KLAREN
Year Twenty-Six
SHE WAS A MOTHER AGAIN.
Not a mistake this time. Rather, a plan that fell perfectly into place.
Her second child sat in her arms, staring up at her. A boy this time, with dark hair and hazel eyes.
He was gentle, this one, but he was strong.
Stronger even than her daughter, Nor, had been.
The queen could feel it when she held the boy, like a spark that jolted from him to her. Sometimes, when she asked him not to cry, he carried on. Sometimes, when she asked him to sleep, he stayed awake for hours, glaring up at her. Screaming until his face was sunset red.
When his father held him, he squirmed as if he, too, hated the man as much as she did.
“Someday,” the queen said, as she looked down at her young son, “you will learn who you truly are. And you will understand why I did everything.”
The baby cried.
She did not love him.
Not in the way she had loved Nor.
“Take him,” she said to the servant beside her. The many-armed woman took the baby into one set of her arms, rocking him gently. “I am going to see Cyprian.”
She swept out into the halls, passing by servants who cast their eyes down.
They had begun to fear her since Cyprian had given her free rein of the estate. Since the place on his arm was no longer taken up by his wife, but instead by the woman he’d ripped away from the battleground on Xen Ptera two years ago.
She found him in his office, seated behind his desk as he pored over the maps of the galaxy. Deciding how best to attack Xen Ptera and the other small planets in the Olen System in the coming days.
“Cyprian,” she said as she entered the cavernous room.
He stiffened. Something he had been doing all too often at the sound of her voice.
She gritted her teeth, forced herself to speak with more strength. “Come to me, my love.”
He stood, his chair scraping back. When he crossed the room, his body was stiff, as if he didn’t want to be near her. He kept his eyes downcast until she placed a gentle finger below his chin and angled his gaze to hers.
“Kiss me, Cyprian,” she whispered.
He pressed his lips to hers in a deep kiss that had him groaning, wanting more. Always more.
She steeled herself as she pulled away and spoke again.
If he obeyed...it would change everything.
“You will take me home tonight,” she said.
Cyprian’s head jerked upward. “What?”
She nodded. Nerves pricked at her senses.
If she could do this, if she could get him to take her back, with their new son in tow...
“I wish to return to Xen Ptera,” the queen pressed. “My husband...he will surrender.”
“Your husband,” Cyprian hissed. “He does not care for you, fool queen.” He shook his head and ripped himself away from her. “I cannot allow this. You have seen too much. Heard too much.” His shoulders rose and fell as he inhaled and released a breath. “You are bound to me now, Klaren. Through our child.”
“Which is why I wish to take him, too,” she said. She swept closer to him. “Cyprian...look at me, my love.”
He spun around, eyes flashing. “I will not allow you to bewitch me again.”
“Bewitch you?” She put the power into her words, where her compulsion was strongest. Put the power into her gaze, too.
She could feel it working on him, but only for a moment.
Then she hit the wall.
Little by little, Cyprian had begun fighting back, building a wall within his mind. As if there was something inside of him, some hidden power that he, too, bore.
“You will send me and Valen to Xen Ptera,” the queen said. Her body shook with the power she urged into her words. “Tonight.”
Cyprian was motionless as he watched her.
“You will send me and Valen to Xen Ptera,” she tried again, sweat beading on her brow. “Tonight.”
“Tonight,” Cyprian said, and she felt the wall in his mind begin to crumble.
Exhaustion had made him weaker.
It was why, each night, she kept him awake with her kisses, her touch, her false love.
“My husband will allow us entry,” she said, still using her power on him, compelling him to obey, “as long as you propose a cease-fire. From both sides. For one day. You will release Valen and me to Xen Ptera, and you will forget that we existed. You will remove us from your memories and from your heart.”
Cyprian looked up.
This time, when he locked eyes with her, she saw that she had finally won.
“Pack your bags, my dear,” he said. “Tonight, you will board a ship. It is time for you to return home.”
“And then?” she pressed.
“And then,” Cyprian said, his jaw tight as her power flowed into him, “I will remove you both from my memories and my heart.”
“Good,” she said. “We leave at nightfall.”
As the prisoner queen left Cyprian’s office, her steps light and bouncing, she could not help but smile at everyone who passed.
Every fool, unaware of her plans. Her time on Arcardius had been hell. A necessary one, but a hell all the same. It had taken years for her to truly understand the magnitude of what was at play.
Tonight she would return to her Xen Pterran throne. Back to her husband, back to her daughter, to introduce them to her newborn son.
He was asleep when she went to him, the many-armed servant standing guard as promised.
“You look pleased, mistress,” the servant said, anxiously twisting her many hands together, like a tangle of knots.
“I am pleased.” The prisoner queen smiled, because she knew the truth. “Perhaps for the first time in a very long while.”
Freedom was within her grasp. And when her children met, when they combined the strength of the abilities that she’d felt in both of them...she could almost feel the distant Conduit tremble, even from here.
The galaxy did not stand a chance.