Realm of the Stars, Volume I: The Unclaimed Crown (Complete 4/18)

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-One

Tantos III, Capital City

Energy bolts impacted the center of the square, throwing up debris and lighting the mists with a lurid red glow. Screams echoed through the air as the crowds scattered, protestors fleeing as an increased barrage poured down from the guild flitters. They didn’t seem to be aiming directly to kill, or the carnage would no doubt have been far worse. Instead, the guild pilots were trying to inspire chaos and terror. And it was working.

“We have to go, now,” Shiran hissed, turning to run and pulling both sisters with him; Arta tried to break free of his grasp, fear warring with outrage in her heart.

“No,” she said. “We have to do something. We have to help these people, I don’t know, try to make the guilds stand down!”

“The pilots have no idea who you are,” Shiran said, “and even if they did, you have no authority to order them to do anything. All you’d accomplish is getting yourself arrested, or worse. Come on!”

Arta scowled angrily, but before she could retort someone slammed into them, throwing all three to the ground. She rolled to her side and looked up to see the crowd pushing and shoving above her as people tried to get away – one large man was stumbling straight towards her, head down and with no indication he saw there was someone in his path. Arta screamed and threw her hands up to shield herself; there was a sudden flash of blue light and people were shoved to the side, forming an open bubble around her. Thanking the Lord for her abilities under her breath, Arta scrambled to her feet and looked around wildly for some sign of Karani or Shiran, but she couldn’t see them.

Instead, all she saw was people now trying to flee in the opposite direction and colliding with those running from the blasts, creating a chaotic mass in which no individuals could be distinguished. What were they… suddenly, Arta realized. At least some people had seen what she’d done, and now were trying to get away from the Adept in their midst as much as from the guild. In the midst of a chaotic, screaming mass of humanity, she suddenly found herself feeling very cold and very alone.

Someone smashed into her side and knocked her hood back from her face; Arta twisted away from their grasp and started to run towards one of the side streets in what she hoped was the way back to the palace, trying to lose herself in the crowd. Taking a deep breath, she focused her will and called energy around her in a faint shimmer, desperately hoping it would be enough to protect her from being accidentally shot or trampled as she looked around again for Shiran or her sister. Wherever they’d been swept off to, Arta couldn’t see them – in the distance, she heard a voice that might be Karani’s, shouting curses she certainly hadn’t learned from their father, but she couldn’t tell where it was coming from.

Still, she tried to head towards it, shoving her way through the crowd, but she kept getting buffeted aside and swept off course; her Adept powers might protect her from potential injuries, but they did nothing to lessen the press of countless terrified people. Slowly, though, she managed to weave her way through the mass and stumble out into an empty alleyway. Collapsing to her knees, Arta panted heavily, trying desperately to regain her composure. There was still no sign of Karani or Shiran.

After what felt like several long minutes she stumbled back to her feet and began to make her way slowly down the alley, one hand trailing along the wall. Vague notions of circling back towards the palace and hoping that her companions had made it back safe as well hung around the edges of her mind, but she found herself too exhausted for much conscious thought. She simply stumbled on, alone, but as she did so a feeling that she was heading in the right direction was growing in her thoughts. It was almost as if something was calling her.

Arta shook her head to clear it, but the feeling was still there. Shrugging, she straightened herself up – maybe it was her Adept gifts, leading her in the right direction, or even Shiran trying to call out to her, but either way, following that feeling seemed like the right thing to do, even though she couldn’t put her finger on why. After a few more minutes of walking she stumbled out of the alley and found herself on an unfamiliar street still shrouded by all-too-familiar fog; she didn’t see any other pedestrians nearby to ask directions from. The street was lined with what looked like shops and restaurants, though most of them were closed; this must be part of the city’s commercial district, and was probably quite lively during the day, if not at however-late-this-actually-was.

Turning in the direction where the guiding feeling seemed to be strongest, Arta made her way down the street for several blocks until she at last arrived at one restaurant that still had lights on inside. It looked moderately nice, so far as Arta’s limited experience could tell, and though it didn’t seem like the sort of place Shiran would go to lay low, something told her that she should go inside. The door slid open as she approached, the filtration systems that kept the fog out of the buildings buzzing as she passed through it, and then she was inside the restaurant’s lobby, it’s warm golden light comforting after the terror at the square.

Arta sighed and lowered her hood before looking around. The lights were on, but there didn’t seem to be anyone here – she didn’t see any other patrons, or even any staff. Slowly, her gaze slid past tastefully low-key decorations, tables, and booths – and then stopped at one booth that was located in a corner near the back. She wasn’t alone after all.

A woman in black was sitting in the booth, a clear glass beside her as she perused what looked like a menu. She seemed to sense that she was being watched, because she put the menu down and looked up at Arta with eyes that glittered beneath her hood. Arta’s breath caught; she’d seen this woman before, in a dream…

No, not a dream after all. Arta’s knees went weak as the realization hit her – that strange meeting, the intruder in her room the night after the assassination attempt… that had been real. The woman had made her forget, somehow.

And that meant she must be an Adept, too, if she could do something like that.

The woman placed her menu carefully on the table and folded her hands atop it. “Gawking is rude, you know,” she said casually. “Fortunately for you, I’m not someone terribly concerned with social niceties. Sit with me, Artakane. Have a drink, if you like – I won’t tell if you don’t. It’s time we got to know each other a little better.”

“What did you call me?” Arta asked warily; far from her only question, but simply the first it occurred to her to ask.

“I called you Artakane,” the woman said, smiling. “That is, after all, your name. A variation on a very old name from a dead language on Lost Terra, I believe; it means something like ‘She Who Desires Righteousness.’ Dramatic, isn’t it?” The woman chuckled. “Come, have a seat. I don’t bite – at least, not normally.”

Against her better judgment, Arta found herself doing as she was asked; perhaps it was simply her curiosity getting the better of her. She seated herself across from the woman and regarded her intently. “Well,” she said, “if you know so much about me, and I don’t know anything about you, that doesn’t really seem fair. Care to share your name?”

The woman shrugged. “Midaia,” she said; Arta waited for her to give a surname, but she never did. Still, she found herself a bit underwhelmed – the name was a common one among women around ten to fifteen years Arta’s senior, having apparently been something of a fad for people to name their own daughters after Queen Aestera’s. Taking that into account, it was entirely possible that the woman had given a fake name; it seemed, Arta thought, like the kind of thing she might do.

“And how do you so much about me, Midaia?” she finally asked after a long pause.

Midaia laughed softly and pulled her hood back; her stark pallor contrasted sharply with Arta’s own skin tone, but otherwise the resemblance she bore to the face Arta saw staring back at her out of the mirror every morning was unmistakable. “Can’t you guess?” the older woman asked. “We are blood, after all.”

Arta felt her heartbeat quicken, and struggled to keep her shock from showing on her face. “Are,” she finally managed to say, “are you my mother?”

Midaia made a face. “Ouch,” she said. “I don’t look that old, do I? I’m your sister, Artakane. Well, half-sister, technically. We had the same mother but different fathers. And I’ve been watching you for a while now.”

“That was you who hired those assassins then, wasn’t it?” Arta breathed. “I thought you were a dream…”

Midaia shrugged. “True enough,” she said, “but like I told you then, I never had any intention of allowing them to harm you. I just wanted to see what you would do under pressure.”

A cold feeling crept up Arta’s spine. “And what about tonight?” she asked. “The protests, the guild, the crowds – was that another way of trying to see me under pressure too?”

“Much as I may pretend otherwise, I’m not actually all-powerful or all-knowing,” Midaia said, a faintly disgusted look on her face. “I had nothing to do with the farce earlier, nor would I have. Something you must realize is that not everything terrible is about you, and neither does it require a hidden agenda. What happened tonight was a conflux of greed and incompetence; Hiram’s power depends on the guilds, so he lets them do what they want to wring a profit from the common people, and when the common people don’t like it, the guilds get to crack down as they see fit. Unfortunately for everyone involved, all this will accomplish in the long run is making the people even angrier. Hiram and the guildsmen may be getting what they want for now, but they’re sitting on a bomb and it will blow up in their faces sooner or later.” She shrugged again. “I’ve seen it before, all around this kingdom. The dukes do what they want, forget who they depend on, and in the end it explodes in their faces. It’s a petty, shortsighted game, and one I have no interest in playing. ‘Vanity, vanity, all is vanity.’”

The last sentence was a quote from some ancient Terran text; Arta had heard it before but couldn’t place it. “If that’s what you believe,” she finally said, “then what do you want? You don’t strike me as someone who doesn’t care enough anything.”

“They say that knowledge is power,” Midaia said after a pause. “I agree with that sentiment, though I think I take it farther than most people would be comfortable with. That’s the real reason the holy sisters kicked me out of their order – publicly they put out that I’d broken my vow of chastity. Hardly. As if such a mundane temptation had any appeal for me. No, the real reason was that I’d delved too deeply into esoteric things that the sisters didn’t want me to learn – there are things that men, and women, aren’t meant to know, they said. I don’t believe that. I’m an Adept, as you must have realized, just like you. I know you’ve started to explore your abilities – I’ve gone farther. Much farther. Being an Adept isn’t just about glowing and influencing people’s thoughts, Artakane. It’s a way of experiencing the universe that few other people can understand or appreciate. I know you don’t understand me now. In time, you will. But let’s just say that my gift led me down paths that the sisters didn’t approve of, and I’m still walking them.

“But I’m also interested in you. I was barely a teenager when we were orphaned, and already living in a convent – sending you to live with me wasn’t an option, and what would I have done with an infant, anyway? I don’t know how you ended up living with Baron Varas; you’ll have to ask somebody else for that part of the story. You do seem to be happy, from what I’ve seen, so I can’t fault the choice of guardians. But whatever else I am or have become, family is important to me. I want to help you, however I can. And that’s why I called you here tonight. There are things I have to tell you. Things that are going to be happening in this Kingdom very soon…”

“Are you talking about the tournament?” Arta asked, part of her still trying to process everything she’d just heard. “I already know. Duke Hiram announced it tonight at the party.”

“Did he?” Midaia asked, raising an eyebrow. “Well, you know part of it, then. But do you know whose idea this tournament was? How much do you know about Duke Naudar ast Sakran?”

Arta shrugged. “Not a whole lot,” she said. “I know he’s supposed to be the most powerful duke after the regent, and I could tell you about his duchy, but I’ve never met him or anything.”

“Naudar is powerful,” Midaia said. “He’s also ambitious, and unlike Hiram or Respen he looks to the future, not just the present. He wants to build a dynasty, and he was the one who pushed the idea for this tournament in the council. That means he intends to win. He would be king.”

“Is that such a bad thing?” Arta asked. “Isn’t that the point of all this, to pick a new monarch? Shouldn’t we all be happy if someone finally gets the throne and can hold things together?”

“Naudar would make a better king than some,” Midaia allowed. “But like I said, he’s ambitious, and he looks to the future. He won’t look kindly on anyone who stands in his way, or who he perceives as a threat.” Her eyes bored into Arta’s, and her words were heavy with implication.

Arta shook her head. “Me? But I’m not a threat to him. I’m nobody.”

“No, you’re not,” Midaia said. “Do you think your new tutor teaches every noble heir whose father or mother gives him a call? Shiran is old, much older than he pretends, and he has been a counselor to heads of state in his time. He came to you because he thinks you’re going to be important. Ask him, if you don’t believe me. But you’ve already been singled out, even if you haven’t realized it yet.”

Arta opened her mouth to question Midaia further but was interrupted by the sound of something buzzing loudly. Pulling up her sleeve, she saw her wrist-comm was flashing brightly. She glanced at Midaia, who nodded, then held it up and answered it.

“Arta?” the Baron’s voice came over it. “Are you all right? Where are you?”

“I’m fine,” Arta said. “I’m in a restaurant not far from the palace, where I ended up after the protest fell apart. I’m not hurt. Is Karani all right?”

“She’s worried sick about you, but otherwise fine,” the Baron said, relief evident in his voice. “I’ll follow your signal and come get you. Stay where you are until I get there. I’m so glad you’re safe.” The comm clicked and went silent.

“Well,” Midaia said, “it seems like you’re going to be in good hands. I’d rather not answer the Baron’s questions, so I’ll take my leave. I’ll see you again soon… little sister.”

When Arta looked over at her place across the booth, she saw that Midaia was gone.

///

When Karani saw that Arta was safe, she rushed over to her and wrapped her in a tight hug. “Lord, I was worried about you!” she said. “Are you all right? After we got separated in the crowd, even Shiran couldn’t find you. What happened?”

Arta gave a quick rundown of her escape, leaving out any mention of Midaia and making it seem like she’d just happened to stumble into an open restaurant and laid low there until she had managed to calm down. Karani seemed to buy it, but the Baron looked thoughtful. “You were very fortunate, Arta,” he finally said. “All of you were. I shudder to think what might have happened. But I’m so glad you’re safe.” Karani stepped back and allowed him to wrap Arta in a tight embrace as well.

“There you are, Katanes!” a voice boomed from behind them in the palace’s entrance hall; Arta, Karani and the Baron all turned to see Duke Hiram hurrying towards them, his round face flushed with outrage. “I heard what happened! What were your girls thinking, heading out into the city at night? Don’t they know it’s dangerous? The way I heard it, they almost got trampled by a mob!”

“The way I heard it,” the Baron said; his tone was mild, but Arta knew him well enough to hear the barely leashed anger underneath it, “the crowd was peaceful until your friends in guild security thought it was a good idea to make it disperse by firing energy blasts into it.”

Hiram waved his hand. “Well, you’ve got to keep the peace somehow,” he said vaguely. “Not how I would have done it, but guild security has authority over keeping the peace on Tantos, and can choose their methods at their own discretion…”

“And when those methods involve shooting at unarmed civilians?” the Baron snapped. “My daughters and their tutor escaped unharmed tonight; not everyone was so lucky. People died tonight, Hiram. Your people. Do you want me to pull up the causality list for you? I can. Have you forgotten that your purpose is to protect the people of this duchy? Or does that only apply to the guilds and not to anyone else?”

Hiram seemed to swell with anger. “How dare you lecture me, Katanes?” he demanded. “You’re only a baron – I’m your duke and sworn liege! I can strip you of your title and put someone else in your place if I want, and you will not talk to me in that tone!”

“Threatening me? Very mature of you, Hiram,” the Baron said. “Especially since you didn’t answer my question. Is it because you know I’m right? Go ahead, strip me of my rank, throw me in prison if you want to. And then everyone will know that the guilds are the real power in Tantos Duchy and that criticizing them is a crime – if they didn’t realize already after their little display tonight.”

Hiram’s mouth worked soundlessly for several moments, and then he threw up his hands in defeat. “Bah,” he said. “I suppose that I can make allowances for a father worried about his children. I won’t punish you for this – today. But don’t you ever take that tone with me again, Katanes. I won’t be so understanding next time.”

“I’ll be returning home in the morning,” the Baron said. “Hopefully that will give you some time to calm down and think about what I’ve said. Good-bye, your grace. I’ll see you in three months, for the tournament.”

Hiram scowled and shook his head. “Have it your way,” he muttered. “See you at the tournament.” He turned and stalked off across the entrance hall, muttering angrily to himself.

When he was gone, Arta and Karani both turned to look at their father in awe. “You talked back to a duke,” Karani said, disbelieving. “And you got away with it!”

“He knew I was right,” the Baron said. “And he may be in deep with the guilds, but he’s afraid of looking weak – and he would look weak, if he punished me for no other reason than because he couldn’t take criticism.” He turned to his daughters then and grabbed both of them into a hug, one under each arm. “And the two of you are worth more to me than my title or all the riches of Tantos III,” he whispered. “Talked back to a duke? I’d talk back to the Emperor himself if I thought it would keep you safe.”

Karani looked embarrassed, but Arta felt a sudden warmth rise in her heart. It doesn’t matter who my birth parents were, or what Midaia is to me, she thought. This is my family. This is where I belong.

The Baron let his daughters go and stepped back. “Now then,” he said. “Let’s get the both of you back upstairs and back to bed. Try to get some sleep, if you can. We’re heading back to Katanes first thing in the morning. I don’t know about you, but I for one am going to be glad to be rid of this place.”

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Two

Katanes, Baron’s Palace

Three Months Later

The sound of clashing swords echoed through the training hall as Arta and Karani sparred. Tomorrow, they would be leaving for Carann, the New Year’s festivities, and the tournament, and both sisters fully intended to be at their best. Dueling had always been an important part of their education – it could hardly have been otherwise, when it was considered a vital skill for any noble, and dueling for sport or for honor was an inescapable hobby among the aristocracy for both men and women – but this would be about far more than that. The fate of the entire Kingdom would turn on the outcome.

Arta ducked a sweeping stroke from Karani’s sword and darted backwards, bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet. The practice swords were faintly energized with a field that dulled their edges, but would still give a nasty shock if they made contact. Warily, now, the sisters circled each other, blades held at the ready, and then Karani lunged forward with a series of quick strikes, trying to use her superior height and strength to force Arta back and keep her on the defensive.

It was a strategy that Arta had familiarized herself with long ago, though; planting herself firmly on her feet, she caught Karani’s blade on her own in front of her face and held it there in a tight lock. She could feel the strain as Karani pushed forward, trusting the fact that this close she’d be able to overpower Arta without much effort; the younger girl knew that she was right, and that she didn’t have much time. Fortunately, she didn’t need it. Suddenly she disengaged and dropped low, letting Karani stumble forward as she overbalanced. Arta spun behind her, and as Karani turned to face her, she caught her sword with her own blade and gave a sharp twist. Karani’s sword went flying and, her balance knocked off-center, she fell backwards and landed flat on the padded floor, Arta’s sword pointed directly at her face.

Karani held up her hands in surrender, then reached up to pull off her helmet as Arta withdrew her sword. “You beat me,” she said in a stunned tone, her mind clearly still trying to process what had happened.

Arta deactivated and sheathed her sword, then pulled off her own helmet. “I guess I did,” she said, trying to sound confident even though inside she felt about as surprised as Karani looked.

Her foster-sister shook her head. “You didn’t use… you-know-what, did you?” she asked.

Arta smirked. “That was all skill, big sister,” she said proudly.

Karani scrambled to her feet and wrapped her arms tightly around Arta’s shoulders. “Little sister’s all grown up,” she said, grinning. “I’m so proud. I’d be prouder if you’d managed to do it without me bruising my back, of course, but it’s a start.”

“Stop it, you’ll be fine,” Arta said, slipping out of Karani’s hug and trying to hide the faint blush that was creeping over her cheeks. She was tired, and surprised… and yes, proud. She’d beaten Karani, without her Adept’s tricks; nothing but pure skill and nerve. She’d never done that before.

Karani threw back her arms and stretched, yawning loudly. “Well, I’m going to the showers, and then to bed,” she said. “It’s late, and tomorrow’s the big day. You should do the same.”

“That’s probably a good idea,” Arta agreed, shaking her head to try and clear some of the stiffness from her neck.

A short time later she left the changing room, dressed in a light green evening robe with the bag containing her gear slung over one shoulder. She made her way down the hallway and stopped at the lift, where she keyed in the residential level and waited. A few moments later, the door opened, and Arta’s eyes widened when she saw that Shiran was inside.

She’d still been having sessions with the Professor since Tantos, but he’d been significantly more distant than he’d been before, as if he was distracted by something – though Karani thought he was feeling guilty after he’d lead them into a riot. Still, he smiled when he saw Arta, and gestured for her to come in.

The door closed behind her and the lift began to rise, it’s two occupants standing silently beside one another. Arta frowned as she looked at Shiran, thinking back to that night – not the riot, but to a conversation she hadn’t told anyone about since it had happened. Finally, she decided that she needed answers, and took a deep breath. “Professor,” she said, “do you know a woman named Midaia? Like the old princess?”

Shiran, fortunately, didn’t seem angry at the question; neither did he seem surprised. Just weary. “Yes, I knew her,” he said. “I taught her when she was very young – younger than you. She was an Adept, one of the strongest I’ve ever known. My methods… didn’t do her much good, so I recommended that she study with the Holy Sisters instead. They know as much as anyone about Adeptitude, which they consider a gift from the Lord and the exclusive province of the Church. But the Sisters couldn’t help her any more than I could; she was cast out of the convent and excommunicated before she turned twenty.” He turned to look at Arta, eyes penetrating. “You’ve met her, haven’t you?”

“I have,” Arta said quietly. “How did you know?”

“I’ve spoken to her recently,” Shiran said. “After I took the job for your father. She took an interest in you.”

“She said she was my half-sister,” Arta whispered. “Shiran, you knew my mother. I know you did. Is she telling the truth?”

The Professor sighed heavily. “She is,” he said; the lift pinged as it reached its destination, and Shiran stepped out into the hallway, gesturing for Arta to follow him. “And I did know your mother. I was never her teacher, but I was her counselor, and her friend.”

The question that hung unspoken on the air seemed to burn at Arta’s throat, and for a moment she almost asked it. Midaia hadn’t told her who their mother was, but Shiran knew. He would tell her, surely… but at the same time, something in her subconscious rebelled, whispering that when she learned that knowledge her life would change, and that she couldn’t be simply Arta ast Katanes, but someone else. Artakane, Midaia had called her. Artakane of what house? Another part, hidden even deeper, seemed to whisper of what that house must be, but… no. Arta forced it down. She had the pieces, but it was all so huge her mind rebelled at the thought of piecing it together.

“Midaia said you were old,” she said instead. “That you’d been a counselor to heads of state. Was she telling the truth there, too?”

Shiran was silent for a long moment, then he nodded. “She was,” he said. “Adepts can live a very long time, if you know the right techniques. I don’t recommend it. It’s a cold, lonely path.”

“Then why did you take it?” Arta demanded. “And why come here? Why not work for, I don’t know, the regent, or Duke Hiram, or someone important?”

Shiran chuckled. “I don’t think Hiram would much appreciate what I would have to tell him,” he said. “As for why… I told you that once, a long time ago, I had a vision of the future. I made a very great mistake because of it, and I’ve been trying to atone for that ever since. As for why that’s brought me here – I’ll tell you everything, but not yet. This tournament has me filled with dread, Arta, and I learned some very disturbing things from an old friend on Tantos Station who specializes in knowledge. The assassins who killed Queen Aestera are still out there, and I don’t know what they’re planning. I’ll breathe easier once the tournament is over, whatever happens. And then I’ll tell you everything, I promise, in the Lord’s name.”

Arta believed him; whether by an Adept’s instinct or just something in his tone, she didn’t know. “I guess I can wait a few days, then,” she said. “Good night, Professor.”

“Good night, Arta.” They nodded to one another and then turned towards their respective rooms, leaving the feel of words that had been said – and unsaid – hanging in the hallway behind them.

///

Arta knew she should get some sleep, but no matter how hard she tried it wouldn’t come; she didn’t know how long she lay on her bed, facing the ceiling with her hands behind her head, trying to still her thoughts. It wasn’t long before she heard Karani enter her own room next door, then her footsteps as she busied herself with stowing her gear and changing clothes before she dropped onto her own bed. Still, sleep wouldn’t come. Finally, Arta sighed and sat up, wrapping her robe more tightly around herself as she left her room and hurried over to her foster-sister’s.

Karani’s lights were off and she was rolled up tightly in her sheets, facing away from the door. Still, there was something about her breathing that seemed, perhaps, a bit too regular, and Arta frowned. Walking over, she sat down on the edge of her sister’s bed. “Karani, are you awake?” she asked quietly.

Karani heaved a great yawn and sat up. “Couldn’t sleep either?” she asked. “Figures. I’m tired, but, with everything going on, I just can’t fall asleep. Sounds like you’re the same.”

“Yes,” Arta said, though that was only part of what was troubling her. “Do you mind if I stay here for a little bit?”

“Of course not,” Karani said, though she shot her a strange look as she did so. Leaning back in her bed, she reached out a hand and clicked a button on the small clock on her nightstand; a holoimage flickered into existence across the ceiling, depicting the stars as they were at this very moment, seen from Katanes’s sky. Karani looked over at Arta. “I remember you always used to like this thing when we still shared a room.”

“I still do,” Arta said, leaning back herself. For a long time the two sisters stared up at the stars without speaking; finally, Arta sighed. “What will you do if you win the tournament?” she finally asked.

Karani shrugged. “Well, like you said, Father will be king, so that would make us princesses.” She shot Arta a grin. “Doesn’t sound so bad to me. And I guess I’ll be famous for winning, of course, and everyone in the Kingdom knowing my name would be nice. Do you think they have a trophy? I guess not; the crown’s probably the trophy. And then I’d get to be queen some day and you could be my knight and we could go off and have adventures, finding new worlds and rescuing handsome princes and leaving all the boring stuff to Danash and Shiran.” She laughed quietly. “Who am I kidding? Neither of us is going to win anything, not with the whole Kingdom competing. But it’s nice to dream, isn’t it? What about you?”

“I don’t know,” Arta whispered. Karani shot her that curious look again.

“What’s gotten into you, anyway?” she asked. “You were always the one who was so determined to make a name for yourself, right?”

Arta turned to look at her, expression serious. “Karani,” she said, “I just want you to know that whatever happens, you’re my sister and I love you.”

“Now I’m really worried,” Karani said. “Come on, Arta – what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said. “I just wanted you to know.”

Karani still looked concerned, but didn’t press her any further. They resumed staring up at the stars in silence and at long last they both fell asleep.

///

Arta was still yawning the next morning when she and Karani walked into the entrance hall, bags slung over their shoulders. Their father was already there, talking quietly with Danash, who was to be left in charge while they were gone; when the Baron heard his daughters approaching, he turned and smiled. He also had a slender bag under one arm, and Arta wondered what could be in it. It looked too small to be his travelling things, and she thought he’d already had those loaded onto the shuttle last night.

“There my girls are,” he said warmly. “Are you ready to get going?”

“Ready to knock spoiled princelings on their backsides, you mean?” Karani asked, laughing.

The Baron chuckled, but then his expression became more serious. “Remember that this tournament is about more than proving how good a swordswoman you are,” he said. “The fate of the Kingdom could turn on the outcome. This isn’t a game, no matter how much it may seem like it.”

“We’ll make you proud,” Arta said. “I promise.”

“I never wanted to be a king,” the Baron said, “but I know you will. Which reminds me.” He set his thin bag on the ground and opened it; inside were a pair of gleaming, slightly curved swords – Karani’s eyes sparkled at the sight, and even Arta felt her breath catch.

“These are for you,” the Baron said, picking up both blades and handing one of each of his daughters. “These are real dueling swords, not toys or practice swords. I had them commissioned especially for you after the tournament was announced. It’s traditional to give a noble their first real sword when he or she comes of age, but, well… I think we can afford to be a little early. There’s a switch on the hilt that lets you control the power setting – at the lowest level, they function just like your practice swords, and that’s the level you’ll be using at the tournament. This is a test of skill, not an excuse to run around maiming people.”

If Karani heard that last part, she gave no sign; she drew her new sword from its sheath and held it up in front of her eyes before she flipped the power switch and let currents of energy arc along the blade. For a moment she stood, mesmerized by the sight, then threw back her head and laughed loudly, doubltess already imagining how she’d look with the blade slung at her hip.

Arta didn’t bother to draw it; instead, she just rushed forward and wrapped her foster-father in a hug. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“You’ve earned it,” the Baron said, patting her back. “Now, Karani, turn that off and let’s get going. It’s a long ride to Carann, and we certainly don’t want to be late.

///

Seen from space, Carann seemed to glitter.

Arta had never been to the capital before, but she’d read enough and heard enough from previous tutors that she’d known what to expect. Much of the planet was taken up by cities; it housed a larger population than any other world in the Kingdom, more than some entire duchies if the census was correct. Arta had expected to see the large swathes of light that covered most of some continents as they swept lower, but the sheer scale of it, the countless spacecraft in the air, the lights… all of that was more than she could have imagined, and it took her breath away.

“Wow,” Karani said from beside her, her own face pressed against the viewport just as Arta’s was. “Just… wow.” Arta said nothing, but privately agreed with the sentiment.

Under direction from traffic controllers, the Twilight Dagger descended through Carann’s atmosphere and emerged from a cloud bank over the capital city itself. Once again, Arta felt her breath catch. The city that stretched out below them was far larger than Tannen, and far more beautiful than Tantos City; it seemed like a great field of gleaming silvery spires that filled the entirety of the immense valley beneath them. And there, built upon a low ridge on the far eastern end, was a structure that Arta had never seen but that every child of the Dozen Stars would recognize – the Royal Palace itself. A cluster of almost crystalline towers that the city seemed to wear like a crown, it was surrounded by a halo of small ships as the competitors for the great tournament arrived.

“Never fails to impress, does it?” Shiran asked suddenly from behind them; he’d been so quiet on this trip that Arta had almost forgotten he was there. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen it, but it doesn’t lose its majesty. Artax the Founder had many talents, but one that’s often overlooked is his skill at hiring architects.” He looked from Arta to Karani and smiled. “There’s a lesson in that, I think. Even a king can’t do everything – but a great king, or queen, knows how to find people who can do things they can’t.”

“Have you been here before, Professor?” Karani asked, unable to keep the faintly suspicious edge from her voice. “I didn’t know that.”

“I worked here for a time, before you were born,” Shiran said noncommittally. “It’s been years since I’ve been back.”

Before Karani could question him further, the Baron emerged from the cockpit, where he’d been conferring with the driver. “We’ll be landing soon,” he said. “When we do, we’ll be shown to our rooms. When we do, change into your armor and meet me in the hallway outside – the opening ceremony of the tournament is tonight, and all the contenders will be presented. I want you both looking like serious, dedicated knights – so Karani, don’t you dare wear that hat you bought in Tannen, all right?”

Karani looked crestfallen, and Arta, who knew for a fact that her foster-sister had brought the hat stashed in the bottom of her bag, covered her face with her hand to hide a giggle. “What happens after that?” she asked when it had subsided.

“Tomorrow is the new year,” the Baron said. “The Royal Palace holds an annual dance in celebration, and this year all competitors have been invited to attend.” Karani’s face broke out into a broad grin at that. “The day after that… the tournament begins.”

///

Arta tried to avoid tugging at the collar of her armor as she waited in line behind Karani outside of a set of double doors that led to the tournament hall. She and her sister both wore armor without their helmets, with cloaks over their shoulders and dueling swords at their waists; around them waited the other competitors from Tantos Duchy. Some of them were as young as the sisters, but most looked to be in their twenties at least. All looked like they could handle themselves with a blade, and none were the titled heads of their houses, but otherwise they were a diverse group of young men and women, around ten in all. The only sound in the hall was that of nervous breathing.

Karani kicked Arta’s shin. “When do you think they’re going to get on with it?” she asked.

“Sssshhh!” Arta hissed, but no sooner had she done so that the doors slowly opened. The contestants straightened themselves and then filed out onto the dueling floor where they joined the ranks of competitors from other duchies; they arranged themselves as they’d been instructed, facing the platform where the dukes sat. The distinguished-looking man in front must be the regent, Arta thought; she saw Duke Hiram’s round face not far away. Other dukes she recognized as well – the thin young man in a military uniform and a cold scowl must be Duke Respen, and the older, mustached man who had a cane leaning against his chair had to be Naudar, but her heart was hammering so hard that she couldn’t place the faces of the other, less powerful dukes and duchesses.

The stands that rose up around them were mostly empty, containing only a few clergy, guildsmen, and the noble sponsors who’d come with their houses’ competitors, their father among them, but Arta knew that in a few days’ time this place would be packed, and the camera mechs that now hovered around the edges would be broadcasting the event across the Kingdom. Arta suddenly felt very nervous and very uncomfortably small.

Once all the competitors were in position, the regent got to his feet and stepped forward. “It has been years since this hall has been host to a true tournament,” Mardoban said, “and never before has it seen such a gathering of talented young men and women as I see before you today. As you’re all no doubt sick of hearing, this is no mere game that we prepare to play – the stakes are much higher than that. Before we begin, you should remember that the fate of our Kingdom and its crown turns upon what will happen here in the next few days. Tomorrow is the New Year; the day after that, we will begin. I know that all of you represent the cream of your houses and your guilds; I know that in the days to come, win or lose you will show us your skills and make your homeworlds proud. It is my honor to welcome you all to this tournament, and may the Lord watch over you.” He gestured to an older man in clerical robes who walked to his side. “Now, then, I shall call your names in turn, and when I do, you shall come forward and receive my acknowledgment and, if you wish, the high prelate’s blessing. Then you will officially be a competitor at this tournament, and once we are finished here, the tournament will officially begin!”

Despite his optimistic words, Arta thought there was something cautious in Mardoban’s eyes; still, he began to call out names, beginning with his own Orlanes Duchy – going first must be a privilege of being regent. The first competitor onto the platform was a slender young man who looked somewhat ill-at-ease in his armor; he bowed and received the blessings of both the regent and the high prelate, and when he stood, Arta noticed that though he was younger and slimmer, he bore a noticeable resemblance to Mardoban. Pakorus had been his name; Arta knew the regent had a son about her age, and thought that this must be him.

Mardoban continued with his recitation, calling the remaining names from Orlanes Duchy and moving on to Sakran Duchy. The first onto the platform was a handsome young man who looked far more comfortable in his armor than Pakorus had been; he shot the regent a cocky smile as he bowed to him, and his name was announced as Darius. Karani didn’t bother to hide the interest in her eyes or the fact that she whistled softly when she saw him, but Arta only felt a cold feeling creep into her chest. Darius ast Sakran was Duke Naudar’s eldest son, and even on Katanes she’d heard he was already a famous duelist. If anyone was liable to win this tournament, it was him. His sister and brother followed shortly after, and Arta knew that neither of them was supposed to be any slouch with the blade either. By luck of genetics or training, Naudar certainly seemed to have stacked the deck in his favor.

The remaining duchies became a blur; Arta watched as, one by one, the sleekly militaristic competitors from Aurann came to the platform, followed by the competitors from Tashir, who were decked in elegant finery but looked like they had a quiet confidence nonetheless, and more duchies besides. Finally, it was Tantos Duchy’s turn. Names Arta was vaguely familiar with were called, and then “Karani ast Katanes” took the stage, bowing flamboyantly as she received the regent’s and the high prelate’s blessings. Arta breathed heavily; she was next.

Sure enough, “Arta ast Katanes!” was called and Arta slowly walked forward, head held high, and mounted the steps to the platform. She bowed to the regent, heard the high prelate murmuring his blessing over her, then raised her eyes. The regent looked at her, and then inhaled sharply, taking a step back.

“Are you all right, my lord?” she asked carefully; the other dukes and duchesses regarded Mardoban with expressions of concern, of varying sincerity, on their faces.

“Something in my throat,” Mardoban said, and waved Arta on. “Nothing to worry about, I’m fine to continue.” As the called the next name, Arta hurried down the steps and made her way back to Karani’s side, still certain that the regent’s eyes were following her all the way.

“What was that about?” Karani hissed when Arta rejoined her.

“I have no idea,” Arta whispered back; inside, she wondered.

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Three

Carann, Royal Palace

Mardoban made it through the remainder of the opening ceremony and politely excused himself once it was over, but he couldn’t keep the Katanes girl’s face out of his head. Having shaken the hands of his fellow dukes and the High Prelate and wished the competitors success in the tournament, he entered a little used side-passage and stopped, staring down at his hands and trying to process what he’d just seen.

Arta ast Katanes didn’t resemble her sister, but Mardoban vaguely recalled hearing that she was a fosterling, not an ast Katanes by blood. Karani ast Katanes was tall – one of the tallest teenage girls the regent could remember meeting – and rangy, taking much after her father in appearance, though the smirk that played around her lips and the casual confidence in her eyes more recalled her mother, whom Mardoban had met before she’d died. Arta, on the other hand – she looked almost exactly like Aestera had when she’d been that age, more than thirty years ago.

Mardoban didn’t know if any of the other dukes had noticed it, but then, most of them had only known Aestera as a queen and rarely saw her without her crown and royal robes, her jewelry and her makeup. Mardoban, though, had known her when she’d been barely older than that girl was today, and they’d been young knights together before he became a duke and she a monarch. And the girl had looked so much like the face he remembered… maybe it was a coincidence, or even the result of extensive reconstructive surgery, but Mardoban doubted it. No, the only idea that made sense was… was…

“damnation you, Shiran,” the regent muttered. “Is this your play after all?”

He was shaken from his thoughts by the sound of footsteps behind him. “Father?” Pakorus said; Mardoban turned to face him. “Are you all right?” There was a look of genuine concern on the boy’s face.

Mardoban waved a hand wearily. “I’m fine, son,” he said.

Pakorus didn’t look convinced. “Really?” he asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”

“Maybe I have,” the regent muttered. “Maybe I have.”

///

The grand ballroom of Carann’s royal palace was a scene of grandeur such as Arta had seldom seen.

Growing up as the foster-daughter of a noble house, she’d thought herself familiar with elegance and glamor, but in comparison to Carann, even the baronial palace on Katanes felt like little more than the home of country nobility, impressive only in comparison to its surroundings. Even Hiram’s party on Tantos III seemed much diminished in comparison, as if this had been what he was trying to imitate and had fallen short.

The chamber was high and sweeping, lined with silvery arches and stained-glass windows depicting scenes from the Kingdom’s history. And yet, despite its size, the room was filled with people, nobility and guildsmen mostly, with a few clergy dotted among the crowds, the men in suits and the women in gowns; serving mechs glided among them with trays of food or drink balanced easily on their limbs.

Though not as viscerally unpleasant as Hiram’s party had been, Arta still found it overwhelming as she nibbled on a small sandwich she’d taken from a passing mech and rubbed her temple with her free hand. It was all too easy to fade into the background here – even a duke like Hiram himself, who she saw not far away chatting animatedly with several guildsmen, would be lost in the shuffle. Karani, for her part, seemed to be enjoying herself immensely; she’d found her way to the dance floor in the middle of the room and was in the process of twirling with a young man from some duchy Arta couldn’t place, but who she’d remembered seeing at the opening ceremony yesterday.

For her part, Arta was content to fade into the background, to simply take in the sights and listen to the music which so many couples were currently dancing to, performed by a live choir and orchestra at one end of the ballroom. The new year was a complex holiday, celebrating many things, and its music reflected that fact. On one level, it was, as its name suggested, a celebration of the turning of the year according to the Carann calendar, which was the standard used across the Kingdom, but it also commemorated the founding of the Dozen Stars by Artax the Founder centuries ago. And it had been a significant day even then, a religious holiday commemorating the Lord’s revelation to His Prophet in that long ago time before Terra was Lost. The current song was a hymn to that theme, one Arta recognized and had loved since childhood; she found herself humming along to the familiar music as others danced.

A sudden feeling pricked the back of her neck, and she turned to see a tall, handsome man a few years her senior standing by a window; Darius ast Sakran himself. He, too, was alone, neither of his siblings in sight, and he was regarding Arta in a careful, weighing manner. At first she felt a cold chill run up her back – Lord, he wasn’t going to ask her to dance, was he? – and then she realized that he’d picked a vantage point from which he could see the whole hall, and had no doubt been sizing up each competitor in turn. Darius was supposed to be the best duelist in Sakran duchy, and Arta had no doubt he intended to win here as well.

She met his eyes for a brief moment, then nodded her head slightly, a gesture of respect from one competitor to another. A smile twitched the edge of Darius’s lips at that, and he raised his glass in a salute before turning his attention elsewhere in the crowd.

Arta had just turned back towards the main ballroom when she felt someone grab her arm. “Oh, no,” Karani said, “you are not standing here like a lump all night, Arta. What’s the point of going to a party like this if you don’t dance at least a little? Come on?”

Arta considered protesting, but thought better of it – her odds of talking Karani out of this weren’t good, and it would be easier to just let her have her way and then wriggle out of it when her attention flitted to something else. She allowed her sister to drag her to the dance floor and shove her at the same young man she herself had been dancing with earlier; for once in her life, Arta thanked her years-old dancing lessons as she took his hand and let him lead her on in time with the music. It was another old new year’s hymn this time, not Arta’s favorite but one she knew well enough, and the dance moves were simple enough that she didn’t have a hard time keeping up with them. Perhaps this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

The song ended, and the young man bowed and excused himself to get drinks. Before he returned, the music started again, and Arta heard someone walk up beside her. “Pardon me, my dear,” a lightly accented voice said, “but might I have this dance?”

Arta turned to find herself facing a tall older man in a white uniform of unfamiliar cut. “Of… of course, my lord,” she stammered out, taking his hand. “And who might I have the pleasure of addressing?”

The man smiled as the dancing began anew. “My name is Publius Vedrans Quarinis, ambassador to the Dozen Stars on behalf of his most august majesty Verus Licinius, Emperor of All Humankind.”

Arta felt herself go cold. The Imperial Ambassador was dancing with her? This was a man as powerful as any duke in the Dozen Stars – perhaps more so. And almost certainly far more dangerous. She wanted to excuse herself, and cursed Karani for putting her in this situation in the first place, but fought the impulse. “I’m sorry,” she said as calmly as possible, “but I wasn’t aware that his majesty the Emperor ruled all of humankind. I thought we had a war here a few hundred years ago where we disagreed with the Empire on that point. Rather strongly.”

If Quarinis was offended, he gave no sign – he merely smiled. “Well, the title is somewhat outdated, I must admit,” he said, “but you know how slow these things are to change. Nonetheless, I am the Emperor’s ambassador, and you, if I’m not mistaken, are Arta ast Katanes. A pleasure.”

“You know my name?” Arta asked.

“I was in the audience for yesterday’s ceremony and I do pride myself on my memory,” Quarinis said. “And I’ve made a point to familiarize myself with the dukes and barons of this Kingdom, and their families. I’ve served in this post a very long time, Miss Arta. Much longer than you’ve been alive. There are many things that I know.” Things that others do not was the unspoken statement that hung in the air, and Arta was suddenly and strangely reminded of Midaia.

“But that doesn’t answer what interest the Emperor’s ambassador has in me,” Arta finally said.

“Oh, you in the Dozen Stars always think we of the Empire are scheming monsters,” Quarinis said lightly. “But the truth, as it so often is, is rather more complicated than that. No one here is entirely what they seem – I’m not, the regent isn’t, and most of the council aren’t.” He lowered his voice. “And I don’t think you are either.”

Arta went cold. “What do you mean?” she asked softly.

“There’s a certain ability I don’t possess myself,” Quarinis said, “but that I think you do. If I strain hard enough, I can feel the energies tingling around you. This ability is valued by my lord the Emperor. There is a place for you with us, if you wish it.”

“And why exactly would I wish it?” Arta asked coldly. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m Dozen Stars nobility – I may only be a fosterling, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have some pride. Why would I want to work for the Emperor, ever?”

Quarinis leaned in close. “This Kingdom is dying,” he whispered. “You were at Tantos the night of the riots, weren’t you? Yes, I see it in your eyes. The rot is here, too. Not as obvious, perhaps – the regent is a better ruler than poor, hapless Duke Hiram – but here. This entire tournament is symptomatic of it. Give a crown to the family of the best duelist in the Dozen Stars? Preposterous. It exists solely to stroke the egos of the nobility, not to actually serve the interests of the people. Oh, don’t give me that look. I know what you’re thinking – the typical self-righteous Dozen Stars contempt for the Empire’s so-called brutality. There is some truth to that, I’ll admit, but I can assure you that a group of jumped up businessmen like your guilds gunning down unarmed civilians would never happen under our rule. We’re not what we were, yes, but we are still strong, while your Kingdom is riven by factionalism and corruption. It will eat itself, Arta. It can’t be stopped. But you can be saved. Come work for the Emperor, use your gifts for us, and we can protect you and your family. You want a knighthood, yes? We can give you something greater. The Emperor can always use a talented Adept; your kind are too rare to turn down. All we ask is that you recognize a lost cause.”

“And if I refuse?” Arta asked, her mouth dry.

Quarinis shrugged. “Nothing terrible,” he said. “I won’t force you. All I ask is that you follow a reasonable course, and consider my offer. But you know in your heart that I’m right, don’t you?”

Arta pulled her hand out of the Ambassadors with rather more force than she’d intended. “I can’t deny that I agree with some of the things you’ve said,” she hissed, “but I can follow my own path without your reasonable course. Thank you for the dance.”

Spinning on her heel, narrowly avoiding tripping on the hem of her dress, Arta fled the dance floor.

///

Mardoban bowed and politely excused himself from a conversation with the Duchess Laodamia, a formidable and opinionated woman who’d already seemed old when he’d first inherited his own position; she rarely bothered attending council meetings these days, sending any of her numerous family members in her place, owing to her general disgust with the current state of the Kingdom. Several of those children and grandchildren were hovering protectively around her now, not that the old woman seemed to need it as she looked around disapprovingly at the rest of the room with eyes that were still bright and focused.

The regent had been doing his rounds, making conversation with the various council members; Laodamia was the last, and he could feel the weariness growing in him. Excusing himself, he made his way to one of the balconies that lined the ballroom and stepped outside, leaning on the railing and looking down at the lights of the city spread out beneath him. After several minutes, someone joined him.

“It’s been a while, old friend,” a familiar voice said, and Mardoban turned to see the Professor beside him. “I trust you’re well?”

“As well as can be imagined, under the circumstances,” Mardoban said. “I’d ask you the same, but I think I already know the answer. You’ll probably outlive us all.”

“Even I’m not immortal,” Shiran whispered.

“Well, you’ve been busy lately, anyway,” said the regent. “I trust that my assumption that you were the one who planted that crown was correct? It’d be embarrassing if it turned out we were all wrong about that.”

Shiran chuckled. “That was my doing,” he said. “I thought that the council needed some incentive to actually carry out their duty rather than continue allowing this Kingdom to factionalize on their watch. I must admit, a tournament wasn’t quite what I had in mind. And there were… other factors. But I’ve been busy lately with other things, too, so I haven’t had much time to come back here and check in on you. I recently took a job as a tutor in Tantos Duchy.”

“A tutor,” Mardoban mused. “Tantos Duchy, you said? The planet Katanes, perhaps? And would the person you’re tutoring happen to be one Arta ast Katanes?”

“And her sister Karani, yes,” Shiran said casually, but he didn’t elaborate further. Mardoban sighed; if he wanted to confirm his suspicions, it looked like he was going to have to ask.

“And tell me this,” he said quietly, “is the ast Katanes girl what I think she is?”

Shiran was silent for a long moment before he answered. “Yes,” he finally said.

“How?” Mardoban asked.

“About a year and a half before she died,” the Professor said, “Queen Aestera had a brief affair with a certain Baron Ionas from Kern Ducy. Hmmm. I see from your expression that you remember it. Ionas died not long after Aestera did. Killed by pirates, wasn’t he?”

Mardoban recalled the incident. “Yes,” he whispered.

“In any case, a few months later, Aestera left the running of the Kingdom the council and dropped out of sight for several months. I trust you remember that much?” Shiran smiled.

“Of course,” Mardoban said. “That was after she’d sent Midaia to be educated at the convent, and the Sisters were already complaining about her nosing into things she shouldn’t; I remember Aestera got into a fight with the Mother Superior over her daughter’s character. The Church thought she wasn’t showing proper respect, so Aestera decided to go on a retreat and pilgrimage to mend that bridge, and she didn’t want to be disturbed. She was gone for most of a year, and…” realization suddenly struck. “Lord,” he breathed.

Shiran nodded. “Yes,” he said. “Aestera was pregnant at the time. She’d already been the subject of several assassination attempts at that point, some of them public, some of them only a few of us knew about. She feared for her life, correctly as it turned out… and her child’s life. When the girl was born, she named her Artakane and before she returned to Carann she gave her to me and told me to find somewhere she’d be safe. If she got to the bottom of the assassination attempts and thought the girl would be free of danger, she intended to take her back and claim her openly…”

“But she died less than a month after her return, and so Arta… Artakane… has been hidden on Katanes all this time,” Mardoban breathed. “damnation it, Shiran, why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“I was sworn to secrecy,” the Professor said. “And I felt that the fewer people knew about Arta, the safer she would be. Baron Varas is a good man, loyal to the Dozen Stars but not a significant player in Kingdom politics. And he had a daughter of his own, about the same age. I asked him and his wife, and they accepted. Spreading the knowledge too far outside of the Baron’s household seemed… imprudent.”

Mardoban felt anger and bitterness over having been left out of Aestera’s and Shiran’s plan rise in him but he fought it down; part of him understood their logic, even if he didn’t like it. “And the crown?” he asked. “It’s for her, isn’t it?”

“Maybe,” Shiran said. “The crown is for the worthy heir. Maybe that is Arta, but only she can prove that.”

///

Arta leaned against the ballroom’s far wall, breathing heavily after the disturbing encounter on the dance floor. She didn’t notice someone was approaching until she heard a voice beside her. “Party not to your liking?” it said, and she turned to find herself facing a young man about her own age in a fine royal blue suit; she recognized him from the ceremony, and found herself blushing.

“Pakorus ast Orlanes, right?” she asked.

He bowed. “That’s me,” he said. “And you’re the younger ast Katanes daughter, I think. Arta?”

“Artakane,” she said, the full name slipping out; she wondered why it was easier to say it to a stranger than to her family. “But everyone calls me Arta, yes.”

Pakorus nodded and looked back towards the dance floor. “Thought I saw you talking to old Quarinis before you bolted. Don’t worry, it’s not you – he can have that effect on people. Probably trying to recruit you to spy for him or something like that, wasn’t he?”

“Something like that,” Arta admitted.

Pakorus looked at her strangely for a moment. “You look like you could use some air,” he said, “and I have to admit, the novelty of all this is wearing off for me too. Would you mind letting me show you a part of the palace that’s a little quieter?”

Arta raised an eyebrow. “Are you propositioning me?” she asked.

Pakorus flushed and held up his hands. “No, Lord no,” he said. “I mean, not that you’re not pretty, because I think you are, but I only just met you, and… and I’m only digging myself in deeper, aren’t I?”

Arta laughed. “I get what you’re trying to say, or at least what I think you’re trying to say. And a quiet place sounds really appealing right about now.”

“Then follow me.” Pakorus lead the way out of the ballroom and down the palace’s twisting corridors; despite the size and complexity of the building, he seemed to know exactly where he was going with little difficulty. Finally they came to a large door that he opened by waving a hand over a small scanner, and they stepped out into what seemed to be a warm, lush forest.

“Lord,” Arta breathed as she stepped out into the garden; looking up she could see the night sky through the glass dome overhead between the leaves of trees. “It’s beautiful.”

“I was born on Orlanes,” Pakorus said, “which is mostly ocean, and what land there is can be pretty lush. The last few years I’ve mostly been living here with my father, but so much of Carann is urban, this is one of the only places that really reminds me of home. And like I said, it’s quiet here – I like to come here to read when I’m not running errands for Father.”

“Katanes isn’t this lush, but we don’t have many cities,” Arta said, running her hand along a tree. “A lot of the planet is fertile plains, good farmland, but it’s mostly mountainous where I live. I love the mountains, though. I like to ride my izdakan and look down on them, seeing them all spread out underneath me, like a map, only alive…”

“Izdakan?” Pakorus asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I guess you’d never have seen one, would you?” Arta asked. “Dragons, some people call them. Big flying creatures with scales. Mine’s called Ezi; she’s still back on Katanes. It’s not like I’m liable to have time to fly while I’m here.”

“I assume your parents came with you?” Pakorus asked.

“Father – my foster-father, technically, did,” Arta said. “My foster-mother died a long time ago, when I was a little girl. I don’t really remember her. Lord only knows who my birth parents were.”

“I’m sorry,” Pakorus said. “My mother’s still alive, but I don’t see much of her these days. She and my father are… separated. They had a fight years ago and never really made up. I think Mother thought he was spending too much time being the regent and not enough with his family – and that he was more loyal to a dead queen than he was to her. I overheard her saying once that she could compete with a living woman, but not a ghost. I didn’t understand for years what she meant.” He shook his head. “I don’t think I agree with her, though. Father’s an important man, and he’s always busy, but he’s also always been there for me when I’ve needed him.”

They fell into a silence for several long minutes, and then finally, Arta laughed. “Listen to us,” she said, “we’ve only just met and we’re already airing all our family problems for each other. If my sister was here, she’d probably slap us both upside the head and tell us to stop moping. Let’s talk about something happier, shall we? The tournament starts tomorrow, after all.”

Pakorus gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Don’t expect great things from me,” he said. “I took dueling lessons at the Academy but I was never very good at it – I know, I know, I’m a miserable failure as a noble. I guess I’d rather study great warriors than be one. Doubt I’ll make it very far. How about you? Are you any good? What about your sister?”

“Oh, I’m not bad,” Arta said, feeling a faint blush creeping onto her cheeks. “Karani’s better, though.” Maybe not anymore, a voice whispered in the back of her head. You beat Karani, remember. Maybe it was a fluke – or maybe it wasn’t. “Still, every noble house in the Kingdom probably sent their best duelists for something like this. There are probably loads of people here better than I am.”

“My money’s on one of the ast Sakrans,” Pakorus said. “I was at the Academy with them. Never much cared for them, but they’re good, especially the older brother. I saw him at the party tonight, sizing up the competition. I’d wager that if anyone wins this, it’ll be Darius.”

“If what I’ve heard is true, you’re probably right,” Arta said. “Still, who knows what might happen?”

They spent what felt like the better part of an hour talking under the trees, comparing the different competitors and weighing their odds against each other, and sharing stories of their home worlds. Finally, Arta felt herself give a great yawn. “I’d better get going,” she said. “It’s late, and Karani’s probably already torn the ballroom to pieces trying to find me. Thank you for showing me this place, Pakorus. I think I needed it.”

“The pleasure was all mine,” he said. “Good luck tomorrow, Arta.”

“Good luck to you too,” she said, and they exchanged bows that were half-playful and half-sincere. Then Arta turned and left the garden behind her. She needed to find Karani and assure her that she was safe, and then get some sleep. She’d need all the rest she could get for tomorrow.

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Four

Carann

The small shuttle, launched from a cloaked ship that hung beyond the orbit of Carann’s furthest moon, descended slowly towards the capital city. It had been cleared by orbital security thanks to a set of faked credentials, and it seemed to a casual observer to be entirely innocuous. And yet it was one of several ships like it that were descending upon the planet this night, and their true purpose was far from benign.

The shuttle hadn’t rested long on its landing platform when its hatch opened and a man in casual pilot’s clothing stepped out. He made his way to the customs booth, where he paid his landing fee, and then walked out onto the city streets. To all appearances, he was alone; the figures who accompanied him, cloaked by technology that hid them from both prying eyes and security scanners, did so as silently and unnoticed as shadows.

The man turned down an alley and checked to see if he was alone, then nodded. The air flickered and the Commander appeared beside him, accompanied by several more of the pirates. The Commander himself glanced around and, noticing no eavesdroppers with his enhanced senses, raised his wrist-comm to his masked mouth.

“Two, are you in position?” he asked.

“Affirmative,” her voice buzzed in response, followed immediately afterward by similar confirmations from the other assassins. At least one was with each of the small pirate groups he’d sent out – their personal cloaking shields could be expanded to cover multiple people, though not for long at a given time. They had each landed at different spaceports throughout the city, and were now slowly making their way towards the palace, where they would meet up again. And where they would carry out their mission.

“Acknowledged,” the Commander said. “Continue as planned. We will rendezvous at the target and proceed from there.” Lowering his comm, he nodded to his pirates and gestured for them to step closer; once again, the cloaking field went up, this time concealing them all from sight, and then as one, unseen, they began moving towards the palace.

///

Arta stood in the waiting room near the dueling hall, holding her helmet under one arm while fiddling idly with the greave on her wrist. From the corner of her eyes, however, she watched as the other competitors moved around the low chamber, some of them talking to each other, some of them waiting quietly against the walls. Seeing Pakorus across from her, she raised a hand and waved; he returned the gesture with a grin.

Karani elbowed her in the side. “Is that the regent’s son you ran off with last night?” she asked, though she knew full well who he was, having seen him at the opening ceremony just like Arta had. “He’s kind of cute.”

“Shut up,” Arta hissed, cursing the fact that she was now blushing furiously. Doing her best to ignore Karani’s snickering, she turned towards the front of the room to where the three ast Sakran siblings stood together, apparently deep in conference with one another. Darius, of course, was unmistakable, and in his armor, he looked more like some sort of hero from the histories than an actual flesh-and-blood human being. Something about him made Arta shiver, though she couldn’t put her finger on what. Perhaps he just seemed too artificial to be real. His sister, beside him, was cut from similar cloth – Tariti, Arta thought she’d heard her name was. She wore her armor as elegantly as if it was a gown, but the hand that rested on the hilt of her sword had an easily confidence and familiarity.

The youngest brother, Galen, was shorter than either of his siblings and skinnier than Darius, though otherwise he resembled him. He looked up just as Arta’s gaze fell on him, and their eyes met, and for a moment she found herself going cold. There was something hungry and calculating in his eyes, and she had a feeling that this was someone who would do anything in his power to win.

“They’re the ones we’ve got to watch out for, Karani,” she said. “They’re favored to win, and I think I can see why.”

Karani smirked. “Challenge accepted,” she said. Arta shook her head, but she was smiling all the same. For all Karani’s talk of how neither of them was liable to win, she knew that her foster-sister was too competitive to let things go without giving them her all.

Looking up at the ceiling, Karani sighed. “What’s taking them so long, anyway?”

Arta looked flatly at her. “Were you even paying attention to Father’s instructions this morning?” she asked. “The regent is giving his speech right now, reminding everyone what’s going on and why we’re here and talking about how great the Kingdom’s heritage of tournament and competition is. When he’s done, the screens on the walls in here are going to come on, showing us the dueling floor; that’s when he’ll announce the first competitors. The winner gets to go on to the next round. There’ll be six rounds in total; whoever wins the last one wins the tournament, and the head of their house gets to try the crown. Make sense?”

Karani rolled her eyes. “I suppose,” she said.

“You’re hopeless,” Arta muttered, but her tone was affectionate.

Before Karani could retort, the waiting room’s lights suddenly flashed red. A moment later, the screens that had stood dark along the walls flared to life, showing the dueling floor. Around the room, conversation stopped; Arta swore she could hear Pakorus groaning softly, but most people – including Karani and the ast Sakrans – looked alert and intent.

“Well, this is it, then,” Karani said; she took a deep breath, straightened herself, and gave another of her smirks. “And may the best woman win!”

///

Mardoban returned to his seat in the judges’ box after he finished his speech, taking his spot in the front row between Naudar and Hiram. The latter was wiping his brow with a handkerchief and generally looked like he’d rather be anywhere but here – perhaps now that the time had come, he’d decided he didn’t like his duchy’s odds. Naudar, on the other hand, sat with both hands on his cane and a wolfishly satisfied expression on his face.

After the regent took his seat, Gilgam approached him, wearing a full dress uniform for the occasion. “We’ve swept the perimeter,” he whispered. “All clear, sir.”

“Thank you, Gilgam,” Mardoban replied; the guard officer bowed and took up his place behind the dukes. Mardoban scanned the seats across from him, most of which were filled with citizens who’d managed to purchase tickets – a potential danger, but still, everyone had been thoroughly vetted, and then scanned and searched when they arrived to make sure they weren’t carrying any weapons. He didn’t believe any of them was a threat, but well, one could never be too cautious when the most important people in the Kingdom were all gathered in one room.

His gaze slid to the VIP box partway up the stands; most of the nobles and guildsmen who’d come with the competitors but didn’t hold a council seat were there, along with the ambassadors. He saw Quarinis, flanked by both his hulking praetorians, sitting in the back, away from everyone else – Ambassador Ceana sat on the opposite end of that row, as much space between her and the Imperial Ambassador as propriety would allow. Mardoban’s gaze flickered downward, past the silvery-suited forms of the guildsmen, and settled on Baron Varas ast Katanes, who sat calmly in the front row. For a moment he thought of the secrets that man had known, then shook his head. Time for that later. First, he had this to deal with.

There, near the bottom of the box, his gaze fell on one final figure, a slender woman in black with a hood pulled low over her head. Mardoban frowned – who could that be, and why was she in the VIP box? – but then the woman looked up and lowered her hood. The regent’s blood froze as he recognized the face, even from a distance and even though it had been years since he’d last seen her, and she’d been a child then. Midaia? He thought What are you-? But when he looked again, she was gone. Had he imagined her there? With Aestera and Artakane on his mind, he must have. Shaking his head, he returned his thoughts to the matter at hand.

The duels were to last until one party yielded; the council’s role as judges was mostly a formality, save in cases where one party overstepped his or her bounds and was considered to have used excessive force, defined as potentially causing deliberate and permanent injury. Knowing Naudar and especially Respen, Mardoban would have preferred a more impartial panel of judges, but because that would be sensible, the Dozen Stars would of course not be party to it. No, all the prestige and authority had to go to the nobility – whether it made sense or not.

The first round of matches had been determined by computer analysis, each duelist matched to someone of comparable skill. Mardoban pressed the small screen on the arm of his chair and pulled up the information, selecting the first two names; a girl from Kern and a guild-sponsored boy from Tantos, neither of whose names he recognized and who had both been judged of average skill. Another few keystrokes and the names and information was flashed across the chamber on immense holoscreens for the crowd to see and the camera mechs to broadcast across the Kingdom.

Moments later, the doors at the base of the stands slid open and the two contestants strode out before turning to face one another. It had begun.

///

Arta watched the first match with baited breath; the fight was close, but in the end the guild-sponsored competitor won out. Even though he was from her own duchy, she found it hard to cheer for him, remembering the crackdown on Tantos III and wondering if any of his sponsors were part of the guild leadership that had authorized the security force’s brutality. Still, she couldn’t keep her mind on that for long; no sooner had the guild competitor bowed in acceptance of his victory than the names of the next fighters flashed above him, and he was hurried off to make way for the next bout.

There were several more duels in which Arta didn’t know any of the competitors, and then Pakorus’s name was called; his opponent was Galen ast Sakran. Remembering his words about not being particularly skilled, Arta looked over her shoulder at Pakorus and waved at him, trying to wish him luck; he smiled back at her, and Karani coughed conspicuously. Arta elbowed her in the side, and then Pakorus and Galen both strode out into the hall.

The duel was a short one, as Arta had feared; Pakorus had heart, but Galen was noticeably more skilled. He pushed Pakorus back across the dueling floor with a series of quick, aggressive blows, while the regent’s son tried desperately to keep his defenses up. In the end, Pakorus was overwhelmed; Galen knocked the sword from his hand and pointed his own blade directly at his opponent’s throat. Pakorus sighed and held up his hands. “I yield,” he said, and Galen smirked before taking his bow.

Not long afterwards, Pakorus returned to the waiting room and Arta hurried over to him. “Are you all right?” she asked.

He grinned wryly. “All but my pride,” he said, “and it could have been a lot worse. Galen and I were at school together and he never liked me much. The Lord must have frowned on me today if I got him as my opponent. Still, I never really expected to make it past the first round, so at least it was sooner rather than later.”

“Well, if I happen to go up against Galen later, I’ll try to avenge you,” Arta said lightly, and Pakorus chuckled.

“I wish you luck there,” he said, glancing over to where Galen stood once again with his siblings. “And – wait, is your sister up?”

Arta started and turned towards the nearest screen – sure enough, while they’d been talking, Karani’s name had been called. Her opponent was another girl, a young woman from Tashir Duchy whose elaborately decorated armor made Karani’s look dull and plain in comparison. The other girl smirked and twirled her dueling sword casually in one hand, but Arta rolled her eyes. She knew a show-off when she saw one, and had a feeling that Karani would show the Tashir girl a thing or two.

Sure enough, the duel was soon over, and Karani took her victory bow as her opponent screamed in rage and hurled her helmet across the dueling floor in a fit of pique. Arta shared a grin with Pakorus, and when Karani returned to the waiting room Arta ran forward and grabbed her in a hug. “Good job, big sister!” she said.

Karani shrugged. “Aw, it wasn’t hard,” she said. “I have no idea who trained her, but she fought more like a ballerina than a duelist. I like a good dance as much as anyone, but a tournament isn’t the time or the place.” She pulled away from Arta and looked over at Pakorus. “And you must be the regent’s son,” she said, grinning wickedly. “Arta’s told me so much about meeting you last night.” Arta was certain now that, were the room’s lights to go out, her blush would provide plenty of illumination on its own.

Darius ast Sakran was up next, and all of the remaining competitors gathered around their nearest screens in great interest, only to be disappointed when the duel was over almost as soon as it had begun. Arta couldn’t even follow what Darius had done; one minute he seemed to just be standing there, and the next his opponent was lying on his back with his sword a meter away. No one spoke, but she could hear several sharp intakes of breath; if one thing was obvious to everyone, it was that Darius’s reputation hadn’t been inflated.

And then Arta’s own name was called, opposed a wiry young man from Aurann. Taking a deep breath, she paused to hug Karani and exchange a nod with Pakorus before marching out onto the dueling floor beside her opponent. The noise of the crowd felt deafening as she walked out onto the smooth floor – thousands of voices, all talking quietly but collectively magnified to a thunderous sound. The hovering recording mechs high above, flashing with lights, seemed only to add to the effect. Steadying herself, Arta took another deep breath and calmed herself using some of Shiran’s meditation techniques, and then bowed first to the crowd and then to her opponent.

Aurann Duchy, the domain of Duke Respen, was said to be completely dominated by its military to the point that its people, commoner and noble, were mandated to do at least two years of military service before they could claim full citizenship. She didn’t know how much that might impact her opponent, but his armor was sleek and functional and he drew his sword and fell into his stance with a practiced ease, no flashy moves like Karani’s opponent had shown.

Arta drew her own dueling sword and she and her opponent began to circle each other, blades at the ready. Suddenly he was lunging forward, and Arta brought up her sword in a block just in time. He hit her hard and fast with a series of quick, economical strikes, forcing her back, and she realized that he was trying to use the same technique Galen had on Pakorus. Well, he was good, maybe as good as Galen was, but now that Arta had seen Pakorus fight, one thing she knew was that she was better than he was – and she had no intention of falling to the same fate.

Her opponent pressed her on, and Arta let herself fall back several more steps, seeing the overconfidence growing in his eyes. Then, as he prepared to strike again, she suddenly disengaged and ducked aside. Her opponent’s eyes widened as he stumbled forward, carried on by his own momentum, but Arta spun around behind him and struck him hard between the shoulder blades with her dueling sword. It was on the lowest power setting, with the energy blunting the blade itself, but the staticky burst the blade gave off on impact still stung and still carried force – Arta’s opponent shouted in surprise and pitched forward onto the floor.

He wasn’t out yet though; no sooner had he fallen than he righted himself and sprang back to his feet, eyes hot and sword flashing as he faced Arta. “You’ll pay for that, little girl,” he hissed.

“Oh, I am trembling,” Arta replied with a cool smile and a tone she was half-conscious recalled Midaia’s; her opponent growled and charged forward. But she had him now – he was too angry to think clearly, and that meant he wasn’t going to be putting that training of his to good use. Arta ducked aside from his charge again and let his momentum carry him past her, and then as he spun towards her with sword raised, she caught her blade on his in a tight parry. For a long moment they strove against each other, him pushing her back slightly with his superior strength, but Arta was ready. She twisted her blade away, wrenching his from his hands and sending it flying onto the floor. He stumbled forward, but it was only to find the point of her sword now resting at his throat.

“Yield,” Arta said.

The Aurann duelist looked at her hatefully, then raised his hands. “I yield,” he spat.

The display screens high above the stands flashed, declaring Arta ast Katanes the winner. Arta smiled and stepped back, then raised her sword to the sky as the crowd applauded her victory.

///

The first round of the tournament was followed by a short break for the audience to stretch their legs and get refreshments and for those competitors who hadn’t been eliminated to take the time to rest and prepare themselves for the next round. The judges weren’t allowed down into the waiting room and those competitors who remained weren’t allowed to leave, but Mardoban looked up to see Pakorus approaching him, grinning sheepishly.

“I hope I didn’t embarrass you out there too badly,” he said as Mardoban stood and put an arm around his shoulder.

“Not at all,” the regent said. “You fought well and honorably; that’s all anyone could ask. And there’s certainly no shame in losing to a skilled opponent.”

“Quite right,” Naudar said from where he was still seated, pride in his children, all three of whom had made it to the next round, evident in his voice. Pakorus shot him a dark look, though the Duke of Sakran didn’t see it.

“Stay here, if you want,” Mardoban said, gesturing towards the seats in the rear of the box, reserved for guests of the judges. “I probably won’t be able to talk to you much, but you’ll have a better view from up here, at least.” He regarded his son proudly for a moment, then grinned. “Congratulations on competing in your first tournament, regardless. Anyone else down there you’d like to see win?”

“Maybe a couple,” Pakorus said, returning his father’s grin, “but that would be telling.” He nodded his head to the regent, then headed towards the back row of seats. Mardoban settled himself back down beside Naudar, looked at the time, and prepared to call the next round.

The second round was, of course, shorter than the first, and there were few surprises; once again, all three ast Sakran children passed, as did several promising duelists from Tashir and Aurann and some who had been sponsored by their guilds. Both ast Katanes sisters also made it through, and Mardoban found himself watching Arta – Artakane – with interest. She seemed to have inherited her mother’s skill, though her fighting style was distinctly Katannen. Mardoban was impressed, both with the girl herself and with whoever, probably Baron Varas, had overseen her training.

The next round proceeded in much the same vein; once again, the ast Sakrans and the ast Kataneses dominated the field, and the remainder of the eight competitors who remained were filled out by a pair from Aurann and a slender, precise young guildswoman. Looking over his shoulder, Mardoban had noticed his son watching the Katanes girls fight and had smiled inwardly; he had a feeling he understood which of the other competitors had caught his son’s eye.

Among the other dukes, Sateira had sniffed disdainfully when her last competitor was disqualified and was now refusing to speak to anyone; Naudar and Respen, for their parts, were both looking incredibly smug, as was Hiram at the unexpected success of the ast Kataneses. Mardoban, for his part, had to admit a certain disappointment that no one from Orlanes had made it this far, but though he had no desire to see Naudar or Respen win, he was curious to see exactly how far Artakane would manage to carry herself.

The fourth round began with Naudar’s smile widening as Karani ast Katanes and Galen ast Sakran strode onto the floor and faced one another. Both combatants faced one another and bowed, and then the duel began. They were both skilled, Mardoban had to admit, especially for being as young as they were; even he, a veteran of many battles and duels, found himself having a difficult time following the flashes and back-and-forth movements of their swords. It was obvious, though, that neither of them had really had to put forth all of their skill at any earlier point in the tournament – now, however, they were testing each other as neither had been tested before. So far as Mardoban could tell, they were evenly matched, neither able to gain advantage over the other, and he found himself leaning forward with his hands on his armrests. Beside him, Naudar was in much the same position, save with his hands both on the head of his cane.

Then something changed. The two stumbled back and faced each other, both breathing heavily, and Mardoban saw Galen running his hand along the hilt of his sword. He couldn’t see if he’d done anything, but then Karani was attacking again, and when Galen brought his sword up to parry, something happened. There was a sudden burst of energy when the swords met, and Karani’s was blasted from her hands and sent flying across the floor. Mardoban frowned. That was not normal. Had Galen’s weapon malfunctioned – or, worse, had he deliberately cheated?

Karani cried out in shock and stumbled back, fumbling for the sword that was now far out of reach, but Galen was on her. With a blow from his shoulder he knocked her to the floor, but she twisted and kicked him hard in the side, sending him stumbling back. When she tried another kick, he was ready; he caught her leg on his and twisted, hard. The crowd had fallen silent, and the crack seemed deafening across the dueling hall as Karani’s leg broke. Mardoban winced, and he saw several of the other dukes and duchesses do the same, though Naudar’s look of steely-eyed intensity never wavered.

Mardoban pulled up his display on his chair’s arm and sent an order to the camera mech to zoom in; he could see Karani up close now, clutching her leg and looking up at Galen with tears on her face, but a defiant expression nonetheless.

“Do you yield?” Galen asked. Karani regarded him coldly with narrowed eyes and then finally, at long last, nodded.

“I yield,” she said, the words seeming more painful to her than her leg.

Galen turned to the crowd and bowed, raising his sword high to acknowledge his victory.

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter! Just a few more to go, now...

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Five

Carann, Royal Palace, Dueling Hall

Arta hurried to the entrance of the waiting room and met Karani as the medic-mechs brought her off the dueling floor; she shooed the mechs away and looped an arm under her sister’s shoulder, supporting her as she carried her over to the nearest wall. Karani sat down with a sigh, injured leg held out straight in front of her, and the mechs zoomed off to fetch a stretcher to take her to the infirmary.

“How are you feeling?” Arta asked, then winced at the obvious answer to the question. “I mean, considering the circumstances and all…”

“Lousy,” Karani muttered, staring at her leg. She was silent for a moment longer, then looked up at Arta with burning eyes. “He cheated,” she hissed angrily. “That lousy little ast Sakran bastard cheated. I saw him thumb the controls on his sword; it was so quick nobody probably caught it up in the stands, but I saw him spike the power up higher than the rules allow. That’s how he beat me.”

“Are you sure about that?” Arta asked skeptically, wanting to believe her sister but worrying all the same that it might be Karani’s wounded pride talking.

Karani scowled and seized Arta by the arm. “I know what I saw!” she hissed. “Galen cheated, and he’s going to get away with it, too!”

“Maybe not,” Arta said. “They haven’t called anyone else onto the floor yet. I bet the judges guessed what he did and are conferring about it right now.”

“Galen’s father is one of the judges,” Karani muttered. “Do you really think old Naudar is going to rule against his son? Do you think any of them are going to side with a Baron’s daughter from nowhere over the son of one of the most powerful dukes in the Kingdom? Be realistic, Arta. He’s going to get away with it, trust me.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Arta said, sighing. “But even if the judges don’t punish him, I don’t think he’s going to walk away clean.” She glanced over at the opposite side of the room, where Galen had been pulled into a corner by his siblings and Darius was speaking softly but intently to him; Arta couldn’t hear his words, but his expression was cold. “I don’t think Big Brother is very happy with Little Brother’s choice of tactics.”

Karani cracked a smile. “Heh,” she said. “Maybe Darius really is as gallant as everyone says he is – or maybe he just doesn’t like it when the family name gets smeared. I’d bet on the last one.” She looked back towards the door and saw the mechs returning, a floating stretcher suspended between them. She seized Arta’s arm and pulled her close. “Promise me something,” she said. “Beat Galen for me. Show him not to mess with the ast Katanes sisters, all right? You’ve beaten me, you can beat him. Think you can pull that one off, little sister?”

Arta smiled tightly and wrapped Karani in a hug. “I think I can, big sister,” she said. “Be safe.”

“I will,” Karani said, letting go and allowing the mechs to bundle her onto the stretcher. “I think it’s you who’d better watch yourself, all right?

“I will,” Arta said, watching as Karani was carried off; she turned to look back at the ast Sakrans and squared her shoulders, a look of cold determination on her face.

///

“This is highly irregular, Mardoban,” Naudar said, leaning on his cane; he and the rest of the judges were gathered in the corridor behind their box following Galen’s victory. “Say whatever you wanted to say and then let’s head back out there and get things on with.”

“The point of discussion at hand,” Mardoban said coldly, “is your son, Naudar. Speaking of highly irregular, the way his sword blasted Miss ast Katanes’s from her hand was rather fortuitous, wasn’t it? Suspiciously so, one might almost say. I have to wonder if it wasn’t deliberate.”

Naudar shrugged. “The blade malfunctioned,” he said. “These things happened. I see no reason to penalize the boy over it. He clearly kept his head and the girl didn’t. He deserved to win.”

“Unless he kept his head because he knew the blast was coming,” Mardoban said. “As the judges of this tournament, we’re charged with making sure things like that don’t happen. I move that we should call for a time out and investigate the blade, and if it turns out to be perfectly functional, then… we should consider what to do about Galen.”

“Are you calling my son a cheater, Mardoban?” Naudar asked, voice soft and cold.

“No,” Mardoban said, “but I am raising the possibility. We should let the facts decide.”

“Facts,” Naudar scoffed. “Facts say that my son won and the girl lost. But very well, if you insist. Let’s put things to a vote, shall we? All in favor of investigating Galen’s actions?” Mardoban raised a hand at once; a moment later, Hiram did so as well, albeit somewhat tenuously; the regent had a feeling he was motivated more by a desire to support his duchy’s contender rather than actual commitment to fairness. But Mardoban felt his heart sink as he saw that no one else was standing with them.

“And opposed?” Naudar asked, his own hand in the air at once. A moment later, Respen and Sateira joined him, the dark looks they shot Mardoban’s way indicating that the real reason for their stance was less about supporting Naudar than it was about thwarting the regent. Duchess Veshte of Kern, an elegant but somewhat weak-willed woman who usually followed Sateira’s lead, added her own hand a moment later. There were still several dukes and duchesses who hadn’t voted at all  - Duchess Laodamia in particular was pursing her lips disapprovingly at both sides – but it was enough. Mardoban had been outvoted.

“Well, glad to see that’s settled,” Naudar said. “Let’s get the show started again, shall we?” he gestured towards the door to the judges’ box and the others began to file towards it. Naudar took up a spot at the end of the line, and Mardoban fell in beside him.

“That was politics, not sportsmanship,” the regent hissed, “and we both know it. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.”

Naudar shot him a pitying look. “Mardoban, Mardoban,” he said. “I do respect you in most things, but sometimes you can be unbearably naïve for a man of your age. Of course it was politics. We’re dukes; everything is politics. Do you really think that this tournament has been about giving the throne to whatever house fields the best duelists? I’ll admit I’ve been impressed by the Katanes girls, who have been successful far beyond anything I anticipated – the younger in particular interests me; you’re not the only one who can recognize a certain resemblance. I wonder where Varas found a girl who looked so much like our late Queen? But it doesn’t matter. We all know who’s going to win this. We’ve all known from the start.”

“You’ve planned this from the beginning, haven’t you?” Mardoban whispered.

“You plied the council with platitudes, Mardoban,” Naudar said. “I fed their egos. Gave them all a chance to show off, let them think they could win, then let the throne come to me. And if, when it comes to it, they won’t accept that fact, you’ll help me put them down, because you’re too noble to let the Kingdom fall into chaos. And if that crown doesn’t work for me… well, we’re no worse off than we were already, except that my house will have won a great deal of fame and honor. I can live with that.” He patted Mardoban on the shoulder. “I am sorry to use you like this, old friend, but life is life.”

Naudar turned and walked away from Mardoban and out into the box; the regent stood still for several long moments then sighed heavily and rested a weary head in his hands, before straightening up and following.

///

Arta passed to the penultimate round of the tournament, to her surprise; her opponent, another of Respen’s followers, proved to be a genuine challenge, but she managed to eke out a win. At the same time, both Darius and Tariti defeated their own opponents and progressed as well, to no one’s surprise. Arta found herself alone against an ast Sakran field on all sides. Though, she reflected, at least that gave her decent odds at having a chance at Galen – or, failing that, one of his siblings. She supposed whichever two ast Sakrans she didn’t end up facing would have to duel each other, a disturbing thought. Despite all the times Arta had sparred with Karani, she couldn’t imagine fighting her sister in an actual duel for the entertainment of a crowd, and wondered if the ast Sakrans felt differently.

Then again, no matter which of them won, their house would still be guaranteed a shot at the championship, so maybe they didn’t care after all. Somehow she doubted Duke Naudar did.

Arta was waiting alone by the door, the waiting room nearly empty now, when she looked up to see Darius ast Sakran walking towards her. “What do you want?” she asked, her tone rather harsher than she’d intended. “Come to gloat about my sister?”

The expression on Darius’s handsome face, however, was much more somber. “No, actually,” he said. “Honestly, I came to apologize, since my brother is too stiff-necked to do it himself. I know what he did when he dueled your sister, and I wanted you to know that I consider it an embarrassment.”

Arta arched a brow. “Really?” she asked. “I wouldn’t have thought you’d have cared.”

“Well Galen doesn’t,” Darius admitted, “and Tariti thinks I’m more concerned with playing the gentleman than I am with winning. I know that my father probably got Galen out of being penalized, but, well, it doesn’t sit well with me. I’ve trained my whole life to be the best duelist I can be, and I guess… well, I just have too much respect for the sport. Your sister deserved better.”

Arta regarded him critically. “You’re not like your siblings, are you?” she asked.

Darius shrugged. “Is anyone really a copy of their relatives?” he asked. “We all have things we care about, and this is mine. And I thought I should be a gracious opponent.” He flashed a grin. “We may be facing each other next, after all. And if you end up facing Galen… just watch yourself, okay?”

“Oh, trust me,” Arta said, “I intend to.”

///

When the next match was announced across the screen, Arta tensed and squared her shoulders. For better or worse, she’d gotten her wish – she was facing Galen ast Sakran. Now the only question was whether she would manage to come through this bout in better shape than Karani had. For her sister’s sake, and for her own, she intended to.

“Are you scared?” Galen asked, leaning in close as they walked out onto the dueling floor together. “Worried that I’ll leave you broken and crying, like I did to your sister?”

“You’re the one who should be worried,” Arta hissed back between clenched teeth. “The ast Katanes sisters watch out for each other. But you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you? At least your brother tries to act honorably. All you care about is winning – no matter how much you have to cheat to do it.”

Galen’s face turned an ugly shade of purple. “You’ll pay for that, little girl,” he hissed. “I promise you.”

Arta didn’t rise to the taunt; instead, she simply grinned as though his words amused her. The two competitors bowed to the audience, then to each other, and drew their swords. Then the match began.

Galen charged almost faster than Arta’s eyes could follow; she had to resist the urge to draw on her Adept’s gifts to enhance her speed as she ducked aside. Her opponent grinned nastily and held his sword up in front of his face, energy crackling along it; Arta took advantage of his posing to angle a lunge for his side, but Galen was as fast with his blade as he was with his feet, deftly parrying her strike and stepping back. The two began to circle each other warily, watching for an opening.

Arta knew that she faced the same risk that Karani had, and kept watch on the fingers of Galen’s sword hand from the corner of her eye to see if they slipped again to the sword’s controls. So far, he didn’t seem to be making a move to overcharge his dueling sword again, but she thought she saw his fingers twitch, ever so slightly. He wanted to, she knew, but he was wary of trying the same trick twice; perhaps there were limits to what even having his father as a judge might let him get away with.

In any case, Arta didn’t intend to let him. Lunging forward, she feinted towards the faceplate of Galen’s helmet and then switched targets at the last minute, striking a solid blow to the shoulder of his sword arm. Galen cursed and stumbled back, off balance, and Arta pressed her advantage with a series of quick jabs that kept the younger ast Sakran brother stumbling backwards. Finally, with a grunt, Galen fell to one knee, breathing heavily. Arta smiled coldly and rested her sword on the side of his neck.

“Do you yield?” she asked.

Galen grinned wolfishly. “Never,” he hissed, and suddenly pivoted on his knee and swept out with his other leg, knocking Arta’s feet out from under her. She fell heavily on the floor, sword falling from her fingers, and looked up to see Galen standing over her, the tip of his blade directly in front of her face.

“How the tables have turned,” Galen said, shaking his head. “What about you, ast Katanes? Do you yield, or do I have to break another leg today?”

At the taunt, Arta’s eyes hardened. “That was a mistaken,” she hissed, and grabbed the blade of Galen’s sword between the palms of her hands. His eyes widened in shock and she winced at the shock that coursed down her arms, even with her gauntlets, but she held on tight. Galen gave a powerful yank, trying to pull his sword from between her hands, but Arta wouldn’t let go. Blinking tears of pain from her eyes, she pulled both her legs back and then slammed her feet directly into Galen’s midriff.

He stumbled back as she released her grip on his sword, then grabbed her own blade and leaped to her feet. Before Galen could react she was on him with a series of quick jabs, keeping him on the defensive and forcing him towards the edge of the dueling floor. She could see his expression changing from shock to fear as he realized that the tide of the duel had turned against him, and then suddenly, to cold resolve. Galen’s thumb crept down towards the power switch on his sword’s hilt, but Arta was ready. A quick blow from her blade struck his wrist; Galen’s hand spasmed and the sword fell from his fingers. Then he was up against the wall separating the dueling floor from the first row of seats with Arta’s sword against his neck.

“Yield,” she hissed. After a long moment, Galen sighed and raised his hands in surrender.

“I yield,” he spat, and suddenly Arta was aware of the crowd erupting into cheers around her. She herself only felt terribly tired, and yet oddly satisfied all the same.

“Karani,” she whispered, “you’re avenged.”

///

The match between Darius and Tariti ast Sakran was less a duel, Mardoban thought, and more of a performance. Both siblings were extremely skilled and they knew each other’s moves by heart; they didn’t seem to be making an effort to harm one another so much as they were putting on a show for the audience. When at last Tariti surrendered with an elegant bow and left Darius as the winner, it seemed to Mardoban that what he’d just witnessed wasn’t a fight at all, but an elaborate scripted dance.

“And so we come to the end,” Naudar said, sitting back in his chair with a satisfied expression. “My boy Darius against Arta ast Katanes. I don’t think anyone expected the girl to do so well – I’d barely even heard of her before today – and I do have to salute her skill and determination. Still, I would wager Darius has the advantage going into the final round.” He looked around at his fellow dukes and smiled. “Anyone willing to take that bet? No? Oh well.”

“Let’s take a moment, shall we, my lords and ladies?” Mardoban asked, raising his hand. “I could use some air, and I think our competitors could use some time to steel themselves before the final round.”

“Of course,” Naudar said, nodding, and the other dukes and duchesses echoed his opinion. Mardoban could hear the sound of them moving about and speaking to each other as he himself stood and walked to the edge of the box and looked down on the dueling field. How strange it seemed to think that things might soon be over – and that by this time tomorrow, there was a very good chance that Naudar would be king and Mardoban would merely be back to being Duke Orlanes and not regent of the Kingdom. He wasn’t entirely sure whether to begrudge Naudar the position, or to pity him for taking the burden.

“Hello, old friend,” a quiet voice said from beside him and he turned to see Shiran standing there, apparently unnoticed by anyone else in the box. “Mind if I join you?”

“Hello, Shiran,” Mardoban muttered out of the corner of his mouth. “May I ask if this was your doing? It does strike me as quite a coincidence that the girl who would unexpectedly make it all the way to the final round would also bear such a resemblance to our late queen.” Here, out loud, he didn’t dare explicitly state Artakane’s true heritage; there were some among the dukes, Respen chief among them, who might well try to kill her if they knew who she really was.

Shiran shrugged. “I’m no swordmaster,” he said. “Arta has always trained rather obsessively, and Varas made certain to purchase training mechs with the highest quality programming – I don’t think either of the girls knows just how well-trained he made sure they were.”

“Maybe he had a feeling where this would end up, too,” Mardoban murmured. “Why are you here, Shiran?”

“Something is nagging on my mind, and I can’t put a finger on what,” the Professor said. “I thought it best to get a good vantage point. I’ve cloaked myself from most of the dukes’ perceptions, but if someone should threaten you – or them – I’ll still be here to offer some protection.”

“Do you really think that’s necessary?” Mardoban asked.

“I don’t know,” Shiran said. “But with how much is riding on things here, I’d rather not take the risk. Let’s just get through today and then see what happens next.”

“Agreed,” Mardoban said; he returned to his seat beside Naudar and saw Shiran take an empty seat near the back, by Pakorus. The regent nodded approvingly at that; at least the boy would be safe that way.

“Are we ready, then?” Naudar asked, leaning over.

“I think we are,” Mardoban sighed. “Let’s begin.”

///

Arta’s heart hammered in her chest as she strode out onto the dueling field beside Darius ast Sakran. She could still hardly believe that she’d made it this far, but pride warred with doubt, as if this was all somehow a mistake and she shouldn’t be here, now, preparing to face someone who was considered perhaps the best duelist in the Dozen Stars. Certainly not with a mysterious crown – and potentially, the throne of the entire Kingdom – in the bargain.

“Nervous?” Darius asked quietly.

“I doubt you are,” Arta whispered back.

“Of course I am,” Darius said. “It never goes away. But you’ve done good to get this far, and let’s put on a show for everyone, all right?”

Arta’s reply was swallowed as a holo-image of Duke Mardoban appeared above the judge’s box. “Before we begin our final round,” the regent said, “I would like to extend my respects to everyone who has fought on this floor today. You have dueled with honor and skill and done your houses, your planets, and your guilds proud. Now as we begin the last phase of this tournament, I would like to extend my respects in particular to Darius ast Sakran and Arta ast Katanes. You have proven yourselves to be exemplary young knights today, both of you. Know that the fate of this Kingdom may rest upon your skill in this coming bout, and so I expect dignity and fairness from you both. But know that whoever wins or loses, you have both earned our respect, and we salute you!” Mardoban began to applaud, soon joined by his fellow council members and then the entire crowd, a tide of sound rising up to the four corners of the hall.

“Duel with honor, bring glory to your duchies, and serve your Kingdom,” the regent said when the applause died down. “You may begin!”

Arta bowed to the crowd, and as she raised her head risked a quick glance towards the VIP box where her foster-father sat; she couldn’t make out the Baron’s face, but she thought he was smiling. Then she turned to Darius and they too exchanged bows, and then they began.

At once, Arta understood one truth – Darius was better than her, better than anyone she’d ever fought. She’d known that already, of course, from watching him fight over the viewscreens, but now, facing his impeccable defense, she understood it deep in her heart. He was as fast as his brother and far more controlled; he left no opening for her to exploit.

But when he himself pushed onto the attack, Arta managed to hold him at bay – barely. He was taller and stronger than she was, but Arta had grown up sparring with Karani, who was taller than many men, and she knew how to use her reflexes and agility to keep out of an opponent’s reach. She duck and wove around Darius, avoiding or parrying his blows but unable to fight past his guard. Sooner or later, she knew, he would manage to wear her down and, unless she got very lucky, that would be the end of it. Still, she intended to make Darius work for his victory.

She didn’t know how long they carried on their little dance across the dueling floor, was barely aware of the crowd watching with baited breath from the stands. There was only the duel, and staying just slightly out of reach of Darius’s blade. Finally, however, weariness began to settle into her bones, while her opponent’s eyes remained bright and focused. She knew that she couldn’t keep this up for much longer; soon she would fall, and would have to yield.

Still, she decided, there wasn’t any shame in having made it as far as she had, and to lose to an opponent as skilled as this. It was far more than she’d had any right to hope for before coming to Carann.

Suddenly Arta stopped, holding her sword out in front of her, as cold prickling rose up the back of her neck. What were those shadow-shapes moving through the stands on the edge of her vision, whose details she couldn’t fully make out? Was she just that tired, or was it something more.

Across the field, Darius stopped, still holding his sword in guard position, and looked at her curiously. “What’s the matter?” he asked. “Giving up already?”

“No,” Arta whispered. “Something’s wrong…”

///

Mardoban watched as the two duelists stopped and seemed to stare at one another, and frowned. What were they doing? Before he could come up with any answers, he felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up to see the Professor.

“We need to get out of here, now,” he hissed. “There is terrible danger here, and I’m not sure what it is, but –“ Shiran suddenly stumbled, his words trailing off. Something had struck him in the back of the neck, something about the size of an insect; he pulled it free and stared at it, and Mardoban felt his body go cold. It was a dart. Shiran’s eyes glazed over, and then he fell forward into Mardoban’s lap.

Shouts of panic erupted around them; apparently, with the Professor’s fall, whatever Adept art had kept him hidden had failed. Hiram gave a most undignified squeal and pulled away, while Respen leaped to his feet and drew his sword and Laodamia peered around the edges of her seat and demanded someone tell her what was going on. Naudar, however, stared at the Professor intently, recognition dawning on his face.

“Shiran?” the duke breathed. “What in the Lord’s name…”

Mardoban felt for the Professor’s pulse and sighed with relief. “He’s alive,” he said, “but out cold. He was trying to warn me about something when the dart hit him – we need to get out of here, right now. Gilgam, I need you and your guards to start evacuating the crowd…”

Gilgam rushed to the regent’s side and had just opened his mouth to respond when beam fire erupted from the stands and tore into the dueling field with a cacophony of sound, light, and smoke.

 

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Six

Carann, Royal Palace, Dueling Hall

The moment the first energy blasts began to tear into the dueling floor, Arta sprang into action. She didn’t know what was happening, or why, but her every instinct was screaming that this was no accident, that she – and everyone here – was in terrible, indescribable danger. Without thinking, she was in motion – not towards the attackers she couldn’t see, but toward Darius ast Sakran, who still stood stunned in the center of the floor as if unable to process how things had gone so terribly wrong.

Arta slammed into him just before the bolts struck, knocking him to the floor. They fell to the ground together, Darius on his back and Arta laying flat across his chest. Scrunching her eyes shut as tightly as they would go, she reached deep into herself, trying to find the state of intense focus the Professor had taught her, trying to draw out as much power as she could. The hail of bolts reached them, lancing down with the Evil One’s own fury…

And stopped, impacting harmlessly in midair. Arta opened her eyes and sat up slowly, a shocked expression growing on their face as she realized that she and Darius were surrounded by a half-sphere of pulsing blue light; the bolts struck it ineffectively, doing no more damage than a few ripples, and then subsided as the shooters must have realized that they weren’t penetrating and that another tactic was in order.

The strange shield was supported by a series of long, glowing tendrils of blue light; Arta held up her hands in shock in front of her eyes, examining them carefully as if she’d never seen them before, as she realized that those tendrils were rising from her own flesh.

Darius stared up at her. “How…” he breathed, and then realization hit him. “You’re an Adept, aren’t you?”

“Yeah,” Arta said wearily. “I am.”

Darius shook his head. “I’ve never actually met an Adept before,” he said. “How long do you think you can hold this? Can you move it, or are we stuck here?”

Arta shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never done this before.”

///

Mardoban stood slowly, holding Shiran’s limp form across his shoulders, as the shooting stopped. The dueling floor was blasted and pitted, but instead of the corpses of Darius and Artakane, the regent saw that the two young people seemed to be enveloped in an odd cocoon of blue light. He had no idea what it was, and he had no time to worry right now.

The shooters now stood openly in the stands and had turned their weapons away from the competitors and toward the crowds, keeping them in their seats. Most of them were dressed in the simple, ragged, but practical clothing that the regent associated with pirates and mercenaries, but dotted here and there among them were a handful of sleek figures in featureless black masks. Mardoban felt his blood run cold. The assassins weren’t destroyed after all, and they had returned.

“We need to get moving,” he growled to his fellow council members and turned towards the back of the box, hoisting Shiran along with him. Before he could take more than a step, however, the air near the door flickered as a cloaking shield came down, revealing a squad of the mercenaries and one of the assassins – a woman, Mardoban thought, from her height and the shape of her body he could vaguely guess under her armor. She holstered what looked like a small pistol – no doubt the weapon that had fired the dart that drugged Shiran – and strolled over to where Pakorus now stood, seemingly immobilized from shock. She rested a hand lightly on the boy’s shoulder and met Mardoban’s eyes with her faceless gaze.

“Put your weapons down, please,” she said in a voice that buzzed electronically but was recognizably feminine nonetheless. “If you don’t comply, first the boy dies, and then my men start shooting all of you. I pray you’ll be reasonable.”

“If you hurt my son,” Mardoban grated, “I will kill you, I promise.”

“No doubt you’ll try,” the assassin said. “But you’ll be dead either way. And so will they. Do you like your odds?”

Mardoban med Pakorus’s terrified gaze for a long moment, then sighed, drawing his dueling sword with his free hand and dropping it to the ground. Behind him he could hear the other dukes and Gilgam’s guards doing the same; Respen threw his weapon down particularly violently, while Naudar simply leaned on his cane, expression unreadable.

“Why not just kill us now?” Mardoban asked.

“Because my superior wants an audience,” the assassin said. “Face forward, if you please. Especially you, regent, and you, Duke Naudar. I think you’ll find this particularly… illuminating.”

Mardoban did as he was bid, turning towards the dueling field and feeling the looming threat of the enemies behind him. Something was moving down amid the smoke – another squad of mercenaries was marching onto the field, one of the assassins at their head. When he reached the center of the field, the assassin turned his gaze up to the stands and tapped something along his lower jaw. When he spoke, his voice echoed through the entire hall, powerfully amplified – and though it too was heavily distorted by electronics, Mardoban thought he recognized it.

“Good evening, lords and ladies, guildsmen and priests and commoners of the Dozen Stars,” he said. “I am called the Commander; you might have heard of me. You may also have heard that I was killed in battle not so long ago, courtesy of the good dukes Orlanes and Sakran; but as you can see, reports of my demise were highly premature.

“You may wonder why I’m here, or what I want. The question you should asking, my friends, is how. How is it that a wanted criminal you were assured was dead has now come walking, quite alive, into the very heart of the most guarded place in your entire Kingdom? How is it that you have proven so very vulnerable? And I say to you, look around you. You have stumbled without leadership for fifteen years, and then, when your council finally decides to resolve the issue, what means to they choose? A tournament. A chance to let noble brats beat each other with swords for their house’s honor and their parents’ entertainment, and they call that government. It is characteristic of your system. Your nobles cannot lead, your priests say nothing but platitudes, your guilds care for nothing but enriching themselves at your expense.

“They will say that I came here today to kill the Kingdom of the Dozen Stars, but I tell you this – it was dead long before I came! All I have come to do is put down a whimpering creature that should have died long ago – an act of mercy. Perhaps now you hate me. In time you will thank me, for whatever rises from the ashes cannot help but be better than what you have endured now.

The Commander turned and prowled across the floor towards the strange cocoon of blue light. “And what is this?” he asked mockingly. “Could it be that one of your champions at this farce of a tournament was an Adept, no doubt cheating their way to victory through powers that no mere mortal can match? Emblematic of the corruption and hypocrisy that dodges this nation, would you not agree. Still, there is more than one path to power. Where flesh fails, technology may serve. Allow me to demonstrate.”

///

 Arta stared out through the blue dome, her body shuddering with the effort of maintaining it, as the Commander approached. Seen through the energy field’s distortion he seemed barely human, a towering figure with only a sleek emptiness for a face, but his unseen eyes seemed to regard her coldly.

“It is true,” he observed casually, “that Adepts have many powers ordinary people do not. But they are not invincible. Their powers rely on clarity of mind, and the mind can be attacked. Observe.”

The Commander held up his hand, and Arta watched in shock as his fingers peeled back, revealing the machine underneath – and a wrist that ended in the barrel of a weapon. She frowned – that didn’t look like any energy blaster she’d ever seen – and wondered what it was he intended to do. Then the Commander pointed his arm directly at her, and his weapon fired.

There was no flash of light, no projectile or other visual sign, but at once her ears were assaulted by a sudden blast of sound. Arta screamed as the agony tore through her skull and fell prostrate across Darius, clutching her ears and trying desperately to block out the sonic attack, to no avail. She saw Darius’s eyes glaze over from the effects of the blast and then he went limp; Arta held on a moment longer, but at last she crumpled, falling into unconsciousness as the pain seemed to drill straight into her soul. Her last sight was of the energy barrier collapsing around her, falling into shards that flickered and went out.

///

Mardoban’s heart clenched as he saw Artakane fall, and then he felt the nearest mercenary poke him in the back with his gun in an insistent way. He turned slowly to face the woman who lead their captors, who nodded at him in what seemed an approving way.

“You show courage in the face of the enemy,” she said, “though now you know just how badly you have failed. It is the last feeling you will know.”

“I thought you were going to spare us if we cooperated!” Duke Hiram spluttered.

“Did I say that?” the assassin asked. “I don’t believe I did. Now, let’s see if a group of pampered, unarmed men and women can face death with dignity. We had wagers, you see, on which of you would break first – “

Her voice cut off suddenly as a smoking hole appeared in her forehead. Through the injury, Mardoban could see no blood or organs, merely the sparking ruin of machinery; the assassins stood still for a moment, then crumpled onto the closest seat and slid to the floor in a tangled head.

Beside Mardoban, Naudar lowered his cane, its tip still smoking from where it had fired the small, precise energy bolt. “I may be pampered,” he muttered, “but I’m never unarmed.”

No sooner had the assassin fallen than Pakorus dived under the seats; once he saw his son was out of immediate danger, Mardoban grabbed his sword from where he’d dropped it. “Take them!” he shouted.

Gilgam and his guards were faster than the dukes or the pirates, the latter of whom still seemed to be in shock at having watched their leader fall. Grabbing their blast pistols from where they’d dropped them, they opened fire and at once several of the pirates fell. The remaining few, apparently considering themselves too far outmatched, turned at once and fled back through the door.

“We need to get you out of here, my lords,” Gilgam said, gesturing for two of his men to pick up Shiran from where he lay. “Follow us.”

“Finally, someone here is talking sense,” Sateira muttered, holding herself up with dignity as she made her way to the aisle. The guards hurried the council members along towards the door, Gilgam muttering quickly into his comm, doubtless calling every available guard to the dueling hall. Last of the council to leave was Duchess Laodamia, who sniffed disdainfully as she stepped over the assassin’s body.

“Are you all right, son?” Mardoban asked Pakorus as he hauled himself up from out under the seats.

“Just shook,” he said. “Are we getting out of here?” He looked out over the dueling field, an anxious expression on his face. “And what about Arta?”

“I don’t know,” the regent said quietly, the knowledge of exactly who and what the girl was and what she might mean churning in his gut. “I just don’t know.”

///

The Commander felt his connection to Two cut off suddenly as she died, and then above him the stands erupted into chaos. Some of the crowd had taken the eruption of bolt fire in the judge’s box as a sign to flee, others as a sign to charge the pirates; while the spectators weren’t armed, they had the weight of numbers on their side. In the VIP box, several of the nobles had drawn their swords, and when the pirates had opened fire in response, they were mowed down by far greater firepower from the pair of Praetorians who’d been protecting the Imperial Ambassador; now the mechanical monsters were shepherding that part of the crowd to safety. The Commander cursed under his breath; he’d seen Praetorians in action before, and doubted he’d see any of the pirates he’d sent to the VIP Box again, at least not in one piece.

He glanced down at the comatose forms of ast Sakran and ast Katanes and shook his head; they were irrelevant for the moment. Shifting his focus, he activated his comm line to Four. “Whatever you’re doing, drop it,” he ordered. “I want all the men you have to the halls behind the judges’ box. Stop the council from escaping; if you can’t, kill Mardoban at least. The regent is your top priority. Understood?”

“Understood, sir,” Four said, his voice heavy with anticipation.

///

Gilgam and his guards led the council into the maze of corridors behind the judges’ box, following no pattern that Mardoban recognized as he tried to throw off pursuit. The regent hadn’t spent much time back here, and he couldn’t be sure where they might end up, though the guards seemed to know the way. Behind him, he could hear the other dukes muttering angrily and tried to ignore them, though that was becoming increasingly difficult. Finally, however, the group rounded a corner and found themselves faced with a large group of pirates, weapons ready; another of the assassins, this one a man, stood in front.

“Leaving so soon, Duke Mardoban?” the assassin asked. “I’m hurt, really. I thought you would have at least waited to see me – and finish what you started.”

The regent frowned, and then realization hit him. “I’ve met you before, haven’t I?” he asked. “I fought you on Tantos Station.”

“You humiliated me in front of the Commander, you mean,” the assassin said. “I’ve been looking forward to evening that score, and I shall do so today.”

“Now, see here,” Duke Hiram said, stepping forward, “I don’t know who you people are or what you want, but this can’t be the most advantageous way to go about getting it! I am very wealthy, and am willing to make concessions if only…”

The assassin drew his pistol and fired in a single smooth motion; there was a flash of light and then Hiram slid to the floor, a patch on his chest still smoking and his expression that of benign bewilderment, as if he simply had no idea how this could have happened. Pakorus stared in the body in horror, and Mardoban himself drew a shocked breath at just how sudden Hiram’s death had been.

“As I was saying,” the assassin said, “your lives are forfeit, as his was. Unless…” here he paused and fixed his unseen gaze on Mardoban, “your regent agrees to face me in single combat. If he defeats me, then I’ll let, say… half of you go free. If I win, you all day. What say you, regent? Are you willing to risk your life for your peers?”

“You’re not going to let any of them go, are you, no matter who wins?” Mardoban asked softly.

The assassin shrugged. “Maybe not. But if you don’t fight, I will kill you all. It’s your choice, old man.”

Mardoban sighed and drew his sword. Before he could take a step forward, Pakorus caught his arm. “Don’t do it,” he whispered in his father’s ear. “You know he’s lying, and this time he won’t underestimate you. He will kill you.”

“If there’s even a chance of getting some of us out of here alive, I have to take it,” Mardoban said. “I love you, son. Don’t forget that when I’m gone.” He pulled away from Pakorus, fearing he would be overcome with tears if he waited another moment longer, and activated his sword, feeling the familiar hum as energy coursed down the blade.

The assassin drew his own sword and brought it to sparking, crackling life as well. “Oh, I’ve waited for this,” he said, raising his weapon in a mocking salute.

“I’ve no doubt you have,” a woman’s voice suddenly said, “but I’m afraid I have other plans.” The assassin suddenly froze, and then his body began to twitch. Shimmers of red light rose from his head, his shoulders, and his hands and began to reach out in twisting tendrils, slowly wrapping themselves around his body like the limbs of some terrible beast. Sparks began to erupt from his joints, and then the tendrils inserted themselves all across the assassin’s body and as one gave a sharp twist. The assassin fell, his limbs bent at unnatural angles as sparks burst from all across his form; then both sparks and tendrils faded and the assassin was left crumpled, a broken, lifeless toy.

The air shimmered and a woman in a dark cloak appeared, standing over the corpse. She raked the pirates with a gleaming gaze and they backed up apprehensively – only to find themselves cornered as another detachment of guards came up behind them. Caught between the enemy and the woman who had killed their leader, they dropped their weapons and raised their hands in surrender.

“I found those gentlemen not far from here, and thought I knew where they might be useful,” the woman said, gesturing at the guards, then she turned and lowered her hood. Mardoban heard the sharp intake of breath behind him as several of the council members realized who she was.

“Princess Midaia!” Respen finally said, unable to keep the shock from his tone. “This is an unexpected… pleasure.”

“And you remain as obnoxious and insincere as ever, Cousin Respen,” Midaia said lightly, before turning to Mardoban. “My lord regent. I’m pleased that you’re well. And Pakorus too, of course.”

“Midaia,” Mardoban finally said, “you saved us all. The council is in your debt…”

She cut the air with her hand. “I didn’t do it for them,” she said. “I did it because, when I was a child, I called you ‘Uncle’ and you balanced me on your knee and made faces to make me laugh. Whatever else I’ve become, I don’t forget kindness.” She glided forward and leaned in close. “Nor do I forget family,” she whispered in Mardoban’s ear. “So tell me, ‘Uncle’ – where is Artakane?”

///

Get up.

The voice echoed in the darkness of Arta’s mind; it was familiar to her, but she couldn’t place it. The echoes of pain still pounded through her head, and she could distantly feel her body curling into a fetal position as she tried to escape it.

Get up, now! The voice hissed, far more insistent. Do you want to live? Then get up, you fool, and fight!

I’m dead already, Arta found herself thinking. The pain is too much, and I can’t move. I just have to lay here and wait, and it will carry me away…

No! the voice said, and now it seemed to be accompanied by a face, a pale woman in a dark hood with bright, penetrating eyes that had always seen too much. You are a queen, Artakane! Queens do not cower, and they do not wait passively for death! Live, Artakane! Live and be avenged!

Arta’s eyes snapped open, and she found herself lying on the middle of the dueling floor, the unconscious form of Darius by her side. The pain wasn’t gone, but she could manage it now, an iron will having replaced it in the forefront of her thoughts. Slowly, shakily, she stood, grabbing her sword from where it lay, and turned slowly to face the Commander.

The masked man stood in the center of the dueling floor, hands folded behind him; only a handful of his mercenaries were with him now, and the stands above him seemed to be empty. High above them the recording mechs still circled, mindlessly carrying out their programming, but Arta ignored them; they weren’t relevant now. Slowly she took a step forward, holding her sword in front of her. She didn’t know what Midaia’s voice had meant, calling her a queen, and maybe she’d imagined the entire exchange – but even if she wasn’t a queen, she could still be a knight, and she would die on her feet.

The Commander seemed to have heard her approach, for he turned slowly to face her and nodded in an almost respectful fashion. “Ah,” he said. “You’re stronger than I thought. Well done, for recovering so quickly. But it won’t save you; I have orders, you see, and one of those orders is that the finalists in this farce of a tournament must die. It’s nothing personal.”

“Orders?” Arta asked. “From who?” Who could possibly give orders to this terrifying man?”

“It doesn’t matter,” the Commander said. He raised his arm that contained the sonic cannon and regarded it critically. “Unfortunately, this weapon requires much of my power; to use it again might render me too weak to escape. Fortunately, I have other ways to kill.” Lowering the cannon, he reached to his side with his free hand and drew a dueling sword that blazed to life. “You’re a duelist, girl. Shall we duel, then, you and I?”

“Challenge accepted, monster,” Arta muttered, and then she charged with all the strength she could muster.

The Commander met her blow easily, wielding his sword one-handed, almost contemptuously. His style was unfamiliar, and Arta wondered where he was from and where he had trained – and the strength even in that one-handed grip was terrible, inhuman. His whole body must be riddled with cybernetics, Arta realized, not just the arm with the sonic cannon. And he had the skill to make full use of his enhancements.

Slowly, effortlessly, he forced her back across the dueling floor, his blank face inscrutable as the void between the stars. Arta knew that she couldn’t win, that she was outmatched far more than she had been even against Darius; it was all she could do to simply keep her sword in her hand while avoiding the craters that the energy blasts had left scored across the dueling floor.

Finally, the Commander gave his wrist a sharp twist and Arta’s sword went spinning from her hand; stumbling backwards, she fell over a twisted tile and found herself looking up at her attacker, his sword point at her throat. This was no duel to first blood or surrender, she realized in her bones – this was a fight to the death, and she had lost. She was going to die, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

The Commander, however, seemed almost to frown, though his mask’s expression couldn’t change. “You look like her, a bit,” he said. “The old Queen, Aestera. I was there when she died, did you know that? I led that mission as well, and it was I who put a bolt through her head myself, when she tried to flee. It seems fitting, I think. My first assignment here and my last, both in this palace. What symmetry…”

He raised his sword for the killing blow, and inspired perhaps by his cold, emotionless tone or perhaps by her own desire to survive, Arta lunged forward with all her remaining strength. This time she had no weapon, fought with no skill; she simply hurled herself bodily at the Commander and grabbed the sides of his head with both of her hands.

And suddenly, she was aware of him, down to the smallest detail. The biological systems that had originally been his, and that now pulsed in time with the cybernetic enhancements that had come to make up so much of his being, countless connections between man and machine. And she saw a faint glimmer of the man himself, the inside of his soul – his viciousness, his arrogance and capacity for violence that he’d tempered but never fully quashed with discipline, the same traits that he driven him to fight her one-on-one instead of shooting her where she lay, his determination to succeed in his mission – and, in a flash, a faceless figure in holo-form, commanding him to bring the Dozen Stars to its knees.

All of this passed through her mind in an instant, and then Arta reached down into his body with all of her will, an Adept’s will trained by Shiran; she found the countless connections between his cybernetic and organic parts, and as one, she severed them.

The Commander gave a sudden howl of agony and threw Arta off of himself, but the damage had been done. Waves of blue light erupted along his torso, head, and limbs, and where they passed, his body bent and twisted amidst showers of sparks. The Commander fell to his back and writhed as the energy engulfed him, immobilized by the uncontrollable convulsions, his hands clawing at his face. Finally, they tore his mask away and he lay still, smoldering.

Arta walked over to stand over him, and looked down with pity upon her enemy’s face, a face that could barely even be called human anymore; it was pale and withered, laced with wires and strips of metal, and it no longer had eyes, merely connector ports for more sensors built into the mask. He coughed wetly as he lay there, and has Arta approached, he seemed to become aware of her.

“You’re a fool,” the Commander wheezed. “You think you’ve won? I am merely the first finger of the hand that now stretches out against this pathetic Kingdom. You have won nothing; you’ve merely delayed your destruction. In the end, you will all die.” He twitched one final time, and then his whole body spasmed and lay still; all along his limbs a new shower of white sparks erupted, as some final failsafe activated to destroy his cybernetics before they could fall into enemy hands. Arta stumbled back, shielding her eyes with her hands.

When she looked up, she saw the Commander’s mercenaries regarding what little remained of their leader with horror, and then as one they turned and fled the dueling hall. Arta was alone, and all was still.

A bone-deep weariness rose within her, and she swayed on her feet as all of the effort of the day seemed to fall upon her at once. Her body twisting, she fell – and then she was suddenly aware that someone’s arms and caught her, and were lowering her gently to the floor.

“It’s all right,” Darius ast Sakran’s voice said from a great distance as darkness swirled down on her. “I’ve got you.”

 

[MasterGhandalf]

New chapter! After this one, there's only the epilogue - almost done!

Spoiler

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Carann, Royal Palace

Arta groaned and slowly opened her eyes to find herself lying on her back in a plain white bed, staring up at a blank ceiling. She blinked twice and shook her head, trying to clear it and remember exactly how it was that she came to be here, and then slowly sat up.

“Welcome back to the living,” a familiar voice said, and Arta turned to see Karani sitting up in the bed next to her own, an open book in her lap and one leg stretched out in front of her, wrapped in a cast. Her foster-sister shot her a jaunty grin. “So tell me – how does it feel to be the heroine of the hour, anyway?”

Suddenly, memories rushed back to Arta in a chaotic jumble – Darius, the attack by the pirates, the Commander, their duel… “What happened?” she finally asked. “How did I get here, anyway? And what’s this about me being ‘the heroine of the hour’, anyway?”

Karani rolled her eyes dramatically. “Oh, nothing much,” she said. “You only defeated and killed the man who led the attack on the palace, who also happened to be the head of a notorious pirate gang and, by his own admission, the assassin who killed Queen Aestera, and you did it on live holo so the entire Kingdom got to watch.” She gestured at a holoscreen on one of the room’s walls, which was now blank. “Oh, yes. You see, the recording mechs were too dumb to realize that the attack wasn’t part of the tournament, so they never stopped filming you, and apparently everyone was too panicked to shut them off before everything was over with. Your face got plastered across every news show in the entire Dozen Stars, little sister. And you did it all without me! I had to watch the whole thing from my hospital bed! Which is where we are, by the way, our own private room in the Palace infirmary. In any case, I got left out, and if I hadn’t been worried so sick about you, I’d never speak to you again.”

Arta managed a chuckle in spite of the seriousness of the situation and glanced around at their surroundings, a small, plain room with two beds and an unoccupied chair in the corner. The faint remnants of a headache were still throbbing in her skull, and she reached up a hand to rub her temple as she tried to piece together what happened. “Last thing I remember was blacking out after the Commander died,” she said. “How did I get up here, anyway?”

“Darius ast Sakran, if you’ll believe it,” Karani said in a tone that indicated she herself still had some doubts. “Carried you up here in person, said you saved his life, and that you should get treatment fitting a Knight of the Realm or the doctors would have him to answer to. Of course, I don’t think the regent was going to do anything less to start with, but I guess the ast Sakran family isn’t entirely rotten after all.” She shook her head. “Anyway, it turns out what you mostly needed was sleep, which you’ve been getting for the better part of a day. Guess whatever you did to that assassin really took it out of you. All I can figure was that it was some Adept thing, unless he just decided to self-destruct for no reason at all.”

“It was an ‘Adept thing’,” Arta said, smiling. “Don’t ask me what I did, because I’m still not sure, but I think I somehow managed to fry the connections in his cybernetics. Without them, there wasn’t enough left of him to keep him alive for long.” The word ‘alive’ stirred a sudden, horrible thought. “What about Father? Did he make it out okay? What about the rest of the crowd?”

“Father’s fine,” Karani said, nodding to the chair. “He’s been here most of the time; stepped out a little before you woke up to get some kaf, but he should be back before too long. There were some casualties – I heard that Duke Hiram didn’t make it, and he wasn’t the only one – but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Apparently once the Imperial Ambassador was clear of danger, he sent his giant metal whatever-they-ares to protect civilians and they handled a good chunk of the pirates by themselves.”

“They’re called ‘praetorians’, Karani,” Arta said, shaking her head in mock disapproval. “Are you ever going to pay attention to Shiran?”

“Only when he has something interesting to say,” Karani shot back with a grin.

A moment later the door opened and Baron Varas stepped inside, a cup of steaming kaf in one hand. When he saw that Arta was awake, he hurriedly put it down and rushed to her bedside, wrapping her in an embrace. “Thank the Lord,” he breathed. “You’re safe. The doctors and their mechs said you’d be fine, but… well, it’s a father’s right to worry.”

“I’m all right,” Arta said, pressing her head against his shoulder. “I’m going to be okay.” She pulled back and met her foster-father’s eyes. “Karani said that I saved the day, apparently,” she said. “But I don’t feel like a hero. I still just feel tired.”

“That’s how these things usually feel,” the Baron said. “But the worst will pass, and we’ll be there for you.”

“I know,” Arta said, “but thank you. And I love you both, and I never want to lose either of you.”

“Hey,” Karani said, “we’re not going anywhere. You’re family, Arta, and you always will be.”

But at her words, for a moment, there was a look of sorrow and loss in the Baron’s eyes.

///

Mardoban looked down at the twisted remains of the Commander where they lay on an examination table in the guard barracks and sighed. “What a mess,” he muttered. “He fooled us all, and nearly succeeded in killing us all, and now this is all that’s left of him. Any word from the analysts?”

“There’s not enough left to be of much use,” Gilgam said. “The cybernetics are so damaged that they’re impossible to trace, and the human parts aren’t in much better condition.” He shook his head. “That girl really did a number on him, didn’t she?”

“It wasn’t just her,” Mardoban said. “He had some sort of self-destruct built into his systems. Whoever augmented him was determined he not be taken alive, or leave behind a corpse that could give clues about his origins.”

“They were thorough, sir,” Gilgam said. “The corpses of the other assassins are still being examined, and they aren’t in much better shape. The pirates we’ve questioned admit to knowing nothing about where they came from, either – only that they were willing to pay well for skilled fighters who didn’t ask questions and weren’t overly burdened by ethics.”

“Have your guards keep searching; try to find where they landed and if their main ship is still in the system,” Mardoban said. “We probably won’t find much, but anything is better than what we have. We will get to the bottom of this, even if it takes another fifteen years.”

“Yes, sir!” Gilgam said, saluting before turning and leaving the room. Mardoban regarded the Commander’s husk for a short while longer, then did the same. In the hallway outside, he found Naudar waiting for him, tapping his cane, all three of his children hovering protectively by his side.

“Learn anything?” the duke of Sakran asked.

“Nothing worthwhile,” Mardoban said. “The Commander’s origins, and the nature of his backers, remains a mystery, I’m afraid, but it’s one I intend to solve.”

“We’ll solve it,” Naudar glowered. “We were both at the battle where that bastard was supposed to have died; it reflects badly on us both that he lived, and then managed to invade this palace. When I find whoever put him up to it, they’d best hope the Lord has mercy on them, for I’ll have none.”

“Father,” one of Naudar’s sons, Galen, said, placing a hand on his shoulder, “wasn’t there something you wanted to discuss with the regent?”

“What my son is referring to,” Naudar said, “regards the matter of who, exactly, won the tournament. That is an issue that needs to be settled.”

“You can’t be serious,” Mardoban said. “We only just barely survived assassination, neither of our reputations may ever recover from the fact that the attack was led by a man we supposedly killed, and you’re still worried about making sure your chance for the crown is still in play?”

Naudar shrugged. “It was, after all, the point of this event,” he said. “And besides, I think that the situation has only grown more unstable after the attack, and other nations will have watched and seen our weakness. Your weakness too, Mardoban, you have to admit. The council may well choose to vote you out as regent over this. We need a ruler, and one seen as strong.”

Mardoban sighed heavily, but he knew Naudar was right. His authority had been badly damaged by the fiasco, or would be as the news spread; Naudar was in a little better position. With Hiram’s death, the guild’s were angry as well, demanding the council’s assurances that their interests be protected. It seemed the only public figure in the Dozen Stars whose reputation had actually improved wasn’t actually a citizen of it – Ambassador Quarinis had been hailed as a hero following his use of his praetorians to defeat the pirates and save the lives of numerous civilians.

Of course, there was still the question of Midaia, but then, she’d made it quite clear long ago that she had no desire to ascend her mother’s throne. And besides, she’d vanished from the palace once again after saving the council, though there were reports that she’d been seen briefly in a dozen places, none of them were substantiated. In terms of heirs of Aestera’s blood, that left only Artakane… which brought the issue back to the tournament.

“The final round was inconclusive, Naudar,” Mardoban finally said. “No one won the right to try the crown, on account of it being… rudely interrupted.”

“Darius was winning,” Tariti said, nodding to her older brother, who was currently standing behind his father and looking as if he was wrestling with some deep internal struggle. “He’d have had the Katanes girl beaten if the round had lasted another minute. He’s the obvious choice.”

“True enough,” Naudar said. “My son was winning – you can’t dispute that, and I doubt the girl would either, if you want to ask her. Just give me the chance to try the crown, Mardoban, and put an end to all of this!”

“No,” a voice said; Mardoban was stunned to realize it was Darius, and the boy himself looked only slightly less shocked.

“No?” Naudar asked, incredulously. “What are you talking about, my boy? What, were you about to lose despite all appearances to the contrary?” He chuckled darkly at his joke.

“Arta ast Katanes saved my life,” Darius said. “She then dueled and killed the assassin of the former Queen while I lay out cold on the floor. Yes, I could have beaten her in a fair duel – I know it, and she knows it, but that’s not what happened. Her house should have a chance to try the crown’s test first.”

“Darius,” Naudar said, scowling, “I’ve taught you that the appearance of honor is important to a duke, but now is not the time or the place.”

“If honor is only useful when it’s convenient, then it’s not worth keeping,” Darius said. “I’m sorry, Father, but I’m not going to change my mind.”

Naudar regarded his son coldly, then hung his head. “Now, you’re not,” he muttered. “Very well. Under the circumstances, it’d probably just be seen as a naked grab for power, anyway. Let the ast Katanes’s try. I doubt the Baron will succeed, anyway; that way, when the crown chooses the most qualified candidate, it will seem more legitimate anyway.”

“So be it,” Mardoban said, and a shiver ran up his spine that had nothing to do with Naudar’s cynical words.

///

The Baron had returned to his chair and was sipping his kaf, occasionally pausing to talk about the tournament or ask his daughters if either of them needed anything, when the door opened and Shiran stepped inside, looking somewhat haggard but basically well.

“You’re all right!” Arta said, feeling relief wash over you. “Where have you been? I’ve barely seen you since we got here; were you caught in the attack?”

The Professor looked somewhat self-conscious. “I sensed something wrong and sought out the regent, thinking he might need my help. I ended up needing his; one of the assassins shot me with a drugged dart. Thankfully, it only knocked me out and I think I’ve mostly got it out my system – still not an experience I would recommend. They must have wanted me alive; Lord only knows why.”

He smiled. “In any case, I wanted to tell you both that I’m very proud of you, both for making it as far as you did in the tournament and you, Arta, for your heroics during the attack. I’ve known adult knights who would have frozen when you acted. You made me proud, and your father too.”

“Still think he’s a spy?” Arta muttered to Karani out of the corner of her mouth.

“Shut up,” Karani hissed back; if Shiran noticed, he gave no sign, but the Baron covered his mouth with one hand to hide a chuckle.

“But that’s not the only reason I’m here,” the Professor said, turning to face the Baron. “I was just speaking with the regent, and it seems that Duke Naudar – apparently at Darius’s urging – has agreed to recognize Arta as the winner of the tournament thanks to her actions during the pirate raid, as the actual final round was cut short. That means that you, as the head of Arta’s house, will have the chance to try for the crown and, potentially, the throne. Congratulations.” He smiled. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I need to go lie down. I’ve only been up for a little more than an hour, but whatever drug was in that dart was potent stuff.” He looked back over his shoulder at Arta and Karani. “Well done again, both of you.”

When he was gone, Karani looked to her father with a wide-eyed expression. “That’s amazing!” she said. “I mean, we joked about you maybe being king, but we never thought it would actually happen! And because of Arta? Good for you, little sister! I guess saving ast Sakran’s sorry life was good for something, right?”

Arta’s eyes were on the Baron’s face; his expression was solemn, as though he was wrestling with some internal doubt, and then he sighed. “No,” he said. “I think we all know that I am not Arta’s biological father; though it has been my honor and my joy to bring her up in my house, she was not born ast Katanes.” He stood, fishing something out of his pocket, and walked over to Arta’s bedside; kneeling beside it he pressed a small object into her hand. “This is for you. It belonged to your mother and was left in my care. I was going to give it to you when you turned eighteen and came of age, but I think under the circumstances, you’ve earned it now. I will always love you, Arta, and we will always be your family, but as baron I hereby cut you free of legal responsibilities to House ast Katanes. Try the test of the crown for yourself. Arta, I’m so proud of you, and proud to have been your father.” He caught her in another tight embrace, and Arta thought she could see tears pooling at the corners of his eyes. Then he pulled away and turned and hurried from the room.

“What was that?” Karani demanded when he was gone. “What’d he give you, anyway?”

Arta opened her hand and held it up; resting on her palm was a small golden ring, set with the image of a Lion of Carann, the symbol of the royal house of the Dozen Stars. “A message,” Arta whispered. “And a promise.”

///

Several days later, Arta stood alone outside the doors to the council chamber, dressed in a new set of tournament armor that had been polished so it gleamed, with a dueling sword at her waist and a fine cloak over her shoulders. Her black hair had been neatly brushed, washed, and fussed over by Karani and was now pulled back in a tail; her whole appearance was meant to be that of an elegant, cultured, and victorious young knight, or so her foster-sister and the Baron had assured her. Arta herself still felt awkward and out of place.

The doors swung open, and Arta sighed, straightened herself, and strode inside. The battle anthem of the Dozen Stars was playing from invisible speakers, and the chamber was crowded with nobles and civilians arranged in neat rows, with an open aisle in the middle for her to walk down. Near the front she passed Karani, who was grinning broadly despite the fact that she was still leaning on a crutch, and the Baron, who nodded encouragingly. The front row was taken up by the dukes and duchesses of the council and their immediate families; Pakorus smiled at her as she passed, as surprisingly, did Darius ast Sakran, though his brother Galen was scowling and their father, Naudar, was weighing her with a calculating look.

The throne seemed to loom above Arta on its dais at the head of the room as she approached; the dais was ringed by guards, but on it stood Duke Mardoban on the throne’s right side with the elderly High Prelate a step behind him and, to Arta’s surprise, Shiran on its left. She passed the guards and mounted the dais, stopping on the second-highest step to offer a curtsy to the throne, as she’d been instructed. On it rested a light circlet of gold, set with sapphires. This, then, was the crown that all of this had been about – the one that had, rumor said, almost killed Duke Respen months ago.

“Hail to the victorious,” Mardoban said as Arta rose. “Whoever wears the crown shall rule, was the message that was left when it was delivered to us. Some took it as a hoax, others as a challenge; others of us felt that it was a sign that this Kingdom was a desperate need of leadership once again. The purpose of our tournament here was to find a house that seemed worthy of attempting the test of the crown. The attack on it by the assassins who slew Queen Aestera was another sign, both of our weakness and of the fact that this Kingdom has enemies who would see it destroyed – another sign that we had to act. Those enemies were thwarted, thanks in part to the actions of this young woman who now stands before us. Arta ast Katanes, by the judgment of the council, has earned the right to wear this crown and see if it judges her worthy, and her father, the Baron Varas ast Katanes, has renounced his own claim in favor of hers. Should she fail, then the test shall pass to other houses whose contestants placed highly in the tournament. Should she succeeded…” His voice trailed off, leaving the unspoken idea hanging in the air.

“Arta ast Katanes,” Mardoban said once the pause had passed, “are you willing to attempt the test of the crown, knowing that failure will cause you great pain?”

“I am,” Arta said, finding her voice.

“Then you may approach.”

Arta stepped onto the top level of the dais and approached the throne. The crown seemed such a small, insignificant thing, resting on the throne’s seat, but when she bent down to pick it up, she felt the energy coursing through it. It was some creation that merged technology with an Adept’s powers, she thought, though she had no idea how such a thing was possible. And there was something familiar about it as well, something that recalled the Professor. Was this his handiwork? What was it meant to judge? Bloodline alone? Surely not; Respen was of royal blood, and he’d failed. Something more, then? Something that its wearer had, or perhaps something they might have, a potential for what they could become.

Slowly she turned to face the crowd, the crown held between her hands. Looking out at the gathered faces before her, Arta took a deep breath, tried to steady her hammering heart, and then lifted the crown and placed it onto her head.

For a long moment, nothing happened. There was no pain, merely a tingling warmth, and Arta had the feeling that whatever power lived inside the crown was exploring her every thought and feeling, judging and weighing her. Then there was a pulse of energy that echoed through her body, and every sapphire on the crown burst into brilliant light.

Arta could hear the crowd’s gasp, feel the weakness at her knees as the import of just what had happened hit her, and then Shiran was at her side, steadying her. “People of the Dozen Stars,” he called, “some of you know me, and some of you do not. Years ago, I was a counselor at the court of Queen Aestera, and when she came to fear for her life, she charged me with protecting her legacy. That legacy stands before you. I give you Artakane ast Carann, born and raised in secret, but the true daughter of a queen, who has been raised and trained to lead with responsibility, fairness, and compassion, who has proven her valor and her commitment to the Kingdom in the face of its enemies before you all. She has been judged, and found worthy. I say to you – long live Queen Artakane!”

For a moment, the chamber was silent; then Karani raised her crutch towards the ceiling. “Long live Queen Artakane!” she called, and then the Baron took up the chant beside her. Then Pakorus took up the call, and then Darius ast Sakran, and then the crowd joined in, the call echoing through the council chamber. And yet Naudar’s expression of cool calculation didn’t change, and Respen’s face was twisted in hatred; several rows behind the dukes, Ambassador Quarinis nodded, his cool eyes appraising.

Suddenly a great wave seemed to crash down on Arta, and she saw at a glance a vast jumble of images, things that would be, or that might be. She saw the war that was coming, the terrible crisis that the Commander had spoken of with his last breath that would test the Dozen Stars to its brink, and yet she also saw, beneath the chaos, a glimmer of hope, that there was a chance – a slim chance, but a chance nonetheless – that from the darkness might rise something great, something that would shine across the stars for millennia. Then it all passed in an instant, and Arta was back on the dais, just a girl in fine clothes and armor, a gleaming crown on her brow.

Looking out over the crowd, her gaze was drawn to a shadowy figure near the back, hood pulled low over her head. Of course Midaia was there – Midaia, her half-sister, who was the missing princess after all, Midaia whose voice had spoken in her mind and given her the strength to fight on when all seemed lost. Midaia’s expression was calm and unreadable, but she inclined her head to Arta in a slight bow – and then she curtsied, and it seemed both an acknowledgment and a promise. Arta didn’t trust Midaia, wasn’t even sure if she liked her, but she knew that her half-sister would be watching out for her in the days to come, as would others, family and friends both. It seemed inescapable now that Arta would shoulder this burden, but she wouldn’t have to do it alone.

Suddenly a great weariness, and a mix of both hope and dread for the future, hit her; stumbling back from Shiran’s reassuring hand, she fell backwards and found herself seated on the throne – the Queen’s throne, her mother’s throne. Beside her, she saw Duke Mardoban nodding at her encouragingly, and the High Prelate stepping forward to address the crowd, but she didn’t hear his words. Merely the cry that seemed to encompass everything that had happened here today, and that was intended as praise, but seemed more to be a promise of the trials, and the uncertain future, that lay ahead.

“Long live Queen Artakane! Long Live Queen Artakane! Long Live Queen Artakane!”

 

[SilverTiger]

This story is brilliant.

It has a good plot, interesting characters, and is very well written. Why haven't you sent it to a publisher yet?

Thanks for posting it-- and if it is published, I'll buy it.

[MasterGhandalf]

And we come to the end... for now, at least. Epilogue!

Spoiler

Epilogue

Carann, Royal Palace

Shiran stood on one of the palace balconies that overlooked the capital city as twilight turned the violet sky vivid shades of red. He pulled his dark coat more tightly around himself as a cool breeze blew past him, lightly playing with his hair and cloak. Artakane had realized who she was, and had taken her throne and the crown he had prepared for her. But his labors were far from over – not yet. He had much he still had to do.

“Hello, old man,” a lightly mocking voice said from beside him, and he turned to see Midaia there, her face shadowed by her hood. “Enjoying the view?”

He shook his head. “Thinking about the future,” he said. “And the past.”

“The future and the past,” Midaia said, unable to keep the barb from her tone. “And that’s what everything comes down for to you, isn’t it? Your past sins, and your grand plans. And what, pray tell, is dear Arta’s role to be in all of this? What is she to you, Shiran? Your redemption, perhaps?”

“Perhaps,” Shiran said. “For too long I’ve carried the weight of my sins; perhaps at last I can put them to rest, and then rest myself. If all goes well, Arta may be the key to that. But don’t make the mistake of thinking that I don’t care for her.”

Midaia scoffed. “You’ve used her,” she said. “You’ve planned out her whole life to suit your own agenda, and you care for her? Don’t make me laugh, Shiran.”

“I do care!” Shiran snapped, surprised at the level of anger that burst out of him. “I care for her, and for you, and your mother, and the regent, and everyone in this Kingdom! Do you think I have used people, as you say, because I enjoy it? No! I do it because I see no other way forward, and for every person whom I have used I have wept anguished tears for! But what would you know about it? You never cared for anyone but yourself, and acquiring knowledge for no other reason than to know it. What is your interest in Arta, really? Sisterly affection, after all this time?”

Midaia was silent, staring out over the city, and when she spoke, her voice was a whisper. “There is a woman of flesh and blood under these robes, Shiran,” she said, “as hard as that might be to believe. Mother didn’t want us to be apart forever, did you know that? She sent me a message, to be opened in the event of her death, telling me that I had a sister, and her name, though it was still some time before I was able to actually track her down. But I’ve found her now. And when I look at Arta, I’m reminded of another girl who should have made better choices. Did you think I wanted to live vicariously through her? No. I just wanted to know her, and her to become a better person than I’ve been.” She sighed. “Of course, you probably figured that out long ago, and never said anything because it didn’t suit your purposes. You’re a manipulative, cruel old man,” she said.

“I can’t deny it,” the Professor replied. “And you are an arrogant, self-absorbed young woman.”

Midaia smiled thinly. “Also true,” she said. “I suppose all either of us can do is try to rise above not, not that we’re very good at succeeding at that. And what a pair we are, perhaps the two greatest Adepts in the history of the Kingdom. Pity the Kingdom.” She watched the sunset for a long silent moment before speaking again. “War is coming, you know,” she said. “I’ve seen the signs. So have you.”

“Yes,” Shiran said. “The dukes have bowed to Arta, for now, but there are those among them who will chafe at her reign. Naudar, Respen, perhaps others. They will find an excuse to declare her an illegitimate heir, and then they will launch their rebellion against her. They’ve come too far to back out now.”

“And there’s more,” Midaia said. “The assassins are dead, the pirate threat destroyed, but we both know that there was someone else involved in this game. Cyborg assassins and well-equipped pirate fleets don’t just emerge from the ether, but these seemingly did so. Someone created them, Shiran, and they went to great lengths to cover their tracks. And I would swear by all the names of the Lord and the Evil One both that whoever it is will try again. This isn’t over. It’s barely begun.”

“It has,” Shiran agreed.

“And my half-sister is in the middle of it all.”

“She is,” Shiran said. “She may save us all, in the end. Until then, I will protect her.”

Midaia’s eyes flashed. “As will I,” she said. “You watch out for her in your way, old man, and I’ll do it in mine. You think you know everything, but I’ve spent years stalking the darkness between the stars. I’ll wager I’ve learned things there that even you have no idea of. The time may come when you need my help.”

“It very well may,” Shiran said. “And I won’t deny that scares me.”

Midaia looked at him carefully, and then she burst out into laughter that was half-bitter and half-genuine. Shiran regarded her strangely and shook his head, but there was a half-smile hidden behind his beard. Teacher and former student, whose paths had long ago diverged but who had much in common still nonetheless, they waited together on the balcony until the sun went down behind the horizon and darkness fell across Carann.

///

Publius Vedrans Quarinis watched the same sunset from his office window, hands clasped behind his back, and contemplated the day’s events. A new queen on the throne, a girl of whom he knew nothing, the tournament reduced to a bloody shambles, an attack by assassins who were now dead. Yes, it was a day of upheaval indeed.

It also marked the end of many of his plans, but far from all. Quarinis always had his contingencies.

He hadn’t lied when he’d told Duke Mardoban that it didn’t serve the political interests of the Empire to set its sights on the Dozen Stars, not with the Alaelam War still underway on the other side of the galaxy. But what he’d failed to mention was that there were other concerns beyond the merely material which guided the Empire’s actions. He’d told the girl-queen when he’d danced with her that the Empire valued Adepts, and that, too was true. But a secret which Quarinis was one of the few to be privy to, one of the greatest state secrets of the Empire, was that the Emperor himself, Verus Licinius, was an Adept as well – perhaps the greatest in the galaxy.

And like all Adepts, the Emperor dreamed true dreams. More than a decade and a half ago, he had awoken repeatedly in terror, night after night, tormented by the same vision – himself, broken and powerless, lying on the ground while above him stood a silhouetted woman, a sword in her hand and twelve stars forming a crown upon her brow. The meaning was clear. Quarinis, already ambassador to the Dozen Stars, had been hastily summoned in secret to a private audience where Licinius had made his will clear – a queen of the Dozen Stars had the power to bring ruin to him and all he had built, and so such a queen must not be allowed to live.

Recruiting particularly sociopathic soldiers from the Imperial legions, equipping them with experimental cybernetics that couldn’t be traced, and sending them to the Dozen Stars as assassins, all while keeping his own identity a secret, hadn’t been difficult for Quarinis. It had taken several attempts before they were able to complete their mission, but in the end, it had been a success – Aestera ast Carann, Queen of the Dozen Stars, had perished, and her only daughter had renounced her claim to the throne to be trained as a nun. There would be no queen, and Quarinis had assured the Emperor that the Dozen Stars, never the most stable of polities, would fracture without centralized leadership. Then the threat would be ended forever.

For one of the few times in his life, Quarinis had been wrong. The regent, Duke Mardoban, had managed to pull a semblance of order out of the chaos, and the Dozen Stars had limped on past what should have been its deserved fate. And when the crown created by the enigmatic Adept known as the Professor had appeared, he knew that action remained to be taken. And so Quarinis had called his long-disused tools into service again – and this time, they had failed him. The Commander and his assassins were dead, and a new Queen now sat on the Dozen Stars’s throne – a queen whose very existence threatened all that Quarinis had dedicated his life too. In the end, the very qualities that had made the Commander a ready tool in Quarinis’s hand, his arrogance and bloodlust, had proven his undoing. True, Quarinis had earned the goodwill of the Dozen Stars by ordering his praetorians to protect civilians – and sacrificed some of his own pawns in doing so – and that would be useful in the future, but it was still a paltry gain compared to what he had lost.

The ambassador sighed. He’d been putting this off, he had to admit, but it had to be done soon. A patrician of the Empire took any task in service to Emperor and Senate with stoic dignity and resolve, no matter how unpleasant. Turning away from the window, he walked over to one of his office’s walls and carefully pressed a series of concealed buttons – a door slid open, and he stepped into a small, dark room.

There were no windows here, nor furniture, nor decorations – merely glossy black walls, lined with technology that would jam any attempt to spy on what went on within, and a large holoprojector in the center of the floor. The door slid shut behind Quarinis as he approached the holoprojector, and he went down on one knee as it flared to life before him.

Publius Vedrans Quarinis bowed his head at the powerful, commanding figure who appeared before him and now regarded him from half a galaxy away and saluted, in the Imperial fashion, with a fist over his heart. “My lord Emperor,” he said. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but I’m afraid I have troubling news…”

 

HERE ENDS

REALM OF THE STARS VOLUME I:

THE UNCLAIMED CROWN

 

THE STORY WILL CONTINUE IN VOLUME II:

THE ENDANGERED CROWN

 

And a final round of character portraits as well!

Spoiler

Shiran, and the Emperor, and a first look at Latharna Dhenloc, a character we haven't met yet but who'll be a major player in Volume II.

A big thank you to everyone who's been following along with me (and Arta) on this journey!

[Ixthos]

I really enjoyed reading this, @MasterGhandalf, and I look forwards to the next installment, and I hope that this eventually is a book that is sold in stores :-)