“Let me,” Navan insisted, and his uncle stepped to one side. With the press of a button, a smaller screen appeared beside the first, showing Navan’s face. “I am Navan Idrax of the Explorer’s Guild, son of Jareth Idrax. I come bearing news for you, Your Highness.”
I watched his face on the monitor, impressed by his calm demeanor. Queen Gianne studied him for a moment before speaking again. “Navan Idrax?” she asked, her tone suspicious. “The last I heard of Navan Idrax, he had gone to the far reaches of the universe. Why would you be here now?”
“I returned as quickly as I could, Your Highness,” he said. “You see, early on in my exploration, I was betrayed. I had Jethro and Ianthan Plexus aboard my ship, but they sought to turn against you, Your Highness—they wanted to feed information to your enemies, the rebel forces. They changed the coordinates of my ship while I was sleeping, and took us to a rebel outpost. I realized in time to stop them from speaking with the rebels, but not before we had landed.” He spoke quickly, and I could see Queen Gianne’s face contorting with each word.
“Jethro and Ianthan Plexus?” she remarked icily.
Navan nodded. “I was forced to carry out their execution for treason. They wanted to smuggle rebels back, to create a weak point in your queendom, Your Highness.”
“At a rebel outpost, you say?”
“It was only a small one, on a forgotten planet a few days’ travel from here, Your Highness,” Navan replied smoothly, his voice never faltering. Even I would have believed him. “There were a handful of rebels there, but they seemed disenchanted with the whole rebellion idea. I think the real rebel base had forgotten them, too. After seeing the execution of Jethro and Ianthan, they begged me to bring them back to Vysanthe, where they might offer you information on the true rebel base, in exchange for immunity... They know their true leader is you, Queen Gianne, and they would seek to be your citizens once more.”
“This rebel base, is it close?” Queen Gianne asked, her eyebrow raised.
“The outpost is a bit under a week away, though the rest of the rebels scattered. Those I brought with me hold the information you seek.”
“How many of you are there?” she demanded, peering closer into the screen, as though she could pick every crew member out.
“Eight, Your Highness,” Navan answered swiftly. “Myself, four other coldbloods—including my uncle Lazar, who helped me out of a spot of trouble I had with my own ship—two creatures called Carokians, and my personal slave, of an unknown race.”
I wondered if Carokians were a real thing. If they weren’t, would the shifters just make something up? Time would tell.
For a few minutes that seemed to stretch on forever, Queen Gianne said nothing. Instead, she simply looked through the screen, studying Navan’s face on the monitor. Surely, if she knew Jareth Idrax, she knew his son, too? From what I’d gathered, Navan was supposed to be close to the queen. Though, by the looks of it, she wasn’t convinced of his loyalty.
“Perhaps your story is true,” she sighed, breaking the tension with her crisp voice. “In these times, I cannot take any unnecessary risks. Stay precisely where you are while my border force comes and investigates your ship. If you move an inch, I shall shoot you from the sky—is that understood?”
Navan nodded curtly, and I could see him letting out a slight breath. “Understood, Your Highness. We’ll await them.”
“Very well, let’s see if you make it through, shall we?” she said softly, before the screen flickered off.
Navan whirled around. “Hide everything, immediately!” he shouted, running out of the cockpit and back into the main space. “We’ve got Impalers coming, boys! Hide the weapons. Hide everything we don’t want the border guard finding!”
I sprinted after him in time to see Nestor, Cristo, and Kalvin come hurtling out of the hallway a moment later, clutching handfuls of guns and boxes of weapons. Their eyes were wide in fear. The shifters followed soon after, carrying stacks of items.
“What are Impalers?” I gasped, heaving a particularly heavy trunk up into my arms.
“The Vysanthean border guard—well, Queen Gianne’s border guard, anyway,” Navan explained rapidly, tossing a bag of rifles to Kalvin, who was running past. He caught them with lightning-fast reflexes.
“Why are they called Impalers?” I pressed, following Navan toward Lazar. He gave me a look, making me realize it was probably a stupid question, and I shuddered.
“You, shifters, change into something vaguely Carokian!” Navan instructed, confirming that it was a real species. The two shifters looked at one another uncertainly, their skins unchanging.
An air of panic bristled through the ship as Lazar led everyone to a shimmering square in the wall of the Asterope, his hand seeking out a secret button that opened a hatch, invisible to the unknowing eye. Without a moment to lose, everyone shoved the boxes and trunks of weaponry into the hatch, making sure there wasn’t a single box of ammo left out in the open. The only thing that stayed out were the metallic vials and boxes of supplies. After all, it had to look like a ship that had been lived in for a short while—the journey from the fake rebel outpost was a week-long journey, after all. I did what I could, throwing containers and bags at whoever was ready to catch them, until there was nothing left cluttering the narrow hallways of the Asterope.
A knock rapped at the front door.
The sound echoed through the confined space, filling me with dread. Everyone whirled around, their eyes on the spot where the gangway slid out. I didn’t doubt these Impalers could have knocked the door down if they’d wanted to, but for now they seemed eager that we should open the ship up to them. A gesture of cooperation.
Lazar lunged for the button that concealed the invisible hatch, the façade sliding down with a rapid swoosh. To my surprise, I could see no hint of the square storage space in the wall’s smooth surface once the screen was down. We had stashed everything just in time.
The Impalers were here.
Chapter Sixteen
Navan opened the door to the Asterope, allowing the border guard in. The moment the door swung up, I was petrified of being sucked out into the darkness of space, but it seemed the Impalers had brought some contraption with them that attached to the outer wall of the ship, creating a tunnel through which they could move from their ship to ours.
Instantly, it was confirmed to me how they’d earned their nickname. They loomed in the doorway, brandishing large pikes with sharp, golden tips, the metal and the staff streaked with red. They reminded me of the spears I’d seen the rebel coldbloods using back at the hidden compound, the weapons crackling and fizzing, as though electricity pulsed through them. I wouldn’t like to be on the receiving end of one of those. The spears had looked torturous enough.
The Impalers wore black and red, with streaks of greasepaint on their faces, making them look even more horrifying than they would have without it. The leader stepped forward, his blue eyes scrutinizing the ship, and everyone gathered in the main space.
Panicking, I turned to see that the shifters had morphed into green-skinned beings with bulging scarlet eyes and webbed feet, their backs hunched over, their mouths gaping open. They looked amphibian, and frankly repulsive… though perhaps not more repulsive than their natural form.
“Stay here while we search your vessel,” the lead Impaler instructed, ushering his colleagues into the small space.
There were ten of them, some male, some female, though all equally terrifying. Branching out from the main space, they flooded the corridors, entering the pods. I could hear the sound of things being thrown around, the whole place being ransacked in search of contraband.
One of the large male Impalers stopped in front of me, his eyes boring down into mine. Quickly, I dropped my gaze, taking on the role of subservient underling. He sniffed me, jabbing my shoulder with the end of his pike. The tip bristled, but no shock of electricity jolted down my arm. He was just testing me, checking to see if I’d react. I didn’t, keep
ing a cool head, playing the part I’d been assigned.
“What are you?” he growled, his breath hot on my face.
I shook my head. “Nobody, sir,” I breathed.
“You got that right,” he sneered, before pulling away, evidently satisfied that I wasn’t harmful. Even so, my heart was pounding in my chest, my lungs barely able to catch a breath. Now, more than ever, I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to be on the edge of Vysanthe, with no choice but to land or die. I wanted to be home, wrapped up in the safety of familiarity. Even the comforting sight of Navan’s eyes, watching me closely, couldn’t take the all-consuming fear away.
Once or twice, several of the Impalers walked past the spot where the hatch was hidden away, but the design was too clever, foxing them. They didn’t seem to notice anything amiss, their eyes barely glancing over the invisible panel as they moved on to more obvious hiding places. They turned over all the food boxes, pulling out everything, only to cast each item aside once they realized what it was. In the cockpit, I could hear a few of them rattling around. They exited, shrugging at their leader with disappointed expressions on their faces.
They hadn’t found anything.
“Remain here. The queen will be in touch shortly,” the leader said, once he had regrouped his troops. With that, they left the ship, the outer door sliding shut after them. I could still hear the sound of their heavy boots on the walkway they had connected from their ship, but that soon faded, leaving the Asterope in uneasy silence.
I was about to ask a question when Navan lifted his finger to his lips. “In case they’ve stuck bugs on the ship,” he whispered.
I nodded. The last thing I wanted was for those terrifying individuals to return because of something I said. Instead, my eyes flicked to the invisible hatch. Lazar was standing beside it, his arms folded across his chest. With the Impalers’ surveillance uncertain, it was clear nobody wanted to open the hatch… just in case. It would have to wait until we were on the ground.
Several minutes later, the sound of the ship’s siren blared in my eardrums, the red light flashing once more. Queen Gianne was calling.
Navan immediately hurried toward the cockpit door, disappearing inside. This time, I didn’t follow him. Instead, I stayed in the main space of the ship, watching as the screen flickered to life again on the far wall.
“It seems you passed my test, Navan Idrax,” Queen Gianne said, smiling coldly. “Your father will be so happy to see you’ve returned.”
“Thank you, Your Highness,” Navan replied, his tone tight. “I look forward to an audience with you, so we might exchange information.”
Queen Gianne laughed. “We’ll see,” she murmured, before the screen went dead. In place of Queen Gianne’s face, a message appeared. Permission to dock, it said, flashing repeatedly.
Lazar moved away from the others and entered the cockpit, with me following close behind. I sat down on one of the chairs in front of the command module and let Navan and his uncle get to work, flicking switches and moving levers to bring the ship down to the planet of Vysanthe.
“Would you like to see?” Navan asked, turning to look over his shoulder at where I sat.
I nodded, though I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to see this new planet or not. He pressed a button, and the shimmering façade of the ship’s front fell away, revealing the expanse of space beyond the glass. In front of my eyes lay a dark planet with two icy tips at either end—the planet’s bitter poles, no doubt. Across the surface were glowing lights, a sign of the cities and towns there. It was strange to see a new civilization rising up in front of me, with people milling about below, going on with their lives, oblivious to our presence above them.
It did not look like Earth, with its welcoming blue and green, its swirling white clouds streaming across the atmosphere. This was its gloomier, darker twin. This planet was far larger than Earth, though I could make out expanses of black water tinged with the pale blue of ice. There were certainly no welcoming vibes. In fact, everything about it screamed a warning to turn back, and run as far from it as possible.
Unfortunately for me, that wasn’t an option.
“It’s… something,” I said, unable to find the right words for my fear and awe.
“A savage beauty,” Lazar murmured, his eyes drawn to the sight of his home planet. “Just like its queens,” he added, almost to himself.
Slowly, the Asterope began to descend, the planet drawing closer. The stars disappeared as we powered through Vysanthe’s atmosphere, following the Impaler ship that flew ahead of us, its engines glowing blue in the darkness.
We seemed to be heading for mountainous terrain, with not a city in sight. I thought it a little strange, but I didn’t even know what strange was anymore. Everything was weird. A vast peak rose up, the apex topped with snow, the sky around it stormy. Rain lashed against the windscreen of the ship, the water running down in fierce rivers. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and a crack of lightning shot out across the bruised storm clouds, lighting everything up for just a moment with its angry glare.
After navigating through a wide, gaping entrance in the side of the snowcapped mountain, Lazar landed the ship a short distance away from where the Impaler ship docked. We were in some sort of cave, though it wasn’t the usual kind—the floor was polished stone, and there were monitors and screens everywhere, running through diagnostics of the ships beside them. Coldbloods wandered around, helping ships to land and fixing any that might be broken, their heads buried inside the bellies of these mechanical beasts.
Some of the ships looked like ours, superficially—with the same shimmering, almost liquid surface—while others were far bulkier and less sleek. That was good, because it meant the Asterope could blend in, and they hopefully wouldn’t notice that, under the hood, it was more advanced than their ships. I realized this must have been how Navan had managed to keep his advanced ship, Soraya, a secret—he’d made the exterior blend in with other regular Vysanthean ships.
“Are you ready for this?” Navan asked, as two clamps extended from the cave walls and gripped the Asterope. A jolt told me it had been secured.
I shook my head. “Can I go home if I say no?” I half joked.
“I’m sorry, Riley,” he said, looking crestfallen.
With a smile that belied my terror, I walked over to him and looped my arms around his neck, not caring that Lazar was there. Gently, I kissed him on the cheek, and looked up into his eyes. “You have nothing to be sorry for, Navan.”
He exhaled, taking my hands in his. “Stay close to me.”
He then led me out of the cockpit and into the main space, where the rest of the team was waiting. There was a nervous energy in the room that was hard to ignore, but I did my best as we headed for the ship’s exit.
As the door slid up, we stepped out into the cave. The cold hit me like a slap to the face, but that wasn’t the worst of my problems. Coldblood guards swarmed us in an instant, brandishing the electrically charged pikes and spears they seemed to favor. One grabbed me, pulling me roughly to one side. Navan tried to keep hold of me, but another guard stepped forward and slammed the staff of his spear down on my wrist, forcing me to recoil from Navan’s touch.
All around me, the other members of the Asterope crew were being manhandled, pulled and pushed in every direction by the armed guards. It all happened in a blur.
“I demand to know what you’re doing!” I heard Lazar call out.
“We’re taking you for interrogation,” one of the guards barked back, hauling him toward the exit of the cave.
“Stop!” Navan shouted. “I will keep my slave with me, or you will answer to Jareth Idrax. She is my property. I will not allow her to be sullied by your hands!” I wasn’t sure I liked the way it felt to be called his property, but I knew he was doing it to keep up appearances. I was supposed to be his personal slave, after all. Besides, I knew it pained him to have to use his father’s name to get something.
The guard holding m
e relaxed his grip slightly. “Boss?” he asked, turning to one of the other guards, who was evidently their leader. On his face, he bore a tattoo, just below his eye. It was a fanged animal of some sort, though it wasn’t a creature I recognized.
“Keep the girl with Idrax,” he muttered, clearly disliking having to bend to superiority. “We’ll leave it to Kiel to decide.”
With the decision made, my guard shoved me toward the vast door that yawned at the far edge of the cave. It led into a long tunnel, which branched out into several smaller tunnels. The guards took us along the one at the very end of the passageway, stopping in front of a hallway of doors.
I watched as Lazar, Nestor, Cristo, Kalvin, and the two shifters, still shaped like Carokians, were pushed through doors. These were interrogation rooms. They couldn’t be anything else. I gulped, realizing we were all going to be questioned separately. I knew enough of the plan to muddle through, but I was convinced I’d get some part of it wrong.
Navan and I were held outside one particular door. The guard holding Navan knocked once, and it swung wide open. There was a squat, barrel-chested troll of a coldblood standing on the other side, his muddy brown eyes peering curiously from me to Navan, and back again. This must be Kiel.
“Commander Kiel, we have Navan Idrax. He insisted he bring his pet along—do you want us to put her in with someone else? Grillo might like a go at her,” the guard said, his tone menacing.
The pugnacious coldblood raised a bushy eyebrow, looking thoughtful for a moment. “Send her to Grillo,” he said, flicking his wrist down the corridor.
Navan strained against the man holding him. “She can’t be interrogated alone, not by a Vysanthean. She’s too weak—she’ll faint… and she’ll be useless to you and me, if that happens,” he added frostily.