on the moon, and Monteg had been struggling to avoid her for the same length of time.

  Xavier knelt beside Tila and glared at Monteg. While Tila chased Monteg, Xavier chased Tila. With the tension brewing between the members of the bizarre triangle, Lynaya’s jabbering suddenly looked good.

  “Lynaya told me that my future is now,” she said to the group.

  “No shit,” Xavier said with a laugh. “All our futures are now…and for the next few hours.”

  Lynaya wagged a bony finger at him in a threatening gesture that seemed absurd coming from such a frail, old woman. “Mark my words, young man. They will have us out within the hour.”

  Relief lit Xavier’s and Tila’s faces. Most miners were a superstitious lot and considered Lynaya’s words sacrosanct. Monteg and Lia’s healthy doubt of much of her “talent” put them in the miner minority. While everyone’s attention was fixed on Lynaya, Monteg shifted away from Tila’s exploring hand.

  “I’m awfully relieved,” Tila announced. “The Guild hasn’t dug out a collapsed mine in over a year.”

  “This time, they are digging for Lia,” Lynaya continued. “It is time for her to embrace her destiny.”

  “Ah,” Tila and Xavier chorused looking at Lia with respect.

  Uncomfortable with their scrutiny, Lia focused on Lynaya. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “You are no longer the child you were before you came here.”

  Great. Her future was now and she was no longer a child. No wonder Lynaya never found her way off the hellish moon. “I’m all grown-up now,” she agreed, humoring the healer.

  “No. You still have some growing to do. You haven’t yet realized while you must fulfill your destiny, you control your fate.”

  “I see,” Lia said quietly, though she had no idea what the crone meant. A glance around showed Monteg’s humor and Tila and Xavier’s awe.

  “No, you don’t. But you will. Just remember who you are rather than who you were,” Lynaya said, patting Lia’s knee with awkward affection.

  Unsure how to respond, Lia opted to stretch out on the hard ground. The wound in her side burned in protest and the hard, pointed rocks pressed into her spine. She ignored the discomfort and stared at the domed rock ceiling of the cavern.

  The feeble light washed the cavern in deep shadows that played along the ceiling and walls. When she first began working the mines, she’d often stared at the shadows and sought images in their shapes. She’d forgotten that game. Looking at the ceiling today, those same shadows seemed threatening and ominous. Aware of the eyes fixed on her, she repressed a shudder. Lynaya’s ambiguous words hovered in the air above her like a living, sinister thing.

  Time crawled slowly forward, and the heat seemed to increase exponentially with the inactivity. When Lia labored to gather ore, the heat buzzed about her like an annoying bug, but the idleness of waiting made her more aware of the oppressive temperature of the mines.

  She considered removing some of her protective clothing, but decided against it. In the unlikely event of a rescue attempt, she would need whatever protection against flying rocks and debris the clothes afforded. Having already suffered one severe injury, she didn’t need another.

  Lia closed her eyes to shut out the shadows, but a tremor beneath her back had them flying open. She half-raised herself to a sitting position, watching the meager, suspended light fixture above her swing violently in response to the vibration. “What was that?”

  “I told you,” Lynaya repeated calmly. “They are coming for you.”

  That didn’t sound very comforting.

  Tila looked alarmed. “But what are they doing? It should take hours for them to dig us out. At this stage of digging, we shouldn’t feel them coming.”

  “They aren’t digging us out,” Lynaya responded calmly. “They are using explosives to get to us quickly.”

  “Explosives?” Xavier gasped. The Guild was too cheap to use explosives to clear a mine. If they chose to rescue them, they would have miners dig them out by hand—when they weren’t working a shift in the other mines.

  “Prepare yourself,” Lynaya told Lia. “Your time has come.”

  Chapter Two

  The Guild rep yanked Lia into the room with enough force to snap her head back. His bruising grip gave her no chance to resist. Not that she would. The rep held the power of life and death over the miners. Only a fool would publicly defy him. Admittedly, she was often foolish, but Lia prided herself on not being a fool.

  “You will pay for this,” he hissed, spittle spraying her ear.

  Her mind raced. She could think of nothing she had done to warrant the rep’s rage.

  Nothing recent, anyway.

  The room stopped teetering as she
regained her balance. She straightened, pride forcing her to her full height. Tall for a miner, Lia looked the rep in his eye. It infuriated him to stand eye-to-eye with a woman, and she took a small pleasure in annoying him. The Powers knew there was little enough enjoyment in a mining camp.

  The rep glared at her, but beneath the hate and anger blazing in his eyes, Lia recognized fear. That fear had her stomach clenching. If the monster was frightened, things were bad, and he was going to make her suffer for it.

  His eyes cut quickly back to the center of the room. She followed his gaze. Four men wearing the black body armor of League soldiers stood in the harsh light of the rep’s office.

  “This is the woman from the mining camp,” the rep announced.

  The supplicating tone told her these men were important. Soldiers without promise, the screw-ups, patrolled the League’s border in this section of the quadrant. A few shillings in the right hand kept the Guild free from any League entanglements.

  But he wouldn’t be able to buy these men. She would have known that without the rep’s appeasing manner. The soldiers before her were warriors, large, hard-bodied and deadly.

  And they were looking for her.

  She fought to stave off panic as the rep dragged her across the room to stand before them. Prayers from her childhood training skittered across her brain. There had to be a way out of this. A way to avoid being identified. She needed to think, to find a way. She’d cheerfully face the rep’s wrath rather than let these men take her back.

  “The League appreciates your assistance in this matter,” one of the soldiers replied, his voice cold, crisp and condescending.

  Lia’s eyes, accustomed to the dark mines, burned under the harsh office light. Blinking the tears back, the face of the speaking soldier wavered briefly, before coming into focus.

  Her heart stuttered, and she managed to keep her jaw from dropping. Just when she thought things couldn’t get any worse—or any better, she wasn’t sure which.

  His face was leaner than she remembered, giving his cheekbones a sharp edge. He had lost the soft features of a young man. The roundness of his cheeks had faded, making his square jaw more pronounced and giving him a determined look. He regarded the rep with gray eyes, the color of melted xyreon ore when light struck it. Unlike the ore, however, his flinty eyes were ice cold. The world “ruthless” flitted across her mind and a shiver danced down her spine.