Blood Metal Bone: An epic new fantasy novel, perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo

by Lindsay Cummings

  Karr slammed his fist on the outer door of the escape pod. His father’s old ring, hammered gold with a small ruby, clanged against the metal with a sound like a tolling bell.

  “Come off, you Son-of-a-Saturn’s…” And just like that, the screw finally popped loose. He yanked it from its hole and frowned at its condition. “Stripped.”

  Karr tossed it aside.

  There was a single porthole next to the pod, just large enough to shed streaks of starlight on him as he worked. He leaned his head against the door, relishing the feel of something solid and cool on his skin.

  And here he sat, staring out at the planet that was next on their manifest.

  Dohrsar.

  A glowing orb in the sky, surrounded by five colorful rings that reminded him of a curved rainbow. There was a single main continent on the dwarf planet, split into three distinct shades that set each place apart: the north, a frozen milky and mountainous white, tinged with bits of blue. The middle, the largest portion of the continent, was pale brown and red, a massive expanse of desert lined with a jagged range of purple and red mountainous land down its center. Beneath it, the only strip of green, leading into what could only be a tropical climate that spilled into the sea.

  Pretty, from the outside. Beautiful, even.

  But it was no surprise to Karr that the planet had yet to be colonized by outsiders.

  It would require an armored S2—a spacesuit capable of blocking out Dohrsar’s poisonous atmosphere. Many planets they’d visited required the S2s, but the Atmos ratings on Dohrsar were off the charts.

  No suit, no survival.

  Karr didn’t plan on donning an S2. Not again.

  While the crew was busy going over the manifest, he’d take this pod and soar away. If he programmed it right, it would get him back to a habitable planet in the next system. From there, he’d smuggle himself onto a transport freighter and head to Beta Earth.

  Karr set back to work, looking for any weak points in the pressure seal, when a bang sounded from the doorway.

  “KARR!” Another bang. “OPEN THIS DOOR, YOU LITTLE—”

  Karr hissed and dropped his screwdriver. Greasy strands of hair fell into his eyes as he heard the telltale screech of metal, then another bang.

  Karr had just enough time to squeeze himself in the shadowed space between the pod and the ship’s curved metal wall before the door screeched open. A grunt sounded out, followed by footsteps.

  Shock swept over him. How in the hell had they gotten through the bypass?

  “You’re smart, Karr,” a voice said. A pair of boots glided into the storage bay. Polished to perfection, the laces tied evenly.

  The Captain.

  Karr sank deeper into the shadows.

  “Smart.” The Captain took a few lazy steps forward, past storage crates and massive Rover vehicles and rows of blood-red S2s. “But not smart enough. I’m the one who taught you that little trick with the airlocks.”

  It didn’t matter how many turns he took, how many side trails he left for the Captain to find. The man was like a bloodhound, and Karr was always captured prey.

  “Do you really want to play this game?” the Captain stopped before the pod, boots gleaming in the starlight. “Stop hiding in the shadows like a bug.”

  A second passed.

  Karr held his breath.

  Then a hand slipped into the shadows, gripping the collar of his oil-stained suit. Karr yelped as the Captain yanked him out into the open.

  “That escape pod is ancient. You’re signing yourself up for a death sentence!”

  Blood boiling, Karr forced himself to stand tall as he glared up at his older brother’s face.

  “What the hell do you want, Cade?” Karr asked.

  They could have been twins, the Kingston brothers, if Cade weren’t thirteen years his elder. They shared the same hazel eyes. The same curly hair, strong jaw and lean build.

  But where Cade was tall and strong, the picture of a captain, Karr was short and scrappy. The smallest on their crew, by far.

  And the two could not have been more different on the inside.

  Cade was all plot and plan, control and command.

  Karr lived moment to moment, like space trash, tumbling head over heels, unsure of where he was going or if he’d ever make it there.

  “I want to protect you,” Cade said, his tone every bit like a disappointed father. “I can’t do that if you’re intent on throwing yourself into a pod that hasn’t worked for over thirty years.”

  “Thirty years is generous,” Karr said. “I can fix it.”

  But even as he spoke the words, he began to doubt them.

  “You could,” Cade said, inclining his head at the pod behind Karr, “if you had a year’s worth of time, and thousands of creds’ worth of parts that we don’t have on this ship.” He placed a hand on Karr’s shoulder. “This is ridiculous. You can’t just run away.”

  Karr barked out a laugh. “Isn’t that what we’re best at?”

  That damned throb-throb-throb returned, which quickly reminded him that his dear brother before him was the one who’d ordered Karr knocked out, bound up, and placed in a locked room aboard the Starfall. Conveniently, just in time to leave Beta Earth and Karr’s dreams of freedom behind. “Let me go back.”

  Cade stooped to pick up the old, rusty wrench. One of the few belongings left from their father besides Karr’s ring. “We aren’t free to choose our destinations. You know that.” He turned the wrench around, grease marring his evenly trimmed fingernails. “You also know we have a mech drone you can use. It would make it easier to fix this junker up.”

  Karr took the wrench from Cade’s hand. “I prefer to use my hands. Just as I prefer not being kidnapped by my own flesh and blood.”

  “It was that or allow Jeb to handle you.” Cade rapped the side of the pod with his knuckles. A bit of metal flaked away. “You were reckless. I did what I had to do.”

  “And you enjoyed it,” Karr spat.

  Cade worked his jaw back and forth in the very same way Karr did when he was trying to hold back a curse. But Cade had self-control. Karr had a mouth like a bottle rocket.

  “Blood is stronger than fear,” Cade said softly. A classic captain’s line. “You’ve taken that to heart, and you’ve always had my back, even when you’d rather stab a knife in it.”

  “Screwdriver,” Karr said. Cade raised a brow. “I’d choose a screwdriver instead of a knife.”

  Cade ignored that sentiment. “We have an opportunity before us, Karr. One that will award us the prize of our lives. Play our cards right, and we can go back to Beta. But not in a pod. We’ll take the Starfall. Hell, we can buy Jeb as our personal pet, and make him do the smuggling for a change.”

  “You,” Karr said as he looked into Cade’s eyes, “have gone mad. We’re never going to get away from this life. I’ve known it since the day Jeb plucked us out of the system. And if we’d been truly convicted by the ITC?” He dropped the wrench on the ground, wincing at the clatter. “We’d both be spending the rest of our lives behind bars. And he’d still be free.”

  The truth hung between them.

  Bare naked and ugly.

  Cade sighed. “We’ve had a change in employment.”

  Karr’s neck cricked from whirling it so fast.

  The brothers were prisoners to the black market; prisoners to Jeb and the illegal empire he’d built, selling drugs and smuggling goods to wealthy collectors galaxy-wide. They’d never be free of this life until they simply took a stand. But even then, Jeb would find a way to get back at them.

  Cade removed something from his jacket pocket and held it out. At first glance, it was simply a dull hunk of jagged black rock. “This is our freedom. And it’s not going to Jeb.”

  “You’re going to double-cross him,” Karr realized. “You want us to double-cross him. “With who?”

  “Friedrich Geisinger.”

  Karr burst out laughing.

  Friedrich Geisinger was th
e king of a pharmaceutical empire. A reclusive man who’d created so many medical advances, society practically bowed at his feet. It was his great-great grandfather that discovered the atlas orb, the cleanest and strongest source of power known to man. It was his great-grandfather that had cured the common cold, and his uncle that had cured cancer.

  It was Geisinger’s father that had created the supplemental vaccine that was supposed to save lives from the environmental changes. It was widely taken by all on Earth before it turned into the Reaper’s Disease. It had wiped out half of humanity there; a fate that Friedrich Geisinger had spent his entire life trying to unwind. To clear his family name.

  Though only in his forties, Friedrich had a pill on the market for every ailment. A patch for every problem. Small solutions… but he’d never cracked the code on the Reaper.

  “There is no way in hell,” Karr said through his laughter, “Friedrich Geisinger would hire us for a job. He’s busy trying to unravel the knots his father made.”

  But Cade wasn’t laughing.

  He crossed his arms and leaned back against the pod, face as stoic as a statue.

  “Cade,” Karr said.

  “Come on.” Cade only shrugged.

  “Seriously?” Karr’s laughter fizzled to nothing. “You’re serious.”

  “A captain never lies. He recently purchased the dwarf planet at auction. A low-level acquisition, being that the planet is practically uninhabitable by outsiders. I think many were shocked to find one of Geisinger’s emissaries wasting their time at the auction. But he’s sending us out on a short-term mission to dig up some of the planet’s resources. He’s a powerful man, despite his father’s history. He says he’s on the verge of something big. And that little planet is the last key to helping him unlock it. One more job, and we’ll have our freedom.” He set the rock in the open doorway of the pod and backed away.

  Karr chuckled beneath his breath. “It’s a pipe dream. Jeb will kill us all.”

  “We have the protection promise of Friedrich Geisinger. Jeb can’t compete with that.”

  True, Karr thought. For he knew that despite all of Jeb’s contacts and threats, he could never hold a candle to a man as wealthy as Geisinger. “What does it do? The rock.”

  “Antheon,” Cade said, staring out the porthole at the little poisonous planet that hung in the sky. It looked like a glistening marble, its center a trio of strangely split colors. “It’s nothing in this form. But Geisinger swears it’s revolutionary. Another pivotal change in science,” he added, in a voice that sounded oddly like the man’s, clipped accent and all. “The job won’t be easy, per se. We’ll have to take a shipload, and… well, there are some minor wrinkles I still need to smooth out. But the crew’s in, and I need you to be, too.” He reached out and grabbed hold of the chain around Karr’s neck. The necklace itself, a flattened bit of glass that looked like the sea, preserved for eternity. “They were scientists. Not thieves. We’ll do it for them. In their memory.”

  Cade had given his time, his life, his freedom, to always stay by Karr’s side. When he looked back on his memories, he saw his older brother taking swing after swing from the other boys in the orphanage when those hits were meant for Karr.

  He saw every extra morsel of meat passed across the table, saved for him. So he could grow strong, and defend himself from the others when they deemed him an easy target because of his size.

  He saw the extra blankets, stolen, so Karr could stay warm. The boots Cade nabbed from a shop, an act he was nearly hanged for. He saw a lifetime without his real mother and father, but with a brother who’d done his best to take their place.

  It didn’t matter what Cade was planning, because as much as he hated the phrase, blood was stronger than fear. He’d always take Cade’s side.

  “You and me, Cade. I’m with you. And I’m sure as hell with Geisinger.”

  Cade looked like he wanted to hug him, but he settled for a curt captain’s nod instead. “Get some rest.” He grimaced at the storage bay, in all of its controlled chaos. Artifacts from planets strapped down to shelves, ancient weapons and strange foods, foreign animal pelts and all manner of alien things. “I don’t know how you can stand it down here.”

  “It’s like art,” Karr said. “A beautiful mess.”

  “Crew meeting in thirty. Details, specs… don’t be late. And for God’s sake, Karr, clean yourself up. You smell like a brewery.”

  With that, Cade spun on his heel like a soldier and left Karr in the belly of the Starfall, alone with his thoughts.

  Chapter 2

  The Planet Dohrsar

  The Kingdom of the Deadlands

  Sonara

  There was a Devil in the Deadlands, with blood as black as her sins.

  She stood disguised in the center of a sweltering golden throne room, her palms pressed close to the blades hidden within the lining of her skirt.

  Death, the blades whispered.

  Death in the shape of tiny bird bones.

  Sonara would not use them yet. Not until the moment demanded, and in a sea of noblewomen hoping to become the king’s next bride, death was not in high demand.

  The throne room itself—thick with bodies, heavy with the heat of a Deadlands afternoon, the walls painted a starless black, polished golden floor tiles and carved black stone pillars stretching towards a domed ceiling made entirely of shimmering diamond—made Sonara feel small enough.

  But it was King Jira himself, as his dark eyes scanned the crowd, that sent a shiver of cold fear creeping across Sonara’s tanned skin.

  There he sat, atop a golden dais high above her on a throne made of his enemy’s bones, staring at the sea of potential brides. Jira was a beast of a man, shoulders wide, his muscles bared and honed from years of ravaging the Deadlands to become king. His large hands curled over the armrests of his throne, easily dwarfing the inset skulls that stared down at the crowd, eye sockets filled with glittering diamonds.

  Those hands caught Sonara’s eye, along with the gold and diamond rings on each of his fingers, each worth an entire small village outside the capital. They’d bring in enough coin to last for moons upon moons. Perhaps more, if Sonara could drive a decent enough deal at market.

  “The Lady Anyta, of House Romar of the Blood Bucket!”

  The trumpeteer’s voice rang out as a woman at the front of the crowd ascended the towering dais, her blood-red hair braided back from her face to reveal her harsh beauty.

  Jira lowered his gaze as she knelt before him, her guard placing a heavy stone box at his feet. Inside, another of many countless gifts the king had no need for.

  The women around the room stood with bated breath, hoping that they would be chosen, not for a marriage to the monstrous king, but for the promised future it would afford their own territories and kingdoms.

  Sweat trickled down Sonara’s back. She fanned herself and held back a yawn.

  The whole display was rather boring. She supposed the real Lady Morgana of House Kwell would spend her time smiling up at the king as he welcomed his potential brides. Perhaps she would even toss him a flirtatious glance as she angled her body just so.

  But that was not Sonara. And the only thing she wanted to draw today was Jira’s blood.

  Preferably in a solid line across his throat.

  “To hell with all of this,” she whispered, hating the part she was playing. Hating everything Jira stood for.

  Her lips curled into a snarl.

  A fingertip gently prodded her side. “Smile, Morgana. Snarls aren’t very becoming on a Lady.”

  Sonara tucked a strand of mixed blue-and-brown hair behind her ear and glanced to the right, where her partner Jaxon stood, tall and muscular in his stolen guard’s uniform, a cap pulled low over his eyes to conceal the jagged scar that ran across half his face. He looked handsome in Soreian blue. Too handsome, perhaps. He was drawing too many eyes. She could practically taste the desire each time a woman cast a glance Jaxon’s way.

  Like spun
sugar, sickly sweet upon her tongue.

  A useless curse, her power to taste the emotions of others. She’d come back from death with it years ago, a tricky little side effect of re-entering the land of the living. Now, Sonara swallowed the insufferable tang of desire away, then pushed with mental fingers until her curse was locked back in its internal cage where it belonged.

  If only she had a power like Jaxon’s.

  A power that could control the bones of the dead creatures among them; like the ones currently hidden in the fabric beneath her fists. The guards had all been cleared of weapons. None would think to check a Lady’s outer skirts for a thin layer of bones.

  “Perhaps snarls are not fit for a Lady,” Sonara whispered back, resisting the urge to squirm in her skirts. Sweat was already trickling down her back, the skirt’s inner slip sticking to her skin. Honestly, how could anyone breathe in these things, let alone move enough to put up a decent fight when the time came? “But they’re delightful on a Devil.”

  The line of potential brides moved slowly, the Deadlands heat creeping across the throne room like a fog. It was a sea of colors, gowns in every shade and style rolling gently as women fanned themselves in the heat, or tossed their hair over their shoulders, or batted their lashes at the king.

  Twenty paces, and Sonara would stand before him atop the dais.

  Twenty more, and she’d finally steal a prize worthy of her outlawing name.

  The woman before her, a baroness from the northern kingdom of the Wastes, was called forward. She ascended the dais, her hair a silken train of white behind her as she went to offer a gift to the king.

  Sonara had no gift.

  At least, not one that would last.

  That was the trouble with items like the one Jaxon held in his pocket. An illusion made by their comrade Markam, much to Sonara’s dismay… and one that would fade by day’s end.

  Sonara’s toes reached the edge of the dais, her slippers damp from sweat.

  “Lady Morgana,” the trumpeteer began, his voice ringing out across the throne room, bounding off the diamond-domed ceiling far overhead. Fractals of light reflected off the golden tiles, making Sonara dizzy as she took Jaxon’s arm. With a predator’s grace, she ascended the golden steps to the throne.