Van Laven Chronicles: Shadow Reign Read online

  “Would I have danced the Stalata with you if I hadn’t?”

  Take care, Vaush, Comron gave the telepathic reprimand.

  Too late, Comron could see the drunken look in Phin’ s eyes as they poured over Vaush’s form. Damn! The essence must be augmenting her pheromones, judging by the way all these grown men suddenly began conducting themselves like hormonal teenagers in her presence.

  “Instead of relying on your staff to teach you about us, why don’t you take the time to get to know us personally?”

  Vaush withdrew a bit. “Pardon me?”

  The color rose in Phin’s face and he waved his hands. “No, please don’t misunderstand me. Next week my family is travelling on holiday to Valmont for some snow sailing along with Houses Gravanis and Lambeth. I assure you, a great time will be had by all. I’d be deeply honored, and grateful, if you would attend the festivities as my guest.”

  “Oh,” Vaush said with a guarded smile, “that does sound tempting.”

  “Then say yes … please.” The desperate quality in his voice was disconcerting. Was he really falling so quickly for her? Did Vaush pick up on it?

  “Forgive me but I have so many pressing engagements, I’d hate to commit to something before consulting my planner.”

  Commit to go for a few hours, nothing overnight! Comron projected.

  “However, I’m fairly confident that I could carve out some time from my busy schedule for such a delightful engagement, even if it’s just for a couple of hours.”

  Phin beamed like a child with a shiny new toy. “That would be marvelous, Your Highness.”

  “My pleasure … Phineas,” she said then waved her hand toward the guests peering out the window. “It seems we’ve drawn a crowd. Perhaps it’s time we returned.”

  “As you command, Your Grace,” Phin said, gallantly offering his arm.

  She took it and glanced back at Comron as Phin escorted her back into the ballroom.

  Yaeger walked over and nudged Comron’s shoulder. “Look, security is airtight around the Empress. Why torture yourself any further? Go home.”

  Comron groaned inwardly. Yaeger was right, there were far more serious matters demanding his attention like formulating the best strategy to bring potential allies, mainly Warbrenger, on board without offering Vaush’s hand in marriage. Then there was the matter of assembling a team of the best renegade minds in the financial arena to help undermine the Hegemony’s totalitarian grip on the system. And finally, they needed to figure out a way to transfer enormous sums of the crown treasury into the Murkudahl Special Projects division without raising the brows of the Imperial Inquisitor hawks. No, there was no time to indulge his darkest fears when there was a mountain of work to be done.

  “If the Empress asks, I’ll be working in my study.”

  Chapter 7

  Empress Vaush Hrollaugr barely flinched as the canons boomed and the fighter jets roared overhead at the close to the solemn occasion. Her breath fogged before her in the cold winter chill, but she felt nothing as the sarcophagus of The Most Honored Lady, Skylar Payce Erlacher, was floated forth on a suspensor field escorted by the honor guard. Her mother would finally receive the state burial befitting an Emperor’s consort, the first wife, mother of the Imperial Heir.

  It hadn’t taken Comron long to locate the Chronicle passages detailing her mother’s last days or to locate her final resting place. Vaush remembered collapsing into his arms when grief consumed her at seeing her mother’s remains, particularly at the blast hole through the back of her mother’s skull. The simple DNA diagnostic confirmed the identity. Comron took it upon himself to make all the burial arrangements down to the location of the mausoleum in which the sarcophagus would be laid.

  He’d been there, as promised, holding fast to Vaush’s hand as she viewed the last days of her mother’s pregnancy and her subsequent death at Larrs Bastionli’s order. Comron had been there with her that night as she curled into the fetal position and wept bitterly at her mother’s dark fate. She remembered how he’d silently wrapped himself around her, offering his warmth and strength, making her feel held, secure as if back in the safety of the womb.

  She heard his telepathic pleadings to open herself to him emotionally, to show him the pain that she would drown herself in. When she found the mental strength to let him in, she could feel him moving around inside her mind, searching, probing for a single thing, a dark thing lurking in the corners but growing larger by the second. She felt him move forward, confronting it, taking it in, slowly consuming it.

  And, little by little, Vaush felt the arc of pain fall and abate. The loss of her mother was still profound, but the immediate, suffocating pain of it was now a manageable, faint memory of a horrific nightmare that would only fade with time. She didn’t know how long they’d remained that way but, when she opened her eyes, Comron was still there, his body wrapped around hers, and she never felt more cared for and comforted. When she finally turned to him and looked into his eyes, she knew exactly where all her pain had gone. Comron had drunk it in, like a poison he extracted from her, only to suffer the pain himself.

  “Comron, no,” she had said. “I can’t let you.”

  He gently stroked her face and spoke softly, “I love you, Vaush. It’s my duty to bear your pains and ease your suffering where I can. Let me be your comfort and do this for you.” The depth of emotion that welled inside her flowed through to him and he was overjoyed by it, to know he’d produced this serenity in her.

  And now, on the day of Skylar’s funeral, Comron stood faithfully by her side, garbed in the attire of the Praetorian Guard. It took an enormous effort not to reach for his hand. Thanks to him, she could now look upon her mother’s last days without crumbling into a weeping heap on the floor.

  She ran through those events in her mind. Duke Larrs Bastionli had captured her pregnant mother and cared for her up until the day Skylar had given birth. At first, Vaush was stunned to see how little interest Skylar had showed in her infant daughter. Skylar’s only concern seemed to be putting the past behind her and moving far away from her life on Novoxos, somewhere in the Hinter Worlds was her preferred destination. All she needed was enough credits to establish herself. Larrs could keep the emperor’s child!

  The duke seemed suspicious at first but, as the days passed and Skylar showed no regard for the new bundle of life, he began to put some stock in Skylar’s request. Perhaps shuttling her off was preferable to murdering the emperor’s wife even if she was already presumed dead.

  After agreeing upon a rather generous sum, Skylar requested the chance to say goodbye to her daughter. Though leery, Larrs permitted a final feeding. It only took seconds for Skylar to change her mind and thrust the baby and bottle back into the arms of the nurse. With that, she hurried out of the room never to see her child again.

  Vaush’s breath was rent from her at the sight of her mother turning away. Heartbroken and distraught, she started to disengage the Bramech but Comron urged her to see it through to the end. So she pressed on and was astonished to learn that that very evening Skylar had returned to Larrs’ cliff-shore home where her baby was being kept under guard. Skylar had crept in and obviously hadn’t forgotten the lessons she learned as General Erlacher’s daughter. She managed to take out the guards and incapacitate the nurses. She hurried to the crib and strapped baby Vaush into a chest harness she’d brought. Later Vaush discovered that the final feeding was Skylar’s opportunity to slip her baby a mild sedative so she wouldn’t cry and expose them when they made their escape.

  My mother came back for me! She’d squeezed Comron’s hand, filled with love and pride.

  Indeed, Skylar’s cool veneer had merely been a ruse to deceive Larrs into letting down his guard long enough for them to make their escape. She’d run out of the house, running for her life and the life of her baby daughter. The moment she hit the grounds, the alarms sounded and bright lights flooded the area nearly blinding her. She had a ground car stashed nearby and hurri
ed to it but was cut off by a swarm of guards. She turned and dashed toward the back of the house, out toward the roaring of the ocean. A transport flew overhead, its search light dogging her every move. The dogs barking in the distance were moving in ever closer.

  Vaush’s heart pounded as she watched Skylar run as far as she could go before she reached the cliff’s edge. She stood their poised on it with baby Vaush strapped to her chest and two blast guns in either hand. She knew perfectly well what Larrs wanted, the Emperor’s child alive.

  Skylar stepped back as far as she could, making it very apparent that she would jump to her death, with her baby, if they didn’t back off. Larrs saw the desperate look in her eyes and discerned she wasn’t bluffing. He inquired as to her terms.

  Skylar swore to him that if he let them go, she’d never inform the emperor of what Larrs had planned to do to her. She would simply disappear, she and her daughter, never to be heard from again. His freedom for hers, she told him.

  A private transport was provided for her safe journey to the Hinter Worlds. All would be well, she told baby Vaush as she stood over the crib singing her a lullaby, for the coordinates to a distant point in the Hinter Worlds had been laid in the transport navigation system and they were fast on their way.

  But it was at that moment, when Skylar was standing over the crib, speaking words of love and hope to her infant daughter, the muzzle of the blast gun was placed to the back of her head and two shots were fired. The blood spattered the walls, and sprayed the baby’s blanket.

  The shooter stepped over Skylar’s body and took the baby from the crib.

  And now, here they were, twenty-five years later, finally laying Skylar’s body to rest. Was she pleased to see her daughter on the throne, strong and independent, free of Larrs’ murderous tentacles?

  As they sealed the mausoleum doors, Vaush’s vision blurred with angry tears. “I will avenge you, Mother,” she whispered. “Larrs Bastionli will face my justice.”

  Chapter 8

  “What is this place?” Vaush asked, the awe echoing in her voice as she and Comron looked down from the observation window. The massive indoor shipyard of Fort Extremis seemed to stretch on forever, housing everything from planetary warships to personal weapon’s gadgetry and flight gear. At least a hundred scientists were at work as armed guards ran security patrol.

  “It was an abandoned Imperial military installation. Emperor Sorren had it shut down decades ago,” Comron answered. “I thought it would be an excellent place to work on certain innovative technologies.”

  “So, this is where the billions in the Patheis 5 budget are being diverted.”

  “Yes, and I’m rather encouraged by what they’ve been able to accomplish in such a short period of time.” He pointed. “Look there, to the left. He’s working on the neuro transmitter that will allow us to interact more intuitively with our tools.”

  “That’s not so cutting edge.”

  “Ah, with the current technology there is a distinct delay as the brain synapses fire, the neuron transmitter must translate before the tool receives the command and responds. Murkudahl have no such delays with their advanced telepathic capabilities.” A slight grin hooked the corner of his mouth. “Now that we have the essence, you and I can phase with the weaponry just like the Murkudahl.”

  “No delays. Instantaneous destruction, eh?”

  “Ach, scoff if you will,” he replied, “but, when the Kurukaii arrive, you’ll be wanting to know why we hadn’t done more.”

  “Mmm,” she said as her gaze drifted across the landscape. “And those gentlemen there, where are they going?

  Comron spotted the green-jacketed group making their way up the metal staircase and disappearing into a room with a high security sign on the door. He knew that bringing Vaush here so soon was a huge risk, but he swore that he’d never withhold critical information from her again and, besides, a visit to the Chronicle Archives could show her what he’d been up to anyway. This was a pre-emptive move, his opportunity to convince her of the project’s merits before she discovered it on her own and became too incensed to hear reason.

  “Yes, those are the bio-chemists and geneticists,” he looked at her, meeting her contemplative stare. “They’re working with a sample of my DNA to see if they can extract the essence and duplicate it for reproduction.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “Comron Rhaeghor Van Laven, tell me you did not just say what I think you said,” she said, glaring at him. “This is in direct violation of the Murkudahl Edict.”

  “No, exploitation of the Murkudahl by taking their lives or stealing from them to extract their secrets is expressly forbidden by the edict. We didn’t steal the essence or take a life to obtain it. It was freely given to us along with the Chronicle Archives to better equip you for a successful reign.”

  Vaush’s brow drew low as she planted her hands on her hips. “You’re violating the spirit of the edict even if not explicitly. Comron, you can’t do this. It’s immoral.”

  “Since when is trying to save my wife’s life immoral?” he asked earnestly. “What is wrong with taking advantage of everything that’s been handed to us so that we can defend ourselves? No, wait,” he lifted a finger when she started to answer. “This isn’t about trying to oppress our neighbors or gain leverage over a political enemy. This is about the survival of your empire. You stood up there before all your adoring subjects and informed me that it was our duty to protect them from the Murkudahl invasion. Well that—” he jabbed a finger at the bio-lab, “is how we will protect them.”

  She turned away, her jaw clenched, but he saw that look in her eyes. The one that said the same thought had crossed her mind. “Comron, don’t you see that by doing this we will have proof that every vile assumption that the Kait had about us was correct? We’ll be exploiting their gifts for warfare. The very thing they’ve renounced.”

  “Not warfare but defense and survival, Vaush. Nothing more,” he argued as she wrestled with the moral dilemma. “We’ll continue to staunchly uphold the edict and swiftly prosecute any offenders who’d—”

  “Meanwhile we conduct illegal genetics experiments and develop Murkudahl inspired weapons technology. This was Larrs’ plan all along!”

  “Our motives are different!”

  “But the hypocrisy remains!”

  “Frithe’s blood, Vaush,” he said vexed by her obstinate self-righteousness. “Will you sleep better knowing that millions of innocent people died simply because you couldn’t bear to get your hands a little dirty? Stop acting like a damned paragon of virtue and start acting like a sovereign charged with protecting the lives of billions!”

  Her cheeks flashed red. “We have a plan. Chaiyse won’t let them harm—”

  “Chaiyse’s plan is a lame shot in the dark at best,” Comron said. “What if they kindly shove her aside and slice you to pieces with a rigon disrupter or worse? If you don’t care enough about yourself, or what it would do to me to lose you, think of your subjects. Do it for them.”

  She grimaced and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “It’s such a monumental betrayal. Chaiyse and Bhedrus would never forgive us.”

  Comron closed the distance between them. “Did it ever occur to you that this is precisely what they hoped we’d do? They’re sworn pacifists, but they’re not the ones being threatened, we are. So maybe they gave us the essence and the Bramech knowing full well what we’d do with the knowledge.”

  “Comron,” she said, refusing to look at him.

  “Love, they won’t hate you for defending yourself. As long as we limit the use of our experiments to defense, they can’t begrudge us this.”

  “How do we ensure the power will never be abused? What if it falls into the wrong hands?”

  “I have taken extreme measures to ensure that this knowledge never leaves this facility. Every scientist and security officer has agreed to a five-year residency agreement with no unsupervised outside contact. These are the best minds in the field who’ve demonst
rated that they are true scientists who live for the work and are immune to bribes and any other enticements. That, and they are extremely well paid.”

  Vaush leaned back against the railing and rubbed her eyes. “I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

  We? Was that her consent?

  “And what about when the Murkudahl threat is over? What do we do with your army of genetically engineered super-soldiers?” Her eyes widened. “How would you even begin to control such a frightfully lethal force?”

  “We’d start small with associates that we already know and trust,” he shrugged, “like Yaeger and Laney, for starters.”

  “Criton under the sea, Comron,” Vaush said, holding her gut. “You can’t be serious. How close are they to cracking the genome?”

  He shook his head. “They’re having a pretty damned hard time of it. Apparently, the Murkudahl didn’t want to make it too easy for us.”

  She cut her eyes at him. “So much for your theory that this is exactly what they want us to do.”

  “No. If we’re not smart enough to solve the puzzle then maybe we’re not smart enough to wield the power. If we crack the genome, we prove our worthiness.”

  She groaned. “As worthy as children playing with fire just because they learned how to start one.”

  “Vaush, can you honestly tell me Chaiyse didn’t know all along that we’d try this? Will she really be so shocked especially after you went rogue and gave me the essence instead of using it all on yourself like they instructed you to?”

  Her eyes rounded with anger. “So now you’re throwing that in my face.”

  He moved closer to her and touched her cheek. “Love, you have a good heart that always wants to do the right thing. And that’s why they entrusted this task to someone like you.” He gave her an endearing smile. “Just think of all the little Pakas you’ll be—”

  “Laka, Comron. The little girl whose family saved us on Anchorii is named Laka.”

  “Right, Laka,” he nodded as if he could ever forget any of their names. “Imagine all the little Lakas who are looking to their beautiful empress to keep them safe from harm. Focus on her.”