Amena's Rise to Stardom!

By Kristen S. Walker

“Amena’s Rise to Stardom: The Youngest Singer on Star Search Wins It All!”

The truth about the pop singer’s dark past.

Fifteen-year-old Amena is a spy and thief for the rebellion, but she dreams of being a singer. Fame seems impossible when she lives in a hidden village in a remote part of the empire. But when she gets arrested on an easy recon mission, a magical doorway appears and offers her a way out.

When the goddess of the rainforest offers Amena a chance at her dreams, she chooses to risk it all. Leaving behind the rebellion, her mother, and everything she’s ever known, she can finally start her singing career. But the goddess’s magic comes with hidden costs.

Joining the big competition, Star Search, Amena tries to balance her music with training as a divine warrior. She must serve the whims of the goddess and avoid her criminal record. A rival singer takes her breath away—but she’s hiding her own secrets. Her new life is more dangerous than the spy game she left behind.

Is the price of fame too high when death is on the line?

Amena’s Rise to Stardom is a prequel novella in the Divine Warriors, a steampunk fantasy series for teens. It can be read as a standalone or at any point in the series. If you like magical girls, pop concerts, and fast-paced adventure, then you’ll love Kristen S. Walker’s series of guns and gears.

Rated PG for mild violence and death. No sex or swearing. Contains LGBTQ+ characters and relationships.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kristen S. Walker
• Release date: May 9, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463513736

Kristen S. Walker

Fantasy author Kristen S. Walker dreams of being a pirate mermaid who can talk to sharks, but she settles for writing stories for teens and adults. She's proudly bisexual, Wiccan, a liberal feminist, and lives in northern California with her family and two rescued pets. To find out more about her stories, please visit kristenwalker.net.

Book preview

Amena’s Rise to Stardom!

Amena’s Rise to Stardom!

Divine Warriors #0

Kristen S. Walker

Kristen S. Walker

Amena’s Rise to Stardom!

Copyright © 2019 by Kristen S. Walker

Cover Design: MiblArt https://miblart.com/

Edited by Sheri Gleason, Light Hand Proofreading

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

© Kristen S. Walker and kristenwalker.net

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Map of the Northern Province

Contents

Round One

Round Two

Round Three

Pronunciation Guide

Thank You

Also by Kristen S. Walker

About the Author

Round One

But Mama, I say again. I know I sound like a whiny brat, but I can’t help it. I broke into that office last year. Isn’t there someone else who can go on this recon mission?

Mama folds her arms and gives me that stern teacher look across the dinner table. It’s because you did it before that we want you to go. It should be easy for you to get the delivery schedule and get out again.

I roll my eyes up to the ceiling. This is kid stuff. Any of your students could do this job without even breaking a sweat. I’m fifteen now, don’t you think it’s time I did something harder? Can I rob the warehouses with you after I get the schedule?

In Jabin, we grow and make what we can, but we can’t trade with normal villages without giving away our hiding spot. So we steal the rest of the stuff we need. Not from poor mainlanders, since they need it just as bad as we do. But in the nearby town of Pisan, there’s a shipping depot that collects all kinds of goods for the big cities. Soon their warehouses will be full of food from the harvest—the best part of the crop, reserved for fancy city folk who’ve never dirtied their hands in a field. My mission is to get their delivery schedule so the rebels know when is the best time to rob it.

Fifteen, but still shy of your Choosing Day. Mama shakes her head and pushes the dirty dishes toward me. It’s just a few months away, so we’re not going to jeopardize your chances. And this could be one of your last missions before you leave.

I groan and snatch the dishes up. It’s not fair I have to do chores on top of this mission, but I can’t argue my way out of everything. Leave so I can do what? I’m not going to be Chosen for a city, Mama. I ain’t that smart.

Aren’t, Mama corrects me. She insists that us kids learn to speak proper, instead of mainlander slang. And you have many skills, if only you would apply yourself to them with as much energy as you use complaining. I have no doubt you will be Chosen for something when the time comes. You could qualify for many ministries.

It sounds like she’s being nice but this is an old argument of ours. Truth is, I’m kinda nervous about Choosing Day. All fifteen-year-old kids, even secret rebel ones who have to sneak in, go through the same test to find out where they’re meant to train and work for the rest of their lives. Almost everyone gets assigned to the mainland, which is backbreaking work in the farms and factories. But if you have an exceptional skill in something useful, like teaching or inventing machines or accounting, then you could get Chosen for a ministry in the floating capital.

I don’t ‘qualify’ for any ministry, I say, raising my voice as I cross the room to the sink.

Houses in the cities, and even some in the bigger towns, have automatic dish scrubbing machines. We don’t even have proper plumbing. I hauled water in from the village well earlier today and heated it over the cooking fire.

I pour hot water from the kettle into the basin and scrub the dishes by hand. My best skills are sneaking and thieving. And singing, I add silently, but the rebellion doesn’t care about singers. Even if the gods see I’m a good thief, they won’t tell the government to put me in charge of all their important paperwork so I can learn their secrets.

Mama snatches the clean dish out of my hand and swipes it with a towel. The gods have nothing to do with your test. Saying that there’s some kind of divine force behind Choosing Day is propaganda to keep us from questioning the results. People will test your skills and assign your job, and if you remember what I’ve told you about the tricks, you can get far enough to catch their eye. But it’s your abilities that will put you over the top. I have faith in you.

I pick at a stubborn bit of cheese crusted on the lip of a bowl. Or I could get caught on this stupid mission tonight and spend the next two years in jail.

Mama sighs. As you pointed out yourself, it’s an easy— She coughs, covering her mouth with the dish towel. Job. No guards, she continues, but the cough comes back. She doubles over, hacking and struggling to breathe.

I drop the dishes and rush to her side. Take it easy. I help her back into the chair. These coughing fits have been getting worse. I should have known better than to let her get riled up over a stupid argument.

Mama waves her hand at the kettle, and I pour some hot water into a cup for her. Sipping on the warm liquid eases her cough, and she gradually calms her breathing down.

I look away. Everyone in the village has some breathing problems because of the bad air in the lowlands, but the healer says Mama’s cough is worse because she didn’t grow up in it. She used to be a teacher in the capital, which floats in the sky above the smog. She should have stayed breathing that pure air. But when she found out she was pregnant with me, she didn’t want to give me up to the state-run school. She ran away from Olona City to join the rebellion, the only way she could keep her baby.

I never had a choice. Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like if I’d gotten to grow up in the capital with all its luxuries, but then I’d never have known Mama.

I rub her back. Sorry, Mama. I turn back to the sink and pick up the dishes like a good daughter. My last mission, huh? I’ll take care of it.

The sun is still up when I’ve finished cleaning up from dinner, but the shipping depot in Pisan is miles away and taking a horse would attract too much attention, so I’ll have to walk. I grab my gear and change into black clothes. Black blouse, black trousers that are easier to move in than a proper skirt, soft black shoes for walking quietly, and a black cap with my bright yellow hair tucked up inside so it won’t catch the light. It’s not the height of fashion, but I’ll be able to blend into the shadows.

At sunset, I climb down from our treehouse and head for the old tree at the edge of the village where I’m supposed to meet with my backup. I don’t need any help on this, but protocol says we never go out on our own. Someone else will go along with me to act as a lookout. At least I’ll have company during the long walk there and back.

Except when I get to the tree, I see it’s Deryt waiting for me. Most girls would say he’s handsome because he’s tall with shaggy blue-black hair that falls in his dark, dreamy eyes. He’s self-conscious about being the tallest person in the village, though, because he hunches over and tries to hide. His good looks are wasted on a lesbian like me.

I hold back a sigh of disappointment. He’s not the most annoying boy in Jabin, like some others who like to pick on girls, but he’s intense for a fifteen-year-old. He tinkers with machines all the time, finding old, broken gadgets from Pisan’s junkyard and rebuilding them, so I guess he’s some kind of mechanical genius. If any of us kids have a chance make it to a city on Choosing Day, it’s him. But it’s like he doesn’t think about anything other than gears and cranks. So much for interesting company on the trip.

Hey, he says, lifting his hand when he sees me. Are you the one going to the warehouse—

Yes, I snap, walking past him. I just want to get this stupid mission over with.