Shrouded: Heartstone Book One (10 page)

The effect swirled through her nervous system until her heel twitched and tapped to release some of the energy. She took another bite of her breakfast and scanned the pathways. The rest of the brides giggled and gossiped and remained completely oblivious.

“She’s coming back,” Tarren spoke around a mouthful of fruit. “Madame Nerala.”

Vashia followed her nod to the pathway. She caught sight of their teacher approaching, but the madness inside her head pulled from the other direction.
He,
or
they,
or one of
them
was coming from the other side.

“Good morning, girls!” Nerala chirped as she burst from the potted plants like some exotic bird. She flit in her multicolored skirts to the nearest table and deposited an armload of data pads. “Enjoying the view?”

“Is there a surface?” Tarren called out. The questions exploded from the rest of them, as if the cork had been removed from their pent up curiosity.

“How long until we go down?”

“Can we breathe that?”

“When are we leaving?”

The noise almost managed to drown out the static, but whichever prince approached, Vashia’s head spun in response. She clenched her jaw and forced herself to stare at Nerala.

“Now, now,” the woman waved the questions away and waited for quiet. “Your questions will be answered in time. I promise. But first, I have something that might help right off the start.” She patted the stack of pads and smiled like a tiger. “These will answer most of your inquiries, and once you’ve studied them, I’ll sort out the rest.” She turned her head from side to side. “Who can help me pass them around?”

Murrel stood up. While she scurried to help Madame Nerala, Vashia snuck a look over her shoulder in time to see him step into view. She’d known he was there, but the shock of him, the primal trembling under her skin, took her breath away.

He stalked from the plants and stopped, his eyes locking with hers immediately, as if he’d sensed her position as well. She figured he probably had. He held her gaze without flickering away while he walked around the clearing’s edge. His head turned as he passed, kept her pinned with hazel eyes that peeked between the loose strands of his hair.

“Good morning,” Nerala hooted, but he didn’t look at her. “Dolfan? Will you be joining us this morning?”

Dolfan.

“I’m afraid not.” The Shrouded Prince, Dolfan––
Dolfan––
shook his head, his silky, black hair dancing above his shoulders. “But I thought I’d see how you were doing.”

Vashia would have bet her last credit that he spoke directly to her. The static in her head thrummed. Her skin shivered, and her eyes linked to his, not flinching either. She didn’t hear what Nerala said next, though the words drew his attention enough that he turned and Vashia was released from his visual grip.

She dropped her eyes to her hands and found them clamped around the table’s edge. Something brushed her shoulder and she jumped, rattling her chair’s legs against the tile patio. Murrel waited at her side. She held out a data pad and fixed Vashia with a sly look.

“You all right?”

“Fine. I’m fine.” She took the device without meeting the girl’s eyes. Her head buzzed on; she didn’t trust herself to feign normalcy. Not with him so close.
Dolfan.
She flicked the pad’s switch and watched words manifest on the screen: Shrouded Law and Cultural Guide for Bride Candidates.
Bride.
Her eyes danced to the prince and back. In less than twenty-four hours, the word had adopted a whole different meaning.

M
ofitan smiled
at him when he opened the door. The bastard grinned and leaned back in the chair. His feet rested on the lip of the Gauss readout, and his big hands locked behind his empty head.

Dolfan smiled back and took a chair beside him. “How’s the Gauss?”

“Same.” Mof twisted his seat from side to side and grinned. “Normal.”

Normal. Except that he’d found the Kingmaker, except that the woman of his dreams, the perfect woman, took Madame Nerala’s station tour as they sat there grinning like idiots. Both of them grinning like idiots. Dolfan frowned. Why the hell was Mof so tickled?

“What gives?”

“Huh?” Mofitan slid his legs off the console and spun to face him. “What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? You’re grinning like a cat and civil.”

Mofitan nodded and leaned back further. He turned back to the screens, but Dolfan could see his reflection smiling out from them. “Maybe I’m just in a good mood?”

“Maybe.” Dolfan nodded, but a seed of suspicion still nagged.

“Besides,” Mof continued. “When I’m king, it will go easier if we’re not at one another’s throat.”

The seed sprouted into a sapling. The statement didn’t hold Mofitan’s usual swagger. He said it casually, matter-of-factly. “It
will
go easier if we get along,” Dolfan said, “
whoever
is chosen as king.”

“Good, because when I’m king,”—he did it again—“I’ll need full support from the Council to be effective.”

“Full support.” Dolfan let him play a little. In fact, he did wonder what Mofitan as king would look like. He let his curiosity answer. “And what would we be supporting, then?”

“Defense increases.” Mofitan had thought his leadership through. The man had plans hovering around his edges that Dolfan had never suspected. “At least double the forces at the elevator platform, increase organized training and, eventually, a second platform.”

“Two platforms? Won’t two elevators weaken our defenses?”

Mof shook his head. “No elevator. A second platform, equidistant from the first, with a response fleet.”

“Response to what?” Dolfan made the mistake of laughing, catching some of the old rivalry in Mofitan’s glare. “Seriously, Mof. An attack
through
the Shroud?”

“It’s not impossible, but no. I was thinking back-up troops should the elevator or the base fall out of our hands.”

“You’ve given this some serious thought.”

“We are prince candidates, Dolfan. Shouldn’t we all give it some serious thought?”

He had a valid point, and it stung more than a little. “I give serious thought to the Gauss, to running the base, to my
work
, Mofitan. I don’t have time to play king.”

“Well, in your case, it would be playing.”

“You seem awfully damn certain about that.”

“Will you support me or not?”

“What makes you think you won’t be supporting me?”

The room went silent. Dolfan watched Mof’s reflection, and it watched him. They stared off for three breaths before both spoke in unison. “The Kingmaker is here.”

Mof’s eyebrows lifted. Dolfan imagined his own expression matched the other’s surprise. How did Mofitan know about her? How could he? Dolfan felt the pull. He knew it every time he got within forty feet of the woman.

“How did you know that?” Mofitan’s upper lip curled. Apparently the idea of peace had lost its appeal. “How do you know about her?”

“How do you?”

“I asked you first.”

Dolfan stared at him. Mofitan couldn’t possibly know about her. Had he guessed, or was he just bluffing? Dolfan had recognized the Kingmaker the moment he laid eyes on her. Mofitan couldn’t possibly understand that. He’d almost convinced himself when Mof spoke.

“I can feel her,” he said. “She’s here for me.”

T
he atrium backed
up to a sizable retail area where what traffic Moon Base 14 did see could shop for the Shroud’s few exports. Silk, some of the finest she’d ever seen, draped across long metal racks. Jewelers cut and set samplings of the stones mined from the Shroud core. As the women window shopped, Madame Nerala explained the finer things they could expect from life on their new home.

Vashia hung back, trailing at the rear of the group and sneaking peeks at her data pad. She read while the others sighed and ran their fingers over the silks. When the group started for the next shop, Tarren tugged on her elbow, and she followed without glancing at the fabrics. She’d seen silk before.

She’d seen gemstones too. So when the women clustered around an open shop to watch the cutters faceting, she flipped to the next chapter and read about her new legal status as a citizen of Shroud. She’d already covered the safety section, though it would take a little study to understand the flag system and breathability. Vashia imagined she’d be wearing her breather regardless for some time. She’d skimmed the bit on magnetism, skipped the section on language for non-Genish speakers and flipped straight to the first section that she felt held direct relevance to her predicament.

“Do they mine them on Shroud?” Murrel’s voice broke her concentration. The girl had pushed her way to the front again, and stood closer to Madame Nerala than Vashia would have felt comfortable with. “Then there must be a surface.”

“Yes, of course.” Nerala beamed at her, easily won over by Murrel’s enthusiasm. “Underneath the Shroud.”

“I thought the planet was called Shroud,” Tarren said. “Or is it The Shroud?”“Both.” Nerala placed her hands together and touched her lips with her fingertips. “The Shroud refers to the gaseous atmosphere, Shroud to the entire planet.”

“But—” Murrel leapt in with another inquiry, but Vashia didn’t hear it.

Instead, she shut off the pad and straightened. She scanned the mall to either side for the man she knew had just walked into range of her “allergy.” She’d almost gotten used to the sensation. This time, when she spotted him, a whisper of disappointment joined the static. It was the wrong one.

He wore his hair shorn everywhere except for the single, long braid that somehow she’d missed the first time. But then, she hadn’t really been looking at him. She’d been right about the build though. This prince might have been Dolfan’s twin—only the hair differed much. Both were built like a barge sled, wide and chiseled for hard work.

He stared at her with the same hazel eyes, but the look sent a different sort of reaction through her. A predatory possessiveness lurked in that gaze. She wanted to bolt from it, her legs moving instinctively. She backed straight into Tarren.

“Hey.”

“Sorry. I just—”

“Look who’s coming.” Tarren brushed her short hair into order. She grinned at Vashia and stuck out one hip in a pose that brought to mind a dark brothel doorway.

Vashia cringed and slid past her. She worked her way deeper into the group and tried not to make eye contact with the Shrouded Prince again. He continued past them without stopping, but he favored Madame Nerala with a nod before turning into a hallway that branched to the right between the jewelers and a display of spooled rug yarns. The bright colors cast him into a darker picture, all black braid and billowy Shrouded clothing.

He looked like a cutout standing there, like a flat, stand-up model. Fake. The idea had nagged at her all morning. The moon base with its distant view of Shroud, perfectly displayed under glass, the pristine mall displaying all the wonders of the planet that almost no one shopping here would ever get to see. The whole thing was a façade. The Shrouded had crafted Moon Base 14 as a decoy, and it featured only what they allowed outsiders to see.

“I have an idea.” Tarren moved in beside her and spoke quietly. “Let’s stop bathing.”

“What?” Vashia spun to face her and they almost bumped noses. “Why would we?”

“So we don’t get picked.” Tarren held up her data pad and grinned. “If you don’t get picked, you’re set for life.”

“How?”

“Chapter six.” She nudged Vashia and winked. “You’re not the only one who can read and walk at the same time.”

Before she could respond, Madame Nerala called them all to attention. “Girls, girls,” she cawed. The other bride candidates closed in on her, instinctively conditioned to follow the motherly tone and waving arm. Maybe Nerala was a decoy as well. Her job was to inform them of exactly what they needed to know, but who decided what they needed?

“I bet she never got picked,” Tarren whispered. “They let you stay and do whatever you want.” She gave Vashia a look that said exactly how appealing she found the idea. “If you don’t get picked.”

“It’s time to do a little shopping for real,” Nerala continued. “Please follow me.”

Vashia waited for the rest of them to move on. Then she followed Tarren past the jewelers to a dark shop full of Shrouded clothing. Nerala unlocked this with a flourish and the brides rewarded her with a collective gasp.

She never got picked.
The abrupt thought brushed aside her conspiracy theorizing. She’d spent the trip dreading the marriage portion of her escape, but she’d never considered that she might get rejected outright. She didn’t know how to feel about it, but a whole new paranoia could wrap around that idea alone. She imagined Dolfan’s face and couldn’t quite bring herself to pursue the thought.

Who cared if she got picked? Tarren might have a point, but she’d have to read Chapter six, to read the whole damned guide, before she decided for herself. She’d read the book, she’d figure out the entire picture, and then she’d try to see behind the thin, intentional façade and sort out what the hell was really going on.

A tug at her arm said reading would have to wait, however. Madame Nerala held open the shop door, and the rest of the group filed inside. Vashia followed Tarren. They had shopping to do, apparently. She could live with some new clothes, but whatever Tarren said, whatever Chapter six said, with two princes shadowing them, no way would she give up bathing.