Stars of Blood and Glory (5 page)

She paused, unsure what to say. Her brother’s
eyes pleaded with her, however, and she knew that she couldn’t
refuse him. She took a deep breath and gave him a parting hug.

“
Do your best, Katsu,” she
whispered in his ear. “Make Father proud.”

“
I will,” he said. “Take care of
yourself, Hika.”

As the door slid shut behind him, Hikaru
clenched her fists to keep her knees from trembling. Never before
had the spotless paneled walls of the Imperial Palace felt so
confining.

* * * * *

Katsuichi gripped his cushioned armrests and
closed his eyes as the ferry shuttle sped through the upper
atmosphere, scramjets roaring as they took him into orbit. The
gee-forces pressed him back against his dark leather chair, but
despite the loud noise, a deep sense of calm and relief washed
through him. After so many months of anxious hand-wringing, events
were finally in motion, with a clear set of objectives in
sight.

Protect Shinihon. Repay the debt of honor to
the Federation. Defeat the Hameji.

The rumbling died down as the shuttle rose
through the last few layers of atmosphere. Katsuichi opened his
eyes and turned his head to look out the porthole to his right. The
clear blue sky had turned pitch black, while far below him the
curvature of the planet bent the horizon into a glowing arc. White
clouds speckled the endless ocean, with massive swirling storms
churning toward the equator and seasonal ice floes visible in the
far north.

“
Beautiful, isn’t it?” said Kenta
from the seat behind him. “If you ever start to miss it, young
master, just think how it will feel to return
victorious.”

“
I will,” said Katsuichi, “but my
heart will never stop yearning so long as I am gone.”

Kenta patted him on the shoulder with a wide,
heavy hand. “Spoken like a proud son of Shinihon,” he said. “You
truly are your father’s son.”

His words made Katsuichi smile. Outside, the
view shifted as the shuttle banked to maneuver into its final
orbit.

The royal fleet lay dead ahead, parked in
battle formation at the planet’s main station in anticipation of
his arrival. Katsuichi leaned forward in his chair and looked over
the pilot’s shoulder to get a better view. The sleek cruisers were
shaped like silver daggers, their hulls as smooth as glass. Each
one had a pair of sublight engines that glowed a dark blue, the
color of the world-ocean reflecting a clear sky at noon.

At the center of the fleet sat
the much larger flagship
Divine Wind,
like a miniature island-city amid a school of
silverfish. Unlike the others, it took a prolonged diamond shape,
with a bulge in the center that resembled a series of cascading
domes from his home. The bridge was at the top of the bulge, with
windows stretching 360 degrees around it.

Katsuichi had been on board it only once,
during a tour of the fleet in which he’d shadowed his father. He
remembered the subtle luxury of the ship, with its arced bulkheads
and multiple windows. Originally a royal pleasure yacht, it had
been converted into a warship when he was just a boy. Now, it
featured multiple redundant jump drives and power reactors, ten
rapid-fire laser stars, twin plasma cannons, an arsenal of almost
fifty tactical nuclear warheads, and six full squadrons of the
latest generation of drone fighter craft. Every square meter, both
inside and out, had been thoroughly converted to military use.

Katsuichi took a deep breath as
they approached the
Divine Wind.
It was an impressive ship, he knew—but it was no match for
a fully equipped Hameji battle cruiser.

“
Beginning auto-docking
procedure,” said the pilot. “We should arrive in the next ten
minutes, your Highness.”

“
Excellent,” said Katsuichi. He
glanced out the side window again and watched as his world slowly
spun away, revealing the blackness beyond. Whatever his fate held
in store for him, he’d find it in the vast and lonely space between
the stars.

* * * * *

Hikaru clenched her fists and stared out the
narrow palace window at the rapidly fading sunset. The outlying
clouds of a tropical storm system had blown in over the afternoon,
and they now cast the sky in brilliant hues of purple, red, and
orange. Shuttles glimmered in the dwindling sunlight around
Fukai-Nami’s various hangars and landing pads, indicating that the
island city was preparing to submerge, perhaps for as long as a
week.

The realization only made her feel more
powerless. She felt as if the city were a cage, dragging her down
into a watery grave—or worse, drowning her in an endless procession
of social events and royal obligations. It was more than just a
pretty flower-box—it was a prison, and she’d been a prisoner since
birth.

“
Milady?” came a timid voice
behind her. She turned and saw two of her maidservants: one of them
with a bath towel, the other carrying a set of silk
pajamas.

Hikaru sighed heavily. “Yes?”

“
Milady, the bath is
ready.”

“
I’m coming, I’m
coming.”

She followed them to the door and stopped. A
crazy idea flashed into her mind, making her heart skip a beat. The
servant with the towel was just about her height, with a similar
face. She moved to slide the door open, but Hikaru grabbed her by
the wrist before she could.

“
M-milady?”

“
Wait,” she commanded. “Your
hair, your figure—what’s your name?”

“
Ch-Chizuko,” the girl stuttered.
Her eyes grew frightened, but Hikaru ignored that.

“
You look just like me, Chizuko,”
she said. “Here, take off your clothes.”

“
T-take them off? Milady,
I—”

“
You heard me,” said Hikaru,
slipping her palace robes up over her head. “Take them off and put
these on. And you—yes, you—help her.”

The two girls did their best to comply with
her strange orders. As the shorter one helped Chizuko out of her
apron, Hikaru all but tore it off, making the poor maidservant
squeal. “Your skirt,” said Hikaru. “Yes—everything but the
undergarments. Hurry!”

Chizuko handed off her clothes and hugged her
chest, unsure whether to put on her mistress’s royal robes. For her
part, Hikaru wasted no time slipping into the maidservants’
uniform. To her delight, it fit her perfectly.

“
Well, aren’t you going to put my
clothes on?” she said, staring at the unresponsive girls. “Come
on—what are you waiting for?”

“
B-but milady,” said Chizuko,
trembling. “Your clothes, I-I am just a servant.”

“
I don’t care. Put them on now!
That’s an order!”

Chizuko seemed on the verge of tears, but she
complied, stepping into the flowery silk pajamas. The resemblance
wasn’t perfect, but with the glowlamps dimmed for the night, no one
would know the difference.

“
Good, good,” said Hikaru,
putting her hand to her chin. “This will do nicely.”

“
N-nicely? Milady, what do you
mean?”

“
I’m leaving the palace,” she
said, “and I need someone to take my place. It’s only for a little
while,” she added, seeing the reaction on her servant’s face. “I’ll
be back.”

“
You’re running away?”

She nodded absent-mindedly as she sifted
through a wall compartment, slipping a wrist console and a handful
of cash chips into her apron pocket. “I’ll need your IDs and
passport datachips—give them to me.” The maid-servants hesitated at
first, but their strict obedience conditioning soon pushed them to
comply.

“
I don’t want either of you
ratting me out to the palace guard,” said Hikaru as she took the
documents from their trembling hands. “Understand? Don’t tell them
that I’ve gone.”

The two girls wrapped their arms around each
other and began to cry. “Please, Milady,” said Chizuko. “Please
don’t make us do this. We’re too young to die!”

Hikaru frowned in confusion, until she
realized that honor demanded that her servants commit ritual
suicide if they failed to obey a direct command. She rolled her
eyes and waved her hand in the air.

“
Don’t be silly—when they find
out that I’ve gone, you can tell them that I made you do it. But
don’t go running to them as soon as I leave,
understand?”

The younger girl was sobbing too hard to
respond, but Chizuko wiped her tears with a shaky hand and
nodded.

“
Good,” said Hikaru, tying her
hair back. “Now, could one of you show me to the servants’
entrance?”

Chizuko opened the door and wordlessly showed
her around the back of the wood-paneled hallway to the butler’s
pantry, where a door led down a decidedly more utilitarian
corridor. Hikaru nodded and clapped a hand on the girl’s
shoulder.

“
Thanks,” she said. “Now, try not
to get yourselves caught right away.”

“
Y-yes, milady.”

Without another word, Hikaru turned and
stepped briskly through the doorway, down the forbidden corridor.
Adrenaline surged through her body, from her heart to the tips of
her fingers. Her brother’s words came to her, the promise she’d
made to stay at the palace, and for an instant, a pang of doubt
almost pulled her back.

He doesn’t understand,
she decided,
quickening her step.
No one understands.
Besides, she wasn’t going to be gone
forever. Just long enough to get out of the palace and breathe some
fresh air—long enough to see what the universe was like outside the
palace. She would be back, of course. She owed her brother that
much.

In the meantime, though, her skin tingled at
the prospect of an adventure.

Chapter 3

Abaqa groaned as he buried his head in his
hands. “Why do I have to learn this stuff, Mom?” he whined. “None
of the other princes ever bother with this planetborn stuff. Why
should I?”

“
Because it’s important, dear,”
said Mother Sholpan, shaking her finger at him. “If you’re going to
rule the stars one day, you need to know the language of your
subjects. It won’t get any easier when you’re older, believe me.
Now, repeat after me …”

Abaqa groaned again, louder this time. “But
Mo-om!”

It wasn’t any use, of course—she was
determined to see him through to the end of the lesson. Eventually,
he gave up his tantrum and decided it would be easier to just
comply. It wasn’t that Gaian was a particularly hard language; he
just didn’t see the point of learning it. After all, his father
always said that the weak should learn the ways of the strong. But
his mother seemed to think otherwise, and since Father was off
campaigning right now, he had no choice but to obey.

“
When will I be able to fight
alongside Father?” he asked as the language lesson came to a
close.

“
When you’re old enough to
command your own ship,” she said, switching off the holographic
display embedded in the surface of the table. “But remember: War
isn’t the only honorable way to win a name for yourself. If you can
rule your people with justice and benevolence, it will work much
more to your credit in the long run.”

“
Yeah, yeah,” said Abaqa, rolling
his eyes. “Father says that when I can pilot a gunboat, I should
join one of my brother’s fleets. I just beat the last training
mission in the simulator—I think I’m ready.”

Sholpan’s cheeks paled. “Is that so?”

“
Yeah. But don’t worry, Mom—I can
take care of myself. After all, Father was younger than me when he
flew his first gunboat.”

“
Indeed,” she said, her voice
subdued.

“
Jahan already told me that he
wants to sign me on with his war fleet. He’s spent the last few
days mobilizing for the new campaign, and—”

Without warning, his mother wrapped her arms
around him in a tight embrace. He started to protest, until he
noticed the tears on her cheeks. With a strange mixture of emotions
in his heart, he put his arms around her as well.

“
I love you, son. You mean
everything to me.”

“
I understand,
Mother.”

“
No, you don’t, Abie. You really
don’t.”

Even though his cheeks grew warm at her
comment, something told him it would be better not to argue. He let
her go and left the room without saying another word.

* * * * *

Abaqa stepped through the airlock into the
luxuriously furnished shuttle. The authentic wood panels on the
floor and walls smelled fresh and earthy, a tribute from the
planetborn his father had conquered. He ran his fingers along the
polished surface and absent-mindedly traced the light-brown
grain.

The door at the end of the corridor hissed
open, and his half-brother Prince Jahan stepped out. A
barrel-chested young man with a round face and swarthy complexion,
he grinned the moment their eyes met and spread out his arms to
give Abaqa a warm embrace.

“
Abie, Brother! How are you? It’s
been too long!”

“
And too long from you, Jahan,”
said Abaqa, patting his brother on the back. “How goes the
battle?”

“
Very well, very well. You’ve
heard about the new campaign, haven’t you?”

Abaqa stepped back and nodded. “Yes, yes, of
course. Will you let me join you?”

Jahan laughed. “You’re young—but that’s only
a temporary handicap. Come, let’s talk about it.”