Page 14 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

CHAPTEREIGHT

Wren rubbedsleep from her eyes as a third day dawned in the sprawling refugee camp on Zorabeta.

“Be back at curfew, everyone.” A female guard arrived to take attendance and shoo everyone out of the tent. No one was allowed inside during daytime. The crowded tents were sanitized then.

The guard scanned their implanted ID chips before releasing them. Surreptitiously, Wren checked the pouches of gems were attached to her belt—and hidden under her loose shirt—before lining up with the others. Head lowered, she did her best to appear small, obedient, and meek. Unimportant. Just another refugee when she was anything but.

With a deep breath and a push on her glasses, she entered the chaos of the camp. The sun peeking over the camp’s electrified fence looked as misshapen and unappealing as a rotting melon. Tents stretched in orderly rows in all directions. Thousands of feet churned up dust, a fine powder that soon coated her glasses and skin. Combining with her sweat, it quickly turned to mud.

She wasn’t onlyonZorabeta—she was beginning tolooklike Zorabeta. Like her clothes, the dirt and distant mountains were a grayish tan. Sprinkled with grit, the tents were the same color as the landscape. It was a monochrome world. Yet alive with colorful people. The breeze carried the odors of sweat and perfume and the sounds of interesting accents. She, who had never traveled anywhere but the Imperial Palace, stared, fascinated, at the spectacle of people: hair worn beaded, braided, or knotted (or some combination of all three); outfits from different planets; exotic body art and jewelry.

There were also missing limbs, terrible scars, or tumors. Worst were the skinny children, with old-soul eyes she was sure had witnessed horrible things. If her life had turned out the way it was planned, she never would have known of the average citizen’s plight in the Empire. She would have gone straight from the refuge of Barokk to a battlelord’s wealthy household, completely clueless. But her sheltered life had been thrown open to the outside world like the sides of the tent were each morning. A place where people cried things like: “Long live the Goddess-Queen!” and “The warlord is dead—may the likes of that monster never arise again!” She heard it everywhere—the praying, weeping, and giving thanks for her father’s death.

It left her feeling sick in the pit of her soul. She’d never been so foolish as to believe her father anything but a sadistic, arrogant man. But mixing freely with his victims brought home the true cost of his brutal rule.

She rubbed the small lump on her forearm, where a personal identifier chip had been implanted along with a dose of nano-meds upon her arrival. They were little miracles, “microscopic smart-ware” that worked with the body to boost physiological functions, target diseases, and accelerate healing, she’d been told. Yet the magical creatures couldn’t fix her nearsightedness. She’d need to visit a doctor for that. There were plenty of them in the camp. Relief organizations had donated their medical care. Topnotch surgeons had volunteered to assist. It was clear that the highest levels of the Triad Alliance wanted peace to take hold. She saw that desire in the kind acts of the many working at the camp—kindness toward their former foes.

She doubted their kindness would extend to her, once they figured out who she was. They’d put meds inside her, but did they take blood samples too? How long before someone noticed hers matched with her father’s?You have to get out of here. The urgency to escape clawed at her.

The pendant lay cool between her breasts, a constant reminder of her promise to Sabra—and now to herself: find the treasure. She would use the riches to help the survivors of her father’s atrocities. She’d donate every last coin, every priceless jewel. She might not be able to rid herself of her father’s DNA, but she could help those who had been harmed by him.

By the stars of Ara Ana go.

A ship screeched up above, headed to points unknown. To freedom. Its flight path drew her attention to the busy docks, where pilots milled around and workers labored, unloading cargo. Some loitering at the docks looked bored and hot. Others were watching the streams of refugees walk past through the main thoroughfare, at whom they snickered and called out insults. Her people had been made an equal partner in the Triad Alliance. Yet, in the eyes of some at Zorabeta, they seemed more the defeated enemy—to be kicked while down. “Each new load of ’em gets worse and worse!”

A guard laughed along with them. “You haven’t seen them Drakken in the showers. They have tattooseverywhere. Even the women, I heard.”

Everyone leaned in to listen.

“On their ass cheeks, inside their lips—no, you pervert, notthoselips. Their mouths. They pierce body parts you don’t want to know about.

“Look at that one.” An old man was now the target of ridicule. “He’s got no teeth. How’s he supposed to eat little children?”

“Swallow them whole!” More laughed.

Wren frowned. She ached to march over to the bullies and teach them manners. A couple of officials patrolling nearby kept her from making a fatal mistake. The pair were in top physical condition, walking with confident strides, striking her as somewhere between elegant and arrogant. Their black uniforms looked different from those of the guards, more like those of the personnel who’d come to Barokk. They weren’t laughing along with the dock bullies. They were focused, serious—and appeared to be searching for someone.

She dearly hoped it wasn’t her.

“Look at her—that girl! Those glasses are artifacts!” People hooted and whooped.

The dockside hecklers had spotted her.

Hunching her shoulders, she tried to look inconspicuous, but it was impossible. At the moment when she most needed to be invisible, she was the center of everyone’s attention.

CHAPTERNINE

Zorabeta’s authoritieshad granted Aral permission to move freely about the refugee camp once he explained his intentions to remove a suspect from their keeping.

“Take as many with you as you want—we haven’t the time or resources to keep up with minor offenders,” the assistant security administrator confessed. “We worry more about genuine war criminals hiding amongst the refugees.”

Little did they know that it was a former battlelord doing them all a favor by taking the warlord’s daughter off their hands.

With his data-vis now linked to the camp’s main computer, he used Awrenkka’s alias—Wren Senderin—to zero in on the location of her sleeping quarters. But when they arrived at Awrenkka’s tent, it was deserted. Camp policy emptied them during daylight. She was now one of countless refugees in a makeshift city of tents.

There was a wildness to the place—too many people, under not quite enough control. Triad soldiers sauntered amongst the refugees, a very thin barrier between calm and chaos. The odors—bodies in need of washing, strange perfumes, scents that defied description—assaulted his nose.

From a dark alleyway between the tents came giggling and a deeper, throaty laugh, followed by the very distinct sound of a hand slapping against a bare rump. There were three or even four people in there, and all behind a tarp. A girl who looked no more than half his age appeared from the shadows. Her shirt was unbuttoned. Underneath tiny, tattooed breasts peeked out. They were splotched with pink marks and a fading bruise. Few evacuees had the opportunity to bring valuables with them. This woman’s value was in her body. The scarcity of young, pretty women in this camp no doubt allowed her to charge high fees for sexual services. She struck a pose for him and Kaz. “A little fun, fine sir and lady?”

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