Prophesied: Interplanetary League series

by Liz Craven

  “Damaia, we cannot cross the threshold of these rooms,” Vardin told her. “Our religious beliefs prohibit entering sanctified areas with a married woman unless her husband is present.”

  “Talon is tied up all day,” Lia protested. “And it will take weeks to schedule another time for me to do this.”

  “But, we have work crews scheduled to start in three days,” Miccar sputtered. “They have all passed your rigorous security screenings. We can’t risk them taking other jobs.”

  Lia tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Can you enter without me?”

  “Damaia, you cannot let Inderians decide your architecture,” Miccar gasped, then paled in fear of insulting the warriors.

  Vardin ignored him. “We can enter as long as no married woman is in the room or enters it while we are there.”

  “Why don’t you do a security sweep? Once you declare the rooms safe, Caden, Kavana, Miccar and I can go in and work. If necessary, we can pull some Home Guard soldiers from their posts to assist.

  “We can’t pull the guards,” Caden interjected. “They haven’t been screened for personal security detail.”

  “Is there another entrance to the apartments?” Vardin asked.

  “The emergency exit has been bricked up since the explosion. For now, this is the only way in,” Miccar explained.

  Vardin fixed Miccar with an unblinking stare, causing the skinny man to visibly tremble. Lia refrained from telling him the expression meant Vardin was considering her request. She didn’t want to offend the warrior by letting him think he was easy to read.

  “Very well,” Vardin agreed, though Lia sensed he didn’t like the idea. “Eglar and Rykkan will sweep the apartments thoroughly and report.”

  At his words, the two Inderians saluted and entered the suite. Miccar paced the small hallway with a contagious, nervous energy that had Kavana drumming her nails against the door. Lia slouched against the wall and watched Vardin lecture Caden on safety protocols.

  Finally, Eglar and Rykkan reappeared. They inclined their heads in unison to Vardin.

  “Very well,” Vardin said, not attempting to hide his reluctance. He addressed the group as a whole. “The Damaia will enter the apartments with Miccar and Caden. They will return. Then, Eglar and Rykkan will do another sweep.” He fixed his red eyes on Lia. “Damaia, you will complete the tour as expeditiously as possible. Debates can occur over holographic reproductions. Regardless, you will return in twenty minutes to check in. Do you agree?”

  Somehow, she managed not to roll her eyes at Vardin’s paranoia. “I agree.”

  “What about the interior design?” Kavana asked. The woman kept her tone polite and professional.

  Vardin’s sneered. “Colors and fabrics can be done with the models.”

  Kavana nodded and stepped aside.

  Vardin fixed Caden with a look that caused the young soldier to blanch. Lia was impressed. She would have expected him to soil himself. Caden had grown since she’d met him.

  Miccar darted into the apartments as though afraid Vardin would change his mind—or decide to snack on him. Not that the skinny man would provide much of a meal.

  Lia moved to follow Miccar, but Caden caught her arm.

  “I go first,” he warned, before preceding her through the door.

  The acrid smell of smoke hit Lia when she stepped across the threshold. She coughed and saw Caden blinking furiously. “I thought these rooms were cleaned.”

  Miccar bobbed his head at her while his eyes swept the room. “Yes. Yes. But we have been anticipating your visit. Security has not allowed us to air them out well.”

  Lia looked around a room four times the size of the quarters she’d shared with Talon aboard the Aegir. Someone had set up artificial lighting that illuminated the empty room and displayed the scorch marks on the walls.

  “I expected the walls to have holes in them,” Lia commented, her gaze riveted to the evidence of the explosion.

  “The bomb was set in your bedroom. This room is the farthest point from the blast site,” Miccar explained. “It suffered the least damage.”

  Caden’s eyes swept the destruction. “Given the limited time frame we have, I suggest we do a walk-through beginning with the bedroom and working our way back to the door.”

  “Yes. Yes,” Miccar chirped. “Follow me.”

  Lia shook her head as the man took off like a shot, before loping after him. They finally reached a cavernous room she assumed was the bedroom. Boards covered one entire wall, but only grooves in the floor and the occasional standing beam marked the other “walls”.

  “The windows were here.” Miccar stood facing the boarded, curved wall, his arms spread wide. The stance reminded Lia of a religious pilgrim before a sacred altar. “The views encompassed the capital city and government buildings, circling around to the Bahari Ocean.”

  “The view sounds lovely. I’d love to have as many windows as possible. Floor to ceiling if possible,” Lia told him. “But, does the room have to be this…big?”

  Miccar spun to face her, hand flying to his chest to clutch his heart. “Damaia, without the size, we could not incorporate all the architectural features we planned.”

  “Do we need all these ‘features’?” Lia asked.

  “Yes. Yes,” Miccar assured her. This time, his whole body bobbed up and down. “For example, an archway here will divide the room—”

  A blast of light cut off Miccar’s explanation, and he crumpled to the floor. Stunned, it took a second for Lia to process that the man had been shot. Realizing she had lost precious moments, she whirled around to find Caden pointing a blaster at her.

  Chapter Twenty

  The familiar burn of betrayal coursed through her veins. She hadn’t realized how much she had begun to trust until the pain rose up to choke her.

  “There was no need to kill Miccar,” she managed, pleased she sounded calm and cool rather than terrified.

  Caden’s icy stare didn’t as much as flicker. Gone was the youth with whom she’d traveled. A hardened man stood before her.

  Pointing a blaster at her.

  “Miccar should survive,” he said. “That was the lowest setting.”

  “You have no familial or political affiliation with either House. Otherwise, you never would have been assigned to my search party or security detail.” Lia stalled, desperately trying to find a way out of the situation. She could scream, but she’d be dead before Vardin and his men reached her. The rooms had been completely emptied. There was nothing she could use as a weapon, nothing to hide behind.

  He sneered at her. “I’m not doing this for something as trivial as personal power.”

  “Then why?” she asked quietly.

  “You are an abomination,” he growled. “A perversion of the Prophecy given to us by the gods.”

  Lia blinked, that was the last thing she’d expected to hear. Hell, hadn’t that been her argument all along? “You are going to kill me, because I was born? I had no control over that.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Your very existence desecrates the sanctity of the Prophecy.”

  “You can’t truly believe that. If you did, you wouldn’t have saved my life on DeKalb Station. You rescued me from the assassins,” she reminded him.

  He shook his head. “No, that was a decoy. By saving you, I would divert future suspicion from myself, in case it became necessary to take riskier measures in carrying out my sacred duty.”

  “If you kill me, you’ll never make it out of here,” she pointed out, praying self-preservation would outweigh his religious fervor. “You took too many precautions to willingly throw your life away.”

  He tensed, but only slightly. “We’ve run out of options. We hoped to end your life painlessly—as you said, you had no control over your birth—and with minimal collateral damage. Unfortunately, we have been unable to do that. My sacrifice is necessary to preserve the words of the Prophetess.”

  Lia’s thoughts raced as she turned the Prop
hecy over in her mind. “The Prophecy called for the Damaia to be born of the direct descendants of the living House lords of her time. Those descendants have been sterilized. If you kill me it will be impossible for the Prophecy to be fulfilled.”

  “The Prophecy is infallible. Once you are removed, it will unfold as originally intended,” Caden explained with complete confidence and an unshakable belief she found more terrifying than anything else he’d said.

  “How many people have been planning my death?” she asked.

  “We are a small, but growing movement, dedicated to the Prophetess and N’yota.”

  Lovely. A movement. People were actually recruiting others to support her murder. She briefly wondered about their recruitment slogan with a strange detachment until a new concern caused her heart to race. “What about Talon? Are you going after him too?”

  Caden’s eyebrows shot up at her question. “No. The first minister has earned his place on our world. His connection to the False Damaia will be severed at your death, and his leadership will be needed to help steer the planet until the true Damaia is born.”

  “I take it Syval’s illness isn’t a lucky coincidence.”

  “No lasting harm done,” Caden assured her. “We are not seeking to cause anyone harm or hurt N’yota. We simply refuse to allow the Prophecy to be blasphemed.”

  His logic astounded her. While “they” refused to “harm” anyone, killing her was acceptable, even warranted. Caden had a different definition of the word “harm” than she did.

  “I regret this is necessary, but I promise it will be painless.”

  Caden shifted his balance and time crawled almost to a standstill. She saw his finger tighten on the trigger and a tidal wave of emotion rocked her. Hurt, sadness, regret and grief. But rage swam to the top, only to be eclipsed by a blinding flash of hatred. Not for Caden, but for Talon.

  There was a time she had been resigned to the inevitable assassination she knew would come, but that was before Talon made her care. And she did care. About the people of her world, about their nascent peace and about their future. Talon had taught her to hope. To want to make a difference on their world.

  Worst of all, the damned man had made her fall in love with him. She’d gone all starry-eyed over him, imagining a future filled with laughter, children, and heaven help her, even grandchildren.

  She wanted to scream. To rage against fate for tempting her with a happily-ever-after and snatching it away, but she couldn’t seem to move, her gaze fixed on Caden’s whitening knuckle as he calmly pulled the trigger.

  So focused on what she was losing, Lia barely registered the flash of red light that surrounded Caden. She couldn’t miss the heavy weight that crashed into her like a small asteroid.

  She hit the ground with jarring force and breathing easily became a fond memory when the hard body followed her down and covered her completely.

  Several heartbeats later, she realized the sound roaring in her ears was shouting. It took several heartbeats more for her mind to process the fact she’d been saved. Her mind couldn’t comprehend the voices buzzing around her, but the need for oxygen had her shoving at the body above her.

  The body hesitated before giving into her shoves and lifting up. When it did, she found herself staring into the furious visage of her husband. Murder shone clearly on his face, and his eyes glittered with silver wrath.

  After a moment, he turned his full attention to her. When his head turned, she glanced past him to see what had held him riveted and discovered Caden’s body lying a few feet from her, his sightless eyes staring unblinkingly at the ceiling.

  Talon shook her, and she finally felt his fingers biting into her shoulders. She tore her gaze away from the body and looked at the man shaking her.

  The buzzing slowly resolved itself into words. “—alright? Are you injured?”

  “I’m fine,” she managed, but her eyes shifted back to the body of their own accord.

  Vardin stepped into her field of vision and spat on Caden’s corpse. Talon still held her shoulders in a death grip, when he turned his anger on Vardin.

  “You shouldn’t have killed him,” Talon roared.

  Vardin didn’t appear impressed by Talon’s fury. “The dishonorable do not deserve to live.”

  “We can’t question the dead,” Talon snarled. “And we can’t make them suffer.”

  “Miccar,” Lia cut in. Her mind slowly beginning to function. “Caden shot him.”

  Eglar knelt beside her. “The paramedics are en route. He is not dead, but suffered a severe stunning. There may be complications.”

  “I want a military airlift to take the Damaia to the nearest Health Center,” Talon barked.

  The presence of the Home Guard soldiers moving around the apartments had escaped her notice until one of them saluted Talon and moved to carry out his orders. Lia pulled herself free from her husband’s grip and struggled to her feet. “I don’t need a Health Center.”

  Unlike Lia, Talon rose gracefully to his feet, earning him a glare on principal. “You are going to the Health Center.”

  Lia considered arguing, but decided she didn’t have the energy. “I’ll see Lex.”

  Talon gave her a hard look, but keyed in a message on his personal com.

  She felt herself begin to tremble. Desperately seeking a diversion, she asked, “What happened to the legislative dispute?”

  “I decided the dispute could wait a day. Setting up the home we will spend the rest of our lives in took priority.”

  “Your mother yelled at you,” she guessed.

  “No. Lex did.”

  —

  Talon sat on the edge of the Health Center bed, clearly trying to rein in his anger. The doctor fussed about the room. While the man had appeared nervous about treating the Damaia, the appearance of a high-level healer had truly sent him over the edge. Ignoring the doctor’s near-hysteria, Ilexa behaved as the quintessential professional.

  Both had assured her husband “the Damaia was uninjured”. For his part, Talon wanted to see her encased in cotton wrap and stashed away from all harm.

  “Can we go now?” Lia asked, impatiently.

  “Soon,” he responded with a noncommittal air.

  Ilexa rolled her eyes. “Big Brother wants to keep you here until you are both old and grey.”

  Lia shot him a suspicious look. “Talon, I want to go home.”

  “Soon,” he repeated.

  “Talon, she’s fine,” Ilexa stated. “As a healer, I am obligated to release her.”

  “No, you’re not,” Talon informed her.

  “Talon—” Ilexa snarled, the stubborn expression on her beautiful face an odd replica of his.

  “Enough,” Lia shouted, drawing their attention. “I’m leaving.”

  She started to sit up, and before she could blink, he’d planted his palm in the center of her chest to keep her supine.

  Lia shoved his hand off her chest. “Talon, enough.”

  She struggled to a sitting position—mainly because his weight on the bed had pulled the covers tight against her. Propping her pillow behind her, she announced, “I’d like a word with my husband alone.”

  To her annoyance, Vardin looked to Talon for approval before gesturing for the room to clear. Ilexa paused at the door to wink at her, before scooting out. Vardin closed the door quietly behind them. Lia turned back to Talon and found him with a blaster resting across his lap.

  “I need one of those,” she decided.

  “Yes, you do. Do you know how to shoot?” At her head shake, he frowned. “You’ll start learning tomorrow.”

  She smiled at him. “Thank you. And thank you for saving me from Caden.”

  His frowned deepened to a scowl. “I’m sorry. I should never have allowed—”

  She cut him off by pressing the tips of two fingers against his lips. “You did everything possible to see to my safety. Caden played his roll well.”

  “I should have seen—”

  S
he cut him off with an emphatic slash of her hand. “There wasn’t anything to see.”

  The look on his face said as clearly as words that he didn’t believe her.

  She sighed. “You’ve never been betrayed before have you?”

  He paused as though realizing something profound. It was enough for Lia to know he’d never suffered the soul-shattering agony of betrayal. The biting sense of loss. The near-physical pain of learning your world wasn’t as you perceived it. The bleeding scratches left behind by the cold fingers of denial. Scrabbling to gain purchase while wondering who else you shouldn’t trust. She couldn’t even remember her first betrayal, but could imagine how the novelty must amplify the emotional pain Talon was suffering.

  He shook his head as if clearing his thoughts rather than in denial. “That’s still no excuse—”

  “It’s not an excuse. It’s a fact. I’ve been betrayed more times than I can count in myriad different ways. I never once suspected Caden. What’s more, he’s a religious fanatic. They will be far harder to detect than someone with a political or blood tie to one of the Houses.”

  Talon’s expression grew more ominous. She’d already recounted Caden’s words and actions on the way to the Health Center. Still, he placed a gentle kiss against her fingers. “We’ll find who’s behind this, I swear.”

  “Well, life with me will never be dull,” she said with a wry smile.

  “That it won’t,” he agreed.

  “I’d like to go home now,” she told him, putting a quiet plea into her voice.

  “No, you need to stay.”

  “Why?”

  “They need to check you out, make sure you’re not hurt.”

  She smiled gently and lifted a hand to cup his cheek. “They’ve already done that.”

  He shook his head. “They need to be sure. They need to check everything.”

  “They have checked everything. I’m fine. Caden didn’t hurt me.”

  “But he could have,” Talon exploded.

  “But he didn’t. Should I lie here in this bed denying other patients medical treatment because Caden might have hurt me if you hadn’t arrived?”