Traitor Betrayed

By Wayne Austin

AUS/UK Edition

Book One of The Zhivar Trilogy

What does it take to drive a noble man to betray his ideals? The deaths of fifty million? The deaths of his family? Or the deaths of his two little angels?

When Arkley Saundier, aka Arkley the Traitor, sinks into madness, no price is too high. Not even the life of his wife, his Federation Whore.

But it’s not Danora’s betrayal that drives him to the brink.

As for Danora, selling her soul is the least she can do to find a cure for her two daughters, caught on the precipice of death. But Salma Neilor, the Stellar Federation’s president, needs her to take an offer to the mysterious Zhivar.

First though, Salma has to stop Arkley, and to do that she gives Melangie Tarjour, a Feebarn Alliance rogue trader and lover of Arkley’s hated cousin, an offer she can’t refuse despite the old wounds it will open.

And to make matters worse, she has to battle wits with Jackarel, the womanizing bastard...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Mar 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9781447817376

Book preview

PROLOGUE

‘So, tell me, el sergeanto,’ Karolic asked in his most officious voice as he squinted at the screen, ‘what’s it like screwing the Federation Whore?’

It was hard to make out what Darnstorn’s agents were up to because the Dragon’s eye was unusually active at the moment. At the best of times this pair of strange quark stars, orbiting each other in close proximity, spat out enough radiation and magnetic flux to drown out any but the most robust of magneto-optics, even those two light years away. But now that the eye was having a fit of tears...

‘Please, mon capitan!’ a wheedling voice rose up from below, ‘Danora, she no like being called that. If she get the chance, she cut Darnstorn’s manhood down to size if it no already so small.’

Jackarel floated to a stop in the central shaft at the side and reached over to offer a bulb filled with a dark brown fluid. Karolic glanced at the hurt look on his partner’s nubile face, though he was far from effeminate. For a moment, Jackarel persisted, then, with a stifled snort, his usual cocky grin returned.

‘Daedorlecto, your favourite,’ he offered, his voice back to its normal, easy-going lilt. The faint perfume from his recent shower wash exuded into the snug space to improve the cockpit’s ambience. ‘Anything new?’

‘Nah.’ Karolic scowled and accepted the bulb with little enthusiasm. He would have liked to sit in the saloon’s comfort, but with space at a premium in the president’s coupé and with Jackarel wanting to work out his frustration on the exercise equipment, well, one had to make compromises in any relationship. Anyway, in another hour it would be his turn to take vengeance on that same equipment. ‘This is driving me cross-eyed. Baby, have you picked up anything? They must be talking to each other.’

‘I have not detected any backscatter in the communication bands, Federation or other,’ the Babirush’s personality answered in President Neilor’s voice, but with a sultry tease that Jackarel had added halfway through the mission. ‘Perhaps Patrek’s theory on Minister Darnstorn’s sexual preferences is correct and he does indeed like the strong, silent types. If you like, I will add that to my report for President Neilor.’

Karolic chuckled, but his mood soured as he stared at the jittery conglomeration of noise that fouled the close-up view of the five ovoid shapes flying in a parallel formation. Then he growled and sat back to stretch. For three weeks, they had been spying on the Minister for Security’s agents and in that time the five ships had done nothing but sweep back and forth across a swathe of space, two and a half million kilometres long by half a million kilometres wide. It took ten sweeps at twenty hours per sweep to cover the swathe and then the five ships refuelled from a tanker and moved toward the comet belt by a hundred thousand kilometres to begin another swathe. This was the third swathe. Boring.

But then Darnstorn didn’t send his most trusted agents on a fool’s errand. Nor did President Neilor.

Karolic sucked on the bulb’s drinking straw for a decent swig of the gamy coffee and swished it round with his tongue before swallowing. It was a pity this mission had been so late notice, but such was the urgency, they hadn’t had time to restock the Babirush, and of all the president’s eclectic beverages, this was the one he could stomach the most.

He glanced sideways at Jackarel, staring forlornly at the screen. After so many weeks of being cooped up with each other, they had both run out of things to say. Though officially captain and sergeant in the Presidential Guard, they held the same rank in President Neilor’s elite Intelligence Section — so secret even Darnstorn didn’t know it existed.

Karolic let out a long, slow sigh to release his tension. It wasn’t the boredom or that he didn’t get on well with his partner that was the problem — they had been on plenty of long missions before and were used to each other’s little quirks — no, it was the not knowing. Like not knowing why they were here. And not knowing what Darnstorn was up to, because he was certainly up to something, the way he seemed to be determined to drive the Trithium Octet into revolt. Was it more than mere revenge? Was that why the president was reduced to grasping at straws?

With a resigned shrug, he turned to Jackarel to get his mind off his brooding thoughts. ‘So? Patrek? I thought you were a tits and arse guy. That’s what you keep telling me.’

‘Yeah.’ Jackarel shrugged, looking forlorn. ‘But when my great-grandaunt commands, I must obey. Actually...’ His cocky grin winked back on and turned to a smirk. ‘You wouldn’t think, to look at her, I mean — she’s so demure and so delicate — but when she wants it ... oh ho! She really wants it.’ He snorted a chuckle and then sucked on his straw. ‘I pity her husband.’

‘She must hate him.’

Jackarel cocked an eyebrow and looked sideways as he thought about it. ‘Don’t know if it’s hate. More like she’s resigned to it. I know she likes to bait him.’

‘I’ve heard he beats her.’

‘Nah. Just slaps her every now and then. He’s got a short fuse. But like I said, she baits him. I think it’s her way of rebelling against her mother. So’s the cheating.’

‘Does he know?’

‘Completely in the dark.’

‘Like us.’ Karolic sucked on his straw and screwed his face up in disgust. How could anyone think to make coffee from beans that had been through an elephant’s gut? He had tried Kopi Luwak at the president’s insistence once and thought it overpriced, nor did it have a subtle aroma that hinted at its origins like Daedorlecto did.

‘I hope Darnstorn’s agents give up this farce soon,’ Jackarel grumbled, ‘I’m supposed to be back in time for Saundier’s inauguration.’

‘So am I, but orders are orders. Looks like we’re stuck here for at least another month.’ Karolic shook his head as he drummed his fingers on the flight console. Orders were one of those pitfalls that went with the job, like getting shot at, but at least with getting shot at, he could shoot back.

‘I heard he was livid when he found out she’d taken the girls.’ Jackarel chuckled. ‘Must be worth a few slaps when she gets back.’

‘You’re a sick—’

An alarm cut Karolic off and a yellow icon lit up on the console as the image, from one of the spiders dispersed along the edge of the comet belt, swung up through ninety degrees. He peered at the dim outline of an octahedron that flew past in reverse, braking, and frowned. Something about the green glow that emanated from the alien ship’s stubby wings twigged an old memory.

‘What?’ Jackarel asked.

‘I’ve seen one like it before. Once. When I was deep in the Feebarn Alliance. Oh, fifteen years ago, I guess.’

‘It is a Klevian trader,’ said Baby.

‘God, look at the size of it,’ Jackarel muttered. ‘I wonder what they’re doing here?’

‘It,’ said Baby. ‘The Klev travel alone, but my information is cursory as they have rarely visited the Stellar Federation. My latest report also comes from the Feebarn Alliance. The Klevian is scanning Darnstorn’s agents ... odd, I can detect traces of Federation encryption in the laser backscatter. It appears to be trying to communicate.’

‘A rendezvous?’ Jackarel stared at Karolic with wide eyes and, for once, the grin was wiped from his face.

Karolic shrugged. Curiosity with lesser species wasn’t one of the advanced races’ strong suits and some did accuse them of wilful ignorance, although... He pursed his lips. Perhaps he shouldn’t have dismissed those rumours from the Feebarn Alliance after all.

‘Baby, is that an old encryption?’ Jackarel asked.

‘My analysis indicates it is using current military algorithms, but the level of uncertainty is high... Now that is curious. It looks like one of the agents is replying. They appear to be having a conversation.’

‘I don’t get it,’ Karolic mused, as he watched the trader slow to a stop, still quite short of the ships. ‘Darnstorn hasn’t reported on making contact with any of the advanced races to the Council. I have a bad feeling about this.’

‘You think they have an interest in Federation politics?’

Karolic glanced at Jackarel and shrugged. This was the last thing President Neilor needed, what with the unrest in the Trithium Octet Protectorate and the terrorist attacks, and now with the Minister for Security trying to oust her with his threat of a No Confidence vote in the High Council.

He grimaced. ‘I wish I knew what they were looking for.’

‘Maybe the Klevian’s just interested in what they know about the gamma-ray anomaly that blew out all the research satellites,’ Jackarel suggested.

But Karolic didn’t believe that for a moment and the sick feeling in his stomach grew. Then the Klevian’s plasma drives flared to life. ‘It’s leaving.’ He relaxed and began to rub his stomach as the feeling eased. ‘You must be right—’

A warning chime rang out. ‘The Klevian has just scanned this region of the comet belt,’ said Baby. ‘It is heading in our direction and the agents are following.’

‘Uh oh, talk about being in the wrong place,’ Jackarel said. ‘Time to go.’

‘Damn.’ Karolic winced. ‘We must have been detected.’ They could outrun Darnstorn’s agents, but not the Klevian, even if they managed to switch.

‘I don’t think so,’ said Baby. ‘It appears to be scanning for something in the interstellar medium.’

‘An ion trail?’ That inferred that a ship had come this way. ‘If it is,’ Karolic mused, ‘it must be really faint if they couldn’t find anything.’ He scratched his cheek as he pondered the agents moving to join the Klevian. Having a conversation was one thing, but working with... Or for... The bad feeling returned as he stared hard at the screen. It had to be an alien ship. That would explain the Klevian’s interest, but why was Darnstorn helping it? That was the important question, but the laser backscatter refused to say.

‘Okay,’ he said at last, ‘but I still want to see if they find anything. So, thrusters only. Nice and slow. Baby, pull the spiders back, but keep them spread out.’

With gentle thrusts, the Babirush eased away from its hiding place behind a pear-shaped chunk of ice and headed deeper into the belt. Hidey-holes were aplenty. The icy fragments were more numerous and more closely packed in this region thanks to the shock waves from the creation of the two quark stars a mere fifty thousand or so years ago. A net of spidery robots followed. They scrambled over adjacent icy bodies before crouching and springing away to land on neighbouring bodies.

The hours passed in a tense boredom until the Klevian trader slowed to a stop at the edge of the comet field. As Darnstorn’s agents peeled off in all directions like a net cast over the Babirush, a small, hexagonal rod peeled off the trader’s underbelly and moved in their direction, poking about like a dog sniffing for clues amongst the nearest icy bodies. In the saloon, Karolic scowled.

What if the Klevian caught them? Would it keep them for its own amusement or trade them on to another race as a mere curiosity or worse?

Death he could face, but the unknown? Every instinct told him to slip away, to cut and run, but instead he cursed Darnstorn under his breath and Jackarel nodded to agree. And it went beyond mere duty. The Minister for Security might think this unknown prize was worth the risk, but he had no right to gamble with the Stellar Federation’s future.

As the Babirush pulled back and crept forward, mirroring the rod’s meanderings, some spiders detected a strange alternating x-ray signature amid the jumble of scanning frequencies and he withdrew them, just in case the x-rays scattered off one and gave them away. It was a slow, painstaking process that couldn’t be helped. Without active scanning, they couldn’t keep accurate tabs on the Klevian and the agents and yet they couldn’t dare to not spy on them.

That settled it. Karolic grimaced and then ordered the spiders to creep closer for a line-of-sight view.

As the Babirush edged forward, he glanced at Jackarel, staring intently at the screen as the images flicked from spider to spider. For once his mouth was squeezed into a sombre line. If Darnstorn’s agents caught them, who would ever find two bodies floating amongst these tombstones?

‘Hey!’ Jackarel leaned forward. ‘Go back.’

‘What?’ Karolic studied the dim picture. In the foreground, the icy cracked texture sloped up to a ragged horizon, its grey outline barely discernible against the blackness beyond. In the top right corner, two stars shone where the spider’s view penetrated the comet field. ‘I don’t see anything.’

‘Baby, back that last spider up. I saw something odd.’

The grey horizon began to retreat with jerky movements and then steadied as the spider jumped across a crack. For a tick, tiny circular fringes bubbled in the image.

‘There!’

‘Have the other spiders detected anything like this?’ Karolic asked.

‘No,’ Baby said after a couple of seconds. ‘And it isn’t noise. It’s exactly the same as before and it has a non-random structure. Someone or something has tried to make contact with that spider.’

‘Damn,’ Karolic muttered under his breath. If the Klevian had kept to itself, they could have backed off and let it claim its prize, but with Darnstorn, there had to be quid pro quo. And that had to be bad for the president. He looked askant at Jackarel’s sly smile and made his decision. ‘Baby, send it in to investigate. Let’s see what we’ve found.’

The spider clambered down into the crack and switched on spotlights to illuminate the depths, but the intense brightness failed to show anything amiss amongst the jagged shards sprouting from both sides. Karolic frowned. No matter how hard he squinted, he couldn’t see anything. Even a brief active scan in other wavelengths failed to reveal—

Another burst of interference distorted the scene, but he couldn’t see where it came from.

‘I have detected an anomaly.’ Baby zoomed in on a ragged black splotch that looked like a hole in space.

It had to be an optical illusion. The spider edged closer and reached a foreleg out, but even though its tip jittered across patches of rough textures, Karolic couldn’t see any features in the absolute-black surface. And yet, in the model that Baby created from the tip’s data, it seemed that a chunk had been broken off something and parts of that new edge fused smooth. The spider reached past the anomaly’s edge to explore underneath.

But its tip kept sliding across a smooth nothingness.

It slipped back and forth above the splintered surface but couldn’t reach down to touch it. Then the nothingness snapped off. Karolic half gasped, half laughed as he stared at a pale-white rectangle with rounded ends. It looked so innocuous if it wasn’t for the fact that the damage looked like a two-dimensional image that had been pasted on to the surface and cut to fit.

‘It is about twelve meters long and three meters in width,’ Baby announced.

Karolic sucked in his lips. It must have been caught in a mixture of explosions and some kind of energy-weapon fire, given the black surgical lines scarring its length. If it had weapons as well, it might explain Darnstorn’s involvement. Quid pro quo could come in many forms. As he glanced at Jackarel, his partner nodded, like he had read his mind.

‘Let’s get it on board,’ he ordered, ignoring the feeling in his gut. Let others judge if his actions were rash. But even if the Klev’s intentions were benign, just the fact that Darnstorn hadn’t reported his involvement meant they were interfering in Federation politics, whether they meant to or not, and President Neilor couldn’t allow that.

‘We have to hurry,’ said Baby. ‘That Klevian scout has changed course toward us.’

‘Has it detected this thing’s signal?’ Jackarel asked.

‘I don’t think so. It’s still scanning, but it might be following a residue trail left by this object.’

As two spiders joined the first, it reached down with another foreleg and stopped.

‘That is odd,’ said Baby. ‘My spider cannot detect any edge.’

‘What do you mean?’ Karolic asked.

‘It felt no edge. If there is one, it is too small to measure. The underneath is like the top as well. It’s there but the spider can’t feel it. Nor can it get a grip.’

Karolic glanced across at Jackarel, but his partner looked just as bemused as he was.

The object didn’t resist as the other spiders darted to its end and pushed against it. None of their sensors detected anything as they hauled it out and manoeuvred it into the small cargo hold in the coupé’s belly. A spider leapt across to an adjacent ice-ball and dug in until only the tip of a tiny detector stuck out, and as the Babirush squirted away, others trailed after it to act as relays for the laser signal. The hours crawled, but at last, the scout drifted to a stop above the crack. Karolic held his breath.

Beside him, Jackarel stared at the screen, tapping his teeth.

Small rods split off and darted into the crack, only to return moments later. The spider registered a brief scan and, as if satisfied, the scout turned and began to retrace its steps. Karolic eased his breath out. As he ordered Baby to follow at a safe distance, he wondered what President Neilor would make of this prize. Whether it was worth it or not, only time would tell. All he had to do was get it home.

They followed the rod back to its mother ship and watched it dock, then the Klevian trader rotated toward the distant sun and its plasma drives flared to life. In the distance, faint dots of light crawled towards a waiting fuel tanker.

‘They must think someone’s recovered it,’ said Jackarel.

Karolic nodded to agree, glad for the relief in his stomach. ‘We’ll wait until the Klevian switches before we head in. Okay, let’s refuel.’

It meant waiting another week or so, but a little boredom was fine by him. Baby brought the plasma drives online at low power and the Babirush picked its way toward a small fuel tanker hidden on the inner edge of the comet field.

Karolic broke into a tired smile. Home ... it had been so long.

* * *

A sudden burst of light roused Karolic. ‘What is it?’ he snapped as he covered his eyes with his hands.

‘An alien ship has arrived,’ said Baby.

‘Huh?’ Confused, he feared the worst as he jerked up into a sitting position and rubbed the sleep away. Had he been tricked out into the open? ‘Is it the Klevian?’

‘No. It is much smaller, and I cannot resolve it at this distance, but it is heading for Darnstorn’s agents at three gees.’

A coincidence? Karolic frowned. He didn’t believe in those. He scrambled into his uniform and raced out, but at the base of the central shaft the drives died, and he flew off the floor to crash into the padded ceiling with a hard thump.

‘Patrek!’

‘Sorry,’ Jackarel called out, ‘but I don’t think we should advertise our presence.’

Still rubbing the shoulder that had taken the brunt of the impact, Karolic hauled himself up the shaft until he floated beside the cockpit. In the screen a tiny dot angled toward Darnstorn’s agents—

Lights and the flight panel blanked out. ‘What the hell!’ he snapped in the pitch black. ‘Baby...! Baby?’

‘It’s no good, Jarques. Everything’s dead.’

But not all was dead. As his eyes adjusted, he began to make out the faint red glow of the backup emergency lights lining the shaft.

‘What just happened? We can’t lose all power like that.’

‘Something shut us down. I saw the commands activate just before the screen died. You don’t think our...’

‘God, I hope not.’

‘Do you think we’re stranded?’

‘After it got us to rescue it?’ Karolic sighed and eased back down the shaft, feeling his way with his toes and his hands. If they were, it would be a cruel way to die.

‘Know any good ghost stories?’ Jackarel called after him.

‘Shut up. And that’s an order!’

He cursed under his breath. Their bounty had fooled him into complacency. It had continued to beam its signal every now and then, picking out the same spot on the closest detector, just as it did to the spider that had crossed that crack, but studying it had proved to be a waste of time since scans were useless. Except for the damaged areas, he couldn’t touch it. Yes, there was a surface there, but it felt more like a pressure stopping his hands. No texture, no hardness, nothing he could make sense of. And its thinness. It was so two-dimensional it had freaked him out. And though Jackarel had come up with one wacky theory after another, which only proved he didn’t know what he was talking about, Karolic could read the signs. His erstwhile partner was just as freaked out as he was, if not more so.

Karolic sighed at his stupidity. In hindsight, he should have stashed it back in the comet belt and then sent in a retrieval team, except his master would not have been amused if it had then gone missing. Not that he wanted to bring it back. If his gut had taught him anything, he shouldn’t trust what he didn’t understand. For hadn’t history taught that when two cultures clashed, it was the more primitive one that succumbed?

It was a lesson that Darnstorn seemed to have forgotten. For if there was one thing the advanced and higher races had rammed down humanity’s throat early on, it was where this pesky little biped stood in the pecking order.

* * *

In the darkness, Karolic listened to Jackarel’s soft breathing. To pass the time, they had swapped anecdotes — Karolic on his past missions, Jackarel too, until he couldn’t refrain from describing in ever greater detail his sexual conquests, culminating in what he planned to do to his Federation Whore once he got back. If they got back. With that, he too had petered out. There was no point in talking anymore. It didn’t matter who you were with, death was such a lonely experience. For an age, they had survived on crackers and the president’s weird taste in alcoholic beverages, wrapping themselves in blankets to ward off the growing cold as the atmosphere curdled—

He flinched at the sudden burst of light.

Jackarel cackled a ragged laugh and Karolic broke into a relieved smile. Their prize had given them a reprieve.

‘Four and a half days,’ Baby announced, but she couldn’t explain it. ‘That alien ship is gone and Darnstorn’s agents are lining up along their departure vector, ready to switch.’

She brought the drives back online while Jackarel punched up his first hot meal in days. ‘Boy, will I be glad to get home!’ he declared, as the agents winked out.

‘Don’t tell me you prefer your whore to us?’ Karolic asked in a miffed voice, trying not to laugh. It didn’t matter what the future held, he was still alive and, for the time being, he might as well relish the moment. ‘Very well,’ he decided in his most officious voice. ‘Baby! Call in the pentadrives. Let’s not keep our sergeant waiting!’

CHAPTER 1

‘Death to Arkley the Traitor,’ the holo image pronounced above the ruin of the Federation Art and Cultural Mission in Windameyer, the capital of Cadoux and the prime tourist destination in the Trithium Octet for adventurous Federation citizens. Arkley Saundier stared at the newscast and fumed.

‘Bastard!’ His grip on the chair’s armrests tightened until his fingers complained, though it shouldn’t have surprised him. But he couldn’t help feeling disappointed. He looked down at the deathly-white pallor in his fingertips and let go to shake some feeling back into them.

‘Damn you to hell, cousin,’ he murmured, as the reporter’s dispassionate voice droned on.

Over thirty dead in the blink of an eye, with the vast majority being Trithiums. And not just any Trithiums. These were fellow citizens who agreed that the Octet should join the Stellar Federation rather than remain a protectorate and suffer the woes that went with it. If you can’t beat them, join them. Salma’s old adage was the way of the future — he truly accepted that now — but it wouldn’t be if Bahn Deeto and his ragtag separatists had their way. Dragon’s Eye? It sickened him how these terrorists had hijacked his home’s special jewel. The Dragon Constellation dominated the night skies on all eight worlds and its eye was supposed to watch over the Trithium Octet and keep its citizens safe.

Not murder them.

Arkley scowled as his eyes watered. These were people he counted as true friends, the kind that would stand by you, and it was hard to believe that this breaking news was already a week old. The blood looked so fresh.

As the cameras followed the Federation troops and Cadoux police picking through the rubble, he tugged to straighten the scarlet sash across his formal jacket’s teal, as if this acknowledgement of his own importance could make him immune from guilt. But, as he blinked to clear his eyes, he felt more and more sick. Yes, he was proud of the line of icons below his left shoulder. They touted his awards for public service to the Federation and he’d worked hard to earn them, but it wasn’t like he’d had to put his life on the line.

Not here, safe in the Federation’s bosom. Not like his friends just had.

It had taken a lot of guts for them to come out as it were, but he needed their help to counter the negative public opinion back home. This very newscast was supposed to announce their support for his appointment as the Octet’s governor. It was supposed to herald his triumphant return. Now... He felt his scowl soften. How hard he had worked to persuade them.

It hadn’t always been that way.

He let his eyes defocus on the carnage. In the early days, even in that very building, the crowds had roared their approval. He was the new Gandhi. Through non-violence, he would lead the Octet to freedom by using the Federation’s very own weapons against it. Its laws.

Time and again, in Federation courts, his evidence had helped skewer the corrupt Federation bureaucrats that ran the Octet. The Federation might well look the other way as Darnstorn’s Cronies got away with murder, but they had better not dare line their pockets. Darnstorn’s father had proved the danger in that. Such weaknesses had been exploited by those who would harm the Federation. That such weaknesses still existed, he had proved beyond doubt time and again and it didn’t matter if much of his hard evidence had come from supposed Octet sympathizers within the Federation, he was no one’s puppet. He had criticized the Federation, just as freely as he had criticized Dragon’s Eye, condemning its increasingly violent stance under its supposedly charismatic new leader—

Arkley swore under his breath as the old memory hit a still raw nerve by dredging up yesterday’s fiasco.

He sat back and rubbed his eyes, trying to let go of the fading anger. He had hit her. Of course. Just as he had been determined not to. But who had been the one waiting for her to arrive home, claws out and eager for a fight as soon as she walked through the door?

Yet again, at a public forum on Parasimon, and though looking more pale than usual, she had spoken out against the planet’s overlords and their abuse of their powers. But Danora maintaining her popularity at home wasn’t the problem. It was how she had done it. Revealing that sensitive information about the Daighberg investigation had let Olansky’s second in command and a very big fish nearly slip his hook. Some evidence had vanished, and some witnesses got at. It was to be Arkley’s coup de grâce against Darnstorn’s Cronies, once he assumed the governorship, and it would have sent his public credibility soaring sky high. But once more, he had been thwarted. Almost, this time. And, of all people, again it had been her.

‘Why?’ he had demanded before she’d had time to take off her coat.

But she had been prepared, and as he followed her about while she unpacked, she had retaliated with the same old arguments. Someone had to stand up for the victims. Someone had to stand up to the Federation and someone had to show those corrupt bastards they weren’t going to get away with daylight robbery and if he wasn’t going to be that someone, well she and others like her damn well would be. That was her slap in his face, and it always stung.

And yet it wasn’t fair. She knew better than anyone why he’d had to publicly give up the cause and work in the background. In the Federation, he couldn’t risk being seen as anti-Federation when he was asking for the Federation’s backing to become the Octet’s next governor once he satisfied all the citizenship requirements. Only then could he do some real good. She knew that and yet...

But he couldn’t leave it at that and walk away like he should have. Oh no! He had to know where she’d gotten the information from, since it hadn’t come from him. It was a stupid demand because he knew the answer.

And so, she hit him again.

Bahn? Yes, I saw him. Slap. At least he’s there, taking the fight to them. Slap. At least, he’s there, giving the people someone to believe in! Slap. He’s the man you should have been—

Slap!

In the stinging silence, his hand had tingled. Why did she have to? And then to just stare at him with that condescending coolness in her eyes, it stabbed him through the heart. No anger. No hatred. Just another meaningless victory. It was so like Bahn. And then, to rub it in, she had come to his bed as the dutiful wife and he had rutted to a meaningless climax, feeling as much as she did and wishing to the Almighty Universe that he could feel something. He didn’t know which was worse: to have his heart pierced by a single blade or many. They say blood is thicker than water...

With a sad shake of his head, Arkley switched to another feed for a closer look at his cousin’s evil handiwork.

Even though terror was a blunt weapon, Bahn tended to wield it with more than a callous disregard. But that was Bahn, through and through. Searching for victims buried beneath, a ragged line of spidery medibots scrambled over the blocks of milky-white marble and fragments of obsidian balustrade that poked up through the shattered remnants of the old Supreme Court’s famous spiral roof. No price was too high to get his way. Family. Friends. Nothing.

What Danora had seen in him in the first place was as big a mystery as to why she had then dumped him and thrown herself at a certain local activist whose political aspirations had begun to nosedive. Get into bed with the enemy? What had he been thinking? And yet he remembered that first time he had seen her. So serious, so determined, and with such a pert derriere. And when she had broken with Bahn so publicly and then approached him, who could blame him for thinking he was in love? He certainly did.

He shook his head as the newscast switched back to the sober reporter, staring past and listening.

Her gaze switched to the camera. ‘It’s now official. The Trithium terrorist group, Dragon’s Eye, has claimed responsibility for this terrible crime.’

That Bahn wanted to ruin his big day was a given. That he would succeed so spectacularly ... Arkley sagged back in his chair and felt old before his time. The attack had even pushed the arrival of the mysterious Klevian Trader off the headlines. Pity. Salma’s spin doctors had been playing, for all it was worth, that the alien had arrived for his inauguration.

‘Their leader,’ the reporter continued, ‘Bahn Deeto, has warned that a wave of attacks will sweep across both the Octet and the Federation if Arkley the Traitor is pronounced a full citizen of the Stellar Federation and given voting rights on the Federation High Council. His ascension will spell the end of the Trithium Octet’s proud heritage of freedom and independence.’

‘What freedom?’ Arkley snapped.

‘What was that?’ Danora called out from the en suite, almost as an afterthought. ‘Oh.’ He twisted round to see her standing in the doorway and staring at the devastation in the holo screen with a startled look on her face, her delicate pale skin looking more fragile than usual. ‘Isn’t that—?’

‘Windameyer. Yeah.’

Arkley turned back to the newscast. Why had she come back? She had put off his pleas and cajoling in call after call, saying she would only ruin it for him, and then she’d had a sudden change of heart. Some change. Unwilling was more like it. She acted like she had been pulled back rather than had come of her own volition. He sighed but didn’t bother to hide his disgust.

‘But I thought—’

‘Bahn’s called off his moratorium within the Octet.’

Danora gasped. ‘But he can’t!’ Arkley looked up as she stopped beside him to stare at the image, her brow furrowed, like she couldn’t comprehend the carnage. ‘He wouldn’t attack Parasimon, would he?’

‘I told you not to leave the girls.’ Arkley gritted his teeth and forced his rising anger to subside. He never used to feel any anger, except when it came to Bahn, but it hung around now, like an afterthought, thanks to her. ‘I wanted them here. For the ceremony. I’m the Octet, you’re the Federation and they represent the future. Now they won’t. What will everyone think back home, huh?’

‘But what if he’s targeted...?’ She bit her lip as she glanced at Arkley. ‘Everyone thinks he will.’

‘And that’s why he won’t. You should know that better than anyone.’

‘Arkley, don’t.’ She placed a hesitant hand on his shoulder. ‘After all, I married you, didn’t I?’

‘As you keep—’ He bit off the rest of the retort as she snatched her hand away, her cheeks reddening, like they had last night.

He never used to slap her. That had only arisen after they had arrived in the Federation for his extended stay. Her whole attitude had changed, subtly as they got closer on the trip out from Parasimon, and he had put it down to the stress of returning to her former home. She had been exiled for sedition and though she had been pardoned, there was no love for her here. But that didn’t mean she should take her frustration out on him. After all, who had introduced him to those contacts within President Neilor’s government and who, in private, had urged him down this path of no turning back? And yet she never publicly acknowledged her support for him in the Octet. It seemed an odd self-denial.

‘Sorry,’ he decided, his anger fading again, ‘I’m just tense, that’s all. After all, today is the big day...’ His critical eye ran over her dress — a standard Octet cut in neutral peach and with a fine silver pattern etched over its surface. By now, she should have put on the classical Federation formal gown he had picked out. Then it dawned on him. ‘Is that what you’re wearing? I thought—’

‘I’ve changed my mind.’

‘But you’ll be up on the dais, ready to join me at my side. Everyone will see you.’

‘No, they won’t.’ She hesitated. ‘I ... I can’t do it.’

Arkley jumped to his feet as an overwhelming urge to slap some sense into her swept over him. But the anger ebbed as quickly as it had arisen. This was different. She wasn’t trying to goad him. ‘Why not? You’ve been at my side before.’

‘It’s ... I—’ She backed off and hugged herself, looking more tired and frail than ever. Nervous and on edge. ‘I ... I just can’t.’

‘But ... damn it!’ Arkley took a deep breath and tried to force the disappointment out of his voice. ‘What is the matter with you? It’s bad enough you keep flitting back and forth to Parasimon without even a moment’s notice, but this last year ... I don’t know what to think. You promise to attend important events with me — people notice! Then you just brush me off when I ask where you’ve been. And lately ... Danora, are you ill? You’ve been so jittery—’

‘Ill?’ Her eyes went wide, then she almost broke into a smile and her words rushed out. ‘Yes! That’s it. I’ve been ill. My nerves. I’m sorry, Arkley, but the pressure — this is such a big occasion and—’

‘No...’ He shook his head and opened his arms to offer a forgiving embrace, but she held back, unsure. What an idiot he was. All those attacks in the media would drive anyone crazy. Whore? If only they knew the truth. He managed a reassuring smile. ‘You should have come to me—’

The front door chimed before he could make amends and start rebuilding that bridge. ‘President Salma Neilor to see Arkley and Danora,’ the apartment’s personality announced.

‘I’ll go and greet her.’ Danora turned and darted out of the room before he could stop her.

A nervous breakdown? He pursed his lips and tried to put a finger on just what troubled him about this diagnosis. As far as he knew, her genetic profile gave no hint of a potential for such a disorder. Sticks and stones...? Dealing in politics, he should have known you can kill a man but not a rumour, and though she had begged him not to, he had sued, successfully, those who had spread the salacious rumours and coined the term ‘Federation Whore’, but all he had done was fix it in the public lexicon. But names... Though she said she had forgiven him, he was just as sure she hadn’t. He shrugged it off and ambled after her.

Just outside the doorway into the entrance hall, he heard low voices fighting each other. Danora’s voice, a little strained, grew louder. ‘—not that! You can’t ask me—’

‘You must!’ Salma hissed as if it were an order that couldn’t be refused.

Arkley stepped into the entrance hall. ‘Must what?’ he asked in a soft voice.

‘Oh!’ Danora started, then shot Salma a furtive glance before looking away.

Salma