Page 30 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

Aral’s hand slid to the pendant. “When I touch it, nothing happens. It could be some sort of smart metal. A biomaterial, perhaps. Designed to interact with you, and you alone. To my knowledge, the Empire had never had such technology. Is the Coalition that advanced? Yet the piece looks ancient. I can’t say why beyond a feeling in my gut. Can something so old be that high tech?”

“Sabra told me the pendant would guide me to Ara Ana. ‘Follow the stars,’ she said.”

“By the stars of Ara Ana go—it’s just a blessing.”

“What if it’s more than that? What if she meant it literally? The five lights in the pendant look like stars. When I was on Zorabeta, near the sanctuary tent, I felt the pendant… activate. It vibrated and felt warmer. I think it was trying to tell me something.” She touched her fingertips to the glassy black face and its five piercing, lit jewels.Show me.Each tiny light brightened sequentially—then dimmed. Glowing dust released into the air before instantly vanishing.

They collectively gasped.

Aral said, “The glow-motes may be able to interact with the ship’s systems somehow. Let’s give it a try. If there are coordinates to Ara Ana embedded in nano-coding, we’ll know shortly.”

On the bridge, Kaz slid the pendant into the ship’s nav-reader.

Nothing happened.

Two vertical ridges creased Aral’s forehead as he stepped away from the reader. “Well, blast.”

Kaz returned to her station. “I’ll run an analysis of the five lights. We’ll call up star systems bearing similarities to the pattern.”

Aral spread his hands. “Wonderful. After we sift through the trillions of possibilities, we can visit them all. The galaxy will have grown cold at its core by then.”

Kaz lifted one brow at him. “All right, Mawndarr. Your turn at an idea. Make it brilliant.”

Filled with a strange calm, Wren stepped between them. The pendant sat on the flight console under the reader, the chain catching the light. She slid her hands toward it, over the table’s surface. Her eyes fell half-closed, and she imagined her mind reaching somewhere far from the ship. “By the stars of Ara Ana go,” she whispered, touching her fingertips to the face of the pendant. It pulsed to life, the five pinpricks of light flaring.

The nav-display almost immediately illuminated with coordinates. A distant star system.

“Well, look at that,” Aral said. “The road to Ara Ana.”

CHAPTERSEVENTEEN

As soon asthey were underway, Aral handed Wren a gun. “A dozer, you say?” A strange name, she thought. They stood in the cargo bay. Below decks, it was cold and hollow-sounding, like being inside of a large can.

“The dozer is a common type of weapon.” Aral launched into his crisp, all-business, must-brief-all-pertinent-information tone. “This model offers several options to neutralize an attacker. From stun to kill. All are variations of dozing—or napping—from a few moments sleep to forever.”

She smiled. “Thus the nickname.”

“You’ll carry your own firearm any time we’re off the ship.”

“Ilkka never allowed me near any of the firearms.” Maybe she had been too afraid of what Wren might be capable of, given the right tools. The woman had good reason to be. Raised to be obedient and docile, Wren had killed without a flicker of hesitation.

“Were you not taught self-defense?”

“Sabra did. Martial arts, mostly. And other things, tests of agility, I suppose, like forcing me to walk on slippery stones across the river while blindfolded or with one hand tied, whatever her diabolical whim of the day. It was fun, in a challenging sort of way. Ilkka thought it was a waste of time. More important in her mind were the skills required in a nobleman’s household, knowing how to serve stim-tea while offering polite conversation. That sort of thing.”

He looked a little horrified by that last bit. “Are you ready to try?”

She double-checked the dozer’s energy was dialed down then aimed at the target he’d pasted to the opposite wall. Accidentally bumping her glasses against the view-site, she pushed them back and tried again. The laser tracked to the target. She pressed the trigger. A hole appeared in the center of target, its edges glowing briefly. “Boom,” she said.

Aral’s eyebrows shot up. “You say you haven’t used a firearm before?”

“No. But in the woods, when I was bored, I used to set up targets and throw knives.” Her mind replayed the disturbing memory of daggers sinking into Ilkka’s body. “The skill appears to carry over.” She pushed up her glasses and took aim before hitting the target’s center again.

“A dead-eye aim. Another superpower?”

“Maybe. My greatest power may be catching fish, though—which, of course, isn’t going to help us much. It’s my favorite thing to do. Being out on the lake, especially at the edges of the day, when it’s hushed and calm. Or standing in the river, water rushing past my legs.” She ached with homesickness. “I miss it. I even miss cleaning the catch. I never thought I’d say that. I stowed a few fishing lures in my travel bag. I had hundreds at home. I made them myself. It broke my heart to leave them all behind. Maybe, one day, I’ll be able to use them again.”

He considered her for a long moment. “I never pictured you fishing. Or knife throwing, for that matter.”

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