by Seven Steps
“We don’t plan on being here that long,” Lex said, taking hold of Arees hand. Though the pleasant warmth of his fingers sent heat through her, she pulled her hand away, and placed a finger over his lips.
“Sshh. Lex, we can’t talk like that.”
He frowned. “Like what? We have a mission from Embrya. We can’t-”
She placed her entire hand over his mouth, silencing him. “We can’t talk that way,” she said.
His eyes filled with questions. She wished she could answer them, but she couldn’t. Not with Cara hanging over her head. They had to be smart. They had to be quiet. And, more than anything, they had to be discreet.
CHAPTER 21
“No, no, no!” Boikis threw his hat across the room, barely missing Etree’s head. “I am not convinced.”
“I don’t know how else I can make you understand. I am not a prince, I’m a slave.”
“Do it again!” Boikis demanded.
Kiln rolled his eyes, and retreated to the back of the room. He’d practiced walking across their large rehearsal space one hundred and forty two times by his count.
“You are thinking. I see it in your eyes. Praxis only thinks when he is at his father’s side. Otherwise, his thoughts are only on War Games, rations, and his next meal.”
“This is impossible. I’m nothing like him.”
“No. It is possible. I will get what I seek.”
“What do you seek, Boikis?” Kiln asked. “You’ve had me at this for hours. You’ve kidnapped my friends and the woman I love and held them as prisoners. And for what? What is all of this about?”
Boikis retreated across the room, his hands clasp tightly behind his back.
“No food for Nadira tonight,” he threw over his shoulder. “Perhaps the thought of your lover’s empty belly will be motivation enough for you.”
Anger bubbled up into Kiln’s chest, and he threw the helmet he’d been wearing across the room. “I’m trying!”
“Not hard enough!” Boikis cried back. “Etree, get the comicore. He will watch the footage of Praxis until his eyes bleed. Then, we will start War Games training.”
Kiln bit his tongue and clenched his fist to keep from attacking his so-called brother. This had been the second day that Nadira has been denied food for the night, all because of Boikis’ too high expectations. He had to find a way to get to her, and get them off this planet.
Dropping in a hard, metal chair, he scratched at the itchy Martian material that covered his legs. All Martians dressed the same. Red camouflage pants, boots, and black t-shirts. There were only three haircuts allowed here: shaved, half shaved, or quarter shaved. They all wore the same beards, except for Praxis and the rest of the royal household who were clean shaved. Lucky for Kiln. He didn’t know how long it would take to even grow a beard. The Martian men talked the same, they walked the same. They ate the same foods. It was like they were clones of each other, each with only one goal and ambition, to win at war games.
Kiln crossed his arms over his chest and, for the hundredth time, watched his brother on the comicore screen.
Boikis had been monitoring and recording Praxis’ every move for a week.
How long has he been planning this treasonous act?
Every few hours, Boikis got a call on his earpiece from some man named Ronak. Something had gone wrong, or was going wrong. Either way, the calls sent Boikis into a rage, and several times he’d kicked a chair across the room.
Who’s Ronak? What’s going wrong with Boikis’ plan? Is Nadira okay?
His heart skipped a beat at the thought of his love trapped in the barbaric stone walled tomb they called a prison. For the past two nights he’d watched her, curled up into a ball on her cot, staring off into space, or crying. He wished more than anything that he could go to her, but, even if he could, Boikis and his men would see him on the screen and who knew what they would do.
How am I going to get us out of here?
“Hey!” Etree’s dark hand slammed on the metal table that the comicore sat on, shaking Kiln from his thoughts. “Wake up. You have a lot to learn.”
The two men stared at each other. Etree seemed just as crazy and bitter as Boikis, only he had none of the power. The only one who seemed slightly humane was Namic, and that’s because he was an idiot. The way the two men kicked and ordered him around demonstrated how little they thought of him.
Kiln looked away first and stared at the screen. The quicker he cooperated, the quicker Etree would leave.
“That is what’s wrong,” Etree said.
“What?”
“You back down. That is why you cannot be Praxis. Praxis never backs down from anything. Not an argument, not a fight, and definitely not a stare down.”
Kiln rolled his eyes. “I am not Praxis.”
“Well, you’d better start being him. If you don’t pass for him, she’ll die. So will you.”
Etree stepped closer, placed his muscled body in front of the screen. “If you don’t want to do this because of your pride, or because you hate your brother, then fine. But, a man like you needs only on motivator. The woman locked in the cell. Nadira.”
Kiln’s cheek ticked. He hated when these men said her name. Her name was too high, too pure, too clean to be soiled in the lips of these monsters.
“You see. That anger. Use it. Listen to what we are saying to you. Become Praxis, and she will be safe. Fail, and she will die in the worst possible way.”
A hatred that Kiln had never felt before boiled in his gut at this man. If his toma was working, he knew that he’d burn these men alive.
“Yes, that’s it. Get angry. The angrier you are, the closer you are to being the Prince.”
With that, Etree walked away, leaving Kiln to his frustration, and his anger.
CHAPTER 22
Kiln’s days had turned from serving his beloved Nadira, to attempting to imitate a man he’d only seen from a distance. For hours, he practiced Praxis’ walk, his manner of speaking. He’d shaved the sides and back of his head, and donned Praxis’ Royal garments. And, most of all, he practiced war game, or, what the men called war for short. Running, jumping, catching, pushing. The training was relentless. The game was brutal. Pretending to play for fun back on Venus was one thing. Playing with men like Etree running at you was quite another.
It was the third day of Kiln’s training and he was exhausted. The thought of living his dead twin brother’s life at the behest of his evil younger brother sent him into fits of confusion, anger, and grief. He was not this man. Yet, he had to be. Nadira’s life depended on it.
He found himself sitting at a table, with an outline of the royal palace drawn on a board.
The palace, or Olympus as the men called it, was setup like a hub and spokes. In the center was a courtyard, a wide-open space that doubled as a war games training yard. Six separate walkways lead from the courtyard to six different segments of the palace. Each segment rose up three levels.
“This is where we are,” Namic said, pointing to a segment to the south of the courtyard. “Above us and below us all belong to you. Your kitchens and recreation area are upstairs. Below us are the rooms of your preferred rations.”
“Rations?”
“Women. A special selection just for you.”
Kiln swallowed. “Is anyone down there?”
“Only one presently. Melu.”
Melu. Praxis’ favored woman. Does he love her? How long has she been down there? What happens if he gets tired of her?
“Next to us, to the right, are the conference rooms. To the right of that are the King’s quarters.”
“King Haggarty,” Kiln whispered.
Father, he thought.
“When will I get to meet him?” Kiln asked.
Namic nodded, a small knowing smile on his lips. “Soon. The King has been very sick. He’d dying, Kiln.”
“Dying?”
“Yes. Soon, you will be King. We just have to get you there.”
Nami
c’s eyes fell back to the drawing on the table. “Here are the guest rooms.” He pointed to a segment directly to the left of his own rooms.
“Wait,” Kiln said. “What’s next to the King’s rooms?”
“Those are the quarters of his preferred rations. Mag. Your mare.”
“Mare?”
“Your mother.”
Kiln’s throat went dry.
Mother? I have a mother?
“When will I get to meet her?” He asked.
Namic shook his head. “I don’t know.”
He quickly went through the remaining two segments, both the guest rooms as well as a leisure guest area.
Kiln had stopped paying attention.
I was born here. I have family here. A mother, a father, brothers. Maybe this won’t be so bad, after all. If only I could find Nadira.
After the lesson on navigating the palace, Kiln was forced back to watching Praxis give speeches on the comicore screen. Yes, it was his twin, but that was where their similarities ended. This man walked and talked with a swagger, something Kiln did not possess. He was well versed in planetary law, on world and off. His reasons for not allying with Venus were sound. He was surprisingly eloquent, not at all like the man that Boikis described to him. Could this obviously well read man be the same one who cared only about War Games and the size of his muscles? Could this man be as bad as Boikis made him out to be? Or did Boikis’ jealousy color his view of his brother?
It doesn’t matter, Kiln thought that night, as he laid back in his bed.
Praxis’ bed.
“This is impossible,” he whispered.
“Nothing is impossible,” came a voice from the door.
Kiln turned to find Boikis’ long limbed body leaning against the door frame of his room. Though Boikis possessed the same height as his brothers, where Praxis and Kiln were barrel-chested and muscled, Boikis was lean. Where the twins were pale skinned and blonde, Boikis was deeply tanned and had jet-black hair. Even his dark eyes were in direct contrast to his brother’s sky blue ones.
“Praxis was a man, like anyone else.” Boikis patted Kiln on the back. His mood was better than it had been in several days. “Perhaps you should take a break. How is our friend doing?”
Kiln glanced at the comicore screen. Nadira leaned back against a set of fluffy pillows. She was freshly washed, fed, and reading a book.
“She’s fine.”
“When you feel like you cannot do it, think of her. You want to keep her safe, don’t you?”
Kiln didn’t respond.
Boikis’ hand squeezed onto his shoulder. “Come, let’s take you out for a test run.”
“But I’m not ready.”
“You’ve seen Praxis. You’ve been watching him for hours. A few more hours of watching him is not going to make much of a difference. There is a war pre-draft meeting tonight. Praxis never misses it.”
~()~()~()~()~
War, as Kiln had seen it, were the highlight of the week for all Martians. It involved a man running a timed grenade covered ball down a field, while trying not to get tackled by an army of men with electrified gloves. The teams had five minutes to get the grenade down field before it exploded, not enough to kill, but definitely enough to take off a few fingers.
He’d watched feeds of it on Venus. He never thought he’d play the game in person. Or be asked to imitate his favorite player.
The windowless truck bounced over rocks and debris as it flew through the dome. Each of the twelve domes on this planet came equipped with a War Games field. The twelve domes, marked A through L, each sponsored their own team. The twelve teams faced off each week for a total of twenty-eight weeks, all in an effort to make it to the Grand Championship and win the cup. There was one week off, then the whole thing started over again.
Each able-bodied man on the planet was registered to play, and the purpose of the draft was to grab the best players in the dome. Some men were primary players, the ones that were drafted week after week. Some men were secondary players, the ones that might never step foot on the field. About five selectmen, not including Praxis the captain, were power players. They never needed to be drafted, and were permanent members of the team until they retired.
Kiln tried to remember everything he’d heard about war, and everything he’d watched on the feeds back in Venus, as he stared out of the window. He recalled the power players on his team. Bo, Jack, Haki, Bronson, and his best friend Bruno. He’d watched these men on the comicore, studied their lives.
Will they see through me?
He shook the thought from his head and refocused on the landscape passing by him. The homes on Mars were identical, single floored, brown boxes with black roofs. It seemed that the Martian’s were beings built on conformity. Some of the houses had a gold statue of a man on the roof. There lived the war games champions.
Some men ran through the domes, each hurrying home to complete their own pre-draft in anticipation of the regular, broadcasted draft the next day.
The fervor for war was undeniable. The sport was more than a pastime. It was a religion, a form of worship that all men participated in.
The Mother Goddess would not be pleased.
The truck pulled to a stop in front of a domed stadium. A large letter A decorated the front.
“We’re here,” the driver said.
He hopped out, did a three-fingered Martian salute toward the dome, and opened Kiln’s door.
Kiln smoothed down his red pants, climbed out of the car, and did the same salute. It was a matter of honor to pay homage to one’s dome.
Silly rules, Kiln thought.
As he followed the driver under the large, curved arch, and along the dark hallway, his heart pounded as he tried to remember his training.
Walk tall, as if you are the only one of importance in the room.
Do not ask permission.
Do not apologize.
Do not say thank you.
Do not look as if you are thinking.
Talk about war and food.
During every conversation, tap people on the shoulder to ensure that they are paying attention to you. Always insert a war reference or pretend that you are throwing a ball down the field.
The rules and regulations sent his head spinning. He took a deep breath to calm himself and swung his arms a bit wider as he walked. He hoped that his cocky stride would be enough for the other Martians to overlook how nervous he was.
If they find me out, my friends and I are done for. I have to be perfect.
He tried to swallow, but his mouth had turned to dust. Sweat dripped down his back, though the inside of the dome was cool.
By the time they turned into the open door, he felt sure that he was going to vomit.
A room full of eyes swung toward them.
Within the room were the biggest men Kiln had ever seen.
“Prax!” A large, black man screamed at him. The metal chairs squealed as they were pushed aside. The men ran at him, surrounded him with good wishes.
“Are you ready for this week, Prax?”
“I got a great draft pick for you, Prax.”
The reverence and love that the men showed immediately slowed Kiln’s racing heart. They only saw their fearless leader, not the man beneath the mask.
Maybe this will work after all.
A bald, dark skinned man that Kiln recognized as Bruno came closer, and Kiln watched the men clear a path for him. Bruno clapped Kiln on the shoulder and smiled wide. “Well, now that our captain is here,” he paused as the men cheered Praxis’ return, “let’s see who we’re thinking about drafting.” Another cheer rose from the group as they hurried to their seats.
Kiln hung back, waited until everyone was seated, then took the only seat left. Front and center.
“Okay,” said the tanned, bearded man up front. “Here are our prospects for the week.”
They scrolled through each man, reading statistics from a sheet of paper.
“Olgum.”<
br />
Some of the mean cheered. “Running is a 5 out of 10 but strength is a 10 out of 10. Seems good for a pile pusher. Prax?”
Kiln looked around the room, before realizing that he was Prax. He stared at the man on screen, big, bulky, and scary looking. He’d seen him before when he’d watched the game on Venus. The man was a bulldozer.
Kiln crossed his arms over his chest, nodded once, and grunted “Yes” in the way he’d been taught. The sound rolled around in his chest. He liked it.
The men around him slouched in their chairs, the same way he was. Legs splayed wide open, taking up space.
There was something natural about the posture, something that felt right.
The man next to the monitor wrote Olgum’s name on a separate sheet of paper, and Kiln let out a breath.
I can do this.
They kept at this exercise for over an hour, reviewing each player, reading off their statistics, and deferring to Kiln for the final word. One grunted Yes, or a long blink and a head shake for no. Some of the men Kiln had seen before, some were new. In all, they had selected twenty-five out of hundreds of primary players. Twelve would play. The rest would be second strings.
Kiln couldn’t help his excitement. He’d been watching war for a long time. To pick his own team and to get to play was a secret dream he’d always had.
The projector man flipped off the monitor, and looked at Kiln, waiting on his last word.
“Dismissed.”
The men applauded, and then went to surround Kiln once again.
“So what do you think about Chari? He’s lost a finger or two.”
“Do you think that Hemrite really should be in the pile? His strength isn’t that great.”
“Why would you pick Relu over Morti?”
The men pressed in on him, peppering him with questions about his picks.
Each set of eyes, each round of questions, were asked with the upmost reverence and deferment. These men looked to Praxis as a leader, a mentor.
How did Praxis live under so much pressure?