The Dragons of Andromeda Read online

  The Celadon Corsairs were rivals of the Pirate Clans, and even more feared. They were the beginning of a supply chain of slaves leading all the way back to the Magna home world across the border. Celadons kept whatever cargo they could plunder, but any captives were sold like chattel in the infamous slave pens of Oras Dracilor.

  The captain shuddered at the thought of it.

  “Broadcast a distress call,” he said, “and prepare to repel boarders...”

  Like most Celadons, Golub was four feet tall with a disproportionately large head. Both his ears and nose were long and pointed and his skin, even in the murky light of the assault ship, was a pale green. Strapped securely into his seat, he watched as the rest of the corsair vessels descended on the Jewel of Amann like a pack of wolves on a lumbering beast.

  Golub loved being a pirate. He especially enjoyed meeting new people and hearing them scream. Of course, he didn’t know what they were saying since he mostly just understood Celadonese. They didn’t teach the human language in schools on Celadon. Golub knew Ougluk and enough Magna to get by and even a few words of Sarkan, but tried to avoid them as best he could. He didn’t trust the Sarkan, although honestly, they weren’t as bad as humans. That’s probably why Golub liked hearing humans scream.

  The humans, who had no respect for anyone except themselves, called Golub and his people goblins because the Celadons looked like creatures from their folklore. Truth be told, the Celadons didn’t respect other races, especially those taller than themselves. Golub’s people didn’t like smaller races either, except to bully them whenever possible.

  The assault ships disabled the engines of the Jewel and came alongside in preparation to board. Golub felt a shudder as explosives blew the airlock open. He and the other corsairs readied their laser rifles before storming into the corridors of the Jewel.

  The rest was the usual routine. Teams split up and neutralized any feeble resistance the ship could muster. This was another aspect Golub enjoyed. As a rule, they wanted to keep as many passengers alive as possible so they could be sold later on, but anyone who actively opposed them could be cut down as brutally as necessary.

  Outside the bridge, Golub stopped to examine a human body, one of the crew apparently. He was older than the others and heavy around the middle. He wore an officer’s uniform, now torn and partially charred. Beside him, next to his outstretched hand, a pipe lay on the floor. Golub bent and took the pipe, inspecting it a moment before tucking it inside a pocket. Most loot was shared among the pirates, but not everything. Golub liked taking a few trinkets just for himself.

  A few decks down, among the passenger cabins, he and his team began searching the rooms. Expensive items were thrown into the hall to be collected later. When encountered, travelers were especially fun. They yelled incomprehensibly at Golub, which he took as an excuse to strike them with the stock of his rifle.

  Opening another cabin door, he saw a man in the room with glasses and a ridiculous mustache. Golub hesitated, remembering his orders, which gave a blue-haired woman, also in the cabin, the opportunity to punch him across the nose, knocking the Celadon flat on his back.

  Golub didn’t always love being a pirate.

  In the officers’ lounge of the HIMS Baron Lancaster, Commander Robert Maycare sat comfortably while reading the recent gravbike racing scores on his datapad. His uncle, Lord Devlin Maycare, had won recently on Regalis. The article showed an image of him pouring champagne over a woman’s head with mousy brown hair. She did not look amused.

  Always the ladies’ man, the commander thought.

  Someone cleared her throat and Maycare looked up to see the Chief Operations Officer, Lieutenant Kinnari, standing over him. She was the only Dahl on board, with pointed ears mostly hidden beneath jet-black hair.

  “Hello, Lieutenant,” Maycare said.

  “Reading anything interesting, sir?” she asked, taking the other chair at the table.

  “Not really,” he replied. “Just some of my uncle’s exploits...”

  “He’s quite a sportsman, I’m told.”

  “The Maycares come from a long line of adrenaline junkies. I guess we just find different ways to get our fix.”

  Kinnari smiled, soaking in what Maycare was saying. The commander always got the feeling Dahls lived vicariously through human antics, as if they could never have any of their own.

  “Have you seen the captain?” she asked.

  “The old man had an appointment with Doc Baines,” Maycare said. “If you can call it that.”

  “Sir?”

  “You know the rumors about him and Samantha...”

  “I try not to engage in petty gossip.”

  Maycare chuckled. “Really? I thought Dahls loved collecting information.”

  “Only if it’s factual,” Kinnari said. “Unsubstantiated rumors are nothing but hearsay.”

  “True, but imagination is usually a lot more fun,” Maycare replied.

  “I’m sure neither the captain nor Doctor Baines would appreciate people talking behind their backs.”

  The commander sighed. “No, I suppose not.”

  “On the other hand,” she went on, “Samantha and I are good friends, so if there was a relationship between them I’d certainly know.”

  Maycare looked at the lieutenant sideways.

  “So, what are you saying?” he asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “You know something, don’t you?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Sure?”

  Kinnari, who actually had a lovely smile the commander just realized, grinned while looking away.

  “Well, he’s too old for her anyway,” Maycare said, provokingly.

  “Oh?” she replied. “It’s been my experience that human males often seek a younger mate.”

  Maycare folded his arms. “You’re quite the romantic...”

  “I mean clinically speaking.”

  “Very romantic!”

  Kinnari’s pale skin turned a shade of red.

  “I’m just saying...” she sputtered, “that age is often not an issue for humans, especially if the woman is of child-bearing age.”

  Maycare stared at the lieutenant blankly.

  “Perhaps this isn’t an appropriate topic...” Kinnari said, her face now a deep crimson.

  “Not with you, apparently.”

  A black band around the commander’s wrist vibrated. Maycare quickly tapped the band and it began speaking.

  “Lord Commander,” the voice of a young ensign from the bridge said, “we’ve just received a distress call, sir.”

  “Understood,” Maycare replied, standing. “Notify the captain!”

  When the Baron Lancaster arrived, the Jewel of Amann was floating listlessly on backup power with nothing but life support, gravity, and emergency lighting still functioning. Commander Maycare, along with a detachment of marines wearing combat armor, used the transmat to materialize directly onto the liner’s bridge.

  “How does it look?” Captain Redgrave said in Maycare’s earpiece.

  The commander glanced around at the destroyed consoles and bodies littering the floor.

  “A mess,” Maycare replied. “It looks like they killed everyone on the bridge and pulled out the electronics.”

  “Any hostiles?”

  “Not yet.”

  Unlike this uncle, Commander Maycare was more used to military ships than luxury starliners, although in its current condition, he wasn’t sure whether this ship had ever been truly luxurious.

  Passing cautiously down hallways of scorched wallpaper and broken sconces, the commander and his marine escorts checked each room, hoping to find survivors. Mostly, they found ransacked cabins empty of people and precious belongings. Maycare became increasingly convinced this was the work of pirates, although the lack of people, except for a few dead crew members, left him concerned.

  “Sir,” one of the marines said.

  “What is it?” Maycare replied.

  The ma
rine pointed her blaster rifle toward the open door of a stateroom.

  “I heard something,” she said.

  His own blaster pistol at the ready, the commander nodded and stepped past her through the doorway. Inside, the cabin was surprisingly undisturbed. Luggage remained unopened and the drawers were still in the dresser. It was a small room, probably second-class by the look of it, Maycare thought. The only other door was a closet, but someone had wedged it closed with wood from the bed frame.

  A noise, like a soft thumping, came from inside.

  With the marine giving him cover, Maycare removed the wedge and tapped the controls. The door opened and a small green man, his hands and feet tied, fell out. His mouth was covered with a piece of cloth.

  The commander immediately recognized him as Celadon by the goblin’s big head and pointed ears. Lying on his side, the Celadon glared at Maycare with eyes full of hatred and a touch of fear.

  Maycare leaned down and removed the gag from his mouth.

  “You got something to say?” the commander asked.

  The Celadon spewed a series of screeches and low growls. Maycare noticed a few drops of spittle landing on his boots.

  “Any idea what he’s saying, sir?” the marine asked.

  Maycare rubbed his boot against the back of his pant leg.

  “No idea,” he replied, “but I have a feeling the Captain will...

  A babelbot was not actually a robot at all. It was a program run by the ship’s AI aboard the Baron Lancaster. By wearing an earpiece, a person could hear an automatic translation of whatever someone said. Captain Redgrave, sitting in a chair in an interrogation room, wore such an earpiece so he could understand the Celadon sitting across a metal table. To make sure the pirate kept wearing his own device, his hands were shackled to the table. After hours of questioning, Redgrave knew the creature’s name was Golub, but not much else.

  “I’m this close to flushing you out an airlock, Golub,” the captain said.

  “How human of you.”

  “Goblins aren’t known for intelligence, but you’ve really screwed the pooch on this one.”

  “Was your mother on board? I didn’t recognize her...”

  “Sylvia Flax was on the passenger list,” Redgrave said. “Was she the target of the attack?”

  “Who?”

  The captain showed Golub her picture on the screen of a datapad.

  “Ah, that’s the one who punched me in the nose!” the Celadon said. “Such a mean lady!”

  “So, you knew she worked for VOX News?”

  “What? No! We don’t watch that human propaganda.”

  “You never saw her before?”

  “Not until she attacked me,” Golub said. “I hope they put her in the pit.”

  “Pit?” Redgrave asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “You’ve got nothing to lose but your life. What pit are you talking about?”

  “There’s a pit where the bigger Ougluks fight,” the Celadon said. “Sometimes they put a human down there just to make things interesting.”

  “Barbaric.”

  “It’s not so bad. The human doesn’t last long.”

  “Sylvia Flax is a well-known celebrity. If anything happens to her, you’ll regret it.”

  “I don’t care what happens to a human,” Golub said. “Your people destroy everything you touch.”

  “You’re a slave trader,” the captain replied. “You’re not exactly standing on high moral ground.”

  “Celadons are pirates, not slave traders! Sure, if a Celadon comes across a screaming human that doesn’t get killed, he might pass the human along to the Ougluks. Those are the slavers.”

  “So, you’re saying the Ougluks have Flax now?”

  “Probably.”

  “Where can I find them?”

  “Bend over and check your ass.”

  The captain took a long breath, exhaling slowly.

  “Computer,” he said. “Unlock the shackles.”

  The metal bracelets holding Golub’s wrists to the table snapped open, freeing him. Captain Redgrave, dropping the datapad to the floor, reached across the table and grabbed the goblin firmly by his long, crooked nose.

  “Ow!” he protested, but the captain was already pulling him across the table.

  When the door outside the interrogation room opened, the captain emerged, nose in hand, as he dragged his stumbling captive along the polished deck.

  “Let go!” Golub shouted, but the captain only clenched tighter, picking up his pace down the hallway.

  After passing a few bewildered crewmen, Redgrave reached an open hatch and tossed the pirate in. Landing with a thud, Golub got to his feet in time to see the hatch closing. Redgrave stared back at him through a small porthole in the door.

  “Look around,” the captain said.

  Delicately cradling his nose between his hands, the pirate’s eyes glanced around the tiny room. Turning, he saw behind him a near identical hatch, but through the porthole, there was only empty space.

  “You have until the airlock depressurizes to tell me what I want to know,” Redgrave said. “Then I push this red button and you become one with the universe.”

  “You call us barbarians?” Golub shouted through the door. “You’re the monsters!”

  On the wall beside the captain, the reading on a pressure gauge slowly dropped. Golub began holding his ears.

  “Can you feel them popping?” the captain asked.

  “I’m not telling you anything!” came the muffled response through the hatch.

  “How good are you at holding your breath?”

  On the other side of the porthole, the Celadon pressed a hand against his bulbous head.

  “Better hurry,” the captain said, watching the pressure gauge continue to drop steadily. “Not much longer.”

  Golub’s posture wavered, his legs buckling until he fell to one knee.

  “Wait...” he muttered.

  “What’s that?” Redgrave said, putting his hand to his ear.

  “Wait!”

  The captain slammed his fist against a button beside the hatch. The gauge level abruptly stopped.

  “The next button I push will either open this door or the hatch on the other side,” Redgrave said. “Which one is up to you...”

  “The Ougluks have a base on an asteroid,” Golub wheezed. “I know where it is.”

  Chapter Twelve

  The Sorcerer approached a space platform orbiting a gas giant swirling with clouds of orange and red. Owned by Warlock Industries, the station was a framework of metal to which a single habitation module was attached. Except for a few navigation lights, the platform was dark, perpetually orbiting in the shadow of the gas giant.

  The Sorcerer sidled up to the platform as a gantry extended to meet it. When the atmospheres equalized and the airlock opened, Oscar Skarlander emerged, stepping onto the station with Lars Hatcher just behind him. A young technician with a waxy complexion and a gray lab coat greeted the Warlock agent.

  “Welcome aboard,” the tech said.

  Skarlander waved the greeting aside. “Where is it?”

  “This way, sir,” the tech replied.

  The tech led the two new arrivals through a corridor smelling of ozone and perspiration and into a laboratory. A mass spectrometer and an assortment of other instruments cluttered work benches along the walls, and a table, basking in harsh light, took up the center of the room. An open book lay on the table.

  Skarlander bent over the book, appraising it like a collector.

  The pages, especially the edges, were burned and brittle. Even the gentle brushing of the air from Skarlander’s movement caused tiny fragments to tear off and drift away. Whatever pages were intact were covered with archaic lettering, an ancient script the agent didn’t recognize.

  “This is all that’s left?” he asked.

  “The special ops team said the Null Cult they got it from was immolated,” the tech replied.

  �
�Immolated? As in burned alive? By whom?”

  “I suspect the special ops team,” the tech said, “but they insisted the cultists were dead when they got there.”

  “Well, this relic is worthless,” Skarlander remarked.

  Lars, his bulbous head pulsing, spoke up. “Not exactly.”

  Skarlander raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “I’m sensing a strong energy coming from it,” the metamind replied.

  The agent stepped back. “Radiation?”

  “Psionics,” Lars said. “Something very old and very powerful.”

  “Can we use it?” Skarlander asked.

  Lars shook his head.

  “What a waste of my time,” Skarlander sighed.

  “I think there’s more like this one,” Lars replied, staring at the book. “This one seems connected to others.”

  “Can you find them?”

  “Maybe,” Lars said. “Are you sure you want to?”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “Finding them and controlling them are two different things. Just ask those Null Cultists...”

  Skarlander glared at the metamind.

  “Just find them,” the agent said. “Leave the rest to me.”

  Like most days on Lokeren, the weather was warm but not oppressive, and the humidity was low. From her balcony, Lady Rebecca Veber watched her two guests materialize on the transmat pad before her staff led them inside the estate. Each arrived separately and alone. This was meant to be a place of safety, neutral ground on which disputes could be reconciled in a civilized fashion. Bodyguards were not needed.

  Of all the rooms of the Veber estate, the former dining hall was the one most used. Where a long, rectangular table once stood, now a round one sat in the center surrounded by seven tall-backed chairs like something from Arthurian legend Lady Veber read about when she was still a child. Now, as an adult, she understood the significance. No one at the circular table was above anyone else, although the Veber matriarch could argue some sat taller than others.

  Lady Sheba Nasri entered the hall first. Her gown was crimson with stripes of white, trailing behind her across the tiled floor.

  “Thank you for coming,” Veber said, offering her hand. “Your dress is divine.”