Firestone Rings (The Two Moons of Rehnor, Book 4) Read online

  “You’re turning into a Lightie too,” I remarked, following him through the series of empty dark offices.

  “I know,” he replied. “Everyone tells me that. Genetics are funny, aren’t they?”

  “They are,” I agreed with a laugh. “No one would ever imagine that I, a simple, humble and jovial fellow and your wretched Evil Emperor are related.”

  Berkan snorted with laughter although he was obviously very weary.

  “Well Prince Sorkan,” he said, standing before the last set of doors. “I hope you come out of this audience alive. Your humor would be sorely missed should you not.”

  “I will.” I winked at him. “Go to bed. I’ll fend off the dragon the rest of the night for you.”

  “Thank you, Sir.” He ducked his head and disappeared.

  I slipped through the dark, ornate doors and found myself in an enormous office. It was as I recalled from a brief visit here nearly ten years ago. It was beautifully furnished and trimmed in highly polished woodwork with ornate frescoes and flourishes. A huge fireplace with a mantel surrounded in River Rock dominated one wall and next to it sat a couple of leather sofas and tables. Along the other wall stood a massive conference table, seating for forty or fifty with vids suspended overhead.

  Directly ahead of me were huge picture windows, lining the entire eastern side of the office. Each one of them was more than thirty feet high and though the sound of the ocean was kept in abeyance, the sight of her was not. Even in the dark of these early morning hours, it was an extraordinarily impressive view.

  In the center of the windows was a set of French doors leading out to a terrace. Before the doors sat a great desk which even at this hour was piled high with papers, a net book, and an empty bottle of vodka or two. The desk was empty but the French doors were open and so I crossed the chamber and let myself out upon the marble terrace.

  “Sorkan,” his voice startled me for I did not see him at first. The voice came from behind and so I turned and spied him sitting wedged in a corner between the terrace wall and the window. He smoked a Mishak cigarette and the tip glowed red in the darkness. The gold bands about his wrists glinted in the dim light.

  “Hello Senya,” I replied. “I will sit on the steps so I may enjoy the view of the stars and the ocean. The two moons are risen. Will you come sit with me here?” I seated myself on the top most step and leaned against the balustrade. It was indeed a beautiful and warm night. Presently, he rose and joined me, though on the opposite side. He settled in awkwardly, his bad leg extended out in front of him.

  “I am glad you waited for me,” I said. “I should like to speak with you tonight.”

  “I have nowhere else to go,” he replied. “My wings have been clipped.”

  “I suppose you could go to bed and sleep. It might do you good. You might actually awaken in a better mood.”

  He exhaled grey smoke into the air but did not respond.

  “It is a cruel irony now that I must ask your permission to marry again,” I said, for this was primarily the reason for my visit. All princes must receive the King’s permission. Even Rekah, for all his many wives, did need to beseech my father, and, of course, Sehron had to appeal to both my father and Yokaa Kalila.

  “No,” my son said and lit himself a fresh cigarette.

  “No?” I cried, taken aback at his quick decision. “Without thought you say this? You know nothing of my lady or my life. Do you do this just to punish me? Surely, I have begged your forgiveness enough over the years yet you still…”

  “You tire of her already,” he interrupted, his voice laced with derision. “You will not admit it because you enjoy her warm body but her conversation is lacking and her copious offspring annoy you.”

  “That’s not true!” I protested.

  “You will return home tomorrow with your own singular grandson and realize that I am correct. You will find his company far more pleasurable to her numerous brats and you will breathe a great sigh of relief that I saved you from yet another colossal mistake. You may go back and tell her that I denied you this permission. She will weep and together you will comfort each other and you will lie there and think how lucky you are that on the next day you may return alone to your bed and your quiet house where everything is just the way you like it. You and Shika will play chess at night. You will teach him to ride during the day, and to work your small plot in your back garden. He will demonstrate a fair skill in both the riding and the growing of zucchini, and you will be content.”

  “Will I?”

  “Of course you will,” he replied and breathed out a great plume of smoke. “You agree with me already.”

  “I don’t,” I protested but mildly for I was already thinking on his words and how much I would enjoy only Shika’s company. I was indeed about to plant zucchini this week and perhaps would now wait and instruct Shika in the best way to do so that he might have his own harvest. “Well maybe you are right,” I conceded for the more I thought on this, the better I liked it. I really did find all of Loora’s children tiresome and though they desperately wanted me to be their Papa, I had hardly been a father, let alone a grandfather to so many. Yes, I would prefer just to have the one boy right now even if it meant Loora wouldn’t be warming my bed at night.

  “Kari-fa, Senya,” I chuckled. “How did you get to be so smart? Surely it was not my genes nor your mother’s for as pleasant as she was, she certainly was no brain surgeon.” Even in the darkness I could see him smile a little at this.

  “Was she pleasant?” he asked.

  “Indeed, she was delightful,” I replied and thought on her and on our brief time together. “Quite different from the rest of those Kalilas, especially your grandmother.”

  “Moira has had a difficult life.”

  “We have all had a difficult life. The difference was you and I dealt with it by intoxicating ourselves. Moira dealt with it by turning into a nasty witch.”

  “She has been good with Shika.”

  “She has,” I agreed. “As have I.”

  “As have you.”

  “Thank you,” I said and watched the moons begin their descent into the ocean. It would be dawn soon. The air was warm. Summer was pleasant here in Mishnah. “It’s your birthday next week,” I realized.

  “Is it?”

  “Yes, of course. Is it not a holiday throughout the Empire?”

  “Is it?” he said again and gripping the balustrade, pulled himself to his feet, or rather his foot as his bad leg could hold very little weight.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “All the time.” He limped back toward the office. I rose and followed him.

  “Is there anything that can be done?”

  He turned and for a moment, the silver light panned my face. His expression was unreadable. “Only one thing, Sorkan,” he said. “I bid you goodnight.” He limped off to toward the fireplace where I saw now a door led out of this room.

  “Goodnight Senya,” I called although he had already disappeared.

  Chapter 24

  Caroline

  When Katie took over as Captain of the Discovery, I transferred off. She was my best girlfriend then and even so I was insanely jealous of her. She was happily married to the most gorgeous and wealthiest guy in the whole galaxy for a number of years already, had the darlingest little boy and now was going to be my commanding officer. I just couldn't take all that. Ten years earlier when we were both young and single and gossiping about every guy in the security force or engineering department, that was one thing. Now her life was clearly so much better than mine, I simply could not function. I needed something just to get me through the day and so I started pinching stuff from the pharmacy.

  Oh, it wasn't anything specific at first. Just little bit of this or a little bit of that just to make me feel better. And then of course it became a little bit more and then a little bit more because your body gets used to the amount you’re pinching and you need more and more over time.

  Of course
, Jerry started to notice that his supplies were dropping faster than we were using them and he started to question everyone except me. That fool always trusted me whether I deserved it or not. About then was when I put in my transfer request and off I went to the SS Columbia.

  Jerry was pathetic. He was a nice guy and I loved him in a kind of goofy, doctor/nurse, friendship kind of way but I also felt sorry for him and I pitied him big time. He so clearly loved Katie and was content to spend the rest of his life in a state of unrequited frustration just in case Dr. Stud Muffin Brain Surgeon decided to move on to multiple or younger pastures.

  That was another reason I started doing stuff. I just couldn't stand to come to work every day and see Jerry's puppy dog face lighting up every time Katie came near as if she were going to throw him a bone.

  So like I said, off to the Columbia I went but unfortunately, at this point, I was too far gone and began pinching bigger and bigger amounts from their pharmacy. I had a boyfriend on the Columbia who liked stuff as much as I did. So there I was pinching stuff for him too and afore long, I was caught, brought up on charges, kicked out of Spaceforce and sentenced to drug rehab and community service.

  I ended up in drug rehab on Derius II which was an Allied planet at the time and known for having a good dry out facility that treated a lot of ex-Spaceforce personnel. Not only were we dried out there, but a lot came in with severe cases of spacesickness, including the kind that blows out your mind instead of just your limbs. The whole entire hospital there was practically Spaceforce rejects in one form or another.

  For a good hospital, the facility was worthy of the early 20th century. It was built entirely of ugly grey cement blocks, had communal showers and bathrooms, and smelled like urine and other nasty stuff and the heating and electricity almost never worked correctly. It was far too hot in the summer and positively frigid in the winter. It was ugly and nasty but after being checked in by Command and suffering through withdrawal for a while, at six months I checked out clean.

  Unfortunately, I had been sentenced to two years community service as well and because I had nowhere else to go and no one else caring where I went, I turned right around and offered up my nursing services and moved right back in. Once my two years were up, I stayed on as a paid employee.

  I liked it in a perverse way I guess. My self-esteem had long since been flushed down the toilet and I figured I needed to spend the rest of my life suffering in this backwater before I could go off and have a heavenly reward. And suffer I did because working with spacesick patients who are permanently so and didn’t know their own asses from their mouths was nasty business.

  All told, I worked there including my community service time for more than thirteen years. Also working in this hell hole were two Andorian nurses Kira and Noka who like me had got themselves kicked out of Spaceforce and sent here as punishment. Like me they had nowhere else to go and stayed on. Kira had a sexual addiction and would do it with and to anyone, anywhere, anytime. She got herself in trouble by coming on to one too many married officers who arranged for her transfer here. Noka on the other hand liked to pinch a little stuff and got herself into dry out just like me. The three of us became a little team which was fine because Kira had no interest in either of us gals.

  Like I said, I had been here for thirteen years or so when Dr. Weimar, commonly referred to as the Big Doc among us nurses, transferred me to the mental wing. These were spacesick types but not the kind that you have to strap down. These were also drug blown brains.

  It was kind of easy work because most of these types were mobile. They could toilet and wash themselves. They dressed and fed themselves and some of them even worked doing routine tasks for which they were paid a few pennies. Some of the borderline cases we tried to give a little therapy. We sat in circles and attempted to make conversation. Most of the time, nobody but the nurses spoke. Like I said though, it was easy work and getting assigned there was a reward for me. Noka was already working that ward because she was a good nurse and very obedient. Kira was working it too because she was screwing the Big Doc among others.

  My group of patients were men, so the first time I noticed the woman was during free time in the dayroom when the vid was on and the news was covering the birthday celebrations for the Emperor of Rehnor. It had just been announced that the Derian planets were being taken over by the Empire as a sort of birthday gift to him I guess.

  It was mid-afternoon and the sun was shining in through the bars on the windows. Most of the patients were in their own zone and only a few of the conscious ones were watching the vid. Noka and I were preparing pill packets and listening to how our lives were about to change.

  “I think it is a good thing,” Noka said. “I like Rehnorians.”

  “I hope this hospital gets taken over by SdK,” I replied. “Maybe they will give us a new building where the air conditioning actually works.”

  “And hot water, too,” Noka added. “Very strange times are these. “

  “I agree but in what way do you mean?” I stacked more than forty cups against the wall. Each had a name and a number. The number would match the one on the patient's bracelet.

  “First I grew up on Andorus and we were only Andorians. Then we were Allied Andorians, then Rehnorian Andorians and now I am Derian Andorian and will become a Rehnorian Derian Andorian!” She laughed making a throaty kind of huh huh sound.

  “Isn't Andorus still Allied?” I asked. “You can go back there if you want. They said you don't have stay within the Empire if you don't want to be.”

  “I don't want to go back,” she replied and went to the window where the patients were already queuing. “I like Rehnor. I like Derius also. I will live here. Andorus served the MaKennah ka Rehnor long before the other planets. We were Rehnorian Andorian even before there was an Empire.” She laughed again at the silliness of it. “What will you do, Caroline?” She checked the male patient's bracelet and then handed him his cup of pills.

  “Oh, I guess I'm here for a while yet,” I sighed. “I really don't have anywhere else to go. I don't mind the Rehnorians either, although I used to hate them. We had so many run-ins with them when I was aboard the Discovery. They were awfully nasty then but of course they were after Dr. Ron and Katie. I don't know how they got so big and made this huge Empire. I thought Katie killed their prince.”

  “Dr. Ron?” Noka gasped. “You call him Dr. Ron?”

  “Yeah. You know about him?”

  “Caroline, you are so silly. Everyone knows about him.”

  “Who?” Kira pushed past the patients and came into the office. “Who him? What am I missing? What guy are you talking about and have I fucked him yet?”

  “I don't think you have,” I said. “At least I dearly hope not.”

  “We are talking about Dr. Ron,” Noka chuckled.

  “Oh, you mean the Emperor?” Kira said and sighed heavily. “Oh my, oh my, that man is hot! Even when he's creepy crazy looking he's hot. What would I give for even five minutes with him? ”

  “Which Emperor?” I asked, closing all the pill bottles and locking the cabinet. I was proud of myself. I wasn't even slightly tempted to pocket a few.

  “What do you mean which Emperor?” Kira sneered. “How many are there? Only one smoking hot big Rehnorian dude that I know of.”

  “Emperor of Rehnor,” Noka said and pointed at the vid. “Dr. Ron.”

  I glanced up at the vid and Holy Jesus, if that wasn’t Dr. Ron dressed up to the nines, standing on a balcony with presidents of the Derian planets and looking like he'd much rather go bury himself in a corner with his netbook, a cig and beer. Kira had to pick me up off the floor because my knees just gave away. All the pill cups that hadn't been given out toppled over and the pills were everywhere.

  “Shit Caroline! Now we have to do it all over again,” Kira snapped.

  “I can't believe it,” I cried. “I had no idea! When did that happen?”

  “A long time ago,” Noka said. “Everybody knows.�
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  “I can't believe it. I truly can't believe it,” I gasped, although the more I thought on it, I could believe it. I really could.

  “Shut up, Caroline, and start making more packets,” Kira growled. “What a dunce you are.”

  “What about Katie?” I cried suddenly. “Where is she?”

  “The wife is dead,” Kira said, sweeping up the pills. “Fuck Caroline, you get to explain what happened to all these to the Big Doc.”

  “Katie's dead?” I gasped, covering my mouth.

  “Maybe.” Noka told the other patients to go sit down for a few more minutes and started refilling the cups. “She crashed in spaceplane and disappeared a long time ago.”

  “Oh Lordy. Poor Dr. Ron! Oh, he loved her so much.” I could burst into tears just thinking about them. Katie dead? My best friend Katie dead all this time and I didn't even know it? “And what about little Shika? Is he okay?”

  “Wait a minute, Caroline. You are telling us you actually knew them?” Kira turned and stared at me.

  “Well yes,” I cried. “I did. Poor baby Shika. He was the sweetest little thing. Katie was my very best friend from the day I came aboard the Discovery and got waylaid by the spacesickness. I can't believe she is dead. It can't be true! Oh lordy, Ron must be totally devastated. She was his sun and moon and stars.”

  “You actually know them?” Kira repeated slowly. “Well fuck it, Adamson. We are out of this place and going to go find him. You know him, you can get us in the door.”

  “Find him and do what?” Noka asked.

  “Do what any woman with a pulse would do,” Kira practically screamed.

  “Oh lord, I just can't believe it,” I cried again and damnit, there was an oxycontin on the floor next to me that escaped Kira's broom.

  “Don't!” Noka yelled, seeing my hand grasp it. “No no no Caroline.”

  “Just one,” I begged. “Just one, that's all. This is just too much for me to handle right now.”

  “Honey, you are not starting that trip again,” Kira commanded. “We have big plans now, and you aren't going to blow it for us.”